What have you watched recently?

JohnK

krudler wrote: »

...but the fights are surprisingly brutal for movie aimed at kids...

I was actually thinking that myself when I saw it, maybe it was done to keep the adults interested

johnny_ultimate

The Long Arm of the Law - so I went to the IFI to see My Night With Maud, which was oddly sold out before I got there. So rather than waste the trip, I went to see this on impulse instead, a 1983 Hong Kong action film I'd never heard of. Surprisingly effective. Now, some of the stuff is pretty naff - the fashion etc... The subtitles are absolutely godawful - full of grammar and spelling mistakes, and sometimes completely failing to translate the film at all (such as at the very beginning during the main character's onscreen-text introduction). And the print had been around many blocks and many continents for sure, full of scratches and a poor transfer. However, this was all part of the appeal, one of those films Tarantio would surely excessively obsess over. The general gangland story is fun, if unoriginal, but punctuated by scenes of genuine grittiness and violence. The attempts at characterisation are often cheesy (not helped by the music - beautifully silly when it wants to be, overwrought sometimes too), but it all ends in a visceral, distressingly violent shootout which surely must rank amongst cinema's best. It's light entertainment, but one whose atmosphere often gets under your skin despite some contrivances

(the gang get away from the police a bit too easily when they need to!)

. The excellent action sequences made me glad I spent the money, although still slightly disappointed I didn't get the chance to see my first Eric Rohmer film

fluke

A V A wrote: »

whats soloman kane like ?? i want to watch it , i would of loved hugh jackmen to play the part , the trailer reminds me of van helsing

Yeah even the posters have a Van Helsing vibe to them, which was off-putting. It was a solid sword and sorcery flick. The CGI budget wasn't huge but thankfully the director made the best use of settings, atmospherics and James Purefoy, who was great in the lead part.

Decuc500

I saw Long Arm of the Law in the IFI as well. I really enjoyed it. The shootout at the end in that walled ghetto was spectacular. It was a brilliantly choreographed, sustained gun battle that almost rivalled the bank heist scene in Heat!

After watching John Woo and Johnnie To action movies it was nice to see the first 'Heroic Bloodshed' movie on the big screen.

mike65

Belleville Rendez-vous (The Triplets of Belleville) 2003.

Highly stylised animated adventure notionally about the kidnaping of, hunt for and rescue of kidnapped Tour De France cyclists. The ploting details hardly stand up to scrutiny but that not why its worth watching. The visuals are at times almost breathtaking with wonderfully exggerated visas and details of both the beatiful and the grotesque. Writer/director Sylvain Chomet finally released his follow up this summer.

Voodu Child

The Secret Reunion (2010)

Decent and refreshingly different thriller/buddy/spy movie.

MagicMarker

Kung Fu Panda - pretty damn good.

A V A

fluke wrote: »

Yeah even the posters have a Van Helsing vibe to them, which was off-putting. It was a solid sword and sorcery flick. The CGI budget wasn't huge but thankfully the director made the best use of settings, atmospherics and James Purefoy, who was great in the lead part.

a beast sounds good . . .but im still trying to find a film like van helsing to watch . . .i just loved that film

Mimikyu

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jayteecork

Black Death.

Actually pretty good.

A bit like the Wicker Man but more ambiguous.

Some great performances as well.

A V A

watched cherrybomb



horribly bad !!!!!!!!

losthorizon

Tony EH wrote: »

Cape Fear (1991) is a remake of Cape Fear (1962).

Night of the Hunter (1955) is a completely different film altogether. The only film Charles Laughton directed. Thank Christ, cos personally I thought it was awful.

For me "Night of The Hunter" is one of the greatest films of all time. Its stunning. Robert Mitchums best acting performance by far.

PhiloCypher

Caught the end of The Constant Gardner on TG4 such a good film .

Ridley

12 Rounds - Die Hard with a Vengeance ripoff from the director of... Die Hard 2. Not that I mind ripoffs of the concept, it's a good concept. So's that whole twelve labours thing. Don't mind John Cena either, and it's better than The Marine but it's so meh. I agree with the "There’s a decent little action movie somewhere inside ‘12 Rounds’" review (without the Cena bashing).

Star Trek (2009) - Quite watchable for my anti-Trek tastes. There's a couple of the movies I liked but the franchise usually isn't my kind of sci-fi except when dealing with time travel but I wanted to give the reboot a shot. Oh and it has time travel. Kirk's a jerk though I know enough about the show to appreciate establishing the

alternate timeline

. Quite smart really. Avoids annoying a load of fans. Some anyway.

DuckTales (#woo-ooh): The Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp - part of a series of films I've been watching for something Indiana Jonesish. Still like it though the lack of GizmoDuck is the same complaint I had when I first watched.

Tarzan II - If you love Phil Collins songs, then this is the movie for you! I wanted something for background noise while reading which was recognisable (Disney not Collins) but which wouldn't get me distracted watching. Usual offal cheap sequel. It was about accepting people for who they are. Using gorillas.

The Treasure Hunter - It was alright film I guess. Reminiscent of The Mummy. The action sequences were good but the rest was fairly underwhelming. The Good, The Bad, The Weird is far superior.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_At5enQ6q8

King Solomon's Mines (1937) - Quite good film interrupted by a load of Paul Robeson songs even though he sings them all the same way. Allan Quatermain the hypocritical British hunter who has a thing against mining is 'tricked' from his job running hunting tours (cause he doesn't like hunting) to eventually help find Kathy O'Brien's missing father who went searching for King Solomon's Mines.

Apart from the addition of adding a female companion I read that it's fairly faithful to the book but I wouldn't know. When O'Brien mentions that she BS'd Quatermain into helping her:

"Yes I know. I've met the Irish before." Which should be adapted to fit any conversation, clearly. Later in the film, while Quatermain is BSing South African tribes, Kathy says he couldn't have done better if he were Irish himself.

King Solomon's Mines (1985) - Mostly horrible Indiana Jones ripoff (or parody) in which an American Quatermain helps Sharon Stone find her father who was searching for King Solomon's Mines. They do fairly early on and then head out on the search for Solomon's Mines just because the plot requires them to.

Summary done better than me by someone here: http://www.agonybooth.com/movies/King_Solomon_s_Mines_1985.aspx

Although it does a few things which would get used in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade...

King Solomon's Mines (2004) - It was a miniseries but I'm couting it here. Patrick Swayze as Quartermain helps Alison Doody from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade look for her missing father. She's playing English, probably because Quatermain's met the Irish before and she wants to see if she can get away with it.

Best version I've seen personally. Since I've got no idea what the novel should be like and this actually builds on the existence of Indiana Jones influence to do something different. Like the music aswell.

Bunny and the Bull - Comedy film from the director of The Mighty Boosh with Fielding and Barrett appearing roles that are largely inseperable to The Mighty Boosh. I like it, especially the art style but I think that's why it gets the praise on the cover rather than being particularly hilarious.

Clash of the Titans (2010) - A film I enjoyed but features a load of characters who say one thing then do another and has the so-called hero killing rape victims and sellout to the rapists while Lord Voldemort of all people is expected to be the villain for getting a bum rap.

It has made me want to see if the game version uses the same story or whether the original script managed to filter through.

Bodhisopha

Zombieland - Pretty good

A Prophet - Really good

There Will Be Blood - Excellent

Lorna's Silence - Very good

Tristram

Captain Morgan wrote: »

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:eek:

Captain Morgan wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

Check out the book if you get a chance. Film did a fairly good job on it's behalf.

PhiloCypher

Tristram wrote: »

:eek:



Check out the book if you get a chance. Film did a fairly good job on it's behalf.

I may well do that , if its anything like as good as the film then it should be a great read.

On Topic another good film I watched recently was The New World by Terrence Malick, now I havent always been a big fan of his, his work can be abit tone poemish for me I personally found The thin red line to be abit pretentious especially whenever we would cut away from the action(which was great) to Jim Caviezel narrating/onscreen all the while Malick would concentrate on a sun dappled blade of grass for half an hour as Jim mused over the nature of war .

Basically for me The new world > Thin red line

music_star

banshee_bones wrote: »

Bolt: Brilliant film! so funny and so cute.

Burn after reading: not as great as all the hype made it out to be.

Taken: new found respect for Liam Neeson!

brilliant film! so funny and so cute ,i think it's really true!

Mimikyu

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ShaneU

Knight and Day - didn't know if it was a romcom or an action move, very awkward.

krudler

Oldboy, havent seen it in ages, still great.

A V A

watched ondine great film 5 stars

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80HzX8UGEKM

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

very good film

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jl9Nvg4yuus

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGyLFdzhw-c

very good film

cop out -good, not that great !!

the terminal- great film

ShiverinEskimo

Watched a Couple of movies over the weekend:

Adventureland - (Romantic) Comedy by the same crowd as Superbad - which threw me. It was good, and very funny in places but at the same time was too much Romantic (Dark) Comedy for my liking and not enough Superbad-esque.

The Book of Eli - I have a hard-on for all things post-apocalyptic so I really enjoyed the setting of this. It's kind of cool at times but in the end it was a bit flaky with its message and put far too much emphasis on

religion

. On a plus note Mila Kunis is a fúckin roide throughout.

krudler

Adventureland is good but its more of a coming of age drama/comedy than some madcap Superbad type thing which is what it was being sold as. I enjoyed it, but it was a different movie than I expected it to be.

mikhail

ShiverinEskimo wrote: »

Adventureland - (Romantic) Comedy by the same crowd as Superbad - which threw me. It was good, and very funny in places but at the same time was too much Romantic (Dark) Comedy for my liking and not enough Superbad-esque.

I really hate that fully half of the reactions to it are in this mould, and it's all the fault of the marketing. It's as if half the people who watched The Dark Knight had emerged from the cinema complaining that it didn't have enough singing.

ShiverinEskimo

mikhail wrote:

I really hate that fully half of the reactions to it are in this mould, and it's all the fault of the marketing. It's as if half the people who watched The Dark Knight had emerged from the cinema complaining that it didn't have enough singing.

Well had the Dark Knight been tagged with "from the makers of The Sound of Music" I'd forgive them too. If anything me posting about the difference serves as a warning to others to expect the type of film it is.

johnny_ultimate

Bright Star - solid Jane Campion period piece about the poet Keats and his relationship with a lady named Fanny. Typically impressive Campion themes of repressed sexuality and the strange conflict between romance and social norms in ye olden times (money > love when it comes to marriage). I'm not a big fan of biopics that just focus one one relationship, though this one pulls it off relatively well thanks to the above. Parts dragged, but overall worth a watch. It ain't quite the wonderful sucker punch The Piano is though.

Michael 09

Taken is a great movie! Banshee Bones I can't believe you didn't have respect for Liam Neeson even prior to seeing this movie!

BopNiblets

The Hidden Blade, Samurai period film, not just fighting, more of a drama.

Tony EH

losthorizon wrote: »

For me "Night of The Hunter" is one of the greatest films of all time. Its stunning. Robert Mitchums best acting performance by far.

Yeh, a lot of people seem to like it. But I thought it was terrible. As for the acting, it's marred by some of the worst over-acting I've seen in a film. Especially by Mitchum and Lillian Gish. Her monologue at the end is truly awful. Also, the sets just don't work on many occasions. I understand that Laughton was tryng to go for a faux German expressionist feel, but it just comes off as hokey, even with the cinematic trappings of the period.

One of the most over-rated films ever put on screen in my honest opinion.