Week Ending 1/30/26
The Sabres are a wagon?!
I only have two quick hits below for many reasons. One, I decided to start binging "Stranger Things" so I can finally watch the final season instead of accepting pitches. Two, I caught some February films knowing I have six virtual tickets to Sundance this weekend and must do a Posterized next week before finishing the Oscar shorts the week after. Three, the Buffalo Sabres are must-see TV again.
I don't just say that because I'm a fan. Everyone is saying it. The hockey world has jumped on this bandwagon with the confidence to declare their recent streak isn't a fluke ... and it feels wrong after enduring fourteen years of the swords being an easy whipping boy. Heck, they filled that role as recently as November.
You know things have shifted, though, when Leafs Nation simultaneously gave up on the playoffs because Buffalo beat them 7-4 Tuesday night. Mixed with the disappointment and pundit finger-pointing was genuine praise for the Sabres running roughshod over them. Sean Gentille and Dom Luszczyszyn have Buffalo at #4 in their Power Rankings. Elliotte Friedman and Kyle Bukauskas interviewed Josh Doan for their 32 Thoughts podcast. The Blue & Gold hasn't been this hot a commodity in so long that only one player to ever wear the crest in a playoff game remains active in the league (Tyler Myers).
So, as we head into the Olympic break, the talk is about getting healthy and buying at the trade deadline rather than organizing golf trips. While the streak started when the team finally got healthy, it's been sustained despite more injuries. They can shut Josh Norris down since Noah Östlund and Konsta Helenius look legit. They can weather the three goalie rotation since they're never all available for more than a weekend at a time anyway (Alex Lyon comes back and now UPL is out). They can also seriously consider letting Alex Tuch walk for nothing.
Why? Jarmo Kekäläinen has done it before with Sergei Bobrovsky and Artemi Panarin in Columbus. Is it prudent? Probably not. But it won't be possible to replace what he brings this season and futures don't help a run. My assumption is that the Sabres aren't willing to do 10.5 million for seven years and Tuch doesn't want to sign for two or three. While many believe the player has all the leverage, however, I think this situation has dragged on long enough to turn the table.
It's one thing to be irreplaceable on a bad team and force their hand to overpay to keep you (granted, Tuch will get 10.5 or higher on the open market). It's another to be irreplaceable on a good team that you have publicly declared is your preferred choice. Bad teams unload good players to contenders. Good teams trade with bad teams to get good players. Tuch has a five-team no-trade list, but does he really want to risk Jarmo trading him into another rebuild and miss out on playoff hockey with his (sort of) hometown team?
I wonder now if Tuch ends up being the one to blink first.
A Big Bold Beautiful Journey
Kogonada's A Big Bold Beautiful Journey is very much a "me" movie. It lives in an A Life Less Ordinary vein seen through a "Pushing Daisies" filter and that description of its tragically whimsical aesthetic is pretty much my ideal for romance when it comes to pop culture's willingness to take a swing. And while it's certainly a tonal departure from the films Kogonada has written himself, Seth Reiss' script definitely still fits his visual and emotional sensibilities.
Is it cheesy? Yes. That's the point. Is it heartfelt and cathartic? Yes. That's what allows it to be so cheesy (although its reception seems to put me in the minority on that fact). Just like David (Colin Farrell) and Sarah (Margot Robbie) are presented the opportunity to take a risk and embrace life outside comfort zones built from decades of self-sabotage and low self-worth, the film is asking us to throw pretense out the window and let love shine.
An absolute wild cast with wilder accents (Phoebe Waller-Bridge's German, Hamish Linklater's Irish, and Kevin Kline's Tom Waits) keeps the fun ratcheted to an eleven as the heavy gut-punches land with increased precision behind each subsequent door. And I love that it isn't about thrusting soulmates together as much as using two souls to stir something dormant from within each other to reclaim their desire for hope. Romance is simply a viable result of success.
7/10
The Lost Bus
I wonder if unfettered use of Pacific Gas and Electric Company's (PG&E) logo and vehicles in Paul Greengrass' The Lost Bus was part of their settlement after being found culpable for the 2018 "Camp Fire" in Northern California. Not that they had any recourse for their portrayal as a result either way. It's just weird to see an active business on-screen as a major plot point without also being thanked in the credits. CAL FIRE got all the appreciation instead.
It's always interesting to see how sprawling, event-driven non-fiction books are adapted into fictionalized films when documentary would be the better, all-encompassing medium. Between the fire, evacuation, and investigation dealing in fault and climate change, there's as much potential for heart-wrenching drama as emotionless procedure. So, as often happens, Brad Ingelsby sifted through the details for the best human interest story: a heroic school bus driver.
Give Matthew McConaughey and America Ferrera (as the teacher chaperone) credit for maintaining stakes in a narrative whose known outcome generally erases them (let alone a majority of their screen-time being in the confines of a yellow bus). Yul Vazquez tries matching their intensity in static scenes of bureaucratic jockeying, but Greengrass' shaky-cam can only do so much. I did love every time he yelled at a PG&E employee, though.
The real star is therefore the spectacle with faux drone-like exposition shots soaring through the blaze as embers ignite and infernos rage. The effects team truly earned that Oscar nomination because fire is generally the least believable of all computer manipulations and it looked pretty darn flawless here. All that smoke surely helped maintain an authentic fidelity because the only real rough moments were via reflections in the yellow-filtered bus windows.
I'm still unsure, however, whether to applaud the excellent child actors or question their parents for allowing them to partake in such harrowing and physical performances demanding they cry in abject fear for two straight hours.
7/10
This week saw Student Bodies (1981) added to the archive (cinematicfbombs.com).
Charles L. Trotter drops an f-bomb in STUDENT BODIES.
Opening Buffalo-area theaters 1/30/26 -
• Arco at Regal Galleria
"The animation style is attractive, the environments intricately detailed, and the action energetic. I also really loved Arnaud Toulon’s score—always present yet never overpowering. It’s a crucial piece that augments the emotions carried by Fay and Valdi." – Full thoughts at HHYS.
• Gandhi Talks at Regal Elmwood
• HOLY WATERS: A John Waters Film Festival (Pink Flamingos, Female Trouble, Polyester & Hairspray) at North Park Theatre (select times)
• Iron Lung at Dipson Flix, Capitol; AMC Maple Ridge; Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria, Quaker
• The LEGO Movie (2014) 3D Exclusive at Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria, Quaker
• Mardaani 3 at Regal Elmwood
• MELANIA at Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria, Quaker
• Moses The Black at Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria, Quaker
• Om Shanti Shanti Shantihi at Regal Elmwood
• Paris Hilton Infinite Icon: A Visual Memoir at Regal Transit, Galleria, Quaker
• Prakambanam at Regal Galleria
• A Private Life at Dipson Amherst; Regal Transit, Quaker
• Send Help at Dipson Flix, Capitol; AMC Maple Ridge; Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria, Quaker
• Shelter at Dipson Flix, Capitol; AMC Maple Ridge; Regal Elmwood, Transit, Galleria, Quaker
• Tafiti: Across the Desert at Regal Transit
• Valathu Vashathe Kallan at Regal Galleria
Streaming from 1/30/26 -
• If I Had Legs I'd Kick You (HBO Max) - 1/30
"It’s an intense ride that won’t be easily shaken. A large portion of that is due to Byrne’s tour-de-force performance, but also credit Bronstein’s aesthetic decision to never show Quinn’s face." – Full thoughts at HHYS.
• Muzzle 2: City of Wolves (AMC+) - 1/30
• Terri Joe: Missionary in Miami (Tubi) - 1/30
• Tin Soldier (Hulu) - 1/30
• Hurry Up Tomorrow (Starz) - 2/1
• The Knife (Starz) - 2/1
"There’s no more damning look into the dangers of American systemic racism than a scenario where the victims of that cruelty are so aware of it that their attempts to survive seal a worse fate." – Full thoughts at HHYS.
• Love, Brooklyn (Starz) - 2/1
"Things must get messy because life is messy, but Holder never lets it fall into cliché or melodrama. It's up to them to [the characters to] embrace this new day and move forward without looking back." – Full thoughts at jaredmobarak.com.
• Old Guy (Paramount+) - 2/1
• White Man Walking (Watermelon+) - 2/3
• Relationship Goals (Prime) - 2/4
Now on VOD/Digital HD -
• Anaconda (1/27)
• Ella McCay (1/27)
• Greenland 2: Migration (1/27)
• Polar Opposites (1/27)
• Trifole (1/27)
• Untitled Home Invasion Romance (1/27)
• Zootopia 2 (1/27)
"Disney has upped the ante with Zootopia 2 in ways that force me to stop giving this series the benefit of the doubt. You aren't creating distance from the taboo [by making everyone an animal]. You're just giving yourself cover to be racist." – Quick thoughts at HHYS.
• Grizzly Night (1/30)
• My Sister's Bones (1/30)
• Peaches Goes Bananas (1/30)
• Pike River (1/30)
Pieces from the An American Tail (1986) and Fievel Goes West (1991) press kit.
