August 28–September 4, 2026 Credits roll. Score locks.
A strange six-movie week: outer space, Crystal Lake, Orange County, the Australian Outback, one friendly alien, and Lars von Trier making grief look like the end of the world. Most were rewatches. A couple were masterpieces. Jason somehow learned archery.
2010: The Year We Make Contact (1984): 5.9/10
2010 tries awfully hard to recapture the wonder of 2001, but it keeps explaining the very mysteries Kubrick had the nerve to leave alone. Roy Scheider gives the movie a sturdy, practical center, and the effects still impress, but Peter Hyams turns a cosmic riddle into a conventional, overly literal space adventure. It is a respectable sequel to a film that never needed one.
Friday the 13th (2009): 5.5/10
This is pretty much how I remembered it: a slicker remake built from the same cheap thrills as the 1980s slashers. The underground tunnels meant to explain how Jason appears everywhere are a weird, slightly silly addition. And Jason with a bow and arrow? Really? Still, the movie delivers enough solid kills to keep moving. The blunt dialogue, gratuitous nudity, and disposable young bodies make it feel less like a reinvention than an expensive continuation of the old formula. That is not necessarily a complaint. It knows exactly what kind of movie it is.
Orange County (2002): 6.6/10
This is mostly filler, and 6.6 may be more generous than it deserves, but the soundtrack alone earns it a few extra points. Even arriving in 2002, the whole movie still feels completely soaked in the late 1990s: the music, the clothes, the studio-comedy rhythm, all of it. Jack Black is easily the best thing in it, barging through every scene with exactly the kind of unrestrained performance the movie needs.
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982): 8.3/10
What is left to say about E.T.? It is a banger. Pure, peak Spielberg: funny, frightening, sentimental, and completely sincere without ever losing its sense of wonder. He makes the impossible feel intimate and the ordinary feel magical. Sometimes the obvious classic really is that good.
Antichrist (2009): 8.2/10
Whatever else can be said about Lars von Trier, the man knows how to make an unforgettable image. Antichrist is an achievement in filmmaking, turning grief into something physical, diseased, and almost impossible to escape. The visuals are astonishing, but they are never merely beautiful; every shot seems infected by the couple's pain. It is cruel, difficult, and at times unbearable, yet its depiction of grief remains incredibly powerful. Von Trier usually goes for the throat. Here, he earns it.
Wake in Fright (1971): 6.9/10
The Australian Outback has rarely looked so beautiful or so hostile. Wake in Fright turns the heat, dust, alcohol, and endless open land into something deeply claustrophobic, capturing the particular menace I love in Australian horror. And Donald Pleasence is Donald Pleasence: strange, magnetic, and enough by himself to get me to watch almost anything.
The Final Tally
Six movies, five rewatches, and one first-time watch. The average score landed at exactly 6.9.
- Best of the week: E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, 8.3
- Close behind: Antichrist, 8.2
- Roughest watch: Friday the 13th, 5.5