Last movie watched...

[Professor Bear]

The most surprising thing about Devil Inside is that it is a real film and not a parody trailer.  Being aware of the sound arguments of an object existing in a theoretically infinite number of states until observed, I can allow that it might not be terrible, but the trailer makes it look terrible.

[Gonk]

It feels like I've watched more than just one film after seeing the "Man Who Fell To Earth". On one level it is a great science fiction yarn. From another perspective the film is an indictment of modern day society, morality and values. Then again it seems to be a film concerned with producing surreal imagery and montage, disrupting normal filmic continuity. Then in the last analysis it comes across as a film about David Bowie. Good stuff.

[HOO-HAA]

Got THE KILL LIST lined up for the player tonight, courtesy of those good people at Blockbusters and their free movies for 2 weeks deal 

[Emperor]

Got THE KILL LIST lined up for the player tonight, courtesy of those good people at Blockbusters and their free movies for 2 weeks deal 

When you've watched it nip over the the KL thread:

http://forums.2000adonline.com/index.php/topic,34347.0.html

[HOO-HAA]

Got THE KILL LIST lined up for the player tonight, courtesy of those good people at Blockbusters and their free movies for 2 weeks deal 

When you've watched it nip over the the KL thread:

http://forums.2000adonline.com/index.php/topic,34347.0.html

Oh, will do, Emp

Hey, you going to Bristol?

(Did I ask you that before?)

[HdE]

I watched 'Godzilla Vs Destoroyah' last night, and found it to be depressingly rubbish.

Now, I know that the rubber suits, naff acting and wonky script are all part of the charm of these movies. But this one just wasn't good enough at being bad, and indeed was sufficiently bad enough at being good, that it it wasn't even good enough to be so bad it was good.

Got that?

[Professor Bear]

Destroyah is one of the 1990s G-duffers, but the big fella melting did make my nephew cry, which I found greatly amusing. I also think the fake-out death of Godzilla Jr and the final image made for a great ending, just for a different era such as the Millenium series where G was allowed to be a total bastard again, as Destroyah's ending is essentially the humans knowing they've given it their best shot but they're fucked now, which is out of place in a film where Godzilla (and Jr) is an essentially benevolent creature.

[HdE]

My problems with Godzilla Vs Destoroyah are legion.

I mean, the film fumbles a lot of what should be its best key ideas. Destoroyah coudl be a really cool baddie if only it was developed a little more with a more satisfactory explanation of what it actually is. I don't think that's generally an essential thing for these movies, but in this case, it would have been appreciated.

Also, the whole 'Godzilla Jr.' thing wasn't very clearly handled - I wasn't left with a clear impression that he was alive or dead by the end of the movie, which bugged the hell out of me. That final shot is filmed in such a way that it risks the audience putting their own interpretation onto it, I think, when it should really spell the ending out.

Also: a beastie who's clearly intended to be as big a deal as Destoroyah was should really go down in a blaze of glory. Instead, he disappeared in a cloud of dust. A BIG cloud of dust, yes - but I expected more.

Ah well.

It's rare that those movies DON'T put a smile on my face. But I didn't dig that one.

[Van Dom]

Watching a lot of Japanese movies lately, in preparation of the move. (Every additional word learned is a bonus).
Retribution by Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Pulse) was very good. You might easily classify it in the J-horror/long black haired ghost category but theres luckily a lot more to it than that, its more a mystery thriller, as a cop investigating a series of murders, committed by different people but with the same m.o, starts to question his own sanity as he becomes more and more implicated in the crimes himself. It's a great story, well acted and produced. You can even overlook the long haired ghost cliche as the story doesnt hinge on it and its done in a much different way than usual.

Kaidan is a ghost story set in feudal Japan, directed by Hideo Nakata, of Ring fame. Nakata is usually pretty good and I've been looking forward to seeing this for years. It was quite disappointing though. The story was meandering and unfocused, it took way too long to get started and then didn't seem to have anywhere to go when it finally did. It was also very slow, but in a boring way, not a compelling way like Ringu was. Oh well.

Then there was Wife to be Sacrificed. A 70's.....porn film basically. This was a strange one. I put it on purely on spec, knowing nothing abuot it, and got a bit more than I bargained for. A bit too much. It's basically about this bastard who molested a child and was sent to prison when his wife reported him. Years later he gets out of jail and tracks his ex-wife down, kidnaps her and takes her up into the mountains to get his revenge. There's a lot of nudity and sex (fairly graphic), lots of hot wax torture, bondage etcetera. It is actually very competently made and the male lead probably has the 'honour' of playing one of the most dispicable, disgusting, horrible characters ever to appear on screen. But I have to say, when his torture techniques expanded to include forced enemas........yeah.............that's when it kind of lost me..... Fucked up shit.

[HOO-HAA]

Watching a lot of Japanese movies lately, in preparation of the move. (Every additional word learned is a bonus).

I went through a lot of Asian Horror about 5-6 years ago.

Some classics are the RING series (of course) and DARK WATER from Japan. The South Koreans excel too, with films like A TALE OF TWO SISTERS and DOLL MASTER (kinda J-horror slasher). There's THREE EXTREMES parts one and two as well, which are very cool little shorts. 

[Noisybast]

The thing that bugs me about the trailer for The Devil Inside is the utterly meaningless claim: "This film is not endorsed by the Vatican". So what? Neither was Yogi Bear. In my limited understanding, the Vatican is not in the business of endorsing movies, regardless of quality or subject matter.

[Spikes]

Seem to remember reading about the Vatican endorsing 2001: A Space Odyssey for some reason.
Anyways, it turns out they like a lot o' film -  http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/slideshow/vatican-endorsed-films-10953176
Who'd thought the Blues Brothers would have got the thumbs up?

[Gonk]

Did the Vatican endorse Finnegan's Wake? 

[Gonk]

Possibly one of the most divisive films of all times is Schindler's List.

                                               


Is it possible to turn the Holocaust into a subject for a film? Can the Holocaust only be truly spoken of by the victims who experienced it? Why is the film told from the perspective of a German? What was the final message of the film; as when it was released in 1993 such crimes against humanity where again being perpetrared in Bosnia, Serbia, Croatia, while Britain and America once again looked on and didn't act?

After watching such a film I do not know whether it will deter me from taking the path of least resistance.

[Professor Bear]

Schindler's List sanitised a lot so it could get a lower age rating.  Personally, I have a low opinion of making popcorn fodder of an atrocity, but that's just me.

Defcon 4, which takes the novel approach of having the blurb on the box be about a different film entirely.  I kind of understand why as the actual film is a bit shit, one of those countless 1980s post-apocalyptic films that just sort of wallowed in the cliches of the genre without bringing anything new to the table, and if it was made toady would have death scenes that last a half hour and lots of close ups of anguished expressions so that we can get right in close to the misery of othes.
Cannibalism?  Check.
Women treated like chattel?  Check.
Ramshackle feudal dictatorship from which characters must escape?  Check.
Promised land of some sort to escape to?  Check.
Pointless rubbish.

Star Trek: Final Frontier and Star Trek: Nemesis, to complete my tour of the crapper entries in the Trek filmic canon.  Final Frontier is still a guilty pleasure with some good ideas and fun character moments, and after the three-film Hero's Journey arc of Kahn, Search and Voyage, makes the sensible decision to get right back into the usual Trek business of high concept adventure, fistfights and Kirk being awesome.  Naked Uhura - for this iteration of the crew - is a stupid idea and always will be, but there's something just plain right about seeing a Trek romp where characters with chemistry get out and solve their problems rather than sit around moping like Nemesis does.  There's tons about Nemesis that's pretty great, like the occasional bit of banter between the cast, the space battle that takes up the last quarter of the film, the general production side of things and the nicely subdued ending, but there's a ton wrong, like little continuity niggles - such as beaming through shields, Worf's presence, the "Warbirds" - to bigger objective problems like the rape scene or Picard wussing out at the last minute even though just seconds before he was a homocidal maniac beating dudes to death with his gun - he wusses out, of course, so that Data can stink up the screen yet again with a death scene, forever being the single worst thing about the TNG movie outings as the writers shoehorn him into every bloody movie script while sidelining better characters as they labor to make him the new Spock despite working with a fraction of the novelty and none of the charisma, and it is saying something about Nemesis that I can still dislike it even when it kills the fucker off.