Saturday, September 21, 2024

Weekend Open Thread

20 comments:

  1. (Lucky Number Slevin (2006): I've been on a Josh Hartnett kick since I saw Trap. I got this one on my weekly trip to the used dvd store. I remember liking it very much back then. I still do. And the cast is stacked.

    The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings (1976): Let me know if you if you heard that one? Richard Pryor, James Earl Jones and Billy Dee Williams walk into a bar... they start playing baseball, hilarity ensues 🤣. What's not a joke is these 3 dudes being in the same flick. It's a baseball movie, so of course I like it. I splurged for the Indicator Special Edition region B blu-ray, which is full of goodies.

    The Chronicles of Riddick (2004): They did it! I don't know how, but Arrow managed to give us both cuts of the movie in 4K HDR (it's apparently a herculean task to have an extended cut in 4K on disc). Kidding aside, the movie's awesome and I'm sad they never managed to do more with the franchise, other than Riddick, which I talked about a couple of weeks ago. Here's hoping we get that one on 4K too. Sometimes the 20yo CGI shows its age in the higher resolution, but I can live with it. The discs are packed with extras and I can't wait to go through them. Especially the disc that contains all the cutscenes from the videogame. They keep remaking videogames that don't need to be, when will they redo this one?

    The Substance (2024): I won't elaborate too much, but I didn't care for it. Demi and Margaret were awesome though.

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    1. Everyone is hyping up The Substance so much that I'm afraid to see it! Worried it might be another Everything Everywhere All At Once. As in I'll quite enjoy it, but ultimately be disappointed because my expectations are too high.

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    2. I cam assure you, it's nothing like you've ever seen

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    3. I believe they're currently shooting the fourth Riddick movie, Riddick: Furya. At least they announced this summer that the shooting would begin in August.

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    4. Let's hope so, but icll believe it when i see it

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  2. When I first watched Mousehunt (1997) a few years ago, I kept thinking that my Dad would really like it. Finally got to watch it with my parents and many laughs were had. Recently I have become more conscious of how our time on this earth together is becoming rather limited, so I doubles the pleasure to introduce them to something (a movie or whatever) that brings them joy.

    Trap (2014) was super entertaining and Hartnett was amazing. I'm a big fan of later stage Shyamalan, but still haven't watched many of his earlier movies. Signs is often mentioned on the podcast, so I should watch that one next.

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    1. I finished the Free Willy trilogy. The first one is a lovely family movie about a boy without a family befriending a orca. Part 2 is lesser re-hash with a big corporation wanting to save the whales after an oil spill, but finally they don't have the orca's best interests in mind. But Free Willy 3: The Rescue was surprisingly great and the BEST in the trilogy. The original kid is older but it also introduces a new boy whose father is a poacher. The boy looks up to him and wants to become a fisherman too, but after befriending Willy is torn. August Schellenberg is in all three movies and I thought was terrific.

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    2. Paul, just wanted to say I love that note -- connecting through movies (or anything!) while we have time together is a beautiful way to live life. Wishing much movie love to you and your folks!

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    3. Thank you for the kind words Jan. Wish the same to you and yours.

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  3. Hi. J.M. Vargas here. Several weeks' worth of movies piled-up. Time to "pull a McVeigh." :-D

    MY OLD ASS ('24, THEATER) achieves the rare feat of making its main hook (a teenage girl talking/getting advice from her 39-year-old self from either the future and/or a drug-induced "trip") secondary. Elliott and her relationships with family/friends are interesting on their own. Maisy Stella carries the narrative (Aubrey Plaza helps but her actual on-screen time is limited) and makes Elliott a rare sexually frank girl who is a great person first and a sexy chick second. Worth seeing just for the Justin Bieber "trip." :-P

    With THE SUBSTANCE ('24, THEATER) Coralie Fargeat, director of 2017's "Revenge," looks at Peter Jackson's "Dead Alive," smirks and proudly says "Hold my beer, junior." This is what the remake of "Suspiria" was aiming for but missed widely: a social critique of contemporary beauty standards for women not afraid to go to extremes to make its point while being gripping entertainment. Kubrickian in style (that carpeted orange hallway!) but Cronenberg-ian in execution (body horror dialed up to 12, with practical make-up effects from the French Gods!), it's also a great reminder of how good Demi Moore can be when given a meaty role. Margaret Qualley, Dennis Quaid (who between this and "Reagan" is having a moment) and a sea of anonymous extras bathed in blood are along for this Cannes Award-winning screenplay ride.

    Kevin Smith's THE 4:30 MOVIE ('24, THEATER) is yet another love letter by the writer/director to 80's John Hughes cinema. Set during an afternoon in 1986 when a group of teens plan to sneak/watch movies at a multiplex all day long, it compensates with good performances (Ken Jeong steals the show as the a-hole theater manager) for a shocking lack of polish in the filmmaking. Seriously, this looks "Clerks"-level bad at times, but its heart is in the good place and the adolescent hijinks are mostly hilarious. Worth a rental.

    CONSTANTINE (2005, AMAZON RENTAL) is getting a sequel (per IMDB) with OG director Francis Lawrence and star Keanu Reeves returning. For an almost 20-year-old picture the special effects sequences (particularly the slomo and 'hellish' alternate realm) hold up well, and the noirish tropes inspired by a DC comic book world are better embodied by an excellent supporting cast (Rachel Weisz, Djimon Hounsou, Tilda Swinton, Peter Stormare, etc.) than the out-of-place, soft-spoken Keanu. If you haven't seen "Constantine" in years it's worth a rewatch to remind you of the early aughts' superhero movie craze, when studios were greenlighting them like crazy.

    Had never seen THREE O'CLOCK HIGH (1987, AMAZON RENTAL) until recently, even though the poster/VHS cover were instantly recognizable to me. Had no idea Spielberg produced it before taking his name off from it, which explains the good-for-'87 production values (Barry Sonnenfeld cinematography pops in HD) and the killer supporting cast (Jeffrey Tambor, Phillips Baker Hall, John P. Ryan, etc.). Ultimately the premise of a meek high school kid (Casey Siesmazko, the Tobey Maguire of 1987) avoiding and/or trying to put off fighting a bully (Richard Tyson) by the end of the school day is too thin a premise to keep this one from outstaying its welcome. A curio time capsule.

    Watched Kubrick's DR. STRANGELOVE... (1964, BLU-RAY) before the sad news of James Earl Jones' passing. :'( Every viewing of this is a treasure. Such compelling B&W cinematography (with imposing Ken Adams sets to match), Peter Sellers effortlessly stealing every scene he's in (and the movie as a whole, especially when you-know-who can't help but raise his hand! :-D), the narrative making our heroic American soldiers boy the unwilling instruments of worldwide destruction, Sterling Hayden chomping his cigar, etc. There's even a cameo by the entire summer 2024 Lionsgate slate ("Borderlands," "The Crow," "The Killer's Game") during the last couple of minutes of the film set to 'We'll Meet Again.' :-P

    MORE TO COME LATER. I'M AT WORK.

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  4. Hello Y'all!

    This week was a completely accidental double double feature: 1) films that sounded good from Screen Drafts podcast drafts 2) the works of John Frankenheimer

    The Train (dvd 1964)

    GORGEOUSLY shot in B&W, i absolutely loved this WW2 action movie. It takes a unique approach to war pictures...its premise is that in the final weeks of the war, Germans occupying france plan to remove a large quantity of stolen priceless art into Germany....by train. A small group of railway employees team up to try and ensure the art never makes it. Its an action flick for sure but also on a deeper level looks at human sacrifice for something tangibly important to a culture as well as a pretty interesting take on how different people appreciate art. Love this movie.

    52 Pickup (1986 Tubi)

    I dont know alot of Frankenheimers work, need to fix that post haste, but going from The Train to this shows that he has massive range as they are WILDLY different. This one is based on the works of Elmore Leonard and is a Thriller about a married successful business owner who cheats on his wife and his blackmailed regarding the affair by three unbelievably skeevy/sketchy criminals. Its a grimy flick in that the criminals world is one of prostitution, porn, and red light districts. The movie goes to some pretty dark places. However the performances are soo incredibly good. I really liked this one.

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    1. Got The Train 4k last week. I saw it before and i can't wait to revisit it. Now, if they can do Grand Prix on 4k, i'll be a happy man

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  5. Good weekend to everyone.

    With the marathon that is Scary Movie Month getting close, the drive to watch a lot films has died down. I want to be somewhat fresher than I currently feel to absorb the horror tide. For something different, I turned my attention to documentaries that are in my watch list.

    THE FIVE DAYS (1974, dir. Dario Argento) – Long live the glorious revolution! In March 1848, the citizens of Milan rose up in revolt against their Austrian rulers and drove them out of the city. The film lets the events of the five days of fighting play out in the background of the comedic adventures of a thief and a baker who team up to survive the turmoil. But will the revolution change anything? Dario Argento was initially one of the writers, and he ended up being pulled into directing it. By far the biggest production of his career, I think he did a great job orchestrating big set-pieces, and the cast brings the story to life. He said in the interview for the Severin release that he found the experience very stressful and did not wish to undertake anything like it again.

    THE PROJECTIONIST (2019, dir. Abel Ferrara) – A portrait of a man who dedicated his life to movies. Nicolas (Nick) Nicolaou, a Cypriot immigrant, started working in New York City cinemas in the early 1970s, learning the business from the ground up. By the late 1970s, he was the owner of several theaters, including those in the then lucrative world of adult film exhibition. Nick guides Abel Ferrara around a very different New York to the places where the defunct theaters he either worked at or operated were. Though a businessman at the core, the love of movies shines through as he (seemingly even today) runs several independent theaters in a difficult economic environment for film exhibition. With some distracting random editing and notable volume issues that forced me to use subtitles, The Projectionist is not without its flaws, but I found it worthwhile.

    FASCISM ON A THREAD: THE STRANGE STORY OF NAZISPLOITATION CINEMA (2019, dir. Naomi Holwill) – Besides the mondo films and the cannibal subgenre they spawned, no aspect of Italian exploitation cinema is as disreputable as the Nazi films of the mid to late 1970s. Though I already know about most of the films mentioned in the doc, there are details about them that come out in the documentary that I was not aware of. It was interesting to hear a few of the directors who work in the subgenre talk about their approaches to the films. Of course, the immortal Ilsa (Dyanne Thorne) is prominently featured. A Nazisploitation day has been in my plans for Junesploitation for a couple of years, but I have not yet fit it in.

    SHE-MAN: A STORY OF FIXATION (1967, dir. Bob Clark) – Bob Clark’s (Black Christmas, Porky’s, A Christmas Story) debut feature is a strange exploitation drama about a blackmailing transvestite, Dominita, who enslaves people. One of her favorite pastimes is forcing people to live like the opposite sex. It’s a mediocre trash oddity that does not come close to the what John Waters would achieve only a few years later in this queer exploitation vein.

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  6. REBEL RIDGE (2024) Great movie! More of a drama/suspense movie than a full-on action flick. But I liked that the fights were more rough n' tumble than flashy choreography.

    MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL (1975) I have to push the pram a lot.

    CONSTANTINE (2005) I'm torn on this one. The visuals are cool, and I like Keanu doing the film noir detective thing, but who can make heads or tails out of this plot?

    WEIRD SCIENCE (1985) It occurs to me that I have no idea which one is Gary and which one is Wyatt.

    IT FOLLOWS (2015) I do love this twisted, bonkers movie. The lack of rules -- assuming there are any rules at all -- just makes it all the more interesting and exciting to me.

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  7. phenom lineup! LOL @ the gary/wyatt line...loooove that movie so.

    As for It Follows, its gonna be one of my first scary movie month revisits...i originally liked it but think i like it tons more upon revisit.

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  8. I watched a bunch of slashers today, because why not

    Last Straw (2023): A 'home invasion' type, set in a diner. It an entertaining movie that I would've liked better if they did it straight. They decided to do a flashback to explain how they got there (the invasion part), and I'm not a fan of those. I still enjoyed it a lot.

    Cuckoo (2024): At some point we see a creepy woman running, trying to catch the unaware main character who's riding a bike. Then it gets weird. Dan Stevens is doing another normal-looking a**hole creep, and it's still working. I was waiting for this one, and I'm not disappointed.

    Blink Twice (2024): Directorial debut of Zoe Kravitz. The first half feels like The Glass Onion, a bunch of beautiful and rich people go to a rich person island and have fun. Then it turns into Epstein Island, and it gets difficult to watch. Not that it's graphic, but actually because they show only flashes of the bad stuff done to the women (not that showing it all would be better). If you can tolerate it, it's worth your time.

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  9. I want to watch Kate Winslet's show, THE REGIME (2024). It looks hilarious. Kate Winslet is hilarious. My favorite dramedian. Course, I probably won't get around to watching it, I never get around to watching anything anymore. But it looks so good. I'm a little weirded out that it's just been existing and the only way I found out about it was through scrolling through instagram reels. I'm the audience. And they barely got me!

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    1. I forgot this existed. I'll get right on it

      I want to watch her new movie with Andy Samberg.

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    2. Me, too. Winslet is so reliable.

      Oo, if you do see The Regime, tell me how it is.

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