🎬 "You wouldn't like me when I'm ... hungry."

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Kahaani is a solidly entertaining Indian crime thriller with a really strong sense of place. Vidya Balan stars as a woman from London who arrives in Kolkata following the trail of her missing husband, and crosses paths with a federal agent looking for a suspected terrorist. As it turns out, that terrorist at least looks like the man Balan seeks, and the city is teeming with secrets and liars.

I loved Balan’s performance and was consistently invested in the huge cast of characters around her, although I wished the story was a bit tighter and more focused. In particular, one of the antagonists is absolutely terrifying (you know who I’m talking about if you’ve seen this), but their implausible exit from the story robbed the movie of a lot of its sense of danger.

Despite my nitpicks, I enjoyed Kahaani and would recommend it — if only to have more friends with whom I can discuss the ending with spoilers. ★★★½

Kahaani is currently streaming on Netflix.

The Incredible Hulk is a fascinating artifact within the Marvel Cinematic Universe — and not just because it’s Edward Norton’s only turn as the Hulk before he was recast with Mark Ruffalo.

Released almost back to back with Iron Man, it takes a much more serious tone than that movie, which makes some sense because the title character’s super-abilities here are more of a liability than a privilege. Norton is a good fit for this tone, depressive and nervous, albeit rarely heroic; I was not as convinced by his doe-eyed, unquestioning love interest, played by Liv Tyler, who seems to have no issue with the fact that he almost killed her.

Also unlike Iron Man, which very gently criticizes the military-industrial complex, this movie doesn’t even engage with themes that would have been germane to its story, such as military overreach, toxic masculinity or science ethics. I did appreciate that this is not a straight origin story — all of that is covered in the opening credits — but I can’t fully recommend this one. ★★★

The Incredible Hulk is not currently streaming anywhere, but you can rent or buy it on these digital platforms.

I went into Iron Man 2 with very low expectations; the last time I saw it in its entirety was when it hit theaters in 2010, and I remember walking out of that theater thinking the whole Marvel experiment was a bust. What did I know?

There are certainly problems with this movie that still bother me 10 years later: The hastiness imposed by having two main villains, the sudden and unearned romance, and the unnecessarily contrived way Tony Stark escapes from his lowest point in Act Two. That said, I liked this movie a lot more than I expected to, perhaps because I know now how the character arcs of Iron Man and the other Avengers will resolve. But I appreciated the character development for Stark, the hilarious performance Sam Rockwell as his foil Justin Hammer, and the dynamically animated action scenes.

Plus, this movie gives us brief but entertaining introductions to both Scarlett Johansson’s character Natalia Romanoff (née Black Widow) and Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury; if you’re the sort of person who at least admires the Marvel conceit of interconnected movies, this is a model of how to do it pretty well. ★★★½

Iron Man 2 is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video and Disney+.

I accidentally had a ScarJo double feature on Sunday, because I realized just hours before showtime that my girlfriend and I had tickets to a drive-in screening of Lost in Translation.

Directed by Sofia Coppola and starring Johansson and Bill Murray, this is a beautifully shot and meditative movie that is a Rorschach test for your insecurities. Both main characters are Americans staying at a fancy hotel in Tokyo, and both feel stuck in different but comparable ways — ScarJo is young and directionless but already married and wrestling with ennui, while Murray is an aging movie star whose career and 25-year-marriage have become perfunctory.

By the end of the movie, there is tremendous satisfaction in feeling like you know these people exactly as well as they know each other, and no more. And I love the fact that their relationship is not exactly a romantic one. Although the two sometimes act like new lovers, in my interpretation they’re searching for something else — a reassurance, a validation of their personhood. Recommended. ★★★★½

Lost in Translation is currently streaming on Peacock.

Despite some dubious directorial choices, Thor is a crowd-pleasing “yes and” to the formula established by the Marvel movies that came before it, expanding the horizons of the franchise to include gods and aliens.

In particular, it deserves credit for its gorgeous digital production design and the cast, which ranges from the Shakespearean (Anthony Hopkins as Odin) to the fun (Chris Hemsworth as Thor) to the about-to-be-a-cultural-icon (Tom Hiddleston as Loki). The first half of the movie is quite strong, and my problems with the second half are not with the size of the battle scenes; unlike many critics of this movie, I really like the fact that we get a showdown that’s not in a big city and a conflict that hinges on family drama more than big guns.

However, there’s no denying that the emotional connection needed to appreciate the climactic character moments is … lacking. For example, although I like Natalie Portman’s character, I never really buy that her relationship to Thor is more meaningful than lust (nothing wrong with that — I mean, have you seen Chris Hemsworth?). Still, there’s enough here that I’m glad I revisited it. Recommended. ★★★½

Thor is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video, Disney+, DirecTV, and Epix.

Having never seen a Fred Astaire movie before, I wasn’t sure if I was going to like Broadway Melody of 1940, but it snuck up on me.

The three leads — Astaire, Eleanor Powell, and George Murphy — have great chemistry, both while dancing to Cole Porter’s songs and just while talking. Some time is filled with shenanigans involving a theater baron courting younger blonde women, and the performances of wannabe Broadway stars that include an intense juggler and a parodist opera singer; despite how all that sounds, these gags hit more often than they miss, and reinforce the film’s lightly satirical sketch of New York’s performing arts scene.

The sequences that have aged the worst are the ones that are just there for spectacle. This includes (unfortunately) the final few dance numbers that take place after the characters have worked out all their issues, which have some impressive choreography but minimal emotional stakes. I liked Broadway Melody enough that I’ll happily seek out more Astaire movies in the future. Recommended. ★★★½

Broadway Melody of 1940 is currently streaming on TCM.

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