I’m so old and boring that I’ve been on a matinee movie binge. Unless they are blockbusters*, they appear in Anchorage a few weeks or months behind their actual release dates, thus the reason for the delay.

A Star is Born. I don’t typically see these kinds of movies, though I admit when something is wildly popular, my curiosity tends to get the best of me. Capitalism tends to allow people to express their beliefs via consumption, so it’s always interesting to see what people are avidly purchasing at any given time and take it as a reflection of current societal values.

I am going to partially defer to my Facebook post for this. I am willing to admit that Hollywood perpetuates a lot of social/societal degeneracy; I think I was taken aback by the steady stream of people exiting the theater with stifled sobs. Everyone has pet peeves, one of mine is the way addiction is portrayed: in this case, as ‘a rite of passage for rockstars’ and, often, a sort of requirement for a talented artist, musician or the like. I linked to an article on Vox, and though I am typically averse to sharing feminazi rants, this article does mirror the reasons for my disgust and contempt for the message(s). Without yammering on for too long, I’ll simply say it’s disturbing to think that young people, especially girls who look up to Gaga, may see this codependent-narcissist relationship as one to emanate. This movie did an amazing job of glossing over major red flags and deep toxicity, not to mention the Vox article is largely right about a lack of consent. Gaga is a really talented musician (and an overall interesting person); I was disappointed in the role she chose to take in this film.

Fallout. This movie was fucking stupid. The action sequences weren’t even that good. My roommate told me if I loved The Fast and the Furious movies (I did) I would love this. No, this was lame.

The First Man. Slow to start, but ultimately good, not so much for the story line (which was OK at best), but because this is the first film I’ve seen that did not hesitate to show the sheer terror that comes with an astronaut’s job. On top of it being an extremely dangerous career in the 60s, leaving and reentering the atmosphere are awful experiences. There are plenty of of g-force losses of consciousness and vomit-stained helmets in this movie, and I appreciated that.

I, like many other young kids, was obsessed with space in my childhood and teenage years. I wanted nothing more than a career in the space industry (I think back to being in Huntsville at ASA, deeply annoyed that two hours of my short week there was spent watching Spaceballs. I was a very serious kid), so apart from feeling anxious nostalgia for the US Space and Rocket Center‘s centrifuge, I was enamored by how frightening the movie was in terms of the astronauts’ experiences. I was talking to a friend lately about hopes and dreams, I think we all have to make peace with the fact that you win some, you lose some: I look back and think about how much I wanted that life in my past, and what a different one I have now, and I think on a personal level it’s been an interesting transition over the last ten years, of transforming a feeling of loss into a feeling I have gained many other unexpected things. Long story short, for a combination of personal feelings and some realistic elements of the film, I really enjoyed this.

*I always wondered what the etymology of this term was, and my guess was completely wrong.