Movies You've Seen Recently |OT| JULY 2014

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Divius said:
is that a weight joke?
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No, I imagine it's a statement on her being a talented comedienne that unfortunately takes the path of least resistance, even when she's left to her own devices on something like Tammy, which IIRC is a passion project for her and her husband.
 
There is nothing talented about playing a fat dirty chick. That's all she does. She's disgusting and can't act for shit. Her delivery is the worst. Her claim to fame was a show where everyone gets to laugh at two fat people fucking and a movie where she shits in some place a person is not supposed to shit.
 
Grand Budapest Hotel - Another fantastic film from Wes. Ralph Fiennes fit in like he had been an Anderson regular from the moment it starts, he was great. Hope he gets an Oscar nomination. Zero was great too along with all the small roles everyone played.
 
TheKaeptain said:
There is nothing talented about playing a fat dirty chick. That's all she does. She's disgusting and can't act for shit. Her delivery is the worst. Her claim to fame was a show where everyone gets to laugh at two fat people fucking and a movie where she shits in some place a person is not supposed to shit.
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I think she's alright, she's a female Chris Farley

Beverly Hills ninja was just about a fat guy who looked funny attempting martial arts cuz he's fat
 
Discotheque said:
I think she's alright, she's a female Chris Farley

Beverly Hills ninja was just about a fat guy who looked funny attempting martial arts cuz he's fat
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Don't insult Farley. His timing was perfect. I watched Wayne's World the other night and the two minutes he is on screen are genius. Even when he did something like fat-guy in a little coat a lot of the laughs are due to his timing. He knew when to pause and hold for a joke. In Tommy Boy when he splits the jacket he gives this look like shit that wasn't supposed to happen. Which is where the laughter originates due to his ridiculousness. What puts him in another class is that he did it naturally.

McMarthy is like an unaware version of Zach Galifianakis. Everything she does is forced.
 
Throughout all of The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, there's no escaping the feeling that Terry Gilliam knew he was never going to get this kind of freedom with the kind of budget he would enjoy (and, from the looks of it at times, even more than the studio bargained for), so he put absolutely everything he could ever possibly want into it. On one hand, it's far too long for its own good, with some scenes going on a couple of beats longer than they really needed to, which could have been better spent on time making the relationships between the various characters stronger than simply being told about them. But that would mean less time spent with one of the most dazzling and intoxicating displays of pure imagination that the medium has ever seen. Each individual scene boasts more inventiveness and drive than entire films can scrabble together in their entire length, and that the film boasts so many scenes like this is astonishing. There's times where you see the cast simply disappear because of just how unbelievable the sights and sounds manage to unfold, sometimes to their detriment, but the script has enough juicy lines for the major players and fun performances to go with them that they're never forgotten. It's not as successful or nearly as cohesive as Brazil, but I got the impression that Gilliam wasn't much interested in going after that. It's pure, unfiltered creativity, and rarely does it come across this successfully.
 
Man, I really miss the types of films that were greenlit in the 80s. Just got done watching Critters, and it's just a flat out entertaining and fun film. The industry takes itself too seriously nowaday to greenlight a film about convict aliens terrorizing a small town and being hunted down by intergalactic bounty hunters. It's basically Gremlins meets Terminator, and while the intention of the film's similarities to those movies is up for debate, especially the former, the film has a surprising amount of nods to other films through out. The movie is obviously low budget, but it uses it well. The bounty hunter's transformation in particular is probably one of my favorite effects in film. The plot is pretty basic and the characters are paper thin, but the film has a good sense of humor, and as I said, it's pretty damn entertaining from beginning to end.
 
harSon said:
Man, I really miss the types of films that were greenlit in the 80s. Just got done watching Critters, and it's just a flat out entertaining and fun film. The industry takes itself too seriously nowaday to greenlight a film about convict aliens terrorizing a small town and being hunted down by intergalactic bounty hunters. It's basically Gremlins meets Terminator, and while the intention of the film's similarities to those movies is up for debate, especially the former, the film has a surprising amount of nods to other films through out. The movie is obviously low budget, but it uses it well. The bounty hunter's transformation in particular is probably one of my favorite effects in film. The plot is pretty basic and the characters are paper thin, but the film has a good sense of humor, and as I said, it's pretty damn entertaining from beginning to end.
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Critters 3 has the best cover.
 
Under The Skin (No Rating) - Really bizarre film. I saw it 4 days ago and can't get it out of my head, yet I cannot give it a rating yet. There many things I loved about it but some of it left me feeling cold.

Neighbors (3/5) - This was pretty funny, but pretty standard Rogen fare. Rose Byrne was great but there were several jokes that fell flat. I did laugh a lot during some parts, but that's really all this movie has going for it.
 
TheKaeptain said:
Critters 3 has the best cover.
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Leonardo DiCaprio being in that caught me off guard a few years back Lol.

I miss 80s/early 90s VHS covers, and by extension, mom and pop video shops :( I miss walking into a video store, not knowing what I want, and having to take a leap of faith based on the cover/back of the box. I'm so damned nostalgic for that shit.
 
harSon said:
Leonardo DiCaprio being in that caught me off guard a few years back Lol.

I miss 80s/early 90s VHS covers, and by extension, mom and pop video shops :( I miss walking into a video store, not knowing what I want, and having to take a leap of faith based on the cover/back of the box. I'm so damned nostalgic for that shit.
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I still do this!
 
TheKaeptain said:
I still do this!
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I try to, but I'm too informed now :( I rarely don't know about a movie by the time it's actually hit home video. It's kind of the same way for games too. The internet ruined this facet of movie watching for me...

The video store I frequented closed down like 8-9 months ago too. I freaking loved that place. It was owned by a Vietnamese family, and they had a pretty worthwhile section for Asian films in general. They would rent out movies before their street dates to valued customers, and would reserve stuff for me. There's still a few video stores left in San Jose, but they're all too far for me to frequent :/

Kind of off-topic, but have you seen Rewind This? Kind of made me want to start collecting VHS films...
 
I used to do that all the time, but with video games. I had a N64 as a kid during that generation, and pickings were a bit slim outside the usual nintendo/rare affairs that came out every now and again. So you just looked at covers/back of the box and said "fuck it, looks cool, lets rent it mom". I discovered a lot of fun quirky shit like Mischief Makers and Mystical Ninja that way.

And crap like Fighting Force 64 and Fighter's Destiny, but that's the chance you take. Never know what you gonna get.
 
After watching Eyes Wide Shut the other week. I'm convinced it's one of the greatest films I've ever seen.

Why?

Having a random thought what strikes me was how well it captures my own dreams there's this strong sense of gloom and mystery throughout the film that's done quite amazingly, but then there's this sense of unsatisfication that one gets when waking up from your own dreams.. a lack of fulfilment, that's very adequately captured in how
bill doesn't satisfy any of his sexual desires
. Of course when interpreted in a literal way, the film serves as a interesting analysis on the nature of class relations.

Already want to watch it again asap.
 
harSon said:
I try to, but I'm too informed now :( I rarely don't know about a movie by the time it's actually hit home video. It's kind of the same way for games too. The internet ruined this facet of movie watching for me...
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yeah, same. and I work at one! I feel like i'm fucking up by not watching every single thing we get in, but... I just don't wanna watch some of that shit
 
I support my local "MovieStop".

I don't question how they are still in business I just support them.

They are going in hard using that struggle GameStop font though.

ViewtifulJC said:
I discovered a lot of fun quirky shit like Mischief Makers and Mystical Ninja that way.

And crap like Fighting Force 64 and Fighter's Destiny, but that's the chance you take. Never know what you gonna get.
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That Mystical Ninja namedrop, it's taking me back to a time where there was still a mystery and magic to games. That was an oddball game, I also picked up games like Chameleon Twist that way, even though that cover looked like shit. Lol.

I love the Internet, but holy shit did it change the entertainment business.
 
Watched some recent stuff for a change...

Transcendence made me regret the decision immediately. Not a single redeemling factor here, bad TV level acting, ridiculous plot, even more ridiculous sci-fi elements, what a pile of formless grey nanomatter.

Jean-Pierre Jeunet's The Young and Prodigious T.S. Spivet was at least nice to look at, and it had some charming ideas. This is the kind of movie I would have my kids watch if I had any.

Noah... I much enjoyed the first half, because that's where the epic stuff happens in this story... all the added elements in the second half didn't work that well for me. Some shots were amazing, also the time lapse sequences were fantastic even if they felt a bit out of place. A schizophrenic attempt at a summer blockbuster.
 
I haven't seen a single movie in all of june. I have no idea what happened.

Anyways, some movie related 'news' which I thought was funny.

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The bench that was seen in a key scene (so am I to believe, haven't seen it yet) in The Fault In Our Stars was stolen which deeply saddened a lot of fans who were taking a trip to Amsterdam to get a picture on that bench. The city of Amsterdam now placed a same looking bench on that spot. And I love that pic of those workers on the bench :P
 
Noah
Damn what a cool movie. A tad too long though.

OT is an awesome sci-fi/fantasy novel and I dont understand how it has taken Hollywood this long for them to actually use it in a proper manner.

Now bring on Book of Revelations headed by Aronofsky!
 
The Panic in Needle Park
Pretty raw. Reminded me of Midnight Cowboy and Requiem for a Dream, but was easily better than both. Strong debut performance from Pacino, even if it was mostly a mix of DeNiro and Dustin Hoffman's Ratso.
 
Bitter Moon: 5/10. An hilariously unerotic erotic thriller from one of our greatest director/rapists. It hardly qualifies though since it doesn't get thrilling until literally the last 2 minutes of a total of 139, so up until then it's just bizarre sex and cruelty. Mildly titillating, like when your penis brushes past a jacuzzi jet.

Maleficent: 7/10. Would never have checked this out if it wasn't 98 degrees outside and I wanted to sit in some air conditioning. This was the only thing playing that I was even remotely interested in seeing, so maybe it was because my expectations were so low but this was not bad at all. A nice fantasy story with some pretty good compositions, and Angelina Jolie was actually a lot of fun to watch (I've only ever seen in her like 2 or 3 other things) And I can't remember the last time I saw a 90 minute movie in a theater. Peer pressure rating: 2/10.

I've ended up watching a lot of sevens the last few weeks, I wonder if it's me? No. No, it's the films who are wrong.
 
Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare Probably the worst of the series? Its quality Reminded me somehow that Halloween movie where there was reality TV show in a house - also bad. 2/5.
New Nightmare (1994) Wes Craven trolling us, the viewers. Which is a plus, really. We can see here the seeds of Scream. The directing is clearly superior to the previous two instalments. 3.5/5

Enders' Game was entertaining enough, I just could not feel the struggles of the characters, they were mostly robotic. Anyway, positive spent time, the later story stages can be seen if you pay attention although the ending itself was maybe rushed. 3.5/5

Waltz With Bashir is something that tells you the war is a bitch, some parts hit me hard, and at the end you realize (I didn't knew beforehand) people were actually narrating parts of what they experienced. If in a future rewatch these same feelings happens again to me, I'll give it five stars. 4.5/5
 
Imitation of Life: You ever notice how the critical appreciation for Douglas Sirk melodramas seem to focus on irony, and artificiality, and hidden subtext that was ahead of its time? IDK, I get the impression that they don't want to admit to enjoy the many surface-level qualities of a "woman's picture", with all its gorgeous cinematography and big melodrama. Embrace it, goddamnit.
 
ViewtifulJC said:
Imitation of Life: You ever notice how the critical appreciation for Douglas Sirk melodramas seem to focus on irony, and artificiality, and hidden subtext that was ahead of its time? IDK, I get the impression that they don't want to admit to enjoy the many surface-level qualities of a "woman's picture", with all its gorgeous cinematography and big melodrama. Embrace it, goddamnit.
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Have you seen the original? Instead of becoming a famous broadway actress, the main character opens up a pancake joint using her Mammy's (the maid whose daughter is passing for white) delicious pancake recipe.

And there's two genres I can't stomach. Musicals and melodramas, especially Douglas Sirk films for the latter. And fuck Far from Heaven for trying to imitate a Sirkian melodrama.
 
The Wolf of Wall Street, an exercise in making the longest pointless movie ever. Wonderfully directed, Di Caprio is a monster, but after the sixth or seventh coke party I almost fell asleep



Snowpiercer. A surprising gem that will obviously be ignored and forgotten really soon. Liked it so much I bought the BR
 
harSon said:
And there's two genres I can't stomach. Musicals and melodramas, especially Douglas Sirk films for the latter. And fuck Far from Heaven for trying to imitate a Sirkian melodrama.
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I'm curious what you consider a melodrama, since even in the context of film I have seen different definitions used. Not there isn't context in your posts, but I wonder how narrow your definition is.
 
Ridley327 said:
Throughout all of The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, there's no escaping the feeling that Terry Gilliam knew he was never going to get this kind of freedom with the kind of budget he would enjoy (and, from the looks of it at times, even more than the studio bargained for), so he put absolutely everything he could ever possibly want into it. On one hand, it's far too long for its own good, with some scenes going on a couple of beats longer than they really needed to, which could have been better spent on time making the relationships between the various characters stronger than simply being told about them. But that would mean less time spent with one of the most dazzling and intoxicating displays of pure imagination that the medium has ever seen. Each individual scene boasts more inventiveness and drive than entire films can scrabble together in their entire length, and that the film boasts so many scenes like this is astonishing. There's times where you see the cast simply disappear because of just how unbelievable the sights and sounds manage to unfold, sometimes to their detriment, but the script has enough juicy lines for the major players and fun performances to go with them that they're never forgotten. It's not as successful or nearly as cohesive as Brazil, but I got the impression that Gilliam wasn't much interested in going after that. It's pure, unfiltered creativity, and rarely does it come across this successfully.
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Well said. I grew up on Gilliam and soaked up most of his filmography when I was 13-16. Munchausen is one of his best by far just from the sheer brilliance in production design and attention to detail. Also the cinematography is truly breathtaking, some shots remind me of Caravaggio paintings, especially when the
balloon made out of panties lifts up out of the theater
. Also the segment
on the moon with Robin Williams is great, the mix of theater like backdrops and practical effects with all the zaniness of Williams' performance makes it one of the most surreal and unique scenes I've seen in a film
.

I really miss old Gilliam ;_; Rewatched Lost in La Mancha the other day and man is that a depressing watch. What could have been...

Guess my recent notable watches include Snowpiercer, Last Lovers Left Alive, and The Double. Snowpiercer really surprised me, was not expecting a movie that elaborate and unconventional (having later found out it was adapted from the manga the director Co wrote). Very satisfying action movie, lots of variety in locations (which is impressive for a movie set on a train), and plenty of shakeups in the story without it seeming forced.

After having rewatched Ghost Dog I was in the mood for another Jarmusch picture and Lovers didn't disappoint. Great mood and atmosphere throughout, with a really cool soundtrack from Jarmusch's own band. Hiddleston does the angsty vamp thing well, and Swinton knocks it out of the park with her otherworldly charm.

The Double I thought was just ok, heard it being compared to Brazil so came into it being a bit wary as I'm thinking who can tackle that style nearly as good as Gilliam did it. It was shot well and had a good sound design which is VERY Eraserhead like in parts (as well as some of the apartment scenes), and the mood definitely has that encapsulated feeling of being in some other bizarre version of reality in this closed off sector of a city. Kind of reminded me of the movie Alphaville a bit with the general stilted weirdness of the population of the city. It certainly left an impression based on the world alone, but I thought the plot was pretty underdeveloped.
 
Blue Exorcist (the movie): So, this is apparently the movie that either comes after or as a prequel to an animated series i have not (and have absolutely no intention to) watched.
This means i most likely lost some of the emotional impact from all the fan service and pandering, i bet.
The reason why i wanted to see this, was exclusively because Shinji Kimura was the art director, and it show up in those seriously amazing backgrounds. That's it.
I pretty much loathed everything else: i hated the ugly character design, the character's horrid smug faces, the silly weapons they had, the shitty story and dialogue.
What annoyed me more than anything else, however, was the absolutely desperate and pathetic, constant attempt at being "cute" and "adorable", it made it a real pain to get through this.

Next time, a Google Image search for "Shinji Kimura" will save me the trouble.

The Wrath of Vajra: As a martial arts movie it wasn't too bad, a couple of decent fights, not a lot of time wasting.
The movie however still felt weird, like RikiOh, but without any of the fun.
Was i supposed to take those Mortal Kombat outfits and story seriously? Hard to tell.

Neo Tokyo (Meikyū Monogatari): a really amazing little collection of what "mature japanese animation" felt like growing up (to me anyway).
It's really super short, which is a shame, but all three shorts (technically 2, i guess) were absolutely fantastic to look at.
The thematic thread between them still felt more stylistic than anything, but i think it did have somewhat of a consistent dark, misanthropic vibe, throughout.

I wish Otomo had expanded on this short, instead of wasting everyone's time with that SteamBoy crap.
 
Hard Eight - one of the best of the mid-'90s character-driven indies(you'd be shocked how many of those they have, especially in the wake of Pulp Fiction). Its always nice when a great character actor like Philip Baker Hall gets a big meaty role like the protagonist here to show what he can do.

Now that I've seen of PTA movies, I can safely tier them with the now-traditional coli face standard

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Boogie Nights
There Will Be Blood

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Hard Eight

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Magnolia
The Master

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Punch-Drunk Love
 
The coli face rating system needs to be adopted worldwide.

I can't imagine what Harvey Weinstein saw in Snowpiercer that resulted in one of his most public wars he's ever had with a film, beyond "hey, that guy is in the Avengers!" Not because it's a bad film (far from it) that only he could "save," but because no amount of editing was ever going to change this film into anything but the weird, wild shaggy mutt that has a limited amount of appeal. Sure, a lot of it screams blockbuster, from its production values to having an easy story to follow along with to, well, having that guy from the Avengers (who gives a pleasantly understated performance, in case you were wondering) in addition to a strong multi-ethnic supporting that cast that manages to not feel too blatant in pandering, but beyond that, it is, from beginning to end, Crazy with a capital C. It's not a matter of editing some of the Crazy out to make it more palatable when the whole film is like that, filled with enough genre changes and visual ingenuity for at least a dozen other films. Somehow, though, director Bong Joon-Ho manages to make it gel together well by ensuring that the tone remains consistent throughout the film, often through visual cues that signify the claustrophobic setting, even in the face of each car often carrying a drastically different decor from one another, as well as never losing sight of the desperation that our heroes fall under throughout. It shouldn't be too surprising to see how well it all flows together, as Bong is something of an expert on being able to handle wild swings from just The Host (and now I'm inspired to seek out his other films), but this film really sticks out in its field for how frustratingly dull a lot of other blockbusters proceed, even if it would have felt more cobbled together from too dissimilar of parts and not having as much care put into it as it does in this film. If it falters, it's surprisingly in the preamble to the climax, which feels a bit too much like it fell out of The Matrix sequels in momentum-halting exposition and explanation, featuring a character serving in a similar role as the much maligned Architect of those films. It feels strangely fitting, though, that a film that never goes in a way you expect it to would wind up doing that again in a dramatically vital moment, and while it looks a bit wobbly on the way down, it definitely knows how to make a good splash with its finale and subsequent ending.

I would argue against there being more films needing to be like Snowpiercer. Certainly, every blockbuster should be made with the same level of careful attention to detail and aspire to be more than just a decent excuse to use someone's air conditioning for two hours (a task that's being failed at with more and more frequency these days), but when we're dealing with a type of filmmaking that is currently suffering from feeling too similar to one another, you don't solve that problem by making more films that on paper offer what this one has, especially with their being a lot of directors who can barely handle simple tasks of tonal consistency in comparable films of less nobler artistic ambition. Tell someone like Michael Bay to do a film just like Snowpiercer, and see how many aspirins you'll need to take after sitting through that mess. There's nothing else that you can really compare this film to, and as far as I'm concerned, it should stay that way.
 
How To Train Your Dragon 2- I thought it was great, the pacing felt really odd to me though, and the tone got a lot darker than I expected. It's on par with the first one for me.

★★★★

The score sounded nice btw. I feel like I will forget it, but it went well with the film and elevated the big moments. Has there been any memorable scores as of late? I feel like I never hear anything that sticks with me anymore.

Anyway, this is probably one of DreamWorks best movies. LEGO is still the front runner for best feature animation this year though.
 
The Insider. Must be, like, the 20th time I rewatch it and it's still one of the greatest movies ever made. Soundtrack is a bit off at times, and that's the only small complaint I can find about it. Immense movie
 
Snowpiercer was fun, but I really didn't care for most characters, some were really bland, some were straight out of a cartoon. I also believe the disjointed nature of the various train parts translated much better to the original graphic novel than it did in the film. I also wasn't a big fan of the shaky cam fighting scenes. In the end I can really recommend the source material, less so this film. I enjoyed The Host and especially Memories of Murder much more.

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I don't know about translations and availability, I have an old Dutch language one, but it seems Casterman is re-releasing them in French at least.
 
Watched Spirited Away, not much to say though, great effort, good pacing.
I remember this being the next Ghibli movie i watched after Mononoke, their first one to see in a theater, and the jump in visual quality was incredible, even if at the time i didn't like the more adorable approach, coming from Mononoke.
I can totally see why it's one of their best regarded movies, it's got a bit of everything that makes their stuff good.
 
You've Got Mail never seen it before I rather enjoyed it. Manhattan in the late 90s seems cool, especially in the autumn! The first time I went was in 99 however I was 9 years old so a big young.. Tom Hanks is loveable as always..

I also have Sleepless in Seattle recording for later (never seen that either)
 
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