Media itt: movie/film discussion - Beware Spoilers

[RODAN]

Sonatine - Completely depressing film wrapped in a very dreamlike and happy package. takeshi kitano is absolutely killer as a world weary yakuza, and the way he presents himself in this world is just so harrowing. it has long stretches of silence punctuated by long continuous shots. its really cool, i dont think ive ever seen a movie like this before. a must watch masterpiece. 10/10

 

[RODAN]

Big Hero 6 - more bad than good. amazing animation, especially on the minibots but everything else is just lame. the comedy sucks, and the plot is lame and boring. the girls are cute though. 4/10

 

[RODAN]

Jackie Chan's Project A - Shockingly boring except it had two amazing action sequences right in the middle of the damn movie. (here and here) the film felt like a 2 movies frankensteined together and it didn't work at all. also i watched the shitty english dub and quite frankly its hilarious that the chinese pirates all talk like southern white men. 4.5/10

 

[RODAN]

The Beguiled - cool movie. very atmospheric and creepy for what is ultimately a period piece. i think my main takeaway from this movie is how real the characters felt, nobody had clear motives to do anything they were doing - just purely acting on impulse/carnality. gorgeous film too, and kirsten dunst kills it in this movie imo - she needs more work. 8.5/10

 

[vonFiedler]

The Celebration (1998) 5/10
Directed by the same man who would 14 years later direct The Hunt, one of the worst movies I've ever seen and seemingly pro-pedophile movie. How strange that this film is the opposite, about an adult who accuses a pedophile and is against all evidence not believed. This is one of those dogshit 69 films, so it looks like absolute fuck and it's garbage. I have no appreciation at all for a system of rules designed by a nazi to allow directors to be lazy. If this movie wasn't really badly made and I didn't have to look at it through the lens of The Hunt, on plot alone, it's fine. So I compromised on the score.

Night Is Short, Walk On Girl (2017) 9/10
RODAN It's your boy Yuasa. I definitely want to see more of his work now, as I rank this one very highly. While at first it just seems like a fun and silly romp, as it unfolds you start to figure out this work of literature. Yes, I'm pulling the literature card again, which isn't really crazy given that the movie itself claims to be literature at one point. This is a movie fundamentally about fate versus coincidence, with two main characters that represent Dostoevsky's unconscious and conscious man. NiSWoG takes place in a Dickensenian world where everyone and everything is so interconnected (including this movie to classic novels) that coincidence is inevitable, and it achieves its thesis statement in a short 90 minutes not in spite of, but because of its seemingly random bunch of anime bullshit. Watch once for the stupid fun, rewatch for the insane details.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) 6/10
I rewatched this because I didn't remember much of it from when I saw it as a kid, and I thought maybe it went over my head. And while a lot did, like its truly awesome fights and commentary on gender roles, my feelings are unchanged about the thing that really stuck with me, and that's that I don't really like the ending at all.

Rushmore (1998) 6/10
I said that Bottle Rocket felt subtly different from other Wes Anderson movies, so here is where things developed into what they would be for a while. Still pretty good, though a lot of the plot is predicated on these two adults being legitimate friends with this kid, and I don't know why, he fucking sucks.

From Up on Poppy Hill (2011) 5/10
I can't believe it's not incest. "It's like a cheap melodrama" a character lampshades, well, doesn't change the fact though. Even this was way better than Tales From Earthsea and less boring than When Marnie Was There.

Glory (1989) 7/10
Pretty watchable historical war movie with a good cast except for Matthew Broderick.

Wolf Children (2012) 8/10
Not the easiest movie to take seriously! But when you look past how furry it is, it's an interesting, compelling, and sometimes radiant film to watch, also I can't rewatch Maquia yet.

5 Centimeters Per Second (2007) 6/10
Knocked out two of Makoto Shinkai's short films. I don't really like short films. I don't want to count something under an hour as a film, but I eventually came around to The Garden of Words because it's really good. Voices From a Distant Star is very interesting. I haven't seen anything else about how warp travel actually affects relative time. Sure could have been an interesting 2 hour movie, but comes off as little more than a trailer. I didn't list it separately and I have no idea how to rate it.

Then you have 5 Centimeters Per Second, which is staggeringly similar. It really is just the same story without space travel. In fact, I've seen 4/6 of his films, and all of them are about missed connections (three involve age differences too, though not this one). If I were his wife, and he's been married to one woman throughout all these films (I know because she's in Voices), I would be a bit worried. Is there some much older/younger girl from his childhood he still regrets not banging? It really seems that way. Anyway, Centimeters is really sad and I'm not sure what to do with that. Also, early Shinkai films be like the most beautiful backgrounds with butt-ass ugly rage comic character designs. Very strange.

Rumble Fish (1983) 4/10
I haven't seen The Outsiders, but this sort of seems like diet Outsiders. Same year, same director, same author, many of the same cast. This film is stylistically very interesting. I wish it was an action movie, because an early fight scene is very well done. But I don't really get this film at all. It's just an hour of Mickey Rourke being really pretentious and we're supposed to think he's super swell. Not enough Nicolas Cage.

 

[Panic Station]

Deadpool 2 8/10

They say the signs of a good sequel are increased stakes, character development, faithfulness to the original, and enough new material to keep things from being an outright rehash. Take those signs, focus half of the character development on the titular merc (with the remaining 50% split between the other characters in varying amounts), add in two or three extra bucketfuls of gore, and you have Deadpool 2.

 

[brightobject]

id amend that to a 7 personally, the shitty romance thing with his gf being in heaven and shit? dragged down what was otherwise quite a fun movie. IF anything not having the stupid dream sequences would have made the gag at the end where he saves her more unexpected. And the entire romance still basically means nothing to me since all the happy couple does is throw out some lines of banter before their house gets shot up. But yeah, aside from that significant blemish I liked DP2 a lot more than the startlingly forgettable DP1. cooler setpieces, funnier gags, all around a winner.

also u guys should see The Rider by Chloe Zhao. its cool, makes me want to see her previous film. The story of the production is even cooler, as they used actors whose life stories were part of the basis of the movie's premise / themes.

 

[vonFiedler]

Patriot Games (1992) 6/10
Harrison Ford takes over for Alec Baldwin as Jack Ryan, possibly one of the strangest casting choices ever. But unlike the more procedural Hunt for Red October, Patriot Games is your bog standard Harrison Ford thriller. There are better. Odd choice of Irish folk music throughout the movie, you don't hear Arab music blasting throughout films when they're the bad guy.

The Cotton Club (1984) 5/10
Filled to bursting with stereotypes, but there's no reason you can't have fun with that. This is how a venue film should be done, with short clips of singing and dancing to set the mood of the scene, then continue on with the plot. Not that the plot is much to write home about. Not enough Nicolas Cage.

Duck Butter (2018) 3/10
Alia Shawkat, Mae Whitman, Hong Chau, and Kumail Nanjini? Sign me the hell up! Oh, the latter three are barely in the movie? Lots of very confusing scenes here starting from the first one. I don't really understand the characters or why they act the way they do. And for the Mad Max: Fury Road of two people fucking, you would hope the only two important players would be good actors and hot. Well one is a good actor and one is hot. After an hour of boredom, this was a LAUGH RIOT when I turned on Netflix's descriptive audio, a tactic I will have to remember in the future.

His Girl Friday (1940) 3/10
Comedy constantly pushes the envelope more than anything, so a very old comedy that was considered "screwball" now seems rather tame. Sometimes clever but never funny. And about a really awful person I have no sympathy for.

The Place Promised in Our Early Days (2004) 5/10
Another Makoto Shinkai movie, another missed connection and age gap film (both facilitated by the same plot device, a coma). First true full length Shinkai film I've seen since Your Name, and no better off for it. It's triple the time of Voices From a Distance Star, but does absolutely nothing with that time except techno babble about a macguffin that never makes any sense. Oh, I've discovered another Shinkai trope, the uncommon hobby. In this the main character ice skates, does archery, AND plays a violin. 5 Centimers Per Second has archery and surfing. The Garden of Words has shoemaking. Your Name has braiding. What will The Children Who Chase Lost Voices have? Will those lost voices be young loves they lost? Does the older man and young girl on the cover have the hots for each other? I forecast a 90% certainty of these things.

 

[vonFiedler]

Racing With the Moon (1984) 4/10
It's a "find the point" movie. Is it a romance? Is it a coming of age story? Well, being that it's about two men who are soon to join the military, isn't that when a lot guys come of age? Sean Penn is too good of an actor for the shit performance he gives here. It seems deliberate, but it's baffling. Decent amount of Nic Cage, and he's really drunk and stupid at one point so that's a plus. What does the title mean? The characters race with a train multiple times, so why not call it Racing With the Train?

Searching (2018) 9/10
The last thing I would expect from a movie that now shares a subgenre with Unfriended would be an opening segment comparable to Up's. Anyway, as a mystery and as an artistic restriction film this is quite impeccable. It's the kind of movie you'd need to watch twice with your finger on the pause button to catch all the clues, but as shocking as the twists are, they are all explicitly spoiled if you could pay attention to the most minute details. That's one hell of a mystery movie. And while John Cho is becoming a pretty overrated actor, I don't think his stiff performance really hurts the movie.

Tehran Taboo (2017) 5/10
A fairly pretty rotoscope animation movie, aside from some ugly cgi cats. Like Under the Shadow, Tehran Taboo is another not-Iranian film, meaning it can talk extensively about sex and gender divide which would normally be censored in country. And while that's pretty important, it doesn't feel much like an Iranian film, lacking complex or interesting plots as the story spreads thin across four characters.

Children of Men (2006) 9/10
Staggeringly well written sci-fi film that exposits and allows you to infer everything. One example exchange goes: "Terrible what happened in Barcelona. A blow to art." "And to people." Because we've already seen a bomb go off earlier in the film, we can infer what they're talking about, and it tells us a bit about the priorities of each character. Oh yeah, the opening is great. I judge films heavily on their first 15 minutes and the this film only needed 2 to show me it meant business.

It's not an action movie at all, yet it has some of the best action shots I've ever seen. It feels like you're following a reporter through a war zone. There's a six and a half minute long take near the end and it's phenomonal.

And not only is the film technically very good, despite all the grimness within it, it's a pretty story about faith and circumstance and it really comes to life in its final scene.

As a tangent, I always knew The Last of Us was highly derivative of zombie stories, but I wasn't aware just how much it rips off Children of Men. It's like they cut up all the plot points and reattached them with no regard for whether they would make sense or not.

Children Who Chase Lost Voices (2011) 6/10
Gosh I know people keep calling Shinkai the next Miyazaki, but I didn't know it was because he once went all in on trying to knock-off Princess Mononoke. Of course, this film is that, but it also fits with my previous theories about him trying to make the same movie over and over again. The hobby this time is radios. As for missed connections and age gaps, this is hard to get into without spoiling the really weird ending, but let's just say this is probably the most uncomfortable we get. As a fantasy film, this really stretch's Shinkai's ability to paint pretty environments. It's almost a 7, but some plot holes and sloppy sequences in the ending hold it back.

Is Makoto Shinkai the next Hayao Miyazaki? Lol no. The guy has been making the same movie over and over again for 15 years. In this context, it should be hard to dispute that Your Name is his masterpiece. At the same time, his next film will retread old ground again or break away from what he's good at, and either way I don't think we can expect something nearly as good again.

 

[Karxrida]

Any thoughts on the upcoming Mary Poppins Returns? I haven't watched the original in a very long time, but it seems like the sequel might be something of a plot rehash. Still cautiously optimistic since they're actually putting in traditional animation and we don't know that much about the movie right now.

 

[vonFiedler]

I most certainly would not consider myself to be cautiously optimistic about Mary Poppins Returns.

 

[GatoDelFuego]

When do we get Mary Poppins Resurrection and Mary Poppins Revengence

 

[v]

soon to be followed by Sound of Music 2: Schindler's Tryst

 

[Panic Station]

Wiseau has accidentally leaked a Youtube link for The Room. The entire movie.

 

[Surgo]

Winter's Bone (2010) 4/10
I love Jennifer Lawrence but like a lot of actresses I'm not in a hurry to see all of her films, because by most accounts this is the only good one from her early days. And like, it's fine. She does a good job. But watching Red Sparrow earlier this year, which was probably a worse movie, still was somewhat successful at being fine. As a drama, what am I supposed to take from this? That the Ozarks suck? Also plagued by two-scene characters.

Replying to old review lol

I'm kinda surprised you didn't like this one honestly (it's one of my favorite movies). I'm not sure what you'd expect to take away from a drama though. The message is, yeah, the Ozarks suck. But at the end of it she established her dad's death, saved her family's household, and brought her extended family closer together. Anything beyond that would be stretching belief of something a 17 year old girl could reasonably accomplish.

 

[vonFiedler]

But at the end of it she established her dad's death, saved her family's household, and brought her extended family closer together.

Yeah that's the plot. But what does it say about the human condition? How can I apply it to my non-Ozarks life? This is supposed to be the high-art genre of the movie industry, I don't see a whole lot of ambition here. It's pretty well made and acted, except for a significant number of throwaway characters, but it didn't make me think. And if something doesn't make me think, it might as well entertain me more than this did. Stakes -> overcoming adversity is not enough for a good drama. If that was all I wanted, I'd just rewatch Passengers.

To each their own, a 4 on my scale means someone else could call it a 10 and I won't raise my eyebrows too much, but that's how I felt.

 

[Oddish.]

I don't usually see movies on their opening day, because I hate dealing with packed theaters, but my friends invited me to go see Venom with them. And how could I refuse hanging out with my friends?

I wasn't interested in seeing this movie until very recently. I mean, I figured it was gonna suck. But if you've been keeping up with movie news, then you've likely seen people call Venom "so bad it's good," "cult movie material," etc. I'm here to confirm that they're all correct. Normally I try to keep my expectations neutral when I see a movie for the first time, but with Venom, I walked in expecting it to be hilariously awful, and I got exactly what I payed for. Minor spoilers below, I tried to be as vague as possible.

A more critical examination of Venom for those who care

Venom is definitely bad. It's an awkward film, in more ways than one. Awkward script, awkward pacing, awkward tone shifts. At the very least, these things do kinda add to the charm. In terms of more "serious" gripes, the beginning of the film is a bore. You get your setup, then you watch Eddie mope around the city for a while. Things don't kick off until him and Venom combine. From there on out, it's a glorious cheese fest, but I digress.

Speaking of Eddie and Venom, anyone who isn't them is utterly forgettable. I could care less about his relationships with his love interest and his love interest's boyfriend (or any of the other randos he talks to in the film for that matter). In fact, I don't even remember their names. The one decent thing about it is that Eddie and this boyfriend character actually hit it off quite well, and he even tries to help Eddie after discovering the symbiote in his body, so kudos to the writers for sparing everyone a petty cock measuring contest between the two.

Marvel also continues its trend of unremarkable villains with this film. He's a brand of the Thanos villain (mixed with Lusamine, in fact, I'd argue he's basically the two of them mashed together), the entirely corrupt guy who is supposed to be intilligent yet presents an amazingly stupid idea for the supposed survival of a species and actually believes in his ridiculous plan. They even both spout some nonsense about "overpopulation." Fucking yawn. I didn't like it in Infinity War, and I don't like it here. Though at the very least, this movie didn't try convincing me that this guy is sympathetic somehow. He's depicted as straight up evil, and I can respect that one-dimensionality far more than Infinity War's pathetic attempts at making me care about Thanos. There's no scenes in Venom where they try to trick you into thinking "well MAYBE he has a POINT" and feeling sorry for him because he cries over his dead loved one or whatever, so I'm less offended by his presence and more utterly unimpressed. Outside of this guy, the other symbiotes are also unmemorable, with one of them just kinda fucking around in other people's bodies until the final act.

Going back to Eddie and Venom, this movie really should've been about their relationship above all. And it seems like it wants to be about that...but it's also bogged down by this "NO HOMO!!!" tone. Seriously, the way Eddie and Venom interact with each other is hilarious, and in a weird way, actually kinda sweet at times, but they gotta keep reminding you that Eddie's boring love interest exists (another Marvel tradition, those pointless fucking romances), so Venom plays wingman in order to assure you that there is indeed no homo going on between him and Eddie. Their relationship is also not helped by the fact that, due to the aforementioned awkward pacing and script, Venom's character motivations and development just kinda...change and happen on a whim. In fact, he's not the only one who falls victim to that in this movie.

On a more technical side, there are some awkward edits and scene transitions, and at times, it's very hard to tell what the fuck is going on. Though on at least one of those occasions that may have been the point? Maybe? Idk. This is as much as I'll talk about that since I'm not too knowledgeable in this area of film making. I just know there were multiple points where I went "what the fuck was that edit?"

Hm, what else...oh, the final act is kinda wack. There's no real sense of tension and urgency because the villains are pretty boring/underdeveloped and everything just kinda happens so suddenly. Also that one guy's plan is stupid anyway so I don't really care. Maybe if they had spent a little more time establishing the other symbiote's goals and his partnership with Thanosamine instead of having him dick around for most the movie, it would've made a bit of a difference. Instead, it's kinda just like "Oh now this other symbiote is here, and he's a problem. Oh, and Venom wants to stop him now." Like, uh, okay? Also, a character is shown to die, with seemingly no way of surviving, and in the next scene, is miraculously back, with no explanation.

Hmmm I think that's it in terms critical review. And really, I only typed all that out because I love going on tangents. None of it really matters that much to me, because as I said, I didn't walk into this movie expecting greatness. I knew Venom was gonna suck, I embraced it, and I had a fucking blast watching it.

 

[Hulavuta]

Oddish. I'm not sure if you know (can't tell entirely from your post whether you thought it was or you were just comparing them) but Venom is not a Marvel film. It's a Sony film based on a Marvel property, like The Amazing Spider-Man movies. So usual Marvel creative oversight is not involved at all.

 

[Oddish.]

Oddish. I'm not sure if you know (can't tell entirely from your post whether you thought it was or you were just comparing them) but Venom is not a Marvel film. It's a Sony film based on a Marvel property, like The Amazing Spider-Man movies. So usual Marvel creative oversight is not involved at all.

I know. Still a Marvel character though, so I counted it

 

[JustoonSmitts]

I didn't know we had a thread for discussing films. Awesome!

I guess I'll start by talking about a movie that's been on my mind almost all week: "The Thief and the Cobbler"

Before I share my thoughts, I can't really talk about this movie without talking about its history: An animator named Richard Williams decided he wanted to make a film that would turn animation into an art form. Production began in 1964, when funding for this movie came out of William's own pocket from making commercial work. It was finally under a complete production in 1988 after Williams finished directing the animation of "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", for which he won two Academy Awards. After that, Warner Bros. agreed to help Williams finance the project. Things looked like they were finally looking up for William's dream project until the film went over budget and went behind production schedule, so Warner Bros. not only hired a completion bond company to finish the film, but they fired Williams from his own film... The film was later handed to Fred Calvert and he edited the film to also include songs and dialogue where there wasn't before. Two years later, Miramax took over and edited it even more and released the film in 1993, where it bombed at the box office and recieved mixed to negative reviews, mostly because Miramax timed it to release one year after Disney's "Aladdin" (which ironically took inspiration from this film). Production was just a gigantic mess. Then in 2006, a fan of William's work and film restoration named Garrett Gilchrist gained access to workprints of the film and not only restored the film to HD, but also edited the film so that it was closer to William's vision of what the film would be, dubbing it "THe Recobbled Cut". Three versions have been released since, in 2006, 2008, and 2013. Even better is that Gilchrist made this version of the film available for free on his YouTube channel, "The Thief Archive".

History lesson done. Now, the film's plot is pretty simple. It follows a poor cobbler named Tack, who under circumstances caused by when a thief breaks into his home for money and riches, gets arrested by the sultan's vazir, ZigZag (played by Vincent Price). There he meets a princess who saves him by saying she needs a cobbler. It turns out ZigZag wants to take over the kingdom and steals artifacts that protect the Golden City where they live from attack from the Mongol-esque One Eye (yes, I know these names are simple. I didn't make it.). So the princess and Tack go on a journey to save their kingdom, being followed by the thief who inadvertently causes and saves the day.

On paper, this plot is WAY too simple. One that could easily be crap and cliche in the wrong hands (Miramax). But in Williams' hands, what saves the story for me is how the story is executed. To begin, there is little to no dialogue. The cobbler Tack and the thief are completely silent (except Tack has one line at the end of the movie), but there is clear character coming from their expressions and movements. Tack is a lead a la Charlie Chaplin, good heart and all that goodie good stuff. The thief reminds me a bit of Wile E. Coyote in how he tries to steal for his benefit and fails at every chance he gets (by strange coincidence, he is primarily animated by Wile E. Coyote animator, Ken Harris) . He also has a lot of good slapstick. The villain, Zigzag, is voiced by Vincent Price. It's no surprise he has the most dialogue, but he's clearly having fun with his somewhat hammy performance and the animation is tailor-made to match his performance. To make him stand out even more, his dialogue is also entirely in rhyme. The rest of the characters, like the princess and the sultan, are pretty simple. They serve their roles fine, I suppose.

But the real star of the film is the animation. Inspired by UPA's flat but expressive designs, Disney character animation, Persian minatures, and M. C. Escher, the artwork in this movie is drop-dead GORGEOUS. There are so many scenes that are incredibly impressive to look at, including the chase scene and the fall of the villain's machine. It's a surreal, but wonderful visual experience unlike any other. There is real weight and character in the animation. Sadly, in the recobbled cut, it's not complete. There are scenes that use storyboards and rough animation. The soundtrack incorporates tracks from Rimsky-Korsakov's "Scheherazade" Suite, as well as various classical works of Mussorgsky and Khachaturian.

So, do I recommend this movie as a whole? Well, I do recommend "The Recobbled Cut" on YouTube. There is so much being told with the animation only, which makes it a unique experience. If it's ever finished, I think it could be a real contender for the title of "Greatest Animated Film", right up there with "Fantasia", "My Neighbor Totoro", and "Anomalisa". For the love of God, do NOT go looking for the Miramax release. The songs they added are some of the blandest I have ever heard. The dialogue added to Tack and the thief by Matthew Broedrick and Jonathan Winters are unnecessary and unfunny. The editing is also very clumsy, and you can tell the newer animation from the original animation by Williams and his crew because the new animation is not even close to the caliber of the original work. All I can say is that if you go and find it on YouTube, it's a film unlike many other made, finished or not. For now, I may consider it the greatest film never finished.

Oh, and I'm not doing any star ratings or numerical ratings. Just a heads up in case I write another review like this.

 

[vonFiedler]

Mandy (2018) 7/10
Nicolas Cage's most critically acclaimed movie in a very long time, probably since Leaving Las Vegas even. And it's a low bar to say that it's one of his better films, but it's not his best. This movie is three things: artsy-fartsy cinematography, revenge plot, and Nic Cage freaking out. All three of these things are done much better elsewhere, but combined the film is entertaining enough. Strangely understated performance by Cage to be honest. There's only one really weird moment from him and it's actually right before he takes demonic LSD. There's one scene where he's just intimidating a character by doing nothing but staring at him for several minutes, and that look on his face... it's really exactly what you want for that scene. But like I said, it's just a bit reined in overall.

The Boy in Blue (1986) 2/10
I can't believe it's not TV movie! Lots of filmmaking sins in this, from terrible scene transitions, to loud blaring music, and even editing that visibly stutters at parts. A sports movie where the sports depicted are entirely without stakes or excitement, as the female lead puts it, "rather not edifying". I tried looking up all I could about the real Ned Hanlan and I have to conclude that most of the movie is bullshit, ending pretty much when his career was just beginning. Probably the worst I've ever seen Nicolas Cage act, even though he did a better job in his first lead role, Valley Girl. Even with Captain Correli's Mandolin you could blame his shit performance on poor accent instruction, but here his abs do more acting than he does.

Birdy (1984) 4/10
A Nicolas Cage movie about a man who loses his mind in the Vietnam War and believes that he is a bird... and the insane man is not Nicolas Cage's character... A somewhat interesting, somewhat odd film. This is the first good ranting monologue we see from Cage in his career, and really it's the first movie where we see his potential as an actor. It won the Grand Prix, but I'd have shaved about 30 minutes off the runtime.

Brief Encounter (1945) 3/10
I've complained about a few films that over-romanticize love affairs, but thin parable against them isn't any better. Probably because it's based on a one-act play. It's watchable and well made enough at first, but once it gets on its soapbox, you can't help but roll your eyes at how naive and tame it all is.

Mind Game (2004) 7/10
Delightfully wacky film. Will require rewatches in slow-motion to understand everything, but I think this is a safe score. I don't think it's as intellectually fully realized as Night is Short, Walk on Girl, though it touches on similar concepts. Wish most of the movie wasn't set inside a whale.

Peggy Sue Got Married (1986) 6/10
A much better movie than I expected. Nicolas Cage's most contentious role, often taking clips out of context to show that he's a bad actor. I didn't like his performance at first, but the character really grew on me. It's a farcical, fake person, and the way he talks matches that. It's really sold by the fact that Cage can still bring the same range of emotion he usually does even when using such an extreme affectation.

Anyway, he's not the main character or anything. Overall, I think the movie is pretty entertaining, funny, and interesting. But its subject matter has been tackled much better elsewhere. It really feels like a collection of disparate elements that don't really fit cohesively together, and I'm not even sure I understand what the movie is trying to say or why it resolves the way it does.

 

[Pilo]

Pulp Fiction - a little while ago i realized i'd never seen a tarantino film in my life so i decided to rectify that. i've always been a sucker for story anthologies so pulp fiction seemed like the obvious choice. the first thing that really leapt out at me was just how entertaining the dialogue was, the incredible acting and character chemistry between jules and vincent made watching them carry out a casual conversation in the middle of whatever scenario they happened to be in a complete joy (in this regard i especially enjoyed samuel l. jackson's performance). the movie also showcases a lot of tarantino's directorial talent in how it builds suspense in many of the scenes, some moments literally had me on the edge of my seat. since this is my first tarantino film i cannot in good conscience say it's his best work but goddamn if it wasn't great.

Raiders of the Lost Ark - not a lot to say about this one really, it's just dumb, pulpy fun. a lot of this movie was funny, most of it unintentionally so but that only added to the experience in my opinion.

Sorry to Bother You - i went to see this one in theaters on a whim mostly because the synopsis sounded kind of interesting and it definitely didn't disappoint in that regard. going in with zero expectations i found the dry humour to be surprisingly on point throughout most of the film and there were a lot of relatable feels like having to pay for shitty breakroom coffee coupled with less relatable ones like spoiler: humans being transformed into horse-people against their will as a metaphor for how capitalism dehumanizes people by turning them into workhorses. not the most subtle premise but definitely one of the most creative executions of the "capitalism is bad" moral i've ever seen

Mind Game (2004) 7/10
Delightfully wacky film. Will require rewatches in slow-motion to understand everything, but I think this is a safe score. I don't think it's as intellectually fully realized as Night is Short, Walk on Girl, though it touches on similar concepts. Wish most of the movie wasn't set inside a whale.

visually speaking, i think mind game is yuasa's most "out there" work and that's my absolute favourite thing about it but i hated how much it dragged during the second half. i think the theme of "seize the day" is just too simplistic to be stretched out to a runtime of 100 minutes.

 

[vonFiedler]

Letters from Iwo Jima (2006) 4/10
Letters is only interesting from a production standpoint. It's a remarkably authentic film about Japanese soldiers during WWII directed by a prominent conservative director. I definitely was much more interested in seeing it than its companion piece, Flags of Our Fathers. But this is still a typically bland and bloated war movie. It looks like an early PS3 game. Just two plus hours of sad people sitting in caves. The actual battle lasted over a month, it had to be more eventful than this film portrays it to be.

Raising Arizona (1987) 6/10
One of Nicolas Cage's better films, one of the Coen brother's lesser films (at least according to IMDB scores). Perfectly fine farce with a lot of good production and acting. I struggled with whether or not to give this a 7 (rewatch score). It's a good movie, but it's not like, oh man, what a good Nic Cage movie. John Goodman hams it up better in this one.

Genius Party (2007) 6/10
How do you rate an anthology by different directors? I came here for Yuasa's Happy Machine and was skeptical that I'd be interested in the other stories. But Happy Machine was one of the lesser shorts. Shinichirou Watanabe's (of Cowboy Bebop fame) Baby Blue and Shouji Kawamori's (designed every non-Gundam robot) Shanghai Dragon would both be the best short film I'd ever seen if they didn't have to compete with each other. In fact, they're both so awesome that they've made me reconsider short films as an artistic medium. On the other hand, Limit Cycle is just shit. 20 minutes of pseudo-philosophy over "relevant" "animation". I have to give this a 6 because I wouldn't rewatch all of it, but I'd rate it much higher if it were just Baby Blue and Shanghai Dragon.

Run Lola Run (1998) 8/10
Constant high energy movie from start to finish. Probably the perfect film to watch while doing cardio. The title does not fail to describe the majority of the film. Lola has 20 minutes to get 100k marks. Run Lola Run. The soundtrack works absolutely perfect for this and never lets up. But the film is also a philosophical exercise about how slight changes in our actions can have drastic effects on the world. Really good stuff.

A Star Is Born (2018) 10/10
So if you want to make a good romantic movie, you just put Bradley Cooper in it, that's my takeaway from this and Silver Linings Playbook. The big question of this film is who is more amazing? Bradley Cooper the director/writer, or Lady Gaga the songwriter/actress. And yeah, she absolutely KILLS it acting.

I usually hate movie romances where we're just supposed to believe that the characters have chemistry together, but you believe it like you were one of the characters meeting one of the others for the first time. The movie drips with fun and relatable dialogue. The pacing moves forward at a constant driving speed as beautifully framed shots transition from one to another like seamlessly. With music from genres I don't really like, but with such story subtext and great singing that I could only love it.

There's a scene in the trailer where he pulls her onto the stage to get her to sing. This might be about 45 minutes into the film. When I was watching it, I knew that after that scene, if the film had ended, it would be a perfect movie. It could only go downhill from there. And while that's not untrue, I cannot say I was disappointed when the credits ultimately did roll. This is going to win best picture.

Lu Over the Wall (2017) 5/10
The weird lovechild of Ponyo and Devilman Crybaby. Has some neat music sequences, but too few to sustain the nearly two hour runtime.

Moonstruck (1987) 3/10
Allegedly one of Nicolas Cage's better movies. He's the only good thing about the film. Subplot subplot subplot. Something about cursed relationships and werewolves. Wtf did I just watch? Everything wraps so absurdly neat at the end but there's no romance at all.

 

[vonFiedler]

The Lady Vanishes (1938) 4/10
I'm starting off two weeks of horror movies leading up to Halloween with The Lady Vanishes. It's not really horror, but Hitchcock was my first Halloween marathon. There are two kinds of Hitchcock films. The thrillers he is most associated with and the adventure films where normal people get swept up in spy shit. This film rides the line a bit too much between the two. It was at least somewhat interesting in the middle, but resolves plainly.

The Thing From Another World (1951) 2/10
I'll admit that I have no idea how to rate this film fairly. The Thing is one of my favorite movies, and to be fair, it's not a remake of this film. But from shot number one, you're beaten over the head with just how much worse the first film does everything. I'd be interested to watch them side-by-side just to see how much this one wastes time. Soundtrack is like someone slamming their fists on a piano. No sense of urgency. Lame monster. I know I shouldn't expect too much from old sci-fi, but is this really above average?

Hellraiser (1987) 6/10
This film is set up very well. It has some excellent scenework in places, a very creepy atmosphere, and some great monster effects. It just spends so long setting up the monster stuff that the heroine spends very little time in peril, and she easily resolves both conflicts. It is a delight seeing Garik from Deep Space Nine though.

Season of the Witch (2011) 5/10
Sadly not a horror film in spite of the subject matter, but I still gotta get my Nic Cage in somewhere. I was hoping this would be a really fun bad movie like Drive Angry, but it turns out it's more of a mediocre okay movie. The production quality is really bad. The movie's morals are a little confused. Sure, the crusades and witch hunts might have been a lot of bullshit, but it's a little hard to make that point when also you're contending with an actual obvious evil witch. But you got Nic Cage playing buddy knight with Ron Perlman and an appearance by Christopher Lee, and while the film doesn't do much with this, it doesn't really ruin everything either (unlike some other promising team-ups).

Phantasm (1978) 3/10
Riddled with baffling scenework and editing. Terrible acting. A grab bag of horror elements that were probably left on the cutting room floor of better movie. At least you'd think it wouldn't be boring, but it's a bit boring too. At least the soundtrack is good.

Repo! The Genetic Opera (2008) 3/10
I can actually be pretty open minded about genres I don't normally enjoy when they're used well in a story. I certainly wouldn't normally have liked the kind of music that is in Metal Gear Rising or RWBY, or even the recent A Star Is Born. But the music in this just sucks ass. I cannot believe that the songwriter had ever practiced or studied music before. It's an endless repetition of stating plot points over and over without a rhyme in sight, and the result sounds like a goth rock version of Lazytown. Now I will say I thought the repo man was kind of cool and the antics of the heirs was entertaining enough, but I cringed watching this mess way more often than I enjoyed it.

Blood: The Last Vampire (2000) 6/10
Feels like an interesting concept film, as its another short one. But then when they made the TV show it became a very different thing entirely. This film is beautifully animated and it's easily the best use of bilingualism I've seen in animation. Sometimes its a little contrived and hokey. The film contrives a way to put the protagonist in a school uniform in spite of no one else at the school using one, and the plot point of being undercover in a high school doesn't even go anywhere.

The Raven (1963) 5/10
A thoroughly stupid movie that has nothing to do with the Poe poem. What it does have is Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Boris Karlov, and Jack Nicholson running around in period costumes and shooting magic spells at each other. So I'd be lying if I said I didn't get some enjoyment out of it.

 

[Panic Station]

The draw of Repo! the Genetic Opera is

minor spoiler

watching Paris Hilton's face fall off

.