It wasn't a bad movie month, dudes. Uh, that is to say, I saw a lot of movies. Many of them sucked, so I guess I'm not sure if it was a bad movie month or not.

Far and away, the best movie I saw this month was Snowpiercer, no small feat as I once claimed I'd never see a movie starring Chris Evans again after his putrid, borderline laughable performance in Fantastic Four. On the other hand, Fantastic Four somehow made Michael Chiklis look like a no-talent knob, so the problems certainly didn't start with Evans.

Anyway, Evans is a powerhouse here. The movie doesn't ask a lot of range of him, as he's experiencing lows most of the way, but he makes the most of every moment and draws the viewer in on a character level to a movie that's mostly plot, plot, plot (which isn't a criticism, exactly, but a movie that focuses so much on plot is often open to issues with the audience giving a damn).

I saw a ton of other movies, too, which I'll hopefully cover during this rare Monday off, but I had to get that one out of the way. What have you seen?

I saw Django Unchained and a few TV shows in this very busy month that was mostly spent on the release of my game. I continue to ignore superhero movies in theaters and lament my lack of movement on the classics.

...but maybe you've seen something?

Alright, I've got a little time to type something up here. Last night I watched this one...

The Last Days (Los últimos días)
2013, David and Alex Pastor

As I grow more cynical about big-budget film, it takes longer and longer every time I open Netflix to settle on something. Last night I got somewhat lucky with this movie which, despite plenty of problems, jumped out at me as a post-apocalyptic journey, which is something I'm always into.

The movie's absurdly stupid premise is that agoraphobia has gone viral due to a volcanic eruption. Thankfully, the filmmakers ask us to just go with it rather than attach some unlikely science. Anyone who goes outside ends up dying, which gets us farther from agoraphobia, but whatever. The rules are inconsistent; cars offer no protection but in a couple of scenes, several characters enjoy open windows and nothing happens. I forgave all this for a couple of reasons: one, it was rather well-acted. There are scads of extras in this film but only two or three characters important to the narrative. Two, it was artfully shot. Three, I liked the two lead characters so much that I truly wanted them to succeed in finding one's pregnant fiance, from whom he was separated when the world went to hell.

You'll have to shrug off some other nonsense - a GPS is used frequently and with pinpoint precision underground - but all in all, I'm typically glad when I make an unlikely selection, and this was no exception.

I have Django Unchained next up and otherwise the month's been light on film, heavy on video games and a couple of books. What have you seen, Citizens?