Movies: Last Movie You Watched and Rate It | Part#: Some High Number +4

[ORRFForever]

The Money Plane (2020) :

A team of thieves, doing one last score, try to steal a billion dollars in crypto currency from a casino in the sky.

With the exception of Kelsey Grammar's salary (he's actually very good as the heavy), the entire movie looks like it was made for the cost of catering a "real movie".

When will the drip, drip, drip of horrible 2020 movies end?

2/10

 

[Langdon Alger]

Had a big weekend where I caught up on a bunch of awesome movies that I should have already seen. My movie history is a bit thin in the first place, as I've been mostly a tv series guy for the past 8ish years, but I'm trying to remedy that this year.

Watched:
- Whiplash (loved it)
- Collateral (enjoyed it)
- Boogie Nights (loved it)
- No Country for Old Men (loved it)
- Lady Bird (loved it)

haven’t seen ladybird, but those other films are very good. Cruise plays a pretty convincing bad guy in Collateral, and Boogie Nights and No Country are pretty terrific films. JK Simmons was great in Whiplash.

you have good taste.

 

[Osprey]

Re-Animator (1985) - 7/10 (Really liked it)

What do you get when a mad scientist with a Frankenstein complex pairs up with a medical student who has access to a well-stocked hospital morgue? You get a cult horror movie, of course. Don't expect the kind with timely social commentary, though. This is the kind in which an undead body walks around holding its own decapitated head in its hands while it's grinning and making puns. Now that's my kind of horror movie.

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Bride of Re-Animator (1990) - 5/10 (Didn't like or dislike it)

Even though everything that he brought back to life in the first movie tried to kill him, our mad scientist thinks that it's a good idea to go even further and fuse body parts from multiple "donors" and then bring them to life. You might be wondering if, like Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, this is a commentary on the limits of science and the bounds of human ego. Naaah. It's just a good excuse to have a naked re-animated bride and give bat wings to the decapitated head from the first movie (oh, yes, it's back and it's mobile). That's good enough for me.

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Beyond Re-Animator (2003) - 3/10 (Really disliked it)

Being responsible for the deaths of dozens of innocent people and locked in prison hasn't dissuaded our mad scientist from his commitment to science. The immoral experiments must continue! Unfortunately, the plot is nonsensical (and, for this trilogy, that's saying something), no one can act (especially Elsa Pataky, though I doubt that her acting is why she was cast) and the whole thing just screams "straight to DVD." Nearly all of the gore and humor is crammed into the final 15 minutes, which makes that portion more watchable, but isn't enough to redeem the rest. It says something when the most memorable thing about a movie is its credits sequence (NSFW).

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From Beyond (1986) - 6/10 (Liked it)

It's not part of the Re-Animator franchise, but is closely linked because it was directed and produced by the same guys who did Re-Animator (Gordon and Yuzna) and starred two of the same actors (Combs and Crampton). It's a little less humorous than Re-Animator and a bit more straight horror and sci-fi-like. In this one, our scientists turn on a Tesla coil-like machine which stimulates their pineal gland, causing them to get a little horny and see creatures from another dimension. It's sort of how nerds trip out instead of using recreational drugs like everyone else. Also, I just realized from looking at the screen cap that each of these four movies includes a grotesque being trying to make out with a pretty lady who's having none of it. Who knew that horror movies could be so relatable?

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Re-Animator (1985) - 7/10

What do you get when a mad scientist with a Frankenstein complex pairs up with a medical student who has access to a well-stocked hospital morgue? You get a horror movie, of course. Don't expect the kind with timely social commentary. This is the kind in which an undead body walks around holding its own decapitated head in its hands while it's grinning and making puns. Now that's my kind of horror movie.

========

Bride of Re-Animator (1990) - 5/10

Even though everything that he brought back to life in the first movie tried to kill him, our mad scientist thinks that it's a good idea to go even further and fuse body parts from multiple "donors" and then bring them to life. You might be wondering if, like Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, this is a commentary on the limits of science and the bounds of human ego. Naaah. It's just a good excuse to have a naked re-animated bride and give bat wings to the decapitated head from the first movie (oh, yes, it's back and it's mobile). That's good enough for me.

========

Beyond Re-Animator (2003) - 3/10

Being responsible for the deaths of dozens of innocent people and locked in prison hasn't dissuaded our mad scientist from his commitment to science. The immoral experiments must continue! Unfortunately, the plot is nonsensical (and, for this trilogy, that's saying something), no one can act (especially Elsa Pataky, though I doubt that her acting is why she was cast) and the whole thing just screams "straight to DVD." Nearly all of the gore and humor is crammed into the final 15 minutes, which makes that portion more watchable, but isn't enough to redeem the rest. It says something when the most unforgettable thing about a movie is its credits sequence (NSFW).

========

From Beyond (1986) - 6/10

It's not part of the Re-Animator franchise, but is closely linked because it was directed and produced by the same guys who did Re-Animator (Gordon and Yuzna) and starred two of the same actors (Combs and Crampton). It offers a bit of role reversal because Combs is not a mad scientist, but a hesitant one, and Crampton isn't just the pretty victim, but a scientist who goes a little mad, herself. It's a little less humorous than Re-Animator and a bit more straight horror and sci-fi-like. I'm glad that I saved it for the end to wash away the bad taste from the last movie. I just realized from looking at the screen cap that each of these movies includes a grotesque horror trying to make out with a pretty lady who's having none of it. Who knew that horror movies could be so relatable?

It's been a while since I've seen Bride of Re-Animator and From Beyond, but my past impression of the films was that Bride was closer in quality to the first Re-Animator film than to the third one, so I'd probably go with something like 7.5/10 ; 6.5/10 ; 2/10 (Beyond Re-Animator, I agree, is just terrible - as I said earlier, Yuzna had a great start as a director but went downhill fast).

I need to see From Beyond again. Where did you catch it? Is it on Tubi? I've long said it was my favorite Gordon film, but I think it might actually be second to Dagon.

 

[kihei]

The Exterminating Angel (1962) Directed by Luis Bunuel 10A

In Mexico City, the cream of the local society--artists, doctors, military men, business elites--gather for a lavish dinner at a downtown estate. For reasons that they can't explain the staff and servants leave before the party begins, but that only causes a minor inconvenience. Inside, the dinner party is a grand success....that is, until time comes to leave, and nobody does. To the chagrin of the host and hostess, everyone just decides to spend the night. Most people think it odd, but even they don't leave. Come the next day and then the next, no one leaves either despite the fact that there is no physical impediment that prevents them from doing so. They are all just stuck in that room. Soon everything gets serious--the outside world cannot come in and conditions within the room deteriorate badly. There is not enough food and water and civility breaks down entirely. Soon everyone is at each other's throats, and still they can't leave. Without ever overstating his case, Spanish surrealist Luis Bunuel creates an extended metaphor in which the Mexican upper class have to suffer the deprivations of the poor, who are perpetually trapped within social/economic conditions that they cannot escape either. Turning the tables on the class system, Bunuel's approach is brilliant, witty, entertaining, and full of surreal touches that add humour to what is taking place. After watching this film, it would have been hard for viewers at the time to maintain any illusions or prejudices they might have had about poverty or about the lot of the poor. In my opinion, The Exterminating Angel is Bunuel's best movie and among the finest movies ever made.

subtitles

available on Criterion Channel

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

It's been a while since I've seen Bride of Re-Animator and From Beyond, but my past impression of the films was that Bride was closer in quality to the first Re-Animator film than to the third one, so I'd probably go with something like 7.5/10 ; 6.5/10 ; 2/10 (Beyond Re-Animator, I agree, is just terrible - as I said earlier, Yuzna had a great start as a director but went downhill fast).

I need to see From Beyond again. Where did you catch it? Is it on Tubi? I've long said it was my favorite Gordon film, but I think it might actually be second to Dagon.

I'm a big From Beyond fan as well.

Just watched Castle Freak and wasn't really a fan. Didn't expect much honestly, despite the "get the team back together" group of Gordon-Crampton-Combs. Combs in particular was really really bad. I certainly don't consider him a good actor by any means, but he fills a certain type of role in the earlier Gordon movies just fine. Not here though. Wooof.

I will NEVER say anything bad about Barbara Crampton.

 

[Osprey]

It's been a while since I've seen Bride of Re-Animator and From Beyond, but my past impression of the films was that Bride was closer in quality to the first Re-Animator film than to the third one, so I'd probably go with something like 7.5/10 ; 6.5/10 ; 2/10 (Beyond Re-Animator, I agree, is just terrible - as I said earlier, Yuzna had a great start as a director but went downhill fast).

Yes, I'd agree that 'Bride' is definitely closer in quality to the original than the third one (though my grades don't reflect that). A lot of the same ingredients are there, so it's largely more of the same, but just not as focused. That seems to me to be the difference between Gordon's films and Yuzna's films and one of the things that I liked best about Re-Animator and From Beyond. They're relatively simple premises done well. To be fair to Yuzna, it's hard to do sequels without putting a spin on and complicating an originally simple premise, so he might be forgiven for the first sequel, but not the second. I considered giving the second sequel a 2/10, but at least it has a sense of humor about itself, so I can't "hate" on it (what 2/10 means to me), but it's pretty bad. According to user reviews at RT, it has its fans who even consider it slightly better than 'Bride', which is kind of surprising. I imagine that they're judging it mostly by the last 15 minutes.

BTW, it turned out that I was right that I had seen Re-Animator and From Beyond before, but it was so long ago that I barely remembered anything. It was really only at a couple of points in each that I got a "hey, that's familiar" feeling. It's neat to re-watch movies that are part of your past, but which you remember so little about that it's almost like watching them for the first time.

I need to see From Beyond again. Where did you catch it? Is it on Tubi? I've long said it was my favorite Gordon film, but now I think it might be second to Dagon.

It's on Amazon Prime, but requires rental.

Just watched Castle Freak and wasn't really a fan. Didn't expect much honestly, despite the "get the team back together" group of Gordon-Crampton-Combs. Combs in particular was really really bad. I certainly don't consider him a good actor by any means, but he fills a certain type of role in the earlier Gordon movies just fine. Not here though. Wooof.

I didn't realize that Castle Freak re-unites "the team." I'll have to watch that now. Thanks.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

I'm a big From Beyond fan as well.

Just watched Castle Freak and wasn't really a fan. Didn't expect much honestly, despite the "get the team back together" group of Gordon-Crampton-Combs. Combs in particular was really really bad. I certainly don't consider him a good actor by any means, but he fills a certain type of role in the earlier Gordon movies just fine. Not here though. Wooof.

I will NEVER say anything bad about Barbara Crampton.

Castle Freak is the lesser film of the "Lovecraft cycle", it's also the further away from any Lovecraft story, as far as I can remember. Combs has a cool little cameo in Edmond - I agree that he's not an actor. He did good as Herbert West, but even in From Beyond, he's pretty bad.

I didn't realize that Castle Freak re-unites "the team." I'll have to watch that now. Thanks.

You might want to watch The Evil Clergyman too, available on Tubi.

 

[Trap Jesus]

Yuzna had a great start as a director but went downhill fast).

Society is one of those movies that gives me so much more leeway for my perception of a director. Screaming Mad George's effects are the standout but it's on the director to create a tone and atmosphere and I don't know if I've ever seen a movie that blends so many different and unusual things together so effectively. That movie was creepy, funny, mysterious, disgusting, goofy, dark and perverse.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Society is one of those movies that gives me so much more leeway for my perception of a director. Screaming Mad George's effects are the standout but it's on the director to create a tone and atmosphere and I don't know if I've ever seen a movie that blends so many different and unusual things together so effectively. That movie was creepy, funny, mysterious, disgusting, goofy, dark and perverse.

Commented on Society just two pages back on this thread. I agree that's a film that feels effortlessly effective on many levels.

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

Castle Freak is the lesser film of the "Lovecraft cycle", it's also the further away from any Lovecraft story, as far as I can remember. Combs has a cool little cameo in Edmond - I agree that he's not an actor. He did good as Herbert West, but even in From Beyond, he's pretty bad.

He has a line reading toward the end of Castle Freak that had me howling with laughter at how bad it was.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Le jeu avec le feu (Robbe-Grillet, 1975) – This is the closest Robbe-Grillet ever got to direct a “comedy”, and it is in my opinion it's biggest flaw. It's amazing complexity suffers from being dressed up with punctual silliness (that car chase is ludicrous), and the echo the film had in popular culture and French pornographic aesthetics plays against it too: watching it today, it looks like porn. Robbe-Grillet started filming just before Emmanuel hit the French screens (with two of the same actresses, including Sylvia Kristel), and his film got much greater and lasting impact on the pornocrates français (anybody familiar with the Marc Dorcel universe will recognize its lineage – it is silly to say, but there probably wouldn't be La ruée vers Laure without Le jeu avec le feu). Robbe-Grillet's attitude towards cinema might also put off some spectators – while his first films were clever demonstrations of exploration and experimentation with the cinematographic language and codes, here he is mostly mocking them or diverting them for less ambitious effects (with some of Robbe-Grillet's cleverness and humor still sometimes in full effect: the police commissioner reading his notes to the spectator to make sure he has the complete information regarding his investigation, or Trintignant who concludes the film by saying that he didn't understand a thing from the screenplay but that he think they won).
Constructed around playful intertextual vignettes linked to Verdi, Shakespeare, Freud, and allusions to Kremski, Bunuel (those who are familiar with him will recognize the brilliant allusion from the screenshot above), and probably quite a few others, the film uses geographical manipulation and character duplication in order to create an oneiric and labyrinthine allegory of incest (the other perversions explored in the many rooms Carolina visit, through erotic tableaux of necrophila, bestiality or cannibalism, are merely aesthetic distractions – something we all probably won't ever see again and should thoroughly enjoy). With a work that complex, there's obviously different ways to read the film, but Robbe-Grillet has admitted that the main theme he had in mind was a tale of incestuous perversion and guilt. Not only does the banker delivers himself his daughter to her kidnappers, but the maison de rendez-vous where she is taken is a breathing and growing mirror of his own house, and it's his doubles that go there to abuse her (this really made me want to see Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me again, which reprises both these themes and the fire of the title). 8.5/10

 

[kihei]

Le jeu avec le feu (Robbe-Grillet, 1975) –
Constructed around playful intertextual vignettes linked to Verdi, Shakespeare, Freud, and allusions to Kremski, Bunuel (those who are familiar with him will recognize the brilliant allusion from the screenshot above)

Too easy, and you got a funny idea of brilliant there, mister.

Movie sounds interesting, though. Where did you screen it, if I might ask?

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Too easy, and you got a funny idea of brilliant there, mister.

Movie sounds interesting, though. Where did you screen it, if I might ask?

How is it too easy if you haven't seen the film? Allusions work through significant return (retour signifiant), so it doesn't get better for being harder to spot (if you spot the Kremski one, you'll get bonus points - anyway, even the Bunuel one only becomes obvious after it's pointed out). So yeah, absolutely brillant, not an empty allusion (or clin d'œil) à la Tarantino.

I own the boxset (which strangely contains all of his films but Un bruit qui rend fou). Le jeu avec le feu is one of his lesser films, but yeah still very interesting.

 

[kihei]

How is it too easy if you haven't seen the film? Allusions work through significant return (retour signifiant), so it doesn't get better for being harder to spot (if you spot the Kremski one, you'll get bonus points - anyway, even the Bunuel one only becomes obvious after it's pointed out). So yeah, absolutely brillant, not an empty allusion (or clin d'œil) à la Tarantino.

I own the boxset (which strangely contains all of his films but Un bruit qui rend fou). Le jeu avec le feu is one of his lesser films, but yeah still very interesting.

The Phantom of Liberty, Luis Bunuel, 1974. Call it an educated guess. "Allusion" to me informally means "passing reference." R-G's shot (compare above) seems like a passing reference to me. If you have another film in mind, let me know.

 

[NyQuil]

What is it about French cinema where there is always a beautiful girl with a generally old and ugly man.....

 

[kihei]

What is it about French cinema where there is always a beautiful girl with a generally old and ugly man.....

Here's anothe one. Have you ever seen a French movie that didn't have a mirror in it?

 

[ORRFForever]

The Fabulous Baker Boys (Kloves, 1989): drags a little 4/10

V.D.'s review stung so I felt the need to find my OLD(!) review - it took a while for me to dig it up...

The Fabulous Baker Boys (1989) :

Brothers Jack and Frank Baker (Jeff and Beau Bridges) need a singer because two pianos are no longer enough to keep the act fresh and marketable. In walks Susie Diamond - Michelle Pfeiffer. The act improves and, all of a sudden, they're in high demand. Unfortunately, the sexual chemistry between Jack and Susie tears the trio apart.

If I was to nitpick, I would fault The Fabulous Baker Boys for not being dark enough. Having said that, the acting, the music and the characters are wonderful, and they make TFBB a joy to watch over and over again. In particular, the "Makin' Whoopee" scene which leaves the viewer, just like the audience in the movie, gasping for air.

The Fabulous Baker Boys (1989) - Makin' Whoopee Scene (6/11) | Movieclips

8.5/10

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

The Phantom of Liberty, Luis Bunuel, 1974. Call it an educated guess. "Allusion" to me informally means "passing reference." R-G's shot (compare above) seems like a passing reference to me. If you have another film in mind, let me know.

Oh, I wasn't suggesting you didn't have the right film in mind, the source is effectively easy to identify for any spectator that knows a little about Bunuel's films (especially once I point out that it's an allusion). It is indeed the right film - and they're looking at pretty much the same thing:

What I was saying is that it wasn't too easy as it is a brilliantly working allusion. Robbe-Grillet borrows from Bunuel's absurd cynism towards censors and morality with a simple allusion. That's brilliant.

 

[kihei]

I Don't Want to Sleep Alone (2006) Directed by Tsai Ming-liang 10C

This slowly paced film is a thoughtful rumination of the importance of human companionship amidst the squalor of the back streets of Kuala Lumpur. A group of migrant workers from Bangladesh discover a discarded mattress that is still usable. While they are carrying it back to their hovel, they notice a man who has collapsed on the street, obviously badly beaten. The laborers wrap him in the mattress and take him to their dwelling in an abandoned building where his needs are conscientiously attended to by one of the men until he recovers. A bond is created between these two strangers. Simultaneously in a separate thread of the story, a young woman looks after a man in a permanent coma. Eventually the two threads will come together in unexpected ways. That beat-up old mattress which keeps getting moved from one unappealing location to another is an important symbol in the movie. It is the safe harbor that people can return to, the closest thing that they have to a place they can call their own. Though homeless and poor, the characters share in common a sense of responsibility toward one another as well as a collective longing for attachment to other people. The final image, a shot of one of the strangest but most poignant love triangles in film history, is achingly beautiful, the perfect way to end an exceedingly lovely work. I Don’t Want to Sleep Alone is my favourite film of the 21st century and among my all-time top ten.

subtitles

Sidenote: This estimation, with minor editing, is the same review I wrote when I first saw the film several years ago. When I watched I Don't Want to Sleep Alone last night, I fell in love with it all over again. On a whim, I looked up my old review and thought, "Well, you can't say it any better than that, so don't try." I Don't Want to Sleep Alone is such a beautiful movie

 

[nameless1]

Muhammed Ali lived a full life. He won the Olympic gold medal, turned professional and won the championship belt at 22, engaged in a legal fight with the government in order to not fight in a war he does not believe it and lost his championship belt and his prime as a result, won the belt back once he got reinstated, fought all the top fighters in his era and had a number of memorable fights that will forever fall into boxing lore, and even after he retired, his subsequent diagnosis with Parkinson put a lot of attention on the disease. By all measures, his life is definitely made for the biopic treatment, and yet, somehow, Mann made one of the most uninteresting and boring biopics out there.

Honestly, Ali's life has so much material, that it would may have been better to make it two parts, or even a trilogy, but Mann and the studio made the choice to do it all in one movie. That means a lot of things, and maybe even important aspects in Ali's life, are taken out, and even though the movie is two-and-a-half hours long, it still feels rushed in parts. Ali's best battles are probably his trilogy of fights with Joe Frazier, but the first fight is largely glossed over, while the second is pretty much ignored, and the last one, the famous Thrilla in Manila, never made it on screen. Meanwhile, the focus is on the Liston and Foreman fights, and while those were worthy and important fights in Ali's career, they accounted for at least 40% of the movie's runtime, and that might not have been the best use of time.

I am also not sure Will Smith is the best casting choice either. The movie wants to show the duality of the man, as there is an onscreen persona that is pompous and full of arrogance designed to be larger than life, and a sensitive and thoughtful personal side that wants to advocate for larger causes. Unfortunately, even though Smith is able to capture the outer life, he looks rather confused, and at times even disinterested, when he has to tackle the inner life. Those personal aspects takes up a lot of the screentime too, so the pace slows significantly as a result, which takes the audience out of the movie.

Perhaps it is to show how Ali is lost, and even powerless, in the tidal wave of giant upheaval during his lifetime, but Mann never makes it explicit. He just shows glimpses of how Ali is manipulated by unsavory figures, but those are never resolved at all. Thus, the movie feels very incomplete, and at times, I even question why there needs to biopic if the questions are left unanswered, and the narrative is so reticent.

There is no other way to put it, but Ali is such a waste of potential. Worst of all, the boxing scenes are filmed poorly too, as I hated the sudden change of camera to a Go Pro style in the middle of fights, so I cannot even say it is a good boxing movie. I would not say never to watch it, because the details are accurate enough, but it will not be a priority.

5/10

 

[ProstheticConscience]

What is it about French cinema where there is always a beautiful girl with a generally old and ugly man.....

I'll give you a hint: which of those two demographics was making the movies?

 

[kihei]

I'll give you a hint: which of those two demographics was making the movies?

Yup.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

V.D.'s review stung so I felt the need to find my OLD(!) review - it took a while for me to dig it up...

The Fabulous Baker Boys (1989) :

Brothers Jack and Frank Baker (Jeff and Beau Bridges) need a singer because two pianos are no longer enough to keep the act fresh and marketable. In walks Susie Diamond - Michelle Pfeiffer. The act improves and, all of a sudden, they're in high demand. Unfortunately, the sexual chemistry between Jack and Susie tears the trio apart.

It's all good, but it's just that - to me - a film must do a lot more than that to get to 8.5/10 (see my last film comment for example, TFBB is an ok film with fun dialogues and characters, but it didn't bring me anywhere else - and that doesn't mean that it's limited to that either, someone else might take it from there and go for miles)

 

[ORRFForever]

It's all good, but it's just that - to me - a film must do a lot more than that to get to 8.5/10 (see my last film comment for example, TFBB is an ok film with fun dialogues and characters, but it didn't bring me anywhere else - and that doesn't mean that it's limited to that either, someone else might take it from there and go for miles)

I know. To each their own.