Matthew Butcher

This is why mathematics is culturally superior to the rest of STEM. A grad student brings up The 400 Blows to describe the current state of math. In any other STEM area, I guarantee it would be Star Wars or maybe the Odyssey.

The 40 Steps assassination in NOWHERE TO HIDE m.youtube.com/watch?v=KX6f...

Finally figured out why the subtitles for French movies often give prices in francs two orders of magnitude away from what the actors are saying.

Every summer I look forward to this funky dance theme being pumped through loudspeakers for the local festival. m.youtube.com/watch?v=iMsy...

I'm Googling a book I saw mentioned here, and I have to wonder: Why are British book covers almost always better than American ones? In the local import shops I see plenty of both, and the contrast is always striking.

I'm reading The Samurai and the Prisoner, and this translation, man, I don't know. "Prithee" and "forsooth" and "it doth please me." I'd think you can convey a certain amount of archaic formality without going full Ivanhoe. And the mediaevalisms don't really pair well with insults like "rat fink."

John Collier's "The Chaser" is just four pages long and has the good sense to end before the love interest even turns up on page, and I guess that'll do for my review of OBSESSION. Except: Was it meant to be so dark that even the college admission letter was illegible? Or was that just my theatre?

Just bashed my thumbnail bloody trying to kill a 12-cm centipede in my kitchen. It got away behind the cupboards, I'm not sure how badly wounded. Might be years before I go barefoot in my apartment again.

The Kinks' "This Time Tomorrow" in Les Amants réguliers m.youtube.com/watch?v=qabT...

Man receives key to a toilet; declines it

The headline is less ambiguous *without* an Oxford comma, though it should still be rearranged. (With or without a comma after "vigilante," Plath can't be the Shah, as there's no comma after "Iran." In the current headline she's not a vigilante either, but with an Oxford comma she might be.)

R.I.P. Tony Rayns. Everybody's rightly praising his crucial work on Chinese film; I'll also remember his fantastic writing on Fassbinder and his role in introducing Suzuki Seijun to western audiences.

Just logged HUMINT at Letterboxd, and I'm feeling geriatric after seeing review upon review referring to the Woo/Tarantino-style Mexican standoff at its climax as "the Spider-Man pointing meme."

Armond White, watch your ass.

Reportedly Orson Welles's favourite book. He adapted it for radio, never film, though you can see the influence on MR. ARKADIN. There was a Hungarian movie ten years ago that took the title and not much else, but the book deserves better than that.

Quote with a fictional band that is not Spinal Tap

As a tribute to Tony, I hastily translated an interview I did with him in 2021, the conversation went on for much longer though...he was so passionate and generous with his time ... read it, share it, let's keeps his name and legacy alive... asian-docs.com/2026/05/06/i...

Okay, fine ...

Do I need to break out the Russell Lynes charts? "Middlebrow" is a moving target that depends on the cultural environment as much as the work itself.

BETTER WATCH OUT. So the premise here is "HOME ALONE but Kevin is evil," and you spend 90 minutes of moronic plot contrivances watching this asshole kid getting more and more annoying, just waiting it out in the faint hope that he'll die horribly, which (spoiler) he doesn't.

Mark Wirtz is great! But there's a rock opera (with a plot line throughout the album) from March 1966, predating Tommy, S.F. Sorrow, The Story of Simon Simopath, "Grocer Jack," and even "A Quick One While He's Away."

"This is Ultimate Pandas. By definition, all other panda DVDs are penultimate or less."

Solidarity with everyone correctly voting for DEATHSTALKER II. m.youtube.com/watch?v=j9Av...

The past couple days on Letterboxd I keep getting this Cloudflare pop-up. (There's no actual "challenge.") The hell is this? Looks like a very belated promotional tie-in for INTERSTELLAR or something. Google turns up nothing.

Huh.

Likewise, Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter were into Soka Gakkai.

I walked into a Disk Union while Margo Guryan's "Love" was playing, and bought Take a Picture immediately. The rest of the album isn't as psychedelic as "Love" — it's more jazzy baroque pop — but I had no regrets.

Lots of people have already posted "Sledgehammer" and "Weapon of Choice," so let's go with this one. m.youtube.com/watch?v=xR5x...

Director Masato Harada (Gunhed, Helldogs, Badlands) sadly passed away. t.co/36rbDSReLs

Eleven years ago, I wrote to Tom Stoppard to ask about this coup de théâtre from 1949. It took me down an unexpected rabbit hole - in memory of Stoppard, here's what I found.

You dare call me a son of a bitch? Sir, I have seen many examples of perversion in my time, but your erotic obsession with your carpet is probably the most grotesque and certainly the most boring I have ever encountered. You're more to be scorned than pitied. Good day, Charlie Brown.

R.I.P. Clearsky, at least in any usable form. People complained about it, but without it, how would I have ever learned that an Asylum sci-fi director had blocked me for arguing that Paul McCartney sang "in which we live in" and not "... we're livin'" in "Live and Let Die"?

Best first watches, July Old: THE SMALL WORLD OF SAMMY LEE — Great, seedy drama about a Soho strip-club comedian frantically trying to scrape up enough cash for his gambling debts. New: Um. FINAL DESTINATION BLOODLINES, I guess.

I am the only person on Letterboxd who's seen TOKYO TWILIGHT. That's TOKYO TWILIGHT the not-terribly-good horror comedy from 2013 and not, you know, the other one.

Best first watches, June Old: DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKNESS — Stands out from other Hammer vampire pictures thanks to Christopher Lee's atypical performance; he embodies hungering menace without speaking a word. Andrew Keir's also great in a Van Helsing-ish part as an irascible priest. New: SINNERS

One of the weirder bits of subtitling I've seen was for RED POST ON ESCHER STREET. At one point a guy says 「俺お前の映画大好きだったよ!」, which pretty much anyone would translate as "I loved your movie!" The subtitler went with "I totally respect the aesthetics of your work." The hell?