|
Post by Carl LaFong on Sept 8, 2020 17:01:02 GMT
Couple of Italian sexploitation films from the 70s. Free to Amazon Prime subscribers.
Just to see the actresses ... incredible looking birds!
Laura Antonelli in Venus in Furs Ornella Muti in Oasis of Fear.
|
|
|
Post by Jep Gambardella on Sept 8, 2020 18:58:54 GMT
I watched the Miyamoto Musashi Samurai trilogy from the 50s over the long weekend. Hiroshi Inagaki is the director.
www.imdb.com/title/tt0048579/referencewww.imdb.com/title/tt0049710/referenceI was a bit disappointed to be honest. These are supposed to be great classics of Japanese cinema but I found the story a bit weak, and the sword fight choreography almost laughable. On the positive side, there are many striking, beautifully composed shots, and Toshiro Mifune is very good in it.
Aj_June have you seen these? I know you are a big fan of Japanese cinema.
Yep, I have seen them and I agree with you that these movies are not at par with top grade Samurai movies (like Harakiri, Seven Samurai, Sanjuro) although still above average and good movies. As a matter of fact, my user name for at least a year on old IMDB boards used to be Kojiro Sasaki. I tried to find what was the real story behind semi-mythical characters of Kojiro Sasaki and Miyamoto Musashi. I intend to read more about medieval Japan and would once I get more free time.
According to the special features in the DVDs, the life of the real Miyamoto Musashi is reasonably well-documented. There is a novel about his life that is considered a classic of Japanese literature, although it apparently takes a lot of liberties with the real story.
About Kojiro Sasaki, not so much is known. He was a good character in the movies, unlike the two women - I thought they were so annoying!
|
|
marco266
Sophomore
@marco266
Posts: 535
Likes: 226
|
Post by marco266 on Sept 8, 2020 19:07:51 GMT
I have nothing to say. Never do. I am switching to horror today. The Amityville Horror (1979). Went to see that house once with some friends. Got back to the car, the car was dead. Same thing happened to another guy I know. Saw the house recently, they took out those infamous windows. Kind of ruins the experience of seeing the house. Strange thing about the Amityville Horror was that before there was an Amityville horror, older kids used to scare the shit out of us by telling us tales of the Defoe family that lived there. You all know what Ronald did. His deeds in that house were the creepy ghost story told around New York well before the Lutz's devised their story.
|
|
|
Post by tristramshandy on Sept 9, 2020 5:07:53 GMT
Watched Being John Malkovich (1999) tonight. One of those weird empty spaces in my movie watching resume. Ultimately, I liked the concept more than the execution - - but it will get me ready for I'm Thinking of Ending Things.
|
|
|
Post by Jep Gambardella on Sept 9, 2020 14:38:42 GMT
I’m watching Champion (1949) on Talking Movies TV just now (Freeview Channel number 81). This is the movie they’re talking about when they say “They don’t make ‘em like that any more”. Simply the best sports movie ever made. Raging Bull can get tae fuck! Kirk Douglas is an absolute force of nature, Incredible performance!
I watched it last night. I had put it on my list after you recommended it, and a few days ago I got the Blu-Ray from the library. I don't know if I would go as far as saying "best sports movie ever made", but yes, it was very good. What a contemptible character that Midge Kelly was!
|
|
|
Post by Carl LaFong on Sept 9, 2020 14:41:25 GMT
I’m watching Champion (1949) on Talking Movies TV just now (Freeview Channel number 81). This is the movie they’re talking about when they say “They don’t make ‘em like that any more”. Simply the best sports movie ever made. Raging Bull can get tae fuck! Kirk Douglas is an absolute force of nature, Incredible performance! I watched it last night. I had put it on my list after you recommended it, and a few days ago I got the Blu-Ray from the library. I don't know if I would go as far as saying "best sports movie ever made", but yes, it was very good. What a contemptible character that Midge Kelly was!
Glad you liked it! Yeah, Douglas is fantastic at playing heels.
|
|
|
Post by klawrencio79 on Sept 9, 2020 14:46:40 GMT
Watched Being John Malkovich (1999) tonight. One of those weird empty spaces in my movie watching resume. Ultimately, I liked the concept more than the execution - - but it will get me ready for I'm Thinking of Ending Things. I loved Being John Malkovich when it came out. I used to write all the movie reviews for the Tulane paper and if memory serves I had this as my #1 movie of 1999, in what was a great movie year - The Insider (my favorite Michael Mann movie, bring it on Heat-lovers!), The Straight Story, Fight Club, Blair Witch Project, American Beauty, Magnolia, Virgin Suicides, Matrix, Office Space, American Pie....Deep Blue Sea. Not sure I've seen BJM since seeing it in theaters but I do remember loving it as this completely off-kilter parable about Y2K jitters and an overall sense of wholesale cultural change due to an ever-increasing technological presence in our lives. My favorite from the Jones/Kaufman team though is Adaptation (2002). That I've seen a bunch of times and that movie gets me every time. If you haven't see, that, definitely check it out.
|
|
|
Post by Jep Gambardella on Sept 9, 2020 14:53:55 GMT
I watched it last night. I had put it on my list after you recommended it, and a few days ago I got the Blu-Ray from the library. I don't know if I would go as far as saying "best sports movie ever made", but yes, it was very good. What a contemptible character that Midge Kelly was!
Glad you liked it! Yeah, Douglas is fantastic at playing heels.
Not entirely sure of what that means but I think I get the gist!
|
|
|
Post by Carl LaFong on Sept 9, 2020 15:06:57 GMT
Glad you liked it! Yeah, Douglas is fantastic at playing heels. Not entirely sure of what that means but I think I get the gist! Honest? Just means a baddie, or more specifically a wrestler who has a bad guy persona.
|
|
|
Post by tristramshandy on Sept 9, 2020 16:55:10 GMT
Watched Being John Malkovich (1999) tonight. One of those weird empty spaces in my movie watching resume. Ultimately, I liked the concept more than the execution - - but it will get me ready for I'm Thinking of Ending Things. I loved Being John Malkovich when it came out. I used to write all the movie reviews for the Tulane paper and if memory serves I had this as my #1 movie of 1999, in what was a great movie year - The Insider (my favorite Michael Mann movie, bring it on Heat-lovers!), The Straight Story, Fight Club, Blair Witch Project, American Beauty, Magnolia, Virgin Suicides, Matrix, Office Space, American Pie....Deep Blue Sea. Not sure I've seen BJM since seeing it in theaters but I do remember loving it as this completely off-kilter parable about Y2K jitters and an overall sense of wholesale cultural change due to an ever-increasing technological presence in our lives. My favorite from the Jones/Kaufman team though is Adaptation (2002). That I've seen a bunch of times and that movie gets me every time. If you haven't see, that, definitely check it out. Wow, 1999 was an amazing year! I know that American Beauty has received in the aftermath some lower level-Crash kind of hatred (and that was even before all of the Spacey stuff came out), but I really love that movie. Fight Club, Magnolia, and Virgin Suicides are also all-time favorites of mine, and Office Space is great for the type of movie that it is. Eventually I'd love to rewatch Being John Malkovich to focus on the theme of inhabiting the other. There are so many levels of it in the film. I wonder what the transgender community feels about it too - - I could see them going both ways on it. Adaptation falls into a group of films that I've been reinvestigating this summer: movies that I saw once either in the theater or as soon as they came out on VHS/DVD and then not again. I had gone 25 years without having seen Jackie Brown again until this year, for example. Adaptation falls into that same category. My hope is that Netflix will scoop that one up as well, seeing as how they tend to get directors' works when they are releasing new films for them (happened with Scorsese and Baumbach at least).
|
|
|
Post by klawrencio79 on Sept 9, 2020 17:03:25 GMT
I loved Being John Malkovich when it came out. I used to write all the movie reviews for the Tulane paper and if memory serves I had this as my #1 movie of 1999, in what was a great movie year - The Insider (my favorite Michael Mann movie, bring it on Heat-lovers!), The Straight Story, Fight Club, Blair Witch Project, American Beauty, Magnolia, Virgin Suicides, Matrix, Office Space, American Pie....Deep Blue Sea. Not sure I've seen BJM since seeing it in theaters but I do remember loving it as this completely off-kilter parable about Y2K jitters and an overall sense of wholesale cultural change due to an ever-increasing technological presence in our lives. My favorite from the Jones/Kaufman team though is Adaptation (2002). That I've seen a bunch of times and that movie gets me every time. If you haven't see, that, definitely check it out. Wow, 1999 was an amazing year! I know that American Beauty has received in the aftermath some lower level-Crash kind of hatred (and that was even before all of the Spacey stuff came out), but I really love that movie. Fight Club, Magnolia, and Virgin Suicides are also all-time favorites of mine, and Office Space is great for the type of movie that it is. Eventually I'd love to rewatch Being John Malkovich to focus on the theme of inhabiting the other. There are so many levels of it in the film. I wonder what the transgender community feels about it too - - I could see them going both ways on it. Adaptation falls into a group of films that I've been reinvestigating this summer: movies that I saw once either in the theater or as soon as they came out on VHS/DVD and then not again. I had gone 25 years without having seen Jackie Brown again until this year, for example. Adaptation falls into that same category. My hope is that Netflix will scoop that one up as well, seeing as how they tend to get directors' works when they are releasing new films for them (happened with Scorsese and Baumbach at least). Adaptation had been on Netflix up until recently. Malkovich and another favorite of mine, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, are currently available.
|
|
|
Post by Rey Kahuka on Sept 10, 2020 13:23:55 GMT
I saw Tenet last night. Non-spoilers at first, spoilers in the spoiler section (what else would you expect me to put there?). As a Nolan guy (as opposed to a 'Nolanite,' the kind of obnoxious twit who believes Nolan makes nothing but flawless masterpieces), I can say Tenet is perhaps the most Nolan of Nolan films-- for better or worse. High concept yet straightforward; tons of exposition explaining what you're seeing and how you're supposed to think about it; it's like Inception meets Memento on steroids. Fast paced with a kicking score that would resuscitate the dead, featuring decent visual effects in the action sequences. I wasn't bored watching this film, but I wasn't exactly blown away. And I have to echo the complaint I've heard from podcasts and general audiences that the sound mixing is atrocious. For a film that was marketed on mystery, it doesn't help when you can't make out a majority of the dialog. I'll circle back to it later, but if you don't want to bother reading the rest, I'll say this movie is a 5/10. Not a terrible movie, but not among his best work by any stretch. I feel I have to delve into spoilers to explain most of my issues with the film, so here we go. Full spoilers ahead.The basic plot: the Protagonist (that's literally the character's name, by the way) is recruited into this program that uses temporal distortion to prevent disaster, specifically the destruction of the world via an arms dealer's attempt to fold time in on itself, destroying the fabric of reality. The premise is great, the problem with the film is the screenplay. The structure of the story is a mess. The film starts off with an action sequence that I still don't understand what was going on. What were the villains after, what were the heroes protecting, who the hell are the heroes anyway? It doesn't matter because we quickly shift into the protagonist's introduction to the temporal world. He's given the password Tenet and a goofy hand signal that I believe he uses once throughout the entire film.
This is an ongoing theme, so many details and concepts and characters are introduced that don't have any relevance to the rest of the film. It's like Nolan is overloading you with information in the form of so much exposition, to distract you from the fact that there isn't much to the actual story. It's a few action set pieces surrounded by garbled stage setting and character introductions. Who are these people, what are they doing, why do I care? Again as a Nolan fan, I admit his greatest flaw might be the coldness of his characters; and in a story such as this, the audience needs something to hold onto in order to stay invested.
Long story short, the protagonist slowly masters temporal distortion and discovers the villain's plot (or has it all explained to him in bits and pieces by various characters). After a protracted battle scene so awful it makes the final battle in Inception look like high art (Seriously. Who are these guys they're fighting? What are the 'blue team' and the 'red team' doing? Where the hell are we?), the heroes save the day. There's a contraption called the algorithm that they disconnect in the nick of time to prevent catastrophe.
A few questions: Who is in charge of this operation? Why does Ives seemingly turn on them at the end of the film? Why doesn't the protagonist do anything to prevent Neil's death? They're literally time travelers. Why doesn't Kat need an oxygen mask when she goes back in time to the yacht? One of those heavy exposition scenes specifically explains why they have to wear masks (which only makes the inaudible dialog that much worse throughout). Neil reminds the protagonist several times that what's done is done, you can't change anything... I mean... isn't that the point of their job? They travel through time to prevent disasters! More to the point, Neil himself attempts to change what's happened in the middle of the final battle by trying to warn the protagonist of impending danger in the mine. I don't get it. Mind you, some or all of this incoherency may have had half-ass explanations in some scenes that I couldn't fucking hear, so there's that.
My biggest disappointment was how predictable the film was. At the first heist sequence, I knew the protagonist was fighting a future version of himself. It was too obvious. Neil's reaction oversold it. Whether or not you saw that twist coming, how much tension can you build around that scene when they repeat it in reverse later in the film? You've seen it, you know how it begins and ends. The fun part about the gimmick of Memento is that film just keeps moving in reverse; you can't repeat a scene verbatim and expect that to actually build tension. I also figured Kat saw herself jumping off the boat, though that scene still held some weight due to the emotion she attached to the moment earlier in the film. (But again, why didn't she have to wear a mask?) During the final battle, you knew it was one of the central characters honking at them in the Humvee as they entered the cave, though I still don't see what he was trying to do-- or why he decided to break his own rule.
Then of course there are the problems inherent with any time travel storyline. What exactly are the stakes when you can travel through time? Neil's dead, or is he? At any given time there are about four versions of him running around the action sequence. He exists in the past and the future somehow; honestly there is no such thing as past and future to one who can do what the protagonist now can. He knew Neil before he met him, he'll go back and recruit him after his death. Right now, Neil is playing his part in the battle above even while he's already been killed in the mine.
Ultimately, Tenet is classic Nolan in that it wants to be a people pleasing popcorn movie while still giving the audience something to chew on, something to examine long after the credits have rolled. The problem with Tenet is, the more you examine it, the more flaws you find. All that said, it's a decent ride even if it doesn't always make sense. It doesn't really have to make sense, though the film's insistence that it does can be distracting. The performances are fine, but again the characters lack depth for the most part. I don't know how often I need to revisit Tenet. It's an average flick, which makes it a lower tier Nolan movie for me. I hate to say this about a Nolan film, but honestly you can skip this one and not feel like you've missed anything. 5/10
|
|
|
Post by Aj_June on Sept 11, 2020 18:04:36 GMT
Hey guys, I can't believe it's weekend. I am about to have a chilled Coke and start a movie. It's 11:32 pm local time and just got rid of a disgusting tiring work week. Movies now....
|
|
|
Post by klawrencio79 on Sept 11, 2020 18:05:29 GMT
Hey guys, I can't believe it's weekend. I am about to have a chilled Coke and start a movie. It's 11:32 pm local time and just got rid of a disgusting tiring work week. Movies now.... I like the sound of that, been having a crazy week muhself.
|
|
|
Post by Jep Gambardella on Sept 11, 2020 18:33:49 GMT
Hey guys, I can't believe it's weekend. I am about to have a chilled Coke and start a movie. It's 11:32 pm local time and just got rid of a disgusting tiring work week. Movies now.... Have a good weekend, and I hope you enjoy whatever movies you are planning on watching. I am thinking of finally watching 12 Angry Men at some point during the weekend.
|
|
|
Post by Carl LaFong on Sept 11, 2020 18:43:40 GMT
Hey guys, I can't believe it's weekend. I am about to have a chilled Coke and start a movie. It's 11:32 pm local time and just got rid of a disgusting tiring work week. Movies now.... Thanks, dude! Right back atcha! What's on the movie bill for you? I have Lincoln on my PVR, but I can't muster up any enthusiasm for it.
|
|
|
Post by klawrencio79 on Sept 11, 2020 18:44:15 GMT
Hey guys, I can't believe it's weekend. I am about to have a chilled Coke and start a movie. It's 11:32 pm local time and just got rid of a disgusting tiring work week. Movies now.... Have a good weekend, and I hope you enjoy whatever movies you are planning on watching. I am thinking of finally watching 12 Angry Men at some point during the weekend.
A great one, but it completely bungles the legal process!
|
|
|
Post by Carl LaFong on Sept 11, 2020 18:49:12 GMT
Thought you'd be watching the first Eng-Aus ODI.
|
|
|
Post by Aj_June on Sept 11, 2020 19:09:30 GMT
Thought you'd be watching the first Eng-Aus ODI. Yep, doing exactly that. Couldn't resist as I smell an interesting finish. You tell me which picture I see after the Eng-Aus? I have three options. A) The Man Who Would Be King (1975) with Sir Michael Caine and Sean Connery. B) Tokyo Story (1953) Yasujiro Ozu C) Pale Rider (1985) with Clint Eastwood.
|
|
|
Post by Carl LaFong on Sept 11, 2020 19:15:16 GMT
Thought you'd be watching the first Eng-Aus ODI. Yep, doing exactly that. Couldn't resist as I smell an interesting finish. You tell me which picture I see after the Eng-Aus? I have three options. A) The Man Who Would Be King (1975) with Sir Michael Caine and Sean Connery. B) Tokyo Story (1953) Yasujiro Ozu C) Pale Rider (1985) with Clint Eastwood. Three good movies. I pick Tokyo Story. Quietly moving.
|
|