Rate the Last Movie You Saw

[dannyboy121070]

We watched BEETLEJUICE, BEETLEJUICE on Max last night, and it was astoundingly unfunny. I think I chuckled once during the entire overlong film. I cannot fathom why Tim Burton crafted so much of the film around the Charles Deetz character, since the actor who played him in the original is a Hollywood pariah due to his child porn conviction. His face was ll over the film, which was...weird, to say the least. What did Tim Burton's girlfriend Monica Bellucci have to do with anything, aside from getting a paycheck? Why was Willem Dafoe there? Who knows? Michael Keaton was fun to watch, but this was just a shitty, shitty cash grab. Ugh.

[Ben Staad]

Really? They used his likeness?

If that is true I am not shocked. Hollywood protects it's own.

[QUOTE=dannyboy121070;n199710]His face was ll over the film, which was...weird, to say the least. QUOTE]

[Ben Staad]

A Sound of Thunder. I ran across this one on Prime. A 2005 film supposedly based on a Ray Bradbury story. I don't recall ever reading this story so I have no idea if it is similar or not.

I time traveling sci-fi action film which deals with how the slightest change to the past can dramatically change our current existence. The first half of the film was well done, with an interesting set-up, fun dialogue, and background building. The 2nd half, and after the past has been changed, became a bit of a slog but still enjoyable enough.

Overall I fun 102 minutes of a movie. Nothing heavy and just a fun little ride. 3.75 stars out of 5.

For me this captured Bradbury pretty effectively and left me feeling like I went on a little adventure.

[Ben Staad]

Red One is a generous 1 out of 5 stars.

This thing is a stinky, boring, CGI infused, snooze fest. I probably shouldn't rate it as we only managed 20 or 30 minutes of this before turning it off.

[sholloman81]

Red One is a generous 1 out of 5 stars.

This thing is a stinky, boring, CGI infused, snooze fest. I probably shouldn't rate it as we only managed 20 or 30 minutes of this before turning it off.

A film I will never see. I just can't do anything with the Rock in it.

[Ben Staad]

I've enjoyed a few of his films. San Andreas was a good pop corn flick.

A film I will never see. I just can't do anything with the Rock in it.

[Ben Staad]

Carry On: Action movie set during the holiday season with some decent popcorn moments sprinkled with light drama. Bad guy trying to smuggle stuff through an airport and using deadly leverage against an agent to do so.

Not bad movie overall, kept us entertained for a bit, however I felt most the cast felt pretty flat. Male lead didn't have much on screen charisma. Anyway this is 3 out of 5 stars for me.

[sholloman81]

Carry On: Action movie set during the holiday season with some decent popcorn moments sprinkled with light drama. Bad guy trying to smuggle stuff through an airport and using deadly leverage against an agent to do so.

Not bad movie overall, kept us entertained for a bit, however I felt most the cast felt pretty flat. Male lead didn't have much on screen charisma. Anyway this is 3 out of 5 stars for me.

Haven't seen this yet but was getting major "Nick of Times" vibes from the commercial. However, even from the commercials, and as you allude to, I wasn't sold on the lead. His name escapes me, but I've yet to see him in anything that I liked. Mainly remember him from the crappy Robin Hood reboot.

[Ben Staad]

Taron Egerton. I hadn't seen him in anything before. The only familiar name on his IMDB is the Kingsman movies and I hadn't seen any of those.

His name escapes me.

[Sock Monkey]

Carry On: Action movie set during the holiday season with some decent popcorn moments sprinkled with light drama. Bad guy trying to smuggle stuff through an airport and using deadly leverage against an agent to do so.

Not bad movie overall, kept us entertained for a bit, however I felt most the cast felt pretty flat. Male lead didn't have much on screen charisma. Anyway this is 3 out of 5 stars for me.

I half-watched this while it was playing at a family member's house. From what I saw, it was a serviceable thriller, but nothing that sent me needing to go back to really sit down and watch it again.

[Sock Monkey]

YEAR-END WRAP UP PART 1 (OF 3):

So I've been terrible about finishing up my horror movies from Halloween and now we're almost a week into the new year, but I'm not giving up and I've decided to roll those titles into the few movies I watched over the holidays into a series of three posts. So here it goes...


Eyes Without a Face (1960):

eyes-without-a-face-1960-movie-poster.jpg

I've had the Criterion blu-ray on the shelf for at least four or five years before finally pushing play on it this last Halloween season and, man, do I regret waiting so long. A riff on "mad scientist" movies, the film revolves around the surgeon who is targeting women in order to use them as unwilling donors to a skin graft surgery to heal the surgeon's daughter who was horrifically injured in a car accident, but it is all in director Georges Franju's execution that this film is elevated from typically horror to art house chiller. The film slides effortlessly between the real, the surreal, and the grotesque--man, those special effects on the surgeries still worked for me--leading to an ending that is both beautiful and tragic. For a film that is is now 65 years old, it feels remarkably modern and moves along at a steady clip during its short 90-minute runtime.
Grade: A

MadS (2024):

hljjt2vtgpsrkltobe68xjqccob.jpg
A movie that made a rather big splash but has since seemed to vanish into the ether of genre film conversation is 2006's Them (or, under its original title, Ils), written and directed by David Moreau and Xavier Palud. While some of the punch of the film has been lessened by multiple films since then borrowing some of the film's themes, upon watching it a year or two back, I was struck by how well it still held up and wondered why it hasn't had a new blu-ray release by one of the boutique labels. Anyways, the duo later went on to do the American remake of The Eye, which I never saw, and that was the last I had heard of them. Fast forward to fall of 2024 and I hear that David Moreau is back with a new film that is supposedly a one-take zombie/infection outbreak film, so it landed firmly on my Halloween movie watch list.

Now, the film is much more experiential than it is plot-heavy, so to delve too much into specifics give some of the joy of the film away. However, the gist is that after scoring some drugs from his dealer for his birthday party, on his drive back into the city, a young man finds a panicked and injured woman on the side of the road. After the woman attacks him, the film follows the young man and his friends over the course of one night as the infection begins to take hold and spread. My description, while accurate, makes the film sound more epic than it is, as this is film is much more contained and much more concerned having the viewer experience the slow dread of the infection taking hold. Surprisingly, Moreau wrings a great amount of suspense out of this concept, especially during one scene in a bathroom. The one-take conceit alternates between keeping the film moving and pumping the brakes, but also creates this sense of claustrophobia as the viewer hardly ever breaks away from the protagonist. The three main actors commit fully to their roles and give it their all. Whether or not this works for the viewer largely depends on if they find the effects of the infection--a slow descent into manic madness--scary or not. For me, even though I thought shaving 5-10 minutes would have helped to keep the movie moving, it worked well for me and though it won't revitalize the zombie genre, it still shows that interesting things can be done within its boundaries. Grade: B

This is also your public service announcement to check out another "one-take" zombie film, One Cut of the Dead. Though not a horror movie, I still find this to be such a fun and joyful watch. If you haven't seen it, just stick with it past the first 15-20 minutes, it will all make sense at the end.

Stopmotion (2023):

MV5BNWJlYWM5ZTMtMjcyZi00OTJhLWJjMTctNGI2NDdiNDAzMmEzXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMDc5ODIzMw@@._V1_.jpg

Sometimes you see a movie trailer and you think that a film is absolutely, completely in your wheelhouse and once you sit down to watch it, you find out that you were absolutely, completely...wrong. Aisling Franciosi stars as Ella, a meek young woman who works with her overbearing mother, a renowned stopmotion filmmaker, on her mother's films yet yearns to create her own. After her mother's death, Ella embarks on a path to creating something as powerful and amazing as her mother's work, only to find herself spiraling into madness and mutilation. On one hand, Franciosi does a great job as Ella and I loved the stopmotion creations that are showcased in the film. However, the film suffers from the same issues that I had with 2019's Saint Maud, namely, the fact that there is no arc for the main character as they are pretty crazy from the get-go and that the film treats the revelation of their madness later in the film as something surprising to the viewer. Stopmotion at least tries to address this early on by letting the viewer in on a particular revelation rather early, but it still didn't work for me. In this type of film, the crux, at least for me, is that while the character's downfall is inevitable, the viewer should still be rooting somehow, someway for the character to be redeemed. Stopmotion fails to achieve this effect and what's left is a less-interesting riff of Lucky McKee's May. Grade: D

Azrael (2024):

photo?size=large-1280&scale=1&url=https:%2F%2Fmetadata-static.plex.tv%2F0%2Fgracenote%2F01a7e33628e194ff50b037ce5664c1b1.jpg

2024 was the year of directors of some my favorite underrated genre films finally making something new. I mentioned this with MadS, but I also get this post-apocalyptic flick from E.L. Katz, whose 2013 dark comedy Cheap Thrills is one of my favorites. Add in that it is written by Simon Barrett (The Guest, You're Next) and I'd already be in, but it also stars Samara Weaving, who I think, even after getting some great buzz from Ready or Not, is still incredibly underrated as an actress. Set after some unknown apocalypse--possibly, the biblical Rapture?--after the murder of her boyfriend, a young woman (Weaving) must fight against a mute cult in order to survive. Also similar to Moreau's MadS having the gimmick of it being a "one-take" film, Katz's movie has its own gimmick in that the film is almost entirely without dialogue. In the hands of a lesser actress, this wouldn't work at all, but Weaving's incredibly emotive reactions carry the weight of the film, leading the viewer on both an emotional and bloody journey. Without dialogue, the film is rather light on both exposition and character development, so if one requires a lot of either to fulfill their cinematic diet, this might feel a little bit like violent cotton candy. For me, even though I didn't quite get it all, I enjoyed piecing the mythology together, and it does feel as if there is a fully fleshed out mythology that is feeding this film, just maybe one that we don't quite understand and the film isn't keen on spelling out. I will also say that the special effects were solid and the designs of the supernatural creatures were pretty gnarly. My only complaint is that I feel like I need to rewatch the film again to see if I nail down the film's ending as I was left scratching my head a little. Grade: B

[sholloman81]

YEAR-END WRAP UP PART 1 (OF 3):

So I've been terrible about finishing up my horror movies from Halloween and now we're almost a week into the new year, but I'm not giving up and I've decided to roll those titles into the few movies I watched over the holidays into a series of three posts. So here it goes...


Eyes Without a Face (1960):

eyes-without-a-face-1960-movie-poster.jpg

I've had the Criterion blu-ray on the shelf for at least four or five years before finally pushing play on it this last Halloween season and, man, do I regret waiting so long. A riff on "mad scientist" movies, the film revolves around the surgeon who is targeting women in order to use them as unwilling donors to a skin graft surgery to heal the surgeon's daughter who was horrifically injured in a car accident, but it is all in director Georges Franju's execution that this film is elevated from typically horror to art house chiller. The film slides effortlessly between the real, the surreal, and the grotesque--man, those special effects on the surgeries still worked for me--leading to an ending that is both beautiful and tragic. For a film that is is now 65 years old, it feels remarkably modern and moves along at a steady clip during its short 90-minute runtime.
Grade: A

MadS (2024):

hljjt2vtgpsrkltobe68xjqccob.jpg
A movie that made a rather big splash but has since seemed to vanish into the ether of genre film conversation is 2006's Them (or, under its original title, Ils), written and directed by David Moreau and Xavier Palud. While some of the punch of the film has been lessened by multiple films since then borrowing some of the film's themes, upon watching it a year or two back, I was struck by how well it still held up and wondered why it hasn't had a new blu-ray release by one of the boutique labels. Anyways, the duo later went on to do the American remake of The Eye, which I never saw, and that was the last I had heard of them. Fast forward to fall of 2024 and I hear that David Moreau is back with a new film that is supposedly a one-take zombie/infection outbreak film, so it landed firmly on my Halloween movie watch list.

Now, the film is much more experiential than it is plot-heavy, so to delve too much into specifics give some of the joy of the film away. However, the gist is that after scoring some drugs from his dealer for his birthday party, on his drive back into the city, a young man finds a panicked and injured woman on the side of the road. After the woman attacks him, the film follows the young man and his friends over the course of one night as the infection begins to take hold and spread. My description, while accurate, makes the film sound more epic than it is, as this is film is much more contained and much more concerned having the viewer experience the slow dread of the infection taking hold. Surprisingly, Moreau wrings a great amount of suspense out of this concept, especially during one scene in a bathroom. The one-take conceit alternates between keeping the film moving and pumping the brakes, but also creates this sense of claustrophobia as the viewer hardly ever breaks away from the protagonist. The three main actors commit fully to their roles and give it their all. Whether or not this works for the viewer largely depends on if they find the effects of the infection--a slow descent into manic madness--scary or not. For me, even though I thought shaving 5-10 minutes would have helped to keep the movie moving, it worked well for me and though it won't revitalize the zombie genre, it still shows that interesting things can be done within its boundaries. Grade: B

This is also your public service announcement to check out another "one-take" zombie film, One Cut of the Dead. Though not a horror movie, I still find this to be such a fun and joyful watch. If you haven't seen it, just stick with it past the first 15-20 minutes, it will all make sense at the end.

Stopmotion (2023):

MV5BNWJlYWM5ZTMtMjcyZi00OTJhLWJjMTctNGI2NDdiNDAzMmEzXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMDc5ODIzMw@@._V1_.jpg

Sometimes you see a movie trailer and you think that a film is absolutely, completely in your wheelhouse and once you sit down to watch it, you find out that you were absolutely, completely...wrong. Aisling Franciosi stars as Ella, a meek young woman who works with her overbearing mother, a renowned stopmotion filmmaker, on her mother's films yet yearns to create her own. After her mother's death, Ella embarks on a path to creating something as powerful and amazing as her mother's work, only to find herself spiraling into madness and mutilation. On one hand, Franciosi does a great job as Ella and I loved the stopmotion creations that are showcased in the film. However, the film suffers from the same issues that I had with 2019's Saint Maud, namely, the fact that there is no arc for the main character as they are pretty crazy from the get-go and that the film treats the revelation of their madness later in the film as something surprising to the viewer. Stopmotion at least tries to address this early on by letting the viewer in on a particular revelation rather early, but it still didn't work for me. In this type of film, the crux, at least for me, is that while the character's downfall is inevitable, the viewer should still be rooting somehow, someway for the character to be redeemed. Stopmotion fails to achieve this effect and what's left is a less-interesting riff of Lucky McKee's May. Grade: D

Azrael (2024):

photo?size=large-1280&scale=1&url=https:%2F%2Fmetadata-static.plex.tv%2F0%2Fgracenote%2F01a7e33628e194ff50b037ce5664c1b1.jpg

2024 was the year of directors of some my favorite underrated genre films finally making something new. I mentioned this with MadS, but I also get this post-apocalyptic flick from E.L. Katz, whose 2013 dark comedy Cheap Thrills is one of my favorites. Add in that it is written by Simon Barrett (The Guest, You're Next) and I'd already be in, but it also stars Samara Weaving, who I think, even after getting some great buzz from Ready or Not, is still incredibly underrated as an actress. Set after some unknown apocalypse--possibly, the biblical Rapture?--after the murder of her boyfriend, a young woman (Weaving) must fight against a mute cult in order to survive. Also similar to Moreau's MadS having the gimmick of it being a "one-take" film, Katz's movie has its own gimmick in that the film is almost entirely without dialogue. In the hands of a lesser actress, this wouldn't work at all, but Weaving's incredibly emotive reactions carry the weight of the film, leading the viewer on both an emotional and bloody journey. Without dialogue, the film is rather light on both exposition and character development, so if one requires a lot of either to fulfill their cinematic diet, this might feel a little bit like violent cotton candy. For me, even though I didn't quite get it all, I enjoyed piecing the mythology together, and it does feel as if there is a fully fleshed out mythology that is feeding this film, just maybe one that we don't quite understand and the film isn't keen on spelling out. I will also say that the special effects were solid and the designs of the supernatural creatures were pretty gnarly. My only complaint is that I feel like I need to rewatch the film again to see if I nail down the film's ending as I was left scratching my head a little. Grade: B

Have been close to pulling the trigger on the criterion of Eye Without a Face for quite a while. Your review may have pushed me over the edge!

[dannyboy121070]

[SIZE=14px][FONT=Calibri]YEAR-END WRAP UP PART 1 (OF 3):



2024 was the year of directors of some my favorite underrated genre films finally making something new. I mentioned this with MadS, but I also get this post-apocalyptic flick from E.L. Katz, whose 2013 dark comedy Cheap Thrills is one of my favorites. Add in that it is written by Simon Barrett (The Guest, You're Next) and I'd already be in, but it also stars Samara Weaving, who I think, even after getting some great buzz from Ready or Not, is still incredibly underrated as an actress. Set after some unknown apocalypse--possibly, the biblical Rapture?--after the murder of her boyfriend, a young woman (Weaving) must fight against a mute cult in order to survive. Also similar to Moreau's MadS having the gimmick of it being a "one-take" film, Katz's movie has its own gimmick in that the film is almost entirely without dialogue. In the hands of a lesser actress, this wouldn't work at all, but Weaving's incredibly emotive reactions carry the weight of the film, leading the viewer on both an emotional and bloody journey. Without dialogue, the film is rather light on both exposition and character development, so if one requires a lot of either to fulfill their cinematic diet, this might feel a little bit like violent cotton candy. For me, even though I didn't quite get it all, I enjoyed piecing the mythology together, and it does feel as if there is a fully fleshed out mythology that is feeding this film, just maybe one that we don't quite understand and the film isn't keen on spelling out. I will also say that the special effects were solid and the designs of the supernatural creatures were pretty gnarly. My only complaint is that I feel like I need to rewatch the film again to see if I nail down the film's ending as I was left scratching my head a little. Grade: B

I had to Wiki the end of the film, because I felt like I had missed something, and, sure enough, it was not what I thought it was.

[Sock Monkey]

I had to Wiki the end of the film, because I felt like I had missed something, and, sure enough, it was not what I thought it was.

I've done a little bit of research online, but haven't stumbled across anything that resolves it in my mind. I might need to dig a little deeper, though. I only did a cursory search.

[Sock Monkey]

Have been close to pulling the trigger on the criterion of Eye Without a Face for quite a while. Your review may have pushed me over the edge!

Highly recommended. Per the course for Criterion, the transfer is great and, frankly, the movie is a classic for a reason. If you like older movies and horror film's that edge closer to arthouse than pulp--this one straddles the line very well--then its an easy recommendation. Of course, I'd wait until one of Criterion's or Barnes & Noble's 50% off sales. No reason to spend more than necessary!