The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013)

MIMDB score: 7.9
Current IMDB score: 7.3
Director: Ben Stiller
Main Actors you care about: Ben Stiller, Kristen Wiig, Adam Scott, Sean Penn

Why I liked it: It's makes me feel good.  This movie made me look at Ben Stiller differently.  It's like Will Ferrell's Stranger than Fiction movie for Ben Stiller.  The comedian type guy who's put in this humbling role that somehow fits really well even though it doesn't seem that way at first.  Mitty's character is reliable to the type of person that watches Walter Mitty-type movies.

What stands out:  The feeling you get from it.  It's like a safe feeling.  It's what humble pie would taste like.

Thing(s) I would change:  I do not like Stretch Armstrong.  I do not like the Stretch Armstrong scene between Adam Scott and Mitty.  It's too weird for the movie unfortunately.  That scene is borderline too weird.  Now the Benjamin Buttons scene is definitely too weird.  I feel like Kristen Wiig had something to do with the development of that scene because it's super weird and that's her humor.  Cut those sequences out please as they are distracting and have little to do with movie.  Deleted scenes is a better place for those.

Favorite Line(s)/Scene:  All the scenes in Iceland.  If you can go to Iceland in your life I recommend it.  It's fits this movie perfectly.  Iceland humbly makes you feel good being there.

Mitty: "And I get it. You got your marching orders... and you have to do what you have to do. But you don't have to be such a dick. Put that on a plaque, and hang it at your next job."  Exactly what needed to be said.  So good.

"Beautiful things don't ask for attention."  Amen movie.  I do not like when people call attention to themselves.  It's showy.  If people want to invest time or thought in you they will.  You don't have to sell yourself or shouldn't have to anyway.

Life's Motto: "To see the world, things dangerous to come to, to see behind walls, draw closer, to find each other, and to feel. That is the purpose of life."  The whole Life magazine being compared to life.  I like a lot of those thoughts.

Similar Movies/TV Shows:  For some reason the Truman Show?  I'll list the original Secret Life of Walter Mitty (1947) but I've only seen the trailer and that doesn't seem to have the same feel.  That one seems like more of a comedy.  The Intern, same feeling but different story and it's recent.  Pursuit of Happiness but it's not the exact same feeling.

"Side" note: I've been to Iceland where a lot of the scenes were filmed.  It was awesome.  I recommend going.  I went to the long boarding scene, helicopter departure scene, and the scenes in supposedly in Afghanistan that were really in the big state park in Iceland.  The really blue glacier he's walking on one time is a glacier I've walked.  Same ones in Interstellar.  Pretty awesome.

Also that's not really Life magazine's real motto unfortunately. . . .

Spotlight (2015)

MIMDB score: 7.2
Current IMDB score: 8.2
Director: Marc Webb
Main Actors you care about: Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, Michael Keaton

Why I liked it: I'm going to start a tradition of reviewing movies that receive an Oscar for best picture going forward.  I didn't think it was amazing but it was good.  Nothing really stood out to me except the ending.  The credits started listing ALL the cities where this has occurred. It takes like 20 screens of fairly small font to get through them all.  Really freaking crazy to believe it went on for so long before some one figured out it was happening.  In case you are not aware this movie covers the sexual (and probably mental) abuse of kids by Catholic persists.  Even more outrageous than that it talks about the cover up the Catholic church was doing for years on it.  I think this subject matter was a large part of why it won best picture . . . and that list of course.

What stands out:  The long list as I said.

Thing(s) I would change:  I was going to say have something more that stood out.  Nothing overly stood out because apparently the idea was not to embellish anything that happened.  There was the scene where the one priest admits to everything which was noteworthy but he was out of his mind so I don't think that stood out too much.  It's good though, really, for this type of movie.  That's kind of how these docuemtary-isqe movies should go.  If they would have embellished I think more would have stood out than just the list.  Not exaggerating made the list stand out more I feel like because that's what had the most attention I thought.

Favorite Line(s)/Scene:  The long list.  Although re-watching it doesn't seem that long but it still stands out.

I do like this line though:
Phil Saviano: I was eleven. And I was preyed upon by father David Holly in Wester. And I don't mean prayed for, I mean preyed upon.
Me: Boom, roasted.

Similar Movies/TV Shows:  They say Argo but I wouldn't say that.  Doubt, Inside Job, The Network, Good Night, and Good Luck, the TV show Newsroom.

"Side" note: These characters are based on an actual Spotlight team at the Boston Globe.  Many of the real journalist who worked on the story were present during the filming of the movie.  Another cool thing while researching this is that the journalists at the Boston Globe use a blue pen, the boss uses a black pen, and the editor uses a red pen.

Michael Keaton's fly is down in one scene.  Have fun finding what scene it is in . . . .