What have you watched recently? 3D!

loyatemu · 26-07-2022 5:34pm

a couple I caught on TV recently

Escape from Alcatraz - Clint Eastwood vehicle based on a true story; good old fashioned drama with a fine array of grizzled character actors including Patrick McGoohan as a sadistic prison warden (is there any other kind?)

Love and Mercy - biopic of Brian Wilson covering his mental breakdown in the 60s and in parallel his escape from domineering psychologist Eugene Landy in the 80s. I love the Beach Boys and know Wilson's story pretty well, but I wasn't 100% gone on this movie. Paul Dano did a great job as 60s Brian, and the scenes showing him working his magic in the studio were great but the interactions between Brian and his bullying father and all round jerkass bandmate Mike Love seemed very clichéd; while I wasn't at all convinced by John Cusack as 80s Brian and the film overall tried too hard to be arty.

(side note - what the hell has happened to John Cusack; looking at IMDB this (from 2014) was the last noteworthy movie he appeared in and everything since has been pure b-movie junk).

sydthebeat · 26-07-2022 5:53pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119390431#Comment_119390431

(side note - what the hell has happened to John Cusack; looking at IMDB this (from 2014) was the last noteworthy movie he appeared in and everything since has been pure b-movie junk).

https://www.looper.com/52774/hollywood-wont-cast-john-cusack-anymore/#:~:text=John%20Cusack%20has%20been%20writing%20films&text=More%20recently%2C%20he%20co%2Dwrote,bring%20compelling%20characters%20to%20life.

28-07-2022 12:56pm

Black Bird 2022 - no not the tour de force of Michael Flatley, but a US tv series prison/serial killer drama about a young hoodlum who to get a reduced sentence agrees to move to a maximum security prison to do undercover work for the FBI. Its pretty good so far after 3 episodes.

Its also Ray Liota’s last work before he died and he is clearly not well, but it works in favour of the part he plays as a supporting role as a sick father to his hoodlum son.

He has a lot of presence on screen, carries a real weight. Worth watching this to see his last work.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO · 30-07-2022 1:12am

Watched Not Okay tonight. Its billed as a "darkly comic satire" about a women who fakes a trip to Paris on her social media to impress a guy, but when a terrorist attack happens in Paris and everyone thinks she's there she ends up carrying on the lie and pretended to be a survivor of the attack for online clout.

Honestly one of the worst things I've ever seen. Between this and Don't Look Up I'm convinced Americans don't know what satire is. There's a scene early on where they make a joke about Lena Dunham making being tone deaf a brand, and then proceed to make the most tone deaf, all over the place mess of a film that had me cringing throughout and really struggling to finish it. God awful trash, I hated every second of it.

pixelburp · 30-07-2022 7:45am

Mindhorn (2017)

Darkplace meets Bergerac; though not remotely a patch on the former, that high watermark for roasting 80s genre TV. In fact, what started as a neat idea - a washed up actor has to reprise his most (and only) famous role for a police case - quickly ran out of steam even before the middle act; to the extent the rest became a bit of a chore. There were some solid laughs, mostly cut from the approach of mocking the titular, fictional show and its paunchy lead now reduced to promoting orthopaedic socks. But not near enough to sustain a flaccid script; while the look of the thing never strayed past televisual, really crying out for someone with the energy of early Edgar Wright.

Does make me wonder will Matthew Holness ever feel the itch to return to his Garth Marenghi character.

04-08-2022 3:23pm

The Forgiven (2021)

A group of mostly unlikable westerners gather in a lavish rural Moroccan setting for a weekend of celebration and excess. On the way for one couple an incident where a local boy is killed occurs. The father of the dead boy eventually arrives and one of the party must accompany him to bury his son in their home location. The piece then continues with the decadence of the party contrasting with the journey and burying of the local. With obvious tones of contempt on both sides from the Moroccans to the Westerners, the film does avoid degenerating into a hackneyed message-fest, primarily because it's not a facile one-sided expression but obviously the "infidels" come off worst in the portrayal. What initially may seem like a grouping of prvileged caricatures does develop into something more nuanced in some cases. Yet all the same it's not completely successful in achieving an overall satisfying coherence. Nevertheless it's an interesting enough exploration. Ralph Fiennes and Jessica Chastain lead and bizarrely David McSavage is in the supporting cast. John Michael McDonagh is director and writer.

6.0 / 10

TICKLE_ME_ELMO · 05-08-2022 11:01pm

Watched Prey, the new Predator film, on Disney+. I have only a vague memory of seeing the first Predator at some point when I was probably too young to be watching it, so I am by no means an authority on this franchise. I enjoyed this though. It looks great, there's some good fight scenes when it gets going, the score is good too. As I said, no idea how it stacks up next to any of the other films, although my understanding is that they've been awful for a while, so this probably doesn't have a very high bar to clear.

05-08-2022 11:32pm

I watched about 30 mins of Prey, I'd read really good reviews of it over the last couple of days. Maybe it's just me, but them all speaking American English really took me out of it. Might come back to it in a better mood:-)

Fysh · 06-08-2022 2:13am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119435514#Comment_119435514

There's supposed to be a Comanche dub, not sure if it's on the initial release though.

Dufflecoat Fanny · 06-08-2022 2:20am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/108911901#Comment_108911901

too many notes 😁

flasher0030 · 06-08-2022 10:24am

Thirteen Lives

Watched this last night. The story of a group of boys who got trapped in a cave in Thailand.

I thought it was amazing. Based on a true story. I presumed a lot of it was Hollywooded, but I was reading on the net about it there, and apparently not. It's an amazing story. It is very intense though. And very claustrophobic if you don't like watching people trying to escape from small spaces under water.

06-08-2022 11:40pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119436285#Comment_119436285

How did you possibly miss the story when it was in the news - it was literally "wall-to-wall" media coverage for the 2 plus weeks that it went on for.

Were you living completely off-grid (or in a cave) at the time?

(Jun 23, 2018 – Jul 10, 2018)

flasher0030 · 07-08-2022 9:18am

Where did I say I missed the story?

I said I saw a film and I presumed it was over dramatised. I didn’t know the specifics of the escape E.g anaesthesist. But I looked up on the net afterwards were there major add-ons in the film which didn’t really happen. And there weren’t.

branie2 · 07-08-2022 12:53pm

2001: A Space Odyssey on Blu-ray, brilliant in that format

07-08-2022 5:45pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119439794#Comment_119439794

fair enough but every news channel and media, even RTE was covering every detail in detail (sedation etc included) along the way.

I'd go out on a limb say that a majority would be familiar with that aspect..

flasher0030 · 07-08-2022 9:11pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119441765#Comment_119441765

Sound. I'm content with myself to be in the minority in this case.

JP Liz V1 · 07-08-2022 11:21pm

Father of the Bride ( Latin take on it with Andy Garcia ) no laughs or chemistry

TICKLE_ME_ELMO · 07-08-2022 11:28pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119443095#Comment_119443095

A whole film in latin doesn't sound like it would be funny, to be fair

s8n · 08-08-2022 12:03pm

Passanger 57 (1992) - This Wesley Snipes action vehicle popped up on my plex provider's movies over the weekend. Have to say, I had forgotten it but really enjoyed it for what it was. Story is almost non existant & acting is questionable but the action sequences are well stitched together & Bruce Payne is wonderfully OTT as the Villian. 6.5/10

8mv · 08-08-2022 1:42pm

Elvis

So good I saw it twice - in the cinema. Once with the kids and once again with the better half. Stunning. Hats off to Baz Luhrmann. And I'm no great Elvis fan. The set pieces are just fantasic and the sound is superb. Austin Butler is a revelation - I'd not heard of him before. His performance is so good, I hope it doesn't define his career and that he gets more good and different roles alá Tom Hanks, who is as good as we have come to expect in his role as 'Col. Tom Parker'. We all know the ending and it is portrayed sympatetically and with compassion to a tragic figure.

pixelburp · 09-08-2022 11:07am

Casino (1995)

I can 100% relate to that moment you buy a lovely muffin, only to find there are fúck-all blueberries within.

So. What if Goodfellas, only not as exceptional, but with exponentially more pastel suits? I've seen some spitballs over the last few years that the 1995 film was Scorsese's hidden gem - perhaps even a dark horse for his best work. I didn't come away with that conclusion myself. Although as darkly entertaining and propellent as any of Scorsese's epics, Casino was too messy, too muddled and noisy in all the wrong ways. In fact, in a weird way it felt curiously prototypical, even though it was released after Goodfellas. As if this was the practice attempt before Scorsese perfected the (sub?)genre with that aforementioned mafia classic.

Not that there weren't plenty of reasons to enjoy the thing: few other directors can make a 3 hour runtime zip by; the performances were uniformly great; all of Scorsese's signature moves were present; and so on. The script didn't work for me though, lacking the dark humour of Goodfellas, or the malevolent charisma of its lead characters. Casino bounced about with little consistent rhythm, while even Scorsese's famous needle-drops felt too aggressive and misplaced.

shazzerman · 09-08-2022 6:09pm

Rewatched Heat this week, as a prelude to reading Heat 2. Still the epic crime thriller to beat them all. I do wonder would an all-digital cinematic rendering of Heat 2 be a very different visual experience for the viewer. I fell asleep puzzling over this, and woke up from a strangely familiar dream...

INT: COFFEE SHOP

CINEPHILE: Ah…thanks for agreeing to have a cup of coffee with me, Mr. Mann.

MANN: It’s fine…

CINEPHILE: Seven years since Blackhat, Public Enemies in 2009, Miami Vice before that…The Miami Vice shoot as tough as they say?

MANN: You lookin’ to become a film critic?

CINEPHILE: You lookin’ to go back to film? You know, I saw some rushes from the Miami Vice shoot, guys with digital equipment struggling in a tornado, one guy holdin’ Foxx back…that you?

MANN: You must have watched some bulls**t rushes?

CINEPHILE: I watched all kinds…

MANN: You see me doin’ four-month location shoots with an “I Love Celluloid” tattoo on my chest?

CINEPHILE: No, I do not…

MANN: Right…I am never goin’ back to film.

CINEPHILE: Then give up directing.

MANN: I do what I do best – I direct films. You do what you do best – try to pin down artists like me.

CINEPHILE: So you never wanted a regular directing career?

MANN: What the f**k is that, Inglourious Basterds and Iron Man?

CINEPHILE: Yeah…

MANN: These regular type films – they your type?

CINEPHILE: My type? No…no my film viewing’s a disaster zone. I got a deadline that’s looming on a piece about some large type foxholes that were used as the venue for a recent 35mm screening of The Fantastic Mr. Fox…and another interview to conduct this week, my third, with an indie director who scratches directly onto the celluloid, and I might get to see some Melville later in the month after chasing guys like you around the digital festival circuit – that’s my type.

MANN:… Guy told me one time, don’t let yourself get attached to film, even if you feel another Heat could be around the corner… Now, if you’re on me and you gotta scrutinise my films, how’d you expect to come to terms with my exclusive use of digital cam- um, aesthetics?

CINEPHILE: Well, it’s an interesting point. What are you, a monk?

MANN: I have analog guys on set…

CINEPHILE: Whaddaya tell ‘em?

MANN: I tell ‘em I’m an artist.

CINEPHILE: So, then, if you spot another article by Nolan or Tarantino championing the celluloid image, bemoaning the loss of film, you still just gonna turn your back on it, not say goodbye?

MANN: THAT’S THE DISCIPLINE.

CINEPHILE: That’s pretty vacant, no?

MANN: Yeah, it is what it is. It’s that or we both better go do something else, pal.

CINEPHILE: I don’t know how to do anything else?

MANN: Neither do I…

CINEPHILE: …I don’t much want to either…

MANN: Neither do I.

[I’ll leave the second part, where our cinephile tells Mr. Mann that he has this recurring dream, where all the shots during the coffee shop scene in Heat are all wide two-shots, proving beyond doubt that Pacino and De Niro were there together – well, only an idiot would think otherwise - to your own imagination!]

winstonia · 09-08-2022 7:38pm

6 part series on Disney+ called Light and Magic is brilliant stuff. IFI are showing the Phil Tippet film Mad God on Thursday too so it's all working out nicely.

Snake Plisken · 14-08-2022 11:05am

So watched Alex Garland's Men a few months back and it was utter trash probably the worst film I've watched this year but might have a challanger for that title Ressurection I saw the trailer with Rebecca Hall and Tim Roth and it looked like it might be an interesting thriller but after an interesting start once you meet Roth's charector it goes off the rails and that ending less said about it the better.

NIMAN · 14-08-2022 11:16am

Saw Elvis at the cinema.

Really enjoyed it.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO · 15-08-2022 11:36pm

Plan B on Disney+

2 teenage girls roadtrip across North Dakota to get one of them the morning after pill. I know this is unfortunately a whole genre of film, and given the state of the US right now the entire idea is incredibly depressing, but this had me genuinely doubled over laughing. I think there's 2 other films that came out in the last year or so that deal with the same idea, but lean more on the serious side to varying degrees, but this one is full on comedy. Booksmart is probably the obvious comparison, but I think I probably enjoyed this one more.

flasher0030 · 16-08-2022 2:26pm

House of Gucci

Not bad. Not very entertaining. Interesting enough story, but really dragged out.

I liked Jared Leto's performance as Paulo. Brought a bit of light-heartedness to it. Not a film I'd be watching again.

pixelburp · 16-08-2022 4:16pm

Insomnia (2002)

Going back and watching Christopher Nolan's most conventional, straight-line feature was a really curious experience, what with all the subsequent conceptual context in the back of my head. All the theming and style that would inform the director's later - and more lauded or remembered - blockbusters. Even though there was a gimmick underpinning this particular film, it never quite played as large a role as I suspected it would have ... had this been made years later - when Nolan would have the clout to crash 747s into hangers on a whim. The moments of insomnia and hallucination brought to life instead in passing flourishes, the bulk of the runtime focused more on its boilerplate mystery set within the constant daylight of Alaska. Unlike something like Tenet, the gimmick here was the garnish - not the whole meal.

That this film has a legacy at all is probably down to the central performances; or more specifically, one central performance. That career swerve of Robin Williams we saw in the late 90s to early 2000s was all too brief, so perhaps that explains why Insomnia's legacy pivots around the late comic's turn as the killer; understandable enough. But in the subsequent two decades of "Al Pacino" coming to mean loud, brash scenery chewing - alongside the myriad impersonations thereof - what surprised upon the rewatch was just how subtle and restrained Pacino's turn was.

His detective slowly fell apart as the cumulative sleepless nights caught up with him, all reflected in an increasingly haunted, dead-eyed appearance. The comparison here is like when actors are asked to play drunk: sometimes they might affect the mannerisms too much, "acting" drunk with a self-consciousness that calls attention to the performance; here in this instance, Pacino simply looked shot to hell. I don't think he yawned once - rather he slumped about exhausted, his speech slurred a touch, always 30 seconds behind the rest of the planet.

loyatemu · 18-08-2022 10:57am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119481559#Comment_119481559

IIRC correctly, even in 2002 Pacino's performance was praised for it's uncharacteristic subtlety as he'd been chewing the scenery for at least a decade before this film as well (Scent of a Woman was the point at which people really started to notice his tendency to full Pacino in every scene).

pixelburp · 18-08-2022 11:11am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119488424#Comment_119488424

Hate to say it, given it's totally a Desert Island Movie - but even Heat couldn't quite avoid it: Pacino's performance is great, but SHE'S GOT A GREAT ÁSS! a definitely moment of the actor going Full Pacino. It's a funny scene, but definitely indicative of that slide towards self-parody. Michael Mann otherwise reigned in those impulses though.

Fair enough though if 2002 was praising Pacino; I got the impression most of the focus then was on Robin Williams, cos for him it was such a significant gear shift from what audiences were familiar with. A shame we didn't see more of that kind of thing.

What have you watched recently? 3D!

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