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Ready Player One

I never rated the book and beside some nifty sfx the film was equally mehh

@ Matt, I got the sense the shimmer was largely instinctive and only started being a problem after it absorbed the first team and picked up human traits

 Turnip Jedi wrote:
Ready Player One

I never rated the book and beside some nifty sfx the film was equally mehh

@ Matt, I got the sense the shimmer was largely instinctive and only started being a problem after it absorbed the first team and picked up human traits

I'm reminded of an old song, "You may be right. I may be crazy." (No "may" about the second part in my case I'm afraid.)

https://youtu.be/Jo9t5XK0FhA


But My feelings still goes towards...



I hope we can respect each others interpretations of the ambiguous ending, net arguments get so boring. I don't think there is a right or correct view.

indeedy, not having the answers spoon fed is partly why the story works, but still think the doctor essentially feeding it broken people wasnt going to end well

Watching Jojo Rabbit.

Only about 20 minutes in so far, and it’s utterly charming in its own way.

Somewhat toned down than Taiki’s usual stuff, but retains all his wit.


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Ready Player One was great for 80’s kids in terms of nerdy nostalgic spots. Beyond that? Honestly? Wreck-It Ralph 2 did it better.

I damn near fell asleep in Ready Player One...and it's a good example of why you don't pick an awful, boring, non-charismatic actor to try to lead your film. Just a huge fething bore.

Predator: Still, just the best.

Thor: Ragnarok: Still a fun Marvel film, and closer to the "feel" of an actual comic book than most of the other films.

Girls und Panzer, der Film: Just as fun and charming as the show, but with less "girls eating food and talking about friendship" that dragged down the actual show. Tanks are still fun/cool/silly.

LOTR:FOTR: The extended full edition is still my favourite of the LOTR films. Great atmosphere and pacing, etc.

OK. Jojo Rabbit is a masterpiece.

100%. Just everything about it is superb, perfectly conceived and thought provoking. And in these days of ever more polarised political stances, relevant.

Watch it. You will not regret it.

Jojo is probably the best movie I saw last year.

Ready Player One is substantially better than the book in the sense that the book was awful and the movie is kind of fun by comparison.

Finished the Dragonheart Pentology only to discover that it will be a Hexatology shortly!

3-5 seem to be written by the same writer (and share many of the same production folks, which I respect) so they actually hang together pretty well as they follow the story of the Dragon's as they spread.

1 and 2 are sooo bad. 3-5 are solid. They keep managing to get A-listers for voice acting the Dragon in most of them too.

Great. Now I really want to watch parts 3-5, maybe 6, of a series. It’s Nightmare on Elm Street all over again.

For reasons I will never understand, I actually watched an asylum "series of images shown in rapid succession to simulate motion along with a soundtrack" (it didn't deserve to be called a movie of film) called "Monster island."

They used to say "I could eat a roll of film and a better movie than this!" Now I guess I'd have to say "I could eat a blank dvd and a better movie than this!"

Monster island was a rip of godzilla kotm, and managed to be absolutely horrible even by the dismal standards the asylum proudly boasts.

I can think of nothing this movie did right whatsoeverr. The cgi was remarkably poor, even by asylum standards. The monster designs were along the lines of "WTF is that supposed to be?!" as to acting, honestly, why can't someone put Eric Roberts out of his misery to spare him more embarrassment by being in more asylum productions?

While most of the cast pronounced kaiju properly, one actress apparently couldn't say it and pronounced it "kie yoo" As to the main monsters name, it was pronounced so poorly and indistinctly I can't remember it.

Not quite as deliberately stupid as the sharknado movies, but in every other way abysmal. Yahweh liked soddom and gammorah better than i liked this movie...

Yeah, sounds like pretty much any Asylum film I've come across. They had some strokes of luck in earlier times (like 10 years ago) with their Sherlock Holmes film, which was kinda entertaining and stuff like the Battle:L.A. one (which was better than the one they aped with it), but overall they just do really boring and cheap films. Never liked the concept of Sharknado (deliberately created "cult" film for the internet to joke about), so I never watched them. Saw a few other newer Asylum films, and they just kinda sucked. Shame, because for a little while they looked like another chance for low-budget B-movies which are fun and maybe even good.

Public Enemies: It's a solidly okay movie. Nothing particularly special, but I'm a sucker for anything Stephen Lang shows up in. Nice period piece.

Empire Records

The mid-90s had an odd John Hughes tribute phase and this is one of better ones, still baffled by the radio edit version of the closing song mind

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

Yup, still good. You should watch it.

A legendary swordsman has a vision while meditating and decides to retire. He gives his sword into the safe keeping of the local magistrate. Thieves steal it and when he goes to regain it, he encounters someone who he wishes to tutor. They have different ideas.

There is so much more to the story than I just laid out, as there are really three coinciding story lines that all intersect and ask you to consider the traditional gender roles and how they conflict, each with their own price to be paid.



Murder Mystery

An Adam Sandler/Jennifer Aniston movie that is a bit better than I expected, but still not amazing. Jennifer Anniston has nailed the suburban white woman role. There are times where the twos banter teeters on the edge of irritating, but dials it back just before crossing over.

I am sure they had a ton of fun making this movie, and it was an OK watch. If you have nothing better to do I have seen much, much worse.

Sword of Destiny

After watching Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon I watched the Netflix sequel.

It has been 18 years since Lu Mu Bai's passing. Sun Lien has been wandering China alone, but returns to the House of Te after Sir Te's death. There she encounters two thieves trying to steal the Green Destiny. Hijinx ensue.

This film was directed by the fight choreographer of the original film. You can tell. The focus is much more on action and less on the intertwining story lines. The movie is lesser for it and feels like a lesser film following normal Kung Fu/Action movie cliches.

Overall, it was a disappointing watch despite a strong performances by Michelle Yeoh and a cast of skilled martial arts movie veterans.

I watched halle berry's 'catwoman' a while back.

I dont get the hate. It wasn't terrible. The idea of a cosmetic company knowingly selling a skin creme that made you look younger but turned your skin to stone was not hard to accept given the realty of botox.

I could see a lot of people looking at that skin creme and asking "How much younger?"

There was a decent plot buried somewhere but I think all concerned knew it was a stinker and went with the only upside they had and pointed the camera at Ms Berry, a lot

Shadow of the vampire.

An excellent film with a unique premise: The classic silent film "nosferatu" starred an actual vampire. It was a movie about making Nosferatu with a real vampire as count orlock.

 Easy E wrote:

Murder Mystery

An Adam Sandler/Jennifer Aniston movie that is a bit better than I expected, but still not amazing. Jennifer Anniston has nailed the suburban white woman role. There are times where the twos banter teeters on the edge of irritating, but dials it back just before crossing over.

I am sure they had a ton of fun making this movie, and it was an OK watch. If you have nothing better to do I have seen much, much worse.

Jennifer Aniston's good. I like her. Sandler is a mystery. Maybe he's just really uncomplicated and good to deal with behind the camera? At this point I somehow can't believe he's just hired so much because his films perform weirdly okay and beyond of how they should. There's a weekly film show I watch on youtube and the past two weeks the presenters discussed "great actors vs. people just getting hired because they're reasonably good actors, but also are just agreeable and work well with others", which was quite interesting.

Didn't really watch any films lately. Not any I remember. I did happen across two recent x-files episodes though. It was weird, but overall ...alright? There was a funny incident when the two latest seasons were released with the production company not wanting to pay the original German voices of Moulder and Scully, so they exchanged them, which (along with the obvious changes in look of the actors) was weird. Apart from that - the Trashman episode was perfectly fine. The other episode (the one with agent Einstein; Moulder and Scully meet basically their younger selves in some young FBI agents) was kinda grating between annoying banter and annoying young agents (he's got that problem many US actors seem to suffer from - looking like a football player. And not being a very good actor, I thought. Agent Einstein was just generally annoying. Sure, they're young and brash and so on, but technically she's talking to superiors, at the very least in seniority.). So I turned the thing off at that point.

hey you leave agent lizzy alone, like nearly all* of her kind shes protected under the 1984 Ringwald treaty (* not Sheeran he knows why)

Barbrella

who needs a plot if you have a pretty lady and a big bag of drugs

Wandering Earth

bit wobbly but awesome visuals

The other strange things about Sandler Sigur, is that he can act and has proven it in several more serious roles. Thing slike Punch Drunk Love, Spanglish, Uncut Gems, etc. He just chooses not to most of the time!

The other thing about Murder Mystery is that is skipped most of the normal Sandler "crew" and had a wider variety of actors.

What! No David Spade!? I'll take it off my Netflix list immediately

I watched The Big Lebowski properly, all the way through, for the first time, and I think I get the hype.

 Vermis wrote:
I watched The Big Lebowski properly, all the way through, for the first time, and I think I get the hype.

Aye, this one's my prime example of a film getting better and better with repeated viewing. Weird thing is that it doesn't stop getting better each time I watch it. :O

Sabrina

The 90's remake with Harrison Ford, Julia Ormond, and Greg Kinnear.

A Rom-Com where the daughter of a rich family's chauffeur returns from Paris. This causes business and romantic complications. The movie mashes up the brothers competing for a woman, and Dream Girl teaches the Stuffy Business Man how to live genres together and adds in a does of Modern Fairy Tale too!

I imagine if this movie was remade today, it would not look remotely the same. Still, I enjoyed it for what it is. It makes me want to track down the earlier (Hepburne?) version.

"The X from outer space".

Some japanese kaiju-fu with a monster that looks like a chicken and the moon had a baby. Some american bashing in it but it's too silly to get offended by.

 Easy E wrote:
Sabrina

The 90's remake with Harrison Ford, Julia Ormond, and Greg Kinnear.

A Rom-Com where the daughter of a rich family's chauffeur returns from Paris. This causes business and romantic complications. The movie mashes up the brothers competing for a woman, and Dream Girl teaches the Stuffy Business Man how to live genres together and adds in a does of Modern Fairy Tale too!

I imagine if this movie was remade today, it would not look remotely the same. Still, I enjoyed it for what it is. It makes me want to track down the earlier (Hepburne?) version.

What a funny coincidence. That one was on TV just two days ago or so. I haven't seen it in quite a few years, but IIRC even for the time it was made it was decidedly old-school looking and sounding, which I believe is a very deliberate move. Anyway, nice film. I think mainly due to the lead actors who carry the thing very well.

Few nights ago I caught two episodes of the new X-files seasons. (the Trashman episode and the one in which Moulder&Scully meet their younger selves in two young FBI agents who look into a suicide bombing somewhere in Texas). Funny side note - prior to release of the first of the two new seasons (was it 10?) there was quite a hooplah about the German dub voices asking for too much money to return, so the production company replaced them. That sure didn't help reception in German-speaking areas as both their voices were quite distinctive.
Anyway, the Trashman episode seemed like a nice, regular monster-of-the-week episode with a bit of the old tongue firmly resting in the cheek. Pretty okay fun. Then the other episode came around and I had to turn the tv off. It GREATLY suffered from annoying things. Mostly endless, abrasive talking. I don't know why, but so often dialogue seems to be written as it each side competed for having the last word or getting a little joke in they just thought of. All while acting all tough and like an idiot, because this is the modus operandi when meeting new people, right? Oh well.

Last night I caught bits of xXX - The Return of Xander Cage again. Few months ago I already did see the first 10 minutes and turned it off. Last night I got a tiny bit further, but it really doesn't improve. It's such a weird film. Suuuuuuuuch a weird film. It's like a 13 year old who really likes instagram and gets a million each month from their rich parents. That is Xander Cage. It's like Last Action hero without a charismatic lead or the kid or any self-awareness. I get it, it's "so over the top that it's ridiculous". I don't get the merit, art, craftsmanship or anything in that. It's just a big pile of nothing with an annoying bow on top.



I did watch a full film too, and a good one even - Ocean Waves (1996)

Japanese animation film, produced for TV by Ghibli. It's one of the more low-priority projects and they had their younger producers do it so they can show what they do. I think it's based on a book.
The story of a 17 year old guy in his last year in school, he's good friends with another guy, a new girl from Tokyo comes to the school for the last year (which is odd in itself). She also acts a bit strange, but the boys are utterly fascinated. At least the one. And then the other, and then a really interesting story unfolds.

It's a pretty neat coming of age film which comes across as rather real (in that the characters seem like actual people, if possibly a tiny bit low-key). There isn't a single annoying character in that film. Granted, there aren't that many at all, but none of them are annoying. It's people talkig calmy to each other, until the big emotions hit. It's kinda like an intrigue ("what's that girl's deal?") film with a love triangle on top. A few funny moments, but mostly it's just a story unfolding which keeps you guessing.

Many will probably find it a bit boring and might conclude with the question "what? That's it?". I don't know, I liked it. It's just people's life in times of change. At a later stage there's a reunion of the class which is just a very real and nice scene, especially later on. It's odd, since you only know the characters for about an hour at that point (btw, this is a rather short film. Like 80, 90 minutes?), but they properly get a feeling of familiarity across in those reunion scenes.

Sure, especially from today's standpoint I'm sure there's a lot to criticize about the film. All I could find is that it's really hard to tell characters apart. Faces are drawn in a very minimal fashion, which makes facial expressions instantly recognizable for what they want to convey, which is very clever (and I'M sure saves time). Since faces and most hairdos are very similar (and of course school uniforms are worn a lot during the film) it's hard to tell minor characters apart. Not that it matters very much, but especially later in that reunion I had a bit of a hard time guessing who that young woman is, or who that guy is.

Either way, nice, nice film. Not Ghibli's strongest, far from it, but I really appreciate this film for depicting life and actual people. No superpowers, no magic (APART FROM ACTUAL PEOPLE AND THE MAGIC OF LOVE and FRIENDSHIP!!1), or stuff like that. Only things that matter to people at that point in their lives.

Watch It.


Oh, I also watched No Country for old Men again as well. Best Cohen brothers film? Possibly? The Man who wasn't there is brilliant of course, but not necessarily very re-watchable.

 Easy E wrote:
Sabrina

The 90's remake with Harrison Ford, Julia Ormond, and Greg Kinnear.

A Rom-Com where the daughter of a rich family's chauffeur returns from Paris. This causes business and romantic complications. The movie mashes up the brothers competing for a woman, and Dream Girl teaches the Stuffy Business Man how to live genres together and adds in a does of Modern Fairy Tale too!

I imagine if this movie was remade today, it would not look remotely the same. Still, I enjoyed it for what it is. It makes me want to track down the earlier (Hepburne?) version.

I really should get round to this one as its indirectly responsible for me finding out about the divine Audrey

Some 25 years back I worked in a small arts centre / cinema that had a faithful core of regulars, one of these were a couple of older ladies who only usually showed up to period or costume dramas but they came to Sabrina, film done I asked if they liked "oh yes a bit old fashioned like the old one and the girl was pretty but she was no Audrey" , "who ? " resulting in a 5 minute film history lesson and a list of her films

New Girl

Been binging during lockdown, skipped it at the time as it looked like trope sitcom 101 and for the first few seasons it very much is but then it morphs into the nearest you 'merika sorts have got to UK levels of dark funny in some time, only sunnier and prettier ( but whilst Jess and Cece are passable theyre no Big Suze
)

Jojo Rabbit

still think it overclevers me but im getting there, another watch and i expect ill crack it

Lifeforce.

I actually see this as a romance movie. Female creature comes from outer space, finds human boy, transforms into his (Anm most people's) idea of the perfect woman, seduces him, falls in lover with him, takes him with her to the stars.

Yeah, I guess i'm pretty twisted, eh?

47 Metres Down: Uncaged.

Has no idea how sharks work.


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Dr Sleep.

Quite fulfilling Shining follow up (sequel implies a continuation it just doesn't have.) Felt a bit long, but honestly don't know what I'd cut.