Choo Choo

Good morning Consumers. This is Please Consume, the movie newsletter features scenes from Phantom Thread and Beavis & Butthead do America! Just how PTA always imagined.

This is what we got for today 👇️

• We get to talk about one of the best actors of a generation. Christian kicks off Denzel Washington Week!

• Will Oppenheimer pass 1 billion?

• All the latest news and notes from this weekend.

Let’s get rolling…

We’ve been foaming at the mouth to do a week like this.

We love Denzel Washington and his vast reaching range as an actor, and with the release of Equalizer 3 (which we imagine will be his best film to date) we couldn’t let this opportunity slip away!

Unstoppable (2010)

Written by Christian Boyd

I could have rolled with a Denzel classic, but what's the fun in that? Unstoppable is one of Washington's most overlooked films in his filmography. People saw the trailers and said “ Just another dumb runaway train movie.”

Well, don’t judge a book by its cover. While this movie has classic tropes that it has a tendency to fall into, I'm going to argue that it might be the best of the sub-genre.

Let's roll...

Washington is a Wizard.

I genuinely think that Chris Pine gives a good performance here, so please forgive what I am about to do.

When Pine is in a scene with Washington, there is no chance he can meet Washington’s caliber of performance.

Seriously, at points, it feels like Lebron James dunking over whatever poor soul happens to be sitting in the paint that evening.

That's the power that Washington has.

Scene stealing, electric charisma.

Great Scott!

You may or may not know the name Tony Scott.

He's the director of this film and many others that you definitely know: Crimson Tide, True Romance, and, of course, Top Gun, just to name a few.

In a recent interview, Quentin Tarantino was talking about how Tony Scott is more of a “ Selector” than a “Director” with his style. Rather than carefully composing each frame of the film, Tony prefers the run-and-gun approach.

He will have 10 cameras going at one time, shooting at every angle possible. Then when it's time, he will select the shots that fit his vision.

This style of filmmaking is what provides the energy you feel in a movie like this. The camera never stops moving. Even when all it is filming is people in a room talking.

The Train Keeps Rolling.

This movie is always moving.

Just like the train, it feels… please forgive me… unstoppable.

And this scene shows that.

For fun, count how many things are happening on-screen. police cars, helicopters, more trains, people dangling from the sky.

It's nuts.

And I absolutely love it.

Today’s Scene

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2023’s Top 5