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Godzilla 2014 is weird because on paper its absolutely fine, but it doesn't quite work in practice. It's really just overstuffed with early 2010 ideas and loses itself in trying to be a disaster movie, a soldier trying to get home to his family, ancient aliens, WMDs, etc, etc. Coupled with CGI that hides its flaws with heavy darkness and too close shaky cam and you get a movie that just doesn't add up to the sum of its parts.

A shame too, because the kiss of death is easily one of the best monster kills the franchise has ever seen and basically puts this into the upper ranks of the franchise all on its own.

Godzilla, King of the Monsters

Right, everything we mentioned as criticism of Godzilla 2014 is valid. And here? Gone! All of it.

Greater focus on the Kaiju, more focussed and relevant smelly hooman stories as mankind begins to understand the Kaiju and their part in Earth’s ecosystem. And the performances are markedly better. Even if Charles Dance is just doing Tywin Lannister again. I don’t care, it’s a terrific performance.

Also the lighting is much better. As are the Kaiju, relying as it does more on long established characters. Not sure about the Massive Mammoth though? At least he looks effing sweet.

It just feels like a much more confident, much more accomplished effort.

In fact, is this a rare film series which only gets better as it expands?

If I were to rank them:

#1 - Skull Island

While the least kaiju of the bunch, its easily the most competent story while still having some good monster fights

#2 - Godzilla vs Kong

This one is a little on the sillier side compared to the rest but wins out for me for a super satisfying final battle that has some of the cleanest choreography in the series.

#3 - King of the Monsters

Probably better than GvK with some incredible shots and beautiful direction throughout. Mostly I was just disappointed by the final battle with King G that doesn't get to breathe while the humans scramble around doing nothing.

#4 - Godzilla (2014)

Said the above. Most of the film is a jumbled mess of ideas, but the final battle mostly makes up for it.

#5 - Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire

I REALLY didn't like this one unfortunately. It has a few moments, but it just shifted too far into GvK's weaker elements and felt too much like a CGI void for me.

I really enjoy The New Empire, as it gives Kong some deserved greater attention, and really sells the Hollow Earth as a place of weirdness and beauty. Though I do agree it’s not quite what it could be.

As I said earlier in the thread, the scale is missing when Kong is exploring Skar’s realm, which makes the final battle feel jarring where everyone is always conveniently big enough to flatten the next building they get punted through. I don’t think that’s actually the case, just a result of sudden and clear scaling where there was none before.

GvK I love for the beautifully crafted “classic Toho” moment during the big scrap. It’s seamlessly stitched into the more modern effects, and is more an Easter Egg.


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Overall I think it’s a really fun film series, which benefits from the studio not trying to fart one or two out each year, every year. And even when there are more than a few bum notes along the way? No one film is terrible.

If for nothing else Kong using a child as a cudgel gets it some extra points.

#3 and 4 would probably vacillate depending on mood, but overall I think Luna's ordering is a pretty solid.

I think part of it is I never bought Skar as a villain on the scale the story tries to make him. He's a tyrant and a bully that would have been a perfect villain for Kong alone, but not the kind of threat that demands a team up film.

Why the series definitely gets right is the world building.

The films are pretty formulaic, but it feels like an advancing timeline where lessons are learned and attitudes develop. Particularly Monarch which starts off evil/morally ambiguous, but comes good in the end.

I wouldn’t say any quite enter my favourites list. But they feel like nerd crowd pleasers to be held in reserve for a movie night.

To break away from the Big G talk.....

Harold and the Purple Crayon

Oh, Zoey Daschanel (sp) how far you have fallen......

If you were a 6-10 year old boy, this would be great. Maybe being really drunk or stoned could help too. However, it is not great BUT I am not the target audience.

However, kudos to the casting director as the guy who played Library Gary and the gal who played Porcupine were GREAT finds.

Unfortunately Godzilla x Kong is dire. MDG has mentioned the scale issue when there is no human reference point but the killer is the utterly moronic antigravity segment. The giant orangutan is a poor villain after Gidorah and mechgodzilla, and just how does holding a small body part mind control the ice dragon?

The only redeeming features are Gojira using the Coliseum as a nest and the juvenile as a club. This comes in as a solid ‘F’.

I still wouldn’t call it dire.

The scale thing is an issue. When we’re in Skar’s domain, all it would’ve taken is some Smelly Hooman Ruins to set it better.

Whip Control Tip Thing I understand, but am not that fussed over. It Just Does, Right is for me an acceptable enough answer.

Skar I do kind of like as a Villain. Take away his whip, and make it a straight fight? He’s clearly weedier than Kong, who we know can’t actually take Godzilla without his spangly axe thing. Because we see him fail without it. But Skar has intelligence. And is the first foe Kong and Godzilla have fought able to use tools and lackeys.

So, yeah. Totally see where you’re coming from. And valid criticisms are of course valid. But I’m just less bothered by the issues you highlighted.


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Enchanted

Moving outside my usual menu of sci-fi, horror and utter crap.

A romcom where a aminated fairytale princess is hurled into modern New York and of course meets her True Love.

I really wish I’d watched this years ago, because it’s bloody good fun! Timothy Spall as as the gimboid henchman utterly sell this movie, single handed. The rest of the cast are good, but he’s the secret ingredient.

Enchanted is absolutely a gem that in no way should be as hidden as it is.

Timothy Spall. It’s all on him.

Everyone else is fun. But Timothy Spall just embraces the Chaos and makes sweet love to it.

Love Enchanted. Pips mime to the dim witted prince is a highlight, and the daughter is that rare thing: an unannoying kid in a movie. The sequel has some moments but can’t measure up to the original.

I think my finest point of praise is that in any given scene? It’s exactly as silly and self aware as it needs to me, and not one jot more.

It’s warm hearted and not being nasty about it’s source material and inspiration.

Also I’ve met lasses like the Princess in real life. Nowhere near as much fun as it seems! Even though she’s innocent and harmless here/

Ready or Not 2, Here I Come

Excellent follow up to an enjoyable original. It’s nonsense, but fun nonsense.

They Will Kill You

Very stylish, very very silly, in a good way. Not actually much of a plot to be honest, but some good laughs among the general mayhem.

Big screen viewing of Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

Still good. Of note, many people at the showing had never seen it before. I guess that happens when you are in a University town.

They were completely shocked by the ending. LOL

Well, it is surprising if you watch for the first time.


I actually watched Enchanted at some point when it was on TV on some idle Sunday afternoon. It was good fun.

Pizza Movie

“I should have been more careful with the football team’s dicks.”


Pizza Movie is the story of two, no three, no four, er, definitely three, college students who take drugs so potent they will suffer sanity death if they cannot eat a slice of pizza in time. And the pizza is all the way downstairs.

It sounds like a stoner comedy, but it is not one. It’s got a lot of fresh jokes or approaches to jokes built on the formulaic frame of a bland college get-to-the-thing comedy. There were quite a few funny scenes and some laugh-out-loud moments, but a lot of it should have landed harder than it did. Feels like the unpolished first movie from a comedy duo who will really deliver some knockouts when they gain a little more experience and more confidence. I’ll be keeping an eye out for their next film.

Hellboy:- The Crooked Man

An ambitious but sadly low budget entry in the Hellboy franchise. It's not necessarily a bad movie, it's just that a lot of the time it feels like it was put together by film students, with a dream, a camera and a very modest grant.

It has its moments (The way it depicts Skin-walking is very creepy), and is a lot better than the last time they tried rebooting the series, but has a long way to go to reach the heights of the Del Toro originals.

Send Help

Competent but overlooked office worker ends up stranded on an Island with nepo baby boss following a private jet crash.

Quite good fun, if not at all what I was expecting. And it’s a Sam Raimi flick.

Just found out Daniel Radcliffe voiced the butterfly in Pizza Movie. So, yeah, it’s that kind of movie.

The Sheep Detectives

Perfectly charming ovine murder mystery that's got a couple of surprisingly dark touches. Great fun and would recommend.

Eraserhead

What the heck did I just watch?
It was certainly interesting, but I am feeling so very confused right now.

That’s perfectly normal.

 aku-chan wrote:
Eraserhead

What the heck did I just watch?
It was certainly interesting, but I am feeling so very confused right now.

I love that movie. And that feeling.

The scene where he meets his girlfriend’s parents won me over. The baby scenes really stuck with me. One of those few movies where the imagery was so strong I could almost smell it.

Altered

Sci-fi genetic guff. Tom Felton from out of off of Harry Potter stars. But this is terrible. The voices appear to be dubbed on poorly, like a bad anime. Except it’s the actor’s voices.

I’d give this one a wide berth if I were you.


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City of the Living Dead

Lucio Fulci is at it again, in this sort-of-zombie-but-more-demonic horror flick.

A Priest hangs himself, opening the gates of hell as a result. And then some sort-of-zombies, but only like, 5 or 6, show up and we at least get some inventive kills. Until someone stabs the undead/demon priest and all the others catch on fire.

Look. You don’t watch this for the plot. Because there really isn’t one. But as I said, there are some inventive kills here for the gore hound, impressive despite the clearly limited budget.


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Boardinghouse

80’s super low budget slasher flick, and apparently the first shot on video.

A Boardinghouse, scene of previous mysterious deaths becomes the undoing of aspiring actresses. Starring nobody you’ll have heard of. But I do wish the skinny blonde bloke who apparently has some form of telekinesis would put some bloody clothes on. I don’t need or want to see him in his posing pouch.

The picture quality is of course terrible. But the acting is…competent enough. I guess. For its budget. But one does suppose most of the budget went on the ol’ showbiz Sherbert. If it wasn’t for its first on video tape status? There’d be exactly nothing to see here. Scenes just sort of end, meaning pretty much every dialogue exchange is pointless.

Probably best avoided.

Mickey 17

Robert (Twilight, Batman) Patterson is a loser hired to be an "expendable" on a space mission. Every time he dies he's uploaded and reprinted/cloned. Sure enough after 17 clonings they accidentally make 2 of him at the same time. And then they run out of ideas.

Mark Ruffalo does his best Trump impression as the expedition commander. There's some made up nonsense that if someone ever has 2 clones at once they both have to die and be erased forever! And then they meet a race of water bugs and there's some stuff there.

Cast is good, Patterson especially, but it's too long with too little to say.

3/5

Night Train to Terror

1985 Horror Portmanteu, and I do love a Horror Portmanteau.

And interesting flick, assembled as it is from three partially completed feature length movies, with shot-for-purpose linking scenes of God and Satan on a train having a discussion about humanity.

Being a salvage job, this is inherently imperfect. But as something made from the sweepings of failed projects, it’s surprisingly enjoyable and genuinely entertaining.

One for a dedicated cheesy horror movie night I think. Ideal for when the viewers are getting a bit tired/tipsy and don’t want anything which requires too much attention.

The Dead Don't Die

Jim Jarmusch zombie movie with the most absurdly stacked cast imaginable. Bill Murray, Adam Driver, Tilda Swinton, Austin Butler, Chloe Sevigny, Steve Buscemi, Danny Glover. Typical Jarmusch sedate pacing and deadpan humour. The highlight is Tilda Swinton's gloriously weird performance as a katana wielding scottish mortician.

A very weirdly low key film!