Movies: Last Movie You Watched and Rate it | {Insert Appropriate Seasonal Greeting Here}

Unholy Diver

Registered User
Oct 13, 2002
20,216
3,869
in the midnight sea
I wish HF had a sad react for posts like this.

It's unimaginable how this kind of nonsense could be spread and perpetuated by folks like Jones, especially weaponizing social media. I was heart broken to realize that multiple people in my personal life that I cared for and respected bought into and actively spread the Sandy Hook conspiracies. As much as this topic interests me, I'm not sure I could make it through watching it without getting sad, frustrated, irate, and sad again.


As I was scrolling thru the channel guide yesterday this was on one of the HBO channels and as soon as I saw the subject I just moved onto some show I had seen several times before, as a parent of a 1st grader, just the thought of this whole thing makes my knees buckle, and breaks my heart. Jones makes my skin crawl to begin with but this whole ordeal is just so far above and beyond scumbaggery.
 

kihei

McEnroe: The older I get, the better I used to be.
Jun 14, 2006
43,875
11,147
Toronto
I have watch lists on the various services. Sometimes I'll watch something immediately. Sometimes a movie can sit there for literal years and I hover over it every few weeks and decide ... "eh, not today."
This got me wondering. Could you list some of the movies that "sit there for years"? That's an interesting category.
 
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KallioWeHardlyKnewYe

Hey! We won!
May 30, 2003
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This got me wondering. Could you list some of the movies that "sit there for years"? That's an interesting category.

Sure thing. These have been on my lists the longest from a couple of the streamers I subscribe to:
Criterion: Andrew Haigh's Weekend, Mysterious Object at Noon, How to Get Ahead in Advertising, Wim Wenders' Until the End of the World.

Tubi: Lone Wolf McQuade, Rock 'n' Roll HIgh School, Cube, Robo Vampire, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot.

HBO/MAX: Shiva Baby, Cabaret, Superman III

Kanopy: Embrace of the Serpent, Tommaso, Yes God Yes, Sophie's Choice, J'Accuse
 
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kihei

McEnroe: The older I get, the better I used to be.
Jun 14, 2006
43,875
11,147
Toronto
Sure thing. These have been on my lists the longest from a couple of the streamers I subscribe to:
Criterion: Andrew Haigh's Weekend, Mysterious Object at Noon, How to Get Ahead in Advertising, Wim Wenders' Until the End of the World.

Tubi: Lone Wolf McQuade, Rock 'n' Roll HIgh School, Cube, Robo Vampire, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot.

HBO/MAX: Shiva Baby, Cabaret, Superman III

Kanopy: Embrace of the Serpent, Tommaso, Yes God Yes, Sophie's Choice, J'Accuse
Now that is a diverse list. I'd put a plug in for Mysterious Object at Noon, though I think it helps if you know a bit about the "game" it is playing around with before seeing it. Also, I love everything Weerasethakul, my favourite 21st century director, so I'm a bit biased.

I've been meaning to watch Sophie's Choice again, but I have put it off, like, forever. For a parent, the premise is so painful, so worst-nightmare-ever, that every time I think, okay, tonight's the night, I go, oh, well, there's a dogsled competition that I should catch. I just cringe away from it. Why do I even want to watch it again? Because I think my response was so emotional the first time that most of the movie lives behind a cloud in my mind. And I want to see if the acting is as good as I think it was. Tonight, perhaps? No, thank goodness for March Madness and the Miami Open. There always seems to be something that I can hide behind.
 

The Macho King

Back* to Back** World Champion
Jun 22, 2011
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Now that is a diverse list. I'd put a plug in for Mysterious Object at Noon, though I think it helps if you know a bit about the "game" it is playing around with before seeing it. Also, I love everything Weerasethakul, my favourite 21st century director, so I'm a bit biased.

I've been meaning to watch Sophie's Choice again, but I have put it off, like, forever. For a parent, the premise is so painful, so worst-nightmare-ever, that every time I think, okay, tonight's the night, I go, oh, well, there's a dogsled competition that I should catch. I just cringe away from it. Why do I even want to watch it again? Because I think my response was so emotional the first time that most of the movie lives behind a cloud in my mind. And I want to see if the acting is as good as I think it was. Tonight, perhaps? No, thank goodness for March Madness and the Miami Open. There always seems to be something that I can hide behind.
Sophie's Choice is such an interesting movie. Haven't watched it since I had kids, and don't think I will, but tonally you're kind of expecting one thing and 90% of the movie is something else entirely. It has a similar rep to Terms of Endearment, but similar to Terms, it's more because of all of the movies that have imitated it afterward (poorly) than any flaws it has in itself.
 
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KallioWeHardlyKnewYe

Hey! We won!
May 30, 2003
15,772
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Now that is a diverse list. I'd put a plug in for Mysterious Object at Noon, though I think it helps if you know a bit about the "game" it is playing around with before seeing it. Also, I love everything Weerasethakul, my favourite 21st century director, so I'm a bit biased.

I've been meaning to watch Sophie's Choice again, but I have put it off, like, forever. For a parent, the premise is so painful, so worst-nightmare-ever, that every time I think, okay, tonight's the night, I go, oh, well, there's a dogsled competition that I should catch. I just cringe away from it. Why do I even want to watch it again? Because I think my response was so emotional the first time that most of the movie lives behind a cloud in my mind. And I want to see if the acting is as good as I think it was. Tonight, perhaps? No, thank goodness for March Madness and the Miami Open. There always seems to be something that I can hide behind.
I'm familiar with the game so I don't think that'll be an issue. I've still only seen one of Weerasethakul's movie, but loved it (Uncle Boonme). I am likely to knock this one out soon. One of my goals for the year was to watch more the World Cinema Project's discoveries/restorations and this on that list. So I'd bet I finally watch it sooner rather than later.

But then again, Tubi might tell me American Ninja 4 is about to go away and that will distract me.
 

The Macho King

Back* to Back** World Champion
Jun 22, 2011
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Speaking of movies a long time on a "to watch" list that I finally got around to:

Once Upon a Time In Hollywood

So I used to be a pretty huge Tarantino fan. Kind of started getting more tepid on him with his post-Inglourious Basterds filmography (which I think is a stone cold classic). Django was good, Hateful Eight was just okay, and I was not interested in the subject matter of this one so it kind of sat unwatched for a long time.

Aaaand I think I was kind of right. I honestly found this fairly boring through a lot of stretches. There are some very good, sweet moments (the girl telling Leo he is a great actor on set, Tate watching her own film), but so much of it was just slow. It doesn't feel as tight, the dialogue doesn't have that sort of interesting patter he's normally known for.

IDK - maybe it doesn't stand out anymore because so much of the current generation of filmmakers were inspired by him to where this feels kind of rote? In a weird way, thinking about Tarantino's influence, I wonder if it is more on either the PG-13 Marvelly movies with the pithy dialogue and pop culture references than the actual R rated cinema/art housey films.

Great use of Chekov's Flamethrower though.

6/10 - well made but kind of disappointing.
 

sr edler

gold is not reality
Mar 20, 2010
12,145
6,638
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969) by Peter R. Hunt 5.5/10

diana-rigg-george-lazenby-on-her-majestys-secret-service


This film's a bit of a mess. It does have some strong suits or parts, but overall it's just way too much of a rollercoaster (in a negative way), on several levels.

Firstly, mostly when Diana Rigg's in the picture it's pretty great, but even she can't level out some of the silliness towards the end. Telly Savalas it's impossible to take seriously as a villain, way too cartoonish.

For instance, there's a shorter fight sequence among some bells in a barn in a Swiss village, in the latter parts of the film, which is clearly meant as some type of humorous homage, and I have to admit I did chuckle slightly at this sequence, but not because it was funny but because it was so stupidly ridiculous.

There's a melancholic strain that runs throughout this movie, which is very appreciable and poignant, though unfortunately a lot of this is quashed by a really stupid midsection which could perhaps be best described as genealogical sex farce (or something), with ex-model George Lazenby running around in a kilt at a Swiss ski resort trying to nail everything that moves.

It's a watchable film, though very up and down. Also, Bond movies in general I think would be much better with a more realistic set of villains, meaning intelligence vs intelligence, spy vs spy, and not just some corny bald guy in the Alps. The latter only works IMO if it's some larger-than-life figure like Goldfinger, and even that is a bit of a stretch.
 
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The Macho King

Back* to Back** World Champion
Jun 22, 2011
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Alright - so then Lady Bird popped up on recommended movies and decided to turn that on.

f***ing kismet. What a joyful, wonderful film. It's basically a Francis Ha prequel but it's okay to act like that when you're a teenager. Laurie Metcalf is wonderful. Whoever plays Lady Bird (not familiar with the actress) is hilarious and wonderful. Timothy Chamalet was low key hilarious?

Coming of age stuff walks a really fine line where it can either feel saccharine or it can feel cynical and somehow this walks the line and feels very... real. I expected to kind of like this movie but did not expect to love it. I want to watch this like 20 more times. The only reason I'm not putting it as a 10 is because I tend to wait until I've seen a movie a few times to see how it resonates on multiple viewings, but I love this and I can't wait until my daughter is older to watch it with her?

9/10 and could be a 10/10 if it holds up. What a joy.
 

kihei

McEnroe: The older I get, the better I used to be.
Jun 14, 2006
43,875
11,147
Toronto
I'm familiar with the game so I don't think that'll be an issue. I've still only seen one of Weerasethakul's movie, but loved it (Uncle Boonme). I am likely to knock this one out soon. One of my goals for the year was to watch more the World Cinema Project's discoveries/restorations and this on that list. So I'd bet I finally watch it sooner rather than later.

But then again, Tubi might tell me American Ninja 4 is about to go away and that will distract me.
I forgot that you didn't comment on Memoria in the "Movie of the Week" thread. If you have only seen Uncle Boonme Who Can Recall His Past Lives I wouldn't council watching Mysterious Object at Noon next. I saw it after three or four other Weerasethakul films, and I was glad I did. It fits in his cannon but in a low-budget, oblique, quasi-experimental way--kind of like an offramp project. Having seen several other of his films really helped put it into context for me. I'd recommend Tropical Malady next, followed by Blissfully Yours and Syndromes and a Century, all of which predate Uncle Boonme Who Can Recall His Past Lives. Here's my ranking of all of his films:

Uncle Boonme Who Can Recall His Past Lives
Tropical Malady
Memoria
Blissfully Yours
Cemetery of Splendour
Syndromes and a Century
Mysterious Object at Noon
Mekong Hotel
(though I love it for atmospheric reasons alone)

I'd argue that the top six are all masterworks in one way or another. Just an endlessly fascinating director able to communicate a totally other world view.

Just my two cents....
 
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Nakatomi

Registered User
Dec 26, 2022
157
200
I watched Cocktail for the first time.

What a strange film. It made sense when I read about it after watching that quite a bit of it was rewritten when rising star Tom Cruise signed on. It really does feel like two separate movies melded together as he seems to exist in a world apart from everyone else.

For what I understand was a movie marketed as a sort of lighthearted romcom, it definitely has some incredibly dark moments. And Tom seems like a rather awful person in it considering how poorly he was treating Elisabeth Shue's character over a dare. Toxic masculinity and 80s excess on full display in this one.

I did enjoy most of the Coughlin's Law moments, though.
 

Pranzo Oltranzista

Registered User
Oct 18, 2017
3,981
2,900
The Pink Panther (Edwards, 1963) – Peter Sellers literally steals the show in this original film of the PP series. Taking on a role he wasn't supposed to play, remodeling it into a comedic performance and nailing it enough to convince everyone to make it the central piece of the movie (the Phantom was supposed to be the main character), Sellers probably made himself sick on diet pills and overwork for this one, but it marks his first collaboration with Blake Edwards and his entry in superstardom. The film itself has a lot of fun though uneven vignettes and relies a lot on simple slapstick built around Inspector Clouseau's goofiness. Many elements here presage great things to come – especially in the last part where you can feel The Party coming – and the film gains from being mostly unrelated to the later PP formula. 5/10

A Shot In the Dark
(Edwards, 1964) – Now this is the true original PP movie as we know them. Inspector Clouseau gains his famous nonsensical French accent, and Dreyfus, Kato and cie make their entry (none of that is in the first film, which wasn't conceived as a Clouseau vehicle). It's a pretty good film too, based on a play, it's a classic “bring everyone to the living room, I'll solve the case” detective story where everyone (and no one!) is a suspect, despite the fact that the maid is present with the murder weapons in her hands at the first few murder sites. Maybe not the funniest of the PP films, but the classiest, and still fun enough to rank pretty high among my favorite comedies of all times. 7/10

Inspector Clouseau
(Yorkin, 1968) – There's good bits of comedy in there somewhere. It's just clumsy, weakly executed, and so very badly acted (doesn't help that they replaced Sellers with an incompetent – maybe part of the joke? – who makes Clouseau feel more like a r***** than an imbecile; sound problems and re-dub, always on his dialogues, just amplifies how weak the delivery is of his often pretty funny lines). The overall result is mostly awkward, kind of feel like an amateur theater group version of a PP film – Yorkin just can't direct slapstick the way Edwards does – but it has its moments. 3/10

The Return of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1975) – This is a return to the original story (the world famous Pink Panther diamond and the Phantom thief – here played by Plummer instead of Niven), with the additional cast of A Shot In the Dark (Dreyfus, Cato with a C, etc.). More importantly, the return of Sellers, Edwards and Mancini, really the trio that makes these films work. The film opens on the robbery of the diamond, which is treated with grand serious if not for one slapstick joke during the escape – and then, of course, Clouseau is put on the case. This is the film that introduced me to Sellers and Edwards as a kid, and the reason why I'll go through the DVD-set once every few years for the rest of my life. I've seen it so many times that it doesn't work too well comedy-wise for me anymore, it still has its moments (the introduction of Clouseau with the minkey, of course), but not everything works – personally, Catherine Schell's Lady Litton is a timing disaster and her reactions to Clouseau smothers most of the comedy (Clouseau's original innocent goofiness is really pushed to over-the-top slapstick from this one on, his accent is also cranked to 10 and will reach 20 in the next two films). There's something off-putting with the ending too, which feels botched and mismanaged (resolution comes from the museum guide's retelling of the story). Not a great film – though it has a few interesting intertextual elements – but still a pretty good comedy, a genre that can often work fine without much refinement. 4.5/10

The Pink Panther Strikes Again
(Edwards, 1976) – The previous film was already over the top in its humor, this one just goes all in. Dreyfus is now a Bond villain with machinery able to destroy continents, and the clumsy inspector is just clumsier. It feels really formulaic now, the sequence of assassins going after Clouseau and only eliminating each other is even a little dull from repetition, but it also has some of my favorite Clouseau moments (him trying to get in the Castle is just pure gold). The inspector was always a fan of silly costumes and role playing, but he now gets his stuff tailored and that's too pushed over-the-top. Probably a slightly lesser film than Return of the PP, it still might just be the funniest entry of the whole series, and its absurd world-ending threat helps its rewatchability (even the title is complete nonsense, the Pink Panther, the diamond not being part of this film at all – as for the credits' cartoon character, it's probably its best bits of the series). 4.5/10

Revenge of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1978) – The film suffers a lot from repetition, nothing really new or fresh, but this is the last time Sellers played Inspector Clouseau (and he was in pretty bad shape at that point), and only for that, it's still somewhat worth it. Edwards couldn't even do without Dreyfus, so he's just back at it, with no mention of him being disintegrated in the previous entry. Despite the film pushing it too far with the costumes and the nonsensical accent, it still kind of works as a low-tier PP film, until the silly chase and fireworks finale which is just bad comedy. A (very) few funny scenes, don't save this one – the magic is mostly gone. 3/10

Trail of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1982) – Certainly, 2 years after his death, Peter Sellers couldn't play Clouseau one last time... but yeah. This film is almost interesting just for existing. It's part experimental collage of outtakes, recycling of already used material, and faux Clouseau (and nothing works about the Sellers impostor, especially not the voice imitation), and part desperate attempt at making what could either be a failed homage or a mockery. The result is mostly embarrassing, and the constant “jokes” about the lady reporter's physique might just be the worst of it (it's also the first film of the series with (brief) nudity – they just knew they had nothing). The encompassing “story” trying to hold these scattered pieces together just doesn't work (it's not even absurd, it's just bad – and the Citizen Kane-ish investigation is just an obvious excuse to push the movie's runtime to its required 90 minutes). The young Clouseau episode could have been interesting had it not been rushed. Still, the best part of the film is the “best of” montage of scenes from the previous entries making up the end credits, which says a lot. 2/10

Curse of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1983) – The film opens as another lazy attempt at cashing in on the PP series, recycling the opening of Trail of the Pink Panther. Dialogues are often stale, and the slapstick ain't what it was with Sellers, but the film has a few pretty funny moments you wished he had filmed himself. It feels like that new American inspector stumbles into what often feels like a real formulaic PP movie, with the usual faces, sets, exotic locations, and some recycled jokes. There's French in France in this one (at last) – a few lines at least, and a sign in the Clouseau Museum which is so badly written it can only be a voluntary joke. Inspector Clouseau is forced in the story, now played by Roger Moore after plastic surgery, but he's completely out of character. The film is generally despised, but it's a lot better than the previous one – it's a bland movie made by a bored Blake Edwards, but I still laughed (more than I should have). 3/10

I'm missing the Son and the remakes, but couldn't go on. Maybe at some other time.
 

KallioWeHardlyKnewYe

Hey! We won!
May 30, 2003
15,772
3,808
The Pink Panther (Edwards, 1963) – Peter Sellers literally steals the show in this original film of the PP series. Taking on a role he wasn't supposed to play, remodeling it into a comedic performance and nailing it enough to convince everyone to make it the central piece of the movie (the Phantom was supposed to be the main character), Sellers probably made himself sick on diet pills and overwork for this one, but it marks his first collaboration with Blake Edwards and his entry in superstardom. The film itself has a lot of fun though uneven vignettes and relies a lot on simple slapstick built around Inspector Clouseau's goofiness. Many elements here presage great things to come – especially in the last part where you can feel The Party coming – and the film gains from being mostly unrelated to the later PP formula. 5/10

A Shot In the Dark
(Edwards, 1964) – Now this is the true original PP movie as we know them. Inspector Clouseau gains his famous nonsensical French accent, and Dreyfus, Kato and cie make their entry (none of that is in the first film, which wasn't conceived as a Clouseau vehicle). It's a pretty good film too, based on a play, it's a classic “bring everyone to the living room, I'll solve the case” detective story where everyone (and no one!) is a suspect, despite the fact that the maid is present with the murder weapons in her hands at the first few murder sites. Maybe not the funniest of the PP films, but the classiest, and still fun enough to rank pretty high among my favorite comedies of all times. 7/10

Inspector Clouseau
(Yorkin, 1968) – There's good bits of comedy in there somewhere. It's just clumsy, weakly executed, and so very badly acted (doesn't help that they replaced Sellers with an incompetent – maybe part of the joke? – who makes Clouseau feel more like a r***** than an imbecile; sound problems and re-dub, always on his dialogues, just amplifies how weak the delivery is of his often pretty funny lines). The overall result is mostly awkward, kind of feel like an amateur theater group version of a PP film – Yorkin just can't direct slapstick the way Edwards does – but it has its moments. 3/10

The Return of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1975) – This is a return to the original story (the world famous Pink Panther diamond and the Phantom thief – here played by Plummer instead of Niven), with the additional cast of A Shot In the Dark (Dreyfus, Cato with a C, etc.). More importantly, the return of Sellers, Edwards and Mancini, really the trio that makes these films work. The film opens on the robbery of the diamond, which is treated with grand serious if not for one slapstick joke during the escape – and then, of course, Clouseau is put on the case. This is the film that introduced me to Sellers and Edwards as a kid, and the reason why I'll go through the DVD-set once every few years for the rest of my life. I've seen it so many times that it doesn't work too well comedy-wise for me anymore, it still has its moments (the introduction of Clouseau with the minkey, of course), but not everything works – personally, Catherine Schell's Lady Litton is a timing disaster and her reactions to Clouseau smothers most of the comedy (Clouseau's original innocent goofiness is really pushed to over-the-top slapstick from this one on, his accent is also cranked to 10 and will reach 20 in the next two films). There's something off-putting with the ending too, which feels botched and mismanaged (resolution comes from the museum guide's retelling of the story). Not a great film – though it has a few interesting intertextual elements – but still a pretty good comedy, a genre that can often work fine without much refinement. 4.5/10

The Pink Panther Strikes Again
(Edwards, 1976) – The previous film was already over the top in its humor, this one just goes all in. Dreyfus is now a Bond villain with machinery able to destroy continents, and the clumsy inspector is just clumsier. It feels really formulaic now, the sequence of assassins going after Clouseau and only eliminating each other is even a little dull from repetition, but it also has some of my favorite Clouseau moments (him trying to get in the Castle is just pure gold). The inspector was always a fan of silly costumes and role playing, but he now gets his stuff tailored and that's too pushed over-the-top. Probably a slightly lesser film than Return of the PP, it still might just be the funniest entry of the whole series, and its absurd world-ending threat helps its rewatchability (even the title is complete nonsense, the Pink Panther, the diamond not being part of this film at all – as for the credits' cartoon character, it's probably its best bits of the series). 4.5/10

Revenge of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1978) – The film suffers a lot from repetition, nothing really new or fresh, but this is the last time Sellers played Inspector Clouseau (and he was in pretty bad shape at that point), and only for that, it's still somewhat worth it. Edwards couldn't even do without Dreyfus, so he's just back at it, with no mention of him being disintegrated in the previous entry. Despite the film pushing it too far with the costumes and the nonsensical accent, it still kind of works as a low-tier PP film, until the silly chase and fireworks finale which is just bad comedy. A (very) few funny scenes, don't save this one – the magic is mostly gone. 3/10

Trail of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1982) – Certainly, 2 years after his death, Peter Sellers couldn't play Clouseau one last time... but yeah. This film is almost interesting just for existing. It's part experimental collage of outtakes, recycling of already used material, and faux Clouseau (and nothing works about the Sellers impostor, especially not the voice imitation), and part desperate attempt at making what could either be a failed homage or a mockery. The result is mostly embarrassing, and the constant “jokes” about the lady reporter's physique might just be the worst of it (it's also the first film of the series with (brief) nudity – they just knew they had nothing). The encompassing “story” trying to hold these scattered pieces together just doesn't work (it's not even absurd, it's just bad – and the Citizen Kane-ish investigation is just an obvious excuse to push the movie's runtime to its required 90 minutes). The young Clouseau episode could have been interesting had it not been rushed. Still, the best part of the film is the “best of” montage of scenes from the previous entries making up the end credits, which says a lot. 2/10

Curse of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1983) – The film opens as another lazy attempt at cashing in on the PP series, recycling the opening of Trail of the Pink Panther. Dialogues are often stale, and the slapstick ain't what it was with Sellers, but the film has a few pretty funny moments you wished he had filmed himself. It feels like that new American inspector stumbles into what often feels like a real formulaic PP movie, with the usual faces, sets, exotic locations, and some recycled jokes. There's French in France in this one (at last) – a few lines at least, and a sign in the Clouseau Museum which is so badly written it can only be a voluntary joke. Inspector Clouseau is forced in the story, now played by Roger Moore after plastic surgery, but he's completely out of character. The film is generally despised, but it's a lot better than the previous one – it's a bland movie made by a bored Blake Edwards, but I still laughed (more than I should have). 3/10

I'm missing the Son and the remakes, but couldn't go on. Maybe at some other time.
Noble work.

I certainly can't endorse the Steve Martin remake BUT the scene where they're trying to teach him how to speak English "I would like to buy a hamburger" is just a sublimely silly bit of comedy that I still find myself seeking out every now and then for a laugh (just the clip though not the full movie).

Edit: why not? here's the link (though it cuts off his last painful exclamation of "der burger!!"
 

KallioWeHardlyKnewYe

Hey! We won!
May 30, 2003
15,772
3,808
Since it is Good Friday ...

The Long Good Friday. One of my favorite gangster movies ever. Bob Hoskins plays Harold Shand a bad dude striving for legitimacy with a big London land deal looming, but someone is out to make his Easter a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad weekend. I love how the plot doesn't really hand hold — several characters are introduced and killed before we even really understand what's going on. It's cleverly structured to keep you wrong footed throughout, just like Harold. I love its very 1980s synth score (despite coming out in 1979, I believe). It almost sounds like Goblin b-sides and evokes a horror movie, which at times it feels like. I love how nasty and brutal it is. Everyone is pretty much unambiguoulsy bad in this. No corners cut. But most of all I love Bob Hoskins who uncorks a monster of a performance, one with more complexity than a character like this often has. Between this and Mona Lisa, few have ever been better at snapping like a mad dog when they're emotionally wounded. His final car ride scene is right on par with similar, much more heralded sequences at the end of The Graduate and Michael Clayton.
 
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Chili

Time passes when you're not looking
Jun 10, 2004
8,793
4,931
The Pink Panther (Edwards, 1963) – Peter Sellers literally steals the show in this original film of the PP series. Taking on a role he wasn't supposed to play, remodeling it into a comedic performance and nailing it enough to convince everyone to make it the central piece of the movie (the Phantom was supposed to be the main character), Sellers probably made himself sick on diet pills and overwork for this one, but it marks his first collaboration with Blake Edwards and his entry in superstardom. The film itself has a lot of fun though uneven vignettes and relies a lot on simple slapstick built around Inspector Clouseau's goofiness. Many elements here presage great things to come – especially in the last part where you can feel The Party coming – and the film gains from being mostly unrelated to the later PP formula. 5/10

A Shot In the Dark
(Edwards, 1964) – Now this is the true original PP movie as we know them. Inspector Clouseau gains his famous nonsensical French accent, and Dreyfus, Kato and cie make their entry (none of that is in the first film, which wasn't conceived as a Clouseau vehicle). It's a pretty good film too, based on a play, it's a classic “bring everyone to the living room, I'll solve the case” detective story where everyone (and no one!) is a suspect, despite the fact that the maid is present with the murder weapons in her hands at the first few murder sites. Maybe not the funniest of the PP films, but the classiest, and still fun enough to rank pretty high among my favorite comedies of all times. 7/10

Inspector Clouseau
(Yorkin, 1968) – There's good bits of comedy in there somewhere. It's just clumsy, weakly executed, and so very badly acted (doesn't help that they replaced Sellers with an incompetent – maybe part of the joke? – who makes Clouseau feel more like a r***** than an imbecile; sound problems and re-dub, always on his dialogues, just amplifies how weak the delivery is of his often pretty funny lines). The overall result is mostly awkward, kind of feel like an amateur theater group version of a PP film – Yorkin just can't direct slapstick the way Edwards does – but it has its moments. 3/10

The Return of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1975) – This is a return to the original story (the world famous Pink Panther diamond and the Phantom thief – here played by Plummer instead of Niven), with the additional cast of A Shot In the Dark (Dreyfus, Cato with a C, etc.). More importantly, the return of Sellers, Edwards and Mancini, really the trio that makes these films work. The film opens on the robbery of the diamond, which is treated with grand serious if not for one slapstick joke during the escape – and then, of course, Clouseau is put on the case. This is the film that introduced me to Sellers and Edwards as a kid, and the reason why I'll go through the DVD-set once every few years for the rest of my life. I've seen it so many times that it doesn't work too well comedy-wise for me anymore, it still has its moments (the introduction of Clouseau with the minkey, of course), but not everything works – personally, Catherine Schell's Lady Litton is a timing disaster and her reactions to Clouseau smothers most of the comedy (Clouseau's original innocent goofiness is really pushed to over-the-top slapstick from this one on, his accent is also cranked to 10 and will reach 20 in the next two films). There's something off-putting with the ending too, which feels botched and mismanaged (resolution comes from the museum guide's retelling of the story). Not a great film – though it has a few interesting intertextual elements – but still a pretty good comedy, a genre that can often work fine without much refinement. 4.5/10

The Pink Panther Strikes Again
(Edwards, 1976) – The previous film was already over the top in its humor, this one just goes all in. Dreyfus is now a Bond villain with machinery able to destroy continents, and the clumsy inspector is just clumsier. It feels really formulaic now, the sequence of assassins going after Clouseau and only eliminating each other is even a little dull from repetition, but it also has some of my favorite Clouseau moments (him trying to get in the Castle is just pure gold). The inspector was always a fan of silly costumes and role playing, but he now gets his stuff tailored and that's too pushed over-the-top. Probably a slightly lesser film than Return of the PP, it still might just be the funniest entry of the whole series, and its absurd world-ending threat helps its rewatchability (even the title is complete nonsense, the Pink Panther, the diamond not being part of this film at all – as for the credits' cartoon character, it's probably its best bits of the series). 4.5/10

Revenge of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1978) – The film suffers a lot from repetition, nothing really new or fresh, but this is the last time Sellers played Inspector Clouseau (and he was in pretty bad shape at that point), and only for that, it's still somewhat worth it. Edwards couldn't even do without Dreyfus, so he's just back at it, with no mention of him being disintegrated in the previous entry. Despite the film pushing it too far with the costumes and the nonsensical accent, it still kind of works as a low-tier PP film, until the silly chase and fireworks finale which is just bad comedy. A (very) few funny scenes, don't save this one – the magic is mostly gone. 3/10

Trail of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1982) – Certainly, 2 years after his death, Peter Sellers couldn't play Clouseau one last time... but yeah. This film is almost interesting just for existing. It's part experimental collage of outtakes, recycling of already used material, and faux Clouseau (and nothing works about the Sellers impostor, especially not the voice imitation), and part desperate attempt at making what could either be a failed homage or a mockery. The result is mostly embarrassing, and the constant “jokes” about the lady reporter's physique might just be the worst of it (it's also the first film of the series with (brief) nudity – they just knew they had nothing). The encompassing “story” trying to hold these scattered pieces together just doesn't work (it's not even absurd, it's just bad – and the Citizen Kane-ish investigation is just an obvious excuse to push the movie's runtime to its required 90 minutes). The young Clouseau episode could have been interesting had it not been rushed. Still, the best part of the film is the “best of” montage of scenes from the previous entries making up the end credits, which says a lot. 2/10

Curse of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1983) – The film opens as another lazy attempt at cashing in on the PP series, recycling the opening of Trail of the Pink Panther. Dialogues are often stale, and the slapstick ain't what it was with Sellers, but the film has a few pretty funny moments you wished he had filmed himself. It feels like that new American inspector stumbles into what often feels like a real formulaic PP movie, with the usual faces, sets, exotic locations, and some recycled jokes. There's French in France in this one (at last) – a few lines at least, and a sign in the Clouseau Museum which is so badly written it can only be a voluntary joke. Inspector Clouseau is forced in the story, now played by Roger Moore after plastic surgery, but he's completely out of character. The film is generally despised, but it's a lot better than the previous one – it's a bland movie made by a bored Blake Edwards, but I still laughed (more than I should have). 3/10

I'm missing the Son and the remakes, but couldn't go on. Maybe at some other time.
I should have skipped the Steve Martin Pink Panther films. He`s an infinitely funny dude but those are bad films, found the humour is quite a bit forced. There is really only one Clouseau, for me.

Read somewhere that Peter Sellers wasn`t available for Inspector Clouseau. Not sure which film he was working on, possibly The Party. Interesting that Sellers was in a film with Alan Arkin recently at the time (Woman Times Seven). `Great line: There is a time for laughing and a time for not laughing. And this isn`t one of them`.

I like a bunch of his films, my favorite is Two Way Stretch
 
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Pranzo Oltranzista

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I should have skipped the Steve Martin Pink Panther films. He`s an infinitely funny dude but those are bad films, found the humour is quite a bit forced. There is really only one Clouseau, for me.

Read somewhere that Peter Sellers wasn`t available for Inspector Clouseau. Not sure which film he was working on, possibly The Party. Interesting that Sellers was in a film with Alan Arkin recently at the time (Woman Times Seven). `Great line: There is a time for laughing and a time for not laughing. And this isn`t one of them`.

I like a bunch of his films, my favorite is Two Way Stretch
Big fan of his. Being There, Dr. Stangelove, Lolita, of course, but a favorite of mine is Hoffman.
 
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Pranzo Oltranzista

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Noble work.

I certainly can't endorse the Steve Martin remake BUT the scene where they're trying to teach him how to speak English "I would like to buy a hamburger" is just a sublimely silly bit of comedy that I still find myself seeking out every now and then for a laugh (just the clip though not the full movie).

Edit: why not? here's the link (though it cuts off his last painful exclamation of "der burger!!"

I haven't seen the remakes. Couldn't help but think of Joey in this scene (the scene from Friends, not the (funnier?) English class one from Joey). Favorite English learning scenes for me are from Le goût des autres (great film):

 
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Chili

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Jun 10, 2004
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Big fan of his. Being There, Dr. Stangelove, Lolita, of course, but a favorite of mine is Hoffman.
I liked Hoffman too. It was rumoured that PS tried to buy that film and burn it because he thought that his portrayal was too much like his real self. I`m up to at least 24 of his films that I have seen. The Ladykillers is a great film (another remake to skip except for the great ending). I also really liked him in The Wrong Box (as a doctor with a lot of cats) and What`s New p***ycat? (in his scenes with Woody Allen who was in his first film).

Edit: For fans of Peter Sellers, this is a biography with a lot of lesser-known facts as well as clips from his early work and some of his films. It's just over 51 minutes, found it interesting...

 
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sdf

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Jan 23, 2015
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Rostov on Don
Oppenheimer

So I was right about this stuff, it's kinda pointless, openheimer just swagging around like ultimate badass under intense zimmer music but nothing dengerous for him not happens, neither there are no situations that might be justified the existence of this film. The pointlessness of it leds to some commedic moments like when he showed Einstein those calculations and Einstein said to him that he will figured out everything by himself, I imagined that Oppenheimer was thinking after it "damn, albert is absolutely useless" :laugh:
 

GlassesJacketShirt

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Aug 4, 2010
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The Pink Panther (Edwards, 1963) – Peter Sellers literally steals the show in this original film of the PP series. Taking on a role he wasn't supposed to play, remodeling it into a comedic performance and nailing it enough to convince everyone to make it the central piece of the movie (the Phantom was supposed to be the main character), Sellers probably made himself sick on diet pills and overwork for this one, but it marks his first collaboration with Blake Edwards and his entry in superstardom. The film itself has a lot of fun though uneven vignettes and relies a lot on simple slapstick built around Inspector Clouseau's goofiness. Many elements here presage great things to come – especially in the last part where you can feel The Party coming – and the film gains from being mostly unrelated to the later PP formula. 5/10

A Shot In the Dark
(Edwards, 1964) – Now this is the true original PP movie as we know them. Inspector Clouseau gains his famous nonsensical French accent, and Dreyfus, Kato and cie make their entry (none of that is in the first film, which wasn't conceived as a Clouseau vehicle). It's a pretty good film too, based on a play, it's a classic “bring everyone to the living room, I'll solve the case” detective story where everyone (and no one!) is a suspect, despite the fact that the maid is present with the murder weapons in her hands at the first few murder sites. Maybe not the funniest of the PP films, but the classiest, and still fun enough to rank pretty high among my favorite comedies of all times. 7/10

Inspector Clouseau
(Yorkin, 1968) – There's good bits of comedy in there somewhere. It's just clumsy, weakly executed, and so very badly acted (doesn't help that they replaced Sellers with an incompetent – maybe part of the joke? – who makes Clouseau feel more like a r***** than an imbecile; sound problems and re-dub, always on his dialogues, just amplifies how weak the delivery is of his often pretty funny lines). The overall result is mostly awkward, kind of feel like an amateur theater group version of a PP film – Yorkin just can't direct slapstick the way Edwards does – but it has its moments. 3/10

The Return of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1975) – This is a return to the original story (the world famous Pink Panther diamond and the Phantom thief – here played by Plummer instead of Niven), with the additional cast of A Shot In the Dark (Dreyfus, Cato with a C, etc.). More importantly, the return of Sellers, Edwards and Mancini, really the trio that makes these films work. The film opens on the robbery of the diamond, which is treated with grand serious if not for one slapstick joke during the escape – and then, of course, Clouseau is put on the case. This is the film that introduced me to Sellers and Edwards as a kid, and the reason why I'll go through the DVD-set once every few years for the rest of my life. I've seen it so many times that it doesn't work too well comedy-wise for me anymore, it still has its moments (the introduction of Clouseau with the minkey, of course), but not everything works – personally, Catherine Schell's Lady Litton is a timing disaster and her reactions to Clouseau smothers most of the comedy (Clouseau's original innocent goofiness is really pushed to over-the-top slapstick from this one on, his accent is also cranked to 10 and will reach 20 in the next two films). There's something off-putting with the ending too, which feels botched and mismanaged (resolution comes from the museum guide's retelling of the story). Not a great film – though it has a few interesting intertextual elements – but still a pretty good comedy, a genre that can often work fine without much refinement. 4.5/10

The Pink Panther Strikes Again
(Edwards, 1976) – The previous film was already over the top in its humor, this one just goes all in. Dreyfus is now a Bond villain with machinery able to destroy continents, and the clumsy inspector is just clumsier. It feels really formulaic now, the sequence of assassins going after Clouseau and only eliminating each other is even a little dull from repetition, but it also has some of my favorite Clouseau moments (him trying to get in the Castle is just pure gold). The inspector was always a fan of silly costumes and role playing, but he now gets his stuff tailored and that's too pushed over-the-top. Probably a slightly lesser film than Return of the PP, it still might just be the funniest entry of the whole series, and its absurd world-ending threat helps its rewatchability (even the title is complete nonsense, the Pink Panther, the diamond not being part of this film at all – as for the credits' cartoon character, it's probably its best bits of the series). 4.5/10

Revenge of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1978) – The film suffers a lot from repetition, nothing really new or fresh, but this is the last time Sellers played Inspector Clouseau (and he was in pretty bad shape at that point), and only for that, it's still somewhat worth it. Edwards couldn't even do without Dreyfus, so he's just back at it, with no mention of him being disintegrated in the previous entry. Despite the film pushing it too far with the costumes and the nonsensical accent, it still kind of works as a low-tier PP film, until the silly chase and fireworks finale which is just bad comedy. A (very) few funny scenes, don't save this one – the magic is mostly gone. 3/10

Trail of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1982) – Certainly, 2 years after his death, Peter Sellers couldn't play Clouseau one last time... but yeah. This film is almost interesting just for existing. It's part experimental collage of outtakes, recycling of already used material, and faux Clouseau (and nothing works about the Sellers impostor, especially not the voice imitation), and part desperate attempt at making what could either be a failed homage or a mockery. The result is mostly embarrassing, and the constant “jokes” about the lady reporter's physique might just be the worst of it (it's also the first film of the series with (brief) nudity – they just knew they had nothing). The encompassing “story” trying to hold these scattered pieces together just doesn't work (it's not even absurd, it's just bad – and the Citizen Kane-ish investigation is just an obvious excuse to push the movie's runtime to its required 90 minutes). The young Clouseau episode could have been interesting had it not been rushed. Still, the best part of the film is the “best of” montage of scenes from the previous entries making up the end credits, which says a lot. 2/10

Curse of the Pink Panther
(Edwards, 1983) – The film opens as another lazy attempt at cashing in on the PP series, recycling the opening of Trail of the Pink Panther. Dialogues are often stale, and the slapstick ain't what it was with Sellers, but the film has a few pretty funny moments you wished he had filmed himself. It feels like that new American inspector stumbles into what often feels like a real formulaic PP movie, with the usual faces, sets, exotic locations, and some recycled jokes. There's French in France in this one (at last) – a few lines at least, and a sign in the Clouseau Museum which is so badly written it can only be a voluntary joke. Inspector Clouseau is forced in the story, now played by Roger Moore after plastic surgery, but he's completely out of character. The film is generally despised, but it's a lot better than the previous one – it's a bland movie made by a bored Blake Edwards, but I still laughed (more than I should have). 3/10

I'm missing the Son and the remakes, but couldn't go on. Maybe at some other time.

A Shot in the Dark was one of my favorites as a kid, even as a film that's been out decades since I first viewed it. Agreed with the relative scoring, best film in the Inspector Clouseau saga and it ain't close.
 
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Chairman Maouth

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Barbie (2023) Directed by Greta Gerwig 8A

Discovering that her feet are suddenly flat and that her legs are developing cellulite, Barbie (Margot Robbie) suffers an existential crisis. She is advised to leave Barbieland and rectify the rift that is occurring between her matriarchal, idealized doll world and the real world outside, still largely dominated by patriarchal authority figures. Ken (Ryan Gosling) goes along for the ride. Turns out he thinks patriarchy is a pretty good idea, and he returns to Barbieland with plans to reform the place. Barbie is still trying to figure things out, but she knows a bad idea when she sees one. Still, she has a lot of thinking to do before she can work out what to do next.

I have to go back to Doctor Strangelove to think of a satire this clever and this thoroughly realized. I think Barbie is especially brilliant when one considers the tightrope that director Greta Gerwig had to walk given the fact that Mattel, maker of Barbie, is one of the major producers of this film. She has to take into account Barbie's history as an idealized sex object with an hour-glass figure and her feet permanently deformed so that she can wear high heels. Then there is the fact that Barbie remains a much loved figure to many of the girls/women who grew up with her and remember her fondly. Add to this a very light, almost frothy, yet still pointed critique of patriarchy and a healthy dose of female empowerment, and it is a heady achievement to pull all this stuff off and look graceful doing it. The material is handled with wit, humour and a candy-coloured tonal palette and supported by set direction and costume design that are already locks for Academy Awards. The result is a special movie that says something important and has a whole lot of fun doing it. As well, the acting is top notch with Robbie perfectly calibrating her performance somewhere between clueless doll and emerging consciousness, and Gosling largely stealing the second half of the movie with his suddenly conflicted Ken. All and all, a tour-de-force for Gerwig and the best American movie so far this year.


Best of '23 so far

1) Riceboy Sleeps, Shim, Canada
2) Barbie, Gerwig, US

I don't like musicals and I don't like dolls. I like Scorsese and Tarantino movies. Is there any chance in Hell below or on God's Green Earth above that I might like this movie?
 

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