This film was remarkably well-timed, being released in November 2024 only for Pope Francis to pass away in April 2025, causing interest in it to spike. It’s fictional of course but its detailed portrayal of what exactly the election for a new pope entails was just what the world needed. There’s plenty of intrigue right from the beginning and scandals are not far behind. All of this seems reasonably plausible to me and makes for a riveting watch. Unfortunately the twist at the end is a leap of credibility too far as the election would never turn out that way in real life. I know that director Edward Berger is plumping hard for a liberal ending but this is just wishful thinking.

We’d previously watched a film by Romanian director Radu Jade that was shocking and felt unique but I didn’t like it too much. This one about a female production assistant who also moonlights as a manosphere influencer at first looks to be similar shock cinema. I’m not sure if it’s because I have a better grasp of EU affairs or because I just understood more of the references, but I soon realized what a brilliantly sarcastic film this is. It says so much about the current state of life in Romania and its complicated relationship with the EU, and as such I’d strongly recommend this.

This was another show that I was always going to watch, at least for one season, because of much I’d played the games. It is astonishingly pretty much the best video game adaptation I’d ever seen. It is absolutely crammed full of reference to the games, down to the smallest details, works hard to expand the lore, has enough of a budget to look fantastic and doesn’t hold back on the violence and gore. It’s an amazing ride for fans of the game but it falls short of a truly great series. The characters are well, written for video games, with little real dramatic depth, and the execution of the story is perhaps a little too faithful to the games. I enjoyed this one but I’m going to wait and see what the reviews say about the next season.

So there are two major superhero films being released in July but I’m probably not going to watch both in the cinemas so Superman it is. I’ve watched every one of James Gunn’s superhero work so far and loved them because he understands the characters he is using. It’s very much the case again with a take on Superman that emphasizes not his superhuman abilities but his compassion and heroism. It also updates the story to incorporate modern issues and concerns as all good adaptations must. It does feel somewhat cramped with some characters not getting much of a chance to show off and the denouement at the end feels too neat. But it’s an excellent start for the DCU.

This was a total surprise to me when it popped up on Netflix. The preview looked intriguing but it didn’t seem like our thing. Then I read about its great reviews and its songs became legitimate hits so I knew I had to watch it. And you know what? It really is great. The premise of fighting demons through kpop is totally outlandish of course but is totally self-consistent. Its take on girl power is original, the choreography looks cool and the music is catchy. The art isn’t quite on par with the best in the industry but I’d say that this is overall better than anything put out by any of the other major US animation studios in years.

Aki Kaurismäki is said to be Finland’s best known director but this is the first I’ve seen of his work, proving once again how incomprehensibly vast the world of cinema is. This one is a deceptively basic and straightforward romantic comedy with its minimalistic setup and sparse dialogue. But with its portrayal of the quietly desperate lives of the working class of Finland and the absurdly wrong time period it is set in, it effortlessly draws us into its world. I’m not certain that Finland is as poor a society as this film makes it out to be but I can’t deny the expressive power of this film.

Here’s another film by the British duo Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, also known as the Archers, and it’s likely to be the last one in a while since the rest of their filmography isn’t as notable. This one is about a group of nuns who set out to establish a convent in a remote part of India near the Himalayas. Since there’s a dashing Englishman involved, it’s easy to guess that there might be some romance involved. But there is so much more to this film and it genuinely flummoxed me for a bit as to what it is trying to say. Multiple interpretations are plausible, yet it is undeniable that this is a unique film.