What I've been watching: March 2025
The good, the bad, and the non-film media I've been enjoying (and sometimes disliking)
As is often the case, March was not as active of a movie-watching month for me as January and February. The arrival of longer days brings with it the urge to step out, sit on a patio, be with friends, etc.
As these monthly media diaries continue, I’m looking forward to seeing what kind of patterns emerge as the seasons change. In general, I tend to rewatch things more than watch them for the first time, but the first two months of this year I really popped off when it came to seeing new-to-me stuff. That wasn’t really the case in March.
Anyway, here is what I’ve been watching (and playing) for the last month 🤠
Best first watches
King Lear (Available on blu-ray and DVD)- Jean-Luc Godard took roughly a million dollars from Cannon Films in the mid-80s to adapt one of Shakespeare’s great tragedies. The result is an anti-adaptation that is as wildly inventive as it is inscrutable. It begins with recorded audio of the financier asking the director where the hell the movie he paid for is. What follows is a post-apocalyptic fantasy about rediscovering lost art, an abrasive collage of overlapping soundscapes, and rapid-fire visual invention that culminates in a moving treatise on filmmaking.
Eephus1 (Now in theaters)- Carson Lund’s debut feature is the best new release I saw this month. A chronicle of the last baseball game on a soon-to-be-demolished New England field, the film is pleasantly thorny, yet relaxes into the rhythm of a game that some players are straining to instill with pageantry.
Black Bag (Now in theaters)- An espionage tale filled with satellite surveillance, drone strikes, and fun-sounding spycraft terminology, Steven Soderbergh’s Black Bag is also an unapologetically sexy romance. Despite its modern flourishes, it’s the reliable old set pieces- dinner parties, lie detector tests- where this film truly shines.
Mickey 17 (Now in theaters)- Robert Pattinson gives a couple incredible performances in Bong Joon Ho’s new sci-fi adventure. He plays Mickey, a man who didn’t read the fine print, and is thus doomed to die over and over at the behest of his corporate overlords. Outside of its fantastic central performance, the film is a big, messy swing, something that I wish we saw more of in our dire, blockbuster-by-committee landscape.
Singles (Available to buy and rent digitally)- By and large, I am not a fan of Cameron Crowe. That said, I found Singles to be not only palatable, but pretty fun! I think a large part of this enjoyment is how immersed in ‘90s Seattle the movie is, and watching it here with a very game crowd doesn’t hurt, either.
Eh
The Equalizer (Streaming on Peacock and Tubi) - Without Denzel Washington, this forgettable action thriller would have no pulse at all. But it has Denzel!
Yikes
Companion (Available to buy and rent digitally)- I found this horror film incredibly dull. It’s all plot, and every development is telegraphed well in advance. I can’t think of a single impactful image in the entire thing.
Best rewatches
All About Eve (Available to buy and rent digitally)- Quite simply one of the greatest scripts ever written, delivered by some of the greatest actors to ever act. It is as stunning, sharp, and hilarious as I remember it being.
All About My Mother (Available to buy and rent digitally)- I didn’t do this exceptional Pedro Almodóvar film as a double feature with All About Eve, but watching them in close proximity was illuminating. They enhance each other, two excellent films having a conversation across decades.
The Thing (Available to buy and rent digitally)- This screened in at a local IMAX theater. It wasn’t optimized for IMAX, but John Carpenter’s sci-fi horror film was still as relentlessly paced and purely entertaining as ever!
Starship Troopers (Streaming on Prime Video)- When Francois Truffaut said, "There's no such thing as an anti-war movie,” he could never have anticipated Paul Verhoeven’s astonishing film. Mickey 17 pulled a few too many punches in excoriating its would-be space fascists, which put me in the mood to revisit this.
Devil in a Blue Dress (Available to buy and rent digitally)- Carl Franklin’s absorbing neo-noir follows a black private investigator (Denzel!) swept up in the case of a missing white woman in ‘40s Los Angeles. The film reworks classic noir tropes to astonishing and incisive effect; it’s a familiar mystery warped by segregation and the ever-present threat of racial violence.
To Die For2 (Streaming on The Criterion Channel)-Wherever Nicole Kidman’s Suzanne Stone goes, she is the eye of the storm; her magnetism draws people into her orbit, and she spits them out (or worse) once they’ve served their purpose. Like so many femme fatales, she’s fun to watch because she’s unapologetic.
Death Proof3 (Streaming on Starz)- One of Quentin Tarantino’s most underrated films, including by the director himself.
Smiley Face (Streaming on Prime Video and Tubi)- Anna Faris anchors this hilarious Gregg Araki stoner comedy, structured as a hilarious extension of her character Jane’s hazy consciousness. She meanders around Los Angeles in an attempt to get more pot, go to an audition, and pay her power bill, getting sidetracked and changing course nearly every step of the way.
First Cow (Available to buy and rent digitally)- Kelly Reichardt’s world-weary drama is essentially a heist film. The job: Sneaking onto an aristocrat’s land in the middle of the night and milking his prized dairy cow to make cakes! If that doesn’t convince you to give this a spin, I don’t know what will.
The Departed (Available to buy and rent digitally)- Rewatched on St. Patrick’s Day. Microprawcessahs!
The Lion King (Streaming on Disney+)- Hadn’t seen this in like 15 years and I feel like it opened old psychic wounds (complimentary).
Television
The Traitors UK: Season 3 (Streaming on Peacock)- Immediately after the conclusion of the newest U.S. season, the real gem of this franchise dropped on Peacock. I thought two of the Traitors in this season were some of the best I’ve seen in any iteration of this show! It simply works better as a traditional reality show than it does with the American version’s insistence on a Who’s Who cast of contestants.
Boston Legal: Season 2 (Streaming on Hulu)- My rewatch of this incredibly dated 2000s legal procedural has slowed down, but is still in progress. In this season, Betty White kills Leslie Jordan with a frying pan, and James Spader gets her acquitted.
The Pitt: Season 1 (Streaming on Max)- I’m 6 or 7 episodes into this and enjoying it quite a bit. Familiar medical show trappings with the tickling clock urgency of 24. Feels like an algorithm premise, but hey, it works!
The White Lotus: Season 3 (Streaming on Max)- I haven’t watched the newest episode, but still feel this season is on par with past ones. Wealthy ennui at sun-drenched resorts, the looming threat of murder, and sometimes humorous, sometimes sad psychosexual banter… It’s fine! Thought Sam Rockwell’s much-hyped monologue was stupid though 😄
Paradise: Season 1 (Streaming on Hulu)- I have a couple of episodes of this show left. It’s so silly, incredibly overwrought, and very watchable!
Video games
Atomfall- I finished this game over the weekend, and am working on a longer piece on it. For now, I will say: I am quite mixed on the final result, as strong as some of it was.
Avowed4- I did another playthrough of this game, and am still quite taken with its detailed political backdrop. Play it!
What have you all been up to this month, cinematically and otherwise?
Reviews of Eephus, Black Bag, and Mickey 17 here. You’re welcome for not linking them individually 😇