Theodora Goes Wild (1936)

Despite having seen Irene Dunne in starring roles before, I could not have named any of her titles without looking (ironic considering I Remember Mama). This was my remedy. The DVD also included her in Together Again (1944), but I felt like watching only the more popular option.

In the fictitious small town of Lynnfield, CT, Theodora (Dunne) seems innocent except for secretly writing hit romance novels that scandalize her stodgy aunts (Elisabeth Risdon and Margaret McWade) and most neighbors. When she visits her publisher (Thurston Hall) in New York, she catches the eye of illustrator Michael (Melvyn Douglas), who follows her without invitation even to her hometown. Under threat of blackmail, she hires him as a gardener. As obnoxious as his approach is, she allows him to draw her out of her tiny comfort zone, which rapidly leads her to fall for him. Alas, he wasn't that serious in his courtship. Well, now it's her turn to be aggressive, in a more public fashion....

RRR (2022)

This is the first Indian movie I've seen at my mom's suggestion; she'd read good things about it. Perhaps the strangest thing about it is the title. In the opening sequence, the letters expand to "Rise Roar Revolt," but it started as a working title based on initials of the director (S.S. Rajamouli) and leads (N.T. Rama Rao Jr. and Ram Charan). I went in knowing little more than its 185-minute runtime, as Netflix doesn't describe the plot. Nor does it offer audio in the original Telugu for some reason; I settled for Hindi.

In 1920, owing to a language barrier, the Hindu Gond tribe unwittingly sells preteen Malli (Twinkle Sharma) into slavery as a henna artist in the Delhi mansion of Governor Scott Buxton (Ray Stevenson), who won't sell her back. Malli's adult brother figure, Komaram Bheem (Rao), assumes the alias of Muslim "Akhtar" and plots to bust her out. He befriends Rama Raju (Charan), an undercover cop assigned to arrest the mystery man alleged to be plotting against Buxton. Neither friend has the slightest suspicion at first....

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014)

I had found Rise of the Planet of the Apes "very Hollywood," by which I mean entertaining but geared toward the lowest common denominator. Of course, you have to expect a lot of simplicity in a story about apes with slightly enhanced brains who want to escape captivity. The sequel promised a rather different plot but had the same IMDb rating, so I decided to give it a try.

A detail I had missed at the end of Rise was the start of "simian flu." The opening herein might remind you uncomfortably of the COVID-19 pandemic, but this one is much worse, reducing the world's human population to the 0.2% who can resist it. The maybe hundreds of survivors in the San Francisco area hope to reach and restore a hydroelectric dam, which requires a handful of them to pass through the uplifted apes' claimed forest. Head chimp Caesar (Andy Serkis) is pretty patient, having been raised by kind humans and sensing a similar type in Malcolm (Jason Clarke), but paranoid tensions mount on both sides....

The Earrings of Madame de... (1953)

So much for my earlier decision not to see this. Eh, I have changed some in seven years. Anyway, yes, that is the entire title, tho it's just Madam de... in the original French. Whenever her surname would be given, it is completely drowned out, interrupted, or visually blocked. I still don't know the purpose -- maybe trying to convey that all sorts of women are like her? At least we know her first name, and the significance of her jewelry becomes apparent almost immediately.

In what I take to be the 19th century, Louise (Danielle Darieux) has been so profligate in her Parisian decadence that she sees fit to sell the earrings her husband, André (Charles Boyer), gave her for their wedding. To save face, she claims to have lost them, but the jeweler (Jean Debucourt) sells them back to André, who gives them to his mistress (Lia Di Leo), who sells them to pay off her own debts. Their next buyer, Fabrizio (Vittorio De Sica), just happens to run into Louise and fall for her....

The Book Thief (2013)

From the title, I was not at all surprised to learn that this is adapted from a book. More surprising to me is the mixed response: Less than half the critics on Rotten Tomatoes like it, yet the mainstream audiences mostly do. And this isn't some dopey entertainment fest.

In the '30s, at age 12, Liesel (Marie-Sophie Nélisse) gets transferred from her mother to foster parents Hans (Geoffrey Rush) and Rosa (Emily Watson) in a fictitious German town, for reasons she doesn't immediately understand. Having lost her kid brother to illness en route, she starts a habit of swiping fictitious books for comfort, despite being illiterate at first. That deficit and her habitual silence toward new acquaintances make it hard for her to make friends, and Rosa's cranky to begin with, tho at least neighbor Rudy (Nico Liersch) has a semi-requited crush on Liesel. But she gets a bit more practice with friendship when a nearly dead young Jewish man, Max (Ben Schnetzer), calls in a family favor for shelter from the Nazis.

She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949)

Ah, my first western viewing this calendar year. The timing felt right to me, since I was getting tired of foreign and indie flicks.

Shortly after Custer's Last Stand, Frontier Army Captain Brittles (John Wayne) is six days away from retirement. On screen, that can only mean that something eventful is going to happen first. Specifically, he receives orders to escort the commanding officer's wife, Abby (Mildred Natwick), and niece, Olivia (Joanne Dru), to a coach heading back east. Since several tribes are on the verge of war against the cavalry, this mission will require a larger party than usual.