Last Movie You Watched

[StarShaper7]

Watched Bad Words a little bit more than a week ago. I was on a long flight, so I decided to watch something to waste time. It wasn't bad. Jason Bateman's a good choice for the main character and I did find the adult-entering-a-spelling bee plot to be interesting. I don't think I would have watched it if I hadn't been on a 11 hour flight though. I took some sleeping pills afterwards and that made a typically uncomfortable experience less so, or at least shorter.

[Atropos]

Watched Derek Jarman's Wittgenstein. Possibly the most accurate depiction of philosophy ever committed to celluloid.

By which I mean, it's rather dry. /explainingthejoke

[movieartman]

DEATH TRAP (1995)___[nature documentary]
- nostagia time!, i rented this when i was a kid from my library several times
- tis about carnivious plants, i became facinated with them as a kid and even owned a venus flytrap twice
- it was made in 95, but has the feel of a early 80s even 70s film, adds to it a lot IMO
- the detail they go in to these plants and how the feed is fantastic
- at times it seems kinda morbid watching the insects so up close being trapped and struggling
- the score is very very retro electronic style, very john carpenter. very good
HOODLUM (1997)___ - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bm-0UrCCFyo
- tim fucking roth you sick charismatic devil you
- beau starr (sheriff meeker on halloween 4-5) and his brother mike starr have a fun time as brother pick axe weilding hitmen
- fishbourne is fishbourne... great as expected
- andy garcia as lucky luciano deserved a lot more screentime

[Oz]

Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Charisma: I wanted to write about how enlightening rewatching Charisma was, but the final 15 minutes of the film yet again trolled the heck out of me. For most of the film I figured the surreal and cryptic story was meant to be a guilt trip inside the mind of the protagonist who runs away into a mystical forest after screwing up in his job. In the forest he comes across a complicated struggle over the fate of the forest and it looks like all the colorful characters represent different aspects of the protagonist, but the ending of the film makes it clear that the film is even more ambitious with its complex and unusual thematics than what it seemed to me at first. If anything, I realized that I had not understood anything about the film on my first try and this time I began to understand what Kurosawa intended with the film. The ending is very polarizing because it completely betrays the viewer’s expectations, turns the story around and changes the film’s enthralling atmosphere. I am still not sure whether I should consider it a true masterpiece or not, but it is certainly one of the creepiest and most fascinating films I have ever seen and Kurosawa is a damn genius.

[Chuckman]

Amazing Spider-Man 2. It was good, up until they shoehorned in an iconic villain, killed off the best female character in comic book movies, and didn't even offer the legendary payoff.

The movie was too busy, cramming in too much and felt like a rehash of the Raimi films. Which is a shame, because ASM was one of the best comic movies ever made.

[ThanatosII]

X-Men: Days of Future Past

I don't care how many times time travel fiction is done to death, I won't get tired of it simply because each work features a set of characters with different motivations and struggles. Happy to say I enjoyed this installment of X-Men. Although it was riddled nods to other movies and time travel cliches, I was interested in the drama/characters.

[Trajan]

Inception, Nolan throws a lot of exposition at you very quickly and it's easy to miss crucial information if you're not paying attention. Dominic Cobb is also one of the most incompetent protagonists I've ever seen. Pretty much every difficulty the team encounters during the film is his fault. But who cares, the film is one of the ten most visually impressive films that I've ever seen and I'm one of those people who's willing to forgive a lot on the story end of things if the technical skill is really marvelous. Besides, Tom Hardy, Ken Watanabe and Cillian Murphy all give really great performances.

The Bourne Identity, aka the one that wasn't directed by Paul Greengrass. Oddly enough, it's the one that I remember liking the most out of the trilogy although that might just be because the duel between Clive Owen and Matt Damon is one of the best photographed standoffs I've ever seen. And Franka Potente is pretty memorable in her own right and also rather cute. We'll see how the other two stand up when I rewatch them again later this year.

The Killer, it may be John Woo's most influential film, but his best film is Hard Boiled. Comparing the choreography between the two, Hard Boiled is much more active and fluid while The Killer suffers a bit from 80s action movie cliches of people just standing around shooting at each other. Some fight scenes suffer from this more noticeably than others, but it's still pretty prevalent. Oh, and the plot (do people really watch John Woo movies for the plot?) is pretty good although some of the development between Chow Yun-Fat an Danny Lee leaves me scratching my head a little.

[Kazuki_Fuse]

The Killer

That ending was depressing.

Tonight I greatly enjoyed viewing a nihilistic little Japanese revenge flick by the name of All Night Long. It's about three boys who are all present in witnessing a schoolgirl brutally stabbed to death by an insane salaryman. The incident causes them to bond and become friends (sort of). A little later, on the way to party one of the three is hosting, the second boy of the group and his new girlfriend are assaulted by a gang of hooligans. They beat him, and rape and kill his girl. He vows revenge and the other two boys agree to help him (one rather reluctantly, the other gleefully).



The acting isn't stellar by any means, and the gore is fairly over-the-top, but it has some great quotes, a cool soundtrack and the final 10 minutes of the film are fantastic. I would recommend it to anyone interested in exploitation films.

8/10

[TomasJC]

The Godfather Part III.
So it isn't really a bad film, in fact, most of the story gets wrapped up pretty nicely. But there are obvious flaws that put it on a shelf far below the other two. The thing I disliked the most was the Robert Duvall no-show. Tom Hagan was such an interesting and integral character, why the hell didn't the studio suck it up and pay him as much as Pacino? He would have made the film more... Godfatherish? And for the love of God, Sofia Coppola's last resort acting is exactly as bad as the critics make it out to be. An interesting character, but the casting was a kick to the brain.
But of course, it makes little sense to watch it without seeing the other two (which are two of my favorite films). A solid effort, F.F.C, but if you didn't really want to make it, tell the studio to bite the dust!
7/10, but only just.

[Guy Nacks]

A solid effort, F.F.C, but if you didn't really want to make it, tell the studio to bite the dust!
7/10, but only just.

Franny Ford was in horrendous amounts of debt when the movie was because of One from the Heart, which he financed and bombed spectacularly in the early '80s, so GFIII was his best option to make a bunch of cash....which it really didn't.

[TomasJC]

Franny Ford was in horrendous amounts of debt when the movie was because of One from the Heart, which he financed and bombed spectacularly in the early '80s, so GFIII was his best option to make a bunch of cash....which it really didn't.

So I heard. Well, I'm sure it could have been worse. I think if making it was absolutely necessary, at least they made it before the 2000's; either he would have had to recast, make the story during an even later date, or it simply would never had happened. I'm sort of glad there is a Part III, but it could have been different.

[Oz]

Joshua Oppenheimer’s The Act of Killing: After finally getting to see this infamous documentary I completely understand why it is one of the most critically acclaimed films of the decade. Oppenheimer’s ballsy decision to film mass murderers and let them recreate their crimes is great even as an idea alone, but the way he turns into a feverish guilt trip for the mass murderers is simply brilliant. The Act of Killing is very profound and gruesome at the same time as it is hilarious and surreal - both for its viewers and its subject.

Mikio Naruse’s Late Chrysanthemums: It had been a long time since I had watched anything by Naruse, but rewatching Late Chrysanthemums reminded me of why I always felt that Naruse was criminally underseen and unknown while his contemporaries (Kurosawa, Ozu & Mizoguchi) have long been hailed all over the world. Late Chrysanthemums is yet another story of geisha, but Naruse takes a look at a group of aging former geisha who are struggling to make a living after quitting their glamorous profession. Naruse manages to craft a bunch of memorable characters and even though the film mostly consists of scenes of middle-aged ladies nagging, it’s a very interesting film right from the beginning until the very end.

Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Cure: I was looking forward to rewatching Kurosawa’s Cure - especially after his Charisma blew my mind on rewatch - and it was even better than I expected. Cure begins as a seemingly straightforward story of a detective trying to solve the mystery of a chain of murders that seem to be somehow connected to each other. While the film has its own unique atmosphere from the get-go Kurosawa begins to reveal his intentions only much later in the film and the film ends with a mindbending climax that certainly betrays the viewer’s expectations. Kurosawa yet again dives deep into the dark corners of the human mind, but he doesn’t do it only with his protagonist - instead he seems to be exploring the mindset of Japan as a whole. The film is psychological horror to a great degree and it does that very well: I can say that Cure is easily one of the creepiest/scariest films I’ve seen in a long time. It doesn’t rely on big scares or hideous monsters, but instead what makes the film creepy is how Kurosawa gradually builds up an atmosphere full of dread and explores chilling thematics. Kurosawa also seems to love weary, messy and old concrete builds since he set most of his films in the 90’s in such environments and Cure is no different with its many brooding locations. Rewatching the film with a clear and prepared mind also revealed that the film wasn’t nearly as cryptic as I remembered it to be - and the story has no need to be more cryptic than it is. Both Cure and Charisma certainly belong among the best films of the 90’s.

Daihachi Yoshida’s The Kirishima Thing: Yoshida’s big domestic hit from 2012 is a good depiction of youth and school life - it’s one of the many Japanese films to deal with the same subject, but its approach is quite different, more subtle and less straighforward than the others. The story is set into motion when the school’s star volleyball player, Kirishima, disappears. We never see the titular character himself, but the film explores how it effects the other students. Yoshida isn’t afraid to jump back and forth chronologically and even repeat some scenes to focus on more than one perspective. With a large cast he spends quite a lot of time wandering around - even to the point of losing focus and making the film last longer than it probably should. The script is quite complicated so I guess he needed to take his time, but for a long time I wondered where the film would be heading. However, the climax of the film puts the film and its intention in focus in a very clever and mature way. The film doesn’t only have an unconventional screenplay - Yoshida’s visual style also makes it stand apart from the other films of the same kind. The style is also different from his usual over-the-top mangaesque aesthetic. Instead he lets his camera roam in a more naturalistic way and lets each scene linger on for a bit more, which works very well in overall. Although I have to say I wondered whether it was a good choice until the end of the film which made me realize it was the right choice for the point of the film. Letting the film wander around allowed the characters to be studied more carefully. It also made it possible for Yoshida to end the film in a magnificent way that highlighted the characters’ growth and the film’s coming-of-age thematics.

[Gendo'sPapa]

My biggest issue with The Godfather Part III is how no one except Al Pacino's Michael seems to be upset that Andy Garcia & Sofia Coppola who are playing first cousins start fucking each other.

Otherwise it's a solid character story - the last half hour is phenomenal filmmaking - that just happens to follow two of the greatest movies ever made. It never stood a chance.

[StarShaper7]

Tonight I greatly enjoyed viewing a nihilistic little Japanese revenge flick by the name of All Night Long.

Seemed like the kind of underground Japanese film I enjoy (some OVAs from the 80's and 90's, Suicide Club, most of Takashi Miike's filmography, etc) so I gave it a try. Yeah, it's pretty much what I expected it to be. The sociological problems, fears and darker parts of Japanese society seen through a cynical lens. Violence and crime begets violence and crime. People are evil, people are fucked up and it spreads like a virus via exposure and infection throughout society. It was entertaining, but it's no Ichi the Killer.

One thing though,

SPOILER: Show

it's more likely that those guys actually did rape and kill his girlfriend and just didn't tell that other girl about it, but what if there never was a girlfriend in the first place? Some M. Night Shamalaning in here.

[TomasJC]

My biggest issue with The Godfather Part III is how no one except Al Pacino's Michael seems to be upset that Andy Garcia & Sofia Coppola who are playing first cousins start fucking each other.

Otherwise it's a solid character story - the last half hour is phenomenal filmmaking - that just happens to follow two of the greatest movies ever made. It never stood a chance.

Oh yes, agreed. That Opera Scene was amazing!

[Oz]

Satoshi Miki’s It’s Me, It’s Me: I had been looking forward to Satoshi Miki’s new film as it has been touted as one of his best and the film’s scenario seemed interesting: a young photographer fools a woman into believing he is her son for money, but suddenly he really turns into the woman’s son and copies of him keep increasing day by day. Remember the scene in Being John Malkovich in which everyone is John Malkovich? Stretch that sequence into a 2-hour film and you can imagine how crazy this film is. With Miki’s sense for dry, offbeat humor I was expecting this to be a glorious masterpiece, but the end result is just weird. What becomes obvious immediately is that Miki has altered his visual style: his color palette is more sterile and less striking and his cinematography in general has become smoother. Yet the whole film is shot with some sort of a digital camera which makes the whole film look extremely artificial. The soundtrack is also quite weird: almost nothing but bleeping electronic music that further twists the atmosphere of the film. The style itself works sufficiently for Miki’s brand of humor, but what really let me down was the writing. The idea is brilliant and the film begins promisingly, but when Miki strays away from comedy and begins to reach for a more ambitious goal (I’m not even sure what he even intends in the end) the film begins to spiral out of control and turns into a feverish nightmare. While Miki has always had the habit of keeping the pace of his films fast with non-stop action and non-sequitor humor, It’s Me It’s Me felt too rushed and tiring - especially during the final third.

Makoto Shinkai’s 5 Centimeters Per Second: It had been a long time since I last watched my favorite Shinkai film, but I decided it was about time I rewatched it so see whether it really is as good as I remembered it to be. Shinkai’s portrayal of the fragility and turbulent feelings of first love is certainly brilliant although this time I realized that the screenplay on its own is not that remarkable. It is Shinkai’s delicate direction that is at its best in this film that makes it work well. The story itself is a fairly common first love story (or rather, a collection of stories) that you can find in many Japanese films and TV series with only slight differences. However, Shinaki’s scenery porn and good use of music make the film stand a bit taller than others of its kind. This time I found his use of inner monologues a bit overt - sometimes it’s necessary and effective, but he uses it a bit too much. Some of the scenes would have been better off without constant rambling. The third part also feels a bit too rushed and lacking since it is so short and jumps around so much. Nevertheless, 5 Centimeters Per Second is still a good film and certainly Shinkai’s best, but I won’t be haling it as much as I have done in the past.

Hitoshi Matsumoto’s R100: Matsumoto is one of the top comedians in Japan who started directing films in his 40’s. In his films Matsumoto likes to play around with his ideas for sketches - sometimes with great results, sometimes with awful results. Symbol was a really entertaining comedy unlike any other while his other films have been failures to some degree and sadly R100 is also a disappointment. It has a premise that seems like a scenario for one of his sketches: a man hires a S&M service to give him beatings during his daily life without him knowing when they come and what they will do. However, the film is split between drama/thriller sequences and twisted comedy that goes very meta at times. The scenes of sadomasochism are more foreboding than funny in some cases and I’m not sure if that is Matsumoto’s intention for all of them. The end result is confusing to say the least. The cinematography is also weird: the whole film is shot with very brownish and grayish colors - it’s almost as if the shot footage was passed through a faint sepia filter. While I wouldn’t have a problem with sepia, the film just looks ugly and boring and the distracting colors don’t really serve any purpose in the film either.

[BrikHaus]

I watched a decently funny movie called Alan Partridge two nights ago. I was totally taken aback by the seige plot of the film, when the Netflix description doesn't mention it at all. Netflix descriptions are usually terrible, though.

[Mr. Tines]

I watched a decently funny movie called Alan Partridge two nights ago.

You mean it got a release outside of East Anglia?

[pwhodges]

I've heard of it as far afield as Oxford, though I've not seen it...

[BrikHaus]

You mean it got a release outside of East Anglia?

The Netflix release is like a true world premiere.