Last Movie You Watched and Rate It | Spring 2021 Edition

[kihei]

Martyrs (2008) - ?/10 (!)

WTH...

Uh, oh. That's on my to-do list.

 

[kihei]

Hellraiser (1987) Directed by Clive Barker 7B

Hellraiser involves a puzzle box (think Guillermo Del Toro's Cronos, though he likely stole the idea from Barker), Cenobites (extra-dimensional baddies with pain on their mind), a resurrection (er, partial--more victims required), a smitten woman (who you would not want to date), an ingenue daughter type (the actress looks like she could be Millie Bobby Brown's mother), vast imagination, and much creative gore. Hellraiser is Clive Barker's first film as a director and it really shows, which leads to some of the worst acting I've seen in a movie. However, Hellraiser manages to overcome these shortcomings with room to spare. The story reflects an outside-the-box approach to narrative that horror movies are too often lacking. I had no idea how this story was going to develop as it went along, but enjoyed the ride thoroughly.

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

Now here's an odd assortment of movies to watch in a row in the last few days!

New Jack City. Yet another childhood favorite I decided to revisit after at least 20 years if not more. Cheesier and sloppier than I remembered, but still pretty entertaining. Here's a question: What's the movie with the biggest gap between its best actor and the rest of the cast? I'd put this on the short list. Wesley Snipes is fantastic in this and I appreciate the fact that he is unambiguously a villain as opposed to an anti-hero or a "complicated" man. But the rest of this cast, woof. Bad up and down. When a young Chris Rock gives the 2nd best performance in the movie, you might have a cast issue. Ice-T does get to deliver a line that is so bad it's great and he nails it.

Heartburn. Nora Ephron is someone I've struggled with my entire life. I understand her significance but I also, for the most part don't like her writing. For someone famed for ostensibly "enjoyable" romantic comedies I always find one of the two main characters in any of her movies to be outright unlikable. Two exceptions - I really do love When Harry Met Sally. And, to my surprise, this. More grounded and less fantastical than her later scripts, this semi-autobiographical story (she was married to Carl Bernstein of Woodward and Bernstein fame) pits Meryl Streep and Jack Nicholson in a doomed relationship, from the meet-cute through the dissolution. The heart of this is sad, but there's some real biting, acerbic humor here. The emotions and behavior felt very human and earned. The leads are complicated, both clearly flawed but neither cartoonish or evil. Great last couple scenes where the big release of emotion comes in a manner I did not anticipate. Deft directing by Mike Nichols (I was inspired to watch this after reading an excellent biography on Nichols, which I also recommend). Deep cast of character types surrounding the leads. One complaint may be Nicholson who is both good, but also is definitely the grinning, leering Nicholson which verges on too big and too much in moments. (Trivia: He was a last minute replacement for Mandy Patinkin who was fired after a few weeks of work).

Rocco and His Brothers. A sprawling (but personal), engaging Italian melodrama from Visconti. The length gives Visonti room to move around with these characters, particularly Alain Delon's Rocco and Renato Salvatori as Simone as the opposite poles of the family, one dedicated to preserving it, one bent on destroying it (though he may not consciously realize it). I was a little shocked at how intense and ugly this got at times. The arc of this feels obvious but that doesn't make the journey any less meaningful.

Dredd. Sometimes you get a very specific itch. This scratched it for me. Scratched it well indeed.

 

[kihei]

^^^^^
Nora Ephron used to write a monthly column on this and that in Esquire (Dwight Macdonald and Malcolm Muggeridge's old stomping ground, too) and she was hilarious and insightful. Her movies never matched that level of wit for me.

 

[Mr Jiggyfly]

Ghosts of Mars (2001) -

The recent debate about what qualifies as a really good bad movie lead me back to this gem.

I won’t even get into the plot because it doesn’t matter.

The script was obviously written after a bowl of magic shrooms, but that is why I watch these kind of films.

It’s been years since I watched Ghosts of Mars with my bro and we had each other in tears with our ‘critiques’.

I rewatched this time solo, but it’s still a lot of fun trying to take it seriously like the writers intended, but knowing it’s so bad you can’t help yourself.

I highly recommend watching this movie with a friend/partner... especially one who has a great sense of humor for bad films.

Big Daddy, a tragic KISS member trapped on Mars, is the marquee attraction even though he has but one line set on repeat - “kahdahdahguhguh”.

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

^^^^^
Nora Ephron used to write a monthly column on this and that in Esquire (Dwight Macdonald and Malcolm Muggeridge's old stomping ground, too) and she was hilarious and insightful. Her movies never matched that level of wit for me.

She's undoubtedly talented. She has a voice and style and a keen eye. It seems like maybe her sharpness diminished some as her career grew? Perhaps she's also the type that is at her best when she isn't fully in charge — both Heartburn and When Harry Met Sally are her scripts but directed by others and I assume editors had oversight over her at Esquire though certainly star columnists have more leeway than some. I feel similarly about Aaron Sorkin whose words are by far more effective when he isn't the one calling all the shots.

 

[NyQuil]

Dredd. Sometimes you get a very specific itch. This scratched it for me. Scratched it well indeed.

I've seen it a few times (including the theatre) and it reminds me that a narrowly scoped, direct and tight story executed well with sufficiently supportive acting can be a very enjoyable movie experience.

I know that there was some initial noise around making a sequel but I suspect that they would fall into the trap of trying to get bigger and wider and the magic would dissipate (see: the Matrix, John Wick etc.).

Better to just leave it as it is.

 

[kihei]

leering Nicholson which verges on too big and too much in moments. (Trivia: He was a last minute replacement for Mandy Patinkin who was fired after a few

I wouldn't say coping with playing opposite Marlon Brando being outrageous in Missouri Breaks ruined Nicholson as an actor, but he sure went broad a lot of the time the rest of his career:

Goin' South
The Shining
Prizzi's Honor
The Witches of Eastwick
Batman
A Few Good Men
Mars Attacks
The Departed

--probably forgetting some.

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

Dredd. Sometimes you get a very specific itch. This scratched it for me. Scratched it well indeed.

I've seen it a few times (including the theatre) and it reminds me that a narrowly scoped, direct and tight story executed well with sufficiently supportive acting can be a very enjoyable movie experience.

I know that there was some initial noise around making a sequel but I suspect that they would fall into the trap of trying to get bigger and wider and the magic would dissipate (see: the Matrix, John Wick etc.).

Better to just leave it as it is.

Just saw this recently for the first time (overdue), and made the mistake of doing so after having re-watched The Raid: Redemption not too long before. The similarities in the plot (even down to the main baddie getting on the PA to give residents the lowdown) were a little distracting -- pretty incredible they came out so close to each other given what they both share.

Still, absolutely got what I wanted out of it, a very solid B. Surprised Olivia Thirlby didn't take off after this, but given that it made zero noise at the box office, it makes sense. Probably would've done better in a post-John Wick world.

 

[silkyjohnson50]

Caught and really enjoyed Saint Maud last night. Definitely prefer it to The Witch. The pacing of Saint Maud was better and I was consistently engaged whereas with The Witch I feel like it relied too much on its atmosphere. Great, chilling performance by the lead. I don’t know if it’s purely a physical resemblance, but Jennifer Ehle was giving my Meryl Streep vibes throughout the film. The ending was perfect. Also couldn’t help but think of Joker afterwards. A24 puts out a lot of quality.

 

[NyQuil]

I finally saw Parasite the other night.

Certainly thought-provoking, more of a dark comedy or dark satire than a drama.

The house itself is a character and I read a fair amount about how much effort went into framing all of the rooms for the film (the set was designed and built for the film).

I was surprised how much I enjoyed the early part of the film, and while the tone certainly shifts and it gets increasingly outrageous, it manages to hold to the fundamental values and philosophy of the work.

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

Been watching a lot and slackin' on reviews, so time for some quick-hit dumps.

Assault on Precinct 13 (1976). A-
This movie is John Carpenter's answer to the question clearly on everyone's minds back in 1976: what if you made a zombie movie, but replaced the zombies with blood-thirsty gang members? All the beats are followed, down to the inciting incident, as well as the "infected" individual that brings the hordes upon everyone. It even elicits the same verbal reactions one might shout while watching a zombie movie ("What are you doing? Get away from that door!!") And being that these are actual people (albeit, nameless, non-speaking-role ones), the ante is upped a bit, as they obviously move with more pace than a zombie.

Helping elevate the proceedings is Darwin Johnson, who delivers a very charismatic, yet still understated, turn as notorious criminal Napoleon Wilson. He's got good chemistry too with Laurie Zimmer's Leigh, who isn't given much to do, but absolutely makes the most of it.
Of course, being a Carpenter film, the score absolutely kicks. Coming in at 91 minutes, this baby is lean, mean, and everything you could want out of an action film.

Juice (1992). B-
Sometimes, a movie's final act can leave a real sour taste in your mouth. Such is the case with Juice, which has got real energy and is a thoroughly entertaining and engrossing viewing experience up until the last 15-20 minutes, where the movie then abandons any semblance of narrative nuance and takes a turn into a bad revenge-type flick (i.e. this is unequivocal bad guy. Bad guy does bad things. Good guy must stop bad guy from doing bad things). Still a recommended watch, as there are some real high points, but one can't help but be disappointed in where the film ends up going.

The Dig (2021). B
I don't think I can add anything else that hasn't already been said here about this flick. I was in the mood for a slow-moving, melancholy, gorgeously-shot film, and got exactly what I wanted.

Shame (2011). C+
The second full-length film from Steve McQueen sees him re-teaming with Michael Fassbender, who plays Brandon, a sex addict in NYC. Things get a bit complicated when his oft-neglected sister Sissy, played by Carrie Mulligan, crashes his place. In short, this one just didn't work for me. The production is on point, with a dreary, grand but vapid NYC serving as the perfect backdrop for Brandon's lifestyle and state-of-mind. However this results in the film almost amorphously moving from one scene to the next in a cloudy haze, so much so that even shortly after viewing it, I struggled to recall specifics. Carrie Mulligan's full-length turn singing "New York, New York" which goes on so long it's almost comedic, is, for better-or-worse, a standout scene. I only wish the movie would've taken a couple more unexpected swings like that.

There's no real ground-breaking stuff in terms of what it says about addiction, though to be fair, it's hard to do so with such a commonly touched-upon topic. Though addiction may be tough on those experiencing it, it's often those around you who end up suffering more.

Chinatown (1974). A
Chinatown draws you in by immediately throwing you into the action (and by extension, the shoes of detective J.J. "Jake" Gittes, a deftly delivered performance from Jack Nicholson), and so the viewer is left to decipher the mystery in real-time with Jake, subject to every twist-and-turn unpacked from a deliciously soupy screenplay. Expertly-paced and thoroughly rewarding, Chinatown is a thoroughly rewarding and intriguing mystery that deserves its status as a classic.

Toy Story 4 (2019). C+
I initially was never planning on seeing this one, as I felt it to be fairly irrelevant in its existence (I know I know, $$). The film introduces and hastily abandons some pretty heavy thematic ideas through the character of Forky ("Is who we are defined by where we're from? Can you really escape your beginnings? Can you have a pre-destined purpose?), which is quite disappointing, and ultimately leads it to being a fairly inconsequential affair.

However, the one thing this movie has going for it, is that it's one of the funniest Pixar movies ever. Big kudos goes to Keanu Reeves performance as French-Canadian stuntman toy "Duke Kaboom," and to the comedic duo of Key and Peele, who are part of a bit which includes a truly inspired piece of heightening I would've never expected to see from a Pixar movie. I "felt" less, but I laughed more, so I suppose as long as a movie is eliciting something positive out of you, well done.

 

[NyQuil]

I really love Chinatown - it is somehow timeless and it really should be a must watch for people who want to see Jack Nicholson in his prime when he wasn’t hamming it up incessantly.

I caught it by accident when I younger and I was surprised how quickly and easily I was riveted for such a slow burn film.

It’s funny because I had seen LA Confidential first and sort of had an a-ha moment when realizing that it was really more of an homage to pulpy noir generically but also Chinatown specifically.

Still an excellent film.

 

[Spring in Fialta]

^^^^^
Nora Ephron used to write a monthly column on this and that in Esquire (Dwight Macdonald and Malcolm Muggeridge's old stomping ground, too) and she was hilarious and insightful. Her movies never matched that level of wit for me.

The only thing I know about Dwight Macdonald is that apparently he watched Last Year at Marienbad three times a week and that endeared him to me.

 

[kihei]

The only thing I know about Dwight Macdonald is that apparently he watched Last Year at Marienbad three times a week and that endeared him to me.

Easily my biggest influence about movies. He was a great and prolific writer, social critic, literary jack-0f-all-trades, and political activist. He took on a long gig at Esquire that I waited for every month in my teens. Nobody has had more influence on me when it comes to thinking about movies and writing about them. I don't know if it is still in print but a collection of his pieces from Esquire and from earlier writings called On Movies remains the best collection of film criticism that I have ever read, with Paulene Kael's works and honourable second.

 

[Chili]

The Graduate-1967

One of my favorite films, re-watch every few years. It was cutting edge at the time, it has aged well for me.

The performances are all on the mark, especially Anne Bancroft. The camera and music tell a lot of the story. Watched Chaplin's City Lights a while ago and the The Graduate's ending reminded me of that film.

Here's to you Mrs Robinson.

The Scarlet and the Black-1983

A story of a courageous man and his companions helping others escape capture in WWII. Monsignor Hugh O'Flaherty set up an organization that sheltered thousands in and around Rome.

Read one of the books on this story which I mentioned in the book thread (The Vatican Pimpernel-Brian Fleming).
Filmed on location in Rome, music by Ennio Morricone (top notch as always).

Very good film of a great story.

 

[Osprey]

Uh, oh. That's on my to-do list.

I didn't want to stay up any later last night to try to come up with a grade and review it. It's not a lot of fun to watch or think about. It tries to be well made and more intelligent than a typical film of this type (though that's a low bar to begin with), but also tries to be just as disturbing. At least it isn't predictable. Reviews at RT are rather polarized. It seems to be a film that most people either appreciate for how effectively disturbing it is or think is repulsive trash for the same reason. I, personally, have difficulty separating the two. I'm curious to eventually read your thoughts.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

It seems to be a film that most people either appreciate for how effectively disturbing it is or think is repulsive trash for the same reason.

I thought it was boring and dumb, and tried way too hard to be disturbing. It's no Nekromantik or Subconscious Cruelty, but it's aiming in the same direction.

 

[Osprey]

I thought it was boring and dumb, and tried way too hard to be disturbing. It's no Nekromantik or Subconscious Cruelty, but it's aiming in the same direction.

Please stop name dropping disturbing movies for me to look up. It's how I wound up watching A Serbian Film and Martyrs. I don't need my mind scarred any more this month.

 

[ItsFineImFine]

(What's The Story) Morning Glory [2010] - 7/10

There's actually a very good story here under some romcom directing. In fact they didn't need to do the romcom bit at all tbh, it could've been put in the background the way it was in Devil Wears Prada and you'd get a better film. Harrison Ford acts like a grumpy old man and Rachel McAdams is animatedly awkward with Diane Keaton doing her thing and a remaining cast of forgettable characters including a strangely subdued Goldblum.

Look, if you're gonna get the Goldblum in your film then you gotta let him Goldblum.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Please stop name dropping disturbing movies for me to look up. It's how I wound up watching A Serbian Film and Martyrs. I don't need my mind scarred any more this month.

A Serbian Film is a masterpiece compared to Martyrs and the other two (stay away).

 

[Osprey]

The Scarlet and the Black-1983

A story of a courageous man and his companions helping others escape capture in WWII. Monsignor Hugh O'Flaherty set up an organization that sheltered thousands in and around Rome.

Read one of the books on this story which I mentioned in the book thread (The Vatican Pimpernel-Brian Fleming).
Filmed on location in Rome, music by Ennio Morricone (top notch as always).

Very good film of a great story.

I just finished this. It very much feels like the 80s TV movie that it is, complete with bad acting from everyone not named Gregory Peck or Christopher Plummer, and it's a little long, but I still enjoyed it, especially the last hour. Peck vs Plummer was fun to watch. Thanks for recommending it, especially because it finally gives me something to recommend to my parents (who would probably not be too keen on the last few horror films that I watched). If anyone else is interested, it's on Prime Video, as well as on Tubi (with ads).

 

[Chili]

I just finished this. It very much feels like the 80s TV movie that it is, complete with bad acting from everyone not named Gregory Peck or Christopher Plummer, and it's a little long, but I still enjoyed it, especially the last hour. Peck vs Plummer was fun to watch. Thanks for recommending it, especially because it finally gives me something to recommend to my parents (who would probably not be too keen on the last few horror films that I watched). If anyone else is interested, it's on Prime Video, as well as on Tubi (with ads).

Just my two cents but I have seen other films with the Pope and John Gielgud here was the most convincing of them. Appreciated the Rome settings, including Peck and Plummer meeting in the Colosseum. Many of the scenes are from the book I read including the escape as a coal delivery man.

The real stars are the Monsignor and those who helped him. They were constantly risking their lives for people they didn't know. I like to see films of books I've read, helped bring this forgotten story of WWII to life.

 

[Pink Mist]

Zaćma: Blindness (2016) directed by Ryszard Bugajski

In Stalinist Poland, a former state interrogator/torturer Julia Prajs (Maria Mamona) has renounced her ideology and seeks forgiveness to her sins carried out during her brutal interrogations. She seeks forgiveness from one of Poland’s Cardinals, Cardinal Wyszyński (Marek Kalita), and waits and waits for him to make an appearance at a centre for the blind, a place where he occasionally makes an appearance to and which is home to a priest (Janusz Gajos) who was blinded in an interrogation carried out by Prajs colleagues. The film shows her long wait for forgiveness while jumping to flashbacks and hallucinations of her guilt as part of the communist regime. The film takes a long time to get to what it wants to say, which is a theological and philosophical showdown between Prajs and Cardinal Wyszyński, which was an excellent, but the direction getting there was poor. The flashbacks and hallucinations bog down the film’s momentum as it jumps back and forth between the present and the past, especially as it is easy to infer her guilt from her actions based on the great performance by Mamona and didn’t need for them to be necessarily shown. However, credit to the film for showing me a piece of history I didn’t know much about as it is based on a true story.

 

[kihei]

A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise

It is interesting to me how almost all of the best horror movies have low body counts. Real horror occurs where death (and, by extension, life) is important. Which brings us to teen horror, a large sub-genre of horror movies, that has flourished now for roughly forty years. While slasher flick franchises are sometimes criticized as appealing to the simple-minded, that seems ungenerous to me. Their appeal is more to an audience that lacks life experience--in other words, adolescents. Seeing great hordes of their generational cohorts creatively tortured and murdered is still fun in movies where simple logic seldom applies and where every adult is a hopeless, mean-spirited, and, most tellingly, utterly clueless blockhead. In a grotesque way, teen horror is the equivalent of YA literature--adults enter at their own risk and should tread gently as this stuff isn't for us.

So despite these provisos, I have always had a soft spot for A Nightmare on Elm Street's franchise. What separates it from its early competition, the Halloween and Friday, the 13th franchises, and more recent entries like the Final Destination series, is the brilliance of its premise: dead child killer Freddy Kruger can inhabit the dreams of the children whose parents in the community were responsible for his execution. Sharing the same dream with somebody else is a great horror idea, the very thought chilling. And what is more frightening than a nightmare to begin with, something which we have all experienced. This is the stuff of genuine horror, a trope with endless potential.

Re-watching the first A Nightmare on Elm Street, the movie stood up pretty well. There were a couple of bumps that I glossed over in my memory that stood out, though. Freddy has yet to develop much personality and he seems to be able to exist in reality on rare occasions as well as dreams. That flaw was airbrushed out of the sequels without ever offering an explanation. Freddy becomes thoroughly a dream figure with real life consequences in subsequent instalments, a very good change, but the mechanics of even that are kept pretty fuzzy throughout the franchise. Likewise, your best friends die, you go to their funeral, and that's that--they are discarded as mere plot devices rather than mourned. The movie has its bites but they heal too quickly. But, again, the story is such a page turner that these flaws are hardly worth mentioning in terms of the movie's overall effect.

The immediate sequel Freddy's Revenge is awful, although Freddy gets to develop his way with a good one-liner a bit more and the dream sequences are becoming more elaborate. But the two young stars are embarrassingly bad--Heather Langenkamp is bad in the original but Mark Patton and Kim Myers are unbearably amateurish in this one, really hard to watch. I thought initially Kim Myers was a young Meryl Streep as she is the spitting image in some early shots. It took about two minutes of watching her to realize my error, maybe less. Writer/director Wes Craven wasn't involved in the is one and it showed.

Craven is involved as writer in the next sequel Dream Warriors, which may actually be the best movie of the original lot, as it gets away from its constricted suburban setting and takes place mostly in an asylum. Plus, Freddy has become the ghoul of choice, played to a tee by Robert Englund who has a gift for combining malevolence with glee but stopping just short of self-parody (well, usually stopping short). Plus, the dream sequences are now becoming very imaginative and inventive. Next up The Dream Master got bombed critically but I really enjoyed it, possibly because it has a heroine who actually can act, Lisa Wilcox, who alone takes the movie to a different level than the past instalments. Craven is not involved but the movie has spirit and imagination.

I skipped the last two instalments and on a whim picked up Wes Craven's New Nightmare, and I certainly wasn't expecting what I got: a brilliantly self-referential Nightmare starring Wes Craven, Robert Englund John Sexton, and the original Nancy, Heather Langenkamp, as themselves. It seems that real life Heather is finding that playing a heroine in a horror franchise is affecting not only herself but her son who is beginning to have some terrible nightmares. This movie works on so many levels largely because Craven plays the material absolutely straight and not for laughs with the result that this might be the best pure horror movie in the entire franchise. I don't know what shocked me more, the brilliance of the idea and its execution or the fact that Langenkamp had actually learned to act and was very good here.

I may or may not pick up the later instalments although I suspect it is downhill from here, but overall my binge watching of these films was a lot of fun.

Sidenote: for anyone wishing to see this shared dream premise executed in wildly different form, pick up Ingmar Bergman's Hour of the Wolf and Ildiko Enyeti's fairly recent On Body and Soul.