The Cowboys (1972)

I hadn't meant to watch this so soon after my last '70s western. But when I read the Netflix jacket, the timing seemed vaguely appropriate: chasing a controversial western that John Wayne hated with Wayne's most controversial western from late in his career.

The title may sound generic for the genre, but the emphasis is on the last syllable: In the 1870s, when gold fever has taken all the usual local candidates for drovers out of the running, Wil Andersen (Wayne) resorts to recruiting 11 boys no older than 15 to help him drive cattle 400 miles. Yes, their parents approve. The only other adult on the journey is the cook, Jeb Nightlinger (Roscoe Lee Browne). Some other adults do offer their services, but Andersen rejects them for their initial dishonesty regarding their background. Those men, led by one Asa Watts (Bruce Dern in a well-done yet surprisingly reviled role), decide to stalk the party in the hope of rustling.

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Part 1 (2012)

A friend of mine talked me into watching the animation on HBO Max with him and then writing this review. I believe it's my first review here of an originally direct-to-disc movie, but hey, if I count TV movies, why not? My main cause for hesitation was that it's only half the story, but then I confirmed that Part 2 was released at a later date, so they really should be seen as separate features.

In what might be the same year as the Frank Miller comic from which it's adapted, 1986, Bruce Wayne (Peter Weller of Robocop fame) is 55 and has hung up the cowl for a decade. Jim Gordon (David Selby), who knows Wayne's secret, is on the verge of joining him in retirement. But it won't be a quiet final month for the police commissioner's career: The so-called Mutant Gang -- who are not of the X-Men superpowered variety, though their leader (Gary Anthony Williams) looks it -- have been on a seemingly pointless murder spree. Furthermore, Harvey Dent (Wade Williams), thought to have regained sanity now that he's no longer literally two-faced, goes back to acting like Two-Face, if sadder. Well, it's not so hard for the ultimate vigilante to come out of retirement....

High Plains Drifter (1973)

Sometimes a movie sounds interesting based on negative reviews -- by virtue of highly contrary criticisms rather than extreme ones per se. In this case, some say it's too derivative, yet John Wayne refused to work with Clint Eastwood afterward because it's too far removed from traditional westerns. I was not aware of these opinions when I chose to watch; I just knew it was popular overall. In retrospect, neither opinion surprises me. It was an era for experimentation, after all.

The new frontier mining town of Lago is worried about what three outlaws who just finished serving time will do when they return. A mysterious sharpshooter (Eastwood) holds promise for dealing with them, but he acts uninterested in sticking around, until the local authorities agree to give him whatever he wants -- and coerce their neighbors to follow suit. His demands, including literally painting the town red, get increasingly outrageous, to the point that some citizens would rather take their chances without him. But even with his guidance, they're all clearly incompetent shots....

Raya and the Last Dragon (2021)

This has not received much mention in my social circles, but it gets moderately high ratings. After seeing its icon on Disney Plus enough times, I decided to give it a go. If nothing else, I'd see a dragon animation and a new effort from Big Hero Six director Don Hall.

The setting is an alternate version of Southeast Asia in centuries past, with humans and monkeys the only real species around. Known civilization consists of five hostile tribes, each named after a dragon body part. They had been in harmony 500 years ago, when dragons provided rain and other great benefits to them, but demons called the Druun turned all the dragons to stone, except one Sisu (Awkwafina), who disappeared after dispelling the Druun. Things get a lot worse when the tribes squabble over Sisu's gem and break it in five, reducing its power to keep the Druun from petrifying more beings. Six years later, Raya (Kelly Marie Tran), 18-year-old daughter of Chief Benja (Daniel Dae Kim) of the Heart tribe, is on a quest to find Sisu and unite her with all the gem shards, if only to unpetrify Benja.

Open Your Eyes (1997)

No, it has nothing to do with the movie of the same title from this year. It does have a remake, but that was Vanilla Sky (2001), reputedly not as good. Both versions include Penelope Cruz in the same role; in OYE (a.k.a. Abre los ojos), she's the only actor whose name meant something to me. At least I'd already had a taste of director Alejandro Amenábar with The Others.

César (Eduardo Noriega) is a Madrid aristocrat and quite the lothario, prone even to swiping dates from his friend (Fele Martínez) -- until the day after his 25th birthday. His most recent ex, Nuria (Najwa Nimri), doesn't want him to move on to the likely next girlfriend, Sofía (Cruz), so she talks him into her car and deliberately crashes. Nuria reportedly dies, and César's face is so injured that even the best surgery money can buy can hardly make him presentable again. Sometimes he takes to wearing a rather realistic yet unmoving mask. He hopes that Sofía will still be receptive to him. And then things start to become hard to explain....

Secrets & Lies (1996)

For a movie so highly rated all around, this was surprisingly elusive. I couldn't find it at the video store back when I lived near one, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't offered via Netflix as soon as I wanted. Late to the DVD party, perhaps?

Cynthia (Brenda Blethyn) hates her life as a middle-aged London box factory worker and mother to Roxanne (Claire Rushbrook), whose surliness seems immature for a woman about to turn 21. Cynthia never leaves the flat except to work or shop and rarely hears from her nearby brother, Maurice (Timothy Spall), because of an even more strained relationship between her and his wife, Monica (Phyllis Logan). But this predictably bleak life takes an unforeseen turn when Cynthia gets a call from Hortense (Marianne Jean-Baptiste), an older daughter she had given up immediately for adoption, whose adoptive parents are now dead and who's curious about her. At first, Cynthia wants no further contact, but then she warms up to the idea of connecting with someone who truly welcomes her -- albeit not letting the rest of her family in on it right away.

Judas and the Black Messiah (2021)

It had been nearly three months since my last 2020 Academy Award nominee viewing, so I moved another up in the queue. Why this one? I think the title got me curious. It certainly wasn't director Shaka King, whose few other works I'd never heard of, but Ryan Coogler as a producer lent some promise.

In '68 Chicago, Bill O'Neal (LaKeith Stanfield) has been impersonating an FBI agent in order to steal what he claims was reported stolen. When he gets in trouble with the real FBI, Agent Roy Mitchell (Jesse Plemons) gives him an alternative to the usual consequences: infiltrating the local Black Panthers (not the other kind associated with Coogler) and spying on popular Chairman Fred Hampton (Daniel Kaluuya). O'Neal also makes occasional unsuccessful attempts to incite crimes among the Panthers, unless he's merely playing up his own extremism to avoid suspicion.