“But that’s what I’ve been telling you man, we are all stuck in the living room of a rich person!” - me, had I seen this film in college.

I was initially baffled by this one, being really only familiar with Buñuel’s early surrealist work, in which you don’t really have to care who’s doing what to whom, they’re just slicing up eyeballs. I was so baffled by the film that at the half hour mark, I decided to start…

Thrilled for this re-examination of Liam Neeson, very much here for the Pamela Anderson comeback, but all I really wanna talk about is Danny Houston. It’s a tiny little needle to thread, being the villain in a movie like this. There needs to be some element of sinister threat, or else nothing matters, but you also have silly jokes to land.  Houston does both with incredible grace. Watching him try to keep his conference of evil billionaires on topic is…

I loathe golden age thinking, but they quite literally do not make them like they used to. The young hunk on the boat is Richard Dreyfus? The titular monster doesn’t appear on screen for an hour? There are no contemporary pop hits on the soundtrack (thank g_d, ‘75 is a terrible year for music.)? The score is used judiciously and sometimes not at all (the Indianapolis scene is eerily quiet)? The film gets blamed for ushering in the era of…