Happy November! Whew!! October has been quite a doozy thanks to Twin Cities Film Fest. I watched a total of 19 movies during the 10-day festival, could’ve been more if I hadn’t been swamped with work last week.
I watched 11 of them in the theaters and the rest online through TCFF STREAMS, which really helps as I live about 40 minutes away from the designated movie theater.
Here are a few pics from the festivities:
TCFF Spotlight Event: A Conversation with Terrence Howard
Anyhoo, here’s what I watched last month:
NEW MOVIES
(films indicated with * are directed by women)
Asteroid City – my review
Love Again
Fair Play*- my review
9 To 5
The Persian Version*
REWATCH
Mannequin (1987)
What a blast from the past. I remember really loving this movie when I first saw it years ago, so when I heard it mentioned in an MPR segment I just had to rewatch it. It’s such a silly movie and it hasn’t aged well, but Andrew McCarthy & Kim Cattrall have such a sweet & playful chemistry.
TCFF 2023 Movies
- A Binding Truth* – my review
- Greener Pastures – my review
- A Winter Love*
- The Holdovers
- Mom and Dad’s Nipple Factory – my review
- Black Barbie* – my review
- All Dirt Road Taste of Salt*
- All Of Us Strangers
- Still Working 9 to 5* (doc) – my review
- Stories Behind the Menu* (doc)
- The Taste of Things
- Foe
- A View of the World From Fifth Avenue*
- Loren & Rose*
- King Coal
- Abroad – my review
- American Fiction
- Downtown Owl*
- The Nana Project*
TV SERIES
I watched the first four episodes of AppleTV’s Monarch: Legacy of Monsters out of the 5 that were given. I’m enjoying it so far, though creature features would likely complain there aren’t enough monsters in screeners. To balance things out, my hubby and I started watching The AfterParty (also on AppleTV) and were immediately hooked after the first episode! After the fun we had with season 3 of Only Murders in the Building, we’re craving another comedic murder mystery and it fits the bill. Glad S2 of The AfterParty already came out!
I’m thrilled to say that I’ve already completed the 52 Films By Women challenge!! Woo hoo!! I prioritized seeing movies #directedbywomen at TCFF so I saw a total of 11 female-directed movies in October, which brings the total 2023 tally so far to 56!
Per Women In Film (WIF) organization, the basic rules are simple: watch 52 films directed by women within the course of one year and share what you watched on social media, using the hashtag #52FilmsByWomen to spread the word, and get more people talking about the women filmmakers that don’t always get attention.
OCTOBER 2023 MOVIE OF THE MONTH
American Fiction was the second to last film I saw at TCFF and it’s hands down the best film of the festival, as well as the entire month of October!! I can’t wait for everyone to see this feature film debut by Cord Jefferson. The film deservedly won TCFF’s Best Feature Film prize, and I’m really hoping it gained enough traction to make it to the Oscar’s Best Picture list. I’ve said this before and will say it again… I could practically start an Oscar campaign for Jeffrey Wright in the Best Actor category!
So what did you see in October and which one(s) are your favorites?
…
FLIXCHATTER FILM BLOG 
My favorite film last month is definitely…. Infinity Pool. Goddamn that film was fucked up. Mia Goth… she really needs to dump that overrated loser Shia LaBeouf and be with me. I’ll be her bitch! She is so fucking awesome in that film.
Congrats as passing the 52 Films by Women pledge as I’m now at 58 films with more to come as I’ve bought tickets to 2 films coming this weekend and next weekend as they’re both directed by women with one of them being the best filmmaker of them all… Sofia Coppola 🙂
I don’t think Infinity Pool is for me though I’ve heard good things about Mia Goth’s performance. Ahah well Goth has a kid w/LaBeouf didn’t she? I’d say she could be the making of him as he’s working through his issues.
Yeah I’m glad I already completed 52 Films by Women 2 months ahead of schedule! I just saw one this weekend, so that brings my total films directed by women to 57 so far!
I’m at 59 films so far as I will reach the 60s next weekend with The Marvels.
Wow, you are on a roll!! Good for you!
I can’t believe there’s only 2 months left in 2023! I only saw three new movies last month. Killers of the Flower Moon (I’ll try to get you my review sometime this weekend). Then I watched No Mercy, an 80s action film that eluded me. I remember seeing on the video shelves back in the days but I never rented it because it starred Richard Gere and he’s not known for being for action. It turned out pretty good, better than I thought it’s going to be. Then I finally watched my 4K disc of Assassin Creed, bought it years ago but totally forgot about it. Even though it’s a box office bomb when it came out in 2016, it wasn’t that bad for a film based on a video game. Fassbender was good as an action hero, too bad it failed and sequels never happened.
I’m looking forward to watching Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, been in the mood for monster action lately. Lol!
Hey Ted! I’ll post your review of Killers of the Flower Moon as soon as you send it to me, curious what you think of that one.
I haven’t heard of No Mercy before, but yeah, it’s rare to see Gere in an action flick. I still haven’t seen Assassin Creed even though my bro was a fan of the game and the movie looked pretty faithful to it. I miss seeing Fassbender on screen, I’m gonna see Next Goal Win later next week and I’ll watch The Killer once it’s out on VOD!
P.S. Stay tuned for my mini-review of Monarch sometime next week.
No Mercy was more of a noir 40s film combined with 80s car chases and shootouts. Apparently, that’s why Gere decided to do it, he wanted something different than the typical action film of that era. I think the only other action film he did was the remake of The Jackal alongside Bruce Willis.
I think that was the last time Fassbender appeared in a movie, he took a long break after the failure of Assassin Creed. He’s one of the producers of the film too, so it must’ve hit him hard that the film failed so bad. I’m looking forward to watching The Killer this Friday on Netflix. I don’t know if it will be available on VOD, though. Netflix rarely license out their films to other services.