Witchfinder General (1968)

IMDb plot summary: A young soldier seeks to put an end to the evils caused by a vicious witch-hunter when the latter terrorizes his fiancée and kills her uncle.
Directed by Michael Reeves. Starring Vincent Price, Ian Ogilvy, Rupert Davies, and Hilary Heath.

I had absolutely zero idea what this was about when I started watching it, and it turns out to be a really engaging little movie, if a little cheesy in its execution at times. It's refreshingly *different* from most of the other 1968 movies I've been watching. Vincent Price is surprisingly subtle as the villain. The film is very darkly lit throughout, which is probably mostly a flaw, but I found it to work very well as immersion into the 1600s setting of the story. I had a good time with this one.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Witchfinder General > A Scanner Darkly
Witchfinder General > Hoodwinked!
Witchfinder General < Chariots of Fire
Witchfinder General < The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
Witchfinder General < Man on the Moon
Witchfinder General > Hawking
Witchfinder General < Elf
Witchfinder General < Jack Goes Boating
Witchfinder General < Queen of Katwe
Witchfinder General < Black Narcissus
Witchfinder General < Crocodile Dundee
Witchfinder General < The Bells of St. Mary's
Final spot: #731 out of 3120.

The Sea Gull (1968)

IMDb plot summary: An aging actress named Irina Arkidana pays summer visits to her brother Pjotr Nikolayevich Sorin and her son Konstantin on a country estate. On one occasion, she brings Trigorin, a successful novelist, with her. Nina, a free and innocent girl on a neighboring estate, falls in love with Boris Trigorin. As Trigorin lightly consumes and rejects Nina, so the actress all her life has consumed and rejected her son, who loves Nina. The victims are destroyed while the sophisticates continue on their way.
Directed by Sidney Lumet. Starring James Mason, Vanessa Redgrave, Simone Signoret, and David Warner.

I've never quite gotten into the swing of things with Chekhov's plays. I find his individual scenes compelling and intriguing but fail to track their connection to each other in a complete arc. This production falls very much in that camp for me as well. There are some really fascinating moments and scenes -- this is an actor's scene study dream come true -- but it somehow doesn't all pull together for me the way I wish it would.

How it entered my Flickchart:
The Sea Gull > The Crazies (2010)
The Sea Gull < Hoodwinked!
The Sea Gull > My Date With Drew
The Sea Gull < Tekkonkinkreet
The Sea Gull < Nothing in Common
The Sea Gull < The Hateful Eight
The Sea Gull < Anna and the King
The Sea Gull < The Horse's Mouth
The Sea Gull > The Wedding Singer
The Sea Gull > The Hidden Fortress
The Sea Gull < The Three Musketeers (1993)
Final spot: #1160 out of 3119.

Dot the I (2003)

IMDb plot summary: Young lovers in London are wrapped up in a love triangle that may not be exactly what it seems.
Directed by Matthew Parkhill. Starring Gael García Bernal, Natalie Verbeke, James D'Arcy, and Tom Hardy.

(Mild spoilers ahead.)

This is such a goofy, gimmicky movie, and I had so much fun with it. From early on it leans into a sort of pulpy psychological thriller feel, and then toward the end of the movie it just embraces the madness head-on. None of it works if you think too hard about it, but if you're willing to just let each silly twist take its course, I found it to be pretty fun. And apparently there's a Bollywood film based on it, so I'll HAVE to watch that too!

How it entered my Flickchart:
Dot the I > Near Dark
Dot the I < The Pirates of Penzance
Dot the I > I Have Never Forgotten You: The Life and Legacy of Simon Wiesenthal
Dot the I < Wonder Boys
Dot the I < Mr. Holmes
Dot the I < Forgiving Dr. Mengele
Dot the I < Hamlet (1990)
Dot the I > The Hidden Fortress
Dot the I < The Bad Sleep Well
Dot the I > The Horse's Mouth
Dot the I > Jackie
Dot the I < Wet Hot American Summer
Final spot: #1152 out of 3118.

The Astro-Zombies (1968)

IMDb plot summary: The Plan - to build a super human; How? - by murdering innocent convenient victims and using various bits of them; The Result - Creatures on the rampage.
Directed by Ted V. Mikels. Starring Wendell Corey, John Carradine, Tom Pace, and Joan Patrick.

This movie is almost charmingly incomprehensible, with all the elements of an awful 1960s B-movie. Inconsistent lighting, overly technical but still nonsensical dialogue, terrible effects, random and way-too-long scene of a woman dancing naked... It's all here. There are parts of this that are definitely entertainingly awful, but more of it is dull.

How it entered my Flickchart:
The Astro-Zombies < Plan 9 from Outer Space
The Astro-Zombies < It Could Happen to You
The Astro-Zombies < Bang the Drum Slowly
The Astro-Zombies < Oklahoma! (1999)
The Astro-Zombies > Clarence, the Cross-Eyed Lion
The Astro-Zombies > The Prince & Me
The Astro-Zombies > The Wedding Planner
The Astro-Zombies < The Book Thief
The Astro-Zombies > My Dog Skip
The Astro-Zombies < Charlie Chan at the Opera
The Astro-Zombies > The Notebook
Final spot: #2939 out of 3117, which feels far too low, but looking at what it went up against, those matches are all correct.

Little Women (2019)

IMDb plot summary: Jo March reflects back and forth on her life, telling the beloved story of the March sisters - four young women, each determined to live life on her own terms.
Directed by Greta Gerwig. Starring Saoirse Ronan, Emma Watson, Florence Pugh, and Eliza Scanlen.

I am very much out of the loop on this whole adoration for Greta Gerwig thing. I found her very off-putting as an actress, and my reaction to Lady Bird was not negative so much as just completely neutral. I feel similarly about Little Women. There's nothing overtly wrong with it, but none of the characters connect with me at all, and I just... can't feel anything about it. It's like Gerwig takes all these concepts and themes that I should be VERY enthusiastic about and then flattens them out so that I don't care about any of it anymore. Maybe one of these days I'll be able to pinpoint what it is about her work that makes me feel this wild disconnect, but I don't know what it is yet. Ah well. I did need to watch this and I'm glad I did.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Little Women < Plan 9 from Outer Space
Little Women > 10 Items or Less
Little Women < Mulholland Dr.
Little Women > The Heartbreak Kid (2007)
Little Women > The Little Princess (1939)
Little Women > Sex Tape
Little Women > The Spanish Prisoner
Little Women < No Country for Old Men
Little Women < Chasing Amy
Little Women > The Big Lebowski
Little Women > Charly
Little Women < Biloxi Blues
Final spot: #1967 out of 3116.

Army of Shadows (1969)

IMDb plot summary: An account of underground resistance fighters in Nazi-occupied France.
Directed by Jean-Pierre Melville. Starring Lino Ventura, Paul Meurisse, Jean-Pierre Cassel, and Simone Signoret.

This one took a loooooong time to get going for me, but once it did it paid off in a fairly emotionally devastating way. The ending in particular lands in such a difficult but interesting way, telling us that none of the people whose stories we're watching survived. I don't have a lot of words to say about it, but it's a good movie and I'm glad I stuck with it long enough to appreciate it.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Army of Shadows > Waxwork
Army of Shadows < The Pirates of Penzance
Army of Shadows > Crimson Tide
Army of Shadows > Manchester by the Sea
Army of Shadows < Peggy Sue Got Married
Army of Shadows < City of God
Army of Shadows > Murder by Death
Army of Shadows < Oscar
Army of Shadows < Lethal Weapon
Army of Shadows > The Children's Hour
Army of Shadows > Split
Army of Shadows > Signs
Final spot: #943 out of 3115.

Wet Hot American Summer (2001)

IMDb plot summary: Set on the last day of camp, in the hot summer of 1981, a group of counselors try to complete their unfinished business before the day ends.
Directed by David Wain. Starring Janeane Garofalo, David Hyde Pierce, Michael Showalter, and Marguerite Moreau.

This was the one David Wain movie everyone seems to love most, but it was the least interesting to me of the ones I've seen. Some good jokes, but it only really got me laughing when it tipped into the bigger, more absurd moments. Its humor was weirdly quirky situational for much of the movie, punctuated with an occasional gigantic goofy punchline that made me wish more of the movie was like that. I think this is one that might sit better with me with time, though, and possibly a rewatch, so we'll see whether its chart location changes over time!

How it entered my Flickchart:
Wet Hot American Summer > Waxwork
Wet Hot American Summer < Brooklyn
Wet Hot American Summer > Battle of the Sexes (WHY is this so high on my chart?)
Wet Hot American Summer < Manchester by the Sea
Wet Hot American Summer < Brick
Wet Hot American Summer < The Return of the Living Dead
Wet Hot American Summer < The Light In Her Eyes
Wet Hot American Summer > Sin City
Wet Hot American Summer > The Three Musketeers
Wet Hot American Summer > Jackie
Wet Hot American Summer < The Bad Sleep Well
Final spot: #1145 out of 3114.

Targets (1968)

IMDb plot summary: An elderly horror film star, while making a personal appearance at a drive-in theatre, confronts a psychotic Vietnam War veteran who has turned into a mass-murdering sniper.
Directed by Peter Bogdanovich. Starring Tim O'Kelly, Boris Karloff, Arthur Peterson, and Monte Landis.

I like Peter Bogdanovich but had never seen this very early film of his, and it's kind of fascinating. It's got this slow burn that, for me, managed to really boost the tension. It brought to mind the cold everyday nature of the deaths in The Seventh Continent, though not quite as intense. The two separate pieces of the story are just as interesting independently as they are when they overlap at the end.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Targets > The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
Targets < Brooklyn
Targets > State and Main
Targets > A Little Night Music
Targets < Peggy Sue Got Married
Targets < City of God
Targets < Murder by Death
Targets < Inherit the Wind
Targets < Tekkonkinkreet
Targets > Quartet
Targets < It's Christmastime Again, Charlie Brown
Final spot: #968 out of 3113.

The King (2019)

IMDb plot summary: Hal, wayward prince and heir to the English throne, is crowned King Henry V after his tyrannical father dies. Now the young king must navigate palace politics, the war his father left behind, and the emotional strings of his past life.
Directed by David Michôd. Starring Timothée Chalamet, Joel Edgerton, Robert Pattinson, and Ben Mendelsohn.

This is primarily a retelling of Shakespeare's Henry V as a grimly realistic portrayal of Henry. The historical plays have taken a long time to grow on me, and this interpretation strips away the language, which is 90% of what made me finally come around on the plays in the first place. It definitely highlights how *young* Henry is. It's fine, I guess, just doesn't wow me.

How it entered my Flickchart:
The King < Don Jon
The King < Kiss Me Kate
The King > Bang the Drum Slowly
The King > Planet 51
The King > Soylent Green
The King > Major League
The King > Funny Face
The King > Three Days of the Condor
The King < Play Misty for Me
The King < Blackadder Back & Forth
The King < On the Town
The King < Live-In Maid
Final spot: #2346 out of 3112.

Platoon (1986)

IMDb plot summary: A young soldier in Vietnam faces a moral crisis when confronted with the horrors of war and the duality of man.
Directed by Oliver Stone. Starring Charlie Sheen, Willem Dafoe, Tom Berenger, and Forest Whitaker.

While usually I find combat films incredibly dull, there are moments in this one that really work and highlight the terrifyingly... out-of-control nature of the work they're doing. It's not tidy and neat, things are going crazy and people are losing their minds and nobody has any idea what anybody's doing and then people die. There are still a lot of pieces in this, as in most war movies, that are slow, often tedious builds of an atmosphere, but I got enough out of it to be impressed.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Platoon > Star Trek: First Contact
Platoon < Brooklyn
Platoon < Swing Girls
Platoon < Sunday in the Park with George
Platoon < Must Love Dogs
Platoon > The Blues Brothers
Platoon > Man on Fire
Platoon < Bye Bye Birdie (1995)
Platoon > Love Me Tonight
Platoon < Imitation of Life
Platoon < Cake
Platoon > Dumbo
Final spot: #1475 out of 3111.

Psych-Out (1968)

IMDb plot summary: A deaf runaway arrives in San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury hippie district looking for her missing brother.
Directed by Richard Rush. Starring Susan Strasberg, Dean Stockwell, Jack Nicholson, and Bruce Dern.

I'm a little surprised 1968 doesn't seem to have that many hippie movies. I guess it was early days. But that makes this kind of an interesting little time capsule. I also love that we have a deaf main character. However, I can't really figure out what this movie is trying to say aside from "Drugs are bad," and I'm not sure it's saying that terribly effectively. Some interesting pieces but doesn't hold up as well as I wanted it to.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Psych-Out < Secret Window
Psych-Out < Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging
Psych-Out > Saw
Psych-Out > There's Something About Mary
Psych-Out < The Swiss Family Robinson
Psych-Out < Shrek 2
Psych-Out < The Money Pit
Psych-Out < Meet Me in St. Louis
Psych-Out > Green Lantern
Psych-Out > Michael Clayton
Psych-Out > Hangman's Curse
Psych-Out > Out of the Past
Final spot: #2515 out of 3110.

Hellfighters (1968)

IMDb plot summary: The story of macho oil well firefighters and their wives.
Directed by Andrew V. McLaglen. Starring John Wayne, Katharine Ross, Jim Hutton, and Vera Miles.

This is definitely more enjoyable than John Wayne's other 1968 movie, The Green Berets, which was a preachy pro-war propaganda film. This one aims for a genuine human connection in the story as well as focusing on a pretty unique type of dangerous occupation -- I've seen firefighter movies, but never specifically about folks fighting industrial oil fires. It's a little bland in how neatly things get wrapped up but it's got interesting pieces to it.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Hellfighters < Star Trek: First Contact
Hellfighters > Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging
Hellfighters < Ghost
Hellfighters > Thirteen Conversations About One Thing
Hellfighters < Give My Regards to Broad Street
Hellfighters > Apocalypto
Hellfighters > Crash
Hellfighters > Joe Versus the Volcano
Hellfighters < The Pajama Game
Hellfighters > Ivan the Terrible, Part One
Hellfighters > The Year Without a Santa Claus
Hellfighters > Where to Invade Next
Final spot: #2047 out of 3109.

Pokemon: Detective Pikachu (2019)

IMDb plot summary: In a world where people collect Pokémon to do battle, a boy comes across an intelligent talking Pikachu who seeks to be a detective.
Directed by Rob Letterman. Starring Ryan Reynolds, Justice Smith, Kathryn Newton, and Bill Nighy.

(Mild spoilers ahead.)

I am intrigued by how... sincere the tone of this is. It doesn't really attempt to lean into the meta self-awareness of the movie as much as I expected, and somehow it kind of works? It's pretty entertaining throughout, significantly more than it had any right to be. It is very strange however to realize that Ryan Reynolds is at the point in his career where he can play a grown adult's father. When did that happen?

How it entered my Flickchart:
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu < Star Trek: First Contact
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu > The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (2005)
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu > Ghost
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu > August: Osage County
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu > Lost in America
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu > Avengers: Age of Ultron
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu > If I Forget
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu > October Sky
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu < Stalag 17
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu > UHF
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu < Modern Times

Final spot: #1563 out of 3108.

The Da Vinci Code (2006)

IMDb plot summary: A murder inside the Louvre, and clues in Da Vinci paintings, lead to the discovery of a religious mystery protected by a secret society for two thousand years, which could shake the foundations of Christianity.
Directed by Ron Howard. Starring Tom Hanks, Audrey Tautou, Ian McKellen, and Jean Reno.

So, yeah, this is really goofy nonsense, but it somehow isn't even FUN goofy nonsense. I can't help but compare Tom Hanks' character to Nicolas Cage's in the National Treasure movies, who proposes equally ludicrous ideas but does so with a sense of gleeful adventure. In contrast, our protagonist here goes around with a sense of either smug self-righteousness or a gritty solemnity that feels wildly at odds with the off-the-wall popcorn adventure style of the narrative. I couldn't even enjoy it as a silly ridiculous story.

How it entered my Flickchart:
The Da Vinci Code < Star Trek: First Contact
The Da Vinci Code > Bullitt
The Da Vinci Code < Beach Party
The Da Vinci Code < The Little Drummer Boy
The Da Vinci Code < A Girl of the Limberlost
The Da Vinci Code > Suez
The Da Vinci Code < Show Boat (1951)
The Da Vinci Code < Gosford Park
The Da Vinci Code < Nine
The Da Vinci Code < Good Night, and Good Luck.
The Da Vinci Code > Zero Charisma
The Da Vinci Code < A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum
Final spot: #2280 out of 3107.

Streets of Fire (1984)

IMDb plot summary: A mercenary is hired to rescue his ex-girlfriend, a singer who has been kidnapped by a motorcycle gang.
Directed by Walter Hill. Starring Michael Paré, Diane Lane, Rick Moranis, and Amy Madigan.

What a weird, weird movie! It's like a post-apocalyptic noir musical parody. The dialogue is so over-the-top, the main character such a ridiculous caricature of macho toughness (toward the end of the movie he abruptly punches his lover to knock her out so he can go fight Willem Dafoe - WHAT), it's almost borderline grotesque. And yet also sometimes very compelling. I don't really know what to do with this movie at all, so I'll just shrug and rank it however I can.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Streets of Fire < Star Trek: First Contact
Streets of Fire > Bullitt
Streets of Fire > Beach Party
Streets of Fire < The Tempest (2010)
Streets of Fire < Captain Marvel
Streets of Fire < They Made Me a Fugitive
Streets of Fire > Gozu
Streets of Fire > Blue's Big Musical Movie
Streets of Fire > Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Streets of Fire < Sarah, Plain and Tall
Streets of Fire < Marvin's Room
Streets of Fire > Four Weddings and a Funeral
Final spot: #1897 out of 3106.

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003)

IMDb plot summary: During the Napoleonic Wars, a brash British captain pushes his ship and crew to their limits in pursuit of a formidable French war vessel around South America.
Directed by Peter Weir. Starring Russell Crowe, Paul Bettany, James D'Arcy, and Edward Woodall.

This film definitely looks good, but even in its enormous length it does little to give me a sense of most of the characters, then expects me to care about them. I think it was supposed to be significant who died, who lived, who got promoted, and whatnot, but given the fact that few of the characters besides the captain, the doctor, and maybe the child, get much in the way of character development, it all feels a bit flat. I wonder if I would have been more wowed by the look of this alone if I had seen the film in theaters.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Master and Commander < The Wiz
Master and Commander > Play Misty for Me
Master and Commander > Monster
Master and Commander > Captain Fantastic
Master and Commander < The Blind Side
Master and Commander < Sullivan's Travels
Master and Commander > An American in Paris
Master and Commander < The Kid Who Would Be King
Master and Commander > In & Out
Master and Commander > The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009)
Master and Commander > Coraline
Master and Commander < Revolutionary Road
Final spot: #1712 out of 3105.