Rate the last movie you watched. - Page 99

Briggykins · 11-07-2009, 10:19

Babel

Picked this up simply because the wife noticed it had Brad Pitt in. It follows the stories of four groups of people who are affected in some way by one of them firing a gun, and is meant to show how we're all interconnected blah blah etc.
It didn't have any new ideas and those that were here were trapped within a turgid storyline which meandered about all over the place without really getting anywhere. The film could easily have had about half an hour shaved off just by cutting out the shots where the camera lingered on one person not doing very much. Some of the plots (especially the Japanese story) remain pointlessly unresolved at the end of the film, and some of the plots are just pointless (Mexico lady, I'm looking at you).
Plus points are the scenes set in the hills of Morocco, where the scenery is stunning in a harsh, barren way. The Moroccan kids story is also one of the more interesting as at least it has some kind of interesting plot that gets properly sorted at the end. Can't complain about the quality of the acting either - all the kids do well and the Mexican woman is very good.
The film received quite a lot of awards so I may well be missing some grand message behind the film, but imo it doesn't do anything the Butterfly Effect didn't do a lot better and in a lot more entertaining way. Can't give this film any more than 3/10.

SiD the Turtle · 11-07-2009, 18:13

Recently I realised that we had enough Nectar points for four cinema tickets, so the missus and I just spent the day sat in the cinema to watch two movies:

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

When the first modern Transformers movie was released, everyone screamed 'get rid of the humans, more robots!'. Whoops. Instead we have two and a half hours of CGI as robots have a fight. Now as much as a movie snob as I am I went into the movie with an open mind and tried to switch off my brain, forget the plot and watch some robot and gun porn. Still, I was BORED. About half way through the movie there's a fight in a forest, it's well done and was paced well. Then for the rest of the movie I lost track of which robot was which in a messy last couple of acts. I had made the fatal mistake of having a drink beforehand that meant I had to leave the cinema for a couple of minutes, on returning I asked the missus what I missed, her reply? 'Dunno, some robots fighting'. That just about sums it up, technically impressive but thoroughly boring.

2/10

Public Enemies

(I should probably prepend my opinion by mentioning that after watching hours of explodey robots, I was in the mood for an action movie so I may be a little harsh on this movie's pacing).
For me this was a movie of two conflicting opinions. On the negative side the cinematography fell over at times with poor framing and rough cutting, Jonny Depp's partners in crime were all the same white, hat and brace wearing gangsters so it was hard to keep track of who was who and the soundtrack was too biased for the actions scenes and the sounds of machine guns- the actors' thick period accents being hard to make out at times. On the positive side Depp is on top form and Bale proves he can do more than grunt loudly. The high production values let you slide right into the feel of the 1930s with the old school car chases, rat-a-tat-tat of the guns and swish night clubs stocked with glamorous women. It's an entertaining movie but I left not quite sure what the 'point' of the movie was. This one I'd recommend, I'm not sure it will be big at the cinemas, but it may be a sleeper hit on DVD.

7/10

loki · 11-07-2009, 18:45

Defiance

Watched this on me hols this week. The story follows two brothers in Nazi occupied Eastern Europe in WWII. They take it upon themselves to protect a number of Jewish civilians as the Germans continue their advances. Based on a true story Daniel Craig really played the role of Tuvia well. Not a lot to say as it would spoil the film but if you want some WWII drama that hasn't been CGI'd or Hollywooded to death then you won't go far wrong with defiance. IMDB has a score of 7 and I think that's a good barometer of the film

7/10

Streeteh · 11-07-2009, 18:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by Briggykins

Babel

3/10.

I agree, incredibly overrated film imo.

A Place of Light · 14-07-2009, 00:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Belmit

Drillbit Taylor

Surprisingly charming film starring Owen Wilson as a homeless ex-army ranger hired by some kids to protect them from the school bully. Co-written by Seth Rogen it has some great performances by the kids and a kick-ass ending. Best scenes are the rap-off and the kids punching each other to learn how to deal with pain.

7/10

Totally agree.
The kids act Wilson off the screen IMHO.

Jhadur · 14-07-2009, 00:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matblack

Knowing

Starts poorly, gets better then SMACK! an ending of pure fail

Mostly 6/10 diving to a 1/10 and that's generous

MB

Yep pretty much agree with this. The ending was a complete WTF.

Blighter · 14-07-2009, 01:06

I found that with Bruno... really odd ending :S

Whole film was absolutely brilliant then spoilt by a crappy ending

Flibster · 14-07-2009, 23:36

I've been busy doing nothing.
Nothing the whole day though....

5 films in one day

Gran Torino, Lesbian Vampire Killers. Bolt, W and Kung Fu Panda

Gran Torino was my favourite of the day surprisingly. Only rented it because I needed 4 for the £10 offer and I kinda like the Gran Torino. *hangs head in shame* As an Eastwood directed film, I expected it to follow his normal style, and I was right. Very realistic. Acting is excellent throughout *although I'm not sure it all was acting with Clint

* and the way the film worked as it went along really struck something with me.

Loved it. 9.5/10

Lesbian Vampire Killers

I really wasn't expecting anything other than what was in the title with this one. And thats pretty much all you get. I did enjoy it though - I liked the obvious childish humour in it. It's certainly not a deep film by any stretch.

Still, 7.5/10 I think.

Bolt and Kung Fu Panda

I'll do these together as they can easily be praised and criticised for the same things.
Voice acting is generally excellent - Ian McShane in particular in Panda stands out for me. Generally the films are pretty good, but the main criticism you can lay against them is they just aren't as good as Pixar films, there's just something missing from them. Bolt suffers from this a lot. It's just a bit ... forgettable...

Bolt - 6.5/10
Kung Fu Panda - 7/10

W

Goonies never say die!
Right, with that out of the way..

I find it hard to classify this - is it a comedy, drama, satire.. what?
It does have some stonklingly good performances in it though. Josh Brolin does possibly the best performance as George W Gump that I have seen in years - Sadly overlooked at the oscars. It was that good imo. Richard Dreyfuss also puts in a supreme performance as Cheney.

Overall the film did leave me feeling a bit uncomfortable as it takes real events and shows what a puppet he really was in many cases. Well worth a watch though just for the performances.

8/10

Dunketh · 20-07-2009, 00:40

Gran Torino

This was to the standard you would expect from an Eastwood movie of the last decade or so, not only the direction but the acting of Eastwood himself, the movie was full of emotion a real roller-coaster which made me laugh out loud in parts and almost brought a tear to my eye (that mainly because of how much Eastwood reminds me of my Father, especially in this movie), and was nice to see such an emotional and touching film like this amongst the high budget, high action movies of today's Hollywood.

4 out of 5

SiD the Turtle · 20-07-2009, 22:38

Moon
It's a hard film to review without spoiling, but think of it as sci-fi before sci-fi meant explosions and giant robots. This is sci-fi where the main hook is the 'human condition', not the technology. Both heart-warming and heart-breaking at the same time, Moon is a brilliant film from the establishing shot of the Earth to reinforce the loneliness of the main character all the way to the fantastic, if slightly predictable ending.

10/10

Side rant: this film is only on limited release. This film has not been advertised at all. It's a crime. A film that costs pennies compared to Hollywood blockbusters but outshines them in every way, relegated to a single screen in a handful of cinemas. I guess people don't want to think in the cinema any more, but are content with explosions, lens flare and eye candy.

11-07-2009, 10:19	#981
Briggykins Vodka Martini Join Date: Feb 2009 Location: Exeter Posts: 753	Babel Picked this up simply because the wife noticed it had Brad Pitt in. It follows the stories of four groups of people who are affected in some way by one of them firing a gun, and is meant to show how we're all interconnected blah blah etc. It didn't have any new ideas and those that were here were trapped within a turgid storyline which meandered about all over the place without really getting anywhere. The film could easily have had about half an hour shaved off just by cutting out the shots where the camera lingered on one person not doing very much. Some of the plots (especially the Japanese story) remain pointlessly unresolved at the end of the film, and some of the plots are just pointless (Mexico lady, I'm looking at you). Plus points are the scenes set in the hills of Morocco, where the scenery is stunning in a harsh, barren way. The Moroccan kids story is also one of the more interesting as at least it has some kind of interesting plot that gets properly sorted at the end. Can't complain about the quality of the acting either - all the kids do well and the Mexican woman is very good. The film received quite a lot of awards so I may well be missing some grand message behind the film, but imo it doesn't do anything the Butterfly Effect didn't do a lot better and in a lot more entertaining way. Can't give this film any more than 3/10. __________________ Last edited by Briggykins; 11-07-2009 at 10:22.

11-07-2009, 18:13	#982
SiD the Turtle Columbian Coffee Join Date: Oct 2008 Posts: 90	Recently I realised that we had enough Nectar points for four cinema tickets, so the missus and I just spent the day sat in the cinema to watch two movies: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen When the first modern Transformers movie was released, everyone screamed 'get rid of the humans, more robots!'. Whoops. Instead we have two and a half hours of CGI as robots have a fight. Now as much as a movie snob as I am I went into the movie with an open mind and tried to switch off my brain, forget the plot and watch some robot and gun porn. Still, I was BORED. About half way through the movie there's a fight in a forest, it's well done and was paced well. Then for the rest of the movie I lost track of which robot was which in a messy last couple of acts. I had made the fatal mistake of having a drink beforehand that meant I had to leave the cinema for a couple of minutes, on returning I asked the missus what I missed, her reply? 'Dunno, some robots fighting'. That just about sums it up, technically impressive but thoroughly boring. 2/10 Public Enemies (I should probably prepend my opinion by mentioning that after watching hours of explodey robots, I was in the mood for an action movie so I may be a little harsh on this movie's pacing). For me this was a movie of two conflicting opinions. On the negative side the cinematography fell over at times with poor framing and rough cutting, Jonny Depp's partners in crime were all the same white, hat and brace wearing gangsters so it was hard to keep track of who was who and the soundtrack was too biased for the actions scenes and the sounds of machine guns- the actors' thick period accents being hard to make out at times. On the positive side Depp is on top form and Bale proves he can do more than grunt loudly. The high production values let you slide right into the feel of the 1930s with the old school car chases, rat-a-tat-tat of the guns and swish night clubs stocked with glamorous women. It's an entertaining movie but I left not quite sure what the 'point' of the movie was. This one I'd recommend, I'm not sure it will be big at the cinemas, but it may be a sleeper hit on DVD. 7/10 __________________ SiDTheTurtle.co.uk - Updated 27/09

11-07-2009, 18:45	#983
loki Vodka Martini Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: Manchester UK Posts: 871	Defiance Watched this on me hols this week. The story follows two brothers in Nazi occupied Eastern Europe in WWII. They take it upon themselves to protect a number of Jewish civilians as the Germans continue their advances. Based on a true story Daniel Craig really played the role of Tuvia well. Not a lot to say as it would spoil the film but if you want some WWII drama that hasn't been CGI'd or Hollywooded to death then you won't go far wrong with defiance. IMDB has a score of 7 and I think that's a good barometer of the film 7/10 __________________ PC & Console LAN 9th-11th July

14-07-2009, 01:06	#987
Blighter Dubious Join Date: Sep 2008 Location: Northampton Posts: 1,571	I found that with Bruno... really odd ending :S Whole film was absolutely brilliant then spoilt by a crappy ending __________________ Look at your signature, now back to mine, now back to yours, now back to mine. Sadly, yours isn't mine. But if you stopped writing about other things and made this your signature, yours could be like mine. Look down, back up. Where are you? You're on Boat Drinks, reading the signature your signature could be like. I'm on a computer. My Blog \| More Outdoors \| MSN \| Email \| Call Me

14-07-2009, 23:36	#988
Flibster Moonshine Join Date: Jul 2006 Posts: 3,388	I've been busy doing nothing. Nothing the whole day though.... 5 films in one day Gran Torino, Lesbian Vampire Killers. Bolt, W and Kung Fu Panda Gran Torino was my favourite of the day surprisingly. Only rented it because I needed 4 for the £10 offer and I kinda like the Gran Torino. hangs head in shame As an Eastwood directed film, I expected it to follow his normal style, and I was right. Very realistic. Acting is excellent throughout although I'm not sure it all was acting with Clint and the way the film worked as it went along really struck something with me. Loved it. 9.5/10 Lesbian Vampire Killers I really wasn't expecting anything other than what was in the title with this one. And thats pretty much all you get. I did enjoy it though - I liked the obvious childish humour in it. It's certainly not a deep film by any stretch. Still, 7.5/10 I think. Bolt and Kung Fu Panda I'll do these together as they can easily be praised and criticised for the same things. Voice acting is generally excellent - Ian McShane in particular in Panda stands out for me. Generally the films are pretty good, but the main criticism you can lay against them is they just aren't as good as Pixar films, there's just something missing from them. Bolt suffers from this a lot. It's just a bit ... forgettable... Bolt - 6.5/10 Kung Fu Panda - 7/10 W Goonies never say die! Right, with that out of the way.. I find it hard to classify this - is it a comedy, drama, satire.. what? It does have some stonklingly good performances in it though. Josh Brolin does possibly the best performance as George W Gump that I have seen in years - Sadly overlooked at the oscars. It was that good imo. Richard Dreyfuss also puts in a supreme performance as Cheney. Overall the film did leave me feeling a bit uncomfortable as it takes real events and shows what a puppet he really was in many cases. Well worth a watch though just for the performances. 8/10 __________________

20-07-2009, 00:40	#989
Dunketh Long Island Iced Tea Join Date: Jun 2009 Posts: 178	Gran Torino This was to the standard you would expect from an Eastwood movie of the last decade or so, not only the direction but the acting of Eastwood himself, the movie was full of emotion a real roller-coaster which made me laugh out loud in parts and almost brought a tear to my eye (that mainly because of how much Eastwood reminds me of my Father, especially in this movie), and was nice to see such an emotional and touching film like this amongst the high budget, high action movies of today's Hollywood. 4 out of 5

20-07-2009, 22:38	#990
SiD the Turtle Columbian Coffee Join Date: Oct 2008 Posts: 90	Moon It's a hard film to review without spoiling, but think of it as sci-fi before sci-fi meant explosions and giant robots. This is sci-fi where the main hook is the 'human condition', not the technology. Both heart-warming and heart-breaking at the same time, Moon is a brilliant film from the establishing shot of the Earth to reinforce the loneliness of the main character all the way to the fantastic, if slightly predictable ending. 10/10 Side rant: this film is only on limited release. This film has not been advertised at all. It's a crime. A film that costs pennies compared to Hollywood blockbusters but outshines them in every way, relegated to a single screen in a handful of cinemas. I guess people don't want to think in the cinema any more, but are content with explosions, lens flare and eye candy. __________________ SiDTheTurtle.co.uk - Updated 27/09