Watch List Weekly Recap 5/12/23
Birds, Blackberrys, vampire bats, and Michael J. Fox -- it was an interesting week.
This is the Friday recap of Ty Burr’s Watch List postings for the week. If you’d like to cut down on in-box clutter and receive this weekly email ONLY, please go to your account page and under “Email notifications” uncheck every box except “Weekly Digest.” If you’d prefer to not receive it at all, uncheck just “Weekly Digest.”
Spring migration is peaking, so faithful Watch List readers know I have to write something about birds. This one just popped into my head while I was out in the field the other day. I suppose it represents the Venn Diagram overlap of my two main interests. Anyway, enjoy. (For paid subscribers.)
I’ve always felt that “Vampire’s Kiss” (1988, ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ 1/2) got a bum rap from both critics and audiences who looked at it and saw only an early Nicolas Cage freak show. It’s that, sure, but also a dark, almost Nabokovian comedy of a lost Manhattan soul. Now that this year’s “Renfield” (⭐ ⭐ 1/2), in which Cage plays Dracula himself, is arriving on VOD, it seemed like a good time to make a case for the earlier film.
A fully-loaded Friday round-up: Reviews of a fine Michael J. Fox documentary on Apple TV+, a Ben Affleck misfire in theaters, the real-life corporate farce “Blackberry,” and a drama about an evangelical Christian girl in full adolescent rebellion. Plus movie suggestions for all the major services.
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