iNCREDiPiNOY

Kingsman: The Secret Service - 5/5

EddieMoney

Venus in Fur - 4/5

inri222

Falling Angels - 2.5/5

The daily lives of a dysfunctional Canadian family in 1969. Not a bad film, but I did not like the shift in tone the film takes from black comedy to melodrama.

asianxcore

Darkness: The Vampire Version (1993)
Savage Harvest (1994)

printerati

The French Connection (1971) on Netflix. This was the first time I had seen the film in its entirety, although I had seen the chase sequence in a film studies class years ago. It's a bit choppy, and the epilogue was a poor choice for the ending, but I enjoyed how unpolished and "real" everything felt. I'm curious to see how the sequel plays (which I have never seen a minute of, to my knowledge).

creekdipper

Draft Day.

Thought it would be too technical & wonky for my wife...boy, was I wrong.

Giles

Josef von Sternberg's 1927 classic Underworld

The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water / 3D

EddieMoney

ESPN 30 on 30: Without Bias

hanshotfirst1138

South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut- Released at the peak of the controversial show's popularity (When I was a kid, the content of the TV show was so outré that it was considered the end of civilization as we know it.), Trey Parker and Matt Stone's big-screen adaptation is as huge signpost for the tail end of the 1990s. Nothing and no one is sacred from their filthy social satire, though some of the shock value has diminished. Their nonstop postmodern smorgasbord of profanity and pop culture references is also a scathing social critique, and it is frequently hilarious, particularly the bizarre musical numbers, though the film does run out of gas a bit and its insanity grows a bit chaotic, the film's satirical targets spread so wide that the film is occasionally unfocused. It's also really, really, really, really funny though, and that's what matter, and damn are those songs catchy.

Kingsman: The Secret Service- "Subversive," my ass. Matthew Vaughn's "la cinema de 14 year old old boys" continues with this manic, ultraviolent, profane, decidedly postmodern English James Bond pastiche. Good performances (Firth is hilarious as a profane British gentleman), a few derivative action set pieces (The sustained long take is one of the most violent scenes ever granted a 15 R rating in the UK, apparently), and some funny jokes. But like Cameron's True Lies, there's an ugly edge to the "all good fun surface," the film's Bond references frequently tipping over into misogyny and nasty politics, contemptuous of the working class, activism, and good taste in a way which is simply adolescent, though the film seems to think it's somehow subversive. Sam Jackson is particularly hilarious as the bad guy with the lisp, though the film's self-referential sequences where the characters sit and talk about Bond flicks get tiresome quickly. And slow motion martial arts sequences haven't been cool since 1999. At least. Fast, and fun, but mean-spirited in places. Go ahead, tell me I should've turned off my brain and that I've over-analyzed the hell out of it. Apparently after X-Men, Vaughn is done with 35mm.

Mission: Impossible- Though narratively silly and frequently incomprehensible, this 1994 adaptation of the popular TV series is benefitted immeasurably by Brian DePalma's slick direction. His trademark gorgeous style means nearly every shot and composition is slick, every camera move is operatic, every set piece is bold and exciting, full of 1950s PI coats and slick architecture. The film also allows the director a window into all of his favorite themes: the fallibility of technology, the unreliability of subjective viewpoints, characters assuming fluid identities, and so forth. It's all pretty nonsensical, but it's sure stylish and exciting.

Mission: Impossible II- What the hell went wrong?! John Woo takes the helm of this second installment, also tailored to his particular obsessions, but whatever DePalma's film might've been, it wasn't dull. Woo's is boring in spite of his endless usual penchant for slow motion violence, lacking the grand operatic strokes of Hong Kong films, and Towne's script has none of the wit and sizzle you'd expect. A big gloss on the James Bond formula, mostly ultimately ending up feeling like an ego piece for Cruise. Should've been a blast, what the hell happened?

Mission: Impossible III- Why can JJ Abrams get this job with so few directorial credits? He certainly proves up to the technical challenges, and the script has a nice sense of awareness of genre conventions. But the film too often feels like a glorified TV pilot, the action scenes nearly all cut too quickly. Abrams compensates with his script, frequently twisty, but disappointingly not very witty. Serviceable for fans of blockbuster action fare, but I don't know, it just feels to me like it should have more punch. Nice escapism, but forgettable.

Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol- Ah, here we go! Bird Bird brings an animator's precise eye to every single shot, composition, camera move, and design element. The result is a film which looks gorgeous, a combination of silent movie rhythms, audacious set pieces, retro spy gear, and gorgeous 35mm and IMAX cinematography. The cast is mostly new this time too, and Simon Pegg brings a nice sense of humor to go with the film's thrills. Generic, thematically anonymous script, but Bird's dynamic direction is more than enough to compensate. Super-slick fun.

inri222

Cleo from 5 to 7 - 4/5

Two hours in the life of a superstitious hypochondriac singer as she awaits the results of an exam that will determine what is causing her abdominal pain.
Within those two hours we see how a spoiled selfish woman becomes humbled when faced with her own mortality. An early gem from the French New Wave.

inri222

American Sniper - 1/5

Badly made patriotic pornography.

OldBoy

Birdman...

iNCREDiPiNOY

The Duff - 3/5 - It was okay. Saw lot of cast & guest at the premiere.
Fifty Shades of Grey - 4/5 - My 3rd times viewing from pre-screening.

inri222

Street of Shame - 4.5/5

The lives of five prostitutes working in a brothel and the threat to their survival by the government who wants to make their profession illegal. For his final film, Japanese master Kenji Mizoguchi abandons the period pieces and goes back to the familiar territory of his earlier films. Completed right before his death, he leaves us with this great film and as always at the top of his game.

printerati

It would be impossible for me to hate myself this much.

Inhumans99

Walk Of Shame (HBO) - it is a one star film, but I actually enjoyed it more than I thought I would. There were some truly funny lines in the film.

inri222

Amour - 4.5/5

The lives of an elderly couple are changed forever when the wife has a stroke and the husband decides to devote himself to caring for her.
A well made, eye opening and sometimes frightening film that makes us think about our own mortality.

hanshotfirst1138

Cloverfield- Though directed by Matt Reeves and written by Drew Goddard, this Bad Robot production has the fingerprints of JJ Abrams all over it. A gimmicky premise-it's The Blair Witch Project meets Godzilla-mixed with some antsy teen drama, the rattling shaky cam style gets tiresome quickly, though the film's central creature is a cool creation when you can actually see it and it's exactly the right length for a B-movie. Fun, but not much more than the sum of its parts.

DJariya

Youngblood (1986)


This recently aired on Encore Action. Watched this for the first time since 1986 or 1987. Predictable as hell and pretty by the numbers sports movie.

Cynthia Gibb was cute as hell in this and she was only 23 when this movie was made.

printerati

The French Connection II (1975) on Netflix. For better and for worse, it's a much more polished film than the original, featuring a noticeably better performance from Hackman due in no small part to the range of emotions required by the script. Editing is also noticeably improved from the original, although it does drag in the middle due to the amount of time spent on Doyle's recovery. I didn't care for the endings of either film, this one because of how abrupt and convenient it is, but both films as a whole are very enjoyable for different reasons.

OldBoy

St. Vincent...mildly amusing, very mildly. just didn't really click with me. didn't buy any of it, the disposition, the tight little bow, even his accent. too bad as i love Murray.

hanshotfirst1138

The Lady From Shanghai- Orson Welles noir film, which as is typical of the director's movies, got hacked to death by the studio to the point of being incompressible in places. Like much of Welles work and noir of the period, it's heavily influenced by expressionism, the whole film shot in shadows and low angles on exaggerated and stylized sets. A number of interesting pieces unfortunately unable to cohere together because of the studio interference, you wind up looking at the individual elements instead of the whole, and the film can't reconcile the tonal inconsistencies. The final shootout in a funhouse hall of mirrors remains a classic film noir touchstone, if only the rest of the film lived up to it.

Candyman- Bernard Rose's adaptation of a Clive Barker short story, which transplants the usual Gothic horror trappings into a decidedly urban environment, resulting a surprisingly effective blend of inner city urban legends and Gothic horror. Tony Todd steals the shows as the monstrous hulking titular character, and the screenplay's connection of past atrocities with contemporary poverty is a surprisingly smart idea, while the film never skips on the gore. A nice spooker with a refreshing side of intelligence.

inri222

Two Drifters - 2/5

A woman who is obsessed with wanting to be a mother, breaks up with her boyfriend for refusing to get her pregnant. Once he is gone, she becomes mentally unstable and claims that she was impregnated by her neighbors recently deceased son who happens to be gay. This strange film from Portugal starts out good and then becomes unbelievably silly. Damn shame.

JimRochester

Nightcrawler = I'll agree that Jake Gyllehall's performance is amazing. He is so creepy though it tempers the entertainment value throughout. Good movie but he is an anti-hero willing to use and abuse everyone to get the story.

inri222

Cloud Atlas - 1/5

What do you get if you repackage Paul Haggis' Crash as a new age sci-fi film that tells six stories while bouncing back and forth through a 500 year span? An overindulgent three hour mess of a film with the same actors playing multiple parts in bad make up. This is what happens when you give three directors who made good films on modest budgets a bunch of money. The important thing is that we're all connected, right.