Satans_Husband

It was on at the Cameo in Edinburgh. I think there are some additional shows this week but they'll be in one of the small screens.

Moonrise Kingdom I know that Wes Anderson is the kind of filmmaker it's easy to dislike but I'm a fan of Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums and I also liked The Life Aquatic and bits of The Darjeeling Ltd. But this is turgid. It's him making yet more of the same though not as well. It's not enough to rely on the audience ooing at Harvey Keitel being a scout leader or Bruce Willis as a weak policeman, they should have some amusing things to say. Some of the cutely eccentric stuff is laid on with a trowel and it's all extremely tiresome. Only part I can honestly say I liked was the set piece with the Noah's Ark play in a church. The cinematography was up to its usual high standard but so what. 3/10

Dark Shadows Went to see this last night with the very low expectations necessary for a Tim Burton film made this century. And it lived up to them. Really quite boring and feels like a bunch of half ideas thrown together. The ending was the sort of tedious, fantasy, CGI battle in a gothic mansion that has been seen so many times before. The only saving grace was the 'old world' speak that Johnny Depp indulged in throughout, some his lines were fairly amusing. 3/10

Possibly my favourite Hitchcock film, even though the roundabout scene doesn't work very well. Robert Walker is simply amazing in it. An interesting and tortured actor, he died while making his next film. His son Robert Walker Jnr looks almost identical to him and popped up in loads of TV stuff. I'll need to check out if Jnr ever played Jesus, he would have been good at that - in a sinister way.

Haven't posted on here for a while so here's my recent cinema viewing. In Darkness A true story from WWII I hadn't heard before. Quite interesting and not too bad. Feels long, but not as long as its huge running time. 7/10 Into The Abyss Fascinating documentary look at Death Row from most sides involved. I felt it wore on a bit, though some of the moments are very memorable. 7/10 The Cabin In The Woods Avoided hearing anything about this beforehand. Was then disappointed to discover little more than a Dr Who episode with gore and no Doctor to save the day at the end. I couldn't get into this fantasy bollocks at all and didn't find the gags very funny either. 2/10 Salmon Fishing In The Yemen (I got given a free ticket) Some films aren't worth watching even when they're free. Absolute guff. 1.5/10

I see that The Governor is going to be in series 3. More than slightly disappointed that John Hawkes has turned down the role he was near perfect for - to be replaced by David Morrissey!

Super Watched this one the other night. Despite it saying 'Far Better Than Kick Ass' on the box, I knew not to expect something like Kick Ass bar the superhero connection. It's certainly all over the place and fairly bizarre. I was pleasantly surprised at how extreme some of the violence was. Not a very good movie though. 5/10

Yes it is, and also on youtube.

The Descendants Of the director's previous that I've seen, I really liked Sideways and Election but I think this is similar to About Schmidt in that it's not too bad but not too great either. I agree with the consensus that Clooney's Oscar nomination is bit bemusing as he's been better in other films and there really isn't anything remarkable here. Still an enjoyable, if downbeat watch though and there isn't much wrong with it. I can't be alone in thinking that Beau Bridges is almost doing a brother of Jeff Lebowski performance. 6/10

The Woman In Black I haven't read the book but saw the play not so long ago. All the stuff the film adds is fairly rubbish, especially the ending. Daniel Radcliffe turns in a reasonable performance and some of it looks pretty good but there's only so often you can shout BOO! at an audience before it becomes run of the mill. 4/10

Martha Marcy May Marlene This film has been getting a lot of praise and, in most ways, justifiably so. It's an excellent film for a first time writer/director and the performances are strong throughout the cast. Elizabeth Olsen looks to be the talented one in the family. It's a thought provoking story and the comparisons between her life with the cult and life with her family are interesting. For me, the spoiler below lets the film down and I would have preferred it if the story had taken a different path. When the cult turns nasty and people are killed. Avoiding the violent similarities to Manson would have made the subject matter and the choices people make all the more fascinating. 7/10

The Awakening I'd heard nothing but bad about this recent British ghost story and it's certainly lousy. The first 20 minutes or so are a not very good creepy story but it all starts to go downhill once the plot attempts to develop. It gets steadily worse until the ludicrous back story comes out making the last third of the film a tiresome watch. Good cast and an evocative location are all this film has going for it. 2/10

Trailer for season return http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1520211/#lb-vi2885591321

The Ward I had VERY low expectations for this since John Carpenter hasn't done anything decent for decades. It was total dross and how anyone ever decided it was worth spending any time or money to make is beyond me. A small number of semi-babes and Meryl Streep's daughter in a nonsense situation with one massive twist (aka cheat) and one last in-your-face 'scare' thrown in as well. Absolute guff. 1/10

The Artist A brave idea superbly executed. I thought the story would be very formulaic but I was pleasantly surprised and was never sure how it would turn out. 8.5/10

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo I haven't read the book but really enjoyed the Swedish film. This was a disappointment. Maybe it was because I was now aware of what was going to happen but this seemed to lack the edge of the original with the more controversial scenes not being as powerful. The ending in particular was very poor. It's still a good story though. 6/10

I think an hour is more than enough for the concept and was actually too long for one or two of them. Konnie Huq is Brooker's (now preganant) wife. Only just caught the third one and I thought it was by far the best, which is a little ironic since Brooker didn't write it. It was done by Jesse Armstrong of 'Thick of It' and 'Peep Show' fame. This one was far closer to the ideals of The Twilight Zone and was both entertaining and thought provoking. With the progress of technology and the obsession with social networking, the whole idea of a 'grain' isn't that farfetched at all. In response to the bit in the spoiler tag above - The grain may have helped the guy expose the affair, actually more of a one-off shag, but it brought misery upon him. After he reflected on how much she clearly loved him and balanced this against one act of unfaithfulness, he decided his life (and maybe everybody's) would be far better off without it.

I thought the second one was quite dull. An hour and twenty minutes was an unnecessarily long time to tell the story.

The Thing I'm a big fan of the John Carpenter one so decided to check this out despite my reservations. It actually started out alright and I was quite enjoying it. Unfortunately, once the thing action kicks in, it falls to bits quite badly with the thing behaving in a nonsensical manner. It was at this time that I realised there had been no real characterisation and the people in the base were pretty much cannon fodder that the audience knew little about. It all added up to a boring experience. 5/10

In case it's of any help, on the certification for Hospital Massacre at the start of the film the title came up as X-Ray.

I was at the Bad Movie All Nighter at the Cameo Cinema in Edinburgh on the Saturday just passed. It opened with The Room, of which I need to say nothing, then the second up was Samurai Cop. You should definitely check that one out. Next up was Roadhouse which I wouldn't really put into a category of real shockers but the last, Hospital Massacre, was a bit of a peach. Of course, as anyone that reads Salty's reviews knows, there are a LOT of truly dire horror movies and it may not be one of the worst of all time but it's a real hoot. May be tricky to see though as the host said it hasn't been released on DVD.

I was bothered by the finger as well, if you know what I mean.

Yep, she'd have to have got the injury somewhere else. Looked like she had a wound on her shoulder. I wouldn't be surprised if we got to see what happened in a flashback sequence. It might even be the opening to the next episode as it would make for a dramatic resumption of the series (or season if you like). Overall I think it's not been too bad. Certainly a bit too slow but it may well improve as it leads up the climax of the second run. Thinking about how it may develop, as I said before, I'm not up to date on the comics but of the content I'm aware of I'd like to see... ...them go to the prison. There are a huge number of possibilities with that both action and character related. I doubt very much the Governor will make an appearance. Not in this run anyway.

I thought it was an OK piece of television but at times it felt very Chris Morris. I agree that the act was far too extreme to make the plot have any kind of plausibility so it never felt dramatic to me. Why Charlie Brooker has been namedropping The Twilight Zone regularly in regards to these programmes is a mystery as I couldn't see any real connection at all.

Whoa! I'm only sharing my opinion, not coming on here to have a dig at anyone that's enjoying it. I won't be passing comment on it anymore as I won't be watching. However, I may occasionally take a look at the thread to see if you've posted any more pictures of the maid. Especially if there are any clips of the old version's gusset.