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Bad Times At The El Royale: a pretty good movie that needed someone with a chainsaw in the editing room
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Oct 15, 2018 04:10
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I liked the slow pacing but I'd say this Bad Times at the El Royale - 3/5: Good acting carries this movie a long way because it's not a movie with a story. It's a bunch of characters with back stories all coming together at the same time for no reason and despite a bunch of stuff happening, nothing really happens. The chemistry of the characters is basically the only substance in the film but it's so good that it's an enjoyable mess. The screenwriter thought they were at least three times more clever and subversive than they actually were. Cynthia Erivo and Jeff Bridges do the heavy lifting here and Jon Hamm had a lot of charm as well.
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Oct 15, 2018 04:30
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I went to see Johnny English 3. Imagine a film written about Cyber attacks and Cyber security only it's made by a 65 year old who really hasn't got a grasp of how any of it works. Also the joke is that English is really outdated so doesn't know what he's doing. Like I don't expect the film to be good but this one was nonsensical and even had a virtual reality sketch in it that could easily be taken out - it made no sense and didn't fit in the film at all. So absolutely bizzare.
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Oct 15, 2018 10:43
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Some recent viewings: Thor: Ragnarok - B+ A Wrinkle In Time - F Doctor Strange - C+ Won't You Be My Neighbor? - A+ The Stanford Prison Experiment - B-
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Oct 22, 2018 19:44
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What did you expect Wrinkle to be?
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Oct 22, 2018 19:51
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got any sevens posted:What did you expect Wrinkle to be? I don't think I had any expectations going into it. I'd heard bad things, but I love Ava DuVernay as a director, and I like most of the actors involved. This was, just...so bad. I honestly can't believe how bad it was. After a while it started making me angry. The acting was all bad, the visual effects were lazy, the song additions were dumb and out of place, etc. The main point is that there are now two film adaptations of the story and they're both miserable. One is a dumb Disney made-for-TV movie, and the other is just a huge pile of nonsense. I always remember thinking the original novel seemed like great material to make into a movie, but no one knows what to do with it.
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Oct 22, 2018 20:02
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Everything I've seen so far this month: Singin' in the Rain: 4.5/5 Only God Forgives: 2.5/5 Killing of a Sacred Deer: 3.5/5 House of Games: 4/5 Scott Pilgrim vs The World: 3/5 Children of Men: 3/5 The Hot Chick: 3.5/5 The Fly: 4/5 Rumble in the Bronx: 2.5/5 Psycho (Rewatch): 4/5 Jackass Number Two: 3.5/5 The Silence of the Lambs: 4/5
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Oct 23, 2018 03:43
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the_tasman_series posted:Singin' in the Rain: 4.5/5 Please, speak further
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Oct 23, 2018 04:05
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Jackass Number Two > Children of Men is quite the take.
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Oct 23, 2018 04:52
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To be fair, Jackass 2 rules
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Oct 23, 2018 04:56
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InterrupterJones posted:I don't think I had any expectations going into it. I'd heard bad things, but I love Ava DuVernay as a director, and I like most of the actors involved. The opening 5 minutes of the movie are people totally chill with a random white lady appearing in their kitchen. That's how I knew I was in for a rough ride. The only thing I can remember is a flying cabbage person and for some reason oprah becomes 100 ft tall. My brain has blocked out the context for those and the rest of the movie. I think it was my worst movie of 2017.
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Oct 23, 2018 06:35
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I Before E posted:Please, speak further Singin’ in the Rain: I gave this a high score because of 1) the musical numbers, every one of which are both memorable and technically perfect, real joys to watch and to hear; 2) the movie consistantly poking fun at the somewhat cynical hollywood studio system that created it, and ultimately justifying its excesses (the flip side to something like Sunset Boulevard); and 3) the humor, which somehow, miraculously, survives mostly intact after sixty years. It’s a very funny movie! Only God Forgives: This movie takes the concept of ‘style over substance’ and takes it to its logical conclusion. I can’t deny that it is very, very beautiful at times, but the atmosphere is so stark and ao unvaried that it the film lost its grip on me partway through. The only real breaks are occasional episodes of darkly cartoonish violence that simply does not fit with the played-straight brutality and dire themes. The in-your-face Freudian imagery and slow neon dreamscapes give it the feel of a less elegant Gaspar Noe movie. That said, it has its moments. Children of Men: I wish I had more to say about this one, because it was impressive in its own way. It was just not to my taste. I will say that this film is billed as beautiful Sci-Fi with both an emotionally engaging plot and important, timely political messaging, and that is why it is critically acclaimed. I can’t argue with beautiful - it is bery well shot! - and I can’t argue with the scifi premise - it pays off. But, the constant betrayals/sacrifices of/for the main characters struck me as a bit melodramatic. As for the political messaging, I don’t think that it was particularly insightful or important. Most people think fascism, dehumanizing foreigners, and police states are bad. That said, the whole thing was pretty entertaining. Re: Jackass 2 > Children of Men: In my view, Jackass 2 has no artistic or literary ambitions, but flawlessly executes what it set out to do. It is a perfect Jackass movie. Children of men gets points for having artistic ambitions, but, in my opinion, couldn’t really pull it off. Therefore, Jackass 2 is a bit better than Children of Men. Though it’s kind of like comparing horse cum to oranges. the_tasman_series fucked around with this message at 06:57 on Oct 23, 2018 |
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Oct 23, 2018 06:54
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the_tasman_series posted:As for the political messaging, I don’t think that it was particularly insightful or important. Most people think fascism, dehumanizing foreigners, and police states are bad. Yes, but many people view those concepts in the abstract through a historical lense and are unable to connect the dots w/ regard to contemporary life.
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Oct 23, 2018 07:59
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I think you should see First Man if you are really interested in good take explicitly about Neil Armstrong and aren't looking for like a documentary about the moon race. Eyeslicer's Halloween Special is worth seeing if you like fun, quirky horror/comedy shorts with a root in currentish internet culture; note that by horror, I mostly mean existential horror, but there are some plain old traditional horror shorts as well. The Ted Bundy short was one of my favorite horror films I've seen.
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Oct 24, 2018 20:48
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Bottom Liner posted:I liked the slow pacing but I'd say this Such a let down. I hosed up and went based on liking the director's previous film "cabin in the woods" a lot. Kept expecting something clever to tie all the poo poo together and got nothing. It felt very much like it wanted to be pulp fiction/4 rooms era tarantino without any of the charm of the material/interpersonal relationships. Everyone else seems to love this movie though, glad it wasn't just me that thought it was incredibly meh. That said there are some actual cool sequences/shots but it's very much a catch it on netflix movie and for sure felt like it dragged hard at 2hrs20min.
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Oct 25, 2018 18:40
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Catching up with some movies I recently saw on TCM The Lawnmower Man (1992): D Weird. loving. Movie. Bears little or no resemblance to Stephen King's story. I'm really surprised that the Rifftrax people haven't yet attacked it. Seems like there'd be a lot of ripe material. High Anxiety (1977): C I thought that this was going to be a movie like Airplane!, but it ended up being fairly lame. Felt like they were trying to push the humor too much, and I didn't find the plot particularly funny at all. Fail-Safe (1964, rewatch): A Tragic that this movie is relatively forgotten. It's something like a serious Dr. Strangelove (which overshadowed it) or maybe 1960s era WarGames. Everyone is pitch-perfect: Matthau as an unlikeable right-winger who thinks that we should end Communism for good; Dan O'Herlihy as a tightly-wound General trying to avert crisis; and Henry Fonda as a president who actually leads instead of sitting on his rear end all day watching Fox News (think of that!). Not an easy film to watch; it's like a slowly unfolding nightmare that you can't escape. One of my favorites. e: Just saw Brainstorm (1983): B- F_Shit_Fitzgerald fucked around with this message at 06:46 on Nov 9, 2018 |
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Nov 4, 2018 06:06
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Here's a smattering of recent Redbox/Netflix viewings, some being rewatches: Tully - A+ Despicable Me 3 - C- Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy - B- A Star Is Born (2018) - B+ Christopher Robin - C+ ~ B- The Emperor's New Grove - B Kronk's New Groove - D+ The Night Comes For Us - A
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Nov 13, 2018 20:48
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I think Tully might be the best movie of the year so far Overlord - 7.5/10. In some ways exactly what the trailer made it out to be, but surprising in a few key ways. If you took out the main conceit of the plot you'd still have a very solid war/heist movie. It gets a little comical at times (so much that I looked up if it were indeed a comic adaptation), but the overall structure holds together well enough. Fantastic use of a pretty small budget too; well shot, lots of great effects, etc. Bottom Liner fucked around with this message at 21:18 on Nov 13, 2018 |
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Nov 13, 2018 21:15
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Bottom Liner posted:I think Tully might be the best movie of the year so far Completely agreed. I think for Jason Reitman's "true life" films your mileage will vary depending on how much you relate to the subject matter. For my wife and I it ended up being one of those movies that I'm glad we rented, and didn't see in the theater. Since my wife has had her own battle with post-partum depression in the past, she nearly had a panic attack mid-viewing. While I did have it spoiled to me that Tully was completely of Marlo's imagination, a la Fight Club, it still took me by surprise when it was revealed. The acting was great, the direction was great, and the script was great. While it may have shown an extreme side of what it was trying to depict, it was still completely human and engaging, which is all we wanted out a film like that. As for another (unrelated) recent viewing, last night we saw Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindewald and it was pretty ok. I've seen people on Twitter giving it a thrashing, but I didn't think it was that bad. The first Fantastic Beasts wasn't exactly a world breaker, so I didn't expect the sequel to be anything terrific. It had some neat effects, some fun little fan-service tidbits, and I still like Ezra Miller as an actor a lot with everyone else delivering exactly the performance you'd expect out of them.
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Nov 19, 2018 19:37
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I thought Johnny Depp was great too, his best performance in a long long time.
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Nov 19, 2018 19:54
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Been a while (early September!) since I've posted in this thread. Going to try a different ratings. Superfly (1973, Gordon Parks, Jr.) [Filmstruck] - Liked a lot Shaft (1971, Gordon Parks) [Filmstruck] - Alright Notfilm (2015, Ross Lipman) [Blu-ray] - Good Love Streams (1984, John Cassevetes) [Blu-ray] - Liked a lot One-Eyed Jacks (1961, Marlon Brando) [Blu-ray] - Liked Ornette: Made in America (1985, Shirley Clarke) [Blu-ray] - Liked Shanghai Express (1933, Josef von Sternberg) [Blu-ray] - Liked Waiting for Godot (1961, Alan Schneider) [Blu-ray] - Liked a lot Blonde Venus (1932, Josef von Sternberg) [Blu-ray] - Loved The Howling (1981, Joe Dante) [Blu-ray] - Meh The Wicker Man (1973, Robin Hardy) [Blu-ray - The Final Cut] - Liked a lot The Fog (1980, John Carpenter) [Blu-ray] - Liked Hobgoblins (1988, Rick Sloane) [Blu-ray] - Bad, but in a good way Forbidden Zone (1980, Richard Elfman) [Blu-ray - rewatch] - Love The Little Hours (2017, Jeff Baena) [Blu-ray] - Liked The Old Dark House (1932, James Whale) [Blu-ray - rewatch] - Love The Love Witch (2016, Anna Biller) [Blu-ray] - Meh Mr. Arkadin (1955, Orson Welles) [DVD - Comprehensive Version] - Liked (best version I've seen so far) Touch of Evil (1958, Orson Welles) [Blu-ray - Reconstructed Version] - Love The Other Side of the Wind (2018, Orson Welles) [Netflix] - Love, well worth the wait. Best film of the year to me so far. They'll Love Me When I'm Dead (2018, Morgan Neville) [Netflix] - Good, but for all the good clips and footage, it takes a shallow approach to Welles himself. Citizen Kane (1941, Orson Welles) [Blu-ray - rewatch] - Absolute masterpiece. Filmworker (2017, Tony Zierra) [Netflix] - Sort of incompetently made, but Leon Vitali is amazing in the interviews. The Devils (1971, Ken Russell) [Filmstruck] -  Wonder Man (1945, H. Bruce Humberstone) [Filmstruck] - Liked, really weird plot. The Devil is a Woman (1935, Josef von Sternberg) [Blu-ray] - Alright. On Dangerous Ground (1952, Nicholas Ray) [Blu-ray] - Meh Du rififi chez les hommes (1955, Jules Dassin) [Blu-ray] - That heist scene  Kiss of Death (1947, Henry Hathaway) [Blu-ray] - Love - one of the best noirs I've seen. Hitler's Hollywood (2017, Rüdiger Suchsland) [Filmstruck] - Liked a lot, actually makes me want to see more Nazi cinema.  Sleuth (1972, Joseph L. Mankiewicz) [YouTube] - Love, even if the ending is bizarre.
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Nov 21, 2018 04:03
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Like the new ratings, I still use numbers but I've winnowed them down into the following categories: WOW | PRO | Pro | pro | mixed | con | Con | CONEgbert Souse posted:Been a while (early September!) since I've posted in this thread. Going to try a different ratings.
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Nov 21, 2018 04:16
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The Wicker Man - I've seen two other films written by Anthony Shaffer - Hitchcock's Frenzy (which is a great film) and recently Sleuth. I read somewhere that Shaffer's writing makes use of puzzles and games in structure. I found this film to be somewhat hypnotic. I've never seen this film before, so I don't know how to compare to the edited versions, but what I assume was restored footage (looking like surprisingly clean faded print) never seemed to be extraneous. The Love Witch - While I found the retro 60s look to be neat, this fell flat on me. It's poorly acted and comes off like an Ed Wood movie with pretty colors. The Other Side of the Wind - Even the brief glimpses that had leaked over the years looked enticing. This is like discovering F for Fake was the "B-side" to an "A-side" which is this film. John Huston is magnificent, but so are Bogdanovich, Foster, and Strasberg. Even with almost dialogue, Oja Kodar looks amazing in the film within the film - as she certainly deserved to have such confidence. There's a scene halfway through in a bar and restroom that's eye-popping between the editing, use of color, and perfect timing to a Blue Cheer song (did Welles personally pick this out?). Even if this turned out to be a long-anticipated dud, the fact we have a "new" Welles movie is beyond wonderful. The fact it's a great film is the icing on the cake. The Devils - I've only seen two other Russell films, Altered States and Women in Love, but I enjoy his unrestrained visual bombardment. This was the edited US cut, so some parts are a bit unclear, but I found it fascinating. Wouldn't mind seeing a better print (it was non-anamorphic widescreen). Kiss of Death - This is best known for Richard Widmark's scene-stealing turn as Johnny Udo, a sadistic mobster with a rictus grin and laugh. But it's also incredibly economical in its storytelling and Victor Mature's performance is just as great. Some really nice photography, too.
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Nov 21, 2018 04:40
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It makes sense to me that The Wicker Man and Frenzy are written by the same person. I assume I didn't see the final cut since I saw it on one of those "A BILLION FILMS ON THREE BLURAY DISCS" collection bought in some bargain bin somewhere.
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Nov 21, 2018 06:59
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Egbert Souse posted:
It's in my all time top 10, maybe even top 5. Just incredible. Altered States owns, and I recently picked up Women In Love again because of the Criterion release. Really hoping for rereleases of The Music Lovers and Mahler. The Boy Friend has a good blu out there somewhere that I need to track down.
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Nov 21, 2018 08:19
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Rick posted:It makes sense to me that The Wicker Man and Frenzy are written by the same person. From what I can find, Anchor Bay released a deluxe edition with the theatrical cut and the pre-release cut. The latter had to be sourced from a 1" analog master, so it didn't look great. Since then, a 35mm print was found at the Harvard Film Archive of all places and StudioCanal let Robin Hardy supervise a new cut. The UK edition is a bit more elaborate with all three cuts (theatrical, pre-release, and final), while the US only got the final cut. BeanpolePeckerwood posted:It's in my all time top 10, maybe even top 5. Just incredible. I'm tempted to import the UK DVD because it's at least anamorphic and the uncut British version (though, still missing a little bit of footage). I'm going to try to check out more of his films. I've wanted to see Tommy for a while since it looks like a trip. Plus, Oliver Reed is magnificent in anything.
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Nov 21, 2018 15:46
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Egbert Souse posted:Plus, Oliver Reed is magnificent in anything. This is the big one, and he's a frequent collaborator with Russell. There's a BBC Blu box set of early Russell works out there and Reed is in two of the best of them: Dante's Inferno, and The Debussy Film. They're sort of like proto bio-pics, but more experimental. Wonderful stuff. I think Reed even has an uncredited cameo in Mahler. BeanpolePeckerwood fucked around with this message at 21:11 on Nov 21, 2018 |
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Nov 21, 2018 21:09
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A couple more movies I've seen in the past few days: The Player (1992): A Firehead (1991, Rifftrax version): A (D- if it's the movie itself) Holiday Inn (1942): A
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Nov 26, 2018 05:52
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Of Human Bondage (1933) - like, Leslie Howard and Bette Davis were great and there were some good montage bits. Its funny seeing the story with modern eyes, so the girl isnt evil or whatever and its just a semi-tragic romance.
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Nov 26, 2018 06:46
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Burning - 93/100 Roma - 93/100 Widows - 82/100 Matangi/Maya/MIA - 87/100 You Were Never Really Here - 90/100 Suspiria (2018) - 77/100 The House That Jack Built (director’s cut) - 80/100 The Return - 84/100 The Banishment - 86/100 Andrei Rublev (185 min cut) - 96/100 Andrei Rublev (rewatch 205 min cut) - 97/100 The VVitch - 88/100 Ex Machina (rewatch) - 89/100
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Nov 30, 2018 00:14
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Boy Erased - 5/5
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Dec 6, 2018 16:59
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Just watched Searching. Directed by a dude with a complicated name where John Cho combs through his missing daughters social media accounts. 5/5 Best use of "the movie is a computer screen" visual direction. The plot was suspenceful and the tension felt good. Smart film smart script. John Cho flexs his acting as the saddest awkward dad.
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Dec 9, 2018 07:36
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Vox Lux - beautifully cynical movie with great cinematography and Natalie Portman delivers again.
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Dec 16, 2018 07:39
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Egbert Souse posted:The Wicker Man - I've seen two other films written by Anthony Shaffer - Hitchcock's Frenzy (which is a great film) and recently Sleuth. I read somewhere that Shaffer's writing makes use of puzzles and games in structure. I found this film to be somewhat hypnotic. I've never seen this film before, so I don't know how to compare to the edited versions, but what I assume was restored footage (looking like surprisingly clean faded print) never seemed to be extraneous. Speaking of puzzles and games, I feel like the whole film is summed up in a way in one scene:  I also really like Frenzy and didn't know until reading your post that it was the same writer.
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Dec 16, 2018 17:30
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Bohenian Rhapsody B+ Plays it safe at the PG level. Went to see it with my father in law, a 68 year old man, and he cringed at the man on man kissing. Feels like they didn't know how to end the film so they put on lip sync battle for 20 minutes then he died. Soundtrack was good. If you like Queen watch this movie. SpaceAceJase fucked around with this message at 07:01 on Dec 24, 2018 |
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Dec 24, 2018 06:59
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Vice: C+ It's probably an impossible task to put the combination of evil and incompetence that was the Bush Administration into context in 2 hours. I have no patience for humanizing Cheney. Bale and Adams are great as usual though.
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Dec 25, 2018 22:17
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Pretty much every review I've seen says the same thing. On paper the story of a guy sleazing his way into becoming the power behind the throne should be interesting but they just can't make it work as a movie.
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Dec 25, 2018 23:51
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Leave No Trace is one of the year's best and you shouldn't overlook it
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Dec 27, 2018 17:56
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Finally got around to watching Upgrade and was surprised by how good it was. I was sold instantly when I saw a half-second clip of it when it had a fixed-to-the-person camera movement scene (can't for the life of me remember the proper name for that technique). It could easily have been a pretty generic action movie, but the plot was interesting, the choreography was some of the most fun I've seen since the first John Wick, and its a sci-fi setting that doesn't hold your hand with setting up what the technology does. 7/10 would watch again.
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Dec 27, 2018 20:28
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Vice sucked. They let Dick Cheney, a massive war criminal, off the hook way too lightly, and the film so far up its own rear end. I highly doubt it was that easy for his daughter to come out to her extremely powerful Republican parents and it's just shown as an afterthought. Literally a scene where Alfred Molina plays a waiter and he's naming off things like illegal torture and wiretapping as menu items, and ends with Cheney going "We'll have one of everything." Almost walked out after that. D
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Dec 27, 2018 22:13
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