Piccadilly (1929)

Funny how a film on the tail end of the silent era can feel somewhat timely, and I had no way of knowing from the description. In the first act, London night club dancer Vic (Cyril Ritchard) repeatedly ignores the express wish of dance partner Mabel (Gilda Gray) that he not kiss her arms and back, especially as they leave the stage. He labors under the apparent delusion that she secretly likes him—and insists she'd be nothing without him. Boss Valentine Wilmot (Jameson Thomas) notices and fires him before she even lodges a complaint. We never hear from Vic again. That said, it isn't strictly virtuous of Wilmot: He has his own designs on Mabel. But he's enough of a gentleman that she falls for him.

The real conflict begins when, alas, the Piccadilly Club's business suffers in Vic's wake. Looking for innovation, Wilmot recalls a dishwasher, Shosho (Anna May Wong), whom he caught dancing on the clock. He rehires her as a dancer, making it essentially the Shosho Show, if you will. It's not clear whether Mabel envies her first for her popularity with the crowds or for her popularity with Wilmot in another capacity, but as the tension heats up...well, I won't spoil it like the Netflix jacket does. Let's just say that silent films don't favor happy endings between whites and Asians.

Lady Bird (2017)

No, it's not about Claudia Alta Johnson. We never do learn how the protagonist (Saoirse Ronan) chose her nickname, tho I wouldn't be surprised if she, an apparent leftist, meant to honor the Democratic first lady. The important thing is that she refuses to go by her birth name, Christine, because she wants to assert her own identity.

I'd say Lady Bird is above average for 12th-grade rebelliousness, especially by Catholic school standards (she snacks on unconsecrated communion wafers, for example). Fed up with her hometown of Sacramento and California in general, she wants to go to college in New York City. Alas, her family is low on finances, so getting her mom (Laurie Metcalf) to agree is a challenge. In truth, getting her mom to agree on anything is a challenge.

Julia (1977)

Every so often, I move all the entries on my Netflix queue with a listed wait time to the top and see what comes next. If not for this method, I might have put Julia off indefinitely. How often am I in the mood for a dark-looking '70s drama whose title is a woman's name? Still, it had acting awards, an Academy Best Picture nomination, and direction by the seemingly underrated Fred Zinnemann, so I'd have to see it eventually.

In the '30s, Lillian Hellman (Jane Fonda) is a rather famous writer, thanks in part to schmoozing with the even more famous Dashiell Hammett (Jason Robards). But an old friend, Julia (Vanessa Redgrave), recruits her for a mission that would normally go to a non-Jewish nobody: smuggling funds for the resistance in Nazi territory. Julia's too injured to do the task herself. It's too bad they couldn't meet again under better circumstances; indeed, meeting at all is iffy....

Your Name. (2016)

Gee, it had been four months since my last reviewed animation and nearly eight since my last reviewed anime. I opted to jump back in with a recent picture that enjoys immense popularity, especially in its homeland, where it broke box office records.

Mitsuha, a modern high school girl in the fictitious backwater town of Itomori, wishes she could be a handsome boy in Tokyo. She kinda gets her wish when she swaps bodies with high-schooler Taki, a switch repeated every time they sleep. Initially, both take it as a realistic dream; when they return to their old selves, they find compelling evidence to the contrary, including acquaintances' behavior around them. They take to writing in smartphone diaries and otherwise leaving messages for each other, hoping not to ruin their lives. This lasts only until the second act, after which Taki misses Mitsuha enough to try to track her down. But he was never prepared for a major complication....

Charlie Chan's Murder Cruise/Charlie Chan in Panama (1940)

Sometimes I check out part of a series simply because it's a long series. I knew going in that no one would revive the fake Chinese man in my lifetime. But some entries, including these two on one disc, enjoy pretty high IMDb ratings to this day, so there had to be more to them than yellowface humor.

The same-year flicks are so similar that I hardly care to go into their differences. One involves a serial strangler aboard a ship to Hawaii. The other involves a plan for wartime sabotage at the Panama Canal. Both problems, of course, come to the attention of the titular literary detective, herein played by Sidney Toler.

The Haunting (1963)

Not for the first time, I got a late arrival intended for October. Rather than save it for next year, I decided to bid Halloween farewell with Martin Scorsese's personal favorite horror. In truth, I think my main reason to put it on my queue in the first place was that the Nostalgia Critic cited it as a G-rated movie that couldn't get a G anymore.

Nell (Julie Harris) accepts an invitation from one Dr. Markway (Richard Johnson) to spend a week at Boston's Hill House and evaluate rumors of its haunting. Along for the ride are Theodora (Claire Bloom), who might have ESP; Luke (Russ Tamblyn), who doesn't believe the rumors at all but expects to inherit the mansion; and eventually Mrs. Markway (Lois "Moneypenny" Maxwell), who tries to talk her husband out of this nonsense. They all observe strange phenomena, but only Nell gets driven over the edge....

Thor: Ragnarok (2017)

Thor's eponymous movies always struck me as somewhat odd compared with the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. He's not exactly designed for viewers to relate to, being a demigod prince from another realm. And unlike Wonder Woman, he really doesn't face any of the challenges that ordinary people typically face. This may explain why I never felt the motivation to watch his movies in a theater -- until now.

When the not-so-immortal King Odin (Anthony Hopkins) passes away, Princess Hela (Cate Blanchett), goddess of death, can finally return from a long exile, planning to expand Asgard by conquest. Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Loki (Tom Hiddleston) together are no match for her. Complications in their retreat send Thor to Planet Sakaar, where he promptly gets enslaved (the god of thunder is surprisingly susceptible to electrical shocks) as a gladiator. If you've seen the ads, you know that that's how he meets "a friend from work" for the first time since Age of Ultron....

L'Atalante (1934)

I was surprised to find this reputed super-classic buried on a disc labeled "The Complete Jean Vigo," which lists three shorts first, in ascending order of length if not popularity. Perhaps this is the Criterion Collection's version of "Warner Night at the Movies," encouraging you to check out the appetizers before the main course. I see the logic in saving the best for last. But I had a feeling that I wouldn't be interested in the whole shebang; even the feature wasn't my usual type.

The title refers to a barge, whose captain, Jean, just got married. Wife Juliette comes aboard for a honeymoon if not a home in the cabin. They discover that it's not as conducive to romance as they'd hoped, thanks to Jean's duties, the barge's squalor, and the presence of a cabin boy and especially First Mate Père Jules. A night out in Paris doesn't improve matters. As tensions rise, Père Jules hopes to facilitate reparations.