Last movie you watched (Page 47 of 83)

Mmmmhmm. It was in the first couple mins as soon as they introduced the "Childhood hero" I knew something was very very wrong...

Also the fact that there is a needlessly long plot review of the first movie at the start of this one, who's only purpose so far as I can tell is to provide a framework to introduce the "Childhood Hero".

Basically if you know anything at all about movies and I tell you "Childhood hero is actually evil." Meatballs 2 is exactly the movie you think it would be, plus a little bit of stuff between the cracks.

Last edited by BigDamnArtist (2014-05-22 12:06:43)

MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE

Bought the blu-ray. I hadn't seen it in years. I enjoyed the fuck out of it.

It's quintessentially 80s--Lundgren, James Tolkan, and a couple of other familiar faces, plus conspicuous Burger King product placement (as in MONSTER SQUAD). The character design for Skelator is badass. Langella's performance is remarkable given that he's emoting from behind a brick of makeup.

I love it despite how brazenly derivative it is. The opening titles sequence is just plain stolen from SUPERMAN. Conti's score sounds like STAR WARS mixed with SUPERMAN plus sprinkles of Jerry Goldsmith's STAR TREK music. Not to mention the fact that the music that plays when Gwildor uses the Cosmic Key is extremely BACK TO THE FUTURE-ish. Even the final battle is ganked right from JEDI.

Lundgren is ostensibly the star. He barely speaks! And when he does, it's one sentence, never two or three strung together. Jimmy pointed out to me that Gwildor--this little disposable character who was not in the toy line or cartoons and was created just so he could engineer the film's MacGuffin--has way more lines than Dolph, the star. So funny.

The making-of is interesting, too. Low-budget, lots of problems with money, didn't know whether they'd be able to finish the film.

Sorry got side tracked by the "story by" credit on their imdb page last night. Either way, it reminds you that this movie has it's root's in that movie then. Point being, you can see that some of the sensibility of the first movie is trying to seep through.

Silent Hill (2006)

An interesting one really, I have mixed feelings on it. I'm a fan of the games and I think that this is one of the better video game adaptations out there.

As a fan, the main issue that gets brought up is the lead character Harry Mason was turned into Rose Da Silva. The director essentially wanted an all female cast and felt that Harry Mason (upon playing the game) had traits that would traditionally be associated with a mother, aka being compassionate and comforting to other characters, and going through hell to save their daughter. Ignoring all the unfortunate implications that this change now implies, the studio didn't like such a female dominance in the film and demanded a male character be thrown in.

This gives us Sean Bean as the husband to the main character. His scenes in the film are interesting in their own right. He's going after Rose to try and bring her and their daughter back safely and he's will to do anything to accomplish that. However his scenes feel tacked on (as they were) and actively pulls you out of the tense atmosphere that Rose's scenes provide. Sean Bean is quite good in this film and it honestly makes me wonder, why bother with making Harry into Rose if you've got him in it? I feel like he could of made a great lead.

Enough on that subject, lets talk about something else. The set and costume design. Give these people a medal, good lord. The atmosphere that the sets provide is very much like the games. Special props to the "double dare you" bathroom scene and the nurse scene.  The sets are gorgeous to look at and not to mention the variation to the sets. Take for instance, the setting of the school. They had to keep track of four variants of it, the foggy abandoned variation, the hellish otherworld variation, 1970s still being used version and modern day abandoned version.

The monster design is also really impressive. All of the monsters bar CG bugs are skilled performers in costume and make up. They give unsettling, disturbing performances that are almost ruined by having additional CG applied and making them look fake. Special mention to that are the "grey children".

Its obvious that a lot of love was put into the film, occasionally doing shot for shot moments from the game.  However theres occasional moments of plot weirdness, lines and the odd hammy over the top acting at times that drags the movie down.

I'd definitely suggest at least checking it out. Hell, it could even make for an interesting podcast. In the end, I suppose it's YMMV. I looked past its flaws to see all the workmanship that was put into it with its sets, props and make up work but others might not be so forgiving.

I heard that the sequel was pretty bad but it had a different director and writing team on that one. I haven't seen it so I can't really say.

Fun fact:

Silent Hill was filmed in the town of Brantford, Ontario. 20 mins from my house. Let's just say at the time they didn't have to do much artistically to make it look like a sad, depressed run down portal to hell.

Brantford's doing much better these days.

I've finally seen "her".

This one hit me on so many levels, I've not enjoyed a film as much in a long time. It lingered and held, Theodore's experience transmitted well.

The end worked for me; it felt rushed and disjointed but that's probably the point.

Taken 2

I'm a big fan of the 'Liam Neeson kills people/animals' genre and I'm also a fan of watching bad things happen to bad people, and this film does both very well. I had been warned that it wasn't as good as the first, so perhaps these lowered expectations and the wariness on my part helped, but I loved this.

Bryan Mills is also the closest that we've come to getting a proper Frank Castle on screen.

The Hidden Face (La Cara Oculta) (2011) - 7/10 (7.3)

Very good Spanish film. The girlfriend of an orchestra conductor disappears and it goes from there. Not too much should be said about it. It does twist and turn a bit. Very well acted by most everyone involved. Very recommended if you like thrillers.

The Jacket (2005) - 6/10 (7.1)

"Jacobs Ladder" meets "Donnie Darko". An injured soldier (Adrien Brody) is put in a mental hospital after an incident, and while there he is subjected to treatment that cause strange events.
Fairly derivative plot (you can tell what movies the writer watched and was inspired by), and despite being normal length, it's not as "rich" in tone and content as Jacobs Ladder or Donnie Darko. Still, good acting and emotionally the movie still connected with me very well. Worth seeing in most cases.

Saw Prisoners at last.

What a harrowing viewing experience. These sorts of stories are really hard to watch, and although I have no children of my own I do have a lot of nieces and nephews and so I can understand the horror of having a child taken away. I get antsy just watching them near something vaguely dangerous. The film is really well directed with just the right tone and some absolutely superb performances from everyone. The characters all feel so real as well.

The ending had me surprised though, without wishing to give anything away. In any case, well worth watching if you can stomach the premise.

I should probably watch a comedy or something next.

Doomsday (2008) (Alternatively titled: "Humans Be Cray-Cray Amirite?")

I watched this many many years ago... and as it turns out I remember'd almost nothing about it.

Short tidbit review for those looking for such things: A wonderfully, deliciously fucked up, little charming movie that is trying really really hard to say something.

I'll probably do a full review later on as there's a lot of thoughts going on in my head right now...but it's 3:30 in the morning, and I have a meeting in 7 hours. But just for now I'll say, when I first watched this, I remembered it as pretty enjoyable but overall very cheesy and kinda stupid, but on this rewatch it's actually got a lot going on, and the cheese factor wasn't nearly as bad as I remember. The concept is pretty cool, and taken as a whole executed very effectively all things considered, although there are some really remarkably gorgeous shots in sections of this, there are also a lot of sections where everything is shot very flat and dully, so the cinematography ultimately feels really out of balance.

Obviously this is going to be a love it or hate type of movie for most people; gore, urban savages, cannabalism, blood, virus outbreak and gore will tend to do that. But I had fun, take that for what you will.

Last edited by BigDamnArtist (2014-06-14 09:25:03)

Huh, I haven't actually seen anything else by Neil Marshall...

...except apparently the 2 episodes of Game of Thrones he did, that are both epic battle episodes and okay, yeah, that totally makes sense. I'm gonna have to check out more of his stuff, The Descent has been on my radar for a while, I just haven't gotten around to it yet.

Last edited by BigDamnArtist (2014-06-14 18:12:52)

The Descent is bloody fantastic. One of the best horror films ever as far as I'm concerned.

Doomsday I think is a misfire. It wants really hard to be a John Carpenter action movie, but it just never gels together. Each 3rd of the movie is a completely different movie awkwardly crow-barred in, and the action is really sloppy and shaky so you can't really follow it.

If you like his Game of Thrones stuff, you should check out Centurion (it might be on netflix), as that's probably his closest stuff to his work on Game of Thrones.