Recently Watched Films

Oh, I'm the same with Batman. Everyone hates Batman and Robin so much and I can't figure out what the big deal is. It's a perfectly fine film to me.

The new Star Wars was mediocre at best. It's basically a redo of A New Hope with video game characters.

Star Wars.

It was Star Wars and I liked it a lot.

I'm with Roger on this.

Also watched Ex Machina and enjoyed that a lot too.

^ Ex Machina was great. There's another film called The Machine with Toby Stephens and Caity Lotz, which is great. Similar prospect, also British, but predates Ex Machina (both are unique enough, just feature androids).

I'm ambivalent about the new Batman Superman thing. Just as I am with the Suicide Squad stuff. I'll give it a go, though.

I'm yet to see Star Wars, but I'm going in a week or so, if only to get people off my back about it.

Last film I watched was Die Hard: With a vengeance , which followed Die Hard 2 and Die Hard 1 (because fuck you, they're Christmas films).

Probably going to give The Martian a shot tonight.

Also, Batman and Robin, and Batman Forever are legit films. I am not going to watch them again any time soon so I don't spoil their memory of them as a child, and realise they're shit, though.

Batman Forever and Batman and Robin are better than the first two for me which I find so incredibly boring. At least they're legitimately insane films and delightful to watch for that reason.

The new Batman Superman movie will be terrible, because Zack Snyder is directing it and he makes horrible trash that's way too long. I'll still see it because it's a Batman movie, but I won't be happy about it.

Star Wars was great, anyone who complains about it can go back to their precious prequels. It had it all and it felt like a Star Wars movie. And I don't know what distinction "video game characters" is.

I saw the h8ful 8ful last night and it was gr8ful. My friends who I went with and I are driving two hours to see the 70mm version in an hour. it's gonna be awesome.

Ex Machina was a favorite film of mine this year. I was the only one of my friends to REALLY enjoy it, but my favorite film of the year is still probably Fury Road. Over the summer I was watching it several times a week.

I legitimately enjoyed Batman Forever last time I watched it, though admittedly that was years and years ago. I did not enjoy Batman and Robin, though, but maybe I was just taking it too seriously. I don't think I've ever actually seen the Tim Burton Batman films. I never watched The Dark Knight Rises either. I'm kind of a failure as a Batman fan.

If forced at gunpoint to pick the best film of last year I'd probably agree on Fury Road. There are four other films I'd put in the same calibre though (Inside Out, The Martian, Ex Machina, Brooklyn). Star Wars is just a hair below those three, probably a 9/10 where the others are likely to be 10/10.

You skipped all of my least favorite Batman movies, so don't beat yourself up too much (I still like the Tim Burton ones, I just think they're a lot more bland than people say they are. The only one I actively dislike is Rises).

I rewatched Django Unchained just to confirm it as my least favorite or second least favorite Tarantino. It's a fun watch but it honestly kind of tastes like ash compared to the rest of his films. Still like a 7/10 or 8/10.

Hateful Eight might have bumped up to a 10/10 on a second viewing.

Deathgasm.
Metal-infused b-grade slasher-comedy as a homage to other b-grade slasher-comedies. It was pretty average, but I'm okay with it when Beastwars is in the musics. The protagonist was likeable enough though.

The Wolf of Wall Street.
Pretty good, but If I wanted to watch three hours of drugs and hookers, I probably could have watched something else. What do you mean it's a movie about stoke brokerage?

The Hateful Eight was dark even by Tarantino standards, but definitely an excellent film. Not sure what rating I want to give it yet, but I think it's a 9/10. It may improve to a 10/10 on a second viewing, but I'm not sure I'll be ready to watch it again so soon. Some of the scenes made me very uncomfortable.

It's an incredibly satisfying second viewing, many scenes take on different meanings, different scenes are fucking hilarious because of context introduced later, and what I recommend the most is watching the long takes, the blocking and the actors in the background. Some of them do their best work when the focus is on other actors, but because of the tight quarters of the set and the 70mm, multiple actors are almost always in frame even if they aren't the focal point. In particular I recommend watching Jennifer Jason Leigh, who is brilliant through and through and it would be a massive injustice if she didn't win an Oscar.

Jennifer Jason Leigh was indeed fucking amazing. Kurt Russell was pretty great too.

The more I think about the film, the more I like it. Tarantino doesn't beat you over the head with his message, which I appreciate, but he seems to be saying that America was founded upon fictitious premises, but it's possible that someday, we may actually be able to live up to the ideals we claim to be founded on. Despite the overall bleakness of the ending, the final scene actually does offer a measure of hope. This review is pretty on point.

I probably do want to see it again, in 70mm if at all possible, but unfortunately the only theatre showing it in 70mm anywhere near me is in Tampa, which is 50 miles away. I probably won't go that far unless I find someone else who wants to see it that way.

I drove 150 miles.

Also keep in mind that the ending is (SPOILER) a white man and a black man, a northerner and a southerner, teaming up to hoist a woman up by her neck like a flag, enforcing the law of the land, then they read a fake letter from Abraham Lincoln as they lay dying on their battlefield. Also the shot is entirely composed of reds, whites and blues. I can't remember if I pointed all this out in a previous post.

You didn't mention that before. I noticed a lot of it, but the red, white, and blue part escaped me. That makes it even better.

I watched Drive yesterday. Still amazing. 10/10

Star Wars: The Force Awakens. 7/10

(SPOILER) It really irked me how Rey was able to basically master many Jedi powers at the snap of her fingers, whereas it took Luke a whole movie. Though, I understand it was convenient for the plot, and it may have sucked more if they spent the whole movie on that. Also, Emo Ren. When he took his helmet off I wished he hadn't done... in the bad way.

Overall an enjoyable film and I'm looking forward to the next one.

I'm going to try catch The Hateful Eight soon, and Deadpool is getting watched next month, for sure. I am interested in the Revenant, but the (SPOILER) Bear rape meme is bothersome if true.

Also (SPOILER) made you look

(SPOILER) Rey didn't really take any more time to master various Force powers than Anakin did in The Phantom Menace. It's far less ridiculous that Rey figures out how to do the Jedi mind trick after seeing Kylo Ren attempt something similar (which, I might add, is never shown to be possible in any previous Star Wars film) on her than it is that Anakin can pod-race at nine years old, which is explicitly said to be something that humans physically cannot do at any age. For that matter, a lot of Rey's skill set makes her aptitude with the Force a lot more understandable; she's proficient at fighting with a quarterstaff, which is pretty similar to fighting with a lightsaber, and it's not as if Kylo is at his strongest when he fights her, anyway; he's just been shot with Chewie's blaster, which is shown to push non-Force adepts back by dozens of yards, while Kylo remains standing. As for her aptitude at flying the Falcon, it's implied that she's gone through that ship several dozen times with other ships, and she's mentioned in supplemental materials to have trained extensively with VR flight simulation. So most of her skill set explains why she's so quick at picking things up.

Kylo's temper tantrums seem ridiculous if you don't take the surrounding circumstances into account, but it's implied that he knows who Rey is and that they're related, and he's specifically at fault for Finn's escape, so it's understandable that he would take both of those particularly hard. He's also shown not to have finished his training, which I think makes for a much more interesting dynamic than the fully formed villains we've seen in most of the previous films. If he can cause Finn and Rey that much trouble when he's injured and untrained, imagine how much more of a threat he will be in future films when he's not injured and has completed his training.

I watched Sicario last night. It's like a 6/10 because I've seen that same movie a bunch of times with different names.

On the subject of Kylo Ren, this is the funniest thing I've seen SNL do in a year or two. Since their Serial sketch, at least.

YouTube Video

(SPOILER) Kylo's temper tantrums didn't come off as menacing at all, though. He seemed more like a man child, which I think that video Sar posted lampoons.

I see what you're saying, Rey did seem quite adept, but even given Anakin, he was still trained by Qui Gon and Obiwan in the use of the force before being able to do what Rey did in the film. He was surrounded by Jedi eventually and even in a school to train them. Rey lives in a time two generations passed where Jedi are a vague memory.

Luke, Anakin's direct descendant, and also strong with the force, and able to defeat Darth Vader, still took time to master some ways of the force with Yoda. It just seemed more convenient to get Rey up to speed before the next film. I'm sure Luke with be tutoring her in the next film to refine her abilities, as they are more like raw reactions right now.

It was still a massively enjoyable film and I can't believe it's going to be 2017 before the next one :/

(SPOILER) I don't think Kylo's temper tantrums were supposed to be menacing. They were supposed to emphasise that he is still immature and untrained.

As far as I know, Anakin received no training whatsoever for his pod racing. Also, Rey's backstory is still quite vague, and it's entirely possible she has received training she is either unaware of or that has been erased from her memory. Given the common fan theories that she is either Luke or Han and Leia's daughter or Obi-wan's granddaughter, it would not be surprising if she had had her memory erased to prevent Snoke and Kylo Ren from finding her. (It also wouldn't be surprising if Snoke turns out to be Darth Plagueis, but that's beside the point).

That SNL thing is awesome.

Apparently The Mummy is being rebooted. Was the Brendan Fraser movie actually decent or did 11 year old me have no taste?

I've never seen it, but it has a 55% rating on Rotten Tomatoes so that doesn't bode well. On the other hand, Roger Ebert liked it so I doubt it's all bad.

I have absolutely no idea why that franchise needed a reboot, but oh well. I guess you could do worse than Orci and Kurtzmann to reboot a series; they did pretty well with Star Trek, anyway.

The Hateful Eight was great. Smashing an antique guitar is bullshit though.

I quite enjoyed Hail, Caesar! Not the Coens’ best film by any means, but a thoroughly entertaining watch from start to finish and they captured the feel of ’50s studio productions beautifully. A caveat, though: if you’re not at least somewhat familiar with movie productions both today and in the ’50s it may make little sense to you.

I can't remember everything I've seen recently, but a quick rundown of what I watched in the last 48 hours.

Hail Caesar - 8/10

This is a pretty minor Coen Brothers work in a lot of ways and a pretty major one in others. It's pretty frivolous, light stuff on one hand -- probably not as funny, pound for pound, as their last straight comedy Burn After Reading -- but it has some of the most ambitious, virtuoso filmmaking of their careers and I speak specifically of the brillaint song and dance number with Channing Tatum. They handled the ensemble really well, and the themes of the movie and double meaning of a lot of scenes didn't dawn on me until halfway through the movie (the speech Clooney gives in the third act is fucking hilarious when read with the double meaning that I won't give away for those of you who haven't seen it) and the entire ensemble is put to really good use. I think it will definitely benefit from repeat viewings, Coen comedies tend to take a lot of unraveling before the tapestry is properly laid bare, so I look forward to seeing it again in a month or so.

The Look of Silence - one billion/10

This is one of the most soul-searing films I've ever seen. This shit chilled me to the fucking bone. I'm still processing the emotions I have from seeing it, but I CANNOT stop thinking about it and will not stop talking about it. I don't know that I have a ton of interesting shit to say about it because the film is so raw that it kind of does all that work for you; its message is very clear and incisive. So if you haven't heard of this movie, it's the companion piece to the documentary The Act of Killing (which we'll get to in a moment), and in this film an anonymous man (called Avi in the film but that's not his real name) travels to interview a series of men under the guise of giving them an eye exam and confronts them about their part in killing his older brother (killed before Avi was even born) and one million other people during the 1965 Indonesian genocide. When we got out of the movie, I drove my friend back to his place in abject silence before saying "I feel like my eyes have gotten blacker just from having seen that movie". It's deeply disturbing and something I'll never forget for the rest of my life.

The Act of Killing - 10/10

I've seen the theatrical version of this and the director's cut, but not for a little while and after seeing The Look of Silence I thought it was time to rewatch this movie. At the time of this writing, I'm only about halfway through my rewatch (taking a break to recharge on my humanity before diving back into that bit of despair) , but I can report that it remains a singularly bizarre experience. I may never be able to process watching a mass murder be celebrated by himself and his community so much, or the open corruption, or the cheering of the paramilitary as the general proudly refers to the troops as "gangsters" and himself as "the biggest gangster of all". The movie itself is so goddamn strange, and descends into such madness in its second half, that Anwar's realization in the last few minutes that the thousand people he killed were all human beings who were scared and confused as he killed them, is so sobering and...fucking bizarre (language has failed me in describing my experience with this movie), that for all the filmic surrealism going on (I believe there's a scene where Anwar is in a cocoon of some sort in the jungle), the strangest part of all of it is a man discovering empathy in his 70s.

I babble on and on about the mindset of killers or people who kill for god and country and how I don't, nor will I ever understand the ability to override basic human impulse and empathy for some ethereal ideal presented to you by someone else, and while these two films may have done the best anyone ever will of putting a camera in those peoples' faces and pushing deeply into their gray matter, I seem to have emerged from them even more confused.

I'm going to go stare at the wall and despair for all of humanity.

So anyway, The Jungle Book was perfect in almost every way that mattered. If I had to pick out a flaw, it’d be that the singing wasn’t as good as it was in the original. But that’s not a big deal, because there were two songs, so we’re talking about seven minutes of a two-hour film. Everything else was basically perfect. In particular it’s one of the most visually stunning films I’ve ever seen in pretty much every way that matters, and the acting was superb. I’d never have guessed the kid hadn’t been in any movies before this one. And of course, you know you’re getting strong performances from a cast with people like Ben Kingsley, Scarlett Johansson, Idris Elba, and Lupita Nyong’o.

Strongly recommended. And see it in 3D; it’s one of the rare films where that actually enhances the experience.

Hey, my roommate is seeing that right now and I couldn't go because I have to go to work!

Batman Vs. Superman was like a 6/10 it's literally exactly as good as Man of Steel. Aside from that I haven't really seen much in the way of new releases, but I've been rewatching the odd David Lynch film here and there, mostly Blue Velvet over and over.