Movies: Last Movie You Watched and Rate It | Mid-Spring Edition. Happy Beltane!

[Puck]

Jolt, Directed by Tanya Wexler, 5.0

IMDB summary: A bouncer (Beckinsale) with a slightly murderous anger-management problem that she controls with the help of an electrode-lined vest she uses to shock herself back to normalcy whenever she gets homicidal. After the first guy she's ever fallen for is murdered, she goes on a revenge-fueled rampage to find the killer while the cops pursue her as their chief suspect. Lindy takes matters into her own hands to both clear her name and find Justin’s killers.

After Wrath of Man comes the next in a series of Summer revenge flicks. Jolt! It's not much better than Wrath of Man but I'll give a point more at 5.0/10, I'm more lenient than Pranzo. Jolt is a cross between Crank High Voltage (another Jason Statham flick) and Atomic Blonde. The difference being Atomic Blonde is actually not bad IMHO. Jolt is like an older, crankier Buffy without the Vampires. The plot has holes. The twists are predictable. The ending with Susan Sarandon however is promoting a sequel. The film is slightly entertaining, Beckinsale does ok carrying the film, if they can tighten up the next script, it might fly as a franchise. But this might also be the official end of Jolt if it doesn't get enough eyeballs to make the project worth it for Amazon Prime.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Blood Red Sky (Thorwarth, 2021) - Vampires on a plane (with terrorists). The premise made me curious, wondering how they could work around the sillyness. It gets boring pretty fast. 3/10

 

[Langdon Alger]

Foxcatcher - 2014

8/10

Steve Carrell did a great job in this.

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

So, I generally have a pretty big problem with historical revisionism. Inglourious Basterds really pissed me off for that. I get that it's just a Tarantino movie and obviously tells its own fictional story...but after spending 2 and a half hours creating this beautiful portrait of 1969 LA, it annoyed the hell out of me when the ending veers completely off the map

This is my big initial hang up with the movie as well. It didn't bother me in Inglorious Basterds but at this point it's become part of QT's schitck.

Funnily enough, the only reason I saw Once Upon A Time at all is that I had read the leak beforehand that the ending was changed. I had (and have) zero interest in seeing that event play out on the big screen. I have zero interest in even reading about it again -- once was enough.

 

[Pink Mist]

Long Day’s Journey Into Night [地球最后的夜晚] (2018) directed by Bi Gan

There’s kind of a funny story regarding the release of this film in late 2018. It released on New Years Eve in China and was marketed as a romantic movie that would make for the perfect date movie for New Years Eve. Screenings were timed so that as soon as the time struck midnight on New Years, the closing kiss between two lovers of the film would be on screen. Chinese audiences flocked to the theatres to watch the movie and immediately panned the film after its first week in theatres. That’s not because the film is bad, but because while mainstream audiences went in expecting something like When Harry Met Sally they got something a bit closer to Last Year at Marienbad.

Bi Gan’s Long Day’s Journey Into Night is an uncompromising art house film, it is not a film I would call accessible for mainstream audiences. The first half of the film, is kind of a noir and tells the tale, through fragments of memory that are difficult to splice together their timeline and order, of a gangster who returns to his hometown and is haunted by the memory of his murdered friend and his former lover. At around the 70th minute of the film, the gangster makes his way to a movie theatre to watch a 3D film and puts on a pair of 3D glasses. The real-life audience was told to put on 3D glasses as well (I however, watched it in 2D on my TV on Criterion Channel), the title card of the film is at last shown – 70 minutes into the film! – and then the second half of the film kicks off which is a slow and hypnotic 50+ minute dream sequence long take in 3D. Easy to see why your New Years date may have been a little disappointed. Bi Gan has a lot of audacity, it would be really easy to call this film the dreaded “pretentious" word, but I don’t necessarily think Bi’s aim is to impress us (while at least not his main aim), but rather to use these techniques to meditate on temporal and spatial relations. I don’t think his techniques work all the time, and at time they draw attention to themselves rather than the film’s story, but it’s hard not to praise Bi’s creativity. The film is also absolutely gorgeous. Bi is clearly influenced by Wong Kar-wai (I think, I’m a little embarrassed to say I haven’t seen a Wong Kar-wai film – he’s a major gap in the things I’ve watched – but I’m well aware of his style) with neon and lush colours in his colour palate, particularly greens to match the green Kaili hills and forests. While the film doesn’t always work it is always pretty to look at, and due to its perplexing structure and confusing story something that probably requires repeat watches to understand. I think there is a masterpiece in Bi’s film somewhere but the final product needed to be refined a bit more. Bi is definitely a director to watch though as this is only his 2nd feature film.

Back to the story of its release and its marketing disaster, while the film was panned by audiences, the film eventually made over $40 million at the box offices which is not too shabby for an art house film and is the most financially successful Chinese art house film ever. So, I guess they had the last laugh.

 

[Puck]

Long Day’s Journey Into Night [地球最后的夜晚] (2018) directed by Bi Gan

Good review.

Did you get the impression that the Director was making a statement about life in China while evading the censors? Something along the lines attempted by Russian Director Zvyagintsev, Iranian Director Panahi, Saudi's al-Mansour, Iraqi-Kurdish film Director Huner Saleem or even Turkey's Nurey Bilge Ceylan? They do that sometimes.It's an interesting hide-and-seek game with the national censorship authority. If it's just a 'pretentious' colourful 3-D collage, then it's less interesting IMHO.

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

A Matter of Life and Death. This movie has literal magical/otherworldly elements in it so it's kinda dumb to call it magical, but it is, not just in that literal sense, but in that movie sense of many of Powell and Pressburger's work. They have the deftest touch and a way making a story like this that may verge into corny or something like The Life and Death of Col. Blimp that could be self-serious or something like The Red Shoes, which could easily be maudlin and make it all so affecting. They're very movie movies. One of the absolute best at balancing artistry and approachability.

The Big Sleep. The 1970s version starting Robert Mitchum. A few week's back I watched the other 1970s Mitchum staring adaptation of a Raymond Chandler classic. I didn't care for that one, which tried to be a 1940s LA period piece. This one updates the time and setting to 1970s England. It feels a little counterintuitive but this one actually worked better for me both with Mitchum's performance and the movie over all. A nice collection of character types pop up in the rouge's gallery roles with an over-qualified Oliver Reed the standout. Not spectacular, but it works. One quirk: Candy Clark's performance in this may be the single worst acting performance I've ever seen in a movie actually trying to be good. It was kinda phenomenal.

The Empty Man. A predictable, but nicely moody and effective creeper. If we're talking recent crazy cult movies, I'll take this more subtle approach over the much more heralded "Hey man I LOVE Wicker Man!!" garishness of Midsommar.

Ain't Them Bodies Saints. Works perfectly well both as Terrence Malick impersonation and a fairly cracking neo-Western. I feel like you could transport the entire script — character, dialog and all — about 150 years back in time and only have to make a few small tweaks to still make it work.

 

[Pink Mist]

Good review.

Did you get the impression that the Director was making a statement about life in China while evading the censors? Something along the lines attempted by Russian Director Zvyagintsev, Iranian Director Panahi, Saudi's al-Mansour, Iraqi-Kurdish film Director Huner Saleem or even Turkey's Nurey Bilge Ceylan? They do that sometimes.It's an interesting hide-and-seek game with the national censorship authority. If it's just a 'pretentious' colourful 3-D collage, then it's less interesting IMHO.

Good question. I'd say similar to American noirs which are a commentary of capitalism, there is a current of criticism of Chinese hyper-capitalism in Long Day's Journey Into Night- it's certainly looking at the gritty underbelly of city life in provincial China of those left behind in China's transition to capitalism. In many ways it is highlighting the flip side of the story of Chinese prosperity as Kaili, where the film takes place, kind of looks like the post-WWII Vienna from like The Third Man or the abandoned sewers and buildings of Tarkovsky's Stalker or something (the director actually gives a pretty big nod to Stalker in the film). I think there's definitely a political commentary which can be fleshed out from the film

 

[ItsFineImFine]

Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (2K) - 6.5/10

I think I mixed it up with expecting it to have this big epic cinematography when it's really played out over a smaller scale. The style for me is.....hard to take seriously. Which is a problem when a film tries to envelope so many serious moments but at least the fights in between are interesting.

Also first images from this film, it's a murdery mystery with these two and I'm pumped. I don't expect Knives Out but it'll be good if it's half as juicy.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

This is my big initial hang up with the movie as well. It didn't bother me in Inglorious Basterds but at this point it's become part of QT's schitck. Though Django Unchained isn't actual historic figures it too clearly has righting a historic wrong on its mind. Once it dawned on me that he was going to pull the same trick yet again, I got annoyed. For a writer-director whose calling card was his creativity, he really seems to be in a run of doing the same shit over and over.

Now I still tend to like his movies for sure ... but I think his first four movies up to and including Kill Bill is light years better and more interesting than the five movies he's done since.

I personally think being the in cool director went to his head and he was never the same after the first few killer movies he did. Cool became self-conscious and insufferable pretty fast. Really don't have a lot of interest in his later work; only watched Hollywood because it was on tv and I actually liked enough of the bits and pieces to give it a formal viewing.

Funnily enough, the only reason I saw Once Upon A Time at all is that I had read the leak beforehand that the ending was changed. I had (and have) zero interest in seeing that event play out on the big screen. I have zero interest in even reading about it again -- once was enough.

I wasn't interested in seeing the actual Manson family murders, but I was interested to see how QT handled them. The premise was strong, the leads were solid, I loved the setting, and I was looking forward to seeing what QT was going to do. Especially as we follow Sharon Tate for a little bit; beautiful, blond, sunny, always bopping to a tune and smiling radiantly. Even the scene where it's specifically said that all the down dumps hit her at once when she was pregnant...and basically she just made a face like my wife with a touch of indigestion. How does QT set up the end of this character? Oh, he doesn't. It just struck me as chickening out. Instead of finding a way to deal respectfully and creatively with history, he just bailed out entirely and just pulled a fantasy ending out of his ass. Didn't sit well with me.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

John Dies at the End (Coscarelli, 2012) - To this day the last film of Don Coscarelli, who's been known to take his time between projects (he made this one 10 years after Bubba Ho-Tep), this is once again a very original and fun movie, showing he can mix up genres with no great regards to convention. Just as his previous film, it's a lot more fun at first viewing as it's pretty shallow, but I still really hope he comes back with at least one last demented project. 4.5/10

 

[silkyjohnson50]

I’m glad that I’m still able to enjoy Tarantino.

 

[ItsFineImFine]

The Great Silence (1968) - 7/10

It's an undeniably well-made Western (bad dubbing aside), so why was I yawning so much? I think I just prefer people talking and the plot moving in unpredictable ways as compared to vast western cinematography and a classic score. Jean-Louis Trintignant playing the badass protagonist was not what I was expecting, he's usually better playing a nerd. Klaus Kinski is perfect casting though.

Time to heap the station trilogy next.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

A Quiet Place 2

with the people from the first one, and also Cillian Murphy.

We start with a flashback to the aliens' initial landings for a few chuckles, then pick things up immediately after the events of the first movie. The Abbot family is on the move with their new discovery of the killer aliens' vulnerability to feedback and shotguns, and they run into their old neighbour and family friend Emmet (Murphy) who's holed up in a foundry. Teen daughter Regan wants to find the source of a radio broadcast that's still going, Emmet's too scared and traumatized to do much of anything, and the rest of the family exists. Regan of course leaves in the night, mom convinces Emmet to go after her, and many other monster movie tropes pop up. Predictability happens.

I dunno, if you liked the first one you'll probably like the sequel. I personally couldn't believe that the aliens' obvious weakness wouldn't have been exploited before they'd wiped out most of humanity (and also presumably anything bigger than a mouse), various well-worn plot devices are trotted out (convenient burden of the brother stepping in a bear trap, evil cultists, the safe spot that isn't, etc), and it didn't even have much decent gore.

Meh.

Nope. Definitely no vulnerable points to aim for there.

 

[Spring in Fialta]

A Quiet Place 2

with the people from the first one, and also Cillian Murphy.

We start with a flashback to the aliens' initial landings for a few chuckles, then pick things up immediately after the events of the first movie. The Abbot family is on the move with their new discovery of the killer aliens' vulnerability to feedback and shotguns, and they run into their old neighbour and family friend Emmet (Murphy) who's holed up in a foundry. Teen daughter Regan wants to find the source of a radio broadcast that's still going, Emmet's too scared and traumatized to do much of anything, and the rest of the family exists. Regan of course leaves in the night, mom convinces Emmet to go after her, and many other monster movie tropes pop up. Predictability happens.

I dunno, if you liked the first one you'll probably like the sequel. I personally couldn't believe that the aliens' obvious weakness wouldn't have been exploited before they'd wiped out most of humanity (and also presumably anything bigger than a mouse), various well-worn plot devices are trotted out (convenient burden of the brother stepping in a bear trap, evil cultists, the safe spot that isn't, etc), and it didn't even have much decent gore.

Meh.

Nope. Definitely no vulnerable points to aim for there.

Never understood the hype for the first one. Thought it blew chunks.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Never understood the hype for the first one. Thought it blew chunks.

Agreed. Saw it in theater and had problems not to laugh out loud at some of it.

 

[Savi]

Long Day’s Journey Into Night [地球最后的夜晚] (2018) directed by Bi Gan

There’s kind of a funny story regarding the release of this film in late 2018. It released on New Years Eve in China and was marketed as a romantic movie that would make for the perfect date movie for New Years Eve. Screenings were timed so that as soon as the time struck midnight on New Years, the closing kiss between two lovers of the film would be on screen. Chinese audiences flocked to the theatres to watch the movie and immediately panned the film after its first week in theatres. That’s not because the film is bad, but because while mainstream audiences went in expecting something like When Harry Met Sally they got something a bit closer to Last Year at Marienbad.

Bi Gan’s Long Day’s Journey Into Night is an uncompromising art house film, it is not a film I would call accessible for mainstream audiences. The first half of the film, is kind of a noir and tells the tale, through fragments of memory that are difficult to splice together their timeline and order, of a gangster who returns to his hometown and is haunted by the memory of his murdered friend and his former lover. At around the 70th minute of the film, the gangster makes his way to a movie theatre to watch a 3D film and puts on a pair of 3D glasses. The real-life audience was told to put on 3D glasses as well (I however, watched it in 2D on my TV on Criterion Channel), the title card of the film is at last shown – 70 minutes into the film! – and then the second half of the film kicks off which is a slow and hypnotic 50+ minute dream sequence long take in 3D. Easy to see why your New Years date may have been a little disappointed. Bi Gan has a lot of audacity, it would be really easy to call this film the dreaded “pretentious" word, but I don’t necessarily think Bi’s aim is to impress us (while at least not his main aim), but rather to use these techniques to meditate on temporal and spatial relations. I don’t think his techniques work all the time, and at time they draw attention to themselves rather than the film’s story, but it’s hard not to praise Bi’s creativity. The film is also absolutely gorgeous. Bi is clearly influenced by Wong Kar-wai (I think, I’m a little embarrassed to say I haven’t seen a Wong Kar-wai film – he’s a major gap in the things I’ve watched – but I’m well aware of his style) with neon and lush colours in his colour palate, particularly greens to match the green Kaili hills and forests. While the film doesn’t always work it is always pretty to look at, and due to its perplexing structure and confusing story something that probably requires repeat watches to understand. I think there is a masterpiece in Bi’s film somewhere but the final product needed to be refined a bit more. Bi is definitely a director to watch though as this is only his 2nd feature film.

Back to the story of its release and its marketing disaster, while the film was panned by audiences, the film eventually made over $40 million at the box offices which is not too shabby for an art house film and is the most financially successful Chinese art house film ever. So, I guess they had the last laugh.

I never knew it was marketed like that, makes absolutely no sense
I loved it even though I can definitely understand why some people won't make it past the first half as it was hard to get a grasp on things early on. I watched it in theaters with some friends and most of them had checked out during that first hour. Not me, luckily, and that long take was astounding, from the descent into town on. Just mesmerizing, almost magical. I still have it as my favourite movie from 2019.

I watched Bi's first movie not too long after, it also had a long take but that one wasn't nearly as good though.

 

[Communal Blood]

Wrath of Man (2021)

6/10

 

[ProstheticConscience]

Wrath of Man

with Jason Statham and other people.

Mrs. PC put this on while I was on the computer, so I guess you could say I watched it.

Turgid. Plodding. Lots of eye-rolling involved. No idea why it's #1 on Netflix today.

You're making me rich for no reason. Thanks!

 

[kihei]

You're making me rich for no reason. Thanks!

 

[End of Line]

The Usual Suspects (1995): 9/10

Godzilla vs Kong (2021): 5.5/10

Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019): 6.75/10

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

The Final Girls (Strauss-Schulson, 2015) - I guess that if Scream and Waxwork had a child, it would make for a postmodern mess where a bunch of old teenagers played by young adults end up inside a parody of Friday the 13th, having a nerd with them to enjoy the rules of the slasher film. If you want to really stretch it, you could say the film is a little bit about grief, and after this and Fear Street 1978, I really needed a moment to grieve the times where we could enjoy a straight-up slasher without useless distanciation and reflexivity (and you all know I love all of that stuff, when it has the slightest of purpose). Is there a single good film that ends with bloopers in its credits? I still enjoyed some of the (very very dumb) humor, so I guess I'll push it up to 3.5/10.

 

[OzzyFan]

The Green Knight (2021)
2.95 out of 4stars

"A fantasy adventure story of Sir Gawain, King Arthur's reckless and headstrong nephew, who embarks on a daring quest to confront the eponymous Green Knight, a gigantic emerald-skinned stranger and tester of men."
First and foremost, the visuals are nothing short of dazzlingly absorbing, easily the best of any movie I've seen come out this year. 2ndly, Lowery as a writer/director seems to be beloved by critics and divided by audiences, and I think a large part of that is because he is rather ambiguous and vague at times while also throwing in things that don't quite fit perfectly with the story (in here, the battlefield scene with the boy fits that to a tee imo), and audiences generally don't like that. That said, Lowery certainly knows how to create intrigue here and a lot of food for thought. Through this fever dream solo journey, Lowery brings up themes of man's civilized vs naturalistic state, recklessness of male youth, masculinity, morality, mortality, self-identity, and the definition of courage. Patel is great too. Haven't seen him in the Personal History of David Copperfield, but this may have peaked my interest into considering that film.

Village of the Damned (1960)
2.80 out of 4stars

"In the English village of Midwich, the blonde-haired, glowing-eyed children of uncertain paternity prove to have frightening powers."
An old school, calmly unsettling mood centric tale about mysterious blackout pregnancies and the birth of powerful supernatural 'Aryan' looking children. It's very effective and a supposed metaphor (purpose or not) of many different things occurring at that time (War, Communism, Youth Superseding Adults, etc.).

In the Mouth of Madness (1994)
2.70 out of 4stars

"An insurance investigator begins discovering that the impact a missing horror writer's books have on his fans is more than inspirational."
A Lovecraftian one off meta horror movie that I personally interpreted a few different ways. 1, what horror writers pen becomes real because it is brought into this world the second it is written. 2, what horror readers absorb becomes real for them because they visualize and live through it inside their minds as an occurrence and it can definitely alter their personal psyches and even day to day lives if it influences them enough. 3, everything we think or see in our minds and dreams is something that is occurring or has occurred in some dimension, some reality, or some universe at some place in time. It uses this concept moderately well, but I don't feel it completely succeeds on what it wants it's audience to feel and go through.

Jungle Cruise (2021)
2.30 out of 4stars

"Based on Disneyland's theme park ride where a small riverboat takes a group of travelers through a jungle filled with dangerous animals and reptiles but with a supernatural element."
It's everychild/everyman pleasing light action adventure entertainment with humor sprinkled in, albeit cliche ridden all over the place. Feels very oddly similar/shares many things on paper to a "Brendan Fraser's The Mummy", but is much lighter and not as interesting.

 

[Puck]

F9, Directed by Justin Lin, 5.0 (3.0 for film quality + 7.0 for action scenes = 5.0)

Fast and Furious is the fast car film franchise starring Vin Diesel as the modern day incarnation of Samson; in this intallment, Diesel is pitted against WWE wrestling star John Cena, playing his kid brother, now an international spy and bad guy. The film franchise is labelled as an action drama but fantasy comedy might be more apt. The vehicular soap opera continues to push the boundaries of magical thinking as our superheroes battle great odds and defy death itself in order to bring the evil Charlize Theron to heel. The chase scenes are highly entertaining, the acting is terrible and screenplay has holes wide enough to let armoured military vehicles through. Good for a few chuckles though as the magnetized car Special FX are kinda cool because much mayhem ensues. They even upstage Elon Musk by putting a car into space, this time with drivers in it. The Toretto family is put though great trials and tribulations, but in the end, you know who pulls through victorious otherwise a multimillion dollar film franchise would come to an apbrupt end; although if that happened we aren't sure how many tears would be shed.

 

[Puck]

Also first images from this film, it's a murdery mystery with these two and I'm pumped. I don't expect Knives Out but it'll be good if it's half as juicy.

I admit, you piqued my curiosity. Sam Rockwell, Saoirse Ronan, Adrien Brody. This might have some potential. A 2022 release date.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt13640696/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_6