This week on The Movie Gourmet – new reviews of two music documentaries, Louis Armstrong’s Black and Blues and The Return of Tanya Tucker: Featuring Brandi Carlile, and the surprisingly thoughtful anti-war comedy The Greatest Beer Run Ever. And I’ve recently refreshed The most eclectic watch-at-home recommendations you’ll find ANYWHERE.
CURRENT MOVIES
- Tar: a haughty spirit before a fall. In theaters.
- Triangle of Sadness: more subtlety, please. In theaters.
- Amsterdam: a star-studded thriller without the thrills. In theaters.
- The Greatest Beer Run Ever: a blowhard plans a stunt, gets an education. AppleTV.
- Don’t Worry, Darling: a misfire (but with Huell Howser’s cool house). In theaters.
- Louis Armstrong’s Black and Blues: what Armstrong was really thinking. AppleTV.
- The Return of Tanya Tucker: Featuring Brandi Carlile: she’s still a handful. In theaters.
- The Grand Bolero: passion unlocked. Amazon.
- Spin Me Round: an unpretentious and delightful comedy. AppleTV.
- My Donkey, My Lover and I: it had me at the title. AppleTV.
WATCH AT HOME
The most eclectic watch-at-home recommendations you’ll find ANYWHERE:
- Her Smell: powerhouse Elisabeth Moss. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
- Augustine: obsession, passion and the birth of a science. Amazon (included with Prime), AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
- Phoenix: riveting psychodrama, wowzer ending. Amazon, AppleTV, YouTube.
- Headhunters: from smoothly confident scoundrel to human piñata. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube, redbox.
- Grizzly Man: a fool’s misadventure. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
- Take Me to the River: fresh, unpredictable and gripping. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
- Lost Solace: a psychopath afflicted by empathy. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
ON TV
On November 12 and13, Turner Classic Movies will present a film on Eddie Muller’s Noir Alley that I haven’t yet written about. It’s the deliciously sordid Tension, where Quimby (Richard Basehart), the wimpy night manager of a drugstore, has one of the worst wives in film noir. Claire (Audrey Totter) spends her daytime hours belittling Quimby and her nighttime hours cuckholding him. When she moves into Barney’s beach house and lets the hairy-chested Barney (Lloyd Gough) beat up her nerdy hubbie, the humiliated Quimby has had enough. There’s a murder and a frame. Wikll the cops find the real murderer? Rising star Cyd Charisse plays the good girl, and Barry Sullivan plays the cop who outsmarts them all.
