Making You the You You Are
February 3, 2025 6:23 AM   Subscribe

THIS WEEK IN FANFARE... A list of Best Documentary Feature Nominees. NEW MOVIES: Sophie Thatcher tries to be the perfect girlfriend, ends up running for her life in Companion; Captain Underpants author Dav Pilkey's Dog Man scampers onto screens; Mark Wahlberg plays against type in Flight Risk. Meanwhile, people still have a lot to say about Nosferatu and Star Trek: Section 31. AND IN TV: A new episode of Severance and its fictional self-help book The You You Are gets a real e-book. Also new in TV: season/series posts for American Manhunt: OJ Simpson; the Netflix adaptation of One Hundred Years of Solitude; and the Sharon Horgan dark comedy Bad Sisters. SPECIAL EVENTS: The 2025 Grammys, The FireAid Benefit Concert, and a new Rifftrax take on Lancelot, Guardian of Time. Bonus inside this week: a massive list of all of the A24 films posted on Fanfare.

2025 Academy Award Nominees for Best Documentary Feature Film
  • Black Box Diaries - Japanese Journalist Shiori Ito investigates her own sexual assault, seeking to prosecute the high-profile offender.
  • No Other Land - This film made by a Palestinian-Israeli collective shows the destruction of the occupied West Bank's Masafer Yatta by Israeli soldiers and the alliance which develops between the Palestinian activist Basel and Israeli journalist Yuval.
  • Porcelain War - Under roaring fighter jets and missile strikes, Ukrainian artists Slava, Anya, and Andrey choose to stay behind and fight, contending with the soldiers they have become.
  • Soundtrack to a Coup d'Etat - Jazz and decolonization are entwined in this historical rollercoaster that rewrites the Cold War episode that led musicians Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach to crash the UN Security Council in protest against the murder of Patrice Lumumba .
  • Sugarcane - An investigation into abuse and missing children at an Indian residential school in Canada ignites a reckoning on the nearby Sugarcane Reserve.
Recently Released Movies with New Posts
  • Companion - New horror thriller with Sophie Thatcher (Yellowjackets) has trailers that tell you maybe more than you would want to know.
  • Dog Man - A new animated family comedy/adventure, based on the series by Dav Pilkey (Captain Underpants).
  • Flight Risk - Mark Wahlberg stars in a new action thriller about US marshals escorting a fugitive to trial.
New/Recent Films with Posts Under Active Discussion Older Releases, New to FanFare
  • Out of the Blue - Harrowing 1980 Dennis Hopper film stars Linda Manz as an abused teen struggling to find a way forward as nihilism beckons.
  • Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter - Hammer's genre-blending attempt to create a swashbuckling horror hero who hunts and kills vampires. From 1974.
  • Diary of a Mad Housewife - Oscar-nominated 1970 dramedy about a woman (Carrie Snodgrass) whose attempt to escape the frustration of her bad marriage with an affair only leads her to more awful men.
  • The Dark and the Wicked - Plagued by waking nightmares, two siblings suspect that something evil is taking over their family at an isolated farmhouse. A 2020 horror film from Bryan Bertino (the original version of The Strangers.
  • 17 Blocks Acclaimed documentary tells the story of the Sanfords, a DC family hit hard by addiction and gun violence, through their own footage.
  • Kin-dza-dza! - Soviet sci-fi comedy from 1986 about two earthlings stuck on the planet Pluke, navigating its absurd social customs and language.
  • Last Man Standing - Walter Hill's 1996 gangaster reworking of Yojimbo stars Bruce Willis.
  • Absolute Beginners - Young Brits seeking stardom in the late 1950's in 1986 Julien Temple musical with Patsy Kensit, David Bowie, Ray Davies, Eddie O'Connell.
  • After the Wedding - Mads Mikkelsen stars in this 2006 drama as the manager of a struggling orphanage in India, sent to Copenhagen to secure a donation from a mysterious benefactor.
  • Kumdo: Age of the Rampant - Joseon-era Korean action yarn from 2014.
  • Blue Ruin - 2013 drama from filmmaker Jeremy Saulnier (Green Room, Rebel Ridge) about a beach bum, driven to become an agent of revenge.
  • Cómo ves? - Gritty 1986 musical about life in the ghettos of Mexico City features a soundtrack of Mexican rock music.
  • Runaway Train - Oscar-nominated 1985 thriller about prison escapees stuck on an out-of-control train. Based on a script by Akira Kurosawa. Starring Jon Voight and Eric Roberts.
Previous Films with New Comments on Fanfare Current TV Shows with New Posts Current/Recent Shows People Are Still Discussing in Recent-ish Posts and Comments Older TV Shows and Rewatches with New Posts and/or Comments Special Events
Books
  • Diavola - Jennifer Thorne skewers all-too-familiar family dynamics in this sly, wickedly funny vacation-Gothic from 2024.
  • The You You Are - The fictitious self-help book from the Apple TV puzzle box show gets a real-life e-book version.
  • Chain Gang All-Stars - The 2023 debut by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is set in a dystopian near-future America where prison systems have been transformed into a brutal, televised blood sport called the Criminal Action Penal Entertainment (CAPE) program.
  • James - New comments on the Percival Everett book.
A24 on FanFare

in reverse order of release
posted by DirtyOldTown (10 comments total) 22 users marked this as a favorite
 
Calling out box for posting those King of the Hill episodes

I recently spotted a Bobby Hill tattoo on someone, they had just purchased a kiln-fired clay dong at a market in southern Mexico (as one does)
posted by ginger.beef at 6:58 AM on February 3 [4 favorites]


I promised to take my son to see Dog Man, glad to see the reviews here seem to think it's bearable for adults.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 7:36 AM on February 3


I recently spotted a Bobby Hill tattoo on someone, they had just purchased a kiln-fired clay dong at a market in southern Mexico (as one does)

Early contender for least-foreseen sentence of the week.
posted by Halloween Jack at 8:48 AM on February 3 [6 favorites]


It's been interesting to me, as I have compiled these that the Trek shows (and Stargate SG:1) basically never die.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:46 AM on February 3 [2 favorites]


Looking back at SG1, I find it interesting how different. some of these early episodes feel compared to the later seasons. You can see the core of what makes the show tick later coming through, but there's a lot of stuff that was surprising to revisit. I will wonder if it really is the showtime/scifi switch that actually makes the change, or if it happens before that official switch.
posted by Carillon at 11:33 AM on February 3


Even if you've had the supposed twist spoiled for you (though it's part of the setup, not the climax, so even then BFD) Companion is this year's current leader in the see-it-before-people-ruin-it-for-you derby.

The way it plays knowingly with serious issues, but is ultimately just trying to be a fun thriller is going to set a million bad takes a-typing. I think you're gonna get people swearing it's deep (it's not) or that it tried to be deep and failed (it didn't).

It's a fun film with leads doing very fun work.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:52 AM on February 3 [1 favorite]


Should I be embarrassed that new Severance is giving me something to live for this week? Probably.
posted by eirias at 7:51 PM on February 3 [1 favorite]


Mod note: fixed title, per DirtyOldTown!

Also, The You You Are, now helping itself on the sidebar and Best Of blog!
posted by taz (staff) at 12:33 AM on February 4


I’m an A24 fan but I hadn’t realised they had done so many films!
posted by ellieBOA at 8:10 AM on February 4 [1 favorite]


There should be threads for all the Best Picture nominees too, dangit, and there are a couple missing. Lemme start those.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 5:53 AM on February 5


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