Masters of the Universe Movie: So, Nostalgia is a Weird Thing

So, there's a new trailer out for a He-Man movie.

And then I saw writer Chris Roberson said, over on Bluesky:

Hallmark Watch: Frozen In Love (2018)

Watched:  01/21/2026

Format:  Hallmark

Viewing:  First

Director:  Scott Smith

Here in real life, we're prepping for a winter storm coming this weekend, and I knew I was planning to finish watching Mademoiselle Fifi in the evening, so we threw on this RomCom from Hallmark, Frozen In Love (2018).  

The film is not a Christmas movie, but the stuff Hallmark programs, post-holidays, to fill the winter months.  Yes, there is snow and ice and ice hockey in this movie.  No, I don't know anything about hockey.

Wise Watch: Mademoiselle Fifi (1944)

Watched: 01/21/2026

Format:  YouTube

Viewing:  First

Director:  Robert Wise

Our viewing of movies by Robert Wise continues with Mademoiselle Fifi, a 1944 movie, made during the darker days of World War II, using the Franco-Prussian War as a wispy-thin analog for the German occupation of France and a clear show of support for the French Resistance.  

This is Wise's first solo directorial effort, but you'd never know.  The movie seems assured of the handling of actors as it does of camera management and tone.  

The movie is intended as an odd propaganda - yes, stateside it would be seen as pro-French Resistance, but also would have informed Americans of what it means to be occupied, and how those under the bootheel may react in ways noble, practical and cowardly.  And, that some may not see much different day-to-day, or take advantage of cozying up to the occupiers.  I cannot assume this would have been very comfortable for movie go-ers who may have wanted to have less nuanced takes on the occupation.

Happy Birthday, Geena Davis

Hey!  It's the birthday of Geena Davis!  Who doesn't like Geena Davis?  

I believe my intro to Davis was as Larry in Fletch.  After that, she was just sort of omnipresent in movies.  But I decided she was *great* (post-Oscar win) when I saw Thelma & Louise and A League of Their Own within a year of each other.  

I didn't see a few of her bigger movies til well after the fact, but I can always say, along with Sigourney Weaver and a few others, if you say "hey, Geena Davis is in it", I'll watch it.  

Davis is less in the spotlight these days - the last thing I saw her in was GLOW, where she crushed it as a casino manager and former showgirl.  But she's not just doing the acting and producing thing (she's a very successful TV and film producer).  She founded the Geena Davis Institute.  

I think she's the right person to have started such an org, and their work is important, bringing research and spotlights to issues of "equitable representation in media" (from their website).  

Here's to Geena Davis - trailblazing and playing my favorite ballplayer in a movie.

Also, she once surprised Stuart at work.

Noir Thriller Watch: Diabolique (1955)

Watched:  01/19/2026

Format:  Noir Alley on TCM

Viewing:  First

Director:  Henri-Georges Clouzot

Diabolique (1955) hangs heavy over so much of cinema that, like many other films I've both finally watched - or still haven't seen (hello, Bicycle Thieves) - the very weight of it made it seem like homework instead of watching something for the sake of watching a movie.  

It also makes these movies difficult to write about.  I don't guess I'm ever breaking new ground, but when it comes to something with the gravity of this film, what's the point of writing about it, really?

But even I thought it was ridiculous I'd never seen Diabolique.  Spousal murder movies are part-and-parcel for noir, from probably before Double Indemnity.    

Anyway - TCM's Noir Alley programmed the movie, and what better way to frame the movie than with Eddie Muller's brand of bar room rather than classroom?  

The film is both familiar - it's been ripped off endlessly in the ensuing 71 years - and yet it remains unique and surprising in other ways.  A post-WWII France, still sorting itself,makes for an interesting locale.  The economic situation is still rough, and the occupation has left its shadow and scars.  It's also made in France and therefore the Hayes Code isn't so much a factor.  But I'd really point to the characters and performances.  Grade A stuff riding a Grade A script..

At a boys' boarding school - the principal is carrying on with a teacher with the full knowledge of his wife, a timid woman with a heart condition.  However, the principal abuses the teacher, and somehow - the wife and the mistress have fallen into a conspiratorial friendship.  Even as we meet them, they're planning how to kill the principal and make it look like an accident.

Vera Clouzot - wife of the writer/ director - plays the wife of the principal.  She is, frankly, stunning in a complex, conflicted role, asked to play so many things, and she pulls it all off brilliantly.  It's simply one of those roles that will never play as outdated and because of the legacy of the film, will keep Clouzot in the public mind despite having only three film roles to her resume (she passed 5 years later).

I don't know what to say - yeah, the movie met expectations.  Windy, twisty, unrelentingly tense...  and, of course, with an ending good enough that they ask the audience not to share the end with anyone right there at the film's conclusion - something I'm respecting here in 2026, and so I'm not discussing the film too much more.  

Anyway - that one is now checked off. 

Clouseau Watch: The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976)

Watched:  01/19/2026

Format:  BluRay Disc

Viewing:  First

Director:  Blake Edwards

We've been having a hard time synching up of late, so Simon returned to Signal Watch HQ at 9:15 AM with this movie in hand.  

I am happy to say, I very much enjoyed The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976), another installment in the Inspector Clouseau series of films starring Peter Sellers and directed by Blake Edwards.  

Taking off from the last film, it runs with the Herbert Lom character, former Chief Inspector Dreyfus, escaping an insane asylum and threatening the world unless they hand over or kill Inspector Clouseau.  In a way, this is the plot of Man of Steel, by the way.  

Recurring jokes recur - like Clouseau in terrible disguises, Kato attacking Clouseau...  but much like a Looney Tunes episode, it's all very welcome.  And the vibe is somewhere between Looney Tunes, Bond and prior Pink Panther films.  

Omar Sharif makes a bonus appearance, we see a *very* early Deep Roy appearance, and Lesley-Anne Down makes a convincing argument for herself.

All in all, recommended.  The jokes hold up, and even scenes that could be read as homophobic kind of aren't.  

Anyway, I'll keep it short because I hate explaining jokes, and the whole movie is a joke machine.  

Happy Birthday to Elizabeth "Bitsie" Tulloch

Happy b-day to Bitsie Tulloch, the actor who brought Lois Lane to life on the recent TV show, Superman & Lois.  If you haven't seen it - fix that now.

Tulloch brought exactly the vibe I was looking for in Lois Lane on a show I admit I was deeply skeptical of when it went into production.  But I happily watched all four seasons, and would have continued had WB not hard-rebooted their entire slate the past year.

Tulloch has had plenty of roles, including the lead on the entire run of NBC's show Grimm, but I'm always reminded - she's multi-lingual and a Harvard graduate.  No dummy, this Lois.  

Not sure what her next roles will be, but we'll certainly be paying attention.

Happy Birthday, Dolly Parton

Happy Birthday to singer, song-writer, performer, actor, philanthropist, movie producer, theme park mogul, and all-around American Icon, Dolly Parton.  Today, she turns 80.  

Here's her latest - a Dolly classic, but now with some friends aboard.  This version was released over this weekend, I believe:

"Up All Night" with Rhonda Shear is Back!

,

Back during some crucial years of my late high school and college years, I basically couldn't sleep.  Long after my folks had gone to bed on the weekend, I'd be up... all night.  And in those days, even cable channels went off the air or rolled over to infomercials. 

But the USA network, a sort of junk drawer of basic cable, knew some of us insomniacs were up for nonsense before we finally gave up and went to bed.  And every weekend, they gave us two or three movies on Fridays and Saturdays, with interstitials featuring pals to take us into the wee hours.  

a true symbol of America's golden age

JLC Regret Watch: Virus (1999)

Watched:  01/16/2025

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  First

Director  John Bruno

A while back, I read that Signal Watch fave Jamie Lee Curtis has at least one movie she made which she'll publicly drag.  Which made me curious.  And that movie was Virus (1999), a sci-fi schlock-fest. 

Having just sat through the hour and forty minutes of Virus, I am in agreement with JLC.  This movie is very, very not good.  

It's an alien-invasion film (on a boat!) where it feels like the movie is just abusing your willing suspension of disbelief while delivering scenes and sequences from other movies you've seen before and is daring you to keep watching.

Our plot:  a wave of candy-colored cosmic energy passes through the Mir Space Station, which, in turn, shoots a beam of candy-colored energy into a Russian science vessel.  The beam blasts energy around the ship while the captain is alarmed it's accessing the mainframe (boy we were worried about mainframes still in 1999) and we cut to a standard, post-Abyss rag-tag working crew of a tug boat in a hurricane.