Rate The Last Movie You Saw

Set in the Soviet Union in the middle of World War II, The Ascent follows two soldiers: Sotnikov and Rybak (Boris Plotnikov and Vladimir Gostyukhin), that end up away from their unit, injured, and lost in the wilderness. As they try to find their way back to safety, they seek refuge in the house of struggling mother Demchikha (Lyudmila Polyakova). As the Nazis draw closer, the three have to wrestle with the enemy, cold and hunger, as well as their own consciences.

This is a film I hadn't heard of before, but what a pleasant surprise it was. The story presents these characters thrust in an impossible situation where "crawling in shit" seems inevitable. The question remains in who is willing to do so, even when it means not being able to "wash it off" afterwards. That quote was from Sotnikov to Rybak; a warning not to try to appease the enemy and cooperate, but rather "to be true to yourself".

Grade:


Full review on my Movie Loot

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1st Rewatch...The Oscar-worthy performance by Nicolas Cage is the best thing about this feature length episode of The Twilight Zone which finds Cage playing a college professor who starts appearing in strangers' dreams, where the dreamer is in some kind of danger and he just is standing to the side and observing. These dreams make him an instant celebrity until the nature of the dreams change and he starts participating in the dreams in varied ways. Cage works very hard at making us accept this, but the story is just not rooted in any kind of logic or reality.

1st Rewatch...Improper marketing and an oddball story hurt this film about an unhappy magazine writer named Lloyd Vogel (Matthew Rhys) who finds his life changed when he is given an assignment to interview the legendary Fred Rogers (Tom Hanks) of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. TPTB tried to market this film as a Fred Rogers biopic but the film is not really about Rogers, it's about this very damaged writer Lloyd Vogel and the strained relationship with his father (Chris Cooper). Rhys is excellent and Hanks works very hard to be a believable Fred Rogers but he never disappears into the character the way we want him to, we never forget it's Tom Hanks. If you're looking for a movie about Fred Rogers, you'll fare much better with a documentary called Won't You Be My Neighbor?.

1st Rewatch...This gritty and slow-moving drama of crime and family dysfunction features a solid cast but sluggish direction. Russell (Oscar winner Christian Bale) and Rodney (Oscar winner Casey Affleck) are brothers who are trying to start their lives over again in the steel mill town where they grew up. Russell has just finished a lengthy jail term and Rodney has just finished four tours of Iraq. Rodney has some serious debt to a slimy drug dealer (Woody Harrelson) that he is trying to take care of through bare-knuckle fist fighting, which doesn't go as planned and when Rodney disappears, Russell decides to take the law into his own hands to find his brother. The characters are interesting, but this movie seems seven hours long. The opening scene which introduces Harrelson's character, is one of the most disturbing introductions of a movie character I have ever seen, but it's Affleck's explosive performance that owns this film, though it's enough to prevent the occasional checking of the watch.

Strange Darling (2023-2024)

4th Rewatch...This sparkling comic fantasy is just as entertaining as the first watch thanks to an imaginative screenplay by director Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach, extraordinary production values, and charming performances by Margot Robbie in the title role, America Ferrera's Oscar nominated performance as Gloria, Will Ferrell as the President of Mattel, and especially Ryan Gosling, in his Oscar-nominated performance as Ken that just lights up the screen. People seem to either really love this movie or really hate it. Count me in on the former.

Loved this movie

I love this movie too until they started cleaning it up. No clue now which is the version to watch. Huge fan of Keitel.

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I’m here only on Mondays, Wednesdays & Fridays. That’s why I’m here now.

I think I watched it on Tubi. However, right after I finished it, started reading up and stumbled upon bits and pieces that I didn't see. So I went back and looked for the film through other, umm, mediums... and saw a couple of scenes that weren't in the one that I saw. Not sure how much of an impact that had on my perception, but well.

Sid and Nancy (1986) - I gave the Never Mind the Bollocks... album a listen before watching this biopic which ended up like my experience with Sex Pistols itself; fun, dirty, childish and you're tired of it before it's over.

Gary Oldman, whose performance I had heard about for years, was rock solid as expected. As the iconic Sid Vicious he owns every mannerism and every clothing item. He and the equally dedicated Chloe Webb fight glouriously against a script that doesn't let us feel anything for and through these two until near the end, when their addiction has gotten out of hand, and their final scenes are imagined and staged interestingly (shot by Roger Deakens, again!) and just sad... there's a child-likeness to their passion, their freakouts and their self-destruction that probably mirrors the idea of the band and their times itself.

Wouldn't recommend highly to everyone, but worth-watching for it's acting duo and outstanding costume design... 6ish/10.

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HEI guys.

IIRC, the original version had a scene where Keitel is naked in the shower?

Don't remember if he was in the shower, but he is indeed naked full frontal in a scene on the version I checked later. The threesome scene is longer and more explicit, and the scene with the young women in the car is longer. The version that I saw first cuts when he implies they need to do something, while the version I checked after features the whole bit with him masturbating.

I just hate it when a movie is bowdlerized.

The Sin follows Aziza (Faten Hamama), a poor woman that has to work in the fields under harsh conditions. When her husband falls ill and is unable to work as well, the pressure to sustain the family falls solely in Aziza. After being raped by a guard and ending up pregnant, she is faced with some harsh decisions. Does she reveal what happened sacrificing both her dignity and her family's means of survival, or does she carry on risking shame and punishment in the future?

As I was browsing for films from Egypt, this often came up as one of the most well-regarded films from the country. Considering the time and place it was made, it's understandable the impact it probably had. Even in more progressive societies nowadays, there are still films that shy away from addressing issues like rape, unwanted pregnancies, abortion, and suicide, or its religious/spiritual implications. So to have this come out from a Muslim country, back in 1965, is quite something.

Grade:


Full review on my Movie Loot

I watched it when it opened in theaters. IIRC it was released with an NC-17 rating and the major chains wouldn't show it at all.

Kinds of Kindness (2024)

I went into this with a knowledge of Yorgos Lanthimos (the directors) style...it is absurd. A story told in 3 stages...a triptych with the same actors and changes in their personalities ("have you been eating enough?" etc). I liked this but might be because I'm in a wistful mood. It didn't really knit overall but it's still cinema that makes you think "WTF is going to happen next". I still hold out that Dogtooth is the directors best.
[rating]3.5[rating]

1992 is Die Hard in da Hood.

OK, that might actually give the impression that it's a better movie than it actually is. As far as urban thrillers go, it's passable - and despite what the trailer might lead you to think, it definitely isn't focused on the 1992 L.A. riots, which quickly become just background noise.

The film starts out giving the impression it's going to try to paint a much bigger picture of what went down on that ominous day of 1992. But as the movie goes on, it becomes an increasingly conventional heist story, and it grows more predictable by the minute.

This is also the last movie Ray Liotta finished before his untimely passing, and it's a shame it didn't give him a chance to play more than a thoroughly conventional baddie.

As for Tyrese Gibson, he's as far removed from his goofy character from the Fast & Furious movies as you could probably expect, and it's a nice change of pace; he really does a good job of carrying the movie on his shoulders.


Twelve years ago, one of the greatest biopics ever made about an American president premiered in theaters; Lincoln was directed by Steven Spielberg at the height of his powers and featured an absolutely brilliant performance by one of the greatest actors of all time, Daniel Day-Lewis.

This weekend, a movie about Ronald Reagan is being released through an indie distributor so obscure even I had never heard about it, and it features a thoroughly hammy lead performance by a Hollywood has-been. Oh, and it was directed by a complete hack called Sean McNamara.

What could account for the difference in the way these two presidents were treated when it came to their respective movies?

I honestly couldn't say; I haven't come across any stories in the trades that could help to shed some light into this enigma.

Reagan features performances that belong in a bad SNL sketch, with terrible makeup and cheap wigs; the cringeworthy script and the hoary cliches are worthy of a bad midnight movie, and the whole thing reeks of mediocrity in every imaginable way. There isn't a hint of subtlety or nuance; even the B-movies Reagan actually starred in were better than this.

In the time since Reagan was actually president, Robert Davi has gone from playing a Latin drug lord in a 007 movie to playing Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev in this one. I think he was more convincing as the Latin drug lord, but it's awfully close.

The absolute worst impersonation of a former world leader probably has to go to Lesley-Anne Down, whose turn as Margaret Thatcher absolutely deserves to win a Razzie. It's enough to make you wonder if she's ever even seen any actual footage of Thatcher. It really has to be seen to be believed.

There is one bright spot in the cast for this movie: Peaches Quaid (Dennis's dog in real life) is credited as playing Reagan's dog. It is the only performance in the movie for which the actor was totally and unquestionably qualified.

Agreed, it's a compulsive watch. There's not much of a journey for me. He's just a bloke with a 90% fked up side and 10% decent side. Abel Ferrara can certainly bring a grittiness to his films. Zoe Lund "injects" the Lieutenant and claimed she wrote lots of the ad hoc dialogue. It's a powerful piece. I attempted "Dangerous Game" the other day, just arty and dull.

SF = Z


Viewed: Blu ray





[Snooze Factor Ratings]:
Z = didn't nod off at all
Zz = nearly nodded off but managed to stay alert
Zzz = nodded off and missed some of the film but went back to watch what I missed
Zzzz = nodded off and missed some of the film but went back to watch what I missed but nodded off again at the same point and therefore needed to go back a number of times before I got through it...
Zzzzz = nodded off and missed some or the rest of the film but was not interested enough to go back over it