Cinema Roundup + Favourite Films: August 2025
Sharing this before the month ends because for the rest of the month I will be attending film screenings at the Venice Film Festival which I’ll cover in September.
Favourite New Releases (in alphabetical order):
Nobody 2: Not as good as the first one, and I guess it can never be, the cat is out of the bag. I had a good time watching it, and it became extra fun when Sharon Stone appeared. “NOBODY CHEATS IN MY CASINO”.
This line appeared at the end of the end credits which in my opinion should’ve been shown at the start - “This work may not be used to train in AI.”
Sketch: A rare PG13 film made today that is emotionally intelligent. About family, grief, art and imagination. “Life is all about balancing the good and the bad; if you don’t carry the good with you, it just makes the bad stronger.” Endearing and funny, great cast and script, and the right amount of VFX monsters that look like a child’s hand drawings.
“What IS THIS playlist?” cracked me up, when a Kenny G type track is followed by a metal track, and shortly after an exchange about the difference between an iPod and an iPhone.
Weapons: Went to see this twice.
She Rides Shotgun: An ending that choked me up. This film should’ve stayed in the cinemas for longer, most people didn’t know about it.
Wish I liked:
Bring Her Back
Coolie: I get the Rajinikanth “Superstar” fan service, but this one was too messy, 4 to 5 films in one, and the Monica Bellucci song was fun to watch but had no reason to be in the film. The underlying story is pro union/labour, and wish it was better developed. The smuggled gold watches looped to make one large lethal weapon rope chain was cool though.
Materialists - This started off well but fell apart midway. But I did like Celine Song’s reply to the dumb and lazy interview using a dumb review from Letterboxd to get her thoughts. More directors and actors should push back and not accept the lazy interviews like this. What’s written on Letterboxd should stay there.
War 2: Got what I wanted from this, watching Hrithik Roshan in a new dance scene with his new bromance co-star, NTR Jr. But the Janaab-e-Aali song and dance number has nothing on Jai Jai Shivshankar from the first War film. As for the film, as always with Bollywood, before interval better than after interval.