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Jared Mobarak

@jaredmobarak.com

1.1K followers 1.4K following 990 posts

Graphic Designer • Rotten Tomatoes-Approved Critic: @thefilmstage.com & heyhaveyouseen.com • Art Director: cultivatecinema.com (RIP) • Member: OFCS.org & @gwnyfilmcritics.com • Curates @cinematicfbombs.com Buffalo, NY • jaredmobarak.com • 🇱🇧

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · Jan 6

Still working through my watchlist, but confident it will take a lot to knock any out of this line-up.

I go long on only seeing two on the big screen (the industry's choice, not mine) and brief on each film.

My Top Ten of 2024 at @thefilmstage.bsky.social:

thefilmstage.com/jared-mobara...

Jared Mobarak’s Top 10 Films of 2024

Following The Film Stage’s collective top 50 films of 2024, as part of our year-end coverage, our contributors are sharing their personal top 10 lists. Besides my annual trip to the Toronto Internatio...

thefilmstage.com

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 6h

Orson Welles from THE MUPPET MOVIE.

paul khruangbin (Dan Lehner) @danlehner.bsky.social · 16h

I think everybody has a “Wallace Shawn from Young Sheldon” — my first one would probably be “Vincent Price, the guy who did the voice of Ratigan in The Great Mouse Detective”

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 20h

THE BIRDCAGE aged very well. A staple in our house during the 90s. The rare remake that might be better than the original (it's also very good).

letterboxd.com/jaredmobarak...

A ★★★★ review of The Birdcage (1996)

"Try more gum." Here's all the evidence you need to refute everyone who says our nation's politics only got this bad because of Trump. Yes, he weaponized it, but Senator and Mrs. Keeley are the specif...

letterboxd.com

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 1d

I do wish Berger went full comic romp with BALLAD OF A SMALL PLAYER, but it was still pretty entertaining.

boxd.it/bzEE0D

A ★★★½ review of Ballad of a Small Player (2025)

"How bout dinner and a dance?" Manic pixie dream girls really can change your life. I just wish the whole propped up its comic energy higher than its redemptive sincerity (stay for the end credits to ...

boxd.it

Reposted by Jared Mobarak

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 3d

My latest thoughts on:

• Anniversary (wide)
• Dracula (lim)
• A House of Dynamite (Netflix)
• Little Amélie or the Character of Rain (lim)
• Sunfish (& Other Stories on Green Lake) (VOD 11/4)
• The Wolf Man (Peacock)
• Wolf Man (Prime)

www.heyhaveyouseen.com/week-ending-...

#heyhaveyouseen

Week Ending 10/31/25

Cinemayaat magazine's AFMI100

www.heyhaveyouseen.com

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 2d

Okay. WEAPONS was the real deal. Pure unadulterated chaos.

And I'm only just now realizing Zach Cregger was one of the MISS MARCH guys—a film I've thankfully scrubbed from my brain.

letterboxd.com/jaredmobarak...

A ★★★★ review of Weapons (2025)

"It’s just a touch of consumption." Love the structure. Love the boldness of Zach Cregger never pretending like he had to hide who was terrorizing the town. Loved Benedict Wong running full speed into...

letterboxd.com

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 3d

Week Ending 10/31/25

Cinemayaat magazine's AFMI100

www.heyhaveyouseen.com

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 3d

Is this house in Rochester? And, if so, is @anomalyfilmfest.com responsible?

.chantal//RYAN @thoughtrise.bsky.social · 3d

thinking about potato house this halloween

a post showing a bowl of candy with a single potato in the center with the text:

Tonight kids chose potato more than 25 times, each time triumphantly proclaiming to friends and family, "I GOT A POTATO!"
One kid shouted, "A potato, just like last year!" and another group said, "Oh, youre the potato house? You're legends!"

This has become an unexpected and joyful tradition. Kids are given the free choice and over and over again they choose Potato. My friends, every day you are given a choice. I encourage you: choose potato

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Reposted by Jared Mobarak

Bookshop.org @bookshop.org · 4d

Amazon is helping fund a $300 million build of a ballroom for the White House.

Independent bookstores are donating to food banks and organizations that help with food insecurity.

They are not the same.

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 3d

Definitely. And even then they had to shoot in Ireland because they knew putting that flag up in America would cause way too much trouble even in 2023.

For Komasa's first English-language film, it turned out, "my Central European heritage played a big role in finding the right tone," he says. "When discussing with the creative production team the political underpinnings of ANNIVERSARY, I always used the analogy of Polish history, in which people had the experience of living under tyrannies from the right and from the left alike." The idea for the altered American flag as the key visual representation of the movement arose from both its symbolic weight and its history of revisions. It would have been tricky to film the scenes with The Change flag in the United States, Churchill notes, had someone outside the production caught sight of it. "It's a piece of cloth that people have died for," Komasa says.

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 3d

My review hits tomorrow morning, but @mattzollerseitz.bsky.social’s thoughts on ANNIVERSAY are very much in line with mine and well worth a read:

RogerEbert.com @ebertvoices.bsky.social · 5d

"If you take a macro rather than micro view, the film’s majestic ambition is easy to see—and its timing is chillingly perfect,” writes @mattzollerseitz.bsky.social about ANNIVERSARY.

Anniversary movie review & film summary (2025) | Roger Ebert

If you take a macro rather than micro view, the film's majestic ambition is easy to see—and its timing is chillingly perfect.

www.rogerebert.com

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 3d

Yes! You nailed it with “mileage will vary,” but boy did this one really work for me too.

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 3d

From the press kit of MAC AND ME:

Directed by Stewart Raffill, starring Jade Calegory, Jonathan Ward, Christine Ebersole, Lauren Stanley, and Tina Caspary.

#filmsky

Eric Cruise (JADE CALEGORY). Photo by Robbie Robinson. ©1988 Orion Pictures Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

MAC AND ME
Pictured: 9-4A - Eric Cruise (JADE CALEGORY) with his neighbor Debbie (LAUREN STANLEY). PHOTO BY ROBBIE ROBINSON. ©1988 Orion Pictures Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

MAC AND ME
Pictured: 74-16 - Ronald McDonald with Eric Cruise (JADE CALEGORY).
73-3 - Eric Cruise (JADE CALEGORY) with a disguised Mac on his lap and Ronald McDonald in background. PHOTO BY ROBBIE ROBINSON. ©1988 Orion Pictures Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

R.J. Louis, who introduced one of the screen's most appealing young
heroes as the executive producer of "The Karate Kid" and "The Karate Kid, Part II," conceived "MAC and ME" five years ago. It has been a labor of love ever since, one which has enlisted some remarkable allies.

Fifteen years ago, as a young account executive at an advertising agency on the West Coast, Louis was introduced to one of the firm's leading clients, McDonald's Restaurants.

The relationship was renewed when Louis requested a special appearance by Ronald McDonald -- the chain's amusing symbol of youthful good will -- in "MAC and ME."

Not only was permission granted, but through his discussions with
McDonald's top management, Louis learned of the work of the Ronald McDonald Children's Charities. Formed in 1984, the charity raises funds for sick and needy youngsters and benefits the worldwide establishment of Ronald McDonald Houses, where the families of critically ill children can stay near their kids in a home-like atmosphere.

A unique arrangement was reached, under which a portion of the
profits of "MAC and ME" will benefit the charity with the minimum contribution set at $500,000.

The result is a trio of gratifying "firsts" ... the first time McDonald's
has ever licensed motion-picture and television rights to Ronald McDonald ... the immensely popular character's screen debut... and the first time McDonald's has participated in a major motion picture on behalf of its favorite cause.

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 4d

Casper Kelly should sue on behalf of Too Many Cooks.

𝔻𝕒𝕟 💀🍻🐦‍⬛ @danmynrd.bsky.social · 4d

AI sitcom accidentally a Lynchian fever dream. The sort of general malaise that only the genius possess and insane lament.

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 4d

WOLF MAN was fine as a creature feature if you ignore its seeming desire to strive for more.

letterboxd.com/jaredmobarak...

A ★★★ review of Wolf Man (2025)

"Sometimes when you're a daddy, you're so scared of your kids getting scars that you become the thing that scars them." A military veteran obviously suffering from PTSD cannot shield his violent tempe...

letterboxd.com

Reposted by Jared Mobarak

Anomaly Film Fest @anomalyfilmfest.com · 6d

✨The 7th Anomaly Film Festival is fast approaching!✨

Experience the best genre cinema from around the world, November 5-9, 2025 in downtown Rochester, NY! A full festival pass grants you access to ALL the films and events. And saves you $ too!

Get yours now! anomaly2025.eventive.org/passes/buy

Tall rectangle promo image. Background is a mossy forest floor. In the middle is a basket of mushrooms, with an Anomaly full festival pass resting inside. A shadowy hand reaches for the pass from the bottom right of the image. Text: 2025 full festival pass. Now on sale!

Tall rectangle promo image. Background is a purple forest with small green fireflies. In the foreground is a 5x3 grid of posters for the feature films and shorts programs being shown at the festival: Dust Bunny, Night Stage, Cannonball, Friday Shorts, A Useful Ghost, Reflection in a Dead Diamond, Saturday Shorts, By Design, Mother of Flies, Obex, Anything That Moves, In the Mouth, Beyond the Drumlins, I Am Frankelda, and It Ends. Hovering around the poster images are several many-eyed potatoes, observing. Text: Anomaly 2025 festival. 13 feature films. 34 short films. 5 astounding days of genre films. November 5-9.

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 5d

For anyone who doesn’t have Watermelon+, Farah Nabulsi’s THE TEACHER just hit Amazon Prime.

watch.amazon.com/detail?gti=a...

@watermelonpictures.bsky.social

From JustWatch:

The Teacher
المعلم
A Palestinian school teacher struggles to reconcile his life-threatening commitment to political resistance with his emotional support for one of his students and the chance of a new romantic relationship with a British volunteer worker.

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 6d

I loved ANNIVERSARY (review on Friday), but it is very silly that a character who works for the sister-in-law of the author whose book has swept the nation into a political firestorm and "changed her life" doesn't recognize said infamous author is literally sitting next to her at the dinner table.

Reposted by Jared Mobarak

Brian Goldstone @brian-goldstone.bsky.social · 7d

You know who the real freeloaders in this country are? Not people who rely on SNAP, but corporations whose business model depends on wages so low that taxpayers have to feed their workers.

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 6d

Perfect timing since I just watched first episode of THE GREAT last night.

"We are, in fact, modernizing in a European way. I have banned beards in men under 50. It is a better look. The big Russian beards look like men are eating a whole beaver, and it will not do."

Big Lou Lamoriello energy.

The Independent @the-independent.com · 6d

Hegseth refuses to meet US troops with beards during South Korea trip: report

www.independent.co.uk

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 6d

I just backed First in Fright: The FANGORIA Compendium on @kickstarter.com www.kickstarter.com/projects/fan...

First in Fright: The FANGORIA Compendium

The Complete History of Horror from the Pages of the #1 Horror Magazine

www.kickstarter.com

Reposted by Jared Mobarak

maxine maxine. 🇬🇩📚🍉✨ @mminthecity.bsky.social · 6d

the answer to that question is almost always “they didn’t.”

Solomon @solomonmissouri.bsky.social · 6d

"How did people survive before______"

friend ... people used to starve to death... i hope that helps

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 6d

I used Leigh Whannell’s INVISIBLE MAN as an excuse to finally watch the original film, so I figured I’d do the same with WOLF MAN before catching his version of that too.

boxd.it/bw7kGh

A ★★★½ review of The Wolf Man (1941)

“Why does everyone insist that I’m confused?” Having the portrait of Larry’s late older brother just be a portrait of Lon Chaney is quite the choice. Sir John goes on and on about the Talbot family re...

boxd.it

Reposted by Jared Mobarak

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 10d

My latest newsletter is out with thoughts on:

• Blue Moon (wide)
• Dream Eater (wide)
• Friendship (HBO Max)
• John Candy: I Like Me (Prime)
• Mistress Dispeller (limited)
• Tenement (limited/VOD)
• This Too Shall Pass (limited/VOD)

www.heyhaveyouseen.com/week-ending-...

#heyhaveyouseen #filmsky

Week Ending 10/24/25

Cash grabbing streamers

www.heyhaveyouseen.com

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Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 7d

“Star from A HOUSE OF DYNAMITE”

static klinger @jessespector.com · 7d

“rise from smashburger worker” is a very weird way to refer to someone who’s been an elite athlete on a professional track since they were a teenager? she was a mcdonald’s all-american!

Jared Mobarak @jaredmobarak.com · 7d

It’s George Bailey vs Mr. Potter and it’s so funny how many of the latter unironically think they’re the former.

Abigail Larson @abigaillarson.com · 7d

Guillermo del Toro on wealth: "a wealthy man is a man who has enough, not a man that needs more. If you have enough to invite someone for a beer? You're rich. If you have a yacht, planes, islands, and you still need more? You're not rich."

Guillermo del Toro quote "...think about wealth for me for example. A wealthy man that has enough..."

"not a man that needs more. If you have enough to invite somebody to beer..."

"...you're rich. If you have, whatever-"

"- yachts and planes and islands and you STILL need more? You're not rich."