Movie/film thread: resurrected

I think we must admit that just as among the stars we may find both wars and treks, then among the dead there are those that yet live and those that are evil. The "lives" of those that are evil are challenging, colourful, and directed while those that merely "live" have no life at all. The "living" dead are more truly just the animated dead. These are the zombies. Flesh without psyche. If the two groups are the same, then Darth Vader is a Klingon. And Captain Kirk is a Death Star functionary.

Black Sheep, as I recall, is a comedy monster movie too.

She must have practiced that same expression for the movie "Lucy".  Embarrassingly bad even for a summer knockoff.  I did find it interesting though that the "dastardly villains" in this one were from Tee-Wan.  I'm sure the marketing department for this studio was proud of itself.

I saw "Lucy" yesterday and I agree about the expression. I noticed that I was the only one who laughed my way through the movie. I am starting to wonder why I seem to be the only one who finds humour in  most situations.   Perhaps that is also why I sing a lot of the time; If I don't, I will probably swear.

The Descent (2006)

Six women - several cavers, climbers, adventurers, and a doctor -  enter an un-mapped cave system and become trapped. And they are not alone. Significantly not alone. Lots and lots of not alone.

This is a pretty cool movie. (Not least because Natalie Mendoza.) Following the adventure-horror style, the story is set up really fast, but in my humble estimation, surprisingly well for a pace so brisk. They use next to no telling and nearly all showing. Super-cool story-telling. It is however a horror movie, and does not let up on the tension. There are also no heaving bosoms, nearly no conversations about men, and no comedy gore. It straight up grinds you down.

 

Banlieue 13 (District 13) (2004)

realistic parkour, comic book storyline 
pretty good acting within the comic book style. 



Banlieue 13 - Ultimatum (2009)

comic book martial arts, incidental parkour
slightly more realistic storyline, but no Dany Verissimo
 



Banlieue 13 was recently remade as Brick Mansions, which apparently is crap.
Accurate subtitles, incidentally, for both the Banlieue movies are hard to find. There's English subs that give you most of what's said, but the ones I had kept going out of sync.

神女 (The Goddess) (1934)

One does have to listen to rather a lot of piano to get through this movie, and it takes a while to generate interest in seeing what happens to the characters, but once it gets rolling, it's remarkable. The characterisations on display are great! Also, ten culture cred points if you watch through to the end.


Sorcerer (1977)

Takes thirty minutes of almost no talking jumping around the world to establish that these guys are a disparate bunch of desperadoes. Then they get into trucks in South America loaded with unstable nitroglycerin. Then they drive across a river, in a storm, on a rope bridge! While this is an existential thriller, and from the seventies to boot, it does have some nail-biting moments simply from watching trucks sway. The fashions are to die for too. Also, locations, locations, locations. Must watch in hi-def or bluray.



/olden-movie-thon

Two Hands (1999)

Lil Heath-y Ledger comes of age in Kings Cross (Sydney). Heath-y does a couriering job for a local bad man and it all goes wrong when he leaves the money on the beach to have a swim. Also, Rose Byrne. One of my favourite movies.


The Year My Voice Broke (1987)

Lil Noah Taylor, along with his inseparable childhood friend Leone Carmen, come of age in rural New South Wales in the early sixties. They're growing up, and a little apart,  and she gets a boyfriend. A snapshot of young life in Australia, at school, in town, on the land. It won Best Film, Best Direction, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Actor in a Supporting Role, and it's pretty good.


Animal Kingdom (2010)

A new film, I watched it last night. Not as horrible as The Boys nor as psychotic as Romper Stomper, but it's in that vein. A teenage kid's mother ODs and dies, and he goes to live with his uncles and grandmother in Melbourne. The uncles are just guys, they're all family, but also crooks and have been targeted by the Armed Robbery Squad of the police. The kid comes of age.


/australia-thon 

The Prince...a movie which seems to have been written by drunken film students in one weekend. Laughable acting, plot wafer-thin and one can only speculate that either Bruce Willis is hurting for money or was being black-mailed by Jason Patrick into doing it. This is a revenge story blended with the now post-Taken trite and insipid uber-awesome-killer-parent-who-retired-have-to-save-daughter-from-baddie schtick. It did not work. At the end of the movie, which has the immensely predictable hostage-stand-off the viewer is absolutely unengrossed and, as such, could not really care less which of the one-dimensional, flat and pointless characters waving a gun around dies. Should you have a choice between studying the history of clog-making in Holland or watching this movie, the clog-making endeavour will be more exciting.

Ai Chu Se ("Color Me Love") (2010)

There are three bouts of suckface in this movie, and two of them work. Which in my humble estimation is astounding because movie kissing never works. Movie kissing is more often a grotesque battle for last meal domination with partners chewing on one another until one of them snuffles a breath and exposes a jugular. The other thing about Ai Chu Se is the storytelling goes off the rails at around the one hour mark and it sort of doesn't matter. While the main story itself goes gappy, the various story lines around it and part of it, as instantiated by the various actors, remain strong and attractive. Joan Chen is pretty super duper in this movie too. As of course is Yao Chen.


 

The Rover (2014)

Intense. Uneven. Ten years after the world economic collapse, in a South Australian outback populated by white men, yanks, Chinese, and a handful of indigenous, three crims steal a hardened loner's car. They shouldn't have. Included is an opium den, a travelling circus, and no kangaroos. The soundtrack is exceptional and Robert Pattinson has more tics than a mangy dog.

 

Waar (2013)

Histrionic. Melodramatic. Patriotic. A Pakistani action thriller with heinous Indian super-operatives bent on mass murder in a variety of paste-on mustaches. The hero however has real facial hair and a grudge to settle. We learn that in Pakistan, wooden matches are still a thing and, goddamn, we will build that dam! On it's own this movie is about as balanced as, say, Top Gun or any one the Hollywood actioners from the 90s. In context however it's kind of cool, and develops into quite a bit of mayhem by the end. They even have a fantastically arch take on the Bollywood habit of inserting dance numbers into otherwise normal movies.

 

I decided to see "SNOWPIERCER" before it finished in the theaters I go to in Brisbane.  I read your review last month EL, so wasn't in a hurry to see it.  The behaviour of the humans was certainly predictable, given my life experiences. The perpetual-motion engine was an interesting concept.  I suggest that you guys Google it to get a better idea of the story and of the writers and of the Korean Director Bong Joon-ho. I must admit to having a smile at the last two humans we see. Without wanting to appear racist, I  certainly wasn't surprised.

Did you figure out how the smaller one got a form-fitting fur coat since all previous views of those showed adult sizes.

I picked up on it EL, plus the boots. I was wondering if the pair were supposed to breed. I also wondered if the writer was trying to change the concept of the older man with a younger woman. Perhaps some others survived and someone will come up with a sequel. The mind boggles.  Perhaps I've got too much time on my hands.

"THE GIVER". Starring Jeff Bridges and Meryl Streep.  Apparently Lois Lowry's award winning science fiction novel for young adults, is a favourite of Jeff Bridges. He has apparently been waiting to make a film of it since it was published in 1994.  To my way of thinking, it was watchable, but a review I read, couldn't understand what drew Jeff Bridges to the book so passionately.  I'd be interested in the views of some of you guys.

The kind of film that I wish I had made about China.

http://www.zeitgeistfilms.com/lasttrainhome/

Deserves all the awards it won. Horribly bitter at points. Beautiful imagery. I also found it laugh out loud hilarious at times. Not because they were trying to make jokes but just because people are hilarious sometimes, the moreso if you know a bit about living here and what some of these people are up to. A cautionary tale too. Watching the Spring Festival train rides, I was having flashbacks.