Amph What was the last movie you saw? (Ver. 2)

How was it?

 

Did you see the first two Hotel Transylvania movies?

 

Hex after Hex (1982) Poor Lo Mang cannot get a break after losing his job as a stunt man at Shaw Brothers studios, his luck seems to get worse until a strange old man in his apartment building says he can have it all, if he marries the old fellow's daughter. There's just one catch, she's dead, so he'll marry a ghost.

Lo's kindly fool spends most of his time trying to get rid of her, with the set piece being a spiritual boxing exorcism in which he displays some wonderful fan fu. Where the film fails is most of the second act is spent on Lo's terrible boss at his new dead-end job. The character is not interesting or cruel enough to deserve the occasional hauntings from Lo's ghostly girl, and sadly proves to me that the screenwriter was attempting to add time to the film because they couldn't figure out what else to do with Lo Mang. It's too bad really as Lo was pretty good at comedy (despite being the "Arnuld" of the Venoms mob), and he has a very likable vibe in this film.

The exorcism sequence saves the movie, and there are two obvious nods to Star Wars (she-ghost appears as Yoda - well in a cheap Yoda mask, and as a samurai-modified Vader).

At this point, Shaw Brothers were trying anything and everything to get people to see their movies (graphic gore, tons of nudity, balls out horror, crazy, kiddie wuxias or not very successful comedies (although some of the kiddie wuxias are great fun, see Demon of the Lute).

 

I just rewatched 20th Century Women and Moonlight. I hadn't seen them since they were in theaters. Let me tell you, they hold up. They're both still as great as they were before. My full reviews have already been posted here, so I won't rewrite those or repost them, but if you're interested, here are the links, should anyone be interested in my full thoughts on them: 20th Century Women; Moonlight.

 

My wife and daughter were traveling earlier this week, so I got my movies on.

Sunday: Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (tons of fun)
Monday: Assassin's Creed (on Netflix; fun action but weird af)
Tuesday: Deadpool 2 (during the midcredit scene, I laughed so hard I couldn't breathe and my friend had to ask me if I was ok)

 

Life Gamble (1979) Of all the movies director Chang Cheh made with the “Venoms mob”, this spaghetti western like wuxia remains my favorite.

Everyone (and we’re talking about 13-16 characters here) wants to get their greedy kung fu skilled mitts on a stolen piece of Jade; save for one man who seeks return the Jade to its owner.

The women scheme as much as the men and most of the characters are terrific IF you watch the Mandarin dub.

The story is super easy to follow, several of the folks get to show off their acrobatic and martial skills, and Kuo Chue’s Qui Yu Zi is one of my most favorite gallants from the hundreds of Shaw Brothers movies I’ve sat through. Even more than the Lizard from Five Venoms, Qui is a noble, complicated character whose awesome skills as a weapons maker are only enhanced by his payment to make new weapons: teach him your kung fu style and you’ve paid your bill.

Another thing I love about this movie is you see almost everyone’s major flaw that play into the greed and bring ruin.

And -gosh- I utterly adore Dick Wei in this too.

While my fondness for the Venoms has faded, I still love this movie. It is so cool to see an obvious wink to spaghetti westerns in a Chang Cheh wuxia.

I wish I known about this movie when the blu ray was released for all but five minutes. If a Mandarin version is ever screened here, I’d love to see.

 

Justice League - finally free to watch, but not nearly free enough. So genuinely terrible it should get special recognition for its authenticity.

 

Antman and The Wasp (2018) Like the first one, it's a fun little Marvel summer blockbuster. I especially enjoyed some of the minor characters, especially Cassie, Officer Woo, and of course Luis. It didn't make me laugh as much as I expected though, I think I saw too many ads and trailers, so the humor wasn't fresh for me.

 

Antman and The Wasp as well. Really enjoyed it. I liked it more than the first, but there were some head scratching parts.

 

The Kiss (1896) – William Heise

This film features John Rice & May Irwin, two actors who had performed together in a long running play called The Widow Jones. The play ended with the two kissing and here they replay that scene for the cameras. The shot is in medium close-up and it takes a while to get to the actual kiss as the filmmakers give them plenty of time to nuzzle and chat (silently, of course) before Rice plants one on Irwin at the climax. This is the very first kiss ever captured on film and it caused a huge scandal; the Catholic Church called for it to be censored and the film was denounced as obscene in newspapers around the country. John Rice, not exactly a prime physical specimen, became about the most unlikely sex symbol of all time and he literally toured the country giving “kissing demonstrations,” which, of course, were also very controversial. I found this one to be pretty entertaining; it’s the first time that the camera’s been close enough to actors for you to actually even really consider using the word “performance,” and the couple have an affable kind of charm, helped along by the fact that they’re not exactly great beauties, but rather just look like a couple of normal people. And Rice has some style about it, neatly smoothing his mustache in preparation. 1 ½ stars.

tl;dr – first kiss captured on camera has surprising charm and warmth. 1 ½ stars.

 

Captain America Civil War (2016) Still my "favorite" Avengers movie. I love how the fights mirror those in Winter Soldier (another car chase scene, etc.) For me, this feels like I am watching a really great comic book come to life (and the original Civil War comic was NOT that). Once again the Cap cast gets some great one liners and things to do (Falcon was so great here). But you know I am going to swoon about Bucky right? Of course I will. Glad to see his character almost the same as Ed Brubaker's awesome rethink.

Great and completely engaging.

 

Yeah, this is a 22 year old franchise we're talking about here. During that time we've had no fewer than three different incarnations of the live-action Spider-Man franchise, so props just for the longevity. Add in that, yeah, it's actually getting better as it goes and the M:I franchise kinda defies any number of Hollywood conventions.

I've always referred to Iron Man 2 as Avengers .5 and Civil War as Avengers 2.5., as both are as much set up for the actual Avengers films that followed as they are standalone films.

 

Hopefully Fallout will still be in the theaters in mid August (have an intense 3 week class that runs from late July til then). I am eager to see Henry* go a mano-a-mano with Ethan Hunt.

Ghost Protocol remains my favorite M:I movie, but it would be great if Fallout tops it.

*I like Henry and want him to have a career post Superman. Though I am still waiting for him to play the classic Supes which I know he can do.

 

Hotel Transylvania 3

 

Yeah, at the end of the day, I give Ghost Protocol the edge over Rogue Nation. I think the set pieces in Ghost Protocol are, on the whole, more creative and compelling. The parallel transfer scene, where the MI crew meet up with two sets of villains at the same time on two different floors, is as fantastic a suspense sequence as the series has had. The parking garage fight is also a better hand to hand fight than anything in the series I think. But Rogue Nation is no slouch. Sean Harris gives a better performance than the villain in Ghost Protocol, so I was totally jazzed when he showed up in the Fallout trailer; for the record, I'm still doing my whole thing where I don't watch the trailers, but I recognized him immediately just from his voice, which is crazy, honestly. And Rogue Nation's motorcycle chase is . . . just maybe the best action sequence of the franchise. But Ghost Protocol and Rogue Nation are so close I don't even really care which one people say is better. They're both far better, in my opinion, than the preceding films which is definitely an outlier among franchises; the series is mediocre at worst and pretty good at best and then it becomes genuinely great with the fourth movie. I hope Fallout lives up to these last two. I'd love to have a third movie to put in the "so good it's even hard to tell which is better" category.

EDIT: It is kind of a shame that Ghost Protocol killed off Sawyer from Lost like five minutes in. I love that guy and I was hoping to see him do more.

 

Happy Death Day

Groundhog Day meets Scream .
it's not bad actually , the lead actress is quite good , the story keeps moving , quite funny at times .
There's something so compelling about the 'replay' plot , it's almost a genre itself now .

 

I think he also played a FBI agent in the movie starring Liam Hemsworth, Gary Oldman, and Harrison Ford about corporate espionage. I forgot the title, though.

 

Braven, starring the actor who played Aquatic Man. The usual one man against the mob scenario, not quite as snowy or mountainous or relentlessly stupid as that Stallone, John Lithgow movie, Cliffhanger, the turd that simultaneously launched and torpedoed Janine Turner's movie career, but still reliably dumb.

 

So have Harrison Ford and Gary Oldman.

 

Incredibles 2 (2018) That was a lot of fun. Character arcs were less dramatic than the first one, so I thought it was a little lighter overall. But it was very true to the characters and their relationships. If that's how long it takes to make a good sequel, then I'll wait another 14 years for I3. Although I'll be 66 by then...

Stay for the credits. There are no more scenes, but the theme songs for Mr Incredible, Frozone, and Elastigirl are worth hearing.

 

The Lost World: Jurassic Park