Movie News, Reviews, and Discussion Super-Thread

[Joe Molotov]

MA? More like MILF!

[Great Rumbler]

 

[Bebpo]

So wait, I'd never looked into the DC shows before but the Doom Patrol trailer and reviews seemed interesting so I thought maybe I'd check out ep1 and figured it'd be on Netflix or Hulu. So DC has their own streaming channel and that's the only place you can watch these DC tv shows on now? Wtf, the world needs to stop making more separate streaming channels. I ain't paying $8/month for some DC channel that has like 3 shows.

[Don Rumata]

 

Opening the trailer with furry ass:

will get them a lot of views. 

spoiler (click to show/hide)

Looks real cool though, animatrix was better than the movies in many ways.

[close]

[Stro]

Polar (2019)

A little disappointed this wasn't as trashy as I had hoped, tbh. I enjoyed it, though, and am fully on board for the enthusiastically trashy action movies wave that has started and stopped between Crank and John Wick movies.  I'm sure a lot of these movies get made, but not with any names or promotion that you'll ever see unless you go out of your way to look for those type of movies.

Sexual objectification is cool
Murdering is cool
Drugs are cool except when they're not
Violence is cool

 

Now, did a trashy action movie based on a fucking web comic need to be 2 hours long? No, probably not. Mads is awesome, Vanessa Hudgens I hope was made up to look bad because she's only 30 and looked like she's been living a very rough 10 years, fucking Richard Dreyfuss OUTTA NOWHERE 

[Joe Molotov]

[Stro]

Yojimbo (1961)

I was really into this until the 3rd act, then it lost me almost completely to the point where I looked up memes for a bit because I was so bored. I don't even know why. The "twist" came and my brain went dead.

[VomKriege]

R100 by Hitoshi Matsumoto (you may know him as one half of the Downtown duo / star of the Gaki no Tsukai TV shows), the story of a meek salaryman with masochistic fetishes who sign up for a non rescindable, year long contract with an experimental bondage club to have dominatrixes randomly drop in to humiliate him in his everyday life. It only gets stranger from there...

I said earlier that I had worries the film would be a bit of a mess but it turns out I was wrong. I think I was apprehensive because of Big Man Japan, Matsumoto's first effort as a director that was basically a textbook example of one of his TV skits not scaling up at all to sustain a long feature format despite all its endearing aspects. He followed up with Symbol which was much better (a genuinely good and unique movie, in fact) and R100, while maybe not as good, confirmed it was not a fluke. Matsumoto, on top of his trademark weird humour, exhibits some real focus in aesthetics, pacing and narration all while the story escalates into weirder and weirder tangents and the tone shifts massively.

It's more deadpan and bizarre than comical but it makes for a very distinctive proposition (though maybe not unique, some of it evoked me Quentin Dupieux's work and his latest film, Au Poste) of a rambling, shocking but always ultimately uplifting and enthusiastic message (insomuch there's one).

And now I'm kinda sad he didn't make another feature since this one in 2013.

[bork]

LMAO    Cringe from everybody!

We went to see Alita: Battle Angel yesterday.  It wasn't a bad adaptation of the original story.  Had some things changed here and there as expected, but overall they did a pretty good job of it.  The biggest change is Jennifer Connely's character, who did not exist in the original.   It felt like the world depicted was a bit too "clean" and nice for the grimier, broken down scrapyard depicted in the comic, though- we are told that this is a dystopian world, but it really didn't come across that way.  Something else I noticed is that they seemed to be using the Japanese names for everything like the names of cities, but kept the name "Alita."  Never got the name change and why they didn't just go with Gally, but whatever.  Her big CG eyes continued to be a bit of a bother, but I can at least see what they are going for with it now:

spoiler (click to show/hide)

We see flashbacks depicting Alita as a soldier before she got scrapped- everyone from Mars has the same kind of big ol' anime eyes.

[close]

   So if you ever wanted to see the live-action anime version of Michelle Rodriguez, there you go! 

The movie is not a gore-fest or anything, but there are scenes of people getting stabbed and cyborgs getting dismembered/cut in half/etc. happening.  Not something I'd bring the kids to, but people didn't get that memo and there were a number of little kids in the theater.  This didn't last long and I saw most of them leaving shortly after it began. 

[Joe Molotov]

Most of Alita’s story was copied from the anime OVA, Jennifer Connely’s character was from that. The OVA was only 50 minutes long, so they added more Alita x Hugo scenes and the rollerball subplot.

[Stro]

Last Man Standing (1996)


An odd coincidence that I'd randomly decide on Saturday "I should watch Yojimbo", then I see Last Man Standing on free streaming services on Sunday. Figured midas well. As the official remake of Yojimbo, Last Man Standing is indeed an official remake of Yojimbo. Except it's set in Prohibition Era Texas instead of feudal Japan. And has noir narration. It has a really weird cast for a noir/Western remake of a Jidaigeki movie: Of course Bruce Willis in one of his last roles of pretending like he gave a shit, Leslie Mann, Dr. Kelso, Jerry Horne, Christopher Moltasanti, the sad weirdo from Blade Runner, the old guy from The 'Burbs, Christopher Walken.


Idk it was fine, it's a full blown western though, kind of weird for the time frame being in the early 1930s, yet the town is straight out of 1860.

[VomKriege]

Ry Cooder soundtrack IIRC.
Otherwise found it to be fairly uninspiring for a Walter Hill film. It didn't look bad tho.

[Stro]

If you told me it was a late 80s/early 90s John Carpenter/Alan Howarth score, I'd believe you. Which sounds like much more of a compliment than it actually is.

[ToxicAdam]

Time to eat crow. Alita was great. Go see it in theaters. Rarely do you see a CGI-fest with such great action scenes.

The pace of the movie is pretty fast, so even the cheesy YA overtones that litter the story zoom by  fast. They don’t belabor any scene.

[bork]

Most of Alita’s story was copied from the anime OVA, Jennifer Connely’s character was from that. The OVA was only 50 minutes long, so they added more Alita x Hugo scenes and the rollerball subplot.

Been so long since I saw that OVA that I didn't remember that.  The "rollerball" stuff is motorball, which is from the storyline that happens after the Hugo stuff.  Didn't mind it being thrown in earlier in the movie story since it just meant more action scenes. 

[BlueTsunami]

Time to eat crow. Alita was great. Go see it in theaters. Rarely do you see a CGI-fest with such great action scenes.

The pace of the movie is pretty fast, so even the cheesy YA overtones that litter the story zoom by  fast. They don’t belabor any scene.

Plan on catching it at IMAX. Sounds like its going to be well recieved by action sci-fi fans but not a critical darling.

[Great Rumbler]

Most of Alita’s story was copied from the anime OVA, Jennifer Connely’s character was from that. The OVA was only 50 minutes long, so they added more Alita x Hugo scenes and the rollerball subplot.

Been so long since I saw that OVA that I didn't remember that.  The "rollerball" stuff is motorball, which is from the storyline that happens after the Hugo stuff.  Didn't mind it being thrown in earlier in the movie story since it just meant more action scenes. 

Grewishka was also from the OVA, along with a few minor plot points.

[team filler]

[BlueTsunami]

I've been sitting down and watching Apocalypse Now as a big boy. And it truly is a very important piece of filmaking. It's all been said already so I'll just say what strikes me. Mainly the loss of sanity. Seeing representations of Willard along his descent into madness in various forms. Himself the form we follow thats in flux. Very far down the road but not quite there. Flirting with it.

[BlueTsunami]

Why should they all die over an ideaization of a false god?


FUCK ME

[chronovore]

Watching Ready Player One. The CG in this movie is INSANE. The direction on The Shining sequence was amazing; like, disturbingly perfect lighting and camera movement. There are a bunch of shortcuts and streamlining from the book, but I'm happy with all of them. Even so, I'm 45 minutes from the ending, and unless there's 20 minutes of credits, it's gonna overstay its welcome just a little. Also, I legit LOL'd at "It's fucking Chucky!"

It seems impossible, but there are apparently even more cameos and fanservice than the book. I dunno, somehow it seems more of a celebration in this than it did in the book, which felt cloying and desperate.

[Bebpo]

Watched Hell House LLC yesterday after a friend recommended it. Story is a found footage documentary about a professional haunt maze that opened up and people died on the first night and was mysteriously shut down with no investigation. Was solid found footage horror flick with a fun mystery air to it. I liked the way the film uses multiple timelines to keep the mystery going and the cast is somewhat likeable. The ending was a bit of a let down for what everyone described it as, but it's solid and leaves a lot of questions.

The funniest thing though is there is like one throwaway mysterious scene about 3/4ths in the movie that makes it seem like there's more to the lore and makes it more spooky/interesting. But then the director posted on the reddit thread that it was just a scene they cut or didn't end up filming and it's like a non-horror/scare explanation for the mystery that takes all the interesting bits away 

And then they made a sequel for shudder that came out last fall to build on the lore more but apparently it's pretty awful so I'm gonna pass. I think the foundation in the first flick is good, so maybe they can do a 3rd film and make it good and interesting to build on the lore.

Anyhow I actually have a soft spot for found footage horror and this was a good one.

[Joe Molotov]

I've been sitting down and watching Apocalypse Now as a big boy. And it truly is a very important piece of filmaking. It's all been said already so I'll just say what strikes me. Mainly the loss of sanity. Seeing representations of Willard along his descent into madness in various forms. Himself the form we follow thats in flux. Very far down the road but not quite there. Flirting with it.

It's a Top 10 movie for me, maybe Top 5. If you haven't seen Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse , definitely watch that too.

[BlueTsunami]

Theres a depth to this film that is disturbing in a way thatbis making me sick. On its face for the initial time , it feels fairly standard but the creeping dread sets in. The sickness stems from somewhere. Apart from simply genes. A truama instilled thats never made clear but you know what it is.

[BlueTsunami]

I'm out here about to rent "The House that Jack Built" I have no need for this nihilism. Fuck me.

[BlueTsunami]

Nvm renting Shopflifters  a von trier film would have made me bite a bullet

[Rahxephon91]

Alita was really good. Amazing visuals.

[Bebpo]

Happy Death Day 2U - There are worse ways to spend 90 mins of your life than back with these characters and this setting again. While the first movie was surprisingly kinda great, this one lacks the focus of the original and is just sorta making problems with the characters to solve to fill the running time vs one coherent story vision. It's entertaining but nothing more. The odd thing about it is the first 20 mins and the post-credit scene show the kind of original creative direction the sequel should have taken but I think the issue was that doing something neat and new would mean not using the main gal from the first as the lead anymore and they probably thought since she was the driving force of the original she had to be the main character in the sequel as well which ended up hurting the sequel because there's just not much she can do as a lead in this story anymore. Her being a MGS2 Pliskin would've made for a much more fun and fresh sequel and it's a shame the whole movie doesn't go that route. Still worth a watch though, can't hate.

I dunno if they'll make enough money to make a 3rd one, but if they do hopefully he has some more creative freedom to go totally zany with the plot.

Also while the first movie was a horror comedy, 2nd movie is not really horror at all anymore and is just like comedy with some sci-fi.

[shosta]

Wow. TVC told me he was watching that so I went to pirate it without knowing there was an original. Turns out I ended up watching the original without realizing it. So now I have to go watch 2U, I guess!

Original was great, at least.

[Joe Molotov]

https://geektyrant.com/news/hanna-barberas-1960s-series-the-banana-splits-is-being-adapted-into-a-horror-movie

They waited a little too long to jump on the Five Nights at Freddy's bandwagon, but okay.

[BlueTsunami]

 

Heavy Metal 2019 

[BlueTsunami]

Man Battle Angel Alita is the real deal. Action is on point, acting is good and it has an emotional core that worked for me. This is my new Dredd and how some people perceive Speed Racer. I haven't been that pumped leaving the theater in a long time.

[Momo]

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/chris-hemsworth-play-hulk-hogan-biopic-1186126

Where my vitamins at?

[BlueTsunami]

Contrastated abstraction and the very real pain of living in poverty. This one hit hard. It also says a lot with so little but this is probably due to its, whats been described as impressionistic, way of portraying the real and unreal. You're left to fill in the gaps, emotionally in some cases. Having grown up as a latchkey kid that had parents try their fucking hardest to provide, it hit home. The sense of futility in your financial place breeds a sense of negativity both vicious and self defeating. So the cycle continues. Ultimately it takes someone determined enough, tired enough, to break the mold formed through generations of hurt and frustration. To ask that of a child and for that child to succeed? Is a miracle in itself.

[shosta]

Man Battle Angel Alita is the real deal. Action is on point, acting is good and it has an emotional core that worked for me. This is my new Dredd and how some people perceive Speed Racer. I haven't been that pumped leaving the theater in a long time.

I'm about halfway through and this is the shit. The trailers for this movie really sucked ass in comparison.

[ToxicAdam]

Not watching Alita in theaters? :disgust

[BlueTsunami]

Man Battle Angel Alita is the real deal. Action is on point, acting is good and it has an emotional core that worked for me. This is my new Dredd and how some people perceive Speed Racer. I haven't been that pumped leaving the theater in a long time.

I'm about halfway through and this is the shit. The trailers for this movie really sucked ass in comparison.

Makes me wish we got a Rober Rodriguez helmed Ghost in the Shell. Maybe that sort of slow pace cerebral isnt in his wheelhouse but the man and Cameron can sure make a film that translates to the screen while remaining somewhat faithful to the beats and tone of the source material. Instesd of just using it as a vehicle to make something else entirely.

[Stro]

The Hunt For Red October (1990)

Much like I couldn't help but think about how Connery from this era would have been back as Bond while watching The Untouchables, I couldn't help but think about a third Timothy Dalton movie in 1991/1992 where Connery was back....having been promoted to M, and being a Bernard Lee tier dick head to Dalton in their one scene together. Or possibly joining in on the mission. Instead, Dalton's last "role" as Bond was a shitty Sega Genesis game in 1993.

Anyway, I know I saw this on TV in the 90s, but didn't remember shit about it. Didn't realize it was a McTiernan joint, but I'm glad it was because this could have been pretty boring shot by someone else. Fucking loooool at there not being a single good or even decent Russian accent, with Connery not even trying one (which is good, part of his charm is his same voice no matter where his character is from), multiple BRITISH ones on the Russian ship, and the handful of guys trying Russian ones sounding like cartoon characters.

Fat Alec Baldwin >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>. In fact I don't think he was good in this at all.


The blue screening at the end was fucking atrocious. Like...what the fuck you could literally see through parts of Baldwin's head 

Overall I give this a "good" rating. Could have been really dull with a lesser director, but also could have been better with someone else as Jack Ryan. And more screen time for Connery.

[HardcoreRetro]

Please discuss. (Watch the entire trailer)

[Great Rumbler]

...

[Stro]

Klown Forever (2015)


This is the second movie based on a Danish comedy series that is basically the Danish version of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Even before I knew it was a TV series and there was a movie before this, it's about as blatant of a rip off of Curb as you can get. Same general concept of a real life retired comedian in a pseudo-realistic shooting style getting into awkward situations with his celebrity friends with the same type of quirky music. It's about as close to a rip off as you can get without being sued. The whole time I felt like this could have been cut into 22 minute chunks and been a season of a show, so it makes sense that it WAS a show first.

If you like Curb style awkwardness and a few Danish dicks (as in penises), you'll probably get a chuckle out of this.

[VomKriege]

...

Svankmajer is dope.

[chronovore]

Deadpool 2: More of the stuff they did in the first movie. Possibly less clever, hard to know. Whole movie was fun, I laughed a whole bunch. X-Force stuff was hilarious. Negasonic is much thinner than in the first movie, to the point where I'd worry weird pressure may have been applied to her. The credits sequence was great fun, and the extras have an extended coda where

spoiler (click to show/hide)

DP shows up to murder baby Hitler.

[close]

[Stro]

Deadpool 2: More of the stuff they did in the first movie. Possibly less clever, hard to know. Whole movie was fun, I laughed a whole bunch. X-Force stuff was hilarious. Negasonic is much thinner than in the first movie, to the point where I'd worry weird pressure may have been applied to her. The credits sequence was great fun, and the extras have an extended coda where

spoiler (click to show/hide)

DP shows up to murder baby Hitler.

[close]

The actress just finished growing up a bit. She looks like a child in the first movie, an adult in the second movie.

[Stro]

Unforgiven (1992)

I have to preface this with I don't like, nor have I ever liked, Westerns. It's not a genre I've ever been drawn to. That said, this was pretty good, but I would have liked more Little Bill scenes, because Gene Hackman was an absolute treat.

[Bebpo]

Alita - I...enjoyed it? The trailers & marketing were so awful and I saw the anime OAV like 20 years ago and it was not particularly memorable, but outside pacing being kinda all over the place, a non-ending, and a tweeny romance subplot, the rest was pretty good! Lot of action, good action, lot of violence, good violence & dismemberment, I enjoyed the setting and characters. Even the ROLLERSPORTS shit that was plastered all over the marketing ended up being such a small part and the main action scene it's in was actually pretty cool since it's more a fight scene. Really nice looking CG too, can see where the 200 million budget went.

Makes me want to pick up the manga and read what happens next since I doubt they're gonna make a sequel with the box office it's doing.

My friends I went with didn't hate it, but didn't like it. They were bothered by some of the anime tropes and the big eyes, the latter which I didn't even notice but then maybe I'm just used to anime eyes from growing up watching anime so it doesn't stick out to me. And for anime tropes, idk I guess I don't see why anime tropes are worse than the standard trope stuff we see in Marvel flicks. Comic movies, especially Marvel, are very by the book and follow usual genre tropes and they're still enjoyable in spite of them and I felt the same way about Alita and anime tropes.

spoiler (click to show/hide)

Also Pacific Rim 2 haha, and yeah I know I'm the only person that enjoyed that one.

[close]

[BlueTsunami]

Watching Cries and Whispers by ingmar Bergman and I have to say, midway through, the priests call for Agnes to send a prayer to God for those on earth is one of the most sorrowful and powerful single moments put on film.

[Nintex]

Did a rewatch of No Country for Old Men.

Still such a great film.

 

[Transhuman]

"Come watch Alita it's like Speed Racer"



"Come watch Alita it's like Pacific Rim 2"

[Stro]

Sharky's Machine (1981)


Really had no idea what to expect coming into this. Kind of thought maybe it'd be a Dirty Harry/Death Wish type movie staring Burt Reynolds, which sounds pretty cool, but the back of the box said something about it being a modern noir so I was kind of  .

Turns out it was kind of both, but Burt Reynolds takes what would normally be the super gruff bad ass cop/vigilante and makes him much softer. Not that he doesn't have plenty of gruff bad ass moments and he's generally referred to by the other police characters as a super tough bad ass rebel cop guy, but he has a soft side that comes out quite regularly that is pretty unique for these kind of movies.

Tom Sharky is a narcotics cop in Atlanta who's demoted to vice after a botched bust. In the depths of this lowly division, while investigating a high-dollar prostitution ring, Sharky stumbles across a mob murder with government ties, and responds by assembling his downtrodden fellow investigators (Sharky's "machine") to find the leaders and bring them to justice before they kill off all his partners and witnesses, including Sharky himself.

It's been described as Dirty Harry Goes To Atlanta, including by Burt himself to Clint Eastwood, and it is pretty similar but Burt's portrayal of the archetype is different enough to make this movie stand out. Also the music is fucking excellent throughout the movie. It oscillates between funk/disco/soul, jazz, and almost horror movie music. It came out in 1981, but it feels, looks, and sounds like a movie from 1976-1979, which is also great. The plot got pretty shaky towards the end, but it was a very enjoyable movie. Weirdly, this and Boogie Nights are the only Reynolds movie my library has on bluray.

[Stro]

The Rock (1996)

The perfect blend of cliches, Nic Cage over acting, a whole cast of "oh it's that guy",  and Michael Bayisms. 

[Bebpo]

"Come watch Alita it's like Speed Racer"



"Come watch Alita it's like Pacific Rim 2"

 

Alita is nothing like Pacific Rim 2, but that's just another anime movie I like. Alita is definitely a much better film than PR2.

[Stro]

I want to say that even though Metal Gear Solid is basically a remake of Metal Gear 2, it's also a remake of The Rock.

[EightBitNate]

Just watched Hereditary

What the fuck

[Stro]

Oz: The Great and Powerful (2013)

Zach Braff's facial hair is fucking disgusting 


Anyway, I'm legit at how much I enjoyed this as it had so many things working against it on paper for me: James Franco as the lead, family fantasy fare, I don't give a single shit about the Wizard of Oz, by default a movie where 90% of anything you see is CGI and green screen, Danny Elfman bullshit, and so on.

Yet I found myself really enjoying it, especially once the movie moved to Oz and it turned out to be a stealth Army of Darkness remake  Mid 90s Bruce Campbell as the lead in this would have been . Shit, old and fat Bruce Campbell would have been . I would have liked all the things being thrown at James Franco to be real shit that Raimi was throwing from just behind the camera like he would at Bruce instead of CGI, but such is movie making these days. Literally everyone was enjoyable in their roles, even Franco (after a while, he started kind of rocky but that was part of the character as well), the visuals mostly looked great (some wonky full human CGI transitions from time to time, and obviously everything was done in post but that kind of unreal look worked for this kind of movie anyway) and it probably would have been cool to see in 3D.

Just a fun, enjoyable motion picture.

[TVC15]

House Party: 6 out of 5 stars

[chronovore]

Oz: The Great and Powerful (2013)

Zach Braff's facial hair is fucking disgusting 


Anyway, I'm legit at how much I enjoyed this as it had so many things working against it on paper for me: James Franco as the lead, family fantasy fare, I don't give a single shit about the Wizard of Oz, by default a movie where 90% of anything you see is CGI and green screen, Danny Elfman bullshit, and so on.

Yet I found myself really enjoying it, especially once the movie moved to Oz and it turned out to be a stealth Army of Darkness remake  Mid 90s Bruce Campbell as the lead in this would have been . Shit, old and fat Bruce Campbell would have been . I would have liked all the things being thrown at James Franco to be real shit that Raimi was throwing from just behind the camera like he would at Bruce instead of CGI, but such is movie making these days. Literally everyone was enjoyable in their roles, even Franco (after a while, he started kind of rocky but that was part of the character as well), the visuals mostly looked great (some wonky full human CGI transitions from time to time, and obviously everything was done in post but that kind of unreal look worked for this kind of movie anyway) and it probably would have been cool to see in 3D.

Just a fun, enjoyable motion picture.

It's also kind of a heist movie, so I liked that, too.

[BlueTsunami]

House Party: 6 out of 5 stars

[Stro]

Persona (1966)

That Ingmar Bergman fella sure knew how to make some fun movies. 

[Nintex]

Reviews of this new HBO Doc are trickling down.
It sounds pretty good.