Saturday, November 14, 2020

Weekend Open Thread

25 comments:

  1. Hello everyone! I had a pretty good SMM. Some of the highlights were:
    Antebellum (2020) - It took me far too long to realize what was happening, which just added to the mystery.
    Doctor Sleep (2019) - I'm not if it was the DC or not.
    Spontaneous Combustion (1990) - Wonderfully weird movie
    Visiting Hours (1982) - Michael Ironside!!!
    Three From Hell (2019) - Zombie back to form with his trademark style
    Warlock (1989)- Adam's recommendation. The flying FX were fun!

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  2. Before SMM, I watched the excellent The 12th man (2017), a Norwegian production about a soldier that has to escape through occupied Norway to neutral Sweden. Based on a true story, it's full of stunning scenery of wintry Scandinavia. Rather than being a "war/action" movie, the story is more about the people that helped him along the way, and their national plight surviving the war as an occupied nation with a resistance and government in exile.

    It really is a beautiful heartwarming movie, and set in a breathtaking part of the world. Reminded me a lot of the handful of winters I spent in N. Canada. Although the plot is relatively simple, it has a lot of nail biting tension through. Recommended.

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    1. ^^^ Wow, the director of "The 12th Man," Harald Zwart, also helmed "Agent Cody Banks," Jackie Chan's remake of "The Karate Kid," Steve Martin's "Pink Panther 2" and the hugely underrated "One Night at McCool's"! What a filmography, which makes me want to watch "The 12th Man" as much as your review, PC. :-)

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  3. NIGHTFALL (1956, dir. Jacques Tourneur) – This certainly is not a first-tier noir, yet there is much to enjoy about it. Tourneur brought his sense of style to the filmmaking. Seeing Anne Bancroft in this was interesting; I doubt she made many crime films.

    MACAO (1952) – A sloppy plot does not dampen the entertainment value of this noir starring Robert Mitchem. He is an ex-serviceman involved in petty smuggling who finds trouble when he gets involved with a shady casino owner in the former Portuguese colony. Along for the ride is Jane Russell, who plays a shady singer who has seen more than her share of difficulties in life. The chemistry between Mitchem and Russell was genuine. They were life-long friends. Mitchem possessed that effortless – for lack of a better word – acting style that was unique to him.

    THE STORY OF G.I. JOE (1945) – Among the finest war films produced by Hollywood during World War II. At the center of the loose narrative is the character Ernie Pyle, who was a real correspondent during the war. Burgess Meredith of Rocky fame portrays Pyle. He travels with the U.S. Army as it fights way from North Africa to Italy, meeting the same unit as the war progresses. Like Pyle’s writings, G.I. JOE does not glamorize the experience of war. Robert Mitchem plays the commanding officer of the unit.

    FIRST LOVE (1977) – A college romance focusing on a generally unlikeable young man, and the film is not helped by a script that is extremely trite. The early roles for John Heard and Beverly D’Angelo are easily the best part of the film.

    THE KID STAYS IN THE PICTURE (2002) – I am not certain how truthful Robert Evans was but he knew how to tell a story. The Paramount executive who brought cinematic classics like Rosemary’s Baby and The Godfather to the silver screen was not lacking in ego, which undoubtedly helped his rise in Hollywood. He at least had a vision of how to engage a new generation of moviegoers tired of the old formulas and genres. It is a decent, very one-sided documentary

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    1. Love the animation tricks the filmmakers behind "TKSITP" used to bring static photos to visually interesting life. Back in the early 2000's this technique felt revolutionary and creative. Now every other doc on Prime or Netflix overindulges in this "animation" technique. :'(

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  4. Hi everyone, hope you're all having a good weekend! Seen anything good lately? After going way over the top and watching 80 horror movies in October (plus Tenet in the theater), I've been taking it a lot easier these past couple of weeks. Still, watched a few...

    After Sean Connery passed away, I watched Marnie for the first time. It looks pretty and the actors are good, but the plot seemed just weird and silly, I didn't vibe with the movie at all. Still, two hours of Connery filmed by Hitchcock, it's still a decent time.

    The Trial of the Chicago 7 is exactly what I want from Sorkin, smart people saying smart things to each other. Sorkin should write all the courtroom dramas from now on. Mark Rylance and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II are the MVP candidates and Frank Langella always plays a good villain.

    American Murder: The Family Next Door is another Netflix true crime documentary, this time delivered only through archival footage and recordings. I'm weirdly fascinated with true crime stuff, so I liked it, but it's not one of the best examples of the genre.

    The Extraordinary Journey of Celeste Garcia is a fun little Cuban sci-fi dramedy about friendly aliens visiting Earth and inviting people to visit their home planet, and a widowed teacher who wants to be selected for the trip. Not a great movie but a pleasant way to spend 90 minutes.

    Also rewatched Contact and Cast Away for the first time since they were new for the Blank Check Podcast's Zemeckis retrospective. Both are pretty great, but I have a little trouble with Contact's ending and what it's trying to say. That mirror shot though...

    And Double Jeopardy is the kind of turn-of-the-millennium thriller I rarely think about, but always enjoy immensely while I'm watching them. It's comfort food.

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    1. Marnie is one of Hitchcock's films that I have read mixed opinions about. A long time has passed since I saw it. One non-Bond Connery film from this period that I like is The Hill, a drama about a military prison during World War II.

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    2. Besides his Bond directors Sydney Lumet was one of the few filmmakers that could put Connery's acting chops at the service of a good story in which he wasn't a leader or someone in control of his destiny. "The Hill" and "The Offence" are my favorite of their five collaborations, but even disposable fluff like 1989's "Family Business" feels like its punching above its weight with Lumet at the helm.

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    3. Lumet's film The Anderson Tapes was one of my considerations for a Connery watch last week, but I ended up going with The Great Train Robbery.

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    4. i really like Trial Of The Chicago 7, and i really like Sorkin type of writing dialogues. but there was one thing i didn't like in the movie. to me, Jeremy Strong, as much as i usually like the guy, was seriously miscast in his role. but that won't stop me from rewtching it a few times, as i usually do with Sorkin stuff

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  5. Besides watching movies, this week I received a couple of orders from last month. I picked up some Arrow releases during the sale on Diabolik DVD. It was mostly films I have seen (What Have You Done to Solange?), but I took a chance on a couple of titles (Toys Are Not For Children). I purchased a few close-out items from Shout Factory, including The House That Screamed blu-ray I have eyed for the past year. The film looks great. I could not resist the Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry/Race With The Devil combo either. I also splurged for the Kino Lorber sale, picking up twelve releases. It is mainly titles by old favorites Mario Bava (4), Jean Rollin, and Jess Franco; but I also chose a few that would be good Junesploitation fits. That order is on the way. Considering all of the movies that I have acquired this year, I should try to make Junesploitation 2021 watches as much from my collection as possible. Only 6.5 more months to wait.

    With the Vinegar Syndrome sale coming up, I still might shell out a little more money for movies, but I know that I must try catching up with what I have now. That has been difficult because I am trying to get through films on the DVR I have recorded from Turner Classic Movies. A lot has been on the channel recently that I want to see. At this time of the year I am competing for DVR space with Hallmark Christmas films. I try not to lose anything.

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    1. Let me guess... significant other recording all those Hallmark Xmas flicks? :-P

      In the States the Criterion 50% Off sale at Barnes & Noble is going until Nov. 30. In NYC there are only two B&N stores left with extensive physical media presence, and even these have cut drastically from their previous shelf space. I know you can order them online, but there's something about touching the merchandise that makes these B&N Criterion sales special for me.

      With reduced inventory to look over, so far I've only picked "Valley of the Dolls"/"Beyond the Valley of the Dolls" and the two-disc "All About Eve"/"Parasite" (all Blu-rays). And I happened to walk into Best Buy next to B&N when they were having a flash sale of "Avengers: Endgame" (4K Ultra HD Blu-ray) for $10. :-D

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  6. I managed to pry myself from ongoing Election news coverage and old episodes of Alex Trebek 70's gameshows on YouTube (what a stache!) to catch a few flicks:

    1988's VIBES (Amazon Prime) is a comedic misfire that not even post-"Fly" Jeff Goldblum and pop superstar Cyndi Lauper (in her only movie role) can save from becoming monotonous and underwhelming. The duo are New York City psychics dragged to South America by Peter Falk to chase after some "Indiana Jones"-type artifact, with Julian "Warlock" Sands hot on their trail. Though tonally consistent and ultimately harmless, you know you're gasping for comedic straws when Lauper's constantly-changing wardrobe is "Vibes'" primary source of amusement.

    Rewatched FRIDAY THE 13th PART 2 (1981, Blu-ray) with the latest Miscast Commentary Track. I've seen this slasher a million times, but this was the first viewing I realized that [SPOILERS!] nobody dies during the movie's climactic final half-hour. For a genre where kills are lined-up to come at timed intervals, that's an eternity. Guess that having Amy Steel playing final girl Ginny makes me care so much about her surviving Jason's attacks I forget about the lack of kills. :-D

    Paul W.S. Anderson's POMPEII 3D (2014, Blu-ray 3D) surprised me by adding up to a lot more than its pedigree would imply. Half "Gladiator" ripoff, half Irwin Allen disaster movie tropes, "Pompeii" is basically marking time until Mount Vesuvius explodes by indulging in the most cliche romance-against-all-odds Hollywood tale since "Titanic." An excellent cast (a ripped Kit Harrington, Keifer Sutherland as an arrogant Rome senator, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje bringing it, etc.), good production values, decent 3D effects (particularly the daytime scenes) and a ballsy-for-Anderson ending make this the director's second best film after "Event Horizon." You can tell everybody involved with "Pompeii" gave it their all!

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  7. Deos anyone remember The White Stallion (1986) with Mickey Rooney?https://youtu.be/t9KFDCKapjM

    I love that theme song wow.


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    1. OMG, my sisters had this and every horse movie ever made ("Man from Snowy River," "Black Stallion," "Flicka," "Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken," etc.) on recorded-from-TV VHS' that they wore down. Of course I remember "White Stallion." Wish I didn't. ;-)

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    2. Really, is it that bad? Haha. I loved it so much then but can't remember it now, only the song. I do remember it felt VERY dramatic.

      I did revisit Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken not too long ago. Phew. Bad.

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  8. The Forsaken - - Y2K horror flick I’d never heard of until Letterboxd users brought to attn. not bad at all. I mean not great, direction is spotty, but it’s got an okay, Near Dark type vampire story done in nu-metal fashion.

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  9. OK, so during #ScaryMovieMonth, I watched as many mermaid-themed horror movies as I could find. Here’s the rundown:

    The best of the bunch was MERMAID: LAKE OF THE DEAD (2018), which is filmed with a lot of style and has a cool twisty-turny plot. Right beside it is THE LURE (2015). This is a lot of movies in one – horror, rock musical, coming-of-age romance, and more. Really great stuff.

    BLUE MY MIND (2017) is the most Cronenberg-style body horror of the bunch, as our heroine’s legs get more and more gross with fish scales as she slowly transforms. It’s another coming-of-age story. The Stan Winston-produced SHE-CREATURE (2001) has a fun performance from Carla Gugino not as the mermaid but as a woman trying to keep it together as everything around her gets crazier and crazier. Then there’s MERMAID DOWN (2019), which is about fishermen at sea hunting mermaids, and also a human-appearing mermaid locked up in an insane asylum. It’s like One Flew Over the Mermaid’s Nest.

    On the lower end of the list, KILLER MERMAID (2014) has a fun cameo by Franco Nero and some nice scenery, but not much else. THE MERMAID’S CURSE (2019) and MERMAID ISLE (2019) are both super low-budget affairs about women turning into mermaids to escape the jerk men in their lives. The former has the actresses/stuntwomen swimming through filthy crud-filled water, and I felt bad for them.

    Finally, NIGHT TIDE (1961) and MERMAID’S SONG (2019) are noir-ish crime flicks in which the mermaid barely appears.

    There you have it.

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    1. That middle tier sounds intriguing, particularly "Blue My Mind." 🥸🤕

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    2. I never realized there were so many Mermaid-themed horror films, Mac. The Lure is playing on Turner Classic Movies in December. I will try to catch that.

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  10. It's not a movie, but I spent the last two weeks going through 14 seasons of Supernatural. My soul seeks an X-Files band-aid. I assumed FOR YEARS it was a gutless CW Tween Drama, and it was surprisingly good and pretty brutal...for like 6 years. It's an interesting arc that's a very gradual morph into a gutless CW tween drama. I recommend seasons 1-5 as an acceptable morphine substitute for the X-Files heroin.

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    1. I thought the same thing. Thanks for doing the homework for me. I'll look it up

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    2. Kim Manners, one of the better directors of "X-Files'" glory years and better episodes, was one of the creative forces and director of "Supernatural's" early years. After his death the latter show really took a dive from which it never recovered, IMHO.

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  11. I finally saw Patriot Games. It held my attention, which is more than I was expecting. But I don't think it compared at all to The Hunt for Red October, which was intriguing until the end.

    Around 2018 I was excited for what movies would come out of the Nixonian time we were living through. Now I'm so tired of politics and I don't even know how political thrillers are going to work anymore because all their premises were based on good/bad/right/wrong and justice. Secrecy, shame and at least trying to appear righteous. Browsing through titles tonight, I worry they will all feel so naive watching them now.

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  12. Between reading comic books, i spent my weekend watching the Matt Damon's Bourne movies. First 3 are as awesome as usual. 4th one is unnecessary, to be polite

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