What I've Been Watching: The Catch-All Film Thread

Thanks, Dart, you too, welcome back. :)

Btw, as long as your name is still free, you can register with the old name, afaik. And Dartagnan is still available. Though you may have come to like coming up with a new name. :)
 
I know, I used DArtagnan last time I was here.

I'm a little embarrassed about the whole coming back and going away thing - so I change my name as a way to communicate the temporary nature of it all :)
 
I'm a little embarrassed about the whole coming back and going away thing - so I change my name as a way to communicate the temporary nature of it all :)
Haha, yeah, well. You could always, you know, just log out? Or if you want to make it harder for yourself, change your password to a random string before leaving. Either way, happy posting.

~~~

I watched Nightmare Alley. Was pretty good. Kept me entertained for its entire duration, although … dunno. Maybe I've seen it before? The original was from 1947, so maybe.
 
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Haha, yeah, well. You could always, you know, just log out? Or if you want to make it harder for yourself, change your password to a random string before leaving. Either way, happy posting.

~~~

I watched Nightmare Alley. Was pretty good. Kept me entertained for its entire duration, although … dunno. Maybe I've seen it before? The original was from 1947, so maybe.

I won't bore you with the challenges of impulse control :)

As for Nightmare Alley, I watched that one recently as well. The new one, that is.

I found it passable.

Probably the best Toro movie I've seen - which isn't saying much, as I don't really care for his movies in general.

The pacing was off - and most of the movie reeked of style over substance - but it was still decent enough.

I feel like the entire movie was built around the ending and the very obvious over-reliance of Cooper's performance during said ending.

Even so, it worked well enough - even though the whole thing was telegraphed from the early stages.
 
Bought myself Encanto on DVD for me - on a whim, as I thought that next week I have a short vacation time, as in my planning I tried to flee from the German Karneval ... I might watch that movie on a fine day, then .. ;)
 
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Encanto is definitely better than carnaval, Alrik. As is the music. :)
Here the madness begins on Saturday, some start even on Friday.
 
Cologne. Everything is a bit different there. ;)
 
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Watched the latest Scream which is technically a reboot that continues the first movie of the franchise almost twenty years later. My older relative enjoyed watching it with me.

Would I recommend watching it?

That depends on if your not tired of the franchise and enjoyed the first movie.
 
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Last night we assembled as a family to honour two birthdays and to watch a film, Belfast. As we're all Irish to some degree, it seemed fitting, though fifteen minutes in we had to pause the movie and explain some things, as it seems school kids these days haven't a clue about the Troubles. I think I lost most of the audience when I started off the explanation by saying, "first we need to go back about seventy years before this films begins". -p

The film itself is fantastic. Perfect, no, of course not, and Belfast itself has an ugly connotation for my entire family, as does Northern Ireland in general. Seeing the hate being openly taught and preached brought back a lot of memories, and I suspect that's what the film creator was trying to achieve. The music was poignant, Van Morrison was a great choice for many of the selections. If you at all interested in this time period, another conflict that was going on during the same era that the American invasion of Vietnam was taking place, this is an excellent take on the turbulent Irish problems.
 
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The Duke [2020]

Another quirky British film. The time is 1961 and the main action revolves around a Northern working class family. Based on actual events it tells the background and the "theft" of "The Duke" by Kempton Bunton (played by Jim Broadbent) from The National Gallery. Mr Bunton's grandson was employed and he believes that the film does not stray too far from the truth. "The Duke" is a portrait of the Duke of Wellington which is a painting by the Spanish artist Francisco Goya valued at £140k in 1961 (£3m now).

Both my wife and I enjoyed it. I have seen it described as a "British comedy drama". I smiled a lot, marvelled at the twists and turns, remembered some working class history. If you are a Brit with a working class background then you will probably appreciate this film.

Other viewers gave the film good scores including The Guardian and The Daily Telegraph (both 5 stars). Personally I would avoid spoilers and reviews before watching the film!
 
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@bjon045; , the new Dr Strange movie is going to be directed by Sam Raimi, just like old times.

I'm not normally one for catching every new superhero movie, but this bit of news could well be a deal maker. I'm a huge Sam Raimi fan. He hasn't directed a movie since 2013, so it'll be fascinating to see if the ol' magic is still there.

I'll certainly watch it. I quite enjoyed Drag me to hell and I see no reason why this won't be as watchable. I even thought the first Doctor Strange movie was quite good for the first half or so of the movie so I do have some interest in seeing how it the sequel turns.

On a completely unrelated note I've been going through all the horror movies on Netflix, from the abysmal Fear street movies to the highly watchable Geralds Game. Mike Flanagan did a great job on that movie and standout performances by it's two stars. I'll have to get around to watching the tv series he did recently called Mightnight Mass.

I even saw the Netflix produced Texas Chainsaw Massacre sequel. Not an amazing movie or anything but highly watchable if you are a genre fan. Even though one of the protagionists is an "influencer" it is all handled quite well - plenty of dismemberment all around.
 
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"X", the latest horror film from A24, looks good.
Looks promising. Sex AND violence. And creepiness.

Ti West has an interesting horror oeuvre. I've seen three of his movies and they're all very different. House of the Devil is very slow moving and retro with a punch at the end. The Innkeepers is also slow as molasses, but very different in atmosphere and look. And Cabin Fever 2 is just pretty fucked up.
Looks like he's going in yet another direction.
 
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Ti West has an interesting horror oeuvre. I've seen three of his movies and they're all very different. House of the Devil is very slow moving and retro with a punch at the end. The Innkeepers is also slow as molasses, but very different in atmosphere and look. And Cabin Fever 2 is just pretty fucked up.
Looks like he's going in yet another direction.

I don't think I've seen any of his films yet. I liked the original Cabin Fever from Eli Roth, so maybe I'll check out West's sequel.
 
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I checked out a film I'd heard about years ago yet had never watched, entitled the Unforgiven, from 1960 starring Lancaster and Hepburn, and directed by John Huston. It's a tough watch, once you realize where Rachel came from, and where this story is headed. It's based on another novel by Le May, and doesn't really pull any punches, the topics must have been fairly heady over sixty years ago. The film was pretty good, although the story is rather tough, and the cast is outstanding, especially some in minor roles.
 
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I don't think I've seen any of his films yet. I liked the original Cabin Fever from Eli Roth, so maybe I'll check out West's sequel.

I thought Cabin Fever 2 was abysmal. It basically takes everything from the first one and throws away anything that makes "sense", relatively speaking of course :) I won't say any spoliers but now the virus transfers also instantly and symtoms manifest very rapidly. It also completely changes the tone of the comedy elements. I don't know how to describe it but the jokes are more silly than "gross" like they were in the original. Also less T&A :(

You can firmly trust the low review scores (for a horror film). It's equally as bad as Cabin Fever 3.
 
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I thought Cabin Fever 2 was abysmal. It basically takes everything from the first one and throws away anything that makes "sense", relatively speaking of course :) I won't say any spoliers but now the virus transfers also instantly and symtoms manifest very rapidly. It also completely changes the tone of the comedy elements. I don't know how to describe it but the jokes are more silly than "gross" like they were in the original. Also less T&A :(

You can firmly trust the low review scores (for a horror film). It's equally as bad as Cabin Fever 3.

Well, horror movie sequels are almost never as good as the original film especially when it's a different cast and director.

In fact, I'm not sure if I could name more than a few sequels in this genre that were better than the first movie. Off the top of my head, Evil Dead 2 & 3 come to mind.
 
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Well, I watched Encanto on DVD last night ... It still feels like a rollercoaster ride to me.
The whole plot is too fast, the whole singing is too fast ... I sometimes could only barely make out words, because they were sung so fast ...

I liked the plot, but everything happened so fast ... The movie gives one no pause to think about what has just happened in it ...

What strikes me is the way the story was told. It almost felt like an experimental movie, looking back at it.
This surprises me. Meanwhile Pixar produces an almost "traditional" movie with "Luca", "Encanto", however, feels as if it was rather an more experimental Pixar movie. How the roles have reversed !

Whereas Luca is to me more like a movie for introverts, Encanto is rather a movie for extroverts.
 
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Saw the new Batman last night, honestly I didn't think I'd like it, as the bloke playing Wayne just doesn't look the part to me, yet the direction and story won me over. Give me a film where Wayne actually uses his detective skill and simply cannot bowl over fifty opponents at once, and you'll win me over. Those first five years or so that he grew into the Batman persona were always my favorite in the comics, and this film does a decent job of carrying that water. Is it perfect? Of course not. Yet from the moment I heard the score kick in, to the poignant song that was used at least twice during the film, I gave it a chance. And it payed off.
 
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So ... is it rather a detective movie ?
 
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