Last Movie You Watched

[TomasJC]

I finally got to see 2001: A Space Odyssey on a 70mm screen last night, as part of the New Zealand International Film Festival's Autumn Events. If you've never been to a screening of it before like that, I highly recommend it. Still an insane film to watch, but the theater made it so much better; the audience was great and even had a moment of laughter at HAL's "I know I've made some very poor decisions recently" line. The soundtrack gets me every time, especially when the rumbling from Zarathustra kicked in. I almost waltzed my girlfriend out when the Blue Danube exit music came on!

[Trajan]

I wish I could see 2001 in theaters, sounds like an awesome experience

[Gob Hobblin]

You telling me most of those were practical effects? That's impressive.

Yeah. CGI was only used to accentuate the action that was already happening, or for practical purposes in scenes like the storm (which was truly a beautiful sequence, visually and editing wise). The great thing I find about the Mad Max films is that they are only tangentially connected. You can pick up any one of the films and watch them as a standalone movie and not be left out of the loop.

It also helps that, following Mad Max (the first film), Max is no longer the protagonist. He's the side-character to other stories that are going on (sort of the lever of things, while the actual protagonists have their conflicts). That allows Miller to tell some really cool stories in this inventive setting without them feeling forcibly welded together.

[Gendo'sPapa]

Seen FURY ROAD twice. It truly is the greatest Hollywood release in several years!

[Bagheera]

Seen FURY ROAD twice. It truly is the greatest Hollywood release in several years!

I am probably gonna see it again next weekend. I have seen it in 3d, now I will see it on the Ultrascreen with enhanced sound. I have never seen a movie that made me want to experience it in different ways, but this is definitely the exception.

[Gob Hobblin]

Seen FURY ROAD twice. It truly is the greatest Hollywood release in several years!

I keep telling everyone this, and I've actually had two or three people disagree with me. I know it's different strokes for different folks, and everyone is not going to like the same thing, but COME ON! The comments I get from those three people (and it's only three people who've complained about it among the dozens of comments I've heard on it), it's like they're being deliberately obtuse. They're going out of their way to nitpick silly stuff to prove that it's not as good a movie as everyone is saying it is.

I don't get it. I mean, if you don't like it, that's fine, but what film did they see versus the rest of us?

[Bagheera]

It had a guy with a flamethrower guitar providing the soundtrack to a post-apocalyptic road chase. What more do you need to realize the movie is made of win?

(seriously, this is like the most metal movie ever made. It's absolutely insane how balls to the wall, over the top it is and it is absolutely glorious.)

[Gob Hobblin]

The Coma-Doof Warrior will live on in our hearts, forever. Next to the place that Fifi occupies, because he gave us back our heroes.

Witness him!

[Gendo'sPapa]

Some of the younger people I've talked to about Mad Max: Fury Road didn't seem to like the movie because according to them "while the action was cool the movie felt shallow & the characters lacked motivation."

Which of course blew my mind because Fury Road is one of thematically richest movies to come out of Hollywood in a while & through action we get to know the characters. As for motivation I felt it was just human decency.

But it got me thinking that perhaps a reason a lot of younger people couldn't connect to MM:FR is because to my mind it's the first blockbuster in years that doesn't have characters monologue the theme & character motivations to people. I though Avengers: Age of Ultron was mediocre specifically because it was plagued with that nonsense.

Fury Road, meanwhile, doesn't have Furiosa give a lengthy monologue where Charlize Theron can "emote to the cheap seats" about how after seeing one young girl suffer she couldn't take it anymore & had to free the women. It doesn't have Tom Hardy's Max stop the action in the middle of the film to say "You know what? I thought you girls were crazy & I was gonna ditch you the first chance I got but I've had a change of heart. Let me tell you why."

Hell, the movie doesn't even play by the rules & have everyone shouting out quippy one liners every chance they get! Nor does it constantly break the laws of physics! It doesn't even strictly adhere to a sense of continuity with the previous films!

Sadly, as awesome as Fury Road is it's a film that really harkens back to a type of big budget filmmaking that doesn't happen that much anymore. It's a movie that exists to be a visual & visceral experience. It has a cinematic purpose! It just also happens to be one of the most thematically rich movies in a long long time.

I've been looking forward to Mad Max: Fury Road for years ever since I read George Miller had fleshed out the film in his head & had storyboarded every shot before a script was written. I always suspected the film would be great but I never dreamed it would be THAT great!

[Bagheera]

Some of the younger people I've talked to about Mad Max: Fury Road didn't seem to like the movie because according to them "while the action was cool the movie felt shallow & the characters lacked motivation."

I understand these words but when they're arranged like that the result is absolute gibberish.

Which of course blew my mind because Fury Road is one of thematically richest movies to come out of Hollywood in a while & through action we get to know the characters. As for motivation I felt it was just human decency.

It's not even that. I think escaping from a death cult that treats people like things (not just the women, everyone -- Max was used as a living blood bag, for chrissakes) is a pretty solid motivation. I mean, what else were they supposed to do? Sit there and die?

But it got me thinking that perhaps a reason a lot of younger people couldn't connect to MM:FR is because to my mind it's the first blockbuster in years that doesn't have characters monologue the theme & character motivations to people. I though Avengers: Age of Ultron was mediocre specifically because it was plagued with that nonsense.

Fury Road, meanwhile, doesn't have Furiosa give a lengthy monologue where Charlize Theron can "emote to the cheap seats" about how after seeing one young girl suffer she couldn't take it anymore & had to free the women. It doesn't have Tom Hardy's Max stop the action in the middle of the film to say "You know what? I thought you girls were crazy & I was gonna ditch you the first chance I got but I've had a change of heart. Let me tell you why."

Yeah, the movie treats its audience like they're reasonably intelligent, which says a lot about the people who don't get it. As to Furiosa's motivation: she wanted to escape for her own reasons. She was kidnapped by Joe as a child, after all. She'd been planning to escape on her own and was waiting for an opportunity, and the wives helped make it happen. They were active players, not waifs Furiosa was rescuing out of the goodness of her heart.

Sadly, as awesome as Fury Road is it's a film that really harkens back to a type of big budget filmmaking that doesn't happen that much anymore. It's a movie that exists to be a visual & visceral experience. It has a cinematic purpose! It just also happens to be one of the most thematically rich movies in a long long time.

Yeah, it pretty much succeeds on every level. It's a visual feast, it's smart, it treats its audience like they're smart, it's metal as fuck, the characters rock, and it's just plain fun to watch. It's everything a movie should be and then some.

[Guy Nacks]

Some of the younger people I've talked to about Mad Max: Fury Road didn't seem to like the movie because according to them "while the action was cool the movie felt shallow & the characters lacked motivation."

Send them to the Thunderdome.

[A.T. Fish]

Hell, the movie doesn't even play by the rules & have everyone shouting out quippy one liners every chance they get!

True, and there were so many opportunities for bad puns and "bad ass" comments in the movie. This kind of thing is so common that it was actually kind of strange to see a movie without them. Every time I thought "here comes the one liner" the characters surprised me by not saying anything, or saying something that wasn't obviously a scripted remark.

[Bagheera]

True, and there were so many opportunities for bad puns and "bad ass" comments in the movie. This kind of thing is so common that it was actually kind of strange to see a movie without them. Every time I thought "here comes the one liner" the characters surprised me by not saying anything, or saying something that wasn't obviously a scripted remark.

I know, right? I compared it with Age of Ultron and was like "wow, AoU is paint by numbers, this is an actual work. I know what's going on and I still don't know quite what to do with that."

[Shinoyami65]

Some of the younger people I've talked to about Mad Max: Fury Road didn't seem to like the movie because according to them "while the action was cool the movie felt shallow & the characters lacked motivation."

Personally, I loved the movie; as for the whole 'motivation' issue, I thought desire to not die was a pretty obvious motivation for the characters throughout the film. I also agree that the film does a great job without monologues (or perhaps because there aren't any monologues). It certainly seems to communicate a lot more through visuals than a lot of films I've seen recently. There's very little verbal explanation but the visual imagery communicates a lot of the plot to anyone who bothers to spot it.

[Gob Hobblin]

The thing about the motivations is how they evolve: they go from something basic and instinctive to something better. From just trying to survive to actually doing something worthy.

[Gendo'sPapa]

One of George Miller's main goals with Mad Max: Fury Road is he wanted to make a movie that anyone could understand what was going on in the story even if they didn't speak English & it wasn't subtitled in their language.

Aside from a few nuances here & there I feel positive that he achieved that.

[bobbyfischer's ghost]

So I finally got around to watching Paranormal Activity after year's of procrastination, it was...about what I expected. I know the movie was about ghost, but honestly the real focus of the film should have been the terrible chemistry between the couple. Firstly it seemed that at every turn the guy tried to outdo his stupidity, he just came off as annoying constantly pestering the woman to look at the camera. I had the urge to pull the guy out of the TV and punch him. It would not surprise me if the real reason she killed him in the end had little to do with demonic possession, and more with just getting tired of the guy.

The guy should have probably thought twice about dating a chick who had been hearing voices from a young age, granted I think it's explained that she never told him about her episodes till they moved in together; that's why you have to learn about your partner before things start to get serious. Also, it might be a red flag if she is willing to lie to you about something as serious as hearing voices. I don't know if it was meant to, but the paranormal investigator's scene's were a case of something being unintentionally funny. It feels like he spent little time explaining things to them, he basically walked in told them "btb you got ghost" and GTFO.

Probably should have skipped this one, heck I manged to avoid it for year's. Not really into number ratings so I'd put it below The Blair Witch Project and slightly ahead of The Last Broadcast. Keep in mind I really didn't like either.

P.S. DO NOT WATCH CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST

[Bagheera]

P.S. DO NOT WATCH CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST

Oh, come on. With a name like that how can I not?

[Ray]

I haven't watched it but it's gone down in cinema history as one of the most infamous horror exploitation films ever. It's so disgusting it is STILL banned from tv and video sales in Italy and several other European countries. It's pretty much impossible to find in the states unless you either torrent it or are really lucky and find an old VHS copy.

What makes it even worse was that the director marketed it as a real "found footage" snuff film saying it had real human beings actually dying on film. He even had a quid pro quo in the contract with the actors saying they couldn't star in another film until a year after the films release to sell the illusion that they had actually died onscreen while filming. He nearly went to prison for murder and the actors had to come out to prove they were in fact alive thus clearing his name

Also, it has notoriously racist overtones, and the director filmed one of his actors ACTUALLY KILLING a endangered python live on film.

So yeah, disgusting exploitation film at its finest. What's even worse is that this crap has influenced a lot of filmmakers over the years. For exams Quentin Tarantino claims he saw it back when he worked as a clerk for a VIdeo store fanboy ing over Hitchcock movies.

If you're going to watch it, don't say we didn't warn you.

[Bagheera]

Wait. Wait, wait, wait. They killed a python onscreen? For real? Fuck that noise, I'm out. I'll put up with any amount of shit acting, shit story, shit whatever, but if you're actually killing stuff I want nothing to do with you.

Movie excised from brain, carry on.