What have you watched recently?

johnny_ultimate

MiloYossarian wrote: »

The Secret In Their Eyes

Wow, what a really good film. It could be the most exquisitely shot film I've ever seen. There's one shot in particular that I can not figure out how they did. It has to be a blending of cgi.

For some reason, for the last few years I have avoided the films that get oscar nominated in the best foreign film category. This film has changed my mind.

At least 9/10

While I didn't think The Secret in Their Eyes was the most deserving of the award in 2010, it is a pretty great film. That stadium shot is indeed tremendous.

Alas, you can safely avoid the piece of crap In a Better World that won the Oscar this year. The Academy back to their predictable, painfully safe tricks.

Nolanger

Botched - Irish made but Russia-set gore comedy about a pair of killers in an office block. Surprised it's not better known?

Sad Professor

Yeah, The Secret in Their Eyes was brilliant. Quite a bit of CGI in it as I recall.

bnt

I don't watch many rom-coms, but thought I would try He's Just Not that Into You on TV tonight. I think it's supposed to be insightful about relationships etc., but the film is populated by idiots for whom I feel no sympathy whatsoever. They're all falling in to and out of relationships, or think they are, or think they aren't. My overall reaction: none of these characters should ever hook up with anyone ever again, then we won't have the prospect of another generation of romantic nitwits. :pac:

edit: I wrote the above before the ending, which was better than I'd expected. The film-makers actually took the risk of not having all the loose ends tied up, with some characters remaining single and dealing with it. It was a helluva slog to get there, though.

MagicMarker

Fast Five: First 45 minutes were awesome, last 45 minutes were awesome, the bit in the middle not so much. Also, I want to go to Brazil.

Bowlardo

Kess73 wrote: »

Saw Attack The Block last night.


Dull, cliched, with cardboard characters that you don't give a crap about. I spent the film hoping that most of the cast would be eaten. A film that tries to appear far more clever than it actually is.

Thank you. I was really pissed off by this film. was expecting it to be ha;f decent but it turned out to bang of some over the top Channel four type bollocks!

Bowlardo

Tony EH wrote: »

Yeah, I like 'Office Space'. There's a brilliant part in it where they

take a photo copier/printer out into a field and beat the ****e out of it.

Class film

the_monkey

Escape from Alcatraz Great film, and has dated very well, Clint Eastwood plays one of the inmates who escaped from Alcatraz prison in 1962.

MagicMarker

the_monkey wrote: »

Escape from Alcatraz Great film, and has dated very well, Clint Eastwood plays one of the inmates who escaped from Alcatraz prison in 1962.

Is that why it's called Escape from Alcatraz?

Voodu Child

Point Blank - By the numbers but fairly enjoyable French thriller.

The Tree of Life - Boring. Gave up half way.

alfa beta

Recent trips to Xtravision have seen me treated to the following:

The Next Three Days - solid, watchable but not amazing - Crowe is good.

Trust - David Schwimmer directs and boy does he need an editor to come along and cut back on the repetitive angst and just speed up things generally - dull (and did have the potential to be a lot better)

The Lincoln Lawyer - this surprised me - very strong plot, well written - wasn't expecting to like it so much - worth a watch in my view.

Ghost Writer - Roman Polanski's direction is expert I think - loved the 'feel' of the movie - the locations, the mood etc. Storyline is good, plot and narrative strong enough to keep you interested (if a bit silly at the end). Pierce Brosnan is good - perfect for the part too. Ewan McGregor sort of annoyed me though with the way he played the writer part - I know he was trying to be all sorta unimpressed with the whole set up etc, but it just didn't really work for me. Also worth a watch though.

krudler

alfa beta wrote: »

The Lincoln Lawyer - this surprised me - very strong plot, well written - wasn't expecting to like it so much - worth a watch in my view.

I enjoyed it, McConnaghey should make more serious films and less by the numbers rom coms, he was a talent to watch at one time and can act when he wants to.

Oat23

starbelgrade wrote: »

The Man from Nowhere
A South Korean action film that is both brutal & touching in equal measures. Similar in vein to "I Saw The Devil", but even better. Not for the feint hearted but thoroughly enjoyable. 9/10

I watched this yesterday after reading your post and googling it. Thought it was fantastic. Similar to not only I Saw The Devil but a few others as well but it's better than all of them imo!

ReacherCreature

irishh_bob wrote: »

its a novel concept for a story - film but at the end of the day its pure gimickry , its baschically forrest gump with an original gimick for a plot , none of the relationships he has with people or in anyway interesting and hes not a particular likeable charechter himself , its a one trick pony , the entire movie

I disagree. They formed the crux of the story and it was done really well. He was "locked" up so long but became free and explored the world. I thought the sailors were a good addition and fortified the "be what you want to be", i.e the captain who was an artist. Then the lady who wanted to swim the channel, his Dad, Daisy all made Benjamin who he was.

Button was a really likable character I felt. Brad Pitt brought real soul and power to it. Just enjoyable.

Nolanger

East of Eden - good but very overrated.

krudler

the first 3 Pirates of the Caribbean, I love the first one, one of the best blockbusters of the last decade, but the sequels just got bogged down in convoluted plots and some baffling character logic, like towards the end of the 3rd movie, the first time I saw it I had NO idea who I was meant to be rooting for, Will seemed to have turned bad, Elizabeth was sort of between good and bad, same with Jack and Barbossa, at least with guys like Davy Jones and Beckett they were just bad, end of. there's so much backstabbing and double and triple crossing you completely lose the idea of who's doing what for what reasons. And its a pity because they're brilliantly made, cgi is flawless for the most part and they've got some great setpieces (flipping the boat in At Worlds End is one of the best scenes of the trilogy)

Kess73

13 Assassins


It arrived from Amazon today so finally got around to seeing this film.

It was surprisingly well paced and controlled for it's slow burning first 75 minutes. There are little flourishes of violence in those 75 minutes but nothing in terms of what may be expected from Takashi Miike. One early scene stands out in particular as it is one involving a woman who has had her....well you will know the scene when you see it. But it really helps set the tone and clearly defines the sides of right and wrong.

I loved the many little touches the film has in it. From things like facial expressions on the extras as they go about their business to things like the level of detail in some of the sets. Also I loved the many nods towards Kurosawa films that popped up during the film.

The final 45 minutes or so falls into more familar Miike territory as it is pretty much one big scrap for that 45 minutes and it is to Miike's credit that it only feels like 10 minutes.

If you have seen Seven Samurai, The Magnificent Seven, or the 13th Warrior then you can pretty much guess that the 13 Assassins will be made up of similar personalities with differing skill sets, but the character of Kiga is quite interesting. At first he seems to be a straight copy of Mifune's Kikuchiyo from Seven Samurai, but he drops a lot of hints in what he says that point towards him being something else, something more primal or supernatural even. We never get an actual answer to that and many won't see anything in what he says, but although my mind took me down the wrong path in terms of Japanese mythology it would seem that Miike's interviews suggest my line of thought is correct. Thankfully me saying all that gives nothing at all away in terms of the plot.:D

I think the film did have an overriding sense of familiarity for me that took a little from my enjoyment of it, but that is down to me being a bit of a Kurosawa fanatic and the feeling that Miike took influence from a few more western sources, but the film is still well worth a watch from casual viewers, especially for the final 45 minute battle, and it is probably a must on the shelf of anyone who loves samurai films in general.

Judgement Day

The 3.10 to Claremorris (2010) Laighne Films. Having finally got hold of a copy of this elusive movie by tracking down the director, Tom Walsh, I sat down to watch it last night. Before inserting it into the DVD player I had a to do a double take - two and half hours long for a low budget Irish production surely a typo on the sleeve! However, I turned off the lights and sat back in 'the comfy chair' expecting to doze off in the middle of it, as I do with most movies when I put the lights off. However, I have to say not once did my eyes close and at 1.30am the credits came up and I had really enjoyed the movie.

It's a Western parody, the title being a take on the famous 3.10 to Yuma (1957) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050086/ which starred Glenn Ford and Van Heflin. For a low budget production the standard of camera work is superb and the cast of amateur actors positively grew into their roles as the movie went on. The film's director, Tom Walsh, is quoted here from The Sligo Champion - Rather than being a lowbudget movie, '3.10 to Claremorris' is, Tom insists, a "no-budget' project.

"We're using a camera that cost about €3,500, funded mostly from proceeds from our last film, and nobody is being paid. By and large, it's a completely voluntary effort. Everybody involved has their own day job in the real world, so it's a case of fitting in filming whenever and wherever we can and whenever the weather allows" .

All the ingredients of a true Western are there, bar room brawls, bank robberies, shoot-outs and ambushes, mixed with crooked politicians, greedy farmers, romance and a twist in the tail. As a connoisseur of quirky Irish movies I can recommend this as a must have! You've all probably seen the trailer before but here it is again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXMUv_cKtLM

mikemac

House of Sand and Fog

Didn't sound like a very interesting plot,
But I loved it, had me interested throughout

Superb acting and some great shots of the bay

The Social Network - Surprisingly I really enjoyed this film, wasn't expecting much from a film about facebook but this was pretty good.

johnny_ultimate

New York, I Love You - hit and miss (like all anthology films, really) spiritual sequel to Paris, Je T'aime. A-list cast but slightly less a-list directors. Some are bad (the most abstract one featuring Shia LeBeouf, John and Hurt and Julie Christie is ****ing awful), some are decent (Brett Ratner's entry is - gasp - moderately enjoyable in contrast to the rest of the mediocre Ratner filmography). Passes the time, but barely a memorable short amongst 'em. Good performances for the most part, though.

Also contains Natalie Portman's directorial debut. It's a so-so tale of a dancer and his daughter, but her starring role in another short as a Hasadic Jew is more enjoyable.

WHIP IT!

Watched Made In Britain this week on the recommendation of a pal... Was very disappointed in it. The chap's a scrote - big deal, who cares? Nothing ending too. Had heard so many good things about the film but was very underwhelmed.

barone

excellent cast..very good 90 odd minutes

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1797469/

Tony EH

*Spoilers*


'Come and See'

Made 40 years after the end of "The Great Patriotic War", Kilmov's 'Come and See' is often hailed as a "masterpiece" of "realism" and "fact", regarding German actions in Russia during the war. Unfortunately, real factual atrocity notwithstanding, I found very little in 'Come and See' to be factual at all, because the director chose to shoot the film in a shroud of arty murkiness, rather than as a clear historical document of atrocity and for the vast majority of the film, there is very little going on.

Essentially, viewed through the eyes of the young protagonist, Florya, the viewer is presented a singular Russian view of WWII. It's simplistic, with little grey area and it absolutely subtracts any homegrown Russian atrocity in favor of the bog standard foreign invader type. There are no complexities available in 'Come and See', there are no questions on the nature of war, or atrocity and there are no honest appraisals of the conduct of the people involved in the conflict. It's simply a short film about an atrocity, wrapped up in a much longer film about nothing.

In the first three quarters of the film, Florya and his young naive female friend, Glasha, go on an insipid odyssey, leading him to seek out a partisan band and "join up". The kids dance in the rain, babble on inanely about nothing, go deaf from explosions and look up at a FW189 recon plane that drones around the sky above their heads. Eventually, after a terribly tedious amount of time detailing very little, we get to the point of the film, the German's burning down a village barn and killing the inhabitants.

These scenes at the end of the film are quite hard to watch and are handled well, for what they are. But, it takes so long for the film to get to the point that the danger is that the viewer might not care any more. I really cannot emphasize enough how little actually happens for the bulk of the running time. It's a film that demands that the viewer be extremely patient with it.

But, there are also issues to be dealt with regarding 'Come and See's central scene. The "nazi's" are presented as some sort of wasteland warrior types, straight out of a 'Mad Max' film, or something. They absolutely do not represent any historical counterpart, though the film attempts to suggest that they are the 15th Einsatzkommando. They are the "Russian" view of the "Germans" and in that bracket alone, the viewer must be careful of what he's being told. The "Germans" are cardboard villains, not people. They are sadistic, vile, rapacious, murderous and cowardly. The lead up to burning the barn is also filled with ridiculous shots of surreal nonsense, with people doing extraordinary things for no reason. The "Germans" herd the Russian villagers to their doom, while playing music over a loudspeaker and saying things like "Germany is a civilised country". They laugh and goof around, drink alcohol, make stupid faces at the camera and get ready to enjoy some good old slaughter.

On the other hand the Communist partisans are playful, comradely and righteous in the way only movies can portray. They are completely contrasted to the "German" savages, with neither portrayal of the opposing sides containing any real truth or fact and the view of the Germans is bordering on racism.

It's clear what this Soviet commissioned film is trying to do.

As a surrealist horror fantasy, 'Come and See' has some merit, if only for the 20 minute barn burning sequence. The rest of the film though, is a real chore and very tough going. It's filled with absurd imagery too, like the female nazi eating shellfish while she enjoys the view of the burning barn. She looks like she's come straight from a nazi fetish website. One also never gets the sense that the director is inviting the viewer to do anything but get bludgeoned over the head by his visuals and overwrought tone.

In the end, I'm left with mixed feelings about 'Come and See'. The mechanics of the film are dreadful at times and it certainly is in need of a much better script. The acting is decent throughout and the last quarter of the film, though heavyhanded, is rewarding...if one can call such visuals "rewarding". However, while it's important to remember man's inhumanity to man, when it's constantly portrayed as coming from certain quarters only, one can get a little jaded. Films with purpose, like 'Come and See', can also leave a bad taste in the mouth. While its comments on Hitler and Nazism, as a vile entity, are entirely correct, it quite conveniently leaves out an comments on Communisms own atrocious excesses.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-Ro0SZf438

MiloYossarian

The Chaser

A former Korean cop turned pimp is losing girls. He thinks they are being sold so begins investigating because it is a massive outlay to put a hoe on the street and he is in serious death. In fact, the ladies are being murdered.

I heard about this a couple of years ago and really wanted to see it. However I forgot the name of it until I saw a post the other night by Johnny Ultimate.

I watched the film in two halves. One half one night and the second the next, which was a mistake because while the first half is slow and has plotting which I am not used to, the second half is much faster. It's better too. This is where the real character changes occur.

Something happens in the latter half of the film that just broke my heart. I really believe that the best thrillers by far come out of Korea. Really good, adult films that Hollywood seem to have forgotten how to make.

As with usual Korean thrillers, this one also has a lot to say about society. It is not preachy, or wedged in. It is very well handled and actually aids the plot.

It is a very good film. The little girl in it is fantastic as well.

7/10

Nolanger

Mr Deeds goes to Town - classic Capra and still holds up. A poet inherits $20 million and gives it away to the unemployed.

mike65

Sexy Beast (2000) not often I think 'this films too short' but this one almost is, I wanted more of everything even though it would'nt be good for the film

mcwhirter

Submarine - great

the_monkey

MagicMarker wrote: »

Is that why it's called Escape from Alcatraz?

yeah hilarious

Im Only 71Kg

Rise of the planet of the apes....possibly the worst film i've ever seen.