Discuss and Rate the Last Film You Watched

[Johnny Novgorod]

The Professor

College professor gets the news he has stage 4 terminal cancer. He can either submit to therapy and live a year (maybe year and a half) or die in six months. He chooses the latter and becomes an apathetic yes man to every hedonistic call he can answer. Movie doens't really go crazy on that department. Once he clears drugs and casual sex it mostly boils down to cutting the bullshit from his life without a care for consequence or appearences (fun, satisfying stuff). To the movie's credit, it never cops out of the premise that this is what this man has chosen for himself. And I was pleasantly surprised that the movie never really took to moralizing over his more self-serving or politically incorrect takes. Then again, he's dying as is.

Open Water (spoilers)

By amazing coincidence, saw another movie about people accepting they're going to die a pointless and inevitable death. This one's a true story. A couple are abandoned during a scuba diving tour in the middle of the wide open sea and, well, that's it for them. Shot in crappy digital video (like found footage but not really), it's 99% these two poor people bobbing up and down in shark-infested waters. You get the process of trying to minimize the situation, crack jokes, try this or that, start pointing fingers, despair and ultimately accept that nobody's coming for you. It's bleak, realistic, horrifying and there isn't a single iota of wit or poetry to the whole ordeal. There's an effective disarming blandess to the couple, feels like I've seen them a million times seating across me packing bags and whispering to each other. The dialogue is banal and realistic: no bullshit emotional journeys involving childhood trauma or redemption of a family tragedy like your Gravities and The Shallows and 127 Hours. And there're no set pieces as you would have in a survival movie, because there's nothing for them to do. Just accept they've been dead from the very beginning.

 

[McElroy]

Open Water
And there're no set pieces as you would have in a survival movie, because there's nothing for them to do. Just accept they've been dead from the very beginning.

Imagine me as a kid after seeing Deep Blue Sea and seeing the trailer for this one. My 11-year-old's expectations weren't met!

 

[Xprimentyl]

Nobody: Amazing / Great

Workaday everyman Hutch Mansell has ground himself into an unremarkable rut in family life. He has his home broken into by two people and he chooses not to fight them, but rather allow them to flee with the few petty items they managed to get. He is ultimately emasculated for his apparent inaction by his wife, his son, his boss and coworker, but he takes it on the chin. Then his daughter, the one person in his life who still looks at him with innocence, love and wonder, asks about her missing kitty cat bracelet the thieves apparently took... Turns out Hutch isn't just "nobody," he's "no one to fuck with."

Such a fun film. Call it formulaic insofar as the "revenge action" genre (directed by the same guy who did John Wick,) yeah, it's on rails, but it's fucking fun, i.e.: the violence nigh over the top, each moment trumping the previous in intensity. I love how they never expressly say what Hutch did prior to settling into his current life, but it's implied many times that he's extremely scary. Worth a watch, a re-watch, a Blu-ray purchase and an Oscar.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

Army of the Dead

One thing is certain, Snyder's passion for film making is readily apparent, but it is perhaps shown at is most boisterous and fun levels here, at least initially. It's front-loaded with his signature style and aplomb, but rather suddenly gives way to more dramatic tones and that's where things get murky. The movie is tonally inconsistent, and the typical archetype cast aside from a couple isn't all that interesting, or perhaps moreso they didn't have that much to work with on paper. I went from thinking this would be a rollicking, bombastic zombie flick, to ultimately feeling like I lost a boner during sex. There is some suspense mixed in and last ditch attempts at humor, but I personally feel like the movie took the wrong path for a finale for this genre. It might've been influenced by the personal mark of tragedy for Snyder himself, which is sad to consider. It makes it more difficult to level criticism at artistic choices, because technically it's pretty solid and being a zombie movie it gets a hall pass from plot logistics. I just would've rather seen it maintain its original tone from the beginning with the fun factor holding center stage more. I actually want to rewatch Dawn of the Dead now.

Apologies to anyone who read this and hasn't seen it yet but plans to; hey, I did ispoiler it!


3 out of 5 undead limbs

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

Nobody: Amazing / Great

Workaday everyman Hutch Mansell has ground himself into an unremarkable rut in family life. He has his home broken into by two people and he chooses not to fight them, but rather allow them to flee with the few petty items they managed to get. He is ultimately emasculated for his apparent inaction by his wife, his son, his boss and coworker, but he takes it on the chin. Then his daughter, the one person in his life who still looks at him with innocence, love and wonder, asks about her missing kitty cat bracelet the thieves apparently took... Turns out Hutch isn't just "nobody," he's "no one to fuck with."

Such a fun film. Call it formulaic insofar as the "revenge action" genre (directed by the same guy who did John Wick,) yeah, it's on rails, but it's fucking fun, i.e.: the violence nigh over the top, each moment trumping the previous in intensity. I love how they never expressly say what Hutch did prior to settling into his current life, but it's implied many times that he's extremely scary. Worth a watch, a re-watch, a Blu-ray purchase and an Oscar.

Been really wanting to see this as I've only heard high praise, but I'm not digging paying $20 for an online rental yet. I think next week it'll be cheaper.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Fellowship of the Ring: Extended Version.

If 3 hours of FotR wasn't enough, you can get the 4 hour version. Which starts off with addition pointless hobbit waflle to make you think it was a bad investment, but then goes on to put in extra bits you may or may not care about, stuff that was in the books but not in the theatrical version. It's ok? Split into 2 parts, so you don't have to watch the whole 4 hours in one go. Not seeing much improvement over the original, will watch the next two at some point.

 

[Xprimentyl]

Been really wanting to see this as I've only heard high praise, but I'm not digging paying $20 for an online rental yet. I think next week it'll be cheaper.

I bought it on Prime, and it was worth every penny. Wish I'd seen it in theaters.

 

[Piscian]

I bought it on Prime, and it was worth every penny. Wish I'd seen it in theaters.

Agreed. I wish I could have seen it in theaters.

 

[Agema]

Awake (2021)

Oh lordy this film is bad. It's like an object lesson in how to take a good idea and completely squander it. The basic idea is that some event has happened, and now (almost) no-one can sleep because reasons. Don't ask, it just is, okay. So first tiredness, then poor judgement and hallucinations, and eventually death. So, society promptly collapses and some mum has a daughter who can sleep has to protect her family in the new postapocalyptic world.

The film starts so abruptly you wonder if you missed the first 10-15 minutes. After that, it's incompetently paced, predictable, boring, utterly wastes some great actors (seriously, Jennifer Jason Leigh has what is virtually a bit part and phones it so much it's like she's concentrating on something else during the phone call). The ending is so corny (and you'll see coming) it's just a bit deflating not least becausethe solution is basically the semi-joke IT advice: turn it off and on again. Never mind that, on a global scale, that answer would have been spotted within 48 hours.

The sad thing is that you can see they are kind of trying to create something - making it in parts conspicuously eerie to perhaps represent a dream-like disorientation of the major characters - but really, it's too little too late in a film that is a mess and plot-holed below the waterline.

 

[Xprimentyl]

Open Water (spoilers)
Just accept they've been dead from the very beginning.

This film has been on my strict "Do Not Watch" list since its release. I am absolutely horrified by, well, open water, and I know I wouldn't be able to sit through a film that is about my purest nightmare. Just reading your description gave me anxiety.

 

[stroopwafel]

The Amusement Park

A lost treasure from 1973 by the late George Romero which was considered lost until they found a copy a few years ago which has now been restored in 4K. Apparently Romero made the movie for the Lutheran society as a treatise about elder abuse and ageism but it was rejected for being too edgy for their taste.

I really enjoyed it. The movie is like half a century old but hasn't lost any of it's relevance. It's about an old bloke in a white waiting room stepping outside into the amusment park which can be considered the miniature version of society. Attempts to still be part of society are rejected, not taken serious or taken advantage of. As the years pile up so do the losses until there is eventually nothing left but shattered illusions and a hopeless surrender to the inevatible. In the movie it divides along similar lines as social class where the rich don't want to be confronted by the ills of the poor. There is one priceless scene where a rich person is literally carried away by servants because he doesn't want to see a poor person eat fries and stew.

I think this is one of the purest works Romero has made as it doesn't rely on zombies or monsters to explain it's metaphores but gets straight to the point. The relentless march of time and the inevatible alienation of no longer feeling needed accentuates society's relationship to decay and death. Ignored until it's reality is inevatible and the next old person arrives at the white waiting room lamenting ''there is nothing left''. You don't need zombies to show life is a horror show. As Romero shows in The Amusent Park, you just need a bunch of old people. A masterpiece in it's confrontative honesty.

 

[Dalisclock]

Raya and the Last Dragon(Disney+)-

So now that this is now longer a premium buy on top of the D+ sub we watched this with my 4 year old. It's good, entertaining and well put together, but it's nothing particularly shocking or amazing. If you're an adult who who has seen more then a couple of fantasy/adventure films in your life you know exactly more or less how this is gonna go and the film doesn't deviate from that much at all. It's even a little bit video game because the basics of the plot are: There's a cosmic keystone that keeps the darkness monsters at bay, the keystone shadows into 5 pieces and each of the 5 tribes all end up with one of the pieces and thus Raya has to take her piece and travel the known world collecting all of the pieces to rebuild the cosmic keystone and preventing the other tribes(who all have their own particular niche and biome) from taking her piece. Also the Cosmic Keystone contains the power of dragons and each one gives Sisu(her last dragon buddy) a new power(Shapeshifting, creating rain, etc) when Sisu touches it. There is some emotional core attached to this but the basic plot is "Collect the 5 magic thingys, combine them all, save the world from darkness".

OTOH, my kid loved it a lot and it was no doubt meant for the little ones more then me and my wife. On the bright side, it was a fun movie so I don't mind watching it again, I'm just not going to go out of my way to watch it again.

 

[Asita]

Treasure Island (1999)

Well...that was different. And by different I mean that it goes off the rails halfway through. You know the story. Kid gets a map from an old seadog, shares it with a confidant who introduces him to someone who can finance their journey with plans of splitting the treasure. He bonds with the ship's cook, finds out the cook and most of the crew are pirates. There's a mutiny, and kinda a civil war on the island. Then the adults decide to cut the kid out of his share of the treasure (wait...) because - after forcing him into a dangerous situation for no discernable benefit (what?) - the captain reasons that he's either dead or joined up with the pirates and thus expendable (Eh???). Then as a direct consequence of them screwing him over, the kid decides to throw his lot in with the pirates and the story ends with everyone but the kid, the cook and the marooned guy dead and they decide to split the treasure and sail to Panama. You know, the classic Treasure Island story...only not really.

...I believe my exact reaction was "...excuse me?" It's certainly a different direction than what I've seen in the other adaptations of the story, but that doesn't make it a good choice. It was surprising, but I'd say that the story suffered for it. The characters most certainly suffered for it, practically being flattened in the process. Gone is the complex duality of Silver in favor of making him almost wholly heroic. Gone is the cold but well meaning pragmatism of Smollett in favor of making him an asshole without redeeming qualities. The film is written, shot, and largely acted like a direct-to-dvd or made-for-tv movie. Nobody brought their A-game (heck, Jack Palance is near incomprehensible in his growling mutterings half the time) and the twist didn't feel earned, much less compelling.

My advice? Look for other Treasure Islands. There's no buried treasure on this one.

 

[gorfias]

I bought it on Prime, and it was worth every penny. Wish I'd seen it in theaters.

Agreed. I wish I could have seen it in theaters.

I read it is better than John Wick. Bold statement. I will see it!

Never seen it before but on HBO Max is King Arthur: Legend of the Sword by Guy Ritchie. Love his work. I recall it is a failure but I anticipate his failure will be more interesting than most people's successes.

2/5. Very meh. A wasted opportunity. Great performances, high production values. But very pedestrian. Doesn't hold a candle to movies like "Excalibur".

 

[Xprimentyl]

I read it is better than John Wick. Bold statement. I will see it!

I hurts me to say it because I love John Wick... but it might be better than John Wick.

 

[Trunkage]

Raya and the Last Dragon(Disney+)-

So now that this is now longer a premium buy on top of the D+ sub we watched this with my 4 year old. It's good, entertaining and well put together, but it's nothing particularly shocking or amazing. If you're an adult who who has seen more then a couple of fantasy/adventure films in your life you know exactly more or less how this is gonna go and the film doesn't deviate from that much at all. It's even a little bit video game because the basics of the plot are: There's a cosmic keystone that keeps the darkness monsters at bay, the keystone shadows into 5 pieces and each of the 5 tribes all end up with one of the pieces and thus Raya has to take her piece and travel the known world collecting all of the pieces to rebuild the cosmic keystone and preventing the other tribes(who all have their own particular niche and biome) from taking her piece. Also the Cosmic Keystone contains the power of dragons and each one gives Sisu(her last dragon buddy) a new power(Shapeshifting, creating rain, etc) when Sisu touches it. There is some emotional core attached to this but the basic plot is "Collect the 5 magic thingys, combine them all, save the world from darkness".

OTOH, my kid loved it a lot and it was no doubt meant for the little ones more then me and my wife. On the bright side, it was a fun movie so I don't mind watching it again, I'm just not going to go out of my way to watch it again.

I like that this felt not stuck in the European/American themes.

I also liked how trust, or lack there of, was the greatest weakness of just about everyone. I feel like they could have fleshed out each of the 5 cultures.

I enjoyed it more than most of the other Disney movies of the last 3 decades. Still it's not saying much.

It WAS the first time I went to the movies with my kid. Gonna have to start bringing the second kid soon since he turned 3

 

[Piscian]

I watched "Sputnik" on hulu last night. It was pretty terrible and not worth talking about. I had heard good things and it definitely looks good, but the plot, which it's relies heavily on, is full of holes and kind of silly. I wouldn't waste your time.

On a more positive note I finally sat today and watched "Wrath Of Man" and it was pretty great. I ignored it when the trailers hit because it appeared to be the typical Jason Statham vehicle. I used to be a fan, but after he did a few of those kicking and punching fests I got a bit desensitized in those genre films. I still like him in dramatic roles.

Wrath Of Man turned out to be something completely different and not even what I was expecting after I found out it was a Guy Ritchie film. I decided to see it because Guy Ritchie has never failed to entertain me, but this one is very "not" guy ritchie. The Story and script is more Michael Mann ala Heat or Thief. It's a kind of play on a heist movie.

Tonally it reminds me a lot of Korean crime films or maybe Takeshi Kitano's works like "Outrage". Very Somber. There's no jokes, no quips no fancy film tricks, its very hard boiled. Overall I really enjoyed it though fair warning it's very dark and macabre. I tend to be very critical of films with logic issues or outright plotholes. Honestly no major complaints about this one. I had a very small one which could technically be explained away just not likely realistic -

Spoiler

The Criminals are all Ex-military and of the same unit, even the inside man served under the same sergeant. That being the case they couldn't get away if even one of them was ID's or if the inside man didn't stay on duty the whole time. The military would ID the rest of them in a heartbeat. It's possible they'd planned for the circumstance that one did die and get ID'd, but it's never clarified. Lastly the bad actor kills everyone and leaves with the money. How he expected to get away and get the money cleaned without getting caught is not made clear, but too that point he is immediately caught so it's totally acceptable that he was a crazy idiot. I like my crime dramas best when the bad guys really do think of everything, but "the one thing they didn't plan for" is at least something I wouldn't think of.

Other that, again I thought it was a quite a ride and very good.

 

[gorfias]

Raya and the Last Dragon(Disney+)-

So now that this is now longer a premium buy on top of the D+ sub we watched this with my 4 year old. It's good, entertaining and well put together, but it's nothing particularly shocking or amazing. If you're an adult who who has seen more then a couple of fantasy/adventure films in your life you know exactly more or less how this is gonna go and the film doesn't deviate from that much at all. It's even a little bit video game because the basics of the plot are: There's a cosmic keystone that keeps the darkness monsters at bay, the keystone shadows into 5 pieces and each of the 5 tribes all end up with one of the pieces and thus Raya has to take her piece and travel the known world collecting all of the pieces to rebuild the cosmic keystone and preventing the other tribes(who all have their own particular niche and biome) from taking her piece. Also the Cosmic Keystone contains the power of dragons and each one gives Sisu(her last dragon buddy) a new power(Shapeshifting, creating rain, etc) when Sisu touches it. There is some emotional core attached to this but the basic plot is "Collect the 5 magic thingys, combine them all, save the world from darkness".

OTOH, my kid loved it a lot and it was no doubt meant for the little ones more then me and my wife. On the bright side, it was a fun movie so I don't mind watching it again, I'm just not going to go out of my way to watch it again.

Unfortunate. This is on my radar, particularly due to Chris Stuckmann saying it was one of the best animations he has seen in a long time. Maybe, given the quality of movies since Tarzan, that isn't a great compliment.


EDIT: Saw it. Nice, fun colorful animation, very well done. Very pedestrian until the final act that good pretty terrific. Worth a watch for people that can appreciate some good animation and fantasy.

 

[Gordon_4]

I read it is better than John Wick. Bold statement. I will see it!

Never seen it before but on HBO Max is King Arthur: Legend of the Sword by Guy Ritchie. Love his work. I recall it is a failure but I anticipate his failure will be more interesting than most people's successes.

2/5. Very meh. A wasted opportunity. Great performances, high production values. But very pedestrian. Doesn't hold a candle to movies like "Excalibur".

The best parts of that movie are when it’s Guy Ritchie British gangster movie IN MEDIEVAL TIMES. Those parts are fucking brilliant and I’d watch a whole movie of them. Every time it tries to be epic fantasy; it soils itself.

Speaking of British gangsters…..

The Bank Job.

This movie has a special place in my heart because it was a date night movie with my wife when it was at the cinema. It’s also just a really good fun 70s period, low level caper and spy movie with Stathem revisiting the kind of roles that made him famous before he was a badass action hero. Long story short it’s inspired by the Lloyds Bank of London heist with a bit of (largely made up) adjacent MI5 skullduggery for flavour. No big set pieces, no over the top action and one very memorable if unpleasant use of a sand blaster.

9/10, give it a shot.

 

[gorfias]

The best parts of that movie are when it’s Guy Ritchie British gangster movie IN MEDIEVAL TIMES. Those parts are fucking brilliant and I’d watch a whole movie of them. Every time it tries to be epic fantasy; it soils itself.

Speaking of British gangsters…..

The Bank Job.

This movie has a special place in my heart because it was a date night movie with my wife when it was at the cinema. It’s also just a really good fun 70s period, low level caper and spy movie with Stathem revisiting the kind of roles that made him famous before he was a badass action hero. Long story short it’s inspired by the Lloyds Bank of London heist with a bit of (largely made up) adjacent MI5 skullduggery for flavour. No big set pieces, no over the top action and one very memorable if unpleasant use of a sand blaster.

9/10, give it a shot.

That's on Netflix. On my radar now, thanks! Heh, Netflix calls it a "vintage" thriller.