Last movie watched...

[Definitely Not Mister Pops]

Fast Five
Started watching before I realised it was a Fast & the Furious sequel, which was of course obvious in not very far hindsight. As big dumb action films go it was great, bit of bank job type thing about it which is always good and of course loads of mental car chases/crashes, while trying to outdo the Blues Brothers for cop cars smashed up. It didn't, but then what could? 

Most cheesetastic non-sensical line from Vin - "You ain't in America no more. This is BRAZIL!!!" Ummm...

As Fast & Furious films go it was pretty good too really. Extra laughs from Dwayne thingy (The Rock) being in it too. Oh, and the guy that was Bucho in Desperado as the bad guy 

I bloody love that silly, stupid, wonderful film. The Rock's super shiny arms has to be one of the best sight-gags in any movie ever.

21 Jump Street. The remake. For the most part it was a a bland movie with some cringey meta-humour about the old show, but the suprise [spoiler]appearance of Johnny Depp was quite funny.[/spoiler]. If'n I were you I'd just look at that spoiler, I don't think it's worth watching the whole film.

[Roger Godpleton]

I actually found Channing Tatum to be likable in that movie.

[judgefloyd]

just took a chance on John Carter and, as I said in the John Carter thread, was pleasantly surprised to find it a good fun flick.  Not timeless genius, but a good fillum all the same

[HOO-HAA]

WAZ (Although the 'A' doesn't have the stepladder bit in the middle). Very downbeat, hardboiled 'Seven-meets-The-Wire' type thriller, filmed mostly in my native Belfast. Very good flick if ruined only slightly by the fact that Melissa George - who I normally find to be very strong in genre films - was just a little too pretty and clean-cut to play the hardened female cop. Also, I could see the "twist" a mile off.

[JamesC]

The Hunger Games.

I was sligtly disappointed in this. I enjoyed the beginning and the ending of the film but thought that the actial 'games' themselves were a bit of a letdown.

My main problems being:

[spoiler]All of the contenders in the games were basically 'goodies' or 'baddies'. The baddies really enjoyed killing people and thought it was great fun were as the goodies were just total victims, never killed anyone and basically just hid in the bushes. A couple of times a character did something if backed into a corner (like the bit with the wasps and when the black guy killed that girl as revenge for killing the little girl).

Anyway, my point is that I thought the film was missing a character who was simply resigned to the situation and played the games simply to try to survive - not an evil character just someone resigned to killing for necessity who would do their best to win. If I was there I'd have been straight up a tree shooting passers by with arrows.

The film spent so much time making us believe in a society that would be prepared to do this to their children that it seemed strange that so few of the children - the products of said society - were prepared to do what was needed in order to win the game.

I realise that killing someone with your bare hands isn't an easy thing to do but they didn't even take easy opportunities - for example when the bags with the much needed supplies were left out, wouldn't you take more than one bag? Just as an easy way of scuppering another contestant?

My other main gripe was that they acknowledged the usefulness of camoflage early on and then pretty much ignored it for the rest of the film.[/spoiler]

I came away thinking that I enjoyed other films with similar themes much more than this - for example The Running Man and The Condemmned (with Stone Cold Steve Austin and Vinnie Jones)!
I'd rather watch a knowingly dumb action film than a wannabe intelectual thriller/social parable that misfires.

Reading this back it sounds like I'm being very hard on the film. I think it's something I'd probably enjoy more the second time once i've gotten over all the things that annoyed me about it!

[Professor Bear]

I approve that you don't mention Battle Royale, JC, which Hunger Games is in no way a copy of in any form whatsoever because the writer of the original novel went to very great lengths to state as much.

The biggest problem with Hunger Games for me is that it doesn't have a clue what it's actually saying about anything at all, it's just a copy of a copy of a copy of a staple plot from movies, comics, tv shows and cartoons, a pointless exercise guilty of the crimes it claims to be commenting upon.  The film, mind, at least makes it look nice.  I suppose you could argue that it's guilty of the sexualising trauma thing, but in modern cinema that is unavoidable and your choice is either like it or lump it.

The Muppets: funny without being cynical, aware without being smug, earnest without being patronising - no bullshit, I think this might be my film of the year (so far).

[Mudcrab]

I approve that you don't mention Battle Royale, JC, which Hunger Games is in no way a copy of in any form whatsoever because the writer of the original novel went to very great lengths to state as much.

Heh, that's exactly what I thought of when reading that and the vague snippets I've heard about it.

Seems to be popular though, made as much as John Carter didn't 

[JamesC]

I approve that you don't mention Battle Royale, JC, which Hunger Games is in no way a copy of in any form whatsoever because the writer of the original novel went to very great lengths to state as much.

I didn't mention Battle Royale because, although I'd seen it, I couldn't remember if it was any better, worse or on a level with Hunger Games.

[Professor Bear]

If it helps, all the things you list as problems with Hunger Games, Battle Royale avoids.  12 years ago.



Further to my comments about the author of the original Hunger Games novel disavowing all knowledge of Battle Royale, I am sure it is also total coincidence that the the sequel to Hunger Games - Catching Fire - covers exactly the same ground as Battle Royale 2.

[Mudcrab]

Well, it's not the first Japanese film to be copied as we all know 

I just watched Passion Play

It's had a bit of a slating it seems (just from a glance at IMDB, but you know...) . The kind of slating you'd expect of a film with Megan Fox as a girl with wings that gets whisked away from Rhys Ivan's freak show by Mickey Rourke. Also Bill Murray [spoiler]as a gangster that whisks her away from him in turn[/spoiler].

Anyhoo, I enjoyed it a lot. For me, the main metaphor (as I saw it) was as subtle as District 9's townships and given that, the ending was [spoiler]a bit of a suprise, if completely obvious in hindsight, but then I tend to accept things as they're happening in some films rather than revel in prediction. [/spoiler]

I can see why it could be hated, but I guess I was just in the right frame of mind for something quiet, weird and romantic. If it was done by Lynch it would have been weirder and possibly better, so a bit like Drive in that respect. Just a bit, it's nothing like Drive really, or as good, so don't take that as any indication.

[Professor Bear]

Well, it's not the first Japanese film to be copied as we all know

Never having seen Perfect Blue 15 years ago when it was covered by even the mainstream press, I think Black Swan is a very original film.

[JOE SOAP]

It's as much a rip-off of Battle Royale as BR's a rip-off of Lord of the Flies or Rollerball. I'd rather they made a film that's like Battle Royale than remake the original because it's not in Amero-English.


The same goes for Perfect Blue and Black Swan, very similar, yet different but both excellent.

[Roger Godpleton]

Black Swan is automatically better than Perfect Blue merely by not being fucking anime.

[Professor Bear]

Battle Royale's writer is very forgiving of the similarities and basically says that even if you don't buy into the notion of a collective creative experience channeling the same influences and thus statistically it's inevitable that people come up with similar end products from different starting points, the idea isn't actually an original one, and he then cites examples going back decades of similar stories in various media.  By contrast, the writer of Hunger Games is adamant that she got the story from channel-surfing between war coverage and reality gameshows and nothing else, and my comments derive not from the belief that she's lying but that this an oddly defensive and precious stance that is ripe for mockery.

It doesn't actually bother me that movies aren't original, otherwise I wouldn't keep going to see comic book films* or movies based on plays, tv shows or novels - but it's fun to take the piss, Joe.  Life is better for laughter.  Go on - pop over to the Trek Versus Babylon 5 thread and tell them B5 is a bit like Lord of the Rings done on an Amiga.  They'll love that.




* In which 90 percent of the time, the plot is about a superhero being pursued by authorities.

[Tiplodocus]

CLASH OF THE TITANS (1981)

Blimey, Ray likes to make things hard for himself. Three flying creatures, a mdeusa with a head full of snakes and multi limbed scorpions and Kraken.

It's still fun stuff if ever so slightly stiff. The Kraken is the biggest disappointment in this but the Medusa Temple sequence is simple but incredibly effective and tense even by today's standards.

Oh and nudity!

What's the remake like?