Movie Tally for May 2014

Honestly, it's been another slow month for movies. Two reasons: major changes are afoot and we've been watching a lot of Mystery Science Theater 3000 on Netflix lately. Debates about the show aside, I'm still not going to count MST3K episodes as films watched. To me, that's cheating. Sure, it would make this month's list longer, but I would feel dirty for doing it. Here's what I did watch that didn't involve commentary from comedians and robots:

Bully
American Hustle
The Witches (1990)
The Amazing Spider-Man 2
House (1977)
Man of Steel
Nurse
The Artist
At Middleton
Fruitvale Station
Nebraska
Godzilla Raids Again
Maximum Overdrive
Cursed
Ravenous
The Incredible Melting Man
CBGB

First of all, I would like to give thanks to my lovely lady, Jennica Lynn. My birthday was this month, and she gave me one hell of a marathon of b-day celebrations, which included pizza, cheesecake, a Dodgers game (where we lost to the SF Giants), and The Amazing Spider-Man 2. What did I think? Look, the most important thing for me was that I had a lot of fun with this movie, which was something that was lacking in a Spider-Man movie for a while. Somehow, its faults ( i.e. Dane Dehaan) gave it an unintentional goofy charm that I got a kick out of. Plus, I personally prefer Andrew Garfield over Tobey Maguire in the title role. I know a lot of folks are not fans of this reboot series, but I have better memories attached to it than the Raimi flicks. Thanks to you, sweetheart.

You've probably noticed, I haven't seen either Godzilla (2014) or X-Men: Days of Future Past yet. Money's been a little tight this month, and going out to a movie in L.A. is a luxury. I'm hoping to see both of those films sometime soon, as I've waited a long time to see them. Anyways, May was still a good mix of first-time views and revisits. My favorite of the latter is definitely Ravenous. I really enjoyed this quirky cannibal tale upon its home video debut, but after two viewing this month, I am just in love with everything about it. The state of female directors getting major gigs in this town is shameful enough, but it's sad we didn't get anymore excursions into horror from Antonia Bird. She would have been a force to be reckoned with.

As far as first-time viewings, by a landslide, the award goes to House (1977). If you are sick and tired of more recent haunted house/paranormal flicks, then pop in this one from Japan. Guaranteed what-the-fuck. That's all I'm going to say. It's definitely a genuine slice of what-the-fuck, as opposed to Nurse, which seemed to be trying very, very hard to be a some outrageous cult classic. It was novel at first, but it wore off pretty damn fast, and it ends up being yet another boring dose of fake exploitation from Lionsgate.

June is going to be a busy month for us. We're moving into a new apartment, so we've got a lot of work ahead of us. However, that just means we're putting a lot of energy into making a better home for us. One in which we can truly express our geeky selves. Exciting stuff, but we'll try to keep the films rolling.