Movies: Last Movie You Watched and Rate It

[Spring in Fialta]

I'm mostly just trying to figure out if it's the conclusions that he draws in the movie that people are viewing as offensive/misguided or if it's simply the context of him tackling the subject when he's being accused of the same thing. I wouldn't have a problem with the latter, especially if he considers himself innocent of them, whereas the former would actually affect how admirable it is as a movie it is.

Like... what are people actually upset about with it? What does him being tone deaf actually refer to?

Appears to be the latter to me, which is ****ing stupid.

 

[kihei]

First They Killed My Father (2017) Directed by Angelina Jolie 7B

First They Killed My Father is about life under the Khymer Rouge in Cambodia as seen through the experience of Loung, a seven-year-old girl. Loung's family endures a forced march, brutal indoctrination, starvation, and, eventually, separation. Loung goes from one camp in which there is no food to another camp in which food is plentiful only because the children are being trained to plant land mines. Angelina Jolie is finally getting the hang of this directing thing. She deserves praise for telling Loung's story from a Cambodian perspective and for never dwelling too long on any one incident as there is no shortage of experiences to cover. Sareum Srey Moch, the young actress who plays Loung, is best during the most emotional scenes but a little monochromatic the rest of the time. As a result it took a while for me to get emotionally involved in her fate. Once I did, though, First They Killed My Father became a memorable film about just how cruel life can be for the innocent when they get caught up through no fault of their own in war and genocide. Jolie deserves a lot of credit for this one.

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Note: available on Netflix

 

[kihei]

Nocturama (2016) Directed by Bertrand Bonello 7B

Nocturama is an exercise in pure cinematic style. For the longest time we follow around a group of young, mostly photogenic terrorists as they prowl around Paris, obviously up to something. At about the point where I wanted to strangle the director, something finally happens as multiple explosions go off all around the city. The fledgling, affectless terrorists than decide to hide in a department store for the night. Scratched my head on that one, but, okay, in for a penny, in for a pound. There, they dabble with the shiny toys, stylish clothes and consumer goodies on offer to them while the city goes on a massive curfew and shuts down. How will they get out of this pickle? None of them seems to have asked himself/herself that question. So director Bertrand Bonello has come up with an obviously ridiculous story, in all likelihood just to give himself something to play with. Whatever the kookiness of the story, the direction of this tale is absolutely marvelous. A deserted Paris looks majestically unthinkable, set design inside the department store is colourful and dazzling, character development of people without much character is rather witty, and the editing and cinematography are both top notch. The result is one very stylish exercise in the service of art for art's sake. I'm guessing that some critics will see in this a comment on the shallowness of modern youth, but, really, I think Bonello is mostly just having fun.

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[Nalens Oga]

Young Frankenstein - 7/10

The comedy doesn't really hold up I guess or maybe it wasn't that funny back then either but an amusing enough film.

 

[BonMorrison]

Loved Nocturama when I saw it at TIFF last year, thought it was really underrated, reminded me of Elephant.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

Wonder Woman

with the impossibly hot Gal Gadot, Chris Pine, David Thewliss and other people.

The Amazonian superhero Wonder Woman gets her modern origin story in preparation for the series of Justice League movies that Hollywood will spew unto the world until such time as they become unprofitable.

Chris Pine is a US spy seconded to Britain during WWI, and during a daring escape from ze Germans, he breaks through the weird cloaking field the ancient gods placed around Thermiscyra, the island home of the immortal Amazon warrior women (where property values must be insane). He's saved from drowning by Diana, the youngest and comeliest of the Amazons but followed through by a German destroyer and escorts. After a fierce battle and much exposition, Diana decides to let Chris Pine go and accompany him back to the outside world to find and kill Ares, who must be behind all the war and killing and bloodshed us men humans have been so good at for the last few forevers. They land in London, and Wonder Woman's fish out of water adventures commence.

Quite good as superhero origin movies go, but with some "Yeah, okay, whatever..." parts. The bad guys are cardboard cutouts, Ares is laughably miscast, the gang that Wonder Woman and Chris Pine gather together are basically the pirates who don't do anything, but Wonder Woman herself kicks ALL the *****. And I do like the fact that an Israeli chick is not only good in the role, but has to be like top five hottest women alive on this planet. Knowing that skinheads/Nazis/Trumpkins are pissed about that makes me happy.

Decent movie, but not that great all things considered. But don't tell my wife. Wonder Woman is up there with Debbie Harry as one of her formative feminine role models.

 

[OzzyFan]

Doctor Strange (rewatch)
2.75 out of 4stars

Upon second viewing, it's still a very entertaining fun ride with great visuals, but I see it's weaknesses more now. Cumberbatch's growth feels more forced in the story than true gradual/proper evolution(not his fault, story's fault), proper character development is lacking for most of the main characters, and expectedly overall more style than substance.

 

[OzzyFan]

Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind
3 out of 4stars

Very well done beautiful anime on humans, war, nature, and the animal kingdom, done through a post-apocalyptic conflict/warning film. Overstuffed with commentary and metaphors on said subjects, and done intellectually and emotionally impacting enough to hit you at every spot it can think of on the subject matter, on a small and large scale. To conclude it's messages: it's very pro-harmony, pro-nature, pro-wildlife, and anti-war/anti-bombs.

 

[kihei]

Beach Rats (2017) Directed by Eliza Hittman 7B

It is a shame Beach Rats is getting compared to Moonlight. Despite some similarities--both movies are about young men struggling with the gradual realization that they are gay--the two movies couldn't be more different. While Moonlight provides a sympathetic character with whom we can readily empathize, Beach Rats Frankie (British theatre actor Harris Dickinson) is the embodiment of "callow" in the term "callow youth." Frankie is 19, still lives at home on Coney Island, and seems neither employed nor at school. He hangs out with a gang of similar young drifters who even he doesn't think of as friends. While he dabbles around with the affections of a pretty girl he meets at the beach, by night he seeks out encounters with older men via gay internet sites. He claims he is not sure what he wants, but, really, he's just not ready to admit it. His amateur standing is in serious jeopardy. Despite the fact that Frankie is a big zero as a human being, the kind of person one would not want their son (nor daughter) to get involved with, he is brilliantly played by Dickinson who with luck could be the next big thing. I would compare his performance here with Colin Farrell's early work in Tigerland--mesmerizing and totally believable with never a false note; the sense of somebody new exploding on the scene. Director Eliza Hittman is here to stay, too. Her direction, especially her touch with atmospheric images and grace notes, sets this movie apart from most of its American competition this year.

 

[guinness]

Ghost in the Shell (2017) - I bought it because it was on sale ($10 for the BR) and I like Scarlett Johansson.

I liked the movie visually, but I'm assuming if they stuck more closely to the source anime, it would be deeper, especially with the characters. Otherwise generic Hollywood scifi plot #45092.

It was better than Lucy though. 6/10.

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

Chungking Express (dir. Kar-Wai Wong). B-

First KWK experience. Really loved the first section. I wasn't as into the second half (despite some truly inspired moments), though maybe that's because I kept on expecting it to move to another section. Knowing nothing about the plot, I was so surprised/excited when the first transition happened, I was just hoping it'd follow that pattern again.

Apparently the original plan was to have it be 3 parts, but they just didn't have the time, so the would-be 3rd section just turned into Fallen Angels. Though I would've loved this movie's second section to be abbreviated a bit in favor of adding on a final third, it still works well in two. Definitely eager to check out more KWK.

 

[guinness]

Wonder Woman (2017)

I generally don't like comic book-based movies, but at least Marvel tries. This was just boring and generic like I couldn't believe.

But I honestly didn't buy it because I thought it was going to be great, the fight scenes were really stretching believability, even as far as action movies go.

Howeverm Gal Gadot and UHD+HDR, holy moley. Totally watched for the plot. 4/10

 

[aleshemsky83]

The King of Comedy

I liked this movie a lot more than taxi driver. It was really funny in a dark way and de niros performance was probably as good as he gets.

My only issue with the ending is that i really feel it was a copout. Same ending as taxi driver really. They left it open to the "is it all his daydream" interpretation with how long the applause goes and how the audio starts looping. To me it shouldnt have been ambiguous at all. The ending should be plainly real because its actually believable for it to be real. Its almost the most logical conclusion.

Not only that but up until then it was plainly obvious what was and wasnt part of his daydreaming or delusions. Why they made it ambiguous at the end and make it an unreliable narrator suddenly made no sense to me.

All in all a very good movie. Basically a PG 13 taxi driver.

 

[Dugray]

Your Name (Kimi no nawa)

Decided to give this another watch after reading the news that Holywood had gotten their grubby mitts on it. I'm perplexed how they will give this any kind of proper treatment considering just how Japanese the source material is. From Shrine Maidens to the Spiritual, to the Disconnect between city and rural life, the story just teems with aspects that will be difficult to translate acceptably. For those who haven't watched the movie because it's animated... You're doing yourself a disservice. Watch it.

 

[Shareefruck]

Chungking Express (dir. Kar-Wai Wong). B-

First KWK experience. Really loved the first section. I wasn't as into the second half (despite some truly inspired moments), though maybe that's because I kept on expecting it to move to another section. Knowing nothing about the plot, I was so surprised/excited when the first transition happened, I was just hoping it'd follow that pattern again.

Apparently the original plan was to have it be 3 parts, but they just didn't have the time, so the would-be 3rd section just turned into Fallen Angels. Though I would've loved this movie's second section to be abbreviated a bit in favor of adding on a final third, it still works well in two. Definitely eager to check out more KWK.

Interesting.... Most people seem to love the second half more and appreciate the decision not to tack on the third.

I love the moment that it transitions between the two as well.

Also... it's WKW or KWW.

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

Yeah. I mean, I know the guy's name... how on earth could I screw that up so badly??? I was even recently texting my friend who lent the movie to me, and in that I referenced WKW. Brief moment of dyslexia there I suppose. Gonna go take a walk of shame now.

Most of my gripes regarding the 2nd half completely revolve around my inability to get a handle on the female lead and apply any logical context of progression for her actions. It made zero sense why, if she loved a guy, she would continually break into his apartment, and then, once the prospect of romantic involvement is on the table, just completely flake out. I guess in that sense, "love" probably wouldn't me the most accurate word to describe her feelings toward him. More of a fascination/obsession, a platonic ghost almost

Looking back on it though, in my attempt to relate to that section of the movie, I've taken a much more abstract approach to interpreting it. I now view it as her breaking into his apartment and slowly cleaning/re-arranging/replacing the things inside it as a metaphor for how, when we love someone, they have that same effect on us, of "breaking in" to our lives and changing little things about us, replacing what we give emotional significance to, or what we deem important (and without us even realizing it's happening). Sure, the outside vessel (the body / the apartment) remains the same, but the details on the inside are subject to outside influence, and we're ultimately better off for it.

Whether that's what WKW/KWW was going for or not, I really can't say, but it's how I've chosen to receive that part of Chungking Express.

 

[aleshemsky83]

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford

I really liked this movie but the end of the movie (im talking the last 20 minutes) i thought was kind of over the top. Now i understand that it is technically accurate but it seemed highly exagerrated as if the guy couldnt show his face any where and jesse james became a robin hood like figure. I realize its a fictionalized version but it was just handled cartoonishly.

My other problem with the movie was with just how terrified everyone was of jesse james. There was 50 times in the movie where they caught him coming up and could have killed him but just got scared and cowered at the sight of him. Now i realize it was trying to show just how deranged amd cold blooded jesse james was that even these hardened criminals were scared of him, but it started getting ridiculous after a point.

 

[Fugazy]

Wonder Woman - 7.5/10

 

[kihei]

American Made (2017) Directed by Doug Liman 6A

Barry Seal (Tom Cruise), a former TWA commercial airline pilot, makes a fortune in the late '70s and early '80's after the CIA talks him into covertly flying weapons to Nicaragua to support the Contras, a project that Congress voted not to legitimize. By playing off one against the other, Barry parlays the CIA's money laundering schemes, the needs of the illegal Contras, Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega, and the Columbian drug lord Pablo Escobar into a multi-million dollar money-making machine that produces more cash than Barry knows what to do with. It is a dangerous house of cards, though, and eventually Barry realizes there may be a high price to pay. Director Doug Liman finds just the right tone for this sordid tale, comic rather than tragic, and, then, pretty much stands back and just lets the movie zip right along. In maybe his best lead role since Collateral, Cruise gets to have fun playing a character who represents the shady, amoral side of the American Dream. Without relying just on charm. he makes Barry into almost a sympathetic character. While this type of story seems overly familiar and while better directors might have taken a much different approach to the material, American Made kept be entertained from beginning to end. I haven't had this much fun at a Tom Cruise movie in quite a while.

 

[MetalheadPenguinsFan]

Watched Yesterday:

4/5

4/5

 

[Nalens Oga]

I Know Where I'm Going (1945) - 6/10

What an impatient bitch. A Canterbury tale from the year before did the same structure far better.

Spiderman: Homecoming (2017) - 8/10

I had a lot of fun watching this. It's still Marvel forcing a bit of humour but not as badly as in GOTG2 and the acting is much better. I was a big fan of Tom Holland in this and the sarcastic anti-Friend. Michael Keaton was a better villain than most of the other monologuing losers in Marvel films. Not as good as the earlier Spider-Man films in terms of the climax or the scenes with tension but everything is pretty well done overall.

 

[kihei]

Chasing the Dragon (2017) Directed by Jason Kwan and Jing Wong 5A

Chasing the Dragon is a competent but hardly distinguished biopic of two crime figures, Crippled Ho (Donnie Yen), a fearsome drug lord, and Lee Rock (Andy Lau), a corrupt but smart cop, who between the two of them ruled the Hong Kong drug scene in the 1960s and beyond. They were assisted by the occupying British Colonial police forces who only really cared about their getting their share of the cut. More fearsome versions of these characters have found their way into Hong Kong crime thrillers in the 90's; in fact, Lau played a tougher version of Lee Rock over a quarter a century ago in a pair of movies (Lee Rock and Lee Rock II). Chasing the Dragon indeed looks like a bit of a throwback itself with lots of action, frequent overacting, and a plot that tries to make a virtue of convolution. In addition to snazzier production values, the main difference here is that the two central figures have been turned into, if not exactly p***ycats, then surprisingly high-minded and principled characters who have moral codes and a sense of loyalty that they refuse to violate. Still, though the movie is reasonably entertaining most of the time, it contains nothing that I haven't seen before. Chasing the Dragon is more a showcase for two fine actors then it is a memorable crime drama.

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[SensBrawler]

Gerald's Game - 7.5/10

As someone who's watched quite a few horror movies over the years, I'd like to think I can handle watching gory scenes. But one scene in this movie proved that's definitely not always the case.

Overall, it was a pretty intense slow burn thriller that had me nervous as hell throughout much of the runtime. It also features a great performance from Carla Gugino, which is key since it's the type of movie that relies heavily on the lead. However, like some of Stephen King's other work, I wasn't a big fan of the ending. For some reason, it felt the need to explain something that was already pretty effective as it was. It didn't ruin the movie for me, but it did take away from some of the mystery/creepiness.

 

[nameless1]

My brief VIFF reviews:

The Desert Bride:
It is slow, even at a brisk 78 minutes, and everything is predictable, especially the ending, but it is rather polished, which is impressive from two first time directors, and the story is very well-told. Paulina Garcia, probably best known internationally for Gloria, once again lifts an average movie into something worth a look.

6.5/10

Lucky:
This is probably Harry Dean Stanton's best role in years, and he delivered in what would become his last film role. However, other than that, and the interesting usage of David Lynch as comic relief, who has some good lines, but is otherwise wooden, the story of how an elderly man finds peace near the end of his journey is rather plain, and just average. John Carroll Lynch shows some promise, but there are still some pointless scenes that just clutter the movie, and the ending is too predictable and cliche.

6/10

Thelma:
The great opening scene hooks the audience, but that is the only highlight in a pointless psychological thriller that does not do anything. The message is also rather arguable, and seems completely unnecessary to make a movie around it.

4/10

The Bolshoi:
It is a skin-deep look at the world of ballet, with cliche characters and situations, but it is very well-done, and I am not bored throughout the runtime. That is a welcome break in a film festival.

5.5/10

Breathe:
This is the quintessential well-made Oscar bait. It moves at a good pace, and I am entertained, so it can be considered a good debut for first-time director Andy Serkis, but because I see so many of these around this time of the year, I am not overly impressed by it. Andrew Garfield wants an Oscar, but it is a mere good performance.

6/10

The Square:
For almost 95% of it, it meanders along from one absurd situation to another, so I am quite bored, even though the theatre laughed a lot at the situations that I only find mildly amusing, and I can see that it is likely a commentary on the randomness of life, and Swedish culture. Then the ending comes, and in typical Ruben Östlund fashion, it leaves the audience disoriented and off-kilter, and the discomfort extends beyond the runtime. Thus, I fully understand why this splits the audience, because it can be seen as both a brilliant satire. or just a convoluted mess. Personally, I think the ending brings it beautifully together, but it is just not worth it to sit through more than two hours of filler. A couple of people in front of me agreed, as they left around the half-way point.

5/10

So far, nothing have impressed me, but I still have 2 weeks to go, and I have not really gotten into the highly recommended ones yet.

 

[kihei]

The Midwife (2017) Directed by Martin Provost 7B

Claire (Catherine Frot) is a middle-aged midwife, alone except for a son away at college. Her small but comfortable world is turned topsy turvy when her father's former mistress Beatrice (Catherine Deneuve) surfaces after a 30 year absence.. With Claire torn between resentment and concern, she and Beatrice sort things out well enough to have a relationship and to get to know one another once again. It doesn't sound like much, but it is enough to create a (mostly) lovely film. As long as the movie stays slice-of-life, The Midwife works beautifully. But tough questions about their former relationship are brushed off, and a few touches here and there draw attention to a script that is tipping the scale on the sly just a little. As well, the film lingers a little too long trying to figure out some way to let Claire go, as she is a spent force physically though not emotionally. In the end, director Martin Provost relies on a leaky boat metaphor, literally. But watching two great actresses, Frot now 50-years old and Deneuve now nearly 74, superbly play off one another is a special treat in and of itself. The Midwife is really more Frot's movie than Deneuve's, but that doesn't stop Deneuve from more than holding up her end of the bargain. Heavier but still beautiful, she gives the sort of performance that she probably couldn't have even contemplated in her youth when in too many of her movies all she needed to do was to stand in front of a camera and look lovely. Hong Kong's Anne Hui and Japan's Hirokazu Kore-eda are two directors who do this kind of film better, but that's not a complaint, just a statement of fact.

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