What have you watched recently: Electric Boogaloo

The Black Oil

Tipsy McSwagger wrote: »

Behind the Candleabra

Brilliant.

I thought it was very good, too. The performances and generally how the film was made, and executed.

briany

Ravenous (1999)

In 1840s America, a disgraced military officer is assigned to a remote outpost in the Sierra Nevada mountains. While there, he and the other men manning the place are surprised when an exhausted stranger shows up one night with a macabre tale to tell.

Excellent horror/suspense film with light dashes of black humour here and there. Thought it would be a bog standard gory horror but it was not. Robert Carlyle is his usual excellent self and Guy Pearce doesn't get in the way too much as the star of the film. Great scenery, good music and a pretty colourful supporting cast. Give it a watch if you're in the mood for a satisfying horror.

Tipsy McSwagger

The Black Oil wrote: »

I thought it was very good, too. The performances and generally how the film was made, and executed.

The scene on the couch where Matt Damon is eating popcorn and Michael Douglas is rubbing his legs is hilarious.

candy-gal1

Get him to the greek - really lolful and tbh both that and "forgetting sarah marshall" is slowly but surely redeeming my funniness in Mr Brand it seems :)

firestarter51

Once were warriors, wow I forgot how good this was, glad I watched it again

Dempsey

Saw a few people talking about Battle Royale on here so I watched it, very good film. Noticed where a few high profile hollywood films got their ideas!

8/10

AllthingsCP

Dempsey wrote: »

Saw a few people talking about Battle Royale on here so I watched it, very good film. Noticed where a few high profile hollywood films got their ideas!

8/10

Battle Royal 1/2 are very good films but personally i taught one was much better

DazMarz

Just watched GoldenEye again last night. You actually forget how much of a brilliant film it is until you sit back and bask in its glory once again.

After a six year absence, James Bond returns with a bang. Our own boy done good Pierce Brosnan makes his début appearance as the super-spy and makes a very good job of it.

The set-pieces are spectacular throughout. The opening mission with 007 and 006/Alec Trevalyan (Sean Bean) being sent to destroy an illicit Soviet chemical weapons plant. From a breathtaking bungee jump from the top of a hydroelectric dam, to the intense shootout in the main production room, to 006's execution and to that final death-defying plunge in the light aircraft, the opening scene sets the stage perfectly.

The film does have weaknesses; Sean Bean's motivation for why he is committing his crimes is quite simply too unbelievable (he would be far too young to remember the incidents that spurred him on) and leaves only simple, common greed as his motivator. I never liked the fact that we never genuinely see Bond behind the wheel of a sexy, wonderful car (tanks do not count). Yes he is provided with a BMW Z3 (hairdressers' car if ever there was one) that has stinger missiles behind the lights, but he never gets to use it at all, really. In fact, for Pierce Brosnan's 4 films, he only gets a truly brilliant, sexy and remarkable car for Die Another Day. The cars in his other films were either hairdressers' or middle aged executives' cars. Only in his final outing does Brosnan's Bond come equipped with a gorgeous Aston Martin.

The few weaknesses aside, this is a very strong Bond film. It was the perfect introduction for Bond into the post-Cold War age and for Generation X. It had plenty of action, a good plot and the acting from both Brosnan and Bean (ever reliable Sean Bean) is excellent. There are brilliant moments between both of them, both trying to outdo the other. Bean gets the best line, however, concerning Bond's funeral: "... with only Moneypenny and a few tearful restaurateurs in attendance". Classic.

The final half hour or so when Bond and the gorgeous Natalya are trying to destroy Trevalyan's Cuban lair is also spectacular. The fight scenes between Bond and Trevalyan are vicious in the extreme, and very well choreographed and edited.

One of Bond's better outings and while the computer-y stuff has dated a bit, this is still one brilliant action film.

krudler

DazMarz wrote: »

Just watched GoldenEye again last night. You actually forget how much of a brilliant film it is until you sit back and bask in its glory once again.

After a six year absence, James Bond returns with a bang. Our own boy done good Pierce Brosnan makes his début appearance as the super-spy and makes a very good job of it.

The set-pieces are spectacular throughout. The opening mission with 007 and 006/Alec Trevalyan (Sean Bean) being sent to destroy an illicit Soviet chemical weapons plant. From a breathtaking bungee jump from the top of a hydroelectric dam, to the intense shootout in the main production room, to 006's execution and to that final death-defying plunge in the light aircraft, the opening scene sets the stage perfectly.

The film does have weaknesses; Sean Bean's motivation for why he is committing his crimes is quite simply too unbelievable (he would be far too young to remember the incidents that spurred him on) and leaves only simple, common greed as his motivator. I never liked the fact that we never genuinely see Bond behind the wheel of a sexy, wonderful car (tanks do not count). Yes he is provided with a BMW Z3 (hairdressers' car if ever there was one) that has stinger missiles behind the lights, but he never gets to use it at all, really. In fact, for Pierce Brosnan's 4 films, he only gets a truly brilliant, sexy and remarkable car for Die Another Day. The cars in his other films were either hairdressers' or middle aged executives' cars. Only in his final outing does Brosnan's Bond come equipped with a gorgeous Aston Martin.

The music being the biggest one, not Tina Turner's theme song I quite like that, Eric Serra's score is ****ing godawful, the worst Bond score ever. I liked his work on The Fifth Element but it was all over the place for Goldeneye, that cringy music that plays during the race between the Aston Martin and the Ferrari, shudder.

DazMarz

krudler wrote: »

The music being the biggest one, not Tina Turner's theme song I quite like that, Eric Serra's score is ****ing godawful, the worst Bond score ever. I liked his work on The Fifth Element but it was all over the place for Goldeneye, that cringy music that plays during the race between the Aston Martin and the Ferrari, shudder.

That too... How I forgot that.

Also to add to the plaudits: the film spawned what is arguably the greatest video game ever. "GoldenEye 007" for the N64, released in 1997. I actually bought an N64 just for this game. And would do so again. It was just so good. One of the defining first-person-shooters. The gameplay and the replay value in it was immense. Obviously, it is now 16 years old and the graphics don't hold a candle to games out there today, but the game itself is so much better than a lot of these slick looking, but equally soulless, games out there today.

What a game.

(now frantically trawling eBay to find an N64 that works and a copy of GoldenEye 007 )

johnny_ultimate

DazMarz wrote: »

Also to add to the plaudits: the film spawned what is arguably the greatest video game ever.

Woah woah woah! No doubting the game's influence at the time, but it has aged pretty badly and not just in graphical terms. Let's not get hyperbolic: it was instrumental in bringing the FPS to consoles, but playing it today is not the most flattering experience, especially compared to its genre mates on PC at the time.

krudler

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Woah woah woah! No doubting the game's influence at the time, but it has aged pretty badly and not just in graphical terms. Let's not get hyperbolic: it was instrumental in bringing the FPS to consoles, but playing it today is not the most flattering experience, especially compared to its genre mates on PC at the time.

Yeah, its not even close, one of those games best left to rose tinted glasses. Seminal? sure, aged well? nooopppe.

DazMarz

Sorry, I still love it and yeah, the graphics have aged pretty badly, but it was still something else back in the day. And I still love it.

Maybe it is rose-tinted glasses. Haven't played it in years, so maybe that would change my perceptions.

Still, was one of the best I've ever played for my money in all my years of playing video games.

DazMarz

Also, this is THAT fight scene I talked about. Absolutely brilliant scene. I can't believe it is actually so short.

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

AllthingsCP

DazMarz wrote: »

Sorry, I still love it and yeah, the graphics have aged pretty badly, but it was still something else back in the day. And I still love it.

Maybe it is rose-tinted glasses. Haven't played it in years, so maybe that would change my perceptions.

Still, was one of the best I've ever played for my money in all my years of playing video games.

Aww remember you could place the characters in the game to have really large heads, And the 1-4 death-match with your mates was fantastic hours i spend in that snow mission where you could go into those tunnels and out into the snow and the out buildings aww good owl N64

Tipsy McSwagger

It's not even the best game on the N64.

e_e

Timesplitters took what Goldeneye did well and perfected it.

NinjaK

42, great film, really enjoyed it.

AllthingsCP

Tipsy McSwagger wrote: »

It's not even the best game on the N64.

Your right i remember playing Zelda for hours bloody loved that game you know i can not remember completing it compared to games nowadays where i could complete in just one night. Another childhood game i loved was Star War Phantom Menace ps1, But back on topic just watched Star War Empire Strikes Back.

AllthingsCP

Also i watched Mini Series Spartacus from BBC with Ross Kemp from my guess one of the least knowing Spartacus movies and my favorite one.

mikemac1

Sugar (2008)

About young baseball players in the Dominican Republic who get selected to play minor league baseball in the USA.
Young men under ridiculous pressure. The odds of getting success are tiny and if you fail then you either stay on as an illegal immigrant or you return home to poverty.
Covers a lot like how the main actor adapted to the new country, friendship, lack of English and other stuff.

A lot is in Spanish with subtitles. I thought it was excellent.

johnny_ultimate

Never judge a book by its cover they say, but when you make a costume drama called A Royal Affair I'm afraid to say some uncontrollably cynical part of my brain kicks into place. Having avoided it on that irrational basis alone for a year or so, good reviews here and elsewhere persuaded me to check it out. I quite liked it, although don't think it was particularly remarkable either. The performances were strong, especially from Mads Mikkelsen and Mikkel Boe Følsgaard. I also admired how the 'affair' of the title is a more complex one. Sure, there's some straight-up lust, but the relationships in the film - between man and woman, people and country - are mostly driven by ideologies, intellectualism and so on. This also leads to major conflict, ensuring there's strong dramatic momentum throughout, and the slow and considered pace is engaging. At the same time, there's nothing particularly special about the way it's all put together, and while the motivations of characters are certainly different and the history intriguing, there's undoubtedly something a bit familiarly melodramatic about it all. Still, very watchable, and a cut above your bog-standard historical epic.

ButtersSuki

Worked my way through 3 movies this weekend.

First up was Seven Psychopaths. Quite a let down if I'm honest, apart from Woody Harrelson and Christopher Walken, both of whom I almost always like. It has a stellar ensemble cast (also including Sam Rockwell, Zeljko Ivanek, Michael Pitt, Michael Stuhlbarg, Olga Kuryenko, Tom Waits(!) and Gabourey Sidibe (or however you spell it) amongst others) but the script just doesn't deliver for me - this is no "In Bruges". It does have some great dialogue in places and some very clever and funny lines and scenes, but overall if this wasn't an "Irish" movie I doubt it would have been as well-received here as it was. I wanted to like it and I expected I would but it just fell flat. This is one Blu Ray I will not be keeping. 5/10.

Next up was Speed Racer. Visually stunning (some of the visuals and colourscapes are amongst the best I've ever seen), it will demand the most from your HD TV but again, it's a pretty lame script. One eye-opener for me was I never really realised how small Emile Hirsch was until I saw this. In the scenes where he's sharing the screen with John Goodman he looks like a hobbit! Tiny! For visual effects I'd give this a 9/10, story 5/10 and overall a 5.5/10.

Last night finally got around to watchign Killer Joe. Matthew McConaghey is pretty cool and deeply dark in this, and ably supported by Hirsch again. Part of the appeal in watching this for me was I'd heard and read such positive reviews of McConaghey's performance in this and he delivers. Gina Gershon though steals a lot of the show for me though with her portrayal of Hirsch's adulterous step-mom. It's a trailer-trash film noir if there ever was one and yet quite similar stylistically to "The Killer Inside Me". If you enjoyed that, I think you'l like this. For me the highlight of my weekend's viewing. My only complaint was that it ended very abruptly (I won't spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen it). This is not for everyone though and it may not be the wisest first date choice ever!
7.5/10

CL7

Bolt (2008)

Not Pixar standard but a very good movie nonetheless. Bolt is a movie about courage, friendship and learning to be yourself. Great message for kids and adults too.

candy-gal1

The Lawnmower Man - freaky type of a movie, and very before its time when it comes to gaming aspects etc imho

Tony EH

ButtersSuki wrote: »

Last night finally got around to watchign Killer Joe. Matthew McConaghey is pretty cool and deeply dark in this, and ably supported by Hirsch again. Part of the appeal in watching this for me was I'd heard and read such positive reviews of McConaghey's performance in this and he delivers. Gina Gershon though steals a lot of the show for me though with her portrayal of Hirsch's adulterous step-mom. It's a trailer-trash film noir if there ever was one and yet quite similar stylistically to "The Killer Inside Me". If you enjoyed that, I think you'l like this. For me the highlight of my weekend's viewing. My only complaint was that it ended very abruptly (I won't spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen it). This is not for everyone though and it may not be the wisest first date choice ever!
7.5/10

I have this knocking around, but I haven't got the urge to watch it yet.

Mathew McConaghey.......ugh...can't stand him.

Barna77

The Cabin in the Woods

The Paperboy

nicklauski

Tucker and Dale vs Evil.

I loved this. I don't know why I waited so long to watch it.
Had some genuine laugh out loud moments for me.

Can't even go too much into "plot" as it gives most of the story away.

Definitely one for fans of Shaun Of The Dead and the like.

7/10

barone

as rhino would say .. bolt is awwwwwwwwsome

Bipolar Joe

nicklauski wrote: »

Tucker and Dale vs Evil.

I loved this. I don't know why I waited so long to watch it.
Had some genuine laugh out loud moments for me.

Can't even go too much into "plot" as it gives most of the story away.

Definitely one for fans of Shaun Of The Dead and the like.

7/10

I prefer this send up more than Cabin in the Woods. It had me in tears laughing at some points.