Oppenheimer (2023)

I knew my dad and I would have to see this while it was still in theaters. Not only is it popular, but it loses something on a smaller screen. Not that nuclear explosions, "real" or imagined, make up much of the three hours.

The story covers the life of J. Robert Oppenheimer (Cillian Murphy) from his doctoral student days in 1926 to his receipt of the Enrico Fermi Award in '63. His key work on the Manhattan Project and reactions to its aftermath tend to dominate the focus, but there's more to it than that. He hangs out with communists too much for the comfort of authorities, and two party members, eventual wife Kitty Puening (Emily Blunt) and codependent Jean Tatlock (Florence Pugh), become his love interests.

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007)

Whew, glad this format allows titles of that length. Say what you will about that clunker; it did more than anything else to get me interested. Sure, Brad Pitt said this was his favorite of his own works, and it got many honors, but if not for the title, I would have neglected to put it on my queue.

The story begins shortly before 19-year-old "Bob" Ford (Casey Affleck) joins the James gang, of which his older brother, Charley (Sam Rockwell), is already a member. Bob has admired Jesse (Pitt) since childhood, but you know the saying "Never meet your heroes"? Between Jesse's behavior and Bob's unwanted entanglement with gang treachery, collecting a reward on Jesse starts to look like a good idea.

The Old Man & the Gun (2018)

I had enjoyed many movies featuring Robert Redford, mostly from the Silver Age but up to Captain America: The Winter Soldier. These did not make me eager to see what's touted as the last time he'll appear on the silver screen. No, my main reason for watching this in a theater was a Meetup invitation; I hadn't accepted one of those in months.

Set mainly in 1981 in the western U.S., it follows Forrest Tucker decades after he made a name for himself as a prison escapee many times over. Now rather old (if much younger than Redford really is), he counts on people not knowing who he is when he robs banks, usually with two other old guys (Danny Glover and Tom Waits). He takes interest in a less criminal woman (Sissy Spacek) who isn't sure what to make of him. Nearly half the movie focuses on John Hunt (Casey Affleck), who doesn't care much for his police work until he gets the chance to, well, hunt the robbers, primarily Tucker.

Gone Baby Gone (2007)

While this movie came seven years after Gone in 60 Seconds and seven before Gone Girl, I couldn't have told you which was which. It was high time I saw one of them. I ruled out Gi60S for not being popular enough. Both GBG and GG involve Ben Affleck, but only GBG has him as director, and he seems less of a gamble than David Fincher.

The heroes are a pair of mainstays in Dennis Lehane's novels: Patrick Kenzie (Casey Affleck) and, with less focus, Angie Gennaro (Michelle Monaghan). When a little girl gets kidnapped, her aunt hires the two private eyes, against the recommendation of the police captain (Morgan Freeman). Their main advantage is that Patrick knows almost everybody in the Boston slum, allowing him connections the cops wouldn't have. They still do some work with police detectives (Ed Harris and John Ashton), but with too much disagreement.

Manchester by the Sea (2016)

The title alone made me a little reluctant to see this movie. The credit to Kenneth Lonergan didn't help. But it takes a lot to shoo me away from an Academy Best Picture nominee in the long term, and Dad and I wanted to get one more out of the way in time for the ceremony. Lion, Fences, and Hacksaw Ridge were not immediately available.

Middle-aged Lee Chandler (Casey Affleck) lives as a Boston handyman with basically no social life beyond the occasional unprovoked bar brawl. His life gets more miserable still when his older brother Joe (Kyle Chandler, oddly enough) dies of a heart attack -- and to Lee's unpleasant surprise, Joe's will asks that Lee take care of Joe's 16-year-old son, Patrick (Lucas Hedges). Lee and Patrick have trouble seeing eye to eye on arrangements. For example, "Patty" would hate to leave his friends behind, but Lee can't stand to live in Manchester, where people whisper about him for reasons that take a while to become clear....

Interstellar (2014)

Christopher Nolan is so popular that today's top news on IMDb is that he'll direct a movie in 2017 -- with no word on the title, subject, or actors. Personally, I have very mixed feelings about his work. It's consistently admirable and entertaining but always contains bothersome elements that prevent me from loving it, such as an obsession with dead wives and girlfriends. (How does his wife feel about that?)

The protagonist of Interstellar -- identified somewhat confusingly by just his last name, Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) -- is a widower, but at least he's not loaded with guilt or vindictiveness. After all, in his time, crop blight has decreased the human population so dramatically that he fears that his daughter Murphy's generation will be the last. (For once, the disaster is not evidently the fault of humans or aliens.) A former astronaut, he's disappointed that schools now teach that the moon landing was a hoax so that kids will be less inclined to become anything other than farmers. Of course, he's not alone: The stealthy remains of NASA have been looking for a habitable world to reach before it's too late. As Cooper discovers, their methods now involve aid from a mysterious source to travel by extra dimensions. He's game to head a mission despite Murphy's protests, but no one can be fully prepared for what happens in the uncharted territory of physics....

Triple Feature: ParaNorman, Frankenweenie, and Hotel Transylvania

Boy, the next movie I saw after Vampyr also had vampires but otherwise couldn't be more different if it tried. I considered reviewing HT on its own, but I had recently seen the other two participants in its Hollywood "duel" and felt like talking about them too. You may ask, "Why bother with comparisons instead of just reviewing a film on its own merits?" Well, not everyone has the resources to make watching all three feasible, so why not help weigh the options?

To qualify for a duel, movies need to come out around the same time with similar themes -- in this case, comical PG family animations focusing on the undead circa Halloween 2012. At present, PN and FW are exactly tied on both the Internet Movie Database and Rotten Tomatoes. HT does marginally better on IMDb but much worse on RT, as you might expect from the one that didn't get nominated for Best Animated Feature. I'd rather not discuss box office figures. I'll start with synopses.