Movie/film thread: resurrected

Macbeth (2015)

Is Macbeth a really slow moving play? This movie version with Michael Fassbender is intense, but surprisingly quiet, and.. sort of... nothing much happens? They speak the Shakespeare's English too. I watched with the subtitles turned on, lol. It was good.

 

(And you know what? I've just now realised Fassbender was in Alien Covenant - so not a trace of that in this movie.)



Thor Ragnarok  (2017)

Not as charming as Guardians of the Galaxy, but a decent attempt at that type of movie. Enjoyable.

 



Only the Brave (2017)

True story of the Granite Mountain Hotshots, the first municipal (as opposed to federal) Hotshots firefighting team in the US, and what happened to them at Yarnell Hill. I watched this because reviews said "affecting fact-based story add up to a no-frills drama that's just as stolidly powerful as the real-life heroes it honors", which is true.

 

Kubo and The Two Strings (2016)

Stop motion Japanese-style fantasy. Charming, pleasing to look at, ends weird, and one worries about authenticity since this Japanese-style stop-motion fantasy is a US production, but I suppose we can chalk that up to globalisation and not yellowface... they don't stick the landing, that's all. Otherwise this Japanese-style fantasy is fine. A kid with a backstory and a sick mother and skills with magic and paper folding goes on a quest. It's really very enjoyable.


 

while you're at it, you should most defintely check out "In the shadows of Motown"..... a great little piece about arguably the most unsung heroes of modern music.

That proved to be an interesting watch (and listen). The music was great throughout.

It's interesting. It's probably just a function of what I do and don't listen to, but with my untrained and wholly amateur ears I've had for some time the suspicion that modern singers just don't have what the singers back in the 50s and 60s did have. I could almost try pointing at this special as proof, but then Chaka Khan did What's Going On... (and was possibly the only singer on the show not overshadowed by the original version too).

 

Standing in the Shadows of Motown (2004)

The Shanghai Job (2017)

Expat Legolas in Shanghai. If it had just had a sense of humor, this movie could have been good. There are a handful of laughs, scored by bit players usually, and some sullen jabs, but the main players are po-faced in the extreme. Super serious about goofy crap that could have been so much more fun. But that's China, I guess.


 

Death Race (franchise)

In the beginning there was Death Race 2000, the Roger Corman cult political satire from 1975. It was goofy. Then there was the 2008 prison-based car combat action movie, Death Race, which started Jason Statham and was advertised as a prequel-slash-remake but it was a long time ago I watched it and I don't remember much and anyway except that it had almost nothing to do with the original. But then came Death Race 2, an actual prequel. Death Race 2 is a prequel to both Death Race in that it is set before the events of Death Race, and to Death Race 2000 in that Death Race 2 presents the origin of Frankenstein, the driver who keeps getting killed but who keeps on winning Death Race anyway.

Now, where Death Race 2000 was political satire dressed in goofy 70s schlock, Death Race 2 is humourless prison schlock that isn't satire anymore because big bad corporations being mean to prisoners is so 90s who even knows why they made it in 2010. But then came Death Race 3: INFERNO. Frankenstein is established now, society is going to hell, and while the corps still own Death Race, the CEOs are being mean to each other. So they go international, and the whole thing jumps the track on them. And then came Death Race 4: BEYOND ANARCHY! The race has forgotten its international spread and moved to a gigantic prison city called The Sprawl (and yes, there are so many references to other weirdo mad max-style movies, there should be some kind of drinking game). But the cars have taken on their Death Race 2000 fairings and everyone everywhere is nutcase bonkers suicidal and woo, is society in the shitter or what?! It's almost time for a political satire again! Death Race 4 doesn't quite go there but it does have the goofy done almost right so perhaps there's hope for Death Race 5, because you know there will be one.

There was by the way a Death Race 2050, but that was a nearly direct remake of Death Race 2000. The Death Race prison movies are getting there in their own time, and may yet even make it. In Death Race 3, they had racers killing, by accident, civilians. You can see them almost going the full 2000. Then in Death Race 4 they don't, but they do have just about everything else that eventually sets up Death Race 2000. The crazy cars, the weirdo drivers, the Mad Max (Beyond Thunderdome) aesthetic, the international audience, and lots of guns...

The Death Race 2000 and 2050 are good movies, more or less. Death Race 1, 2, 3, and 4 and super-crappy but they are getting better with each iteration. Punish yourself today.

"THE SHAPE OF WATER":
This was an unusual movie set against the backdrop of Cold War era America circa 1962. Elisa (Sally Hawkins) and a co-worker discover a secret classified experiment in a high security Government laboratory where they work as janitors. Elisa forms a strange relationship with the masculine looking aquatic creature. I am not surprised that it was listed as MA15+. I thought that I must have been at the wrong movie when they showed a full frontal of a naked Elisa (pubic hair on display). I am pretty sure that she was also masturbating in the bath tub. I didn't consider myself a prude, but these scenes really surprised me. It received very good reviews here in Oz. Has anyone else seen it yet?

I'm definitely going to need an unedited copy of that to view.

In the meantime, I've just wathed the edited to local cable TV standards version of Friday the 13th, parts 2 - 8.  Sadly the edits took out 98% of the best parts of the movies.  Happily, the censors slipped and a few frames of uncovered C cups made it on screen several times.

Part 8 had Jason acting way out of character.  He's never passed up an opportunity to kill one or more people just because another target was running away before.

"Sweet Country" is a movie which might interest some Aussies! It is set in the 1920's in the outback of Australia's Northern Territory. It is unusual in that it revolves around a middle aged Aboriginal man. Having been a Nurse in the Northern Territory in the early sixties and having also lived on a large country property, I think I saw things which a lot of folks would miss. Most city folk have never seen a" full blood" Aboriginal person and certainly not in his own environment. The story was inspired by real events.

I've probably asked this before, but do any of you guys go out to movie theatres to see a movie?

only when the movie is worth it.. usually big special effect things do it for me.
Saw Black Panther 3 weeks ago and it needed to be on a big screen. For everything else, there's my laptop

Some movies deserve the big screen, so I go out for those.  Otherwise, I just end up waiting for the video pirates or cable TV to have them.

Last time I went to an actual cinema was in Oz to see Inception. It might just have been that session or that cinema, but I recall being distracted by the image quality. The big screen seemed to me both pixelated and blurry.

But truth be told, I'm not much into the social aspects of movie watching. Watching a movie is more like reading a book than going out to dinner.


/curmudgeon

For me, going out to a movie has no better social aspects than watching the movie on TV with friends.  Some movies just deserve the big screen treatment.  Sad to hear that theater screwed up with Inception.  That was a movie which need a BIG screen for maximum effect.

"Red Sparrow"is a movie which stars Jennifer Lawrence and Joel Edgerton. Sparrow School, a secret Russian intelligence service, trains exceptional young people to use their minds and bodies as weapons. I think some of you guys will find it interesting.

I saw the reboot of Tomb Raider in the theater on Monday.  It had potential which it just couldn't quite figure out how to achieve.  It wasn't exactly bad, but instead was sort of in the middle and missed out on the possibility of being a really good flick.  Maybe we'll get luckier if they make a sequel.