What films have you watched recently?

thing

Just watched the four Alien films with the grandson. (not in one fell swoop I might add). Not seen them for years but definitely came away thinking that the third one was best, the one with Brian Glover and Pete Postlethwaite in the prison colony.

Not ploughed through the rest of this thread but thoroughly enjoyed The Dig recently, and Sound Of Metal was very watchable too.

SPECTRUM001

Don’t Look Back - 1967 (D.A. Pennebaker)

Obviously loads of Bob Dylan stuff on TV at the minute. Although I knew of this film, I’d never actually seen it before (factoring in I am not much of a Dylan fan).

But I really enjoyed watching, and it is a very good snapshot of the UK in the mid sixties, exaggerated by using grainy black and white filmstock.

Dylan comes across very well, and determined to get on with the job in hand - his national tour. Alan Price seems to be woefully provincial by comparison and Joan Baez seems to be on another planet.

The most interesting ground is the artist and journalist relationship. In that Britain’s finest don’t seem to know what they want to say to Dylan or how to say it - so end up floundering in circles causing needless arguments about nothing.

Nicely paced at an hour and a half, this is well worth a watch.

7/10

Sassafras

The Man From Uncle by Guy Ritchie.

You don't often see such a load of bollocks unless it's direct to DVD rubbish.

Barquentine

Benny Loves You. Horror comedy - it's a hoot. Kenny - best mockumentary since Spinal Tap.

phil_b

The Iron Lady

Bio pic of Mrs Thatch. For me the film did not work. There is really too much story there to cram into an hour and a half film. meryl streep does a really good portailal but the political events and policies are very much glossed over and most of the film is based on her struggle in her final years to live without Dennis and her struggle with old age.

Moominpapa

Sassafras said:

The Man From Uncle by Guy Ritchie.

You don't often see such a load of bollocks unless it's direct to DVD rubbish.

Probably in a very similar vein,  Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation  ABORTED!

I got (a reluctant) 10mins 15 seconds into this before I decided that life was too short to waste any more time on a film that appeared to have cost quintillions of dollars to entertain 12 year old boys.

Moominpapa

High Life (2018) Directed by Claire Denis and starring Robert Pattinson & Juliette Binoche. Got mixed reviews but I rather liked it. Character study drama set in space. I like Robert Pattinson as an actor and I think he is very good in this. In the early section of the film he has some lovely scenes with a really sweet child.

Philly_Q

Moominpapa said:

Probably in a very similar vein,  Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation  ABORTED!

I got (a reluctant) 10mins 15 seconds into this before I decided that life was too short to waste any more time on a film that appeared to have cost quintillions of dollars to entertain 12 year old boys.

To be fair, that's exactly what a big chunk of the (Hollywood) movie industry is based on.  Maybe 12's towards the bottom of the target market's age range - not enough disposable income, unless they have malleable parents.

not_the_dj

Army of the Dead (Netflix)

Cliche ridden no brainer of a zombie movie, with added bits of Aliens, Escape from New York and countless heist films. 

Utterly silly, and massively overlong, but I did enjoy it. 

SteveRobinson

In the Soup (Amazon Prime)

Low budget tragi-comic independent film about an aspiring scriptwriter in love with the girl next door.

SPECTRUM001

Effie Grey - 2014

Dark and atmospheric account of John Ruskin’s loveless marriage to Effie Grey. Greg Wise and Dakota Fanning are incredibly authentic looking in the main roles, and Tom Sturridge gives a valiant effort as the knight in shining armour that is John Millais.

The story is straightforward and attention to detail quite incredible. It’s a slow and quite disturbing burner - very watchable and beautifully paced.

Ultimately, Ruskin is a right bastard.


7/10

Philly_Q

The Woman in the Window

An agoraphobic, alcoholic, traumatised woman spies on her neighbours and thinks she witnesses a murder - she reports it but no-one believes her and it appears no crime has even been committed...

I wasn't expecting any big surprises in this Rear Window rip-off, but for a while it looked reasonably promising - big names in the cast and crew, a great setting in a gloomy, rambling New York house.  There are a few good moments, but it gets increasingly contrived, stagey and eventually utterly ridiculous.

I thoroughly recommend The Woman in the Window - the 1944 Fritz Lang film, that is, not this tripe.

guitartango

Philly_Q said:

The Woman in the Window

An agoraphobic, alcoholic, traumatised woman spies on her neighbours and thinks she witnesses a murder - she reports it but no-one believes her and it appears no crime has even been committed...

I wasn't expecting any big surprises in this Rear Window rip-off, but for a while it looked reasonably promising - big names in the cast and crew, a great setting in a gloomy, rambling New York house.  There are a few good moments, but it gets increasingly contrived, stagey and eventually utterly ridiculous.

I thoroughly recommend The Woman in the Window - the 1944 Fritz Lang film, that is, not this tripe.

Did the director pinch the music from Pysco?

ICBM

Hope Gap

Bill Nighy and Annette Bening in an emotional drama about a marriage breakup and its impact on their son. That's it really... there's not that much of a story other than the basics of that, no great revelations or plot twists, and although the photography is very good there's nothing much else to say about the direction! But...

Nighy and Bening are absolutely outstanding. If you want to see two hugely experienced actors doing what they do best, it's worth seeing for that alone. Nighy is subtle, Bening is possibly a little over the top in a couple of places, but her character is meant to be uncomfortable, and she just about stays the right side of the line. I think the film is trying to say something meaningful about relationships, which it largely fails at, but it doesn't really matter.

7/10

(Netflix)

Philly_Q

guitartango said:

Philly_Q said:

The Woman in the Window

An agoraphobic, alcoholic, traumatised woman spies on her neighbours and thinks she witnesses a murder - she reports it but no-one believes her and it appears no crime has even been committed...

I wasn't expecting any big surprises in this Rear Window rip-off, but for a while it looked reasonably promising - big names in the cast and crew, a great setting in a gloomy, rambling New York house.  There are a few good moments, but it gets increasingly contrived, stagey and eventually utterly ridiculous.

I thoroughly recommend The Woman in the Window - the 1944 Fritz Lang film, that is, not this tripe.

Did the director pinch the music from Pysco?

No, but it does have a score by Danny Elfman, remarkably.  The whole thing has an air of Netflix/Fox being prepared to spend quite a lot of money.  I thought it may have been shot during lockdown, due to the enclosed sets and a sense that the cast are always quite socially-distanced, but that's just the staginess...  Turns out it was filmed in 2018 but delayed until this year.  

I'm not very good at remembering movie scores - my brother's much better at that - but even I noticed it felt Hitchcocky during the "exciting" bits.

Stratavarious

Philly_Q said:

The Woman in the Window

An agoraphobic, alcoholic, traumatised woman spies on her neighbours and thinks she witnesses a murder - she reports it but no-one believes her and it appears no crime has even been committed...

I wasn't expecting any big surprises in this Rear Window rip-off, but for a while it looked reasonably promising - big names in the cast and crew, a great setting in a gloomy, rambling New York house.  There are a few good moments, but it gets increasingly contrived, stagey and eventually utterly ridiculous.

I thoroughly recommend The Woman in the Window - the 1944 Fritz Lang film, that is, not this tripe.

Yep.. the 1944 Woman in The Window is an absolute gem...   an object lesson in building tension.

Double Indemnity of similar vintage is great too. Saw that last week. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036775/

Stratavarious

Suspiria from 1977- the remastered version with the original over the top colours. An oddball Italian arthouse horror film. 

Watched it last night.    OK for movie geeks and a must for horror fans.  Like a hammer film on steroids.

Moominpapa

Annihilation (2018)

I'm a huge fan of the trope of team of scientists/special forces  people must go into location X where weird thing Y has happened, whether X is in space or somewhere on Earth. This film is a very decent instantiation of the trope - one of the most interesting I've watched. I would say that in Zappa terms, this is Black Page #2 (The Easy Teen Age New York Version) to the Black Page #1 of Tarkovsky's Stalker (1979). And if you know Zappa's music, you know that's not a put down by any means - they are two different things made with two different intentions for two different audiences. There's a "statistical density" to Stalker that you have to make some sacrifices to appreciate - it's a harder watch than most films and not everybody thinks the results are worth it. Black Page Part #2 is cool, and I liked this film a lot. As well as the obvious connections to Stalker there are echoes of Event Horizon (1997) and The Descent (2005) - as well as a little bit of Predator (1987). Kudos to the cinematographer & set designer who give the X location a nicely off-kilter & fucked-up look.

hollywoodrox

https://youtu.be/CstNDziXkts

Philly_Q

Stratavarious said:

Suspiria from 1977- the remastered version with the original over the top colours. An oddball Italian arthouse horror film. 

Watched it last night.    OK for movie geeks and a must for horror fans.  Like a hammer film on steroids.

I'm a huge fan of Argento's work - well, for the first half of his career, at least, before the quality dropped off a cliff in the 1990s. 

I've seen Suspiria many times, but watching the restored version on a big screen a few years ago was quite an experience.