Discuss and Rate the Last Film You Watched

[happyninja42]

[can't quote you for some reason]

@happyninja42 I wouldn't say Face the Music is a cash grab. I mean sure, it's made to make money obviously, but it didn't give me that cynical feeling that, for example, the Disney live-action remakes do. Alex Winter has tried to get a sequel made for years, but it didn't feel like it was for the sake of fame and money, but because he just really likes these characters. It doesn't feel like an attempt to revitalize the franchise, or them trying to pass on the torch to younger characters, which they had the perfect oppertunity to do. Face the Music feels like a reunion tour, one last hoorah.

This movie still feels like Bill and Ted, not just some corporate product wearing its skin. I think the inherent problem with this movie is that it's a sequel to a franchise that was never really that good, but it holds a special place in our hearts. And a sequel now is likely never going to compete with how we felt about those movies back then, eventhough quality wise it's pretty much on the same level. There is actually a very touching scene that involves Bill and Ted meeting a version of themselves in the future that feels set up as just another joke, and in a way it is, but it's also quite sincere in that quintessential Bill and Ted way. Kinda like the proposal scene in Bogus Journey, where you're laughing at the situation, but you know that for Bill and Ted it's this very serious moment, and it makes you love these guys even more.

Also, the daughters are called Bill and Ted. There's some variations throughout the movie, like Billie and Thea, and I think at one point they're refered to by their full names, which I think are Theodora and Willemina. But Bill and Ted having named their own daughters after one another is certainly in this movie.

Well that's encouraging to hear. I might check it out.

I am THRILLED to hear they did actually stick with the Bill/Ted naming convention with the girls. I could've sworn I saw something early on that indicated they just named them regular girl names, with no joke in there, so I was very upset. glad to know I was wrong.

 

[Piscian]

I watched "The Forever Purge" last night.

I'd heard good things about it, even from Escapist I believe. I vaguely the recall the first two movies and some of the third so I watched one of those timeline retrospectives on the purge which was kind of enlightening. I guess in the prequel and TV show they established that The Purge was created by an Ultra conservative group who'd come into political power. The purpose was indeed to use the purge as a means to control minority populations and do sinister land grab type stuff. I kinda want to go back and watch the prequel because its apparently quite good and explains that the first purge was a failure as people ended up just throwing parties so the government sent in mercenary hit squads dressed as revelers to amp up violence and target political/civil rivals. I think this was always an assumed undertone of the first two films, but they've made it official.

Anyway the forever purge focuses on white and hispanic border families that get caught up in an uprising where in Anarchist and proudboy-esque hate groups decide they've had enough and want to use the Purge to take power. America is essentially falling and Canada and Mexico give a brief window for amnesty to any who can make it across the border. It wears its plot on its sleeve, mexican and white families learn that race doesn't matter when you're running for your lives. Though not particularly subtle the acting and story telling was quite good. They've all but removed any camp from the series at this point. It's all played quite seriously as a drama with little in the way of gore. The stand-in group for alt-right nationalists was pretty spot on and timely. Its a strange feeling the US these days as now that Trumps left office everyones trying to pretend like the alt-right nationalist groups just dissipated so Forever Purge almost feels dated..almost. Highly recommend. Very curious to see where they take the series from here.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Happy Death Day 2U

Not as good as the first one, but still liked it more than I thought I would. Massive props to Jessica Rothe - she brings tons to the character and carries the whole movie. Having the character trying to regain control of a situation she already bested in the first movie should feel dull and derivative but she sells the humor of a control freak being unfairly jerked around by fate beautifully. And I feel this is 100% in her portrayal of the character moreso than in the movie's writing, which was pretty mediocre. There's some revolting Juno-speak and I wish the plot would have more fun with the time-loop constraints like in the first one, but overall, can't say I didn't enjoy myself. I'd watch a third one so long as Rothe keeps starring.

 

[BrawlMan]

The stand-in group for alt-right nationalists was pretty spot on and timely. Its a strange feeling the US these days as now that Trumps left office everyones trying to pretend like the alt-right nationalist groups just dissipated so Forever Purge almost feels dated..almost. Highly recommend. Very curious to see where they take the series from here.

Not really. These movies got more and more relevant each year. They were ahead of the curb starting with Anarchy. I highly recommend you re-watch Anarchy and Election Year again. Purge 4 is okay, just don't expect too much. I have no plans watching the TV series. I did notice the action gets better and better with each sequel.

Spoiler: DT Purge Reviews

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

The Final Girls

By an amazing coincidence, another time loop movie about a girl learning to let go of the memory of her dead mom while battling a slasher killer. But Happy Death Day 2U stars Jessica Rothe, and Final Girls doesn't. 1-0.

The time loop element doesn't factor very much actually. Five friends get warped into an 80s slasher flick (famously starring the lead girl's mom, since dead) and while it's established in the first act that reality resets every 92 minutes to the beginning of the movie they're trapped in, it never does that ever again. So for all intents and purposes they only get one shot at surviving a slasher flick, while trying to use their knowledge of tropes to their advantage (although not very successfully).

The movie goes for an emotional moment between daughter and mom (or character played by mom) that did nothing for me. Happy Death Day 2U on the other hand got me teary with a similar scene. It didn't just feel more real, it felt earned. 2-0.

For a parody of slasher movies this one's mostly bloodless and not at all raunchy. The dude playing the horndog jock and the girl playing the bimbo were on point but that's about it. Jason X was a better parody of Jason movies AND we got violence and nudity in that.

 

[thebobmaster]

Happy Death Day 2U

Not as good as the first one, but still liked it more than I thought I would. Massive props to Jessica Rothe - she brings tons to the character and carries the whole movie. Having the character trying to regain control of a situation she already bested in the first movie should feel dull and derivative but she sells the humor of a control freak being unfairly jerked around by fate beautifully. And I feel this is 100% in her portrayal of the character moreso than in the movie's writing, which was pretty mediocre. There's some revolting Juno-speak and I wish the plot would have more fun with the time-loop constraints like in the first one, but overall, can't say I didn't enjoy myself. I'd watch a third one so long as Rothe keeps starring.

One thing I really liked about the film was the chemistry between Rothe and whoever played her mother (can't be arsed to look it up). You could really buy why Tree had such a struggle with her choice, and that made the film so much stronger than it could have been. That scene where she's discussing her choice (purely hypothetically, of course) with her mother was a surprisingly emotional scene.

 

[Piscian]

Pig (2021) 10/10

Its a running theme that Nicolas Cage, due to suffering from like 40 million in debt, does 2-3 straight video paycheck films a year. Unlike some of his contemporaries he's still doing serious pictures every few years. The most recent being "Pig". NC plays an recluse truffle farmer whos Pig is stolen and he goes on a mission to find it. The trailer sort of misrepresents the film enough that you think it might be a sort of bizarre action film like his last standout picture "Mandy". This is actually more of a serious Drama. Regardless it's brilliant. It's amazing how good of an actor he still is when he cares. This one is prime Anthony Hopkins hayday quality acting and emoting from Cage. You can feel everything hes thinking and affecting throughout the film. Theres a couple moments that would almost be laugh out loud funny if they weren't so earnest and beautiful. I'll admit I almost cried at the climax. Highly recommend if you enjoy more atmospheric character portrait films. You don't really gotta take my word for it on this one -

"On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 97% based on 102 reviews, with an average rating of 8.2/10. The site's critics consensus reads, "Like the animal itself, Pig defies the hogwash of expectations with a beautiful odyssey of loss and love anchored by Nicolas Cage's affectingly raw performance."[9] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 84 out of 100, based on 28 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[10]"

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Little Nicky

Adam Sandler affects an incredibly annoying wheezing voice and puts on a dumb face like he suffered a stroke for a 90 minute Popeye's commercial populated with SNL has-beens and bad CGI.

 

[Xprimentyl]

Without Remorse I Saw It / I Hadn't Previously

Extremely formulaic Clancy joint: guy is wronged by the military/government, seeks to uncover the truth. Was entertaining enough, but nothing about it was stellar. These kinds of movies are almost tongue-in-cheek anymore, like, they know what they are, but still assume a façade that they're unique enough to not be relegated to the pile of mostly identical films released over the past 20 years. At least have some fun with it, ala John Wick, but no, this one's played straight with an ending most see coming before the opening idents fade out.

 

[BrawlMan]

Fear Street Parts 1 (1994) & 2 (1978) - Netflix (2021).

These are Netflix movies released one week apart with the final to arrive on Friday 16th. Maybe I should have waited until then and I'd watched all three, but oh well. They are adapted (I think very loosely) from some YA horror books by the author R.L. Stine, although interestingly, the movies are "upgraded" and rated adults only. There are still YA elements to them, but they broadly succeed as being adult fare.

The years are well chosen. 1994, of course, is the self-aware slasher horror reboot era. 1978 is the original slasher horror era. And so it is that Part 1 is very much in the mould of Scream, and Part 2 in the mould of Friday 13th. However, both movies manage to add their own modern take on them, and the end result is pretty positive. The basic idea is that there are two towns, Sunnyside and Shadyville. Sunnyville is rich and happy; Shadyville is a pverty-stricken dump, believed afflicted by a curse by a 17th century witch Sarah Fier: and indeed every generation or so, someone goes on a murderous rampage there. The movie starts with the obligatory random murdered teen, like any horror. From that point, our heroine Deena is fretting over her collapsed relationship with Sam, and is gradually drawn into another mass murder. She is ably assisted by her brother Josh, meets back up with her girlfriend Sam, and various other teens - all of whom may or may not survive but I wouldn't want to spoil that for you.

I am likewise going to skip carefully into Part 2 hopefully without giving too much away, where our (surviving) heroes from Part 1 find out the history of the last mass slaughter, all very homagey to Friday 13th, as mentioned, as a crazed killer cuts loose at a Summer holiday camp in the woods. Again, a healthy supply of teens to kill. And in fact also children - although the film decides to protect our sensibilities by having them murdered off-camera, and we'll only see the remains. I'm not toally sure how I feel about that: I understand why it was done, but it was perhaps a lack of boldness.

I don't think Part 2 is quite as good as Part 1, but they are both good movies. Unlike the generally interchangeable and unexceptional victims of most horror movies who are really little more than walking sacks of flesh to be messily disposed of, I think you are invited to care about and like many of them, and it makes it a little bit more wrenchingly sad when some of them die. And that also perhaps makes for a better horror movie.

So good work, looking forward to part 3 (1666). That that will be I suspect in the style of a sort of old style witch horror.

I finished Part 1 last week and Part 2 just now. Both I found about equally good. I admit to enjoying Part 1 a little more, but I care for the kids/teens and don't want to see them died. That is how you do proper horror in a slasher film. I find it funny that Part 1 takes place when I was 5, and my older bro was 11 at the time. We're just two kids in Detroit when all of this crazy shit is going on. Even more eerie and ironic is that my dad's birthday is today, and the tragedy took place on July 19th, 1978.

Looking forward to Part 3.

BTW can they adapt some R.L Stine's other Fear Street and Non-Fear Street stories? The FS stories with the vampires is a good start. And then you can add Hit & Run and The Babysitter series in to the mix. Those are his stand alone and separate series respectively.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

BTW can they adapt some R.L Stine's other Fear Street and Non-Fear Street stories? The FS stories with the vampires is a good start. And then you can add Hit & Run and The Babysitter series in to the mix. Those are his stand alone and separate series respectively.

Didn't they already do The Babysitter? Is that not the same thing? I don't know the RL Stine story.

Edit: Looked up the movie, and the plot of the book. Yeah, probably not the same thing.

 

[BrawlMan]

Didn't they already do The Babysitter? Is that not the same thing? I don't know the RL Stine story.

Edit: Looked up the movie, and the plot of the book. Yeah, probably not the same thing.

Looks like you answered your own question. Trust me, if The Babysitter got adapted, my brother and I would have already know that long ago. We were big R.L fans back in day; especially big bro. If I remember correctly, he stopped reading Babysitter after III. Got too silly and convoluted, and was bored afterward.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

A Quiet Place Part II

Perfectly good movie, not as good as the first one. Right off the bat the sequel is at a disadvantage because 1) we know what the monsters look like, and if you don't remember, a heavily action-packed prologue will remind you; 2) we know their one weakness, because finding one was the whole point of the first movie. So the sequel just doesn't have that sense of urgency or tension. Been there, done that. The main characters split and fan out into a bunch of quests of sliding importance, which also means the movie feels somewhat directionless. You have your main quest involving the deaf girl and Cillian Murphy, and everything else feels like padding.

Not to knock on the movie but I walked out with a sense of diminishing returns. The rules about the monsters remain strict yet somehow inconsistent.

 

[Piscian]

Without Remorse I Saw It / I Hadn't Previously

Extremely formulaic Clancy joint: guy is wronged by the military/government, seeks to uncover the truth. Was entertaining enough, but nothing about it was stellar. These kinds of movies are almost tongue-in-cheek anymore, like, they know what they are, but still assume a façade that they're unique enough to not be relegated to the pile of mostly identical films released over the past 20 years. At least have some fun with it, ala John Wick, but no, this one's played straight with an ending most see coming before the opening idents fade out.

The trailer lost me at "he is more dangerous and effective than any man we have in the field" and its played soooo serious. *yawn* I could tell already a 5 year wrote it. I just wonder when they're gonna learn nobody is into AMERICAN SUPER SOLDIER OUT FOR REVENGE movies anymore. Then again Gerard Butler just did like 3 of them recently so I must be in the minority.

Let me guess? His country betrayed him, but it wasn't actually his country it was corruption from the inside by some cheap government sindly wishlash stand in for Ray Liotta?

Theres a certain alore to films like John Wick and Nobody that differients them, probably going all the way back to Die Hard. People like human protagonists. You could argue that John wick and the others are essentially invincible super soldiers, but the tone and story are dramatically different than something like "without remorse".

I skipped it. I just can't bring myself to watch it if the story is just Michael B. Jordan being a badass for 2 hours. You know what was good? "the Long Kiss Goodnight" Now I feel like rewatching it.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

The trailer lost me at "he is more dangerous and effective than any man we have in the field" and its played soooo serious. *yawn* I could tell already a 5 year wrote it. I just wonder when they're gonna learn nobody is into AMERICAN SUPER SOLDIER OUT FOR REVENGE movies anymore. Then again Gerard Butler just did like 3 of them recently so I must be in the minority.

Let me guess? His country betrayed him, but it wasn't actually his country it was corruption from the inside by some cheap government sindly wishlash stand in for Ray Liotta?

Theres a certain alore to films like John Wick and Nobody that differients them, probably going all the way back to Die Hard. People like human protagonists. You could argue that John wick and the others are essentially invincible super soldiers, but the tone and story are dramatically different than something like "without remorse".

I skipped it. I just can't bring myself to watch it if the story is just Michael B. Jordan being a badass for 2 hours. You know what was good? "the Long Kiss Goodnight" Now I feel like rewatching it.

You nailed it.

I watched it with my dad, because aging boomers love that shit, and even he found it both silly and overly formulaic.

 

[Dalisclock]

Without Remorse I Saw It / I Hadn't Previously

Extremely formulaic Clancy joint: guy is wronged by the military/government, seeks to uncover the truth. Was entertaining enough, but nothing about it was stellar. These kinds of movies are almost tongue-in-cheek anymore, like, they know what they are, but still assume a façade that they're unique enough to not be relegated to the pile of mostly identical films released over the past 20 years. At least have some fun with it, ala John Wick, but no, this one's played straight with an ending most see coming before the opening idents fade out.

Well, the book is 30 years old and the movie has apparently been in dev hell for 20 of those. I suspect that's a lot of the problem right there. The book and movie plot seem to have almost nothing to do with you, because the book is basically Rambo re-enacting Death Wish against a Drug RIng before getting sent to VIetnam to Rambo it up there and rescue some prisoners. You know, Clancy faff.

I haven't seen the film and have no urge to.

 

[Dalisclock]

Watched The Muppets and Luca this last weekend.

The Muppets(2011) is revival film for the Muppet Franchise, set up as a "Get the Band Back together" type film because an EVIL OIL BARON named Tex RIchman(I see what you did there) is going to buy the old Muppet studio(in the middle of LA), tear it down and tear it down unless the muppets come up with 2 Million dollars in a week. Since the muppets have been scattered to the 4 winds since the original movies/show ended.....look, you've seen this plot before.The writers know this too and there's a lot of self awareness in the humor here and your enjoyment of the movie hinges on your enjoyment of the muppets and the humor, because that's what it is. It's a musical at times, complete with a small town going into a production number because why the hell not?

It was fun overall. Chris Cooper as the villian is having a lot of fun as a character who has no soul(He can't laugh, so he just says "Maniacal Laughter" and expects his flunkies to laugh for him), the characters are on point and the plot works just well enough to drive everything along. There's also a subplot where the network tells them they need a guest star to go on the air and since all of Kermit's old contacts are apparently dead or retired(there's a 30 year old rolodex he slowly reduces to nothing trying to find someone), the rest of them kidnap Jack Black and put him onstage, still visibly tied up and protesting he's been abducted and yet nobody cares. Which for some reason I enjoyed far more than I should have "Why did you kidnap Jack Black?" "We decided as a group that celebrities are not a people".

Luca, the newest Pixar movie, is a movie about two fish boys who hang out in 1960's italy and make some friends and try to win a Vespa, because for some reason the sea people can turn into land people/humans if they dry off out of the water and, sure, why not? It's very low stakes, with a local bully and the one boy's parents come looking for him to drag him back to the ocean, and mostly spend a lot of time throwing water on random kids to try to find their son.

It's not Amazing but it's pretty chill and good enough for a quiet afternoon to watch with the kid.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Theres a certain alore to films like John Wick and Nobody that differients them, probably going all the way back to Die Hard. People like human protagonists. You could argue that John wick and the others are essentially invincible super soldiers, but the tone and story are dramatically different than something like "without remorse".

In Die Hard (the first one), he's fairly human, dealing with airsickness and lack of shoes. In the latter ones he turns into a boring superhero without a cape. John Wick, however is a kung fu vampire without bloodsucking and with guns from pretty early on. You could swap Blade and John Wick around without too much trouble.

 

[Xprimentyl]

Last Flag Flying: Great / Perfect

Steve Carrell is a Vietnam vet who reconnects with a couple fellow veterans (Bryan Cranston and Lawrence Fishburne) when his son is killed in the line of duty, and Carrell wishes their presence for the burial in Arlington National Cemetery. I might have missed it in the myriad conversations throughout the film, but it's left fairly ambiguous what their connection is, but it's implied there was some trauma. Whatever their history together, it led to Carrell serving 2 years in military prison, Fishburne to God and Cranston to drink. Yet, the three very differing personalities +30 years later rekindle their brotherhood and set in on given Carrell's son the burial he deserves.

I'm not much for dramas, but this is a man's drama, and a damned good one, if I can say. Cranston steals the show in pretty much every way; both his character and his portrayal of said character simply dominate the screen; you can't wait to hear what's going to come out of his mouth next. I don't think Cranston is underrated, but I don't think his name is in discussion enough with some of the greats whose name alone can carry a film like a Tom Hanks or such.

 

[OblongYellow]

Just watched The War with Grandpa. It's a good family movie, there are a few funny moments. I would give this a 7.5 out of 10 being the highest.