What have you watched recently?

It's a step up from Who's That Knocking at My Door but still poor in my opinion. Packed with religious imagery from what I remember but the story never pulled me in. Barbara Hershey was fine but some poor acting from the others. Actually liked the final scene myself Pretty memorable!

Paddy Samurai wrote: »

King Kong(2005)

Watched it the weekend with the family.Seen it when it first came out.
Everyone enjoyed watching it,but it is a bit long.2 hours would have been enough.Jackson seemed to pack every saturday matinee action scene into the film.

He dies in the end

:D

what annoyed me most about the running time of Jackson's version is that he spends the first hour building all these crew member characters and most of them just vanish before it goes back to New York. its a classic case of a director over indulging themselves, the original was barely 90 minutes long told the exact same store as the 3 1/2 hour version Jackson did. I like the 2005 one overall but its got its flaws, its too much of too much in a lot of places, and it takes waaaay too long to get to the island, we dont really care about the ships crew, bring on the monkey!

krudler wrote: »

what annoyed me most about the running time of Jackson's version is that he spends the first hour building all these crew member characters and most of them just vanish before it goes back to New York. its a classic case of a director over indulging themselves, the original was barely 90 minutes long told the exact same store as the 3 1/2 hour version Jackson did. I like the 2005 one overall but its got its flaws, its too much of too much in a lot of places, and it takes waaaay too long to get to the island, we dont really care about the ships crew, bring on the monkey!

^^^ What he said... overall, I liked it... but a good hour of it should've ended up on the cutting room floor...

Renn wrote: »

From a review on IMDB:

"Boxcar Bertha also happens to be surprisingly loaded with religious references, painting Bill as a Jesus-like figure. Most obvious of these is the highly symbolic ending, but there are a number of more subtle hints. A scene somewhere in the middle opens with David Carradine standing before a biblical fresco, and later in the city Barbara Hershey stops to look at a film poster for The Man who Could Work Miracles. The religious angle is something which actually runs through all of Scorcese's work, rarely stated out loud but always under the surface."

Check out this link as well - Martin Scorsese: a biography By Vincent LoBrutto


Kinda backs up what I remember.

Interesting mate. I guess the only reason I didn't notice any religious symbolism is because the majority of it is quite subtle up to the last scene anyway.

luvbulmers01 wrote: »

The Two Escobars: A documentary about Pablo Escobar and Andres Escobar a Columbian footballer who was murdered after the 94 World Cup.

It tells the story of Pablo Escobars rise and murder, while also telling Anres Escobars story of his rise in football to his murder. Neither were related but it shows how much the the drug money in Columbia was a big factor in Columbias rise in the football world, and while not making Pablo Escobar out to be a saint it shows some of the atrocitys he commited it also show the good he done in his own community to help the poor and how after his death Columbia spiralled out of control.

A must watch id say even if your not a football fan or the Pablo Escobar story is of no interest its a story told in a fascinating way showing what life in Columbia was like at the time.

Yes, a very good doc... it's part of the ESPN 30-for-30 series which are, in the main, all excellent... The Two Escobars is certainly one of the best of the lot - quite horrifying but riveting at the same time.

luvbulmers01 wrote: »

Oh right id never heard of any of these until I stumbled across the Two Escobars today, is there any youd recommend?

I've actually watched em all!

Of course, Sod's Law, I can hardly think of any now! There's one called Once Brothers about Eastern European basketball players Vlade Divac, Drazan Petrovic and Toni Kukoc who all made it big in the NBA but who's friendships were torn apart by the breaking up of the Eastern Bloc etc... Petrovic died tragically at 26 when he was becoming an NBA star and he and Divac never made their peace with each other... this is a particularly good one...

Others I enjoyed, there is one about Martina Navratalova and Chris Everet which was surprisingly good.... A couple of excellent ones about Gridiron players who had tragic stories - I found I didn't have to be interested in the sport in question or know anything about the subject, I enjoyed them all.

purcela wrote: »

Googled this straight after reading your comment and the 30 for 30 series sounds excellent. Did you watch them online or get them on DVD?

I bought them all on DVD from the US (it was quite alot cheaper but it did cost a US$18 Customs charge) but it was well well worth it... obviously you'll need a region-free DVD player to play these...

American Gangster. Bought the blu ray a couple of years ago and finally sat down and watched it. I really enjoyed it, great cast and brilliantly directed by Ridley Scott. The '70s atmosphere was captured very well and at just under three hours it went by very quickly.

The Man With Two Brains: Hilarious comedy with Steve Martin. Probably Reiner's and Martin's finest if I'm honest. If you haven't seen it, I can't recommend it enough.

Silent Running.

Other than some annoying folksy tunes, I enjoyed it very much. Neat ideas and effects.

just finished Melancholia, I'm sick of Von Trier now...absolute ****e. The main idea could have worked if his cast and background story wasn't so utterly nonsensical.

Tower heist, good fun and not too demanding. Very good cast work well together. I had taken a strong dislike to Ben Stiller recently but he is very good in this. Some good laughs and well worth a watch.

Gee Bag wrote: »

Have been doing a bit of a John Carpenter retorspective, watched They Live last night. Feckin' great show. Now I have to face up to the grim, grim neccessity of having to watch Vampires & Ghosts of Mars.

Unfortunately after those you'll have to contend with his most recent, The Ward. A more generic, insipid piece of film-making you'll have difficulty finding, a poor bookend to an oeuvre which, though replete with many missteps and ill-judgements, was never bland.

50/50

Best movie I've seen all year tbqh - loved every second of it.

The way it jumped from sad, depressing moments to those of sheer hilarity was excellent.

Warning: Spoilers

'The Thing'

While not a patch on Carpenter's 1982 version, the 2011 prequel is far from being the inept "premake" that a lot of fans worried it would be. The most unfortunate...er...things about 'The Thing' is it's unimaginative title, which may well cause problems for both movies in years to come. Universal may, ironically, end up calling the earlier film 'The Thing 2'...ugh.

The other worry was brought about in the Hollywood-ism of having a 20 something hottie at the centre of the story. This time in the shape of Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who plays a somewhat unbelievable 27 year old Paleontologist (Kate Lloyd), who is asked by Dr. Sander Halvorson (Eric Christian Olsen) to accompany him and his assistant (whom Kate knows) to the South Pole to investigate a "structure" and a "specimen" that has been buried in the ice for over 100,000 years and has been recently discovered by a Norwegian Antarctic research team. Obviously, the creature gets loose and causes havoc among the human members of the research team.

Winstead, though not bad in her role, grates a little, as she's a little too young to buy into and the fact that there are young female characters (there's a 20 something Norwegian sweetie too) at all swanning around Antarctica in the early 1980's needs a little suspension of disbelief. Carpenter's all male cast in the 1982 version better reflected the true nature of staff in those ice-bound research facilities. Though today, it's a very different story, of course. On the plus side, Winstead carries herself well and there's no annoying romantic sub-plot, thank Christ.

The other characters are fine in their roles too and tend to speak Norwegian to each other, but there are too many that can conveniently speak English to the "must have" Americans who are drafted into the story.

The story itself suffers somewhat from a retreading of Carpenter's version, inevitably I suppose and a lot of shots are quite similar too. The research station is very like the US station in the 1982 'The Thing' which may have been the case in real life, who knows. But it does go someway to making the prequel seem too familiar at times. But, on the plus side, it's never boring and the characters react to their situation in a relatively logical manner.

The effects are quite well done too and the CGI, though evident, doesn't overwhelm the project too much. Though it's obvious where the rubber ends and the pixels begin. The Thing itself appears in a number of crazy forms and there are a couple of gruesome deaths, but overall, Rob Bottin's physical creations are far superior than the computer generated effects here. There are a few too many "boo" scenes though and the alien isn't so much bothered with hiding from the humans as trying to kill them in spectacular ways. Carpenter's alien makes efforts to conceal itself until the game is up and it has no choice but to reveal itself.

One thing I've never understood about the "Thing" is why it never makes any effort to communicate with the human characters of either film. It's clearly an intelligent being and can absorb everything from the creatures it takes over, including language. But, suppose that wouldn't make for a very interesting film.