leebutler Drama, Musical, Review

The Color Purple (2024) – Hell Yes

Released: 25th January
Seen: 1st February

In 1982, Alice Walker released her Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Color Purple which received rave reviews and massive sales. That book caught the eye of one Steven Spielberg who turned it into the beloved 1985 film that’s not only gone on to be a beloved cinematic classic but essentially jumpstarted the careers of Whoopi Goldberg and Oprah Winfrey, so it’s hard to deny its importance as a piece of cinema. Twenty years after the film was released, somebody got the bright idea to turn this dramatic tale into a musical where it would initially get poor reviews but, upon being revived in 2015, got the recognition it deserved as a truly great work. Now it can have that recognition forever since we have The Color Purple musical on film and it’s truly something worth singing some praises about.

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leebutler Biography, Biopic, Drama, History, Music, Review, Romance

Maestro (2023) – Play Me Off

Released: 20th December 2023
Seen: 15th January 2024

With the Oscar nominations being announced just a few days ago, the time has come to tackle the annual tradition of playing catch-up on every nominated film that I somehow managed to miss throughout the year. Sometimes a film just isn’t released down here before the nominations (That’s happening with over a dozen films that I could see), sometimes a film is released but falls past the radar of must-see (how the hell was I meant to know that The Creator would be an Oscar nominee) and sometimes a film just seems like it’s going to be something I’m going to hate trying to review and because this is an unpaid hobby I avoid it until absolutely required… my dislike of biopics put Maestro firmly in that category and while I can admit it’s great, it’s still not my cup of tea.

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leebutler Comedy, Drama, Review, Romance, Sci-Fi

Poor Things (2024) – RICH!

Released: 18th January
Seen: 23rd January

Yorgos Lanthimos is one of those directors who you can guarantee will deliver a film that’s so different from everything else in the cinema that it’s hard to describe it as anything other than “A Yorgos Lanthimos Film”. Even when he does something close to a regular period piece like in his last film The Favourite there is something just beneath the surface that creates a strange experience. He’s one of those filmmakers that we’re lucky to have because he keeps things interesting and allows the audiences who see his work to experience something truly unique. Once again, with his latest film Poor Things, Yorgos has delivered something truly fascinating to behold.

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leebutler Comedy, Drama, Review

The Holdovers (2024) – Hold On

Released: 11th January
Seen: 17th January

Making an original Christmas film is an art that seems to be lost. Sure every year there’s the requisite retellings of A Christmas Carol that everyone tries to tell but an actual enjoyable film that captures a Christmas spirit is hard to come by. The last truly great one that I can think of might be Violent Night, which falls into that category of “What if we took something wholesome and made it say fuck while it bled out”, it’s just not easy to pull off but when you can make something that captures a very specific element of the Christmas season you get something kind of special, and The Holdovers definitely captures something kind of special.

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leebutler Action, Comedy, Crime, Drama, Netflix, Review, Thriller

Lift (2024) – Drop It

Released: 12th January
Seen: 15th January

Lift Info

It’s become something of a joke lately that Netflix keeps producing so many films that they can’t even properly advertise them all, but it’s also probably for the best that they don’t because a lot of them are strangely forgettable garbage that’s just kind of created so that Netflix has a library of films that will never be taken away from them. What’s weird about this is that Netflix spends an absolutely jaw-dropping amount on films that, at best, will spend an eternity sitting in their digital library where they aren’t really designed to turn a profit. These are blockbusters that are made without the intention of getting blockbuster profits, a strange phenomenon that would maybe be OK if it led to fun enjoyable films… but it doesn’t, it leads to content like Lift. 

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leebutler Drama, Review

Society Of The Snow (2024) – We Live In A Snowciety

Released: 4th January
Seen: 7th January

In 1972 the Old Christians Club rugby union team boarded a plane in Uruguay, along with several family members and supporters, with the intent of getting to Chile to compete against an English rugby team. Part of this flight required a trip over the Andes mountain ranges, a trip that in normal conditions would be perfectly doable but the weather was bad enough to make it impossible to see. The details of how the crash happened are far too complicated to put in the opening paragraph of a film review but the core point is that the plane crashed in the snow-covered mountains, the 45 passengers and crew on board were effectively lost in the snow and debris. 

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leebutler Comedy, Drama, Review, Romance

Good Grief (2024) – Grief, It’s Good

Released: 5th January
Seen: 7th January

Telling gay stories in film is kind of a landmine sometimes. It seems more often than not those stories deal with immense tragedy, loss of family or just having one of the leads getting a specific fatal illness and dying for a dramatic conclusion. It’s rare to see a film about gay joy or even just gay resilience, it feels like more and more films are just kind of depressing in tone and it’s kind of sad… so it takes someone pretty damn talented to take a film about a gay man dying and turn it into a charming, funny and also emotional tale that feels somewhat hopeful by the end. Fortunately, Dan Levy is just that damn talented and has brought us Good Grief, something so charming and sincere that it’s just so soothing to watch.

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leebutler Action, Adventure, Drama, Fantasy, Review, Sci-Fi

Rebel Moon: Part One – A Child Of Fire

Released: 22nd December
Seen: 25th December

Here’s the hottest of my hot takes regarding recent trends in cinema. Zack Snyder has changed from being an interesting director who took chances into possibly one of the most boring directors out there. What makes him boring, at least to me, is that he seems to think every film he touches has to be some edgy, dark, gritty adult tale no matter what the context. This works when he does films about Zombies, something where being dark and gritty actually can work, however, when he tried this with goddamn Superman it started the ball rolling on the utter destruction of the DC cinematic universe. Now he’s turned this dark gritty edgy lens to another beloved property that’s primarily aimed at children, Star Wars… and god damn it, Rebel Moon just kind of sucks.

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leebutler Comedy, Drama, Review, Thriller

Saltburn (2023) – Brilliance On The Dance Floor

Released: 16th November
Seen: 24th November

In 2021, Emerald Fennell released Promising Young Woman, which quickly became one of my favourite films that I’ve ever been able to review. The year it came out I proclaimed it the second best film of the year, had the fourth best performance of the year and was adamant that the film should win every single Oscar it was nominated for. I was an evangelist for the film and when talking about it on the Best List I said, quote “if Emerald Fenell walks into your office and asks to make a movie, you hand that woman a blank cheque and let her go wild”… It’s clear that someone was listening to this request, because if Saltburn isn’t what happens when Emerald Fennell goes wild, I don’t know what is.

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leebutler Biography, Drama, History, Netflix, Review

Rustin (2023) – Historic

Released: 16th November
Seen: 23rd November

Bayard Rustin was born in 1912 and lived one of the most fascinating lives that you will ever skim through on Wikipedia. Raised as a Quaker, the man was openly gay back when that was a much more dangerous thing to be than it is now (and oh boy is it still dangerous now), he recorded several albums of gospel music, was at the forefront of many civil rights movements and even ended up adopting his lover in the 80s because they were unable to get married so had to do the most creative workaround ever to ensure they had their rights. The man is genuinely fascinating, someone who should probably have an entire docuseries made about his life but if you were to pick one event from his remarkable life to make a movie about it seems fitting that his work in organising the legendary march on Washington would be the focal point for the biopic Rustin.

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