WATCHLIST - October 2025

Welcome! Welcome! Welcome, to all my spooky boos and autumn aficionados! The season approaches on cloven hooves, so I'm putting together another Spooky Watchlist. I've been making these for a few years, originally just for myself and the folks I live with, but other pals kept asking to be included, so here we are. This year marks my second collab with MovieJawn, and you can and should read the first one HERE, because it was written to help folks who might otherwise feel overwhelmed by too many choices feel more at ease, and to make building their own month-long movie marathon less intimidating. So go read that one, then come back. I'll wait.

I will, however, reiterate my three main rules because they bear repeating:

Rule 1: Start with the easiest prompts first. Don't get hung up on one you're having trouble with, just come back to it.
Rule 2: There are no wrong answers. Make your selections however you want, and if you're "wrong" about a movie: who cares, as long as you had fun watching it.
Rule 3: The search bar is your friend. First, I hope we've all turned A.I. responses off (it's easy to do), but if you're having trouble coming up with a title, Letterboxd and to a lesser extent IMDb have plenty of themed lists for you to peruse for inspiration.

Now let's dive in. I've shared the image so you can copy it or print one out if you want to. Now I'm going to walk you through the prompts with some suggestions. We'll start with the ones that are extremely YOU-specific:

Free Streamies
    Tubi, Plex, and PlutoTV are all excellent and importantly FREE resources for films great and small,
    and I'm trying to reinforce the idea that you don't necessarily need to pay for all your entertainments,
    even if you're big into streaming. So fire up your free streamer of choice and find something that looks
    fun!
Physical Media
    Choose a film you currently own, or owned at one time, or want to own on VHS, DVD, Blu-ray or
    some other format.
Birth Year
    A movie released in your birth year, or the birth year of a loved one who'll be watching with you.
Studio Specific
    Pick a flick from a favorite studio if you have one - TriStar Pictures, Cannon Films, or Full Moon
    Entertainment leap readily to mind for me.
Homegrown
    A film made or set in or near your hometown, or wherever you might live now.
First Time Watch
    Select a movie you, or someone watching with you, has never seen.

For the rest of these prompts, I'll try to make at least one suggestion family friendly in case you've got kids who'll be watching with you or maybe you just don't love the scarier side of the season. Also, in light of the country's recent bout of xenophobic inhospitality, I'll be suggesting at least one film of non-American origin, if for no other reason than to better appreciate the global arts community.

Monster By Name
    A movie with 'monster' in the title - Monsters (2010), Monsters, Inc. (2001), Monster Seafood Wars
    (2020, Japan).
Monster By Nature
    A movie where the "monster" doesn't look like one - Psycho (1960), Monster House (2006), Hausu
    (1977, Japan).
Monster By Nurture
    A movie about what it takes to make a monster. It could be trauma, an evil spirit, a potion, a curse,
    alienation, anything at all - Evil Dead II (1987), Gremlins (1984), The Loved Ones (2009, Australia).

Blockbuster
    A film that was such a smash that it inspired numerous imitators - Alien (1979), E.T. the Extra-
    Terrestrial (1982), Godzilla (1954, Japan).
Mockbuster
    A film that's clearly inspired by something else - Life (2017), Masters of the Universe (1987), Bloody
    Muscle Body Builder in Hell (1995, Japan).

Horny
    Define this one however you're most comfortable: a film that's actively about being horny, or just one
    with a sexually-charged atmosphere, or perhaps one about The Devil or another famously horned
    character - Species (1995), Little Nicky (2000), Shivers (1975, Canada).
Costume Inspo
    Folks dress up as all kinds of non-spooky things from movies for Halloween, so watch a movie that's
    got good, non-spooky costume fodder - Police Academy (1984), Minions (2015), Ultraman (1966,
    Japan)
The Master of Suspense
    A film by or in the style of Alfred Hitchcock. On the plus side, a lot of Hitchcock is pretty all-ages
    friendly - What Lies Beneath (2000), The Birds (1963), Cobweb (2023, South Korea).
"Never D Your Own G"
    This phrase--coined the Hate Watch/Great Watch Podcast, Episode 131: Beneath the Darkness
    (2011)--means "Never dig your own grave", which is unquestionably good advice. Choose a movie
    with grave digging or a cemetery - Shallow Grave (1994), Army of Darkness (1992), Cemetery Man
    (1994, Italy).
Kid Favorites
    Could be a favorite from when you were a kid, or if you have kids it could one of their faves, or just a
    well-liked film made for kids - Teen Wolf (1985), The Addams Family (1991), Wallace and Gromit:
    The Curse of the Where Rabbit (2005, UK).
Summerween
    A good scare is an any time of year treat Jaws (1975), Tremors (1990), High Tension (2003, France).
Permission to Board
    Movies where someone uses an Ouija board or similar device - Ouija Shark (2020), 13 Ghosts (1960),
    Alison's Birthday (1981, Australia).
Season of the Witch
    Yes, there are a few films with this as a title and you could watch one of them, but this could be any
    witchy movie - Bell Book and Candle (1958), Supergirl (1984), Suspiria (1977, Italy).
A.I. Was Never a Good Idea
    "Artificial Intelligence" is heavy on the artificial part and extremely scarce on the intelligence. Always
    has been - 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), The Mitchells vs. the Machines (2021), Ghost in the Shell
    (1995, Japan).
Monster Mashup
    Choose any film where more than one type of monster appears - Freddy vs. Jason (2003), Scooby-
    Doo (2002), Santo and Blue Demon vs. Dracula and the Wolf Man (1973, Mexico).
Weapon of Choice
    Decide on a movie where a distinctive weapon is used - Planet Terror (2007), Krull (1983), Shaun of
    the Dead (2004, UK).
Clowning Around
    Step right up and choose a circus or clown-centric genre film - Freaks (1932), Something Wicked This
    Way Comes (1983), Santa Sangre (1989, Italy).

1950s
    Pick a genre film from the decade that brought us Snoopy - Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954),
    Them! (1954), Diabolique (1955, France).
1960s
    Choose a genre film from the Free Love era - X: The Man with X-Ray Eyes (1963), Mad Monster
    Party? (1967), Black Sabbath (1963, Italy).
1970s
    Select a genre film from the decade of Pong - Phantom of the Paradise (1974), The Phantom
    Tollbooth (1970), The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971, UK).
1980s
    Decide upon a genre film from the age when Tiffany ruled the malls - Return of the Living Dead 
    (1985), Young Sherlock Holmes (1985), Pin (1988, Canada).
1990s
    Opt for one genre film from the epoch of Crystal Pepsi - Anaconda (1997), Galaxy Quest (1999), I
    Bought a Vampire Motorcycle (1990, UK).
This Year
    Single out a genre film from 2025 - Sinners (2025), KPop Demon Hunters (2025), Bring Her Back
    (2025, Australia).

This penultimate prompt is designed to make things easier for you--think of it as a cheat code to help make your October viewing go even more smoothly.

Franchise Freebies!
    Basically, if you want to watch an entire franchise spread out over Oct., feel free to count some of the
    films in that series INSTEAD of any prompts you're having trouble with. Can't think of a Monster By
    Nurture film you wanna watch, or not that interested in a movie from the '70s? Watch some of the
    Saw films instead. But all your substitutes must be from the SAME franchise, and they must be
    watched IN ORDER.

This last prompt is the ONLY one I think is date-specific:

All Hallows Eve
    On the 31st, watch a really "Halloweenie" movie - Murder Party (2007), It's the Great Pumpkin
    Charlie Brown (1966), The Wicker Man (1973, UK).

Feel free to build your watchlist in whatever order you want, by the way, and remember: the spooky season isn't just for horror. There are plenty of other genres that fit right in: sci-fi, martial arts, super heroes, fantasy, whodunnit, kaiju, etc. Best of luck, I hope you have fun. 

I cohost the Hate Watch/Great Watch Podcast and we've covered some of the films mentioned above, if you're interested:

• Episode 11: Shaun of the Dead (2004)
• Episode 28: Hausu (1977)
• Episode 110: Phantom of the Paradise (1974)
• Episode 111: Cemetery Man (1994)
• Episode 118: Bell Book and Candle (1958)
• Episode 131: Beneath the Darkness (2011)
• Episode 140: Alison's Birthday (1981)
• Episode 155: Freddy vs. Jason (2003)
• Episode 159: Jaws (1975)
• Episode 168: Supergirl (1984)

Share your progress with #SpookyJawnList on your social media of choice, and as always - Long Live the Movies!

Twenty Twenty-One in Film

Howdy everyone. Since 2017 (I believe?) I've made one of these year-end lists, ranking all the movies released in the previous year, that I've seen, in order from best to, let's say least-best.

The factors that go into the ranking are all arbitrary, but they include overall quality (obvs), novelty, and rewatchability, as well as many other metrics. For rule sticklers, there are some pre-2021 films in here which were added because their initial release was either outside the U.S., at a film festival, or maybe even both. Add to that COVID's effect on theatrical screenings and my cautious avoidance of the ones there were, and I ended up counting a lot of "released on streaming dates" as "wide release" dates.

There is a method to the madness.

To that end, there are also some short films and some miniseries included on here because that is the way things are trending - streaming services are willing to shell out the moolah for a project, but more easily for a miniseries than a single, non-franchise, average runtime film.

Also, I usually include a poster or other image from the flick, but currently I'm having a lot of fun with that Wombo Dream app, which is an art app which uses artificial intelligence to generate an image based on your prompting, so I've used that to make "movie posters" for the films. Enjoy!

Twenty Twenty in Film

Hello all. Since I started tinkering away at this blog - back in 2017 - I've endeavored to end the year with a post cataloguing all the year's films that I'd seen, in a personalized order. Obviously, this isn't a new idea by any stretch, year-end lists are a dime a dozen, but the majority of the more well-known ones represent the compiled tastes of a group of people or some kind of Metacritic-like aggregate.

My year-ender is always based entirely on a very slippery personal metric that takes the overall quality of a film and marries it to my personal views on its rewatchability. In that regard, an absolutely flawless film could easily rank below a fun trashterpiece bit of popcorn entertainment. The question of Would I Recommend This to People? is also in there as well as my affinity for novelty, appreciation for originality, and of the creative voice... it's a complex system and the goalposts will absolutely change from year to year.

And there are a number of flicks that I could put asterisks next to for one reason or another. Some are short films - one of which I worked on -, one's a mini-series, some were actually made many years ago but were not previously widely available - or still aren't - in the US, so I'm counting them now as this was the year I saw them.

What can I say?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Anyhoo, I hope you enjoy it and I encourage you to make your own. Drop me a link in the comments and I'll surely read it.

"SYNCHRONIC" (2020)

SYNCHRONIC (2020)

Directed by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorehead
Written by Justin Benson
Starring Jamie Dornan, Anthony Mackie and Katie Aselton
Running time 1 hour and 36 minutes
MPAA rating: R for drug content and language throughout and for some violent/bloody images

by Hunter Bush

I really like those Moorehead & Benson boys. They seem like good people. I first got into them slightly before their previous flick The Endless premiered but their names quickly rose high atop my Pay Attention To -list. Starting with Resolution in 2012, then through Spring in 2014 and The Endless in 2017, they’ve proven to be writers/directors/performers who know how to deliver big ideas on modest budgets. But, though Synchronic shows their production values increasing, their ideas are no less expansive.

Where some of their previous efforts have had that particular Lovecraftian flavor of existential horror, Synchronic reminded me of Phillip K. Dick right out of the gate. Not a bad thing when dealing with the tropes they are here: designer drugs, the nature of reality and how it only exists the way it does because we think it does. But Benson & Moorehead don’t just approach big concepts, but also big issues. For better or worse.

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN, Vol.21 - November 2020

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN
Vol. 21 - November, 2020

by Hunter Bush


Howdy once again, y’all. This is one of the more difficult intros for me to write in my two-ish years on this column. I’m writing this before Election Day y’see and have no way of knowing what will happen, and it’s twisting up my guts not knowing. I’ve been putting it off and putting it off and now I’m into the final week of October and haven’t done diddly. By the time this comes out, things will hopefully be looking up, but there is the chance that they’ll be somehow even darker than before and that’s a reality that I’ve been chewing on for weeks. More likely that not though, they’ll be in some horrible liminal space where we don’t know what will happen.

So before I get into this month’s column proper, let me just say to you all that I know things have been difficult for a while now and it may be a while longer until they’re, not but I have to believe that they will get better. Whenever I needed a break from what I used to consider stress (oh how naive I was) I’d pop over to the nearest movie theater and see something. Anything really. Whatever was playing next. Obviously current circumstances and concerns make that impossible (or at least staggeringly ill-advised) but I’m here with the latest Everything Old Is New Again to help you keep an eye on what’s coming to screens in the near future.

Fantasia Festival 2020 Review - "THE OAK ROOM" (2020)

The Oak Room (2020)
Written by Peter Genoway
Directed by Cody Calahan
Starring RJ Mitte, Peter Outerbridge and Ari Millen
Running time: 1 hour and 30 minutes
Unrated-contains salty language, violence both explicit and implied and emotionally upsetting formative childhood recollections

by Hunter Bush

There’s a lot happening in the margins of Cody Calahan’s nested-narrative thriller The Oak Room. For a film with a story tucked inside a story inside a story, a lot goes unstated but while some details never quite coalesce, enough becomes clear for us to infer the shape of things. Adapted by Peter Genoway from his own stage play, on its face The Oak Room is the story of two men in a bar talking about two other men in a different bar, but what it’s really talking about is the power and nature of stories.

The film opens with Paul (Peter Outerbridge) *just about* to close up his bar, The Pool Room, for the night when, in out of the snowy blizzard comes Steve (RJ Mitte), the son of Paul’s best friend. Thing is, Steve hasn’t been home in three years, not even for his own father’s funeral, leaving Paul to pay for everything out of a sense of camaraderie, which means Steve has a debt to settle. Steve, who admits to just “drifting” since failing out of college doesn’t have anything like the money to pay off his debt, but he does have ...a story. A story he thinks may be of interest to Paul.

If you’ve read Moviejawn’s pre-Fantasia Fest 2020 round-up, you may recall I was quite excited for the small-town true-crime aspect of The Oak Room, but that its frequent use of the word “story” in the trailer meant I would be paying special attention to that thread and how that implied importance tied into the film’s themes. The bad news is: I don’t think there’s a real clear through-line regarding the importance of Story. The good news however, is: I still think the film is pretty solid.

Fantasia Festival 2020 Review - "SANZARU" (2020)

FANTASIA FEST 2020 COVERAGE:
SANZARU (2020)
Written and directed by Xia Magnus
Starring Aina Dumlao, Justin Arnold, Jon Viktor Corpuz, Jayne Taini
Running time 1 hour and 40 minutes
Currently unrated, but contains mild gore, adult themes and brief ghostly nudity



"Sanzaru" is the collective name for the See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil monkeys (who each traditionally have their own names btw). I avoided looking this up until after watching the film for fear of accidentally spoiling a major element of Xia Magnus' sweaty, southern, spookhouse flick. As it is, knowing the meaning spoils none of the plot but exposes some of the themes I thought were most interesting in the film, specifically communication.

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN 18

Everything Old Is New Again

Vol. 18 - August 2020

by Hunter Bush

Howdy, howdy one and all. How's everybody doing? Dark lord but it is hot out! I dunno how things'll be where you are, or when this drops but as I'm writing it we are heading into the dog days of summer in Philly. Nevertheless I'm back hunched over my laptop, the click clack of my fingers on the keys battling the susurration of a fan and clink of ice cubes in my glass, all to bring YOU, dear reader, the latest installment of Everything Old is New Again!

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN 17

Everything Old is New Again,
Vol. 17 - July 2020

by Hunter Bush



How's everybody doing out there? States are reopening, businesses resuming in some feeble attempt at "normalcy" but I keep getting this sinking feeling... and maybe this is just me but, does anybody else keep feeling like we're in the middle of Jaws when the mayor (Murray Hamilton) refuses to close the beach in the middle of prime tourism season despite the warnings of experts? Ugh. Well, I hope wherever you are you're doing well and staying safe.

As for me, I'm back with your July installment of Everything Old Is New Again, my - now monthly - column where I attempt to keep y'all abreast of upcoming releases that fall under the EOINA purview: Remakes (a movie, but again), Adaptations (used to be a book, TV show, play or what have you but now it's a movie) and Long-Gap Sequels (the last one came out *how* long ago?) and things of that ilk.

Since no one in their right mind is going back to theaters right now, I'm sticking to what flicks and series' are coming to the various streaming services around. The downside of this set-up being that streaming services are kind of difficult to get reliable release dates and/or trailers from. But I did my best and, whenever possible, tried to give my overall impression of the type of movie or series we'll be getting. Appearances *can be* deceiving however, don't forget.

"I'm Right on Top of That, Rose!"

"I'm Right on Top of That, Rose!" :

How a Bad Mom's Absence Creates a Better Mom in Her Stead

An alternative POV on 1991's Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead.

When the co-titular Mom (Concetta Tomei) leaves her five kids in the care of the co-titular Babysitter (Ida Reiss Merin) while she's in Australia for a summer, events transpire on a spectrum somewhere between "wacky hijinks" and "unbridled chaos". Broken hearts and bones abound, the matriarchal per diem gets given away and the dishes get "done" only in the most gangland sense of the word. And while this is all presented to the audience as being the fault of unruly kids lacking in supervision, I posit here that it's all Mom's fault. Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead (1991) is definitely a Bad Moms Movie.

Thing is, it's presented as a different type of flick altogether: the Kids Minus Guidance Equals Chaos film. While this is a subgenre that has entries from probably all of film history, it really hit its peak in the late 80's early 90's during the rise of Nickelodeon and their "kid power" propaganda. Films like Adventures in Babysitting (1987), Camp Nowhere (1994) and The Goonies (1985) all showcase what happens to a group of kids without "proper supervision" and attempt to cross the aisle between kids and adults by showing all the fun & adventures the kids get into while usually having them get a firm talking-to and maybe a severe grounding in the final reel.

Pizza Film Club October 2019

Minutes from the Moviejawn Pizza Film Club meeting, October 2019
By Hunter Bush

  

Welcome once again pizza punks and movie goons, to another installment of MOVIEJAWN'S The Last Slice, where I will be relaying the minutes from the previous month's meeting of the Pizza 🍕 Film 📼 Club ♣ which - if you're not savvy - is our monthly meeting where we watch fun flicks, eat pizza and other goodies and generally socialize together as a group! We publish this newsletter to lead by example: we hope you'll see that we watched a movie or made a snack that perks your ears up and you'll want to get your own bunch of buddies together and host a Pizza 🍕 Film 📼 Club ♣  of your own!

In October, we celebrated another birthday coinciding with our meet-up, this time of P 🍕 F 📼 C ♣ co-founder, Moviejawn matron and host of the Cinematic Crypt podcast, Rosalie Kicks! She and husband Ben hosted (wait til you see the decorations) the group of us for a double feature viewing of The Devil Bat and The 'Burbs!

Twenty Nineteen in Film

Howdy. Every year (since way back in 2017) I've kept track of how many of that year's films I've watched within the year. For instance, in 2017 I watched 47 films released in 2017. Make sense? In 2018, I logged 68 which is a lot and I still managed to top it. In 2019 I saw 70 films of the year!

The list below is just all of them, ranked from my favorite to my least-favorite based entirely on my own internal, arcane criteria including things like rewatchability, originality, novelty, overall quality, creative voice and the possibility of bonus points for including things I personally enjoy. It is entirely subjective.

I encourage you to make your own list and drop me a link in the comments. I'll happily read it!

"TERMINATOR: DARK FATE" (2019)

Terminator: Dark Fate
Directed by Tim Miller
Story by James Cameron & Charles H. Eglee & Josh Friedman and David S. Goyer & Justin Rhodes; Screenplay by Goyer & Rhodes and Billy Ray
Starring Linda Hamilton, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Mackenzie Davis
Running time: 2 hours and 08 minutes
MPAA rating: R for violence throughout, language and brief nudity

by Hunter Bush

I'm a big fan of the trope I think of as "The Titular Line", when a character in a movie says the title of the movie they are in. Sometimes it's so synonymous with what the movie is that taking note of it is pointless, like someone saying "Ghostbusters" in Ghostbusters. What I enjoy is seeing if the writers and actors can make some of the clunkier subtitles sound natural. So, around an hour twenty into Terminator: Dark Fate when characters start really throwing the word "fate" around, I perked up. But it wasn't to be. The best you get is Natalia Reyes' Dani at one point saying "Fuck fate!", which is... pretty close.

""Riches to the Conjuror"

"Riches to the Conjuror" :

How a Viewpoint Sleight-of-Hand Yields a Wealth of New Perspective on the Destruction of a Model Family

An alternative POV on 2018's Hereditary.

Ari Aster's recent sophomore feature Midsommar has been a big deal in film talk circles recently, but his previous film, last year's Hereditary, is what put him on most people's radar. A film dealing with family and grief (Aster's topics of choice) through the supernatural chicanery of a witchy cult, Hereditary is most definitely when all's said and done, a Bad Moms Movie. What I posit today is that there is a way to view the events depicted in the film that makes it, somehow, an Even Worse Moms Movie.

Also, heads up, I will have to outright RUIN Hereditary for you if you haven't seen it.

Moviejawn Pizza Film Club Minutes, August 2019 - The Court Jester (1955)

Minutes from the Moviejawn Pizza Film Club meeting August 2019
By Hunter Bush

  

Welcome cinemaniacs and pizzatarians to the 2nd installment of The Last Slice, the newsletter devoted to unpacking our Pizza Film Club meetings every month in an effort to - A) encourage you to host Pizza Film Club meetings of your own and - B) expose you to some things - films, foods, drinks - that may be new to you but could end up becoming a favorite in no time!

This month's newsletter covers our Pizza Film Club meeting from August, which just so happened to fall exactly on the birthday of Pizza Film Club co-founder, author of the previous Last Slice installment & my co-host on the Hate Watch / Great Watch podcast, Allison Yakulis (!) so it was only fair that she choose the flick. Additionally, we were hosting so she actually programmed the whole day's film lineup, made the cocktail & the snacks, all with very little help from me; a birthday dynamo!

THE FLICK: The Court Jester (1955)

The picture's plot pertains to the proper heir, perceptible by the purple pimpernel port wine patch on their posterior, and the plan to place him in the palace, presumably to protect the propriety of the province and profit the people personally.

Sorry. THE COURT JESTER is known for its tongue twister dialogue and song lyrics and I thought I'd give it a shot, but that's just exhausting. Fun, but exhausting.

The most expensive comedy ever made at the time, THE COURT JESTER stars fleet-of-foot funnyman Danny Kaye as Hawkins, a former circus performer who abandoned the big top life to be of service to The Black Fox, a Robin Hood-type bandit living in the forest with his men. In an effort to place the rightful heir, a baby, on the throne and oust the current usurper King Roderick (Cecil Parker), Hawkins takes the identity of famous jester Giacomo ("King of Jesters and Jester of Kings") and attempts to steal a key to the secret tunnel beneath the palace through which the rightful baby-heir could be smuggled safely into the castle. Due to Hawkins' own ineptness and the intervention of the witch (!) Griselda (Mildred Natwick), Hawkins finds himself in the midst of several bits of palace intrigue including the King's plan to marry his off his lovely daughter Princess Gwendolyn (Angela Lansbury) and Lord Ravenhurst's (Basil Rathbone's) attempts to kill his fellow Lords all the while attempting to take the key without alerting the King.

Wackiness ensues. As was pointed out during our viewing, with Danny Kaye in the lead role he had no one to bounce off of and thus has to use every trick in the Danny Kaye playbook here. The result is extremely enjoyable with a quick pace and the aforementioned wordplay to keep your attention even if you're not usually into this kind of flick. The performances are all incredibly charming; the kind of Saturday Matinee movie you'd watch from the living room floor, gleefully enraptured. The sets and costumes are all gorgeous even on an unrestored DVD edition. THE COURT JESTER is definitely worth a watch but may pair better with friends (and pizza).

THE COCKTAIL: The Brew That is True (Hard Arnold Palmer a.k.a. Half and Half)

Though the Black Fox's men would most likely have been downing mead or ale, those in the court may have been lucky enough to imbibe something as delicious and fragrant as The Brew That is True. Named after one The Court Jester's most quotable scenes, and one of cinema's most quotable attempted poisonings ("The pellet with the poison's in the vessel with the pestle; the chalice from the palace has the brew that is true!"), Allison's Brew is designed not to be as oversweetened as concoctions like these tend to be. Seriously though, name another quotable cinematic poisoning that isn't from The Princess Bride. I'll wait.

Recipe Provided by Allison Yakulis

1 part sweet tea flavored vodka
1 part unsweetened iced tea
2 parts lemonade

Pour over ice and garnish with lemon. For the overachievers you can make your own lemonade syrup.


Lemonade Syrup

2 cups sugar
1 cup water
Rind of 2 lemons (cut into thin strips)
Juice of 6 lemons (about ¾ cup of juice)

Boil together sugar, water, and lemon rind for 5 minutes. Let cool and strain out rind. Stir in lemon juice. To prepare for drinking, add water to taste (somewhere in the neighborhood of 1 part syrup to 3 parts water)

THE MENU: Harlequin Deviled Eggs

Named for the famous dual-color diamond pattern commonly associated with clowns and jesters, these doubly delicious deviled eggs are customizable to the party's palette. Allison provided a slightly spicier take on the traditional deviled egg as well as a floral, pesto variation!

Recipe Provided by Allison Yakulis

12 eggs
About ⅓ cup pesto
About 2 tbsp mustard
About 3 tbsp mayonnaise
Hot Sauce
Paprika
Parsley

Hard boil eggs. Peel and cut in half. Remove yolks and divide evenly in 2 separate bowls. In one bowl add pesto and about 1 tbsp mayo and mix until yolks are pulverized and the mixture appears well-blended. Fill half of the eggs with this mixture and top with parsley. In the remaining bowl add about 2 tbsp mayo, 2 tbsp mustard, and a few dashes of hot sauce (to taste) and mix until yolks are pulverized and the mixture appears well-blended. Fill the remaining eggs with this mixture and top with paprika.

THE BIRTHDAY CAKE: Purple Pimpernel Funfetti Cake

Not all Pizza Film Club meetings include a cake but then again not all Pizza Film Club meetings fall on a birthday. Allison used a novelty cake pan to get the rough shape of the baby butt, then trimmed out the excess cake before icing in one color and piping on the purple pimpernel free-hand! Not too shabby!

Recipe Provided by Allison Yakulis

4 ½ tbsp unsalted softened butter
1 ½ cups sugar
½ cup Canola oil (or vegetable oil)
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
¾ cup milk
5 egg whites (room temp preferred)
½ cup sprinkles (although we used a full cup)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and grease and flour your cake pans*. In a stand mixer beat butter on medium low until creamy. Add in sugar and oil and beat until well-combined, scraping down the sides as needed. Add in vanilla. In a separate bowl combine flour, baking powder, and salt. Measure out your milk. With mixer on medium alternate between flour mix and milk (starting and ending with flour), scraping down sides when needed and allowing each addition to become fully combined before adding more. In a separate bowl beat egg whites with a hand mixer on high speed until stiff peaks form. Using a spatula, fold egg whites and sprinkles into batter until just combined (do not over mix, but make sure sprinkles are evenly distributed throughout the batter). Bake at 350F for 35-40 minutes, rotating pans halfway through bake time for even heat (depending on the size of your cake pans, the cakes may bake faster - keep an eye on them). When they’re done, you should be able to insert a toothpick and remove it mostly dry or with a few crumbs - if it comes out wet, bake for another 5-10 minutes and check again. Cool for 15 minutes before removing from the pan, and allow cakes to cool completely before frosting.

*Note: Again, to get a butt shape we used a novelty boob cake pan like this one (link - https://www.amazon.com/Pipedream-Boobie-Cake-Pan-Silver/dp/B00163B6Y4 ), cut out about an inch of the center, and pushed the two remaining lobes together before icing. It used about half of the above recipe and we made cupcakes with the rest of the batter.

In addition to the above snacks, folks brought extra goodies like chocolate covered Nutter Butter cookies, trail mix & White Claw! We also had some more homemade hummus (the recipe for which can be found in the first Last Slice newsletter), with chopped veggies and pita wedges.

Here are some photos of the group including appearances from Party Cobra and The Lady Waldo!

Remember that you can join the Pizza Film Club no matter where you are via our slack channel and that we'd love to include your satellite parties in future newsletters, so send us some pictures of you & your crew enjoying our snack, drink & film pairings!

If you really love pizza & film, check out Moviejawn's Pizzaman tab for info on our first short film! As ever, thanks for reading and may your movies & pizzas always be just the right amount of cheesy!

You can read every Pizza 🍕 Film 📼 Club ♣ newsletter on Moviejawn, join us on Slack or take our advice and host your own!

You can always hear me on every episode of the Hate Watch / Great Watch podcast. Remember: Don't be a Danzig! Like & Subscribe!

Until next time:
Long Live the Movies!

"RUNNING WITH THE DEVIL" (2019)

"It's Cocaine's World, We're All Just Living in it..."

by Hunter Bush

Near the end of Jason Cabell's solo directorial debut RUNNING WITH THE DEVIL, a backpack full of drugs falls in a mountain stream and is swept away by the current, which is actually a pretty apt visual metaphor for the film as a whole. This movie is about drugs - cocaine specifically - and the ways in which it is a part of the lives of everyone it encounters, but the whole thing is fairly dispassionate. We meet all these players up and down the totem pole - distinguished by titles like The Cook or The Executioner or The Boss or whatever - but they're hard to care about because this is not really their story, it's cocaine's story. Everyone in this is a supporting player to Cocaine.

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN 10

Hello again and welcome back to Everything Old is New Again, the column where I write about the movies & series coming to screens of all sizes in the next two months, but specifically the ones based on some previously-existing work, intellectual property or franchise. I also included two movies coming to limited release based on true stories because, cynic that I am, I question the ethics of releasing these stories Right Now. But we'll get there.

"THE INTRUDER (2019)"

Deon Taylor's The Intruder is uneven, riddled with clichés, largely poorly directed, seems edited with a hacksaw and stuffed at the margins with useless ADR dialogue. In short, it's trash. But then why did I absolutely love it?

"AVENGERS: ENDGAME (2019)"

It's fair to say I was suffering from a spell of Franchise Fatigue leading up to my viewing of Avengers: Endgame but...that may be the perfect headspace to go into it with?

Do you realize it hasn't even been a full year since Avengers: Infinity War came out (or Endgame: Part One if ya nasty) but in that time, two other Marvel movies have hit theaters? Wanna know where Ant-Man was when Thanos blew into town? You've gotta see Ant-Man and the Wasp. And then you've gotta go see Captain Marvel (who was teased in the Infinity War post-credit stinger) so you'll know...who the hell that even is. It's starting to feel like homework.

"FAST COLOR (2019)"

Fast Color is the kind of movie I've been waiting to see made for a while, and one we're likely to see more of in coming years. It uses the big money buzz of superhero movies, but bucks all the spandex and villain clichés to instead make a smaller, more intimate feeling movie in a genre generally unrepresented when superhuman abilities are in play. One about family and one focused specifically on the relationships between mothers and daughters, but yes, also there are superpowers.