What movies have you seen lately? Now with reviews!Movies

[Diego440]

Hollywoodland (Allen Coulter, 2006) -- A struggling private investigator treats his work more as a means to make a living than a want to do right by what few clients he has. Simo is hired to investigate the death of actor George Reeves, who was best known for his title role in Adventures of Superman, which he always despised, in part since it typecast him as a "cartoon", despite it bringing him a certain fame. His June 16, 1959 death by a single gunshot wound while in his bedroom in his Los Angeles home was ruled a suicide by the police. Reeves' story is told in part in flashback as Simo, who is trying to make a name for himself with this case, talks to or tries to talk to some of the players involved, and so as viewers we are placed with all the possible answers to the murder/suicide and the whys and why nots. The problem with the movie is that despite being set in the late '50s, it lacks a lot of time-period characterizations and a lot fo the actors and situations seem oddly modernized. Acting is okay, plot is very thin and the movie is a tad too slow, making what could've been a mildly interesting flick a Hollywoodian bore. 5/10

 

[Public'sTwin]

Vantage Point .

I am not gonna even bother Posting a proper review I really disliked the film .Very Boring and predictable .

Did anybody actually Enjoy it ?

No. Vantage Point is terrible.

Although both the original theatrical, and later made-for-TV remake films Vanishing Point were both enjoyable.

/too lazy to correct syntax error

 

[jeffgoddin]

Somehow accidentally looked up Vanishing Point instead of vantage point... here's the imdb synopsis:

Kowalski works for a car delivery service. He takes delivery of a 1970 Dodge Challenger to take from Colorado to San Francisco, California. Shortly after pickup, he takes a bet to get the car there in less than 15 hours. After a few run-ins with motorcycle cops and highway patrol they start a chase to bring him into custody. Along the way, Kowalski is guided by Supersoul - a blind DJ with a police radio scanner. Throw in lots of chase scenes, gay hitchhikers, a naked woman riding a motorbike, lots of Mopar and you've got a great cult hit from the early 70's.

The part with the Dodge Challenger caught my interest, so unless anybody says this is a crap movie, I think it's going to be the next thing I watch.

 

[Diego440]

Vanishing Point is an awesome car movie. Haven't seen Vantage Point, though I heard it's not bad.

 

[CAMAROBOY69]

Fast Five​

Based on the good words here I finally went and saw Fast Five.This is easily one of my favorite Movies (Top 20)Yes it did have the usual crap (Vin and Paul seem un die able Hollywood style )but surprisengly there was some pretty good acting (Vin in Particular)Paul walker was said by alot of reviewers that his acting was weak I certainly didn't think so.The old team being back was fantastic to see ,lead to alot of funny jokes and scenes.The Rock was a great addition and I join the fan club with the Vin Rock fight scene supporters .Some really creative scenes in the movie .
Negatives:
-Well Typical Americans ,they think the Ultimate fast agile car is a tweaked out Dodge Charger and T-12 remark about the CCX was spot on (did they really had to add the 'R'.
-Another point was although there were some juicy cars on display the racing was almost a no go (aside from the drag race).Why did they cut the Charger Porsche race and the GTR-CHallenger one aswell 👎 .

All in all after that long post if you think the past 4 Movies were a piece of crap then seeing this movie will certainly leave you with a better taste in your mouth 8.7/10


Oh and thanks for the heads up guys on the scene after the credits (Wow what a turn of events really sets up the next one nicely)

Glad you enjoyed it. I have been telling everyone to watch that movie because it really is the best of the entire series. It truly is an amazing experience for sure. And also glad you watched the ending credits. What a shocking bombshell that was. Easily the biggest twist in ending credits I have ever seen in my life. 👍

 

[sems4arsenal]

No. Vantage Point is terrible.

Although both the original theatrical, and later made-for-TV remake films Vanishing Point were both enjoyable.

/too lazy to correct syntax error

a Waste of time really (actually the only reason I watched it because I saw a very cool trailer of it which had a fantastic Song.(the song didn't appear in the film)

Glad you enjoyed it. I have been telling everyone to watch that movie because it really is the best of the entire series. It truly is an amazing experience for sure. And also glad you watched the ending credits. What a shocking bombshell that was. Easily the biggest twist in ending credits I have ever seen in my life. 👍

I just Hope they provide a believable reason for the Next one .Oh and while everybody was going out of the Cinema I told everyone to stay (Feeling like a king )

 

[chuyler1]

Re: Hollywoodland

That movie was so bad I forgot I watched it. We watched it around the time we saw The Black Dahlia which was equally forgettable. Both movies are so forgettable that I often confuse the two when trying to actually remember some sliver of the plot.

Re: Vanishing Point

I've never seen the original, but I caught the TV version on its premier when I was in high school. I enjoyed it at the time, but its one of those movies you can't really recommend to anyone. The car is cool, driving fast through the desert is cool, but there isn't much substance. I forgot that Aragorn, i mean Viggo, was in it.

 

[Diego440]

Re: Hollywoodland

That movie was so bad I forgot I watched it. We watched it around the time we saw The Black Dahlia which was equally forgettable. Both movies are so forgettable that I often confuse the two when trying to actually remember some sliver of the plot.

Exactly. Didn't even figure out why it's called like that, other than an attempt to set it in the late 50s?

Re: Vanishing Point

I've never seen the original, but I caught the TV version on its premier when I was in high school. I enjoyed it at the time, but its one of those movies you can't really recommend to anyone. The car is cool, driving fast through the desert is cool, but there isn't much substance. I forgot that Aragorn, i mean Viggo, was in it.

It's a car movie... nothing more. Much like Two-lane Blacktop or The Driver... not much more going on. But as such, it's awesome.

 

[Tesla]

Jus finished Tron:Legacy. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and having Daft Punk doing the soundtrack was a massive bonus:tup: 8/10

 

[S.Kobayashi]

Independance day, still like that movie

And it's not a movie but I've watched the first episode of Human Planet from BBC Earth yesterday. A great documentary again!

 

[AOS-]

Old Master Q.

Imma Chaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

 

[Diego440]

Senki (a.k.a. Shadows) (Milcho Manchevski, 2007) -- Every now and then the Slavic countries give us a good movie that makes me think the Eastern Bloc is actually made up of some forward-thinking people and not the square-minded people the news has us believing most of the time. Senki is a drama about a son of a reputable physician who struggles to live up to other people's expectations of him, or at least that's what IMDb says. The truth is that there is so much depth to it, that this is only the tip of the iceberg and it's actually a movie about a man who's life is saved in a car crash by the ghosts of people who's bones have been used without permission for studies, and as such, he starts being haunted by the images and souls of these ghosts who come and follow him and interact only with him in a very eerie manner. The scare factor is really at a minimum, but there's plenty of good acting and I completely fell in love with the main actress (Vesna Stanojevska). Senki is probably a very rare and hard-to-find movie that despite where it's made, it looks and feels very 1st worldly and with drama and suspense levels to rival the Western counterparts. 7.5/10

 

[Lain]

Got back from seeing X-Men: First Class. Never been a huge X-Men fan before, but this movie won me over. It was quite epic. 👍

 

[niky]

Best.X.Men.Movie.Ever. 9/10

 

[Brett]

I really enjoyed First Class also.

 

[jeffgoddin]

Snake in the Eagle's Shadow, pre-80's Jackie Chan kung fu, formulaic and predictable, but excellent execution of the fight choreography and quite fun, 7/10.

Edit: forgot to say, Vanishing Point was nice, kind of fatalistic like Easy Rider, protagonist the quiet type. Sweet "supercharged" 1970 Challenger (R/T?) in a 1971 movie with a stunt driver who can turn it on a dime and (painful but exciting to watch) plow it through dirt, sand, and debris at great speed with admirable precision. 7/10, too. I should say, I'm not too critical, but 7/10 is good for me. A meh movie is 5/10, horrible would be 2/10 or 3/10, and great is usually 9/10, with perfect 10 reserved for only a few for me, like Blade Runner, Seven Samurai, North By Northwest, Spirited Away, The Last American Picture Show, Naked, and a few other true mind-blowing classics.

 

[niky]

I grew up on Jackie Chan flicks... they cost us something like a quarter to watch, in old, non-air-conditioned theaters. Snake in the Eagle's Shadow still stands out as a hallmark in terms of fight choreography, for me, just edging out Drunken Master for the fluid way it communicates the differences between styles to an audience largely ignorant about Kung Fu...

Had it on videocassette, had it on videodisc... maybe it's time to add it to my DVD collection (BluRay would be nice, but given the quality of the original film stock, it would likely be useless).

 

[CodeRedR51]

Edit: forgot to say, Vanishing Point was nice, kind of fatalistic like Easy Rider, protagonist the quiet type. Sweet "supercharged" 1970 Challenger (R/T?) in a 1971 movie...

The car wasn't supercharged.

 

[Diego440]

Raising Cain (Brian de Palma, 1992) -- After the amazing success of The Bonfire of Vanities, De Palma went back to the genre that really made him famous: suspenseful thrillers. Unfortunately, this Hitchcockian attempt really didn't work because the setting is as used up as it is boring, playing up on the multiple personality disorder. Still, it's a very De Palma-ish movie that not only borrows a few cues from the style of Hitchcock, it even goes as far as copying scenes straight from Psycho.

The reason the movie stops working is that De Palma introduces so many twists to the plot that it just doesn't make sense and just becomes a senseless music video (thanks to the extremely cheesy soundtrack). Also, de Palma has always been a director of style over content, as in it's not the story itself, but how it gets told.

Still, the movie keeps up the tension in a nice manner and John Lithgow's acting is superb. Still, the subject as I mentioned before has been overdone, but the fact is that it's still done a lot nowadays. So this one is just another one of those movies. 6/10

 

[Diego440]

Shooter (Antoine Fuqua, 2007) -- A marksman living in exile is coaxed back into action after learning of a plot to kill the president. Ultimately double-crossed and framed for the attempt, he goes on the run to track the real killer and find out who exactly set him up, and why. I started out watching this movie from an objective and critical point of view and 25 minutes into it I realized that wasn't going to work because the movie is too cliché and works too much on technicalities and scientific data which are completely uninteresting to the average viewer and which, clearly, is made up. So I watched it like an honest action movie that doesn't try to be anything else, and through that, I was amazed. The movie works very well as yout typical action movie about revenge and double-crossing, with some believable moments and very exciting action scenes. If you're looking for an action-packed friday night movie, this is as good as most, but if you're looking for a movie with much more content, look elsewhere. 7/10

 

[PureAwesomeness]

This week I watched two movies that share their titles with people's names: Hannah and Paul.

Both movies were very entertaining in their own ways. I recommend both.

 

[SuperShouden]

Drive Angry - If there is one Nick Cage movie to see...it's Con Air...Drive Angry is a close second. It's a crazy, supernatural car chase with a lot of killing, a little nudity and a lesbian for a co-star. (well, technically, according to her, she's bi, but she's dating a chick at the moment.) It doesn't take itself seriously and almost seems like a spoof of Night Rider than anything else. There's a lot of moments that defy the laws of physics (like the cop car jumping over the edge of a bridge) but, like I said, it doesn't take itself seriously. A 4 out of 5.

True Grit - From the brothers who brought you No Country for Old Men comes... essentially a movie just like it. Jeff Bridges is barely understandable throughout the movie, so watch this one with closed captioning on. You might actually miss 50% of the jokes.

There's a LOT of story for such a simple end. At least this time, the ending doesn't make you feel like the rest of the movie was a waste of time. Although, The Cohen Brothers have been a prime example of starting a story off in one direction and ending at a completely different point.

I don't know. There was a lot of great things about this movie. (the cast for one) but there were also a bunch of things wrong with it...it seemed like they wanted to do a "Red Dead Redemption" style story with it...you really have no freakin' clue where the heck they are in the country...They make a big fuss about Josh Brollin's character who isn't in the movie for that long...I don't know. It just seems like the They've got a point A and point B, and then they wander around like a lost cowboy. I mean...you know where they're trying to go, but it really doesn't feel like you're going anywhere half the time.

Most of the movie consists of Jeff Bridges intelligible ramblings or him and Matt Damon bickering.

At least you can sum up their two biggest movies in a single sentence:
No Country for Old Men - A guy randomly discovers a million dollars under a tree and is pursued by a serial killer who is pursued by a cop, but the guy who stole the money dies, the cop retires and no one wins in the end.

True Grit: A girl's father is killed, so she hires Jeff Bridges to avenge him and he does...eventually.

A 3 out of 5

 

[niky]

Howl's Moving Castle

It's been mentioned here before by Tom Servo... and I watched it myself back in 2006 or so, but I just had to revisit this movie. One of Hayao Miyazaki's trippier works, this one has all the hallmarks of a Miyazaki movie... and then some... the world of Howl is actually more detailed and better realized than most of his other films... with a rich, Victorian feel to it... something like "Kiki's Delivery Service" meets "Steamboy" meets "Spirited Away"... it's a fascinating blend of Miyazaki's fascination with insectile mechanisms, aviation, steampunk, classical fantasy and the horrors of war.

It's not quiet as deep and riveting a tale as some of his other films, but it's a brisk movie with lots going on, and is so riveting that you don't mind the length of the film.

The bizarre twists and turns of the plot mirror Spirited Away, but it's reminiscent to me, actually, of some Roger Zelazny books... where you almost, but don't quite, know what's going on until the very end... it's a smorgasboard of fantasy and mystery, and a pleasing watch for Miyazaki and non-Miyazaki followers alike.

9/10

 

[MercilessOne]

8.5/10

Gotta say, definitely one of the best superhero/comic book films I've seen in a while, and the best one out of all the X-men films by a mile. The action was varied enough to keep things interesting, and the overall story is good enough to flesh out the cast. I liked Wolverine's cameo thrown in there.

 

[FoolKiller]

I agree with X-Men First Class. It as well done, however the story felt a bit jumbled for fans of the comics because this one had its hands tied by the first three films. It was a jumbled convolution of characters and storylines from different generations and teams, so I spent half the film going, "huh?"

Also, it apparently chose to ignore the Wolverine film, as apparently Emma Frost aged about 15 years by going back in time by about ten years. But then, it did refer to Stryker.

I truly felt that Magnet, Xavier, and Banshee were extremely well cast. Havoc, not so much. After the movie I said to my brother-in-law that I felt like he was plucked out of a Disney Channel show. When I looked it up he was in Hannah Montana: The Movie. I also felt iffy on Kevin Bacon as Shaw.

But if you forget Emma Frost was in Wolverine and know nothing of the comics it plays out very well and works. My only issues are with the casting of a few people.

I also saw:

Super 8 - (6.5/10)
Honestly, I was enjoying this film as a sci-fi thriller. About halfway through they gave you the opportunity to see the creature, but it was always dark, so it was never clear. Why it is only out in the dark is also explained. But the last five minutes ruined everything for me. I won't ruin it, but I will say that if you imagine what a mix between JJ Abrams and Steven Spielberg would be like you'll probably get this very close.

Also, JJ Abrams is quickly approaching M Night Shamylainsjkgsdjk status, in that his movies are beginning to be more about a trademark gimmick. Thank God Abrams is doing Star Trek between his "Guess what it is" films. It may save him from being so stuck to his gimmick that when he does something different it is The Last Airbender.

 

[Aldo]

Just got back from seeing Senna.
Fantastic film! I don't usually get emotional at films but this left me with a bit of a lump in my throat.
Extraordinary man and wonderful guy.
👍
10/10

 

[CAMAROBOY69]

8.5/10

Gotta say, definitely one of the best superhero/comic book films I've seen in a while, and the best one out of all the X-men films by a mile. The action was varied enough to keep things interesting, and the overall story is good enough to flesh out the cast. I liked Wolverine's cameo thrown in there.

I just watched this on saturday and it was a LOT better than I expected. Not the best out of the series but it was pretty dang good IMO. 👍

 

[CodeRedR51]

Also, JJ Abrams is quickly approaching M Night Shamylainsjkgsdjk status, in that his movies are beginning to be more about a trademark gimmick. Thank God Abrams is doing Star Trek between his "Guess what it is" films. It may save him from being so stuck to his gimmick that when he does something different it is The Last Airbender.

Eh, I applaud the man for being one of the only people in Hollywood to actually think outside the normal "remakes and sequels" box. Original films > everything else. While I agree Super 8 was a small let-down for me, I'm still looking forward to see what he comes up with next.

 

[FoolKiller]

Eh, I applaud the man for being one of the only people in Hollywood to actually think outside the normal "remakes and sequels" box. Original films > everything else. While I agree Super 8 was a small let-down for me, I'm still looking forward to see what he comes up with next.

Another Star Trek film.

Remakes and sequels...we are talking about the same guy that did MI3 and Start Trek?

I like his original stuff, but he is reusing his own gimmick to the point that he is known for it.

 

[Diego440]

Black Swan (Darren Aronofsky, 2010) -- Finally got around to watching this one. I'm still to see an Aronofsky movie I don't like and though Requiem for a Dream still remains my all-time favorite, Black Swan now displaces Pi and takes second place. As you probably are all aware, the movie is about a ballet dancer who wins the lead in "Swan Lake" and is perfect for the role of the delicate White Swan but slowly loses her mind as she becomes more and more like the Black Swan. Camera angles, suspenseful moments, cinematography and excellent acting are truly what make this such an awesome movie, all under the diligent direction of Aronofsky.

Still, the movie isn't really a suspense/horror movie per se, but more of an ellaborate drama and as such, it's one of the best I've seen in recent years, even with all its iconic and horrific moments. It's quite obvious that Portman's acting is superb, to the point that she got the Oscar for it, but thankfully her qualities didn't overshadow the excellent bits of Winona Ryder and Mila Kunis. The score is another thing that really had me loving Black Swan, and it comes as no surprise that it was Clint Mansell who did this eerie and epic score.

Such an iconic movie that could've worked only in the hands of a director such as Aronofsky, especially in the downward spiral that the concluding scenes make the movie become. A truly horrible and beautiful movie. 9.5/10




Wait Until Dark (Terence Young, 1967) -- Starring Audrey Hepburn as a recently blinded woman who is terrorized by a trio of thugs while they search for a heroin stuffed doll, which they believe is in her apartment. Despite the slow start (not that odd in a 1960s movie) and the fact that the main 'suspense' of the movie comes in the last 20 minutes, it's a movie that has stood perfectly against time as one of the scariest movies ever made. Much like other suspenseful movies of the time, this one is based on a theater play and most of the action takes place within an apartment. The cinematography captures very well the whole concept of being blind, and not just because some scenes are completely dark, but also because the uncertainty of the main character is also reflected in the apparent intentions of the 'bad guys'. 7.5/10