Last Movie You Watched.

Had a second viewing of The Force Awakens ... apart from the bit in the outpost place where Luke's lightsabre is discovered noticeably outstaying its welcome a touch this time round, there's still a lot to like.

Muddled how Luke's lightsaber came to be in that film considering it fell out of the backside of Cloud City.

Am hoping the next film goes someway towards explaining it. Also, how Ren came to be so influenced by Vader's ideology and Threepio's red arm.

I just watched Slumdog Millionaire. How this film won 8 Oscars is beyond me. Anyone else feel the same?

FieldsMan wrote:

I just watched Slumdog Millionaire. How this film won 8 Oscars is beyond me. Anyone else feel the same?

Total shit.

FieldsMan wrote:

I just watched Slumdog Millionaire. How this film won 8 Oscars is beyond me. Anyone else feel the same?

I liked it.

The Hateful Eight - I liked it, but overall I preferred Django Unchained. Choosing to shoot in 70mm Panavision and then setting most of the movie inside what is essentially a large log cabin seems a perverse decision, but that's Tarantino for you.

I disagree with the indoor setting wasting 70mm. It's not a format exclusive to vistas. I thought the format gave the cabin a lot of character and Tarantino did a good job compositing the characters in that frame. Plus, that stew looked delicious.

The story's arguably too slight to sustain the near 3-hour runtime, too.

I think that's true, though I get the feeling Tarantino made this picture as a "hang out" movie where you just sit back and soak in the characters, watching them do their thing before the story takes over with the mystery of who's in on Jennifer Jason Leigh's breakout, which doesn't truly begin until the second half of the film with the fourth chapter "Domergue's Got a Secret".

Maybe it's no coincidence that JACKIE BROWN is my favorite of Tarantino's and that's very much a
"hang out" movie that's more about the characters than the heist.

Creed - of the franchise, I'd only previously seen Rocky 4 (but having picked up a boxset of all 6 films in HMV's Black Friday sale, I will be rectifying this). It's not really necessary to be 100% au fait with them to enjoy Creed, though ... and I did enjoy it a lot.

Triumphantly 'punch the air' feelgood stuff ... perfect for this dismal month :) .

3 Days of the Condor

Excellent movie, paced well, some interesting characters and nicely tense when it wants to be. Government conspiracy films are a dime a dozen today (definitely a theme that has been done to death) but despite its '75 vintage this still manages to feel both fresh and relevant putting all recent contender to shame.

Thor

Good rather than great but holds up well to repeat viewing and is now probably my favourite of the phase one Marvel's.

Have never seen 3 Days Of ..., but read once of an ITV pre-watershed screening that had the killing of Redford's colleagues near the beginning cut out. It didn't seem to bother them that this was a pivotal plot point .

Give up watching certain movies on ITV. Either get butchered to accomodate pre-watershed or get this gossipy movie news thing in it OR the evening news.

It is always tremendously disappointing to see a movie you like turn up on ITV which seems to have zero competence with regard to what could legitimately be cut and what should never go, but "3 days...." is well worth buying or renting imo - treat yourself and give it a go!

The Big Store (Marx Brothers)

One of the later Marx Bros, still terrific fun but there is certainly one or two musical numbers too many......oddly of those there are truly extremes going on here - you have the wonderful 'Sing while you sell' and the doughy but actually memorable 'if its you' and then the absolutely abysmal 'Tenement Symphony' croaked out in stark contrast.

Hilly KCMG wrote:

Give up watching certain movies on ITV. Either get butchered to accomodate pre-watershed or get this gossipy movie news thing in it OR the evening news.

And not forgetting the ad breaks.

THE REVENANT

I liked it. Didn't realise Fitzgerald was played by Tom Hardy until afterwards. Guess that makes it a good performance. I suppose Leo was OK too, though he just spends most of the movie grunting, frothing, and crawling from one misfortune to another.

Oh, and that bear scene was fucking brutal. You could say it was unbe... OK, I won't.

From the clips I've seen, Hardy seems to be doing his Bane voice in it.

Yeah was a little hard to understand him at times, but I was tired when I watched it so thought I just wasn't as acute.

But yeah I liked The Revenant. Not sure Leo deserves the Oscar for it for the reasons you mention CJB, but I haven't seen the other nominations in their films yet, so can't say for sure.

He's a good actor but this whole "Leo deserves an Oscar for everything!" business is a bit of an internet fad.

Which the Academy might just buy into this year, given they submit to every other tantrum one throws on the net.

Ant Man (2015)

Another amiable Marvel film, fun within the confines of its runtime and benefiting from one of the more intriguing concepts. A few lingering touches of Edgar Wright are present but it remains regrettable he didn't complete the project as it frequently has an otherwise generic tone.

Rating the Marvel/Disney movies is increasingly difficult, I find them generally good but few really stand out - probably Winter Soldier, Thor and Incredible Hulk are my personal faves but it is marginal and I dont see any as essential viewing.

The Revenant's shoot seems to have been gruelling ... if Leo's performance in it loses out to Eddie Redmayne for effectively putting on some lippy and a dress, he may well lose his shit .

One thing I particularly enjoyed about Ant-Man was the literal scaling-down of the threat. The potential destruction of Earth/the human race as we know it loses its resonance when trotted out in at least one film a week released during the summer.

The Big Short - quite an amusing drama, although ultimately you come away from it feeling pretty angry (especially as the closing onscreen caption would seem to indicate that the banks haven't learned a damn thing from the global financial collapse of the late Noughties).

Blunt Instrument wrote:

One thing I particularly enjoyed about Ant-Man was the literal scaling-down of the threat. The potential destruction of Earth/the human race as we know it loses its resonance when trotted out in at least one film a week released during the summer.  

Agreed here, and as to literal scaling - the battle around the Thomas the Tank Engine track was inspired fun. The problem acute for Marvel is that it is happy to throw high stakes and consequences into the mix but never convincingly and it still hasn't really found a villain (or left a villain alive long enough) to convey any sense of threat or danger. In his brief 'in suit' moments Yellow Jacket is great but his appearance is rushed and is left with zero resonance. 

Blunt Instrument wrote:

The Big Short - quite an amusing drama, although ultimately you come away from it feeling pretty angry (especially as the closing onscreen caption would seem to indicate that the banks haven't learned a damn thing from the global financial collapse of the late Noughties).

It's clear neither bank nor any government have learned a thing imo, in effect all we got was the next generation of fat cats blaming the previous one for being vaguely 'unwise'. A shame because the potential for a bloodless form of globalised revolution was strong leaving the alternative still ahead i fear.

Night of the Hunter (1955)

Always fascinating but by turn either creepy, creaky, absurd, haunting and sometimes even surreal this is one of those films I enjoyed at the time but it is the the way it kept popping into my head subsequently that makes me re-evaluate it as something really special.