Last Movie You Watched

[Kenshin Sephiroth]

Saw two greats recently.

Rewatched Pen-Ek Ratanaruang's Last Life in the Universe, a film that is growing on me like a benign and neighbourly tumor. This is one of those movies you (I) can always revisit, its presentation being a wholly new experience each play: a truly harrowing exploration of anhedonic detachment and depression through a crotch-clutching character study, and an arthouse cinematography that's filled with pretention, but pretension that delivers. And what delivery. I was hypnotized by the character of Kenji, that lone librarian and hikikomori puppet struggling to enact his death, to negate his own existence, to cut off his disgusting puppet strings and drop out of the play to the soundtrack of infernal alarm clocks and furious telephones; the scenes of his apartment, invasions from the real world notwithstanding, attained the cloister-like divinity of a hermit's lair. Pacing will be slow for many, but the silver imagery resting in suicidal ambience will for others make a lullaby of the abyss, neverending. That score too, a perfect guide for such an abyss's yawning and stretching dreamscapes, lulls; giving access to Kenji's mind, his domain of eternal slumber. The whole movie's a dreaming, a wandering. (Avowed cinephiles often claim to have been awestruck by Inception's dreamlike ending, but to see a truly otherworldly conclusion to a film where the boundaries between reality and fancy are completely blurred by the end, one should investigate Last Life in the Universe.)

And then, The Sunset Limited. The whole film is one room, with two characters in it, White and Black, discussing life, death, God, suicide, art, and the meaning of things. It's written by Cormac McCarthy, one of America's best living authors (who is finally getting noticed by Hollywood), and directed by Tommy Lee Jones, who also stars in it, as White, alongside Samuel L. Jackson, as Black. When I realized how good this film is I squealed like a little girl getting stepped on, and by its apocalyptic climax I sounded like a slaughterhouse.

[Oz]

^ Last Life in the Universe is awesome indeed.

The full trailer for Nobohiru Yamashita's (Linda Linda Linda director) next film starring Atsuko Maeda is out. This looks rather good, but it's a shame the film won't be out in theaters until July - which means I can't watch it while I'm in Japan and have to wait for the eventual DVD release. The trailer can be found at the bottom of this page: http://asianwiki.com/Kueki_Ressha

[Bomby von Bombsville]

Am I the only one who wasn't really that big on Last Life in the Universe? Maybe I should give it a rewatch one of these days.

Watched Kon Ichikawa's The Makioka Sisters. This is how you film a dialog-heavy family drama. Every last shot is beautifully framed, not to mention bravura performances from Sayuri Yoshinaga and Yuko Kotegawa. The plot itself felt kind of like an average family drama to me (though apparently the book its based on is considered a very important book in 20th century Japanese literature), but Ichikawa's direction kept me interested throughout the whole duration. Of course, it's never the story itself but how the story is told that determines its effectiveness.

[MightyWings]

The last movie that I watched for the first time was "The Red Baron". Pretty good story, although I question the historical accuracy.

The last movie that I watched (for the umpteenth time) was "Boys in Company C". This movie saw R. Lee Ermey's first role as a drill instructor, and in my opinion, the movie was better than "Full Metal Jacket" overall.

[EvangelionFan]

I forgot to mention, I saw Mission Impossible: Ghost Procotol last weekend. It is reasonably good.

[Kenshin Sephiroth]

Chinatown is still a really average movie. I'm sorry, it just is.

[Bomby von Bombsville]

Sion Sono's Cold Fish is really an average movie, as well. This movie didn't really move me at all in the slightest. It just kind of played out in front of me, the first of Sono's films to not really strike any sort of chord with me whatsoever. I didn't dislike it, either. It wasn't a waste of my time. It was just kind of... there. Funny, considering that this movie seemed to get some of the most polarizing reviews I've ever read.

Suicide Circle is probably technically a worse film, but I at least actually objectively liked a lot of what was in it.

[Fazmotron]

So, another month gone, another lot of films that I watched;

April
The Fifth Element (1997)
The Thin Red Line (1998)
V For Vendetta (2006)
Wrath of the Titans (2012)
Coffy (1973)
The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003)
Watchmen (Director’s Cut) (2009)
21 Grams (2003)
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999)
Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones (2002)
Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005)
Star Wars (Original Theatrical Cut) (1977)
American Reunion (2012)
Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (Original Theatrical Cut) (1980)
Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (Original Theatrical Cut) (1983)
Blue Velvet (1986)
Lost Highway (1997)
Spartacus (1960)
Lolita (1962)
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb (1964)
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Barry Lyndon (1975)
The Shining (1980)
Full Metal Jacket (1987)
2010: The Year We Make Contact (1984)
Eyes Wide Shut (1999)
Battleship (2012)
Do The Right Thing (1989)
Timecrimes (2007)
Genius Party Beyond (2008)
The World (2004)
Time Bandits (1981)
Children Of Men (2006)
The Number 23 (Extended) (2007)
Legend (Director’s Cut) (1985)
Bad Eggs (2003)
Memories of Underdevelopment (1968)
Bronson (2008)
Infernal Affairs (2002)
The Seventh Seal (1957)
Tron: Legacy (2010)
Red Dragon (2002)
Hulk (2003)
The Incredible Hulk (2008)
Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)
Iron Man (2008)
The Avengers (2012)

The Kubrick marathon was really fun, seeing all those awesome films on BD was awesome, as was seeing Lost Highway for the first time, now my favourite Lynch film. I went on a Marvel binge the last couple of days to get hyped for the fairly underwhelming, but still entertaining Avengers film. I have to say I really enjoyed Hulk a lot more than I expected, it has a lot more depth and the comic book style just really did it for me, Ang Lee can really direct. Finally, I watched Tron: Legacy again, this time in surround sound with the volume way up, and it was great, and so far it's the only film I've seen twice this year. This lot of films takes my total so far to 156.

[Bomby von Bombsville]

Memories of Underdevelopment (1968)

Curious to hear your thoughts on this one. I remember really liking that when I saw it in film class about four years ago.

[Fazmotron]

It was really interesting, and I did like how it showed one man's story as the world around him was changing, and everyone he knew was leaving. Quite a good movie that.

[Twin Drive Sigma Aquarion]

Good Burger. Why didn't I give this a perfect score before? Well I am now and that is all that matters.

[Henry Spencer]

Iron Man. It took me a couple of views to make me realize that it's one of my favorite Superhero movies ever.

Now to go watch The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man 2, Thor, and Captain America: The First Avenger before seeing The Avengers.

[Azathoth]

Tron Legacy. I probably should have seen this about a dozen times in theaters. If there was ever a movie meant to be seen on the big screen, this was it. The protagonist is a joke and he won't shut up, sure, but Jeff Bridges' performance as [s]himself[/s] ole Flynn the rotting computerized acidhead...biodigital jazz, man. Every part of the script that isn't read by him does kind of suck, although some of it is made to work. I probably would have been okay with it if Bridges and Michael Sheen were the only speaking roles. Olivia Wilde is more amusing when she doesn't talk anyhow. I'm sure someone has already beat me to saying so, but she makes a great synecdoche for the movie: visually striking, prepossessing when in motion, occasionally charming in presence, but whenever she starts jabbering you kind of wish she'd just shut the hell up and do her thing.

[Bomby von Bombsville]

Kenji Mizoguchi's Ugetsu. I feel like, considering how much I like this movie, I should be able to write about it to no end, yet whenever I watch it, I'm left without words besides the usual exorbitant praise. So yeah.

[Henry Spencer]

Now to go watch The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man 2, Thor, and Captain America: The First Avenger before seeing The Avengers.

...Which I have done. So! Quick reviews:

Hulk - While it's my least favorite film in the MCU, it's certainly not bad.
Iron Man 2 - Not-as-good story-wise, but the action scenes go above and beyond that of the first. Thanks, Genndy Tartakovsky!
Thor - The dumb romantic subplot in this was actually much less forced than I remember it being. I like the contrast between the Asgard and Earth scenes.
Captain America - Having 90% of your special effects undigitalized = win. This was my absolute favorite in the MCU, until...
Avengers - Blew my expectations away, and they were pretty high to begin with. The characters were well-developed, the jokes were sidesplitters, and the action was amazing. I can't wait to see what they do next.

[FreakyFilmFan4ever]

Iron Man 2 - Not-as-good story-wise, but the action scenes go above and beyond that of the first. Thanks, Genndy Tartakovsky!

Not a bad movie considering that I didn't even realize watching it the first time around that the movie has no real threatening villain. No civilians were put in harms way, all the robots were too focused on Iron Man to do anything dangerous lime that. It was basically a giant cat-fight between two people over who had the best suit. The whole movie can be summed up in:

"My suit's better than yours!"
"Grl, pleez. Yo just upset 'cuz my daddy's better than yo daddy."
"Oh, I kno yo did not say dat to me! Yo dad stole from my dad!"
"Did not!"
"Did to!"
"Did not!"
"Did to!"

They fight.

Despite that fault in the film, I still enjoyed it.

[Guyver Spawn]

Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky (1991) - I watch this movie on birthday with my friends and we both a great laugh.

[Kenshin Sephiroth]

A Few Good Men. Jack Nicholson shouting Aaron Sorkin dialogue at a hapless Tom Cruise -- YUSH! It was weird watching this film and spotting only a single walking-down-the-hallway-while-talking-really-quickly scene, a scenario that Sorkin would later become notorious for incorporating into countless episodes of The West Wing.

[Bomby von Bombsville]

Saw a 35mm print of Inglourious Basterds at the campus art museum today. It's a very entertaining, if not also very flawed film.

[Fireand'chutes77]

(500) Days of Summer: Watched it yesterday and really liked it. The humor was darkly hilarious, but it managed to be heartfelt and sincere at the same time. It definitely earns a place in my top 20 favorite movies.

...As does one I just finished a few minutes ago: Moon. It's a realistic, hard-nosed science-fiction film that manages to a do a lot with a tiny cast and a limited budget.