It’s worth just searching stuff on YouTube to see what shows up. Like the first movie made by Ari Aster of Midsommar and Hereditary.
The Strange Things About The Johnsons was released to festivals in 2010. It introduces Aster’s recurring themes of betrayal of the family contract, denial, and society as oppressor. Unlike his later movies, his first film reveals the horror early on, and makes the plot about how the Johnson family copes with that horror.
Come And See often appears in critics’ lists for “Best Movie Of All Time”. After the German invasion of Russia, partisans recruit a teen boy. The boy finds starvation, random death, and finally an einsatzgruppen. The teen survives, but is shattered and still has the rebuilding of his country ahead. The teen is played by an actor with no previous experience, which just adds to the rawness of his emotions. Trauma therapists were on set to help all the actors. Not as intense as say Saving Private Ryan, but ten times more believable. As above, YouTube won’t let me link directly.
Wisconsin Death Trip is not as horrid as the title implies. Imagine Ken Cook documenting the rough decade endured by a rural Wisconsin county. An influx of immigrants copes with land fraud, brutal winters, an overwhelmed health care system, disease, and crime. No, it is not contemporary; this happened in the late 1800s. The stories are respectful. They remind that our current woes are truly quite old, and that our ancestors were just like us, people just trying to get through. Come for the scandals, stay for Mary the Wisconsin Window Smasher.
I don’t know why I’m watching things like this. I used to write humor. I used to perform sketch and improv comedy. Comedy on TV doesn’t make me laugh anymore. There isn’t anything worth binge-watching. Improv based movies just annoy me at the moment. It’s expected that nothing will compare with what I liked as a teen, but even Monty Python is not aging well. Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead are still my faves. Does anyone do smart comedy with good sight gags anymore?
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