Movie Moments V: July 2017

Only two movies in July! I’ve got to step things up.

Creed, 28 July 2017, Amazon Prime
Full disclosure: I don't think I've watched any of the Rocky movies. I mean, I’m familiar with all the parts we all know via cultural osmosis, but I have no ties to the narrative history. I just really love Michael B Jordan, from Friday Night Lights, and it's well past time for me to familiarize myself with his work with Coogler. (Black Panther, y’all.) And who can say no to Tessa Thompson and Phylicia Rashad? (Stallone was a surprise, but yeah, that Oscar nom wasn't a sham.)

The charm of the movie, outside of its stars, were the pops of media-savvy: Youtube and the tri-color of the projector cascading over Donnie, the goofy playfulness of the pop-up boxer stats, the stilted hagiography of HBO Sports, the idle Google searches over breakfast, the cable sports commentary riddled with chyrons. The legend-building methods of the original movies are long in the past.

Congratulations to whoever created this graphic for knowing, I suspect, nothing about sports except what’s on this screen.
What's so odd to me was that the actual boxing, with its zooms and dramatic music, felt drastically un-boxing-like. I grew up watching matches on TV, and boxing is largely poorly-lit rounds of aggressive hugging, rapidly punctuated by oil-slick jabs. By making the matches a series of dramatic combos, they lost out on something.

In any case, think of this as a movie of folks who know they're making a dumb decision either immediately before or after they hurt someone, and then reluctantly attempt to do better, clumsily. Then it's incredibly graceful. And who doesn't love a good training montage?

Spider-Man: Homecoming, 29 July 2017, Riverdale 10 VIP Cinema

• Either this movie is excessively charming or enough time has passed to rob me of my rage about having paid to see Spider-Man 3 a decade ago.
• Brown folks! Brown folks everywhere! Of varying ethnicities, genders, roles, linguistic histories, and socioeconomic brackets! Plus NED! Mabuhay ang Pilipinas!
• This is why students need affirmation and challenges, STARK. Do you need a link to my teaching philosophy? GOD.
• Those Cap videos are delightful, and twice as much when you think about the work that must have gone into them.
• This is an argument that we need stronger unions, right? That's what I’m picking up.

And on to August!