Humor

Next Year’s Movie Night Candidates

A brief review of the Junior Caucus’ upcoming choices for Movie Night.

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After last month’s Junior Caucus Movie Night set a new record of 20 upperclassmen attendees, the S.U. excitedly announced last Monday that it would be revealing the candidates for upcoming movie nights in next month’s S.U. newsletter. Fortunately for us, The Spectator News reporters managed to get a sneak peek at the list during one of the S.U.’s weekly “student compliance” meetings and returned with *most* of their organs intact.

Here are some of our top recommendations.

“Battery After 10th”

If you’re into indie films, this one’s for you. Filmed through the lens of a secondhand iPhone 4 camera and live-streamed through Snapchat, “Battery After Tenth” captures the harrowing struggles of underclassman Jenjamin “Jen” Erik’s rise to infamy as he beats up little kids from neighboring school P.S. 89 to boost his abysmally low clout levels.

While the movie does follow the overused underdog cliché, it sets itself apart by not only making Jen the most unlikable lead possible—courtesy of his abnormally prepubescent voice and nasty habit of referencing crusty memes—but also through its excellent cinematography and sound design.

We know a lot of critics dookied on the movie for being filmed in 144p and the difficulty hearing the scene over the sounds of 300 white kids hyped up on Honest Kids and Annie’s Organic Fruit Snacks, but to us, those choices just add to the intensity and nuance of the scene.

Oddly enough, the S.U. seemed to completely miss the point of the movie when making the list, as reporters found the movie at the top of the recommendations with nothing but the words “simply epic meemays” circled in red ink along with an image of what appeared to be a malnourished haha react. We wanted to question the S.U. about what part of the movie they considered a “meemay,” but we felt it was better for our reporters to leave with their livers in one piece.

Rating: A nice cult classic but not for everyone. One mile away/10.

Some Freshman’s Facebook Feed

A modern masterpiece. This movie received critical acclaim after its initial release during a freshman’s PowerPoint presentation for biology class. Rotten Tomatoes called it “nuanced, fast paced...a joyride until the end,” referring to the paragraph-long rants said freshman’s friend Saul T. Naizguy was sending after he got rejected for the 32nd time in a month.

A renowned method actor, Saul trained for his role months in advance by macking on every freshman and freshman-sized upperclassman in the school, hitting up their DMs with his signature “yo lemme smash” before calling them out as “fake-[expletive] [gardening tools]” after being rejected. By the time that filming came around, Saul was prepared to improvise on any script, now armed with a vast array of grade- and mother-related insults.

The film also received praise for its “unbelievably unexpected plot twist” when, during the finale (spoilers ahead), one of the group chats revealed that the lab answers they were copying the whole time were measured in degrees Kelvin instead of pounds. During its first screening, half of the freshmen reportedly broke down at this scene. Whether it was from being moved to tears at this emotional moment or because they realized their lab grades were going to drop 0.000001 percent that day, we still think it’ll be a surefire hit.

The movie has since been translated into five other languages by the Foreign Languages department as part of their Level 3 listening finals, and its sequel, “JupiterEd Sending Grade Alert E-mails” will be released in 2019, a week after the in-school screening. If you haven’t already, we highly recommend saving the date for this movie.

Rating: A must-see. 99/100 unread messages.