Movies you've just watched

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ChurchOfSolipsism
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by ChurchOfSolipsism »

vol.2 wrote:i think the genre demands of the film didn't match his directorial style
What an interesting perspective... couldn't the same have been expected about the gangster film and how he treated it? Btw have you seen As Tears Go By?
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by vol.2 »

ChurchOfSolipsism wrote:
vol.2 wrote:i think the genre demands of the film didn't match his directorial style
What an interesting perspective... couldn't the same have been expected about the gangster film and how he treated it? Btw have you seen As Tears Go By?
I have seen it, but not for a long time, and I don't have a clear memory of it anymore. I watched all those films in the mid 90s and I've only rewatched a select few of them (Chungking Express, Fallen Angels, Happy Together). I think it also just didn't stand out to me as much. I remember liking Days of Being Wild better than that one, and I certainly remember more details of it in spite of not having watched in over twenty years.

I don't know which one you refer to as "the gangster film." Fallen Angels maybe? That was not styled like a gangster film at all. It was an art film featuring gangsters. Ashes of Time was terribly mired in the tropes of Wuxia, probably because the studio expected it to appeal to fans of the genre. It was overly ambitious, and he learned a lot from the failure about where his strengths lie as a director (which I think is obvious by the style of the next few films.

Again, he failed when trying to mix his style with hollywood in Blueberry Nights, and then slipped into mediocrity with the Grand Master. Perhaps he'll figure it out again and get more courage to make another film with the energy of his best work; I certainly hope he does.
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ChurchOfSolipsism
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by ChurchOfSolipsism »

vol.2 wrote:
ChurchOfSolipsism wrote:
vol.2 wrote:i think the genre demands of the film didn't match his directorial style
What an interesting perspective... couldn't the same have been expected about the gangster film and how he treated it? Btw have you seen As Tears Go By?
I have seen it, but not for a long time, and I don't have a clear memory of it anymore. I watched all those films in the mid 90s and I've only rewatched a select few of them (Chungking Express, Fallen Angels, Happy Together). I think it also just didn't stand out to me as much. I remember liking Days of Being Wild better than that one, and I certainly remember more details of it in spite of not having watched in over twenty years.

I don't know which one you refer to as "the gangster film." Fallen Angels maybe? That was not styled like a gangster film at all. It was an art film featuring gangsters. Ashes of Time was terribly mired in the tropes of Wuxia, probably because the studio expected it to appeal to fans of the genre. It was overly ambitious, and he learned a lot from the failure about where his strengths lie as a director (which I think is obvious by the style of the next few films.

Again, he failed when trying to mix his style with hollywood in Blueberry Nights, and then slipped into mediocrity with the Grand Master. Perhaps he'll figure it out again and get more courage to make another film with the energy of his best work; I certainly hope he does.
Sorry, I could have been clearer, I meant "the gangster film" as a genre, like Wuxia. For me, As Tears Go By and Fallen Angels both belong in this category; and while I agree that ATGB didn't yet have that unique Wong Kar-Wai style, it's still noticably different from/ better than the usual gangster fare that was released in Hongkong at that time. (I, too, haven't seen that film in a long time - time for a Wong Kar-Wai retrospective!) We could argue about whether the gangster film genre is defined more by typical plot and/ or characters (which would be my position, so from this perspective Fallen Angels clearly is a gangster film, admittedly a very unusual one) or by formal elements; still, I'd say that every director/ directorial style can be successful in every genre - a good example being Shinya Tsukamoto, who started off with radical b/w industrial films, then did lots of psycho drama, and his most recent (and fantastic!) film, Killing, is a samura film. I just thought that Ashes of Time was boring as shit.
But yeah, you're right, Blueberry Nights was a dud as well, I erased that one from my memory, probably because I was so disappointed by it... The Grandmaster wasn't bad (Tony Leung is just wonderful in everything he's in), but when you compare it to high voltage films like the first Ip Man or Sha Po Lang, it comes across as old fashioned and a lot less energetic than those films.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

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Snake Eyes

Oh dear god I don't even know where to begin - what a horrible disjointed piece of shit. Awful script. Poor poor POOR fight choreography. How the fuck does a movie with Iko Uwais on the set not have a single decent fight scene? HOW?

A ninja movie without a single redeeming fight scene.

If it was just a ninja movie it would get an F, but it was supposed to be Snake Eyes, the coolest Joe ever. Larry Hama even wrote it for them and they still fucked it up.

F-
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Re: Movies you've just watched

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Stevens wrote:Snake Eyes

Oh dear god I don't even know where to begin - what a horrible disjointed piece of shit. Awful script. Poor poor POOR fight choreography. How the fuck does a movie with Iko Uwais on the set not have a single decent fight scene? HOW?

A ninja movie without a single redeeming fight scene.

If it was just a ninja movie it would get an F, but it was supposed to be Snake Eyes, the coolest Joe ever. Larry Hama even wrote it for them and they still fucked it up.

F-
If I can say one good thing for it, I loved their depiction of Baroness and Scarlett.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by Vexorg »

Caddyshack: **1/2

For a film considered by many to one of the best comedies of all time I expected more of this. Although Rodney Dangerfield's performance as obnoxious upper class twit Al Czervik stands out, some of the top billed performances feel phoned in (Chevy Chase in particular) and there is little in the way of actual plot, ultimately giving it the feel of something like a Police Academy movie, mostly a bunch of comedy sketches strung together with a few thin strings of plot like substance. Still funny, just don't expect much beyond that.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by cj iwakura »

Vexorg wrote:Caddyshack: **1/2

For a film considered by many to one of the best comedies of all time I expected more of this. Although Rodney Dangerfield's performance as obnoxious upper class twit Al Czervik stands out, some of the top billed performances feel phoned in (Chevy Chase in particular) and there is little in the way of actual plot, ultimately giving it the feel of something like a Police Academy movie, mostly a bunch of comedy sketches strung together with a few thin strings of plot like substance. Still funny, just don't expect much beyond that.
You might enjoy this, which I think is more entertaining than the film itself:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UHcQjPIBpY
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by vol.2 »

Vexorg wrote:Caddyshack: **1/2

some of the top billed performances feel phoned in (Chevy Chase in particular) and there is little in the way of actual plot
As opposed to what, Fletch? I think maybe you just don't like Chevy Chase. You wouldn't be the first one. For my money, Bill Murray takes it in this movie though.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by drauch »

Ah man, same. I'm kinda shocked at the amount of people that like Ashes of Time. Love all his other stuff, but this one just plods along introducing so many great actors, only for them to do so little amidst so much confusion and love affairs and blah blah.

Bride with White Hair though A+++

Not talked about as much, but I really like The Dragon Chronicles, The Maidens Of The Heavenly Mountains. The sets and lighting in it is the sort of stuff I love.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

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vol.2 wrote:
Vexorg wrote:Caddyshack: **1/2

some of the top billed performances feel phoned in (Chevy Chase in particular) and there is little in the way of actual plot
As opposed to what, Fletch? I think maybe you just don't like Chevy Chase. You wouldn't be the first one. For my money, Bill Murray takes it in this movie though.
Admittedly I'm not a huge Chevy Chase fan, but it felt like they mostly put him on "straight man" duty in this one next to Ted Knight and Rodney Dangerfield, which isn't necessarily a bad thing since there's generally a need for a foil in those types of situations, but it feels like a bit of a waste to use him like that. From what I've read the maintenance shack scene between Chevy Chase and Bill Murray was a late addition to the movie after Harold Ramis realized that there weren't any scenes where both were on screen at the same time.
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ChurchOfSolipsism
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by ChurchOfSolipsism »

drauch wrote:Ah man, same. I'm kinda shocked at the amount of people that like Ashes of Time. Love all his other stuff, but this one just plods along introducing so many great actors, only for them to do so little amidst so much confusion and love affairs and blah blah.

Bride with White Hair though A+++

Not talked about as much, but I really like The Dragon Chronicles, The Maidens Of The Heavenly Mountains. The sets and lighting in it is the sort of stuff I love.
Cheers for the recommendation, my pile of cinematic shame is as big or even bigger than my videogame pile of shame, but I'll try to watch it at some point in the future!
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by null1024 »

I got to see The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, which is a dumb, but very fun movie. Hit on all the right notes for me. It tries to be a bit meta with the writing, and it actually pulls it off fairly well. Mostly comedy at the start, then shifts into action by the end, and it handles both nicely.

I got to see it with a buddy in an otherwise empty theater. That was wonderful, we got to crack up and talk shit as much as we wanted without bugging anyone. 8)
I know it's like a weekday and movie theater attendance is down anyway with the pandemic, but we've ended up in a lot of empty showings lately.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by vol.2 »

Everything Everywhere All at Once

I was immediately on board as soon as I saw Short Round and David Lo Pan from Big Trouble in Little China, and the movie itself didn't disappoint. Solid script, great acting, just the right amount of goofiness.

The only thing I thought was a little over the top in a "too much" way was
Spoiler
the butt plug fight. I really didn't need to see that.
Some have called it out for taking too much from The Matrix, but I felt like the focus of the movie was so solidly on the "real world" and not the fantasy world that it was more of an anti-matrix movie than anything else. The focus was on the family and the fantasy elements were clearly there to serve as very literal analogies to the family issues. It was like watching a cartoon where the main characters lived out an elaborate fantasy, only to wake up from a dream and find that they had been working out a complex social problem in their fantasy play. It reminded me a lot of the Muppet Babies.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by xxx1993 »

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness was... quite a "Strange" one. But I enjoyed it! I also saw the Netflix French buddy cop thriller The Takedown, which I heard was a sequel to On the Other Side of the Tracks, and that was a fun one also!
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Re: Movies you've just watched

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Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness (IMAX 3D) - 4/5

The Sam Raimi direction is perfect for the whole supernatural witch craft vibe of this film, and Danny Elfman's score is hand in glove here as well. Not as slap-stick heavy as Evil Dead but I wonder if it'll be too unsetteling for my youngest kid.

Also watched Uncharted with is fun but sadly gets dragged down by the current "Hollowwood" A1 cut-and-paste token characters; over-powered, small-framed "bad ass" that takes on the main character without breaking a sweat. 3/5
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Re: Movies you've just watched

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The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent 7/10

Nick Cage at his Nick Cagiest. In which the man plays out his own fantasy-driven metaphorically autobiographical ego trip. Sort of a a cringe factory, sort of a play within a play, and frequently hilarious. I enjoyed enough of it and had enough rolling in the aisle laughing moments to make the movie totally worthy of my evening. I'm not going to say it was a "great" movie by any stretch of the imagination, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and would recommend it with some caveats.

If you don't get drug humor, it might not be for you. If you don't like Nick Cage, it's definitely not for you. If you want to take it seriously, also not for you.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

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The Lost City: **1/2

2022 action/comedy that's basically an unofficial remake of 1984's Romancing the Stone. A struggling romance novelist (Sandra Bullock) gets kidnapped by a "rich idiot with no day job" bad guy (Daniel Radcliffe) while on a book tour with the vapid cover model from her novels (Channing Tatum), who then travels to an island in the Atlantic Ocean to rescue her, where she is being forced to help find a treasure referenced in her novels. Has a few good moments and definitely seems to be more comedy than action film, but is otherwise fairly unremarkable. Daniel Radcliffe, being one of those actors it's basically impossible to separate from his best known roie (in this case Harry Potter), just feels like he should be using an Imperius curse to do all this instead of a bunch of guns and disposable thugs. Brad Pitt's appearance in what amounts to an extended cameo is also notable, but short. This is also one of those films that gets dragged down on occasion by an completely unnecessary B-plot, breaking what little immersion there was in the story in the first place on a regular basis.

Probably worth watching once, but Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas did this better.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by xxx1993 »

The Northman. It’s like an R-rated version of The Lion King!
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by BIL »

:lol:

I've had my eye on that one since Eggers' The VVitch and The Lighthouse. Your review clinches it though :cool:
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by xxx1993 »

I wanted to see it, but April was already packed. I wanted to see Massive Talent more, anyway. Next up is The Bad Guys.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by xxx1993 »

The Bad Guys was pretty fun!
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by BryanM »

Doing four Space Pocahontas movies all at once is pretty ambitious and optimistic. It kind of feels like James waited decades until movies weren't a thing anymore before finishing up on that. He's quite the gutsy fellow.

Was bullied into watching that cat movie everyone was talking about. Enjoyed the office space stuff at the beginning a little bit, the rest was a tiresome waste of time on the whole. I feel bad for the fans who waited 20 years for a god damn clip show.

As a trendsetter back in the day, it brought to us chunnibyo, leather outfits, and opened the door for more superhero movies. To see what a pale imitation it's become... the Unreal Engine 5 demo had more energy behind it.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

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I blissfully remain ignorant of 2-4. In my mind, it's still what it was, and it's significance to me diminishes over time.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by GaijinPunch »

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart at River Styx
This was on my tablet, so watched it on a recent flight. This is my first foray into the series. Wow... didn't expect the hyper violence. The kid is quite tricky for his age! Perfect runtime and just enough story to tie together all those fight scenes.

Drive My Car
Switching gears a bit (pun intended) I had a 3.5 hour flight and figured this was a good time to knock this one out. Quite the slow burn, but not too boring. Clocking in at 3 hours it is a bit daunting but a good payoff in the end.
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drauch
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Re: Movies you've just watched

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GaijinPunch wrote:This is my first foray into the series. Wow... didn't expect the hyper violence.
You're in for a real treat! Each one has violence in spades.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by GaijinPunch »

drauch wrote:
GaijinPunch wrote:This is my first foray into the series. Wow... didn't expect the hyper violence.
You're in for a real treat! Each one has violence in spades.
Can't wait! I'm not travelling much for the summer [ref: Weightlifting thread] and these are the perfect quick plane trip films. But, I should be chilling in bed quite a bit so perhaps that's where I'll check them out. There are 6 on HBO Max, which looks like all of them. IMDB shows a highly rated (by very few) TV series as well. I can't imagine that being more than a spaghetti western without the blood. Mind blowing that there were 6 films in 3 years - 4 in 1972 alone. I assume they filmed them all in one go. Bonus: I do like how the protagonist is kind of an old fat dude. No way would this get made today. He'd be some skinny ass kid that waxes his arms.
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drauch
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by drauch »

Not sure if you've seen any Zatoichi films, but that's actually his brother! They were both pretty chubby during their entire careers. I love it.

I've got the series but still haven't given it a shot. I assume you're right though on the lack of violence; it certainly appears that way.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by Mischief Maker »

Zatoichi, when it's good, it's really good. But when Zatoichi is bad, it's still pretty good.

I own The New Tale of Zatoichi, Zatoichi's cane sword, and my personal favorite Zatoichi Challenged.

I think what I love the most about Zatoichi films is he's a blind character who isn't a saint or a victim. He's a crook and a rascal but with a heart of gold.
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Re: Movies you've just watched

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Last night I went to see Mulholland Dr. at the local theater with the super big screen. So, so good. I was blown away by the sound work in the film, especially the scene in club Silencio.

Wondering what others interpreted the film as. Was there a mystical element to it, or was it all just the machinations of a fractured psyche trying to justify a terrible act?

If there was a straight answer to it, what is the meaning of the man who dies of fright in the alley and the homeless man? What about the people who place the new lead actress in the film by force and the man who invades the director's home?
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Re: Movies you've just watched

Post by BIL »

The man who meets a scary end outside WINKEH's is actually my good friend, and patron saint of Hard Scrolling Action, Edmond Dantes. :sad:

"He's hiding behind there." "Who is?" "The man. The man behind NG's."
Spoiler
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"Alright. Let's go see him, together."

*wwwwwwwwwwww*
Spoiler
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*WWWWWWWWWWWW*
Spoiler
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*WWWWWWWWWWWW*
Spoiler
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"Eddie? Edmans?! What's the matter?! What's going on Edm-
Cool movie! *REMEMBERING THE SCENES* ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

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