Blame the Game (Game Night), 2024

Spieleabend is a 2024 German feature film directed by Marco Petry based on a screenplay by Claudius Pläging and starring Dennis Mojen and Janina Uhse. The comedy film was released on Netflix on July 12, 2024.

TRAILER

PLOT

Pia and Jan get to know each other in the park while walking their dogs. Pia is a photographer, Jan has a bicycle shop. The two become lovers. At a regular game night, Jan gets to know Pia's circle of friends. Pia's best friend is Karo, a designer by training, who runs a furniture mail order business and is married to the vocational school teacher Oliver. Sheila is a pharmacist, she has known Pia as well as Karo since kindergarten; she stalks her ex-girlfriend, while Sheila claims it's just a long relationship break. Long-term student Kurt is the brother of Karo.

The game night takes place in the villa of Karo and Oliver. Karo wants Pia to join her company as a designer, not least because she doesn't think Pia and Jan's business is lucrative. At the game night, Jan wants to make a good impression. As a gift, he brings Karo an airbag for cycling, but it immediately comes off and destroys Karo's hairstyle. To talk to his friend Alex on the phone, Jan looks for a quiet room, where he opens the window. Oliver's cockatoo, whom he calls Helmut Kohl, escapes. Jan asks Alex to recapture the escaped bird. In the process, Alex destroys Oliver's climbing frame in the garden. Oliver and Karo have an au pair in Gabriela, who takes care of her daughter Emma and prepares the food.

In the course of the evening, Pia's ex-boyfriend, the dentist Matthias, also appears. He tries to show Jan off repeatedly, and in passing he tells him about his marriage proposal to Pia. Jan didn't know anything about Matthias and his proposal, it had no meaning for Pia and she hadn't accepted it.

Jan has brought the game Who Would for the evening, in which questions are drawn from a pile and everyone has to write down the name of a person from the group. Oliver freaks out because he finds himself portrayed as a loser by the others. As a result, he disguises himself as the all-powerful elf king Ogandur. Karo thinks that he embarrasses her and himself in front of his friends. An argument ensues between the two, in which it turns out that the two do not have sex with each other and Karo has to take medication to function. Karo accuses Oliver of having an affair with Gabriela.

After Jan called Matthias a loudmouth, Matthias challenges Jan to a duel in table tennis. At Karo's suggestion, this takes place naked. The loser has to drink a bottle of chili sauce. Matthias states that he cannot tolerate spiciness. He is confident of victory, but loses the duel. After drinking the chili sauce, Jan hands Matthias a bottle of milk, but it is breast milk.

Finally, it comes to an argument between Jan and Pia. She feels like a trophy in the duel between Jan and Matthias. Jan, on the other hand, accuses her of not fitting into her world of the rich and intelligent. He also finds out that Matthias and Pia kissed, but according to Pia, before Jan and Pia were really together. Jan leaves the villa with Alex, but Alex has lost his key, so the two have to return. In the process, the two end up in a net trap set up for wild boars in the garden of neighbor Fieper.

Pia accuses Oliver of inviting Matthias and of only drawing those cards in Trivial Pursuit that Matthias was prepared for. Oliver wanted to help Matthias get together with Pia again. Matthias himself is drunk in his car in the direction of the Berlin Zoo, Oliver, Karo, Pia and Sheila follow him later.

Fieper frees Jan and Alex from the trap and gives them the cockatoo, which he has stunned with a shot. Jan brings Helmut Kohl back to the house, but in the meantime only Kurt is present. Jan, Alex and Kurt also go to the zoo. In the enclosure of a tiger they find Matthias' cell phone, Jan climbs in because Matthias is also suspected to be there. However, he later reappears outside the enclosure. Pia and Jan reconcile, as do Karo and Oliver. Oliver reveals to Karo that he had secretly taken dance lessons from Gabriela for the wedding anniversary. The next game night takes place in Jan's apartment and without Matthias.

Rating: 10 Stars

The Guilt Trip, 2012

 The Guilt Trip is a 2012 American road comedy film directed by Anne Fletcher from a screenplay written by Dan Fogelman, starring Barbra Streisand and Seth Rogen, who both also served as executive producers on the film.

TRAILER

PLOT

Andy Brewster is a UCLA-graduate organic chemist and inventor. He wants to get his environmentally friendly cleaning product, ScieoClean, in a major retail store. However his sales pitches fall on deaf ears.

He visits his mother, Joyce Brewster, in New Jersey before leaving on a cross-country trip to Las Vegas, lying that a pitch to K-Mart went well so she will not worry.

While there, she reveals that he was named after Andrew Margolis, a boy she fell in love with in Florida, who she hoped would object to her marriage with Andy's father. However, he did not, making her feel she had never mattered to him. After a little research, he finds Andrew Margolis is alive, unmarried and living in San Francisco. He invites his unknowing mother on the trip, saying he wants to spend some time with her.

The road trip quickly becomes hard for Andy as his mother meddles in his life. After their car breaks down in Tennessee, Joyce calls Andy's ex-girlfriend Jessica, whom she insists he should get back together with, to pick them up. At a pregnant and married Jessica's house, she reveals that Andy proposed to her before college, and she turned him down, shocking Joyce.

Andy is glum afterward, and Joyce apologizes for calling Jessica, which he half-heartedly accepts. In Texas, he meets with Costco executive Ryan McFee. Joyce stays at the meeting, criticizing the product's labeling and name along with Ryan until Andy snaps at him. At a motel that night, a depressed Andy begins drinking, and Joyce attempts to make up with him. He gets angry, only to have her snap back and leave for a bar. Later, Andy attempts to retrieve Joyce and gets in a fight with a bar patron over her, receiving a black eye in the process.

At a steak restaurant the next day, the two exchange apologies, and Andy reveals that he is failing at selling ScieoClean. Joyce enters a steak-eating challenge and is noticed by cowboy-businessman Ben Graw, who gives her tips to help her finish the challenge.

Afterwards, Ben reveals he does business in New Jersey and asks her to dinner. Joyce, who has not been in a relationship since Andy's dad died years before, balks at the offer, so Ben merely leaves his number and asks her to call if she reconsiders.

Andy and Joyce begin to genuinely enjoy each other's company after, taking time to visit the Grand Canyon (which Joyce has always wanted to see) and having other adventures.

In Las Vegas, Joyce has such a good time that she suggests Andy leave her while he visits San Francisco, forcing him to reveal that he chose the city so she could meet Andrew Margolis. Joyce is very distraught, having believed Andy solely invited her to spend time with her.

Andy makes his pitch at the Home Shopping Network but finds that his science-based pitch bores the executives. Seeing Joyce, he takes her advice by talking about family safety, and drinking a large amount of it to prove his product will not harm children. The CEO shows genuine interest in selling ScieoClean on the Network. Jubilant, Andy and Joyce decide to visit Andrew Margolis's house.

When they arrive, they meet Andrew's son, Andrew Margolis Jr., whom Andy mistook for the father. He reveals that his father died five years ago. Seeing Joyce's grief, he invites them inside. She asks if Andrew's father ever mentioned her, but he says he never did as he only confided personal information to their mother, who is in Florida.

Andrew then introduces his sister, who is also named Joyce. Joyce is overjoyed, believing that you name your children after someone you cherished and want to remember. This makes her believe that she mattered to Andrew.

Afterwards, they part ways at the San Francisco Airport: Andy to make his next sales pitch and Joyce back to New Jersey, where she arranges a date with Ben Graw. The two leave content and much closer than they had been.

Rating: 10 Stars

The King, 2019

The King is a 2019 epic historical drama film directed by David Michôd, based on several plays from William Shakespeare's Henriad. The screenplay was written by Michôd and Joel Edgerton, who both produced the film with Brad Pitt, Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner, and Liz Watts. The King includes an ensemble cast led by Timothée Chalamet as the Prince of Wales and later King Henry V of England, alongside Edgerton, Sean Harris, Lily-Rose Depp, Robert Pattinson, and Ben Mendelsohn.

TRAILER

PLOT

King Henry IV of England has several sons, including the eldest, Henry, Prince of Wales ("Hal"), and Thomas. Hal, uninterested in succeeding his father, spends his days drinking, whoring, and jesting with his companion Falstaff in Eastcheap.

King Henry IV grows tired of Hal's debauchery and announces that Thomas will inherit the throne.

King Henry IV sends Thomas to subdue Hotspur's rebellion. However, Hal arrives and upstages Thomas by challenging Hotspur to single combat. Hal kills Hotspur, ending the battle without further conflict.

Thomas, feeling cheated of his glory, complains to King Henry IV. Shortly thereafter, Thomas dies while campaigning against the rebels in Wales. King Henry IV dies in his bed with Hal present. Hal is anointed as King Henry V and opts for peace and conciliation with his father's many adversaries, despite his actions being seen as weakness.

At King Henry V's coronation feast, envoys from the Dauphin of France present Hal with a tennis ball as an insulting coronation gift. However, King Henry V chooses to frame this as a positive reflection of his boyhood. His sister Philippa, now the Queen of Denmark, cautions her brother that nobles in any royal court have their own interests in mind and will never fully reveal their true intentions.

King Henry V interrogates a captured assassin who claims to have been sent by King Charles VI of France to kill him (King Henry V). French agents approach the English nobles Cambridge and Grey. The traitors plot against Hal and unsuccessfully attempt to win over the Chief Justice, Gascoigne. Gascoigne advises Hal that a show of strength is necessary to unite England, so Hal declares war on France and has Cambridge and Grey beheaded. He approaches Falstaff and appoints him as his chief military strategist, saying that Falstaff is the only man he truly trusts.

The English army sets sail for France. After completing the Siege of Harfleur, they receive taunting messages from the Dauphin. The English advance parties stumble upon a vast French army gathering to face them. Dorset advises Hal to retreat, but Falstaff proposes a false advance to induce the French into rushing forward into the muddy battlefield, where they will be weighed down by their heavy armor and horses. They will then be attacked by the English longbowmen and surrounded by a large, lightly armored flanking force hidden in the nearby woods.

Unable to dissuade Falstaff from leading the advance personally, Hal proposes to the Dauphin that they meet in single combat to decide the battle and minimize bloodshed. The Dauphin, seeing this as weakness, refuses. The Battle of Agincourt commences. Falstaff's plan works – the bulk of the French army charges to engage Falstaff's force and is soon mired in the mud. Hal leads the flanking attack, and the outnumbered but far more mobile English army overpowers the immobilized French, though Falstaff is killed. The Dauphin, seeing his men being driven back, reinvokes Hal's challenge but repeatedly slips and falls in the mud until Hal permits his soldiers to kill him. Hal orders all French prisoners executed for fear that they might regroup, despite Falstaff having previously warned him that such an action would be unchivalrous and unworthy of a king.

Hal reaches King Charles VI, who agrees to adopt him as his heir and offers him the hand of his daughter Catherine of Valois. Hal returns to England with his new wife for a celebratory triumph. In private, she challenges his reasons for invading France and denies the supposed French actions against Hal, suggesting the assassin was a plot from within his own court. Suspicious, Hal confronts Gascoigne, who confesses that he had staged the insult and acts of aggression, believing that his sole duty is to protect the king even if it means deceiving him. In a cold fury, Hal stabs the Chief Justice to death, and returns to Catherine, asking that she promise to always speak the truth to him, as clearly as possible.

Rating: 10 Stars

In Time, 2011

 In Time is a 2011 American science fiction action film written, produced, and directed by Andrew Niccol. Justin Timberlake and Amanda Seyfried star as inhabitants of a society that uses time from one's lifespan as its primary currency, with each individual possessing a clock on their arm that counts down how long they have to live. Cillian Murphy, Vincent Kartheiser, Olivia Wilde, Matt Bomer, Johnny Galecki, and Alex Pettyfer also star. The film was released on October 28, 2011, and grossed $174 million against a $40 million budget. It received negative reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, which praised the premise but called the execution heavy handed. On Metacritic, it received mixed reviews.

TRAILER

PLOT

In 2169, people are genetically engineered to stop aging on their 25th birthdays and are given one free year to live. Everyone has a timer on their forearm that shows their remaining time; when it reaches zero, the person "times out" and instantly dies.

Time is now the universal currency, transferred directly between people or stored in capsules. The country is divided into Time Zones; Dayton is the poorest, a ghetto where people rarely have more than 24 hours on their timer. New Greenwich is the richest, people there are effectively immortal.

Factory worker Will Salas lives in Dayton with his mother Rachel. One night, he rescues drunken Henry Hamilton from time thief Fortis and his gang the Minutemen. Hamilton reveals that the people of New Greenwich hoard their time while constantly increasing prices to keep the poor dying.

Hamilton transfers all his time to a sleeping Will before deliberately timing out and dying. Raymond Leon, the leader of the police-like Timekeepers, assumes that Will killed Hamilton and pursues him.

Will's friend Borel warns him against having so much time in Dayton. Will gives Borel ten years, one for each year of their friendship. Will sets off to meet his mother, intending to take her to New Greenwich. His mother times out and dies in his arms, less than a second before he could transfer time to her and save her life. Will vows to avenge his mother's death by taking the people of New Greenwich for everything they have.

In a New Greenwich casino, Will meets time-loaning businessman Philippe Weis and his daughter Sylvia. Will wins over a millennium at poker while nearly timing himself out. Sylvia invites him to a party. Leon arrests Will and confiscates all but two hours of his time.

Will takes Sylvia hostage and escapes to Dayton, but Fortis's gang ambushes them, leaving them with 30 minutes each. Will attempts to get some time back from Borel, but his wife Greta explains that he has drunk himself to death. They get a day each by pawning Sylvia's earrings. Will demands Weis pay a 1,000-year ransom to the people in Dayton in exchange for Sylvia's safe return. Weis refuses, and Will releases Sylvia just as Leon finds them. Sylvia shoots Leon in the arm, and Will gives him enough time to survive until the other Timekeepers arrive. They use Leon's car to pull over a New Greenwich resident whom they rob of her time and car.

Will and Sylvia rob her father's time banks and give time capsules to the needy. They realize they cannot significantly change anything, as prices are raised faster to compensate for the extra time. Fortis's gang ambushes them to collect the reward for their capture, but Will kills him and his gang. Will and Sylvia steal a one-million year capsule from her father's vault. Leon chases them back to Dayton but fails to stop them distributing the stolen time. Leon times out, having neglected to collect his day's salary. Will and Sylvia nearly time out themselves but survive by taking his salary.

Television reports show factories in Dayton shutting down as everyone has enough time to abandon their jobs. Having seen the consequences of his obsession with the pair, Leon's colleague Jaeger orders the Timekeepers to return home. Will and Sylvia progress to larger banks, still trying to crash the system.

Rating: 10 Stars