Watching - April 2025

Back to the Future (1985)

Forty years old and as fresh as a daisy (although I'm not sure what's specifically so pristine about daisies). Saturday film night with Z.

Back to the Future II (1989)

The second BTTF film is usually considered the worst of the three,^{[citation needed]} but although it's the most complicated, it's also the most satisfyingly complete from a time-travel point-of-view.

The Lego Movie (2014)

Blimey, over ten years old! Surely this has to be the best of the product tie-in films - imaginative,  very funny. tongue-in-cheek and superbly animated. A firm favourite in our house for a reason - the kids were speaking along with it during our pizza 'n' movie night.

Wicked Little Letters (2024)

I'm not quite sure why Netflix describes this as a "riotous comedy" - there are some funny moments for sure, but there's more drama than laughs and the overall message about the subjugation and judgement of women in the 1920s is, ultimately, not amusing at all, just the cause of indignation (as intended, of course). But it's a good watch and the three central women - Olivia Coleman, Jessie Buckley and Anjana Vasan - are superb.

Our Welsh Chapel Dream (season 2, 2025)

Unfortunately this time there's even more of a feeling of the material being stretched than there was in the first series. The narrator is doing double time, so even if you discount the (apparently necessary) multiple re-caps at the top of each episode and after each ad break, the main voice you hear is his. Poor old Keith and Marj feel like they're just supporting artists in their own documentary, as they only really pop up for a sentence or two at a time, and the whole is very disjointed. Still a watchable series though, even if it's just to marvel at the outré decorative choices being made!

Hidden Figures (2016)

I struggled with the original book of this (or maybe it was one of those that just didn't download to my e-reader properly, I can't remember), but really enjoyed the film - as a piece of storytelling with a clear point. There's no question that many liberties have been taken with historical accuracy in order to tell it (just see the fairly damning list on Wikipedia), and while this is to some extent understandable - as the book's author says, you can't have a film with 300 heroes - it spoils it a bit for me to find that, once again, a really interesting piece of real life has been chopped around to fit a standard Hollywood template. That said, it's still making important points as well as being moving.

Waking Ned (1998)

A simple idea, wonderfully told - even if is leaning a little heavily on a vision of bucolic Irish country simplicity - very funny and very sweet in places. The (small) twist at the end is unbelievable and unnecessary in my view, though.

The Wild Robot (2024)

Animated films take a huge amount of effort over years of time, and so it's a shame that here the resultant stunning visuals are in service of a clichéd and mawkish story. And I like sentimental - but this was too much. There's charm, for sure, and everyone loves a cute talking animal, but the anthropomorphism treads well-worn paths and the plot feels like several of the original books smooshed together. We watched it with Z (whose choice it was) and I'm pleased we did something together, but it's a kid's film, with simplistic ideas and predictable results. A miss (although for some reason, the critics loved it, according to Wikipedia, which baffles me).

Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice (2019)

Things I thought I knew about Linda Ronstadt before I watched this: she was spectacularly pretty and she sang country rock in the 70s. Well, I wasn't wrong about either of those things, but that represents a very small fraction of the overall picture. I hadn't realised what a huge star she was in the US, what a variety of music she recorded, or quite how good a singer she is - the few songs I knew don't really show her range - or, most importantly, how she carved her own way through a rampantly sexist music business for decades. I've listened to some of her albums since and while none of it particularly grabs me, there's no denying how good she is. Consider me educated!

The Adam Project (2022)

Fairly standard time travel film, enlivened by Ryan Reynolds. Good fun.

Doctor Strange (2016)

I fancied re-watching this for some reason - probably not seen it since around when it came out.  Watched it with Z (who needed little persuading) as preparation for the sequel. It's fairly typical Marvel fare of course - too much action and not enough plot - but enjoyable nonsense. I don't understand why they made Benedict Cumberbatch do a very average American accent when it would have made no difference to the plot to have him use his own, though.