asianxcore

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

inri222

About Schmidt - 2.5/5

A man retires after 32 years of working for an insurance company. After being home for a while, he soon realizes that due to his repressed emotions he leads an empty and unhappy life.
Another overrated film about midwestern dysfunction from critical darling Alexander Payne that tries too hard at getting the viewer to empathize with the lead character and fails.

Vipper II

After Hours

Such a great movie, and one that's rarely discussed when Scorsese is brought up. I really wish he'd do another dark comedy someday.

joe_b

Mysterious Skin - Excellent (though extremely dark) film dealing with the long-term ramifications of child molestation. Joseph Gordon-Levitt was fantastic here.

Punch-Drunk Love - PTA veering a bit more into arthouse quirk. Thoughtfully put together... liked it, didn't love it.

Julie & Julia - Sweet, but I think a straight up Julia Child movie with Streep and Tucci might have been better (though I welcome seeing Amy Adams in just about anything).

I find it an odd coincidence that I randomly watched these three movies back to back for the first time and they all feature Mary Lynn Rajskub in a supporting role.

Inhumans99

Alligator (if ever a man vs beast/nature film needed to see a Blu Ray release this is the one, c'mon, you have Robert Forster and Robin Riker participating in a film that is written by John Sayles, so it is almost a tragedy that Lake Placid received a blu release before this wonderful film...a rare horror type film that even my mother likes, she roots for the alligator, mostly, as she is still glad the main characters survive).

inri222

Scenes from a Marriage - 5/5

Ingmar Bergman's deep look into the disintegration of a 10 year marriage. Another stunning Bergman masterpiece that should be seen by everyone.

Inhumans99

Godzilla (2014)

inri222

Showgirls - 1/5

A young woman with a shady past, heads out for Las Vegas to peruse her dream of becoming a dancer. Once there she eventually realizes that in order to survive she will have to become just as ruthless and deceptive as the people she despises. A big budget exploitation film with a flimsy message about how women are used in the entertainment business. Horrible in just about every aspect it and worthy of zero stars, it gets one for the nudity.

inri222

Battle In Heaven - 4/5

A middle aged chauffeur for a wealthy Mexican general, kidnaps a child for ransom and winds up accidentally killing it. Overcome by guilt he confesses his crime to the general's daughter with whom he is in love with. The daughter who is half his age and works evenings as a prostitute recommends that he go against his wife's wishes and turn himself in. A good film that delivers a scathing critique on social class and religion in Mexico. The film pulls no punches and is at times difficult to watch due to the explicitness of its subject matter.

My Other Self

Blended -- 2.5/5
Draft Day -- 3/5
Neighbors -- 3.5/5

joe_b

Wonder Boys - This always looked like a film I wouldn't care to miss. Over the years, I've heard it described in such poetic terms as "It's like a comfortable pair of slippers." or, "It's like a great novel you appreciate more each time you revisit it." I'm betting some of those people were lit majors. Personally, once was enough.

The Lookout - Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays a young man suffering from various mental impairments after a traumatic car accident. Some local thugs plan to exploit his position as night janitor at a small town bank to break into the vault. Tight little thriller with a memorable supporting role by Jeff Daniels.

The Quiet - Melodrama with Camilla Belle playing a deaf girl (that might not be deaf) who spouts tiresome platitudes about life via voiceover. She moves in with her godparents after her father's death and discovers their seemingly bitchy daughter (Elisha Cuthbert) is hiding a dark secret. While the material is serious, the whole tone of the movie is just... off -- with some humorous results.

iNCREDiPiNOY

The Book of Life 3D - 5/5 - I loved the spanish accent. Musical and arts was classic!

The Boxtrolls 3D (Premiere) - 4/5 - It was awesome!

Jory

Gamera: The Giant Monster (1965)



And so my Gamera marathon begins. I've seen all twelve movies before, a handful of them several times; but I've never seen any of the original Japanese cuts of the original eight, only the terrible pan-and-scan English dubs. It's a minor revelation seeing Gamera in widescreen and with the original soundtrack. It's not a pimple on the ass of Godzilla, or even Godzilla Raids Again for that matter, but it actually feels like a real movie now rather than a complete fucking joke. Looking forward to the rest.

milos87popovic

Shawshank Redemption

hanshotfirst1138

Are the American cuts on the DVDs? Because the AIP versions of most of the Godzilla films are disappointingly hard to find .

Godzilla- Garth Edwards' reboot of the iconic monster is miles ahead of the maligned Roland Emmerich abomination, but probably still not the film many monster fans hoped for. The big G himself has very little screen time, and though Edwards' attempts at atmosphere are admirable, the smoke and dust blocking up the screen gets old quickly. Of itself, this wouldn't necessarily be a problem, but the human drama, though not incompetent, feels terribly perfunctory and one note. Though by and large well-cast, the actors are mostly underused Crantson, in a glorified cameo, does little besides scream, Ken Watanbe, who's apparently now Hollywood's go-to "Japanese guy" doesn't get much to do besides look very confused, Aaron Taylor-Johnson is rather uncharismatic, and Elizabeth Olsen, though pleasing to look at, gets little to do beside be the wife to go home to. Though the film tries mightily to create a new kaiju to spice things up, watching giant insects wail on the Big G, though not ineffective, has been done before, and the film feels too generic to satisfy, perhaps because of its giant budget. The cheesy charm of the rubber suit is still the real king. Still, seeing the King back on the big screen after an absence of nearly a decade is welcome.

Jory

I'm watching the Mill Creek Blu-rays, which only have the Japanese cuts.

Shout Factory released the films on DVD a while back, and they're hit and miss when it comes to including the dubs. I only have a couple of them, so I had to skim through DVD Talk's reviews to get the following info:

Gamera: The Giant Monster - Japanese only

Gamera vs. Barugon - Japanese only

Double Feature:
Gamera vs. Gyaos - Japanese, English (AIP), English (Daiei International)
Gamera vs. Viras - Japanese, English (AIP)

Double Feature:
Gamera vs. Guiron - English (Sandy Frank), English (AIP)
Gamera vs. Jiger - English (AIP)

Double Feature:
Gamera vs. Zigra - Japanese, English (Studio Not Mentioned)
Gamera: The Super Monster - Japanese, English (Studio Not Mentioned)

arminius

Weird movie, the first for Jim Brown.

inri222

The Impossible - 1.5/5

Based on the true events of the Belon family from Spain (now the Bennets from England) who while on vacation in Thailand got caught up in the 2004 tsunami.
Awful heavy handed sappy racist film that focuses on European suffering and forgets about the Thai people except only when shown as corpses or doctors.

Dan

Godard's Goodbye to Language 3D.

What a load of shit.

EddieMoney

I really liked this film, but the last line of your review literally made me spit my coffee out.

inri222

A wealthy European family's vacation ruined by a pesky tsunami that killed a quarter of a million Asians, how unfortunate.
The more I think about it, the more it pisses me off. I'm lowering my rating from 1.5/5 to 1/5.

Jory

Gamera vs. Barugon (1966)



It's a movie of firsts: the first Gamera movie in color, the first one without an annoying screaming kid as a main character (a feat not to be repeated until 1995), the first one in which Gamera fights another monster, and the first one in which things start to get really weird. (Gamera fights a dinosaur thing that shoots destructive rainbows out of its ass.) It's probably the best of the original series and the best until Guardian of the Universe came along 29 years later. It actually reminds me of Godzilla '14, since the villain monster gets far more screen time than Gamera, who gets one scene in the beginning and another in the middle before disappearing until the final ten minutes. I wonder how much fanboy bitching would have been directed at this movie had the internet existed in 1966.

pacaway

oh good! I'm glad I missed it because I had to go bowling then!

JeffTheAlpaca

Adult World on Showtime

I thought it was funny and worth recording on your DVR if you have not seen it and even better since it was raining last night.

Jory

Stupid, stupider, stupidest. This movie's screenplay feels like it was written by a four-year-old. And yet I would be a hypocrite if I said that it sucks just because the screenplay is dumb, since I've enjoyed so many Godzilla and Gamera movies that felt like they were written by chimps. I guess all that matters is whether or not it's entertaining, and Godzilla gets the job done well enough. The characters are contemptible schmucks and a lot of the humor falls flat, but I actually found myself liking this stupid piece of crap simply for the spectacle of it all. Roland Emmerich certainly does Big Dumb Action far better than Michael Bay. Not exactly huge praise, but let's just say that the Blu-ray was worth the five bucks I paid for it and leave it at that.