Last movie watched...

[Professor Bear]

You may get even more cross after Nerdwriter1 points out to you the minor, blindingly obvious tweaks to the film that would have likely made it better.

[von Boom]

Apologies TordelBack. I watched Passengers a couple of weeks ago, but I couldn't bring myself to admit to anyone that I actually watched that drek to the end. If I had perhaps I could have saved you the aggravation. Maybe a support group is needed.

Hi, I'm Vince and I watched Passengers...

[JamesC]

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

I sort of enjoyed this but I can't really see what all the fuss is about (this is a fairly standard reaction with Coen Bros films). It looked lovely and the performances were good but I didn't think the stories were up to much. The title story was probably the most enjoyable part of the film - very stylishly done with a weird unsettling tone. The Gal Who Got Rattled was strongest from a narrative point of view but - blimey - they dragged it out a bit. Meal Ticket was like watching paint dry and was very slight in story terms.

Aquaman

Was enjoyable for the flash,bang,wallop but ultimately wasn't very satisfying.
I'd have liked to have seen more build up around Aquaman himself - so we knew at least something about him other than that he hangs round bars and drink-drives [spoiler]and blames himself for his mum's death.[/spoiler]
Where does he live? Does he have any friends? Does he have a job?
[spoiler]The fact that Vulko had been training him seemed to come out of nowhere.[/spoiler]
I thought the performances were all a bit bland and there was no chemistry between Momoa and Heard.
As it was, I thought the dad was the best character in the film and his scenes were my favourite bits.

Oh, and Dolph looked cool with pink hair and a beard!

[Mardroid]

Anna and the Apocalypse

A film that very much transcends it's fairly hack premise* with surprising levels of creativity, heart, an amazing young cast and a standout soundtrack of original and insanely catchy pop songs. An absolute winner, and it's a great shame that it's been pretty roundly ignored at the box office. This is a future (Christmas) cult classic if ever I saw one. I'd literally watch it again right now - see it if you can.

*'Zombie Christmas Musical' admittedly sounds like one of those witless late 2000s Shaun of the Dead knock-offs

Saw this advertised then forgot all about it.

Thanks for the reminder!

[radiator]

Anna and the Apocalypse

A film that very much transcends it's fairly hack premise* with surprising levels of creativity, heart, an amazing young cast and a standout soundtrack of original and insanely catchy pop songs. An absolute winner, and it's a great shame that it's been pretty roundly ignored at the box office. This is a future (Christmas) cult classic if ever I saw one. I'd literally watch it again right now - see it if you can.

*'Zombie Christmas Musical' admittedly sounds like one of those witless late 2000s Shaun of the Dead knock-offs

Saw this advertised then forgot all about it.

Thanks for the reminder!

You might have to act quickly - I think it's leaving cinemas where I am in the next couple of days!

[Dudley]

Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse.  My boy's first superhero film in the cinema and it sets a really high benchmark. The animation mixes multiple styles in the same frame to really beautiful effect, the characters are all well drawn, and any child watching this will be instantly sold on the idea of future Miles Morales movies. The finale maybe gets a little confusing, but I was impressed with how solid a grasp I had on the space where it was all taking place considering that it was [spoiler]multiple Spidermen swinging through a multiverse crash[/spoiler]. Kingpin was a truly evil-hearted bastard and the secondary villain reveal was a brilliant surprise. Hoping for much, much more of this.

[Hawkmumbler]

Can we just appreciate Spuderverse has by far the best post credit scene i've ever seen?

[Mardroid]

Just on my way back from the cinema on my half-day off work. I was thinking of either Aquaman or Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse.

I went for the latter, mainly due to it being the next one showing, but I did fancy it more, too.

Yes, that was pretty good. The screen looked kind of fuzzy, like out of focus on occasion, but I think that was intentional. It seemed little over the top, though.

I felt it dragged a little at the start, but when it got into the, ahem, swing of things (cough) it worked very well.

[spoiler]No punk Spider-Man, though? Actually, that might be a good thing. He might have been a bit too much. Also I think Fisk is depicted way too strong in this but he often is in the comics too.[/spoiler]

A very good Spider-Man film.

[broodblik]

Watched Aquaman today and I really enjoyed the movie. The cast work well with the movie and Jason Momoa casting as Aquaman was a great choice.

[Professor Bear]

I was told Batman & Robin was a terrible film, I was told Pearl Harbor was a terrible film, I was even told Paul "Wank Shaft" Anderson's Three Musketeers movie was terrible, and maybe they were, but by golly they were a hoot to sit through, so I was all ready to give Pompei a fair shake despite its drubbing by all and sundry but... more like Pom-piss.  Or... POOmpei, amiright?  I dunno.
Keifer Sutherland has the right idea, and makes a good bad hammy villain even if his English accent is distractingly funny, and Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (we all know I Googled how to spell this and then copy and pasted it, let's just move on) is quite the charismatic figure, but the rest of the onscreen thesps are just so much wooden planking passed off as talent, which is okay because this is just a load of old action movie shit you can watch with a beer and some pizza, and even though the CGI is occasionally really bad, it's enjoyable enough until they totally fluff the tone of the ending and retroactively make all the rest of it seem much worse than it was.  The last time a movie ending with a volcano eruption annoyed me this much was How It Ends, a movie that trolled you before it even fucking started with that title, but what happens to the couple in that is the opposite of what happens to the couple in this, so ehhh - maybe there just isn't a good way to end a volcano movie or something.
I was enjoying the gladiator stuff, cliched as it was, but then the eruption happened and it got in the way of everything else, mainly thanks to the aforementioned rubbish CGI.  If the ending had been a bit more by the book and they'd trimmed out a few of the more obvious 3d sequences for the non-3d version, this might at least have been salvageable as a good bad film.  As it is, it's just toss.

[Radbacker]

Bumble Bee, well it took them what 5 - 6 attempts but I think they finally made a decent Transformers movie (though I didn't mind the first one for all my sins).  The opening 15 minutes or so just gave me warm tingles for the original series which I guess it was supposed to (and proof the original designs can work in live action) and the rest wasn't too bad too, sure it was all a bit ET and Iron Giant but if you're gonna rip off some movies you might as well go for some good ones.  That wrestler guy was okay but the whole military sub plot was a tad undercooked, the main girl did pretty well good little actress and quite cute too but way too young for me these days l, the real star was definitely Bumble Bee he was so well done, solid and endearing. I liked lots

CU Radbacker

[TordelBack]

Spider-Verse. Hot damn! If you've ever enjoyed a superhero comic, you'll love this. As Spider-Man is my favourire superhero of all, i was blown away. Powerful in every way, from its tear-jerking Stan Lee spot to its genius end credits. Killing [spoiler]Peter Parker[/spoiler] - for real - in the first 15 mins took some serious cojones, and it just got better from there. Unreservedly recommended.

[Frank]

A Quiet Place.  Idea for sequel:

https://youtu.be/b2bzrCCKDwc

[Professor Bear]

Long Way North - Anime nerds almost universally agree on one thing: "never watch the English dub", and that applies especially to this French/Danish 2d animated feature about a 19th century Russian girl who runs away from home to follow her grandfather's doomed polar expedition.  The art style of the animation is great, really coming into its own in the atmosphere it creates in the arctic sequences, while the themes of thwarted ambition, stubbornness and coming of age aren't overplayed.
A really lovely little film, criminally overlooked in favor of more expensive CGI efforts.

[Tiplodocus]

TOMB RAIDER - the recent one with Alicia Vikander.

A couple of neat and suspenseful sequences aside it's pretty run of the mill stuff. She just gets thrown from one scene to the next to an extent where you get the feeling she isn't in control of any of the action - needed to be more proactive. Hell, it's even the drunken sailor proposes and sets up her initial escape from the baddy's camp. It looked like they were hoping she'd be more proactive in the sequel but that's not likely is it?

Dominic West spends seven years in cave and still comes out looking like a quick wash oh his hair with head and shoulders will make him look all handsome again.

More like TOMB SHITTER.