Rate the Last Movie You Saw

[dannyboy121070]

Wow, I just saw THE weirdest movie.......SHANKS.

I first learned of this bizarre film when I saw it listed on TCM a few years back. It was on way too late for me, and I've had my eye out for it ever since. TCM ran it again last week, in the dead of night again, but this time they have it available on their Watch TCM app. It's available until 9/12, and I can't recommened it enough. If you're on this board, you'll really appreciate this film.

What's it about, you ask..? I spent the whole running time imagining how it could be described.

(Spoilers will follow, so if you're interested in this film, I guess don't read the rest of this post!)

SHANKS is a 1973 mime/Horror/fairy tale concoction starring Marcel Marceau (!!!), and directed by the legendary William Castle (!!!!!).

Marceau stars as Malcolm Shanks, a deaf-mute living somewhere in the midwest, with his harridan sister-in-law and her alcoholic second husband. (All three are french, and living in bumfuck America, for some reason.) Shanks is hired out of the blue as an assistant by a weird old recluse (Also played by Marceau), who is perfecting his method of re-animating dead bodies. (!!!!)

The old man dies, setting off a bizarre series of events resulting in Shanks' family being killed and re-animated as his slaves (!!!). There's also Shanks' creepy relationship with a little girl who is probably 13 or 14. "Mom,. can I go on a picnic with this 55 year old mime?" Sure, no problem!

The little blonde girl goes off with Shanks to the old man's castle, he dresses her up like a bride, and uses his corpse slaves to throw her a birthday party. Of course, the party is crashed by that old 70s B-movie bugaboo, the biker gang. The bikers beat up Malcolm, rape and kill the little girl (!!!!!), and the stage is set for the mime zombies vs bikers finale.

This is a jaw-droppingly weird film. TCM host Alicia Malone said that Marceau made Castle tone down the horrific aspects of the film, and make it more of a fairy tale. I'd hate to see how dark it was before the changes, since this fairy tale features CHILD RAPE AND MURDER!!!! You really have to see this to believe it.

I'd love to hear if anyone else has seen this film....

I can almost guarantee that you've never heard of this creepy little oddity, and this description does not even begin to touch how weird it is.

[Ben Staad]

3D gives me a migraine. So I pass on them as well. IMAX also bothers my head but I think that has something to do with the enhanced sound systems in IMAX theaters and not necessarily the screen. IDK but very loud and booming noises don't work well with me in the theater. Feel similar when watching or listening to an orchestra in person. Headache city.

Weird thing is firing my gun or setting off fireworks doesn't bother me.

I believe it was national cinema day across the country. Saw Jaws for the first time on the big screen in IMAX for 3 bucks as well. Never been a fan of 3D as it causes me motion sickness or something there of the like.

[Sock Monkey]

One of the things that I seriously dislike about this message board are the lack of threads...everything that anyone could possibly talk about are tied up in a handful of threads: Random Thoughts, and What are you reading/watching/listening to? Going forward, I'm going to try to start new threads for books that I'm reading, and movies that I've seen recently, to try to spur on a little more diverse conversation around here. I love the movie talk here, but once we start talking about PREY, for example, then the talk about NOPE dies out. I'd like to have more specific threads on the board that people can pop into and have discussions when they finally get around to seeing/reading specific films and books.

That said......My wife and son and I watched PREY last week, and we all loved it. I thought Amber Midthunder did a great job as the hero. Being adorably cute was also a plus. The animal CGI didn't bother me much, because I'm used to iffy animal CGI at this point. I guess the days of filming an actual bear or dog are gone. (I know the dog was real, I was thinking more about the recent CALL OF THE WILD remake, which I really enjoyed, but the fake dog drove me nuts.) PREY seems to be a huge hit for Hulu, so I'm hoping we get some more Predator adventures in different time periods. And it's still not too late for the Arnold/Danny Glover team-up that I've wanted to see for decades......

My wife and I watched THE BLACK PHONE on Peacock last night. We both enjoyed it, but I'm glad that I didn't see it in a theater. Nothing about it needed to be seen on a big-screen. That make me sad to say, since I used to go to the movies every weekend pre-Covid, but most of my trips to the theater post-Covid have been awful. People just don't know how to act in public anymore. Loud talking, phones, tablets, yelling at the screen......I tend to only go see the big spectacles now, early in the morning, before the assholes wake up, and leave smaller films for home viewing. Back to THE BLACK PHONE....I thought there was some great acting on display, especially the little girl, and Ethan Hawke always kills it, whatever he's in. The dialogue was pretty corny at times, especially the kids, who all spoke in that faux-hip Stephen King kids voice, such as the little sister cursing out the cops and calling them "fartknockers".....And as someone who grew up in that time period, in The Bronx: That was maybe THE most violent neighborhood in America! Kung-fu kids beating the teeth out of bullies, knife-fights at the convenience store, rocks bashing heads and faces, plus a serial killer in a black van, which I would think would make SOME nosy neighbor take notice, lol. Good film, great performances.

I'm also about halfway through Netflix's THE SANDMAN adaptation, but I should start a new thread about that.

I like your ideas of threads taking deeper dives into book or movie discussions. I'm wondering if maybe anyone on the forum would be interested in a group read and discussion?

I'm finding that I am very much in the minority in my disappointment in PREY. I don't think it was bad by any means, but I just didn't like the idea of modernized John Wick-type action.

Your thoughts about modern movie-goers is EXACTLY why I don't go to the theater. The fact that a segment of movie-goers feel like they can behave like a theater is their own living room and tend to act offended when their actions are addressed bothers me to no end. In my opinion, it is this factor, not the increase in theater ticket prices or the reduction in home theater components, that is causing the decline in cinema attendance.

I'm about halfway through THE SANDMAN as well and I've been liking it, but it hasn't been knocking my socks off. But, to be honest, the first arc of the comic which the first half of the season is adapting is probably the weakest in what I remember from the series. My wife feels very lost. I try to explain the best I can. I do like Jenna Coleman as the series Constantine, but I really, really want a very hard R-rated faithful adaptation of the HELLBLAZER.

[Brian861]

I believe it was national cinema day across the country. Saw Jaws for the first time on the big screen in IMAX for 3 bucks as well. Never been a fan of 3D as it causes me motion sickness or something there of the like.

[sholloman81]

AMC theaters had a special promotion on Saturday offering $3 movie tickets. Decided to go check out Jaws in 3D. It was awesome! Have always wanted to see Jaws on the big screen and now finally have done so! It has been ages since I have seen a movie in 3d and it seems to really have improved in the intervening years. Some of those kills were extra gnarly in 3D. I have seen Jaws a million times and Quint's speech toward the end still gives me chills. it is such an awesome movie scene! Really happy that I ended-up going and hope AMC will bring this promotion back in the future.

[dannyboy121070]

One of the things that I seriously dislike about this message board are the lack of threads...everything that anyone could possibly talk about are tied up in a handful of threads: Random Thoughts, and What are you reading/watching/listening to? Going forward, I'm going to try to start new threads for books that I'm reading, and movies that I've seen recently, to try to spur on a little more diverse conversation around here. I love the movie talk here, but once we start talking about PREY, for example, then the talk about NOPE dies out. I'd like to have more specific threads on the board that people can pop into and have discussions when they finally get around to seeing/reading specific films and books.

That said......My wife and son and I watched PREY last week, and we all loved it. I thought Amber Midthunder did a great job as the hero. Being adorably cute was also a plus. The animal CGI didn't bother me much, because I'm used to iffy animal CGI at this point. I guess the days of filming an actual bear or dog are gone. (I know the dog was real, I was thinking more about the recent CALL OF THE WILD remake, which I really enjoyed, but the fake dog drove me nuts.) PREY seems to be a huge hit for Hulu, so I'm hoping we get some more Predator adventures in different time periods. And it's still not too late for the Arnold/Danny Glover team-up that I've wanted to see for decades......

My wife and I watched THE BLACK PHONE on Peacock last night. We both enjoyed it, but I'm glad that I didn't see it in a theater. Nothing about it needed to be seen on a big-screen. That make me sad to say, since I used to go to the movies every weekend pre-Covid, but most of my trips to the theater post-Covid have been awful. People just don't know how to act in public anymore. Loud talking, phones, tablets, yelling at the screen......I tend to only go see the big spectacles now, early in the morning, before the assholes wake up, and leave smaller films for home viewing. Back to THE BLACK PHONE....I thought there was some great acting on display, especially the little girl, and Ethan Hawke always kills it, whatever he's in. The dialogue was pretty corny at times, especially the kids, who all spoke in that faux-hip Stephen King kids voice, such as the little sister cursing out the cops and calling them "fartknockers".....And as someone who grew up in that time period, in The Bronx: That was maybe THE most violent neighborhood in America! Kung-fu kids beating the teeth out of bullies, knife-fights at the convenience store, rocks bashing heads and faces, plus a serial killer in a black van, which I would think would make SOME nosy neighbor take notice, lol. Good film, great performances.

I'm also about halfway through Netflix's THE SANDMAN adaptation, but I should start a new thread about that.

[Sock Monkey]

I watched Prey on Friday night and had the weekend to mull it over. Set in the late 1700s, the movie follows a group of Comanche hunters, including a female hunter who has yet to prove herself, as they have to battle a Predator hunting in their area. I absolutely loved the idea of taking the concept of the original Predator and setting it in a time period where we had even more primitive weapons (no one is blasting the jungle apart with a gatling gun in this movie!). Even the teaser trailer showing a the female Comanche hunter running from the woods into a prairie only to be dragged down by a fellow hunter who signals that there is something in the woods and draws his bow before the signature three laser dots show up on him was incredibly effective. I was hoping for more of this pared down approach. I hate to say "a little more realistic" when dealing with a hunter from space that uses high-tech gadgetry to kill his prey and acquire trophies, but, yeah, maybe a movie where the characters were a little more original Die Hard John McClane instead of Keanu Reeves's titular John Wick. That was definitely not the case. The movie was filled with standard modern Hollywood action set pieces where our heroes can somehow slide across the forest floor or bounce of trees to launch attacks. On one hand, I loved that Hollywood has progressed from the depiction of Native Americans as "noble savages" to showing them as kick-butt warriors. But on the other, some of this left me cold as a lot of modern action movies do.

As I watching the movie, I think what it came down to was that the movie felt too modern. Beyond the title card stating the year and the rudimentary weapons and technology, the movie just didn't feel like it was set in the late 1700s. The actors were great, but all their actions and mannerisms were very modern. I'm assuming this was deliberate the on the part of the director--maybe to ostensibly show that in that time they were modern?--and the acting we see depicting that time period in other films is surely manicured artifice, but these decisions created a weird anachronistic feel to the movie that, at least for me, made the acting feel out of place in the world that is being created around them.

The ultimate takedown of the Predator was just okay, but I didn't feel that it was clever enough to feel earned. As far as the special effects, the CGI on the Predator was solid, but the CGI on the animals in the film was not very good. And we just saw the Predator too darn much. There wasn't the feeling of our heroes were being stalked and hunted so much as if they were just on the tracks when a train barreled through.

This wasn't a bad movie, but it just seemed to miss the mark for me in what I was hoping for versus what I got.

Grade: C

[Martin]

And if so, what difference does this potentially make to the story? Ricky seems to remember it well enough and it definitely happened as evidenced by the memorabilia room and the veiled former actress. So if he is an unreliable narrator, which we really only get the story through those flashbacks and the story Ricky tells about the SNL skit, what does that mean for the story? It seems like something is just out of reach of understanding. I like that Peele is not answering specifically about it.

And Martin, Where the Crawdads Sing showed up at my local theater today but it was our 12 year anniversary and we couldn't work a movie into the day but hopefully it's still there next week because I want to see it. Thanks for alerting me to it!

Happy anniversary!

[Tommy]

And if so, what difference does this potentially make to the story? Ricky seems to remember it well enough and it definitely happened as evidenced by the memorabilia room and the veiled former actress. So if he is an unreliable narrator, which we really only get the story through those flashbacks and the story Ricky tells about the SNL skit, what does that mean for the story? It seems like something is just out of reach of understanding. I like that Peele is not answering specifically about it.

And Martin, Where the Crawdads Sing showed up at my local theater today but it was our 12 year anniversary and we couldn't work a movie into the day but hopefully it's still there next week because I want to see it. Thanks for alerting me to it!

[dannyboy121070]

I generally don't like to put such deep thought into movie-watching. so I don't usually go into the "The guy with red hair was a metaphor for the way the Irish were mistreated when the came to America!" deep-dives, especially since I think most movie dissections like that are total BS, but this film was just fraught with things that I didn't connect upon my first viewing, so, yes, I would love to see it again, especially in a uncut version at Peele's original running time. I've been reading some articles about the film and interviews with Peele lately, and he seems to never want to comment on why the shoe was standing on end. Maybe it was to show that Ricky was an unreliable narrator...?

[Tommy]

I may very well have missed something, but I didn't get the impression that the shoe was used as a weapon. I figured it just flew off her foot. I think Gordy just beat them to death with his hands, since they were literally dripping blood during the fist-bump.

No you didn't miss anything, I did. The shoe was not a weapon Gordy used. I went looking for an answer and haven't found anything really amazing with regards to the shoe other than during the massacre the boy sees a strange site that defies gravity or maybe he misremembered in the horror of the moment? Not a lot but, looking it up I see now that the mother in the sitcom was an astronaut and the sitcom was set in Cape Canaveral where The Challenger disaster occurred. Both things leading back to space and in the case of The Challenger, the first disaster I can remember seeing because I was home sick from school that day and I was young but I remember. Some folks feel sympathy for Ricky and find him to be a tragic character. That is interesting and something to think about as well because he was warped by the acting system that child actors go through and then abandoned by it. This leads to the idea that abused people abuse others and so forth. I kind of want to watch it again now.

[dannyboy121070]

I may very well have missed something, but I didn't get the impression that the shoe was used as a weapon. I figured it just flew off her foot. I think Gordy just beat them to death with his hands, since they were literally dripping blood during the fist-bump.

[Tommy]

Yeah, I’ve got to agree, you got a lot more out of it than I did!

Guess I need to cut down on the vodka I sneak into the movies.

Good points - the cinematography & sound we’re very good.
NOPE is definitely a movie that needs to be seen in the theater, IMO, if you are going to see it.

The acting was good, especially the actors that played the brother & sister. Angel provided some well timed comic relief, and it was good to see Michael Wincott working again.

Lesser points - I was just kind of underwhelmed with the story. Maybe my expectations were too high going in, but I was just expecting more from the storyline.

One question, if any body can answer it: what was up with the vertical slipper/shoe in the Gordy scene?

B

We wondered about that as well. Other than it being the killing weapon and resting in a weird position? I don't know. The fact that the man put it in his private collection of memorabilia is ghoulish.

[Tommy]

Wow, Tommy! I stated I was bored with the film and was bummed since I had wanted to see it so badly. Your review actually makes me enjoy the film so much better without another watch. Thank you for opening my eyes to what was right in front of my face. Clearly, I wasn't qualified to view it lol.

Glad you enjoy it better from my scattershot thoughts and everyone who likes movies is qualified for an opinion. Some reviewers have said a movie should be good enough to not have to watch again but I really disagree with that. I've re-watched movies I didn't like just to see why I didn't like them the first time. When I was an avid reader, a reread of a story or a book was sometimes like reading it again for the first time because I missed so much the first go round.

[Sock Monkey]

Man, I feel like I need to go see NOPE so I can get in on this conversation. I love it when a movie sparks some conversation and debate.