What Was The Last Movie You Watched?

[D Angelo Barksdale]

On 16/12/2022 at 08:07, BFTD said:

Fine, I'll do it.

[tongue_tied_danny]

19 hours ago, coprolite said:

 

All Quiet on the Western Front (2022)

Naive youngsters sign up to be heroes in 2018 Germany, but war turns out to be unpleasant.

Quite liked the look and feel of this and thought it brought the horror home well. Not much in the way of story and relentlessly grim, which I guess was the point but didn’t help it work as a film. 

6/10

 

 

I'm keen to see this.

I've read the book and I've got both of the previous films on DVD. The original 30s one is a classic and the 70s remake with John Boy Walton playing Paul Baumer is decent enough in its own way.

I hope that they haven't fucked about with the storyline too much.

 

 

[tongue_tied_danny]

The Virgin Soldiers

1969 comedy/drama about a bunch of raw British conscripts serving in the Malayan Emergency in the 1950s.

Badly dated but entertaining enough in places. 

5/10

 

[coprolite]

49 minutes ago, tongue_tied_danny said:

I'm keen to see this.

I've read the book and I've got both of the previous films on DVD. The original 30s one is a classic and the 70s remake with John Boy Walton playing Paul Baumer is decent enough in its own way.

I hope that they haven't fucked about with the storyline too much.

 

 

I haven't seen the others or read the book but i think it's a pretty loose adaptation. 

[MSU]

167 The Fabelmans -- If this didn't have Steven Spielberg's name on it, and if it wasn't commonly accepted as being a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age tale from his youth, I'm not sure many would give this the time of day. It's a pretty dull story of a boy in a wealthy family discovering movies and moviemaking, where he is supported by his creative mother and somewhat scorned by his scientist father, all the while his family is slowly coming away at the seams. The script is clunky and overly melodramatic. That said, there's a great shot where young Sam projects his first movie onto the palm of his hand, Mateo Zoryon Francis-DeFord and Gabriel LaBelle who play Sammy at different points in his youth have some of Spielberg's mannerisms down pat, and genuinely the best part of the movie comes from a throwaway cameo in the final few minutes, but none of this is enough to elevate the movie beyond Spielberg's most boring effort to date. 4/10

[Soapy FFC]

Highlander (1986) The plot is decent enough, but the acting and effects are crap by today's standards. This is one that could do with a remake.

[JustOneCornetto]

On 18/12/2022 at 17:04, MSU said:

167 The Fabelmans -- If this didn't have Steven Spielberg's name on it, and if it wasn't commonly accepted as being a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age tale from his youth, I'm not sure many would give this the time of day. It's a pretty dull story of a boy in a wealthy family discovering movies and moviemaking, where he is supported by his creative mother and somewhat scorned by his scientist father, all the while his family is slowly coming away at the seams. The script is clunky and overly melodramatic. That said, there's a great shot where young Sam projects his first movie onto the palm of his hand, Mateo Zoryon Francis-DeFord and Gabriel LaBelle who play Sammy at different points in his youth have some of Spielberg's mannerisms down pat, and genuinely the best part of the movie comes from a throwaway cameo in the final few minutes, but none of this is enough to elevate the movie beyond Spielberg's most boring effort to date. 4/10

I heard that David Lynch is in this so noted it down for one to watch. Is his appearance memorable or blink and you miss him?

[MSU]

4 hours ago, JustOneCornetto said:

I heard that David Lynch is in this so noted it down for one to watch. Is his appearance memorable or blink and you miss him?

It's the best bit of the movie.

[accies1874]

228. Better Watch Out (2017)* - Digital Rental

About 15 minutes in, I was thinking “wouldn’t it be neat if spoiler?” and then that’s exactly what played out! Some would say predictable, but it was a fairly original and scary idea. Despite that, it kind of feels like a film in its early stages: you could’ve done a few more takes to bring out some performances, was that really the best camera angle or editing decision, did you really make the most of the Christmas setting? That makes it feel like a bit of a let-down despite what I liked, although I’ll probably watch it some Christmastime in the future.

Spoiler

The idea of a creepy kid in this is much scarier than so many films that try and have a SPOOKY SCARY CHILD, and that's because it feels so real. An entitled young boy who sees the world as a playground for his fantasy and goes apeshit when that doesn’t transpire – it’s probably happening in your street. It’s a shame, then, that the kid actor isn’t able to pull off the performance. I feel bad for him as it’s a lot to put on the shoulders of a young actor, but he really isn’t good at all.

229. Violent Night (2022)* - Cinema

If you’ve seen the trailer and liked the look of this, then you’ll enjoy Violent Night. The trailer kind of annoyed me but I still liked parts of this. It’s paper thin, pretty messy and quite mean-spirited, but it isn’t disastrous for a Christmassy couple of hours.

My screening didn’t have any picture for the first wee bit of the adverts, then the picture was out of focus throughout (I kinda got used to it) and the sound seemed to be distorting at high levels even during dialogue (goddamn John Leguizamo’s delivery), so the fact I wasn’t completely miserable throughout is quite a miracle. A Christmas Miracle. 

230. Miracle on 34th Street (1947)* - Digital Rental

A Christmas classic. It strikes a nice balance of being appropriately earnest and schmaltzy but with the good sense to have smatterings of fairly straight, deadpan humour that ensure the tone never strays too far into saccharine territory. It’s obviously a family Christmas film so there’s no escaping some things, but I appreciate it when there’s a degree of unapologetic cynicism and nasty characters in this kind of stuff.

231. Batman Returns (1992) - Sky Cinema

My thoughts on this haven’t really changed from the first time I saw it; the sets, costumes, makeup and music are all wonderful. They create this dark Christmassy atmosphere which I think is great for a Batman film, and a film set in Gotham in particular, but sadly both this and, from what I remember, Batman 89 take quite detached approaches to the Batman character. It’s been years since I saw the 1989 film, but I remember being surprised by how much of it focused on a couple of journalists investigating Bruce Wayne and/or Batman (I can’t remember). Batman’s still obviously the focus there so that’s fine, but it was still quite an interesting choice for a blockbuster.

Now with Returns, Tim Burton seems to focus on everything but Batman. He focuses on all of the things in my first sentence, he focuses on Catwoman’s origin, Penguin’s origin, Max Shreck’s schemery, Penguin’s run at mayor. All that stuff with Batman as a plot device to punch baddies. I actually quite like the idea of that providing the supporting cast and plotlines are all interesting enough to carry it, but nothing in the script is able to match the excellence of the technical aspects which, for me, made it drag quite a bit.

232. Iron Man 3 (2013) - BBC iPlayer

Another superhero movie set at Christmas, but sadly Christmas in this is just as half-baked as everything else. I think Shane Black wanted to do something pretty good, even if his filmmaking and some of the script’s plotting aren’t great, but studio-mandated explosions and rushing through any scene that might have actually been interesting meant that it was all just one big tease. I can’t believe I’m about to say something should’ve taken inspiration from The Phantom Menace, but if this committed to its second act as much as that did then it would’ve instantly risen in my estimations as that contains the best parts. RDJ and Jon Favreau carry the first act through some boring scene-setting and poor handlings of PTSD (which is a good idea poorly handled), but if the film just wallowed in that wee town for a lot longer then it could’ve been saved – that’s where all the interesting stuff is. The Mandarin twist is fun, I’ll give it that, but Jesus Christ that third act is dull. 

[Detournement]

Both Sides Of The Blade (2022)

Vincent Lindon and Juliette Binoche are a happy couple until Binoche's ex appears back on the scene starting a new business with big Vincent. The acting is obviously top drawer and it's quite subtle in it's themes about race and responsibility with the important part of the story involving Lindon's mixed race son which none of the reviews I've read seemed to focus on. It also has one of the all time best cameos when Lillian Thuram appears as himself on a radio show to discuss race and starts talking about Frantz Fanon. You've got to love the French.

The Fourth Man (1983)

A  nicely perverted Paul Verhoeven film which answers the question 'What if Hitchcock but Dutch and bisexual?' It's got one particular scene that is hard to forget but it's extremely entertaining all around.

To Catch A Thief (1954)

The most straightforward Hitchcock film i've seen to the point it's almost as if he didn't want to ruin the French Riviera with Grace Kelly and Cary Grant positive vibes by having too much plot. I suspect that if he knew Grace Kelly would end up marrying into the Monaco royal family and quitting acting he wouldn't have made it. Major f**k up from Alfred here.

3 Women (1977)

Sissy Spacek's country bumpkin befriends her co-worker Shelley Duvall who is completely delusional. It's a Robert Altman film and isn't overly concerned with plot for the most part so on the few occasions when something dramatic happens it hits hard. 

The Drive By Night (1940) 

Bogie plays second fiddle to George Ratf as a pair of truck drivng brothers trying to beat the system of their exploitative industry. The first half is quite 'red' in that it's all about dishonest bosses and villainous finance companies grinding down the working man then it turns into a Femme Fatale noir with Ida Lupino as the crazy bad girl and Anne Sheridan as the good girl with all the witty one liners. A great watch.

Night Moves (1975)

Gene Hackman plays a private detective who gets conned by pretty much everyone he meets in a very, very cynical and dark neonoir. A young Melaine Griffiths plays a sex mad teenager who's mother is a washed up actress which must have been hard for her. It's the first Arthur Penn film i've watched and it was excellent, I need to check out more.

Eyes Wide Shut (1999) 

The GOAT's final triumph. After watching Messi's last masterpiece I went to see Kubrick's on the big screen for the first time. It looked incredible and the red/purple/blue colour scheme was more prominent and the christmas lights looked great on the 35mm. It was quite a weird screening as people were laughing a lot at some of the stranger acting in the first half but in the second half it was total silence. I think it's the only major Kubrick film which hasn't had a 4K release so hopefully that happens soon.

 

Edited December 20, 2022 by Detournement

[jimmy boo]

Northman...managed to see through to the end of this after switching off first attempt when a bit squiffy. Wish my stream had subtitles but caught most of it. Had no idea some of the actors were in it until I checked imdb later!!...7/10

[Theroadlesstravelled]

Avatar: The way of water.

It looked pretty. The story was a bit shite - save the space whales. 

The first movie was better.

[accies1874]

233. Master (2022)* - Prime

This has a lot of the uncomfortable subconscious everyday racism of Get Out, done in some really clever visual or spoken ways, but also goes beyond that with a few overt moments to push the characters over the edge. It actually surprisingly balances those well as the tone stays pretty downbeat throughout and the pacing fairly slow, but there are still plenty of awkward moments which straddle line between uncomfortably funny and just plain uncomfortable, similar to Get Out. I’d say it’s probably scarier than Get Out, too, especially when it blends reality and fantasy with some hella creepy sequences. I liked it.

234. The Lodge (2019)* - Sky Cinema

Man this is grim. Maybe even too grim for me. I appreciated the first hour or so as it relied a lot on its visual storytelling and atmosphere while very slowly ramping up the scares, but that last 30-40 minutes is bleak af. I went to bed that night, having just watched Krampus and the end of Aberdeen’s bed-shitting, and suddenly the last scene of this was playing in my head, and there's one early on that isn't much better. It is set around Christmas though, so that’s something!

235. Krampus (2015) - Netflix

When I first saw this a couple of years ago, I was actually a bit annoyed as I loved the family dynamic they’d set up and was keen to just watch a typical dysfunctional Christmas family film with them, but this time around, having got that disappointment out the way, I just took the film for what it is and thoroughly enjoyed it. They set up the admittedly stereotypical families really nicely which makes you care when the horror starts, giving weight to the well-crafted set-pieces and creature designs. Maybe a tad overlong but I enjoyed it a lot.

236. Brick (2005) - DVD

While I think Knives Out probably is Rian Johnson’s best film (not seen Brothers Bloom or Glass Onion), there’s just so much to love about Brick. A neo noir set in an American high school is a great premise and he completely commits to it with the music, narrative, characters and – most importantly to me – the language of it. The script blends po-faced noir dialogue with imaginative ways to describe the mechanics of high school and other everyday things, delivered by Joseph Gordon-Levitt in a strange way that portrays his character as someone who believes himself to be the hero in the story but probably falls more into a shade of grey. His weirdness is compelling to me. That language, combined with the mystery taking us through the high school’s surroundings and the different cliques, creates this world that’s placed just outside reality but uses the magic of movies to make our reality a bit more interesting. I suppose it’s a combination of teen movies and noir. I’m also quite fond of when films use music that we so much associate with a certain time period and/or genre and apply it to the modern day which is done here.

I could just be an idiot, but every time I watch it, my brain does stop being able to keep up with the plot developments as it begins to reach its climax, and I’m always grateful for when it gets summed up right at the end for us morons. Maybe the aforementioned language and line delivery doesn’t allow revelations to be as accessible as they need to be, but I’d much rather it retained what makes it so impressive than become less original just for a moment of satisfaction so I’m not gonna complain.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s podcast interview with Rian Johnson is absolutely class, aside from RJ’s annoying laugh. It predates the release of Knives Out so is a bit out-of-date, but there’s so much to be learned from it.

237. Parallel Mothers (2022)* - MUBI

This completely flew over my head and did nothing for me other than its wonderful use of colour. 

238. National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989) - Sky Cinema

I still think it’s far better when acting as a satire than its comedic set pieces, but when they marry up (disappointingly fleetingly) it works brilliantly. Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo are great fun in these roles, although the latter doesn’t seem to be as prominent in this as she was in European Vacation.

239. Knives Out (2019) - DVD

Perfect entertainment and a real “comfort movie”. As soon as the film starts, I just immediately feel at home. It’s so rewatchable, a delightfully written script performed by such a distinct cast of characters and A-listers from many different generations of Hollywood. The amount of clever details packed into it also help with the rewatchability.

I don’t tend to look too much into the makings of a specific film, but I’ve spent quite a bit of time taking a dive into the background of this  because A) it’s so well made, and B) it’s so damn fun. Craftsmanship combined with enjoyment creates means that it’s a pleasure to look into the mechanics of how the film works or the foreshadowing of certain things or details that other folk picked up on. Even something like how a baseball weaves a b-story is incredibly clever. It’s just a really terrific crowd-pleaser that’s made by someone whose love and passion are apparent throughout. The kind of film, imo, that makes you instantly want to see more like it, and learn more about how these kinds of things are put together.

[D Angelo Barksdale]

Watched quite a few this week being on holiday.

Black Adam

As superhero films go, it's not great, but not completely terrible. Felt like the most Marvel-esque film so far from DC. An absolute shan superhero C list back up from The Justice Commission or whatever they were called. 5/10

Home Alone 1&2

Christmas classics. The heartwarming story of a child with a savant level of espionage continually abandoned by the worst parents in the world being hunted down by 2 hardened criminals. 8/10

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

Not the Cohens best effort, but relatively entertaining. A couple of the chapter's were quite good, the others a bit meh. 7/10

[D Angelo Barksdale]

Also, for those that enjoy this thread, a reminder to vote in the P&B top 100 fims poll.

[Ewanandmoreagain]

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Quite Good

" George " gets more animated as the film goes on , and Ricky Tar would not be that pleased if he ever met him again

Spoiler

and why did Mark Strong's character visit Colin Firth's before going to Budapest ?

 

[Ewanandmoreagain]

On 20/12/2022 at 17:23, Detournement said:

Both Sides Of The Blade (2022)

Vincent Lindon and Juliette Binoche are a happy couple until Binoche's ex appears back on the scene starting a new business with big Vincent. The acting is obviously top drawer and it's quite subtle in it's themes about race and responsibility with the important part of the story involving Lindon's mixed race son which none of the reviews I've read seemed to focus on. It also has one of the all time best cameos when Lillian Thuram appears as himself on a radio show to discuss race and starts talking about Frantz Fanon. You've got to love the French.

The Fourth Man (1983)

A  nicely perverted Paul Verhoeven film which answers the question 'What if Hitchcock but Dutch and bisexual?' It's got one particular scene that is hard to forget but it's extremely entertaining all around.

To Catch A Thief (1954)

The most straightforward Hitchcock film i've seen to the point it's almost as if he didn't want to ruin the French Riviera with Grace Kelly and Cary Grant positive vibes by having too much plot. I suspect that if he knew Grace Kelly would end up marrying into the Monaco royal family and quitting acting he wouldn't have made it. Major f**k up from Alfred here.

3 Women (1977)

Sissy Spacek's country bumpkin befriends her co-worker Shelley Duvall who is completely delusional. It's a Robert Altman film and isn't overly concerned with plot for the most part so on the few occasions when something dramatic happens it hits hard. 

The Drive By Night (1940) 

Bogie plays second fiddle to George Ratf as a pair of truck drivng brothers trying to beat the system of their exploitative industry. The first half is quite 'red' in that it's all about dishonest bosses and villainous finance companies grinding down the working man then it turns into a Femme Fatale noir with Ida Lupino as the crazy bad girl and Anne Sheridan as the good girl with all the witty one liners. A great watch.

Night Moves (1975)

Gene Hackman plays a private detective who gets conned by pretty much everyone he meets in a very, very cynical and dark neonoir. A young Melaine Griffiths plays a sex mad teenager who's mother is a washed up actress which must have been hard for her. It's the first Arthur Penn film i've watched and it was excellent, I need to check out more.

Eyes Wide Shut (1999) 

The GOAT's final triumph. After watching Messi's last masterpiece I went to see Kubrick's on the big screen for the first time. It looked incredible and the red/purple/blue colour scheme was more prominent and the christmas lights looked great on the 35mm. It was quite a weird screening as people were laughing a lot at some of the stranger acting in the first half but in the second half it was total silence. I think it's the only major Kubrick film which hasn't had a 4K release so hopefully that happens soon.

 

Night Moves - Absolutely Brilliant

A greater sense of impending .... ,

more than the Cr*w R**d

Edited December 24, 2022 by Ewanandmoreagain

[Ewanandmoreagain]

On 29/11/2022 at 23:27, Archie McSquackle said:

The Spy Who Came In From The Cold with Richard Burton. Watched it tonight from Sky Cinema. I've seen the TV series but it was a long time and this film version was wonderful, just so clever.

Brilliant plot , and brilliant sub plot

Spoiler

save our ex Nazi spy , frame the Jew

 

[BFTD]

The Bishop's Wife (cinema) - miserable bishop David Niven is sent an angel in the form of Cary Grant to help him re-evaluate his priorities in life.

This is a weird one; it's interesting to watch older films and see how society has changed. We're informed that Niven's bishop was a different, happier family man until his promotion and obsession with finding funds from rich benefactors to build a new cathedral, but we certainly see little evidence of it until the last few seconds when he finally displays some affection for his wife, who he seems to view more as a possession throughout. Cary Grant flits about making everyone's life happier, and it's hard not to come away with the conclusion that everybody would've been much better off all round if Grant had just replaced Niven, as he apparently would like to by the end.

Bit of an odd film - is this a Christmas staple that I was unaware of? It certainly doesn't have the catharsis of something like It's a Wonderful Life, although it seems to think it does. Glad I saw it anyway, even if it's not my bag.

[BFTD]

On 23/12/2022 at 14:55, Slim Charles. said:

Black Adam

As superhero films go, it's not great, but not completely terrible. Felt like the most Marvel-esque film so far from DC. An absolute shan superhero C list back up from The Justice Commission or whatever they were called. 5/10

Can't remember if I mentioned anything about this on here, but Black Adam really did demonstrate another facet to how DC has suffered from Marvel getting ahead of them in the movie-making game. They both wilfully ripped each other off back in the day, and the Council of Justice-y People did just feel like knock-offs of various Marvel characters we've already seen - the Gobots to the Transformers robots.

Also, I still keep referring to this film as "Young Adam", the Ewan MacGregor film where he gets his lad out and shags anything that isn't nailed down, so that's annoying me