Iron Eagle (1985)

IMDb plot summary: A young pilot plans a rescue mission when his father, an Air Force Colonel, is shot down over enemy territory and captured.
Directed by Sidney J. Furie. Starring Jason Gedrick, Louis Gossett Jr., David Suchet, and Larry B. Scott.

LOL, this movie is ridiculous. Kind of likably, laughably so, and I could see a young kid getting really into this. It has a very cheerful Disney "you can do anything you want with FRIENDSHIP!" feel to it.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Iron Eagle > Black Snake Moan
Iron Eagle < Sleeping with Other People
Iron Eagle < Starship Troopers
Iron Eagle < The Miracle Worker
Iron Eagle > Cinderella (1950)
Iron Eagle > Choke
Iron Eagle < 12 Years a Slave
Iron Eagle < John Dies at the End
Iron Eagle > Star Trek Into Darkness
Iron Eagle < True Grit (1969)

Final spot: #1268 out of 2811.

Animal House (1978)

IMDb plot summary: At a 1962 college, Dean Vernon Wormer is determined to expel the entire Delta Tau Chi Fraternity, but those troublemakers have other plans for him.
Directed by John Landis. Starring Tom Hulce, Stephen Furst, Mark Metcalf, and Mary Louise Weller.

This movie has had a looot of other comedies imitating it, getting ever louder and grosser, but this one actually works decently well, by alternating between noisy, icky scenes with slightly quieter, more subtle bits. There's a lot that, not surprisingly, doesn't work in here for me, but there's a sense of comedic artistry and purpose that I don't see in a lot of the films that imitate it later. Appreciate it, don't love it.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Animal House < Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Animal House > Hiroshima mon amour
Animal House < Die Hard With a Vengeance
Animal House < Sarah, Plain and Tall
Animal House > The Internship
Animal House > Thoroughly Modern Millie
Animal House > Sands of Iwo Jima
Animal House < The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Animal House < Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Animal House < The Forest
Animal House < That Touch of Mink
Animal House > Cruel Intentions

Final spot: #1953 out of 2810.

The Final Countdown (1980)

IMDb plot summary: A modern aircraft carrier is thrown back in time to 1941 near Hawaii, just hours before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
Directed by Don Taylor. Starring Kirk Douglas, Martin Sheen, Katharine Ross, and James Farentino.

This is such an interesting concept for a movie, executed in such a bizarrely dull way. Most of the movie is filled with tedious jargon, and then the film builds to a big dramatic climax only to immediately run away from it when it actually happens. It feels like the concept was handed to someone who really didn't want to write a time travel script, so worked around it as much as they possibly could. So many baffling choices for what could have been a fun and silly flick!

2 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
The Final Countdown < Twin Sisters
The Final Countdown > Hiroshima mon amour
The Final Countdown > Our Paradise
The Final Countdown < Aladdin
The Final Countdown < Coraline
The Final Countdown < Where Eagles Dare
The Final Countdown > Rango
The Final Countdown > Chinatown
The Final Countdown > Quitting
The Final Countdown < Moonstruck

Final spot: #1718 out of 2809.

CQ (2001)

IMDb plot summary: A young filmmaker in 1960s Paris juggles directing a cheesy sci-fi debacle, directing his own personal art film, coping with his crumbling relationship with his girlfriend, and a new-found infatuation with the sci-fi film's starlet.
Directed by Roman Coppola. Starring Jeremy Davies, Angela Lindvall, Élodie Bouchez, and Gérard Depardieu.

There are parts of this that work so well for me. I really enjoy the juxtaposition of the young filmmakers' aimless everyday life with this hyped-up 1960s sci fi flick he's trying to edit. Something about seeing them both together really emphasizes the shallowness of both of them, albeit in very different ways. So I really like the conceit of the film, and a few of the individual moments, but a lot of this is brought down by just how unsympathetic our lead character is. He's pretentious and self-important for no reason and has no real motivation to do much of anything and even his final successes seem to be resolved rather aimlessly. This colors the rest of the film, since I started (mostly subconsciously) applying the things I didn't like about the on-screen filmmaker character to Roman Coppola, the film's actual director. Like... you don't make a film this self-indulgent about how tough filmmaking is and NOT have it be basically autobiographical, right? So there's a disconnect for me, which is a bit of a bummer because I wanted so much to like it as a whole. But it ended up being a slightly mixed bag.

2.5 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
CQ < Runaway Jury
CQ > Lady in the Water
CQ > Maleficent
CQ < The Big Lebowski
CQ < Ponyo
CQ > The Man with One Red Shoe
CQ > Kagemusha
CQ < The Woman in Black
CQ < The Best Years of Our Lives
CQ > Deceived
CQ > Fish Tank
CQ < Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory

Final spot: #1685 out of 2808.

Coco (2017)

IMDb plot summary: Aspiring musician Miguel, confronted with his family's ancestral ban on music, enters the Land of the Dead to find his great-great-grandfather, a legendary singer.
Directed by Lee Unkrich and Adrian Molina. Starring Anthony Gonzalez, Gael García Bernal, Benjamin Bratt, and Alanna Ubach.

While this movie doesn't connect with me on a personal level the way some of Pixar's others have, it's still a tremendously well-told, moving story, and it still managed to make me cry at the end. The narrative plot points were a little predictable but the characters (especially our main protagonist) are so likable it didn't really matter. Lovely movie.

4 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Coco > Maine Pyar Kiya
Coco > Baby Driver
Coco < Garden State
Coco > Bernie
Coco < The Lady Eve
Coco < The Red Violin
Coco > The Graduate
Coco > Never Let Me Go
Coco > The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
Coco < The Fault in Our Stars

Final spot: #488 out of 2807.

The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

IMDb plot summary: James Bond investigates the hijacking of British and Russian submarines carrying nuclear warheads, with the help of a K.G.B. Agent, whose lover he killed.
Directed by Lewis Gilbert. Starring Roger Moore, Barbara Bach, Curt Jurgens, and Richard Kiel.

I'm often just bored by Bond, but this took the series to almost campy heights and that was a lot of fun.

3.5 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:

The Spy Who Loved Me > Maine Pyar Kiya

The Spy Who Loved Me < Baby Driver

The Spy Who Loved Me > Unbroken

The Spy Who Loved Me < Girl Shy

The Spy Who Loved Me > Away We Go

The Spy Who Loved Me < Ikiru

The Spy Who Loved Me < John Wick

The Spy Who Loved Me < Sleight

The Spy Who Loved Me > The Fall

The Spy Who Loved Me < The Bad Seed

Final spot: #958 out of 2806.

War Machine (2017)

IMDb plot summary: An idiosyncratic general confronts opposition from enemies, allies, and bureaucrats while leading a massive rebuild operation in Afghanistan.
Directed by David Michôd. Starring Brad Pitt, Daniel Betts, John Magaro, and Emory Cohen.

The tone of this movie is all over the place. While it's telling an interesting story and getting into some interesting details, it's too serious to actually be a comedy but too broadly goofy to actually be a drama. The result is an awkward tone shift every five minutes, and it's messy.

1.5 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
War Machine < Kiki's Delivery Service
War Machine > Along Came a Spider
War Machine < Sixteen Candles
War Machine < The Life of David Gale
War Machine > Play It Again, Sam
War Machine < The Trouble With Angels
War Machine > Baby Mama
War Machine > Swingers
War Machine < Cambio de ruta
War Machine < A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
War Machine > Before I Fall
Final spot: #1980 out of 2805.

McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971)

IMDb plot summary: A gambler and a prostitute become business partners in a remote Old West mining town, and their enterprise thrives until a large corporation arrives on the scene.
Directed by Robert Altman. Starring Warren Beatty, Julie Christie, Rene Auberjonois, and William Devane.

Robert Altman's movies are... not easy for me to get into. They tend to be slice-of-life almost aggressively, daring me to make the connections between the tiny bits of everyday mundanity and form a larger narrative. I struggle to find the overarching story in these films where almost nothing is coded to be more important than anything else, and that is definitely the case here. When the final "showdown" happens, it's so downplayed that I was never sure the climax has actually happened. There's nothing really bad about this movie, but it's all so underwhelming that it doesn't really connect with me at all.

2 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
McCabe & Mrs. Miller < Lord of War
McCabe & Mrs. Miller > Sleeper
McCabe & Mrs. Miller > Graveyard of Honor (1975)
McCabe & Mrs. Miller < The Big Sleep
McCabe & Mrs. Miller < Man Hunt
McCabe & Mrs. Miller < The Love Witch
McCabe & Mrs. Miller < The Girl with Dragon Tattoo (2009)
McCabe & Mrs. Miller < Crank
McCabe & Mrs. Miller < A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy
McCabe & Mrs. Miller > Neverwas
McCabe & Mrs. Miller > Sixteen Candles
McCabe & Mrs. Miller < Fifth of July
Final spot: #1748 out of 2804.

Die Hard With a Vengeance (1995)

IMDb plot summary: John McClane and a Harlem store owner are targeted by German terrorist Simon Gruber in New York City, where he plans to rob the Federal Reserve Building.
Directed by John McTiernan. Starring Bruce Willis, Jeremy Irons, Samuel L. Jackson, and Graham Greene.

The first Die Hard is a wonderfully taut thriller. This one is so bloated with extra fight scenes and plot points and silly riddles. The movie winds to its conclusion right around 1:25 and then just... keeps going. Cut like 40 minutes out of it and it'd be fun. As it is, it wears out its welcome.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Die Hard With a Vengeance < Lord of War
Die Hard With a Vengeance > The Children's Hour
Die Hard With a Vengeance > Double Jeopardy
Die Hard With a Vengeance < The Big Sleep
Die Hard With a Vengeance < Man Hunt
Die Hard With a Vengeance < The Love Witch
Die Hard With a Vengeance < The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009)
Die Hard With a Vengeance > The World Is Not Enough
Die Hard With a Vengeance < Little Lord Fauntleroy
Die Hard With a Vengeance > Our Paradise
Die Hard With a Vengeance > Einstein and Eddington

Final spot: #1737 out of 2803.

Undercover Blues (1993)

IMDb plot summary: A wise-cracking husband and wife team of ex-Spies arrive in New Orleans on maternity leave with their baby girl. There they are hassled by muggers, the police and their FBI boss, who wants them to do just-one-more job.
Directed by Herbert Ross. Starring Kathleen Turner, Dennis Quaid, Fiona Shaw, and Stanley Tucci.

This is a silly, fluffy popcorn movie whose entire strength rests on the fact that Dennis Quaid and Kathleen Turner are just really dang charming here. The plot doesn't matter at all, none of the side characters are interesting (not even Stanley Tucci, who's usually a shoo-in), but Quaid and Turner set the tone early on and they remain the most entertaining part. I'd enjoy watching their lives even if it didn't involve spies and nuclear explosives. (Maybe even more so.) There's nothing groundbreaking or impressive about this, but it's a cute watch.

3 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Undercover Blues > Lord of War
Undercover Blues < Manchester by the Sea
Undercover Blues > Blade
Undercover Blues < Auntie Mame
Undercover Blues < V for Vendetta
Undercover Blues < Jesus Christ Superstar (2000)
Undercover Blues < Nine to Five
Undercover Blues < City Lights
Undercover Blues < Witness
Undercover Blues > The Shining
Undercover Blues > The Killing
Undercover Blues < Loving Vincent

Final spot: #1046 out of 2802.

The Post (2017)

IMDb plot summary: A cover-up that spanned four U.S. Presidents pushed the country's first female newspaper publisher and a hard-driving editor to join an unprecedented battle between the press and the government.
Directed by Steven Spielberg. Starring Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, Sarah Paulson, and Bob Odenkirk.

A very good story but an awkward script that spends most of its time reiterating the same points over and over again and doesn't build much tension the way I usually expect from Spielberg's dramas. Decent, but better in concept than in execution.

2.5 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
The Post > Pulp Fiction
The Post < Manchester by the Sea
The Post < Blade
The Post < Mother!
The Post > Camp Rock 2: The Final Jam
The Post < The Switch
The Post > Nowhere Boy
The Post < Downfall
The Post < The Scarlet and the Black
The Post > The Hangover
The Post < Batman: Under the Red Hood

Final spot: #1288 out of 2801.

I Am Legend (2007)

IMDb plot summary: Years after a plague kills most of humanity and transforms the rest into monsters, the sole survivor in New York City struggles valiantly to find a cure.
Directed by Francis Lawrence. Starring Will Smith, Alice Braga, Charlie Tahan, and Salli Richardson-Whitfield.

3 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
I Am Legend > Pulp Fiction
I Am Legend < Sweet Smell of Success
I Am Legend > Finding Forrester
I Am Legend < Auntie Mame
I Am Legend > Hamlet (2009)
I Am Legend < 12 Angry Men (1997)
I Am Legend > Broken Blossoms or the Yellow Man and the Girl
I Am Legend < EDtv
I Am Legend > Celeste and Jesse Forever
I Am Legend < John Wick
Final spot: #934 out of 2800.

Atomic Blonde (2017)

IMDb plot summary: An undercover MI6 agent is sent to Berlin during the Cold War to investigate the murder of a fellow agent and recover a missing list of double agents.
Directed by David Leitch. Starring Charlize Theron, James McAvoy, Eddie Marsan, and John Goodman.

This movie was somehow simultaneously confusing and boring.

1 star.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Atomic Blonde < Pulp Fiction
Atomic Blonde < The English Patient
Atomic Blonde > Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
Atomic Blonde > Playtime
Atomic Blonde < American Made
Atomic Blonde < Robin Hood: Men in Tights
Atomic Blonde > Outsourced

Flickchart died on me here, so it stays at #2253 out of 2799.

The Asphalt Jungle (1950)

IMDb plot summary: A major heist goes off as planned, until bad luck and double crosses cause everything to unravel.
Directed by John Huston. Starring Sterling Hayden, Louis Calhern, Jean Hagen, and James Whitmore.

While I like pieces of this individually, I find it hard to differentiate it as a whole from other film noirs. The tropes that make some people absolutely love this genre always make me feel like it's just very predictable, and there are only so many ways it can be told. So there's nothing wrong with it, but I'm not sure it stands out from the rest of the genre in a meaningful way. The most notable thing about it for me is some very cool staging of characters and framing of them with the camera -- some really great shots in here. But that probably isn't something I'm going to remember for too long.

2.5 stars.

How it entered my Flickchart:
The Asphalt Jungle > Pulp Fiction
The Asphalt Jungle < Sweet Smell of Success
The Asphalt Jungle < Blade
The Asphalt Jungle < Mother!
The Asphalt Jungle > Camp Rock 2: The Final Jam
The Asphalt Jungle < The Switch
The Asphalt Jungle < Oliver Twist (1948)
The Asphalt Jungle < Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
The Asphalt Jungle < High School Musical 3: Senior Year
The Asphalt Jungle > The Dresser
The Asphalt Jungle < Cabaret

Final spot: #1308 out of 2798.

Kingpin (1996)

IMDb plot summary: A star bowler whose career was prematurely "cut off" hopes to ride a new prodigy to success and riches.
Directed by Bobby Farrelly and Peter Farrelly. Starring Woody Harrelson, Randy Quaid, Vanessa Angel, and Bill Murray.

The Farrelly brothers just have the complete opposite sense of humor as I do. I thought maybe since they just directed this one and didn't write it that it might work better for me, but nope. It still just leaves me with an icky taste in my mouth, and I don't think I laughed even once.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Kingpin < Pulp Fiction
Kingpin < Run Lola Run
Kingpin > Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
Kingpin < The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
Kingpin > Seven Pounds
Kingpin < Facing the Giants
Kingpin < Freaky Friday (1976)
Kingpin > The Collective
Kingpin > The Devil is a Woman
Kingpin < Bulworth
Final spot: #2344 out of 2797.

American Made (2017)

IMDb plot summary: The story of Barry Seal, an American pilot who became a drug-runner for the CIA in the 1980s in a clandestine operation that would be exposed as the Iran-Contra Affair.
Directed by Doug Liman. Starring Tom Cruise, Domnhall Gleeson, Sarah Wright, and Jesse Plemons.

1 star.

How it entered my Flickchart:

American Made < Lord of War

American Made < The Children's Hour

American Made > Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End

American Made > The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

American Made < The Illusionist (2006)

American Made > 30 Minutes or Less

American Made > Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus

American Made > The Interpreter

American Made > Eagle Eye

American Made > The Boss

Final spot: #2187 out of 2796.