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

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

My favorite films québécois:

1) Les Ordres
2) Au clair de la lune
3) La vie heureuse de Léopold Z.
4) Pour la suite du monde

 

[Langdon Alger]

I think The Sweet Hereafter is one of the best Canadian films ever made after Mon Oncle Antoine. Will be good to get your thoughts (one way or the other).

Well, I actually have seen it before, but it was a long time ago, so I don’t remember much. Once I watch it again, I will post my thoughts. The film is considered by critics to be one of the best Canadian films of all time, and I believe it has 98% on rotten tomatoes, so clearly the critics loved it. Siskel and Ebert both had it on their list of the best movies of 1997.

I plan on watching it this weekend.

 

[ORRFForever]

For some reason (I don't know why), I hate Dave Franco, but I'm still looking forward to see The Rental.

The Rental (2020) :

ALL of the “renting a cottage” movies have a similar pattern...

* A bunch of friends rent a home in the middle of no where - and there is little to no cell phone coverage;

* The owner is always creepy, often perverted, and usually secretly watching them;

* The friends take drugs, party, and do something "no one can know about" – providing an excuse why the police can NOT be called after someone dies;

* The movie loses all semblance of reality in the final act as the friends attempt to cover up their crime(s), turn on each other, and try and survive the weekend.

The Rental is par for the course.
5/10

 

[kihei]

My favorite films québécois:

1) Les Ordres
2) Au clair de la lune
3) La vie heureuse de Léopold Z.
4) Pour la suite du monde

Never have done a Quebec list, but now's a good time. Can't narrow it down beyond a dozen:

Mon Oncle Antoine (yes, I am one of those)
Les Ordres
Cafe le Flore
Mommy
Polytechniqe
Heatbeats
Le Bons Debarras
Curling
The Salesman
Before Tomorrow
Boris without Beatrice
The Far Side of the Moon

 

[Arizonan God]

have you seen the sweet hereafter? That’s also directed by Atom Egoyan. I have it on my PVR. Need to watch it soon.

Not yet, but it's next on my list. Will likely watch over the weekend.

 

[Arizonan God]

My favorite films québécois:

1) Les Ordres
2) Au clair de la lune
3) La vie heureuse de Léopold Z.
4) Pour la suite du monde

Just like Anglo-Canadian films, Quebecois films are a big blind spot for me. Really only seen a few french-language Denis Villeneuve films. I'll add these to my watchlist, along with kihei's list.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

The King of New York

with Christopher Walken and everyone from New York crime tv shows and movies.

1990 NYC. Frank White (Walken) is a drug/crime/sexy cocaine nightclub baron who just got out of prison, and boy oh boy are there ever a lot of people he wants dead. The drug importation and distribution business has entirely too many people involved. Luckily, he's got Jimmy Jump (Larry, yes, Larry Fishburne), Test Tube (Steve Buscemi's first major screen role), and a whole bunch of people from everywhere to run around shooting people, snorting coke, twitching to bad rap music, and taking over all the NYC rackets. He's also got the ear of the local government schmoozing scene, and aims to build a new hospital in the Bronx while killing Chinese, Italian and Colombian drug suppliers and getting laid in his spare time. He runs the very unlikely rainbow coalition of NYC gangs, but hot on his trail is a cadre of pissed-off NYPD cops who totally don't play by the rules, man! They include an overcaffeinated David Caruso, who's auditioning for every role he ever got in his life after this movie, Wesley Snipes, and other luckless civil servants. Suspense! Well, not really.

Interesting artifact from every NY actor's back resume. You're watching this going: Law and Order, Law and Order, NYPD Blue...oh, that alley in Chinatown's been blown up in at least three movies...behold the wonder of Lawrence Fishburne in his young punk phase! Only a decade before Morpheus he was wearing rope chains, snorting coke and laughing like a hyena as he shot Wesley Snipes. Also, see what Gus from Breaking Bad looked like with hair. You'll have lots of time to think about stuff like that because the movie itself isn't all that. Even Chris Walken is very subdued for him.

It kind of reminds me of one of those early bands of some genre that blows up later and all the big bands in it cite as a massive early influence...but nobody actually cares about or likes on their own merits.. Like how Metallica and Exodus loved Budgie, and how the Seattle grunge bands like Nirvana, Soundgarden and Pearl Jam all loved Mudhoney and Mother Love Bone. Yeah, google them.

Hey, let's all go work for a pale white guy! Yeah! Totally! Whoo! Yeah!

 

[kihei]

Cemetery of Splendour (2015) Directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul 9C

A group of eight or nine Thai soldiers lay motionless in beds in a small hospital that has been built virtually on top of an ancient burial ground for royalty. A modest cadre of physicians and nurses care for these young men, including Jenn, a middle-aged volunteer, and Keng, a psychic who is hired to comfort them and monitor their progress. The soldiers wake up periodically, but briefly, at which time they eat and exercise; inevitably they fall back to sleep, sometimes in the blink of an eye. Jenn befriends Itt, one of the young soldiers, and they develop a warm platonic relationship. Sometimes they talk together in his waking moments. At other times, when he is unconscious they talk through the assistance of Jenn who can read the soldier's thoughts. Basically, in a lush small town setting the movie consists of conversations among these three characters. What makes director Apichatpong Weerasethakul so special is his ability to combine a particular brand of Thai mysticism with the common events of ordinary life. In doing so, he creates a world that seems richer and more dimensional than what we experience in the West. For instance, Jenn prays at a small nearby temple. Later while she is having lunch, the two young goddesses for whom the temple is devoted join her, in street clothes, and chat with her. Jenn is skeptical but not for long. In her world this kind of thing can happen. The goddesses tell her that the soldiers affliction is caused by the dead generals buried in the ancient cemetery beneath them who are using their youthful energy to still fight their old wars. Jenn, a completely normal and likable person, accepts this explanation as a possibility. However, she is still taken a little aback when the goddesses, giggling like school girls, admit they are dead. Under Weerasethakull's deft direction, the audience becomes gradually accustomed to this world, too. It's just a different way of experiencing reality. For Weerasethakul's characters, there are gradations of consciousness and awareness and the mystical flows into the everyday without any fuss at all. I find his films utterly captivating.

Sidenote: I first saw this at TIFF in 2015. Watching it again, I couldn't believe how much I had missed because the film was, probably, like my eighth movie in three days. You just can't do that with great slow cinema. You need to be fresh and alert to watch such films and give them justice. When that is so, and one is experienced in this kind of viewing, then slow cinema doesn't seem the least bit slow; rather it seems abundant in the richness of detail it provides while allowing time to contemplate the work while it is still in progress. At these times, such movies can create a depth that ordinary cinema mostly struggles to attain.

subtitles

MUBI

 

[kihei]

Just like Anglo-Canadian films, Quebecois films are a big blind spot for me. Really only seen a few french-language Denis Villeneuve films. I'll add these to my watchlist, along with kihei's list.

It would be great to get more people's opinions on Quebec and Canadian film on here. Hope you let us know your thoughts about the films you will see.

 

[Spring in Fialta]

I remember loving Un zoo la nuit but it has been such a long time. Gorgeous poster, though.

Might watch it this weekend if I can find it...

 

[Osprey]

* A bunch of friends rent a home in the middle of no where - and there is little to no cell phone coverage

I've been watching a lot of older (especially 80s) horror movies lately and something that I've been appreciating is that they didn't need to contrive explanations for cell phones not working. I find that it adds a bit to the plausibility of the situations and is refreshing.

* The owner is always creepy, often perverted, and usually secretly watching them

We can probably thank Hitchcock for that one.

 

[ORRFForever]

I've been watching a lot of older (especially 80s) horror movies lately and something that I've been appreciating is that they didn't need to contrive explanations for cell phones not working. I find that it adds a bit to the plausibility of the situations and is refreshing.

Fair enough. However, it's getting less plausible as time goes on - at this point, don't cell phones work just about everywhere?

You ALWAYS get that scene where Person 1 says to Person 2,

Person 1) "Ah crap, no reception. I've got no bars!"

Person 2) "Nope. No reception up here."

At that moment I roll my eyes and think, "Here we go again."

 

[Osprey]

Fair enough. However, it's getting less plausible as time goes on - at this point, don't cell phones work just about everywhere?

You ALWAYS get that scene where Person 1 says to Person 2,

Person 1) "Ah crap, no reception. I've got no bars!"

Person 2) "Nope. No reception up here."

At that moment I roll my eyes and think, "Here we go again."

You may have missed my point. I was agreeing with you on that. That's why I find it refreshing to watch horror movies from 20+ years ago that don't need to address that issue.

 

[ORRFForever]

You may have missed my point. I was agreeing with you on that. That's why I find it refreshing to watch horror movies from 20+ years ago that don't need to address that issue.

Yes. I re-read what you wrote and I see what you mean.

 

[Osprey]

Solaris (2002) - 8/10 (Loved it)

A psychologist (George Clooney) travels to a space station to try to understand what's happening to its crew, only to find it happening to him. As surprised as I was that I disliked the 1972 original am I that I liked this remake so much. It's very tight and polished, likely due to Soderbergh being the writer, director, cinematographer and editor. The screenplay is especially terrific and a huge improvement over the original's, IMO. The story is boiled down to its essentials and, at 98 minutes, is perfectly paced, neither too short or too long. A notable subtraction is the original's extensive philosophizing about the human condition (i.e. "we had to go into outer space to look ourselves in the mirror"), replaced with a much more subtle, personal version and expanded themes of regret, grief and memory. I liked that change because it made the film feel less pretentious and more personally relevant and emotional. To that end, an important addition, I think, is the use of interspersed flashbacks to show what the couple's relationship was back on Earth. I'm often not a fan of flashbacks, but, here, I think that they give a needed point of context that's missing in the original and make the love story resonate more because we see how the couple used to be. It also adds an especial eeriness to Natascha McElrone's character, who we can see is different than in the flashbacks. Speaking of which, the acting is quite strong across the board, even from Clooney. Much less surprising is Viola Davis. Is she ever not amazing in a role? The visuals are also very nice (<insert joke about Clooney being naked... twice>) and they hold up well, considering their age. Overall, I found it to be a very thoughtful and polished sci-fi film and enjoyable to watch. It's too bad that it happens to be a remake of a classic because I imagine that it'd be regarded as one of the better and smarter recent sci-films if it were an original adaptation or story (like Moon, for instance), instead.

 

[kihei]

Code Unknown: Incomplete Stories of Several Journeys (2000( Directed by Michael Haneke 6B

Talk about truth in advertising: the full title tells you all you need to know about this movie. A random scuffle occurs on a Paris street corner. One guy gets in the face of another guy who has been rude to a beggar. Things get out of hand and the police get involved, complicating the situation further. From that point we bounce from brief vignette to brief vignette getting peeks into the lives of some of the people who were involved in this incident. Their stories are not necessarily related in any way, and sometimes the vignettes come to abrupt ends virtually in mid-sentence. (In a Godard-like move late in the movie, an unseen narrator pops up while photographs of miscellaneous people pass by on the screen to tell us about “the ecology of image” and “the value of the non-intended message.” I don’t know about the first assertion, but the second assertion was close to redundant). One of the characters involved in the goings on is a woman played by Juliette Binoche who it turns out is an actress. So, all of her vignettes become immediately suspect including the first jolting one when it appears that she has fallen prey to a serial killer. To what extent is she “for real” or is she merely an actress playing several roles in many movies? Haneke’s cleverest scenes involve her character principally because Binoche is so talented that she keeps us guessing as to what we are actually observing. Finally, haphazardly careening from the facile to the brilliant, Haneke provides her character with a truly vicious little twist right at the end of the movie. So how are all these seemingly disconnected vignettes related? Code unknown, baby, code unknown.

subtitles

Criteriion Channel

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Code Unknown: Incomplete Stories of Several Journeys (2000( Directed by Michael Haneke 6B

That's a 9,5/10 film to me!

 

[Chili]

Just like Anglo-Canadian films, Quebecois films are a big blind spot for me. Really only seen a few french-language Denis Villeneuve films. I'll add these to my watchlist, along with kihei's list.

Off the top of my head...

Incendies is a powerful film. Enjoyed Claude Jutra's Mon Oncle Antoine and Kamouraska.

Some favorite Canadian films:

The Fast Runner in Inuktitut, unforgettable
Goin' Down the Road Classic
Kabloonak story of the film Nanook of the North

There have been some good hockey related tv movies maybe hard to find anywhere now...

Net Worth is a film about the attempt of some NHL players to form a union late 1950's, very well done.
There was a Gordie Howe bio film I liked, also one on Spinner Spencer. Another on the 1972 Summit Series.

There are older movies that were filmed in Canada such as River of No Return (Marilyn Monroe/Robert Mitchum in Alberta), Niagara (Marilyn Monroe) and Captain of the Clouds(James Cagney) not great films but some awesome footage especially Niagara Falls and in the Cagney movie the legend Billy Bishop addressing a real pilot graduation parade during WWII as well as footage of Parliament Hill at the time.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

ARQ

with a handful of people in two rooms.

Near future dystopia. A man and woman in rags wake up on a sparse bed at 6:16 am when masked intruders burst in. The man is killed trying to escape. He then wakes up again at 6:16 am, and lives a little longer, this time being taken downstairs and tied up. He is later killed trying to escape again. He then wakes up again at 6:16 am, and the scenario plays out a little further. The masked intruders are with The Bloc, and they want his scrips. In the basement, one of their guys has been killed by this big machine, which has a large metal roller that just keeps spinning faster and faster. It's called the Arq. The man is its inventor, having stolen it from his former employer the Torus Corporation, which is fighting a war against The Bloc. He created a hyper-efficient power generator, but it's now turned into a time machine, creating a loop from 6:11 to 9:25 am. How long have they been stuck in the loop? How do they get out? And who are these masked people, really?

Another entry in the Groundhog Day temporal loop movies, and it's not bad. Suspenseful as more and more of the inhabitants of the loop become aware of their former loops and plot to outwit each other and the double-crosses, betrayals and secret identities pile up.

A better movie than Edge of Tomorrow despite having about .0001% of its budget and star power.

On Netflix.

Deja vu #2342335...

 

[kihei]

That's a 9,5/10 film to me!

I thought it might be. But outside of playing around with the medium in a clever way, what's the point?

 

[ItsFineImFine]

Archive (2020) - 6/10

The need to have a twist and fragment things kinda ruins this film for me. Pacing never got going, lead wasn't quite good enough and he's certainly not Oscar Isaac in Ex-Machina.

 

[Osprey]

Archive (2020) - 6/10

The need to have a twist and fragment things kinda ruins this film for me. Pacing never got going, lead wasn't quite good enough and he's certainly not Oscar Isaac in Ex-Machina.

That's too bad. I hope that I didn't over-sell it for you. I didn't mind any of the things that you had issues with, but I can understand how they might not be for everyone.

 

[nameless1]

My favorite films québécois:

1) Les Ordres
2) Au clair de la lune
3) La vie heureuse de Léopold Z.
4) Pour la suite du monde

I will have to check those out. What about Denys Arcand? Where would he rank on your list?

 

[nameless1]

I would love to do a Anglo-Canadian recommended list too.

The first two from the top of my head are Blackbird and Sleeping Giant. Those are definitely the best English Canadian films I have seen thus far.

I will also give some love to The Body Remembers When The World Broke Opens. It is not my favourite, but I appreciate the skills required to make a believable one shot movie, and the focus given to the Vancouver East Side, the notoriously poverty and crime infested area in the city, and the long overlooked aboriginal women. I will have to say it is probably the best movie from British Columbia.

The one that makes me the most uncomfortable is Punch. Honestly, the movie is not anything special, and the story is quite straight forward, but there is a scene in particular that I just cannot move past, mainly because the director and main actress are actual father and daughter in real life.

Spoiler

The daughter spread her legs in order to seduce another character, and the father just points the camera at all her naked bottomless glory. That is just very weird and uncomfortable to me.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

I will have to check those out. What about Denys Arcand? Where would he rank on your list?

Not a big fan. I like Le déclin de l'empire américain and its sequel, but that's maybe 7.5/10 films for me. Le confort et l'indifférence is by far his most relevant/interesting film, but not a great film in itself.

I'd like to add to my list:

5) Mourir à tue-tête - brilliant film