Fallen utopia meant to save humanity that has a retrofuturistic aesthetic set in an unusual location with a morally dubious protagonist and an enormous plot twist involving the leader of the utopia.
So, that was enough to keep me in my seat. My issue?
Too many ending. The movie honestly should've ended at the door to the engine. I also felt that much like Looper the psychic powers were a pointless distraction.
Linespider5ALL HAIL KING KILLMONGERRegistered Userregular
I always love the horror movies that are based on some kind of transgression: The idea that the characters should have known better, that they have committed an indiscretion, and that the horrible monster is completely in the right for anything it may want to do in response.
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AtomikaLive fast and get fucked or whateverRegistered Userregular
Fallen utopia meant to save humanity that has a retrofuturistic aesthetic set in an unusual location with a morally dubious protagonist and an enormous plot twist involving the leader of the utopia.
So, that was enough to keep me in my seat. My issue?
Too many ending. The movie honestly should've ended at the door to the engine. I also felt that much like Looper the psychic powers were a pointless distraction.
Sometimes it seems like it's not Asian cinema until someone has magic powers.
Fallen utopia meant to save humanity that has a retrofuturistic aesthetic set in an unusual location with a morally dubious protagonist and an enormous plot twist involving the leader of the utopia.
So, that was enough to keep me in my seat. My issue?
Too many ending. The movie honestly should've ended at the door to the engine. I also felt that much like Looper the psychic powers were a pointless distraction.
Sometimes it seems like it's not Asian cinema until someone has magic powers.
It felt like it was a lazy justification for making the Security expert's daughter useful. And for that matter, if the Security expert was so dangerous, why not just kill him?
Yeah, I know the whole train is falling apart and they need everybody they can get in case of breakdowns, but they seemed to be managing fairly alright.
Also, I feel like the sense of scale on the Snowpiercer itself was never very well shown? That said, I did like the weird culture that developed in the 20 or so years humanity has been just the passengers of the train.
So I know I'm late to the party, as usual, but that doesn't really matter, because Dredd was very enjoyable. I wonder if Karl Urban had muscle fatigue in the face during shooting because he kept that frown the whole through. And it was great he never had the helmet off.
Now I'm sad yet again we'll never get a sequel.
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Apothe0sisHave you ever questioned the nature of your reality?Registered Userregular
Hey, cinephiles, film nerds, and movie dorks, it's time for another edition in our series of sophisticated punditry regarding the state of motion pictures. This thread starts in November, and this is what we have to look forward to in the coming weeks:
11/6 - Big Hero 6
11/6 - Interstellar
11/6 - Rosewater
11/13 - Dumb & Dumber To
11/13 - Foxcatcher
11/20 - The Hunger Games Part Three Part One
11/25 - Horrible Bosses 2
11/27 - Imitation Game
Let's try not to talk about movies that have their own threads already, and as always, let's keep it civil and classy. Ask yourself, "What would @Astaereth do?"
In Australia we don't get Big Hero 6 until boxing day.
What the F
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AtomikaLive fast and get fucked or whateverRegistered Userregular
Hey, cinephiles, film nerds, and movie dorks, it's time for another edition in our series of sophisticated punditry regarding the state of motion pictures. This thread starts in November, and this is what we have to look forward to in the coming weeks:
11/6 - Big Hero 6
11/6 - Interstellar
11/6 - Rosewater
11/13 - Dumb & Dumber To
11/13 - Foxcatcher
11/20 - The Hunger Games Part Three Part One
11/25 - Horrible Bosses 2
11/27 - Imitation Game
Let's try not to talk about movies that have their own threads already, and as always, let's keep it civil and classy. Ask yourself, "What would @Astaereth do?"
In Australia we don't get Big Hero 6 until boxing day.
What the F
The catch here is that in Australia, we're talking about kangaroo boxing.
I always love the horror movies that are based on some kind of transgression: The idea that the characters should have known better, that they have committed an indiscretion, and that the horrible monster is completely in the right for anything it may want to do in response.
The transgression usually is having sex while being horny teenagers.
So I know I'm late to the party, as usual, but that doesn't really matter, because Dredd was very enjoyable. I wonder if Karl Urban had muscle fatigue in the face during shooting because he kept that frown the whole through. And it was great he never had the helmet off.
Now I'm sad yet again we'll never get a sequel.
There have been rumblings about a sequel. Still, it is wise to remain cynical until it appears.
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TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
Three Musketeers (1993 Disney version), I really liked it!
I admit to never seeing it when it came out because it was right on the cusp of the cynical 90's and I was all, "pfft, a Disney live action movie is for babies," and I think it didn't do too well back then either (but wasn't a Cutthroat Island), but wow if this probably had more violence than the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. And I think this is where their marketing failed pretty big. I was expecting sword fights to end with punch knockouts and props from the environment, but nope, they kill people. A lot of people.
They might not show a lot of blood but Jack Bauer is in his infancy here (complete with drinking problem), Charlie Sheen is Monsignor Martinez only french, and Oliver Platt steals scenes and shows us how cool a gun sword really is, take that Final Fantasy 8. And Rebbecca De Mornay is all nice and Tim Curry has so many excellent one liners, and Michael Wincott is the best of all as Rochefort (and I just realized he was in 24 Live Another Day so the cycle continues decades later!). The only downside is Chris O'Donnell being the lead character, and really can't land his role as teen heartthrob upstart musketeer. But everyone else is just so good it doesn't matter.
The film even has a french dandy played by a british guy hamming it up so it's double dandy replete with makeup, a move so intentionally corny the film is daring you to really get upset about it or just go along with the setup of everyone sometimes having accents, but the cool guys are the Americans because what, say something.
It was 1993 so some of the stunts are a little too apparent in stunt doubles, and only the DeMornay romance subplot actually deserves to be in the film compared to the others, but I guess that's the break of having to have Bryan Adams, Rod Stewart and Sting sing their super important rock ballad. On the plus side the sound editing is top notch, with a nice original score that should be pilfered more by movies and commercials.
Now I'm going to waste all this goodwill and watch that other Three Musketeers movie from 2011 by Resident Evil guy and gal.
Three Musketeers (1993 Disney version), I really liked it!
I admit to never seeing it when it came out because it was right on the cusp of the cynical 90's and I was all, "pfft, a Disney live action movie is for babies," and I think it didn't do too well back then either (but wasn't a Cutthroat Island), but wow if this probably had more violence than the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. And I think this is where their marketing failed pretty big. I was expecting sword fights to end with punch knockouts and props from the environment, but nope, they kill people. A lot of people.
They might not show a lot of blood but Jack Bauer is in his infancy here (complete with drinking problem), Charlie Sheen is Monsignor Martinez only french, and Oliver Platt steals scenes and shows us how cool a gun sword really is, take that Final Fantasy 8. And Rebbecca De Mornay is all nice and Tim Curry has so many excellent one liners, and Michael Wincott is the best of all as Rochefort (and I just realized he was in 24 Live Another Day so the cycle continues decades later!). The only downside is Chris O'Donnell being the lead character, and really can't land his role as teen heartthrob upstart musketeer. But everyone else is just so good it doesn't matter.
The film even has a french dandy played by a british guy hamming it up so it's double dandy replete with makeup, a move so intentionally corny the film is daring you to really get upset about it or just go along with the setup of everyone sometimes having accents, but the cool guys are the Americans because what, say something.
It was 1993 so some of the stunts are a little too apparent in stunt doubles, and only the DeMornay romance subplot actually deserves to be in the film compared to the others, but I guess that's the break of having to have Bryan Adams, Rod Stewart and Sting sing their super important rock ballad. On the plus side the sound editing is top notch, with a nice original score that should be pilfered more by movies and commercials.
Now I'm going to waste all this goodwill and watch that other Three Musketeers movie from 2011 by Resident Evil guy and gal.
I too love that movie. It's light and fun without being silly and a great family movie.
Dick Lester's Musketeer movies (the first two, at least) are phenomenally entertaining. The fights are all brilliantly choreographed to be exciting and realistically clumsy and haphazard, the jokes are often very funny (the script is by George MacDonald Fraser), and the atmosphere and costuming are wonderful (as you'd expect from Lester, who got the texture of these and Robin and Marian exactly right).
And the cast is incredible.
Charlton Heston as Richelieu
Faye Dunaway as Milady
Christopher Lee as Rochefort
Richard Chamberlain as Aramis
Frank Finlay as Porthos
Michael York as D'artagnan
Oliver Reed really stretching himself to play the drunk, belligerent Athos
Raquel Welch as Constance
Roy Kinnear as Planchet
And Spike Milligan in the movie for no good reason other than he's hilarious
They remain the best Musketeer movies by miles and miles and miles.
I always love the horror movies that are based on some kind of transgression: The idea that the characters should have known better, that they have committed an indiscretion, and that the horrible monster is completely in the right for anything it may want to do in response.
Sometimes I feel like I am the only person who doesn't like/get the Dumb and Dumber movies. People seem to think it's the height of comedy, but I'm left feeling revolted and bored. I don't think I've ever managed to get all the way through the first one.
Now watching the promos for this new one I can't help but think: "Jeff Daniels, you're a better actor than this." And "Jim Carrey, please go away and never come back."
For me, this comedy style is right up there with the "...and then everything is really awkward!" style of comedy. It's completely unfunny to me. Like my brain is miswired or something.
I'm with you. Watched the first and didn't walk out of it in the cinema but should of.
When I then watched Me, Myeslf and Irene I did walk out.
Orlando Bloom has such a good time in that version that I can never hate it.
That movie had the moment where my wife and I were squinting at the screen going "Is that Orlando Bloom?" and then later when another character turned up saying "Ah, no THAT'S Orlando Bloom"
I did the same thing while watching. "Man, Orlando Bloom is really flamboyant in this. Oh wait, this new guy is actually Bloom, and he beats the first guy in the over-the-top department by a factor of 100." I did enjoy the newest one way more than I expected to (helped by Ray Stevenson being in it) in a zone out-'splosions-LXG kind of way. Mads Mikkelsen was another high point, especially for someone who hasn't started watching Hannibal yet.
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jungleroomxIt's never too many graves, it's always not enough shovelsRegistered Userregular
The Farrelly Brothers' entire schtick is based of gags. It's practically vaudevillian in origin, with every joke coming from something overt, and almost always physical comedy. It's also incredibly low-brow and scatalogical; think back to just about any joke in There's Something About Mary and you'll be hard pressed to find one that doesn't involve some kind of bodily function or reference to a physical abnormality.
Does this ever work for them? I guess it depends on your threshold for juvenile humor; I personally don't really care for it, largely because it's just not that intellectual engaging. To use Matt Stone and Trey Parker's instruction about setting up a joke, the Farrellys never seem to concern themselves with the more involving work of developing something for a payoff; it's all "and then this happens!," never "this happens because something else happened."
I don't respect their filmography much at all, though I have a soft spot for Carrey and Daniels performances in Dumb & Dumber, as they're both embracing their roles with reckless abandon. Will that still be funny twenty years later? Probably not, not the least of which because it never was terribly funny to begin with. It was a spectacle.
Their humour is incredibly juvenile but it is juvenile at it's best. Which is of course not saying much but at least it means that it's good for those people who are in that time of their life where they appreciate juvenile humour.
I have an appreciation for great movies, whether they be big sprawlers like Inception or something a bit more intimate like Aronofsky's earier things. But I also love me some stupid shit.
I like it a lot.
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jungleroomxIt's never too many graves, it's always not enough shovelsRegistered Userregular
Hey, cinephiles, film nerds, and movie dorks, it's time for another edition in our series of sophisticated punditry regarding the state of motion pictures. This thread starts in November, and this is what we have to look forward to in the coming weeks:
11/6 - Big Hero 6
11/6 - Interstellar
11/6 - Rosewater
11/13 - Dumb & Dumber To
11/13 - Foxcatcher
11/20 - The Hunger Games Part Three Part One
11/25 - Horrible Bosses 2
11/27 - Imitation Game
Let's try not to talk about movies that have their own threads already, and as always, let's keep it civil and classy. Ask yourself, "What would @Astaereth do?"
In Australia we don't get Big Hero 6 until boxing day.
What a nail-biter! I haven't been this terrified in years, and this is coming from a die-hard horror fan
On your request I watched V/H/S
Well, actually I watched the sequel.
I have to say, it was an interesting film (though I'm quickly tiring of "found film" horror), but it didn't really make....sense, I guess. I can appreciate the concept of the film, but I think all of the mini-films worked at cross-purposes, especially couched in the overall narrative of the movie.
I haven't seen the first one, so maybe it works better, but the sequel was very strange. I really enjoyed each individual film, for the most part, but I guess I really didn't enjoy the framing of the private investigator, and the final scene was just campy and stupid.
Anyway, all that to say this (in spoilers) about Jason Eisner's short film
I really liked this! But I couldn't handle the dog dying at the end. That was nice, because the film did things we tend to stray away from in movies- killing kids and pets, but I admit it got to me. It made me deeply uncomfortable.
I guess I would recommend, if you could, to watch the short films on their own in V/H/S 2. I know Eisner's short is on Vimeo, but I don't know about the others.
| Zinnar on most things | Avatar by Blameless Cleric
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reVerseAttack and Dethrone GodRegistered Userregular
The segments of VHS 2 are in the order of
bachelor, relationship, childbirth, married with children. The guy's vlog speculates that the videos are more powerful if you watch them in a specific order, hence the reanimation.
So the past two weeks I've seen John Wick and Fury. I'd have to give the nod to John Wick for the lack of super uncomfortable dinner scene.
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AstaerethIn the belly of the beastRegistered Userregular
edited November 2014
As promised, here's the wrap-up post for Killtoberfest 2: Kill Me Twice, Shame On Me. This year was much more successful than last year, even if I didn't meet my overall (highly ridiculous) goal.
Here's the full list of reviews for this year (with links to my blog, not the posts, because those are easier to find):
Best movie I hadn't seen before: Detention
Worst movie: Hellraiser IX: Revelations (runner up: Yellowbrickroad)
Best foreign film: Picnic at Hanging Rock
Find of the year: Detention (runner up: Triangle)
Scariest movie I hadn't seen before: Dark Water
Saddest movie: Dark Water (runner up: Triangle)
Funniest movie: Detention (runner up: Tucker and Dale vs. Evil)
Movie that most made me want to stand up and cheer: You're Next (runner up: Fermat's Room)
Image that'll take the longest to get out of my head: finding Megan in Megan is Missing
Best genre blender: Pitch Black
Best twist: The Ring (runner up: The Tall Man)
Worst twist: Frailty (runner up: Hellraiser VI: Hellseeker, where, surprise! you've been watching the boring version of the story)
Most improved in the last 20 minutes: Fire in the Sky (runner up: Megan is Missing)
Best found footage movie: Man Bites Dog
Worst found footage segments in a non-found footage movie: Hellraiser IX (runner up: Yellowbrickroad)
Best movie based on a Stephen King book: The Shawshank Redemption
Best death: Anthropophagus: The Grim Reaper, where the bad guy is sliced open and then collapses while defiantly eating his own intestines
Best orrery: Pitch Black
Best last 15 seconds: The Fury
Least like a horror film at all: Looking for Mr. Goodbar
Best performance, ensemble: Stoker (runner up: Birth)
Best performance, female: Diane Keaton in Looking for Mr. Goodbar (runner up: Lina Leandersson in Let the Right One In)
Best performance, male: Bruce Campbell in Bubba Ho-Tep
Best athletic performance by a werewolf (basketball): Teen Wolf
Best athletic performance by a vampire (free-climbing): Let the Right One In
Worst athletic performance by a snowman (moving): Jack Frost
Best Elvis impersonation: Bruce Campbell in Bubba Ho-Tep
Worst Elvis impersonation: TIE, everyone else in everything else
Best Harrison Ford impersonation: Dennis Quaid in Pandorum
Most surprisingly not terrible performance, male: Dane Cook in Detention
Most surprisingly not terrible performance, female: Chloe Moretz in Carrie
Sexiest piano-playing: Stoker
Best scene: Mr. Dark in the library, Something Wicked This Way Comes
Best cinematography: Let the Right One In (runner up: Evil Dead and Detention)
Best sound design: Stoker
Best editing: Detention
Best screenplay: The Ring (runner up: Pitch Black)
Best director: Chan-Wook Park, Stoker (runner up: David Fincher, Gone Girl)
Best score: The Ring
Worst score: Teen Wolf (runner up: Eyes Without a Face)
Best production design: The Haunting (runner up: The Call of Cthulhu)
Best remake: Evil Dead
Best movie that happened to be a remake: The Ring
Movie that most needs a remake: Something Wicked This Way Comes (runner up: The Bad Seed)
Biggest value X, where X = (time between set-up and punchline of joke / humor value of joke): Dog Soldiers
My favorite review: Let the Right One In (runner up: Triangle)
Best movie that won no other category here: Night of the Living Dead (runner up: Ils)
What should you watch on Netflix right the hell now: Detention (runner up: The Conspiracy)
Thanks again to everyone for reading, watching, discussing, and encouraging! Tune in next October for Killtoberfest 3: The ReKillening!
Orlando Bloom has such a good time in that version that I can never hate it.
That movie had the moment where my wife and I were squinting at the screen going "Is that Orlando Bloom?" and then later when another character turned up saying "Ah, no THAT'S Orlando Bloom"
You're getting your Bard's confused with your Legolas's
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TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
Three Musketeers (2011), a cast almost on par with the '93 version, but wants to be the cool Musketeer film and falters a bit. It's not bad, but it's above average though you can see how it lost the marks to be in the good category. Not a waste of time but you're going to feel a little bummed when certain things happen.
The main cast is mostly excellent. Ray Stevenson is always a treat, Luke Evans psychs everyone out as Orlando Bloom until Orlando Bloom does show up as French Wario, Madds Mikelson is a good Rochefort, Christoph Waltz brings his own touches to being the Cardinal. Milla Jovavich is mostly good as Milady but it is very apparent she gets more screentime because she's married to the director and gets a lot of the fancy solo time because hey, it's 2011 women can do anything men can do girl power (this might not be the film's intention but it really comes across this way). Particularly in the first 2/3rds the film feels like it's cutting out moments from the big 3 and instead leaving in a lot of Milady stuff to show kewl steampunk stuff and feats that just weren't done then but Assassins Creed did it so it's totally accurate, which I'll return to. And the comic relief is very bad with James Corden, now anointed as the new Ricky Gervais by Hollywood, being the whipping boy manservant of the musketeers, with forced David Brent-like awkward humor complete with the durability of fat guy loser tossed in for good measure. For a movie that really wanted to be the cool kid at the lunchtable it does a lot of things that make it much more of what you think a Disney film is than the '93 version.
Like the 93 version Darquetanian isn't well cast, only double so because this guy really seemed like he never even did menial labor in his life, he's the sparkly vampire musketeer wunderkind. But unlike the Disney version this film pushes him a lot more, with a romance that never feels reciprocated, but the chick simply using the guy's desire for her to do the job she requests.
But the frustrating thing is that the film picks up a good head of steam multiple times then wastes it all a minute later because it's trying to be fancier than what the period calls for. You have all these elaborate traps done more to show off special effects than being practical, devices that I'm going to say are steampunk even though they're a little too soon because the film thinks it needs something to catch our eyes, so airships! Razor wire set up like laser beams complete with spy doing impossible acrobatics! Mission Impossible wire drops! Machine gun cannons! What also happens quite a bit is the film just drops plots completely to focus on the next thing, often at the expense of the musketeers even being on screen. The jokes about the french royalty being all silly in attire is good the first time, not so important the third or fourth.
And when the film ends it does the cocky move of thinking there's going to be a sequel so everything feels a little bit like a TV action drama. Just...focus on finishing the first movie strongly because it seems to wrap up 10 minutes quicker than what we get.
So in the end we have a movie where the cast does all it can to make up for the director's mistakes, but the Disney one is better. Now I need to see all the older ones, and even that Man In the Iron Mask movie with Jordan Bellfort.
Waltz was disappointing as the Cardinal, Tim Curry's over-shadows his performance. I felt no menace from him.
Harry Dresden on
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TexiKenDammit!That fish really got me!Registered Userregular
Well they set up the Cardinal for a lot more but he never gets to do anything. He was much more believable as the King's advisor, but then again don't show the Cardinal fencing like he's super #1 fencer and then not let it bear fruit.
All the villains kind of lost screentime in favor of showing the teen king with his weird mustache and pouting trying to hit on Juno Temple.
Well they set up the Cardinal for a lot more but he never gets to do anything. He was much more believable as the King's advisor, but then again don't show the Cardinal fencing like he's super #1 fencer and then not let it bear fruit.
It wasn't that. In every scene he never evokes terror like Curry's did. Curry's Cardinal could drink tea and look like a super-villain.
All the villains kind of lost screentime in favor of showing the teen king with his weird mustache and pouting trying to hit on Juno Temple.
Why do you keep referring to Eli as a she? It is made exceedingly obvious in the book that he is a castrated boy, and as far as I remember it's also made clear in the swedish movie.
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AstaerethIn the belly of the beastRegistered Userregular
Why do you keep referring to Eli as a she? It is made exceedingly obvious in the book that he is a castrated boy, and as far as I remember it's also made clear in the swedish movie.
Eli appears to present as a girl; at least, she wears female clothing (Oskar gives her his mother's dress at one point), doesn't bother to correct people who address her as female (I think the hospital attending does this), etc. She tells Oskar she's not a girl, but it's unclear whether she means her gender or her vampirism (which the movie considers more important).
Also, to discuss her character as a boy involves both spoilers and a complicated explanation, and since the movie isn't clear, I default to identifying Eli as female when writing about the film. It's not a great solution, but I don't think there are any great solutions here.
As promised, here's the wrap-up post for Killtoberfest 2: Kill Me Twice, Shame On Me. This year was much more successful than last year, even if I didn't meet my overall (highly ridiculous) goal.
Here's the full list of reviews for this year (with links to my blog, not the posts, because those are easier to find):
Best movie I hadn't seen before: Detention
Worst movie: Hellraiser IX: Revelations (runner up: Yellowbrickroad)
Best foreign film: Picnic at Hanging Rock
Find of the year: Detention (runner up: Triangle)
Scariest movie I hadn't seen before: Dark Water
Saddest movie: Dark Water (runner up: Triangle)
Funniest movie: Detention (runner up: Tucker and Dale vs. Evil)
Movie that most made me want to stand up and cheer: You're Next (runner up: Fermat's Room)
Image that'll take the longest to get out of my head: finding Megan in Megan is Missing
Best genre blender: Pitch Black
Best twist: The Ring (runner up: The Tall Man)
Worst twist: Frailty (runner up: Hellraiser VI: Hellseeker, where, surprise! you've been watching the boring version of the story)
Most improved in the last 20 minutes: Fire in the Sky (runner up: Megan is Missing)
Best found footage movie: Man Bites Dog
Worst found footage segments in a non-found footage movie: Hellraiser IX (runner up: Yellowbrickroad)
Best movie based on a Stephen King book: The Shawshank Redemption
Best death: Anthropophagus: The Grim Reaper, where the bad guy is sliced open and then collapses while defiantly eating his own intestines
Best orrery: Pitch Black
Best last 15 seconds: The Fury
Least like a horror film at all: Looking for Mr. Goodbar
Best performance, ensemble: Stoker (runner up: Birth)
Best performance, female: Diane Keaton in Looking for Mr. Goodbar (runner up: Lina Leandersson in Let the Right One In)
Best performance, male: Bruce Campbell in Bubba Ho-Tep
Best athletic performance by a werewolf (basketball): Teen Wolf
Best athletic performance by a vampire (free-climbing): Let the Right One In
Worst athletic performance by a snowman (moving): Jack Frost
Best Elvis impersonation: Bruce Campbell in Bubba Ho-Tep
Worst Elvis impersonation: TIE, everyone else in everything else
Best Harrison Ford impersonation: Dennis Quaid in Pandorum
Most surprisingly not terrible performance, male: Dane Cook in Detention
Most surprisingly not terrible performance, female: Chloe Moretz in Carrie
Sexiest piano-playing: Stoker
Best scene: Mr. Dark in the library, Something Wicked This Way Comes
Best cinematography: Let the Right One In (runner up: Evil Dead and Detention)
Best sound design: Stoker
Best editing: Detention
Best screenplay: The Ring (runner up: Pitch Black)
Best director: Chan-Wook Park, Stoker (runner up: David Fincher, Gone Girl)
Best score: The Ring
Worst score: Teen Wolf (runner up: Eyes Without a Face)
Best production design: The Haunting (runner up: The Call of Cthulhu)
Best remake: Evil Dead
Best movie that happened to be a remake: The Ring
Movie that most needs a remake: Something Wicked This Way Comes (runner up: The Bad Seed)
Biggest value X, where X = (time between set-up and punchline of joke / humor value of joke): Dog Soldiers
My favorite review: Let the Right One In (runner up: Triangle)
Best movie that won no other category here: Night of the Living Dead (runner up: Ils)
What should you watch on Netflix right the hell now: Detention (runner up: The Conspiracy)
Thanks again to everyone for reading, watching, discussing, and encouraging! Tune in next October for Killtoberfest 3: The ReKillening!
can someone give @Astaereth an award or medal for being one of the most underappreciated movie reviewers on the web?
If this forum is the only place where those reviews are collected then the internet is being robbed of a serious treasure.
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AstaerethIn the belly of the beastRegistered Userregular
Thank you all for the kind words!
I typically use this forum as the first draft or the first place for posts that go on my blog, so there's plenty of stuff archived there for the curious, including last year's Killtoberfest, some other random movie stuff, board game reviews, Game of Thrones reviews, etc. Following that is a great way to support me and keep up with any writing I do that doesn't originate here.
Somewhat tangential: does anyone here know of a good app or website where you create a watch list for when certain films, directors or actors are on TV (ideally it should let you define the channels to check - in my case it'd be UK, German and Swiss channels) and then alerts you a week or two in advance?
"Nothing is gonna save us forever but a lot of things can save us today." - Night in the Woods
So in the end we have a movie where the cast does all it can to make up for the director's mistakes, but the Disney one is better. Now I need to see all the older ones, and even that Man In the Iron Mask movie with Jordan Bellfort.
There's a BluRay set of the first two Lester ones, so....! As others said, they're seriously great.
Holy shit! All the time these past two weeks you guys have been talking about Nightcrawler I just assumed it was some Xmen spinoff ("comic book movie? into the trash it goes"), I've never even heard of this crime movie it actually is?
's cool though, since you're saying it's good? It's nice to have a see-worthy Gyllenhaal movie to look forward to.
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No-QuarterNothing To FearBut Fear ItselfRegistered Userregular
Posts
Fallen utopia meant to save humanity that has a retrofuturistic aesthetic set in an unusual location with a morally dubious protagonist and an enormous plot twist involving the leader of the utopia.
So, that was enough to keep me in my seat. My issue?
Shitty Tumblr:lighthouse1138.tumblr.com
Sometimes it seems like it's not Asian cinema until someone has magic powers.
It felt like it was a lazy justification for making the Security expert's daughter useful. And for that matter, if the Security expert was so dangerous, why not just kill him?
Also, I feel like the sense of scale on the Snowpiercer itself was never very well shown? That said, I did like the weird culture that developed in the 20 or so years humanity has been just the passengers of the train.
Shitty Tumblr:lighthouse1138.tumblr.com
Now I'm sad yet again we'll never get a sequel.
In Australia we don't get Big Hero 6 until boxing day.
What the F
The catch here is that in Australia, we're talking about kangaroo boxing.
A fantastic one. But as movies I give my nod to John Wick. As film Nightcrawler is the clear winner.
The transgression usually is having sex while being horny teenagers.
There have been rumblings about a sequel. Still, it is wise to remain cynical until it appears.
I admit to never seeing it when it came out because it was right on the cusp of the cynical 90's and I was all, "pfft, a Disney live action movie is for babies," and I think it didn't do too well back then either (but wasn't a Cutthroat Island), but wow if this probably had more violence than the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. And I think this is where their marketing failed pretty big. I was expecting sword fights to end with punch knockouts and props from the environment, but nope, they kill people. A lot of people.
They might not show a lot of blood but Jack Bauer is in his infancy here (complete with drinking problem), Charlie Sheen is Monsignor Martinez only french, and Oliver Platt steals scenes and shows us how cool a gun sword really is, take that Final Fantasy 8. And Rebbecca De Mornay is all nice and Tim Curry has so many excellent one liners, and Michael Wincott is the best of all as Rochefort (and I just realized he was in 24 Live Another Day so the cycle continues decades later!). The only downside is Chris O'Donnell being the lead character, and really can't land his role as teen heartthrob upstart musketeer. But everyone else is just so good it doesn't matter.
The film even has a french dandy played by a british guy hamming it up so it's double dandy replete with makeup, a move so intentionally corny the film is daring you to really get upset about it or just go along with the setup of everyone sometimes having accents, but the cool guys are the Americans because what, say something.
It was 1993 so some of the stunts are a little too apparent in stunt doubles, and only the DeMornay romance subplot actually deserves to be in the film compared to the others, but I guess that's the break of having to have Bryan Adams, Rod Stewart and Sting sing their super important rock ballad. On the plus side the sound editing is top notch, with a nice original score that should be pilfered more by movies and commercials.
Now I'm going to waste all this goodwill and watch that other Three Musketeers movie from 2011 by Resident Evil guy and gal.
Shitty Tumblr:lighthouse1138.tumblr.com
It's got a few odd bits, like some weird joke about washing a girl's feet, but the fights are the best and it's full of good fun. There's a couple sequels too: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073012/ and http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098194/?ref_=tt_rec_tt
Highly recommend checking them out.
I too love that movie. It's light and fun without being silly and a great family movie.
And the cast is incredible.
Charlton Heston as Richelieu
Faye Dunaway as Milady
Christopher Lee as Rochefort
Richard Chamberlain as Aramis
Frank Finlay as Porthos
Michael York as D'artagnan
Oliver Reed really stretching himself to play the drunk, belligerent Athos
Raquel Welch as Constance
Roy Kinnear as Planchet
And Spike Milligan in the movie for no good reason other than he's hilarious
They remain the best Musketeer movies by miles and miles and miles.
Choose Your Own Chat 1 Choose Your Own Chat 2 Choose Your Own Chat 3
So a reverse John Wick.
I'm with you. Watched the first and didn't walk out of it in the cinema but should of.
When I then watched Me, Myeslf and Irene I did walk out.
I made a game, it has penguins in it. It's pay what you like on Gumroad.
Currently Ebaying Nothing at all but I might do in the future.
That movie had the moment where my wife and I were squinting at the screen going "Is that Orlando Bloom?" and then later when another character turned up saying "Ah, no THAT'S Orlando Bloom"
I made a game, it has penguins in it. It's pay what you like on Gumroad.
Currently Ebaying Nothing at all but I might do in the future.
I have an appreciation for great movies, whether they be big sprawlers like Inception or something a bit more intimate like Aronofsky's earier things. But I also love me some stupid shit.
I like it a lot.
It was kind of uneven, like the final act didn't freak me out too much.
The forest and the hotel room? Dear god.
Try February.
And we don't get John Wick until 2015 either.
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On your request I watched V/H/S
Well, actually I watched the sequel.
I have to say, it was an interesting film (though I'm quickly tiring of "found film" horror), but it didn't really make....sense, I guess. I can appreciate the concept of the film, but I think all of the mini-films worked at cross-purposes, especially couched in the overall narrative of the movie.
I haven't seen the first one, so maybe it works better, but the sequel was very strange. I really enjoyed each individual film, for the most part, but I guess I really didn't enjoy the framing of the private investigator, and the final scene was just campy and stupid.
Anyway, all that to say this (in spoilers) about Jason Eisner's short film
I guess I would recommend, if you could, to watch the short films on their own in V/H/S 2. I know Eisner's short is on Vimeo, but I don't know about the others.
Here's the full list of reviews for this year (with links to my blog, not the posts, because those are easier to find):
And here are my awards:
Best movie I hadn't seen before: Detention
Worst movie: Hellraiser IX: Revelations (runner up: Yellowbrickroad)
Best foreign film: Picnic at Hanging Rock
Find of the year: Detention (runner up: Triangle)
Scariest movie I hadn't seen before: Dark Water
Saddest movie: Dark Water (runner up: Triangle)
Funniest movie: Detention (runner up: Tucker and Dale vs. Evil)
Movie that most made me want to stand up and cheer: You're Next (runner up: Fermat's Room)
Image that'll take the longest to get out of my head: finding Megan in Megan is Missing
Best genre blender: Pitch Black
Best twist: The Ring (runner up: The Tall Man)
Worst twist: Frailty (runner up: Hellraiser VI: Hellseeker, where, surprise! you've been watching the boring version of the story)
Most improved in the last 20 minutes: Fire in the Sky (runner up: Megan is Missing)
Best found footage movie: Man Bites Dog
Worst found footage segments in a non-found footage movie: Hellraiser IX (runner up: Yellowbrickroad)
Best movie based on a Stephen King book: The Shawshank Redemption
Best death: Anthropophagus: The Grim Reaper, where the bad guy is sliced open and then collapses while defiantly eating his own intestines
Best orrery: Pitch Black
Best last 15 seconds: The Fury
Least like a horror film at all: Looking for Mr. Goodbar
Best performance, ensemble: Stoker (runner up: Birth)
Best performance, female: Diane Keaton in Looking for Mr. Goodbar (runner up: Lina Leandersson in Let the Right One In)
Best performance, male: Bruce Campbell in Bubba Ho-Tep
Best athletic performance by a werewolf (basketball): Teen Wolf
Best athletic performance by a vampire (free-climbing): Let the Right One In
Worst athletic performance by a snowman (moving): Jack Frost
Best Elvis impersonation: Bruce Campbell in Bubba Ho-Tep
Worst Elvis impersonation: TIE, everyone else in everything else
Best Harrison Ford impersonation: Dennis Quaid in Pandorum
Most surprisingly not terrible performance, male: Dane Cook in Detention
Most surprisingly not terrible performance, female: Chloe Moretz in Carrie
Sexiest piano-playing: Stoker
Best scene: Mr. Dark in the library, Something Wicked This Way Comes
Best cinematography: Let the Right One In (runner up: Evil Dead and Detention)
Best sound design: Stoker
Best editing: Detention
Best screenplay: The Ring (runner up: Pitch Black)
Best director: Chan-Wook Park, Stoker (runner up: David Fincher, Gone Girl)
Best score: The Ring
Worst score: Teen Wolf (runner up: Eyes Without a Face)
Best production design: The Haunting (runner up: The Call of Cthulhu)
Best remake: Evil Dead
Best movie that happened to be a remake: The Ring
Movie that most needs a remake: Something Wicked This Way Comes (runner up: The Bad Seed)
Biggest value X, where X = (time between set-up and punchline of joke / humor value of joke): Dog Soldiers
My favorite review: Let the Right One In (runner up: Triangle)
Best movie that won no other category here: Night of the Living Dead (runner up: Ils)
What should you watch on Netflix right the hell now: Detention (runner up: The Conspiracy)
Thanks again to everyone for reading, watching, discussing, and encouraging! Tune in next October for Killtoberfest 3: The ReKillening!
You're getting your Bard's confused with your Legolas's
The main cast is mostly excellent. Ray Stevenson is always a treat, Luke Evans psychs everyone out as Orlando Bloom until Orlando Bloom does show up as French Wario, Madds Mikelson is a good Rochefort, Christoph Waltz brings his own touches to being the Cardinal. Milla Jovavich is mostly good as Milady but it is very apparent she gets more screentime because she's married to the director and gets a lot of the fancy solo time because hey, it's 2011 women can do anything men can do girl power (this might not be the film's intention but it really comes across this way). Particularly in the first 2/3rds the film feels like it's cutting out moments from the big 3 and instead leaving in a lot of Milady stuff to show kewl steampunk stuff and feats that just weren't done then but Assassins Creed did it so it's totally accurate, which I'll return to. And the comic relief is very bad with James Corden, now anointed as the new Ricky Gervais by Hollywood, being the whipping boy manservant of the musketeers, with forced David Brent-like awkward humor complete with the durability of fat guy loser tossed in for good measure. For a movie that really wanted to be the cool kid at the lunchtable it does a lot of things that make it much more of what you think a Disney film is than the '93 version.
Like the 93 version Darquetanian isn't well cast, only double so because this guy really seemed like he never even did menial labor in his life, he's the sparkly vampire musketeer wunderkind. But unlike the Disney version this film pushes him a lot more, with a romance that never feels reciprocated, but the chick simply using the guy's desire for her to do the job she requests.
But the frustrating thing is that the film picks up a good head of steam multiple times then wastes it all a minute later because it's trying to be fancier than what the period calls for. You have all these elaborate traps done more to show off special effects than being practical, devices that I'm going to say are steampunk even though they're a little too soon because the film thinks it needs something to catch our eyes, so airships! Razor wire set up like laser beams complete with spy doing impossible acrobatics! Mission Impossible wire drops! Machine gun cannons! What also happens quite a bit is the film just drops plots completely to focus on the next thing, often at the expense of the musketeers even being on screen. The jokes about the french royalty being all silly in attire is good the first time, not so important the third or fourth.
And when the film ends it does the cocky move of thinking there's going to be a sequel so everything feels a little bit like a TV action drama. Just...focus on finishing the first movie strongly because it seems to wrap up 10 minutes quicker than what we get.
So in the end we have a movie where the cast does all it can to make up for the director's mistakes, but the Disney one is better. Now I need to see all the older ones, and even that Man In the Iron Mask movie with Jordan Bellfort.
All the villains kind of lost screentime in favor of showing the teen king with his weird mustache and pouting trying to hit on Juno Temple.
It wasn't that. In every scene he never evokes terror like Curry's did. Curry's Cardinal could drink tea and look like a super-villain.
I liked that. It humanized the king.
I love this one, but one question comes to mind.
Also, to discuss her character as a boy involves both spoilers and a complicated explanation, and since the movie isn't clear, I default to identifying Eli as female when writing about the film. It's not a great solution, but I don't think there are any great solutions here.
can someone give @Astaereth an award or medal for being one of the most underappreciated movie reviewers on the web?
Yeah @Astaereth, just want to say that I love your reviews, especially the in-depth analysis ones. Keep it up!
PSN: jrrl_absent
I typically use this forum as the first draft or the first place for posts that go on my blog, so there's plenty of stuff archived there for the curious, including last year's Killtoberfest, some other random movie stuff, board game reviews, Game of Thrones reviews, etc. Following that is a great way to support me and keep up with any writing I do that doesn't originate here.
As for medals...
"Nothing is gonna save us forever but a lot of things can save us today." - Night in the Woods
There's a BluRay set of the first two Lester ones, so....! As others said, they're seriously great.
's cool though, since you're saying it's good? It's nice to have a see-worthy Gyllenhaal movie to look forward to.
Started watching it. Got through the hotel.
Damn, just, damn.
I also may or may not also have a awkward crush on that actress now.