Today marks the birth of actor and author Ingrid Pitt, born this day in 1937 in Warsaw, Poland. If that date and location seem a bit ominous, Pitt was also Jewish and spent time in a concentration camp.  She and her mother escaped. Pitt became an actress in Europe and tried her hand in America.  Her largest success was in England, especially in horror films.  In the US, she's a cult horror figure, famous for appearances in The Wicker Man, The Vampire Lovers (one of my favorite films), Countess Dracula, The House That Dripped Blood and others.  She also appears in British action movies, including the dynamite film Where Eagles Dare (recommended).   She also penned a few books, including an autobiography and a series of horror-related books. Her filmography is not particularly deep, and she was never a Bond girl, so her exposure in the states in minimal.  I, personally, think she's great.  In the sea of Hammer's extraordinary talent, in my opinion, she's one of the absolute best to do it. Pitt passed in 2010 at only 73 years old. https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/20/2025Format:  UP Faith and FamilyViewing:  FirstDirector:  Davis S. Cass Sr. Job: BakerLocation of story:  Somewhere in California?  Outside of San Francisconew skill:  ElfingMan:  Adam MayfieldJob of Man:  Bitch Boy to a CEOGoes to/ Returns to:  Goes toEvent:  Christmas tree lighting ceremonyFood:  Cookies So, new to me and not a Hallmark movie, exactly.  This movie is about a Santa who will stop at literally nothing to make sure Lacey Chabert and her boyfriend break up and almost forces her into a relationship with someone else.  He will bend the very laws of nature, create life, destroy roads...   This Santa is mad with power. Anyway, for a long time, and maybe still, a lot of the movies on Hallmark were technically independent movies.  I am unclear how it works now, but basically Hallmark would help fund movies for North American distribution.  But after X amount of time, these movies were back in the hands of the producers.  Part of how they had so many movies in the years where it seemed like a factory cranking out way too many movies, this was the trick.  They were essentially licensing very cheap indie movies, and part of them funding those movies was that they were given script approval.   And, thus, the sameness of Hallmark.   But you want to know about Santa. As a child, one Christmas Chabert watches her parents start making out.  This sets in her heart her fondest wish, her own Prince Charming with whom to mack down for the Holidays.  20 years later, Chabert  seems to be running her own bakery and is dating a very distracted, young CEO (Thad Luckinbill).  CEO's best pal and major domo is Man (Adam Mayfield), who he seems to treat like a personal assistant, including having Man pick up Chabert for dates.  This has been going on for a while, and they seem indifferent to one another, but Santa (Donovan Scott) has decided these two need to bang. CEO does seem like an idiot.  Even as he invites Chabert to his family's lakehouse, he neglects to mention he's actually hosting a Christmas party to entertain the Board?  Like, this lakehouse isn't nearby, Chabert has to take a flight, and is cornered by Santa who insists on talking to Chabert the whole time while arguably seeming like he's hitting on her. The plot of the movie is then 10,000 manipulations of the fabric of reality as Santa just wrecks the CEO's life, while also offering CEO his throwing his ex at him so he doesn't go away without a prize of his own.   Chabert and Man take their incognito Santa to a small mountain town where he's to play Santa, and their car breaks down (because Santa magic!).  John Ratzenberger plays the lazy mechanic, and Florence Henderson the hotel manager.  And wouldn't you know it, there's not enough rooms and Chabert and Man need to share a room.  Which is in no way awkward.   It is not until Santa has coerced Man and Chabert into elf outfits that suddenly Man is like "whoa ho!  What a hottie!"  which is definitely a kink choice.   Anyway, yeah, at some point Santa either teleports a poor bear or creates a living bear from nothing.  He creates a rockslide off-screen burying a road.  He makes it snow.  He makes GPS devices fail and reservations for restaurants merely disappear.  He's basically *a* deity of some sort.   Any time it's looking like Chabert might escape or CEO might make it to her, Santa plays supernatural cock-blocker.   Curiously, this movie has the weirdest scene you're going to see at the end as Chabert and CEO stand facing each other with their newly selected sexual partners and just say "It's all good.  I'm gonna @#$% this one now." to each other.   Full stop, this is a movie that, Santa or not, is about people cheating on their partner and then both basically laughing about it, high fiving, and going separate ways.  Except Man still has to go report to CEO and his new girlfriend on Monday. Santa is a freak. he sees you when you're sleeping, he knows when you're awake... https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/19/2025Format:  NetflixViewing:  FirstDirector:   So, yeah.  I kind of vaguely remember this occurring.   In 2019, someone posted a joke online that they were going to "assault Area 51" - ie, gather as many people as they could to "Naruto Run" onto the top secret military base with the idea "they can't stop us all".   Since X-Files debuted, Area 51 has been part of the zeitgeist.  We all know it's there, it was a major location in the 1990's movie Independence Day, and is rumored to be where the US Air Force keeps downed alien spacecraft.  More likely it is where we test experimental aircraft as that is where the U2 surveillance craft was first deployed, as well as the Stealth Bomber, etc... Area 51 is in the middle of nowhere and still well guarded for a reason.  If you cross onto the property and don't stop for the guards, you will be shot.  And I guess one might solve the greatest mystery of all as you find out what's beyond this veil of tears.  Anyway, the documentary is about how all of this got wildly out of control in a way, the power of social media to attract people with bad risk/reward understanding, and that the kids probably are all right.  Stupid AF, but all right.  How people who have no practical experience should try to host a million person rave in the desert.  And how relying on the mob can really save your bacon. Essentially, it follows a young man who puts a gag event on Facebook, that event goes viral, and before long, he's (1) got over one million people saying they're coming to party/ run onto Area 51, and (2) has the FBI knocking on his door. I don't want to say too much more as the fun is the slow motion trainwreck (hence the branding) of what happened.  So read no further or rejoin us after you've watched the two-parter (about 90 minutes total). These docs are all about schadenfreude, and it really is wild to watch something spin out of control. What's odd is that the Trainwreck docs (of which I've now watched 4) do nothing to reflect upon the events of the doc or draw any useful comparisons.  And while it keeps the docs to a neat 45-55 minute runtime, it kind of defeats the purpose of why you go back over things in a documentary - it need not be just a simple recounting of events. And there's lots to say, not just vaguely hint at.  Like: * What the fuck is wrong with YouTubers?  Why are the worst people on Earth so popular for young viewers? * Why was it only YouTubers who showed up at the gates of Area 51?  (this point may be correlated with the prior point) * Imbeciles can cost us all untold money and will willingly create disasters to do something "cool" * How is this a microcosm of any movement - where the thing takes on a life of its own, and ultimately gets co-opted by those who angle for personal, financial gain?  Especially strong men/ con men * Oh, this is how the mob steps in But they just won't go there and talk about it.   The doc instead tries to keep it simple as the story of a dude who is in way over her his head.  Like, on a cosmic scale.  Sure, this guy who seems nice enough, he just does not have the tools at all for what he went through (and still seems to live in his Mom's garage at age 26 or so).   Honestly, some of the doc never ads up, and I suspect there's a much weirder version of this story.   I absolutely understand the part where a meme takes on a life of its own, but things like the County Commissioners deciding to approve the permit that will piss off local voters and lead to endangering them and their property *could* have been a choice to hold the permit holders legally responsible for what's coming.  The *more likely* case is someone gave the commissioners a briefcase full of money.   How our motel owner wound up paying any bills herself seems like a scam-artist was involved, and she got suckered by other scam artists along the way.   How the guy from Vice was so in his own bubble he seemed oblivious to what was actually happening then or since is kind of remarkable.  Terrible job! How ANY of this got to this point seems nearly impossible to conceive, but it is worth noting that it's one thing to click you're coming to an event on facebook, and another to actually show up. I wish these docs did go a bit deeper, because it's a missed opportunity to illustrate to people how things like Russia's Communist Revolution got taken over by the worst possible people.  Or how *any* movement you think about joining needs to be watched carefully, even if you think it's just for fun. Younger viewers will think that the military and police over-reacted.  "It's just a joke" by morons with a camera is a real @#$%ing issue.  We had some influencer visiting town a month or two ago and shooting people at the park with a pellet gun.  They were arrested, but enough 14 year old dipshits will have watched to both make the arrest profitable and make it go away - as well as encouraging the next dipshit to try it. Frankly, I think the FBI underreacted, or else we got a very soft version of events.   https://signal-watch.com

no no.  You're playing siblings again.  Back up a pace. Watched:  11/18/2025Format:  HallmarkViewing:  SecondDirector:  Dustin Rikert Job: DoctorLocation of story:  Somewhere in Scotlandnew skill:  Lording over peasantsMan:  James RobinsonJob of Man:  GroundskeeperGoes to/ Returns to:  Goes toEvent:  Some underwhelming solstice thing, a banger of a party and a ballFood:  liquor, really So, I thought I'd covered this movie because of the image I used for my 2023 Hallmark report when I was moving too fast assembling my ChabertQuest2025 list.  But I had not.  So here we go. This is a movie about a naive woman American doctor and her family who inherit a Scottish castle.  However, the diabolical groundskeeper seduces and bamboozles the doctor into falling for him so that he may claim ownership of the lands he's worked since he was a child.  That same labor presumably led to his father's early demise, and this is his revenge.  With dead eyed smiles, he earns the trust of the stressed out family, offering to take care of everything and let them live off the fat of their inheritance.   Unfortunately the movie ends just after he's successfully bedded the heiress doctor but before we can put his nefarious schemes into motion, so we never see that part. (take 2) This is a movie that makes the 2009 Folger Christmas advert seem positively chaste.  Scott Wolf (Party of Five) and Lacey Chabert (Party of Five) play the adult children of a former Scottish Dutchess who find she ran away from her duties to become a folk-rock singer.  Now the whole family is reconnecting in Scotland as the mom is the inheritor of the family estate, and she's offering it to Wolf and Chabert.   From the moment they land, Chabert and Wolf - who live in LA and SF so don't see each other often - have eyes only for each other.  Wolf immediately begins ignoring his wife (Kellie Blaise) and the two siblings spend every minute together trying to reconnect.   At the film's end, Chabert is hurt by Wolf's decision to stay in Scotland and run the estate, and one is not left wondering why she feels so abandoned as he seems to recommit himself to his wife.  But seeing no other way to be together, she returns to the Castle instead of going back to SF. (take 3) This is a movie about something called a "Dirty Reindeer", which is not a disgusting euphemism.  Unless you want it to be. (take 4) A Merry Scottish Christmas (2023) is a movie about a mother who guilt-trips her kids into coming to Scotland for Christmas.   It's a Hallmark travel movie, a popular genre, wherein a woman over 30 goes to Europe and bangs a local and feels it is very authentic.  In these movies everyone loves Americans, the three or so things everyone knows about another country are treated like the deepest lore, and it's often shot not at all in that country.  Example, this movie extolling the virtues of Scotland is filmed in County Kildare, Ireland and asks Irish people to do their best Scottish accent. It's about a mom who ran away from her role as a Dutchess, blah blah blah.  The kids have to wander around and try and figure out if living in a @#$%ing castle with free servants is the right move.  It has the usual "let's bake a local item" thing, and says stuff about Scotland I'll just accept to be true because I've never been there, and don't currently know any Scots I could ask.   Chabert plays a doctor with her own GP clinic, Wolf plays a busy accountant and a wife who is unhappy, and their mother is played by Fiona Bell.   There is a creepy groundskeeper (James Robinson - actually Scottish!) who should be scaring the shit out of the whole family, but instead they love him.  And, man, this guy shows every red flag in the book, just following Chabert everywhere so he just happens to show up.  And flatter her professional skills in one way by asking for her help when he clearly just bruised his wrist, and then negs her by making her double-check her work by going to his mom's clinic where it is clearly stated there is no X-Ray (not a plot point, somehow).   The highlight of the film is the party where Hallmark star Will Kemp shows up, they throw in some jokes for Chabert fans who've seen the two paired before, and it seems like they're having an actual good time. I did wonder how Chabert felt opposite Wolf who is a pretty solid actor.  Like, someone was kind of meeting her energy level and the scenes are mostly very watchable and the two work much better together than Chabert and her supposed love interest here.   Is it any good?  Yeah, it's fine.  I mean, I absolutely hate the writing and acting (dead eyed enthusiasm) of the love interest, but there's enough other stuff going on, it's fine.  Fake-Scotland is picturesque, and Wolf's wife's hair is amazing. Chabert is given fairly good stuff to do in this movie, like having understandable doubts that don't seem ginned up.  I just don't believe she connected so much with Man as she did with hanging with her family and the promise of a big-ass castle with staff and having kind of a guaranteed clientele thanks to the only other doctor approaching retirement age.  Also, she'll probably buy herself an X-Ray machine with her Dutchess money. Also, the line of sight in this make it looks like Chabert and the wife are looking at each other longingly while Goofus there on the left is checking out Scott Wolf.  https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/17/2025Format:  NetflixViewing:  FirstDirector:   I will never, ever get on a cruise ship. No, but seriously, it's a minor miracle that no one died on this ship.  Or contracted some awful disease.   What were the odds no one needed to be evacuated after the second day?  Pretty close to zero, and it sounds like that didn't have to happen.   What's most wild, that the doc touches on but doesn't really ever explore, is how *fast* society breaks down predictably when the lights are off.  From public fornication to Bible studies breaking out.   It really is a testament to the crew that things felt enough under control that violence was contained.   But, no, really.  I always assumed Carnival, etc... had emergency plans for this sort of thing, but they sure do not.  Fun! The "Trainwreck" series of docs is pretty fascinating.  Little hour-long nuggets of "oh yeah, that disaster".  We also watched "Balloon Boy", which is just as frustrating to watch as you'd imagine.  If you have any radar for people who are both full of shit and people who think they can lie to you because they assume you're not as smart as they are, this is a doc about someone living neatly in that intersection.   Also, everyone needs to get a better idea of how much helium you would need to lift a whole kid and still buffett around like that.  But I guess physics is not on your mind when you think a kid is whizzing through the sky. https://signal-watch.com

by Fiona Underhill, Staff Writer Although she played a range of roles, Totter said herself that “the bad girls were so much fun to play.”

Watched: 11/16/2025Format:  HallmarkViewing:  secondDirector:  Maclain Nelson Job: Copywriter/ Editor?  She never works during this whole movieLocation of story:  Evergreen Lane - which I think is in Salt Lake Citynew skill:  Mastery of the Christmas ArtsMan:  Wes BrownJob of Man:  ArchitectGoes to/ Returns to:  stays in same place (this is the 2nd installment)Event:  Several ongoing Christmas festivtiesFood:  Cookies Editor's Note:  So, y'all.  Despite my stated goals and belief I'd done a phenomenal job documenting ChabertQuest 2025 (pats self on back), I messed this one up.  Yes, I'd seen this movie, but had I written it up?  I had not.  Thought I had, but that was a lie I told myself, and discovered my error in July.  I felt terrible as we agreed the the deal was I would watch and review all of the movies I could find starring one Lacey Chabert and you'd be like "why are you doing this?" So, here we are, rewatching this one.  And writing up this movie.  For you, the people. There were really only so many directions one could go with the premise of Haul Out The Holly (2022), the first film in what is now a trilogy.   The premise of the first film is that a woman breaks up with her live-in boyfriend and goes home for Christmas, only to find that her parents weren't expecting her and are actually moving to a seniors' condo in Florida.  She's essentially left behind in her parents' McMansion.  However, her own father was head of the HOA, and he set up a very Christmassy set of rules, which Chabert finds herself required to adhere to (despite the fact she does not own the house) and is force marched through the holiday season.  Guys, she also falls for Man nextdoor along the way. So... we end the film with Christmas, love, and a 5000 square foot house in which she'll creep around like a Victorian ghost, I guess.  But what next?  Haul out another holiday?  Tragedy strikes Evergreen Lane?  She casually starts putting out inverted pineapples when the neighbors come over? Here in the sequel, Emily (Chabert) been gifted her parents house, she's all-in on Christmas madness, dating Man, and helping out with the neighborhood festivities.   However, as Christmas approaches and events are just beginning, the Jolly Johnsons, winners of a Christmas-themed reality show, move into the cul-de-sac.  To the longtime Christmas-nerds of Evergreen Lane, this is like having your favorite quarterback or rock star move in and they flip out (yes, these movies operate in a cartoonish heightened reality).   The *conflict* is that the Jolly Johnsons want to own Christmas.  The well-oiled machine of the HOA starts to break down as the Johnsons immediately start elbowing in and try to make Christmas theirs - turning community events into a series of competitions with different rules and essentially pitting people against each other. To be real, as someone who has to organize group activities as a PM and who used to manage *large* activities (conferences, workshops, etc...) for a living, this one is maybe too close to my personal point of irritation, as I have been in *plenty* of places where someone waltzes in at the last minute and wants to keep grabbing the wheel and drive.  Sometimes people do have good ideas, and you can't just shut anyone down who wants to participate.  Further, shutting people down can also halt participation from more timid souls watching how this plays out.  It's a challenge! But because most of the characters are default "nice", and the Johnsons are Grade-A assholes, Our Heroes keep getting railroaded, and eventually bullied as the Johnsons set up their own events. To be honest, I am sure playing the Johnsons was a lot of fun.  I am less sure that maybe the movie didn't need to dial it back a bit, because at some point, it's honestly sort of unpleasant.  You don't really see anyone coming back from this.  They will, it's Hallmark, but if it were me?  I'd now be in a cold war with the folks down the street and hand over the keys to the neighborhood events and wish everyone the best of luck.  Sometimes you have to let people self-immolate. Fortunately, our film ends with a mostly unearned kumbaya moment, and then a proposal.  I guess these two forty-year-olds are ready to seal the deal.  But peace is restored as Chabert's character shrugs and does the first sensible thing all movie. The cast from the prior movie is back, including Melissa Peterman, Stephen Tobolwsky, Ellen Travolta, and Walter Platz.  The Johnsons are played by Seth Morris and Jennifer Aspen (apparently an old Party of Five co-star with Chabert).   Is it any good? It's at least trying something!  Many of the jokes land, especially if you're already in and onboard from the first movie.  Without it, it's going to take a minute to sort out.  My favorite joke of the movie is Lacey Chabert's frustration as she learns the Johnsons refusing to participate in HOA mandated activities is an actual option, and she could have skipped everything in the first movie.   I've previously opined that Lacey Chabert is underserved as a comedian.  She is pretty funny, and as the straightman here (the hardest bit of all), she has some genuinely good moments of exasperation with both the Johnsons and the still unfolding reality of Christmas mania on Evergreen Lane.  Plus the recurring Nickleback jokes are pretty solid. Hallmark movies are divorced from reality in so many ways, they kind of critic proof themselves.  As a screwy comedy, the Haul Out the Holly movies kick it even further up a notch, and practically dare you to challenge the movie's premise.  And that premise is that what people want to do during Christmas is hang out with their neighbors and play games and drink cocoa.  Not deal with visiting family, obligatory activities, etc... At least this one is *trying* to be funny, have some zaniness and has, like, characters.https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11.16/2025Format:  AmazonViewing:  SecondDirector:  Brian DePalma There's a lot going on in Phantom of the Paradise (1974).   Here's a pie-chart as shared by The Dug about half-way through the movie (we'd thrown together a last-minute watch party). And then without about ten minutes left: it helps to know that "giraffe" is code for "no, thank you"  This seems right.   It's a rock'n'roll odyssey put out at the height of the music industry's debaucherous post-60's embracing of glitz and glamour and hard drugs.  It's hard not to see the movie as helping push boundaries with formats for music (gestures broadly at Jim Steinman) and as reflecting what was going on out there in the pre-punk days.   The story borrows from Faust, barely from Phantom of the Opera, Dorian Gray and nods to German Expressionism.  But it's also a musical propelled by a Paul Williams-penned soundtrack.  It's more or less a young filmmaker going nuts and having fun putting *ideas* up on screen, as well as homage.   DePalma has fun with lens and shot selection, set design, and a star in William Finley who is not afraid to disappear into his over-the-top character with silver teeth and an oddball headcovering that leaves one wild eye rolling inside the mask.  The movie was filmed a few places, but I learned that the theater that plays "The Paradise" is the Majestic Theatre of Dallas, Texas.  So it's very possible extras from Logan's Run are also in the audience here.   As I opined, Phantom of the Paradise is somewhat like Showgirls in that it is actually very successful at doing what it set out to do.  Whether you like what it's doing is unrelated.  Looking at the reception bits on Wikipedia, arguably most of the reviewers kind of missed DePalma's goals, which happens as the new generation comes along.  He wasn't *spoofing* anything, he's using pieces of pop culture and culture to simply tell a modern rock fable.  And doing it with a wink as he's doing it - knowing how over the top and absurd it is.  It's mostly a study in seeing what you can get away with.   We're taking a journey, man.  A journey that starts with a nostalgia act, The Juicy Fruits doing that 1970's thing of playing a sort of Greaser version of a doo-wop act that would bring is Sha-Na-Na, moves into a Beach Boys pastiche.  Paul Williams' soundtrack has some pretty good tracks as the film progresses, but who gets songs and when doesn't really match the usual format of a musical.  Swan (Williams) never has a solo explaining himself.  We kind of subvert Phoenix's (Jessica Harper) song and it's not much of an "I Want" song.  It's more... just songs.  And I wasn't able to dig in enough to the lyrics during my two viewings to hear what they had to say.  But I did listen to the soundtrack on its own, and it's very Paul Williams and listenable. Do I like this movie?  Well, yeah.  I kind of think I do.  In the way I always like it when a movie swings for the fences and wants to do its own thing.  Maybe it winds up being a bit off-putting as there are no heroes in this movie, exactly - even our wholesome female star/ Christine stand-in gets immediately compromised when success and possible celebrity is thrust upon her.  And Winslow (our Phantom) is kind of weird and hard to cheer for, so you're just sort of watching things happen. Does it make much sense and is it hard to follow on a first viewing?  I don't know, but it is more fun when you know what's coming.  https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/16/2025Format:  HallmarkViewing:  FirstDirector:  Terry Ingram Three Wisest Men (2025) is the third film in the very popular (for Hallmark) series.  We previously covered the first and second installments.   The problem with this movie is that we've established not just three characters, but their mom, spouses and partners, children, etc...  and it is not a small cast.  And everyone needs to get a plotline.  So it's a lot of movie.  I couldn't help but notice that this one was an "extended cut", which means whatever aired with commercials had less movie, and I have to assume that made this even more of a jumble.   From a business perspective, it's a fascinating peek into how Hallmark now functions like an old-school studio with their constellation of stars.   Back in 2022 when the first one of these aired, the appeal was seeing three Hallmark Hunks Male Leads together in a movie as brothers.  The plot was essentially Three Men and a Baby, a very popular 1980's comedy.  And while there's a romance in there somewhere, it was indicative of a shift as we were doing more of an ensemble thing.  It was safe, sure, using a very proven formula, right down to the charm being casting three known male actors out of their depth.  In fact, it relied on the guarantee that Hallmark fans knew Paul Campbell, Tyler Hynes, and Andrew Walker.  And, if you didn't know them, they were already favored Hallmark talent and maybe you would like them here.  And maybe in their other Hallmark movies. The movies are written by the actor Paul Campbell and his sometimes co-star Kimberly Sustad, who is one of the better Hallmark stars, and who has realized that the real money is made having additional pieces of the thing (and probably staking out other opportunities should the roles dry up).  Further, the leads have a piece of the Executive Producing action - ie: they're getting a real cut. To ensure some additional success, Campbell and Sustad brought in Russell Hainline who wrote last year's oddball Netflix hit Hot Frosty.  But his specialty is writing comedy at Hallmark that is... funny.  Not like...  "whoops, they slipped on the ice" or "isn't this awkward?", but... like... jokes.  He was also on Sustad's 2025 acting entry Merry Christmas, Ted Cooper!.  Which was actually kind of funny.   Merry Christmas, Ted Cooper! was also co-written by star and executive producer Robert Buckley.   Anyway, it's nice to know there's a pipeline for the talent and *also* a platform they can use once they have Hallmark's trust in order to do something a bit different from the time-tested formula movies of weary city gals meeting their high school sweetheart who is now a guy with a duck jacket and stubble.   And the more Hallmark swings for the fences, the more likely eventually they'll make, like, a regular pretty good movie that normal people would enjoy.  We're getting closer every year!   This movie is very clearly meant to wrap up plot lines started in the first film and give us one more shot at spending time with these guys.  But it's also clear we either make this an ongoing TV show or wrap it up, because it's hard to keep coming back and make folks' continuing issues humorous and not troubling.   Walker is freaking out about having twins on the way.  Campbell is accidentally sabotaging his own wedding planning.  Hynes is offered a chance to move to San Francisco and have a cool job, but he'd be leaving his family behind in Seattle.  Also, his ex from the first movie (Ali Liebert) is working at the new company, and he reasonably feels weird about that as he's with the girl from Movie #2. Meanwhile, a soon-to-be father-in-law arrives and is, of course, an asshole (Lochlyn Munro, fresh off Peacemaker Season 2).  And  Really, what I think the Hallmark movies borrowing from other movies need to do is realize that less is more.  This movie had so much going on, there's a whole bird plotline that just abruptly ends - and the problem with that is that every story arc should be pulling toward your resolution once it's introduced.  We just get the bird back so they don't have to talk about it any more, but the play was to have the father-in-law forgive Paul Campbell and *then* the bird comes back in that moment.  It would have saved us some unnecessary business. And there's probably four or five things like that in this movie.  And the last movie that felt like that over at Hallmark was Haul Out The Halloween, the third Haul Out the Holly movie.  So something is going on in how these movies are being written or approved, and I really don't have any educated cases what that is other than a lack of time to get it right at the script stage. Anyway, it's fine.  The idea was a 90 minute hang with familiar characters and that's what was delivered. https://signal-watch.com

We are somewhere in the year of the 100th Anniversary of the release of Phantom of the Opera (1925), the silent film starring Lon Chaney, man of 1000 Faces.   I haven't watched it again this year, but I will!  I promise.   I can't say when or where we are in relation to the original release schedule.  Google is telling me the release date was November 15th, but I'm seeing much earlier in the year on Wikipedia.  In the 1920's the movie would play in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and other major markets.  Then, it might move on to other cities.  This could be several months apart.  Eventually, beat-up prints might leave the country or be sent to podunk towns.  So who knows when or if Phantom of the Opera played most cities.  But 1925 is the year in which the movie was released. I saw Phantom of the Opera the first time circa 1990 on a lo-fi VHS tape obtained from a bin at Walmart.  As the film precedes 1928, it fell out of copyright, and I found a copy produced by "Goodtime Videos" that set me back less than $10, and as an angsty teenage kid I spent an evening watching my first feature-length silent film while listening to some moody music.   Frankly, I was blown away.   I'd expected the movie to just be actors more or less pantomiming in front of shoddy sets, and all in wide shots.  And, instead, a film taking place against the massive backdrop of the Paris Opera House unspooled, with wild visuals and dramatic moments.  What I do not recall is if I had already read the novel of Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux, but I sort of suspect that I had.  I do know I had seen the film and watched the movie by the time I saw a non-Andrew Lloyd Webber stage play of the story toward the end of that same academic year.* If silent-era films aren't your jam, I get it.  I struggle with them as well and hats off to the folks who've trained themselves to watch silent films that aren't Buster Keaton or Chaplin.  But I think Phantom of the Opera is practically must-see/ assigned viewing.  It gives you an idea of how complex storytelling was handled during the era and the spectacle that could be created on the silver screen with visual tricks, gigantic sets, etc...  It's almost hard to believe it wasn't actually filmed on location somewhere. Lon Chaney is absolutely brilliant as Erik, which seems trite to say, but every time I watch the movie, I'm stunned by how terrifying he is.  Others are good, no doubt.  One does not dismiss Mary Philbin who plays Cristine and Mary Fabian's Madame Carlotta is terrific.   Whether I loved the recent Frankenstein or not, what I can say is that I love how it swung for the fences as an epic.  We get one of those every few years in the horror genre, and it feels like Phantom of the Opera is the first of these in America.  And, dang, you owe it to yourself to see this thing. Happy 100th, Phantom of the Opera! *I have no feelings on Andrew Lloyd Webber's version as I've only heard it and never seen it      https://signal-watch.com

Film. Comics. Sci-Fi. Superheroes. Noir. History. Superman. 20th Century Archaeology.

  Today marks the 119th birthday of silent film star Louise Brooks.   Here's all of Pandora's Box.https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/12/2025Format:  CriterionViewing:  UnknownDirector:  Edward Dmytryk Crossfire (1947) is one of the movies they recommend when you're first trying to sort out noir, which is a bit odd.  It's about as far from Maltese Falcon or Out of the Past as you're going to get.  Heck, it's a social message movie, and feels like a prestige film on top of that - earning a few Oscar nominations, including that for Gloria Grahame in a small but powerful role. The movie is about a murder that occurs, and the suspects are from a group of soldiers waiting to be de-enlisted from the army in the wake of World War II.  There's no obvious motive,just possibilities for opportunity.   Robert Young plays the cop figuring out who did it, and he pulls in a young Robert Mitchum, Robert Ryan and is looking for Steve Brodie and George Cooper.  None of these guys seem to particularly like each other - their grouping is the loose affiliation of their unit, but they all know Cooper's character, Mitchell,is struggling. Mitchell had really tied one on, and tried to find solace with a girl from a dime-a-dance joint, Ginny (Gloria Grahame).  And, man, is there a lot of story in her relatively few minutes on screen.  There's a whole other noir here about a girl trapped in hell who maybe saw Mitchell as anything from a chance at one night with a decent guy to maybe a way out. And, kudos to Paul Kelly who plays a singularly weird role as "the man" against Graham. The victim is played by one of my favorite supporting actors of this era, Sam Levene.  And eventually it becomes clear that the only motivation that Young can figure is that he was killed merely for being Jewish.   If it's noir, the movie is a post war film reflecting on the darkness waiting for people as they came home, from cheating spouses to the same hatred that fueled the fascism in Europe and Asia that's festering at home.  This is about people already out of control before the movie even starts.   The look is probably the tipping point.  This movie is *beautifully* shot, and in the version on Criterion, you can really see how brilliantly J. Roy Hunt lit and filmed each scene.  This is a movie that takes place mostly over one night, in the dark of the city, in bars, walk-ups and hotel rooms.  And a few scenes in the balcony of a theater.  As good as the film is story-wise, acting (Grahame was nominated for Best Supporting Actress), directing (Dmytryk also nominated), it's worth watching just for Hunt's work. Also, the scene where Graham meets Mitchell's wife (Jacqueline White).  Hoo-boy. In short, I love this movie, but felt I'd watched it several times and could take a break.  But I am so glad I returned to it.  It remains as relevant and powerful as ever, and maybe hits harder in 2025 than it did a decade ago.https://signal-watch.com

I saw Superman (2025) a few times in the theater and have seen a number of reaction videos to the film.  Mostly audiences responded very well to the Jimmy Olsen stuff once they started catching on to what the movie was doing and learned that Jimmy wasn't just a generic reporter guy there to give Lois someone to talk to.   In the run up to the release of the movie, we'd talked about our enthusiasm regarding the casting of Skyler Gisondo, who we know from a few things, but primarily The Righteous Gemstones.  And while we thought Sam Huntington was pitch perfect for 2006 Jimmy Olsen, Gisondo managed to do the thing where he both made the part totally his own while also being utterly, recognizably Jimmy Olsen to fans of the character.  It seems fair to say that the Jimmy and Eve Tessmacher stuff was better than it had any right to be, and as a Jimmy Olsen stan (are we saying sicko now?  It seems like we're saying "sicko"), I was absolutely delighted.  It's just funny that the audience was so utterly thrown by everything Eve and Jimmy were doing.  And it warms my cold, leaden heart to know that James Gunn is continuing on his quest to make a DCU of movies based on doing whatever-the-@#$% he wants instead of worrying about selling Batman toys.   The headline here is that on November 11th I saw some notices that, after some rumors cooking since July, Jimmy might get his own show.   Look, no one wants a weekly show following Jimmy in and out of scrapes more than yours truly.  But if the current mode at DC is proof of anything, it's that they'll sell no wine before its time.  Gunn and Safran have already canned numerous projects that seemed to have traction, and decided to play it smart rather than standing in front of investors and promising a slate of projects, each more lucrative than the last.  We've all learned from Disney's hubris and the absolute self-own that was Diane Nelson's DCEU.   Do I want a Jimmy show?  Yes.  Do I want it to co-star Sara Sampaio?  Also, big yes.   Word is that, as of today, the American Vandal team is looking to produce this, which is a mixed bag for me.  Tony Yacenda and Dan Perrault put out one season of a show I watched and enjoyed years ago, but I didn't finish the second season and have heard nothing from them since.  Whether they actually take this across the finish line or not is an open question as these big properties tend to change hands a few times before they land.  But maybe the pitch was just that good. Honestly, the answer is Lord and Miller, but they're otherwise occupied. We'll see what comes out of this.  I am hopeful for the moment. https://signal-watch.com

  It is Wallace Shawn's 82nd Birthday.  May he celebrate with close friends.https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/11/2025Format:  TCM Noir AlleyViewing:  FirstDirector:  Robert Gordon A cheap and cheerful B-noir from 1947, Blind Spot is a quick watch that depends on charm of its talent and two or three gags to keep it moving. The film was programming on TCM's Noir Alley, which I confess I am not watching as much as I should be of late.  The good news is that I found myself, once again, enjoying the intro and outro by noirista Eddie Muller as much or more than the movie. This film follows an alcoholic writer of novels with an artistic bent (Chester Morris) who, while on a bender, goes to his publisher's office to try and sneak in and tear up his contract, which he has decided is unfair.  While there, he meets a sultry blonde (Constance Dowling) and argues with his publisher in front of a successful writer of mysteries (Steven Geray).  It is suggested that Morris switch to writing mysteries to make more money, and he agrees to do so. He retreats to the bar in the lobby of the publisher's building and makes time with the blonde, who has just quit after the publisher got handsy. That night, the publisher is found dead, and Morris seems to be the suspect.  But the evidence is circumstantial.   It's a lost-time mystery as the now sober Morris tries to pull the pieces together, including possibly condemning himself as the murderer as it seems the technique he dreamed up for his own murder mystery novel is what was used to kill the publisher.  Meanwhile, both Dowlinga nd Geray are working overtime to assist the writer. It's no award winner, but it plays like a solid novella or short story, and the characters are colorful.  Morris and Dowling play very well off each other, even if she seems draw to him for absolutely no reason.  And part of the cost-savings appears in overly long scenes where the same ideas keep getting conveyed as we work to fill the necessary runtime. It's absolutely not crucial viewing, but you could do way worse.  Oddly, it would also fit in neatly with Criterion's current "Black Out Noir" showcase of film's where a lead is trying to account for lost time while they were drugged, asleep, drunk, hallucinating, etc...  https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/09/2025Format:  HallmarkViewing:  FirstDirector:  Maclain Nelson Hallmark fans are never happy.  And maybe with good reason.  There's a contingent that seems to get mad if anything actually happens in the movies, and others who get mad if it's not a particular kind of movie. Which leaves Hallmark in a pickle as they can't keep making the same movies over and over from a decade or two ago, but anything *new* is also a threat to part of their audience. But, all that matters is if people watch, and apparently they are watching.  And, given the viewership habits of Hallmark viewers - which means a lack of awareness of debuts of new movies, watching later, catching the movies on the app or whenever...  that's a pretty good turn out of viewership across streaming and cable. This year it seems Hallmark is cramming more value into fewer movies to drive up advertising during broadcast and draw eyeballs to the app.  This is opposite the decade-ago strategy of going for quantity over quality - ie: they chose not to release 75 new movies in a single Christmas and hope the novelty kept folks locked in.  But it's a risk when you make new kinds of movies and fewer of them, and give people a chance to tune away. But the new approach means they wound up with A Keller Christmas Vacation (2025), which is about all I had energy for as the weekend post-surgery wound down.   A lot of money went into this movie, bringing in stars like former-Superman Brandon Routh as "Cal" (yeah, I know), former Mean Girls star and Hallmark stalwart Jonathan Bennett as Dylan (the middle kid) and Eden Sher as Emory, the kid sister.  It's three adult children of a couple who want to take everyone on a European Christmas River Cruise.  And, in the way of these things, all three children have different challenges.  And it's largely (or completely) filmed in Austria and Germany? Cal recently got divorced (as did Routh IRL), Dylan is trying to get engaged to his longtime partner who is acting weird, and Emory is let go from her "steady" data analyst gig just as she heads out the door.  In any other movie, each of these is the whole plot.  Here, it's their defining thing, but they're all essentially carrying subplots that maybe are jointly undercooked in the 82 minute runtime. SPOILERS The movie hinges on no one saying what is happening with them in order to maintain the holiday peace, which is a very real thing.  To a degree.   But at some point the dramatic irony wears thin in both real life and in this movie.  Like, you didn't murder someone, Cal... Just come clean.  But at the same time, I am well aware, even (or especially) in family, no one tells everyone everything.  And as parents age, they get *very* weird about what they will reveal about their health and when.  Which is kind of heavy for Hallmark. In this way, this movie was not a huge amount of fun.  I get it.  It was trying to capture something honest about family and the way life just works with the complexity of the holidays and our loved ones.  And it even nailed the idea that when you come clean, it allows everyone to pivot and actually work to make sure you're having the best possible holiday.   In this case, the looming cloud is that Dylan's partner won't agree to marriage *in this moment*.  This is, as we deduce, because Dylan's parents have turned his partner into their neurologist and dropped the veil of doctor/ patient confidentiality around just the partner as the father is dealing with early Parkinson's disease.   It seems lousy to do to your kid and their partner, but I won't say it's implausible.  And, the movie even ends with the couple agreeing that went poorly and they need to work on communication.   I'd never seen Eden Sher before, but she's pretty funny and I expect we'll see more of her. Kudos to Brandon Routh who took what could have been a boring, one note jock part and made it feel very real.  That dude is largely underrated. But by the last 30 minutes of this movie I was just irritated with all of the characters.  You knew where this was headed, and it would not stop playing the long game.  It feels like there was a better movie here where everything is on the table and the last forty-five minutes is the "yes, and then...?" bit that could have been interesting. But good for all of them for getting to go to Europe and have a good time. I assume Hallmark reddit will hate this one, as it's not a whispy tale of wildly red-flagged romance in Hicksville, USA.  But we'll see.  I don't really think a complaint about varying vibes and tones to the movie holds much water as I think that's kind of the real deal when stuck with people for several days. https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/08/2025Format:  Criterion ChannelViewing:  Unknown.  Probably fourth or fifth.Director:  John Woo Back in the early 1990's, JAL and others and I would head over to Hogg Auditorium on the campus of the University of Texas on the weekend.   One of the campus clubs would bring in prints of Hong Kong cinema action movies and, sometimes sober, sometimes not, we'd sit in the then 60-year-old auditorium with whomever else had the few bucks needed to get in.   And, bats.  Austin is full of bats, and the Mexican Free-tailed Bats would flit about above us in the dark, occasionally throwing shadows in the screen.   Anyway, that was my intro to all kinds of movies, and where I developed a huge crush on Michelle Yeoh during Police Story 3:  Super Cop, and then had it reinforced with Heroic Trio (and of course no one ever saw Michelle Yeoh again). I considered myself a fan of action films, but, holy shit, I had never seen anything like Hard Boiled (1992) before that first screening.  It had elements of what I was used to from American-produced action films with a dash of what I was used to from what I'd learn to call Neo-Noir.  Chow-Yun Fat was so clearly a leading man, and Tony Leung an ideal up-and-comer.  But it would be decades before I'd get around to watching him in In the Mood For Love, probably his greatest success in the west until Shang-Chi.   As a story, Hard Boiled has enough twists to keep you going, and not all of them add up.  It's also largely a backdrop for the kick-ass action that John Woo would deliver that would fundamentally change action cinema world wide.  As JAL pointed out, you don't get to John Wick without Hard Boiled.  And, it has the mix of action and bits of oddball comedy that would come to punctuate American action film (and confuse a generation that is very cross that moods can sometimes mix in a movie).   In general, I feel like this is a movie that film fans should see at least once.  You may not even like it, but if you understand the flow of time and how influence works in cinema, this is one of *those* films.  Just be ready for more cartoonish violence than you ever thought could fit into a single minute of film occurring for at least 1/3rd of the movie's runtime. https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/07/2025Format:  AmazonViewing:  UnknownDirector:  Robert Zemeckis I have no idea how this movie would read to The Youths.  Fine, I expect, minus some of the jokes that would fly over their heads (ie: "The Doobie Brothers broke up?").   Mostly it makes me miss Kathleen Turner in movies (yes, I know she's still very active... we just don't cross paths anymore).  And, man, she showed up fully formed as a movie star.  Her Joan Wilder (this is her third film and fourth screen credit) is a really pretty fun character even if they have to work overtime to make you think she's "blossoming" during the course of the film. Maybe the action-packed climax goes on too long (I've felt this since I saw the movie as a kid) but it's otherwise a lean, tight movie with lots of solid stuff.   But also, rewatching is a reminder of how 1980's the 1980's truly were.  Romancing the Stone is an astounding cultural artifact in that respect.  From turning Danny DeVito into a movie star (he was a huge hit from this, which is kind of odd when you see how little he's actually in this movie) to the Alan Silvestri soundtrack.  Michael Douglas exudes weird 1980's male energy that lacks any self-awareness.    And our odd relationship with South American countries in the 1980's as the drug trade was in high gear and the CIA was mucking about installing governments.   Unfortunately, they rushed the follow up and made one of the single worst sequels I remember from the era, killing the golden goose. https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/07/2025Format:  Disney+ Viewing:  ThirdDirector:  Matt Shakman So it was the day after my surgery and I was taking pills that make it so I can't remember proper nouns, which is weird.  Sure, I can remember the dog's name, but if you're like "name the people on Mythbusters" I'm hitting like 3 and 1/2 of them accurately. But my dad came over to keep an eye on me/ keep me entertained, and I made him watch Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025).  Which, he concluded with "14 year old me liked it a lot", which is I think a great take from a guy pushing 80.      Anyway, I think we were in agreement that this movie is pretty wild and fun.   Here's the thing about Fantastic Four: First Steps.  It's way too short.  Should it have been an 8 episode TV show?  I don't know.  Possibly.  Could it have been a 3 hour movie?  You've told Kevin Feige to please stop hurting your bladders, so he obliged.   So, the movie goes for narrative economy, which sacrificess things we all would have liked.  Could I have watched Ben Grimm and Rachel Rozman pal around for 2 hours?  Yes.  That's a movie.   (Generally dropping Natasha Lyonne into any Marvel movie sounds like a good time to me.)  Would seeing more of the classic Fantastic Four villains gallery have been great?  Absolutely.  Reed open doors to anti-matter dimensions and give Annihilus a bad time?  Show me!  Could I have watched Vanessa Kirby jut sit in a chair and read for two hours while sipping tea?  Yes.    But we're on a clock here.  I do not have time for that  What I do need is to (a) set up the world from which the Fantastic Four sprung, which is wildly different than the MCU in regards to politics and the potential impact of heroes in that world so when they DO cross over to our more familair MCU (see the end of Thunderbolts*), their expectations are misaligned.  I need to (b) set up Franklin Richards as a cosmic MacGuffin.  And (c) convey that the Fantastic Four is here for all of us in a way that maybe even the Avengers never quite pulled off with all their internal splits and in-fighting.    It's actually kind of wild that a Fantastic Four movie is as much about the trust in a world in their heroes and what it manages to (almost) accomplish.  They were minutes away from having successfully harnessed the might and brain power of humanity to hurl Earth across the cosmos to save it from Galactus when Shalla-Bol showed up.  Stuff like this used to seem myopic but in 2025 it feels like aspirational science-fiction. I did enjoy the movie again, maybe more than ever.  I'm not just taking it all in, but getting to listen to what the characters say and take in detail a bit more.  There's some fun retro-futurism going on in this thing I'm still picking up, like robots walking dogs.  I expect in future movies we'll get more of Reed's teased character bit of analyzing things from a cost-benefit stance and on bigger scales.  Probably we'll see more of Johnny and Shalla-bol, and exactly what Franklin means to all of the MCU.https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/07/2025Format:  NetflixViewing:  FirstDirector:  Simon Stone It's Noirvember, so I need to keep fitting in noir, neo or otherwise.  I also had foot surgery yesterday, so I am couch-bound and taking drugs.  So maybe all of my choices are not great in the moment.  I vaguely remember putting on like 4 Hallmark movies yesterday as I rode out a hydrocodone adventure. Anhoo...  I was pretty excited back when I heard Hannah Waddingham was going to be in an ensemble locked-room-murder-mystery.  She seems kind of perfect for being a little extra in a Murder on the Orient Express sort of movie.  And I like Keira Knightley well enough.  And I've been pulling for Guy Pearce since Momento.   I was even planning to make time for this movie the weekend it dropped on Netflix.  And then the reviews hit.  Not great.    And having had watched this movie, I am not surprised by this. First:  all the acting is fine to good.  You cannot blame Ms. Knightley, Mr. Pearce or Hannah Waddingham (especially not Ms. Waddingham).   The directing is... fine?  The script is awful.  The cinematography is beyond dreadful.  Who even knows about the editing... But the movie feels like it has no idea why people find these movies interesting.   It's a movie about a reporter (Knightley) who is coming off of a rough story where her informant was killed for giving her information.  Does this have any story impact?  No!  It could have.  It suggests it does.  But it doesn't. She's given a chance to cover a luxury cruise on a yacht owned by a billionaire carting his billionaire friends across the North Sea (the worst waters in the Northern Hemisphere, but does that come into play?  No!).  The billionaire (Guy Pearce) is looking to start a foundation in his wife's name as she is soon to pass, now dealing with Stage 4 cancer.  She is, of course, on the cruise with her personal doctor. They barely introduce the passengers coming aboard - and this is highly unusual as anyone who has seen a Knives Out movie, The Last of Sheila or a Poirot mystery will tell you.  Nor are any of these characters developed.   Hannah Waddingham is given a few lines here and there, but she's mostly used the way you use a fun dog in a movie.  When they don't know what else to cut to, they cut to her having a reaction.   Knightley finds her ex-boyfriend is on the cruise as a photographer (David Ajala) and is so alarmed she dashes into a cabin not-her-own to hide from him (sigh).  Here she stumbles across the mysterious woman in Cabin 10.   That night she hears a disturbance in Cabin 10 and then sees someone in the water.  But there never was anyone booked into Cabin 10!  Is she craaaaaazy?  Well, no.  She's our protagonist and this movie isn't that interesting.  But because the movie doesn't care to develop anything about the passengers or give them motives for killing anyone and hiding it, we kind of have to assume it has to do with Guy Pearce and his wife, and we know billions are at stake.   Then the movie tells you what is happening with like 45 minutes to go and.....  yeah.  It's super lame. The movie kind of makes you think, because they keep cutting to Waddingham as the only warm color in the movie, that she'll do something at the end, and instead they pull a character out of the background who suddenly becomes important.   I didn't hate this movie, but it's not good.  It's not even entertaining.  It just kind of keeps happening.  It's poorly shot, mistaking every shot being underlit for mood.  And ignoring every opportunity to do or say something that would have been interesting - like the fact our hero is middle-class and they set up the class differences like something that might matter, but I assure you, they don't.  At some point, someone clearly tries to murder our hero in front of everyone, and they're still calling her paranoid.  Like... make it make sense.   It is also the second thing I've watched produced in 2025 that was clearly run through ChatGPT to ensure the dialog was as flat and obvious as possible for people scrolling while the media plays (the other being the pilot of All's Fair on Hulu).   And I almost want to raise a flag if this *isn't* the product of AI and algorithms, because it would suggest writers are receiving blows to the head and still being forced to work. But, yes, Waddingham looks smashing throughout. https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/05/2025Format:  HallmarkViewing:  FirstDirector:  Jennifer Liao So, we were busy and we had stuff going on as I was having some foot surgery on the 6th, so we kind of randomly put this movie on. There are two very exciting things about this movie, and one is that it co-stars Tia Carrerre as the "mom" if you want to feel your age, Gen-X'ers.  And she is desperately trying to underdress so she is not obviously Tia Carrerre. The second is that I was 4/5ths of the way through the movie and the dad character made a particular face and I ran to IMDB.  And, yes, the guy playing the dad is Yee Jee Tso, who I suddenly recognized as someone from the 1990's Nickelodeon show Fifteen.  Not even a main character.  Just a guy.  Which means this guy is exactly my age and somehow wound up 30 years later playing the husband to Tia Carrerre.  Well done, my dude. The movie is about a young woman of Chinese descent living in Nob Hill in San Fracisco.  She works at the San Francisco Chronicle as a photographer when she meets the hotshot new reporter with an unplaceable accent (South Africa - one of the oddest accents we've ever cooked up).  It turns out that Our Hero's family throws a big party every Christmas and for movie reasons, she's ashamed of this party and her family?  But not really her family.  But maybe a little. Man is assigned to find and report on this party, and she's to be his Jimmy Olsen.  But so deep is her shame about this party that she lies to Man, herself, her family, random ladies she knows...  but the lie does not hold, and instead of everyone being very concerned about what seems like a psychotic episode, they all just blow it off. Truly, this Hero is the absolute worst.   how you doin', leads' mom? The goal of the movie is to share the Chinese-American experience at Christmas, and who knows if any of this is accurate?  Not I.  But I am not sure that framing your parents throwing an annual party that raises money for charities you selected as a kid is exactly the framework I'd have selected for sharing something inherently good.  But the main character *hates* it. In the last act we learn, Our Hero, who is 28 if she's a day, is embarrassed that back in middle-school someone shared a video of her singing at her parents' party, and at school people made fun of her for singing Christmas songs in Cantonese.  Because middle- schoolers are the worst people on Earth.  And, sure, I can maybe understand some trauma, but, girl...  singing familiar tunes in Catonese is the least embarrasing thing I can think of happening in middle-school.  Get a therapist.   At the film's, they show the party, and I don't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't "a really nice party I'd be thrilled to attend."  Like, it's not crazy at all.  It's just a pleasant evening with neighbors and terrific looking good.  No one is hanging from chandeliers or wearing lampshades on their heads.  It's just adults in jackets milling around and talking. My theory is that this movie was written to be a lot more complicated and about the complicated life of a first or second genertaion American kid dealing with parents with expectations that are far afield from what they want.  I also am going to guess that the party was not intended to look like a church social.  There's probably a movie that was in here originally that was a lot less nonsensical and was more on point about the Chinese-American experience.  And I'd be happy to watch that movie.  But this movie was hellbent on knocking the edges off to the point where this just turned the lead into an asshole for not liking her family, who all seem cool.   I wish I could say this is passable, and I want Hallmark to do more movies like this with, frankly, non-white leads.  Christmas is varied from house to house, and that's something that automagically mixes things up a bit.  But you also have to be willing to show *some* discomfort and *some* unhappiness in your movie, or you get... whatever this was.   https://signal-watch.com

Back in the day, network TV would air pilots for TV shows if they felt they might be a costly gamble, and then the show would or wouldn't get picked up based on the success of that pilot, often released as a TV movie.   On November 7th, 1975, ABC aired The New Original Wonder Woman aired and got solid ratings.   If you've never seen the show or it's been a while, this version of Wonder Woman was set during World War II, using the original origins from the comics, which was adapted to World War I for the film.  Steve Trevor crashes his plane onto the mysterious island, populated entirely by ageless, brilliant, warrior women.  Diana, Queen Hippolyta's daughter and the only child of Paradise Island, wins a contest to return Steve to Man's World, which the Amazons abandoned millenia ago. The pilot includes the entire bullets and bracelets bit, which assumes that somehow Amazons have guns and bullets in the comic.  I don't recall if they use Steve's gun in the pilot.  But the basic idea sets up that Diana can use her fancy metal cuffs to deflect bullets. Hippolyta is Cloris Leachman here, and the tone is camp.  Folks like Ken Mars appear.  We're less than a decade since Adam West's Batman, and superheroes have become synonymous with comedy in the public's mind, and will remain there until Michael Keaton swoops in.  For many-a-kid, opening a comic book in the 1980's felt like entering a secret land where these stories were actually taken seriously, and superheroes were, of all things, cool. I have vague memories of Lynda Carter and Wonder Woman from when I was a kid.  Part of that was that the kid I played with when the show was still in first-run episodes always wanted to play superheroes, and always wanted to be Wonder Woman.  And, yeah, he was a little boy in 1970's suburban Michigan.  But can you blame him?   Boots?  Check.  Flashy suit?  Check.  Wisdom of Athena?  Check.  Invisible plane?  Check.  Tossing bad guys around like a minor inconvenience?  Double check.  Plus: twirling and a magic lasso. Later, I caught episodes in syndication, but not often.  Then, in college, The SciFi Channel (eventually SyFy) ran the show during the day, and if I was home, I'd watch.  I got into Wonder Woman comics around 2000, and still read and collect them.  A huge part of that was that Phil Jimenez, who wrote and drew the run that got me on board, understood what was appealing about the character beyond cheesecake and warrior-woman stuff.  And I know that came via the show.  Wonder Woman was not just to be ogled, she was smart, she was determined, she was literally fighting for truth and justice. And those were things that Lynda Carter brought to the screen. Which I know, because eventually I picked up the three seasons of the show on DVD, and watched episodes, but all out of order.  But it wasn't until maybe 2010 that I finally sat down and just blitzed through the whole series.  And I had a blast doing it.   Yes, the show starts on ABC and for a season takes place during WWII.  But then the show moved to CBS for its next two seasons and was set in contemporary times - and this is probably the version you remember.   Full stop, I think that Wonder Woman is a straight up good show.  It made me really miss when you could watch one-off episodes of something, and while there's a bit of mythology/ lore/ what-have-you, you're resetting every week and it's just about that week's adventure.   Lynda Carter is so solid in this show, it's unreal.  I've not seen her in too many other movies or shows, but she's effortlessly charismatic, beautiful and buyable as the lead.  And she's like in her mid-20's carrying this show.  Clearly born to play the role, so much so that despite Gal Gadot appearing several times as Wonder Woman, I still default to Carter in red boots for my mental image of Diana. The only other real supporting cast is Lyle Waggoner who plays Steve Trevor, and had the show gone on to a fourth season it seems he was being written off.  Behind the scenes it seems he and Lynda Carter weren't getting along, and by the end of the third season he would appear in whole episodes where he spoke to her on the phone. In general, I do prefer the 1970's-set episodes when they took the show more seriously, but YMMV.  It's still pretty silly and self-aware, but isn't leaning into wisecracks and forcing the comedy and works better for an hour-long program.  And they had a wider variety of things to take on in the 1970s. Anyhoo... here's to Wonder Woman, in her satin tight fighting for our rights and the old red, white and blue.https://signal-watch.com

Watched:  11/04/2025Format:  Criterion ChannelViewing:  FirstDirector:  Harold Clurman I know a tiny smidge about the Group Theatre in New York in the pre-WWII era, and have made a few connections over the years.  And so it was that I saw Clifford Odets' name come up during the opening credits as the screenwriter, and I got a rough idea of the film that was about to unspool.  Odets was an actor who participated in the Group Theatre movement before finding his footing as a writer - in fact, the writer upon whom the Coen Bros. based the titular character in Barton Fink. So while Criterion included this movie in with "Blackout Noir", as in "people who lost time and are trying to recover what happened", my attention shifted to the usual social issues and naturalism that I expected to populate the film.  Curiously, the film is also directed by Harold Clurman, one of the Group Theatre directors - in his sole film directing credit.  Methinks it did not go well. The major spoiler I'll drop here at the beginning is that this movie seems like a wandering mess until the finale slam dunks everything you've seen before, tying together themes, plot elements and character motivation that has seemed... wandering at best.  Honestly, tip of the hat to that end, which is how I'll remember the film.   Set in New York City, a sailor on leave wakes up in a paper stand being fed black coffee and can't account for how he wound up with a stack of cash.  He wanders into a Taxi Dance hall and meets Susan Hayward.  Together they piece together that he must have stolen the money from a woman he was helping to fix her radio, but they got blackout drunk together.  They go to return the roll and find her dead. What follows is a bizarrely structured odyssey of people seemingly acting out of spontaneity and with a minimal sense of self-preservation.  We meet a variety of characters, a man mourning his cat, an Orange Julius barista, and more...  and it can make the film feel like it's all over the place.   Example, a cabby becomes concerned about Alex, our nimwit protagonist, and joins in the hunt for the killer while also consoling Susan Hayward.  He has no reason to do so, but everyone just likes having him around.  SPOILERS But it turns out in the final moments that this cabby did it all along, and one of the seemingly random side-stories was actually there to set up why the cabby did it.   The biggest problem is that the movie never feels structured like a mystery, exactly.  They never figure it out, instead we have a last minute confession.  So it's really a character study of these people and how this woman's death pulls this group together, but it also feels like... bullshit?  And it doesn't help that our focal character/ protagonist is written as a moron who is aware he's a moron.  He almost seems imported as the third guy in the group from a Gene Kelly musical.   But the rest fo teh cast is great.  A young Susan Hayward gets top billing and she's really terrific.  Paul Lukas as the cabby is terrific.  And Joseph Calleia makes a late entry in the film, but is stunning as the dead woman's mobbed-up brother.   It's not the first movie I'd recommend to anyone, and it's almost more interesting trying to sort out what Odets and Clurman werre doing.  Honestly, this movie is just a year before the real noir movement would kick into gear, and maybe if they'd made this in 1952, the picture would have been very different.  I can't say.  But knowing the background of the writer and director and then how oddly everything unfolds...  it's a curious watch. https://signal-watch.com