Professional Sweetheart: Best of 2024

(Plus, Some Other Stuff)

Hello, you! Thanks for subscribing to my newsletter. This is an open post but if you’d like to become a paid Pro Sweetheart and support me and my work, mash this button below.

---

My year in a nutshell?

I realized this morning that the last time I dropped into your inboxes was right after I got laid off from my second television programming job in less than two years, which also happened to be six days after the last election. Fun stuff. This was the job I took right after the severance ended on my first programming job, and lasted a whole four months before it was eliminated alongside nine others at the network I was working for. I guess the best thing about losing a job after only a few months is that the grief I felt was fairly minimal, comparatively speaking. Really, I was just super annoyed. I mean, it took me three months to qualify for their health insurance plan, for crying out loud!

Since then, I’ve mostly been in a deep, contemplative place. Not dark, but at least kinda punk rock, with many late-night philosophical debates with myself in my own head. (It’s usually in bed while staring at the ceiling.) Mostly existential in nature, including but not limited to:

• whether the TV business is finally “cooked” (answer: yes)

• whether I can realistically count on finding another full-time, benefits-eligible job in my field that I can maybe keep until retirement (answer: no)

• whether I have it in me to go back to LinkedIn culture (answer: HELL NO)

• the feeling of melancholy whenever thinking about the desperation of semi-functioning weirdos to stay in any “cool” job we can get, even if it’s to our personal detriment, because they seem like the only places where our niche interests and passions can pay our bills

• the truly demented modern corporate grift to make all jobs seem like “cool” places for us “weirdos” to “create” which naturally instills a huge emotional buy-in from workers, only to ruthlessly lay them off whenever the hell they want without a second thought

• how to mitigate these feelings as someone who never even thought I’d work in corporate America to begin with

• whether I should just move back to California, buy a small hippie cabin on the coast or in a canyon, and create a grief garden to ride out the rest of my dumb life

Having said all of this, luckily your girl is a resilient one¹. I was fortunately blessed with a good sense of humor and the gift of scrappy resourcefulness² starting at a very young age. I got a few plates spinning in the past month or so, and indeed, there are actually some things to look forward to in 2025! I’m going to list them out so I can really feel good about them:

• I’m already doing some freelance programming work for yet another television/entertainment company that has waaaaaaay better movies than the last place I worked³

• I’m wrapping up the capstone project for my masters’ program which is all about the prison letters I received while working at TCM (with hopes to maybe do something with it after I graduate in May)

• I’m gearing up to start a new film podcast in early 2025 (more on that soon!)

• I’m going to Tokyo for my birthday in March

• I’m otherwise fucking around making weird little short films, making beats, painting, reading, and doing all the things I actually want to do with my life

With that, let’s move on to —

BURN 2024 BURN (But Here’s Some Stuff I Liked)

• The Last Showgirl (d: Gia Coppola)

My favorite movie of the year. Beautiful to look at and unexpectedly tender. INCREDIBLE run time (90 minutes). The Coppola family sure do know how to make a movie look good, huh? Man, I hate Las Vegas but loved being in the mix with Pam and Jamie Lee there. By the way, the current iteration of Pamela Anderson being her full makeup-less, mid-life energy self is 100% my inspiration right now. I want good things for all these characters.

• Anora (d: Sean Baker)

Pretty hard for me to not like a classic screwball comedy with some exploitation elements + anything Sean Baker does. An exciting farce with a gut punch ending. Is there anything more romantic than someone lighting two cigarettes and giving one to someone? I say no! For me, though, it was all about Toros, played by Karren Karagulian. He was like the Russian Charles Grodin character throughout the entire film – totally brilliant!

• Love Lies Bleeding (d: Rose Glass)

Imagine the gym sequence from Miracle Mile (1988) being an entire movie and adding a passionate gay love story around it. I remember I saw this movie at the very beginning of the year, not long after I saw The Iron Claw (2023) and I was very excited about the possibility of 1980’s-style bodybuilding coming back. Mostly, I’m just really glad I got to see a jacked goddess like Katy M. O’Brian on the big screen.

• Challengers (d: Luca Guadagnino)

We all talked a LOT about this when it came out so I don’t need to say much. The repetitive use of a heavy 80’s synth track, tennis whites, dick jokes, a woman’s ambition and her power over two bisexual dudes – what’s not for me to love! Speaking of, I rewatched Luca Guadagnino’s version of Suspiria (2018) for a show I did over on Amazon Prime’s YouTube channel for Halloween this year and it made me realize that I think I just really love him and his influences.

• Didi (d: Sean Wang)

I wrote about this earlier this year and was obviously in my feelings about it! More stories about Asian American childhood through the lens of alternative/rap/skate culture, please!

• Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (d: George Miller)

I wrote about this one too. As you know, I was prepared to hate this due to the lack of my girl Charlize, but I was pleasantly surprised by how Anya Taylor-Joy came in ready to rock. (To be quite honest, though — it would basically take something truly terrible to get me to NOT like anything in the Mad Max universe at this point. We can think of what that might be in the comments, if you want.)

• Nosferatu (d: Robert Eggers)

A late in the year entry, of course. Who knew I would LOVE Count Orlok with a handlebar mustache. The reviews I’ve read coming in from friends seem to suggest it’s not doing enough (how…?) and that it’s real style over substance. First, I think it’s sort of unwise to compare a modern movie to something that’s a over hundred years old. Second, as always, I reserve the right to like something on vibes alone! I mean, I definitely caught some of the thematic suggestions here (i.e. women’s madness, sexual shaming, obsession, loneliness, incel culture, maybe?!) but can I ALSO appreciate multiple heavy-handed creepy castle doorway shots and Lily-Rose Depp looking almost exactly like Olivia de Havilland in The Heiress (1949)?! Plus, there are multiple, genuinely disturbing/terrifying scenes while also being sort of funny, too (i.e. any time Willem Dafoe spoke), which basically reminded me of The Lighthouse (2019), which I loved. Bah. Just go rewatch The Exorcist (1973) and Shadow of the Vampire (2000) for your Coke back, then.

• Honorable Mention: RM: Right People, Wrong Place (d: Lee Seokjun)

Not sure why I’m making this an Honorable Mention versus just throwing it in the bigger list above, but I am. Maybe because it’s a documentary about the making of a solo album by RM, the leader of the K-Pop group BTS, and because of that, perhaps needs a bit more context for non-BTS fans to really get into. It’s no secret that 2024 was the year I finally figured out K-Pop. It’s been a mixed bag of fascination, genuine appreciation, and slight bombastic side-eye ever since. I think the fascination/side-eye part comes from the sheer output of content, which is definitely the goal of the hyper commercialized/capitalistic Korean music industry (I sort of wrote about it here earlier this year). For example, my 2024 Letterboxd stats shows I somehow watched FIVE documentaries about BTS members this year. That’s like if the Eagles decided to release seperate documentaries about each member in the same year! Considering all of this, there is something very down to earth about the Right People, Wrong Place doc. The album it’s rooted in feels much closer to an American indie rock or American alternative hip-hop tradition than anything K-Pop I’ve heard so far, and the documentary feels much more cinematic than most of the BTS promo-doc stuff I’ve seen. It also, pleasantly, feels like one of the more authentic glimpses into these very famous people’s lives (the other is Suga’s Road to D-Day, which came out last year). I think it’s worth looking into if you have the bandwidth.

And, if you’re interested, some of my favorite first-time watches of 2024:

• Pumping Iron II: The Women (1985, d: George Butler)

This was my favorite thing I saw all year. Contains a separate magic from the first Pumping Iron (1977) with this crazy, 1980’s Cinemax glamour hovering over it at all times. An absolute cult classic that is ripe for rediscovery. I want to screen it in Atlanta so bad!

• Industrial Accident: The Story of Wax Trax! Records (2018, d: Julia Nash)

A much-needed document of what being a dark music-obsessed teen was like in the 1990s. The fact that it was all started by a gay couple from Colorado makes it even more heartwarming and wonderful.

• Haru (1996, d: Yoshimitsu Morita)

Thanks to the Asian Film Archive, I discovered the Japanese director Yoshimitsu Morita this year, including his very sweet, romantic movie about two lonely people who meet on a film message board (!) during the very early days of the internet. When the titular Haru suggests that her new friend watch Semi-Tough (1977) because he’s an ex-football player, I gasped in utter delight. Will make you miss the days of being a pre-Letterboxd film nerd just looking for connection!

• The Last Detail (1973, d: Hal Ashby)

A huge gap in my 1970’s New American Cinema viewing that has finally been corrected. I said this in my Letterboxd review but it bears repeating: my dad always used to tell us that the only reason he signed up to be in the Navy in the early 70’s was because of the uniforms – this movie is proof!

• Hawk Jones (1986, d: Richard Lowry)

I caught this during a Trash & Trivia night that Wendy Mays & Videodrome hosts at 97 Estoria here in Atlanta each month. Gotta love a completely kid acted film! Imagine Bugsy Malone (1976) but as a 1980’s detective movie in the style of Beverly Hills Cop (1984) or something. When the camera zooms on to the desk of the little kid police chief and he’s got a bottle of Rolaids there, I just laughed so much.

• To Die For (1995, d: Gus Van Sant)

Another huge, embarrassing gap for me that I managed to rectify this year and another reason to love Nicole Kidman doing her thing away from her marriage to Tom Cruise in this era. Illeana Douglas was the real secret weapon for me in this one. She’s so damn funny. The movie looked great on Criterion, too.

• Dune (1984, d: David Lynch)

Okay, you know how massively uneducated I am about the big science fiction IP! So yes, I finally watched the original Dune when it got re-released in theaters this year. And I gotta say, it’s a lot of fun. Especially as a Lynch fan. To be truly honest, I might not have gone had it not been for the Jodorowsky's Dune (2013) documentary, which I finally saw earlier this year thanks to my ex-TCM co-worker Genevieve. I ended up getting so wrapped up in the weird mythology/thought experiment-ness surrounding everything that I had to finally watch this Lynch version. Might be ready for the Denis Villeneuve ones now!

Happy New Year, everyone. Let’s stay sucka free in 2025! Love to you all.

- Millie

1. This is me right now.

2. See: being an oldest daughter of immigrants, an Aries, etc.

3. This is also me right now.

---