Plane Ride Movie Reviews

I watched FIVE movies on the plane!

So I took a trip to France a couple weeks ago. When you fly there you get some “night” so you can sleep on the 9 hour flight. But the flight back stays “day” the whole trip and I couldn’t fall asleep. So I watched movies. Five movies. While sliding into a sleep deprived madness that required two separate cold brews to balance out the exhaustion in my bones.

Here’s what I watched!

Dazed and Confused

This movie came out in 1993, and is absolutely my favorite Richard Linklater film. Ignoring my love of Jeremy London (he’s phenomenal in Mall Rats) this movie truly feels like an accurate portrayal of high school. The students show a camaraderie apart from the teachers.

Set in 1976, this ensemble film follows several groups of Texan high school students as they celebreate the last day of school before the summer. The clothing style is accurate, the music is pure radio hits on the 60’s and 70’s, and the communication method for the youth relies on seeing someone at one of the hang out spots and passing the word about what’s going down.

The movie conveys a range of high school experiences. The seniors ruling the social circles, the Freshmen working their way into the cool kids’ groups, and underage drinking and pot smoking without an adult in sight. Except for Matthew McConaughey character, that is a full adult.

Blake Says: Watch this with friends, it’s a blast.

Accepted

I first watched this on DVD just before graduating from college. It follows Bartleby Gaines (Justin Long) creating a fake college acceptance letter after getting rejected from every legitimate college he applied to. The plan quickly snowballs as he has to invent an entire college to keep up appearances. This movie has jokes, Long doing a Chevy Chase thing (he keeps tripping and bumping his head), and a message for the rejects of society.

I don’t know if I would recommend this movie today. To make the story make sense every character practically screams “You have to go to college. It’s the only path to success. If you don’t attend college you’re basically dead.”. It’s a weird tone in 2024 when we’ve mostly discovered that college isn’t the best path for everyone. Especially now that the trades are no longer demonized and an emphasis on networking and connnections has emerged.

That being said, it is a fun harmless college comedy. Jonah Hill plays a nervous foil to Long’s charming every-man, the cast is fun, and Dean Van Horn (Anthony Heald) is a classic “evil dean” every college comedy about underdogs needs. The hiccup of packing a movie like this with jokes is that you get the full range of hilarious to flops. But that’s the price to pay when you fire that joke machine gun.

Blake Says: if there’s literally nothing else to watch, still watch Old School or Animal House first.

Scooby Doo

I watched this mostly out of curiosity, and partly from sleep deprivation. I knew James Gunn wrote the story and screenplay and Matthew Lillard did such a good job he turned playing Shaggy into a mini career. Despite watching it years ago I didn’t remember any of this kid’s movie.

And it’s absolutely a kid’s movie. Which is good, that’s who Scooby Doo is made for; children. Children and not 40 year olds who bought a mystery Machine hat literally a week ago. But some kids movies can appeal to adults as well, and this movie drops a couple of jokes only adults will get. The best thing this movie does is the mystery. It’s a well done whodunnit with on screen clues that allow the audience to try and solve it with the Mystery Inc gang. They also cast the gang flawlessly.

I’m not saying you need to watch it ore than once to catch easter eggs, but it’s a decent film you can watch with kids if you want to get them into Scooby Doo beyond the millions of Scooby Doo movies that exist.

Blake Says: Give it a go, it’s a fun watch.

Emily the Criminal

Aubrey Plaza plays Emily, a Door Dash type worker saddled with unfathomable debt from art school. Throughout the film she falls into the Los Angeles criminal underworld through a credit card scam ring.

This film utilizes sound so well I’ll have to watch again on my home TV and not on the free airline earbuds. There is almost no soundtrack, the film instead focuses on the sounds of what’s in the scene. The present crinkle of the aluminum of the food deliveries, the hard plastic ‘flack’ sound of the credit card copying machine, even the small scraping sound of Emily sketching out art in the scene.

My top highlights would be the editing and the grounding of the scenes. The film lingers on scenes just long enough for you to get the point then leap into another time and place, following Emily’s progression into her ever changing life. The grounding makes every scene and interaction feel real. Her living arrangement, the various offices with stacks of file folders, and the lighting made me feel like I was in the too warm offices with Emily. Even though I was on a plane!

The magic of movies!

This film looks at the transformation of a woman into a criminal. Or perhaps it reveals who she’s been the entire time. No matter how you look at Emily’s choices you’ll get a dense, well acted, well written, gritty tale of desperation and bold moves.

Blake Says: Absolutely see this. Highly recommend it.

The Holdovers

I’m not blowing anyone’s mind by saying this movie was great. The acting is stellar, the writing is on point, and the flair of putting a grainy film filter over the entire film is a smart touch. The film follows the few people who remain at a North East boarding school over the holiday break. We see unlikely friendships form and these “holdovers” revealing who they are over the course of several weeks.

Where I think the film excels are the small moments showing who these characters are. Angus Tully (Dominic Sessa) comforts a fellow holdover who had a nightmare and wet his bed, which is the first time we see Angus not be directly antagonistic. We get several scenes of Paul Hunham (Paul Giamatti) growing and opening up to others, which was compelling in a way i wasn’t prepared for on a 9 hour flight and with a cold brew rattling in my system. We only get a few scenes with Mary Lamb (Da’Vine Joy Randolph) but we see how her son dying in the Vietnam War affect her and the relationships she maintains.

I’m absolutely going to watch this again, probably during the holidays this year. The film is 2 hours and 13 minutes long but not a single second of film is wasted. This is a heart rending and affirming film everyone should see.

Blake Says: Go see this. If you don’t watch this, then we’re not friends. (kidding, of course we’re still friends, but this is a really good movie!)

In conclusion

There, all the movies I watched in a daze while flying from Dublin to Seattle. Hopefully one of these will make your movie night a hit. Also maybe watch these on a TV screen and not a tiny plane seat screen.

*I didn’t bother finding where they’re streaming because you can do that work for yourself. I also know how quickly streaming rights change and didn’t want to lie through the passage of time.