Movies: Last Movie You Watched and Rate It | Part#: Some High Number +1

[ORRFForever]

What bothers me about modern movies...

You can't scratch your butt in public without it being caught on half a dozen security cameras. So... how do modern movies deal with this reality?

Well, if you're Cold Pursuit, you ignore it.

 

[ORRFForever]

The Final Wish [2019] :

Aaron is a Chicago lawyer who returns to his small town home after his father dies. When he gets there, we realize why he left in the first place - his mother is nuts, all his past relationships are poison, and there's a demon haunting his family.

While the film's premise is pretty simple, the story's a mess and the direction is over powering. As a result, the movie falls apart during the final 30 minutes.

That's not to say the movie isn't scary or involving because it is. It just could have been so much more by being less.

Despite The Final Wish's many faults, I quite enjoyed this low budget ghost story.

7/10

P.S. The movie reminded me of 2018's The Witch In The Window, just not as good.

Movie Trailer :

 

[Hockeyfrilla]

Searching (2018) - 7/10

Watch this film!

 

[kihei]

I don't know how I feel about Stellen Skarsgaard - sometimes I like him, sometimes I find him distracting.

I'm the opposite. Along with Romain Duris, Mads Mikkelsen, Bill Nighy, and Viggo Mortensen, Skarsgaard is among my favourite actors. In addition to his versatility, what sets him apart for me is his sense of wry amusement and general good humour. But he is also good at playing troubled characters, too--you should check out the BBC mini-series River on Netflix for an example of him at very near the top of his game.

 

[ORRFForever]

I'm the opposite. Along with Romain Duris, Mads Mikkelsen, Bill Nighy, and Viggo Mortensen, Skarsgaard is among my favourite actors. In addition to his versatility, what sets him apart for me is his sense of wry amusement and general good humour. But he is also good at playing troubled characters, too--you should check out the BBC mini-series River on Netflix for an example of him at very near the top of his game.

That's fair. I know far more people agree with you than with me.

 

[ORRFForever]

Pimped [2018] :

Tight ninety minute femme fatale movie with lots of twists and turns.

6.5/10

Movie Trailer :

 

[kihei]

Arctic (2019) Directed by Joe Penna 6A

A minimalist, slow burn survival movie set in a frigid climate, Arctic provides an incredible mise en scene courtesy of nature and the elements, some grueling hoops for our hero (Mads Mikkelsen) to jump through, and a clean, pared-down style that fits the movie to a tee. Mikkelsen, playing a stranded pilot, is pretty much the whole show here--it's virtually a one-character movie with little dialogue (shades of Robert Redford in All Is Lost). Mikkelsen effortlessly held my attention, though. While probably not since Leonardo DiCaprio in The Revenant has a performer been asked to accept the challenge of such a physically demanding role, Mikkelsen is even better in all the quiet moments when he is wordlessly communicating his thoughts without being too obvious about it. Some viewers will probably want more action and more backstory than they get here, but their absence is clearly part of the movie's design. Also Arctic goes a little soft in the end (twice, no less), but what's a Hollywood movie gonna do when the finale comes around? Regardless, Arctic is the first movie of 2019 definitely worth seeing.

 

[Spawn]

Arctic (2019) Directed by Joe Penna 6A

A minimalist, slow burn survival movie set in a frigid climate, Arctic provides an incredible mise en scene courtesy of nature and the elements, some grueling hoops for our hero (Mads Mikkelsen) to jump through, and a clean, pared-down style that fits the movie to a tee. Mikkelsen, playing a stranded pilot, is pretty much the whole show here--it's virtually a one-character movie with little dialogue (shades of Robert Redford in All Is Lost). Mikkelsen effortlessly held my attention, though. While probably not since Leonardo DiCaprio in The Revenant has a performer been asked to accept the challenge of such a physically demanding role, Mikkelsen is even better in all the quiet moments when he is wordlessly communicating his thoughts without being too obvious about it. Some viewers will probably want more action and more backstory than they get here, but their absence is clearly part of the movie's design. Also Arctic goes a little soft in the end (twice, no less), but what's a Hollywood movie gonna do when the finale comes around? Regardless, Arctic is the first movie of 2019 definitely worth seeing.

I was pondering in another thread wondering awhile back what sort of traditionally mainstream content we will begin seeing out of YouTube content creators. This was in relation to Bo Burnham writing/directing Eight Grade who got started as an incredibly successful YouTuber.

Joe Penna, this director, is another director who got his start as a very successful YouTuber.

I'm looking forward to this one.

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

First Man
I’m a big space/NASA content wonk. The space program was still a huge deal when I was growing up and like many my age, I at least briefly entertained, astronaut dreams. So, when I watch a movie like First Man its my version of Marvel easter eggs ... That’s Jim Lovell! That’s Deke Slayton! How will they depict Apollo 1? About half this movie’s work was done for me in advance given my affinity for the subject. Admitting my biases up front.

Still, I thought it was excellent. It’s the yang to The Right Stuff’s yin. These men weren’t all rootin’ tootin’ space cowboys. Some, like Neil Armstrong, were haunted and taciturn. He’s as driven as any of his peers, but it doesn’t seem to be bravado behind that. Similarly, for all the grandeur of viewing Earth from the stars, there’s still the frightening immediacy of creaking metal and straining bolts. The space program is a big topic that’s been treated big repeatedly. I applaud Damien Chazelle’s decision to go small, almost POV at times. We know exactly how the story ends, but I thought he did an excellent job of using sound specifically, alongside other elements, to wring tension out of the journey. The depiction of the Apollo 1 tragedy is haunting as the interior explosion merely dents the door outward. You barely notice, which is as an effective a visual metaphor for the incident itself as could be.

I can see why it was off-putting to audiences (and awards voters) -- it doesn’t make the easy and obvious play for your heart or your patriotism. It’s a discomfiting gut shot about the side effect of grand achievement.

 

[kihei]

The Holy Mountain (1973) Directed by Alejandro Jodorowski 1C

Definitely hated it. This pretentious movie starts out like a retelling of part of the Christ story, but then a mentor appears with his own set of truly weird revelations to show Christ who looks vaguely stoned and no doubt was. Eventually after an endless journey consisting of uber-surreal vignettes that get ever less interesting as the movie progresses, we end up at the super holy Holy Mountain where great mystical truths are revealed...well, maybe, not so great. There is a great deal of religious symbolism, some incoherent social commentary, and a lot of nude or semi-nude women, an exercise in mindless female objectification if there ever was one. The vignettes are a hit and miss lot, some occasionally funny, most not (wildlife does not seem to be safe around Jodorowski), with one big production number focusing on transforming human excrement (sure looked real) into gold. Could have lived without that one--could have lived without the whole movie for that matter. Does Jodoroski have a vivid imagination? Yes. Do I want to watch any more of that imagination in action? No. The candy-bright colour cinematography is fun, but The Holy Mountain is shallow, bad pop art at its most self indulgent and vacuous.

subtitles

 

[ORRFForever]

The Holy Mountain (1973) Directed by Alejandro Jodorowski 1C

Definitely hated it.

Wow, a "1". You seldom go that low.

 

[Spring in Fialta]

The Holy Mountain (1973) Directed by Alejandro Jodorowski 1C

Definitely hated it. This pretentious movie starts out like a retelling of part of the Christ story, but then a mentor appears with his own set of truly weird revelations to show Christ who looks vaguely stoned and no doubt was. Eventually after an endless journey consisting of uber-surreal vignettes that get ever less interesting as the movie progresses, we end up at the super holy Holy Mountain where great mystical truths are revealed...well, maybe, not so great. There is a great deal of religious symbolism, some incoherent social commentary, and a lot of nude or semi-nude women, an exercise in mindless female objectification if there ever was one. The vignettes are a hit and miss lot, some occasionally funny, most not (wildlife does not seem to be safe around Jodorowski), with one big production number focusing on transforming human excrement (sure looked real) into gold. Could have lived without that one--could have lived without the whole movie for that matter. Does Jodoroski have a vivid imagination? Yes. Do I want to watch any more of that imagination in action? No. The candy-bright colour cinematography is fun, but The Holy Mountain is shallow, bad pop art at its most self indulgent and vacuous.

subtitles

A 1.

Even my dear little Buffalo '66 managed a 3! Although I was surprised to see that MUBI rated it 4/5...did not expect that.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

The Holy Mountain (1973) Directed by Alejandro Jodorowski 1C

Definitely hated it. This pretentious movie starts out like a retelling of part of the Christ story, but then a mentor appears with his own set of truly weird revelations to show Christ who looks vaguely stoned and no doubt was. Eventually after an endless journey consisting of uber-surreal vignettes that get ever less interesting as the movie progresses, we end up at the super holy Holy Mountain where great mystical truths are revealed...well, maybe, not so great. There is a great deal of religious symbolism, some incoherent social commentary, and a lot of nude or semi-nude women, an exercise in mindless female objectification if there ever was one. The vignettes are a hit and miss lot, some occasionally funny, most not (wildlife does not seem to be safe around Jodorowski), with one big production number focusing on transforming human excrement (sure looked real) into gold. Could have lived without that one--could have lived without the whole movie for that matter. Does Jodoroski have a vivid imagination? Yes. Do I want to watch any more of that imagination in action? No. The candy-bright colour cinematography is fun, but The Holy Mountain is shallow, bad pop art at its most self indulgent and vacuous.

subtitles

I wasn't expecting you to like it since you hated El Topo, but some of these comments seem really shallow to me and I'm kind of surprised. Discrediting an artwork for being pretentious is quite banal, and normally comes from people who don't appreciate art, which doesn't seem to be your case. Who's pretentious? Godard, Resnais, certainly are to many. Bergman too. Normally you get this from people who won't do the effort to try and see what's the work about.

The Holy Mountain certainly is at times "incoherent" and its symbolism is at best blurry, but it follows the footsteps of Bunuel and Antonin Artaud, who weren't proposing clear and rigid critical stances towards arts and society, but hints and ideas tainted with absurd logic and humor (and violence, and shock effects, yes). I think this is the most interesting of Jodorowsky's films, and it reminds me in tone of my favorite sequence from Le fantôme de la liberté, where a man is caught showing reprehensible pictures to kids and we later see adults react to them in shock (pictures of architectural landmarks, mostly). There's quasi-sense to it, there's certainly humor, and there's a unique critic of our way of doing/thinking things.

I'm a fan of the Panic Movement, and as little serious and borderline silly as it was considered by its own makers, I don't think "bad pop art" qualifies as a valid comment on their work. I understand and respect that people might hate it, it's certainly not for everyone, but it's too easy to dismiss it for being absurd (it is), shocking or destabilizing (it aims to be).

 

[Mario Lemieux fan 66]

Free Solo: 7.3/10 Not as good as Meru but still interesting.

Border: 7/10

Overlord: 6.8/10 Great first 10 minutes.

 

[kihei]

I wasn't expecting you to like it since you hated El Topo, but some of these comments seem really shallow to me and I'm kind of surprised. Discrediting an artwork for being pretentious is quite banal, and normally comes from people who don't appreciate art, which doesn't seem to be your case. Who's pretentious? Godard, Resnais, certainly are to many. Bergman too. Normally you get this from people who won't do the effort to try and see what's the work about.

The Holy Mountain certainly is at times "incoherent" and its symbolism is at best blurry, but it follows the footsteps of Bunuel and Antonin Artaud, who weren't proposing clear and rigid critical stances towards arts and society, but hints and ideas tainted with absurd logic and humor (and violence, and shock effects, yes). I think this is the most interesting of Jodorowsky's films, and it reminds me in tone of my favorite sequence from Le fantôme de la liberté, where a man is caught showing reprehensible pictures to kids and we later see adults react to them in shock (pictures of architectural landmarks, mostly). There's quasi-sense to it, there's certainly humor, and there's a unique critic of our way of doing/thinking things.

I'm a fan of the Panic Movement, and as little serious and borderline silly as it was considered by its own makers, I don't think "bad pop art" qualifies as a valid comment on their work. I understand and respect that people might hate it, it's certainly not for everyone, but it's too easy to dismiss it for being absurd (it is), shocking or destabilizing (it aims to be).

Feel free to delete the word "pretentious" if you want. Doesn't change the review an iota. It's still a "1C" in my opinion. I had to look up "the panic movement," and it is safe to say we are on polar opposite sides on that one. I think The Holy Mountain is bad art not because it is absurd, shocking or destabilizing; for my two cents, it is bad art because it is without value, lacks any kind of emotional or intellectual depth, provides zero insight into the human condition, its only purpose being to call attention to itself, and ultimately it bored me.

Personally I don't think that Bunuel and Jodorowsky are even comparable ---or put another way, it would be like comparing great sex to masturbation.

Hey, if people can enjoy this stuff and get something out of, great; everybody, certainly including me, has their own quirts and fancies. But I think Jodorowsky, technical facility aside, is a sham director in every other meaningful way.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Feel free to delete the word "pretentious" if you want. Doesn't change the review an iota. It's still a "1C" in my opinion. I had to look up "the panic movement," and it is safe to say we are on polar opposite sides on that one. I think The Holy Mountain is bad art not because it is absurd, shocking or destabilizing; for my two cents, it is bad art because it is without value, lacks any kind of emotional or intellectual depth, provides zero insight into the human condition, its only purpose being to call attention to itself, and ultimately bored me.

Personally I don't think that Bunuel and Jodorowsky are even comparable ---or put another way, it would be like comparing great sex to masturbation.

Hey, if people can enjoy this stuff and get something out of, great; everybody, certainly including me, has their own quirts and fancies. But I think Jodorowsky, technical facility aside, is a sham director in every other meaningful way.

Oh I really don't mind it being a 1C in your opinion - just as much as you won't mind me giving it 9/10. What bothers me is taking shortcuts to conclusions like "no intellectual depth", especially supported by blaming the film for calling attention to itself - which is like square 1 to any autoreflexive artwork. Taking that away, you might of course miss some of The Holy Mountain's intellectual depth (and I say "some" because it's not only that, and yes the fact it goes in all directions makes it somewhat confused and not as exhaustive as something Raoul Ruiz would have made out of the same material, but you can certainly say the same about most of Godard's thoughts, for example).

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Personally I don't think that Bunuel and Jodorowsky are even comparable ---or put another way, it would be like comparing great sex to masturbation.

That's funny because you seem to have it backwards, or at least according to Nicolas Winding Refn: "I got the chance to become friendly with him a few years ago and, of course, having seen his films by then numerous times, I was always fascinated by that type of cinema language. It’s a very unique cinema language and it’s very much a cinema language that goes against all conventions. I think that after having Bronson and Valhalla Rising and Drive, I wanted to try something that would go against all those kind of conventions that I had worked with before. It’s like when your sex life gets a little boring, you have to spark it up." (Refn explains why Only God Forgives is dedicated to Alejandro Jodorowsky and equates meeting him to sparking up his sex life.)

13 Things We Learned About ‘Only God Forgives’ From Nicolas Winding Refn at Cannes Film Festival

 

[kihei]

I will decline to defer to Refn in this instance; I'm quite happy with my simile as stated---given the spewings from various orifices that can occur in a Jodorowsky movie, "masturbatory" seems the perfect adjective to describe his work . I'm pretty sure it will come as no surprise to you to learn that I gave Only God Forgives a 3B (if memory serves, and I think it does). Didn't know about his reference to Jodorowsky that you state above. Kind of funny, actually--I appear to dislike Jodorowsky even when someone else is doing him. If nothing else, I deserve some points for consistency.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

I'm pretty sure it will come as no surprise to you to learn that I gave Only God Forgives a 3B (if memory serves, and I think it does).

Well I gave it 5/10 so I won't give you much crap for it!

 

[Spring in Fialta]

Well I gave it 5/10 so I won't give you much crap for it!

Screw that. I thought Only God Forgives is an underrated movie, personally. I found it very striking visually, even if the story (and writing) really wasn't all that. It's technical skills made it worth it.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Screw that. I thought Only God Forgives is an underrated movie, personally. I found it very striking visually, even if the story (and writing) really wasn't all that. It's technical skills made it worth it.

If you go back a few of my posts, 5/10 is actually a decent grade for me. I didn't hate it at all, I thought it was interesting, but I didn't get enough pleasure from its slow rythm. It might be because I was expecting a lot. I'll watch it again at some point, I bought the DVD.

 

[kihei]

A Paris Education (2018) Directed by Jean-Paul Civeyrac 7B

A Paris Education is a throwback to French New Wave films of the late '50s and '60s. Etienne (Andranic Manet) is a wannabe film maker from Lyons and he comes to Paris to go to film school and begins to meet other students, all with high hopes. However, life gets increasingly complicated for all of them. Etienne has a needy girlfriend back home who surprisingly ends up breaking up with him, leaving him in even more of a quandary. He has casual sex with a few young women, but they seem no more than mere distractions. As things just sort of slip out of his control, he realizes he may not realize any of his aspirations. Quietly, whatever one's best intentions or philosophy, life wears him down, not disastrously so but it aches anyway. A Paris Education is a long movie, nearly two and a half hours, and it is a talky movie with character and relationship development as its central focus. But with its black and white cinematography and emphasis on talk, women, books, philosophy, and movies, it slightly echoes those great darkly romantic works of Francois Truffaut. I suspect some people will have trouble with Andranic Manet's portrayal of Etienne which is very self-contained, reserved, but never dull. With his lanky walk, his late Beatles hair style, and his photogenic sneaky good looks, he comes across as both a little broody and self-absorbed but also as intelligent and vulnerable. For all the actor's reticence, he reveals a lot about Etienne in a very believable way. Good coming-of-age movies are a dime a dozen but A Paris Education has a quiet authority that caught me by surprise.

subtitles

 

[Spring in Fialta]

If you go back a few of my posts, 5/10 is actually a decent grade for me. I didn't hate it at all, I thought it was interesting, but I didn't get enough pleasure from its slow rythm. It might be because I was expecting a lot. I'll watch it again at some point, I bought the DVD.

I didn't mind the slow rhythm so much and adored the use of both flashy and grim colors throughout the movie, especially in their contrats. I just found the writing to be a bit too tight. It came across as try-hard dialogue. Like how a cocky neurotic would imagine cool gangsters communicate. The choreography was sublime as well. Very delicate and graceful.

 

[Jevo]

A Paris Education (2018) Directed by Jean-Paul Civeyrac 7B

When I saw that picture and read the first two sentences of your review, I thought Antoine Doinel immediately. Then you I see you mention Truffaut halfway down. I have to ask now where it would rank among the Antoine Doinel films?

 

[kihei]

When I saw that picture and read the first two sentences of your review, I thought Antoine Doinel immediately. Then you I see you mention Truffaut halfway down. I have to ask now where it would rank among the Antoine Doinel films?

Etienne is a different type than Doinel--less impulsive, less impish, less scattered, less funny. I could see him fitting right into another Truffaut-influenced film, though--Noah Baumbach's Frances Ha. Etienne could have easily been one of the guys Frances met along the way.