Life's been rough lately. So time for some of my favorite escapism: movies.

162. (1816.) Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)
I actually enjoyed this sequel more than the original Ant-Man, though probably only because it hews a little closer to the silliness of the Silver Age comic books that inspired it.

163. (1817.) Holiday in Spain (1960)
This movie was originally called Scent of Mystery and was designed to be smelled as much as viewed. (In the original release, scented oil was pumped into the theater air to match what you were seeing on screen.) Like the worst 3D movies, the story is secondary to the gimmick and is probably worth viewing only as a novelty. ("See if you can guess what this scene is supposed to smell like!")

164. (1818.) This Land Is Mine (1943)
A poignant WWII tale made all the more pointed by its sympathetic portrayal of the fascists and those who would choose to support them. It does a great job of illustrating the corrupting evil of collaborationism with good intentions. I wish it wasn't relevant in today's world.

165. (1819.) The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years (1988)
A documentary (with some staged scenes) featuring the heavy metal bands in the Los Angeles music scene of the late 80s. It's like a real world version of This is Spinal Tap (a connection I'm sure was intended by the filmmakers). I loved it.

166. (1820.) Battle Circus (1953)
Humphrey Bogart is the chief surgeon falling for nurse June Allyson in a US Army MASH unit during the Korean War. Its strength isn't the romance but the many great scenes showcasing the difficulties facing the unit so near the front lines. If you like Altman's film or the television show, you should see this.

More to come.

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I have no idea how I managed to watch 16 movies in August. I feel like I spent all my time in front of my computer. But my database doesn't lie. Here are the first 8:

140. (887.) Point Blank (1967)
Say, I've seen this before! This is the movie that Payback was based on. Lee Marvin is always bad ass, but I still prefer Payback. It's my favorite Mel Gibson movie.

141. (888.) Miss Firecracker (1989)
This tale of disappointment in the last remnants of the Old South is part Tennessee Williams, part William Faulkner. It's billed as a comedy, but that's using the Shakespearean definition where "comedy" means a play in which not everyone dies in the end. It has its moments, but they were too few and far between.

142. (889.) Ant-Man (2015)
This was better than any movie remaking Iron Man has any right to be, but it's still not great. Hint to filmmakers: don't use fake science to explain your hero's powers if you're just going to contradict your own explanation at your movie's climax.

143. (890.) The Beginning or the End (1947)
The Amazing True Story of the Birth of the Atomic Bomb! Except that a lot of liberties have been taken with the story, including the addition of a character who dies from radiation poisoning after tinkering with the very same bomb that would go on to level Hiroshima.

144. (891.) One Way Passage (1932)
William Powell falls in love on his way to the gallows. Don't worry about his girlfriend, though. She has an incurable, fatal disease. Ah, romance movies.

145. (892.) The Racket (1951)
Robert Mitchum plays an honest cop hunting the head of a local criminal organization. It's good, but I kept expecting this movie to have a twist ending, like the Adventures of Superman episode "Crime Wave." (Turns out that episode came out 2 years after this movie. Coincidence?)

146. (893.) Ladies They Talk About (1933)
I think I have a crush on Barbara Stanwyck. Even playing the most lowly bitch &hdash; for 90% of this movie, she's truly a bad person who deserves her jail time — she's always tough, resourceful, and beautiful.

147. (894.) The Expendables 3 (2014)
When they say "a cast of thousands," they don't usually mean that's the sum of the ages of the lead actors. I didn't hate it, but Payback is still my favorite Mel Gibson film.

More to come.

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In the original Marvel Comics' Tales to Astonish stories featuring Ant-Man, bio-chemist Henry "Hank" Pym discovers a way to shrink himself to the size of an ant. In an attempt to keep real ants from killing him, Pym next invents a helmet that allows him to communicate telepathically with ants. What does he do with these two amazing bits of technology? He becomes a superhero, of course! Pym knows that shrinking to the size of an insect is a technology "far too dangerous to ever be used by a human again," so he keeps it to himself and immediately launches a crusade against Soviet spies.

I'd never really realized it before, but most of the signature characters of the Marvel Age were all grounded in the Cold War struggle against the U.S.S.R. The Fantastic Four had to beat the Soviets into space. A Soviet spy triggered the bomb test that birthed the Hulk. Iron Man was a casualty of the escalating "limited conflict" in southeast Asia that would become the Vietnam War. Spider-Man and Thor are notable exceptions: their careers triggered respectively by an accidental spider-bite and an alien invasion -- another common Marvel adventure even to this day. (In hindsight, it's probably not much of a coincidence that I lost interest in Marvel Comics about the time the Soviet Union collapsed.) For Pym, the battle against the Reds was personal: they killed his wife, an Hungarian freedom fighter. Sure, she'd given up fighting for freedom when well-to-do American biochemist Hank Pym came along, but she was really serious about it in college.

However, don't expect to see any of this lunacy in the long-rumored Ant-Man movie. If the thing is even made, they'll no doubt ignore the fact that Pym changes his superhero moniker from Ant-Man to Giant-Man mid-conversation if he changes his size. (Freud would have a field day with that.) Or the fact that he grafted biological wings and antenna into his female partner, the Wasp, but neglected to give her the ability to change her size without the aid of his size-changing gas or pills. (Pym kept for himself the cybernetic helmet that allowed him to change size at will. Dick.) Not to mention the fact that when Pym is ant-sized, he inexplicably maintains his full-size strength while growing stronger when he gets larger-than-life size. Or that his rogues' gallery consists primarily of such forgettable nutcases as Egghead, Human Top, Magician, Porcupine, or the scientist Garrett, who mixes eagle blood with horse blood to create a flying horse in order to exact revenge on Giant-Man. (They market these books to children and they wonder why Americans lag behind in science.)

No, they'll put Ant-Man in a black costume and pit him against the evil robot Ultron. Because mark my words, nothing ruins a computer like a bug. (Don't blame the messenger: it's just how Hollywood thinks.)

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