Last movie you saw.

[indigo 389]

Gravity (2013) - that was some long take porn but I didn't expect any less from mr. cuarón. very intense film, one of the best movies of the year for sure! probably the first movie in which the 3D technology really works like it should.

 

12 Angry Men (1957) - classic. for a film that's about 12 men talking in one room for 90 minutes, I wasn't bored even for a second, thanks to great dialogue and characters.

[Bear 1817]

Intouchables - Great film with a huge amount of great humor. I love how they make you laugh with the disabled, and not of them. The chemistry between Omar Sy and François Cluzet are brilliant, and Omar Sy is just great in this. Hands down.

[Jigsaw9 6783]

^ Incidentally, I also watched that movie a week or so ago with my friend. Very touching and funny piece, I really liked it too!

 

Last film I saw was yesterday, finally watched Elysium. Of course it can't be compared to Blomkamp's previous work District 9 but it was an okay sci-fi/action movie. I'm a sucker for cyberpunk imagery so the run-down slightly post-apocalyptic gadgets and milieu won me over, heh.

[Bear 1817]

The Fog - Great John Carpenter-flick with a brilliant atmosphere. Great acting (Adrienne Barbeau!!!), a brilliant soundtrack by the man himsef and typical early Carpenter magic. The mood is set early in the film and it just gets better with each scene. Lovely!

Village of the Damned - Great, atmospheric sci-fi/horror from the early 60's. The most creepy kids ever. Jesus fucking christ! Horrible kids.

City of the Living Dead - The first entry in Lucio Fulci's unofficial Gates of Hell trilogy, and a great one it is. Great atmosphere, insane special effects, AMAZING soundtrack by the one and only Fabio Frizzi and, well, just great. It's got some of the most memorable scenes ever caught on film (vomit!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!), and if you're a fan of gore you won't get let down by this. Amazing!

The Beyond - Second film in the Gates of Hell trilogy. This is, believe it or not, even better than the first one. Better atmosphere, meaner and more evil. The goe is, once again, insane, even though no scenes are as momorable as the special one in CotLD. But it's another great film. Mean and evil! Fabio Frizzi was once again in charge of the soundtrack, and once again it's an amazing one. God! Both of them!

The House by the Cemetery - The third and last entry in the Gates of Hell trilogy. This is slower, less atmosheric and less gory (you'll still get gore, though, and it's brilliantly done!) than the others, and sadly, not as good. It's an enjoyable film, just not as good as the two others. The most disappointing thing about this film is the soundtrack. Fabio Frizzi's gone and Walter Rizzati's in. It's a good soundtrack for sure, but Walter just isn't Fabio. A shame.

Catriona MacColl's got the lead role in all the films (different roles each time), and she's amazing. She's as good at acting as she's beautiful.

Love Actually Great romantic comedy set around christmas. Really fucking funny. Bill Nighy steals the show in this one. Amazing performance!

Black Christmas - This is one of the first, if not THE first, modern slasher films ever made. This didn't only set the layout for the modern slasher films, but also the standard. It's a brilliant piece of film making, this. This isn't my favourite slasher film (top 10, sure. Maybe even top 5), but this IS slasher. This is what slashers are about! Brilliant!

And if there's any doubt at all, the films I have seen are the originals, not the remakes.

[Jigsaw9 6783]

^ City of the Living Dead and The Beyond are amazing! They have such "thick" atmosphere, it's great.

 

I watched The Hangover 2 yesterday night. Well... I remember kinda enjoying the first one, so my curiosity drove me to this but I only smiled throughout the whole movie literally 3 times or so... so yeah. Not really recommended.

[Bear 1817]

^ City of the Living Dead and The Beyond are amazing! They have such "thick" atmosphere, it's great.

 

Yeah, that's true. Same with Carpenter's The Fog. Brilliant stuff. The films just drags you into their universe and doesn't let you go until they're finished.

[sai 868]

Love Actually

 

It's that time of the year again (but then again, who doesn't enjoy Hugh Grant as the prime-minister?)

[Tokage 5930]

Yeah, that's true. Same with Carpenter's The Fog. Brilliant stuff. The films just drags you into their universe and doesn't let you go until they're finished.

The Fog is great. I don't know if it's blasphemous to say so, but I think I like it more than Halloween, even.

[Bear 1817]

Shiet, that is blasphemous. It's a great film, but Halloween is way better. Eviler, meaner and better.

[Bear 1817]

Bad Santa - As hilarious as ever, and Billy Bob Thornton is just great in this one. This one ain't too far behind Superbad, and one of the better comedies since the 80's. Brilliant.

[RoseOfHizaki 131]

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues

[Bear 1817]

In Bruges - As good as always. Fantastic dialogue, great humour and Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson and Ralph Fiennes all delivers on the acting side. The brothers McDonagh has something really exciting going on. I hope they will make something together sooner or later.

[freesia 714]

Gintama: The Movie: The Final Chapter: Be Forever Yorozuya

This is the best Gintama movie that I have watched. At times, it was touching, then a second after that, it went to crack-up funny.

8/10

[Pandabear 414]

Oblivion - Amazing visual effects. Tom cruise does some good acting and the sci-fic story is not too shabby. 7/10

 

Hansel and Gretel - Action packed film version of the children's tale. I wouldn't really call it action packed....violent..yes. Predictable story and dialogue with some okay acting. I would only watch this film if you're really bored. 4.5/10

 

The Great and Powerful Oz - 2013 prequel to the great wizard of oz. Visual effects are great and so is this acting. Mila kunis, why you so hot? It is a bit long at 2 hours and a half, but still enjoyable. 7/10

 

Jack The Giant Slayer - Another movie based on a children's tale. This was actually not as bad as I thought it was going to be. It was a fun watch. 6.5/10

[Bear 1817]

Home Alone - Just as good at it always have been. Hilarious film with plenty of charm and feeling, and Joe Pesci's brilliant!

 

Gremlins - I haven't seen this for years, but it's as brilliant as I remembered it. Great christmas horror!

Joe Dante is such an underrated director.

 

Die Hard - This IS action! Enough said.

[hiroki 5521]

Citizen Kane (1941) - Lol, I'm VERY slow I know. I dunno if it's because I walked into this without any expectations whatsoever, but I ended up really liking it. I find that themes of lost innocence, vanished childhood, etc. have become somewhat cliched thanks to how they have been overworked by SO many artistic productions. This film captures everything perfectly though, and with just the right balance of artistic endeavor and melodrama (just to keep things interesting). 8.5/10

[Des 289]

Anna Karenina (2012)
Quite literally theatrical because almost all of the film takes place inside a theatre. This goes two ways. At times the transitions between scenes are beautifully done, as for example the environment changes when an actor steps away from the stage that was supposed to be a bedroom and into an empty space with snow suddenly falling down. Visually it's very pleasing, eye candy everywhere. At other times however, it feels quite clumsy. Surely the story of Anna Karenina is very well known and therefore one can take some freedom with cutting bits here and there... taking shortcuts is perhaps the best way to put it. This can be felt in dialogue and the very rapid falling in love of Anna with the cavalry soldier. I liked it, but there was room for improvement. 7/10

 

The Tarnished Angels (1957)

Plotwise this drama is not very surprising but it is surprisingly tightly scripted. Not a moment feels gone to waste. Everything serves a purpose, whether it is subtly foreshadowing future events, development of character's backstories or excitement during the air races. This kept my attention throughout the film that at times felt mediocre, but never goes into the 'bad' territory. I am not aware of any other old films covering bits of drama and a love triangle set to a background of airplane racing, and I guess that made watching this a little more special too. A 6/10 rating would about suit this... with an extra plus 1 for the airplane footage. 7/10

[Jigsaw9 6783]

Watched a bunch of stuff lately:

 

Absence - Found-footage movie; pregnant girl's fetus mysteriously and unexplicably disappears overnight, couple plus girl's brother (I think? xD) go to relaxing holiday near the woods, have fun/drama, spooky but kinda boring things happen, lots of flashing blue lights and stuff, then I just fast-forwarded. Boring but at least it didn't have that many jump scares.

 

Alone with Her - Found-footage movie; stalker stalks girl... uhmm, that's more or less it, lol (without giving too much away). Maybe my expectations were too low but it was surprisingly enjoyable! I liked how it wasn't just one camera doing the recording, so it really had that uncomfortable creepy voyeuristic feel.

 

Exhibit A - Yup, found-footage again; family problems escalate out of hand, documented by the daughter and her camera. Also a decent one, this wasn't really the typical thriller/horror type of handheld recording, more like a drama. The everyday characters were really believable too.

 

Cropsey - This was an actual documentary about the disappearance of some children on Staten Island where some pretty crappy-condition mental institute once operated. Of course people found a scapegoat pretty quickly but it's all really hazy without much evidence, only lots of speculation and local boogeyman folklore. Anyway, it was okay for one watching.

 

Side Effects - Saw this for the 2nd time, still a great drama/thriller from this year, highly recommended!

[Bear 1817]

The Hidden Face - Cool, but a bit disappointing thriller from Colombia. It's not bad at all, in fact it's quite exciting, but it just lacks that last nerve to put it together with those films you'll talk about in five years. It's well-acted and well-directed, but the story just lacks that suspense that I would like. But it was a good one.

 

Twitch of the Death Nerve aka A Bay of Blood - It's hard to know what to call this film as it has been released under a billion different titles (apparently no film had more titles than this, and one of the titles were Last House on the Left – Part II, even though it had nothing at all to do with that film). Anyway, Twitch of the Death Nerve (which I believe is the most known name for this film) is a giallo (a type of Italian horror film that has a strong mystery-vibe to it) made by the (horror)legend Mario Bava. The story is a bit messy and confusing, though very exciting. The film shocked the living shit out of people when it was released in the early 70's because of its very graphic violence, which are executed brilliantly. You believe them, and they're just stunningly made. And the atmosphere is really nice.

 

This isn't Mario Bava's best film, but it sure as hell is his more influental film. This is a proto-slasher, and one of the proto-slashers that had the most influence on the genre, something which is easy to see. Classic films such as Friday the 13th, Friday the 13th Part 2 and The Burning are so obviously inspired by this film, and two of the murderes were even reused in Friday the 13th Part 2. That's how important this film was. Just as important as Psycho for the slasher genre, maybe even more. Says a lot.

 

Breaking Bad, season 4 - Another great season, and the last few episodes are just really, really intense. You almost get exhausted because of the high intensity level. Gustavo Fring is a great character, and Walter White's character development is insane. You just gotta love it.

 

However, one scene almost ruined this season because it's that bad.

 

The last scene with Gustavo Fring after the explosion, where he was out the door and then straighten his tie. It looks like something from a cheap 80's action comedy / horror comedy. It just breaks with the rest of the series. It's so out of place and doesn't fit the mood of the series. It's not even well done. It just doesn't look good when you see Gus' fucked up face. A huuuuge meeeeh!

[Des 289]

New Year's Eve (2011)
I wouldn't even recommend this film to my worst enemy if I had one. It's an abysmal soap opera turned to a two hour torture session. Recognizable faces everywhere most of whoms intentions are questionable at the least. De Niro and Halle Berry among others must've done it for the money, because I highly doubt they couldn't recognize a catastrophic screenplay when they see one. Sarah Jessica Parker must've done it because towards the end of the film (definitely a spoiler, but who really cares in this case?) she hooks up with a guy half her age and because the film required her fictional daughter to say that she is 'hot'. The only one from the entire cast who seems to really try and make something of their character is Michelle Pfeiffer! Incredible indeed!

 

So the only plotline that looked like the beginning of something interesting was the one with Michelle Pfeiffer as an middle-aged introverted, shy woman who promises a younger guy two elusive tickets to a certain party. In return he has to help her cross some things off of her New Year's resolutions list. With a more competent production team behind this, it could've been the start of a fun little film, but unfortunately it's a minor plotline in this abomination and it doesn't get a good treatment here.

 

Also, product placement is EVERYWHERE. They even shamelessly pull out a Valentine's Day dvd + Blu-ray set (yes, both of them!) from a woman's vagina during the end credits. This really happened, I'm not even joking...

 

Do not watch this film, ever! 1/10

[Kaye 296]

Prince of Tennis.

 

I watched it with a friend who came over from Japan for New Years. First movie of the year. I don't know how many shots of Soju we had to get ourselves through.

Also, the fact that this was my third or fourth time watching it for no good reason still gets me confused.

[hiroki 5521]

Ulysses' Gaze (1995): The kind of film you either hate or love. A highly elliptic "narrative" (if it can even be considered one) that explores the meaning of time, space, history, people, etc. set in the Balkans, Ulysses' Gaze parallels Homer's Odyssey in its epic vision. Simply put, it's exemplary of the kind of films that scream "I am high culture" in your face. Apparently also in the TIME top 100 list, in which ideally films are somewhat well balanced between artistic credentials and mass-market appeal, I was quite surprised by how this film is way skewed to one side of the spectrum. Definitely not everyone's cup of tea, and for most people the 3 hours could be better spent.

[Bear 1817]

We're the Millers - Surprisingly good film. Jason Sudeikis's comical timing is great, but Nick Offerman just steals the show here. What a great performance! Yeah, solid film. Worth checking out if you want a laugh.

 

Homicidal - This film was released in 1961, a year after Psycho and it was a knock off of the mentioned film. Yes, it obviously tried to cash in on Psycho's sucsess, but it was also a great film so who cares? It's a bit campy, but that's a part of the charm here and the film felt a bit ahead of its time. Both the atmosphere and acting are great, and especially Joan Marshall's amazing here. That's one hell of a memorable performance.

 

If you enjoy Psycho you might as well check out this, because I think there's a big chance of you enjoying this as well.

 

I like how William Castle starts off introducing the film, just like Hitckock did with his TV-series. Gotta love it!

 

Another thing that's really interesting is the "fright break", which was a gimmick that William Castle came up with. It might look stupid in 2014, but in the 1960's in the cinema I'm sure it was exciting as hell, and I sure liked it.

 

 

A 45-second timer overlaid the film's climax. A voice-over advised the audience of the time remaining in which they could leave the theatre and receive a full refund if they were too frightened to see the remainder of the film. To ensure the more wily patrons did not simply stay for a second showing and leave during the finale Castle had different color tickets printed for each show.[2] About 1% of patrons still demanded refunds, and in response:

"William Castle simply went nuts. He came up with 'Coward's Corner,' a yellow cardboard booth, manned by a bewildered theater employee in the lobby. When the Fright Break was announced, and you found that you couldn't take it anymore, you had to leave your seat and, in front of the entire audience, follow yellow footsteps up the aisle, bathed in a yellow light. Before you reached Coward's Corner, you crossed yellow lines with the stenciled message: 'Cowards Keep Walking.' You passed a nurse (in a yellow uniform?...I wonder), who would offer a blood-pressure test. All the while a recording was blaring, "'Watch the chicken! Watch him shiver in Coward's Corner'!" As the audience howled, you had to go through one final indignity – at Coward's Corner you were forced to sign a yellow card stating, 'I am a bona fide coward."

 

William Castle was a master of gimmick and used gimmicks to sell his films to the audience. He's quite known now, but that's more for his gimmicks than his films, even though he made plenty of great films and even some classics like House on Haunted Hill and 13 Ghosts. The man was creative as fuck, and unlike 2014 where we only get one shitty gimmick - the 3D, he made up plenty of different stuff. I'd recommend taking a look at his wikipedia side for more info on this. I wish I could experience those gimmicks myself.

[Bear 1817]

Red 2 - This was a rather disappointing film. I didn't expect much as the first one was only OK, but still lacked the humour of the first one, and it looked really uninspired at times. That's the biggest problems. Another annoying thing is that Byung-hun Lee seems to suffer from the Jet Li syndrom. Amazing in Korean films, but really stiff and boring in english speaking films. That's a shame.

[Peace Heavy mk II 7200]

New Years was apparently LGBTQA history month for me, so I watched But I'm a Cheerleader and Paris is Burning. The first is a quirky 90s movie with RuPaul about a girl who gets sent to a camp to 'become straight' after her family was convinced she was a lesbian for not liking to kiss her boyfriend and for eating tofu. Eventually everyone at the camp learns that you can't really change who you are and the main character eventually escapes with her tragic first lover (seriously: fashion was dead in the 90s). The movie was described as 'when you're in the mood for campy humor,' and that's pretty much what this movie was. I believe it was also a significant gay film in the 90s, as well as controversial in terms of rating--something about it being rated R even though there wasn't strong language just because it had an implied female sex scene.

 

Paris is Burning is a documentary about the ballroom scene from the 70s and 80s and how non-heterosexual POC in poorer sections of NYC competed in what was pretty much gang violence but with fashion. It's interesting to see how terminology is changed from then till now. For example, the use of 'tranny' was pretty liberal, and the status of 'faggot' was a good thing. It was interesting to see how this influenced the club kid scene, which is a 90s movement that was also closely tied to the LGBTQA people. Good documentary, definitely low budget, but obviously the people it was about did not have much money. The biggest object of note was that 90% of RuPaul's drag race terminology and challenge ideas came from this movie. If you're interested in queer history, then this movie would be good for you. If you really have no interest, there's nothing here that would keep you watching.