Pranzo Oltranzista
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The film that scared me as a child (and that still scares me to this day!) is Cathy's Curse. It's a pretty bad film, and it was shot around here (found the house).
Last Movie You Watched and Rate It | Spring 2021 Edition
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From the sad panda version of The Blair Witch Project.kihei's take is so removed from my initial and subsequent reactions to Don't Look Now that rather than comment on his position directly, here's a picture of a sad panda:
Pranzo, you're welcome to add that to your wall-facing collage.
Tkachuk4MVP
32 Years of Fail
Iron Man holds up as well as any of the Marvel movies, most of which getting significantly less interesting on multiple viewings. It's leaps and bounds ahead of Homecoming IMO.
The movie that scared me the most growing up was The Shining. I watched it as a teenager with my first ever girlfriend and completely embarrassed myself because I was so scared and in a twist of gender roles she was totally even keeled and had to comfort me
Anaconda (1997) - 3/10 (Really went over my head)
Snakes on a boat. Beyond that, there isn't much of a story and the script doesn't bother to tell us anything about any of the characters except for Jon Voight's. Partly for that reason, he's the most interesting character, yet also an obvious ripoff of Quint from Jaws, just a sketchy old snake hunter instead of a sketchy old shark hunter. He's supposed to be Paraguayan, which was hard enough to buy without his strange accent that didn't sound Spanish at all. At first, I thought that he was meant to be Eastern European. He also does this strange frown through the whole film, even while speaking, that felt like he was imitating Marlon Brando from Apocalypse Now. Jennifer Lopez looks good, but doesn't do much. Eric Stoltz sleeps through most of the film... literally. Ice Cube is decent, which always surprises me. Owen Wilson and Kari Wuhrer are just kind of there and underwhelming. At a couple of points, they use the words "lucid" and "satiated," respectively, and I wondered if there was a miscommunication between the writing and casting departments. There are several other amusing moments that I'm not sure were meant to be. There's one when a character is being squeezed to death by a man-eating snake and someone screams to him to "give me your hand" (like that's going to help). There's also this shot of a character being finished off, which looks like something else entirely:
Perhaps this was a creative choice to highlight the irony of the character leaving the world the way that he entered it, but I'm not sure if the director deserves that much credit.
I thought that I hadn't seen this film, but I'm starting to wonder if I saw it 20 years ago and just forgot everything about it. It's that memorable. Even a bad movie can be fun and I do appreciate a good B movie, but this particular one was hard to swallow.
Snakes on a boat. Beyond that, there isn't much of a story and the script doesn't bother to tell us anything about any of the characters except for Jon Voight's. Partly for that reason, he's the most interesting character, yet also an obvious ripoff of Quint from Jaws, just a sketchy old snake hunter instead of a sketchy old shark hunter. He's supposed to be Paraguayan, which was hard enough to buy without his strange accent that didn't sound Spanish at all. At first, I thought that he was meant to be Eastern European. He also does this strange frown through the whole film, even while speaking, that felt like he was imitating Marlon Brando from Apocalypse Now. Jennifer Lopez looks good, but doesn't do much. Eric Stoltz sleeps through most of the film... literally. Ice Cube is decent, which always surprises me. Owen Wilson and Kari Wuhrer are just kind of there and underwhelming. At a couple of points, they use the words "lucid" and "satiated," respectively, and I wondered if there was a miscommunication between the writing and casting departments. There are several other amusing moments that I'm not sure were meant to be. There's one when a character is being squeezed to death by a man-eating snake and someone screams to him to "give me your hand" (like that's going to help). There's also this shot of a character being finished off, which looks like something else entirely:
Perhaps this was a creative choice to highlight the irony of the character leaving the world the way that he entered it, but I'm not sure if the director deserves that much credit.
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Pranzo Oltranzista
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- Oct 18, 2017
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You shamed me into watching a movie that you've never seen, yourself? I feel so used.
Pranzo Oltranzista
Registered User
- Oct 18, 2017
- 3,981
- 2,900
Deadly Illusions (James, 2021) - So Netflix informed me that this is NUMERO UNO in Canada, and as I'm often very dumb, I bit. It was pretty obvious from the first crane shot on the bookstore that this was tv-movie quality at best - and you just end up wishing it was that good. You feel all along that Mrs James is confident her project is a contender for international awards, which just adds to the catastrophe. Kristin Davis is atrocious, and she just can't sell the very dumb and poor twists of this clumsy plot (please note Mrs James' skills at spatial construction when Davis flees the shower at the final confrontation, I was rolling on the floor). I was relieved to find it's sitting at 3,6 on IMDB and trending as the worst film ever. At least it seems to bring people together. 2/10
Could be a 1/10.
Could be a 1/10.
jasonleaffan
Registered User
Anyone want to recommend some Lovecraft-esque cosmic horror movies? I watched The Void the other night and I'm currently watching Black Mountain Side.
Spring in Fialta
A malign star kept him
Haha, same thing happened to me during me and my wife's outing at Midsommar. She was tense as well but I was just about to have a stroke. Watching it in a theater was everything with that movie. We were both so shook leaving the theater we went straight to get a splash of brown liquor at some dive.
Granted I haven’t seen Anaconda in ages, but when Quint died in Jaws it was sad and disappointing whereas when coach Kilmer died in Anaconda it was about damn time and brought on applause.Anaconda (1997) - 3/10 (Really went over my head)
Snakes on a boat. Beyond that, there isn't much of a story and the script doesn't bother to tell us anything about any of the characters except for Jon Voight's. Partly for that reason, he's the most interesting character, yet also an obvious ripoff of Quint from Jaws, just a sketchy old snake hunter instead of a sketchy old shark hunter. He's supposed to be Paraguayan, which was hard enough to buy without his strange accent that didn't sound Spanish at all. At first, I thought that he was meant to be Eastern European. He also does this strange frown through the whole film, even while speaking, that felt like he was imitating Marlon Brando from Apocalypse Now. Jennifer Lopez looks good, but doesn't do much. Eric Stoltz sleeps through most of the film... literally. Ice Cube is decent, which always surprises me. Owen Wilson and Kari Wuhrer are just kind of there and underwhelming. At a couple of points, they use the words "lucid" and "satiated," respectively, and I wondered if there was a miscommunication between the writing and casting departments. There are several other amusing moments that I'm not sure were meant to be. There's one when a character is being squeezed to death by a man-eating snake and someone screams to him to "give me your hand" (like that's going to help). There's also this shot of a character being finished off, which looks like something else entirely:I thought that I hadn't seen this film, but I'm starting to wonder if I saw it 20 years ago and just forgot everything about it. It's that memorable. Even a bad movie can be fun and I do appreciate a good B movie, but this particular one was hard to swallow.
Perhaps this was a creative choice to highlight the irony of the character leaving the world the way that he came in, but I'm not sure if the director deserves that much credit.
Pranzo Oltranzista
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- Oct 18, 2017
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Well, the obvious (and probably the best) Lovecraft adaptations by Stuart Gordon:
- Dagon
- From Beyond
- Re-Animator
and Castle Freak, but it ain't as interesting
Other than that, Color Out of Space was pretty cool too.
But I guess you've seen those already.
Fulci's Gates of Hell trilogy is inspired by Lovecraft, but only The Beyond is really worth seeing. In the Mouth of Madness too.
Other films you might consider: The Mist, Videodrome, Event Horizon, Cloverfield, Annihilation, and probably Prometheus too.
And well... pretty bad adaptations: The Curse, The Unnamable, To Cast A Deadly Spell...
Very interesting question. I hope others have suggestions too. Could have been its own thread.
jasonleaffan
Registered User
-The Mist, Event Horizon, Cloverfield, Annihilation, Prometheus and color out of space is all I've seen from those films. Or at least all I can remember seeing.
I also recently watched the Masters of horror episode Dreams in the witch house, which is a Lovecraft short story adaption too.
Thanks, hopefully more people do add in and we can get a good list going.
jasonleaffan
Registered User
Dawn of the Dead (2004) Directed by Zack Snyder 3A
First time for this one, and I haven't seen the original yet because I thought this was the original. *sigh* What can I say? The North American side of the pond wasn't a strong suit of mine in this period, not that it is now though I am a mite less oblivious. Anyway, Dawn of the Dead is amiable but lame. Could the original possibly have been this cuddly? The plot--let's hide in the mall because there are zombies about--is unchallenging in the extreme, the whole movie seemingly put together by a focus group trying to come up with the most innocuous horror movie ever that will attract a large aidoemce. What does one call this? Corporate horror? Horror-lite? The zombies have no personality and a shorter and dumber life expectancy than Orcs. God forbid that Dawn of the Dead 2.0 should scare anybody. Horror is replaces by frequent non-threatening jolts of cheap thrills along the way, mostly consisting of an extended shoot-the-zombies-in-the-face routine. There is even one of those annoying pop song interludes where everybody is having a jolly time while the worst song imaginable is imposed on the audience's collective eardrums. This could be a date movie. The superficial characters are superficially likeable, but, damn, Dawn of the Dead is about as far removed from genuine horror as you are going to get.
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ProstheticConscience
Check dein Limit
Dawn of the Dead (2004) Directed by Zack Snyder 3A
First time for this one, and I haven't seen the original yet because I thought this was the original. *sigh* What can I say? The North American side of the pond wasn't a strong suit of mine in this period, not that it is now though I am a mite less oblivious. Anyway, Dawn of the Dead is amiable but lame. Could the original possibly have been this cuddly? The plot--let's hide in the mall because there are zombies about--is unchallenging in the extreme, the whole movie seemingly put together by a focus group trying to come up with the most innocuous horror movie ever that will attract. What does one call this? Corporate horror? Horror-lite? The zombies have no personality and a shorter and dumber life expectancy than Orcs. God forbid that Dawn of the Dead 2.0 should scare anybody. Horror is replaces by frequent non-threatening jolts of cheap thrills along the way, mostly consisting of an extended shoot-the-zombies-in-the-face routine. There is even one of those annoying pop song interludes where everybody is having a jolly time while the worst song imaginable is imposed on the audience's collective eardrums. This could be a date movie. The superficial characters are superficially likeable, but, damn, Dawn of the Dead is about as far removed from genuine horror as you are going to get.
jasonleaffan
Registered User
I went with Re-Animator to start, I don't know if to laugh or cry with the stupidity in this film. I don't really want to pay too much attention at this time, so I'll be going with Bride of Re-Animator next.
Pranzo Oltranzista
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- Oct 18, 2017
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Pranzo Oltranzista
Registered User
- Oct 18, 2017
- 3,981
- 2,900
Dawn of the Dead (2004) Directed by Zack Snyder 3A
First time for this one, and I haven't seen the original yet because I thought this was the original. *sigh* What can I say? The North American side of the pond wasn't a strong suit of mine in this period, not that it is now though I am a mite less oblivious. Anyway, Dawn of the Dead is amiable but lame. Could the original possibly have been this cuddly? The plot--let's hide in the mall because there are zombies about--is unchallenging in the extreme, the whole movie seemingly put together by a focus group trying to come up with the most innocuous horror movie ever that will attract a large aidoemce. What does one call this? Corporate horror? Horror-lite? The zombies have no personality and a shorter and dumber life expectancy than Orcs. God forbid that Dawn of the Dead 2.0 should scare anybody. Horror is replaces by frequent non-threatening jolts of cheap thrills along the way, mostly consisting of an extended shoot-the-zombies-in-the-face routine. There is even one of those annoying pop song interludes where everybody is having a jolly time while the worst song imaginable is imposed on the audience's collective eardrums. This could be a date movie. The superficial characters are superficially likeable, but, damn, Dawn of the Dead is about as far removed from genuine horror as you are going to get.
I'm pretty sure you will hate the original too, but it's one of my favorite horror films. The remake is just paint-by-numbers made as you said to attract the most viewers. It's still miles above the remake (or remakes?) of the third film.
Yeah, I was just describing how they're introduced. They diverge after that, but I didn't want to give too much away... why, I'm not sure.
I watched a number of them in order last year. Night of the Living Dead is the only one that I'd seen and, I remember being rather underwhelmed with it, same as you. The next one in the series is 1978's Dawn of the Dead, the one that you meant to see. I was pretty underwhelmed by that, as well. That was followed by 1985's Day of the Dead, which I recall being very hokey and badly acted. I then watched the 'Dawn' remake that you just did and my thoughts were similar to yours. Unfortunately, I didn't like any of them. Granted, I'm not really a zombie fan. Maybe that's why I liked the parody Return of the Living Dead better than any of the films that it was parodying.
Pranzo Oltranzista
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Yeah, I was just describing how they're introduced. They diverge after that, but I didn't want to give too much away... why, I'm not sure.
I watched a number of them in order last year. Night of the Living Dead is the only one that I'd seen and, I remember being rather underwhelmed with it, same as you. The next one in the series is 1978's Dawn of the Dead, the one that you meant to see. I was pretty underwhelmed by that, as well. That was followed by 1985's Day of the Dead, which I recall being very hokey and badly acted. I then watched the 'Dawn' remake that you just did and my thoughts were similar to yours. Unfortunately, I didn't like any of them. Granted, I'm not really a zombie fan. Maybe that's why I liked the parody Return of the Living Dead better than any of the films that it was parodying.
Return of the living dead is a very fun film on its own too.
ItsFineImFine
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- Aug 11, 2019
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Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021/2017) - 6.5/10
Cringe. It might be the newer Marvel films which have made this seem worse than it is but too many moments of cringe. Zack Snyder also seems like the sort of dude who tries way too hard to make a film deeper than it is whether it be overusage of slow-motion or some really forced melodrama from his heroes. This film is at its best when it's action-heavy and the parts in between feel poorly acted and edited. Speaking of which, there's a reason why it should be cut down to film length, a lot of the transitions and extended scenes here feel really awkward, films have deleted scenes for a reason.
I mean there are some lines in this like "I bought the bank" where I just went
Cringe. It might be the newer Marvel films which have made this seem worse than it is but too many moments of cringe. Zack Snyder also seems like the sort of dude who tries way too hard to make a film deeper than it is whether it be overusage of slow-motion or some really forced melodrama from his heroes. This film is at its best when it's action-heavy and the parts in between feel poorly acted and edited. Speaking of which, there's a reason why it should be cut down to film length, a lot of the transitions and extended scenes here feel really awkward, films have deleted scenes for a reason.
I mean there are some lines in this like "I bought the bank" where I just went
Speaking of zombie films, I watched a small one a few nights ago: 2008's Pontypool. It's about a radio shock jock taking calls from small town residents who are describing some kind of zombie apocalypse. He goes from thinking that people are pranking him to trying to understand what's going on and using the airwaves to warn others. It takes place almost entirely in the radio station and there's almost no action or gore. It also doesn't hide the fact that it takes place in Ontario, Canada, which was refreshing. The characters even speak French at one point. Most Canadian films that I've seen are either nation-neutral or take place in America to pander to the American market. I watched Psycho Goreman last week and rolled my eyes when one of the characters named dropped "the President" and "real American hero." Was the writer afraid that I would turn off the movie or enjoy it less if she said "the Prime Minister" and "Canadian hero"? Anyways, it's a very cerebral and different kind of zombie film. I liked the first half more than the second, when it seems to make it into a social commentary about how language and ideas spread, which didn't really work for me. The ending was disappointing to me, but it was an interesting concept and different. I wasn't going to review it, but I guess that I just did, so I'd give it a 5/10. It's on Apple TV+.
Pontypool was a low key and a not bad, sort of fresh movie which maybe would have been better off as a radio play. Too bad nobody plays around with that medium anymore--requires more imagination from the audience, thus great scare potential.
I think I'll dive into The Nightmare on Elm Street franchise next. I thought it was a pretty clever idea way back when. I wish more horror films focused on nightmares because it seems such a natural medium for the genre to explore.
I think I'll dive into The Nightmare on Elm Street franchise next. I thought it was a pretty clever idea way back when. I wish more horror films focused on nightmares because it seems such a natural medium for the genre to explore.
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