[Hutnicks]

So is that 3 out of 10 or minus 3?

 

[WraithApe]

So is that 3 out of 10 or minus 3?

Errrr... 3/10 = 3 out of 10. Or 0.3 I guess. Maybe I'm being thick here, but where does the minus come from?

Oh I see, the dash between the title and the score

 

[grantman102002]

Man on the Moon (1999)
I can't believe I waited so long to see this movie, it may be my favorite Jim Carrey movie yet, or at least tied with The Truman Show.
There is also a documentary about Jim Carrey and how he prepped for the role, called Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond which was AWESOME, as well!
I give Man on the Moon a solid 9/10, and same goes for the documentary...

 

[wuwhere]

Radius

6/10

I was entertained.

 

[Hutnicks]

Radius

6/10

I was entertained.

Given the obvious budget constraints it was not a bad film at all. I was pleasantly surprised to see how they wrapped it up given that they led it very far in to go one of two ways. Entertaining it certainly is.

 

[MM1990]

Godzilla (2015)

4/10

Good special effects. Acting was ok, but you didn't really care about the characters....

 

[wuwhere]

Doctor Strange

5/10

Nice special effects.

 

[wuwhere]

Singularity

2/10

Need I say more?

 

[WraithApe]

Cat People : 7/10

The first collaboration between producer Val Lewton and director Jacques Tourneur was a fruitful one. As with their next feature, I Walked With a Zombie, it's an exercise in subtlety. Tasked by the studio with making a horror film (by all accounts, the title came before the film began shooting), Lewton decided to go down a different route to the Universal monster movies of the time, and make a horror film without the typical genre trappings. There are no in your face scares here - it's all about creating atmosphere through a less-is-more approach.

There are a couple of stand out scenes: in the swimming pool, where Alice is stalked by an unseen predator while the shadows from the light on water dance on the walls, and then when she's followed down the road, before catching a convenient bus ride out of danger. As in Night of the Demon, there's also a tension between scepticism and the occult; in this case, Dr. Judd is tasked with being the voice of reason, as a psychiatrist. It's a get out clause for an audience unwilling to believe that Irena is really a shape-shifting panther but there's not really any doubt about who is right - in the end, they acknowledge "she never lied to us."

It's as much a melodrama centred around a failing marriage and the sexual repression at the heart of it as it is a horror, but like I Walked With a Zombie, it opened up the possibility of making a genre film that wasn't about cheap scares and effects. Personally I prefer Zombie, mainly due to the otherworldliness of the Caribbean setting, but Cat People was probably the more influential of the two films.

The Curse of the Cat People : 7/10

A follow up to the original Cat People that was demanded by the studio and which Lewton reluctantly agreed to produce. The title is a real misnomer, as it has very little to do with the first film, save for a few of the same cast members and the odd reference. It also makes it sound like a typical horror, and in fact, it's anything but. Audiences at the time, going along expecting a horror flick would probably have been sorely disappointed!

This film is all about Amy Reed, the daughter of Oliver, who was a central character in Cat People. Everything is seen from her perspective, as she struggles to come to terms with the banality of the real world, preferring to escape instead into a fairy tale world she creates for herself; it's a film about the validity of imagination. At first, her father fails to grasp this, too wrapped up in worldly matters and having repressed his own experiences with the supernatural. It's only at the end, when he's able to lay Irena's memory to rest, he can understand his daughter's outlook. Unlike the urban setting of the first film, Curse relocates to the country, at Christmas time, and there's something genuinely magical about the snowy outdoor scenes and the gloomy interiors of the Farren house. I guess you could say it's rather a slight film but you'd have to have a heart of stone not to be touched by its quiet charms. Ann Carter is especially good as Amy, acting with a naturalism kids often struggle to nail.

On a side note, it was also the first director credit for Robert Wise, who took over from shooting half-way through when RKO decided to let Gunther Von Fritsch go, who apparently refused to fall in line with the studio's tight shooting schedule.

 

[Hutnicks]

I agree with you on Zombie being the better film. It maintained an elegance of structure that Cat People failed to capture for me.

 

[Catomon]

Thor: Ragnarok

8.5/10

All in all a very enjoyable movie, the comedy was really great and the way the movie plays out is a lot better than its predecessors.

 

[Hutnicks]

I, Olga Hepnarova (2016) 9/10.

Not for the faint of heart this one. A film telling of a true story of a young woman driven to mass murder in Prague in the 70's. A black and white delight, slowly paced mirroring the actions of the lead who was bullied and marginalized into sociopathy. No coincidence that the word Robot was originated in Czechoslovakia and this film will show you it's bleak and dire origins, albeit tertiarilly.. The lead actress here puts in a performance that will leave you chilled, particularly after being arrested and taking responsibility for her actions while unintentionally and in the most sinister way, alluding to the fact that the mass murder committed somehow has moved her into the sphere of the normal. Only to further on descend into madness while in custody awaiting her lobbied for death sentence to be carried out.

Watching this film leaves you with a hole somewhere that would easily be laid off on the film itself, but that really is the point. The essence of "something here is really missing" is the core that is not there in Olga herself.

As a study in a system based on conformity destroying lives this one is the example. Her chilling prophecy that "There are more of us" in retrospect should have been words well heeded.

 

[WraithApe]

I'll have to keep an eye out for that one, @Hutnicks. Sounds like it might be up my street!

And now for something completely different...



Spacewalk : 6/10

Russia's answer to Apollo 13. Given the relatively modest budget, this film based on the true story of the flight of Voskhod 2 is certainly well-made. It's clearly structured, well-paced and visually effective too, if a little slick-looking. In terms of plot, it should be hard to go too far wrong, given the fascinating source material - a mission to become the first men to conduct a spacewalk, set against the backdrop of the space race with the US and under mounting political pressure from the Kremlin. The basic facts may be correct, but there are a lot of 'Hollywood' flourishes in the telling of the story: every crisis the cosmonauts face seems to come down to literally the last second, or the last molecule of breathable air. It's obviously done for dramatic tension but has the overall effect of making it less believable; the treatment of actual events feeling somewhat airbrushed. I don't know much about lead cosmonaut Alexey Leonov, but the film would have you believe he was a pretty flawless character, making his introduction with an incredible emergency landing of a failing jet fighter, showing unwavering mental resilience throughout training and performing many a death-defying feat once in orbit - all the time radiating overwhelming positivity to everyone around him. It might be accurate, it just seems a bit too good to be true! The score is of the rousing variety, designed to tug on the heartstrings in all the right places, just like Hollywood does it. I wasn't too surprised to see a photo of Putin watching an advance screening; I'm not saying this is propaganda film-making, but it certainly makes sure that the bravery and pioneering spirit of the USSR is front and centre. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, it seems Russia has been on something of a quest to rehabilitate the image of the Motherland, using Hollywood's tools to play it at its own game.

 

[Hutnicks]

Certainly check out Olga. It is not a film I would recommend to many people in that it is not uplifting date fare but it is brilliant at what it does (and does not) do.

I need to check out Spacewalker. Leonov is worth reading up on if the subject interests you. Twice decorated hero of the Soviet Union, was picked to command the first Soviet moon landing mission as well as a host of others that were eventually cancelled. He commanded the Apollo Soyuz Russian half of the mission (I toured the Cape back when it was being built). He was the prototypical Soviet Cosmonaut so it is not at all surprising that he would be selected for a film treatment on the Russian space program.

As long as the film is glossy like Apollo 13 without going comic book like The Right Stuff, I think I will like it.

 

[wuwhere]

American Assassin - 5/10

Typical