Rate The Last Movie You Saw

The Last Voyage of the Demeter takes those brief passages blowing them up to full feature length. The main focus of the story is on Clemens (Corey Hawkins), an African American doctor that earns a spot on the ship as a deck hand. As the ship sails, they stumble upon some of their unique cargo whose plan is to "feast upon the hordes of England".

This is one of those films where you know more or less what's going to happen, which diminishes the thrill and tension of the events. Regardless of that, the film is good enough to still keep us engaged with effective performances, solid dialogue, and good overall production values. There is some dodgy CGI here and there, but not enough to be an issue.

Grade:


Full review on my Movie Loot

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August Rush - (2007)

You might be looking for a modern updating of Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist - one where Oliver is a musical prodigy, searching for his real mother and father. You might be even more interested when you find out that Robin Williams is playing the Fagin role (in this film he's called "Wizard", and instead of having his boys pick-pocket they busk to earn him money for their keep.) But unfortunately this film is so schmaltzy and cloyingly sentimental that you might be like me and get completely turned off. In this film music is the magic that young Evan Taylor (a very young Freddie Highmore) sees all around him in every chinkle of a fence and slap of a foot hitting pavement. Classical musician Lyla (Keri Russell) and rock band singer Louis (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) conceive him during a night of passion, and now it's up to Evan to use music to bring the three of them back together - Lyla being lied to by her father about her baby dying in childbirth, and the two lovebirds losing touch as the young boy grows up in an orphanage. Terrence Howard appears briefly as Evan's orphanage counsellor. It's all presented to us as magic, fate and the almost supernatural power of music and the universe to bring people together. I can only endure so much of that, and although Williams tries gamely to lift this one out of the doldrums there's simply no way to avoid feeling like you're being talked to by a new age enthusiast on Diazepam.

4/10


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The Ghost Breakers - (1940)

The Ghost Breakers is probably the most well-rounded Bob Hope film I've seen so far, because it offers so much more than simply it's star attraction spouting one-liners. Good stuff. Up there with My Favourite Brunette. Full review here, in my watchlist thread.

7/10

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This film from 1970 has been on my watchlist for a long time but the DVD was always hard to get for a reasonable price.
Imagine my delight when, today, I stumbled upon a good quality upload on youtube.
However....*cue ominous music*

Goodbye Gemini has all the right ingredients in (mostly) the right place, it's even got Michael Redgrave and Alexis Kanner. What could possibly go wrong?
It's based on a novel but apparently some changes were made. Now I'm not sure if the film would have been much better if it had been more faithful to the source, and it's also possible that they didn't change enough.
Either way, it doesn't satisfy on any level - it's not creepy enough, it's not ethereal enough, it's not sleazy enough, it's not funny enough. Just a few glimpses here there to show us the "what could have been".

Perhaps it could have been better made as a limited series, something in the style of Bouquet Of Barbed Wire.
Oh well, at least I can take it off the list now.

3/10

Tonight I watched Batman Assault on Arkham. It's a great one. I really liked this film. Sure the film isn't perfect and a mite messy in spots. Overall though it was really well done and quite good. I dug it plenty. It focused more on the villains than Batman, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, especially since they did a good job with it. I will never watch the live-action Batman films. The animated ones are usually great though. Next up I have Killing Joke, so far as Batman goes.

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I destroyed the dastardly dairy dame! I made mad milk maid mulch!

I hate insomnia. Oh yeah. Last year I had four cases of it, and each time it lasted three months.

Ooh, a friend of mine actually interviewed the director of that recently, if you're interested.

Los Reyes Magos (or The 3 Wise Men) is a Spanish animated film that follows the titular characters as they're on the way to visit baby Jesus. In the process, they are joined by a young man, Tobias, and a young revolutionary, Sarah, as they set out to face the wrath of Herod and his evil counselor, Belial.

There are good things and bad things to this film. Overall, the animation is pretty decent and the character design is solid, even if at times some of them look like characters from other animated films. The film plays more like an action/adventure film and there are some thrilling setpieces in the midst of it all. However, it feels so removed from what we usually associate with the Three Wise Men story that it kinda feels off.

Grade:


Full review on my Movie Loot

Squared is a 5-minute short from director/writer Tony Leech. It follows Karen (Summer Perry) as she gets a mysterious call one night. I stumbled upon this short as I was exploring Leech's filmography for some reason, and thought I'd give it a shot. With that brief runtime, there's not a lot that can be said without spoiling it.

Grade:


Full review on my Movie Loot

1st Rewatch...a darkly unhinged performance by Bill Murray makes this film rise above a rather mundane storyline. Murray effectively channels Jack Nicholson here playing Vincent McKenna, an alcoholic gambler and womanizer who owes money to everyone and is having a relationship with a Russian pregnant stripper (Naomi Watts) who becomes an unlikely mentor to the son of a single mom (Melissa McCarthy), in the middle of a nasty divorce, who move next door to him. Murray somehow manages to make a very unlikable character totally likable and McCarthy scores definitely cast against type.

2nd Rewatch...This movie gets better with each re-watch. A ferocious performance from James Franco in the starring role that should have earned him an Oscar nomination, anchors this biopic about Tommy Wiseau, an eccentric filmmaker who, after spending years trying to find success as an actor, decides to finance and direct his own movie called The Room and giving the lead to Greg (Franco's brother, Dave), a struggling actor he met in an acting class in San Francisco. The Oscar nominated screenplay keeps Wiseau shrouded in mystery throughout the film and there is one cringe-worthy scene after another here...that scene where Tommy auditions for Judd Apatow in a crowded restaurant is a heartbreaker as is the premiere of the movie where the audience starts laughing at the movie, which was not Tommy's intention. The Franco brothers work really well together and Seth Rogen steals every scene he's in as Sandy, the script supervisor for The Room. A uniquely intense film that stays with you as the credits begin to roll and you see footage from this movie played side by side with actual footage from The Room.

1st Rewatch...The original version of this classic romance set against a show business backdrop is starting to creak around the edges a little, but it's still very easy to see why this film has inspired three remakes (so far). Janet Gaynor plays Esther Blodgett, a girl from the midwest who moves to Hollywood to become a movie star who gets a leg up when she meets alcoholic movie star Norman Maine (two time Oscar winner Fredric March), whose career slides into the bottle while Esther becomes a major star named Vicki Lester. The film definitely has some dated elements after all these years, but it's worth a look for no other reason than the dazzling performance by March as Norman Maine, which should have won him a third Oscar.

The Secret Scripture (2016)

Emotional drama from Jim Sheridan. This used time cuts very well as Rose is shown in the present (Vanessa Redgrave) and the circumstances which lead to her imprisonment and torture (ECT) played by Rooney Mara. It's a great cast and the story bumbles along but a coincidence makes it not a satisfying conclusion for me. And kinda with that the impact of the film is compromised into melodrama. Still, pretty watchable.

Yes I would! Is there a link to the interview?

Blood Simple (1984) - Joel Coen: 8/10

9/10 -- Bresson is a director whose work i deem for myself to be grown into, because so far all i can cling to are surface, and notional aspects, in that of tone, style, and time period. The use of sound, and how for me it heightens a sense of realism, underlines it. As for tone, the seriousness, and the lack of emotion on display, which at this time is brought to my awareness the misconception Stoicism has, that emotions are suppressed. If it were so, there'd be usual a breaking point. .... i get that narratively is about environmentalism, and these are teenagers figuring out what sort of world this is, if there's any complex relationship information going on, it often goes right over my head, but it's pretty plain that these people are not having the time of their lives in this story, directed by one of the Gods of cinema. I'm not sure if it should be mentioned in the same breath as his earlier work, and of his last film L'argent, because the connection between sorrow over the environment and ending one's life as a viable cause to a cinematic act is something i feel estranged to. If i felt more love towards mother earth i'd then give it a perfect score.

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Coming Home - (2014)

The 8th and final film in my Zhang Yimou/Gong Li boxed set had me wandering around the room with tears in my eyes - such is the emotional impact of the very sad and melancholic Coming Home. It takes aim at the Chinese Cultural Revolution and the long-term devastation it wrought among ordinary, innocent families. Lu Yanshi (Chen Daoming) has escaped from the labour camp he was sent to for no other reason than being an "intellectual" and desperately tries to meet up with his beloved wife Feng Wanyu (Gong Li), but their indoctrinated daughter Dandan (Zhang Huiwen), cruelly manipulated by the authorities, has other ideas. Leap forward a number of years, and the madness has ended. Lu is allowed to come home, but when he finally gets to greet his wife he finds her the victim of severe mental deterioration, and she no longer remembers who he is - forcing Lu to invent new identities and try all kinds of methods to reach the only woman he'll ever love. Gone is Zhang Yimou's newfound flair for visual spectacle, but Coming Home isn't depressing, despite it's spartan, colourless features. Instead it's a deeply sad meditation on loss, damage and the irreparable consequences of persecution and cruelty. It made me reflect a lot on my family, and loss - familial love and security is so important, so to lose that certainly hurts. It's sweet though - the small victories, and resolute strength of will when it comes on never giving up on your loved ones will shine through, and hope comes to the fore quite often. A fine way to finish off this 8-film voyage through Zhang Yimou's work.

8/10


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Haunted Honeymoon - (1986)

I've avoided this Gene Wilder-written & directed comedy for such a long time now, pretty much aware of it's PoS status and not really attracted to it at first glance anyway. I decided to check it out, just because I got curious. For the first third or so, I thought it was going to prove to be a hidden gem, and that perhaps it was an ill-regarded movie that clicked with me for some reason. I was finding it uproariously funny and clever! The cast! Wilder and Gilda Radner. Jim Carter as a Dracula-like magician seemed a perfect fit. Bryan Pringle as Pfister, the butler, was killing it. I love Jonathan Pryce, and Ann Way is such a precious character actress to add fun to proceedings. It was all working so well. Wilder's secret trysts with ex-girlfriend Sylvia (Eve Ferret) were a riot. He plays Larry Abbot - a performer on radio who is so affected by bouts of fear that a group of family and friends decide to try a technique which involves scaring him so much during a pre-wedding weekend that it'll desensitise him. Dom DeLuise plays Aunt Katherine Abbot, and gets some great deadpan lines. Then everything simply falls apart - there's too much going on, and none of the comedy gets to breathe at all. Wilder tries to spread everyone so thinly - generous to a fault, but it means nobody really has time to develop well-measured comedic moments. The film collapses under it's own weight, and the whole thing is a mess - no longer funny, and simply scatterbrained. Jim Carter just goes missing, Pryce is wasted and Pringle is used too much - diluting his effect as the ugly, overbearingly frightening butler. The frenetic slapstick antics aren't funny, and the carefully worked out comedy falls victim to rushed attempts at bombast servicing a scattered and tangled plot. This could have been good, but something bad happened during this film's production and/or post-production.

4/10

Malina, Werner Schroeter's 1991 psychological drama of falling apart internally was one of the best first watches ever for me, and i think perhaps that even a normal person would find it hard to follow, so if you wanna feel what normal movies feel to me, watch this, a sense of being lost in a world of mind numbing aloofness, of regret and delusion, of going down with the good ship sanity, in a blaze of passionate but not cringy sentimentalism. Malina is a challenging watch even now, but it's a part of the roots of my film journey, which i feel has been at a standstill for a few years now. The suffering artist theme done the way i like, i give it a 10/10 score.

The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976)

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[ J ] - [ S ] - [ F ]

Yup; here you go: https://www.filmcomment.com/blog/int...w-the-tv-glow/

Francis Galluppi, 2024





A fairly well-made little thriller that spends most of its run time in one location. There are plenty of nods to other (better) films, such as Terrance Malick's Badlands, and there is quite a bit of Tarantino worship here. Unfortunately, it lacks the inventive dialogue and memorable characterizations of Tarantino's films, so in the end it just comes across as sort of a low rent knock-off. It's well made and showcases some technical skill, but doesn't really contain any surprises as everything plays out pretty much as you would expect. It wasn't a bad film, but most likely won't make my Top 10 of 2024.

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