What have you watched recently: Electric Boogaloo

Standing Bear

delbertgrady wrote: »

An American Werewolf in London (1981)
"I will not be threatened by a walking meatloaf."
JFK (1991)
"Back, and to the left... back, and to the left... back, and to the left."
The Last of the Mohicans (1992)
"I ain't your scout. And we sure ain't in no damn militia."

An American Werewolf.....Jenny Agutter - need we say more?

The Outsider 2018 Netflix film where Jared Leto plays a Gaijin, that is a white guy in Japan who saves the life of a Yakuza while in prison and then gets 'inducted' into the family. While the family is at war with another Yakuza family from Kobe Leto gets embroiled in the ensuing battle of power and betrayal. Pretty good, if lagging a bit in the middle, but I'm sure Japanese cinema lovers will like it. Leto is a good actor, somehow managing to look like he's in his early 30's while being in his mid 40's.

Bowlardo

The thing John Carpenter’s classic. Some
Film in fairness. Great ending. Special effects for their their time. Music unreal
Big trouble in little China absolute cheese but funny as **** with some great one liners from old jack burton. Kim (sex in the city Samantha) is hot it and gives early signs of her comic timing.

Tony EH

'Red Eye'

Paired down and a model of efficiency, Wes Craven's 'Red Eye' is an absolutely absurd story that's carried off fairly well, mostly due to the two leads. Cillian Murphy creeps his way through the nifty running time and Rachel McAdams suits as his put upon victim, who must carry out Murphy's demands, or else her father (Brian Cox) will suffer a horrible fate.

80% of 'Red Eye' takes place on a Boeing 767 night flight and when it's bound to such, it works quite well and is worth its score below. It's only when we leave the flight that it gets really silly, which is also why it's worth its score below.

But, 'Red Eye' zips along at a pleasing pace, that doesn't allow the audience to dwell on its absurdities, and everything is wrapped up cleanly at the end. A ok little film that doesn't demand too much of you.

7/10


'I, Tonya'

Centred on a blistering performance from Margot Robbie, that was a serious contender for a Best Actress Academy Award, 'I, Tonya' features a dramatised account of Tonya Harding's skating career, culminating in the events that led up to the famous "incident" at the 1994 US Figure Skating Championships, the attack on Nancy Kerrigan, Harding's main "rival" for team selection in the Winter Olymipics.

'I, Tonya' is shot in part as a mockumentary and also as a 'Goodfellas' style "period piece" - complete with contemporary music selections - spanning a number of years from Harding's childhood to her 20's. Its 2 hours speed along and even if you couldn't care less about figure skating (like me) you'll get something from it, as a story.

There's excellent support from everyone around Robbie, but Allison Janney stands out as Harding's mother, who is never more than an absolute bitch. However, she remains fascinating to watch and was well worth her Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.

I have no idea how much licence was taken with the actual events of Harding's life, herself, or the people that populated it. But, waving all that away, 'I, Tonya' is still an utterly absorbing watch.

9/10


'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre'

Tobe Hooper's magnum opus and the film he dined out on for his entire career is one of the 70's most beloved genre films and rightly so. Shot on a tuppence hay'penny budget with complete unknowns, it documents the events that befall a group of five unfortunate 20 somethings who make a journey to the titular State, where Sally and her disabled brother Franklin wish to visit the old family house.

Along the way the come into contact with the Sawyer family who inhabit a house of horrors all of their own and get subjected to a nightmare they didn't expect.

A must for any genre fan, 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre' is one of those films that nearly everyone on the planet has heard of, despte being nearly 44 years old. It's eyecatching title being largely responsible for that visibility. Once that title is seen, it's difficult to forget and it conjures up all kinds of awful imagery. But, the title and its tagline - "Who will survive and what will be left of them?" - don't betray the fact that 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre' is, almost, entirely bloodless and relies instead on the subtle creepiness of its backwoods setting and soundtrack oddities to form the basis of its uncomfortable viewing.

Of course, there is also the terrifying character of the famous Leatherface, a crossdressing transvestite who's handy with a Poulan 306a. Leatherface, not only dresses in the clothes of a female, but also their skin, acts as the "woman" in the film's disfunctional family unit, which is also filled out with a "father" figure, a "son" and "grandpa" - the greatest killer that ever lived.

The low budget of 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre' both helps and hinders the film, but never scuppers it. For instance, the makeup on Grandpa is laughably bad, but the old film stock it's shot on gives a satisfying exploitation grindhouse look to the movie. Hooper also literally ran out of film and money on the last day of the shoot, but this resulted in a fortunate and sudden climax. As is to be expected, the acting is wobbly here and there, especially from Paul A. Partain as Franklin. But Marilyn Burns gives a pretty convincing performance as Sally, who spends most of the second act screaming in abject terror in the face of the horrible torment she receives.

Tobe Hooper's direction is functional and he manages to get his cast of unknowns to do what they need to do. He stages several standout scenes, including the "meathook scene", that are horror classics and the initial appearance of Leatherface is one of the greatest of any horror film. But Hooper refrains from soaking his movie in fake blood, probably because the budget didn't allow such an extravagance. But like running out of film, this actually aids the film, instead of being a drawback and the audience convinces themselves that they've been subjected to a much more gut spilled event than they actually have.

In spite of the mixed reviews upon release, 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre' met with incredible success. But it also received the ire of numerous organisations too, many of which hadn't even seen the film, yet convinced themselves of the "gory" nature of its content. Amazingly, it also spent a bit of time on the BBFC's banned list, mostly due to James Ferman's squeamishness, but was finally "let off" in 1998. Although, the censor's problem with 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre' was not what to cut, but how to minimise the over all "discomfort" of the viewing experience which, frankly, was an unenviable and impossible task.

The film's success led to inevitable sequels and recently a reboot revival has sparked a mid tier franchise. Unfortunately, every production since has been of much lesser quality than the 1974 movie, despite the bigger budgets and talents available. As such and is usual, it's the original that remains the one to watch.

8/10

johnny_ultimate

A Fantastic Woman -

A late middle-aged man named Orlando visits his girlfriend - singer Marina - on her birthday. That Marina is transgender is unimportant: these two people simply get on like a house on fire, and have a loving evening together. But when Orlando awakes with a painful headache, everything falls apart - and, unfortunately, so does the film.

An assured lead performance Daniela Vega and moments of interesting direction can't save this unfortunately misjudged film from Sebastián Lelio. What should have been another landmark representation of a transgender character is undermined by a script that only occasionally rises above 'transphobia is bad' themes. Which of course it is, but that's the sort of easy progressive messaging that actually feels weirdly regressive - the sort of Crash school of 'big issues' filmmaking. Here, the focus on repeatedly emphasising people's bigoted reactions to lead character Marina means her personality doesn't have the opportunity to shine through, except for in brief moments. This is not to say characters' gender or sexual identity can't be a key theme in a narrative (much great LGBT cinema embraces that wholeheartedly), but this feels like it bludgeons home a message most viewers will likely already sympathise with it.

A few particularly lazy directorial choices don't help. The emphasis on mirrors as a visual motif is as trite as such symoblism can be, and an ill-placed (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman needle-drop is on-the-nose to the point of pure farce. There are fleeting moments of the film this could have been - especially in the opening few minutes, and others scattered throughout (including a solid ending). But we need to move beyond 'message' films of this sort to create a truly progressive, forward-thinking cinema - films like Tangerine show the sort of model that can truly give transgender actors and actresses the material they deserve.

ButtersSuki

Stephen King's IT in Cineworld last night as part of IMAX Day. First off, I haven't seen many movies in the IMAX but it looked and sounded great last night. It also looks like they've reupholstered or replaced all of the seats since I was last there (for Bond Spectre if memory serves me correctly) - it really was a thoroughly comfortable and enjoyable audio visual experience. Nice touch from the staff as well with the red balloons and the clown faces. The audience were largely well-behaved but plenty of phones on display throughout and two idiots beside me talked constantly for the first 5 minutes until I politely but firmly asked them to stop.

For context I read IT and watched the Tim Curry version but both were so long ago now I'd forgotten many salient parts.

The film itself: I didn't get to see it on general release as I was travelling a lot with work. As a King the author fan but not a great fan of the works translating onto film I was a bit nervous about it, but I was very pleasantly suprised with the result. The child actors were almost all very good, the staging and 80s referencing was great, the soundtrack was interesting and the story kept me engaged. The adaptation had a very strong Stand By Me feel to it. Not a horror per se, more of a chiller/thriller. As King adaptations go I found it right up there. I'd give it a 7/10 - looking forward to Part 2.

Liam McPoyle

buried wrote: »

Nice wan, I liked some of the works Haneke has done but never checked that one out, will seek out the two of them things!

If yoiu havnt you should also check out The Pusher Trilogy and Bleeder, all by Nicolas Winding Refn, he of Drive and The Neon Demon fame. 4 superb Danish crime dramas.

jh79

Ninja 3 : The Domination

Recorded off Film 4, a great cheesy film for a Sunday night. A Cannon film that blends 80's ninja films with horror.

A ninja posses a woman to avenge his own death. No point i going in depth on this ; just a bit of daft fun..

Liam McPoyle

Night of the Living Dead (1968)

George A Romero's seminal, genre defining debut has finally gotten a release befitting it's status courtesy of those fine folks at Criterion. A pristine 4k restoration, the movie has never looked or sounded better. Considering the source material is 50 years old the film looks astonishingly good.

Like the two later entries in the series, Night proffers an acute social commentary, tapping into the unknown fear of nuclear war and the potential detriments of the space race, it challenges racial perception by having a black man as the hero in the piece while the main white man is the snivelling coward.

The onscreen violence, while positively tame by modern standards was something rarely seen before then and I'm sure it helped with the films success.

In Night, Romero laid out the blueprint for zombies, slow, shambling, instinctual creatures with a hunger for human flesh, that a bite means you are finished and that a head shot is the only way to take them down.

Every single zombie movie that followed owes a debt of gratitude to Romero and his vision, without Night and without him, we may never have gotten the zombie genre which would be a crying shame.

Any serious cinephile needs to have this release in their collection, it can be gotten on Amazon for less than €20, as a stand alone movie it is excellent, as the door opener for an entire genre it is mind blowing.

10/10

jh79

jh79 wrote: »

Ninja 3 : The Domination

Recorded off Film 4, a great cheesy film for a Sunday night. A Cannon film that blends 80's ninja films with horror.

A ninja posses a woman to avenge his own death. No point i going in depth on this ; just a bit of daft fun..

jesus christ I remember watching all of these in the pre-van damme splits era.

check this out, the voice overy guy alone is pure gold..

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

branie2

Mary Magdalene at the Cinema yesterday, which was very good.

The Quiet Man on DVD this afternoon.

The Eiger Sanction 1975 Possibly my favorite Clint Eastwood film. The kind of thing that doesn't get made today because its simply too dangerous. Roger Ebert said at the time the story and script doesn't matter when you have such visual drama, but for me the script is brilliant with some memorable lines throughout and brilliant characters. Dragan as the pure albino is exceptional "Twice your usual fee? Absurd" "You recognize that this is outrageous?". George Kennedy is his usual energetic and likable self. But of course the brilliance is in the mountain climbing, and how it was shot with palpable danger in a number of scenes, with mountain climbers even dying during the shooting.

Quite the film for Clint to take on back in 1975 as actor director and its easy to forget his impact on film sometimes because he portrayed so many tough guys. But really in many ways Clint is untouchable

http://newimprovedgorman.blogspot.gr/2012/03/interesting-background-on-eiger.html?m=1

Harry Palmr

The Sentinel (1976) Dir Michael Winner.

Winner Winner - like a chicken dinner. What can one say other than this is a film that should be seen just so you can say to yourself "I saw that - what was I thinking!?!"
So much of Winner's oeuvre is pure hackery with all the directorial style of TV of the same era just with a much bigger budget and more nudity, sex and violence. And that's the case here as a young women snags a suspiciously cheap uptown apartment in a town house full of strange neighbours. I'll say no more about the story but will mention the music score by Gil Melle which is a tremendous, full blown bombastic affair worthy of Bernard Hermann or Pino Donaggio. I didn't recognise the name but he also worked on The Andromeda Strain, Blood Beach, Ultimate Warrior and loads of TV work including Killdozer, Questor Tapes, Frankenstein: The True Story, The Six Million Dollar Man pilot and many more all coming after a jazz career on the renowned Blue Note label. Must look for more of his work.

The other thing I'll mention is Winners amazing ability to assemble a cast which is clearly far too good for the material which he has signed them up for. The Sentinel is typical of this - packed with spot the veteran actor and spot the future star names. Even in the smallest roles you'll go "that's X never knew he/she was in this".

Gwynplaine

Just watched 10 Cloverfield Lane. 9/10. Loved it.

Mister Vain

The Foreigner staring Jackie Chan and Gerry ad... ehh Pierce Brosnan. Brilliant film. Better than I expected.

quickbeam

Gwynplaine wrote: »

Just watched 10 Cloverfield Lane. 9/10. Loved it.

I have that recorded as I liked the premise of it. But I've not seen Cloverfield. Do I need to see that first?

Gwynplaine

quickbeam wrote: »

I have that recorded as I liked the premise of it. But I've not seen Cloverfield. Do I need to see that first?

Not really. But you probably should.
I watched the Cloverfield Paradox before watching 10 Cloverfield Lane. All 3 are only barely connected.

Fysh

quickbeam wrote: »

I have that recorded as I liked the premise of it. But I've not seen Cloverfield. Do I need to see that first?

Not at all, the connection is more for marketing than anything else. 10CL was written and sold as a standalone spec script, which later got a couple of bits tweaked to make it fit into the same universe as Cloverfield.

Unless you particularly want to watch a passable found-footage-Godzilla-knock-off movie, I'd skip Cloverfield. 10CL is the only good film out of the three so far, the other two are passable popcorn affairs at best.

El Duda

As Good As It Gets - 7/10

Frequently cited as one of, if not the best Rom-Com of all time. It's very rare that you get an actor as prestigious and decorated as Jack Nicholson to agree to star in a movie like this. Christian Bale quite famously says that he will never do a Rom-Com as they generally aren't regarded as the most respected genre of the art form.

Well this is a clear exception to the rule. This is a well written, well acted, progressive Rom-Com with fully fleshed out characters and some great lines. Nicholson oozes charisma and bags a well deserved third Oscar for his portrayal of a misanthropic OCD sufferer. The chemistry with Helen Hunt is great and I liked the way it starts their journey off on seemingly irredeemable wrong foot.

Although featuring an openly gay character (Greg Kinnear) was clearly a very forward thinking move in 1998, I think he is the weak link of the film, despite the Oscar nomination. The scenes with him seemed to drag a little.

It has some pacing issues and the script lacks focus at times but this is undoubtedly one of the best films of its kind. Certainly from that era.


Spirited Away - 9.5/10

I'd recently watched The Red Turtle as my first ever Studio Ghibli film and was slightly underwhelmed by it after all the hype from critics. Spirited Away seems to be their flagship movie so I was hoping for a lot more with this one.

It is unbelievably good and it far exceeded my expectations. This is the highest rated animation in the imdb top 250 and quite rightly so. It is dark, weird, scary, wonderful, abstract etc... Everything I used to love about kids films when I was younger. I haven't seen anything this dark and off-beat aimed at Children since the brilliantly twisted 'Return to Oz.'

When you consider that the storyline was developed during the film making process, its even more incredible. It gives it a real spontaneous sense of unpredictability throughout and everything feels organic. The pacing is excellent and it doesn't feel its length at all.

One of the most imaginative and spectacular family films of all time.

fin12

Can anyone recommend a good film to go see at the cinema? I saw Damo n Ivor but that wasn’t that funny. Is Mary Magdelane good?

david75

Interstellar

I love this film. After a long time trying to figure out the science involved and the tesseract I realised I was doing my own head in. just stop turn off and enjoy it.

This is a great one.

policy75

I Kill Giants: A really very touching film as a young girl comes to terms with the impending loss of her mother. It tells the story of how she fights against the idea that she could lose her mother until finally she accepts the reality. What makes it so poignant is we all face this at some point in our lives so we can understand exactly what the child faces. Its a very well made film and a definite worthwhile watch

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

policy75 wrote: »

I Kill Giants: A really very touching film as a young girl comes to terms with the impending loss of her mother. It tells the story of how she fights against the idea that she could lose her mother until finally she accepts the reality. What makes it so poignant is we all face this at some point in our lives so we can understand exactly what the child faces. Its a very well made film and a definite worthwhile watch

This is the one that sounds very like A Monster Calls.

Fysh

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

This is the one that sounds very like A Monster Calls.

I'm sort of intrigued, because A Monster Calls did a tremendous job with that story. I Kill Giants was originally a very well received comic miniseries widely praised for its writing, but I have to say that the trailer that has been released for it makes it look like a real two-flusher. How much of that is down to the advertising campaign and how much to the chosen process of adaptation remains to be seen, I guess...

branie2

A Wrinkle in Time at the cinema yesterday. I have to say it was very good.

Harry Palmr

Callan 1974 Dir Don Sharp

Spin off from the popular Thames TV series about a government spook moving in the shadows of the cold war on the home front. In this film he's brought back into the fold mainly in desperation as he ekes out a living post a jail spell. Shot in that familiar "TV with fractionally more money" style that was common in low budget British cinema in the 70s it's an efficient programmer with good turns by Ed Woodward, Eric Porter and Carl Mohner as his target.

ButtersSuki

Holy Motors on Blu Ray. One (as is pretty much the norm for me these days) I bought a long time ago but only got to watch for the first time tonight. It should have worked for me being French and pretentious and arty as f*ck :rolleyes:, but it just didn't. I can admire the creativity and the beauty of it and still be underwhelmed by it. I might do a re-watch relatively soon to see if I change my opinion on it but for a first watch a 6/10. I can pretty much guarantee that most people will hate this though and find it to be a giant stinking turd of shoyte - this is not a Hollywood movie!

Finally got my hands on The Shining: The Extended Cut on Blu Ray in Fopp in the UK last Friday. I've been looking for this at a non-insane price since release (amazon was £45STG last time it was available there, it was #15STG in Fopp by comparison). I hope to be able to find the time to watch it this week.

decky1

Been watching a box set of Hitchcock films , that man was a master.

wheresmahbombs

Watched the Young Offenders on Netflix recently. I quite enjoyed the humour of it. Might give the TV series a shot sometime.

Outlaw Pete

Dark River (it's on in the IFI and the Lighthouse).

Excellent film with some great performances, particularly from Ruth Wilson who plays the lead character.