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Josh Matthews

Movie Reviews

La Haine

La Haine 1995 ★★★ Rewatched Nov 20, 2020 joshmatthews’s review published on Letterboxd: Two points of view for this movie. One POV is the cinematography, watching just for that. An astounding work, so many great shots, plus editing. Probably because this is black-and-white, which makes everything better, generally, it's higher…
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December 22, 2020
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Eyes Without a Face

Eyes Without a Face 1960 ★½ Watched Nov 21, 2020 joshmatthews’s review published on Letterboxd: Possibly the most overrated "underrated" movie ever, "Eyes Without a Face" is one single premise with little development of it, stretched (pun!) over 90 minutes. Think about "The Twilight Zone." What that show coudl do…
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December 22, 2020
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Heaven’s Gate

Heaven’s Gate 1980 ★★½ Watched Nov 23, 2020 joshmatthews’s review published on Letterboxd: The goal for all viewers of a film, I think, is to find the right ways to watch it. Of course, not all movies are linear, obvious, beautiful, or clear. Probably the promise of Heaven's Gate, that…
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December 22, 2020
Comedy

Hail the Conquering Hero

Hail the Conquering Hero 1944 ★★★★½ Watched Nov 28, 2020 joshmatthews’s review published on Letterboxd: This wartime Preston Struges comedy, which outright names some of the most brutal battle of the WW2 theater, including Bataan and Guadalcanal, seems to mock fog-of-war political machinations as much as it encourages viewers to…
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December 22, 2020
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Sullivan’s Travels

Sullivan’s Travels 1941 ★★★★★ Rewatched Nov 30, 2020 joshmatthews’s review published on Letterboxd: Just when I was going to accuse the movie of saccharine sentimentalism, it whammed me (again) with the third act, which introduces a real plot problem, that director John L Sullivan also gets whammed, left for dead,…
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December 21, 2020
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Chinatown

Chinatown 1974 ★★★½ Rewatched Dec 03, 2020 joshmatthews’s review published on Letterboxd: Tough to review an "American classic" because of expectations. First, I tried but could not shake all the LA Noir I've read. Easy starters there: Raymond Chandler and Ross MacDonald. The latter is a master, too much so, and…
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December 21, 2020
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Five Easy Pieces

Five Easy Pieces 1970 ★★★★½ Watched Dec 06, 2020 joshmatthews’s review published on Letterboxd: American drifter movies, by 1970, were a dime a dozen, as they had been in literature forever. Somehow "Five Easy Pieces" stands out, probably because it is an epic as much as lyric. The textures are…
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December 21, 2020
War

Paths of Glory

Paths of Glory 1957 ★★★★★ Rewatched Dec 07, 2020 joshmatthews’s review published on Letterboxd: The Bluray makes this movie looks like it could've been made at late as the 1980s, that combined of course with the camerawork and cinematography. Hard to come up with another movie that looks like it…
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December 21, 2020
Best Movies

Blow-Up — Michaelangelo Antonioni

Blow-Up 1966 ★★★★★ It begins with the photographer, a cocky male Brit, sitting atop his subject, aping copulation with her. His domineering sneer, holy attitude, and apparent power snakecharms all of the ladies who he "shoots" and who want to be "shot" by him. More on "shoot"…
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December 19, 2020
Comedy

Mon Oncle — Jacques Tati’s 3rd Feature Film

Mon Oncle 1958 ★★★★½ "Mon Oncle" displays Tati coming into his own, with content galore, wrapped up in the spirit of playfulness that exudes his entire body of work. I recall Truffaut dissing this movie as simply pitting Old Paris vs. Modernistic Paris. It does. The two halves…
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December 19, 2020