Falling in love with a movie is a thrill, and sharing that thrill with another movie lover is always a good time. But most movie nerds will tell you that the richest discussions about cinema are the arguments — good-natured ones, at least — especially those disagreements about films that seem to have all the elements of greatness but somehow fall short. Such confounding near misses were the focus of my spirited Substack Live this week with Shea Serrano of Good Movie.
What makes a movie go from simply not great to truly disappointing? How can you really say something is disappointing if you enjoyed almost all of it, as in the case of A House of Dynamite? (The ending, or lack thereof, left Shea “furious” as he recounts.) What’s the movie that seemed to disappoint cinephiles the most this year?
Among the titles we discussed: Mickey 17, Megan 2.0, Superman, The Fantastic Four, After the Hunt, How to Train Your Dragon and Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning. However, you’ll have to subscribe to find out which ones were ultimately determined to be disappointments. We also talked about Shea’s new book, Expensive Basketball, and why so many movie nerds are basketball nerds and vice versa. In the end, whether it’s sports or cinema, we’re all just in it for the story.
However, I want to flag one thing for you paid subscribers before you press play — in case you think this chat is just going to be about negative energy.
