Felt the same way. Excellent in some, very narrow, respects. Terrible in all others.
1 Like
Edge of Extinction. This quickly turned into a list of things Not To Do In The Post-Apocalypse.
Don’t live near cannibals.
Don’t use a white plastic tub as an animal trap in the middle of a moor.
Don’t drag your half-full jerry can of water from your water source back to your base, you lazy bastard. Carry the fucking thing instead of leaving a drag mark an aeroplane could follow.
Don’t go looking around houses that are derelict. There’s nothing there. They’ve been looted. And you bump into other scavengers who are as stupid as you are.
Don’t trust the first person you meet. You fucking idiot.
Definitely let your tools and weapons get rusty.
Terrible film.
1 Like
More and more I’m finding that I simply can’t accept laziness when it comes to stupid writing in films. If you can’t do 5 minutes of research on a subject, I’m not going to watch your film. There are just too many convenient lapses to permit your protagonists to continue. It may only be small things, but my time is valuable, and The Old Guard is a waste of my time.
2 Likes
Agreed 100%. I’m more forgiving if I know going in that what I’m watching isn’t asking much of me. I watched maybe a half hour of The Old Guard, which is a high-budget, relatively high-concept action movie with a major star, where we’re set up to expect Quality. It is not quality (even with a little q), so I bailed.
At the same time, I’m watching S2 of The Order, which has zero known actors, is made for TV, and makes no effort to be taken very seriously. So I have sort of low to middling expectations, and it’s (like S1) better than it needs to be, so I’m all in.
I’m rooting for The Order to keep exceeding its limitations and surprise me, whereas The Old Guard just feels like a cash-grab for Theron and a shiny subscription lure for Netflix.
I watched Crawl last night because it got surprising good critical reviews and I always enjoy a good horror/suspense movie. It was complete trash and I am baffled by lol the good reviews. The characters made mind-numbingly stupid decisions time after time and there was absolutely no logical consistency. I’m willing to suspend belief here or there for a fun popcorn creature feature but this movie was about 75 minutes of nonsense. It started off well, but after about 5 minutes everything fell to pieces.
2 Likes
Vivarium. Just in case the title doesn’t give it away, the opening scene spells it out for you. That aside, it works as an analogy of suburbia, but it’s also a nicely odd tale of a trapped couple in a very peculiar Hell. Imogen Poots is great, Eisenberg rather less so and hilariously miscast. Some good imagery but the story is basically a Twilight Zone episode.
Capone. Whatever you think a film about good old Al is going to be, it’s not this, a former gangster with a mind destroyed by syphilis, watched by the authorities, and surrounded by his family who don’t know how to cope with him or find what’s left of his fortune. Increasing illness and disability encroach as he relives memories in a bewildering mixture, with a past full of horrors revisiting him. Tom Hardy is good if bordering on parody, Matt Dillon has a great turn, Kyle Machlachlan doesn’t have enough to do. It looks nice and it has a great soundtrack. I’m not sure there’s enough here for a whole film.
A Perfect Day. A bunch of slightly hopeless UN workers try to get a corpse out of a well during the Yugoslav Wars. Contains the proper proportions of humour, misery, and absurdity. A very good bit of work by Tim Robbins, especially.
Danger Close. Genuinely good, reasonably accurate war film. Always enjoy seeing the ANZACs get down to it, and there’s no Hollywood silliness. All the difficulties of warfare are shown, and while the film struggles with compression of space in order to keep things clear for the viewer, it does a great job of depicting the challenges without insulting your intelligence.
Shazam! What if Big but superhero. Pretty decent actually, but it settles for a few laughs and skewering a few cliches and then falls back on easy, wholesome answers. Genuinely enjoyable for at least half of it though. Poor Mark Strong, again.
1 Like
He can pretend to be a superhero all he wants but he will forever be Chuck…
1 Like
Underwater. An underwhelming title for an underwhelming film. Kristen Stewart plays Sigourney Weaver, T. J. Miller gets to play a man who wisecracks a lot, Vincent Cassel as a noble captain who may or may not sacrifice himself for no appreciable reason. Extremely wonky science, terrible visual design, and a plot that is strictly by the numbers, complete with unlikely escape plan, obstacles, unfortunate death, etc. Hard to imagine a film less imaginative.
1 Like
Agreed. I watched it because it got decent reviews and my favorite sub genre of horror is the claustrophobic creature feature, but the movie just bored me by being far too paint-by-numbers. The setting was cool, though. They could have done more with it.
1 Like
Greyhound, on Apple TV+.
Starring Tom Hanks, that guy who always plays an Italian guy with a heavy accent who’s name you never know, some CGI, and the miserable looking Atlantic Ocean. Based on the novel by CS Forester.
This was tense and very well done - God bless those sailors, they’re certainly braver than I’ll ever be. Hanks is the star of the show with everyone else playing bit parts. Not sure why they bothered to introduce a love interest in the beginning, only to have it play no role whatsoever in the movie itself.
Only complaint is that it was at times hard to hear, but I’m not sure that that wasn’t intentional in an effort to illustrate the chaos Hanks is experiencing.
Also, try to not watch with your wife who has no concept nor understanding of WWII undersea warfare, convoy or u-boat tactics. You’ll enjoy it more should you not have to pause the movie on a regular basis 
8 Likes
Project Power, The Old Guard and 6 Underground - all on Netflix
My wife and I have been doing Saturday Night, Movie Night recently with these random Netflix Original action films.
Here is what you need to know. Project Power and 6 Underground are 5/10. The Old Guard is probably 5.5/10.
These are perfect 5/10 movies, pop some popcorn, see some cool chase/fight scenes, ignore the huge plot holes (or actual lack of plot) and just enjoy.
No need to tell you about the movies, watch the trailers, you know everything you need to know.
No regrets, just good dumb fun when you don’t feel like engaging brain.
3 Likes
Bill and Ted’s Midlife Crisis. Just some cheerful stupid joy. It makes absolutely no sense, but that really does not matter. Some actual harmless innocent fun, badly needed.
3 Likes
Exorcist Aye-Aye-Aye. This is far better than I remembered. With a great duo of George C. Scott and Ed Flanders (not Ned) leading the way, two grumpy old men who obviously love each other and show it by giving each other unceasing shit, we have a horrific crime tale of a serial killer apparently returned from the dead. While big chunks of the good stuff are adopted from the novel, the medium of film means parts of it are chopped out and abridged, with the result that everything apart from Scott’s character is a sideshow, with some parts feeling vestigial or tacked on. The hospital is a great setting, and there are several brilliant, chilling set pieces. Scott does an incredible job, and although it feels like a 70s film in part thanks to him, it was made in 1990 and is more modern than I thought. Excellent little role for Brad Dourif too.
4 Likes
I was 4 years old when the original movie was in cinemas back in 1984.
I was 9 years old when my cousin showed it to me on a crappy small portable TV+VCR for the first time.
I was 9 years old when I read the (translated into German) book for the first time.
I was 13 years old-ish when I read all the (then) released books for the first time in English (among my first non-native books I read in full)
I may have been 13 as well when I saw the movie for the tenth time, played and finished Dune (1), and Dune 2 for the first (of many MANY) times.
…
I will be 40 when I am probably missing out on watching the remake on the big screen when (if?) it hits cinemas around here because of "these uncertain times"™…
I watched several “classics” way after their original run on the big screen. I never had the chance with Dune…and now I may miss the chance a second time?
Edit:
Went back and started a fresh playthrough of Dune 1…argh what I am doing with my life?
7 Likes