What Movie or Game Just Makes You Feel GOOD?

Minor (I promise) spoilers for Atomic Blonde ahead.

I hyped it pretty hard on the podcast yesterday, but Atomic Blonde is my favorite movie of 2017 so far. Austin has already written about its fantastic sense of place—Berlin in 1989, during the upheaval and excitement of the wall coming down. I think that grounding—combined with such style, a hero I adored, and perfect, slow-burn pacing made this a movie that felt so good to watch.

It moves from action scene to simmering double-triple-quadruple cross plot delivery with such ease and momentum, carried expertly by Charlize Theron as Lorraine (the badass secret agent and Atomic Blonde of the title), that nearly every scene was a pleasure. And yes, the movie is sexy as hell, with a queer romance that I didn't expect to be as well-realized as it was, even in a movie where characters are necessarily sketched, not fully fleshed out. This is spycraft after all.

There is a particular character death that wasn't awesome, which I think was the movie's only major misstep. But it didn't ruin Atomic Blonde for me.

I need to mention the fight scenes which also, in their own brutal way, felt good. There's much more weight here than in most modern action sequences, particularly in the famous stairway scene, which plays out in long takes (it looks like a single shot, and I'm sure if I watched it again, I might spy a few sly 'invisible' edits, but it's a hell of an achievement regardless). That scene plays up with an almost unbearable tension, because it feels, for want of a better word, real. Lorraine fights several baddies in a decrepit apartment building, smashing, shooting, hitting and even arm-barring them as needed, and they do the same to her.

It feels real in the way they move—using actual fighting techniques, not some acrobatic bullshit that looks cool—the way they get exhausted and hurt, the way they lurch forward and use every opportunity to take out their respective opponent. It's a marvel to watch.

I could go on all day about the pleasures of Atomic Blonde: the outfits, the depiction of youth culture in Berlin of the late 80s, the music—oh my god, the music—the hazy lighting and neon permeating every scene, but instead, I'll throw it to you, dear readers. What's a movie or game that just feels so good to enjoy, every time?

Have thoughts? Swing by Waypoints forums to share them!