Discuss and Rate the Last Film You Watched

[SilentPony]

Just got back from Firestarter. The fuck is going on with reviews? They said it was a hot mess of dog shit. I thought it was great! If you tightened up the sricpt a little, made it an hour longer, and changed some of the lore around I would be 100% satisfied with this being the MCU's introduction of mutants and the Xmen. Its basically a pyrokinetic Xman origin story that rolls the credits literally the day before she's brought to Xavier's school for gifted youngsters. Like truly I half expected an end credit scene with Patrick Stewart, its that compelling on an origin story.

8/10 give it a watch pretending its about a mutant and tell me it wouldn't fit perfectly into the MCU.

 

[Bartholen]

Vampire's Kiss, 8/10

This is a Nic Cage dark comedy about a literary agent whose life starts falling apart after he is (supposedly) bitten by a vampire. It's the Nic Cage performance to end all Nic Cage performances: weird accent that comes and goes, losing his shit completely, ultra weird body movements, bug eyes, screaming at the top of his lungs, it's all here. And it's gloriously entertaining and hilarious. It's so entertaining in fact that it's easy to miss how clever and even deep the film is due to the central performance taking all the attention. There's clear commentary on workplace culture, abusive bosses, addiction, sex and race and power dynamics. It'd make for an interesting double bill with American Psycho: both are about young, successful and psychotic men in the upper echelons of New York. There's even a scene in American Psycho I believe to be a straight up homage to this film.

What can be both a strength and a weakness of the film is how it doesn't really initially spell out what kind of film it is, and that's why it can be misinterpreted as "so bad it's good". But after 15-20 minutes there's no ambiguity, and it's a really fun watch.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness

6 out of ten broken watches

Kind of a mess of a movie, but ultimately still fairly entertaining. It tries doing so much and winds up saying so little. Olsen plays one of the most frustratingly annoying, stupid villains. Her character doubles down on the dumbest parts of Wanda Vision and somehow manages to be even worse. Then a revelation that could’ve easily fit anywhere in the movie is saved for the very end because what little of an arc it has is made of silly putty to begin with. To be fair, the chaotic nature of its plot filler kinda fits with the theme, but it’s nothing to lose sleep over. Sam Raimi at least closes it out with his signature calling card to good effect.

Also, Hawkeye did the kid sidekick better.

 

[gorfias]

Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness
I got to see this at the theater tonight. 7.5/10. Best Marvel movie since End Game, which too was not perfect, but I really love it and have watched it multiple times.
I hear it had more reshoots than any other Marvel movie to date. As much as 85% of it may have been reshot. Thank goodness as I understand the original run has Strange a supporting character in HIS movie with no character arc. This version has such an arc.
It is a visual feast. It has some good food for thought (do the ends ever really justify the means?) Plenty of Raimi flourishes, especially slamming doors.
I am bummed one cameo didn't happen

Spoiler

no Tom Cruise as a version of Ironman

Hope you all get to the theaters to support this movie.

 

[Ezekiel]

In Cold Blood (1967)

Very good. Kieslowski most likely watched this before making A Short Film About Killing, part 5 or 6 of Dekalog.

 

[gorfias]

In Cold Blood (1967)

Very good. Kieslowski most likely watched this before making A Short Film About Killing, part 5 or 6 of Dekalog.

I confuse In Cold Blood with the 1979 film based upon another true story, "The Onion Field". James Woods stars as murderers are NOT put to death for their cruel murder of 2 police officers.

 

[Agema]

Chaos Walking (2021)

Starring Tom Hollander as some adolescent who lives in a futuristic pioneer MGTOW/incel community on a colony planet, where humans battle an indigenous species called the "Spackle" (really - that's what you called them?). Then the second wave of colonists arrive and Daisy Ridley crashlands nearby. Holy shit, a female. Our hero and heroine have to flee the rampaging men, and a load of predictable adventure action ensues. The other thing of note is that living creatures release some sort of telepathic signalling with a glowy haze called the "noise", which is reveals their thoughts but can be used to create distracting illusions. Except human girls/women who don't. Insert gender issues commentary here.

Why this setup? In short: Young Adult. This is typical of the sort of thing about YA that makes me grind my teeth: contrivance and artificiality to make some sort of scenario work. I knew it was YA before I started which lessens the pain, but it's still grating. Beyond that, it is dull, predictable, the action scenes are mediocre, and it just sort of stumbles along with uneven pacing, bland characterisation and very little chemistry between the leads. It's no disaster by any means, but it singly lacks any compelling reason to watch.

Ever since The Hunger Games, there's been a drive to make SF YA films based on popular books which mostly turn out to be very undistinguished. Maze Runner, Divergent (or whatever it was called), Ready Player One and now this. Hopefully, people will soon realise they suck and stop.

 

[BrawlMan]

Ever since The Hunger Games, there's been a drive to make SF YA films based on popular books which mostly turn out to be very undistinguished. Maze Runner, Divergent (or whatever it was called), Ready Player One and now this. Hopefully,

Whenever one of these comes out, people seem to forget immediately. The teenagers even more so. If I ask somebody what Maze Runner is, most of them would say, "Maze what now?". Didn't Divergent do even worse, and even more people forgot?

 

[Chimpzy]

Jackass Forever

So much cock and ball torture. As infathomably juvenile and stupid as it is tho, I got a lot of nostalgic enjoyment out of it. Kind of felt like a teen again, watching these goobers get chewed up, back when MTV was actually still fun.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Whenever one of these comes out, people seem to forget immediately. The teenagers even more so. If I ask somebody what Maze Runner is, most of them would say, " Maze what now?". Didn't Divergent do even worse, and even more people forgot?

They made the Divergent series into a film series, intending to make the final book into 2 movies (like you do nowdays), but they never made the second part. Then they were going to make it into a TV series but decided not to.

At least the Shadowhunters TV series got to have an ending, albiet a bit rushed.

 

[Xprimentyl]

Jackass Forever

So much cock and ball torture. As infathomably juvenile and stupid as it is tho, I got a lot of nostalgic enjoyment out of it. Kind of felt like a teen again, watching these goobers get chewed up, back when MTV was actually still fun.

I never had any sort of fondness for the Jackass troop or their antics; they're like a bunch of stoners who refuse to grow up to the tune of severe bodily harm. Aren't they all in like their 50s by now? What the hell? Find another shtick; this is pathetic.

 

[Chimpzy]

I never had any sort of fondness for the Jackass troop or their antics; they're like a bunch of stoners who refuse to grow up to the tune of severe bodily harm. Aren't they all in like their 50s by now? What the hell? Find another shtick; this is pathetic.

Yes, afaik most of the original crew is in their late 40's. Tho a lot of the dangerous physical stunts in this movie are done by new younger dudes. Doesn't make it any less stupid, that I agree with.

 

[gorfias]

Yes, afaik most of the original crew is in their late 40's. Tho a lot of the dangerous physical stunts in this movie are done by new younger dudes. Doesn't make it any less stupid, that I agree with.

Kinda reminds me of a recent documentary I saw on HBO about Tony Hawk. Back in the day, I played this a bunch with the boy. Tony Hawk Underground 2 for the OG Xbox was 720 P way back then! An amazing achievement. But those games allowed you to play as other skateboarders who, in the early 2000s, were still young fellows. Well, it has been 20 years. They're all losing their hair and their teeth! Ah. We are mortal.

I loved toward the end of JAF, we see Johnny K younger do the same stunt as his older self and young JK walks it off. Old JK gets a hospital visit.

 

[Xprimentyl]

Yes, afaik most of the original crew is in their late 40's. Tho a lot of the dangerous physical stunts in this movie are done by new younger dudes. Doesn't make it any less stupid, that I agree with.

Jesus, they've passed the torch to another generation of asinine masochists? At least I can't complain they're being disingenuous; what they're selling is in the title; shame on the buyers.

 

[Agema]

Whenever one of these comes out, people seem to forget immediately. The teenagers even more so. If I ask somebody what Maze Runner is, most of them would say, " Maze what now?". Didn't Divergent do even worse, and even more people forgot?

Yeah, pretty much. I think Maze Runner and sequels made a tidy profit though, in part because they were made on a much more modest budget.

 

[Piscian]

Some odds & ends

You are not my mother

I was pretty disappointed by this one as I quite liked "Hole in the Ground" and this was a reversal of that with pretty solid reviews. The premise is rather straight forward - a girls mother who struggles with bouts of depression disappears for a few days only to return full of energy and different. They go pretty much straight to her mom being a changing goblin which is common folklore in the UK. Unfortunately theres minimal scares or body horror. Mostly her mom acts crazy until towards the end when we get glimpses of a more engrossing monster. The acting is fine, but I feel compelled to recommending skipping this one. Just no real reward for time spent.

X (2022)

Blegh. I call myself a horror fan, but I'm not the Rob Zombie, I heart Fangoria horror fan. I'm not particularly into blood and guts, but I am fascinated by a good scare or some spooky ghosts. Occasionally I'll degrade myself to catching one of these if I hear good things, but I was really just not into it. X is a texas chainsaw massacre homage by Ti West in which a team rents a farm cottage to film a porno and yadda yadda farmers are evil. No twists or anything like that just a young people being murdered and sex. Not my sandwich, but critics raved about it. Cant recommend it unless you're there for the gory experience. If so yeah, tits, eyeballs, people getting stabbed etc. Thinking on it I do enjoy some gore. I liked the Hatchett trilogy and the original Wrong Turn series. I guess one difference is that I didn't like any of the characters and there was no monster.


The Northman

Similar to The Green Knight theres not much story here. The film is a very straight forward tale of viking revenge, based on an old Norse tale that shares similarities with Hamlet.

This was a passion project driven by the star ‎Alexander Skarsgård who had supposedly been working his whole career towards an opportunity to do one for his homeland. Its actually written by some Scandinavian folks and features bjork so you can tell already this is a personal one.

The real draw is the music, acting and atmosphere and boy does it delivery, once it gets going the whole thing is entrapping, escalating towards a revenge of the sith style climax. The media is kind of all over it already, but it definitely has my recommendation.

 

[Phoenixmgs]

X (2022)

Blegh. I call myself a horror fan, but I'm not the Rob Zombie, I heart Fangoria horror fan. I'm not particularly into blood and guts, but I am fascinated by a good scare or some spooky ghosts. Occasionally I'll degrade myself to catching one of these if I hear good things, but I was really just not into it. X is a texas chainsaw massacre homage by Ti West in which a team rents a farm cottage to film a porno and yadda yadda farmers are evil. No twists or anything like that just a young people being murdered and sex. Not my sandwich, but critics raved about it. Cant recommend it unless you're there for the gory experience. If so yeah, tits, eyeballs, people getting stabbed etc. Thinking on it I do enjoy some gore. I liked the Hatchett trilogy and the original Wrong Turn series. I guess one difference is that I didn't like any of the characters and there was no monster.

I also checked it out because of the good reviews and it was a slog. It was just like an average 70s horror movie at best.

 

[Piscian]

I also checked it out because of the good reviews and it was a slog. It was just like an average 70s horror movie at best.

I get the impression from critics that it was supposed to be funny. I just didn't see it. It played itself way too serious.

 

[Ezekiel]

Was watching some Mexican movie, but became very tired twenty minutes in, slept a few hours

Finally fully watched Canoa: A Shameful Memory (1976). A poor town fearful of outside forces (godless Communists) is incited into lynching some young university workers who just wanted to pass through to go hiking. Good unintentional horror movie. Well, partly intentional. That guy staring with his big wide eyes as he tells what happened to some other college students weeks ago as the mob amasses outside gives those vibes. Feels part documentary, in how there are these large snippets commenting on the town and the priest in interviews (and the lack of music), but it's all drama.

 

[XsjadoBlayde]

Parapod: A British Ghost Hunt (Prime, bought)
Based off the (now seemingly finished) Parapod comedy podcast about two northeners, one bumbling believer and one voice of reason talking about supernatural stories, it's not really a film I can see anyone accidentally stumbling across without specifically looking for it after learning of it from listening to said podcast. So how could anyone review this for an outsider looking for recommendation? You just can't. And if you've stumbled upon this film by total happenstance with zero knowledge of the podcast, then we must seriously question what you've been up to during those sporadic 'blackouts' the last few years.
For those who do know the podcast, well it's basically a more expensive, outdoorsy episode with professional sound recording and a few more awkward moments, seemingly hoping to ape the "sincere" ghost hunting programs, except unable to escape the hijinks and borderline banter between the two hosts. Mostly, I'm just a little sad they haven't done any new episodes since the recent explosion of conspiracy madness infecting the world post coronavirus. Though I suppose the dynamic would be different with the extent of the craziness merely being too far beyond Barry's limited gullibility for the usual back 'n forths.

Tales of the Creeping Death (Prime, bought)
Ok, this wasn't too great in the end. Some nice ideas here and there with committed performances, but the strains of budget and technical competency are hard to ignore. While I can accept low budget horror in many forms, this doesn't seem to apply a consistent level of care to scenes. The practical effects are appreciated, but wierdly missing in some shots where it shouldn't have been a problem to add. The sound mixing in a few scenes is poor enough to make even my casual-ass ears realise that sound mixing is a thing that can be fucked up too. This feels like a promising student project that suffered a few setbacks in production and just had to release it in time for the final exam as is.

Last Night in Soho (Prime, Bought)
Finally a film that can be recommended without asterisks, exemptions, warnings, disclaimers or the signing of legally-absolving documents! Feels like ages since one of these has snuck by. Is best to go in with minimal knowledge, but a short summary: an Edgar Wright directed film about young woman, obsessed with the 60s, raised entirely from Cornwall on her way to fulfill her ambition of becoming a fashion designer by way of a student course in London, Soho.