**TW Suicide is referenced in Dear Evan Hansen and in this review as well**

Humans are social creatures and will go to great lengths to connect with one another. For some that process is easy and natural, but for others connection is a bit tougher. For others still, like the titular lead of Dear Evan Hansen, true human connection can only be forged by gaslighting the family of a deceased classmate.

Getting old is a long and often lonely road, one that Clint Eastwood knows well. More than fifty years have passed since the spaghetti westerns that made him a household name and nearly twenty since his last Academy Award. Now 91 years old, far closer to the end of that road than the beginning, Eastwood is still making movies. With Cry Macho, like The Mule before it, the cowboy of old Hollywood is starting to grapple with his journey coming to an end.

Anyone who had seen Paul Schrader’s existentially dreadful First Reformed had a pretty good sense that his newest effort would be anything but breezy. Man’s struggle against punishing oppression and his culpability for society’s sins has been the defining feature of Schrader’s long, illustrious career. With The Card Counter, it’s Oscar Isaac’s turn to grapple with the dark corners of his past.

It’s a special Throwback Thursday this week and for the rest of September as Spinning the Reel embarks on another Decades Project. This time we are covering the 1960s on the podcast and right here on the blog. First up is my pick for the month: Agnes Varda’s Cleo from 5 to 7.

Often the most common, and most often lazy, pieces of film criticism ask “Who is this movie for?” Usually the answer is self apparent and traces back to some studio’s desire to make money quickly. Every so often though, a movie comes around that so violently antagonizes every potential audience that its very existence comes into question. Forgive me for asking, but who is He’s All That for?