What DVD / Video did you watch last night? (pt3)

[pissflaps]

C4, y u cutting all the super gory bits out of a film who's only redeeming feature is it's super goryness?

 

[DaveCinzano]

Ok, I'm not that great at remembering directors, but in terms of carrying you with them, really making you want to know what happens, I liked Happiness and Dark Horse (Todd Solondz).

I think suspense is more something you get in mainstream cinema, which I guess Hitchcock was of his day, like The Bourne Identity. That's pretty well done and there's loads of suspense.

TBH I don't think you have a very firm grasp of suspense!

There's some useful pointers here (including the famous Hitchcock comment about suspense vs surprise using the example of the ticking timebomb): http://mysterymanonfilm.blogspot.co.uk/2008/10/elements-of-suspense.html

 

[Sue]

Ok, I'm not that great at remembering directors, but in terms of carrying you with them, really making you want to know what happens, I liked Happiness and Dark Horse (Todd Solondz).

I think suspense is more something you get in mainstream cinema, which I guess Hitchcock was of his day, like The Bourne Identity. That's pretty well done and there's loads of suspense.

Hmm, Hitchcock vs the Bourne identity..... ;-)

 

[redsquirrel]

Hmm, Hitchcock vs the Bourne identity..... ;-)

Exactly what I was thinking.

 

[Idris2002]

The Curse of the Jade Scorpion

Woody Allen just before he totally lost his mojo. It's a pastiche of screwball comedy and film noir, set in a New York insurance agency in 1940. The way blonde bombshells played by Helen Hunt (meant to be the HIldi Johson character) and Charlize Theron throw themselves at him (Allen looks like somebody's grandfather in this one) is frankly implausible.

Dan Aykroyd is woefully miscast, but there is a nice cameo from "the baldy guy out of the Princess Bride", i.e. Wallace Shawn.

It's not as bad as I'm making it sound, but the best thing you can say about it is that it's not as bad as his flicks from the past few years.

 

[Virtual Blue]

Cloud Atlas - balls. complete utter balls. mish-mash of balls, rolled into a giant meat of all sorts. I couldn't help but compare it to the superior Mr Nobody.

 

[Nanker Phelge]

Down the Shore - indie-budget human interest story with James Gandolfini and Famke Janssen. It was so so, but good to see the big man on screen doing his most hangdog expression and moping about after his lost love while working a dead fairground on the New Jersey shoreline. Good performances from all involved, just not a lot else to work with.

 

[pissflaps]

Beasts of the Southern Wild.

Featuring a five year old kid and a bloke who happened to own a bakery across the road from where the casting director was having auditions, neither of whom had acted before.

acting is not a fucking 'craft'.

 

[Idris2002]

The Curse of the Jade Scorpion

Woody Allen just before he totally lost his mojo. It's a pastiche of screwball comedy and film noir, set in a New York insurance agency in 1940. The way blonde bombshells played by Helen Hunt (meant to be the HIldi Johson character) and Charlize Theron throw themselves at him (Allen looks like somebody's grandfather in this one) is frankly implausible.

Dan Aykroyd is woefully miscast, but there is a nice cameo from "the baldy guy out of the Princess Bride", i.e. Wallace Shawn.

It's not as bad as I'm making it sound, but the best thing you can say about it is that it's not as bad as his flicks from the past few years.

And now I've watched Mr. Allen's Stardust Memories, with Charlotte Rampling. Now this is more like it. It's a sort of companion piece to Annie Hall, an extended discussion of the bit at the start of AH where he says that life is terrible and it's over far too early. Very good indeed, and I wish I'd seen it in the cinema.

 

[maya]

Les Rivières Pourpres (The Crimson Rivers)- french thriller/horror film with sinister (and very bloody) goings-on in and around a fictional alpine university village... and Jean Reno.

 

[inva]

One of Our Aircraft is Missing
Very enjoyable and quite funny in places.

 

[Orang Utan]

I've been trawling through the Sopranos yet again.
It really is the best tv show ever. It's so rich in detail that it bears many a repeat viewing.
It's worth watching and concentrating on certain characters, like you would do when studying a text at school or college.

 

[starfish]

Had forgotten that we also watched Monsters University which we all thought was quite poor, it had a couple of funny moments but was generally disappointed. We then watched Mary & Max which they all thought was wonderful & very funny but a bit sad. Im sure at least one niece was crying.

 

[JimW]

Bob le flambeur, there's not a great deal I can say other people won't have put better. Great film, of course, but if I had to pick a nit did find his use of incidental music a bit wonky.

 

[redsquirrel]

Great film

 

[butchersapron]

Scarecrow - Hackman and Pacino try to out act each other in as modern hobo-types from the early 70s. Enjoyable but slight, lucky it had these two on top form really.

Silenced - film based on a real life sex-abuse network at a deaf school in Korea. Some really hard bits to watch, and some odd choices made by the director. Got very good reviews when it came out but, but i can't quite get why - maybe i'm being too cynical in thinking it was because of the subject matter. I don't know.

 

[JimW]

Great film

Saw this list of Kubrick's favourite films posted somewhere else so thought I'd try and see the ones I hadn't that looked interesting.

 

[JimW]

Finally got round to watching Deadwood too (halfway thru season 1 so far) -- some great moments of unlikely human decency in the most unpromising of circumstances, which I do like in my telly.

 

[DotCommunist]

Sword of Honour

Daniel Craig bimbles around with some othe cultured officah types in ww2. Think its a three parter. Normally not my sort of thing but Craig carried it and there was some good gentle humour.

 

[Idris2002]

Sword of Honour

Daniel Craig bimbles around with some othe cultured officah types in ww2. Think its a three parter. Normally not my sort of thing but Craig carried it and there was some good gentle humour.

I wouldn't bother - read the original Evelyn Waugh books instead.

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

The Yellow Sea (same director as The Chaser). Lots of action (blood and car chases). Not as good as The Chaser and I got a bit lost with all the characters

Have a choice tonight of:

Cold Fish
The Woodsman and the Rain
Adrift in Tokyo
Return to Burma
The Foreign Duck, The Native Duck and God in a Coin Locker

Decisions, decisions

 

[Nanker Phelge]

The Place Beyond the Pines - Enjoyed the first hour, 2nd hour was ok, 3rd act was dull.

I think the writer/director tried too hard to come up with a narrative that fit a concept or an idea. It doesn't, so feels forced and clumsy.

Some good performance though ad on the whole I enjoyed it, but I felt like I was sitting through a failed project. All that said, it had a nice seventies feel to it and wasn't a hyper jazzed hollywood action fest, so I'm always happy that films like this are still getting made.

Is there a better portrayer of ratty scumbags than Ben Mendelsohn out there right now? He's nailed it down to an artform.

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

Cold Fish - typical Japanese bloodfest

 

[butchersapron]

Cold Fish - typical Japanese bloodfest

It's not typical at all. None of his films are typical.

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

It's not typical at all. None of his films are typical.

Well I meant the amount of blood with Japanese films

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

and I've not really seen any of that director's films other than Exte so no idea what the rest are like

 

[butchersapron]

and I've not really seen any of that director's films other than Exte so no idea what the rest are like

You are in for a treat then Minnie, seriously - i think you've managed to watch his two most throwaway films. I can't recommend Love Exposure enough.

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

You are in for a treat then Minnie, seriously - i think you've managed to watch his two most throwaway films. I can't recommend Love Exposure enough.

I've still got Adrift in Tokyo, The Foreign Duck etc., Return to Burma and The Woodsman and the Rain to watch before I start ordering more!

Will check on TWF and Terracotta though to see if they have any. Do you know about Third Window Films and Terracotta Distribution? Really pleased I found them

 

[DotCommunist]

Dark Knight Rises. They aren't even pretending with this one

Particularly enjoyed banes risible non-accent.

'theres a storm coming and you people will wonder how you had so much and left us so little'

thanks catwoma, you've just managed to make it all politics of envy.

 

[maya]

Eartha Kitt is the one and only catwoman, IMHO.