What have you watched recently? 3D!

bnt · 25-03-2021 10:19pm

For some reason I was reminded of L.A. Story (1991) and thought I would watch the opening again, but ended up watching the whole thing. I think it's one of Steve Martin's best films, and he apparently worked on the script for seven years. It's not all Steve all the time, with strong support from Victoria Tennant (his wife at the time), Marilu Henner Richard E. Grant and Sarah Jessica Parker.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pB2VJp0aSUE

dubstepper · 26-03-2021 3:10pm

Hadn't heard of that The Empty Man before it was trending on twitter yesterday. Looks interesting.

gmisk · 27-03-2021 3:39pm

Save yourselves!

Blurb below
A young Brooklyn couple head to an upstate cabin to unplug from their phones and reconnect with each other. Blissfully unaware of their surroundings, they are left to their own devices as the planet falls under attack.

Random little hipster sci fi comedy quite enjoyable I have to say. The two leads are really good in it.
7/10

dubstepper · 27-03-2021 4:42pm

gmisk wrote: »

Save yourselves!
...
Random little hipster sci fi comedy quite enjoyable I have to say. The two leads are really good in it.
7/10

I have it ready for viewing. 7/10 is not bad. Might put it on after various matches over today.

buried · 28-03-2021 8:38pm

The Empty Man.

Starts off well enough with a very Raiders of The Lost Ark type beginning but that was about the best of it. The next half a hour after the opening credit was decent enough but then too way way too much is shoehorned into the thing to make it in any way coherent to keep your attention. It is shot very well, very much in a 'Hereditary' style and looks very nice, but again there was way too much thrown into it in such a limited time frame, it just seemed messy as hell. It even breaks into comedy at parts. I think this would have made a better 6 part mini series than a 2 hour film, just to flesh out the plot in a more slow burn which could have worked out very well. Wouldn't be returning to this at all. Sorry Snake, but thanks for the heads up, I enjoyed the visuals 4/10

Bad Trip

Netflix Candid camera road trip buddy comedy. Works really well, some right laughs in this thing, especially with the lunatic sister character aggressively confronting total strangers on the streets. How much was staged and what was actually candid is up for debate. But the thing works well, good chemistry between the two lads for a road trip movie, which is what you need for this sort of old fashioned road trip caper, candid cameras or no. 7/10

Jason & The Argonauts.

The classic version from 1963. Really enjoyable, seen it years and years ago on RTE 1 some Sunday afternoon, can remember the Skeleton soldiers scene from back then and it came straight back to me when they emerged again. Fantastic craic, the dialogue and delivery is laughably bad in places, but I think that was in some way intentional because of the nature of this sort of fantastical story taken from the ancient Greek myths. Really well shot for the time, must have been amazing to see this thing back when it was released and see what were at that time, the most craziest and well crafted special effects on the big screen. Would have also been feicin great to see Nancy Kovack on the big screen writhing around the statues Temple of Hecate too! Great afternoon couch slouch watch 8/10

el Fenomeno · 29-03-2021 1:10pm

Watched The Friend with Casey Affleck and Jason Segel recently. A really nice film, definitely had something in the back of my throat towards the end.

Homelander · 29-03-2021 4:20pm

Synchronic with Jamie Dornan and Anthony Mackie. A simple but thought-provoking sci-fi that doesn't overly rely on special effects or spectacle, and while I usually dislike Anthony Mackie but he's pretty decent in this.

Directed by the guys who made "The Endless" (available on Netflix) which is a stunning low-budget, high-concept movie. I'd say Synchronic is a bit more "mainstream" but it's a solid movie.

Decuc500 · 29-03-2021 4:27pm

Calm With Horses

A quite decent Irish film which is always a cause for celebration as there’s so few.

Not exactly an original storyline but the script was well written and the whole thing moved along at a nice pace until the final third which turned a bit melancholic.

The lead performance of a punch drunk boxer played by Cosmo Jarvis started to grate after a while but Niamh Algar and Barry Keoghan were as good as always.
Keoghan has an intensity and charisma that should see him as a bigger star.

briany · 30-03-2021 1:44pm

I'm not sure if this truly qualifies as a film or not because it's technically 12 short films and was first shown on TV, but when I saw it, it was all 12 vignettes consecutively, but anyway,

Les Documents Interdits or 'Forbidden Files' (1989)

Psuedo-documentary styled short films which each proport to detail a (fictional) mysterious or paranormal event in a dry documentarian type of way. Mostly shot in black and white with dual French and English audio tracks on certain items.

If you like your horror in a found-footage/mockumentary style that's low budget and is more about what you don't see than what you do, then this'll be right up your street. Probably one of the earliest examples of the genre as well.

El Gato De Negocios · 31-03-2021 9:55pm

Shocker (1989)

One of the few Wes Craven movies I'd never seen in its entirety, its pretty poor fare. Felt like he was trying to recreate another monster to rival Freddy but it falls terribly short. Where Elm Street has a bona fide horror icon, Shocker has an extra ham and cheesey bad guy in Horace Pinker. The climax is mind bogglingly bad, like even as a late 80s horror b movie it absolutely stinks.

Craven really did have more piss poor efforts throughout his career than classics. Other than Last House on the Left, Hills have eyes, Elm Street and Scream, his catalogue is pretty dire.

One for completists / masochists only.

3/10

barrymanilow · 01-04-2021 1:07pm

Homelander wrote: »

Synchronic with Jamie Dornan and Anthony Mackie. A simple but thought-provoking sci-fi that doesn't overly rely on special effects or spectacle, and while I usually dislike Anthony Mackie but he's pretty decent in this.

Directed by the guys who made "The Endless" (available on Netflix) which is a stunning low-budget, high-concept movie. I'd say Synchronic is a bit more "mainstream" but it's a solid movie.

Thanks for the recommend , watched it last night and really enjoyed it. Terrific concept , well executed on a thin budget.

pixelburp · 01-04-2021 5:15pm

Freaky (2020)

Yet another effortlessly balanced mix of horror, comedy and elevator-pitch gimmickry from the director of the "Happy Death Day" films: the horror aspect this time accentuated through some suitably crunchy kills, while yet again the characters had effective, relatable arcs that kept the sci-fi premise grounded; its young leads game and enthusiastic throughout. The standout was obviously Vince Vaughan, playing a teenage girl with almost disturbing ease, but the whole package was pure entertainment. When they're on form, Blumhouse really mainstream horror look easy.

Crimson Tide (1995)

There's something unique about dramas on a submarine that can't be replicated in almost any other working environment. It's such a specific, modern circumstance that automatically possesses high tension and claustrophobia by dint of its very being. Throw in a faction war over whether to launch nuclear missiles and you have what was arguably Tony Scott's high point as director. The testosterone never boiled over, the action never strayed too far into outright histrionics, while all the performances sold this battle of wits throughout. Hackman and Washington were fantastic. The only minus point was perhaps its most famous piece of trivia: the scenes Quentin Tarantino was hired to rewrite were almost painfully obvious, if only for the utterly needless pop-culture non-sequitors.

4Ad · 01-04-2021 10:37pm

Creation Stories.
Story of Alan McGee and his Creation Record label..
I really enjoyed it but I love the music and bands, goes stupid towards the end..
Ewen Bremner is very good in it though.

dubstepper · 02-04-2021 2:52pm

El Gato De Negocios wrote: »

Shocker (1989)
Craven really did have more piss poor efforts throughout his career than classics. Other than Last House on the Left, Hills have eyes, Elm Street and Scream, his catalogue is pretty dire.

People under the stairs is also very good. As is serpant and the rainbow.

Del.Monte · 03-04-2021 5:07pm

Airforce One is Down on Amazon Prime

Serbian rogue army officer wants revenge on the West.

Poorly acted, poor special effects, no likeable characters and, apart from the Russian Foreign Minister, nobody able to act. Corny is the best description. 4/10.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTrtZRyxDn8

TICKLE_ME_ELMO · 04-04-2021 12:04am

I watched Minari tonight and was bit disappointed, to be honest. I get why it's an important film, and it's not a bad film, but as far as the story goes it felt like something I've seen before multiple times.

04-04-2021 12:14pm

Shiva Baby - 2020

A short film drama very much set in the New York Jewish suburban milieu about a fairly lost young woman feeling the usual Jewish parent expectation pressure about what to do in life. Oh and she has a very questionable side hustle. It all comes to a head at a funeral after party. Interesting and doesn't overstay its welcome.

6.5 / 10

06-04-2021 8:01am

The Father Anthony Hopkins delivers a whirlwind of a performance here, most brutally showing Alzheimers in all its misery. I can't remember a more sobering final act of a film, and I hope he picks up best actor for the bravery alone it took to make this and perform his final scene.

run_Forrest_run · 06-04-2021 9:44am

The Vanishing (the original one, 1988)

When Mark Kermode said it's in his top 10 of movies that scared him I had to watch it. Awfully disappointing really. Maybe at the time, it was scary (the ending?) but by today's standards, I thought it was fairly poor, to be honest.

06-04-2021 11:46am

Drive - 2011

I hadn't seen it since the first viewing in the cinema. It's short on lead character dialogue which serves to create an enigmatic aura about him. Yet this man of few words is decisive when called upon to be so and the film's tension is heightened by this deliberate scarcity of the verbal form. There is little fat here and it's all the better for it. I'd forgotten that the moments of violence were so intense and graphic. A finely judged soundtrack completes the picture.

7.8 / 10

cmac2009 · 06-04-2021 3:02pm

glasso wrote: »

Drive - 2011

I hadn't seen it since the first viewing in the cinema. It's short on lead character dialogue which serves to create an enigmatic aura about him. Yet this man of few words is decisive when called upon to be so and the film's tension is heightened by this deliberate scarcity of the verbal form. There is little fat here and it's all the better for it. I'd forgotten that the moments of violence were so intense and graphic. A finely judged soundtrack completes the picture.

7.8 / 10

I'm not a huge fan of rewatching films but I make an exception for this.

The Raging Bile Duct · 06-04-2021 4:05pm

The Dry with Eric Bana is a great little Aussie thriller. Bana plays Aaron Falk, a federal agent who returns to the hometown he left abruptly as a teenager to attend the funeral of his childhood friend, Luke, who is apparently responsible for a murder suicide. Although intending to leave as quickly as possible, Falk is persuaded by Luke's parents to look at the case to try and clear their son's name. While investigating with the local cop, Falk starts to believe the case isn't as clear cut as many believe and that the case might have a connection to the death of one of their friends 13 years before. The films switches between the present and the past leading up to the tragic death of Aaron's friend. The flashbacks to a summer in his adolescence playing in the river with his friends highlights the devastation caused to the community by the drought it is now suffering and Falk's return acts as a tinderbox reigniting old tensions. Well worth a watch.

06-04-2021 11:00pm

The Raging Bile Duct wrote: »

The Dry with Eric Bana is a great little Aussie thriller. Bana plays Aaron Falk, a federal agent who returns to the hometown he left abruptly as a teenager to attend the funeral of his childhood friend, Luke, who is apparently responsible for a murder suicide. Although intending to leave as quickly as possible, Falk is persuaded by Luke's parents to look at the case to try and clear their son's name. While investigating with the local cop, Falk starts to believe the case isn't as clear cut as many believe and that the case might have a connection to the death of one of their friends 13 years before. The films switches between the present and the past leading up to the tragic death of Aaron's friend. The flashbacks to a summer in his adolescence playing in the river with his friends highlights the devastation caused to the community by the drought it is now suffering and Falk's return acts as a tinderbox reigniting old tensions. Well worth a watch.

read the Jane Harper book a couple years back so may not watch this as the style of the book's writing would not be easy to bring across imo - may give it a go sometime tho.

darced · 06-04-2021 11:36pm

run_Forrest_run wrote: »

The Vanishing (the original one, 1988)

When Mark Kermode said it's in his top 10 of movies that scared him I had to watch it. Awfully disappointing really. Maybe at the time, it was scary (the ending?) but by today's standards, I thought it was fairly poor, to be honest.

I only seen this last year, scary? Maybe not but an absolutely brilliant film.

The Raging Bile Duct · 06-04-2021 11:42pm

glasso wrote: »

read the Jane Harper book a couple years back so may not watch this as the style of the book's writing would not be easy to bring across imo - may give it a go sometime tho.

I don't know how faithful it is to the book but from reading up on it, fans of the book have enjoyed the film. The cinematography is great at capturing the arid desolation of the drought-striken town. I'd have only one niggle about a very convenient plot point, in I guess you'd call the epilogue, which I don't know if it's how it happened in the original book or was as a result of the script tying up loose ends. Apart from that, I enjoyed it a lot and it had me guessing the whole way through.

S.M.B. · 07-04-2021 7:58am

glasso wrote: »

Drive - 2011

I hadn't seen it since the first viewing in the cinema. It's short on lead character dialogue which serves to create an enigmatic aura about him. Yet this man of few words is decisive when called upon to be so and the film's tension is heightened by this deliberate scarcity of the verbal form. There is little fat here and it's all the better for it. I'd forgotten that the moments of violence were so intense and graphic. A finely judged soundtrack completes the picture.

7.8 / 10

Can't believe this is 10 years old, also can't believe I still have not watched it or any Winding Refn movie for some reason.

07-04-2021 1:02pm

The Raging Bile Duct wrote: »

I don't know how faithful it is to the book but from reading up on it, fans of the book have enjoyed the film. The cinematography is great at capturing the arid desolation of the drought-striken town. I'd have only one niggle about a very convenient plot point, in I guess you'd call the epilogue, which I don't know if it's how it happened in the original book or was as a result of the script tying up loose ends. Apart from that, I enjoyed it a lot and it had me guessing the whole way through.

it's more about the childhood events that are related to the present day. there is a lot of flashback stuff in the book which works in the written word but I find doesn't really work in film. don't know if they left this out in the film or not but it was a big part of the book.

The Raging Bile Duct · 07-04-2021 1:15pm

glasso wrote: »

it's more about the childhood events that are related to the present day. there is a lot of flashback stuff in the book which works in the written word but I find doesn't really work in film. don't know if they left this out in the film or not but it was a big part of the book.

The flashback stuff works really well in the film.

I think it does a great job of showing how Aaron's perception of what had happened in the past coloured his opinion of Luke but he hadn't known that Luke came up with the alibi not to protect himself but to protect Aaron. He only discovers that after Luke's girlfriend tells Aaron that Luke was with her on that day.

barrymanilow · 08-04-2021 11:45am

darced wrote: »

I only seen this last year, scary? Maybe not but an absolutely brilliant film.

What is the remake like ? any good?

Mad_maxx · 10-04-2021 2:25pm

Doctor Sleep

really enjoyed it until it completely falls apart in the final twenty minutes or so at the lookout hotel

run_Forrest_run · 10-04-2021 2:35pm

Mad_maxx wrote: »

Doctor Sleep

really enjoyed it until it completely falls apart in the final twenty minutes or so at the lookout hotel

totally agree

dubstepper · 10-04-2021 2:41pm

I find a lot of Stephen King's works fall apart near the end.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO · 10-04-2021 8:20pm

dubstepper wrote: »

I find a lot of Stephen King's works fall apart near the end.

The book ending for Doctor Sleep is different from the film ending. I'm pretty sure I prefered the film ending.

mikhail · 10-04-2021 11:23pm

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

The book ending for Doctor Sleep is different from the film ending. I'm pretty sure I prefered the film ending.

It is. The hotel is destroyed at the end of King's The Shining, but not in Kubrick's. Dr Sleep treads the line between adapting King's Dr Sleep (a sequel to his own book) and being a sequel to Kubrick's The Shining.

I slightly preferred the book, to be honest. The film just jarred in comparison with Kubrick's. For example, reducing the woman in room 327 to a tiredly repeated punchline was as tone-deaf as I'd feared going into it.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO · 11-04-2021 12:13am

mikhail wrote: »

It is. The hotel is destroyed at the end of King's The Shining, but not in Kubrick's. Dr Sleep treads the line between adapting King's Dr Sleep (a sequel to his own book) and being a sequel to Kubrick's The Shining.

I slightly preferred the book, to be honest. The film just jarred in comparison with Kubrick's. For example, reducing the woman in room 327 to a tiredly repeated punchline was as tone-deaf as I'd feared going into it.

I haven't read or seen The Shining, but did read and watch Doctor Sleep, so I was going in with very different eyes, I guess.

silverharp · 11-04-2021 9:41am

Nightcrawlers is great, just saw it for the first time last night

Del.Monte · 11-04-2021 12:31pm

"Secret State" (2012) 4 part mini-series on Amazon Prime.

Excellent, realistic thriller starring Gabriel Byrne as the UK Prime Minister surrounded by disloyal ministers, and military/industrial interests as he tries to find out who was behind the death of his predecessor - Iran or the military/industrial complex. There'sa lot more going on in the background but I cannot say more without giving too much. 10/10

run_Forrest_run · 11-04-2021 1:42pm

Lake Mungo - enjoyed it, 90 mins get in, scare, get out, perfect.

Harry Palmr · 12-04-2021 5:57pm

Whiplash Young would-be Buddy Rich goes to school to be schooled by abusive tutor.

If you love post war jazz and drums you'll love this!

Del.Monte · 13-04-2021 9:32am

"No Country for Old Men" (2007) on Amazon Prime.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38A__WT3-o0

Don't know how I missed this Coen Bros classic before but I really enjoyed it - if one can really enjoy murder/mayhem? If there's one disappointment

it's the ending - did they run out of time, film, money or ideas?

8/10

Tony EH · 13-04-2021 9:36am

Ah no way Del. The ending is brilliant.

pixelburp · 13-04-2021 9:47am

The ending is a total gear-change, but it's magnificent. Understated, and a total downer but also, it's right there in the title. It is truly No Country for Old Men and in the last moment comes the realisation.

13-04-2021 10:39am

Harry Palmr wrote: »

Whiplash Young would-be Buddy Rich goes to school to be schooled by abusive tutor.

If you love post war jazz and drums you'll love this!

Easily one of the best films of the 2010's imo and J K Simmons was definitely the number 1 casting choice of the decade.

13-04-2021 10:48am

Del.Monte wrote: »

"No Country for Old Men" (2007) on Amazon Prime.

Don't know how I missed this Coen Bros classic before but I really enjoyed it - if one can really enjoy murder/mayhem? If there's one disappointment
it's the ending - did they run out of time, film, money or ideas?
8/10

it's based on a book by Cormac McCarthy and stays pretty close to it.

bnt · 13-04-2021 1:18pm

I watched Weekend at Bernie's for the first time a couple of days ago. (It wasn't exactly high on my list of must-watch movies, I have to admit.) Some of the things that poor old Bernie gets put through, it's amazing he was still in one piece by the end. The reviews were not good even at the time e.g. one called it "a film with no respect for the laws of nature, the laws of man, or the intelligence of the viewer". In hindsight, is Weekend at Bernie's an 80s classic? Probably not.

Tony EH · 13-04-2021 1:22pm

I wouldn't call it an "80's classic", but it's a relatively fun picture.

In saying that I haven't seen it since the 80's, so...

run_Forrest_run · 13-04-2021 2:53pm

glasso wrote: »

it's based on a book by Cormac McCarthy and stays pretty close to it.

definitely, I loved both, probably the film edged it for me. McCarthy's 'The Road' is a great book.

Tony EH · 13-04-2021 3:10pm

Both are good books because of their stories. But I absolutely loathe reading McCarty's writing.

loyatemu · 13-04-2021 3:37pm

The Man from Uncle (2015)

Threw this on for the kids as it was on Sky Movies, and was surprised at how good it was, considering I barely remember it being released.
It's Guy Ritchie directing, between this and the RDJ Sherlock Holmes movies he knows how to adapt an existing story and keep it rattling along at an entertaining pace. It had a nice retro vibe without being too beholden to the original TV series, and Cavill and Hammer were pretty good in the lead roles (having seen this, I could envisage Cavill doing Bond). Very obviously setup for more movies at the end which I guess we won't now be getting.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO · 14-04-2021 12:58am

loyatemu wrote: »

The Man from Uncle (2015)

Threw this on for the kids as it was on Sky Movies, and was surprised at how good it was, considering I barely remember it being released.
It's Guy Ritchie directing, between this and the RDJ Sherlock Holmes movies he knows how to adapt an existing story and keep it rattling along at an entertaining pace. It had a nice retro vibe without being too beholden to the original TV series, and Cavill and Hammer were pretty good in the lead roles (having seen this, I could envisage Cavill doing Bond). Very obviously setup for more movies at the end which I guess we won't now be getting.

I've been hoping for a sequel to this since it came out, but recent events have probably killed that idea entirely. Unless the plot included Kuryakin going deep undercover with an entirely new face.

What have you watched recently? 3D!

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