Movies: Last Movie You Watched and Rate It | Part#: Some High Number +3

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

BTW, I don't mean to be argumentative and you don't have to answer if you don't want to, but I'm curious about how you can call it a very bad film with a very bad script when it was nominated for Best Picture and won Best Original Screenplay. I totally understand if none of it is to your taste. I have a loathing for American Beauty, myself, but I'm not going to argue with the experts about its objective quality. I just don't understand being so convinced that the experts have it completely backwards, especially such that you'd laugh at one's opinion (I mean, what's the point of students taking and staying in a screenwriting class if they believe that they know what a good screenplay is better than the teacher?). Anyways, I don't mean to put you on the spot. That part just seems a little strange to me. I can totally see and respect the film not being to everyone's tastes, though, especially nowadays.

No worry about putting me on the spot, and it's all part of a past life for me, but I have a Masters degree in Film studies, a PhD in Semiotics, I've been a film critic, I've taught Film studies and Art history in a University (I've taught Horror films and Science fiction films classes that were so much fun), and I've been a speaker at international conferences on cinema, literature, videogames and new media. So yeah, the "experts" of the Academy I don't care much for. And that teacher was an ass, not just for his Ghost-loving comments, but for his lack of general knowledge about the arts.

That being said, I don't think you need the diplomas or theoretical knowledge to acknowledge that the Academy Awards are a highly political game, and that they are not truly crowning the best at anything. I don't think 1990 was a particularly good year, but Kiarostami wrote Close-Up, Kurosawa wrote Dreams, and I don't think anybody in their right mind would suggest that Ghost might be considered in the same league.

 

[nameless1]

I guess now I know how everybody felt when you went out of your way to defend Forrest Gump!

Seriously, I'm glad my little comment got you to go back to watch it. It's still is a very bad film, with a very bad script, predictable plot, always borderline offensive (to anybody who's not a white rich christian banker in his 40s, anyway), and profundly dumb. It made you laugh and cry? I laughed when I saw the demons (and not only because they were terrible effects or looked like crap - both true), but crying on this movie feels completely absurd to me. And believe me, I'm a big softy, both After Life and that dumb thing my gf makes me watch (Zoey's music playlist or whatever) got me yesterday, I'm the worst baby ever. Anyway, to each their own and I'm still very happy you had a good time with it.

I have a deep dislike for Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist. The premise is only good for one episode, like on Scrubs, but if a whole show is based on the idea, then it is just dumb.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

I have a deep dislike for Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist. The premise is only good for one episode, like on Scrubs. If a whole show is based on the idea, then it is just dumb.

Yeah, that's pretty bad. Far from the worst thing I've watched to make her happy, but still... At least the (all-over-the-place) efforts to be gender-race-disabled-redhead inclusive are cute.

 

[nameless1]

The songs are decent, some of which are new to me and I have added to my own playlist, and I do like Jane Levy as an actress, but this is the exact type of over-produced junk I never want to watch. The producers make it overly sentimental, and one sees through the gimmick rather quickly. There is no need for more LaLaLand.

 

[Shareefruck]

Do "experts" even determine who wins academy awards in the first place? Isn't it just people who work in the industry voting for it?

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Do "experts" even determine who wins academy awards in the first place? Isn't it just people who work in the industry voting for it?

Yep. But I'm all for sound technicians voting on sound awards. It would be a good formula if not for the political drama and budgets allowed for academy advertising.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

Time to Hunt

with Korean people

Kinda heist thriller set in a a future Korean crapsack dystopia somewhere between Children of Men and Half Life 2. Jun-Seok is a hardcase (or so he thinks) fresh out of a three-year prison bit who gets picked up by his two best friends Ki-Hoon and Jang-Ho. During their beery bro-tastic reunion, conversation turns towards Jun-Seok's fantasy of uprooting them to Taiwan, where his prison buddy's got beach to spare. But uh-oh, turns out the won has bottomed out, and the proceeds from the robbery they perpetrated years earlier are now worthless. D'oh. But among the graffiti-covered ruins, they discover their old buddy Sang-soo (who owes them money but can't pay them back) is working in an illegal casino. Hey...it's cool to rob illegal businesses because they can't go to the cops! Right? Right?! How has nobody ever thought of that before?! But uh-oh, turns out they have thought of that. Enter the Korean Terminator.

Man, Korean people are really into pathos, aren't they. Most of it isn't as bloody as you expect as a lot of the retribution takes place off-camera. You're still involved enough to be annoyed as the heist gang gets ever more stupid as the movie goes on. Of course, if they had half a brain between them, they'd have never tried to rob the casino in the first place, and then there's no movie.

On Netflix now.

...meh.

So badass. So dumb. So dead.

 

[Osprey]

That being said, I don't think you need the diplomas or theoretical knowledge to acknowledge that the Academy Awards are a highly political game, and that they are not truly crowning the best at anything. I don't think 1990 was a particularly good year, but Kiarostami wrote Close-Up, Kurosawa wrote Dreams, and I don't think anybody in their right mind would suggest that Ghost might be considered in the same league.

It wasn't just the Academy Awards that honored Ghost. At least half a dozen other national and international awards recognized the film or its screenplay, including the British Academy Film Awards, the Golden Globes, the Japanese Academy Awards, the Nikkan Sports Film Awards, the Saturn Awards and the Writers Guild of America Awards.

As for Dreams, it wasn't even nominated for the Best Screenplay Award by the Japanese Academy Awards in its own country. It seems to me that it doesn't fit much of what people usually look for in screenplays (ex. how well the characters and plot remain interesting and the pacing good over the length of it) because it's a collection of 8 short films, not a single narrative.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

As for Dreams, it wasn't even nominated for the Best Screenplay Award by the Japanese Academy Awards in its own country.

That's funny, but I wouldn't go there. Dreams wasn't even financed in Japan, its own country - for political reasons too. Go have a look at that year's best film at these Japanese Academy Awards for the full irony effect.

Anyway, kind of like Ghost, the film is uneven, it goes in all direction and genres, and it's overly corny for effect. It's not what the people was looking for, but it's worth something. To me, anyway. I really don't care much for the Nikkan Sports Film Awards (6 years later, they gave the same award to Speed, just saying).

 

[KallioWeHardlyKnewYe]

Been rewatching the Bond movies. Had wanted to do that for a while and it occurred to me they're the ideal sort of entertainment I need in moments these days. Seen them repeatedly. Comforting. Don't demand 100% of my attention. I'm through the first nine. Everytime I rewatch one, I always hope I'll pick up on something new or react in a different way ... but I never do. My feelings about each one are pretty consistent after every viewing. The good remain good. The bad remain bad. Goldfinger remains my favorite, which is not a very interesting take. Diamonds Are Forever is still bad. Live and Let Die is still an awkward mix of being uncomfortably dated and pretty damn entertaining. On Her Majesty's Secret Service is still a great movie crippled by a bad lead. The Man With the Golden Gun is still its inverse — a bad movie whose only redeeming quality is a cool, well-acted villain.

 

[kihei]

Been rewatching the Bond movies. Had wanted to do that for a while and it occurred to me they're the ideal sort of entertainment I need in moments these days. Seen them repeatedly. Comforting. Don't demand 100% of my attention. I'm through the first nine. Everytime I rewatch one, I always hope I'll pick up on something new or react in a different way ... but I never do. My feelings about each one are pretty consistent after every viewing. The good remain good. The bad remain bad. Goldfinger remains my favorite, which is not a very interesting take. Diamonds Are Forever is still bad. Live and Let Die is still an awkward mix of being uncomfortably dated and pretty damn entertaining. On Her Majesty's Secret Service is still a great movie crippled by a bad lead. The Man With the Golden Gun is still its inverse — a bad movie whose only redeeming quality is a cool, well-acted villain.

It would be interesting just to rate the Bond movies in terms of their villains. My favourite was Klaus Maria Brandauer as Largo in Never Say Never Again, but it is one of my least favourite Bond movies otherwise.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

It would be interesting just to rate the Bond movies in terms of their villains. My favourite was Klaus Maria Brandauer as Largo in Never Say Never Again, but it is one of my least favourite Bond movies otherwise.

Of course, my favorites are Bambi and Thumper:

 

[kihei]

War and Peace (1968) Directed by Sergey Bondarchuk 9A

Having just sat through this 7+ hour adaptation of War and Peace in one sitting, I came away very impressed. Originally the movie was intended to show that in terms of epics Russia could compete with Hollywood and anyone else in the world. Further it was a form of revenge to be taken on the disastrously bad Hollywood version of War and Peace that starred Henry Fonda and Audrey Hepburn. That massively edited Hollywood abomination was largely seen as a desecration of a national treasure in the Soviet Union. So Sergey Bondarchuk, not exactly a young lion but not a member of the old guard either, was provided with virtually an unlimited budget and as many extras as he needed, courtesy of the Red Army, and instructed to make the definitive film version of Leo Tolstpy's great novel. The end result is an epic film that is remarkably faithful to the sprawling novel while setting new standards for battle sequences that have yet to be matched to this day without the help of CGI. War and Peace is a historical romance that deals with both Napoleon's attempts to reach Moscow and thus control Russia and with the fates of three people whose lives are caught up in these turbulent times: Natasha, the youthful, graceful princess who wears her heart on her sleeve; Prince Andrey, aloof and aristocratic who falls in love with her despite his better judgement; and Pierre, kind-hearted but of low birth, who always somehow finds himself at the centre of great events. How their personal fortunes play out amidst the backdrop of the cataclysmic seismic shifts of history is at the heart of both the novel and the movie. The first four hours of the movie focus on the romantic intrigue but does include the battle of Austerlitz which the French won; during the final three hours, romance takes a back seat as war dominates everything. The battle at Borodino and the failure of the French to hold Moscow, both beautifully photographed and edited, dominate this part of the movie, which includes battle sequences of a prolonged duration, like 45 minutes, that are as breathtaking to behold today as they were half a century ago. Not just film buffs, but European literature aficionados and military historians should find War and Peace well worth its imposing running time.

subtitles

available on the Criterion Channel

 

[Osprey]

War and Peace (1968) Directed by Sergey Bondarchuk 9A

Having just sat through this 7+ hour adaptation of War and Peace in one sitting, I came away very impressed. Originally the movie was intended to show that in terms of epics Russia could compete with Hollywood and anyone else in the world. Further it was a form of revenge to be taken on the disastrously bad Hollywood version of War and Peace that starred Henry Fonda and Audrey Hepburn. That massively edited Hollywood abomination was largely seen as a desecration of a national treasure in the Soviet Union. So Sergey Bondarchuk, not exactly a young lion but not a member of the old guard either, was provided with virtually an unlimited budget and as many extras as he needed, courtesy of the Red Army, and instructed to make the definitive film version of Leo Tolstpy's great novel. The end result is an epic film that is remarkably faithful to the sprawling novel while setting new standards for battle sequences that have yet to be matched to this day without the help of CGI. War and Peace is a historical romance that deals with both Napoleon's attempts to reach Moscow and thus control Russia and with the fates of three people whose lives are caught up in these turbulent times: Natasha, the youthful, graceful princess who wears her heart on her sleeve; Prince Andrey, aloof and aristocratic who falls in love with her despite his better judgement; and Pierre, kind-hearted but of low birth, who always somehow finds himself at the centre of great events. How their personal fortunes play out amidst the backdrop of the cataclysmic seismic shifts of history is at the heart of both the novel and the movie. The first four hours of the movie focus on the romantic intrigue but does include the battle of Austerlitz which the French won; during the final three hours, romance takes a back seat as war dominates everything. The battle at Borodino and the failure of the French to hold Moscow, both beautifully photographed and edited, dominate this part of the movie, which includes battle sequences of a prolonged duration, like 45 minutes, that are as breathtaking to behold today as they were half a century ago. Not just film buffs, but European literature aficionados and military historians should find War and Peace well worth its imposing running time.

subtitles

available on the Criterion Channel

I've wanted to watch this for a while, but 7 hours is a bit long. I think that I'll wait for a 2-hour edited down version.

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

What does HFb think of this list? The ones I've seen (not as many as I'd like) I've certainly enjoyed.

30 Movies That Are Unlike Anything You’ve Seen Before

Certainly skews more modern.

 

[kihei]

I've wanted to watch this for a while, but 7 hours is a bit long. I think that I'll wait for a 2-hour edited down version.

Almost had me.

 

[kihei]

What does HFb think of this list? The ones I've seen (not as many as I'd like) I've certainly enjoyed.

30 Movies That Are Unlike Anything You’ve Seen Before

Haven't seen everything on that list, but I would strongly recommend:

Uncle Boonme Who Can Recall His Past Lives
The Act of Killing
Dogtooth
Enemy
Leviathan
The Tale of the Princess Kaguya
The Taste of Cherry
A Touch of Sin
Three Times
Zama
Cameraperson
Daughters of the Dust

Holy Motors (if one is looking for something way off the beaten path)

Couple I would add to "unlike anything you've seen before" list:

Kill List, directed by Ben Wheatley
You, the Living, directed by Roy Andersson
Enter the Void, directed by Gaspar Noe (not necessarily good, but unquestionalby different)

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

Enter the Void, directed by Gaspar Noe (not necessarily good, but unquestionalby different)

That's quite the understatement as far as I'm concerned

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

What does HFb think of this list? The ones I've seen (not as many as I'd like) I've certainly enjoyed.

30 Movies That Are Unlike Anything You’ve Seen Before

I'm more curious about which ones you've enjoyed than you are about what I think of the list (I certainly appreciate that he goes for Carlos Reygadas, but I think there's a few films in there that are just trash..... you've most probably not seen anything like a Lucifer Valentine film before, but I wouldn't recommand you do).

Also, like @kihei (I was sure you hated Holy Motors for some reason), I'd add some stuff:
Roy Andersson, I'd go with Songs From the Second Floor, but yeah, amazing aesthetics
Gaspar Noé, even though I'd say Enter the Void is necessarily good, it's still not Noé's best (Irréversible), but maybe his most unique. Seul contre tous is something too.
Raoul Ruiz, of course, Les trois couronnes du matelot, best film ever.
Marguerite Duras, her best film to me is Le Navire Night - and still different from anything else enough - but I'd go with Son nom de Venise dans Calcutta désert as her most unique.
Bernard Queysanne's Un homme qui dort, based on Perec's novel.
Peter Greenaway's The Tulse Luper Suitcases project.

And there's a lot of other directors with very strong signatures.

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

I'm more curious about which ones you've enjoyed than you are about what I think of the list

Big fan of Enemy. I also found a lot to like about Holy Motors as well. And I think Scott Pilgrim is fun as hell. Uncle Boonmee, Speed Racer, Perfect Blue, and Princess Kayuga are all ones I've previously bookmarked to check out, but haven't gotten around to any of them yet.

I certainly appreciate that he goes for Carlos Reygadas, but I think there's a few films in there that are just trash..... you've most probably not seen anything like a Lucifer Valentine film before, but I wouldn't recommand you do

Well I mean, I'd certainly like to know which ones to potentially stay away from as well.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Big fan of Enemy. I also found a lot to like about Holy Motors as well. And I think Scott Pilgrim is fun as hell. Uncle Boonmee, Speed Racer, Perfect Blue, and Princess Kayuga are all ones I've previously bookmarked to check out, but haven't gotten around to any of them yet.

Well I mean, I'd certainly like to know which ones to potentially stay away from as well.

I would have put Pilgrim in the ones to avoid, with Speed Racer and Heaven Knows What.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Oh, two films with Isabelle Huppert to add to the above suggestions:

Werner Schroeter's Malina
Alain Robbe-Grillet's Glissements progressifs du plaisir


both directors have quite a few very unique films

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Makavejev's Sweet Movie?


Ok, I'm done...

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

Jires' Valerie And Her Week of Wonders?

I... must... stop...

 

[kihei]

Strongly second Irreversible. Hard to sit through, but a movie of real importance about rape and toxic masculinity.

Though I feel "meh" about some of the movies on the list (Orlando; The Limey), the only movie I actively dislike that I have seen is Dick Tracy, but even then I wouldn't say don't see it. I'm no fan of Scott Pilgrim, either, but not to the point of thinking people should avoid it.

Post Tenebras Lux should have made my original list.

More movies I would add:

Nights of Lisbon (Ruiz)
The Exterminating Angel (Bunuel)
The Death of Louis XIV (Serra)
Upstream Color (Carruth)
and likely my favourite movie of the century I Don' t Want to Sleep Alone (Tsai)

I really need to see more Marguerite Duras movies.

I have an overwhelming urge to see Happy Feet Two now.

This shit is really addictive. I...will...stop. Maybe.