Watching
Tragically, there is no sequel (yet) to Tamala 2010: A Punk Cat in Space (2002), and as of now the original is not easy to find with subtitles. Wikipedia says it is “written, directed, animated and featuring music by a 13 to 16 year old person named Onizuka, also with his friends K. and kuno” (the credits call this team t.o.L., which stands for trees of Life) and its Fandom wiki describes it as “a cartoon cat version of Thomas Pynchon’s novel The Crying of Lot 49.” A must-see.
The dialogue of Maya Dardel (2017) is worth powering through the medication commercial-cinematography, I think. I imagined, while watching, that the titular protagonist was inspired by Mary Gaitskill, for no reason other than superficial ones, like that she’s a writer with long, side-parted hair. The conflict is that she’s reclusive but horny, plus she wants to kill herself and needs an executor to her estate.
The premise of Delirious (2006) is not believable and its characters are time capsule-y, being that they are a print paparazzo, an MTV pop star, and the homeless guy that steals the latter’s heart, but individual scenes centering on reality TV, the Post, and fragrance deals hold up. It’s self-referential, too, starring the famously plucked-from-obscurity Michael Pitt as a vagabond-turned-It Boy and Steve Buscemi as a mostly behind-the-scenes man, without whom there would be no story.
I have seen almost every Laura Dern thing, and I’d rank Daddy and Them (2001) somewhere just under Citizen Ruth (1996) and Enlightened (2011–2013). It’s also the only movie I’ve seen that’s directed by Billy Bob Thornton, who was dating and living with Dern then, if I understand the timeline correctly. She has said he got married to Angelina Jolie without even telling her that they were broken up, in 1999, which is something Bob’s character might do to Laura’s character, too.