What films have you watched recently?

Haych

Spenser Confidential

Mark Wahlberg plays wronged ex-cop who does time for stumbling across a conspiracy in the force and beats up his boss for his involvement.

Gets out of prison and then can't leave the case alone after his old boss and another cop are murdered on the day of his release.

It's typical, predictable, loud and rather overbearing with a couple of amusing moments but certainly not Wahlberg's best film ever although is watchable enough to see it through to the end, just.  

6/10 at best.

Lodious

Joker. An OK film with an outstanding performance from Joaquin Phoenix. Overall 7/10

EricTheWeary

Train to Butan.

Korean zombie movie.
I wondered if there was a comic element that I didn't get and it wasn't my choice of viewing but some good performances, well paced and some great visuals. 

Moominpapa

EricTheWeary said:

Train to Butan.

Korean zombie movie.
I wondered if there was a comic element that I didn't get and it wasn't my choice of viewing but some good performances, well paced and some great visuals. 

I really liked it.

EricTheWeary

Moominpapa said:

EricTheWeary said:

Train to Butan.

Korean zombie movie.
I wondered if there was a comic element that I didn't get and it wasn't my choice of viewing but some good performances, well paced and some great visuals. 

I really liked it.

Not usually my kind of thing ( instead of a meal out we had take away pizza and a film for MrsTheWeary's birthday)but a well made film is a well made film regardless of genre and I liked it a lot more than I thought I would. For anyone who has been watching Kingdom on Netflix and wondered what it would look like pulled forward a few hundred years this is your answer.

Danny1969

Uncut gems, superb film loved it 

Still think Jojo Rabbit is the best film from the recent crop though and almost no mention of it in here .... 

Grangousier

Anyone who's taken by Far Eastern zombie films might want to check out One Cut of the Dead, and stick with it past... oh, you'll know when you're supposed to stick with it past. I'm sure it's somewhere on streaming by now. 

Pom!

ICBM

Forgot to post...

Blow-Up

Following on from The Passenger, I got the first of Antonioni's English-language trio, which is famous for among other things featuring The Yardbirds with Page and Beck in a cameo. I'd also seen this when I was a teenager.

Hmmm. Not quite as good as I expected. It's definitely got some of the same enigmatic surrealism and obscure meaning (if any) but it seems more contrived and it's not as compelling and mesmerising as The Passenger. The scene in which Vanessa Redgrave spends about ten minutes wandering around topless is laughable - every camera angle and prop possible is used so you never see her tits... not that I really needed to, it just seems very awkward and interrupts the sense of realism. The Yardbirds performance is similarly a bit jarring and takes you slightly out of the narrative, even though it is part of it. I did wonder if there is meant to be some 'meaning' in the last scene, as if it's meant to imply the whole thing has been in David Hemmings' mind, but I'm really not sure. Interesting, but not that great, I don't think.

7/10

Will have to look for Zabriskie Point (the middle one of the trio) now.

MagicPigDetective

Outlander, 2008 film on Netflix. A b-style horror science fiction about......err..... Vikings v Aliens! A lot of fun, plenty of comforting cliché's, really enjoyed it, if you want over the top historic action this is where it's at.  

Moominpapa

MagicPigDetective said:

Outlander, 2008 film on Netflix. A b-style horror science fiction about......err..... Vikings v Aliens! A lot of fun, plenty of comforting cliché's, really enjoyed it, if you want over the top historic action this is where it's at.  

Cheesy, yes - but as you correctly say a lot of fun. (It's another take on the Beowulf story.) Must have watched it a dozen times over the years. I really like the monster.

MagicPigDetective

Moominpapa said:

MagicPigDetective said:

Outlander, 2008 film on Netflix. A b-style horror science fiction about......err..... Vikings v Aliens! A lot of fun, plenty of comforting cliché's, really enjoyed it, if you want over the top historic action this is where it's at.  

Cheesy, yes - but as you correctly say a lot of fun. (It's another take on the Beowulf story.) Must have watched it a dozen times over the years. I really like the monster.

I don’t how I managed not to know of this till now, it’s totally my kind of film. Just found it randomly on Netflix.  Makes me want to watch Beowulf again. And Predator. 

LastMantra

Birds of prey. 
Pretty much what you would expect.

goldtop

Notes on a Scandal. Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett as teachers at an inner-city school. Bitter spinster Dench has the hots for Cate, but Cate has the hots for ... well, someone she shouldn't. Dench is awesome, as usual. Bill Nighy also stars and just does his usual soppy character well enough. Well told, but needed the ending to build to more of ... something. 7/10

EricTheWeary

goldtop said:

Notes on a Scandal. Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett as teachers at an inner-city school. Bitter spinster Dench has the hots for Cate, but Cate has the hots for ... well, someone she shouldn't. Dench is awesome, as usual. Bill Nighy also stars and just does his usual soppy character well enough. Well told, but needed the ending to build to more of ... something. 7/10

I have fonder memories of the book than the film...'she was so posh she didn't know what a three piece suite was.'


[ I don't know how accurate that is just from memory!]

HAL9000

ICBM said:

Forgot to post...

Blow-Up

Following on from The Passenger, I got the first of Antonioni's English-language trio, which is famous for among other things featuring The Yardbirds with Page and Beck in a cameo. I'd also seen this when I was a teenager.

Hmmm. Not quite as good as I expected. It's definitely got some of the same enigmatic surrealism and obscure meaning (if any) but it seems more contrived and it's not as compelling and mesmerising as The Passenger. The scene in which Vanessa Redgrave spends about ten minutes wandering around topless is laughable - every camera angle and prop possible is used so you never see her tits... not that I really needed to, it just seems very awkward and interrupts the sense of realism. The Yardbirds performance is similarly a bit jarring and takes you slightly out of the narrative, even though it is part of it. I did wonder if there is meant to be some 'meaning' in the last scene, as if it's meant to imply the whole thing has been in David Hemmings' mind, but I'm really not sure. Interesting, but not that great, I don't think.

7/10

Will have to look for Zabriskie Point (the middle one of the trio) now.

Wasn’t there supposed to have been an exchange of memos between the director and Jeff Beck along the lines of...

Memo from Mr Antonioni's PA: "Mr Antonioni requires you to smash your Les Paul"

Memo from Jeff Beck: "Tell Mr Antonioni to Fuck Off!”

goldtop

EricTheWeary said:

goldtop said:

Notes on a Scandal. Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett as teachers at an inner-city school. Bitter spinster Dench has the hots for Cate, but Cate has the hots for ... well, someone she shouldn't. Dench is awesome, as usual. Bill Nighy also stars and just does his usual soppy character well enough. Well told, but needed the ending to build to more of ... something. 7/10

I have fonder memories of the book than the film...'she was so posh she didn't know what a three piece suite was.'


[ I don't know how accurate that is just from memory!]

I don't remember it, but that quote sounds about right. And reminds me of Maggie Smith delivering "What's a weekend?" in Downton Abbey.

Is the book famous? The writing - especially of Dench's character's bitter and cutting inner-voice - is excellent.

ICBM

HAL9000 said:

Wasn’t there supposed to have been an exchange of memos between the director and Jeff Beck along the lines of...

Memo from Mr Antonioni's PA: "Mr Antonioni requires you to smash your Les Paul"

Memo from Jeff Beck: "Tell Mr Antonioni to Fuck Off!”

I believe so - so an unfortunate Höfner bit the dust instead. Apparently Beck also objected on the grounds that it was Pete Townshend's act and not his.

Still, at least it wasn't a priceless 145-year-old Martin...

Haych

I attempted to watch Alien v Predator: Requiem. 

Utter, utter drivel! 

1/10 and that’s being kind.   

Stratavarious

Battle Beyond The Stars...  not bad at all. 

Liked it as a kid.

EricTheWeary

goldtop said:

EricTheWeary said:

goldtop said:

Notes on a Scandal. Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett as teachers at an inner-city school. Bitter spinster Dench has the hots for Cate, but Cate has the hots for ... well, someone she shouldn't. Dench is awesome, as usual. Bill Nighy also stars and just does his usual soppy character well enough. Well told, but needed the ending to build to more of ... something. 7/10

I have fonder memories of the book than the film...'she was so posh she didn't know what a three piece suite was.'


[ I don't know how accurate that is just from memory!]

I don't remember it, but that quote sounds about right. And reminds me of Maggie Smith delivering "What's a weekend?" in Downton Abbey.

Is the book famous? The writing - especially of Dench's character's bitter and cutting inner-voice - is excellent.

I think the novel is reasonably well known in it's own right, quick Google says it was a Booker runner up. My attempts at reading prize winning novels usually over by about page 70 so it mustn't have been too challenging if I finished it!