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The Witches (2020) Witches Get Stitches

Released: 10th December
Seen: 20th December

In 1983, Roald Dahl released his 14th novel The Witches and his story of a boy and his grandma going up against a coven of witches has always been somewhat polarizing. On the one hand, it’s a best selling novel that recently appeared on the BBC’s list of Top 100 most influential novels and on the other it’s been accused of being a misogynistic text ever since it released (and considering that the main villain is, essentially, every woman who isn’t a kindly old grandma and it was written by Roald Dahl… yeah, yeah that’s definitely there).

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The Trial Of The Chicago 7 (2020) – Order In The Court!

Released: 16th October
Seen: 13th December

The Trial of the Chicago 7 Info

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Say, for the sake of argument, that you’re part of a group of protestors who disagrees with actions that’re taken by the president and decide the best way to do it is to get a large group of people to march and demand that someone listen to their grievances. Now, while this is a right of the people it is often denied by those in charge who would instead choose to ignore them… or, as a random example, send a large amount of police to instigate a riot, throw tear gas at peaceful protestors and beat innocent bystanders with clubs and shields only to then turn around and blame the very protestors who have been attacked.

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The Prom (2020) – Hope You Had The Time Of Your Life

Released: 11th December
Seen: 11th December

The story of Constance McMillen’s 2010 prom is truly something. Constance had plans on going to the prom with her girlfriend while wearing a tux, something that’s completely harmless in every possible way… unfortunately, her school board consisted of massive pieces of excrement and they decided to ban her from the prom. Like any good member of the LGBT community that knows their history, she fought this ban on the grounds that it was stupid and bigoted so the school board did what anyone with no brain would do. They cancelled the prom. 

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Happiest Season (2020) – Merry and Gay

Released: 26th November
Seen: 11th December

Happiest Season Info

At the time I write this, I will have seen a little over 150 films so far this year. Considering that 2020 has been a roaring dumpster fire for cinema with every film seemingly moved to some point in the future, that’s not a bad total. Here’s a bad total though, out of those 150+ films you wanna take a guess how many of them featured an LGBT person as one of the named main characters? 15. 15! 15!! That’s one in every ten films that feature a character that openly identifies as either L, G, B or T. 

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The App That Stole Christmas (2020) – B@h, Humbug

Released: 20th November
Seen: 7th December

Sometimes a bad film is hard to write about because its badness is hard to explain. It’s hard to express in text form why the tone of a piece doesn’t work or how a performance doesn’t quite land. A bad film can also be so spectacularly bad that you wonder if you can just make a review of it “Everything about this film is wrong” and leave it at that… but that’s no fun. Strap yourselves in, I found something spectacular.

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Hillbilly Elegy (2020) – Ya’ll Don’t Come Back Now, Ya Hear?

Released: 24th November
Seen: 7th December

Hillbilly Elegy Info

At the time that I write this, the actress with the most Oscar nominations without a win is Glenn Close with seven nominations to her name. Seven times Glenn’s had the chance to be handed that little gold statue that is a symbol of Hollywood’s respect and seven times she’s been denied what she probably should’ve gotten back in the 80s. Following her at six nominations is Amy Adams, another person who probably should’ve gotten the gold at some point by now.

It’s clear that the two of them are due to get that recognition and for a while people have been speculating that Glenn might try to land one with her upcoming screen adaptation of the Sunset Boulevard musical and that Amy was pretty much inevitably going to get one at some point… I guess I just hoped they wouldn’t resort to obvious Oscar bait in order to cross that finish line.

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The War With Grandpa (2020) – War Is Hell!

Released: 12th November
Seen: 7th December

The War With Grandpa Info

At some point in every prestige actor’s career, you will hear them utter the following phrase… “I did this one for my grandkids”. It’s a phrase that’s almost always followed by a movie that won’t be remembered for long but it’s forgivable because it’s for kids and clearly the actor in question would like something to share with their young relatives. Robert De Niro’s done enough films like The War With Grandpa, he can stop doing them any damn time that he wants!

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Shirley (2020) – The House On Biopic Hill

Released: 9th July
Seen: 4th December

Shirley Jackson is perhaps best known as the author of the book The Haunting of Hill House, a book that’s been adapted multiple times into films (both a beloved 1963 version and a reviled 1999 version) and into the recent hit Netflix series. She has been named as an influence on authors like Stephen King and Neil Gaiman among a slew of others. Her work has stood the test of time and now at last we have a biopic about her. The biopic happens to be a genre I’m not exactly fond of because usually they are all very similar… which is why an exception like Shirley is much appreciated.

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