Last movie watched...

[Spikes]

Blade II - last night on 'telly. Forgot how much fun these films were - well, the first two anyway.
May have to invest in the boxset....

[Colin YNWA]

Well finally got around to watching Prometheus after all this time and while I'm conscious of not wanting to open old wounds (I avoided the old thread before it got locked to avoid spoiler... which i won't be hear by the way so stop reading now if you ain't seen it, but its reputation proceeded it and a bit of me fancies going to see how it turned into such fight) I fail to see how I can not pass comment on such a curious film. At times it teased with being good, it looked wonderful and there was the odd idea in there that was great, the odd scene that was genuinely compelling. All of which was Godlessly butchered by other moments of damn right ludicrousness, some scenes of bewildering silliness and over all very confused messages and themes.

As with reading books you each take out something different from your reading of a film but really this one I just couldn't pin down. Science seems to be well and truly lambasted at times, so does religion, yet the central  premise when broken down says very little of any worth about either. A creation 'myth' for the human race in no way undoes Darwinism as said by the biologist at the beginning... but then I think we're meant to hate him and his horrible death... oh spoilers but I suspect I'm the last person to see it who would really care. ... with the equally rubbish geologist ... is that meant to have a subtext, both abandoned and a lone, confused with no clue before hand. I think there could be things to think about, consider, muddled themes to work through but frankly I don't have the energy or desire to do so. At the end of the day for all its attempts at subtext and deeper meaning all I got from it was bio-weapons are bad and people gain a wonderful sense of their place in humanity when faced with the prospect of the Earth probably being about to be invaded by something that you don't really know, have barely seen but have been warned about by the character whose state of mind by this point was all over the shop... no even that was confused and not worth the effort...  maybe I got don't expect answers from your Gods in case you don't like them, or they turn out to be a big angry bear who woke up wrong side the bed... no how about if you're about to be crushed by a big rolling thing run to the bloody side ya numbnut, don't try to out run it dumbass... yeah defo got that from it.

And all the 'cute' illusions to Alien... were really bloody annoying. I mean either do it or don't all this playing with it. uh look this is from Alien isn't it... look you're getting the parallels here aren't we, look the set up is all the same not just the overall visual tone... oh cut it out... and that bit at the end with the proto Alien thingie, well that was just really irritating...

What a befuddled mess of a film... and yet a bit of me wants to watch it again just to see what is worth unpicking... I know if and when its on regular telly I'll record it and give it another go... I also strongly suspect resenting wasting another two hours of my life.

[I, Cosh]

I'd been looking forward to Only God Forgives, which I found very disappointing. There's no doubt it's a great looking film but everything about it is so mannered and stilted I rapidly lost interest. There's a stiffness about the performances which is clearly deliberate, given that it's manifest in everyone other than Kristin Scott Thomas who is the only one who gets to have any fun.

It's not as if I went in expecting something different. It's the OTT stylisation I liked about Bronson and I've even been know to stick up for Valhalla Rising's enigmatic staring, but this fell flat for me. Refn remains a director interested in making films rather than telling stories and hopefully some day he'll strike the right balance.

Out of interest, if anyone's seen this in the UK or US, is the Thai dialogue subtitled? I watched it in Switzerland and was able to follow most of it with a combination of the French and German subtitles they have here but I wasn't sure if I was supposed to as it seemed like the sort of film where they might deliberately leave it as is to push the sense of dislocation.

[I, Cosh]

And I enjoyed the discussion of DTV/ B movies. It's a bit late to join in but I'm broadly on Prof Bear's side and would like to submit Universal Soldier: Regeneration, which was easily better than 90% of the cinema released action or genre films of the same year, as exhibit X.

[Professor Bear]

Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning is pretty decent, too, though the occasional pretentiousness of it baffled and irritated me - I just want to see people get kicked in the head in a Van Damme flick!  Then the main character kicks someone in the head with their own leg and all is well with the world of STV head-kicking again.  Some very impressive one-take fight sequences, too.

Where the Sidewalk Ends - as recommended by our own Buttonman up t'thread a ways.  More cheap thriller than it is proper proto-noir, but some of the character work is great, like Karl Malden's ambitious lieutenant eager to stitch up the wrong man for an accidental killing and stumbling into the actual how and why of the death only because no-one around him wants to point out how daft his theory initially is, and Dana Andrews' rough piece of work copper who hates crims because of the daddy issues that are his eventual undoing.  The ending struck me as the makers looking to tell a story rather than just wallow in the cheap tropes of the genre as has become the norm of late, and thus was quite welcome.
Very enjoyable.

[Ghost MacRoth]

The Host.

That lass out of 'the lovely bones', and 'Hannah' once again shows her skills as an actress of worth, but other than that?  Tedious, overly sentimental horseshit.

[Link Prime]

The Host.
Tedious, overly sentimental horseshit.

The trailer didn't tip you off?

[Recrewt]

Well finally got around to watching Prometheus after all this time and while I'm conscious of not wanting to open old wounds (I avoided the old thread before it got locked to avoid spoiler... which i won't be hear by the way so stop reading now if you ain't seen it, but its reputation proceeded it and a bit of me fancies going to see how it turned into such fight) I fail to see how I can not pass comment on such a curious film. At times it teased with being good, it looked wonderful and there was the odd idea in there that was great, the odd scene that was genuinely compelling. All of which was Godlessly butchered by other moments of damn right ludicrousness, some scenes of bewildering silliness and over all very confused messages and themes.

I don't hate Prometheus, but then I don't associate it with the other Alien films.  I recall recently watching the documentary of John Carpenter's 'The Thing' and there was a comment in there where John said that basically he didn't want to do another 'guy in a suit' monster movie such as alien.  And that's the thing, Alien was hardly the most original, thought-provoking idea but it was executed to perfection.  It became so much more than the sum of its parts. 

Prometheus is the opposite though; it tries so hard and ultimately fails on every level.  It tries to include all these clever sub-plots and stories but doesn't even manage to keep the main story on track.  Unfortunately it is just a mess, worth a watch or two but that's about it.

[COMMANDO FORCES]

Just finished Killing Them Softly and found the death of one character rather interesting! He was shot in slow mo and one round went through his cheek and then to top it off, his head impacted a surface very hard and that was in slow mo as well. SPOOKY OR WHAT

[Ghost MacRoth]

The Host.
Tedious, overly sentimental horseshit.

The trailer didn't tip you off?

Never seen the trailer.  Try to avoid trailers where I can.  Although I did know it was written by the Twilight types, so knew to set my expectations low.  But I had to watch it for the lead actress as she's been good in other stuff.

[von Boom]

Tampopo (Dandelion) 1985 - A Japanese film directed by Juro Itami. Features a young Ken Watanabe in a supporting role. The film revolves around a truck driver that visits a poor ramen house and takes it upon himself to help the widow that owns the place improve her ramen and her life. Extremely good film with some strange, seemingly disconnected vignettes scattered throughout. If you can track a copy of this film down I would recommend you buy and watch it.

The Heat - In a word, bloody awful.

[I, Cosh]

Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning is pretty decent, too, though the occasional pretentiousness of it baffled and irritated me - I just want to see people get kicked in the head in a Van Damme flick!  Then the main character kicks someone in the head with their own leg and all is well with the world of STV head-kicking again.  Some very impressive one-take fight sequences, too.

I really liked Day of Reckoning, although I think I've got a slightly higher tolerance for artsy pissing around than you. I loved the way they'd decided that everyone knows what to expect from a Universal Soldier film so instead we'll have the first half be a vaguely trippy film noir kind of deal. That big fight scene in the sports shop where you gradually see Adkins coming to terms with what he is and what he can do is absolutely first rate action storytelling.

Plus I just love Dolph.

[Mabs]

Well finally got around to watching Prometheus after all this time and while I'm conscious of not wanting to open old wounds (I avoided the old thread before it got locked to avoid spoiler... which i won't be hear by the way so stop reading now if you ain't seen it, but its reputation proceeded it and a bit of me fancies going to see how it turned into such fight) I fail to see how I can not pass comment on such a curious film. At times it teased with being good, it looked wonderful and there was the odd idea in there that was great, the odd scene that was genuinely compelling. All of which was Godlessly butchered by other moments of damn right ludicrousness, some scenes of bewildering silliness and over all very confused messages and themes.

I don't hate Prometheus, but then I don't associate it with the other Alien films.  I recall recently watching the documentary of John Carpenter's 'The Thing' and there was a comment in there where John said that basically he didn't want to do another 'guy in a suit' monster movie such as alien.  And that's the thing, Alien was hardly the most original, thought-provoking idea but it was executed to perfection.  It became so much more than the sum of its parts. 

Prometheus is the opposite though; it tries so hard and ultimately fails on every level.  It tries to include all these clever sub-plots and stories but doesn't even manage to keep the main story on track.  Unfortunately it is just a mess, worth a watch or two but that's about it.

I had high hopes for Prometheus, and even after I watched it for the first time, I liked it. Not blown away by it, but I thought it was a solid science-fiction film with some great ideas. But having watched it again, all the faults which I tried to ignore first time round became more prominent. There were moments when I was literally cringing at some of the bad dialogue, and some shoddy acting from a few. And why one earth Ridley got Guy Pearce to play on elderly frail man, when there were a lot of elderly actors who could have played the part perfectly - I do not know. But amidst the poor decisions, there were some high points. The film looked bloody gorgeous especially on a big screen, visually it was impressive even if the script was not. The opening was breathtakingly executed, there was almost a chilling feel to it, a feeling of genuine fear and wonder when we see the Engineer atop the cliff as the sight of the mothership looms large in the background like a magnificent colussus.  Michael Fassbender's potrayal of David was excellent, especially the opening scenes of him going about his business. His obsession with Lawrence of Arabia/ Peter O'Toole was a nice touch too. I also saw a bit of H.P Lovecraft in the film, especially the 'At The Mountains of Madness' setting of the film; and the very Lovecraftian bigass tentacled face hugger at the end. There was some genuine tension in certain scenes, especially when the crew first enters the chambers. There's a feeling of foreboding just like the scenes in the original Alien when the crew enter the crashed ship. But....it's all let down by some poor decision making. Which is a big shame, as it had the potential to be a great film, rather than an average one which it is now.

And on this evidence all I can say to Sir Ridley, is to stay away from my beloved Blade Runner! It doesn't need a prequel/ sequel, it's perfect the way it is.

[Professor Bear]

All you need to know about Prometheus is what the makers have openly admitted in interviews: they had a finished script that was definately an Alien prequel and everyone was dead excited about it and the studio threw money at it until it was theirs.  Then they hired Scott and he sat the writer(s) down for three days giving them notes on how to change things - and what they couldn't put in this film, Scott would put in the two sequels.

Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning is pretty decent, too, though the occasional pretentiousness of it baffled and irritated me - I just want to see people get kicked in the head in a Van Damme flick!  Then the main character kicks someone in the head with their own leg and all is well with the world of STV head-kicking again.  Some very impressive one-take fight sequences, too.

I really liked Day of Reckoning, although I think I've got a slightly higher tolerance for artsy pissing around than you. I loved the way they'd decided that everyone knows what to expect from a Universal Soldier film so instead we'll have the first half be a vaguely trippy film noir kind of deal. That big fight scene in the sports shop where you gradually see Adkins coming to terms with what he is and what he can do is absolutely first rate action storytelling.

Plus I just love Dolph.

I don't mind artsy, but it's the sixth film in a series built on the premise of kung-fu steroid zombies beating each other over the head with pipes, and really doesn't benefit from extensively paraphrasing Sartre.

I did like the final assault on the UniSol base, though, where it's shot over-the-shoulder in lengthy takes so that the scene is mostly framed exactly like a videogame, or at the very least looks like Scott Whatsisface playing soldiers with his mates.

[Tiplodocus]

THE WOLVERINE and PACIFIC RIM.
Enjoyed both (Pacific Rim more so) but felt both were let down by the final quarter.  The central smack-down in PR is nothing short of gobsmacking and never dull despite taking up what must be a quarter of the film's running time.  Similarly, the Funeral and Bullet Train sequences in The Wolverine are good, inventive fun.  I particularly liked the fact that [spoiler]the Ninja army that take down Wolverine as he approaches the baddies castle are conveniently dismissed for the final confrontation. "Yeah, well done lads. Go home, Take a break put your feet up and crack open a tinnie (of sake). These handcuffs will keep him in place."[/spoiler]

Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec
Quite enjoyed this as well but felt there wasn't much to engage with the lead lass. Equal parts charming, quirky, funny and a bit pants.  Loved the Mummies.