One 2 Ka 4 (2001)

IMDb plot summary: When a cop's partner is killed in the line of duty, he assumed guardianship of his orphaned children while investigating the murder.
Directed by Shashilal K. Nair. Starring Shah Rukh Khan, Juhi Chawla, Jackie Shroff, and Nirmal Pandey.

I enjoy silly Bollywood movies, but they've got to at least pretend what their characters do makes sense. This one really doesn't, plus it's full of horrible children. Not one of my favorites.

1.5 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
One 2 Ka 4 < Ghostbusters
One 2 Ka 4 > Julia
One 2 Ka 4 < Love's Labour's Lost
One 2 Ka 4 < Paint Your Wagon
One 2 Ka 4 < The Happiest Millionaire
One 2 Ka 4 > The Rescuers Down Under
One 2 Ka 4 > The Spanish Prisoner
One 2 Ka 4 < Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier
One 2 Ka 4 > Doc Hollywood
One 2 Ka 4 > Bedtime for Bonzo

Final spot: #1933 out of 2671. (1.5 stars.)

Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933)

IMDb plot summary: A wealthy composer rescues unemployed Broadway performers with a new play.
Directed by Mervyn LeRoy. Starring Joan Blondell, Ruby Keeler, Dick Powell, and Aline McMahon.

Early Hollywood musicals tend to be heavy on spectacle, light on narrative and coherent characterization. This definitely fits the bill, but the big musical numbers do look so stunning it's almost enough to carry it all the way through. If only there had been more than three of them! I did find myself often rolling my eyes at the poorly-defined characters and the half-written troubles they find themselves in, so I definitely wish the movie had gone the jukebox musical route of filling its runtime with so many great songs you don't realize until the end how thin the rest of it is. I found myself glued to the screen during some of these numbers, and choosing my favorite screenshot of the movie was incredibly difficult because so much of it looks fantastic.

3 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Gold Diggers of 1933 > Ghostbusters
Gold Diggers of 1933 < Chariots of Fire
Gold Diggers of 1933 < At First Sight
Gold Diggers of 1933 > Star Trek Into Darkness
Gold Diggers of 1933 < A Separation
Gold Diggers of 1933 < Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken
Gold Diggers of 1933 > Swing Time
Gold Diggers of 1933 > Wild Zero
Gold Diggers of 1933 < The Ring
Gold Diggers of 1933 < Descendants
Gold Diggers of 1933 < The Gift
Gold Diggers of 1933 < Cat's Eye

Final spot: #1138 out of 2672.

Song of the South (1945)

IMDb plot summary: The kindly story-teller Uncle Remus tells a young boy stories about trickster Br'er Rabbit, who outwits Br'er Fox and slow-witted Br'er Bear.
Directed by Wilfred Jackson and Harve Foster. Starring James Baskett, Bobby Driscoll, Ruth Warrick, and Luana Patten.

I didn't know very much about this film aside from the controversy over its racist portrayal of African-Americans in the south. I definitely see those elements in here. While the film purportedly takes place after the Civil War and the characters here are not plantation slaves, there is a definite air of subservience and passivity to the African-American characters -- Uncle Remus's entire purpose is to tell encouraging stories to the young white boy -- and it is uncomfortable to watch.

Fortunately, there's not much of a conflict here between my discomfort with the negative stereotypes and my enjoyment of the film, because I didn't think it was terribly good to begin with. The animated sequences are well done and many of the songs are enjoyable (incidentally, I suppose I'm glad that the animated characters were played by actual African-American actors, not white actors adopting a dialect? I think?) but the story framing them is thin, awkward, and doesn't allow time for the miraculous changes supposedy wrought by Uncle Remus' stories. The final scene is particularly silly, when the father abruptly reappears, no explanations, no indications of whether what took him away in the first place was resolved, apparently hinting that they're going to live with Grandmother forever now and not return to Atlanta.

I'm glad I've seen it to help cross off my Disney list but I certainly don't have any reason to watch it again.

1 star.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Song of the South < George of the Jungle
Song of the South < Rio Bravo
Song of the South > The Great Train Robbery
Song of the South < Doctor Zhivago
Song of the South < Bedknobs and Broomsticks
Song of the South > Stalker
Song of the South < Frankenstein
Song of the South > Mamma Mia!
Song of the South < Fame (2009)
Song of the South > David Copperfield (1935)
Song of the South > Me Before You

Final spot: #2280 out of 2670.

Fright Night (1985)

IMDb plot summary: When a teenager learns that his next door neighbour is a vampire, no one will believe him.
Directed by Tom Holland. Starring Chris Sarandon, William Ragsdale, Amanda Bearse, and Roddy McDowall.

Lately I've been finding myself giving just about every movie I see a mid-to-low ranking and I've been wondering if I wasn't in a positive movie-watching mood or if I had been seeing just that many mediocre movies. Well, whichever one it is, the streak has been broken, because I LOVED this. I've seen the 2011 remake with Colin Farrell, Anton Yelchin, and David Tennant, and I had a great time with it, but I recall it basically wearing its camp on its sleeve, ramping everything up into a fast-paced meta melodrama horror. This one is surprisingly a little quieter, with the first chunk of the movie leaning heavily on slow creepy scenes before it jumps into wild gross effects in the latter half. Both halves of the movie are equally interesting, though, and I didn't at all feel disappointed when faces started melting and goo started dripping because after all that build, I wanted to see some stuff go crazy, and it really, really did. SO much fun.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Fright Night > Ghostbusters (1984)
Fright Night > Catfish
Fright Night > The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
Fright Night < A Charlie Brown Christmas
Fright Night > Horrible Bosses
Fright Night < District 9
Fright Night < Love and Death
Fright Night > High School Musical 2
Fright Night < Life of Brian
Fright Night < Terminator 2: Judgment Day
Fright Night > Kick-Ass (...Why is this so high on my chart?)
Final spot: #236 out of 2670.

UHF (1989)

IMDb plot summary: An unemployed visionary becomes the manager of a local public station. The station becomes a success, with all sorts of hilarious sight gags and wacky humor.
Directed by Jay Levey. Starring "Weird Al" Yankovic, Victoria Jackson, Kevin McCarthy, and Michael Richards.

Earlier in my current movie challenge I watched Pee-Wee's Big Adventure and it did *not* go over well. This one reminded me of it on more than one occasion. They both have a sense of playful goofiness, but this one is (somehow) slightly more grounded. There are actual stakes involved, the characters are quirky but they're mostly acknowledged as quirky within the world so I don't feel like I'm watching a group of aliens trying to be human. A lot of the humor does *not* work for me here and just goes for the most childish option, but there's a goofy sincerity here I kind of admire, and I can absolutely see this being something I'd love as a child. As an adult it doesn't sit quite as well, but it's all right.

3 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
UHF > Trainwreck
UHF < Catfish
UHF < The Player
UHF > Marathon
UHF > Laura
UHF > Pi
UHF < The Red Shoes
UHF < Star Trek: First Contact
UHF < Finding Dory
UHF > Wide Awake
UHF < Stalag 17

Final spot: #1039 out of 2669.

Wild Zero (1999)

IMDb plot summary: Only legendary Japanese garage rock band Guitar Wolf can stand between a race of aliens from destroying earth with an army of zombies.
Directed by Tetsuro Takeuchi. Starring Guitar Wolf, Drum Wolf, Bass Wolf, and Masashi Endô.

The concept of this movie is more fun than the actual execution, for me. In theory, a punk rock biker zombie flick sounds *amazing*, but it can't quite maintain that energy and I ended up spending a lot of time watching people I didn't care about do things that didn't matter to me. There are some terrifically fun elements, so it does land in the upper half of my chart, but I didn't like it as much as I wanted to once I realized what it was. I'm glad I got to watch it though!

3 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Wild Zero > Trainwreck
Wild Zero < High Strung
Wild Zero < Manhattan Murder Mystery
Wild Zero > Marathon
Wild Zero < A Separation
Wild Zero < Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken
Wild Zero > Adam
Wild Zero > A Tale of Two Sisters
Wild Zero < The Ring
Wild Zero < Descendants
Wild Zero < The Gift
Wild Zero < Cat's Eye

Final spot: #1136 out of 2668.

The Florida Project (2017)

IMDb plot summary: Set over one summer, the film follows precocious 6-year-old Moonee as she courts mischief and adventure with her ragtag playmates and bonds with her rebellious but caring mother, all while living in the shadows of Disney World.
Directed by Sean Baker. Starring Willem Dafoe, Brooklynn Prince, Valerie Cotto, and Bria Vinaite.

Mild spoilers ahead.

This is kind of an amazing movie. So much of that has to go to the character of the young child Moonee and the *amazing* actress that plays her. This is some of the best child acting I've ever seen. (That final scene with her and Jancey... Wow.) She's surrounded by equally great adult actors, but since most of the story centers around her viewpoint, she could have easily tanked the whole thing if she hadn't been perfect. Fortunately, that's not the case.

At first I wasn't sold on the ending. It reminded me of what I dislike most about the Coens -- their tendency to end their movies in the middle of a scene, and not even a scene that feels climactic. I had to do a little digging and read other reviewers' takes on the film's final few shots before I could get on board. Now, though, I think it works, and it left me feeling simultaneously hopeful and sad for the characters I'd grown to empathize with, though I couldn't say I'd grown to love them (they are so aggressive and combative I always felt myself bristling a bit as they interacted with others). I have a feeling this one will climb higher the longer I sit with it.

4 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:

The Florida Project > Trainwreck

The Florida Project > Cloud Atlas

The Florida Project < Benny & Joon

The Florida Project < The Phantom of the Opera at the Royal Albert Hall

The Florida Project > The Producers (2005)

The Florida Project > We're Not Married!

The Florida Project > Jack Goes Boating

The Florida Project < The Goodbye Girl (2004)

The Florida Project > The Great Race

The Florida Project < Get Out

Final spot: #514 out of 2666.