Jump to content

What Is The Last Film You Watched? (Older Films)


Mr. Breathmask

Recommended Posts

8 hours ago, bollemanneke said:

Nocturnal animals. 

 

Okay, I’ll never watch it again because ...

 

Too bad. It's one of those movies that gets better during a second time.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 hours ago, Jay said:

You're lucky you weren't able to see the opening credits visuals ;) 

Oh, I forgot to mention those, they sounded interesting, but pretty repulsive to watch I guess.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 hours ago, Jay said:

You're lucky you weren't able to see the opening credits visuals ;) 

 

Dammit I'd successfully blocked that out from my memory until now 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, Holko said:

The Tale of the Princess Kaguya

IMG_20210612_204310_887.JPG

 

Animated adaptation of a 1000 year old Japanese fairytale (still containing elements recogniseable in western ones too), about a rural elderly couple finding a magical baby in a bamboo forest and trying their best to give her the best life she deserves. The heroine's characterisation was so well done and made her so likeable that it made me think I've never seen something on his level before. A fantastically touching, truly special work. An absolutely gorgeous, mostly restrained and tasteful but still joyous and expressive celebration and savouring of the beauty of life in all forms.

on dvd?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Buster - breezy, romanticised and sanitised telling of petty crook/'lovable rogue' 'Buster' Edwards' part in the Great Train Robbery and subsequent attempt to have a new 'dream life' in Acapulco with his wife and daughter. Phil Collins does fine as Buster, as does Julie Walters as wife June.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The Rocketeer

 

Entertaining and watchable, but also a little boring. The action scenes and the special effects are great for its time though.

 

Horner's score is great, but he repeats both the heroic theme and the villain theme A LOT. For some reason this didn't bothered me when I listened to the score, but in the movie he quotes at least the first few notes of the theme in almost every scene the main character appears.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I Still Know What You Did Last Summer

 

The first film, while twisting Lois Duncan's dramatic novel into a slasher movie, was a decent little thriller. Not great, but perfectly watchable.

 

The rushed follow-up (greenlit because the first raked in the $$$) is just dull, idiotic and rehashes every tired slasher movie cliche in the book. Gratuitous shots of Jennifer Love Hewitt in cleavage baring outfits? Check. Brandy and Mekhi Phifer as the token couple? Check. Jack Black as a painfully unfunny stoner guy? Check. The villain managing to off victims and clean up after himself in record time? Check. Lame twist ending with the heroine screaming her lungs out? Check.

 

At least it's not Species II level bad.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Fargo - 25th anniversary screening at local 'arthouse' cinema. Still a brilliant blend of a blackly funny comedy of errors and a celebration (albeit a gently mocking one) of the decent good-hearted folks of smalltown America like Marge and her husband. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Dog day afternoon. 

Well, I’d say it was pretty interesting. The first note I took was: why does this sound better, even though it’s still in mono, than Jaws? Or rather, why did Jaws sound like garbage compared to this?

Most of the actors were outstanding, especially Al Pacino, Amy Levitt and Charles Durning, though he really overused Sonny’s name. Gary Springer was bad, but Susan Peretz made a real impression. Yeah, okay, I’m just listing everyone now, whatever. It’s hot in here, what can you do?

I do feel like I’m missing some very important context, though, because some things just do not make sense at all. 
- Since when do we flock to banks to cheer on robbers? (I was going to include ‘and hate the police’, but, well, you know.
- Then everyone started queuing up to tell me Sonny was a dangerous, dangerous madman, while he seemed to be an incredibly well-meaning guy to me who, despite everything, had a really good heart, wanted to help the whole world and would never ever hurt a fly. And he didn’t, he only raised his voice after 90 minutes. And be bought pizzas!

There was some bad editing going on during location transitions and I’m not entirely sure how I feel about there being no score in this movie at all, especially in the final act. Come out, Sonny. Sonny? Sonny! That’s it, Sonny.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Watching Superman (1978) for the first time ever, with my son. It is the Extended Cut, so we are watching it spread out over three nights. I bought this Blu-ray:

 

81qVGg7b+xL._SL1500_.jpg

 

So now I am looking for Superman II on Blu-ray. Not The Donner Cut, just the regular one I remember from having watched it at least twice growing up. I’m not sure, but it looks like the only way to get it in the US is in a 5-film collection. Super annoying.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yup. I have no idea if Donner definitively has final say over what versions of the movies are distributed solo, but the same thing being applied to the theatrical cut of the original film (at least before the 4K release) makes me think so as well. The lack of III and IV solo releases is odd though, given he'd have nothing to do with those, so perhaps that could just be WB not wanting to waste shelf space on sub par movies. Hopefully some region free BD exists of II to make it an easy import.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Aquaman (2018)

 

Jesus Christ...I get it they're embracing the silliness of the whole premise and whatnot, but this is just horrendous. Absolutely horrendous. There's absolutely no campy fun to be had. It's just a collection of every cliché and trope in the book, awful CGI, no sense of physics, of things being actually there, fake CGI sunsets, underwarter scenes that look everything but underwater, cheesy action poses, awful trailer lines...

 

Awful, awful, awful. An absolute waste of time. It's beyond me how this got average reviews and great box office results. 

 

Flash Gordon is absolute masterpiece in pulling this sort of thing off compared to this piece of crap

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, Romão said:

Aquaman (2018)

 

Jesus Christ...I get it they're embracing the silliness of the whole premise and whatnot, but this is just horrendous. Absolutely horrendous. There's absolutely no campy fun to be had. It's just a collection of every cliché and trope in the book, awful CGI, no sense of physics, of things being actually there, fake CGI sunsets, underwarter scenes that look everything but underwater, cheesy action poses, awful trailer lines...

 

Awful, awful, awful. An absolute waste of time. It's beyond me how this got average reviews and great box office results. 

 

Flash Gordon is absolute masterpiece in pulling this sort of thing off compared to this piece of crap

 

Eh. 20 years from now this will be the new Flash Gordon. (I've seen so much worse.) I bet more people will be talking about Aquaman than Shazam. (How is Aquaman an "older" film?)

 

We watched Field of Dreams tonight for Father's Day. My kids were old enough to enjoy it (and ask "Is that Darth Vader?!?") but not old enough to weep at the end. (Although my boy did grab me a little tighter.)

 

It's a freaking masterpiece! This was in my "I don't like Kevin Costner but I love all of his movies" phase. Now I'm thinking he's terrific. And the rest of the cast that I always loved is AMAZING. It's only 32 years old and I'm thinking "They don't make them like that anymore!"

 

And the score? Damn it, I am not going to spend the rest of my life weeping every time I hear a Horner score! Especially not the ones that made me weep before. Ok, maybe I am. (Titanic is on our watch list. I'm just not ready!)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 hours ago, Tallguy said:

20 years from now ... I bet more people will be talking about Aquaman than Shazam.

 

You give these movies too much credit. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Honestly: I think Aquaman has essentially been forgotten about at this point. The most anyone ever really brings up is the likely continued involvement of the one actress in the sequel. Shazam gets positively mentioned quite a bit every once and a while (as it should). I guess it'll just depend on what 20 years later will actually have us remember.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is far far too much fantasy stuff being published at the moment anyway.

I wished all the budget would rather be spend for adventurous more or less accurate historic dramas instead.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The score did help to keep Flash Gordon somewhat in the pop culture consciousness and for better or worse, the movie still is fairly memorable. Far from me to defend as a piece of great filmmaking, but at least there is some uniqueness to it.

 

Aquaman? I could produce the same exact same narrative and tropes by editing together scenes from previous films. It's just so bland, forgettable and boring. Studios should be punished at the box office for producing this kind of crap

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, Romão said:

Aquaman (2018)

 

I get it they're embracing the silliness of the whole premise and whatnot, but this is just horrendous. Absolutely horrendous. There's absolutely no campy fun to be had. It's just a collection of every cliché and trope in the book, awful CGI, no sense of physics, of things being actually there, fake CGI sunsets, underwarter scenes that look everything but underwater, cheesy action poses, awful trailer lines...

 

Awful, awful, awful. An absolute waste of time. It's beyond me how this got average reviews and great box office results. 

 

Flash Gordon is absolute masterpiece in pulling this sort of thing off compared to this piece of crap

 

Agree on all counts. I found Aquaman to be borderline unwatchable, while Flash Gordon is wildly entertaining.

 

However...

 

11 hours ago, Romão said:

Jesus Christ...

 

https://y.yarn.co/9f63ddbb-b40c-4061-b5c1-73486929c653_text.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 hours ago, Romão said:

I get it they're embracing the silliness of the whole premise and whatnot

 

I really hate that tactic with superhero movies in general. Its been pretty much trademarked by the MCU, and here we have the DCEU trying to do the same.

 

What happened to playing things straight, for crying out loud?!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

 

I really hate that tactic with superhero movies in general. Its been pretty much trademarked by the MCU, and here we have the DCEU trying to do the same.

 

What happened to playing things straight, for crying out loud?!

 

I think it mostly works in the MCU (less so in the DCEU).  And that's fine.  Irony and that type of humour, when done well (which is rarely) has its place.

 

But that said, I actually think earnestness, which used to be a hallmark of Hollywood filmmaking (especially in big epics) is underrated in cinema, especially these days, and I'd like to see more of it.  But earnestness in art is generally mocked in our post-modern culture.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Nick1066 said:

I think it works (mostly) in the MCU, and that's fine.

 

It works better in their more outright-comedic entries, but I've had my fill of those, too.

 

Its about time for earnestness to make a comeback!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Chen G. said:

 

I really hate that tactic with superhero movies in general. Its been pretty much trademarked by the MCU, and here we have the DCEU trying to do the same.

 

What happened to playing things straight, for crying out loud?!

 

Aquaman, to be fair, doesn't really take a a self aware, ironic tone towards the whole thing. It is fairly earnest. But I get whay you're saying concerning movies that seem to be embarassed of the source material and go for the jokesy, silly, self aware aproach, like this next Suicidade Squad. It was old after Mistery Men did it and it has been old ever since

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, AC1 said:

Can't we have both? Or what about a balanced mix of serious and humor?

 

The question at the moment isn't "serious" and "humouristic" - a movie can be played straight either as an outright comedy, a lighthearted adventure or a solemn drama.

 

As for having both, I think the Greeks had it right: one comedy for every three tragedies. Nowadays the trend seems reversed, unfortunately.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, Chen G. said:

 

The question at the moment isn't "serious" and "humouristic" - a movie can be played straight either as an outright comedy, a lighthearted adventure or a solemn drama.

 

As for having both, I think the Greeks had it right: one comedy for every three tragedies. Nowadays the trend seems reversed, unfortunately.

 

I like to think the old Raimi films, for all its melodramatic pulp, struck that balance well. There was humour, there was heart, and most of all, the stakes felt real.

 

There are no real stakes in Marvel films. And it sure doesn't help that every "dead" character just happens to get their own movie/tv show post-death anyway...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 hours ago, Nick1066 said:

 

I think it mostly works in the MCU (less so in the DCEU).  And that's fine.  Irony and that type of humour, when done well (which is rarely) has its place.

 

But that said, I actually think earnestness, which used to be a hallmark of Hollywood filmmaking (especially in big epics) is underrated in cinema, especially these days, and I'd like to see more of it.  But earnestness in art is generally mocked in our post-modern culture.

That's why Guardians and the Galaxy 1 & 2 and Endgame are the only good MCU movies.  They balance the humor with a decent amount of drama

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 minutes ago, Not Mr. Big said:

That's why Guardians and the Galaxy 1 & 2 and Endgame are the only good MCU movies.  They balance the humor with a decent amount of drama

 

Guardians of the Galaxy, though? Really? Because that's a good example of the MCU doing an outright comedy (coincidentally, one of their comedies in which I laugh the least, but that's an aside). Its not in any way earnest.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just now, Chen G. said:

 

Guardians of the Galaxy, though? Really? Because that's a good example of the MCU doing an outright comedy (coincidentally, one of their comedies in which I laugh the least, but that's an aside). Its not in any way earnest.

Mainly the sequel.  Haven't seen the first since release

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 minutes ago, Not Mr. Big said:

Haven't seen the first since release

 

I've seen both movies twice! I agree, Vol. 1 is one of the best entries. And Spielberg agrees with me (it's his favorite Marvel flick).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Somehow, the Marvel movie that makes me laugh the most is still The Avengers. I don't think Whedon set-out to make a comedy, per se, but for me that's the effect of the movie. I mean, its basically Ghostbusters with superheroes!

 

It may well be my favourite action-comedy.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guardians of the Galaxy is probably my favourite Marvel movie, but I wouldn't call it in any way earnest. I did think it balanced the comedy, action and "drama" pretty well. On the other hand I struggled to finish Vol. 2.

 

My taste is definitely out of synch with most people on this though. I also quite liked Branagh's Thor, but thought Ragnorak was stupid, and really not very funny.  Fat Thor was also one of the things I didn't like about Endgame (a movie I otherwise enjoyed).  IMO for the later films they pushed the comedy element a little more than they used to, at least a kind of, um, broader comedy.

 

Except for Black Widow & Guardians 3, which seems to just be cleaning up old business, I have pretty much have zero interest in Phase 4.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If we're talking about superhero flicks that are 'self-aware', surely the Deadpool ones are the ultimate expression of that? 

For that reason, I think it's going to be weird if the character gets 'folded into' the wider MCU ... for one, he'll have to be watered down for those all-important 12A/PG-13 ratings and for another, if he's aware he's in a movie (and all the other meta stuff) ... where does that leave all the other characters?     

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Nick1066 said:

On the other hand I struggled to finish Vol. 2.

 

My taste is definitely out of synch with most people on this though. I also quite liked Branagh's Thor, but thought Ragnorak was stupid, and really not very funny.

same

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It was the same for me, but when I watched it again, I thought it was very funny. I can't explain it but it probably has to do with preconceived expectations. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ultimately, comedy is very subjective and it changes: what we find funny in one time, we don't in another, much more so than is the case with drama.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/21/2021 at 8:59 AM, Chen G. said:

 

I really hate that tactic with superhero movies in general. Its been pretty much trademarked by the MCU, and here we have the DCEU trying to do the same.

 

What happened to playing things straight, for crying out loud?!

Isn’t this what DC did for years and everyone complained that it was too serious?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 minutes ago, Koray Savas said:

Isn’t this what DC did for years and everyone complained that it was too serious?

 

Yeah, but the "serious" DCEU films sucked, so...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Black-Narcissus-2021-06-17-at-10-18-22-P

 

Black Narcissus

 

Putting aside its casual racist platitudes, this is indeed a masterclass in framing and cinematography. Clearly informing the work of many contemporary filmmakers, few works have made its innate psychology so deeply evocative in its visuals.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Guidelines.