Last movie watched...

[Spikes]

Dracula (Hammer 1958) on BBC2 last night.
Now I love me a bit of Hammer, and this is a 100% classic.


Also its was the (slightly) restored version, which I hadn't seen before.
Wasn't some additional footage found in a Japanese print a year or two ago?

I've heard that the Blu-ray release wasn't all it should be - in terms of the transfer, so it had put me off buying. Has that been corrected now, does anyone know?

[Mabs]

I saw The Prophecy was on last night, so I sat down to watch it. It'd been years since I watched it and was looking forward to some naughty angels getting up to mischief. But to my utter dismay I found that it was not Angels, but rather hormonal boys in Porky's!! Clearly the channel listed the wrong film.   

[NapalmKev]

I saw The Prophecy was on last night, so I sat down to watch it. It'd been years since I watched it and was looking forward to some naughty angels getting up to mischief. But to my utter dismay I found that it was not Angels, but rather hormonal boys in Porky's!! Clearly the channel listed the wrong film.   

Ha, me too.

I like Porky's to be honest but I've seen it so many times I just fell asleep.

Cheers

[Daveycandlish]

The blu-ray of Dracula is a thing of beauty - a lovely restoration - and I heartily reccommend it (the Japanese extra footage is only a few seconds though, so if you want it just for that... well that's up to you)

[TordelBack]

The Croods.  Some very nice, very funny, creature designs, maybe two decent gags, and the rest of the film didn't know what it was supposed to be at all at all.  It's really not a great sign when you wonder if a film is nearly over and it turns out to be the 45 minutes mark, but I got through it by imagining it was the prehistory of the world of the infinitely superior How To Train Your Dragon.

[Professor Bear]

Gravity - not much of a film away from the 3d effects, really.  I've missed all the hype about it so I don't know if it was supposed to be scientifically accurate, either, but given the premise I imagine this was a selling point, yet there was lots of inaccuracies or seeming inaccuracies that would distract anyone with a passing interest in space travel - though fair play only nerds are interested in the crowning achievement of humanity as a species and everyone else has a more healthy interest in football and who has the more ace mobile phone this week.  Like the Star Trek reboot, space is totally silent until several seconds later when it isn't, and rockets are prevented from accelerating by stationary objects in space - it's a mish-mash of whatever internal logic gets us to the next setpiece or glaringly obvious and pointless 3d effect, with the low point coming when everyone in the room started giggling at Bullock's emotion-tears floating towards the camera.
I've watched it, though - I just won't ever do so again and can't really see myself recommending anyone going out of their way to do so themselves.

Riddick - which is less pretending to be hard sci-fi and more pretending that Vin Diesel can act, but it doesn't pretend very hard and boils its appeal down to basic emotional triggers, panto-level baddies, and some glaringly obvious/cheap-looking FX shots, but for all that, it's an enjoyable romp as long as you don't keep reminding yourself that Diesel is a shortarse in real life so they're angling the cameras to make him look like a giant in almost every shot.  The McGuffin is pretty good in being held back to the third act as a kind of Checkov's Gun rather than an omniscient menace, the body count is surprisingly low and the ending avoids the usual Final Girl tropes of a badass wandering off into the sun, which seems a bit odd given the whole point of the film is some sort of reboot of the franchise to make it more about Riddick being a badass and less about grand space opera, but it's still enjoyable fluff that takes itself just the right amount of serious before going home.

[HdE]

Yeah - I said 'artlessly'. Because swearing IS big and clever. At least, it is in writing. It can be used to tell us something about the characters who do it, and it can add humour. Simply chucking an f-bomb into a sentence wherever you like isn't good enough, and these characters toss it around like schoolkids who have just learned the joys of effing and blinding without consequence.

Good observation!  As an old person I hate gratuitous swearing in media, but (for example) I love Deadwood.

We are friends now (you have been warned!)

You hit the nail on the head with the word 'gratuitous'. When profanity is splurged all over dialogue as liberally as it is in 'Elysium', the result is that it makes the movie difficult to take in. The excess of it adds nothing to the movie, and actually makes it feel like it's poorly written (which, for the record, I don't actually believe is the case.)

And here's a secondary observation: People don't generally swear like that in real life. Not unless they're uncommonly crass and brainless. Now, it's all well and good saying 'but the characters are crass and brainless'... but do you REALLY want to root for characters like that?

It's a 'do not do' in writing, as far as I'm concerned.

[Professor Bear]

I do agree that swearing, nudity, gore, and so on is often used with little consideration as to its narrative worth in various media, but saying people don't actually swear like that in real life is crazy talk - haven't you ever worked on a building site or a in a factory?  I've worked with many men who swear just as much as the cast of Elysium - if not moreso.

[COMMANDO FORCES]

You'd probably end up being sacked if you swore like that in factories nowadays.

[Ghost MacRoth]

Nah, you wouldn't!  Same as the whole 'you can't make sexist/racist/whatever remarks' without getting fired, when in actual fact, what is more likely is some folk will think you're a dick for saying something horrible, and then get on with their day. 

[JOE SOAP]

People don't generally swear like that in real life. Not unless they're uncommonly crass and brainless. Now, it's all well and good saying 'but the characters are crass and brainless'... but do you REALLY want to root for characters like that?

It's a 'do not do' in writing, as far as I'm concerned.

Best not come around my house– too much real-life going on.

I can't remember much harsh swearing that stood-out in Elysium for it to affect the all ready paper-thin story and characters. Probably could've done with a bit more real life purple language to liven up its so called future gangland L.A.

[COMMANDO FORCES]

Sorry Ghosts, we just did a respect and dignity course at our place and believe me swearing can get you the sack, not a one off incident but if you do it often enough in front of the wrong people, the process of a disciplinary will start. We have about 1400 at our place, from various nations and people have been shown the door for all sorts and that has included a manager for sexist comments.

The rule is, make sure you know who is in earshot before saying what you think 

[Ghost MacRoth]

Daaay-um!  That's harsh man!  Glad I work in an industry where we can say pretty much what we please!

[Professor Bear]

The problem is that the respect and dignity card works both ways - people in your work environment are just as likely to be accused of being unreasonable in asking someone who's sworn all their life to stop overnight, essentially putting one person's means of expression above another's seeing as swearing in some quarters is more than just punctuation, it's a deliberately-used form of expression and suppressing it opens you up to being accused of class snobbery.

Although I remember seeing a documentary about army training once, and that drill sergeant didn't half turn the air blue.  Seems to me he didn't need to be quite so coarse - it's hardly those lads' fault they don't know what they're doing, that's the reason they have a drill sergeant in the first place, after all.  He could have been a little nicer and created a more encouraging environment for them.

[Mardroid]

The Dark Knight Rises

The first Blu-ray I've watched on my new HD TV. It was actually leant by a friend months ago.

I think it's too long, but I liked it a lot. Not to the extent that I'm inclined to buy a copy for myself but it was good.