Discuss and Rate the Last Film You Watched

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thebobmaster

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Watched Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child. Other than the remake, this remains my least enjoyed Nightmare film. Freddy's Dead (which is tomorrow night) is probably worse technically, but this one takes itself quite seriously, which makes it bad in a not-fun way. Kills are still neat, but pretty much everything between them is bland and boring.
 
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Phoenixmgs

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Bullet Train - 7/10

It's basically a Snatch/Smokin' Aces type movie, not as good as Snatch but better than Smokin' Aces. Brad Pitt is the main star and he's always great. The supporting cast is overall solid as well. Some of the "bits" throughout the movie are overdone and repeated too much feeling forced at times. The movie is definitely overlong, could've trimmed at least 15 minutes. The ending was too over-the-top/CGI for me but still entertaining once I just went with it, I think going with a more over-the-top Tarantino-like style (shorter quick bursts of action that the movie kinda did before the ending) would've been better and also shortened the ending quite a bit.

Hocus Pocus - 6/10

I decided to rewatch it before watching the new one and it holds up pretty well. The movie has really odd tone fluctuations but it somehow works, the witches come off as dumb and funny one moment then legit "scary" the next moment. There are a few "goofs" as the witches are from 300 years ago and one of the witches comments on cooking lobster in margarine (which she wouldn't know about) and the chase scene (protags in a car and witch on a broomstick) kinda doesn't make sense for the witch to be impersonating a cop but still a decently fun scene. After rewatching this one, I have a feeling that the new one is gonna be quite shit as they really don't make movies like this anymore and the tone is either gonna be super silly or too serious.

Confess, Fletch

John Hamm (Mad Men etc) stars as the titular character, based on the book series. This is also a sequel of sorts to the Chevy Chase movies.
But none of that really matters- it's just a fun stupid mystery comedy of the sort that doesn't seem to exist any more and it's a damn shame because it's a good time.
Why I like this movie:

1- It's under 2 hours
2- While it's technically part of a franchise or "cinematic universe," you certainly don't need to have watched or read anything because it's just about a loveable scamp getting involved with mischief.
3- Cast is great
4- Jokes are funny, mostly (this one scene where he fake-interviews a lifestyle expert had me actually lol)
5- Cast is solid, with Hamm but also Kyle McLachlan, a comedian a recognized from The Daily Show, and an Italian lady or at least someone who plays an Italian lady convincingly.
- Unfortunately the weak link was the Countess played by an actress I normally like but her attempt at an over-the-top bougie rich Italian is cringe.

If this would have come out in the 1990's I would have rated it like 6/10 because it's pretty ok with some solid moments and instantly forgettable, but seeing it now it is like a refreshing cool drink in a sweltering season of franchise nonsense, tedious prestige award bait and "controversial" streaming stuff. So 10/10.
Ha, I also gave this a 6 a few pages back. I thought the reveals were quite disappointing for the type of movie it is, overall fun movie though.
 
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twistedmic

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Bullet Train - 7/10

It's basically a Snatch/Smokin' Aces type movie, not as good as Snatch but better than Smokin' Aces. Brad Pitt is the main star and he's always great. The supporting cast is overall solid as well. Some of the "bits" throughout the movie are overdone and repeated too much feeling forced at times. The movie is definitely overlong, could've trimmed at least 15 minutes. The ending was too over-the-top/CGI for me but still entertaining once I just went with it, I think going with a more over-the-top Tarantino-like style (shorter quick bursts of action that the movie kinda did before the ending) would've been better and also shortened the ending quite a bit.

Hocus Pocus - 6/10

There are a few "goofs" as the witches are from 300 years ago and one of the witches comments on cooking lobster in margarine (which she wouldn't know about) and the chase scene (protags in a car and witch on a broomstick) kinda doesn't make sense for the witch to be impersonating a cop but still a decently fun scene. After rewatching this one, I have a feeling that the new one is gonna be quite shit as they really don't make movies like this anymore and the tone is either gonna be super silly or too serious.
Didn’t those happen after the witches had been out for a while? Like I’m pretty sure that chase happened after they hitched a ride on the bus and the driver was hitting on the blonde witch.
And I know that the brunette was watching TV at the “devil’s” house at one point.
 

thebobmaster

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Watched Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare. The movie is not good, and the tonal whiplash between the main story and setting, the backstories of the characters, and the goofy deaths and Freddy's puns can be quite jarring, but it's at least an enjoyable bad movie, which makes it much easier for me to watch than the last film.
 
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Thaluikhain

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Tomorrow at Ten (1962)

Robert Shaw plays a kidnapper who tells a rich man that his little boy is locked in a room with a bomb that will explode tomorrow at 10 am. If he's given 50,000 pounds and allowed to get on the 17:30 flight to Argentina (presumably a non-extradition country), he'll get there by 7am and call to tell where the boy is.

Low budget, character driven story, quite well done.
 

hanselthecaretaker

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Also, Conan isn't necessarily the biggest baddest dude who does all the cool shit - both his companions add a lot to both the fighting and the emotional core of the story. They actually feel like a team, as opposed to just side characters. Conan as a character has the image of this brooding loner, but in this movie he's quite amicable as soon as he meets Subotai. And both him and the love interest (they never mention her name in the movie which is weird) actually save his life. With that scene of Conan being crucified and Subotai coming over the horizon while sweet uplifting music playing, the movie might as well be called Conan: Friendship is Magic.
I’ve always found this amusing from the Conan days -
1664982694959.jpeg
 

Old_Hunter_77

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Bullet Train - 7/10

It's basically a Snatch/Smokin' Aces type movie, not as good as Snatch but better than Smokin' Aces. Brad Pitt is the main star and he's always great. The supporting cast is overall solid as well. Some of the "bits" throughout the movie are overdone and repeated too much feeling forced at times. The movie is definitely overlong, could've trimmed at least 15 minutes. The ending was too over-the-top/CGI for me but still entertaining once I just went with it, I think going with a more over-the-top Tarantino-like style (shorter quick bursts of action that the movie kinda did before the ending) would've been better and also shortened the ending quite a bit.
Yeah... I'll admit when I first saw the trailer for Bullet Train I was excited because a fun action-y comedy heist thing with Pitt looked fun. Then I saw the trailer for like 3 years at the movies, then the reviews were mixed. So it moved from a movie I wanted to see in the theater to something I'll wait to watch at home. Your description pretty much matches what I was guessing about it.
 

Phoenixmgs

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Didn’t those happen after the witches had been out for a while? Like I’m pretty sure that chase happened after they hitched a ride on the bus and the driver was hitting on the blonde witch.
And I know that the brunette was watching TV at the “devil’s” house at one point.
The witches were only in the modern world for like 8-10 hours tops and they only had the night to live if they didn't steal more life from the kids. The one witch watched like a single commercial because there was a kid in it but it's not like they sat down to watch TV for hours or even just a single show. It's very doubtful that margarine came up in their very short experience (or even if it did why the witch would integrate it into some known recipe). The chase scene is more plausible because they did ride a bus and talk with the driver, though chances are low they would've discussed cops and being pulled over by them. The movie could've had a lot more fun with them being out of their time and kinda just gives up with that aspect halfway through when they've just been around for a few hours.
 

Phoenixmgs

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Hocus Pocus 2 - 5/10

Better than I was expecting it to be for sure. The girl that played the teenage girl of Bette Midler's character in the opening really looked like what you'd think a teenage Bette Midler would look like. The jokes and gags are perhaps a bit better than the original and they play up the fact the witches are out of there time more here than before. Though there is one oddity that happens near the start where one of the witches says "thanks for the time hack" and I thought at that moment the writers totally forgot the time issue and the witches were just gonna act/talk like modern day people, but that is quickly squashed when they don't know what the word "aisle" means a few minutes later. This movie definitely does the time difference overall better and more consistent though. The main problem of the movie I feel is that it's too "safe" and the witches never come off as legit scary/frightening like they do in the original, the kids are never in actual peril. They never do anything bad and the movie almost makes them into good people and stops just shy of that. The main witch even completely succeeds at becoming all powerful and does nothing with it. Also, the sequel lacks a talking cat.
 
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thebobmaster

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Tonight's film was Wes Craven's New Nightmare. It can be a bit tricky to follow the film at times because of the meta plot, and the child actor playing Dylan is...not the best actor, but the other actors do a very good job, and that same meta plot allows for a rather creative movie, and does quite a bit with blurring the lines between the film's reality and dreams. It's definitely an upper-tier Nightmare film.
 

Bartholen

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Days of Heaven, 7/10

One of Terrence Malick's earliest films, this is a drama set in (I'm assuming) depression-era US heartland. Richard Gere plays a man traveling the country for work with his girlfriend and younger sister. The owner of a farm they work at takes a romantic interest in his girlfriend (who Gere's character pretends to be his sister), and complications ensue. It's really good, but I feel I kind of got everything out of it on a first watch. The strongest part are the visuals, which are simply jaw-dropping. The stunning cinematography hasn't aged one bit, you could release this movie today and it wouldn't look dated at all. I'd say this movie is worth watching for the visuals alone, because 1. they're just that good and 2. the story itself is nothing special, but to my understanding that's never the focus with Malick's films. It's a good movie to put on the background or zone out to, because the plot is very much in the background most of the time, and there's not some great twists or turns you're going to miss. The acting and period detail are all spot on, and there's some themes of class difference you can dig into, but it's not some in-depth societal breakdown.

The biggest mark against the film is the ADR, which is both plentiful and distractingly noticeable. This being such an otherwise immersive film, it definitely takes you out of it when it happens. The story is also purposely frustrating towards the end (mainly to do with Gere's character), but it succeeds in what it sets out to do, so I can't really call it a criticism, but it's still frustrating. Beyond that there's not a whole lot to criticize the film for, but neither did it set my world on fire.
 
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hanselthecaretaker

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I know Andre was a huge dude, but next to Arnold (who's roughly as tall as I am) like this puts into perspective just how big.
Both him and Wilt look like they could roll him up and throw him over whatever they’re standing by if they wanted to.
 

Johnny Novgorod

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Eastern Promises

Rewatch. Ending still feels abrupt. Apparently one of the producers retooled a sequel script into a shitty Jason Statham flick. So you know what, good riddance. 15 years ago I remember walking out of the theater liking it but wishing it'd delved a bit more into the Russian mob. Now it seems just about right. And I Iove the ending fight scene in the bathhouse. It boils down to the protagonist fending off two random goons armed with knives, which is the kind of action scene that might open a movie but rarely serve as its climax. I still consider it a benchmark of melee action: vicious, intense, realistic. Hero is super vulnerable and every movement has a dumb weight to it. And I don't know how Cronenberg does it but man is the gore gnarly as fuck. Two throats are slashed throughout the movie and even though I've seen a million movies where that happens it only feels real here.

I have a dumb nitpick. It's incredibly dumb. Sorry. But the whole grieving-mother-meets-surrogate-child always plays out the same way. I can't think of a single movie about a woman who lost a baby or a child at some point in the past that doesn't get a replacement by the end.
 
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thebobmaster

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Continuing on my October marathon, watched the original Candyman. It still holds up for the most part, but there is one thing I have a problem with. In real life, if Tony Todd were to say "be my victim" to me in that voice, I'd immediately agree, and the movie would be half as long as it actually is.
 
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