Exploring Food and Movies

Wednesday: The Oxford Murders (2008)                Martin is a grad student who comes to Oxford University in hopes of working with the famed Professor Seldom. He is staying with a friend of Seldom's. Her daughter lives in the house as well. Not long after Martin moves in she is killed and her body is discovered by Martin and Seldom. It is the first of several murders each with a coded message. Martin and Seldom have to work together to find the killer. I thought this movie was alright. It was trying too hard to be intelligent.  Friday: The Amateur (2025)          A CIA decoder, Charlie, is onto something big. Then his wife, while on a business trip in London, gets taken hostage and killed in a terrorist attack. His supervisors are not acting fast enough. They don't seem motivated at all to arrest the people behind the attack. Charlie forces them to get him training so he can hunt down the killers on his own. They ag...

 Saturday: Jurassic World: Rebirth (2025)       Zora is a covert operative. She gets hired by a man, Martin, who works for a pharmaceutical company that wants to use dinosaur DNA to develop groundbreaking medicine. He needs Zora to help put together a team to go to an abandoned research facility on an island. There they will get the DNA they need from the dinosaurs that live there. Along with people she's worked with before they also hire a scientist, Dr. Loomis. They head off to the island. Little do they know what really happened on that island. I thought this movie was alright. The writing wasn't very good. Also the acting wasn't the best. Sunday: The Double Life of Veronique (1991)         This is a French and Polish film. Veronique is a French aspiring singer. While in town one day she sees a young woman getting on a bus who looks exactly like here. She feels a connection between them. Veronique lands an audition at a well known theater....

 Friday: Materialists (2025)        Lucy is a matchmaker. She has become very successful. At a wedding of one of her clients she meets the brother of the groom, Harry. Harry is very wealthy and charming. Despite not wanting a relationship she falls for him. At the same wedding she runs into her ex, John. He is a cater waiter at the wedding. They meet up after to catch up. Despite her delight in seeing him she ends up spending most of the night with Harry. Lucy and Harry start seeing each other. He is everything she thought she wanted. Soon Lucy starts to reevaluate her life. I thought this movie was ok. It's kinda slow. Not a romantic comedy like the trailer makes it seem. Barely a romance. More of a commentary on dating. I don't like the lead actress. She has kinda dead eyes. She doesn't really seem to commit to anything so you can't believe anything she does. It's like she doesn't put in any effort. I don't know. Something is just off about her. My main in...

 Friday: Karate Kid: Legends (2025)        Li moves to New York City with his mom from China. They are starting a new life after a tragedy. Li trained to fight kung fu with Mr. Han in China. He promised to give it up in NYC. He meets Mia, who's family owns a pizza place. Soon they become close. Mia's dad, Victor, used to be a boxer. Victor is in debt and thinks if he can win a fight he can use the money to pay off his debt. After seeing Li fight he asks Li to train him. Li agrees. He gets sucked back into the fighting world and enters a karate competition. He needs help. Mr. Han shows up and enlists the help of Daniel LaRusso. Together they help Li get ready for the competition. I thought this movie was alright. A little predictable but still enjoyable.  Saturday: Your Name. (2016)        Mitsuha wakes up feeling weird in her own body. All day people tell her how strange she was acting the day before. She has no memory of it. Just strang...

 Friday: The Penguin Lessons (2024)       This movie is inspired by true events. Tom is an Englishman who gets a job at a school in Argentina in 1976. Argentina is divided between two political parties fighting to be on top. Tom no longer has passion for teaching. He's just there to make money. The school is shut down for a week due to a coup. So he goes on vacation to Uruguay. There he ends up rescuing a penguin from an oil spill. Despite his best efforts he can't find anywhere to leave the penguin so he ends up taking it back with him. Others discover Tom has a penguin and the penguin is named Juan Salvador. One day after continuing to struggle to keep his class under control Tom brings Juan Salvador to class. His students promise to behave if they can feed Juan Salvador. Slowly their schoolwork starts to improve. Tom finds his passion again. The fighting political parties continue to make life difficult. I thought this movie was good. Sunday: Uptown Saturday Night...

 Saturday: Lilo and Stitch (2025)       The story is pretty much the same as the animated version. There are some new characters like a neighbor and a social worker. Nani has dreams of going to college to study marine biology. I thought the movie was good for the most part. The actress they got to play Lilo is perfect. She is super cute and chaotic. Stitch was also well done. The original voice actor for Stitch came back to voice him for this movie. I wasn't sure at first about the actress playing Nani, but she did a good job. Speaking of Nani, the actress who played the social worker is the original voice of Nani from the animated version. Pleakley and Jumba were alright. Pleakley wasn't in drag like in the animated which was a little disappointing. But he did wear some feminine clothes so at least there's that. Still prefer the animated version. Sunday: Men of Boys Town (1941)         Father Flanagan ambitiously builds several new buildings in B...

 Saturday: Weathering with You (2019)       Hodaka is a young teenage boy who runs away from home to Tokyo. Tokyo is experiencing extremely heavy rain for months on end. Hodaka struggles to get by because no one will hire a teenager with no ID. Eventually he finds work with a man he met on the ferry to Tokyo, Suga. Suga has a magazine that prints articles about local legends, alien sightings, and things like that. Hodaka learns about sunshine girls. Girls who have the ability to control the weather and bring out the sun. He realizes he has already met one, Hina. An orphan living alone with her little brother. Due to the current weather her ability is in high demand. They start a business where people can hire her to bring out the sun. For sports games, farmer's markets, weddings, and so on. It goes well for a while. There is more to her power than they now. I thought this movie was good. It's by the same guy who did Suzume . ------------------------------------------...