What MOVIE(s) have you been....seeing? watching?

For some reason 1917 reminded me Lord of Rings Return of King. Maybe it's how terrible the journey is through Mordor is (I mean France). Maybe it's because Tolkien wrote Lord of the Rings about his experience in war.

I'm making a copy of FEROX so I decided to watch Eli Roth's The Green Inferno. I'd read it was terrible but I've already seen Cannibal Holocaust and I knew that Cannibal Ferox also has on-screen animal killings, so it seemed like the sensible choice, in its own way. I shouldn't have bothered. There was barely any tension, it wasn't scary, and it was just poorly-directed trash that was tonally all over the place. I liked the yellow-faced cannibal, though.

I also recently saw Hardcore Henry, which was trashy as opposed to being trash. The film doesn't have much of a plot as it mostly relies on the POV gimmick, but when the action scenes are creative and well-staged it's really fun. I also enjoyed Sharlto Copley's performance and the final fight sequence is bonkers, gory mayhem that ends the film on a high note.

Possessor was great. It's a psychological horror film written and directed by Brandon Cronenberg (David's son) about an assassin who uses technology to inhabit another person's body to kill her target without being traced. It's atmospheric and stylish, and it does a good job of conveying the abstract concept of someone's mental state deteriorating. There's plenty of body horror and outright gore at times and it goes to some really dark places. I want to watch it again sometime to see how it holds up and to see if some of the more esoteric imagery makes more sense the second time around.

Speaking of rewatches, my son wanted to see Color out of Space so we watched it last night. I liked it much better the second time and it has to be on the very short list of good, if not great, H.P. Lovecraft film adaptations. I noticed the sound design a lot more this time, and how it was used to make already-uncomfortable scenes more disturbing. Cage's performance still doesn't quite fit the film but everything else works very well. If you wanted to do a Nicolas Cage-themed horror movie night, Mandy and Color out of Space would make for a great double feature.

HBO max has pretty much all the Miyazaki Studio Ghibli stuff, so we’ve been diving into all the kid friendly ones. Secret World of Arrietty was one I hadn’t seen before and I thought it was pretty good. Kiki’s Delivery Service was as charming as ever and Ponyo is probably the weirdest one.

I've now seen all of Satoshi Kon's films and I suspect Millenium Actress might be his best. It's emotional, beautiful, great. However, it's a film about cinema and me, being completely ignorant, didn't quite get it. I'm simply proud that I made the connection between the wool spinner and the reels of a camera. The cranking should have given it away!

Terminator: Dark Fate was okay. I loved the first two Terminator movies and skipped everything since then, until now. Dark Fate followed the basic template of the first two movies: there is a person in our time who is critical to a future timeline. Two time travelers seek that person; one seeks to kill the person and the other wants to protect that person. The effects look great, and both the fight and chase scenes have considerable intensity. But the cast is not as good this time around, even the people who were great in the first two movies. Mackenzie Davis showed some potential, but this was not quite the breakout role that she needs. Natalia Reyes was the weak link of the core cast. The dialogue is adequate aside from a few nice callbacks to the original movie. Terminator: Dark Fate is strictly optional viewing, but not a bad movie.

Terminator films are increasingly becoming fanfic. I kinda liked 3 and the McG one could have been cool if they had doubled down on replacing Connor with a machine. Alas those ideas never really bore fruit but just perverted Genysis into an absolute mess. Dark Fate has similar problems, in that the movie feels very disjointed, it seems to be trying to lay down spin-off ground work rather than adhere to its own internal consistency, and fan service trumps innovation.

But it was fun to see Linda back in all her gritty, gravelly, "old lady don't give a fuck" badassness. Nanny-Arnie is best forgotten though.

I'm not really sure WHAT I want to see in a terminator experience. The TV show was sorta interesting in having machine and boy both inform their future selves in an adolescent hormonal feedback loop. But it just feels like the time travel aspect really hurts the "blow shit up" action aesthetic.

I think a total reboot, 5 million dollar budget, Blumhouse full horror type film is really the only way to go. Or just go nuts with Robocop, Batman, Predator, TMNT and Aliens all fighting it out with T-800s (I'm pretty sure all of these properties have crossed paths).

I think that the whole Terminator premise is a.) great and b.) limited. It would probably be best if Hollywood just left the whole Terminator concept alone unless somebody comes up with an interesting idea for it.

jason10mm wrote: I think a total reboot, 5 million dollar budget, Blumhouse full horror type film is really the only way to go. Or just go nuts with Robocop, Batman, Predator, TMNT and Aliens all fighting it out with T-800s (I'm pretty sure all of these properties have crossed paths).

Don't give the guy that did Van Helsing any ideas.

And my wife loved Sara Connor Chronicles. She's still steamed that they took it off the air.

Monster Hunter - I've never played the video games but this is a Paul WS Anderson movie so that's not important. What's important is Milla Jovovich fighting giant CGI monsters. If you're watching this for any other reason you will be disappointed. If you're watching just to see Milla in yet another Anderson videogame action-flick where she does some ridiculous shit then you'll probably be satisfied.

ChristopherMD wrote: Monster Hunter - I've never played the video games but this is a Paul WS Anderson movie so that's not important. What's important is Milla Jovovich fighting giant CGI monsters. If you're watching this for any other reason you will be disappointed. If you're watching just to see Milla in yet another Anderson videogame action-flick where she does some ridiculous shit then you'll probably be satisfied.

My only question is, does someone stop in the middle of fighting a giant monster in order to sharpen their sword?

hotseatgames wrote:

ChristopherMD wrote: Monster Hunter - I've never played the video games but this is a Paul WS Anderson movie so that's not important. What's important is Milla Jovovich fighting giant CGI monsters. If you're watching this for any other reason you will be disappointed. If you're watching just to see Milla in yet another Anderson videogame action-flick where she does some ridiculous shit then you'll probably be satisfied.

My only question is, does someone stop in the middle of fighting a giant monster in order to sharpen their sword?

Not that I recall. It's more like fight giant monster and lose. Then take a day to recover, maybe sharpen sword and actually plan. Then fight giant monster again.

I care a lot on netflix. Oomph, what a film. I have never loathed a character more than in this film. Fucking LOATHED as in "wanted to see her suffer and die endlessly over and over and over". Then the film twists into almost comedic crime territory and ends with....well, an ending that you wont see coming. If you have elderly family this film should TERRIFY you.

But damn, did i hate that woman in the best way. Rosamund Pike has always delivered and she out to be up for a streaming oscar or whatever netflix competes in. Dinklage is great and really has managed to land roles that completely ignore his physiology in a way that would be nice to see other actors get. Seeing Dianne Weist in this was a true pleasure as I've always liked her in Lost Boys.

My wife is an investigator for adult protective services and she said the guardianship scam is a thing that does happen. Our state has laws that prevent it but I guess it happens a lot in Nevada.

Moxie on Netflix, which was very watchable and a lot fun as well as being delightfully subversive. It shapes itself as a fairly straightforward 'plain Jane'-coming-of-age High School drama then turns out to be anything but.

All the usual suspects are present - the adversarial Principal, the jaded teacher, the arch cheerleader, the punky rebel, the 'still waters' outsider, arrogant jocks, and so on - but expectation is quietly turned on it's head, often without fanfare or fuss. These are all in fact modern characters teased as something else and the narrative thumbs it's nose at genre tropes.

Running throughout is a very strong line on equality and empowerment. I'll take a moment now to point something out, because I know that there are one or two guys on here who struggle with this. This is a teen movie that empowers youth, women, black lives, the immigrant journey, non-binary gender choices, men being accepted rather than reviled for 'doing the right thing', and all those other ker-azy lib'rul attitudes about people deserving to be treated with respect and equality, and it does it with subtlety and aplomb. So you might well watch it and then want to complain that it 'wasn't made for you' but that's kind of missing the point, and not a little ironic. This is very much a movie for our times; the antagonist would once have looked somewhat of a pantomime villain but is increasingly and skin-crawlingly an avatar for the disturbing and out-dated attitudes that are all too familiar and prevalent. Alongside this is the message that it isn't enough to sit back and be upset about it, we should instead stand up and take action. We shouldn't allow it continue like this. It's not a problem just for those who are affected, it's a problem for all of us. Right on.

Amy Poehler has made a very accomplished adaptation of Jennifer Mathieu's novel, and despite a saggy middle where it gets a bit predictable (hitting the standard 'long dark night' movie pacing of everything going against our protagonist), it has a very satisfying denouement and still manages to land a couple of surprises cf. disassembling genre tropes. The players are all well cast, the tone is engaging without being over-wheening, it's straight-up a very good and very modern movie.

Recently re-watched Incredbles and the sequel. They really hold up well. I especially like it when they combine their powers to find creative solutions to problems.