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

[ManwithNoIdentity]

The Blair Witch Project

10/10

Yeah it’s not as scary now that the found footage craze has come and gone but I’ll always remember the marketing campaign they did before viral marketing was really a thing and it was brilliant, people actually thought the actors were dead

I really hope they release the supposed 2 hour cut of the film someday

 

[kihei]

The Kingdom: Exodus (2022) Directed by Lars von Trier 9B

The Kingdom: Exodus isn't actually a movie, but a five-part mini series directed by Lars von Trier. Still, I think the series should be of great interest to film fans, especially those familiar with the director's dour, misanthropic works (Breaking the Waves; Dancer in the Dark; Dogville; Antichrist; Melancholia; Nymphomania; The House That Jack Built). On the basis of these works, one would never guess that von Trier had a light side, but The Kingdom: Exodus is a comedy and one of the funniest in series history, that is, if your taste in comedy runs to brilliant, acidic absurdity. Two previous instalments of four parts each (which ideally should be viewed first) set up this perfectly executed final season.

The Kingdom in the title refers to one of the leading hospitals in Denmark and each series deals with the strange events taking place there. These goings-on are hard to describe, an unholy mix of supernatural horror and caustic humour. But here is a taste. Underneath the foundation of the hospital, there is a gigantic "starch swamp" in which weird things are happening, The giant head of Udo Kier is in water up to his (its) nostrils and he (it) is in danger of drowning from his own tears. He is not the only menacingly surreal thing lurking in this swamp by any means. The above hospital itself is staffed by a collection of well-meaning Danish idiots who are the bane of the chauvinistic Swedish doctor who works there and hates everything Danish. Despite his supposed superiority and massive disdain for his colleagues, these cheerful morons manage to get his goat every single time. In the first two seasons this character was played superbly by the late Ernst-Hugo Jaregard who is replaced by his "son," played by Mikael Persbrandt, in the final series. Persbrandt does a good job filling very big shoes. In addition, there are a number of patients and staff who believe that the hospital is haunted by some very strange ghosts who live in the elevator shafts, ghosts who might be interested in hastening the apocalypse. If you like this kind of dark, absurdist humour, comedy doesn't get much funnier than this. Pretty good creep factor in parts, too.

Sidenote: Given the fact that von Trier has contracted Parkinson's disease, this may be his last significant work. I think along with Antichrist, The Kindom series are the best thing that he has ever done.

The final series is available on MUBI.

subtitles

 

[shadow1]

Who Am I? (1998) - 7/10

The amnesiac sole survivor of a military helicopter crash is targeted for assassination by a crooked CIA agent.

Jackie Chan stars as "Who Am I", a special forces agent working on a multinational operation in Africa. However, the team is double crossed, and "Who Am I" is left as the sole survivor. After recovering from his injuries in a tribal village but suffering from amnesia, "Who Am I" returns to civilization and tries to find his real identity with the help of spunky off-road racer Yuki (Mirai Yamamoto) and persistent reporter Christine (Michelle Ferre). However, this inadvertently draws attention to himself, leading to arms dealing CIA Agent Morgan (Ron Smerczak) putting a hit out on "Who Am I"...

Who Am I? was co-directed by Benny Chan and Jackie Chan, with Jackie also earning a writing credit. The film was the last time Jackie worked with producer Leonard Ho, who was the co-founder of Golden Harvest productions. The two had collaborated on over 20 films, beginning with 1980's The Young Master. Ho passed away at age 72 before Who Am I? was released.

Who Am I? tells a classic spy story where a special agent loses their memory, and then are pursued by bad guys. The film is fairly plot heavy as a result, with the first fight scene not taking place until 45 minutes into the run time. Who Am I? plays things a lot more serious than most of Jackie's other films, though there are couple comedic scenes. The Chan directors do a good job of getting the audience invested into Who Am I?'s story; it's a movie that's easy to get sucked in to. The film also gives the audience a good variety of locations, including rural South Africa, Johannesburg, and Rotterdam. On the downside, there are a couple cheesy plot threads, and I also thought the plot could've been even more effective if we didn't know from the start that Agent Morgan was dirty, but that's a nitpick.

Action wise, the film is back loaded. The first half of the movie is light on fight scenes, but it makes up for it later on. Near the end of the film, Jackie has a classic fight scene against two great fighters on the rooftop of a tall building; he immediately follows this up with possibly his last great stunt, which I'll just say involves him taking a shortcut to ground level. (Not so fun fact: in grade school, I read Jackie's biography and showed this scene to my classmates, while wearing my taekwondo uniform... ). There's also a cool car chase sequence in the middle of the film, which is a change of pace compared to most of Jackie's other work.

Who Am I?'s biggest weakness is probably its characters and performances, which are a mixed bag on both fronts. There are a couple characters that are quite annoying, and some really rough performances to add insult to injury. I hate to single out one person, but Michelle Ferre who plays Christine was not a trained actress. She was a CNN correspondent who was interviewing Jackie on the set of this movie(!), and he invited her to co-star. She has a massive role in the film, and unsurprisingly gives a very stiff performance. But considering the unusual background of her casting, I have to give her credit for doing as well as she did.

Overall, Who Am I? is a solid Jackie Chan film with a few issues, but nothing that detracts too greatly from the overall product. Who Am I? is the film I consider to be the final film of the Chan's "Golden Era" of films (maybe I should call it the "Leonard Ho Era"?). Though he'd find big success with USA produced movies right after this (like 1998's Rush Hour), Jackie's Hong Kong films took a steep decline is both consistency and quality after the release of Who Am I?. All good things must come to an end, and Who Am I? is a solid bookend to nearly two decades straight of consistently above average Hong Kong outputs by Jackie Chan.

 

[Spring in Fialta]

Finished the movie about an hour ago and I had it at 8.5/10, but thinking a bit about it and writing this comment, I pushed it up. Might be recency bias, might be because it's just freakin' brilliant. I watched it because it was first on the list that was posted here, thinking I'd be disappointed. I was not.

View attachment 626902

Aftersun (Wells, 2022) – Narrative masterclass in restraint and subtlety, this film is a lot more about what it doesn't tell than about what is actually included in its story. On the surface, a father tries his best for his daughter to have a good time with him during their Summer vacation. With great pace, great atmosphere, and an attention to details that present their relationship with depth and finesse. The overly realist approach's only glitches come from images taken from a video camera by the daughter and some flashes of an unknown character who seem lost in her thoughts on a dance floor. Though it is never explicitly presented as such, it is soon clear that what we are seeing is the recollection of that Summer by the daughter, now an adult, through what little concrete recordings she has and her own memory. Though it is never said, you understand that it's a film about loss, about holding on to someone dear to you, about trying to understand what went wrong. Once you're there, the film becomes fascinating. Even though her understanding of that Summer's events is necessarily limited (through single perspective and flawed memory), the story unfolds through omniscient narration, strongly underlying these few moments where Sophie is absent (or sleeping), moments where the memories are necessarily fabricated. It's in these moments that she tries to make sense of what her father was going through and that she missed as a child, moments where his despair shows up. These few moments inform the spectator of what she is trying to understand through the whole process – a suffering, an incident, that is not in the film. Other moments on which she insists portray some kind of constructed guilt: she insists on him telling where he failed as an adult (what he thought he'd be doing with his life), she's mean to him and leaves him alone for the night, she refuses to acknowledge his apologies. Little details that fly by, but that once you understand what's going on, only make the memories more painful and poignant. It is purely brilliant cinéma, and a narrative feat. 9.5/10

This movie sounds incredible. Thanks!

 

[kihei]

Women Talking (2022) Directed by Sarah Polley 7B

Sarah Polley wrote and directed this adaptation of Miriam Toews' novel that was based on a real-life occurrence in an isolated Mennonite community in Bolivia in 2010 where several women were routinely raped in their sleep after being given horse tranquilizer by seven males in their colony. When the women discovered what happened, the police were brought in....to protect the status quo. The women were given two options, forgive the men and go on like nothing had happened or leave and be excommunicated, meaning that they could never enter heaven. As all the women were uneducated (by patriarchal fiat) and could neither read nor write, these choices represented a pair of fearsome extremes.

Women Talking is about eight women (and two young girls who hang around to listen) meeting in a barn loft where they discuss what they and their female neighbours should do, adding a third possibility, staying and fighting for change. While Polley finds ways of briefly escaping from the loft, no question Women Talking is a dialogue heavy movie. At first I feared it was going to be a kind of dry point making pro-and-con exercise, but Polley is a much more gifted director than that. She turns the movie into an intensely emotional, even suspenseful experience as these women debate collectively what they are going to do and what it might cost. It is interesting that the conversations occur among a group of women who would likely think themselves the furthest removed imaginable from any kind of feminist ideology. Yet their words and action resonate far beyond their own community, providing a great deal to think about and to discuss in the here and now.

Afterthought: While still a very good film, the more I think about Women Talking, the more flaws start to appear, starting with shooting it in a style and with washed-out colour that has the effect of dating the film for no discernible and certainly no beneficial reason.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Le rendez-vous de minuit (Leenhardt, 1962) – Mise en abyme, reflexivity, the contamination of reality by images (as one character says: “today, it's life that imitates cinema”), despite one very dated insufferable male lead, this film feels quite ahead of its time. It's about a lower class woman who looks like a famous actress and fantasizes about her latest character, a billionaire eccentric – Lilli Palmer, playing herself playing Anne Leuven the billionaire who ends up killing herself, and also playing Eva Crowley, a failed actress trying to emulate Anne Leuven in real life, playing her better than Palmer did, until the end, for real. The film flirts with metalepsis but never really gets there. It's still an impressive exercise in reflexivity. I guess it's no real surprise, Leenhardt is quasi-unknown, and only made three feature films, but he was a man of the arts, making a bunch of shorter films, mostly about other artists. Former movie critic himself, Leenhardt is considered a spiritual father to the French New Wave, founded a cineclub where the boys hang out, and both Godard and Truffaut would later give him small roles in one of their films. 6.5/10

Top Gun (Scott, 1986) – Now this. It's a pretty good 80s flick. It does nothing great, but works on the edges of a few genres with enough flair to be somewhat interesting. And well, it's from my youth, so I'm probably too generous with 5/10.

Top Gun: Maverick (Kosinski, 2022) – Now that. I had to go read a few comments from people who put that thing in their best of the year lists. Just as I thought, they really have nothing to say about it. Watching the original just before felt a bit cheesy, but you know, it's from another time and it gets somewhat of a pass. Recreating the cheese just felt awkward, and so unnecessary. The bar scene followed by Maverick's introduction as their instructor mirroring the original movie was bad enough, the shirtless football scene was just embarrassing. I really tried to enjoy it beyond the cool plane stuff as a variation on the original, a sequel/remake kind of – but of all the elements of distanciation (not good distanciation where you are invited to reflect on what you are watching, just plain unwanted distanciation throwing you off of what should be a banal immersive experience), including some weird contamination from the Mission:Impossible universe, I think Goose's son's freakin mustache was the worst to me. No thank you. All these 80s films being called back for a last farewell make Sylvester Stallone look like a genius (not that I don't think he is). 3.5/10

 

[kihei]

Causeway (2022) Directed by Lila Neugebauer 4B

Causeway is a very rare bird, a Jennifer Lawrence movie with one of her best performances in years that has generated absolutely no awards' buzz whatsoever. In fact, the movie opened for a week in October to qualify for Academy Award consideration and then went immediately to direct-to-disc distribution. While it may have opened in one theatre in October in LA, it may have never been screened as it seems to have generated no revenue whatsoever. So what happened?

Causeway is about an Army Engineer (Jennifer Lawrence) recovering from her truck blowing up with her in it in Afghanistan along with recuperating from other long-standing traumas of more distant origin. She is a physical and psychological mess who takes a job as a pool cleaner in her hometown of New Orleans in an attempt to help herself get back on her feet. She meets a friendly auto mechanic (Brian Tyree Henry), and they start a fairly complicated platonic relationship to which they both bring a significant amount of guilt and desperation bred of loneliness. Starved for human connection, they reach out tentatively to each other, but who knows for how long? Lawrence and Henry have great chemistry, and one would think this film should have developed into a powerful character study. But first time director Lila Neugebauer brings so little energy to the plot that Causeway just plods along dismally, so inert that not even Lawrence's and Henry's fine performances can inject any urgency into it . The potential for a good movie was wasted by a director who has yet neither learned how to pace a movie nor how to maximise the effectiveness of her gifted actors..

 

[Mario Lemieux fan 66]

Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio: 8/10 Beautiful animation, good songs and good story.

the fabelmans: 7.5/10 a much better movie from spielberg than west side story.

Knives Out 2: 7.3/10 a couple notch below the first movie but still a decent entertainment.

the banshees of inisherin: 7.3/10 Interesting movie with great set location, good acting and good imagery. As long as you don't have huge expectation this is a fine movie. Don't expect to be as entertain with that movie that you were with In Bruges or 3 billboards.

 

[Nakatomi]

Emily the Criminal - 7/10 Aubrey Plaza showing off her acting chops here. A few things don't add up if you think about them too much, but all-together an entertaining and well put together film.

 

[JackSlater]

I received Quentin Tarantino's book "Cinema Speculation" for Christmas and read it over the last few days. Covers mainly 1970s films that had an impact on him at the time. While some of the films are quite famous, others are not well known or even highly regarded. One that I had never heard of that caught my attention based on his description was Rolling Thunder, so I found it and gave it a watch.

Rolling Thunder - Basically a typical 1970s revenge film in theory. The film is set in 1973 and follows Major Rain as he returns to the United States after seven years as a POW in Vietnam. The first third of the movie is fairly straightforward - Rain returns as a hero to his town, which welcomes him with a parade, gives him a new convertible, and even a silver dollar for every day he was held captive. He even has a groupie who wore his identification for the duration of his captivity. While Rain is a hero in the town, his nine year old son does not remember him and largely rejects him while his wife tearfully welcomes him back before informing him that she has been having an affair and intends to marry another man. Rain is very clearly damaged from his experiences and expresses little to no emotion throughout. He sleeps in the shed, akin to his quarters at the POW camp, and confesses that he survived his torture by learning to like it. He seems to not care that his wife, who does feel guilty, plans to leave him and he is clearly unmoved by being a local hero. The thing that surprised me was that the opening is a very effective drama in his own right. There is nothing showy about Rain's very withdrawn performance and things like his son rejecting him are done very subtly.

Eventually and suddenly everything changes when gangsters break into Rain's house to steal his silver dollars. They attempt to torture him into revealing the location of the money, which predictably fails, and things culminate with Rain's family dead and a hook in place of his hand. It sounds ridiculous but it is played pretty seriously and effectively. Rain of course goes on a revenge quest with the help of his "groupie" and eventually his fellow POW who is going through the same dead man walking existence, a young Tommy Lee Jones. A man with a hook for a hand storming a Mexican brothel for revenge sounds over the top, but the movie has a surprising level of restraint. It was written by Paul Schrader before Taxi Driver and is clearly a bit of a companion piece. Apparently the script as Schrader wrote it would even have Travis Bickle showing up in a sort of cameo.

I'd rate it a solid 7/10. Surprisingly effective movie that could have turned out extremely ridiculous if it wasn't so understated. Not as good as Taxi Driver, but better than Death Wish or any other 1970s revenge film I've seen.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

The Center of the World (Wang, 2001) – Rewatch. 20 years later and it still feels like it could have been something, but just failed short. It's the meeting of the lap-dance and the laptop. In themes, a minor companion piece to Danny Boyle's The Beach, with major debts to the Dogme95 films. It's got plenty of stuff for me to enjoy (starting with the paintings on the walls of the hotel room, identifying the sexual content – the masturbation scene, the quasi-lesbian scene – as representation) and it's subtle enough to be a fun read, but its depth is very limited and leaves you on your appetite. A single hardcore shot makes the film less daring than part of a trend that started - or came back - in the late 90s (following much better films like Idioterne and Romance). 6/10

Le redoutable (Godard mon amour, Hazanavicius, 2017) – If you like Godard's films, you'll most probably hate this. It's an adaptation of two Anne Wiazemsky autobiographical novels about her relationship with Godard, from La Chinoise to Le vent d'Est (and even at that, a pretty bad one, it's like Weekend had never happened, like Pasolini had never existed). It's not clear what Hazanavicius is aiming for here. If it's a pastiche of Godard's work, it's the worst thing ever. If it's a parody (and it feels like it is), you just can't understand why a man of so limited talent would try to make a mockery of a legendary filmmaker (unless it's kind of a Machine Gun Kelly attempt to fame). My guess is it's supposed to be an homage, just a despicable one. I like Louis Garrel a lot, but his Godard is ridiculous, he worked on his speech and diction to sound like a [intellectually challenged] with a potato in his mouth. 3/10

I watched Treason too on Netflix. Meh.

 

[OzzyFan]

Orpheus (1950) (subtitles)
3.70 out of 4stars

“A poet in love with Death follows his unhappy wife into the underworld.”
An excellent art fantasy romance drama that tells an existential metaphysical tale about obsession, self-fulfillment, time, love, and death. Feels like a tragedy set in a dream-like ethereal reality that’s stuffed with symbolism. I interpreted this as an already highly accomplished man’s personal/professional obsession for the possibly unobtainable or insatiable greatness in his poetic profession, leading him closer to death as he tries to ‘conquer it’ while also chasing it to end his misery and being negligent in his relationship with his wife. It’s essentially a battle of self vs others, pursuance of immortality vs routine relational obligations, time usage and the existential importance of absolute desire fulfillment vs a chores and interpersonally ladened life. In the art professions especially, as poetry is used here, it’s an ever fascinating challenge and life preoccupier of self-love and artistic obsession. Historically and arguably publicly, or even for some outsiders personally, he can be seen as heroic and celebrated. Yet, also selfish, self-absorbed, tyrannical, irresponsible, and neglectful, especially to those most close to him. It’s an interesting quandary that is outwardly relatable on various levels. Which parts of Orpheus’ life are distraction and which are not? And which parts of Orpheus’ life are sacrifices made and costs paid? Is one already ‘living dead’ by not pursuing one or the other? Other forms of love expressed in the film include manipulative, jealous, admirational, devotional, sacrificial, and slavery-type bondage. Which begs the question, what is the truest form of love? Or most important/worthy/valuable? Even some actions within the film can be debated as justice or martyrdom. Symbols include dreams, mirrors, and not so subtle death. Some fun visual effects too with what looks like reverse filming and mirror penetration scenes as well as others adding to its surreal world. Overall, its openness to rangey extreme multi-interpretations at its core, of its contemplations, and of its characters with their different viewpoints is remarkable. An impressive accomplishment.

The Kid (1921) (silent)
3.40 out of 4stars

“Chaplin's first full-length feature is about a little tramp who discovers a little orphan and brings him up but events put their relationship in jeopardy. Chaplin directed, produced, edited, and starred in the film, as well as composed the score.”
An excellent comedy drama that is very funny and surprisingly hearty, mixing a wonderful blend of joy and pathos. That said, it’s mostly joy of course. I say surprisingly hearty because the whole film has a light jovial feel about it that makes the warmer scenes shock a bit and impress with their effectiveness. Near perfectly blends the emotional highs and lows of its humor and turmoil while utilizing its child element with zeal. The child’s angle is utilized through innocence, affection, bonding/warmth, stature, irony, and cuteness. While the drama is a bit foreseen, the scenes are thoroughly designed and portrayed so that anyone with a heart will feel their touch. All the expressiveness is exemplary throughout. The physical comedy/slapstick and deductive humor are top notch as well, with a “bully fight scene” that is very memorable. Supposedly highly influential also.

Dementia (1955) (silent/no dialogue)
3.10 out of 4stars

“During one night in Los Angeles, a psychotic young woman has nightmarish experiences as she walks through skid row.”
A great black and white experimental expressionist psychological horror noir that is a trippy Freudian fever dream. Always curiously intriguing as it flies by in its sub 1hour runtime. The soundtrack in itself is great. From its use of a haunting vocal wailing that’s blended perfectly with instrumentals to it’s jazz usage that is everything from creeping to menacing to even seductive, shocking, and breezy at times as it’s style, tempo, and volume set the stage and feel throughout, part in thanks to Shorty Rogers and his Giants whom have a cameo near the end of the film. Open to interpretation, but my initial take of the film is that it's a tale about a psychotic bipolar paranoid woman who has both a bloodlust or proneness-to-violence and fear of being attacked, based partly on an abusive traumatic childhood/genetic inheritance. There is also some subtle and not so subtle symbolism and imagery revolving around that and other interpretations, psycho-sexually being a predominant theme also.

Graves end (2005)
2.65 out of 4stars

“When society turns their back on reformed felons, the town of Graves End welcomes them but when the ex-cons disappear, FBI agent Paul Rickman comes looking for them and discovers more than he expected.”
A good mystery suspense thriller that is a very entertaining mixture of really good elements alongside some poorer/lower executed ones. Low budget with a supertwisty story, a few quotable lines, and some poorer acting, dialogue, and side story choices. Feels like a campy made for TV movie, but the storyline is incredibly clever alongside its ‘anything can happen’ vibes. Mostly skin deep, but if you are one that likes unguessable inventive mystery thrillers, this is right up your alley.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Brainwashed: Sex-Camera-Power (Menkes, 2022) – Pretty interesting exploration, through lots of great examples, of Mulvey's proposition of the male gaze dominance in narrative films. Clearly born out of the me-too movement, what starts as a harmless demonstration of a feminist understanding of film that's pretty well known (and, I think, generally accepted), soon makes the leap to its impact on reality and its influence on rape culture. As there is not much measurable data or causality, the tone of the film shifts a little and leans then more on emotion than demonstration, but I don't mind the agenda. On the other hand, Menkes' insistence to use her own films as examples of more acceptable ways of using a camera is a little cringe. Based on a series of conferences by Menkes, it's a lazy documentary, with at its core a TED-Talk approach that weakens its value as a film (makes you appreciate even more Sophie Fiennes' work on the Zizek films). It's still well worth a watch. 5/10

For sure a great film to see right after The Center of the World.

 

[shadow1]

Armour of God (1986) - 7/10

A treasure hunter teams up with his ex-girlfriend's fiancé to rescue her after she is kidnapped by Satan worshiping monks.

Jackie Chan stars as Jackie - aka Asian Hawk- a former musician turned treasure hunter. Jackie successfully steals and sells a piece of the Armour of God, a legendary five piece armor set that is believed to grant powers if all pieces are assembled. A cult seeks this power, so they kidnap Jackie's former girlfriend Lorelei (Rosamund Kwan) hoping to force him to collect all of the pieces. Jackie, along with Lorelei's fiancé - and former bandmate - Alan (singer Alan Tam) reunite in order to rescue her. Jackie and Alan strike a deal with Count Bannon (Bozidar Smiljanic), a rich collector in possession of three of the pieces. Using the pieces as collateral, Jackie and Alan promise to return with all five pieces of the armor. The duo is joined by the Count's daughter May (Lola Forner) and head to Yugoslavia to rescue Lorelei...

Armour of God was directed by Jackie Chan, and partially by prominent actor/director Eric Tsang (who is uncredited). The film is well known for an accident that happened to Jackie while filming the opening sequence in Yugoslavia. Jackie insisted on doing another take of a relatively minor stunt, but during the reshoot a tree branch he was swinging from broke, leading to him falling and fracturing his skull on a rock. Jackie had to have emergency brain surgery and was fortunate that a surgeon visiting from Switzerland was a two hour flight away, as no one else local could perform the procedure. The injury left Jackie with a permanent hole in his head and he has worn his hair long since the accident (including for the balance of the film - his hair is very short in the opening sequence). Eric Tsang left the project, as he didn't know how long it would take Jackie to recover, and Jackie took over directing duties after healing.

The film tells a somewhat ridiculous story featuring devil worshiping monks, mind control, a mysterious treasure, and lovelorn bandmates. It is told in a coherent fashion though, so a lot of the odd creative choices don't detract from the film much. Jackie's Asian Hawk character - the backflipping adventurer with a custom Mitsubishi reminiscent of something James Bond might drive - is the glue that holds it all together. He's a cocky, wisecracking character who can back up his mouth with his fists.

Though the background of the characters being in a former band has little bearing on the plot, it should be noted film has a memorable soundtrack, with songs sung by both Jackie and Alan Tam. It's also worth mentioning this is a rare Jackie Chan rated R, due to brief nudity and a pretty violent shootout scene early in the film in which a camera man is shot through the eyes.

Armour of God has a good balance of plot and action throughout, but the film is most memorable for its outstanding third act. The final act of the film has a good comedy scene involving dynamite, two great fight scenes, and caps it all off with a great stunt involving a hot air balloon. The scene where Jackie takes on a dozen monks at once is one of his best sequences ever, and I've always thought this movie probably represented his peak in terms of fighting and athletic ability.

Overall, Armour of God is a classic action film from Jackie Chan's prime era. The film was released in the United States as "Operation Condor 2: The Armour of the Gods", a bizarre choice considering 1991's Operation Condor is actually the sequel to this film. The background of this is that Operation Condor was released first in the United States (including a theatrical run), so Dimension Films seemingly didn't know what to call this film when releasing it on home video to American audiences. It's a shame because Operation Condor is very easy to find, but it's getting harder to find this film recently. It's not available to buy digitally in the USA, and the only version available for streaming is an extremely low quality (VCD transfer?) version on Tubi. I was able to watch an old DVD I own for this review, but I hope Armour of God gets a proper re-release soon; it's one of Chan's best films.

 

[x Tame Impala]

I finally watched “Prey” on Hulu tonight. Pretty good for a simple/cool movie you don’t expect much from. Predator took way too much damage however and his active camo makes him pretty lame IMO since he’s a sissy and always uses it.

Otherwise really liked the atmosphere the movie created, Midthunder and Beavers were very good in their roles too.

6.5/10

 

[Unholy Diver]

Puss - in - Boots: The Final Wish - 7.5/10

Puss is down to his last life and has to steal a magic map to find a star that will grant him a wish, while being pursued by Big Jack Horner, Goldilocks and the Three Bears, and a "Bounty hunter", good action adventure road trip film, some funny spots, my daughter enjoyed it quite a bit and it kept me entertained. Great voice work

 

[ItsFineImFine]

The Interview (1998) - 7/10

Hugo Weaving is an evil motherf***er (the person not as an actor) cos no way can you act that evil that often without actually being evil. Anyways this would've been a better movie had it not been for a certain Hollywood film doing it better earlier but it is fairly solid in its own right, it just feels and probably is a bit too derivative of the Hollywood film. We get good moments here in bland cinematography compared to the other film having being consistently gripping rather than just building it up to certain moments in what feels like a TV movie here (maybe it was a TV movie I'm not gonna look this stuff up).

Marnie (1964) - 6/10

Not a Hitchcock film which has aged well. Some poor effects, some poor sets, and a really weird chemistry between two leads and a conclusion filled with psychological ramble. Sean Connery's character is bizarre here, he constantly seems like he's up to something nefarious when he isn't. It's a film that suffers from a buildup and not much of a payoff.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

144 (Contreras & Stowell, 2021) – Documentary about the WNBA's COVID bubble season and the social justice actions of the 144 players who too part in it. Not a great film, but I love the league, love those players, and the intentions were great. It was fun and touching for me to go back to it, but it ain't nothing special and only a small minority of possible viewers would/will enjoy it. 4/10

Terrifier (Leone, 2016) – I was sure I'd hate this thing, but I enjoyed it quite a bit. I don't know if it was intentionally made as an homage to 80s gore films, but it succeeds way better than most of the recent films trying do recreate that period's vibe (kind of is to gore films what the excellent The House of the Devil was to the haunted house subgenre). It's obviously not much, made with limited talent (spatial construction is often terrible, but it succeeded in making me jump once, and that's something), and way too expeditious to be terrifying, but its emphasis on gore as the money shot isn't devoid of interest. Liked it enough to watch the sequel for sure. 4.5/10

Shiryô no wana (Evil Dead Trap, Ikeda, 1988) – Rewatch. Terrifier made me want to watch one of the original gore films, and I hadn't seen this one in over 30 years (and it's a lot less gory than I remembered, it's mostly contained in the opening sequence, and that money shot you do remember). You recognize quite a few Eastern influences (even the tracking shots from Evil Dead), but Fulci most of all, with some questionable use of “experimental” f/x and a weak ending going full crazy-japan. Somewhat important j-horror film, but not one of its finest. 4/10

 

[Sentinel]

𝐵𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑒𝑡 𝑇𝑟𝑎𝑖𝑛 (2022). In a parallel universe, where our laws of physics and logic don’t apply, there is another Japan with high speed railroad transportation. There is a train full of gangsters and assassins of Japanese, American, Mexican, Russian, and English origin and of both genders, trying to kill each other, but also of deaf and blind people, oblivious to the fighting and the destruction that the first two categories inflict upon each other on the said train. Director David Leitch is doing his best to imitate Tarantino (both 𝑃𝑢𝑙𝑝 𝐹𝑖𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 and 𝐾𝑖𝑙𝑙𝐵𝑖𝑙𝑙) but all he does is reminds us how stylish and clever Tarantino’s films really are, and how pedestrian this caricature is. It’s 2+ hours of pure nonsense. The only two good things about it are (1) frequent references to my son’s favorite show from 12 years ago “Thomas the Tank Engine” and (2) Brad Pitt. Pitt is truly a gifted actor who manages to act believable in completely unbelievable (or, rather, ridiculous) scenes and even deliver his lines with a degree of conviction (a better title for this movie would’ve been “Pittbullet Train”). Everything else is sheer derivative pulp. There is even a snake on this train. Oh, and what was Sandra Bullock doing in this movie (or the last minute of it)? What a waste. 3/10

=====
𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐺𝑟𝑎𝑑𝑢𝑎𝑡𝑒 (1967). Finally, I got around to watching this classic about the cinema’s most famous evil cougar, Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bankroft), seducing and trying to destroy a young man (Dustin Hoffman) who falls for her daughter (Katharine Ross). It’s an excellent film with excellent dialogue and innovative camera work, characteristic of the era (my favorite shots are in the pool and in the corridor). My biggest problem is, believe it or not, Dustin Hoffman. For starters, he is just too old. He was 30 at the time of the film’s release and does not at all look 21, like his character is supposed to be. Second, his acting is simply too wooden. I get it, he was supposed to be fluctuating between uncomfortable and cocky / jerky but he is not convincing as either, sharply contrasting Bankroft and Ross who are both very much in place. Ross is especially surprising, given that she is playing a college student despite being 27 and having just gone through a second divorce. The best part of the film is, of course, the soundtrack, featuring three of the greatest songs of all time: “Mrs. Robinson,” “The Sound of Silence,” and “Scarborough Fair”; all by the Simon and Garfunkel duo. Film versions of the songs are slightly different and enjoyable in their own way. To me, this movie stood the test of time, especially if one can overlook Hoffman’s deficiencies. 8/10

=====
𝐺𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑂𝑛𝑖𝑜𝑛 (2022). A sequel to an unexpectedly good recent “whoddunnit” flick 𝐾𝑛𝑖𝑣𝑒𝑠 𝑂𝑢𝑡, and, naturally, it’s not nearly as good, inversely proportional to the increased expectations. 𝐾𝑛𝑖𝑣𝑒𝑠 𝑂𝑢𝑡 toed the wokeness line but kept on the side of taste and reason. 𝐺𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑂𝑛𝑖𝑜𝑛 is a ridiculous over-the-top story, filled with terrible acting and social justice platitudes. I cannot discuss too much without spoilers, and this film is still too new. But the only returning character is the “world’s greatest detective” Benois Blanc, played by Daniel Craig with a ludicrous accent. I will have two spoilers: he is exposed as gay (his lover is played by the 2-seconds-screen-time Hugh Grant), and the tycoon innovator Miles Bron (played by Ed Norton) is exposed as an idiot. This is the second cinematic attack on Elon Musk in a year (𝐷𝑜𝑛’𝑡 𝐿𝑜𝑜𝑘 𝑈𝑝), and, by extension, on all genius inventors (or is it just the white ones?). I hope it makes the losers of the world feel better about themselves. The film starts out nicely but then acquires strange and disturbing quasi-woke overtones, and I don’t think it does African Americans any favors. It’s full of unexplained unnecessary characters. The only acting talents here are Ed Norton and, unexpectedly, Kate Hudson. This film is entertaining (especially the first half), completely and utterly unbelievable, and, honestly, while it tries hard to spit at Musk, it misses and falls on Agatha Christi’s grave instead. 5/10

=====
I have also rewatched three Woody Allen films from the Mia Farrow era: 𝑍𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑔 (1983), 𝐻𝑎𝑛𝑛𝑎ℎ 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝐻𝑒𝑟 𝑆𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑠 (1986), and 𝐶𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑀𝑖𝑠𝑑𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑟𝑠 (1989). All three are excellent. It’s almost as if Allen knew how badly this collaboration will end. 𝑍𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑔 (probably the best Allen film to introduce your children to), a mockumentary about a “human chameleon,” explores the subjects of conformity and the need to fit in. 𝐻𝑎𝑛𝑛𝑎ℎ 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝐻𝑒𝑟 𝑆𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑠 deals with a highly problematic family, in which one sister has an affair with her sister’s husband and another sister ends up marrying her sister’s ex-husband. A side topic of the “meaning of life” is raised and discussed. Finally, 𝐶𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑀𝑖𝑠𝑑𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑟𝑠 is the best of the three: a real masterpiece with one of the most depressing, un-Hollywood finales ever. Two plots, of an extramarital affair gone wrong and of a loser filmmaker making a biopic about a man he despises, both end badly. “Evil goes unpunished” and “life is not fair” are the take-home messages here, and never have these trivialities been on display with such conviction, grace, and bite. All three are true cinema classics. 8/10, 8/10, and 10/10, respectively.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

𝐵𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑒𝑡 𝑇𝑟𝑎𝑖𝑛 (2022). In a parallel universe, where our laws of physics and logic don’t apply, there is another Japan with high speed railroad transportation. There is a train full of gangsters and assassins of Japanese, American, Mexican, Russian, and English origin and of both genders, trying to kill each other, but also of deaf and blind people, oblivious to the fighting and the destruction that the first two categories inflict upon each other on the said train. Director David Leitch is doing his best to imitate Tarantino (both 𝑃𝑢𝑙𝑝 𝐹𝑖𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 and 𝐾𝑖𝑙𝑙𝐵𝑖𝑙𝑙) but all he does is reminds us how stylish and clever Tarantino’s films really are, and how pedestrian this caricature is. It’s 2+ hours of pure nonsense. The only two good things about it are (1) frequent references to my son’s favorite show from 12 years ago “Thomas the Tank Engine” and (2) Brad Pitt. Pitt is truly a gifted actor who manages to act believable in completely unbelievable (or, rather, ridiculous) scenes and even deliver his lines with a degree of conviction (a better title for this movie would’ve been “Pittbullet Train”). Everything else is sheer derivative pulp. There is even a snake on this train. Oh, and what was Sandra Bullock doing in this movie (or the last minute of it)? What a waste. 3/10

=====
𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐺𝑟𝑎𝑑𝑢𝑎𝑡𝑒 (1967). Finally, I got around to watching this classic about the cinema’s most famous evil cougar, Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bankroft), seducing and trying to destroy a young man (Dustin Hoffman) who falls for her daughter (Katharine Ross). It’s an excellent film with excellent dialogue and innovative camera work, characteristic of the era (my favorite shots are in the pool and in the corridor). My biggest problem is, believe it or not, Dustin Hoffman. For starters, he is just too old. He was 30 at the time of the film’s release and does not at all look 21, like his character is supposed to be. Second, his acting is simply too wooden. I get it, he was supposed to be fluctuating between uncomfortable and cocky / jerky but he is not convincing as either, sharply contrasting Bankroft and Ross who are both very much in place. Ross is especially surprising, given that she is playing a college student despite being 27 and having just gone through a second divorce. The best part of the film is, of course, the soundtrack, featuring three of the greatest songs of all time: “Mrs. Robinson,” “The Sound of Silence,” and “Scarborough Fair”; all by the Simon and Garfunkel duo. Film versions of the songs are slightly different and enjoyable in their own way. To me, this movie stood the test of time, especially if one can overlook Hoffman’s deficiencies. 8/10

=====
𝐺𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑂𝑛𝑖𝑜𝑛 (2022). A sequel to an unexpectedly good recent “whoddunnit” flick 𝐾𝑛𝑖𝑣𝑒𝑠 𝑂𝑢𝑡, and, naturally, it’s not nearly as good, inversely proportional to the increased expectations. 𝐾𝑛𝑖𝑣𝑒𝑠 𝑂𝑢𝑡 toed the wokeness line but kept on the side of taste and reason. 𝐺𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑂𝑛𝑖𝑜𝑛 is a ridiculous over-the-top story, filled with terrible acting and social justice platitudes. I cannot discuss too much without spoilers, and this film is still too new. But the only returning character is the “world’s greatest detective” Benois Blanc, played by Daniel Craig with a ludicrous accent. I will have two spoilers: he is exposed as gay (his lover is played by the 2-seconds-screen-time Hugh Grant), and the tycoon innovator Miles Bron (played by the only real acting talent here, Ed Norton) is exposed as an idiot. This is the second cinematic attack on Elon Musk in a year (𝐷𝑜𝑛’𝑡 𝐿𝑜𝑜𝑘 𝑈𝑝), and, by extension, on all genius inventors (or is it just the white ones?). I hope it makes the losers of the world feel better about themselves. The film starts out nicely but then acquires strange and disturbing quasi-woke overtones, and I don’t think it does African Americans any favors. It’s full of unexplained unnecessary characters. The only acting talents here are Ed Norton and, unexpectedly, Kate Hudson. This film is entertaining (especially the first half), completely and utterly unbelievable, and, honestly, while it tries hard to spit at Musk, it misses and falls on Agatha Christi’s grave instead. 5/10

=====
I have also rewatched three Woody Allen films from the Mia Farrow era: 𝑍𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑔 (1983), 𝐻𝑎𝑛𝑛𝑎ℎ 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝐻𝑒𝑟 𝑆𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑠 (1986), and 𝐶𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑀𝑖𝑠𝑑𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑟𝑠 (1989). All three are excellent. It’s almost as if Allen knew how badly this collaboration will end. 𝑍𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑔 (probably the best Allen film to introduce your children to), a mockumentary about a “human chameleon,” explores the subjects of conformity and the need to fit in. 𝐻𝑎𝑛𝑛𝑎ℎ 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝐻𝑒𝑟 𝑆𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑠 deals with a highly problematic family, in which one sister has an affair with her sister’s husband and another sister ends up marrying her sister’s ex-husband. A side topic of the “meaning of life” is raised and discussed. Finally, 𝐶𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑀𝑖𝑠𝑑𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑟𝑠 is the best of the three: a real masterpiece with one of the most depressing, un-Hollywood finales ever. Two plots, of an extramarital affair gone wrong and of a loser filmmaker making a biopic about a man he despises, both end badly. “Evil goes unpunished” and “life is not fair” are the take-home messages here, and never have these trivialities been on display with such conviction, grace, and bite. All three are true cinema classics. 8/10, 8/10, and 10/10, respectively.

I'd probably go 10/10, 9/10, 8/10 on the Woody flicks, and I'm kind of worried about some of the comments about Glass Onion (even though I rated it even lower than you did), but hope you keep 'em coming.

 

[Pink Mist]

=====
𝐺𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑂𝑛𝑖𝑜𝑛 (2022). A sequel to an unexpectedly good recent “whoddunnit” flick 𝐾𝑛𝑖𝑣𝑒𝑠 𝑂𝑢𝑡, and, naturally, it’s not nearly as good, inversely proportional to the increased expectations. 𝐾𝑛𝑖𝑣𝑒𝑠 𝑂𝑢𝑡 toed the wokeness line but kept on the side of taste and reason. 𝐺𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑂𝑛𝑖𝑜𝑛 is a ridiculous over-the-top story, filled with terrible acting and social justice platitudes. I cannot discuss too much without spoilers, and this film is still too new. But the only returning character is the “world’s greatest detective” Benois Blanc, played by Daniel Craig with a ludicrous accent. I will have two spoilers: he is exposed as gay (his lover is played by the 2-seconds-screen-time Hugh Grant), and the tycoon innovator Miles Bron (played by the only real acting talent here, Ed Norton) is exposed as an idiot. This is the second cinematic attack on Elon Musk in a year (𝐷𝑜𝑛’𝑡 𝐿𝑜𝑜𝑘 𝑈𝑝), and, by extension, on all genius inventors (or is it just the white ones?). I hope it makes the losers of the world feel better about themselves. The film starts out nicely but then acquires strange and disturbing quasi-woke overtones, and I don’t think it does African Americans any favors. It’s full of unexplained unnecessary characters. The only acting talents here are Ed Norton and, unexpectedly, Kate Hudson. This film is entertaining (especially the first half), completely and utterly unbelievable, and, honestly, while it tries hard to spit at Musk, it misses and falls on Agatha Christi’s grave instead. 5/10

You need to stop obsessing over the "wokeness" boogeyman. Few things are more cringy than grown adults using the word "woke" in 2022.

 

[John Price]

I binged the 2 sonic films I liked them even as a 40 year old adult. I thought the movie wouldn't appeal to non kids but I was wrong

 

[OzzyFan]

Babylon (2022) Directed by Damien Chazelle 5B

Babylon is a big slice of Hollywood folk lore that focuses on Jack (Brad Pitt), a matinee idol who has the misfortune of ageing just as sound comes in, Nellie (Margot Robbie), an aspiring actress from the wrong side of the tracks who gets hotter than a pistol, and Manny, a Mexican masquerading as a Spaniard who starts on the fringes of the industry but works himself up to studio executive. They all rise and fall, but we meet them at different stages of their careers. In short, Babylon is a big, frenetic, sprawling tribute to Hollywood's Golden Age at a time when the movies were transitioning between the silent era and the early sound era. Often referencing Singin' in the Rain, Babylon covers somewhat similar ground only in a more prurient, sensationalist way, emphasising sex, decadence, vulgarity, and an approach to gossip that raises innuendo and rumour to a form of myth-making.

Whether Babylon is a poison-pen letter to the movies or a valentine is often hard to tell--the movie seems to seek to be both simultaneously. The early pace of the movie is exhausting as we watch Jack's gradual realisation that his time is past and Nellie's gradual awareness that her time has just begun. Everything is filtered through Manny whose job in the first two thirds of this three hour movie is just to react to what other people are doing or saying. Chazelle, lazily, must splice in about 50 close ups of Calva's face reacting, reacting, reacting--way over-the-top, but then again so is the entire movie.

Babylon is often an frustrating experience, one that pours on so much hot sauce, in addition to other less tempting fluids, that whatever story Chazelle wants to tell seems to get overwhelmed by its toe-tapping salaciousness. However, Robbie is terrific, in bravura scene after scene fully the equal of her larger-than-life, wild-child character. And there are some amazing sequences such as when Chazelle shows just how difficult it was to shoot even the briefest of scenes using early sound equipment or when a half dozen movies get shot simultaneously in a silent-film staging area. To use a cliche, the sort that turns up too often in the movie, Bablyon is one of those failures that is more interesting than most other Hollywood directors' successes.

I agree with your comments, but for me this is 7/10 territory on it's entertainment merits alongside it's commentary, warts and all. Babylon is a comedy drama that is highly entertaining, wild, excessive, funny, occasionally gross, and thematically a bit scattershot. It is both a tribute to old Hollywood and a criticism to what Hollywood evolved into and has become even today, where the medium and people behind the camera transitioned vastly. The advancement of filmmaking's complexity and it's movement toward stricter commercialism/big-business-means killed creativity and individuality for the medium while gentrifying it's industry workers professionally and personally behind the screen. Not sure if it's meant to be political or not, but there's a domino effect shown as wild parties and gambling and drugs and fetishes/taboos change from open acceptance and common knowledge to shameful, closeted habits, and are often controlled by dangerous mafia-like entities and locations while taking on more dark malicious/malevolent qualities. I really did love this messy homage. It's also sadly fitting that it bombed at the box office.

 

[Seattle King]

Finally caught Sunset Boulevard (1950) last week and was thoroughly satisfied.
It's a classic noir film that is loaded with irony in the story and the cast.
Cecil B DeMille is an actor in the movie, playing himself, which was very cool to see.
This is a really good movie and especially interesting to fans of the early cinema.

 

[Sentinel]

You need to stop obsessing over the "wokeness" boogeyman. Few things are more cringy than grown adults using the word "woke" in 2022.

I don't *need* to do anything. I use words according to their semantic meanings.
"Grown adults" is redundant.
So, they don't say "woke" anymore? So what's the short term for "cringy social justice politically correct" b.s.?