Dimension X

If you're "such a DC fanboy," how come it took you 13 (?) years to finally watch Smallville?

Ash Ketchum

So far, my favorite first-time viewing for the challenge is the astounding female-dominated western, WOMAN THEY ALMOST LYNCHED (1953), starring Joan Leslie and Audrey Totter as battling femmes in a border town straddling Arkansas and Missouri during the Civil War. Totter plays Kate Quantrill, wife of the notorious renegade Colonel Quantrill, and she's even more of a vicious killer than he is. Quantrill is played here by Brian Donlevy, who also played him in an Audie Murphy western two years earlier (KANSAS RAIDERS). Other famous outlaws on hand: Jesse and Frank James and Cole Younger. Leslie and Totter have a catfight in a saloon and later a quick-draw gun duel on the town's main street. And that's only half-way through the film. There's more in store for BOTH of them. JOHNNY GUITAR has nothing on this film.



My favorite repeat viewing is Walter Hill's TRESPASS (1992), which I last saw in a Times Square theater on a cold January night in 1993. What a lean, mean, down-and-dirty crime picture this is. And it's all character-driven, not plot-driven. Nobody does anything outside of the laws of physics. Everything is thoroughly plausible. How many action films can you say that about in the last 30-odd years? And all shot on location in a massive abandoned cotton mill in Atlanta. Now it makes me want to dig out such other Walter Hill favorites for this challenge, like JOHNNY HANDSOME and EXTREME PREJUDICE.

Trevor

Too much stuff too little time. But also, I like to wait until shows are completely finished before starting. Plus I have a 'save the best for last' thing. I'm pretty weird.

shadokitty

There's an interesting show about snipers on H2 right now.

BobO'Link

If that's "pretty weird" then I'm in the club! I do the same thing with TV shows, movies, comics, novels, music, food, well... pretty much everything. I use the challenges to help me force myself to get to those "best" films/shows.

LorenzoL

Snake in the Eagle's Shadow (1978) and Drunken Master (1978)
These two movies are always on the top 10 list of must see Kung Fu movies and for good reason. Jackie Chan is at his best in both movies, fighting off Hwang Jang Lee with a big assist from Yuen Siu-tien. Both movies share actors but they are good in their own right.
I watched "Snake in the Eagle's Shadow" in a crappy version online at Veoh and my Sony DVD of "Drunken Master" needs to be replaced as its missing part of the Cantonese track and its saddled with dubtitles. Rumour is that Twilight Time will be releasing both movies on Blu-ray and if they are done properly, it will become a must buy for Martial Arts fans.

My Wife is a Gangster (2001)
A Female gangster needs to find a husband in order to fulfill her dying sister's wish. This Korean movie is surprisingly funny and has some nice action scenes.

Millionaires Express (1986)
I'm not sure what type of movie Sammo Hung wanted to make for this one but it's a crazy combination of western, comedy and martial arts movie. Countless of HK/International actors are also present in this movie. The whole spoof with Wong Fei Hung is great with Jimmy Wang Yu. It has a great end fight but this one works more like a comedy.

Wheels on Meals (1984) and Dragons Forever (1988)
The former is the second collaboration onscreen of Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung and Yuen Biao while the latter is their third and final film collaboration. These two movies are also present in any Top Ten list and one of the main reasons is the fight between Jackie Chan and Benny "The Jet" Urquidez in both movies. It's a must see!!!
I like "Wheels" more than "Dragons" as in the latter movie, the trio goes against their usual roles. Jackie plays a playboy/lothario lawyer while Sammo actually gets a chance to romance a lady. Yuen gets the role of a idiot/crazy one. They seem to have a lot for fun in "Wheels" and shooting in Barcelona brings an exciting aspect to the film.

Watched both movies on the HK Blu-ray (Kam & Ronson) versions. The PQ are not great since it looks to be upscaled version and not true 1080p versions.

sleepyhead55

I'm going to watch this today. Thanks for the good review in advance.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

I liked watching that with Dead Presidents and Set It Off. Judgement Night too, which would make a better double feature than the other two. Those two make a good make a good double feature if you're in the mood for bank robberies.

I liked the dialogue in Pulp as well but the big chunks of dialogue that got cut really went on too long. I don't think I've seen Slevin yet but I'm pretty sure I have it around here somewhere.

LJG765

With this one, it's more the spraying blood where there is more blood than would be in a human body when someone's head is cut off or arm/leg/anything that sticks out. It just seems gruesome to be gruesome and not to really add something to the film. Having not watched a lot of the films Tarantino is playing homage to, perhaps that is part of them? But yeah, being unrealistic will make a film easier to watch sometimes, but it kind of depends on what they're emphasizing past reality.

I'm actually a small fan of b movies where the scary bits are funny because of the bad acting or costuming or over reactions. I grew up on MST3K and usually can find something humorous about movies like that... And it's not like I was scared or upset during Kill Bill at all, it just kind of turned me off with the over the top violence and gore. I like a purpose to my violence and gore, dang it!

shadokitty

Being in the mood to continue my comic tv watching, I just finished one of the initial bonus features on Season 1 of Teen Titans, about the creation of them as a whole on paper and on screen.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

Alien from L.A. was awful but was way different than what I was expecting it to be.

Ash Ketchum

I wonder which edition of this you saw. There are several different versions. I have three different editions myself, one on VHS, one on HK import DVD, plus the Dragon Dynasty DVD which is called SHANGHAI EXPRESS. The last one is the most complete, but it has a "Deleted Scenes" extra containing scenes that are included in at least one of the other versions, yet the main film is still longer than the other versions. Plus I saw it on the big screen in Chinatown in the late 1990s in yet a different cut. Either way, it's a wonderful film. My big lament is that they shot so much more footage with a whole bunch of HK stars who all wound up on the cutting room floor. Yet they were all invited to the premiere, thinking they were all still in the film! We find this out in one of the interviews on the DD disc. Plus Bey Logan gives a great audio commentary. The film reminds me of IT'S A MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD more than anything else and it could use a MAD WORLD-type restoration.

Dimension X

Too much stuff makes sense. I haven't watched Agents of SHIELD or Agent Carter yet, but I am keeping up with The Walking Dead, Arrow, The Flash, Gotham, and Constantine. Smallville was just about the only game in town back when it started.

BobO'Link

Last night I watched (again) the 1941 version of The Maltese Falcon. It was *very* interesting viewing this version so soon after a first viewing of the 1931 version. Much of the dialog (a significant portion) is identical and other scenes are close enough to almost make the 1941 feel like it used the same shooting script. Since the two films are so close in dialog and scene I did a bit of research which indicates the 1941 version began as a rewrite of the 1931 version and the dialogue for both films is often taken verbatim from the novel. Most differences are due to the 1931 version being Pre-Code while the 1941 version had to conform more. Today those "lewd" moments excised from the 1931 version, and that kept it from being re-released, are rather tame. After reading that the 1941 film began life as a revised version of the 1931 film I don't believe the commentary track which said Huston wrote the script with Bogart in mind. That also is further disputed with reading the Sam Spade role was intitially offered to George Raft who turned it down as he didn't want to work with the inexperienced John Huston directing.

After watching the film I did something I rarely do which is to watch again and listen to the commentary. This one was provided by Bogart biographer Eric Lax. Before I comment further I must quote a review here on dvdtalk:
Yes, he shed light on many production aspects with lots (often way too much) background information on the actors. It might have been interesting but it sounded like he was reading a essay rather than just talking about the film "off the cuff." I found it quite boring, as his delivery is "flat" with absolutely *no* inflection, and fell asleep on it after about 30 minutes. Before nodding out I recall thinking I'd rather just read the essay than hear it delivered in such a sleep inducing manner. Commentaries like this are why I normally ignore them.

BobO'Link

So I'm looking over the unwatched pile to decide what to watch next but get distracted looking for my Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet 100 episode collection from Mill Creek. This causes me to discover (re-discover? find? run across?) the Mill Creek "Greatest Mystery Classics: 100 Movies" set I'd picked up at WM some time before *last year's* (or was it year before last?) challenge and forgot. It looks to have *lots* of good titles. Oh well... at least it also works next month too so that takes *some* of the "gotta watch 'em all this month" pressure off!

shadokitty

I've got my Warriors set that works for both Challenges myself. I've been in a bit of a rut lately, and have been having trouble deciding what to watch. So much, but don't know what.

shadokitty

All day today, I've been turning something on, then turning it off. But I think I figured out my problem. One of our boxers has a stomach bug, and I've been worried about him.

Trevor

Someone should have told me it was more like X-Files with 'teens' than the soap opera all the previews I saw made it look like. I'm sure it won't be like this all ten or whatever years, but we're loving it so far.

Dimension X

I remember people complaining online about the freak-of-the-week episodes in the early seasons. Different strokes...

I watched The Legend of Hercules (2014) last night, expecting to dislike it, given all the hate I'd seen for it online, but I actually didn't think it was bad at all for the type of film it is. I'm sure my lowered expectations helped, but the 3D, which was used to good effect throughout the film, helped a lot, too. Godzilla (2014), on the other hand, for which I've seen mixed reactions online, just sucked. I'm not sure if 3D could help that one or not.

shadokitty

Got an early start today by watching an episode of CSI. While I don't know much about the spin off series', I always kind of liked the original. It's one of the few modern day crime dramas I'll watch, next to the Law and Order franchise.

Ash Ketchum

If you want to get an accurate sense of what Manhattan looked and felt like in the 1970s, there are three films that fit the bill: SHAFT (1971), ACROSS 110TH STREET (1972), and TAXI DRIVER (1976), all three of which are eligible for this challenge, along with such other great New York movies of that time like REPORT TO THE COMMISSIONER (1975). Forget ANNIE HALL.

I've revisited SHAFT and TAXI DRIVER often enough over the years, but last night I pulled ACROSS 110TH STREET off the shelf and watched it for the first time since seeing it in a theater in April 1973 (I stayed to see it a second time back then). Talk about down-and-dirty, tough, gritty, lean, mean New York crime pictures. And fast, too. It's as good as I remember it. Starring Anthony Quinn, Yaphet Kotto and Anthony Franciosa, it's filled with great local actors of the time, including a couple of people from PUTNEY SWOPE, Antonio Fargas and Joe Fields, not to mention Ed Bernard, Paul Benjamin, Richard Ward, Gil Lewis (later the King of Cartoons on "PeeWee's Playhouse"), Marlene Warfield, Arnold Williams, and, in an early role, Burt Young, pre-CHINATOWN, pre-ROCKY. Most of it takes place in Harlem.


The theme song, by Bobby Womack, was later used in the opening of JACKIE BROWN.

Side story: on the way to see this film back in '73, I almost got mugged. A gang of punks watched me pass them on the bridge over the New York Central railroad tracks in the Bronx and sized me up as an easy mark. As they approached, I ran into two friends coming up the street from the opposite side. One of them was the local karate instructor (who'd been inspired to learn martial arts after watching Bruce Lee on "The Green Hornet"). I pointed out the miscreants tailing me and the would-be muggers stopped in their tracks, turned tail and fled. Talk about life imitating art. (Or is it the other way around?)

shadokitty

I just temporarily lost my main internet access as the phone cord to my modem broke. That means no Roku, and need to use my phone for Netflix, Hulu and Amazon.

shadokitty

Crisis averted. I found a spare phone cord on an unused DSL filter, so my modem is working again.

BobO'Link

Last night I did a mix of stuff, starting with Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay. I went into it not expecting much as I didn't much care for the original film (I purchased both from BL for under $3). I got about what I was expecting. There were a few laughs but mostly I felt it was trying for laughs using foul language and body function jokes. Surprisingly it actually seemed to have a plot, I don't recall one in the first film, and that helped. It was the typical Teen Summer "R" rated film aimed at the "PG-13" crowd. At least it's no longer in the unwatched pile...

That was followed by a couple of Basil Rathbone "Sherlock Holmes" films. They redeemed the evening!

shadokitty

I just finished Rebirth of Mothra. The fact that it is geared toward children is evident, both in the prominence in the movie of the 2 children, and also in the strong environmental message. After close to an hour though, when the kaiju showed up, at least in my mind, the movie got better, as it did have some nice kaiju battles.