Latest / Pick Up and Deliver / May 2025 Movie Roundup
Transcript
- Untitled - July 15, 2025 00:00:00 Speaker: Welcome to Pickup and Delivery, the podcast where I pick up my audio recorder as I step out for a walk and deliver an episode to you while I stroll around. I'm Brendan Riley. Well, good morning, listeners. It's a lovely day here in suburban Chicago. I'm out for a walk and enjoying the weather and talking to you about games. The birds are all chirping today. The sun is out, but it's not brutally hot, at least not yet. And I am really keeping up with things. So let's jump into it. I was looking back at some of the regular episodes that I've run recently, and I realized I haven't done a movie roundup in a minute, so let's do that. It's time for the Movie Roundup May 2025. If you're not familiar with the Movie Roundup format in this, in this episode, I will talk about movies that I watched in a specific time period, usually a month. This will be May 2025. I'll talk a little bit about what the movie was like, what I thought of the movie, and then I usually try to come up with, like, if you were going to watch the movie and play a game, what game might you play with that movie? So that's kind of the vibe I'm going for here. If you're not a movie person or you're not interested in talking about movies, maybe this episode isn't for you. I hope you'll stay and listen, but I'd understand if you don't. So let's just jump right in. This first movie I was reminded of because I was talking with a young person 20 something or 19, 19, 18 year old who watches a lot of movies, and they were recommending movies or asking, have you seen this movie or that movie? And so I suggested that they watch City of Lost Children, which is a delightfully weird, sort of fantastical movie about a group, a sort of found family of strange weirdos who are maybe evil. I don't remember, it's been a while. It's a weird movie, but a delight. And then I remembered, hey, I haven't seen anything from the director of that film, Jean-Paul Jeunet, Basically since he made Amelie. Now, this is a director who made a bunch of movies in the late 90s and early 2000. He made delicatessen. City of lost children. Then he was the director of the fourth alien movie, which I like, but a lot of people don't. Alien resurrection. And then he directed Amelie, and that was sort of the, I think, probably the high point in terms of people knowing who he was outside of France. He's a French director after Amelie, his next picture was Micmacs, which is much closer in tone to Amelie. It's sort of like halfway between Amelie and City of Lost Children. The premise is there's this guy, this kid whose parents are both killed by, or whose father I think his mother is. I don't remember what happened to his mother. He's an orphan in some way. His father is killed by a landmine created by One Arms Company, and later he's working at a video store, and there's a gunfight in the street outside, and he's hit by a stray bullet, and he loses his job and some of his. I think he loses some of his ability to like it messes with his head a little bit. So he shot in the head. And the arms manufacturer that made the bullet that he was shot with is a is also is another arms manufacturer. And then one day he's sort of wandering around. He can't keep a job because of his injury. And he ends up connecting with this sort of found family of outcasts who have delightfully weird talents and a sort of loving family relationship with one another. And he joins them, and they live in a junkyard under in a sort of cave they've dug into the hillside of junk, where they make weird machines and delight each other. And it's a it's kind of lovely. And then he finds one day he's out scavenging or something, he and he finds a street where on one side of the street is one of the arms manufacturers that killed, that killed his father. And on the other side of the street, right across, is one of their competitors, the one who made the bullet that hit him. And so he asks the people in his found family to help take take down these companies. And what results is the sort of madcap, delightful set of strange events and weird circumstances that result in. Well, I'll let you figure it out. It's a it's a delight. It is everything. I was hoping it would be really fun. Cute. Super weird. Exactly the kind of thing I was hoping. And it makes me sad that when I was looking, then Jean-Paul Jeunet has not done a lot of films. Or Jean, Jean-Paul, Jean-Pierre Jeunet. It doesn't seem like he's done a lot of films since then, but also the title Micmacs Micmacs is essentially it means shenanigans, which fits because that is what they're doing in the movie. That's Micmacs from 2009, as I think about what game I might play that has that feeling of whimsy and justice. I think a light adventure game is probably the right connection, and given the the set of whimsy connected to it, I think probably the right bet is something like Stuffed Fables or Mice and Mystics. Now, admittedly, both of these games are pretty old and I think the gameplay in them is dated. I thought Stuffed Fables was fine, the storytelling was fine. I didn't enjoy the gameplay much at all. Mice and mystics. I remember enjoying it, but it's literally been 15. Well, ten years at least. Probably, uh, 12 years. 13 years since I played it. So hard to say what it's actually like, but, uh, that that would be the closest thing I can think of to that. Next up, we have a comedy special that I watched, which is it was like 90 minutes. So I'm calling it a movie. This is Bill Burr, the Drop Dead Years. Bill Burr is an interesting figure. I think I like I think his heart is in the right place. He often says stuff that are a little off or a little uncouth, or sometimes show perspective that I wouldn't have. But I think he's exploring these things. Honestly, I think he grows. He's growing. I think he's one of the few figures that kind of crosses the aisle, but I think he stands on the right side of it. I think he appeals to people on both sides. He's a complex figure, but I enjoyed this special. It was really interesting and kind of funny. I don't know what. I guess I don't know what game you would play paired with a stand up special, except I think there are games that are kind of about stand up comedy, or probably a party game about telling jokes, joking, hazard, maybe. Or you could even do. I can't remember it now. The one where you're. Oh, party, party. Any of these where part of the idea is you're making jokes as you play? I really like I think those would fit given the context of the stand up comedy. So that's my suggestion for Bill Burr, the drop Dead Years, if you want a slightly angled version of that. I know there's a game called The Mandalorian Adventures. I haven't played it, but since Bill Burr is a guest star on one of The Mandalorian Adventures episodes, I think you could, uh, reasonably play that and say, oh, I'm playing a Bill Burr related thing. So that is Bill Burr, the drop Dead years 2025. So the next couple of movies that I watched, I watched while I was recovering from having my wisdom teeth removed. So if I remember these a little weird. I was on pain meds. They weren't real super strong pain meds, so I was I was fine, but I, I spent about a day convalescing just to get over the pain of it. The first one that I watched was a movie I wanted to watch for a long time, and I just finally got around to watching it. It was the in-laws. The in-laws is a Peter, Peter Falk and Alan Arkin movie, both of whom I think are great in this movie, Peter Falk plays a CIA operative who is trying to do something. I don't remember exactly what. And his daughter or his son is marrying Alan Arkin's daughter. So we meet. We meet him through the perspective of Alan Arkin. Who is a sort of, um, dentist. He is a dentist. Not sort of a dentist. He's a dentist with a kind of nervous affect, although much more proactive and reactive than his character in some other films. A little bit more put together, but both he and Peter Falk end up getting in in trouble. And it's sort of one of these hesitant person pulled along in dramatic fashion by a outgoing person. It's pretty entertaining. I really liked it. It is a movie I'd happily watch again. The madcap Peter Falk is somebody I really enjoy and I'm always going to like seeing him in a movie. I strongly recommend. If you haven't seen The In-Laws, you definitely should. It's really, really good. Also short small appearance by Ed Begley Jr, which is always welcome to my mind. And like I said, Alan Arkin and Peter Falk both just having the times of their lives. Not this is not a great game for the Bechdel test or movie for the Bechdel test. There are really only three named women in the movie, and all three of them spend their time talking about what the male characters are doing. As I recall, there might be one scene where Alan Arkin's wife and Alan Arkin's daughter talk about the wedding, but generally, uh, it is it falls into that category, I'm afraid. Now what game, what movie would I watch in concert with? Or what game would I play in concert with the in-laws? This is a tricky one, and I am having trouble thinking of one that would fit. You would want it to be a sort of spy adventure game, but like The Accidental Spy is not generally a genre that we see in board games, which makes me think maybe it should. I guess the closest I'd say there's an interesting game called redacted, which is David Turkey's first design, in which players are trying to steal plans from the embassy and or steal plans from each other and or turn around the the drama at the embassy, or find the other spies at the embassy. So there's a sort of dramatic element of finding these plans outmaneuvering each other. And you also don't know who's on your team and you don't know which team other people are on. So there's a really it really is basically modeled around a board game based on the opening scene of the first Tom Cruise Mission Impossible movie, where they are in an embassy and they're trying to steal the plans, and there might be other agents there trying to countermand them. So that's redacted, which I think would be a fine accompaniment to the in-laws. It's also sort of a madcap, weird game, which sort of fits because The In-Laws is a madcap, weird movie. Next up is another 1971 movie, The Andromeda Strain. I'm not sure this one is sort of the height of my. Oh, I guess I'll just watch whatever delirium in the day after I got my wisdom teeth out. I don't remember liking The Andromeda Strain, particularly all that much as a movie, but I hadn't seen it in a very long time. I read the book a long, long time ago. It maybe was my third Michael Crichton novel to read that I read. I read Jurassic Park first, and then I read sphere, and then I think I read The Andromeda Strain, and as a novel, The Andromeda Strain is a really tight little medical thriller with a little bit of science in it as a movie. I mean, it's got the same stuff, but it doesn't hit the same. Uh, it also really aged poorly in some elements. There's a bit of a racial component and definitely a sexist component that feels not good. The technology part is interesting. There's some technology in the movie that feels ahead of its time and would have felt very futuristic at the era, particularly the use. The way they use computers, I think is fascinating. All in all, The Andromeda Strain is a fine movie from the 70s. It's a thriller. It'd be fine to watch while you're doing something else, like a crossword puzzle or a regular puzzle. Like it's very talky. There are visuals that matter, but there's a lot that where you don't it. It's a passable movie. It's fine. It's fine if you haven't seen it. There's a couple scenes that are really interesting. The when the virus first shows up is particularly compelling. But I mean, I think, I think the miniseries for Stephen King's The Stand is a better version of that, for example. If I were thinking about what game I might play to go with The Andromeda Strain, I think I would have to go with pandemic. Just the original straight up pandemic. Actually, pandemic legacy might be interesting. Obviously it doesn't work because The Andromeda Strain is one two hour movie and pandemic legacy. You play 12 to 24 times. But here's where the connection lies. For me in The Andromeda Strain, one thing is that the virus changes over time, and that creates sort of dramatic elements in the movie. And this is also true in pandemic legacy. Over, over time, the disease changes. Sorry if I've spoiled something for you, but you've had a decade. I don't know, a decade. You've had several years to play it. And I think the idea that the game changes over time should not be a surprise if you know what a legacy game is. So I don't think I've ruined anything. So that's pandemic legacy. A nice pairing for The Andromeda Strain, which is a 1971 movie based on Michael Crichton's novel from the late 1960s, which, as an aside, Michael Crichton wrote while he was a med student at Harvard Harvard Medical School. It was a very smart guy, even if in his later years he turned super conservative and I guess he probably always was super conservative. If you read disclosure, you'd know. Yeah, he came to like, think climate change is fake and that sort of thing. It's a bummer because I really liked Jurassic Park. Next up, I watched The Fall Guy from 2024. This is a Ryan Gosling Emily Blunt adventure movie or action movie Ryan Gosling. It's named after a TV show starring Lee majors, and we saw Lee majors and the female lead from the show. I apologize, I don't remember her name. They both show up in as a cameo at the end of the fall. Guy. Um, so this is a movie based on the TV show where the main character is a stuntman. In the films, Ryan Gosling plays Colt Seaver, I believe is his name, and he plays the stuntman who is in love with this producer and was the primary stuntman for a particular actor until he has an accident, and then it's sort of about his attempt at a comeback. It's a very fun. It's a funny movie with really good action sequences and a nice commentary on the nature of stunt work. There's a funny element in there where somebody is watching all the stunt work and reflecting on how hard it is and dangerous it is, and says, oh, you know, can you guys. Have you ever won an Oscar for that? And he's like, they don't give out Oscars for that. And I mean, the cool thing is now they do. So I think The Fall guy was a pretty good movie. I mean, it's silly but interesting and I had a good time with it. There's also some really funny Nods to filmmaking itself. In it, there's like, for instance, there's a conversation about split screen while they're doing a split screen on the screen. Next up is Paddington in Peru. This is the third of the Paddington movies, and while I think it's not as good as Paddington two, I feel like they have definitely cracked the formula to make these movies entertaining. Uh, heartfelt and enjoyable. Uh, one of the big things is they bring in a couple top tier stars, people who carry a lot of weight as actors, and then they let them just chew the scenery up in Paddington two. It was Hugh Grant and Brendan Gleeson as the scenery chewers. And in Paddington three, Paddington in Peru, it's Olivia Colman and Antonio Banderas, and both of them do a great job. We also have most of the cast returning, although we now have Emily Mortimer as the mom Instead of whoever played the mom before, which is kind of weird, but I get the I get they they'd rather recast the movie The Mom than like, write her out. So because you'd have to if you're gonna have the mom die or something, you'd have to address that. I guess they could have had her be away, but I guess the the mom didn't want to participate at all. The person who'd been playing the mom before. So Emily Mortimer stepped in and did a fine job. Paddington in Peru was a delight. It's weird, but well worth watching if you get a chance. Now, if we're talking about adventure games with little animals, I can't help but think of the ones I mentioned before mice and mystics and Stuffed fables. But neither of those really fits the The Jungle theme. So I'm going to go a little off track here, because I did actually think of a book and a game when I was watching the movie, and that was the book, The Lost City of Z and the game The Lost Expedition, both of which are about searching in the Amazon for lost civilizations. Now, the Amazon, of course, is a very lush and fecund place, but it's full of real dangers. When explorers would go into the Amazon in the early the late 1800s or the early 1900s, they would often encounter incredible dangers. They could get bug bites that would get infected, or they'd sometimes have bugs, like lay eggs in their skin. They would face immense danger in terms of heat stroke and supplies. There were when they would encounter the people who lived in the Amazon. They were often not friendly, as I wouldn't probably be if I were them. And so the movie or the the book explores a lot of these different dangers, as does the game. Pierre Sylvestre has a great game called The Lost Expedition, which is about trying to find this great lost city. You don't even have to get out, you just have to find it. You start with three explorers. If you even one of them makes it to the city, you've done a good job or you've done a winning job anyway. Maybe not a good job. It's a really vibrant game with great art that's scary and gross and good tension. You can play it as a two player game, but I find it. I really like it as a solo game and I haven't played it in a while, but definitely one I'm keeping around, so I couldn't help but think of that as an accompaniment to Paddington in Peru because of the location. Now, narratively, it doesn't fit at all. Paddington, Peru is a a light, cute game movie where about a family trying to rescue another family member. So you certainly could go that way. But like, I was like I was saying, if I was going to go that way, I would say Stuffed fables has got to be your choice, because. I would say Stuffed fables has got to be your choice, because the cute, the nature of it being cute just is really important. By contrast, I think the idea of the jungle, which the reason I thought of it because there's a part where the family believes themselves to be stranded in the jungle and they just like, go walking in the in the rainforest. And I couldn't help but think of like, all the dangers that we learn about in the book and that game or in the book. And I couldn't help but think of how the game would make a good accompaniment to that movie. So that is Paddington in Peru from 2024. All right. The last movie I'm going to talk about today is from 2025. It's one of the only films, if not the only film, I've gone to see in the theater this year. This is sinners. Sinners is a movie about the black experience in the 20s. It's also a horror movie. It's also a movie about family and trying to make your way in a world that's against you. It's a musical with incredible musical sequences. It's incredibly well acted. I don't want to say too much about the plot, because it is a movie that I think you should see as unspoiled as you can, and I think you should definitely see it. It's really good. If it's not nominated for Best Picture this year, I'm going to be mad. If it doesn't win Best Picture, I won't be surprised, but I'll. I think it's definitely worthy of consideration. I haven't there's a lot of 2020. There are a lot of 2025 movies I haven't seen. So arguing for Best Picture halfway through the year with a lot of movies I haven't seen is silly, but anything else that comes out is going to be in conversation with, but not automatically defeating sinners as far as I'm concerned. Now, there are a couple of ways to go. If you think about what kind of game would you play alongside this movie? On the one hand, you could go with content. There is. There are multiple games about speakeasies. There is a game called Speakeasy Blues that came out a couple years ago that you could play. There is a new game coming out called speakeasy, which I think fits the genre there. I think that the game. The movie would also welcome something about being trapped and trying to figure out who's who's a traitor. You could look at even a game like werewolf would work in the context of the movie, or a game that has a hidden traitor component. You could look at the thing. Although the thing is weird to play in the context of another movie because it is directly about a movie. So I would say you could use Panic Station, which is sort of like if someone made the thing but didn't have license for it and has a sort of interesting or weird card exchange mechanism. It's one of the games I've kept on my shelf for a long time and haven't played, but would enjoy playing at some point, but any of these games have at their heart this idea of potential betrayal by somebody within your circle. I would say the third angle you could take, and this is maybe what makes sinners so interesting, is there are literally a bunch of different themes or ideas that you could draw on. The third one would be making music because there is a big thread in the movie about the the nature of music and the relationship of music to community. So you could go with one of the games that have come out recently about being a musician. There's on tour, there is Rock hard 1975. Those are two that I think would fit the genre pretty well. I don't know of any games necessarily about being a blues musician, which is what's what the movie is about, but I think there's a lot to be said for playing a game that has to do with music. There's also Roland Wright records from the same game company that makes summit, and I can't remember the name of it right now, but I guess the long and short of it is sinners is a fantastic movie that you should definitely watch if you can. And that could really foster an interesting night. I didn't even I kind of left out the main thing. Go ahead and skip. Skip ahead one minute if you don't want to be spoiled about the movie. Actually, no, I'm going to I'm going to offer this as a commentary after the closing credits. So listen on past the closing credits if you want to hear more about sinners. Well, that's about it for me today. I want to say thank you for joining me on my walk. If you would like to share your thoughts about these movies or other games, head over to BoardGameGeek Guild 3269 and share your thoughts there. If you have a message. For me, the easiest way to get a hold of me is on BoardGameGeek. Wombat 929 is my username or I do also have an email Brendan at rattlebox Games.com. Well, thanks for joining me on my walk today. I hope that your next walk is as pleasant as mine was. Bye bye. All right, this is just another moment talking about sinners. If you haven't seen it, I recommend scrolling away unless you're absolutely not going to watch it, in which case you should watch it. But still, if you have seen it and or don't mind it being spoiled a bit, here it is. So the movie is also a vampire movie. I think depending on the media you've encountered, it may or may not be clear that it's a vampire movie up front. I knew, but I wish I hadn't. I think it was a nice twist. They do establish it relatively early, so I guess it's not a huge spoiler, but that does beg the question. Like a vampire game could fit as well. I think One Night Ultimate Vampire is probably the best one in that regard, because the question of who the vampire is works well. But another one I think you could play is til Dawn, which is a Richard Launius push your luck game that involves being a vampire and going out and hunting, and the idea of going out and stalking your prey and hunting works really well for this game. I would say. The other one, if you were going to play a vampire game, is The Hunt, The Hunger, which is a top 50 game for me. This is a Richard Garfield pusher luck game about or sort of a push your luck deck builder about being a vampire and looking for, uh, food out in the countryside. So those are a couple of games you could play along with sinners. Also bite. Brought to you by Rattlebox games. Hello.