What Was The Last Movie You Watched?

[accies1874]

2 hours ago, Steve_Wilkos said:

Did you not find the acting and the dialogue hilariously terrible?

I absolutely did. That kinda worked for me in the sense that it gave off Corny Slasher vibes, however that also made things feel much more movie-leak which sort of goes against the simplifying of violence. 

When I think of something good about this film, it makes me think of something bad; when I think of something bad, I'm reminded of something good. Can't think of anything I've been more conflicted about all year. 

[Theroadlesstravelled]

American Psycho (2000)

The movie that spawned a million P&B gifs.

I found it a bit pointless. Did he? Didn't he?
Bale was great.

I'm going to watch American Psycho 2 with Mila Kunis and William Shatner straight after I return these video tapes.

[MSU]

098 Trap — By any conventional measure, Trap is a bad movie. At best, the dialog feels like it comes from a Choose Your Own Adventure, at worst from someone for whom English is not their primary language. The acting isn't any better, particularly wooden from the director's daughter and the director himself.

The premise, though, is great. Cooper, a seemingly loving dad who moonlights as a barbaric serial killer, takes his daughter to a Lady Raven concert but the feds have been tipped off about his presence and the whole thing is the titular trap. So with all the cops and FBI Philadelphia could muster, Cooper has to use his wits to escape.

The story quickly highlights another issue with the whole endeavor. There's no protagonist, so we end up rooting for the serial killer until the director's daughter gets more involved and then we kind of root for her, and then we end up rooting for a character who wasn't in the first two acts. The whole thing feel directionless and muddled.

Despite all this, and despite Cooper's ability to escape from ANY situation, and despite law enforcement treating a serial killer easier than they would had he just robbed a 7-Eleven, and despite no one at the concert behaving like anyone I've ever seen at a concert, and despite the end going on for MUCH longer than anyone wanted, it's decent nonsensical fun up to a point. The director's daughter might not be able to act, but she can sing and as a vehicle for her musical career, the movie sort of delivers, but it seems an awful lot of effort getting all these people together just for that. 6/10

[accies1874]

I know I shouldn't be tempted by Trap, but Shyamalan keeps making films with kinda-fun premises and they're continuing to draw me in despite me knowing that they'll probably not be very good.

[Chripper]

"Guardians of the Galaxy 3"

I loved the first two. They were fun. Well written. Great dialogue. Great stories and the character development was really good.

The third installment was a huge let-down.

I wanted to love it.

Generally, it felt like James Gunn was going into this project half-heartedly as he knew that he was going to be the new co-CEO at DC Studios.

I liked Rocket's origin story but everything else from Adam's persona, Gamora's new life choice, Peter's demeanor, Nebula's character development and then Drax's weird passive aggression towards Mantis.

It just felt disjointed.

The whole movie felt like a patchwork of the first two movies. A bad one.

Easily 6.2/10

 

[Stellaboz]

Babylon on Netflix

 

This starts batshit crazy and goes back to that constantly. Absolutely loved it, not sure if it's because I like watching Morgot Robbie and Brad Pitt or just because it's a great film.

2 nobodies get into very early cinema in the 20s via a random party and struggle with what goes along with that.

The scene with Toby Maguire was bloody brilliant.

[Miguel Sanchez]

Regarding Trap, I've just seen the advert and it's billed as "An M. Night Shyamalan Experience" which I think speaks for itself. 

[The Golden God]

In The Name Of The Father

 

Excellent and depressing, made more depressing by it being a true story. A 2 hour long answer to the question why does everyone hate England. 

[coprolite]

Final destination 1-3

Slasher films without a slasher from the noughties (i think). Teens (1&3) and young adults get bumped off in order of decreasingly objectionable personalities by sometimes very elaborate accidents. 

Entertaining but empty. My 12 year old thinks they're the best thing ever. 

5,5,4(/10)

[MSU]

099 Harold and the Purple Crayon — Harold and the Purple Crayon was never a thing for me so everything I learned about it, I learned from this movie and I have to say I was pleasantly surprised. It's no Paddington 2 or anything, but it's a charming, funny, family movie that kept me entertained thanks to a script that didn't take itself too seriously, and fun performances all round, particularly Jemaine Clement as the (I suppose) evil librarian and Tanya Reynolds as the human embodiment of a porcupine. 

A bit saggy in places, a police investigation thread thankfully goes nowhere, and maybe the end needed a bit of oomph, but it has some great traditional animation in the introduction and bursts of imagination throughout and I reckon I'd probably enjoy a sequel if it ever came about. 7/10

Edited August 7 by MSU

[Scorge]

Just out of Trap - first half of the film is quite a good set up, but the second half is utterly 'aye right' bonkers. The swamp of dodgy acting, bad dialogue and iffy plotholes doesn't help either.

(Far better was the unlimited screening of Kneecap on Tuesday night - very funny film dripping with statelet-baiting humour. Recommended when it comes out in a fortnight.)

[Craig fae the Vale]

It Ends With Us at Odeon Braehead. 

We went to see this because my wife is obsessed with hate reading Coleen Hoover's books. She consumes them gleefully to rip the pish out of them.

This may be the worst film I've ever seen. It doesn't work as a romance, and the message of "domestic violence is bad" doesn't land because no one seems particularly upset by it. Jenny Slate saves it from being 100% dreadful as she is fantastic, but everything else is terrible. 0 stars.

[jimmy boo]

4 minutes ago, Craig fae the Vale said:

It Ends With Us at Odeon Braehead. 

We went to see this because my wife is obsessed with hate reading Coleen Hoover's books. She consumes them gleefully to rip the pish out of them.

This may be the worst film I've ever seen. It doesn't work as a romance, and the message of "domestic violence is bad" doesn't land because no one seems particularly upset by it. Jenny Slate saves it from being 100% dreadful as she is fantastic, but everything else is terrible. 0 stars.

Mrs Boo and daughter are going to see this tomorrow at our recently refurbished Astoria in Ayr. They both love the books so i'll keep this quiet. Kevin Maher of The Times loved it which would confirm it's pish. I'll get peace to please myself. Please not pleasure.

[Craig fae the Vale]

31 minutes ago, jimmy boo said:

Mrs Boo and daughter are going to see this tomorrow at our recently refurbished Astoria in Ayr. They both love the books so i'll keep this quiet. Kevin Maher of The Times loved it which would confirm it's pish. I'll get peace to please myself. Please not pleasure.

If they like the book I'm sure they'll love it. They'll be wrong, but at least they'll be happy

[ArmadaleKillie]

 

2 hours ago, Craig fae the Vale said:

If they like the book I'm sure they'll love it. They'll be wrong, but at least they'll be happy

I am being made to see this tomorrow... sometimes having an unlimited card is a bugger.

[Craig fae the Vale]

Trap at Odeon Braehead. 

Highly watchable and enjoyable despite its flaws. Really tense and a fantastic performance from Josh Hartnett, but a few too many far fetched moments. I enjoyed it though, enough to it to make it worthwhile watching.

[accies1874]

66. I Saw the TV Glow - Cinema

It’s messy, but then, like We’re All Going to the World’s Fair, it uses its form to tell its story. The whole thing is discomforting and I wanted to escape, and that’s similar to the pretty obvious point Schoenbrun is making about transitioning. 

That definitiveness was one of my complaints and it really came to a head towards the end – albeit the actual final 15 mins or so were devastating – as it felt a bit too much like what would be the subtext in other films was becoming the text in this. For example, I thought that Titane used a similar approach in a much more effective way. 

That said, I appreciated how Schoenbrun used the TV show, The Pink Opaque, as a metaphor for transitioning while also allowing it to act as something a bit more universal. Owen finds connection through The Pink Opaque and it brings him escape... yet it’s trash. It's camp and goofy, but the point seemed to be that just because some/most of the world’s population find something to be alien, there are pockets of people who respond entirely differently. I think that the film did a great job of allowing us to see the world through Owen's eyes by providing the film-world as something so harsh and confusing. 

What’s more, the aforementioned final 15 minutes were tragic. Without going into spoilers, it’s all about the life that trans people feel like they have lost pre-transition, however this takes that a step further by considering it as an entire life left unlived and how the status quo warriors trying to make clamp down on positive change are… well, they’re not so good. That’s why films – and other art forms – are so important, as filmmakers can find ways to give you perspectives that you might not have in your own life, and those make-believe perspectives can allow you to reflect on real-life situations. 

It’s not We’re All Going to the World’s Fair, which was one of the best of the decade so far, but Jane Schoenbrun is undoubtedly someone who’s finding interesting ways to put their own voice and experiences on The Big Screen.

67. Gasoline Rainbow - MUBI

I think I'd have liked this a little bit more if the characters weren't insufferable. Wanna spend a couple of hours on the road with American high school stoners? No, me neither. 

I absolutely accept that it's my own fault as there are no pretensions as to what kind of a film it's trying to be, and it deserves credit for how the laissez-faire approach to story comes to a head these high schoolers realise that time does in fact keep on moving. It's just all very annoying though.

[MSU]

100 Cuckoo -- For the first hour or so, I thought I was looking at a 10/10 2024 movie, something of a rarity. Knowing very little before going in, I wasn't sure what to expect but I know I didn't expect this. The opening sequences do a great job of establishing family dynamics and pecking order as Hunter Schafer's Gretchen finds herself as a cuckoo's chick of sorts with a dad who has remarried and a step-sister she barely acknowledges as she's dropped into a weird Bavarian hotel where everything feels desperately amiss. Adding to this sense of disorientation and alienation is the time setting. It looks very much like a movie set in the 70s or 80s, yet Gretchen has a mobile phone and fancy headphones.

The opening reaches a crescendo with a genuinely terrifying sequence as Gretchen cycles home at night but as is usual with movies of this nature, the investment in the opening doesn't quite cover the pay-off as we get closer to the end and secrets are gradually revealed. But the acting is brilliant, Dan Stevens is approaching national treasure levels, the score and visual effects are wonderfully unsettling and the movie has the sense to finish everything off with a fantastic joke that I imagined in my head but never thought would be played out.

I'm enjoying 2024's batch of horror-movies-that-are-better-than-Longlegs and this ranks pretty highly among them. 8/10

101 The Instigators -- A bit too formulaic to truly stand out, but this odd-couple-buddy-heist movie with Matt Damon and a different Affleck is an enormous amount of fun and benefits from a surprisingly stacked cast as the pair are joined by Toby Jones, Ving Rhames, Hong Chau, and Ron Perlman. The script, too, is sharp, funny and manages to conceal a couple of surprises, and it's nice to see so many familiar places in Boston. Director Doug Liman's reputation is built on making this sort of movie; fun, entertaining, maybe something you'd dig out again in a year or two. 7/10

[Stellaboz]

Having watched it in the cinema when it came out, I've just watched again Matrix 4.

At the time I thought it was OK until Neo was unplugged. Fell asleep for part of it too. 

Watching it again, really enjoyed it. Key is to not compare to the original and its a good wee film. 

[KnightswoodBear]

The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare

Total nonsense, but no less enjoyable for it.  The Nazi's in it fall into the Indiana Jones category in that they are there purely to be shot, stabbed, blown up and generally dispatched with in a variety of different ways.