Topic: "What Movies Have You Seen Lately?" Thread

[Quemaqua]

I wondered about that one.  Thanks for the recommendation... I'll have to check it out for sure now.

[Raisa]

Juno
superb. it's has great music, some very witty dialogue and most of all, it's immensely touching. the writing is top notch and the characters feel like actual people, which is no doubt helped by some great actors. it starts off small, but grows into something much bigger, with the relationships becoming fleshed out and the gradual insights we get into each of the characters.

i haven't felt as moved by a movie since amelie, or maybe eternal sunshine. it's bitter sweet in the truest sense of the phrase and i can't recommend it highly enough.

That's one of the very few movies out that i actually want to see. very tempting.

[beo]

i hate hyping stuff up for fear of disappointing someone, so please don't go into it with high hopes - but please do watch it. one of the few films i've watched where i just want to hit the play button again as soon as it finished. i'm watching it again now.

[Raisa]

hheh.. it had already caught my eye before you typed up your post... I've checked out the different clips online, read up on it... i'm thinking of getting a... copy... for now.. 

[Pugnate]

I saw Rush Hour 3. I wish it had been better.

[Xessive]

I saw Rush Hour 3. I wish it had been better.

It was not that good.. I actually kinda wish they stopped with RH2.

I watched The Ten, that was alright. Silly funny.

[Pugnate]

It was good to see those two together again. Tucker isn't aging well hehe..

But yea the movie should have had a better script.

[beo]

I watched The Ten, that was alright. Silly funny.

i've been wondering about this one, since it was directed by David Wain. i've recently become a fan of his thanks to the insane, yet quite hilarious Wainy Days series on youtube. so, you say it's alright, but would you actually recommend it, or not so much?

[Xessive]

i've been wondering about this one, since it was directed by David Wain. i've recently become a fan of his thanks to the insane, yet quite hilarious Wainy Days series on youtube. so, you say it's alright, but would you actually recommend it, or not so much?

It has a unique sense of humour. The cast just seems like a bunch having fun together and you get to tune in. I enjoyed it, but I can see how someone else wouldn't. I don't wanna hype it too much, but it's definitely a fun movie to watch especially with a group.

EDIT:

I just watched some of Wainy Days and I can see why they work so well together! hehe If you enjoy Wainy Days you'll like The Ten. It's just as ridiculous

[idolminds]

Sunshine

I liked it quite a bit. Its almost like Event Horizon, but not so flat-out horror stuff.

[Pugnate]

Watched "Stranger than fiction". I liked it.

It strived for greateness, but fell short of it. Was still enjoyable.

[KontrollerX]

I watched the movie Little Children starring Kate Winslet.

I thought it was going to suck.

I was wrong.

It is one of the most fascinating, deep, dark and emotionally powerful films I have ever watched about human nature.

One of the top five or ten films I've seen in my life.

[Quemaqua]

Never even heard of it.  You've got me curious, now.

[idolminds]

Stardust

I really enjoyed it. Very entertaining movie.

[Raisa]

I watched the movie Little Children starring Kate Winslet.

I thought it was going to suck.

I was wrong.

It is one of the most fascinating, deep, dark and emotionally powerful films I have ever watched about human nature.

One of the top five or ten films I've seen in my life.

It looked really intriguing, but the darkness kind of made me apprehensive to see it.  i saw parts of it but never sat down to see the whole thing.  Does it end really bad? 

[Xessive]

Stardust

I really enjoyed it. Very entertaining movie.

Stardust was great! It was a wonderful fairy tale I kinda enjoyed it more than Big Fish.

[MysterD]

Rescue Dawn -- Excellent movie. Definitely a must see movie; more story than action, as Deiter (played by Bale) has his plane shot down on a Black Ops mission. He gets captured and is stuck in a POW camp in Laos for years and is trying to escape.  Bale just has some sort of knack for taking on those grueling kind of roles and movies. And again, another good one from Bale -- a great one, indeed.

Mr. Woodcock -- Back when I saw the first trailer for it a long time ago, I thought: looked like it could be hilarious, but hoped the good stuff wasn't only shown in the trailer. Well, that is how the flick turned out. Billy Bob just freakin' rules as the bad-ass gym teacher. Hilarious movie.

Wedding Daze -- A fun to watch movie romantic comedy. Decent story; funny premise; good comedy bits; Isla Fisher and Jason Biggs works well together on screen. A worthy good date movie, if you ask me. Better than actually expected.

American Pie Presents Beta House -- Starts off hilarious for the first 30 mins or so (the experience of college and Frat houses), gets boring for way too long (they decide to develop a relationship here w/ the lead Erik Stiffer and Ashley....snooze material there, pretty much), then the movie gets funny again in the "third act." But, yeah -- why the big lull and bad pacing in the middle??? Bah. None of the American Pies after American Wedding been good, but at best mediocre, if that. Namely b/c all three of these films seem to lose something some steam somewhere in the film for a bad amount of time -- and this one just follows suits.


 

[Jedi]

Just seen Cloverfield, it was pretty good. I wont say much about it other than I liked the view point which was used for 100% of the film.

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I liked how to start with it was 911ish and how you saw very very little of the monster, and how as things moved on you did see more of it which was good, but I did feel that maybe we saw too much it at the end.

Anyway I didn't realise JJ didn't write or direct it, the way his name is all over it you'd think he was more than just the producer.

[ScaryTooth]

I saw "Cloverfield" last night too. I liked it a lot. It was different. I love the way it was shot. And I really liked seeing the special effects. It was pretty amazing how it was done. Definitely check it out.

[Quemaqua]

It sort of seemed interesting at first, but the commercials just annoy me.  It's like they took all the biggest idiots they could find and rounded them up just to make the movie.  If they all die, I might consider watching it.

[KontrollerX]

No Raisa.

Its ending is a real tear jerker.

So I'd say it ends well. 

[Cobra951]

No Raisa.

Its ending is a real tear jerker.

So I'd say it ends well. 

Thanks for the warning.  I'll stay away.

[MysterD]

It's like they took all the biggest idiots they could find and rounded them up just to make the movie. If they all die, I might consider watching it.

ROFLMAO!

[Jedi]

It sort of seemed interesting at first, but the commercials just annoy me.  It's like they took all the biggest idiots they could find and rounded them up just to make the movie.  If they all die, I might consider watching it.

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Then by all means go!

[Raisa]

nanny diaries - the role wasn't for scarlet.  i would say there would be other actresses who could've pulled this off really well.  the script needs quite a bit of work imo.

into the wild - it's a bit.. hmmm, heavy to watch right after nanny diaries.. hah

[MysterD]

King of California -- Very good movie. Excellent acting from a crazy Michael Douglas and Evan Rachel Wood.

The Comebacks -- Wasn't great, but still was funny.

Fido -- This was a funny movie.

[Pugnate]

I saw "Shootem Up."

One of the worst pieces of shit I've seen. I want to break the DVD into little pieces. What a horrible piece of garbage.

[Xessive]

I saw "Shootem Up."

One of the worst pieces of shit I've seen. I want to break the DVD into little pieces. What a horrible piece of garbage.

Hahahah it was a retarded movie! It was more of a joke about action movies. I think that's what I enjoyed about it. If I ahd watched it seriously though I would have been pissed off too.

[Pugnate]

But that's the thing, it wasn't funny, it wasn't clever. The title suggest something of a parody, and aside from a couple of things it didn't have any clever moments. Nor were the action scenes good enough. And that sex shooting scene was tacky.

I just kept watching and thinking,"What the fuck is this shit?"

haha.

[MysterD]

I really liked Shoot 'Em Up.

I definitely agree w/ Xessive on this one.

It was a definite satire on most of those action movies (and poking fun at all their cliches) made in the last decade or so.

It was fun, ridiculous, and also very entertaining -- which is exactly what it was aiming for.

But that's the thing, it wasn't funny, it wasn't clever. The title suggest something of a parody, and aside from a couple of things it didn't have any clever moments. Nor were the action scenes good enough. And that sex shooting scene was tacky.

I just kept watching and thinking,"What the fuck is this shit?"

haha.

Oh, I thought the sex-shooting scene was hilarious.

If there was ever a movie about sex and violence, this would be one -- but, w/ that scene....ummmm...simultaneously, in this case....hehe.

EDIT:

I saw Death Sentence the other night.

It was okay. The youngest son was terrible -- definitely miscasted, if you ask me.

The action, when it happened, was pretty good. Can't argue that.

It's the drama that's more on and off than a light switch -- namely, the stuff w/ Bacon's familt and the gangs. We didn't need some of it, basically.

Kevin Bacon was great, but even he couldn't save the rest of the movie, since the director and editor definitely should've made the film a lot shorter; it felt too long for its own good, wasting a good deal of time. 20 minutes shorter might've helped -- namely, cutting out a lot of the not-so-good drama scenes, basically.

[Pugnate]

Umm.. what satire? Aside from a couple of scenes the movie couldn't decide if it was trying to parody or not.

[MysterD]

Umm.. what satire? Aside from a couple of scenes the movie couldn't decide if it was trying to parody or not.

Shoot 'Em Up defiintely had a combo of both, using action-movie cliches (to try to use it) to its advantage and at other times punching the cliche right in its face.

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Butchering Of Action Movies:
--Cliche of "Woman Being Victims" in action movies is poked fun of by the pregnant girl shooting the gangster early on in the first few minutes of the flick.

--Ridiculous action sequences and high body count = something made fun of throughout the entire flick. -->I.e. character played by Paul Giamatti talks about this in the scene in which he asks for numerous people to help him, in the long staircase scene and this huge scene of one many against loads of enemies occurs; i.e. the high-body count like that in the "Crazy 88" scene in Kill Bill Vol 1 .
-->I.e. action sequences w/ him holding a baby in the middle of a complete shootout and participating in the shootout
-->I.e. Smith sets up ridiculous amount of complex traps at the weapons warehouse in a matter of no time, not too long afterh e finds out at the place.

--World has been desensitized by violence throughout mediums (books, movies, video games, music, TV, etc etc; it'd be movies, in this case). See, the baby is basically only happy when violence is happening on-screen.

--Also, some lines from either Giamatti and Owen speak in general about "good guys and bad guys," referring to how they are often portrayed namely in action films.

--Male lead and female lead character often have sex in these action movies. Only, this movie takes it to a new extreme by having a shootout happen with it at the same time. A jab thrown at movies that are known for being "sex and violence" action movies.

In-Joke:
--Clive Owen plays Smith, who happens to be an ex-agent/military man...Agent Smith reference from The Matrix, anyone?

[Pugnate]

Ugh... it became the movies it was trying to parody. Putting in a couple of scenes that parody the genre, doesn't give it a pass, nor does it mean it qualified as a satire. And I really thinking you are reaching with some of those.

[Xessive]

To me "Shoot 'em Up" achieved what "Death Proof" was supposed to achieve.

Oddly enough I feel about "Death Proof" exactly the same way Pug feels about "Shoot 'em Up."

[Pugnate]

What? Death Proof was basically a homage to exploitation cinema, where kids snuck in to the movies to see some tits and gore. I liked parts of Death Proof, though I found the hour long conversations a snore.

I think if I had taken Idol's advise about leaving my logic at the door, I probably would have enjoyed it a lot more. My mistakes was to expect some sort of a well told satire on the genre.

Also while I didn't exactly like Death Proof, it did have some class. Shoot 'em up felt a bit sleazy. Again, I am sure I would have enjoyed it more had I taken Idol's advise.

[Pugnate]

I watched "The Holiday."

I like Jack Black. Whenever I see him, I think he is some friend I made in college. Anyway the movie was above average as far as romantic comedies go. I liked it. I am not saying it was great, nor am I saying it was good. But it was above average, and will probably get you laid if you watch it with a chick.

[idolminds]

Spiderman 3: Eh. Bruce Campbell and the newspaper boss were the best parts of the movie.
Rush Hour 3: Not enough stunts, Chris Tucker is way over the top. Doesn't flow well. It got to the end and I was like "WTF? That was it?"
King of Kong: Really interesting documentary on a guy trying to break the high score on Donkey Kong. Check it out.

[beo]

aw yeah, watched king of kong recently. brilliant. classic underdog movie. as a gamer, i obviously loved it, but i think it has appeal beyond that. it reaches into the greater pool of competetive spirit the same as any sports movie, but just brings it down to a more more "real", everyman level. i really enjoyed it.

also, just to pimp it some more, i just watched juno again for the fourth time. i know it's getting rave reviews now and everything, but i'd really love to see an opinion form one of you lot now. there are parts where it's a little contrived, but overall, i found it so emotionally effecting, i just want to know that someone else felt it.

[Quemaqua]

It's coming on NetFlix for us, I think... but it might be a while, heh.  Also, that King of Kong movie sounds awesome.  I'll have to nab that.

[Pugnate]

I saw Miami Vice. While I was watching I recognized all the Michael Mann hallmarks without knowing it was actually his movie. I kept thinking,"Wow this is a lot like a Michael Mann movie."

It was similar in style to The Insider, or Heat or even the Soderbergh pic, Traffic. While it was a few notches below those great flicks, it was worth a watch. I had expected it to be some cheap popcorn thriller, but it was thankfully more than that.

The music was pretty good as well, at least better than what appeals to the Linkin Park Generation.

I'd recommend Vice. It's had an average story that was elevated by Mann's style. It was a lot like Heat in that it focused on its characters, their relationships with each other, and their relationships with their opponents. And while the action was sparse, it was worth it, again like Heat.