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again, more from my unwatched dvd stack :
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid ok movie, stunning visuals, nice climax. Groundhog Day Pretty funny, dont nomrally like Bill Murray but this is tailored perfectly for him. Nightmare Before Christmas Tim Burton's creative vision is pure genious. Musical numbers got a bit too much for me but it looks spectacular and the dark humor is done well. The Quiet American Good stuff, tight sotry at about 90 mins and pretty good acting and tension. Punch-Drunk Love Not as good as I was hoping but the quirky moments are quite welcome and the visuals are great. Adam Sandler does a Truman Show with this one. Psycho No Gore but much better than the slasher flicks of the last 20 years or so. They way Hitchcock makes you think that the movie is about some woman with personal problems in the first hald hour is fantastic. The Pianist Brody deserved his oscar as did Polanski. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest Jack Nicholson must have hit a pruple patch with this and Chinatown. Excellent stuff though the ending felt a bit too cute. Once Upon a Time in America Again, not as good as I'd hoped but there's a lot to like, especially in the first half. Leone probably bit off a bit too much though. Monster's Ball Way better than I thought it would be, quite an interesting handling of the subject. Misery Pretty good, the sledgehammer scene actually had me feeling James Caan's pain. Too contived and predictable in the end though. Miller's Crossing Excellent stuff, Gabriel Byrne does his best at a film noirish charcter and the Coens put together their best film after Fargo. The Man Who Wasnt There Average movie with moments of inspiration. Wonderful B & W cinematography. Jaws Considering the age, the film holds up really well. I didnt think I'd like it this much given that I was watching it now. The Hours Everyone, I mean everyone, in this movie is in superb acting form. Movie itself is quite good, if a bit hard to relate to all the depression. High Fidelity Amusing film, probably because it has so many familiar characters. Good Will Hunting Wow, much better than I thought. The ending was poor, and the idea a bit too BS, but the rest is quite impressive. Gangs of New York average film with good visuals and a good performance by Day Lewis and a bearable performance from DiCaprio. The Game Very good till the very end, where it falls complteley flat on its face. Considering the script, Fincher did a damn fine job with it. Equilibrium Not sure on this, it spares you the Matrix's philosophical crap yet the Matrix probably has a better script regardless. The action scenes are very good, even though some sequences (ie it has its very own Lobby Sequence near the end) are too Matrixey. Worth watching anyway. Finally got my copy of John Carpenter's classic 1988 Neo-Red Scare flick They Live on DVD. For details check http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096256/ and my take on it is very much along the lines of the comment on that page -- there SHOULD be more movies like this =)
The only drawback to the DVD tho is the lack of commentary by The Carpenter (I was hoping he and "Rowdy" Roddy Piper would have as much fun doing the commnetary as JC and Kurt Russell did on the The Thing and Big Trouble In Little China -- the clink of glasses and the flicks of lighters, along with some of the most wayward commentary you'll ever hear, simply adds to the movie experience after you've seen it the initial time). All in all, it's just good to see this movie on DVD, but I'm still hoping a Special Edition is coming soon... Bad Boys 2 was just released, and I happened to find the first movie on DVD a few weeks ago. Even though you might not like the movie itself (about two-thirds of it is spent watching Will Smith running with his shirt open in slow motion), there are some nice extras.
The documentary is more about the special effects used in the movie than the movie itself, which is nice. Also, there are some short clips shot with special cameras that show you just what real bullets do to various items, and how those movie explosions look. And then there's an isolated music soundtrack, a very nice touch, and something I'd like to see used more often. Boring vehicle for action scenes that aren't really all that cool.
Whatever-the-hell that girl's name is... (I can't think of it now, but the main star) she is the perfect vampire-killer-chick-in-leather. I did not feel cheated by the bad movie because she was just that hot (and I could barely sit through Blue Crush). She doesn't lap dance the whole erotic element of the dark, sexy killer chick thing. She's pissed off and bitchy and oh so hot for it. She out-acted the movie. Did I mention she was really hot? Because she was. movie looks alright in the ad though.
On another note, saw Dark City again, but this time on DVD. Fuck it looks great! And the first 70 minutes is still awesome. I saw Phone Booth recently and quite enjoyed it. The brevity of the film is something rarely seen outside of animation, but it worked well. All in all, it's a bit different from all the rest and was worth the 81 minutes of my time.
I recently saw Spider on DVD. It was a visual masterpiece as far as I'm concerned. Acting was good. It's a good movie to figure out if you enjoy that sort of thing, with several subtle symbolic things to check out on subsequent viewings. The movie works surprisingly well considering how little dialogue there is.
My primary complaint is that it moves too slowly. There are too many shots of Mr Cleg slowly walking down a road, writing in his journal, or some other act that didn't really need to be shown on screen for that long. so-so film which had great potential. Some of the characters they picked were questionable though (ie Tom Sawyer just seemed to be in so that american audiences could identify with something). Action scenes were okay but the jerky usage of the camera was a clear sign of a limited budget. And there's a sequel coming.
Other viewings recently included : Exorcist - very nice, not that scary but very cool nonetheless. I actually thought the much talked about spider walk was actually pretty cool. Didnt understand how Regan was posessed though, it went from Iraq to the US without much explanation. edward scissorhands - tim burton needs to have his visual creativity bottled and sold. And he and johnny depp need to make more movies together. This is classy, albeit predictable & cliche storytelling. The avon lady would have to be the best character though. dr strangelove - good but not as great as I was expecting. The scenes in the plane (barring the survival kit stuff) were too long and boring. The rest was pretty cool though, although the ending may have been better with just the first explosion as the last scene, and dr strangelove's speech moved to just before that. dog day afternoon - very good and very funny, perhaps 15 mins too long but that's forgiveable given what precedes it. Al Pacino is in awesome form and the script is great. The Picture of Dorian Gray is one of my favorite books, and the use of Dorian Gray in the movie made me want to wretch. It was heresy.
Long, boring movies with cool scenes is Kubrick's trademark. Burton is the man. Ooh, scored some tickets today to go see all three of the LOTR movies back to back to back on December 16. There'll be intermissions in between, of course -- and it'll rock just to see the whole thing together at the theater, like some uber-quality miniseries ;) They're only showing it in TWO theaters in Tennessee -- anyone else know when and where it's showing elsewhere?
Enjoyable. Not a serious a movie, but not corny either (I felt the trailer was trying to be too funny/cute, and that's not what the movie is). Lots of action, lots of gore, and lots of outrageous, laughable gore. I thought the movie got lost on side-stories too frequently and for too long, though. Still, I liked it.
Got Wrong Turn and The Gate -- with Wrong Turn being a solid survival horror flick with some great shocks, although its depiction of the South and the rural inhabitants is a bit off-putting in its exaggeration. I mean, the Redneck Trucker and the One-Toothed Gas Station Attendant were a bit much alongside the inbred mutants who are the prime offenders in the movie. All that aside, Wrong TUrn is a really good one-time view, but not necessarily a keeper for the collection.
The Gate is a classic in my book: It came out in 1987, and is a stand-out since it doesn't rely on either gore or titillation as did most movies of that period. It even has a PG-13 rating =) Yeah, it's sorta sappy at the core, but a really neat movie about the Old Gods invading from below via a hole in this kid's backyard =) you seem to be into horror stuff, can you recommend anything good? Only stuff I've seen from the genre that I'ave actually liked are Exorcist, The Thing & Rosemary's Baby.
I love the horror genre, and am really happy that it seems to having a bit of a resurrection lately. But the genre itself is not nearly as cut-and-dry as most people think, and I detail some of my own specifications in the partial list below:
Audition (Oodishon) - 2000: Takashi Miike's utterly disturbing take on a May-December romance ;) It takes some time to get going (this is done deliberately, as far as I can tell), but when it does, it pays off. Mind you, this isn't a film for the weak-stomached, and it is Japanese with subtitles. The Brood - 1979: David Cronenberg's take on internalizing our anger. Cronenberg's early films like this tend wind along a bit unevenly at times, but the performances are fairly solid, and some nice shocks are in store. Again, this is a disturbing and graphic film -- but Cronenberg, while excessive, is always effective. C.H.U.D. - 1984: This is typical of one of my favorite sub-genres in horror, Cheese Horror. Cheese Horror is usually caused by a restricted budget, forcing the filmmakers to take what had been a serious concept and weaken it slightly, due to the lack of realism in production or of focus in the script. But when it's done well, Cheese Horror makes for a great watch -- and C.H.U.D. is one. If you can find the DVD, the commentary track by the director and lead actors is hilarious. Cannibal Holocaust - 1980: This movie has to be seen to be believed. This is the template on which lesser films like The Blair Witch Project are based, providing a faux-documentary feel to its subject, but its it believable, and powerful. This is not as much a horror film as an exploitation film, and again it is graphic and disturbing. It won't leave your mind for some time after you see it. The Car - 1977: The Cadillac of Cheese. The Mysterious Black Car From Hell torments a small town, and James Brolin vows to total it. What's odd here is that this is a really bad concept done really well, but since the concept is so bad, the overall effect is like watching one of the Airplane! movies. A hoot. The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover - 1989: From the wonderfully whacked Peter Greenaway (I need to find more of his stuff, btw) comes this elegant and ultimately quite disturbing movie. The film is like a play or opera of sorts, very classical and well-paced -- and the ending is worth the wait. Dawn of the Dead - 1978: One of my all-time faves, this rates as higher quality Cheese. The higher rating is for the thought-provoking premise, and the undercurrents of black satire that run throughout the film. Its predecessor Night of the Living Dead and sequel Day of the Dead seem to lack both of those qualities, IMO and aren't nearly as much fun to watch. This is getting ready to be re-released in a new version starring Ving Rhames, and I heartily suggest the original be seen first, although I have high hopes for the new version. (see below for more) Dead & Buried - 1981: Written by Dan O'Bannon, the guy who helped script Alien and Total Recall, and who directed the original Return of the Living Dead (see below), this movie plays like a made for TV flick, but has a good bit of gore here and there, and a neat premise. Not way up on the list, but a good rental nonetheless.
The Dead Zone - 1983: David Cronenberg again, but considerably more solidified than his past films. One of the best Stephen King adaptations (my other faves are Tobe Hooper's made for TV miniseries Salem's Lot and Mick Garris' The Stand,), and starring The Man Himself, Christopher Walken. A really good thriller, simply put. Deep Rising - 1998: Stephen Sommers' first hit before The Mummy. More a sci-fi/horror/action m�lange than anything, it's a great ride, funny as hell in parts (due mainly to Kevin J. O'Connor as Joey, who should be in more movies, dammit), and has some awesome shocks and great tension. Big, noisy fun. Deliverance - 1972: The film Wrong Turn wanted to be like, but couldn't. Directed by John Boorman, one of my fave filmmakers (I even forgive him the retched Exorcist II), this is a very disturbing and effective movie, with solid performances by the likes of Jon Voight, Ned Beatty, Burt Reynolds and Ronny Cox. A must-see. Demon Seed - 1977: Sci-fi/horror, an adaptation of a novel by Dean Koontz, with the beautiful Julie Christie giving a nice performance in this tale of technology gone amok. Sure, it's somewhat dated, but effective and overall a creepy flick. The Devil's Rain - 1975: This movie is total Cheese, but oddly enough the ending freaked me out a little. William Shatner takes on Ol' Scratch, vividly portrayed by Enrest Borgnine! No, really! Don't Be Afraid of the Dark (TV) - 1973: I only include this for two reasons -- I've GOT to find it on VHS or DVD (doubtful if it'll ever come out), and it's being remade as well. In it a young woman nad her husband inherit her father's old Victorian house, which has a few suprises in store for her. Simply put, I watched this on late-night TV once was a kid, and couldn't sleep afterwards for a week. Creepy as fuck stuff. That's all for now, I'm cramping here. But this is fun, and I'll add more later if anyone likes. If you're going to show the south at all then you might as well depict everyone in it as Fualknerian chuds.
I'm already afraid to drive through the bible belt. Well, you're an idiot. That's like depicting Noo Yawkers as guys named Vinny, Midwesterners as people obcessed with dairy products and the enitre state of California full of Jeff Spicolis. And it's Faulkneresque, you git.
will see if I can track down some of those. I've got Deliverance, didnt know it really classified as horror.
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