Movie Tab II

Should maybe read: "...how far some 'white' people..."

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"Don't be so gloomy. After all it's not that awful. Like the fella says, in Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love - they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock."

I guess I should've worded that differently, but I'm sure glad that I wasn't alive when it was this bad.

"Racism's still alive, they just been concealing it."

It's not as bad as it was now, though.

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004, Wes Anderson)

Being a fan of Wes Anderson's other films I was disappointed with this one. Sure it had its funny moments, as well as some very unique sets and images, but in the long run it seemed like it was trying too hard, distracting me from its lacklustre script.

Rocky 1976

My first time seeing Stallone's writing and acting in this enjoyable character study with numerous interesting players. Consistently hysterical it's build up to the finale is much sweeter than the actual thing - which literally can not deliver the knockout blow.





The Conversation 1974

Francis Ford Coppola's technological thriller sets Gene Hackman on the most personal and difficult performance I've seen him give. Who I always enjoy seeing as the cocky but wise type , is a very paranoid isolated man and rightly so as secrets are what keeps him on top of his game (gadget spying). Many Coppola usuals are in here and awesome as usual - Harrison Ford plays a mysteriously menacing role. Top notch character study/thriller with commentary on privacy as well technology - I have a feeling this one will only get better with more viewings.





Zatoichi 2003

Takeshi + samurai + crazy sword fights = good one

He unfolds it out in a very unorthodox style , but as always with absolute energy.

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Nice work on The Conversation, Meatster! I love that flick.

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Belle De Jour (Luis Bunuel, 1967) -

This was interesting enough, certainly looked good and kept me interested. Granted, I felt like there could've been more to it but I was okay with what was there.



Terminator: Salvation (McG, 2008) -

"A-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ah-ha-ho-hee-ha-ho-ha and I thought my jokes were bad..."

While it was interesting to see the future of the Terminator universe realised on screen, it doesn't compensate for the fact that Salvation is at best a mediocre film. While there are a handful of interesting moments and little references to the first three films (the same Guns 'n' Roses song from T2 plays at one point, something I wasn't too sure whether to like or hate), it's still pretty weak.

For starters, the acting. There's nothing particularly special to be seen anywhere. Bale's acting was pretty weak between the fact that John Connor lacks dimension as a character and that Bale's constantly raspy voice was too terrible to take seriously. The movie essentially becomes Worthington's, who has a more interesting plotline as Marcus, the mysterious death row inmate turned CyberDyne experiment. The rest is nothing to write home about (although it was fun seeing Michael Ironside pop up in a supporting role).

The action is about what you expect from your average modern-day action film, rife with CGI, frantic filming/editing and explosions. While there was a half-decent fight sequence towards the end of the film, most of it was pretty passable. Ultimately, there's not much to write home about it. In a sense, I agree with James Cameron on the franchise - it ended with 2. After that, it started to go in the same direction as most quadrilogies - down.

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Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

Belle de Jour is probably the most accessible Bunuel film - there are a few of his pattended surrealist touches and his contemptible attitude towards the bourgeoisie is plain to see - i'm glad you enjoyed it Iro. I wouldn't push Catherine Deneuve out of bed either. It's probably up there among my favourite Bunuel films, so i'd probably rate it a bit higher than yourself. Oh and I agree with you on Terminator Salvation.

I didn't even finish watching The Life Aquatic; I thought it was awful. I love Bill Murray and the plot sounded really cool, but...I thought it was just really, really bad. I'd give it about a . :P And half of that half-a-point is due to the nifty theme song.

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"The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven."
John Milton, Paradise Lost

My Movie Review Thread | My Top 100

Happy Feet(George Miller 2006)-There are only three CGI animations that are amazingly good and Happy feet is among them,It has a gripping story great humor delivered by Robin Williams the choreography of dancing and singing were conducted very well and most of all it's about penguins which are one of my favorite birds

I'm wondering what the other two are.

Wetback:The Undocumented Documentary(2005 Arturo Perez Torres)



Starting in Nicaragua, the filmmakers take the journey with two men who are hoping to make it across the border into the United States. Along the way, you meet many more desperate for that same dream.

It would be incredibly ridiculous for anyone to think that anything about such a trip would be easy, but when your confronted with everything that they have to go through it's overwhelming. From trains, brutal Mexican gangs, police, border patrol, American vigilantes who dedicate much of their free time keeping them out and the environment itself, much is against them every step of the way.

There is a lot of things in the doc that I wish had been explored further but I don't think the primary objective here was to examine the issue fully, but rather to just put a human face on it. A-

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
Shane Black, 2005

Wow, I've had a pretty bad movie day two days in a row, seeing as I've only watched two movies in the past two days. Anyways, I guess I'll start off by saying that I absolutely loved this movie. It's always been one of those movies that I thought looked incredibly interesting, but nothing that I would like all that much. Boy, was I wrong. I had absolutely no idea that it was supposed to be a comedy before watching it, though. It ended up being a crime, comedy, and thriller all in one movie, but mainly leaning towards comedy. I honestly couldn't stop laughing at all throughout the movie. I've actually been thinking and I see it more as a spoof on the crime film genre. It's extremely different than most of the crime movies I've seen, though.

The entire movie is pretty fast paced, and if you walk away for a second, you'll completely lose pace with everything that's going on. I know a lot of people would say that Robert Downey Jr. made his comeback, if you say, with Iron Man, but I have to disagree. I'd pretty much count his comeback film as either this or Zodiac, both of which I think he gave better performances than in Iron Man. He seems to just have a certain kind of charm of him that works well in comedies, and this charm helped him a lot in Tropic Thunder as well. His role in this seemed a lot more personal than Tropic Thunder. Val Kilmer really helped out some with Downey Jr., because his character really worked well with Downey Jr.'s. Also I never really noticed how hot Michelle Monaghan really is, but I guess that's just because she looked really old in the past few movies I've seen her in.

I can't wait to get the money to go out and buy this one, though. I'm pretty much postive that I'll love it just as much with re-watches. Actually I think my rating for this could possibly increase with the more times that I end up watching it.

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Mostly it's because of the penguins so suck it up
Finding Nemo(the best there is) and Wall-e I like Shrek and Ice Age yes but they are just laugh and no story

The Ice Princess (Tim Fywell - 2005)

My kind of flick. No surprises, nobody dies. Happy ending and an all around nice little movie. I think I'm just tired of depressing flicks and needed a light hearted fun movie and this is a pretty good one.

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 (Sanaa Hamri - 2008)

Ha! This flick is about Pants! Get it? Pants! Ha he he ho ho ha.... anyway. I liked the first one quite a bit and this one has its moments but at times it was a little too smarmy for me.

A Little Romance (George Roy Hill - 1979)

Just terrific! Thanks be to MoFo for bringing this wonderful movie to my attention. Little Diane Lane was so cute I could've just eaten her up. I loved how smart the kids were. Kids just aren't like that today. Oh, well. Great movie.

The Secret Life of Bees (Gina Prince-Bythewood - 2008)

I know a lot of folks would like to see singers stick to singing and let the actors do the acting and most of the time I'm one of those people. However, there are times when certain movies come along that really fit the musicians who are playing the roles. This movie is a good example of that. I actually think Queen Latifah is a better actor than a singer/rapper and Jennifer Hudson and Alicia Keyes may also fall into that category if they kepp it up. I mentioned a little while ago that I am becoming a Dakota Fanning groupie and rightly so. She is going places folks. Watch her while she is young so when she starts bringing home trophies you won't have to wonder where she came from. Anyway, good flick.

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We are both the source of the problem and the solution, yet we do not see ourselves in this light...

Doghouse



Jake West, director of Evil Aliens pulls out another Brit horror with a strong cast of the nutter from This Is England, Danny "fackin" Dyer and Noel- "are you dizzy blad"- Clarke from Kid/Adulthood. It's a rather formulaic plod of zombie flicks, taking notably from Shaun of the Dead. Has nice some lad moments and likeable enough characters with some good helpings of violence and male humour- liked them deciding which of the zombies (they're all women) they'd give one to. Played that game before. Overall just competent enough to keep it as an average flick despite it's inherent lack of logic and plagiarism.




The Hangover +



Was funny for the most part, had some good laughs though did get a little too over the top to stay on a consistent level of humour. The guy with glasses did just seem like an older McLovin but the other two were both funny, especially the guy with the beard (ain't gonna attempt spelling his name off my head) and Jeffrey Tambor phones in a George Bluth performance. If it wasn't for the contrived wrap-up and the gutless cliched Hollywood ending, would have said it was pretty good with a fair few belly laughs and some original enough jokes.




Terminator Salvation



I've always thought the trailer looked pretty strong so kept high hopes for this and i wasn't entirely disappointed. I thought the weakest point was the pilot bird but other than that was ok. Was very impressed with Anton Yelchin's Kyle Reece, could totally buy his performance as a young Biehn. Everyone else did their job, didn't have the problems most did with Bale but you could tell it was Worthington's film. Think film suffered too much "Bay-hem" in trying to pre-empt Transformers 2, too many needless 'Bay-plosions' like in the escape sequence, which kinda bogs the film down into a standard Hollywood flick opposed to the more sophisticated first 2. Those bikes were stupid though




The Taking of Pelham One, Two, Three



Not too sure on this one, liked a lot of it but was somehow less than i expected. Not that i mind it being a more restrained thriller but some of it seemed bit dumb and lacked a satisfying confrontation. Made me curious for the remake, don't think the action from the trailer will work too well or Washington taking the character as begrudging action hero. Have to give this another go before decided on more than a neutral rating.




Harold and Maude



An interesting one, for sure. Quite dark and amusing at times, glad Birdy got me to see in the trade-off tab as it's been on my radar sometime. It kinda verges on being disturbing if their romance wasn't, surprisingly to say, believable. Testament to the well written characters and the performances. It's a good little film that recommend to anyone really as it's certainly one of the most unique romance films you'll see and successfully combines an ironically morbid humour to it all




To Live and Die in LA +



Liked this one a lot, very gritty and moody. Sometimes got impression Friedkin was trying to emulate some of his French Connection glory with a familiar car chase. Cracking ending, after a few more watches can see this maybe coming into all time favs. Big fan of hazy shades of morality and the characters all take to the theme well with some fantastic results. Great companion to many crime films that are more popular, since this will probably show them up on most fronts.




Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai -



Not quite the sci-fi film i was expecting since they don't actually do anything in the titular 8th dimension. Big fan of Peter Weller and he leads the oddball, very cultish film along well enough, though thought he could have been bit stronger. Wasn't quite as off-the-wall as i was hoping or expecting. You can tell everyone involved was having a good time making it with some cheesy jokes and stuff but doesn't quite all gel together to make it a solid film. But that's probably why it has it's cult status. Be well up for seeing the proposed sequel undertaken with a new cast.




The King of New York



Now this i liked A LOT. Just my type of movie. Stunning performance from Walken and some great performances from young Snipes and Fishbourne. Have to find a place for this on my top films. New Jack City, another fav of mine, seems almost like a remake of this. Can't think of anything not to like, from the examination of crime in the city to the way the city itself is captured, especially considering the hard to notice low budget.

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Divorce, Italian Style (1961, Pietro Germi)

This very funny, dark comedy takes place in a small Sicilian town and centers on Ferdinando Cefalu (Fefe) excellently played by Marcello Mastroianni. Fefe is in love, but not with his annoying and needy wife, of course not, he's in love with his beautiful young cousin. The funniest scenes in the film are when Fefe gets this certain look in his eyes and drifts off into a homicidal fantasy, like the moment he reads in a newspaper about humans first orbitting the planet in a spaceship he has her being blasted off into space. He sets out to plan her murder but must be careful on how he goes about it, in order to escape as much jail time as possible he has to play the honour card, as honour is a big deal in Sicily. With a vast assortment of interesting characters, moments of true hilarity and a wonderful musical score that seems so well timed, this film should should not be missed.



When Father Was Away on Business (1985, Emir Kusturica)

Emir Kusturica's Palm d'Or winning film takes a look back to the uncertain times that was Yugoslavia in the early post-war years. Malik's world is turned upside down when his father Mesa is sent away to a forced labour camp after upsetting the authorities. Mesa made an offhand comment to the woman he's having an affair with about the state "going too far" after a cartoon is published in a newspaper of Darwin working at his desk with a portrait of Stalin hanging on the wall, unfortunately she naively mentions this remark to the wrong person at the wrong time. Malik, along with his mother and older brother have to deal with the loss of support not only from the absence of the father but also the absence of support from friends and family, as the majority of the populace at the time were concerned that anything they said could have them shipped off in the same manner without notice. Malik at first believes that his father is only on an extended business trip, but as the film progresses he slowly learns the truth of his father and of life, with the inevitable loss of the hero figure and the innocence that accompanies certain youthful ideals and dreams.



This Sporting Life (1963, Lindsay Anderson)

Rugby as a metaphor for life is a theme that runs through this honest and bold film told with confidence while shifting back and forth between the recent past and the present. Richard Harris is excellent as Frank Machin who sees himself as a man who has the guts to take a risk and rise above the working class despite his insecurities and intense desire to love and be needed. Frank lodges with Margaret Hammond, recently widowed, and her two children, spending time with them when he's not on the rugby field or out drinking after a match. Frank focuses his attention on Margaret but she resists his persistent and somewhat overbearing attempts to form a relationship, she has trouble moving forward after her husbands untimely death. The frustration and resulting rage caused by his lack of acceptance is only exemplified when he notices that despite being a highly paid and respected athlete he is still seen as the hired help in his futile attempts to rise above his class.

You like pants? You should see this...

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0283054/