Tough Guys Don’t Dance (1987)

IMDb plot summary: Writer, ex-con and 40-something bottle-baby Tim Madden, who is prone to black-outs, awakens from a two-week bender to discover a pool of blood in his car.

Directed by Norman Mailer. Stars Ryan O'Neal, Isabella Rossellini, and Debra Stipe.

Tough Guys Don’t Dance stars Ryan O'Neal as someone who life begins to spiral after his wife leaves him, up to and including a murder investigation. The one thing I knew about this movie before watching it was the viral clip of Ryan O'Neal getting bad news and saying "oh god, oh man" over and over again in a hilarious show of bad dialogue and bad acting. Turns out it's just the perfect example of what the entire movie is like, although that is the most amusing piece. Mostly it's just a meandering melodrama with a thoroughly uninteresting protagonist. It's so pretentious but at the same so silly, and none of it works well together. It takes itself so seriously that at first maybe I thought it was a spoof, playing it deadpan, but, nope. It's just bad. Occasionally enjoyably so, but bad.

How it entered my Flickchart:

🎥 Tough Guys Don't Dance (1987)

📊 Ranked #3772/4153 on my Flickchart

🎯 Flickscore™: 9

lost to Fahrenheit 451 (held at #2075)

lost to The Disappearance of Alice Creed (held at #3113)

lost to The Right Stuff (held at #3632)

beat Gidget (#3891 → #3892)

lost to Medium Cool (held at #3761)

beat Bee Season (#3826 → #3827)

beat Shrek the Third (#3793 → #3794)

beat The Christmas That Almost Wasn't (#3777 → #3778)

lost to Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (held at #3769)

beat Oklahoma! (#3773 → #3774)

lost to Monkey Business (held at #3771)

beat How to Lose Friends & Alienate People (#3772 → #3773)

Carry-On (2024)

IMDb plot summary: A mysterious traveler blackmails a young TSA agent into letting a dangerous package slip through security and onto a Christmas Eve flight.

Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra. Stars Taron Egerton, Jason Bateman, and Sofia Carson.

Carry-On is a thriller starring Taron Egerton as a TSA officer and Jason Bateman as the terrorist who is forcing him to allow a dangerous item through the checkpoint, or terrible things will happen. This is a fun premise for a movie -- the problem is, it goes on too long. I'm firmly of the belief that the best one-location thrillers come in around 90 minutes, as it's very hard to carry that energy beyond that. This one stretches to two hours, and the final 40 minutes feel tedious. The first two thirds are a good ride, though, and Jason Bateman is a lot of fun as the heartless terrorist. That deadpan delivery of his turns out to be kind of terrifying when it's being applied to widespread destruction. If this is a genre that you're already drawn to, you might not feel the length, but if not, this isn't the one that is going to draw you in.

How it entered my Flickchart:

🎥 Carry-On (2024)

📊 Ranked #1649/4152 on my Flickchart

🎯 Flickscore™: 60

beat Hamlet (#2074 → #2075)

lost to 20th Century Women (held at #1037)

lost to The Virtuous Sin (held at #1555)

beat The Wicker Man (#1814 → #1815)

beat Cinema Paradiso (#1684 → #1685)

lost to I'm Still Here (held at #1619)

beat Unpregnant (#1651 → #1652)

lost to Newsies (held at #1635)

lost to The Thin Man (held at #1643)

lost to Battle Royale (held at #1647)

beat Allegiance (#1649 → #1650)

lost to Hit Man (held at #1648)

The Quiet Girl (2022)

IMDb plot summary: In rural Ireland, a quiet, neglected girl is sent away from her dysfunctional family to live with relatives for the summer where she blossoms and learns what it is to be loved.

Directed by Colm Bairéad. Stars Carrie Crowley, Andrew Bennett, and Catherine Clinch.

The Quiet Girl follows a young girl who is sent away from home to live with relatives while her mother has a new baby and deals with that. It's clear that the young girl is a nuisance to her biological family, but she slowly finds her place with her new temporary guardians, and they coax her out of her shell. This is a quiet movie, matching the slow patience of the guardians to the pace of the film as we watch this child slowly gain confidence. Because of that, I did sometimes feel myself getting antsy for something to *happen*, but the gentleness of the story worked for me most of the time. The final scene in particular does a great job of bringing home the emotion of the whole story. I feel like this is a film that is just on the edge of being one of my favorites, but I'd have to watch it at the right moment in time. Maybe one of those movies I go back to when I need to be reminded that good people exist. It's good to have a collection of those, and this is definitely one to add to the list, even if it felt a little slow to me on this first watch.

How it entered my Flickchart:

🎥 The Quiet Girl (2022)

📊 Ranked #874/4149 on my Flickchart

🎯 Flickscore™: 79

beat Broken Blossoms or The Yellow Man and the Girl (#2073 → #2074)

beat The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (#1036 → #1037)

lost to Crimes and Misdemeanors (held at #518)

lost to Colossal (held at #777)

beat Music and Lyrics (#906 → #907)

lost to Margin Call (held at #841)

lost to The Fantasticks (held at #873)

beat Upside Down (#889 → #890)

beat Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby (#881 → #882)

beat Titanic (#877 → #878)

beat Holiday (#875 → #876)

beat Saturday Night (#874 → #875)

The Castle (1997)

IMDb plot summary: A working-class family from Melbourne, Australia fights city hall after being told they must vacate their beloved family home to allow for infrastructural expansion.

Directed by Rob Sitch. Stars Michael Caton, Anne Tenney, and Stephen Curry.

The Castle is a story about a family who discovers their house has been sold out from under them to make way for an airport expansion. The father isn't going to take this lying down, and he sets out to fight the acquisition in court. I stumbled upon this one but hadn't ever heard of it before, and it turned out to be a delightful surprise. While these characters are way out of their depth when it comes to legal matters, the film never looks down on them for their lack of knowledge or paints them as lesser-than. There's such love for the characters and the community they build around them. The film gives its narrator and the world he's building a very distinct voice that makes it easy to instantly relate to these people. Overall, it was a wonderful discovery, and I'm glad I got a chance to see it.

How it entered my Flickchart:

Here's how The Castle first ranked at #538 on my Flickchart...

The Castle beat Happythankyoumoreplease (2011)

The Castle beat The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994)

The Castle lost to Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989)

The Castle beat Colossal (2017)

The Castle beat Much Ado About Nothing (2013)

The Castle beat The Big Sick (2017)

The Castle beat Argo (2012)

The Castle lost to Short Term 12 (2013)

The Castle beat Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967)

The Castle beat Kramer vs. Kramer (1979)

The Castle lost to The Map of Tiny Perfect Things (2021)

The Castle lost to A Face in the Crowd (1957)

The Life of Chuck (2025)

IMDb plot summary: A life-affirming, genre-bending story about three chapters in the life of an ordinary man named Charles Krantz.

Directed by Mike Flanagan. Stars Tom Hiddleston, Jacob Tremblay, and Benjamin Pajak.

The Life of Chuck tells its story in three reverse-chronological acts, each revealing a new layer of an ordinary man whose life turns out to have cosmic significance. The result is almost epic in emotional ambition. The structure is one of the film’s greatest strengths, unraveling piece by piece in ways that constantly reframe what you think you’re watching. I'm not as convinced as I'd like that all the pieces fully cohere, though I do suspect this is one of those films that will need time to settle before it fully clicks. It does feature one of the most existentially terrifying sequences I've seen on film, at the end of the first third. I also love a non-musical movie bold enough to devote real time to full-on dance scenes. Even if I’m unsure about the whole, each individual section is impactful and absorbing, and I was never bored watching. I’ll need to sit with it, but it’s definitely a ride worth taking, and I suspect it might resonate more deeply the longer I let it linger.

📊 Ranked #810/4147 on my Flickchart

🎯 Flickscore™: 80

How it entered my Flickchart:

beat Broken Blossoms or The Yellow Man and the Girl (1919)

beat The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994)

lost to Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989)

lost to Colossal (2017)

beat Music and Lyrics (2007)

beat Margin Call (2011)

lost to A Midsummer Night's Dream (1999)

beat 9 (2009)

beat Rise of the Guardians (2012)

beat Megamind (2010)

beat New York, New York (1977)

beat Ninotchka (1939)

Heart Eyes (2025)

IMDb plot summary: When two coworkers have to survive the Heart Eyes Killer on Valentine's Day, the two have to find out who it is.

Directed by Josh Ruben. Stars Mason Gooding, Olivia Holt, and Gigi Zumbado.

Heart Eyes follows a young pair of colleagues whose business relationship takes a turn for the nightmarish when a serial killer who only targets couples mistakes them for a romantic pair and starts stalking them. I had pretty high hopes going in, since I'm a big fan of Josh Ruben’s comedy work and his film Werewolves Within, and while this leans less into the comedy and more into a horror/romance blend, it’s still a pretty enjoyable ride. I doubt it’ll stick with me long-term, but it’s not boring, and it hits the beats it aims for with confidence. The killer reveal is a highlight, giving the movie an excuse to unleash some big, unhinged, wonderfully over-the-top moments that energized the whole finale. The film balances sincerity and slasher fun well enough that I walked away satisfied. Not a new favorite, but a fun watch—and it definitely makes me want to see more from Ruben as he continues playing with genre.

How it entered my Flickchart:

🎥 Heart Eyes (2025)

📊 Ranked #2007/4146 on my Flickchart

🎯 Flickscore™: 52

beat Happythankyoumoreplease (#2071 → #2072)

lost to Robin Hood (held at #1035)

lost to Mrs. Miniver (held at #1553)

lost to Splice (held at #1812)

lost to A Patch of Blue (held at #1941)

lost to The Forest (held at #2006)

beat I Am Legend (#2038 → #2039)

beat The Wrestler (#2022 → #2023)

beat Spy Game (#2014 → #2015)

beat John Carter (#2010 → #2011)

beat The Last Castle (#2008 → #2009)

beat The Prestige (#2007 → #2008)

Stranger Than Paradise (1984)

IMDb plot summary: A New Yorker's life is thrown into a tailspin when his younger cousin surprise-visits him, starting a strange, unpredictable adventure.

Directed by Jim Jarmusch. Stars John Lurie, Eszter Balint, and Richard Edson.

Stranger Than Paradise follows a hip immigrant New Yorker, his visiting cousin from Hungary, and his equally detached friend as they travel from New York to Cleveland to Florida. And oh my gosh, this is so boring. The film is clearly aiming for a sort of Americanized French New Wave sensibility with static shots, minimalist storytelling, ironic detachment, and I haven't enjoyed that in other OG New Wave films either. These characters just wander around with no goal, no urgency, and nothing to draw me to them, and the movie seems content to let them meander indefinitely. I truly couldn't tell you what the point is or what it's trying to say. If it had a point, I couldn't see it. I know that many people find this kind of deadpan minimalism profound or charming, but it's very much not for me.

How it entered my Flickchart:

🎥 Stranger Than Paradise (1984)

📊 Ranked #3301/4145 on my Flickchart

🎯 Flickscore™: 20

lost to Happythankyoumoreplease (held at #2071)

lost to The Dinner Game (held at #3107)

beat Little Italy (#3625 → #3626)

beat Teacher's Pet (#3366 → #3367)

lost to One 2 Ka 4 (held at #3236)

beat Big Fat Liar (#3301 → #3302)

lost to Barry (held at #3268)

lost to Dolly Parton's Christmas on the Square (held at #3284)

lost to Funny Face (held at #3292)

lost to Madeline (held at #3296)

lost to Monty Python's The Meaning of Life (held at #3298)

lost to My Friend Irma (held at #3299)

lost to Rikki-Tikki-Tavi (held at #3300)