[Redcarmoose]

My wife thinks I'm crazy because I watch a lot of really, really bad movies - especially anything before ~1975 - often the older the better. Monster movies (Lugosi, Karloff, Chaney, etc), Japanese Godzilla & all his friends, Hong Kong Kung Fu, Roger Corman's hillbilly race cars, 50s & 60s Sci-Fi, Spaghetti Westerns, etc, etc, etc. I love 'em all!

I think bad movies can have a charm. Because their set budget is soo low they go to houses and hotel rooms and give us an almost unintentional documentation of the times. They can have a cute humor that was not noted at time of release. They can also carry a charm due to not being thought out and shot on close time restraints, giving a purity often not found from the major houses. The acting can be bad though.

 

[Redcarmoose]

Alien 1979 10/10
 
 
My first time to see it in HIDef Blu ray. Amazing Quality. Now I'm hyped up to see how James Cameron changed Aliens with the de-grain and de-noise software. I hear he saturated it too! Let's see?

 

[Focker]

  Her (2013): 9/10
 
It (more than) occasionally delves into territories that I wish it had explored more fully--this has the unfortunate side effect of making some sequences in the film come across as pretty preposterous. Nonetheless, this is a thought-provoking and generous film, graced with some great performances (ScarJo's breathy vocal-only performance is very effective, as is Amy Adams playing a sweet geek--a far cry from her performance in American Hustle); that it's also (occasionally very) funny and beautifully shot helps, though some audience members may find it a bit too twee for their liking. Oh well. I loved it. 

 
I saw this a few nights ago, but haven't mentioned it on here yet...haven't really decided what I felt about it. I was absolutely fascinated for the first twenty mins, but then something happened (I wont say it in case some consider it a spoiler) that really took me out of the film and the moment. The whole thing felt awkward and I almost found myself laughing. It became hard for me to take it seriously for a few minutes, but eventually I was able to get back into it. 
 
It reminded me that Joaquin Phoenix is an incredibly talented actor and that ScarJo is AMAZINGLY sexy even when you can't see her. 
 
BTW, for anyone who likes this general concept (even though the films are very different), check out Lars and the Real Girl with Ryan Gosling. I really enjoyed that one. 

 

[WhiteCrow]

'Crazy fat Ethel 2' the sequel to 'Criminally insane' -  I was confused/10
I did hear about this on Red Letter Media and just had to check it out.
 
just...just so much about this movie...I was so confused; the first half hour to forty five minuets is Ethel in an insane asylum eating and taking naps, with flash backs to the first movie. The worst part about it was, the first movie was...well a movie; it had little but some production value. Crazy Fat Ethel 2 was filmed on an air cooled Handy cam in the 70's...just so much about the movie didn't make sense; and the flashbacks were just such a sucker punch each time....think about watching starwars...and every now and they they cut to the unedited footage using the puppets in place of...well effects or practical effects. The dialog was hilariously bad, the acting was just too awful for words....there's an abrupt almost 70's porn scene involving someone seductively eating a candy bar.
 
The only part of the story I could gather...from anything was the Ethel was in an insane asylum after murdering her family for trying to make her lose weight by withholding food...and may have been abused in the past? She hadn't done any violent acts while in the asylum and was set free due to budget cuts. The movie tries I feel to play on the quality of life of those in halfway homes or under house care...but it was just SUCH a mess it didn't do any of that. I was prompted to do research on the director...and now I'm not sure if he films porno...or just really odd off color humor movies..involving porno.

 

[Redcarmoose]

Iron Sky                        8/10
 
The Sci/Fi comedy that exposes the worlds competition for the lunar helium 3.

 
 

 

[metalsonata]

   
I saw this a few nights ago, but haven't mentioned it on here yet...haven't really decided what I felt about it. I was absolutely fascinated for the first twenty mins, but then something happened (I wont say it in case some consider it a spoiler) that really took me out of the film and the moment. The whole thing felt awkward and I almost found myself laughing. It became hard for me to take it seriously for a few minutes, but eventually I was able to get back into it. 
 
It reminded me that Joaquin Phoenix is an incredibly talented actor and that ScarJo is AMAZINGLY sexy even when you can't see her. 
 
BTW, for anyone who likes this general concept (even though the films are very different), check out Lars and the Real Girl with Ryan Gosling. I really enjoyed that one. 

 
Yeah, I believe that I know exactly which scene you're talking about--one of the ones that I think didn't quite fit as is and should have been explored more deeply in order for it to come across better. Well, unless you're talking about the 'cat' scene? Because that was just pure comedy period, lol. ^^

 

[kkl10]

Caché - 7
 
A normal couple watches bewildered to the contents of a VHS cassete tape left at their house, it's origin is a mystery.
The video consists on a simple recording of the exterior of their house from a fixed point in frontal position with unclear exact location, in the video the wife and the husband of the couple can be seen leaving the house to go on their usual duties...
Anonymous phone calls, small postcards with suggestive messages and several other VHS tapes follow and soon it's clear that the couple is under the unwelcome vigilance of a stranger who knows the man of the couple... or so it seems...
As the stalking manifestations continue and efforts are made to find out who is behind them, the dark past of the man of the couple is unveiled little by little.
The argument suggests a thriller but the ascetic cinematics can either improve, worsen or confuse the experience of the beholder.
The movie eventually takes the mold of a psychological study of a man tormented by guilt.
This work by Michael Haneke develops in a realistic, sober, cold, raw and analytical style, not given to sentimentality or artificiality of expression and has no soundtrack.
I felt that the austerity of the cinematic style also translated into the acting of the main characters, which hampered their authenticity and the impact this film could have.
It also didn't get quite clear in my mind what was the real premisse behind this movie: was it to do a psychological essay about a character suffering with guilt? was it to do a thriller exploring an ascetic aesthetic and see how it works out? was the premisse to do a phylosophical essay about observation and guilt? was it all of these things?
And the fact that the origin of the stalking is never unveiled gives this movie a surreal aura and makes it inconclusive on various thematic aspects.
I think this was a particularly interesting cinematic and aesthetic experiment in the thriller genre, I found it to be a fascinating concept and wished that the result could be fully accomplished, but it didn't seem quite there yet.
It's hard for me to rate this work, I think it's a very interesting movie, it has no major technical flaws (assuming that the unsolved mistery of the origin of the stalking is intentional) and it has some trully brilliant moments to behold, but it's premisse is not very clear and several things are just left in blank, seemed inconclusive to me.
I'm left with the impression of an experimental asceticism and an inconclusive plot from which only Hitchcock could forge a masterpiece, but I still think it is worth to be seen.
 
This is one of the most interesting auteur films I've seen in the last years from contemporary european cinema.
As usual with auteur cinema this movie is not particularly generous with it intelligibility and requires some commitment from the viewer.
To me it was an unique experience and left lots of things open to interpretation and debate.
The main character guilt was one of the few certainties I came out with.

 

[metalsonata]

Wide Sargasso Sea (2006): 5/10
 
An amateurish, messy, and incomplete film that can't be saved by its performances, fine as they occasionally are. Probably only worthwhile viewing for hardcore fans of the Jane Eyre 'mythology.' Do such people exist?
 
Pride & Prejudice (2005): 8/10
 
I get tired of Austen's storytelling and characters pretty quickly, but confident, stylish, expertly paced directing and editing have a way of making even the oldest stories seem fresh, and charismatic actors with great chemistry are just the icing on the cake. Keira Knightley is especially delightful--she's an underrated actress who really sines in the right role, and Lizzie is 'the right role.'
 
He Knew He Was Right (2004): 5/10
 
There are two or three enjoyable movies here--but therein lies the problem. Smash them all together and string them out for four hours and it's just *too much.* The director simply does not have the same skill as master directors like Ingmar Bergman and Rainer Werner Fassbinder, who could make legitimately great, very long miniseries that also received uncut theatrical presentations--works that amaze both as miniseries and as complete, single-sitting stand-alone films (Bergman's Fanny & Alexander at 5 hours and Fassbinder's Berlin Alexanderplatz at 15 and a half). Taken in serial chunks He Knew He Was Right works, but it'd be great to see the stores here presented in long-form that brings out their literary richness--what we get here is just too workmanlike to inspire. 

 

[Focker]

   
Yeah, I believe that I know exactly which scene you're talking about--one of the ones that I think didn't quite fit as is and should have been explored more deeply in order for it to come across better. Well, unless you're talking about the 'cat' scene? Because that was just pure comedy period, lol. ^^

 
 
LOL, I forgot about the cat scene...yeah that was hilarious. 

 

[tdockweiler]

Inside Llewyn Davis - 6/10
 
Boring and pointless.
Some a-hole is depressed and sleeps around on random friend's couches while trying to get a job as a folk singer. Oh and his ex-girlfriend is pregnant and his friend's cat runs away.
In the most dramatic part of the movie, he takes a road trip to Chicago and listens to men read poetry and talk about pooping.

Spoiler: Warning: Spoiler!

He can't get a job so he yells at some poor old woman on stage and gets beaten up by her husband. The end.

 

[oqvist]

Somewhere in this thread some link to a movie on the same theme of captain phillips is linked. Somebody remember the name? I believe it´s quite recently made.

 

[kkl10]

Shadow of a Doubt (1943) - 8
 
Fine movie from Hitchcock and perfect showcase of the charm and enchantment present in Classic Cinema apparently lost today.
The pub scene, in particular, with Young Charlie and Uncle Charlie and the waitress in the middle really deserves to be seen and lived in all it's Bluray quality splendor, I wish I was there.
Contemporary sensibilities might find the acting very... theatrical, but this was the style of the time and didn't detract from my enjoyment, I was grabbed by the movie from start to finish.
First of several movies from the "Master of Suspense" I'll be watching in the coming times.
 
EDIT: Revaluated for an 8 instead of 8.5.

 

[Muinarc]

Battle Royale II:

Wow this was a bad movie. The acting was bad but I expected that, the pacing was terrible. The entire middle of the movie, which was filled with weird (and I'm pretty sure anti-American) propaganda, was used as a build up to a fight sequence at the end.... except there was no build up, the story just kind of came to a halt. Bonus point given for the (mediocre) gore.

3/10

 

[5aces]

Somewhere in this thread some link to a movie on the same theme of captain phillips is linked. Somebody remember the name? I believe it´s quite recently made.

This one?

 

[billybob_jcv]

Speaking of bad Kung Fu movies, yesterday I watched a movie that literally made me LOL: King of Beggars




When I pulled it off Netflix, I had no idea it was one of the classic Gordon Chan movies. It's English subtitled. This thing has it all - Kung Fu masters, Imperial Soldiers (the HK equivalent of Star Trek Red Shirts), hookers, beggars, etc. This is one of those HK movies where the Kung Fu Masters can literally do ANYTHING. They can fly, conjure, command the wind, make people explode, you name it, they can do it. In one scene someone got split vertically completely in half with a sword. Great fun!

Rating: 6/10 just because some of the outrageous scenes made me laugh