I spent too many hours watching old Veronica Mars episodes in October, and as a result, I watched only 8 new-to-me movies. Here's the first four.

165. (912.) Jewel Robbery (1932)
It seems William Powell always played a debauched lawyer or detective, or a debonair con man or thief. As you can probably tell by the title, in this romantic comedy, he's the latter. Light on plot, this film was the date movie of its day.

166. (913.) Rendevous (1935)
Here William Powell plays a reluctant spy (who's a kind of con man) during The Great War. I spent the entire film thinking that Rosalind Russell's scheming society girl should have been played by Myrna Loy. That might have provided the extra spark this rather dull thriller needed.

167. (914.) Man of Steel (2013)
No, I didn't watch all of this movie. I just couldn't take it. It was worse than I thought it would be. The Kryptonese are assholes. Pa Kent is an asshole. The other kids in Clark's school are assholes. The kids who bully the kids who bully Clark Kent are assholes. Their parents are assholes.... All the conflict in the entire movie comes from people being assholes to one another. The filmmakers seem to have thought that in order to make Superman "good," every other character in the entire movie has to be an asshole. That's such a fundamental understanding of what makes the character of Superman great that it killed any desire I had of seeing how the actual plot was resolved. I hope Superman flew away and went to some Universe that wasn't populated with just assholes.

168. (915.) The Cincinnati Kid (1965)
Steve McQueen plays Paul Newman in The Hustler! Whoo-hoo! I didn't love this film, but I didn't find it nearly as terrible as The Hustler. That's probably largely thanks to McQueen, whose typically mute style (see also: Clint Eastwood and Harrison Ford) allowed his card sharp to be a far more sympathetic character than Paul Newman's pool shark.

More to come.

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To be continued...

 

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