Nitro Circus. I watched this show a few years ago, because it reminded me of a faster, louder, dumber Jackass. The movie was half stunts (which were Goddamned impressive), half interviews of a spectrum of douche-baggery (Channing Tatum and Rob Dyrdek for fuck's sakes), and featured some crazy show they did in Vegas. Fun hour and a half, just watching them destroy things (and each other), but this movie is good for about six stunts and a lot of nonsense. Total Recall. I barely remember the Ahnuld version, and there are serious scientific liberties taken here for no Goddamned reason (in the film the only two countries left are Britain and Australia, yet actors like Nighy, Beckinsale and Farrell who are fucking from the UK speak with an American accent.). This film doesn't even try to insert the supposition that the events were part of a fantasy, but it was still surprisingly fun to watch. The futuristic stuff was done well, the cast was excellent (Beckinsale is stunning the entire time), and the no-gravity scenes were very impressive. Bottom line, don't expect Blade Runner, but it wasn't too shabby. Looper. This movie did for time travel what Inception did with dreams. It's a severe mind-fuck, and I'd suggest watching it twice just to make sure. Still, it's quite good. The scenery is fantastic, and doesn't try to overwhelm you with how futuristic things are. The acting is superb, the style is unusually different, and it has a sort of Wild-West feel. It does a great job of weaving lives together, via past, present, and future without smashing you over the head with it. The best way I can describe it is: No Country For Old Men with time travel. If it sounds weird, it was, but it wasn't bad.
I Saw The Devil (2010) This Korean film (Subtitles. FUCKING DEAL WITH IT) is a delirious, no-holds-barred rollercoaster ride that will make you gasp, cover your eyes and scream and pain just watching it. It brings a level of excrutiating, utterly realistic violence that I don't think I've ever seen in a film. I never thought I could watch a film again that could make me flinch, and this film made me do just that. Maybe more than once, even. That being said, this is also a gorgeous-looking film. Really, one of the most-beautifully shot and directed films I have ever seen. It is stylish in a way you have not seen and ultra-clear, with colours that almost jump out of the screen. Every single shot looks like great pains were taken to construct it. It almost seems that the film's director, Kim Ji-woon, sees things that no other directors can see. It's about an unrepentantly evil serial killer (Choi-Min-sik, star of Oldboy) who seems to live only to rape and dismember beautiful women. When he brutally kills the gorgeous, pregnant wife of a wily (and deadly) secret service agent, the agent chooses instead to low-jack the psycho in order to hunt and torment him repeatedly. Am I revealing to much? Not at all. This film does not pander to the audience and doesn't try to make friends. This movie It's NEVER over until it's over. It is so many things: a gruesome horror-thriller, a beautiful tragedy, a wonderful artistic exercise, and a brilliant study on how evil becomes evil. The two opposing leads give award-caliber performances, with Min-sik quite honestly playing what's probably the sickest, most unlikable character in movie history. This film features amongst many things a double-stabbing murder inside a cab you will NEVER forget and the most horrifying achillies tendon-slicing scene that anyone will ever see. What I think makes it even more upsetting is that all the women in the movie are almost impossibly gorgeous, soft-spoken and shy, making their death scenes ever more horriffic. Not for the squeamish, but if you are ready for its subject matter the rewards are MORE than ample. Not happy rewards, though. This film tugs all sorts of bad emotions on an incredibly real level and has such an unrelentingly sad aura about it. To take such a grim, violent excercise and turn it into its end result is nothing short of a miracle. One of the best films of this decade. Just don't say I didn't warn you. 9.5/10
The Dark Knight Rises Christopher Nolan concludes his Batman Terrorism Trilogy on a high note, presenting what I think is the best of the trilogy and the best franchise film since the 1989 film (no comic book movie will ever be better than that film). Nolan manages to fill in the much-needed voids from the last films: namely, fight scenes that don't suck and confident action scenes, which this film has in spades. It also neatly ties all three films together thanks to good-sport cameos by trilogy familiars. He also manages to juggle several main character as he did in the last film to much success, Tom Hardy makes for a vivid Bane although he looks like his main source of getting into shape for this film was lots of KFC. Anne Hathaway is a good Catwoman (with a hot and clever costume) but Michael Caine delivers the best punch adding rich depths to Alfred who finally spills out exactly what we were expecting from him for the entire series. Caine is criminally underused and delivers an award-caliber performance. An epic scale and beefed-up music score add to the film's power while it pays wonderful homage to Bob Kane's orginal comic-- and an especially sharp ode to the Knightfall series-- all the while this movie is doomsday dark and cold as its weather. The meanest and nastiest of the entire franchise gives exactly the ending I wanted out of it, were it not for predictable and unnecessary "twists" towards the end of the film it would be one of the year's best. This time, Nolan knows he made a comic book movie and made it very well. 8.5/10
Batman: Under the Red Hood This animated film is a tight package and I found the story to be very engaging. It was a pleasant surprise to see that DC allowed people to die, and the Joker had some good scenes that solidify him as something twisted and frightening. My only complaint was with Nightwing. I might be confused about this, but I thought there was a major disagreement with Bruce at one point which led the two to part ways. Seeing Nightwing depicted in this movie as a cheery/carefree personality didn't fit the film's tone and bothered me because I remember him being hardnosed and similar to Batman. It's a minor gripe though, because the movie isn't about him. The movie is about how Batman handles a devastating failure. I just watched Crisis on Two Earths, and Batman said it best in that movie when confronting his evil doppleganger by saying "We each looked into the abyss, but the difference between us is that you blinked". For me, this movie is right up there with Mask of the Phantasm as one of the better animated Batman films
If you watch this and don't watch the animated version of The Dark Knight Returns, then I hope goblins crawl into your bed at night and give you syphilis.
Yeah, the Dark Knight Returns is where I started and how I became aware of the list of movies that DC released. I liked it, but thought Under the Red Hood was better. From the list, I was planning on watching Wonder Woman, Year One, Doom, and the two Superman/Batman movies.
American Psycho (2000) Brett Easton Ellis' novel of the same rocked the western world when it was released, this much-debated film (which had a lot of pre-production problems and debates involving DiCaprio) is too toned-down and turgid to match the gruesome, grim power of the book. However, it is made entirely watchable due to Christian Bale's magnetic, unforgettable performance as the monotoned maniac Patrick Bateman. Most of the stellar supporting cast is wasted (except for Justin Theroux) but Bale's performance has to be seen to be believed. An emotionless sadist completely obsessed with presentation and keeping up with the Jonses, Bale's role has fittingly become a fixation in modern pop culture-- I still laugh with hysterics every time I see the scene of him running nude down the apartment building hallway in high-tops while blasting a chainsaw at full volume. Too bad the rest of the film doesn't hold such close scrutiny, Bale deserved better. 6/10
The Talented Mr. Ripley Someone recommended this movie to me and I just watched it for the first time. I had some minor complaints, but it was pretty good overall. For those who may not have seen it, a wealthy man mistakes Ripley for a Princeton graduate and friend of his rebellious son, Dickie. Ripley humours the man, but is then offered 1000 dollars plus expenses to go to Italy and convince Dickie to return home. Ripley goes to Italy and befriends Dickie, but things eventually take a turn for the worse and the real ride begins. It takes about an hour before the game changing event happens, but Ripley and Dickie were good enough to hold my attention until then. Ripley is odd, yet charming and I liked watching his efforts to insert himself into Dickie’s life. Dickie is spoiled and irresponsible, but he’s high on life and someone great to hang out with. I really liked how Dickie’s girlfriend described him. Something along the lines of “when his focus is on you, it’s like the sun is shining, but he can put you down for someone else and leave you feeling very cold”. Mentioning anything from the second half of the movie would be a spoiler, so I’ll stop there. A question I had was Spoiler Why did he keep the rings and stay in Italy? I’d count my blessings and get out of there. Also, I get that the goal was to make the bad guy likeable, and I know Ripley had sexual feelings for Dickie, but given Ripley’s talents for impersonation, it’s hard to believe that the thought of impersonating Dickie didn’t cross his mind until he was mistaken for him. The movie is around 2 hours, but definitely worth a watch.
MEMENTO Directed by Christopher Nolan and starring Guy Pearce and Carrie-Ann Moss (Matrix). This movie is extremely innovative in the way it's presented. It's done so in two different types of scenes. First we coloured scenes, which are shown in reverse order, and black-and-white scenes, which are shown in chronological order. The ending climax of this movie occurs when both sequences meet, providing you with the whole story. Clues are given along the way as you attempt to decipher what's going on, and it's interesting to find out how certain perspectives are misguided when made without knowing what exactly preceded them. Another major theme of the movie is the short term memory loss of the Pearce's lead character. This ties in extremely well with the reverse order coloured sequences, and adds another component to any attempts to understand how the characters are where they are at the current time, as well as the motives behind their actions. I thoroughly enjoyed this movie. 8.5/10
A couple of 20th anniversary reviews to make us feel like old, creaky bastards. I encourage you to piggy-back on these ones since I know they are widely honoured: Jurassic Park (1993) Bringing together Stan Winston and Phil Tippet for the special effects you knew this film had to blow your mind or it would be an utter failure. But they have not lost their edge to this day and by and large, are the greatest of their kind in movie history. The first time the T-Rex tore through the fence people went white. This showed what CGI could really do and Spielberg throws in palm-sweating cliffhanger action sequences left and right to cushion the blow of the basically lame plot and annoying and lame main characters-- with the exception of Jeff Goldblum. Goldblum is brilliant, articulate, hilarious. His hands always moving, his mouth constantly motoring-- off wisecracks at a machine-gun pace, it is fantastic to watch his Ian Malcolm with his perfect comic timing. John Williams' score adds to his long list of majestic classics, and the pace never stops moving once it gets rolling. Conventions bog it down but nobody's complaining once the thrill ride gets moving. Bit characters also add to the fun, I loved the Aussie game warden and Sameul L. with that line of lines... Hold on to yer butts. 8/10 Dazed and Confused (1993) I have met very few people from my generation, or any generation, that does not adore this movie. How can't you? Richard Linklaeter fills the screen with colourful characters, fabulous cars and pain-staking period detail that gives the utter impression your watching a time capsule of the last night of school in a small Texas Town. There are SO MANY great moments (like Benny threatening freshmen over his P.A. while the Vietnam vet teacher cackles with laughter), awesome characters, and all-too-believable situations. This film has no true beginning or ending so we don't have to get to know the characters so we don't really get forced to root for one or the other. That's another thing that's great about the movie: it's refreshingly unsympathetic. And that cast. Matthew crowns his career as the jailbait-wooing Wooderson, Affleck is a riot as the roid-raging O'Banion, lots of future players in bits too: watch really fast for Renee Zellweger as one of the senior girls shaming the freshman chicks in the parking lot, Milla Jovovich as Pickford's near-mute knockout acidhead girlfriend... the list goes on. The best thing about the film is how it is always fun to watch, because you always notice something new watching it: LinkLaeter fills the camera with goings-on in the foreground and background, funny moments that go unnoticed unless you know when to look. It's fun to see what the second-unit director has the extras doing like passing out against cars and getting their asses beat. Not to mention that wonderful soundtrack of carefully selected period music that gels perfectly with moments in the film. Altogether, it's the best teen comedy ever made. It's mature, fun, funny, doesn't pander and ends with a neat but not completely happy ending, the way it should be. Always a joy to watch. Yes, it's a drinking game whenever Mitch touches his face when talking to a girl. It's an intentional nervous habit they game him until he gets loaded. And like you, it makes me want to punch him in the face too. 9/10
The Full Monty I thought this was a straight comedy that would appeal to my immature sense of humour, but there were some serious themes in the mix as well. It’s a decent movie, but it wasn’t what I was expecting so I don’t think I appreciated it as much. Some of the british slang was difficult for me to keep up with as well. This is Spinal Tap This documentary follows a fictitious metal band on the decline. The band doesn’t realize that their 15 minutes of fame are almost up, which is due to them being dimwits and from having a manager that pulls the wool over their eyes with weak rationalizations. They lack self awareness and take themselves too seriously at times, but reality eventually hits. I had a lot of fun with this movie. Cyborg Terrible. The fights were amateurish and cheesy because of excessive cuts and slow reactions in these scenes. Van Damme stood still at one point and waited for a guy to kick him in the face. The dude was literally crucified and then back in action the next day. It’s impossible to take this movie seriously. The friend who recommended this to me is a dick.
Outside Providence (1999) Since I brought this up in the other movie thread people were curious about this film. This is a Farrelly Brothers movie, though credited direction goes to Michael Coorente he had about as much directing in this film as James Cameron did in Piranha II: The Spawning. The film is based on Bobby Farrelly's 1988 Roman a Clef novel about his own prep school experiences. The focus is on Tim "Dunph" Dunphy (familiar character actor Sean Hatosy, his only starring role) a dimwit slacker-stoner who hangs out with a crew of absolutely hilarious slacker-stoners who basically move sideways through their teen years in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. After Dunph commits the mother of a fuck-ups while high, he is plea-bargained into attending a posh boarding school upstate where he will graduate sans friends in a completely alien environment. Instead, he wages war against the only teacher he hates and constantly get himself and others in trouble by introducing the unpopular kids on his floor to drugs and alcohol. I'm not giving away hardly anything. This movie is flat-out funny, believable, and disarmingly truthful with Alec Baldwin devouring the scenery as his Archie Bunker-ish dad (his scenes with his equally idiot poker buddies are gold) and who only ever calls his son "Dildo". Dunph has an equally touching and hysterically evil way of bonding with his wheelchair-bound kid brother who he gives a level playing field. Amy Smart has never been more appealing or radiant as his at-school love interest, and the film is packed with Farrelly trademark bad taste and disarming one-liners. Dunph's letter that he receives from his perma-fried best friend "Drugs" Delaney from home and read by the school headmaster in front of him would be considered a gaspingly hilarious scene in any film, but it's so perfectly done here Hatosy's reaction as the letter is read is just as priceless as the very proper man casually reading a very Improper letter. Lots of hijinks abound, but the film is surprisingly unpredictable and refuses to take the easy way out so soon. The film also surprises with a few extremely unexpected and possibly unnecessary serious turns before steering back on course with a tidy and perfect comedic wrap up on the front lawn of the school between Dunph, his brother and dad that keeps it refreshingly happy without resorting to "Mega Lottery Happy". I don't know if you'll like it or hate it. It's not slapstick screwball, it has a deliberate pace but I thought tonnes of laughs and real heart. You may be pleasantly surprised. 7.5/10
The Road (2009) Just finished taking this in, as I'm recently drawn to post-apocalyptic subject matter. An adaptation of the 2006 novel by the same name, it follows a man and his son and their daily struggle to survive in the wake of an cataclysmic disaster that has eradicated nearly all life on Earth. The specific type of disaster remains a mystery (though the nerd in me immediately believed it was Lavos, as the film's setting reminded me very much of the 2300 AD parts of Chrono Trigger) as do the names of the two protagonists. What's left of humanity has devolved into "good guys and bad guys", and the bad guys are all thieves, rapists, and cannibals. I think it addressed most of the subjects and lessons it wanted to such as a commentary on homelessness, the responsibilities of fatherhood, appreciating the little victories, sticking to your morals, optimism in times of crisis, and trusting your fellow man. It begins to allude to God in some capacity, maybe a Noah's Ark allegory, but I don't think it followed through on that. I also thought the son was too whiny, but overall, I was glad I rented it. 7.5/10
I watched the original La Femme Nikita yesterday and I have to ask--why is this such an acclaimed movie again? It was billed as the best female assassin movie of all time. What a pile of shit. Two words: Kill Bill. Assassins should not cry, especially those "programmed" to kill (despite the fact that the only programming I saw was when she learned to color on the computer. The use of computers was incredibly stupid, even for an eighties film). She cried the whole fucking movie. Her elite training was nothing more than fighting against a high school karate class and blasting a paper target. The rest of it seemed to be focused on tactical make-up application and the fundamentals of making your dorm look like someone threw a grenade in the room while children were drawing on the walls. Her missions were stupid, and the only one worth anything (the final one) was glazed over with so many tactical tears that it ruined what little action was taking place. The ending? Are you fucking serious? You think that something is finally going to happen--a big Jason Bourne-esque battle scene where the created smites the creator. But no, it's two guys smoking and talking. Fin. Fucking fin. Nothing. Eat a dick, frenchies. 1/10. I'd rather watch Land Before Time XXI with a knitting needle in my urethra. Also, her tits sucked.
A warning to all: If you are going to watch this, you watch this first, then Leon: the Professional. Not the other way around, because it'll suck that much more. I'm not sure, but I think Nikita was Besson's first time out trying to do action, I'm pretty sure it was "cool" at the time but wouldn't stand up for the reasons mentioned above. And don't see the remake either, because the real strength was some nice cinematography, that'd make for a cool trailer, but that doesn't translate apparently. My favourite point of the film is that a drugged out crazy bitch turned efficient killer is really just a nice girl who wants the domestic life. A lot of the Professional doesn't stand up either but is way more fun, and has Gary Oldman in it.
The Professional is a great movie, and it's amazing that the same guy was behind both. Comparing La Femme Nikita to The Professional is like comparing getting punched in the dick to getting a blowjob.
Hammer time. This was bound to happen, they've been planning it for a decade. At least they got an actor with real chops to play the lead. But I'm sorry....Spike fucking Lee? |Wrong" is the first word that pops in my head. I hope this is better than...let's see.... 90% of his films.
Tremors (1990) Not losing a bit of its impact, nearly a quarter century later this film is still a blast to watch from beginning to end. Basic send-up of 50's sci-fi/horror B movies about a small desert hamlet set upon by four ravenous, titanic sandworms or "Grabboids" is given hyper-charged treatment. Great characters (especially stars Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward who are a great team, as are Burt Gross and Reba McIntyre as a heavily-armed doomsday preppers), incredible practical special effects, and suspensefully tense action. It's also relentlessly comical and good-natured, with plenty of surprises and ideas. Tons of fun, worth more than one viewing. I can't believe Kevin Bacon once thought of this as the low point of career. Did he forget he starred in Footloose and Trapped? 8/10