Arachnophobia (1990)

This feature gets a very mixed reception, as reflected by the disparity between critic and audience scores on Rotten Tomatoes: 93% vs. 54%, respectively. Regardless, I'd heard enough good things about it, mostly pertaining to the humor, to give it a whirl.

An entomologist's (Julian Sands) research party enters a highly secluded area of Venezuela. The photographer (Mark L. Taylor) gets bitten by a tarantula and dies in seconds. The spider hitches a ride in his coffin to his fictitious little hometown of Canaima, California, where it reproduces with a local. Not only are the smaller hybrids just as venomous; they are extraordinarily eusocial, effectively taking orders from their hulking progenitor. The merciful news is that the first batch of hybrids is sterile and short-lived. But that could change soon, and given how the species dominated that secluded area...

Son of Frankenstein (1939)

I didn't think I'd be seeing any more old Frankenstein entries from Universal Pictures. Even The Bride of Frankenstein was more cheesy than scary or funny. But this one was on a list of horror recommendations, and I did want something older and more allegedly classic than I've been seeing this month.

Shortly after the natural death of Heinrich von Frankenstein (why he wasn't Victor is beyond me), his son Wolf (Basil Rathbone) moves into the castle, hoping to make use of the adjoining lab and restore honor to the family name. There he finds squatter Ygor (Bela Lugosi), who had assisted Heinrich; and Heinrich's infamous creation (Boris Karloff), who has been secretly alive but comatose for some time. Wolf performs a project to re-energize the monster, if only for scientific study. The monster does as Ygor bids, apparently out of sheer fondness for a fellow misshaped outcast. Alas, Ygor is vengeful....

Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (2010)

This was actually my first viewing this month, but I opted to wait until after a scheduled Meetup discussion to write my review. It's the kind of film I have trouble evaluating without a broader perspective.

In modern rural Thailand, Boonmee (Thanapat Saisaymar), around age 60, has a kidney disorder and knows he is not long for this world. Perhaps that's why the ghost of his wife (Natthakarn Aphaiwong) shows up and sticks around. Soon after, their long-vanished adult son (Jeerasak Kulhong) returns as a sort of glowing-eyed yeti, explaining that he got that way from sex with another such creature, which he calls a Monkey Ghost. Everyone in the homestead -- including Boonmee's nephew and caretaker (Sakda Kaewbuadee), who's not as prominent as the title implies -- acknowledges these surprise guests but is not alarmed. Indeed, things progress quite peacefully toward the conclusion, a mix of the inevitable and the unpredictable.

Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971)

I was only tentatively planning to see this someday and hadn't expected to right after another Disney movie about kids and non-evil witchcraft. But people have been bringing it up with the passing of Angela Lansbury, so I thought it a fitting way to honor her.

In World War II, Eglantine Price (Lansbury) is legally compelled to host three evacuated siblings in her rural English mansion, however unwillingly and temporarily (a scenario I hope never happens in the U.S.). She has been studing magic via mail-order instructions to help the war effort, but the course ends abruptly before she can learn a key spell. Since youngest child Paul (Roy Snart) has a habit of collecting random things and Miss Price wants to enchant a turnable object, he supplies a bedknob. From then on, he can make a certain large bed travel to any destination, which allows the party to hunt for the needed information.

Halloweentown (1998)

I hadn't heard of this when it was new, probably because it was showing only on the Disney Channel. Only now that I've seen it on a couple lists of favorites to stream this time of year did I take any interest, and still not much. Mainly, I wanted something short and readily available to kick off my October-appropriate reviews.

Every year, single mother Gwen (Judith Hoag) forbids her children from going out on Halloween night, but her mother, Agatha (Debbie Reynolds), pays a visit the kids welcome much more than Gwen does. What makes this year different is that Marnie (Kimberly J. Brown), 13, overhears an argument between the adults and learns that they are a family of natural-born witches, tho Gwen insists on raising them as mundanely as their late non-warlock father would. Furthermore, Agatha comes from a hidden town populated with all sorts of beings most humans don't welcome -- and its citizens have been turning suddenly hostile and vanishing to parts unknown. When Gwen refuses to help solve that case, Marnie sneaks aboard the magic bus that Agatha catches, along with Marnie's preteen brother, Dylan (Joey Zimmerman), and seven-year-old sister, Sophie (Emily Roeske).

Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956)

Looks like this is my first boxing movie viewing in two and a half years. Can't say I missed the subgenre, but this one has a little something extra to interest me: basis on the life of a real boxer I'd already heard of. Not that I could have told you anything else about him.

Rocco "Rocky" Barbello (Paul Newman) is a fairly violent Brooklyn thief. Fellow con Frankie (Robert Loggia) suggests that he box for money. Rocky does so only in desperation, adopting the last name "Graziano" to hide his criminal record. Once he realizes how far he can go without losing a match, he learns to love it. But his past threatens to catch up to him, particularly when Frankie tries bribery and then blackmail to get him to take a dive.

Imitation of Life (1934)

This is a bit lesser-known than its 1959 remake but almost as popular. At one time, it was widely preferred. I figured I ought to see both someday and might as well start with the first.

Delilah (Louise Beavers) goes to a wrong address to apply for a housekeeping job but persuades Bea (Claudette Colbert), broke widowed mother to toddler Jessie (Juanita Quigley, later Marilyn Knowlden and Rochelle Hudson), to let her work for room and board for herself and daughter Peola (Dorothy Black, later Fredi Washington). When Bea learns what uniquely excellent pancakes Delilah makes, she shows her own persuasiveness and opens a pancake restaurant, "Aunt Delilah's." After five years, fan Elmer (Ned Sparks) recommends selling the pancake mix; Bea hires him as an exec, and the brand takes off. She and Delilah have never been richer, yet money won't take care of their social difficulties.

The Judge (2014)

Perhaps the most notable thing about this flick is that it made Robert Duvall the oldest Oscar nominee yet, at 84. That record has since been broken. Of course, I was just as likely to have been drawn in by the lead actor, Robert Downey, Jr.

Hank (Downey) is an especially scuzzy lawyer, favoring guilty clients for profit, which may explain why he's getting a divorce and hasn't seen any of his birth family in ages. The latter changes when he attends his mother's funeral in her fictitious hometown of Carlinville, Indiana. He's eager to head back to Chicago -- until his father, Joseph (Duvall), a long-time judge, gets arrested for a fatal hit and run on an ex-con (Mark Kiely) Joseph might well have wanted to kill. Sensing how inadequate a local defense attorney (Dax Shepard) is, Hank reluctantly steps up to the plate, but Joseph, who can't remember hitting anyone, may prefer to be found guilty of second-degree murder if the alternative is to publicize his waning mental faculties. And the prosecutor (Billy Bob Thornton) is determined.

Paddington (2014)

I hadn't expected to see this, but people kept bringing up the title character in connection with Elizabeth II, because the filmmakers had them appear together in a short video to celebrate her Platinum Jubilee. While she is not in either of his feature films, this viewing seemed an oddly decent way to pay my last respects to her.

The sudden demise of his uncle (Michael Gambon) prompts his elderly aunt (Imelda Staunton) to send the iconic young bear (Ben Whishaw) from their Peruvian jungle to London, where she hopes he'll find succor from the anonymous explorer (Tim Downie) who befriended them 40 years ago. The first hospitable human he meets is one Mary Brown (Sally Hawkins, who would later take special interest in another nonhuman). Since his given name is hard for humans to pronounce, she dubs him after the train station where they meet. Her husband, Henry (Hugh Bonneville), is reluctant to house Paddington even for one night, citing stranger danger to their kids, but Mary can be persuasive. As they search for the explorer, the explorer's daughter Millicent (Nicole Kidman) searches for Paddington -- to make a museum exhibit of his corpse.

Predestination (2014)

No, it's not another flick with a religious focus already. It's an adaptation of the Robert Heinlein time travel short story "'--All You Zombies--'" (yes, that's how it's officially punctuated). I don't blame the studio for changing the title, partly because reaching feature length, specifically 97 minutes, required an extra plot element.

Despite being an Australian production, it's set in the U.S., primarily Cleveland and New York City, in various years between the 1940s and, I think, the '90s at latest. The secret Temporal Bureau has been attempting to prevent or reduce historical disasters, including attacks by the elusive time-traveling "Fizzle Bomber," who is set to kill 10,000 New Yorkers in '75. This alone is more than the Netflix summary will tell you, but don't get the impression that the plot is simple. It's just so full of twists that it's hard not to spoil.