Last Movie You Watched.

Fantastic Beasts and where to find them. (2016)

Anything but fantastic, this is a charmless affair that a few cute references cannot disguise or elevate. If proof were ever needed that David Yates was never the right man for this universe it is here, everything falls flat or feels as 2d and lifeless as the films drab palate. Very disappointing!

Horror Express (1972)

Cheapo spaghetti horror it maybe but the story is interesting, the setting is well used and provides ample opportunity for Cushing, Lee and Savalas to work their not inconsiderable magic.

lachesis wrote:

Horror Express (1972)

Cheapo spaghetti horror it maybe but the story is interesting, the setting is well used and provides ample opportunity for Cushing, Lee and Savalas to work their not inconsiderable magic.

One of my favorites from that era. As you said the setting is well used and the performances were fun especially when Savalas shows up. Also a really solid score as well especially the end titles music.

A Dark Song - I've flushed scarier things than this achingly slow and ploddingly dull British horror. Don't bother.

THE ARRIVAL - It was okay, but for my money found CONTACT to be a much better type of genre film.

ROGUE ONE - A Star Wars Story: didn't really care for this. Thought it was over-hyped and time will likely be far less kind to it than initial reviews were. It's nowhere near as bad as any of the prequels, but not as good as any of the original trilogy or even FORCE AWAKENS.

I didn't like the characters...didn't believe in Jen Erso....found no character particularly inspiring....the CGI use of Tarkin and Leia was bad. I understand what the director was going for (gritty World War II type of drama), I just didn't agree with where they were going with the movie.

Yeah but how about that scene at the end where Darth Vader is super kool and chops people up? That makes up for the preceding two hours of bland, cow-milking, dead horse-beating, fan fiction dirge.

Haywire - middling, convoluted action thriller which one suspects got its A-list cast to sign up due to Soderbergh's 'I'm retiring from directing' thing and they saw this as their last chance to be directed by him, as opposed to its script.

Independence Day Resurgence (2016)

'Independence Day Regurgitation' would be more appropriate and as with that process no matter how tasty you found the material originally, it is now acidic bile and stuff you desperately need to flush!

Yep. Terrible film ... ironic that Will Smith allegedly blew it off in order to appear in the equally ill-received Suicide Squad.

Little Children (2006)

An effective, captivating drama with some fine performances and an underlying quirkiness. I like these types of films. Anyone know of any similar movies?

lachesis wrote:

Independence Day Resurgence (2016)

'Independence Day Regurgitation' would be more appropriate and as with that process no matter how tasty you found the material originally, it is now acidic bile and stuff you desperately need to flush!

I have fond memories of ID:4. Still love it to this day. But the sequel came out 17 years too late. The intervening years I think exposed the film makers for who they truly were, and it was a turn-off for most of America.

Speaking of bile.....I just got finished watching FURIOUS 6 and FURIOUS 7. I think it may be time to open up one of those lists....you know? Like: 100 Things I learn from watching FURIOUS 7: I'll get us started.

In FURIOUS 7 I learned:
That it makes more sense to not disguise yourself from God's Eye, a spacial/facial pattern recognition program that find anybody anywhere in the world. Armed with this knowledge does Dom's crew make any attempt to alter their appearance in order to allude Owen's men?

I learned i can drive off a mountain in Russia with 2 dozen men shooting at my car while i fly over the cliff, hit the ground, keep rolling until the car is nothing more than spare parts, but you'll emerge from the wreckage without a scratch.

I learned that The God's Eye is something that every film writer should have because it eliminates any need for storytelling. just turn on the God's Eye and it'll do all the investigation for you.

I've heard that in the new one, The Rock somehow manages to stop a missile with his bare hands.

*Facepalm*

Blunt Instrument wrote:

I've heard that in the new one, The Rock somehow manages to stop a missile with his bare hands.

*Facepalm*

As a Bond fan I'm obviously willing to suspend some disbelief. But the F&F franchise just pushes things too far sometimes. For example, in F6 the last 20 minutes (at least) involve 3 different fight scenes inside the back of the Russian transport plane, plus all the shooting and fighting going on between the cars chasing the plane and the people on the plane. But that's hardly the stupidest thing about the fight sequence. About 3-4 minutes into the scene I start wondering: how long is this runway? The action sequence takes forever to wrap itself up, and the whole time not only does the plane not slow down as it shambles down the runway, but three different cars manage to keep pace with a plane that has reached a speed fast enough to eventually acquire lift, even if it doesn't complete the take off. And because they've got so many characters in this thing, they've got to give everybody a fight/action sequence there near the end, which means what in most films would be a 5-7 minute action sequence ends up taking 20-25 minutes.

And don't even get me started about the ending to FAST7. The ending in Los Angeles, where the "family" lures Owen and his men into attacking them levels a parking deck...a satellite tower....and blows up dozens and dozens of police and civilian cars. And The Rock was pure cheese. I literally flashed back to INVASION USA with Chuck Norris. It felt like a bad 80's action movie.

I felt like the films cheat a bit as well. Like, they're not really all that clever. I was waiting to see what Dom would do when cornered on that cliff in F7, but the writers didn't seem to have any idea how to find a clever way of getting Dom out of the situation, so they just have him drive off a cliff and emerge from the car without a scratch. I know the car is built to take some hits, but nobody can just walk away from that wreck unscathed.

And the "plots"...I seriously had no idea who or what Djimon Honsou's character was or was supposed to be doing in the film. He's literally the GENERAL CHANG of F7: he's apparently important, but has almost no scenes with anyone else of importance and the character could be cut from the film and you'd never miss him. And the dialogue Honsou was given? Oh man! Atrocious. Most of his lines were "What?:" and "Huh?". Total paycheck performance. But so was Vin Diesel. This guy is phoning in his performances, and I can't recall anyone else right now that is as big a star as Vin Diesel allegedly is that has ZERO CHARISMA or SCREEN PRESENCE. How in the world does this man still have a job?

And Helen Mirren is in the last one? Did someone blackmail her into it? I guess we can look forward to Dame Maggie Smith in F9?

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

... and I can't recall anyone else right now that is as big a star as Vin Diesel allegedly is that has ZERO CHARISMA or SCREEN PRESENCE. P

Daniel Craig?

FieldsMan wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

... and I can't recall anyone else right now that is as big a star as Vin Diesel allegedly is that has ZERO CHARISMA or SCREEN PRESENCE. P

Daniel Craig?

Daniel......oh I'll get me coat.....

Guardians Of The Galaxy 2 - half-an-hour longer than the first, which unfortunately just means that it sags drearily in the middle. But there's enough action and irreverent humour to see it through.

The Killer Elite (1975)

Despite being a more commercial venture Sam Peckinpah still churned out a really solid if not uneven actioner working in his usual themes of loyalty and friendship among outlaws into the story and also a bit of commentary on the nature of black ops programs. Even though James Caan didn't much like the final product he still gave a very good and physically demanding performance here as a mercenary who has to build himself backup after being betrayed by his buddy played by Robert Duvall who shot him and left him crippled on a job to protect a Russian defector. Both Caan and Duvall have very good on-screen rapport and the characters do feel fleshed out and realistic. The main knock I would have against this film though is the pacing does feel a bit uneven at times and sadly Peckinpah's editing of the more violent scenes to make this a PG-rated film does show at times especially the otherwise exciting finale (although funny enough this film has plenty of topless women and even a visit to a brothel early on). The cinematography is striking though and the cast is terrific with both Gig Young and Helmut Dantine from Peckinpah's masterpiece Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia making appearances. Burt Young and Bo Hopkins are also very good here as well as a pair of retired mercs hired by Caan to protect Mako. Despite it's flaws though it's a fun film and still has some of Peckinpah's spirit running through it even though it is considered a lesser film of his.

Plenty of topless women, eh? :D

Funny how the classification boards can sometimes be strangely liberal about allowing that into PG-rated movies ... Zulu is another example.

James Caan, Robert Duvall and topless women? Sold.

Blunt Instrument wrote:

Plenty of topless women, eh? :D

Funny how the classification boards can sometimes be strangely liberal about allowing that into PG-rated movies ... Zulu is another example.      

I guess it's just a shift in what people felt kids could handle. Guess back then it was like "Happy birthday, kid. Have some gun battles and knockers, ya' little pirate." Now if they took took their kids to a PG movie like The Killer Elite they'd probably drive straight to the therapist's office right after the credits rolled.

Heat (1995)


Just got the new 4K remastered Blu-ray in today. A good upgrade over the one Warner released back in 2009 that had good picture but pretty unbalanced audio. Still one of the more definitive cops vs. robbers films. A dark, realistic film that not only gives us a very authentic look at heist crews and the detectives who take them down but the toll it takes on their personal lives. Al Pacino gives a startling and lively performance as an overworked cop and Robert DeNiro in one of his last truly great performances as a professional but ultimately ruthless thief  whose code of conduct is shaken a bit by the love of a designer. The supporting cast for this film is tremendous as usual from Mann with great performances from Val Kilmer, Tom Sizemore, Jon Voight, Ted Levine, William Fichtner and small but memorable roles for Henry Rollins, Tom Noonan and Hank Azaria who gets memorably berated by Pacino (although sadly Mann didn't add back in the "Ferocious, aren't I?" line he cut from that scene in the 2009 release which may be my only true complaint with this release).

As mentioned thankfully the issues with the previous release has mostly been fixed. The audio sounds very good and much more balanced. Now dialogue is clear as ever and the action sequences still sound very explosive (especially the pinnacle shoot-out scene following the robbery which is still one the best shoot-out scenes ever filmed). The picture quality has been given a very good 4K upgrade over the first Blu-ray, eschewing the more colder, grayer look for somewhat warmer and more realistic-looking skin tones and natural looking lighting while still retaining it's dark, shadowy look.  Also the film does look a bit more detailed than the previous release did and given this is a 2-disc release the new transfer is housed on it's own disc with the special features on the second disc so compression is pretty much non-existent here. Also special features wise they added the Film Academy screening Q&A from last year as well as a Q&A with Mann from 2015 at the Toronto Film Festival.

Overall still one of the best and most refined feeling crime films made. It's still perhaps Mann's most accomplished masterwork with everything he was working up to in his previous crime work finally culminating here with intense technical authenticity. Sadly this would also become one of the last truly great films for both DeNiro and Pacino but at least something as accomplished as this with both onscreen together at last exists to remind what powerhouses they were then.

I would have agreed with you and said that Heat was De Niro's last good film. And I suppose you're right in the leading role capacity. But I recently watched A Good Shepherd (which he also directed), and thought his performance was great in that.

Still, that was about 10 years ago.

Alien : Covenant - enjoyed this a good deal more than Prometheus. Not JUST as good as the first couple of movies in the franchise, but still way ahead of the likes of the aforementioned Prometheus and Alien : Resurrection.

Asylum - endearingly unscary British 'portmanteau' horror from the early Seventies with the likes of Robert Powell, Peter Cushing and Herbert Lom.

Excalibur - I'll take John Boorman's telling of the Arthurian legend over Guy Ritchie's Beckham-cameoing 'Lock-Stockified' flop version any day of the week.

Blunt Instrument wrote:

Alien : Covenant - enjoyed this a good deal more than Prometheus. Not JUST as good as the first couple of movies in the franchise, but still way ahead of the likes of the aforementioned Prometheus and Alien : Resurrection.  
 

Only reason I went and saw this is because I was afraid I'd learn spoilers between now and when it came to Netflix/Redbox. Nothing about the trailers motivated me to see it, and my reaction to the very first trailer was "This sort of looks like AvP: Requiem" (which was garbage). Subsequent trailers made the film look better, but still nothing approaching "event status".

While the film is not terrible by any means, it doesn't really stand out either. No iconic lines of dialogue or characters. The more Alien films we get, the more diminished seem to be the returns. Too much de-mystifying of the alien creature. Explaining where it comes from and why was unnecessary. Ridley has tried to make the series more than it was ever conceived to be (a simple monster movie). His grand themes of creation and playing God are more or less going over the heads of most the audience who simply want to see a movie that scares them.

I honestly don't need or want another Alien film that explains events prior to Alien ('79). There's nothing left to say that hasn't already been said.

And with the box office returns of A:C being *less* than what AVP made (in 2004 dollars no less), some soul-searching and head-scratching is going to be going on at 20TH Century Fox.

One other thing: why does this series of films seem to have such a fixation on female leads? Sigourney Weaver...Sanaa Lathan...Noomi Rapace and now Katherine Waterston???

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Too much de-mystifying of the alien creature. Explaining where it comes from and why was unnecessary.

I honestly don't need or want another Alien film that explains events prior to Alien ('79). There's nothing left to say that hasn't already been said.  

I agree and more it is a general problem I find with all major franchises today, including Bond/DC/Marvel/Dr Who etc....there is a desperate desire to explain every facet and foible of every major character, to de-construct and rationalise to the n'th degree and the result is invariably, imo, to undermine and devalue said character. Movies and Tv are merging on this and every series based on a great movie is, no matter how good, always going to reflect and impact on the original article till you cease to see the originality and mystery that made it so great.

I am dreading Blade Runner 2, Scott lost the art of subtle in the late 90's - albeit Villeneuve may be its salvation, but in no way did that film require a sequel or for that matter a directors cut or final cut..... everything that could or would make it great/influential was there at the outset and was actually enhanced by its odd imperfections as they became the mechanism the audience bought in.

Wonder Woman - overlong at 2 hours 20 and also lighter on action than I would've liked. That said, it is at least much less gloomy than recent takes on DC's other 2 'big hitters' Superman and Batman and in the title role Gal Gadot both kicks ass and looks great doing it.