Weekend Watch - July 2023 Recap

                Welcome back to the Weekend Watch where each week we take a look at a new piece of film or television media and give it a rating and review. This week, we are looking back at the month of July, giving recognition to the best films of the month, categorizing them by their likelihood of making this blog’s list of Greatest Films of All Time. July continues 2023’s trend of months (besides May) with better films than we usually expect, with three of the year’s most anticipated films all actually landing successfully with audiences, and plenty of other offerings that have legitimate shots at earning greater recognition as the year goes on (particularly with the SAG and WGA strikes lessening the press for the other upcoming films this year). Again, the three categories of film are Long Shots, Possible Things, and Sure Things. Let’s get into it!

Long Shots:

Joy Ride: The female ensemble comedy from Adele Lim about a group of friends who travel to Asia to help one of their group find her birth mother landed with solid reviews at the beginning of the month. It delivers on the comedy and with some solid performances from its leading ladies. Some review bombing on IMDB (classic) keeps it here in the long shots, but love for its screenplay could bode well in awards season.

Theater Camp: The niche mockumentary about a theater camp starring Ben Platt and Molly Gordon hits the notes that theatre nerds love. Is it going to be everyone’s cup of tea? Probably not, but that doesn’t mean its status as a lingering cult classic couldn’t get it into the land of All Time Greats.

The Deepest Breath: A documentary about freediving from Netflix and A24 could spell some major love come awards season, but for now, mixed positive critic reviews leave it as a long shot. The nerve-wracking, beautifully shot film can be seen on Netflix if you want to boost its chances.

They Cloned Tyrone: A modern sci-fi blaxploitation film from Netflix, starring Jamie Foxx, John Boyega, and Teyonah Parris? Count me in! The comedy/mystery/thriller walks the fine lines of its genres well and will probably stick around as another of this year’s cult classics more than an All-Time Great.

Stephen Curry: Underrated: Apple TV+ and A24 teamed up on this sports documentary about the greatest 3-point shooter of all time to tell his story. Framed as a coming-of-age film about an underrated, undersized guard, it hits most of the right notes but has gotten some criticism for its climax coming at the wrong point of Steph’s career. It sounds like another successful hit for NBA fans that may or may not hit with other audiences.

Possible Things:

Wham!: Netflix’s documentary about the iconic 70s and 80s duo of George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley is sure to scratch the itch of Nostalgia for the Gen X-ers that populate the streamer these days. It’s landed well with critics as well, boding well for its awards potential, though other music docs and celebrity bio-documentaries could believably keep it out.

Lakota Nation vs. United States: This is a poignant documentary about the fight of the Lakota Nation to reclaim the land that has been stolen from them throughout history by the U.S. government. It checks the boxes that you want to see from a good documentary, but its under-the-radar status might keep it out of contention.

Earth Mama: With some of the bigger releases of the year currently in flux, indie films like this one are currently looking better and better in their chances to make the list. Savanah Leaf’s intimate portrait of a single mother in the Bay Area has garnered some buzz among the audiences who have already seen it, and as it continues to expand to more theaters, expect that buzz to keep rolling.

About Dry Grasses: Nuri Bilge Ceylan is one of the biggest Turkish directors in the modern era, and his latest film, which gained quite a bit of recognition at Cannes, maintains his run of solid outings. It’s currently only in limited release in the U.S., but inevitable awards love should expand its audience base and get its scores more reliably trustworthy.

Afire: Christian Petzold’s romantic dramedy about a group of friends caught in the midst of a forest fire is another international film that dropped in the U.S. this month with some level of success and acclaim. The German director could finally see success on a wide level, but a stacked category of submissions from other European nations will probably keep it out.

The First Slam Dunk: This film has quietly garnered a lot of acclaim already, leading up to its American theatrical release this year. Winning the Japan Academy Prize for Animation of the Year and sitting as one of the highest-grossing anime films of all-time, the film about a Japanese high school basketball team, which adapts the manga series Slam Dunk, could be quite the contender in the coming months.

Talk to Me: A horror film directed by the Australian YouTube duo RackaRacka (a.k.a. Danny and Michael Philippou) shouldn’t be doing as well as it already has, but here we are. The supernatural horror has already garnered high praise, with some calling it Gen Z’s Hereditary. Don’t sleep on this film as the year continues to unfold.

Sure Things:

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One: While I may not have been crazy about this latest entry in Tom Cruise’s espionage empire, most critics and audiences have been. A poorly timed release date has kept its box office numbers down, but that barely matters with the amount of love it continues to receive from people’s ratings and reviews.

Oppenheimer: With so many people calling this Christopher Nolan’s best film, it’s easy to see this film carrying its critical and commercial success into a very successful set of awards campaigns for director, picture, actor, supporting actor, supporting actress, screenplay, and plenty of technical awards as well. This sits up there with Across the Spider-Verse in the category of best films of the year.

Barbie: The other (more controversial for some reason) half of Barbenheimer weekend also continues to see success with audiences and critics. Its great acting, production design, writing, and direction, aided by what’s looking to be a billion dollar box office haul by the time it’s all said and done, looks to spell all-time greatness for Greta Gerwig’s first main-stream hit.