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

What a Republican

 

Dunkirk is another Nolan Messing With Time movie.

He likes playing with time like Tarantino loves feet.

 

Malignant (2021)
Directed by: James Wan

 

Citizen Kane (1941)
Listed among the top movies of all time. Orson Wells stars as newspaper magnate Charles Foster Kane who's dying words is the subject of a deep investigation of the life of a very complicated man who's name was known throughout the world. His last dying word was, "Rosebud"; but what did it mean? Who did it refer to? Was it some sort of symbol? The movie goes through important scenes of Kane's life story in an attempt to piece together who he was. By the end, you know none of it had to do with really anything.

Spoiler

Is it snowing outside?

 

Warning Shot. This mid-sixties movie falls somewhere in the gap between the end of noir and the start of neo-noir. It’s a dark, brooding detective movie with elements from both eras — it’s adapted from a novel by crime writers who got their start in the forties and features a gruff detective of the kind you’d expect in a fifties picture, but it’s in color and not particularly stylized, and it depicts the social turbulence of the swinging sixties. But while it has elements of both, it actually seems to land most comfortably among that era’s abundant crime TV. This isn’t a surprise, as it was originally intended as a TV movie but got a little too dark for sixties prime time. It has the look and feel of a TV production, like an expanded, grimmer episode of Dragnet. This isn’t a bad thing, and it gives it a unique feel, but it does keep it from feeling all that noirish.

The plot, though decent, also feels TV-specialish. David Janssen stars as a taciturn cop who shoots a suspect after seeing a gun — a plotline just as timely today. No gun is found, however, and the fleeing dead man turns out to be a doctor and a pillar of the community. Janssen, facing trial, insists he made no mistake, and sets out to defend himself by finding the gun and figuring out what the doctor was up to. While this makes for a decent detective film, there is a bit more potential here than it lives up to. The attempts to introduce ambiguity, with Janssen coming off having been shot and potentially spooked by it, and the unsympathetic elements of his contrarian stubbornness and seemingly scattershot attempts to latch on to anything to smear the doctor with, don’t feel as fully explored as they could be. Most of all, Janssen is so relentlessly pilloried by the press, and the doctor portrayed as such a saint, that it’s impossible not to believe the turnabout is coming. There’s no real question the gun will turn up, which I guess preempts anybody feeling an outraged betrayal that the cop’s shooting was justified. Though I called the rather hokey means immediately, as likely will anyone else paying attention.

There are some nice dynamics to the plot, but mostly it’s pretty predictable stuff. The main appeal to the film is Janssen’s surly performance, supported by a TV-style roster of B-list guest stars. The atmosphere is not exactly a draw by cinematic standards, but for anyone who enjoys sixties and seventies crime TV, it is actually pretty fun to see the love child of Dragnet and The Rockford Files dressing up as neo-noir. It’s not a great movie, but it’s an interesting one in its own way and I enjoyed it.

 

These are some of the film I watch the weekend.

The Green Knight (2021)
I did not get it.

Rocky III (1982)
Rocky wear ridiculous high heels and 80's haircut to take on Mr T, who is the best thing in this film. (Rocky 4 next - which I love)

Kate (2021)
Netflix film starring Ewan McGregor squeeze Mary Elizabeth Winstead (looking like a young Sigourney Weaver / Ripley) as assassin poisoned with polonium in Japan. Can she find who did it and get violent, bloody revenge before she die? Yes, but by that time nobody really care. Not great / Not bad film. Also has one of the most ridiculous, unnecessary over-use-of-CGI car chase ever.

 

Hitch-Hike 1977 .
Franco Nero , Corrine Clery

I'd never heard of this , found it on a streaming service . it's an Italian movie set in America .
A couple on holiday are in a troubled marriage , they pick up a hitch-hiker who turns out to be a crook , he forces them to drive to the border .

it's the sort of film Tarantino would love , lots of 70s violence/sex etc. There's a rape scene rather reminiscent of Straw Dogs .
it's well made . Good acting and photography . it's dubbed but I think its dubbed by the actual actors.

 

Wonder Woman 1984 What I liked most was the depiction of Wonder Woman's flight, which I recall from the comics as "using the natural updrafts" all the way to just below the jet streams, I guess? Anyway, my clunky description is her sort of drifting, sorta, not without momentum or force but without the big "Up up and awaaay!" following a push off from the earth by strong Super thighs. It seemed the selection of 1984 referred to Orwell's Big Brother, which theme Maxwell Lord utilized in the final scenes. I'm unfamiliar with Pedro Pascal; his accent sounded like Tommy Wiseau's to me. Someday I'll catch The Mandalorian to see more of his work.

 

Spoiler

It referred to his desire to regain the childhood he'd lost. It's like when he says he'd have been really happy if he'd never been rich.
By the way, in the novelization of the Kingdom Come graphic novel, we learn that Bruce Wayne loves watching "Citizen Kane". He thinks it's the funniest comedy he's ever seen, since he can't understand why anyone that rich would be unhappy.

 

Spoiler

That’s weird for Bruce Wayne. Especially with how much his character is heavily influenced by Citzen Kane. Even the Batman theme song from the 1988 movie is based on a melody used in Kane when his massive home is show at the start of the picture. And it’s not so much Kane hates being rich. It’s that he lost his family and life when pushed into the world of wealth. It’s very similar to Bruce losing his parents.

Bruce was born rich in an educated family. Charles Foster Kane is born to poor parents that operate a boarding house. His father is older, seems not much of a bread winner, and drinks. When a boarder can’t pay for his stay, Kane’s mother excepts a seemingly worthless deed to land and mineral rights as payment. That land it turns out contains one of the richest veins of gold ever discovered. Instantly Kane’s mother is extraordinarily rich. Not Kane’s parents - Kane’s mother alone has ownership of this wealth.

Kane’s mother uses that money to send her son away to be educated. So for Kane his wealth is also associated with loss of family, feeling unloved and abandoned. Kane’s legal guardian becomes the banker Walter Thatcher. There relationship is sort of like Alfred and Bruce Wayne if Bruce despised Alfred.

The rosebud line is Kane saying all he ever wanted was to get back to the world of his childhood - before he was special for being rich. When he had regular imperfect parents but felt that he was loved and regarded as the person he was - not for his net worth.

 

@Jedi_Sith_Smuggler_Droid ‘s Citizen Kane comments the only ones making sense

 

Clearly someone who's never had an intro film studies class.

 

Seven Samurai (1954)
Directed by: Akira Kurasowa

"I have been in many battles, but always on the losing side."

One of the Rosetta Stones of action cinema. It's been the subject of countless homages, rip-offs, parodies, and remakes, some of them good in their own right, and yet still feels just as fresh today as it probably did when it was first released.

 

Forgot AGAIN to do my Nolan ranking after my review of Dunkirk. With one movie left (but two reviews; try to figure that one out), here's where we stand:

1. The Prestige
2. The Dark Knight
3. Memento
4. Dunkirk
5. Insomnia
6. Interstellar
7. Batman Begins
8. Following
9. Inception
10. Doodlebug
11. The Dark Knight Rises

 

I freaked loved Dunkirk. Harry Styles was even very good in the role of quite a jerk.


My favorite Seven Samurai remake is A Bug's Life

 

My favorite Seven Samurai remake is The Three Amigos

 

I’m team Bug’s Life.

 

Ugh. Yeah, Franco Nero did his English dub, and so did David Hess (who played a similar role in Wes Craven’s The Last House on the Left). I may have been a Franco Nero apologist for a lot of the exploitation garbage he was in, but I am not a fan of this movie. I politely disagree with your comments, and would rather rewatch Nero in The Monk or A Quiet Place In The Country instead.

Hellraiser (1987) Time has not dampened this clever and nasty horror about the evils men and women do in the name of love. Pinhead and the female Cenobite are still quite unsettling and scary here, much as they were in Barker’s novella. Though my favorite scene remains Kirsty’s accidental summoning of the aforementioned demons.

 

I need to watch Hellraiser, I've only seen bits and pieces.

 

When it comes to 7 Samurai remakes, you can't forget Battle Beyond the Stars. Seriously, you can't, no matter how hard you try, please somebody help me forget!

 

Up vote because Kane is shown soooooo much in school. The movie holds up really well to repeat viewing. I think that helps it being so well regarded in an academic setting where educators must repeatedly watch it.

 

A bunch of movies recently.
Black Narcissus 1947
I had to see this simply because of a Twitter thread about matte paintings.


Nuns in a monastery high in the Himalayas (I think) teach children and slowly go mad, apparently because of the view and the clean air. And because of their repressed feelings and jealousy for a handsome man who helps repair things.

A truly gorgeous film with Indian imagery overlaying the Christian.


Great White (2021)
A low budget Australian film about 5 people in a raft being picked off by a big CGI shark.
Bad CGI. Sheeh. It's 2021, not 1998.
Nothing memorable about it really. Doesn't go anywhere unexpected.

Boss Level (2020)
Ground Hog Day, but a lot more violent. Perhaps more a lightweight Edge of Tomorrow, as the hero figures out how to get further through his day to defeat the Boss.
Happy and jokey fun that doesn't matter much.

The Lighthouse (2019)
The realisation that this is essentially the story of me and my dog after 2 years of work from home and lockdowns.

Kagemusha (1980)
The predecessor to Kurosawa's Ran.
A thief has a striking resemblance to a Feudal Lord, and so is employed as his double.
As with Ran, it has that Japanese-Shakespearean drama to it.

 

You have to remember this is when Bruce's secret identity has been revealed, he's all alone in Wayne Manor, he all but runs Gotham City from behind the scenes, he's held together by an exoskeleton & his own iron will, and he's got no one to restrain him. Thus, he's in an...interesting place, psychologically.

 

Oh, man, you got some real winners there. Black Narcissus is a beast of a movie. Sister Ruth, man. She does not get mentioned enough when people talk about great villains. And she doesn't exactly fit the category of villain, at least for a lot of the movie, but she's close enough for me.

And Kagemusha is an oft-overlooked Kurosawa. And not necessarily a good place to start with him, but it's a great movie.

 

The ending of Black Narcissus... the madness... her EYES.