Last movie watched...

[Roger Godpleton]

MISSION IMPOSSIBLE 4. Really fantastic stuff. Going in, I wanted a fucking Brad Bird movie and a fucking Brad Bird movie is what I very much got. It feels like a live action cartoon in the very best way, showing up most other contemporary blockbusters for the empty (and frequently nasty) confections they are.

THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO 2K11. Definitely successful as an exercise in Fincherian atmospherics, with a good performance from Ronney Mara. But I really did not care for the frankly rote thriller that they were dressing up, and Daniel Craig's character was the most insufferable tool. Saw the twist from miles away.

[blackmocco]

THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO 2K11. Definitely successful as an exercise in Fincherian atmospherics, with a good performance from Ronney Mara. But I really did not care for the frankly rote thriller that they were dressing up, and Daniel Craig's character was the most insufferable tool. Saw the twist from miles away.

Didn't care for this at all. It looked sleeker than the Swedish version for sure but the changes they made to Lisbeth's character to cater to an American audience were just pathetic. I dunno. Waste of everyone's time.

[Mardroid]

X-Men First Class.

A very decent film, I thought. It did raise a disparity with the other films though.

[spoiler]I'm thinking mainly of Xavier losing the use of his legs at the end of this film that's set in the sixties. In X-Men Last Stand and X-Men Origins: Wolverine we see Xavier walking, and I'm sure those time periods were set after this film. It could be argued that what we saw in those films was in fact a mental projection, or that he actually did regain the use of his legs for a limited period. The latter is a bit of a stretch, mind.

Also, I guess the young lady with the diamond power who featured briefly in Wolverine, wasn't actually Emma Frost after all, although no doubt she was meant to be at the time. That kinda works though as she is only ever referred to by her first name in that film.[/spoiler]

Anyway, a good new film in the series, arguably as good as the first two if not better.

[James Stacey]

Planet of the Apes. The original one. My good lady friend gave me the blu ray box set of all 7 films for Christmas (which unfortunately means owning a Tim Burton film but we can ignore that) I'm never sure what quality a film is going to end up like on blu ray. Remastering can swing from pristine to down right ropey. Fortunately Apes looks damn swanky with a very good transfer. Hope the rest look as good. The film is still pretty excellent holding up well for its age, and the ending is still one of the best ever IMO.

[SmallBlueThing]

The Wicker Man remake, on 5* last night.

Obviously, since I'm a huge admirer of the sublime original, this is an abomination. Neil LaBute's dismissive attitude toward everything that made the proper film so good- notably the folk songs- is a matter of record, and yes, everyone involved with this balls-up of gargantuan proportions should burn in a wicker man of their own, for eternity. Even the rather saucy Leelee Sobriesky and the young Harry Osbourne/ Planet of the Apes man.

...but... and oh good grud, I hate to admit it, but... if you can somehow swallow your bile at the indignities heaped upon the original, if you can squint at it and pretend it's a film in its own right... if you can take it as a quirky Nic Cage thriller... then- oh the shame- it's not bad. Yes, it has him dressed as a bear punching a woman, yes he manages to deck several women over the runtime (including the aforementioned Leelee, with a hilarious karate kick), yes he shouts "HOW'D IT GET BURNED?!?!" far too many times to be anything other than chokingly funny, and yes "ARGH MY LEGS!" is the single worst bit of extraneous voice-over ever dubbed onto film... but (and this is, to my horror, the third time I've seen it) I actually quite like it a lot.

SBT

[Greg M.]

Films wot I have watched recently:

The Harder They Come (1972)

Cult Jamaican movie starring Jimmy Cliff as the curiously amoral Ivanhoe Martin, a character based on the true-life "Jamaican Dillinger" of the same name. Ivan comes to Kingston with the vague intention of finding work and making a record (the titular track) and ends up a folk hero, drug dealer and murdering racketeer. Low-budget but very visually appealing (Jamaica in the early 70s is a pretty vibrant looking place), with Cliff great as the permanently untroubled Martin, a man who seems to approach the business of shooting police officers with the same kind of casualness he applies to fixing bicycles or singing. I'm no special fan of reggae, but the soundtrack is unmistakeably a strong one, the title song having wormed its way into my brain. I needed the subtitles on to fully decipher the Jamaican patois, mind you, but that's no hurdle to enjoying a great movie.

The City of the Living Dead (1980)

Lucio Fulci's zombie classic, brought out for a recent rewatch. It's a toss-up whether it's this or 'The Beyond' that's the high-water mark of Fulci. While it's often suggested that 'City...' has no plot, that's a far more valid assessment of 'The Beyond' - 'City...' actually has an extremely straight-forward plot, it's just that there's absolutely no logic to anything that happens. However, this is in fact a positive – the atmosphere is absolutely top-notch, Fabio Frizzi's soundtrack is a corker, and there are some genuinely unnerving moments. The subterranean dead in Father Thomas's tomb are outstandingly creepy and the whole 'underground' sequence is visually glorious. Great fx and make-up work – Giovanni Lombardo Radice getting a drill through his head is the best known, but there's a whole host of wonderfully revolting brain-squishing moments. Unfortunately, the last 15 seconds make absolutely no sense, and are knocked into a cocked hat by the ending of 'The Beyond' (which, admittedly, has one of the greatest endings to a horror movie ever.) Nonetheless, 'City...' is pretty much everything I want in a movie – Fulci made plenty of films, but his 'golden age' work of 1971-1981 is unbeatable.

[Keef Monkey]

Since it's not really xmas without Bruce Willis shooting people (and Die Hard wasn't to hand) me and my paw watched Last Man Standing for the first time. Very stylish, with some nice bang bang shooty stuff (I especially liked how bullets propelled their victims to John Woo degrees) and Willis does that sort of thing so well that it was a good night in.

On a different note, me and Bea watched Easy A which was way better than the chick flick nonsense I'd feared. It's very self-consciously post-Juno, but the script is witty enough to not suffer mcuh in the comparison and the performances were all likeable (Emma Stone is veeeeeeeeery cute).

[radiator]

I'd heard good things (and John Hughes comparisons) about Easy A, but found it a bit cringey when I tried to watch it a few months back and so it didn't last long before I gave up on it. I should probably give it another go. Don't mind the odd chick flick so long as they're well written, and there aren't many that are.

Watched Titanic for the first time in about ten years last night as it was on telly. Was struck by how hammy it all is. So many unintentionally hilarious moments, and the script is painful at times. Some of the performances are ludicrous (Billy Zane) and there's zero chemistry between Dicaprio and Winslet - she looks about twice his age!

Then we watched The Lion King, which I'd got my gf on Blu ray for Xmas. I was astonished at how amazing it looks in hd - sumptuous and crisp with gorgeous colours,  probably only ever seen on VHS before now and was pretty blown away by it.

[Mardroid]

Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Another great film! I've been fortunate with my DVD haul for Christmas. (The weakest was probably X-Men Origins: Wolverine, and I liked that too... although I suspect I'm in the minority there.)

I felt a bit like kicking myself part the way in suddenly realising the subtitle track was off and we could actually 'read' the signing,  but I don't think I missed that much.

Anyway, a strong film which took a familiar concept but did something a bit different with it. That being said there are similarities with Conquest... (or was it Battle..., I get those mixed up?) but this had a more real-world realistic setting. I like both in different ways though.

Anyway. Great film.

[Tiplodocus]

Clan Tips enjoyed this clumsily titled film as well, Though disappointed that pretty much the whole film was given away in teh trailer, it did twist and turn enough to keep me entertained and engrossed. Truly superb work from weta to make the apes so sympathetic.  Some nice bits of side story telling going on as well (the plague, the space mission). And the confrontation on the bridge was great.

Probably the main thing I disliked was that it removed the paradox from the original films.

[Eric Plumrose]

Even "Take your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty ape!" is shoehorned in to good effect. Too busy groaning, I was caught completely offguard by that what happens next.

[HdE]

Saw the anime sci-fi racing movie 'Redline' last night.

Jeepers. Over-rated. Although I will say it crammed an impressive amount of insanity and carnage into its running time.

Of course, when the film your racing suddenly throws a sub-plot at you concerning a rampaging radioactive monster called 'Funky Boy', you have have to either reach for the off button or just go with it.

[Roger Godpleton]

RotPotA needed more Phil Hartman.

[willthemightyW]

Captain America and X-men First Class on blu-ray (Christmas prezzies!) which I've seen before and really like, but I have a question, anyone else who owns First Class on Blur- ray or dvd, could you please tell me, does the audio occasionally drop out and get quieter for a few seconds, usually in scenes where the magneto theme is playing, and specifically the scenes when banshee is about to jump out the plane, and then the scene when he does. Any help would be appreciated, thanks!

[Spikes]

Good call on The Harder They Come, its been a while since i last watched it, so gonna have to give it a spin again. The soundtrack is a Skinhead reggae classic, brilliant stuff.

Anyways just borrowed from a friend, and thoroughly enjoyed X-men First Class . Im not a reader of the comics, nor a fan of the films, but was pleasantly suprised by this. At times i wasnt quite sure if i was watching a early James Bond, a Harry Potter, or a Austin Powers film, but it was a pretty enjoyable way to spend a hour and a half. Like i say, im not a fan of the whole X-men thing, but i would say its the best of the films released so far. Recommended.

could you please tell me, does the audio occasionally drop out and get quieter for a few seconds, usually in scenes where the magneto theme is playing, and specifically the scenes when banshee is about to jump out the plane, and then the scene when he does. Any help would be appreciated, thanks!

Just rewatched those scenes again to check, but didnt notice any sound drop on the dvd.