Deaf runaway Susan Strasberg arrives in San Francisco searching for her long-lost brother Bruce Dern and is taken in by a trio of hippie musicians, including Jack Nicholson. They help her search for her brother while also teaching her how to be less square. I have no idea how accurate it actually is to the era, but it is filled with free love, mind-altering drugs, and lots of groovy tunes.
This is my third King Kong film and thus far my least favorite. Set during the 1970s, it offers a Heart of Darkness theme with members of a secret government organization joined by Vietnam War soldiers and a war photographer to hunt down Kong. It lays heavily on the era setting with a constant jukebox of songs. Kong isn’t even the main antagonist on the island. Instead skull crawlers that remind me of the monkey creatures in Temple Run are the real enemy. The group never actually leaves the island with Kong and Brie Larson, as the main female character, isn’t Kong’s love interest but also doesn’t have much else to do than take pictures she supposedly isn’t going to share with anyone. In fact there are so many extra characters that there were some I didn’t even notice were part of the expedition until halfway through the movie. What the film does have going for it is that’s very beautiful. Kong is impressive from every angle, but even those visuals are more about style than substance.
Oscar Nominee: Best Achievement in Visual Effects
In this spiritual sequel to Village of the Damned, six children from around the world are discovered to have superior intelligence and special powers. When they are all brought to London for a collective study, it is determined that the world is not ready for the advancements they exhibit. This film is a bit longer and focuses more on the children’s experiences. The general atmosphere of the two films are similar, but overall they come across incredibly different in message and I sincerely can’t say which one I prefer more. 
Psychiatrist Rosalind Russell repeatedly has run ins with cartoonist Lee Bowman. She instantly dislikes him and he continually harasses her until, with her father’s help, he tricks her into marrying him. That sounds awful even as I type it. Russell is great as a self-assured doctor, especially in her work with shell shocked soldiers. There’s nothing else to recommend though.
Womanizing car salesman Robin Williams is given two days to sell twelve cars in order to keep his job. Williams juggling at least three love interests and many other assorted pressures, this film is really all over the place and the characters are constantly yelling at each other. It goes further off the rails in the over extended second act when manic Tim Robbins holds up the car dealership because of his own wife’s infidelity. The whole thing is flimsily held together by Williams’s performance, one that would be much better suited in a different film, but only barely.
Two months after the inhabitants of an English village experienced a shared loss of consciousness, all females of child bearing age discover they are pregnant. The pregnancies proceed relatively smoothly, but every child born has similar features and share a supernatural bond. There’s a great eerie atmosphere in this classic film. Children are a great antagonist in such a film. Thought to be innocent, their strange blonde hair and creepy glowy eyes tell a different story.
In rural 1860s England, Florence Pugh finds herself in a loveless marriage to a controlling older man. When he leaves their estate on an extended business trip, she relishes her newfound freedom and begins an affair with a servant. Once she has relinquished the constraints foisted upon her, she stops at nothing to prevent them from returning. Beautifully filmed, the strength of the work totally lies in Pugh’s powerful performance.
The Tuskegee Airmen were a group of predominantly Black American fighters during World War II. This ostensibly tells their story. Filled with an incredible cast, there’s nothing by way of character development, no sense of a life for any of them beyond fighting in the war. Hotshot pilot David Oyelowo is given a romance with an Italian woman, but it feels really out of place since none of the other men even mention romantic partners and there is a lot of time spent on this sole storyline. There’s some racial strife, but it’s quickly brushed over. The entire film is gorgeous, shown through an over-saturated color filter. The fighting scenes really look like cut-scenes to a video game with even the dialogue during those scenes sounding like it comes from a fighting simulator. I unfortunately don’t remember much of my viewing of The Tuskegee Airmen but this makes me want to watch it again hoping it offers something more. 
When the presumed dead Fred MacMurray returns home after being missing for a year, he is surprised to discover his best friend and business partner Melvyn Douglas and his wife Jean Arthur have married each other in his absence. Someone accidentally finding themselves with two spouses is hardly a unique story at this point and there are some weirdly questionable points in this particular iteration. It is delightful to see Jean reap the benefits of the situation as both of her husbands have neglected her for either adventure or work during her history with them. It’s unfortunate that everyone, including her own father, are pushy and insistent that she has to make a life-determining decision as soon as possible. 
Oscar Nomination: Best Sound, Recording
During the Depression, car designer Herbert Marshall is taking a much needed break from work when he meets unemployed Jean Arthur in a park. She automatically assumes he is also out of work and he gamely agrees to pose as a couple to acquire jobs in the household of gangster Leo Carrillo. After a recent Downton Abbey marathon, it was fun watching Marshall learn how to be a good butler from his own servant. Otherwise there’s not much that makes this essential viewing, but Jean Arthur is genuinely appealing here, as in almost all of her roles.