What have you watched recently: Electric Boogaloo

Decuc500

Rocky Balboa

Pretty good instalment in the Rocky franchise. I thought it started off a bit too maudlin with Rocky looking back on his past and reflecting on his life with the now deceased Adrian.
But it picked up eventually when the challenge bout was organised and the Rocky theme kicked in for the inevitable training montage.

Excalibur

My first time seeing this (HMV exclusive Blu Ray picked up in London). I was very impressed. It had a very stylised look to it, some really beautiful shots. The score was very dramatic.
It reminded me of was Michael Mann's The Keep (a good thing!) and even if the story was a bit meandering the visuals kept me hooked.

j.s. pill II

Disobedience (2018)

Some minor flaws aside, this was superb.



would really love to hear more of the choral music from that film - anyone know where I might find this or something similar??

8mv

The Way Way Back
I had this in my 'un-played' pile for a long time - years actually and finally put in on. Pretty decent coming of age / morality tale / feelgood movie. A young boy's enforced and miserable summer vacation with his Mother (Toni Colette) and her new boyfriend (Steve Carell). Finds a home from home in a local water park, managed by a wisecracking Sam Rockwell. Alison Janney almost steals it with her handful of scenes.
7/10

spodoinkle

Salo 120 Days of Sodom

I don't know what was worse, the feast scene or the cross eyed dude.

pixelburp

The Christmas Chronicles (2018)

My wife un-ironically loves cheesy Xmas movies, so each year has a playlist ready of the Netflix's finest offerings I thought I'd give this one a whirl, purely out of curiousity over Kurt Russell playing Santa. It was ... weird.

Russell himself was an absolute blast, and gave a performance with plenty of gusto and charm: his Santa was funny, sarky & self-aware, but still endearing. Think the ultimate Cool Uncle. If there's a sequel - and going by the apparently viral success of the film, I imagine there will be - Netflix would be fools not to focus more on Russell's Mr. Claus.

Everything else in the film was a bit of a mess, crashing between low-rent treacle (the type the Americans like to describe as an "after school special"), poor CGI'ed elves that were shameless Minions knock-offs, and jarring tones during the various scenes in downtown Chicago.

Stick with the 'fish out of water' comedy via Santa in our world, drop the saccharine plotting, and a sequel could be a bonafide Xmas classic

Tony EH

'Red Road'

Andrea Arnold's treacle paced suspense plays out interestingly, if infuriating at times, as the viewer isn't in on why the main character, Jackie (a brilliant Kate Dickie), is doing what she's doing and you are often left wondering why she's putting herself in so much potential peril throughout the film. The reveal at the end let's you know why. Jackie works for a surveillance company that uses Britain's myriad of CCTV street cameras to observe the streets of Glasgow and she sees, one day, a man who she takes a special, and dangerous, interest in.

'Red Road' is rough, nasty and real, even though the events are extraordinary to most people. I'm not sure if it works in its entirety and there's a sense of unnecessary explicitness about a particular scene, but it's a relatively absorbing watch.


7/10


'Zombie'

When a crew-less boat enters New York harbour, the events it kickstarts lead intrepid reporter, Peter West (Ian McCulloch), and the boat owner's daughter Anne (Tisa Farrow) to the Island of Matul, where the bodies of long dead Conquistadores are rising up from their graves to chow down on unfortunate Caribbean residents.

Lucio Fulci's ridiculous and quite fantastic cheapo undead epic from 1979, which kicked off a whole cycle of zombie/cannibal exploitation pictures that lasted well into the 80's. 'Zombie', or 'Zombie Flesh Eaters' as I've always known it as, is Italian exploitation cinema's king flick. A badly acted, badly paced, badly directed masterpiece that never fails to entertain, if you're in the right frame of mind.

It's as silly as it sounds, but it doesn't stop it from being wildly amusing. Made for a paltry $500,000, 'Zombie' is surprisingly well shot and looks like it was made for much more. It's special effects are gruesome, especially for the time, and there's a real OTT nature to everything. The showcase zombies are creepy and the guts they spill are in glorious deep red. Special mention should go to the utterly ludicrous zombie vs shark sequence, where a stuntman in zombie makeup squares off with an, honest to shit, tiger shark! Remarkable stuff.

It's hard to mark 'Zombie' with an out of 10, because I have a personal history with the film. Since I first discovered the film on the shelves of a tiny video shop when I was a child and its subsequent banning under the infamous video nasties bill, I became a little obsessed with tracking down the film. During the late 80's and well into the 90's I scoured everywhere I could to buy an uncut copy, but to no avail. Where once the video was everywhere, it was nowhere to be found by that stage. Vipco released a heavily cut version on video in the mid 90's, but that was pointless. I eventually settled for an awful looking pirate copy that I bought from some guy in Belfast. But it wasn't until the advent of DVD and the internet, that I could get a legit copy that didn't look like it was filmed on a potato. These days there's a list as long as your arm of various releases of 'Zombi', 'Zombi 2', 'Zombie', 'Zombie Flesh Eaters', or whatever it's called in your neck of the woods. The latest is a 4K transfer on blu-ray, from Blue Underground, and the film has never looked better. It positively destroys the previous benchmark release from Arrow Video in 2012 and it, more than likely, looks better than it did in most cinemas in 1979.

I wouldn't recommend 'Zombie' to everyone, though. Most modern zombie fans would think it quaint, most film fans would think it stupid and there would be plenty of people still appalled by it's gory effects. But, if you want to check out something like this, you probably know what type of schlock the film is already, if you haven't already seen it by now.

TerrorFirmer

Is that the one with the infamous boat propeller to the face scene? It's been at least a decade since I watched all those films and the host of cheaper knock-offs, but I really enjoyed them all for what they are.

I remember one, might have been Zombi 3, where a) one character goes from speaking with a Jamacian accent to an american one and b) zombies go from shuffling around like the undead to being lighting fast ninjas leaping over walls, etc.

Fysh

Re Zombi (which I know mainly as Zombie Flesh Eaters) - I remember the scene in the doorway (with the splinter) being tense and having good effects, but I can't rewatch the film at this point because its various significant faults (made worse by having seen more Fulci films in between first and subsequent viewings, which made his limitations as a director more obvious) are now too glaring to overlook, for me.

Having said that, I first saw it in the early 2000s on DVD so can't really comment on what effect it would've had on original release.

Fysh

Recently, I have watched:

Mortal Engines - what a load of pish. A film whose core premise is "What if Mad Max Fury Road, but with entire towns and cities as vehicles?" is not, in fact, what the film is about - so the best bits of the film are the sequence from the trailer in which London captures a smaller city attempting to outrun it. It's problem is not that the plot is ludicrous (which it is, in bafflingly stupid ways even for a film about "municipal darwinism"), but that it's not entertaining enough. The CGI is rarely better than mediocre, the action is anything but visceral too much of the time, and the characters have the depth of your average puddle. In time someone will make a good 5-10 minute short out of this set to the score from Fury Road; frankly, I'd say wait for that rather than wasting money or time on it at the cinema.

Cold In July - a superior crime thriller about a man who finds his life spiralling out of control after he shoots an intruder in his home. Well-plotted, with engaging dialogue and characters, one aspect I particularly liked with this is that it seems to be a "What's in his past?" story in the vein of A History Of Violence for a while, before veering in a different direction. A pleasant surprise.

Sorry To Bother You - well, that was an anarchic delight from start to finish. Someone sent me the teaser at the start of the year and I've been wanting to see it since then, and it didn't disappoint. It's such a delight to see a film which keeps its surprises for the film rather than spilling all in the first trailer; indeed the main thing I'd say about it is - "don't read anything about it, just go to see it".

Tony EH

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Is that the one with the infamous boat propeller to the face scene? It's been at least a decade since I watched all those films and the host of cheaper knock-offs, but I really enjoyed them all for what they are.

No and I can't remember what that film is but it rings a bell. But, as Fysh says, it is the one with the splinter in the eye scene, that still looks icky.

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

I remember one, might have been Zombi 3, where a) one character goes from speaking with a Jamacian accent to an american one and b) zombies go from shuffling around like the undead to being lighting fast ninjas leaping over walls, etc.

The only thing I can remember from that film is the flying zombie head.

greencap

Don't usually peruse this forum.

But, came here tonight looking for recommendations.

Anyway. A recent good one on tv was 'black sea'. (Jude law)

Submarine based action thriller.

Good solid watch if you like (v.semi) plausible action. Fun film, probably not going to be your lifetime favorite, but well worth a watch if you're stuck for a decent film.

3.5/5.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3eBpt6bRX0

buried

Eyes Wide Shut (1999)

I like to sit down and watch this in the run up to Christmas and I think this film is highly underrated by general audiences and is a total classic masterpiece. The film is set around Christmas but the whole thing is just a fantastic magical otherworldly dream/nightmare-scape, a modern grimm fairytale for grown adults. Its hard to fathom what scenes you are watching are dreams/visions in the Cruise characters own insecure and guilt ridden mind or his portrayed actual "reality" on screen.

The orgy house for example,

one moment Cruise's character is wandering around the house witnessing all the high class depravity, he is ushered out of a room filled with the masked people glawping at the depravity and into another room where all the masked orgy goers are standing there a split second later glawping at him. Also stuff like the ridiculous dialogue and the "take off your clothes please" demands in the throne room-

definite dreamscape/nightmare material. The film is riddled with this sort of stuff but its easy to miss a great deal of it and its great fun watching it with your eyes WIDE OPEN and trying to find many more hidden themes and all the visual easter egg stuff within it. Scenes of actual New York city footage intercut with the fake city streets shot over in the UK, which had to be done anyways, but ends up adding even more to the acute bizarreness of the whole work!

A good few scenes in this I always end up bursting my ar$e laughing at random weird characters, Marion Nathonson's Tom Cruise lookalike fiance, Sandor Szavost the slick rick vampire man, Alan Cummings weird creepy hotel desk clerk, its all like a bizarre adult Disney fairytale cartoon, that's the best way to watch it and its perfect for Christmas viewing. 10/10

branie2

Aquaman at the cinema yesterday evening. I thought it was very good.

fin12

buried wrote: »

Eyes Wide Shut (1999)

I like to sit down and watch this in the run up to Christmas and I think this film is highly underrated by general audiences and is a total classic masterpiece. The film is set around Christmas but the whole thing is just a fantastic magical otherworldly dream/nightmare-scape, a modern grimm fairytale for grown adults. Its hard to fathom what scenes you are watching are dreams/visions in the Cruise characters own insecure and guilt ridden mind or his portrayed actual "reality" on screen.

The orgy house for example,

one moment Cruise's character is wandering around the house witnessing all the high class depravity, he is ushered out of a room filled with the masked people glawping at the depravity and into another room where all the masked orgy goers are standing there a split second later glawping at him. Also stuff like the ridiculous dialogue and the "take off your clothes please" demands in the throne room-

definite dreamscape/nightmare material. The film is riddled with this sort of stuff but its easy to miss a great deal of it and its great fun watching it with your eyes WIDE OPEN and trying to find many more hidden themes and all the visual easter egg stuff within it. Scenes of actual New York city footage intercut with the fake city streets shot over in the UK, which had to be done anyways, but ends up adding even more to the acute bizarreness of the whole work!

A good few scenes in this I always end up bursting my ar$e laughing at random weird characters, Marion Nathonson's Tom Cruise lookalike fiance, Sandor Szavost the slick rick vampire man, Alan Cummings weird creepy hotel desk clerk, its all like a bizarre adult Disney fairytale cartoon, that's the best way to watch it and its perfect for Christmas viewing. 10/10

That film is crap and a film you’d only watch once if even.

buried

fin12 wrote: »

That film is crap and a film you’d only watch once if even.

Crap argument cousin

Tony EH

'First Man'

A film that's as cold and aloof as Ryan Gosling's performance, Damien Chazelle's 'First Man' is a curious affair. For such a monumental achievement, it remains a very lacklustre account and comes across as mightily underwhelming. It's perplexing, as the ingredients all seem to be there. But, at the end of the film, I was sort of glad it was done.

There's nothing wrong with the film in any general sense, although I'd question how accurate a portrayal of Neil Armstrong it was, and the events play out in a relatively ok manner, but it all seemed very perfunctory and in some places, rather dull.

It's directed well, looks fantastic, and contrasting Gosling's pretty vacant turn, there's a genuinely pleasing performance from Claire Foy as Janet Armstrong. But, I couldn't help but feel that it was all terribly uninvolving. There's also one or two queer portrayals in the film, apart from the central character. Was Buzz Armstrong really an arse? Maybe he was, but it certainly didn't feel right.

Perhaps I was expecting 'The Right Stuff', but just got some..."stuff"?

5/10


'Village of the Damned'

It'll come as no surprise to anyone here, if anyone reads this nonsense, that I'm quite the John Carpenter fan. But, I've never been blind to his faults either. The man has incredible highs and terrible lows, but even his lows are interesting enough. But, two films of his that I've never cared enough to even bother with (not in their entirety anyway) have been 'Starman', 'Memoirs of an Invisible Man', and his 1995 remake of 'Village of the Damned'.

If Carpenter is to be believed, he reluctantly took on the job to remake the 1960 British Sci-Fi classic because of some vague contractual obligation and wasn't that enthused about it. The resulting film shows all the hallmarks of that lack of enthusiasm too as it is incredibly mediocre on such a deep level that you'd genuinely question if it was directed by the same person that made 'The Thing'. Everything about 'Village of the Damned' is so bog standard you'd be forgiven if you checked the back of the box a number of times to see if Carpenter's name was really on there. But on there it is, along with Superman, Mrs Crocodile Dundee, Luke Skywalker and...er...Kirsty Alley.

The story runs pretty much along the same lines as the original, A village falls asleep in a strange manner and when they wake up, they find that a number of women are mysteriously pregnant. Later they give birth to odd looking white haired children, who have a hyper intellect and other worldly powers which they use for malevolent purposes.

There are a number of deviations from the 1960 movie, but not many and there's nothing too wild going on. But, the film is just so entrenched in that awful, and insipid, 90's period, which was probably the worst decade for horror movies, because the MPAA exerted an iron grip over what film makers could show. But, in fairness, the sins of 'Village of the Damned' transcend it's limiting timeframe and it would have been an unmemorable outing no matter when it was made. It's 90 minutes felt much longer and more than once I had to stop myself from admiring Linda Kozlowski and return back to the story.

I suppose if one had never heard of 'The Midwich Cookoos' or the 1960 'Village of the Damned', then there might be something in this film for them and going in with a clear mind might benefit the viewer. But if you've seen the older film, it's impossible not to draw comparisons and, ultimately, negative conclusions.

2/10


'Barry Lyndon'

Stanley Kubrick's often overlooked epic about an Irish rogue, who sees his fortunes rise and fall during the Seven Years War in Europe. 'Barry Lyndon' features some of Kubrick's most obsessive work and everything from the likes of costuming, characters, music, locations and lighting are all superbly handled. Although I feel he could have been a good bit more pedantic about Ryan O'Neal's wandering "Irish" accent. The film looks magnificent too (on the Criterion Blu-ray) and genuinely feels like a glimpse into mid 18th Century. At times it's like looking at a Gainsborough or Hogarth painting in motion and coupled with the excellent choices in music, such as the central motifs of Handel's Sarabande and Schubert's Piano Trio No.2, it makes for very admirable viewing.

Where 'Barry Lyndon' may let itself down, though, is in it's sloth-like pace. Kubrick is in no hurry to get Redmond Barry - or us - anywhere and his deliberate unwinding of Thackeray's tale may be far too slow for many people. But, it's hard not to be impressed by the sheer, stubborn, sense of commitment to the production.

Acting wise, it's unfortunate that the central character comes off as the worst. Ryan O'Neal does his best with what is a fairly unlikeable guy, but his aforementioned vocals leave a lot to be desired from a native Irish man, it has to be said. It's fair to say that his lack of mastery of the accent becomes less and less important as the story progresses, but it's nonetheless slightly grating on the ear. Elsewhere, O'Neal is supported brilliantly by the always excellent Leonard Rossiter (as the pompous British Captain John Quin), the creepily voiced Patrick Magee (as Barry's partner in genteel crime, the Chevalier du Balibari), the stiff and militaristic Hardy Kruger (as Prussian Captain Potzdorf) and the beautiful Marissa Berenson (who exudes an effortless sexiness under a ton of clothing and cancer causing lead based white makeup).

'Barry Lyndon' is certainly not for everyone and, in fact, it's difficult to imagine young audiences of 1975 sitting still for its 3 hour running time, never mind the iPhone obsessed movie-goers of today. But, it has its own rewards for a viewer who's patient enough to simply watch a well told story unfold in a artistically crafted film.

9/10

branie2

I enjoyed Eyes Wide Shut as well

buried

Watching Barry Lyndon myself later tonight, just finished watching Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb 10/10

Having a Merry Kubrick Christmass!

Tony EH

Tony EH wrote: »

'First Man'

A film that's as cold and aloof as Ryan Gosling's performance, Damien Chazelle's 'First Man' is a curious affair.

I am at a loss as to why ryan gosling is a popular actor or considered a good actor. One expression, no charisma, the definition of wooden. I suppose the ladies must love his mystery...

Tony EH

Deleted User wrote: »

I am at a loss as to why ryan gosling is a popular actor or considered a good actor. One expression, no charisma, the definition of wooden. I suppose the ladies must love his mystery...

Yeh, it's an odd one. He's not a terrible actor by any means, but he's one note. I've been watching him since I saw 'The Believer' nearly 20 years ago and even in that film his acting was praised. But, also back then it was the same schtick. Moody looks at the camera with hound dog eyes.

He has an act and he sticks to it, I suppose. In that way he kind of reminds me of Kevin Costner. A one trick pony (acting wise), that has a certain weight with a lot of people.

Tony EH

buried wrote: »

Watching Barry Lyndon myself later tonight, just finished watching Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb 10/10

*Ben Kenobi voice*

Now there's a film I haven't seen in a long time.

buried wrote: »

Having a Merry Kubrick Christmass!

Not a bad way to spend it.

I might chuck on 'Lolita' this evening. The only Kubrick film I've never seen all the way through for some reason.

joombo

I watched that new Spider Man the other day and it wasn't that bad, still not my cup of tea as not a fan of movies with just animations, prefer real actors, definitely lots of spider webs throughout the movie, I'd give it 6.5/10

CastorTroy

Saw Lara Croft: Tomb Raider was on Universal when I was browsing. So decided to watch.
Have seen it before but as far as treasure hunting/adventure movies go, I enjoyed it. Don't get many these days. Though I never understand why the good guy gets the item to unlock the great power the bad guy wants and doesn't destroy it. Especially since they just end up destroying the weapon itself later on.

Oh and Universal is crap for movies with pointless editing of their movies

Liam McPoyle

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Is that the one with the infamous boat propeller to the face scene?

That's Dr Butcher : MD aka Zombie Holocaust, nowhere near as entertaining as Zombie Flesh Eaters which is for my money at least, the best non Romero zombie gut muncher.

I've held off upgrading to the Blue Underground 4k scan as I'd imagine Arrow will release it them selves at some point in the future and I'm a complete whore for their special editions.

Sugarlumps

Camping - Brace yourself for a holiday to remember. A group of old friends go on a camping holiday in Devon to celebrate a landmark birthday. However, tensions and emotions quickly start to rise.

Tony EH

Tony EH wrote: »

He has an act and he sticks to it, I suppose. In that way he kind of reminds me of Kevin Costner. A one trick pony (acting wise), that has a certain weight with a lot of people.

Always the hate for Costner :pac: I find him charismatic, I think he has a presence on screen that commands attention. Thinking about it his range of emotion is pretty slim, but one trick pony is harsh to say the least! Recently Yellowstone was really enjoyable

Tony EH

Deleted User wrote: »

Always the hate for Costner :pac: I find him charismatic, I think he has a presence on screen that commands attention. Thinking about it his range of emotion is pretty slim, but one trick pony is harsh to say the least! Recently Yellowstone was really enjoyable

Nah, I don't hate Costner. In fact, I think he has a couple of very good pictures. 'Dances with Wolves' is excellent.

But yeh, he's not Keanu Reeves, but he's got no range to speak of.

johnny_ultimate

Howdy all.

We've reached the 10,000 post limit on this thread (honestly we're one post off but who's counting) so there's a new one over here: https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2057938835