Spinal Tap II: The End Continues: This is the 2025 sequel to the original This Is Spinal Tap from 1984. It stars once again Christopher Guest (Nigel), Michael McKean (David) and Harry Shearer (Derek) getting back together after fifteen years of being apart. Nigel and David had a falling out and then they went their separate ways, in different parts of the world. Rob Reiner re-creates his director role as Marty Dibergi, and he has tracked down the members of the band and some of the other side characters (like Fran Drescher and Paul Shaffer) providing some updates to their very different lives. It is good to see Rob Reiner once again as this was the last film he worked on. There are several cameos one of which is really clever and enjoyable. The original manager has passed away and his daughter is played by Kerry Godliman who I recognize from Ricky Gervais’ After Life where she played his departed and beloved wife Lisa. Inserted is a new business manager who is meant to create tension, which is done successfully.

Forty one years have passed and these actors and performers have all aged, and this is precisely the point. As part of the preparation for the “final show” there are discussions about promotions and other ways to create revenue. It takes the updated reality of music with online, the internet, social media in producing and selling music. Much of it deals with death and the finality of it all for these aging rockers. It is once again is campy fun.

Rather than letting this older group of men rehearse and prepare for their final gig, there is a tension amongst the band members that they can’t address because there are ridiculous side distractions. They play some of the old tunes, which were originally created by the members. Things do eventually come to a head between David and Nigel and the audience better understands the tension between them. The concert carries on. They perform more of the previous songs. In short, this was a return visit to some characters that were funny and quirky. It didn’t suck. The finale was a surprise, and ended up bringing the earlier discussions full circle. There were some genuine laughs for me, moreso than the original to be frank.

Marty: Life Is Short: Netflix has this new documentary directed by Lawrence Kasdan. Martin Short of course is the SCTV and Saturday Night Live personality who has been a TV personality, in movies and everywhere else a comedian can go. Lately he has been seen in Only Murders in the Building. He also happens to be dating Meryl Streep apparently! But I digress. The who’s who of SCTV personalities are interviewed for this (Eugene Levy, Andrea Martin, Catherine O’Hara, Dave Thomas). It also includes other well known actors like Steve Martin, Tom Hanks, Steven Speilberg and others.

Did I learn anything new about Martin Short? I didn’t know about his wife, Nancy Dolman. I also hadn’t known that she had passed away in 2010 of ovarian cancer. Tragic. Two people who had a tremendous marriage and connection. She was a singer and an actress. They had met while he was involved in Godspell, when he was dating Gilda Radner who Nancy was an understudy. We learn more about the early days. The cast members basically dated one another and became family, on and off the stage. I didn’t know that he and Nancy couldn’t have children. They adopted. He was the youngest of five in his family. His eldest brother died when Marty was 12yo in an accident. Another brother, Michael, was an Emmy-winning writer. He lost his Mother at 18yo and his Dad at age 20yo. He has had a cottage in Snug Harbor in the Kawartha’s and he regards it as his little slice of heaven. Nancy bought it without him ever looking at it. It would seem like a fun time to go to the Martin Short Christmas Party.

I had forgotten how many truly awful movies that Martin Short had been in from Three Amigos, to Cross My Heart, Innerspace, and Captain Ron. He was not a leading man. His best parts were those in a supporting role like in Father of the Bride with his good friend Steve Martin. He plays the eccentric, and hard to understand wedding planner. He excels at creating new characters, especially in TV settings and improv. He can find the right words, with the right mannerisms for a unique take on a character. That is his gift, and he has shown it time and again.

I very much enjoyed the Jiminy Glick section. It’s very funny. The emotion comes from the section about Nancy amd her loss. He obviously loves the work and loves to laugh. Was this entertaining? Yes, I enjoyed this. This is worth the time.

Arrival (Revisited): I decided to revisit the most excellent Denis Villeneuve film starring Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner. Remarkably it has been out ten years already! I have watched this more than half a dozen times and each time I take something new from it. This time, I was profoundly impacted by the effective use of the dream sequences that were able to show how Louise (Adams) is unknowingly learning the heptapod language. The brilliance is how the use of the child, the most important aspect of a woman’s life, would be able to teach her about the gift being provided. I hadn’t seen the connection as much until watching it this most recent time. Before it was disjoined, and I thought of them as foreshadowing or other moments in time, but now I see them as dreams, and how they are shaping Louise.

There is a point where Ian (played by Renner) asked Louise, “are you dreaming in their language?” after discussing the concept that people who learn another language can have their brain re-wired. This is a very important discussion in the movie and reveals a great deal. Louise manages to identify what the gift is from the heptapods which they explain will be used to help them in the distant future 3000 years from then. Time is not linear for these beings. It is a powerful story, and also was my first introduction to the music On the Nature of Daylight by Max Richter. This music also leveled me in my viewing of Hamnet this past Oscar season. It is probably one of the saddest, let me correct that, emotional pieces of music I have heard in a long time. It evokes the films that have used it so well.