Movie What's the last movie you saw? (7)

[dumb]

The Rooster (2023) ⭐ 6.6 | Drama, Mystery

1h 41m

www.imdb.com

hugo weaving

sparse, kind of interesting male/friendship angle but kinda clumsy as well. soundtrack was a huge misfire, beats you over the head early with cop/bach plays, hermit/improv jazz plays. i quite like bach and impov jazz but feels like they've used music to tell a story the writers couldn't. other audio bits didn't match the landscape and should have used silence or more environmental sounds.
ping pong was the placeholder for any male sport we discuss to escape our mundane lives, just so happens to be one of a few you can play by yourself with the right equipment. pool table would have been the other choice but doesn't work as well in the bush.
kind of touching as it is pathetic. would never have become friendly with each other if one of them didn't supply alcohol.

 

[Frank Bunn]

Shane (1953)

It's the classic Western story - mystery stranger turns up just in time to protect the community from the bad guys who are trying to take their land.

The landscapes were good and I liked Jack Pallance as the gunslinger villain but that was it. It's predictable, clunky in pacing and takes an age to get to the climax. Alan Ladd isn't convincing in the lead role and there's some wooden acting all round. The wife of the homesteader has thirst for Shane but for some reason the director focuses on his relationship with the son. The 10 year old actor, Brandon deWilde, was somehow nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor despite his performance being both inexpressive and annoying. The fight scenes are cringeingly unrealistic.

4/10

Pale Rider (1985)

It's a remake of Shane except this time the locals are gold prospectors. Clint is awesome as usual. Chris Penn is good as a bratty villain. Richard Kiel who plays Jaws in James Bond has a scene with Clint that is copied in the recent remake of Roadhouse. The mother has the hots for Clint. Only slightly less dubiously than in Shane the alternative love interest is the 14 year old daughter. It all looks great, the pacing is good and the shoot out finale is well constructed.

7/10

 

[Madas]

Under the Silver Lake

A sort of noir where a guy wants to bone his new neighbour then she goes missing in strange circumstances so he sets out to find her, delving deeper in to a mysterious conspiracy and/or psychosis.

Look, imma say it straight up: I didn't get it. That's fine, I don't get a lot of stuff, but I did something from watching this - I don't think the director/writer/creative team got it either. They didn't know whatever they were going for or trying to imply, and there's a point where leaving it open to the audience is just a lazy way to cover for 'we don't really know where we are going with this so we threw a bunch of shit against the wall in the hope some sticks'. It feels this was being made up as it went along without a firm resolution in mind.

Andrew Garfield basically carries the film as the main character, a youngish careless slacker with an infatuation with Hollywood culture and a suspicion of conspiracy and hidden meaning in everyday life. His efforts can't really be faulted. A fair amount of side characters come and go on his journey to find his neighbour?

There's a lot of themes, messages, allegories going on. It's never quite clear if what's happening is real or just imagined. The ending is again, a little bit sudden. If nothing else, there's certainly a lot of reading one can do on the internet about this flick and what it could be trying to say or show, arguably more interesting than the film itself, and you could be one of the people that this really clicks with, by the sound of it they are out there. I didn't hate it or think it was shit by any stretch, but as I repeat, I also didn't get it, and again, not sure they did either. I think it's important to understand a film, no matter if it's good guy punches bad guys, or some highly cerebral art, and it's important to get the sense it's being made with purpose and vision even if you personally don't understand it.

This was a rather meandering tale to nowhere strung together by a sequence of events held together by The Amazing Spiderman, that maybe thinks it's a bit cleverer than what it is?

5/10.

Sent from my Nokia 7.2 using Tapatalk

Haven’t seen this movie but the point you made about the writers / director struck a chord
There are quite a few modern movies like this , where they try and be overly clever but just end up lost and I thought it was just me being dumb
But I think they use the age old mantra of “ if you can’t dazzle them with brilliance baffle them with bullshit !”

 

[JackOutback]

Shaun of the Dead... 20th anniversary rewatch. This is almost the perfect comedy, there's not a wasted scene, not a wasted line, everything serves a purpose. The filming and framing is beautiful, the jokes laugh-out-loud funny, there's a heart to the film about the malaise that can set in in your 20s and the need to find purpose in life, keeping relationships and friendships alive. The cast is fantastic, the writing razor sharp, the direction excellent, it's just a brilliant genre mash-up. I think I may give this one a 10/10 as well.

 

[Cruyff14]

Shaun of the Dead... 20th anniversary rewatch. This is almost the perfect comedy, there's not a wasted scene, not a wasted line, everything serves a purpose. The filming and framing is beautiful, the jokes laugh-out-loud funny, there's a heart to the film about the malaise that can set in in your 20s and the need to find purpose in life, keeping relationships and friendships alive. The cast is fantastic, the writing razor sharp, the direction excellent, it's just a brilliant genre mash-up. I think I may give this one a 10/10 as well.

Hot Fuzz is infinitely better.

I tried watching Shaun of the Dead and I think I turned it off cos I just wasn't feeling it.

 

[sandeano]

Shane (1953)

It's the classic Western story - mystery stranger turns up just in time to protect the community from the bad guys who are trying to take their land.

The landscapes were good and I liked Jack Pallance as the gunslinger villain but that was it. It's predictable, clunky in pacing and takes an age to get to the climax. Alan Ladd isn't convincing in the lead role and there's some wooden acting all round. The wife of the homesteader has thirst for Shane but for some reason the director focuses on his relationship with the son. The 10 year old actor, Brandon deWilde, was somehow nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor despite his performance being both inexpressive and annoying. The fight scenes are cringeingly unrealistic.

4/10

Pale Rider (1985)

It's a remake of Shane except this time the locals are gold prospectors. Clint is awesome as usual. Chris Penn is good as a bratty villain. Richard Kiel who plays Jaws in James Bond has a scene with Clint that is copied in the recent remake of Roadhouse. The mother has the hots for Clint. Only slightly less dubiously than in Shane the alternative love interest is the 14 year old daughter. It all looks great, the pacing is good and the shoot out finale is well constructed.

7/10

I'll respectfully disagree on SHANE. It has been a while since I have seen it so I may be cloudy on some aspects, but I regard it as a western about westerns. Here we are in 1953. Westerns - at least as a Hollywood A-film have become, as the critic Andre Bazin has theorised - super westerns. That is, westerns by name only in which the genre is used as a coat hanger of sorts to extol various political and social topics.

SHANE does the same, except its commentary is on the genre itself. The father (Van Heflin) is a decent bloke trying his best, but, like a lot of men after WW2 is feeling weak, emasculated and impotent (probably has not had sex since the boy was born). The mother is hanging out for it but cannot get it. The boy is looking for a father figure that exists in his own imagination.

Shane arrives and can fulfil those duties But Shane is a figment of westerns past. He is a Manichean hero (in the vein of Tox Mix, Buck Jones, Gene Autry et al). The type that no longer existed for A-Movie audiences in 1953. He does his deeds but cannot stay. "Come back Shane" yells the boy, but he had long gone from westerns and for audiences. The reason it was a huge hit in the day was that the viewers longed for a white-hatted Shane to appear and return a sense of morality to the genre that one offered stability in their lives. But no, he could not stay. He no longer existed and had to continue on his way, back to the past.

 

[Beerfish]

Hot Fuzz is infinitely better.

I tried watching Shaun of the Dead and I think I turned it off cos I just wasn't feeling it.

Ridiculous take. Hot Fuzz was hot garbage. Barely got through it once. Have never bothered trying again.

Infinitely better.. lol

 

[Gralin]

Shaun and Hot Fuzz are both great

 

[GreyCrow]

I'll wait for 74561347 take on Shauns Hot Fuzz

 

[phantom13]

Shaun and Hot Fuzz are both great

Dont really like either of them TBH.

 

[SnakeMan86]

Interestingly the original script was written by Chernobyl/The Last of Us writer maybe she was attached to that but then Eli Roth has absolutely butchered it to what it is now.

That or she just needed an easy paycheck

Apparently the original "Eli Roth' style movie cut, which was far more graphic, more swearing. But the studios dumbed it right down. Which explains some of the janky cuts in the movie.

Not saying this would have made infinitely better... But would have been more accurate to the source, as well as the awkwardness of some of the dialogue and editing.

Borderlands Movie Had Characters 'Blowing People's Heads Off' Before PG-13 Changes

According to the film's stunt coordinator, director Eli Roth filmed a lot of gory and violent moments

kotaku.com

 

[Toump Ass]

Longlegs (2014)
Nicholas Cage being a maniac seems a bit of a tired trope at the minute so not very exciting but he really does a lot with his minmal screen time. This not-gory horror movie is kind of half a crime-thriller and it's mostly just an exercise in heavy atmosphere a bit like that late night with the devil film I saw the other day. Soundtrack is really good. Lead lady is nice too. And the black cop has the right amount of hokeyness. A bit of a style > substance but better than most of the shit that people watch IMO 7/10

 

[Jatz]

Dont really like either of them TBH.

Yeah this is me. Really don't get the fascination behind either.

 

[Beerfish]

Shaun of the Dead... 20th anniversary rewatch. This is almost the perfect comedy, there's not a wasted scene, not a wasted line, everything serves a purpose. The filming and framing is beautiful, the jokes laugh-out-loud funny, there's a heart to the film about the malaise that can set in in your 20s and the need to find purpose in life, keeping relationships and friendships alive. The cast is fantastic, the writing razor sharp, the direction excellent, it's just a brilliant genre mash-up. I think I may give this one a 10/10 as well.

Hot Fuzz is infinitely better.

I tried watching Shaun of the Dead and I think I turned it off cos I just wasn't feeling it.

Ridiculous take. Hot Fuzz was hot garbage. Barely got through it once. Have never bothered trying again.

Infinitely better.. lol

Shaun and Hot Fuzz are both great

Dont really like either of them TBH.

Well I think we have just about every opinion possible covered now. Good work everyone!

 

[raskolnikov]

A Quiet Place: Day One

It probably would have been ok as a stand alone story but as a Quiet Place movie was disappointing.

Spoiler

I was expecting much more about the origins of the creatures and how people find out that they need to be silent. There also didn't seem to be any real motive as to why the two main characters hooked up

 

[Gralin]

Dont really like either of them TBH.

Yeah this is me. Really don't get the fascination behind either.

Well I think we have just about every opinion possible covered now. Good work everyone!

 

[Gralin]

nobody ever mentions The World's End and that's totally fine

 

[Beerfish]

nobody ever mentions The World's End and that's totally fine

Or Paul which was actually not bad from memory.

Certainly better than Hot Fuzz.

 

[joey_jo_jo]

View attachment 2100978
Longlegs (2014)
Nicholas Cage being a maniac seems a bit of a tired trope at the minute so not very exciting but he really does a lot with his minmal screen time. This not-gory horror movie is kind of half a crime-thriller and it's mostly just an exercise in heavy atmosphere a bit like that late night with the devil film I saw the other day. Soundtrack is really good. Lead lady is nice too. And the black cop has the right amount of hokeyness. A bit of a style > substance but better than most of the shit that people watch IMO 7/10

both movies lost it a bit in last act, another horror I watched recently was the same, Cuckoo. I think thats a common issue with horror movies lately, come up with a cool idea but they dont have any idea how to wrap the film up so theres too much focus on a neat twist or call back to things mentioned in pasting earlier in the movie.
Compare that to Barbarian or Dont Breathe that just keep escalating, theyre much more satisfying films from start to finish.

 

[joey_jo_jo]

Or Paul which was actually not bad from memory.

Certainly better than Hot Fuzz.

Paul has Pegg and Frost in it but wasnt helmed by Edgar Wright.
Was about to say all his films since are pretty good (Scott Pilgrim/Baby Driver) but forgot his last film was that hot mess Late Night in Soho

 

[Beerfish]

Paul has Pegg and Frost in it but wasnt helmed by Edgar Wright.
Was about to say all his films since are pretty good (Scott Pilgrim/Baby Driver) but forgot his last film was that hot mess Late Night in Soho

Oh ok. I thought we were just doing Pegg/Frost films.

 

[joey_jo_jo]

have watched a lot of films lately because of MIFF and catching up on a few new horror movies with my horror movie buddy.

firstly MIFF films
The good -
Substance - amazing, such a good time at the movies if you love body horror and euro style gross out humour. Great turn by Demi Moore and the less you know about this before seeing it the better
Teaches of Peaches - really made me sad I wasnt able to get tickets to her last gig here in 2022, shes still a great live performer and it was a good trip down memory lane of hitting the clubs in my early 20s

THe ok -
Cuckoo Dan Stevens was awesome in this and theres some good set pieces but overall a bit underwhelming

The really really really bad
Megalopolis - was expecting this to be "such a train wreck its entertaining" but it was just too long and tedious to even enjoy in that regard. How did Adam Driver agree to this? **** me its bad, and its so confused with it themes. Save your time and skip this but google "Jon Voight boner scene" for the best (unintentional) laugh in the movie

Onto the Horror movies
as mentioned above was a bit underwhelmed with Longlegs was also really disappointed with MaXXXine, such a let down considering how good X and Pearl are. Almost feel like the first two movies getting such a cult following was to the detriment of this movie as there were some really bad celebrity castings in this that take away from the vibe that the first two films had.
Not sure how I feel about Alien Romulus, some really great set pieces but the call backs to the old movies werent for me. I think I expected more because I love Alien and Aliens and have liked the director's previous movies (Dont Breathe/Evil Dead remake).
In a Violent Nature, pretty interesting concept mashing up slow cinema with full gore horror. Some pretty disgusting and creative kills if you are into that (my mate loves that shit but I was closing my eyes alot haha).

Going to try catch Strange Darling this week, heard its really good and quite surprising like Barbarian (which has to be one of my favourite horror movies of the last few years).

 

[joey_jo_jo]

Oh ok. I thought we were just doing Pegg/Frost films.

Possibly! I thought the first comment was referencing the Cornetto trilogy

 

[Beerfish]

Possibly! I thought the first comment was referencing the Cornetto trilogy

Yeah I'm probably in the wrong there.

 

[Cruyff14]

Ridiculous take. Hot Fuzz was hot garbage. Barely got through it once. Have never bothered trying again.

Infinitely better.. lol

Never.

I have seen it 6 times I reckon. It's just as funny every time, I loved it.