Weekend Watch - January/February 2024 Recap
The best films of January and February were the wide releases of films from the 2023 slate, and so far, there’s only three films legitimately worth mentioning with actual 2024 release dates. Everything else has either underperformed, divided audiences, or just been legitimately bad.
Welcome back to the Weekend Watch where each week we take a look at a new piece of film or television media and give it a rating, review, and recommendation. This week, we’re looking back at the first two months of film releases in 2024, highlighting those that have a shot at making it on this blog’s list of Greatest Films of All Time. As always, they’ll be categorized into Long Shots, Possible Things, and Sure Things (spoiler alert: there’s no sure things so far this year). These first couple of months have been perhaps the most dismal in recent history in terms of putting out anything that lives up to its hype or even that overperforms against expectations. The best films of January and February were the wide releases of films from the 2023 slate, and so far, there’s only three films legitimately worth mentioning with actual 2024 release dates. Everything else has either underperformed, divided audiences, or just been legitimately bad. Hopefully the rest of the year gets better. Let’s get into it.
Long Shots:
The Greatest Night in Pop: Netflix’s documentary about the making of the iconic song “We Are the World” gets the year’s slate of music documentaries kicked off with a solid start, hitting the right notes with audiences and receiving positive, if strained, reviews from critics. If you like the music from that era or just music history in general, this’ll be up your alley.
Scrambled: The year’s first legitimate sleeper hit is a comedy about a woman who decides to freeze her eggs as she continuously finds herself as the bridesmaid and never the bride. Written by, directed by, and starring Leah McKendrick, the film has been a solid hit among critics and its target audience and has now become a topical film as well, so don’t count it out.
Orion and the Dark: The first film from Netflix’s animation department boasts the writing of Oscar winner Charlie Kaufman, and that’s been reflected in the response. The more mature themes have made it hit or miss with audiences expecting an easygoing kids’ movie based on the art and promotion, but critics have been fairly positive on it. Director Sean Charmatz has so far done Netflix’s animated specials, but this puts him solidly in the right direction for future animated endeavors.
Possible Things:
Society of the Snow: J.A. Bayona’s adaptation of the true story about the survivors of a plane crash in the Andes in the 1970s released on Netflix ahead of awards season. Critical and audience acclaim combined with a few awards nominations make this the best film of the year so far, but it’ll need to pull a serious upset to cement itself as a film with true staying power.
Origin: Director Ava DuVernay consistently tackles topical and challenging subjects, and her adaptation of Isabel Wilkerson’s book Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents is no different. Since its wide release this year, its ratings have continued to climb among its audience. Quiet press tours and the late release have unfortunately left it out of awards conversations, but if it continues to improve its ratings, it’s not all the way out.
Weekend Watch - January/February 2023 Recap
In keeping with the norm in recent years, January and February this year have been pretty sparse in terms of all-time great films; a few cult classics have marked themselves out as long-shots to keep an eye on, but there’s really not even any possible things and certainly no sure things this early in the year.
Welcome back to the Weekend Watch where each week we take a look at a new piece of film or television media and give it a rating, review, and recommendation. This week, we are recapping the notable films that have released so far in 2023, as is tradition. In keeping with the norm in recent years, January and February this year have been pretty sparse in terms of all-time great films; a few cult classics have marked themselves out as long-shots to keep an eye on, but there’s really not even any possible things and certainly no sure things this early in the year. Now that we are “back” from COVID protocols, the late releasing Best Picture contenders have had to jump back into December and have left us without anything but some above average action and horror films to tide us over until the blockbusters and sleeper hits of March come. Let’s get into it.
Long Shots:
M3GAN: The slasher comedy was another box office success for the horror genre, achieving a sequel announcement already and giving us something to talk about for a few weeks there in January. Unfortunately for the memeable robot, I’m not sure that its slightly above-average reviews from fans and critics will be enough to elevate it to the status of an all-time great.
A Man Called Otto: Critics were fairly low on the Tom Hanks-led American remake of A Man Called Ove, but Tom Hanks and an uplifting story seem to have been enough to keep fans happy, sitting at a 97% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes and a 7.6 overall on IMDB. I don’t expect it to rise much farther than that, but it’s worth mentioning.
Plane: Another overperforming genre film from January, this time from the action films. The Mike Coulter and Gerard Butler collaboration has outdone everything that you could expect from such an underwhelming title, also being greenlit for a sequel “Boat”. Again, I don’t expect this to receive any kind of late in the game love, but its above average reviews make it a welcome addition to recent January films.
Sick: It’s a straight to Peacock slasher film about a killer during quarantine. For all intents and purposes, this film should have been terrible. As it stands, it seems like it was just decent, which means I’ve gotta mention it here. Any time a film with as much against it as this one has gets average or above average reviews from both fans and critics, there’s definitely something there worth talking about.
Missing: Following in the footsteps of its predecessor Searching, the latest found-footage cell phone thriller has again given audiences and critics what they want. It’s a testament to the writers, Sev Ohanian and Aneesh Chaganty, that they’ve been able to come up with two crowd-pleasing stories that are told through what is essentially a phone screen on the big screen. They’re not quite good enough to achieve all-time status on their own but definitely a film to keep your eye on.
Pamela: A Love Story: Netflix’s Pamela Anderson documentary is the first of many documentaries that will generate some buzz this year but probably won’t end up on anyone’s lists of awards finalists. Its 98% Tomatometer score and 94% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes indicate that it’s a film worth seeing, but don’t expect to hear much more about it.
Knock at the Cabin: What has been heralded as M. Night Shyamalan’s best film since Signs still sits with a bunch of very average ratings from fans and critics. It seems the formula of Dave Bautista and a predetermined direction for the story have enough to get M. Night away from his recent history of Old and Glass, but not enough to get him back to the all-time greatness of The Sixth Sense.
Infinity Pool: Brandon Cronenberg has followed in his father’s footsteps with this one, crafting a thrilling body horror piece with plenty of social critique attached. Also following in his father’s footsteps, Brandon’s film has divided audiences, satisfying fans of the genre but not bringing in any new converts. Mia Goth and Alexander Skarsgård have received some love for their work as well, but I’d expect this to be mentioned as Goth’s stat-padding film rather than her focus for an awards campaign later this year.
Of an Age: This indie romance hit theaters this past week with solid reviews, praising the film’s writing and its performances. I’ve heard it called Moonlight lite, which is high praise. Its currently just above average reviews will probably keep it on the radar, but I don’t currently expect it to hit the highs of its comparison; I could be wrong though.
Jesus Revolution: Look, I really don’t expect this film to go anywhere – its Metacritic score of 46 and Tomatometer of 46% should tell you all you actually need to know. However, a 7.6 on IMDB and 99% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes means that this film about the start of the modern evangelical movement (problematic as it is) starring Kelsey Grammer and Kimberly Williams Paisley gets a mention.
Bruiser: This Hulu original film about toxic masculinity and generational violence has probably the best overall reviews of any film that has released this year so far. If IMDB wasn’t losing credibility by the minute in terms of its overall scores for any film starring a black lead, female lead, or LGBT lead, this film would probably be sitting as a possible thing. Like its other sleeper hit Prey, I don’t expect Bruiser to bring much outside success to the streaming service.
Cocaine Bear: Should this even be here? I talked about Jesus Revolution, so I’m also gonna talk about Cocaine Bear. The consensus around the creature thriller seems to be that it is definitely crazy but could do with more of the bear. Expect this to be one of those films mentioned alongside M3GAN and Pacific Rim in the future. It does what it sets out to do, but there’s nothing truly groundbreaking here.