Something Old & Something New

Nothing borrowed or blue

The Covid summer wave is real. It laid me low for several days but now I’m on the mend. While I was sick, I watched a lot of TV and movies with my daughter, who had to stay home from camp. We delighted in Confessions of a Shopaholic, a movie I missed when it first came out in 2009. It’s actually a pretty good (if predictable) addiction/recovery narrative and it’s funny, too. The supporting cast is bonkers, tons of great actors. It has two female screenwriters and is based on a novel by Sophie Kinsella. You can find it on Disney.

The other show we discovered is a reality show on Netflix called The Big Flower Fight, which is about people who design giant floral sculptures. The contestants are artists, gardeners, farmers, “plantfluencers” (lol), and landscape architects. There’s only one season, unfortunately. I guess it was a little too esoteric to catch on. But, we love it. 

(Yes, we got Netflix back. Also Max. Because I really, really wanted to watch Hit Man and Hacks. Also my daughter HAD to see the new season of Gabby’s Dollhouse. I’m pretty sure that show is what is keeping the lights on at Neflix.)

In other news, my novel, We Were Pretending, is coming out next week and the Goodreads Giveaway is still open for a few more days. If you’d like to preorder, it’s available in four formats–ebook, audiobook, paperback and hardcover–and prices are low at the moment. I won’t be writing much more about my book for this newsletter but if you want more updates, I have another newsletter (I know, I’m nuts) that I write sporadically, just about my fiction. It’s on beehiiv. It’s free. 

Finally, my husband Mike is contributing a review this month, for one of his all-time favorite movies, Real Genius. I hope you enjoy his fresh take along with four other recommendations. 

---

Lily Gladstone’s Other Star Turn

Fancy Dance (2024)
Directed by Erica Tremblay
Written by Erica Tremblay and Miciana Alise
1 hour 30 minutes; Streaming Apple+
IMDB * REVIEW * TRAILER

This was a Sundance favorite in 2023, and made it to streaming thanks in part to Lily Gladstone’s star-making performance in Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon. Gladstone anchors this much smaller movie with her trademark gravitas; set on a Seneca-Cayuga reservation in Oklahoma, Fancy Dance is a well-plotted family drama centered on a custody battle over Roki, a young girl whose mother has gone missing. In the absence of Roki’s mother, local authorities decide that Roki should go to  live with her white grandparents in town, rather than stay on the reservation with her Aunt Jax (Gladstone). It’s a heartbreaking situation that Jax rebels against, impulsively, going on the run with Roki. This is part road movie, part crime drama, but at its core it’s a mother-daugther story.

Real Classic

Real Genius (1985)
Directed by Martha Coolidge
Written by Neal Israel, Pat Proft, and PJ Torokvei
1 hour 48 minutes; AMC+, VOD $3.99
IMDB * REVIEW * TRAILER

Directed by Martha Coolidge (who is best known for another 80s classic, Valley Girl), Real Genius is a lovable rebuttal to the sleazy and sophomoric college and “nerd” comedies of its time. Real Genius came out in early 1985, six months after Revenge of the Nerds and six months before Weird Science. Those other movies pander to horny teenage fantasies about how exceptional intelligence might be harnessed to see more boobs. In contrast, Real Genius celebrates the genuine charm and charisma of brilliant young minds. Coolidge turns the fictional Pacific Tech into a wonderland for the world’s greatest college-aged minds. They pull off fantastic pranks like turning the dorm hallway into an ice rink and parking the bully’s car inside his tiny dorm room. The cast includes a very young Val Kilmer, the year before he broke out as Iceman in Top Gun. It’s probably my personal favorite Kilmer performance. Every line is a witty comeback, and his comedic and dramatic range carry the story. Another stand out from the young cast is Michelle Meyrink as the hyperkinetic Jordan. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen any other female love interest that finds a way to make being a brilliant nerd look sweet and sexy. 

When I was a kid, there was a VHS of this at my parents’ friend’s house, and I’d watch it every time we went over there, while the grownups hung out. I recently watched it with my 11-year-old son and I still like it—maybe even more now. 

-Mike Arauz

Best Friend Dramedy

Babes (2024)
Directed by Pamela Adlon
Written by Ilana Glazer and Josh Rabinowitz
1 hour 44 minutes; VOD $5.99
IMDB * REVIEW * TRAILER

I was really excited for this movie (it’s on my most anticipated list) but then it got mixed reviews and I avoided it for a while, because I didn’t want to be disappointed. When the price dropped to $5.99 I gave it a try and I don’t know why I waited! This movie is warm, fun, sweet, and hilarious. It was billed as “raunchy” but I wouldn’t have described it that way. I guess if you’ve never been pregnant or talked frankly about pregnancy (hello, male critics) then it might strike you as gross. Some reviewers complained that it wasn’t dramatic enough, but I think what they were responding to was the fact that the conflict between the women arises from outside pressures on their friendship, not a flawed relationship dynamic. More simply put: there’s nothing wrong with the women and the choices they make; they don’t need to be “fixed.”

Babes shows how modern parenting culture is shaped around the idea that friendship is less important than marriage, children, and financial status. The characters have to overcome the expectation that “growing up” means letting each other go, and find a way to keep their friendship alive. If that’s not dramatic to you, then you have probably not had the experience of struggling to maintain an adult friendship. I loved the warmth of this movie and its love for its characters. Also, Michelle Buteau has to be one of the funniest actors working right now—put her in more movies!!

Old School Tick Tock

Money Monster (2016)
Directed by Jodie Foster
Written by Jamie Linden, Alan DiFiore and Jim Kouf
1 hour 38 minutes; streaming on Hulu
IMDB * REVIEW * TRAILER

This title popped up on Letterboxd and I was surprised that I had never heard of it because it stars Julia Roberts and George Clooney. I’m not sure why I missed this when it came out, but it seems to have disappeared pretty quickly despite having a star-studded cast and a decent script. Clooney plays a slick TV personality, Lee Grant, who hosts a popular show about playing the stock market. When an angry investor wielding a handgun barges into the studio during filming, the show turns into a hostage situation. Roberts plays Patty Fenn, Grant’s director, and she coolly commands the situation from the sound booth. It’s a tense, fast moving thriller and I think if it had premiered on streaming a few years later, it would have been a huge hit.

Will She or Won’t She?

My Brilliant Career (1979)
Directed by Gillian Armstrong
Written by Eleanor Whitcombe and Miles Franklin
1 hour 40 minutes; streaming on HBO, Criterion
IMDB * REVIEW * TRAILER

Apparently this is the movie that made Jane Campion want to become a director. I was certainly reminded of the landscapes of Campion’s films—especially her recent western, The Power of the Dog—while watching this. Most viewers will know director Gillian Armstrong from her 1994 adaptation of Little Women, and if you liked the unrequited romance between Jo and Laurie, you’re going to love this movie. It centers on Sybylla (Judy Davis), a young woman who wants to be a writer but is understandably tempted by a marriage proposal from Sam Neill. Sybylla finds herself wrestling with a question that is currently at the center of a half-dozen contemporary divorce memoirs and novels: Can a woman write and be married? 

---

❤️ Link Love  ❤️

Washington Post Ann Hornaday columnist reflects on seeing My Brilliant Career at the beginning of her career. (gift link)

I totally agree that Barb & Star have been overlooked and underrated. 

A new biography of Agnès Varda hit the shelves a few weeks ago

Susan Faludi’s comprehensive and wise review of Amy Chozick’s Girls on the Bus, which was adapted from Chozick’s memoir, Chasing Hillary, which was in turn adapted from Chozick’s reporting on Hillary Clinton during the 2016 campaign. Faludi has a take on all three and it’s one of the best pieces of criticism I’ve read this year. 

---