Movies I’ve been watching

DARIA: IS IT COLLEGE YET? (1994) has the perpetually cynical high-schooler contemplate the next phase of her life, while her friends and acquaintances all grapple with their own destiny (“I don’t want to be a model representative of my race.”)—a good capstone to the series and fun to rewatch. “Instead, I gave an inspiring speech.”
CAN’T BUY ME LOVE (1987) has a young Patrick Dempsey hiring his head-cheerleader Dream Girl to pose as his girlfriend for a week in hopes of hanging with the Cool Kids only to discover that Popularity Corrupts and Absolute Popularity Corrupts Absolutely. Not that radical in its take on the high-school in-crowd (Square Pegs was there first) but nicely done, with a very good turn by Amanda Peterson in the lead. “There’s only one other breast like this in the world.”
BATMAN (1943) was the Caped Crusader’s first screen appearance, a 15-chapter serial in which he thwarts Japanese agent Dr. Daka (J. Carroll Naish) from acquiring radium to build a disintegrator that will give Japan victory and help Daka crush democracy. No Batman Begins but better than a lot of reviews had led me to expect; also of note for introducing the “Bat’s Cave” and a skinny Alfred (the portly butler of the comics soon went on a diet). Virulently racist, like most movie portrayals of Japanese (cheerfully assuring viewers that it was a “wise government” that locked up all those Japanese Americans in prison camps).