Last Movie You Watched and Rate It | Spring 2021 Edition

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[ItsFineImFine]

The Ghost Writer (2010) - 7/10

We've had an unfortunate decline in this sort of political thriller over the past decade. They do still get made but fall into that budget range of films we're seeing less and less unfortunately. Ewan McGregor is great like usual (albeit his character lacks serious survival skills) and Brosnan makes for a pretty good villain. Solid, basic film from a genre that I think I took for granted until it dried up.

Also appears on a list of 'Best movies Hitchcock never made' on Criticker: Criticker - Film Recommendations and Community - Rate Film and Read Film Reviews

Alien (1979) - 7/10

It does have a bit of a strange rhythm at the choppy start but man are the designs on this film good. They hold up so well. Unfortunately horror films just aren't very entertaining for me, I don't enjoy characters being slowly picked off one by one with little nuance to them so I can appreciate how good it looks but can never fully enjoy it.

 

[Rabid Ranger]

Had never seen Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. I like political/historical thrillers so was pleased. Very good cast/acting. Oldman was great. It was interesting to get a glimpse of the inner workings of MI-6, especially post-Suez crisis. 9/10.

 

[Chili]

Strange Cargo-1940

Was interested to see this adventure film of an escape from Devil's Island (as a fan of Papillon the book and original movie).

Believe it was Clark Gable's first film after Gone With The Wind and he's in fine form. Alot of chemistry with co-star Joan Crawford.

Interesting tale.

 

[nameless1]

Had never seen Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. I like political/historical thrillers so was pleased. Very good cast/acting. Oldman was great. It was interesting to get a glimpse of the inner workings of MI-6, especially post-Suez crisis. 9/10.

Another good le Carre adaptation is The Spy Who Came In From the Cold.

Also, give le Carre books a try. They are very good too.

 

[Rabid Ranger]

Another good le Carre adaptation is The Spy Who Came In From the Cold.

Also, give le Carre books a try. They are very good too.

I've read a number of his and Graham Greene's books. They make for great movies.

 

[ItsFineImFine]

The Spy Who Came In From The Cold has fairly positive reviews, mid-60s production value is always good with Hollywood, going to find an HD copy of this.

 

[Chili]

The Spy Who Came In From The Cold has fairly positive reviews, mid-60s production value is always good with Hollywood, going to find an HD copy of this.

Watched it recently. Maybe my favorite Richard Burton performance, must be a good book too.

 

[kihei]

Watched it recently. Maybe my favorite Richard Burton performance, must be a good book too.

I'm a huge fan of Richard Burton, one of my favourite actors when he gives a f---. Other performances you might try if you haven't already:

Look Back in Anger
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Beckett (bonus: an excellent Peter O'Toole performance, to boot)
Equus
The Night of the Iguana

 

[nameless1]

The Spy Who Came In From The Cold has fairly positive reviews, mid-60s production value is always good with Hollywood, going to find an HD copy of this.

Criterion has it in its collection. That is probably the best version you can get.

 

[Osprey]

Below Zero (Bajocero) (2021) - 6/10 (Liked it)

An armored prisoner transfer van is attacked at night, in freezing temperatures, trapping a cop (Javier Guiterrez) inside with the prisoners. This Spanish action thriller is a little Assault on Precinct 13 and a little Con Air. Much of it takes place in the tight confines of the fortified prisoner van, which lends a little claustrophobia, as well as tension because the cop is caught between the prisoners who don't like him and the threat outside. There's an element of mystery because the latter's motives are not clear. It's a little slow to get going, but, once it does, it doesn't let up. It takes place mostly at night and is pretty violent. I found the last half hour to be a little cool and unexpected and there's a nice twist at the very end that turns things upside down. Unfortunately, the plot suffers from being rather unbelievable and you could surely find holes if you tried. In spite of that, I enjoyed it. It has "eventual remake starring Bruce Willis" written all over it, if that gives you an idea of what kind of movie it is. If you're in the mood for a violent thriller with a simple premise, it's on Netflix and can be watched with subtitles or English dubbing.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

Hawk the Slayer. I remain a glutton for 80s garbage and man was this trash. Muddled sword and sorcery flick. Magic sword. Angry relatives. Jack Palance. (I actually didn't know Palance was in this. Then his partially masked character starts talking and I was like whaaaa? This is obviously pre-comeback.) Future solid character actor John Terry is out-of-place as the hero here. He's stiff and boring. Palance is barely trying. A few positives though -- the quick editing when characters shoot bows and crossbows IS BONKERS and the peppy, flute-heavy score deserves to be in a much more fun movie.

Aw, damn. Meant to respond to this in the last thread, but didn't. Procrastinated too long. My bad.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

Hawk the Slayer

with *ahem* people. Sorta. Also Jack Palance, who must've had some pressing bills to pay.

1980 sword and sorcery stuff that's right down there with Krull.

Evil Voltan the Black One (Palance) is ravaging the land, or something. He's captured the Abbess of a background artwork abbey somewhere, and is demanding 2000 gold pieces for her return. This is after killing his father and getting his younger brother Hawk annoyed. Hawk then runs around in the forest for a while, righting various wrongs, and meets a witch who got the circular prison things used in the first Superman movie to contain the Terence Stamp version of General Zod, and she uses it to visit a few of Hawk's friends. The giant (tall guy), the dwarf (short guy), the elf (guy with plastic Spock ears)...and, oh yeah. There's a one-armed guy whose village was wiped out by Voltan's guy. He develops a rapid-fire crossbow for shits and giggles. They all go fight Voltan. The plot's actually pretty hard to describe.

I first saw this when I was 7? 8? years old, and I've been trying to find it ever since. Not that it's *good* or anything; I'm slightly autistic about movies and tv shows. Once something gets in there, I remember it forever. I have a party trick where I do impressions of whatever random thing someone plays for me. There are certain episodes of GI Joe and the Transformers and various other things I saw as a kid that I can still remember in perfect clarity almost 40 years later, and Hawk the Slayer is one of those things that got in there and won't go away. When it's occurred to me I've tried to find it, and now...yeah. It's on youtube.

Holy shit it's terrible. It's so, so bad. It's really objectively awful in every way, and I've remembered the editing making the elf and one-handed crossbow guy being machine gun turrets for forty years now. If you have a weird mental quirk by which you can remember odd movies from your childhood, then watch this. There is literally no reason anyone else ever should.

"So, is Richard Donner going to want these back, or...?"

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

Funny enough, re: Richard Burton, I happened to take in one of those over the weekend. My wife and I have been on a big Egypt kick so we decided to settle down (on Valentine's Day no less) for the famed disaster Cleopatra, which is a much more interesting Hollywood and business story than it is a movie. I thought the first hour was some solid classic epic film making ... but there are three hours after that and each seems to get progressively worse. Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra begins the movie very shrewd but is neutered and lovesick by the end. Burton is the real detriment here though. Why anyone would follow this man in to battle let alone fall madly in love with this simpering drunken man-baby is a mystery. I suppose Burton is trying to bring depth/complexity to the character befitting his theatrical roots but man is it poorly calibrated. I did like some of the grand old Hollywood sets though the scale of the pic is really undermined in the big naval battle which appears include hundreds of ships in the long shot but only two on an empty sea when the battle moves in close.

 

[Chili]

I'm a huge fan of Richard Burton, one of my favourite actors when he gives a f---. Other performances you might try if you haven't already:

Look Back in Anger
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Beckett (bonus: an excellent Peter O'Toole performance, to boot)
Equus
The Night of the Iguana

The Night of the Iguana is a great film, several top notch performances. Re-watched Virginia Wolff recently, don't believe I've seen the others, Becket was on the 'to watch' list.

Also enjoyed Richard Burton in Where Eagles Dare and in a small memorable role in The Longest Day.

Funny enough, re: Richard Burton, I happened to take in one of those over the weekend. My wife and I have been on a big Egypt kick so we decided to settle down (on Valentine's Day no less) for the famed disaster Cleopatra, which is a much more interesting Hollywood and business story than it is a movie. I thought the first hour was some solid classic epic film making ... but there are three hours after that and each seems to get progressively worse. Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra begins the movie very shrewd but is neutered and lovesick by the end. Burton is the real detriment here though. Why anyone would follow this man in to battle let alone fall madly in love with this simpering drunken man-baby is a mystery. I suppose Burton is trying to bring depth/complexity to the character befitting his theatrical roots but man is it poorly calibrated. I did like some of the grand old Hollywood sets though the scale of the pic is really undermined in the big naval battle which appears include hundreds of ships in the long shot but only two on an empty sea when the battle moves in close.

Remember reading that the director's intention was two 3 hour films. Like Once Upon a Time in America, it got reduced to one l o n g movie, many scenes cut out. Not a great film but the scene where Cleopatra enters Rome is awesome.

 

[ItsFineImFine]

Ze Spy Who Came In From The Cold (1965) - 7.5/10

I just can't miss on well-rated British classics, another good one here. I did unfortunately see the ending coming as soon as they got into the car, felt unnecessarily cold and abrupt but the rest of the journey was well-done with an extremely good amount of twists and head-spinning for the viewer in this sort of slower paced classic.

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

Remember reading that the director's intention was two 3 hour films. Like Once Upon a Time in America, it got reduced to one l o n g movie, many scenes cut out. Not a great film but the scene where Cleopatra enters Rome is awesome.

Yep you are correct -- about two hours of story excised so perhaps Antony's military genius was among the cuts. Saw something that said the eventual budget — $49 million then — would be $400 million today. Yikes.

The entry into Rome is probably the highlight of the movie. Maybe the one moment it does spectacle right.

The funny thing about Burton here isn't even that he's bad, but rather that the movie he seems to be making isn't the one everyone else is making. It feels like it oddly would have been better with less "acting" and more of a charming, swashbuckling himbo in the role.

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

Solarbabies. Another key stop my perpetual 1980s nostalgia tour. Saw this in the theater and had been wanting to revisit for a long time. I remembered several elements — the orb, the roller skating, the machine that makes you see you fear — but the rest was hazy. I went into this expecting a bit of that so-bad-its-good-what-the-heck-were-they-on magic and you know what? It isn’t bad-good. I thought it was actually good-good! I genuinely enjoyed it mostly free from snark and irony.

There are problems. Yes, it’s quite obviously assembled from bits and pieces of other movies, most notably Mad Max, Rollerball and ET. Even what’s on screen feels a little slapped together. Characters appear and disappear without much acknowledgement, especially in the third act. It’s sloppy in a way that feels like helpful context was cut somewhere. The Darstar character seems important but probably could have been written out completely. Every challenge is solved pretty quickly (oftentimes with the team cheering “Yeah!” afterward). Why are they on rollerskates? Why is the an evil robot programed to enjoy inflicting pain?

But here’s what I liked. The world itself is kinda cliche but the sets and costumes and production design is well done. It’s big and tactile and dirty and real. Doesn’t look cheap. It has the idealized (for better and worse) 80s teen crew — Leader, Girl, Younger Kid, Tough Guy, Smart Guy, Black Guy (does he beatbox? Yes. It’s the 80s). For what this is, the acting is good. Richard Jordan is the exact evil ham you need him to be. This is at heart, a kids adventure and all the kids are good for what this is — that most of them continued to have careers is a testament to the casting. There’s an earnestness about this whole thing that won me over. It’s not camp. It’s not cheesy. It’s almost knock-off Spielberg. I liked it.

 

[The Beyonder]

The Game (1997)

So finally watched this film after years of just putting it off. Great premise. Loved the first 2 acts of the film, the mystery and the constant escalation really engaged me. But the film lost me from the moment he wakes up in the middle of nowhere up until the end. The end really disappointed me.

I honestly thought that...

Spoiler

CRS was going to be an old company ran by rich elite oligarchs. That his dad played the same game, and that since Michael Douglas' character was so similar to his father, they ended playing the same game which got them both killed. I was just expecting a twist tbh, but there ended being none and it just deflated me

The film of course is amazingly directed by Fincher, but not his finest imo. 3rd act wasn't up the to quality of rest of the film.

6.5/10

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

Also worked in a double-header of really good Carl Franklin thrillers from the early 1990s.

One False Move. Penned by and co-starting a before-he-was-famous Billy Bob Thornton, three criminals make their way from LA to Arkansas after a robbery, leaving destruction in their wake. Meanwhile a bumpkin sheriff and two LA cops sit waiting for their arrival. Great, character-driven script, particularly with Bill Paxton's jovial sheriff who is more complex than he appears. It lets Paxton run a surprising gamut of emotions through the movie, more than a movie like this often lets folks do. Thornton and Michael Beach are memorable as the requisite hot head and cool customer among the crooks. There's a murder here that is absolutely chilling in how the scene is played. The weak point for me is Cynda Williams in the mysterious femme fatale role. I just don't think she's a good actress and wished throughout someone else was in the role.

Devil in a Blue Dress. Deserves to stand among the great post-war LA noirs with the likes of Chinatown and and LA Confidential. Ok, maybe a tier below, but its certainly worth celebrating and every bit in the tradition of those. All the elements are in place — a missing person, vices, conspiracy, power brokers and a decent man somewhat unwillingly thrust in the middle to sort it all out. In the recent Hanks v. Denzel thread around these parts someone asked if Denzel has ever had a passive part ... (maybe passive wasn't the exact word, but it was close). I think this qualifies. He's often a step behind most other characters, which is certainly in step with the genre and a scene stealing Don Cheadle pops up to be his physical muscle. So Denzel actually is bit of a passenger for a lot of this. And he's good at it! (of course). I'm a big fan of the Walter Mosley novels that this is based on. Damn shame we never got more of Washington and Cheadle who make a great (and funny) team here. One big quibble is the voice over. Again, it fits with the tradition of the genre but other than the opening and closing bits it didn't do much for me ... especially since it's often describing something that's about to happen or could have easily just been show briefly. Still, I love the movie.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

The Hardly Boys In Hardly Gold (Wegman, 1995) - Good detective work by the boys and very distintive humor by Wegman. It's available on YouTube and only 26 minutes long if you're curious. 6/10

Everybody's Fine (Jones, 2009) - Some fun things, some teary stuff, but overall it just doesn't aim high enough. Should have been a lot better. 3.5/10

 

[Osprey]

Solarbabies. Another key stop my perpetual 1980s nostalgia tour. Saw this in the theater and had been wanting to revisit for a long time. I remembered several elements — the orb, the roller skating, the machine that makes you see you fear — but the rest was hazy. I went into this expecting a bit of that so-bad-its-good-what-the-heck-were-they-on magic and you know what? It isn’t bad-good. I thought it was actually good-good! I genuinely enjoyed it mostly free from snark and irony.

There are problems. Yes, it’s quite obviously assembled from bits and pieces of other movies, most notably Mad Max, Rollerball and ET. Even what’s on screen feels a little slapped together. Characters appear and disappear without much acknowledgement, especially in the third act. It’s sloppy in a way that feels like helpful context was cut somewhere. The Darstar character seems important but probably could have been written out completely. Every challenge is solved pretty quickly (oftentimes with the team cheering “Yeah!” afterward). Why are they on rollerskates? Why is the an evil robot programed to enjoy inflicting pain?

But here’s what I liked. The world itself is kinda cliche but the sets and costumes and production design is well done. It’s big and tactile and dirty and real. Doesn’t look cheap. It has the idealized (for better and worse) 80s teen crew — Leader, Girl, Younger Kid, Tough Guy, Smart Guy, Black Guy (does he beatbox? Yes. It’s the 80s). For what this is, the acting is good. Richard Jordan is the exact evil ham you need him to be. This is at heart, a kids adventure and all the kids are good for what this is — that most of them continued to have careers is a testament to the casting. There’s an earnestness about this whole thing that won me over. It’s not camp. It’s not cheesy. It’s almost knock-off Spielberg. I liked it.

Did you watch this because I reviewed it last week or is this just a bizarre coincidence?

I didn't quite "like" it, but I liked some of the same things, specifically the nostalgic 80s-ness and the setting and look of it. One of the locations, obviously Mad Max-inspired, is the aptly named Tire Town. I kept thinking that it sounded like an Ottawa theme park (because the Sens play in Canadian Tire Centre).

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

Did you watch this because I reviewed it last week or is this just a bizarre coincidence?

I didn't quite "like" it, but I liked some of the same things, specifically the nostalgic 80s-ness and the setting and look of it. One of the locations, obviously Mad Max-inspired, is the aptly named Tire Town. I kept thinking that it sounded like an Ottawa theme park.

A little of both. It had been on my mental to-watch list for quite some time but I hadn't pulled the trigger because I didn't want to rent it. But seeing your review spurred me to look for it again and lo-and-behold it was now streaming through Prime.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Here's two films that are not on your mental (or other) to-watch list:

Cérémonie d'amour (Love Rites, Borowczyk, 1987) - I like Borowczyk a lot. His fist films exist in a world of their own, but because he commited some atrocities (Emmanuel 5 being absolute garbage), I never gave a chance to his last one. I should have! Like a few of his earlier films, it's an adaptation of an André Pieyre de Mandiargues story, and it captures some of his earlier spirit. The whole last part gets a little out of hand, but before that you've got some distant thematic cousin to films like In the Realm of the Senses or the best parts of Romance, making an interesting (if not very complex) equation between sex and representation. The theatrical dialogues in the Paris subway, the constant references to theater and acting, the obvious recognition of the gaze (through obstruction in the shots) and a quasi-ironic distanciative narration gives the whole thing panache. Still, if it's your first Borowczyk, better go with something else. Little warning: the film didn't age that well and is somewhat guilty of racism, homophobia. It also walks a thin line between emasculation and misogyny that could offend some. 6.5/10

The Beautiful Risk (Penney, 2013) - At this point, I probably should have went to sleep. After Love Rites, Tubi suggested this one. I thought for sure it would be pure smut, but at 7.8/10 on IMDB, I was curious. I'm somewhat glad I was. It's not a good film, this must be clear. It's amateurish to a point that is borderline tolerable: acting is terrible, pacing is terrible, spatial construction is terrible, and the sound work is terribly terrible. Still, it tries to go places that not a lot of films go, even if it does it all wrong. It was also a pretty fun ride through Montreal's trashy nightlife: Cinéma L'amour, Super Sexe, Café Cléopâtre ... The character even ends up at Hurley's (Montreal's classic Irish Pub). A few beautiful shots show that Penney has some visual sensibility (including that shot of the Notre-Dame Basilica), but overall it's a very poor result on a somewhat honest effort (up to that shot - the moment where he meets the Québécoise after having his ass kicked - the film is kind of interesting, made me think of Stuart Gordon's Edmond, but after that it gets lame fast). 3.5/10

 

[Mr Jiggyfly]

For anyone who enjoyed Solarbabies, there are a number of films made in this era with a similar future dystopian element:

Prayer of the Rollerboys
Class of 1999
Screamers

These films really give off that cheesy dystopian future vibe that only that era of films could, but all three are quite entertaining in their own right.

They aren’t going to make anyone’s list for extremely well made movies, but neither would Solarbabies.