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Made in us
Battlefield Tourist




MN (Currently in WY)

Not a movie, but I just finished Shadow and Bone on Netflix.....

Summary: A young adult novel made into a show from an author that played way too much of the Blades in the Dark RPG.

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[MOD]
Otiose in a Niche






Hyderabad, India

Avenue 5

That guy from House plays the captain of a luxury space liner knocked off course turning an 8 week trip to a 3 year one. Watch as his billionaire boss and the rest of the passengers go slowly insane. Neelix is there too. A lot of subtle humor.

"See those skulls, all 4 of the Beatles, they're real, signed and everything. They didn't sign them obviously, that would be impossible, I did."

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/05/18 21:11:37


 
   
Made in at
Buttons Should Be Brass, Not Gold!





Vienna, Austria

Leprechaun 3 (1995)


Horror comedy about nasty Leprechaun wanting to keep his gold together. This time he's going to Las Vegas!
This one goes full silly comedy and after a slow start it goes full on bonkers. I went into this one knowing nothing (hadn't even seen the second film!) and it won me over. It features very fun characters (except maybe for the leads), a fun Leprechaun, at least two very cool and inventive kills and a ton of gags. I enjoyed it a lot.

Watch It. (presuming you're open to watching a murderous leprechaun film)




Black Cobra (1987)

Action film starring Fred Williamson. This is the first in the 4-films Black Cobra series. Fred Williamson is Joe Malone, a tough cop dude who doesn't play by the rules, but by god, he gets the job done. He's after a nasty gang of motor bikers and has to protect a witness lady who saw their leader and thus the gang is after her.

The plot is very generic, the level of violence is high, the characters are all pretty lifeless. Of course it also suffers from English dubbing of course. But still - I wasn't taken by the film.

Don't Watch.

   
Made in us
Battlefield Tourist




MN (Currently in WY)

Fred Williamson is pretty awesome though.....

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Made in fr
Longtime Dakkanaut






The beast within. 1982.

Since this is a year we have cicadas returning, at least in my sector, it's kind of a thing to watch this horror movie coming to you from 1982.

Basically, it's a monster cicada movie. There's a monster that apparently has kinda the same lifecyle as a cicada. It gets born, it hibernates for like 17 years, then comes out, kills some people, breeds, leave an offspring that will repeat the cycle in 17 years, then dies.

See? Just like a cicada. Well, except for the fact it hibernates in a human body for 17 years, kills people and breeds thru violent rape, yeah, it's exactly like a cicada.

It's a minor cult classic with at least slightly above average effects, acting and such than the typical almost direct to vhs rental store movies of the day, and a star of the movie was also in another 1982 movie you just may have heard of called "Star trek 2, the wrath of khan." She plays a mother in both movies, tho in this one her son, the cicada monster, is a little more sympathetic a character and better acted than her little kirkling in ST2.

Check a review of it. https://www.popmatters.com/177133-the-beast-within-2495703411.html

"But the universe is a big place, and whatever happens, you will not be missed..." 
   
Made in in
[MOD]
Otiose in a Niche






Hyderabad, India

Avenue 5

The next to last episode turns really dark. Then the last one goes for farce as the cast fight over the one shuttle seat back home. Didn't really stick the landing but I'll give season 2 a try when it's out. Apparently it was renewed because they thought a show about 5000 people in lockdown is just what we need now.

Joss Whedon presents: Rule 63 Steampunk X-Men

Spoiler:


Really? You put the head of the school in a wheelchair? You didn't think that was just a bit too on the nose?

OK pilot but tried to introduce too many characters at once, should have halved them and brought in the rest over time. Will stick with it.


 
   
Made in us
Secret Force Behind the Rise of the Tau




USA

Army of the Dead

It's that new Snyder zombie flick. It's okay for an action movie. Cliche plot. Bland characters to are too dumb to live. Not sure anyone is looking for that in a zombie movie though.

A couple scenes further convince me that Snyder holds audiences in contempt, but Snyder's audience seems to consider that a plus half the time so XD

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/05/21 21:28:02


   
Made in us
Battlefield Tourist




MN (Currently in WY)

I would think Snyder's cinema nihilism would work great in a Zombie flick.......

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Made in us
Secret Force Behind the Rise of the Tau




USA

 Easy E wrote:
I would think Snyder's cinema nihilism would work great in a Zombie flick.......


I could just be biased. I expect Snyder to state the obvious and stupidly think it's clever, so maybe I'm just seeing what I expect, but it happens a lot in this movie and it's a lot more condescending that his usual shtick.

To give a specific example

Spoiler:
So early in the film it's a 'gets hired for a job, gathers the team' sort of deal. Not much of a spoiler there that's basically the trailer of the movie. Anyway, one guy hired for the team is this safecracker whose obviously really into safecracking but is the token idiot. While explaining the 'plan' the film practically breaks the 4th wall to have him ask "how do we kill the zombies' and then one character looks around at everything but the camera and explains how to kill zombies. The obvious way obviously. And that scene feels not like it's making a gag about how this guy is an idiot savant, but like it earnestly believes it needs to explain to the audience how this works which is pretty typical of Snyder in my experience. He treats bum basic information like it's somehow clever and talks down to the audience to explain everything from children's book aesops to his own empty platitudes, and now the basics of zombie flicks (headshots, duh).


That ranted about, it's still a fairly well put together (if very generic) zombie/heist flick. I didn't feel like it was a waste of my time or anything. The sheer fact it has decent production values and a capable cast already puts it a leg up on most movies of its genre XD One character in particular really ruins the entire show imo mostly because she's so fething dumb she feels like a wound inflicted on you every time she has a moment because her entire roll in the plot is 'selfish donkey-cave who gets people killed in the name of doing the right thing that is so obviously the wrong thing" that it hurts to have to watch her be involved in the plot.

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/05/21 22:41:52


   
Made in at
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Vienna, Austria

 Easy E wrote:
Fred Williamson is pretty awesome though.....


That is true. He's great for the role. It's just a bit weird when he's in longer dialogues, revealing his character's motivations. Not due to him, it's just the clunky dialoge (maybe it's just the dubbing).



Started watching Leprechaun 4; I've got the feeling that a.) this won't be as good as part 3 and b.) that originally this was a film about space soldiers to which they added the Leprechaun later. I think the German release was called Space Platoon. At least I know a film now which starred Heidi from Tool Time.


I have little inclination of watching Army of the Dead, but I just read up on the development history of that one on wikipedia. Seems like Warner Bros. had this one planned since 2007, in 2019 Netflix picked it up, stuck a starring name on it which people know, got a director whose name people know, added some more names to cover more target audiences (Sanada and bloody Schweighöfer) and off they went. Looks like Netflix are working as per their cookbook. What I didn't expect to see was how expensive this film was: 90 million dollars. That's a lot of money for a zombie heist comedy. I'm sure they turned it into something entirely watchable.

   
Made in us
Purposeful Hammerhead Pilot




United States

The Mitchells vs the Machines:

It was way better than it had any right to be. A friend of mine said that they heard it was a "make fun of gen Z and Millenials for cell phone addiction" and I don't know where that came from. The film only comments on tech addictions a few times, in the beginning, to set up the dad's alienation with his family, and otherwise, all characters are portrayed as competent well-rounded individuals. There aren't any "Let me teach the spoiled kids how to do X" moments or anything like that. It's just a good pretty wholesome movie about family and how our different unique interests can make us a stronger group. I am convinced Lord and Miller can't make a bad film.

Plot setup:
Spoiler:
Weird artsy girl is obsessed with film, Her outdoorsy father doesn't really know how to connect with her and it's been straining their relationship. The girl is about to leave for film school and in a last-minute fear that she will leave home and never return Dad decides to take the family on a long road trip to spend some more time with her before she goes to college.

Meanwhile, an Apple stand-in accidentally causes a robot apocalypse when his not-Siri AI assistant realizes that planned obsolescence means she is about to be phased out. Cue hilarity as the dysfunctional family becomes humanity's last hope.
   
Made in fr
Longtime Dakkanaut






The devil's rock.

WW2 supernatural horror, low budget. basically a 3 person cast. 2 commandos are sent to an island called the devil's rock to see what nazis are doing there.

Summoning on hawt demon to win the war for der fatherland. Vat could pozzibly go wronk, ja?

Very hawt actress who was in the power rangers, sadly retired after this, and no actual nudity. Lots of dead nazis.

Here's a poster for the movie, can't post the actual image, just a link because it has a bad word in it and as Bill Maher said, babies get offended when you use a bad word.

https://www.nzfilm.co.nz/sites/default/files/styles/scale_width_half_column/public/2017-11/The_Devils_Rock_-_Poster_2_Fina_Vendettal.jpg?itok=sxdyvsLn

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Made in us
Battlefield Tourist




MN (Currently in WY)

The Exception

A German Wehrmacht soldier is sent to lead the guard of Kaiser Wilhelm in Holland after the Nazi invasion of Holland in 1940. A British agent is suspected to be in the area as well.

The movie plot is obvious and you know exactly how it is going to end. However, it was still interesting to me because..... Christopher Plummer (RIP) plays the Kaiser (RIP)!

Enjoyable and mostly accurate except for the British Agent and Himmler plots. I also liked the ending......

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Legendary Master of the Chapter





SoCal

Animalympics

Free on YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GB8BOxMa9eg

It’s an animated comedy from the late 70’s that parodies network coverage of the Olympic Games. There is a ton of talent in the movie, from the voices of Billy Crystal, Gilda Radner and Harry Shearer to directors and animators like Steven Lassiter and Brad Bird, and it shows. The soundtrack is amazingly catchy. Even if one is not old enough to get the pop culture references, the comedy still holds up due to them covering all the bases: word play, puns, slapstick, visual gags, character interactions, and surrealism. Unfortunately, there is a bit of fat shaming and one blatantly racist character (Bruce Kwakimoto), so it hasn’t all aged well.

I’d recommend checking it out for at least the following scenes:
Bolt Jenkins
Noah’s Ark Disco
Ice Hockey
Platform Diving.

Some great animation and humor from top talent at the beginnings of their careers.

   
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Vienna, Austria

Meh, it's blocked in my glorious contry of Asutaria. But I think I might remember that film. I'll have to look it up.

   
Made in us
Storm Trooper with Maglight





Army of the Dead


Since this is a recent Zack Snyder film I think a lot of people are going to have an opinion on it before even watching it. Ignoring who the director is though, I was actually pleasantly surprised. My expectations were admittedly low, though being a fan of the zombie movie genre in general I found this to be better than most.


I'm not sure what your average George Romero fan thinks, though I imagine most would have preferred it if Snyder hadn't used the name that he did for this film.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/05/24 19:44:50


 
   
Made in gb
Longtime Dakkanaut





Oxfordshire


I didn't know that was a film. It was cut up as a series of shorts between programs from what I recall, though I don't remember the channel.
   
Made in us
Legendary Master of the Chapter





SoCal

 Henry wrote:

I didn't know that was a film. It was cut up as a series of shorts between programs from what I recall, though I don't remember the channel.


I understand it was originally created to be aired in segments during the 1980 Olympics.

   
Made in gb
Joined the Military for Authentic Experience





On an Express Elevator to Hell!!

El Torro wrote:
Army of the Dead


Since this is a recent Zack Snyder film I think a lot of people are going to have an opinion on it before even watching it. Ignoring who the director is though, I was actually pleasantly surprised. My expectations were admittedly low, though being a fan of the zombie movie genre in general I found this to be better than most.


I'm not sure what your average George Romero fan thinks, though I imagine most would have preferred it if Snyder hadn't used the name that he did for this film.


Can I ask how did it compare to his Dawn of the Dead? I really enjoyed that film.

From the trailer I had the feeling this was more of a light-hearted tongue-in-cheek film more like Zombieland than his earlier film?

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SoCal

RLM’s Half in the Bag pretty much tore Army of the Dead a new one...which might be an even more appropriate metaphor for this film considering where Snyder apparently wanted to go with the zombies.

   
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 Pacific wrote:
El Torro wrote:
Army of the Dead


Since this is a recent Zack Snyder film I think a lot of people are going to have an opinion on it before even watching it. Ignoring who the director is though, I was actually pleasantly surprised. My expectations were admittedly low, though being a fan of the zombie movie genre in general I found this to be better than most.


I'm not sure what your average George Romero fan thinks, though I imagine most would have preferred it if Snyder hadn't used the name that he did for this film.


Can I ask how did it compare to his Dawn of the Dead? I really enjoyed that film.

From the trailer I had the feeling this was more of a light-hearted tongue-in-cheek film more like Zombieland than his earlier film?


It's been quite a few years since I last watched the 2004 version of Dawn of the Dead, but from what I remember Dawn of the Dead leaned more on the horror elements. Army of the Dead is more of an action film, which happens to have zombies in it.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that Army of the Dead is similar to Zombieland, it just doesn't try to rely on jump scares. It's a pretty tame film overall, as long as you don't mind lots of gore.
   
Made in gb
Mighty Vampire Count






UK

Quite disapointed with Army of the Dead - thought it was overlong and rambling in parts. Action was ok in parts but mostly a meh film for me.

Very little humour - don't be misled - if you want that - plenty of really good Zombie comedy-drama films and tv shows out there.

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Made in at
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Vienna, Austria

Yeah,I won't watch Army of the Dead. Had my latest fake fighting event ruined with ads for that one, and I haven't read a single really favorable review. I do like the Day of the Dead remake from 2005 a lot though. Possibly my favourite serious zombie film (apart from Train to Busan). In terms of comedy... well, everything's been said and done (well) in Shaun of the Dead, hasn't it.

What I DID see though was Cape Fear (1991). Pretty sure I wrote about it before, so I'll keep it short. It's a very interesting film and yet it doesn't feel like Scorsese's strongest, or even close to it. It's very violent, very "human vs. evil". Because that Max Cady IS pure evil, isn't he. This film also is a testament to how good the Simpsons once were. Nowadays you can't watch Cape Fear without thinking of the Simpsons episode. Either way, very interesting, not the least due to Juliette Lewis' character who adds a cool layer to the film.

In the end I forgot about the 'speaking in tongues' bit. That was pretty creepy.
If you haven't seen it - Watch It of course. No Ifs and Buts.



I also watched half of Alien Nation (1988) (or "Space Cop L.A.1991", as the German release is called Not to be confused with "Der Space Cop" from 1991 ). I'm not sure why, but I love Alien Nation. The TV series probably more than the original film, but the film's good as well. Of course the film doesn't go as in-depth as it should go, and Newcomer culture/phsiycal differences to humans is in large parts played for laughs, but that's okay.

I don't know what it is, but I love the idea of a cop drama with that additional layer of the Newcomers having landed. It's a bit like I, Robot, but interesting. I also just like the look of the Newcomers, I like the mystery, I like the setting. I really like how in the series they play with Newcomer culture. Some rich hipster humans being enamoured with it and become "Newcomer posers", some young Newcomers being fed up with having to 'integrate' getting all 'aware' of their 'roots' (which they never cared for before and which they misinterpret). The slightly different clothing, tastes in interior design, and so on. Interesting stuff. I'm not sure I've seen all the TV films which followed the end of the show.

Anyway, I like it a lot. It's got a special something to it, I think. Oh, I also like the tv show's theme music. Quite ahead of its time, that whole thing.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/05/26 22:09:16


   
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MN (Currently in WY)

I feel like the Netflix movie Bright is an interesting successor to Alien Nation, and that Alien Nation is an interesting adaption of the mini-series V.

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Starship troopers
It's really interesting when you look into the production stuff. They purposefully chose good looking actors who couldn't really act well just to cement the sort of propaganda feel of the movie.
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Vienna, Austria

Yeah, Verhoeven is clever like that.

   
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Hyderabad, India

Somehow there are people who weren't sure if ST was a parody or not...

 
   
Made in us
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MN (Currently in WY)

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
Somehow there are people who weren't sure if ST was a parody or not...


More than you would like to realize. I most often see it with folks who are big "Heinlein" fans who like the source material a lot, and do not realize that the movie is making fun of fascism and totalitarianism.

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Hyderabad, India

After we saw Robocop my dad turned to me and said that has to have been a parody.

I didn't believe him till years later.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Easy E wrote:
Not a movie, but I just finished Shadow and Bone on Netflix.....

Summary: A young adult novel made into a show from an author that played way too much of the Blades in the Dark RPG.


Watching it now. My 3rd steampunk series after Sherlock Holmes Steampunk Fairies and Rule 63 Steampunk X-Men.

So far my favorite of the 3.

Even if it is Steampunk Avatar the Last Airbender.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/05/27 22:41:16


 
   
Made in gb
Joined the Military for Authentic Experience





On an Express Elevator to Hell!!

 Easy E wrote:
I feel like the Netflix movie Bright is an interesting successor to Alien Nation, and that Alien Nation is an interesting adaption of the mini-series V.


I thought Alien Nation was better than Bright - wonderful concept for the latter, but like everything that has him in it, it managed to be the Will Smith show even though he was surrounded by Orcs and Noomi Rapace as an elf. Thought it had a fair bit of wasted potential (should have had more of things like the Centaurs working as traffic police) and didn't think the end of the film worked very well.

Then again I haven't seen Alien Nation for many years so it might not have aged as well.. but from memory it certainly seemed a lot less preachy.

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