Last movie watched...

[Spaceghost]

an interesting reaction to DRIVE - http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/oct/10/woman-sues-drive-trailer

Idiot.

[SmallBlueThing]

Cheers prof, i'll give that one a miss then!

SBT

[Professor Bear]

No no no, SBT, now you tell us why Wild Wild West was brilliant.  To do otherwise sends us mixed messages.

[SmallBlueThing]

I believe Wild Wild West starred Mr Wil Smith. Therefore i am unable to comply as i have never seen it.

SBT

[Ignatzmonster]

DRIVE. A glorious '80s pastiche that on occasion almost verges on parody. I'm sure there are films to better compare it to (and I've no idea if it does march to the Takeshi of a different drum) but the minimal dialogue and haunting sountrack had me thinking of THE HITCHER.

Well you can compare it to direct inspiration:


Walter Hill's, the Driver (1978)

Car chases. Minimalist filmmaking. Rarely-speaking, taciturn and un-named main character:

Ah Walter Hill. Gotta love the guy. Yeah a definite inspiration, though the action in Drive is criminal on criminal. I can see what you mean Eric about the eighties flick homage stuff being close to parody. It's there from the florescent pink titles. Also the plot is stripped down to practically nothing, and that kind of  makes everything feel almost mythic or unreal. Does that make sense? I have my doubts.

[Ignatzmonster]

an interesting reaction to DRIVE - http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/oct/10/woman-sues-drive-trailer

Idiot.

Well Drive is apparently an inspiration for all kinds of idiots.

http://www.avclub.com/articles/man-claims-drive-inspired-him-to-throw-hot-dog-at,63311/

[Professor Bear]

I believe Wild Wild West starred Mr Wil Smith. Therefore i am unable to comply as i have never seen it.

I say we sponsor SBT to watch a bunch of Will Smith films and then at length tell us only the good things about Wild Wild West, Independence Day, Bad Boys, Bad Boys 2, and Jersey Girl - a Kevin Smith film which for plot reasons goes to great lengths to point out that Will Smith is a great human being.
Just like I paid money that one time to see a man trampled into broken glass, I am willing to pay to hear someone give a logical defence against my conviction that anyone involved in making Bad Boys 2 needs to be publicly stabbed in the face.

[Tiplodocus]

I gave up on Bad Boys II after 10 minutes. And I'd thought Bad Boys had been passable filler.

But stabbing in the face is a tad harsh.

[SmallBlueThing]

Having recently received a ban from gallifreybase for jokingly suggesting (in a 'films you hate' thread) that anyone professing a liking for either Grease or The Blues Brothers should be reported to 'secret kgb assassination squads', as 'post cold-war they have little to do and stocks of radioactive poisons dont keep forever', i cannot possibly condone stabbing wil smith fans in the face.

Im sure that, 'joking or not, threats of violence are not tolerated'. I fully understand why dr who fans might not be able to tell the difference...

However, i will say that the only wil smith films ive seen are Indepence Day (boring and stupid) and I Am Legend (which wasnt as fun as the porno version I Am Cock, and that's saying something).

SBT

[Albion]

I dread the fact I still have The Spirit on my LoveFilm list!

You are right to dread that.
I saw The Spirit in the cinema and absolutely hated it. One of the worst films I have ever seen. I can't compare it to the comic as I've never read it but the movie was just stupid.

[Tiplodocus]

I've probably done a few similar jokey death critques myself in the past (probably even recently).

It's a tricky one - sometimes it can be very amusing to read but other times with less talented writers, it just sounds unpleasant and rubs off badly on us all.  So in an attempt to be consistent, I was thinking of pointing it out as harsh whenever anybody did it and maybe it would tone down.

But now I type all that it sounds stupid. 

So pretend I didn't.

[SmallBlueThing]

The Dead (2011).

Genre-savvy Earthlets will have been following this production for a while now, and will be aware of the horrendous trials undergone by the British filmmakers, while shooting in Africa. It's become somewhat mythic in itself, and were it an American film, or concerning itself with the supernatural, we'd be hearing that it was 'cursed', a la Poltergeist or The Exorcist.

Thankfully, this is a much more prosaic film, one that follows two characters (one, African star Prince David Osei, in a breakout performance) across Burkino Faso, trying to escape the shambling zombies who have overrun the continent (and maybe the world). Rob Freeman, our white American military mechanic is trying to get out- while Osei is looking for his son.

What follows is a road movie of sorts, shot against the stunning scenary of Africa, featuring locals as zombies and some of the most astonishing, breathtaking fx makeup sequences you're ever likely to see.  It's beautiful, classy stuff, devoid of humour and played absolutely for real- so avoiding any comparison with Romero's zombie epics, and going some way to rescue the genre after the shocking affrontary of bloody Shaun of the Dead and Zombieland. No corpses run here, they are most certainly dead not 'infected' and nobody thinks its ironic or hilarious- it's just a sweaty, gorgeously-filmed, very clever survival horror that might just be the best example of 'dead cinema' since Romero's Day of the Dead.

10/10, easily, and i recommend interested parties to look up the story behind its production, and prepare to be amazed and in the end heartened by the basic nature of humans.

SBT

[The Enigmatic Dr X]

Just watched The Box.

Vauguely unsettling for the first hour or so, then confusing, then lapsing into an unfair morality tale where the consquences of your decision to hurt someone innocent is that someone innocent of your decision is punished...

[Ancient Otter]

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy - real slow burner, demands lots of patience. Nice to see a good few familiar faces from British t.v. in supporting roles in amongst the big guns of Oldman, Hurt et al.

[Professor Bear]

But stabbing in the face is a tad harsh.

I rather hoped the extreme nature of the punishment would speak as to how seriously one should take the suggestion.  Clearly I was in err and apologise.

Having recently received a ban from gallifreybase

I am confused - the nature of your post suggests this was a punishment rather than a blessing.