In Movie Lines: July 19th - July 25th

Week of July 19, 2015

Here's the recap of what I watched this past week (a few days late, I know):

Re-Watched

The Dark Knight Trilogy

Christopher Nolan's Batman is the best Batman ever. It will never be done this well again. Sorry, Snyder, but, despite my love for Affleck as the Caped Crusader, your movie looks like shit. Maybe you'll prove me wrong. 

Anyway, my wife surprised me by selecting this trilogy as what we should watch together this week. On account of that I was reacquainted with the middle part of this thing, the best sequel ever made, and a standalone movie in The Dark Knight that is one of the best crime dramas ever put on screen. I can't wait to dig into these movies soon here on the blog, as it will be the next entry in my When I Was Thirty trilogy series. 

Batman Begins (2005)

Directed by Christopher Nolan
Story by David S. Goyer
Screenplay by Christopher Nolan and David S. Goyer

"Bats frighten me. It's time my enemies shared my dread." 

The Dark Knight (2008)

Directed by Christopher Nolan
Story by Christopher Nolan and David S. Goyer
Screenplay by Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan

"Because he's the here Gotham deserves, but not the one it needs right now. So we'll hunt him. Because he can take it. Because he's not our hero. He's a silent guardian. A watchful protector. A Dark Knight." 

The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

Directed by Christopher Nolan

Story by Christopher Nolan and David S. Goyer
Screenplay by Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan

"A hero can be anyone. Even a man doing something as simple and reassuring as putting a coat around a young boy's shoulders to let him know that the world hasn't ended."

Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story (2004)

Written and Directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber

Dodgeball is a go-to need-to-feel-good movie for me. It is stupid in its genius and ingeniously stupid. One of its many great touches is the Jason Bateman cameo as color man to Cotton McKnight's (Gary Cole) lead commentator. Priceless stuff. 

"Effin' A, Cotton! Effin' A!"

First Timers

Twenty Feet from Stardom (2013)

Directed by Morgan Neville

Only the best documentaries are both important and fun to watch. Morgan Neville's 20 Feet from Stardom is one of those documentaries. It charts the history of some of the biggest names you've never heard in popular music over the last 50 years. It does this through emotion-filled interviews mixed with archive photos, videos, and the sounds of the last great generation of music. The biggest high for me came when backup singer Merry Clayton listens to her isolated vocal track, many years later, on The Rolling Stones' "Gimme Shelter." She feels it. We feel it. I got chills. 

Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Directed by David Lean

Bloated, boring, but beautiful. Click here for my July Blind Spot review. 

Mommy (2014)

Written and Directed by Xavier Dolan

Painful, powerful, profound, pissed me off in the end. Click here for my On Home Video review. 

The Numbers

I have seen 140 movies so far this year.

Re-watched - 48

First Timers - 92

See anything good last week?