Rate the last movie you have watched.

Watched Alien Abduction on Netflix over the weekend. A predictable found-footage type movie but kind of fun to watch and with one or two good FX moments. Two out of five stars.

I watched Enders Game this morning. Very pretty, nice zero-gee effects. Way too much cut. The movie was only one hour & 45 minutes long. As a stand-alone movie, 6/10. Decent, but nothing special. A once watch. As an adaption, 3/10. Pretty bad. Everything was compressed or cut outright. Aside from Fords character (Graff), the characterizations weren't very good. Any of the kids could have been switched for any other and little would have changed.

Not even close.

The Dark Knight was a great film, but was not the landmark that Superman was.

I just watched a little of this again, as it came up in conversation with a friend who likes Lars von Trier's films.

I think the best way to sum up Antichrist is what critic Tom Long of the Detroit News said:

Rene Rodriguez of the Miami Herald also had it right:

For those who have seen it, let me just say that one scene--hint: scissors--had me squirming. Small scale though it may be, that was one of the most shocking bits of on-screen violence I've ever seen.

Superman IS a landmark; it ushered in the age of comic book film adaptations.

Several elements of it are iconic--John Williams' theme, Christopher Reeve's performance as Superman--and it has one of the greatest action sequences ever in film (the helicopter rescue).

Its influence is undeniable.

That said, The Dark Knight is a better film.

You're one of those ESB is better than SW guys, ain't ya?

TDK is a better thriller film. It's not a better comicbook film.

It has the curious distinction of being one of the few roles recently that Ford hasn't just frowned and grumbled through.

I suppose I agree with this.

But when I say TDK is the better film, I'm arguing just on the basis of story, characters, how involving it is, themes, etc.

Superman IS a great film, but it is a comic book film, with some cartoonish characters and situations. TDK transcends its comic book origins and feels like something that almost COULD happen.

Watched the Ninja Turtles movie. It was... okay.

Not as bad as I thought it was going to be, though critics have savaged it.

To me, the problem with Superman is, watching it as a grown-up, it feels a little choppy.

Feel-bad movie? I like this expression! Lars von Trier was in a very, very bad mood when he filmed "Antichrist". He collapsed several times. Again, it's not the horrible violence which makes this film such an unpleasant experience, at least for me. It's the nihilistic atmosphere. The despair. Lars von Trier is an ok director in my book, but far from being a genius. However, "Antichrist" works because Dafoe and Gainsbourgh are such excellent actors, perhaps among the best of this generation.

I've read that there will be an American remake of "Martyrs", btw... The story will be rewritten for an American audience. Which certainly means that in the end, the protagonist will meet God and die with a smile on her face, and all her suffering will have made sense. Which is EXACTLY the opposite of the message of the french original. Or they make a stupid torture flick out of it, which the original "Martyrs" is definitely NOT.

Meanwhile, I'm quite fed up with all these sick, but oh so artsy movies produced in France. "New french extremity", yeah... I'm not impressed, to say the least. "Frontieres", "Irreversible", "baise-moi"... Yes, some of these movies are well-made and thought-provoking. Because of "Martyrs", I watched several of them during the last weeks. However, just being "extreme" by breaking every imaginable taboo and desperately trying to shock the audience is just not enough. Most of these movies are simply bad. Bad storylines, bad actors, ridiculous dialogues, bad FX... Most of these movies try to be as sick and twisted as possible without being able to create atmosphere. Booooring... "The Human Centipede" in french. Get the popcorn and enjoy the fun. And ten minutes after watching, you have forgotten all about it. No big difference to Hollywood. Torture porn trash.

"How to train a Dragon 2" was ok for a sequel. It lacks the magic of the first part, but it's still entertaining. 7/10

Last night I watched The Legend of Boggy Creek, a movie I saw at a drive-in when I was ten years old. Scared the living shit out of me back then. Watching it now I don't really understand why.

Then this afternoon I watched When Worlds Collide, the George Pal disaster epic from the early 50s. Still love that one for some damn reason . . . I remember playing as a kid and making up scenarios for "escaping the planet before it blows up" with Major Matt Mason or GI Joe or even with the other kids around. We had a gully nearby where the bank was washing out, making a sort of mini-gravel pit and a lot of our adventures happened there.

Jaws: The Revenge, 2/10 and only because the shark looked so bad it was good.

The Giver was pretty decent. There were a lot of liberties taken with the book, but someone that never read it won't be bothered by it. For those that have, this film will be polarizing at best. I will say Katie Homles entired sucked in her role and even Meryl Steet seemed to be phoning it in at parts. Best acting goes to Alexander Skarsgard; I was kinda skeptical given he's more casted for sex appeal, but he was exactly how I imagined Jonas's dad the baby nurturer to be.

Overall, 7/10.

That film has one of my favorite movie moments of all time in it. When they've landed on the new planet, one of the guys goes to open the door to the spacecraft and another objects that the atmosphere may not be breathable. The first guy says something along the lines of "It's all we've got" and opens the door. And he's absolutely right. If they can't breathe the atmosphere on the new planet, it's not like they can go looking somewhere else!

Oh, that movie is just so, so bad. My favorite bit is Lorraine Gary's character having a flashback to events at which she was not present.

I like what Michael Caine says about the film:

Watched On the Waterfront yesterday evening. Good film, though I didn't like the anti-union message. 7/10.

Did a TMNT -off yesterday - showed my kid the old '90 version, then went to the drive in to see the '14 version. The '90 version was far better IMO.

Hopefully there will be a grown up movie soon... Though I did see Guardians of the Galaxy, and that was quite fun. I'm looking forward to Interstellar and surprisingly the Equaliser.

I watched the sex scenes from nymphomaniac volume 1 today. I would rate them 6 stars out of ten

Two things I watched recently on video...

Lolita - the 1997 film adaptation of Nabokov's still-controversial classic novel with Jeremy Irons as Humbert, a middle-aged man whose obsession and illicit relationship with a teenage nymphette (very well-played by then-newcomer Dominique Swain) leads to dark places. A little slow in the middle, but well-acted all around. Frank Langella is wonderfully repellent as the mysterious playwright Clare Quilty who also has designs on young Lolita. A better and more faithful adaptation than the 1962 Kubrick film, methinks. 7/10.



Blue Ruin - engaging, suspenseful tale of a homeless man who avenges himself on the man who killed his parents, only to have the man's family come after him (and his family) seeking revenge. Shot on a small budget and featuring mostly unknowns, this is a grim slow burn, but it's a solid revenge film. 8/10. One special note: Eve Plumb (yes, middle sister Jan of The Brady Bunch) has a small but significant role in the film and it is, to put it mildly, an unexpected turn from the actress:

^^^
So she finally snapped and offed Marsha?

Marsha Marsha Marsha!!

The Three Musketeers (1973)

Love this movie from when I was a kid. By far my favorite of all the filmed versions of the story. It screams 1970s, which is a big part of why I like it so much. 7/10.


Three Days of the Condor

One of those films that everybody has seen that I hadn't seen until last week (or, if I had, I had forgotten). Good flick. Also very much of its time, but I dig that here as well. 6/10.

Watched Saturn 3 last night. It was one of the wave of Alien wannabes that came out following that classic. Stars Kirk Douglas, Farrah Fawcett, and Harvey Keitel. The basic story is okay, even interesting, but it gets a very trite treatment here. Production values are not impressive even for the time considering the names in it. On the plus side, Farrah is briefly topless and as young as she is in this movie looks utterly delectable. Two out of five stars.

I remember watching Saturn 3 when it came out on cable when I was a kid (1981 or so). Scared me then, now I think it's just kinda...awful.

It's fascinating that the filmmakers re-dubbed all of Harvey Keitel's dialog with a different actor. I didn't realize they'd done this when I was a kid; now it's just surreal to hear another man's voice coming out of his mouth.

"You have a great body. May I use it?"

As much as you would like to believe it would, this does not work as a pickup line. In fact it may get you physically assaulted by the female you try it on. And not in a good way.

Across 110th Street - good but not great. Though technically a "blaxploitation" movie it's much more than that really. No heavy handed "stick it to whitey" message or anything. This is the kind of movie Spike Lee and Quentin Tarantino wished they could make. Yes there are racial politics addressed but they are accurately and honestly illustrated.
And Huggy Bear from Starsky and Hutch is in it! Also starring Anthony Quinn who ironically plays a bigot in a Spike Lee movie "Jungle Fever" many years later.
BTW the theme song is a rushed, faster temp version of the classic, linked here.
Worth a watch or two at least for the crime drama fan. Better than Superfly but music isn't as good.

The Bad and the Beautiful, the Kirk Douglas/Lana Turner flick from 1952.

Good film where Douglas plays a pushy, asshole Hollywood producer. I like movies about the movie and television business and this one is pretty good. Beautifully shot (the cinematographer won an Oscar for his work on the film).

6/10

Coherence. Twilight zone indie film that will have you confused and thinking by the end. 8/10.