Topic: Rate the last movie you've seen

[Halbred]

Yeah, I'm not sure why those movies can't crack the 70-minute barrier.

[Adrock]

Here's a list of movies I've seen over the past month or so

Me And You And Everyone We Know
I love this movie. I haven't seen it in almost 7 years so once I saw it on Netflix, I absolutely had to watch it again. It's just endearing  and charming and funny. I can't recommend this movie enough. ))<>((

Cashback
Another movie I haven't seen in years. I actually own this on DVD but I didn't watch it again until Netflix recommended it to me. Netflix is starting to know me very well. I'm going to be honest. I first heard about this movie because I found out Keeley Hazell (look her up, you won't be disappointed) had a bit part in it. I really like this movie. I think it's artsy without being pretentious. The climax and falling action are rushed and the ending is a bit too clean. None of those things ruin the movie but if I had to fish for marks against the movie, I'd start with those things.

Hollow Man
Ugh... The only reason this movie exists is so Rhona Mitra could brush her hair topless and then get invisible raped off-screen. I feel like I missed the part where the invisibility compound gave Kevin Bacon superhuman strength. In the 20 minute mayhem part of the movie, there were way too many completely implausible moments, even for a movie. Then, the protagonists would get these sudden fits of retardation. For example, it took Elizabeth Shue's character seeing almost her entire team get killed before she triggered the sprinkler system so she could FUCKING SEE HER INVISIBLE ENEMY. Why the **** didn't an entire group of scientists think of that sooner? I can't suspend my disbelief enough to buy that level of stupidity.

Ironclad
I didn't even know this movie existed before I came across it on Netflix. It wasn't bad. It was bloody for the sake of being so but it didn't aspire for more. Ironclad was a popcorn flick through and through. I enjoyed it for what it was and it didn't insult my intelligence.

From Dusk Till Dawn
I feel like this is one of those movies that you really have to watch without knowing anything about it which is almost impossible even for a movie that came out in 1996. The first half of the movie is decidedly not a vampire movie. This was the second time I've watched it but I knew it was a horror movie when I saw it way back when. The horror part comes out of no where then the movie becomes this weird, campy B-movie. It's not Quentin Tarantino's or Robert Rodriguez's best but I don't think this movie could have been done correctly written and directed by anyone else.

Season of the Witch
Goddammit... Why do I watch Nicolas Cage movies? I should have known better. I've only liked 2 movies in the last 10 years with Nicolas Cage in it: Matchstick Men (which I hated the first time because of the ending) and Kick Ass. It's not even about a witch. Face + palm. The only positive thing I can really say about the movie is that Claire Foy is pretty and that's not even about the movie. Thanks Mr. and Mrs. Foy for that.

Red State
There's a 15 minute anti-gay sermon in the middle of the movie. I get it (in terms of plot and characterization) but it was still 15 MINUTES LONG. Red State does a little switcheroo a little over half way through and becomes an action movie with a giant shootout capped off by killing Kevin Pollack's character who I didn't even know was in the movie until he showed up then got shot in the eye 3.286 seconds later. I have nothing against a filmmaker trying to expand his horizons. It's still odd that Kevin Smith even attempted to make a movie like this considering he built his career on dick and fart jokes. He didn't do too bad here but it takes a really skilled filmmaker to pull this off. Smith isn't bad necessarily; he's just not good or experienced enough to make this work completely. And he clearly saw No Country For Old Men and decided to steal heavily borrow from the ending. I wish he stuck with the original ending which had an angel literally coming down from heaven and killing everyone then the apocalypse starting. That would take balls. If he was willing to pull a Kansas City Shuffle and change genres midway through the movie, might as well go the extra mile.

And finally...

Bitch Slap
This has been in my Netflix queue for over a year.  I saved it because the I laughed at the title. I decided to actually watch it because I recently found out Julia Voth got top billing. Julia who? Her likeness was used for Jill Valentine's redesign in the Gamecube remake of the original Resident Evil. Most regulars of this message board probably know that I'm a fan of all things Jill Valentine. I even named my new car after her. Yeah, I know... /looks down in shame

Anyway, Bitch Slap is actually not terrible. It's not good but it's not terrible. It's clearly following in the footsteps of Tarantino/Rodriguez's Grindhouse but Rick Jacobson is no where near as talented. Bitch Slap is something of a throwback to old grindhouse exploitation films and a parody of that genre but it commits to neither and that's where it suffers most. It edges closer to the former which I thought was a big mistake because it doesn't want to be that; it doesn't want to be that sleazy. Oh, it's still sleazy. There's tons of boob grabbing and chicks kissing. In one scene, the girls inexplicably just start splashing water on each other followed by a lesbian sex scene. There's also sexy shoveling. If anyone legitimately tried to dig a hole that way, it would take hours. Anyway, if they were aiming for parody, they didn't quite get there. However, parody is one of the most difficult forms of comedy to do correctly. One hopes for Young Frankenstein but usually gets Epic Movie.

The special effects are cheesy but intentional so, in a way, they're actually quite good. I think they achieved the look they were going for. There's a lot of green screen use when they could have easily filmed on location. The story isn't particularly strong but I don't think it aspired for depth. There are A LOT of flashbacks which I feel should be used sparingly in movies because most movies don't do reverse storytelling as well as Memento. Additionally, I thought the ending was predictable. The Usual Suspects didn't invent the twist ending but it's definitely responsible for numerous twist endings over the past 15 or so years that are neither as clever nor as well done. So, the ending here makes sense and it fits but it's also inexplicable due to a certain character's age.

The acting is probably the most interesting part of this movie and what spurred me to write this fairly extensive review. At first, I thought a lot of the acting was way too over the top, particularly America Olivo and Julia Voth. Until the end. I couldn't decide if Voth's acting was really terrible or borderline brilliant, depending on whether my prediction of the ending was correct. She plays up the ditzy, naive, weak, vulnerable tart to the point where you suspect she either sucks at acting or her character is up to something. In a parody or even one struggling to be a parody, one should expect the acting to be over-exaggerated. You can't fake good acting, but good acting allows you to fake bad acting. In retrospect, Voth's performance won't win any awards but she did a fairly good job of intentionally playing the part over the top. In the scene that called for her to be serious, she toned it down and her inflection is spot on. And good Lord, she is gorgeous.

Also, for a movie called "Bitch Slap," there wasn't a lot of bitch slapping. It could have used more.

[BranDonk Kong]

Adrock, you need to watch the director's cut where the Rhona Mitra scene is not off screen. It's pretty creepy, but at the same time, a boner's a boner.

[BranDonk Kong]

Halloween 2 (2009) - 2/10
This was just pretty terrible, and basically seemed like and excuse for Rob Zombie to put his wife in another movie. The remake of Halloween was pretty fantastic, but this was just plain stupid (and predictable, for the most part). It almost seems as if they made half of a movie, then their deadline got moved up to the next day, so they just ended it as quickly as possible. If you have seen the 2007 remake, but not the sequel, then do yourself a favor and never watch it, or it will ruin the first one as well.

[Plugabugz]

I saw John Carter literally 30 minutes after i left work on Friday and it was exactly what i thought it would be. It's a $200 million big-budget blockbuster by Disney.

Want to know what its like? See their last big-budget movie The Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, the set design and even clothing felt like it came from there. I liked the film in some spots but the writing felt pretty weak in places.. i took particular issue to how he gets to mars. they say that he's literally copied there, so if thats the case then how is his host body surviving? When he was sent back the other person had already died and decomposed. Placing him into a locked-from-inside room doesn't solve that either.

It's good for what it does, and little else.

[Morari]

It's good for what it does, and little else.

Ruin a beloved franchise? Yeah, it looks like it does that pretty darn well.

[broodwars]

It's good for what it does, and little else.

Ruin a beloved franchise? Yeah, it looks like it does that pretty darn well.

Well, apparently it's such a beloved franchise that before this movie came out, I'd never heard of it.

I recently finally got around to seeing The Adventures of Tintin, and it's damn good adventure movie.  It's probably the best-looking CGI-based animated film I've ever seen, with great use of color and pretty much perfect lighting.  The action scenes are really well-staged and the movie overall is extremely well-edited, though the car chase near the end of the movie practically screamed that this film was made with 3D in mind.

Unfortunately, this movie's big weak link is the lead character himself, Tintin.  I haven't seen such a Mary Sue/Gary Stu character in a movie in a long time.  While he's pretty decent in a fight and reasonably intelligent, he just seems to have almost no character and no agency in his own story.  His dog does more in this movie than he does.  Finally, although they're really well-staged, towards the end of the movie it does feel like perhaps there's 1 or 2 action scenes too many and the movie seems to drag a little.  The movie also dedicates an absurd amount of time to the annoying Detective Thompsons, who do nothing in this movie but waste time acting stupid with a case that's only peripherally related to the main plot.  Overall, it's a really fun movie to watch, though.

[Morari]

It's good for what it does, and little else.

Ruin a beloved franchise? Yeah, it looks like it does that pretty darn well.

Well, apparently it's such a beloved franchise that before this movie came out, I'd never heard of it.

You must have went to a public school.
It's no wonder Hollywood can continuously crap all over stolen material... no one is informed enough to even know that it is stolen to begin with. Edgar Rice Burroughs is pretty standard reading for anyone even slightly interested in science fiction. It may be pulpy, but that was the style of the time. The only pieces of his catalog that overshadow the Barsoom series is Tarzan himself.

[Plugabugz]

I haven't read the book either but as a self-contained movie (clearly aiming to push to a franchise of its own) its not doing much.

I didn't walk out of the movie pondering the endless possibilities of what they can do and play with (like Inception did, for instance).

[broodwars]

You must have went to a public school. : : : :
It's no wonder Hollywood can continuously crap all over stolen material... no one is informed enough to even know that it is stolen to begin with. Edgar Rice Burroughs is pretty standard reading for anyone even slightly interested in science fiction. It may be pulpy, but that was the style of the time. The only pieces of his catalog that overshadow the Barsoom series is Tarzan himself.

We never read Tarzan either, though as least I was familiar with that one through various movie adaptations.  Our required reading list was weird growing-up in the 80s & 90s: in my dad's day, he had to read The Lord of the Rings.  In mine, only The Hobbit was required.      And let's not get into all the politically-correct snore-fests I had to read in Middle & High School.

My point, though, is that the John Carter books are frickin' obscure in the modern era.  I love pulp-type fiction stories, especially when they were converted into radio dramas in the 30s and 40s (which you can still find these days, one of the miracles of the internet).  But these stories haven't received a previous film or TV adaptation (that I'm aware of) that would put them in the public consciousness.  You see a trailer for a seemingly (emphasis on appearances)-StarGate rip-off with a guy who jumps like Mario, and it's kind of obvious why this movie isn't doing well.  People just aren't widely familiar with the source material these days, even if you are the audience for it.

It's actually kind of the same thing that happened to Tintin here in NA.  It did alright here in NA because of the Spielberg attachment, but it made most of its money in Europe and elsewhere where the Tintin name is much better known.  I love pulp adventure storytelling, and I just wasn't aware of Tintin before the movie released.  We had Jonny Quest here instead.

[ThePerm]

Princess of Mars 4/10 Ok i didnt watch the whole movie, but I saw it was on the syfy channel and I was like haha its the syfy version of john carter. terrible.

I still havent seen TinTin, I used to watch the cartoon on HBO and nick though.

[BranDonk Kong]

Resident Evil: Apocalypse - 4/10
So I've only seen the first RE movie besides this one, and it was pretty bad, but this was just downright awful. The video games are basically perfect for someone to make a live action film based on them, but they always have to go and make them...not Resident Evil. It probably didn't help that I watched it on SyFy, which made the movie about 70 minutes long after skipping through the commercials, but it probably would have been worse now that I think about it...

I did see a few minutes of the one with Ali Larter in it, and it seemed like it was probably a million times better than these two just based on those few minutes.

[Kairon]

Season of the Witch
Goddammit... Why do I watch Nicolas Cage movies? I should have known better. I've only liked 2 movies in the last 10 years with Nicolas Cage in it: Matchstick Men (which I hated the first time because of the ending) and Kick Ass. It's not even about a witch. Face + palm. The only positive thing I can really say about the movie is that Claire Foy is pretty and that's not even about the movie. Thanks Mr. and Mrs. Foy for that.

Hehe, I have the same problem. I can't help it, Nicolas Cage, Denzel Washington... I watch their movies even if I know they'll be bad!

I think the best thing about Season of the Witch (Which I give a "watchable" 3/5 to) is the British cast, and yeah, especially Claire Foy. Man, now I want to watch Little Dorritt again.

Anyways...

Three Blind Mice
A techie guy in London accidentally witnesses a murder on a webcam page he's a fan of, thus getting caught up in the police investigation and eventual international conspiracy. Honestly, I was a little bit surprised, I was expecting more of a "Hackers" vibe to it, but it's really not a tech movie and more about them trying to figure out the purpose behind such a random crime, even as the police stop official investigation. I'll have to admit, I threw this on my queue because of Emilia Fox, who I have a passing interest in as she played Georgiana Darcy in the 1995 Pride and Prejudice. I was actually second-guessing everyone's intentions and roles very early on, but the movie definitely lulled me into a sense of complacency before it had expended all of its twists and surprises. An interesting movie, but just a tad on the mundance side in the first half... 3/5.

[jrlibrarian]

The Village: Another of M. Night's movies that was marketed as a horror movie despite the fact that it's anything but. Set in the 1800s, there is a village surrounded by woods, haunted by Those We Do Not Speak Of.  This is a movie created for people who know how to watch movies, if you know what I mean. Ignore Roger Ebert's review of it (he gave it a measly 1 star), and find a copy of this movie. But whatever you do, don't look up ANYTHING about the plot or the ending before you watch it. Amazing movie, in my opinion. I'm working on tracking down a copy of Unbreakable at  the moment.

[ThePerm]

i figured out the ending of the village long before the end

i noticed some pretty obvious anachronous things, iv only seen it once though, at the theaters

[Adrock]

I saw it in theatres and I figured out the ending in the first scene. The gravestone gave it away. I was hoping I was wrong but when I saw everything unfolding, I kept saying in my head, "Don't be modern day. Don't be modern day. Don't be modern day. Gahhhh, it's modern day." I was actually kind of hoping that the truce was real and there would actually be real monsters when Ivy was walking through the woods.

[Kairon]

I'm working on tracking down a copy of Unbreakable at  the moment.

I really liked Unbreakable, I hope you do too! I know it's not fashionable to like Shyamalan's work anymore, but I still have a soft spot for his films. I like how they each seem to be based around some sort of theme or concept, like archetypal fairytale roles in The Lady in the Water. No one seems to like The Happening, but I was absolutely tickled how the whole movie was some sort of applied Scientific Process, and with Mark Wahlberg as a science teacher no less!

As for The Village, I became a big fan of Bryce Dallas Howard after that, but unfortunately I can't say I ultimately enjoyed the movie.

[MysticGohan]

You must have went to a public school. : : : :
It's no wonder Hollywood can continuously crap all over stolen material... no one is informed enough to even know that it is stolen to begin with. Edgar Rice Burroughs is pretty standard reading for anyone even slightly interested in science fiction. It may be pulpy, but that was the style of the time. The only pieces of his catalog that overshadow the Barsoom series is Tarzan himself.

We never read Tarzan either, though as least I was familiar with that one through various movie adaptations.  Our required reading list was weird growing-up in the 80s & 90s: in my dad's day, he had to read The Lord of the Rings.  In mine, only The Hobbit was required.      And let's not get into all the politically-correct snore-fests I had to read in Middle & High School.

My point, though, is that the John Carter books are frickin' obscure in the modern era.  I love pulp-type fiction stories, especially when they were converted into radio dramas in the 30s and 40s (which you can still find these days, one of the miracles of the internet).  But these stories haven't received a previous film or TV adaptation (that I'm aware of) that would put them in the public consciousness.  You see a trailer for a seemingly (emphasis on appearances)-StarGate rip-off with a guy who jumps like Mario, and it's kind of obvious why this movie isn't doing well.  People just aren't widely familiar with the source material these days, even if you are the audience for it.

It's actually kind of the same thing that happened to Tintin here in NA.  It did alright here in NA because of the Spielberg attachment, but it made most of its money in Europe and elsewhere where the Tintin name is much better known.  I love pulp adventure storytelling, and I just wasn't aware of Tintin before the movie released.  We had Jonny Quest here instead.

Hehe, funny...... I was aware of TinTin 20+yrs before this movie was a twinkle in some director's eye. There was a TinTin animated series after all, during the early 90's if memory serves me.

[Kairon]

It's true that TinTin's flat character is a bit of one of the negatives about the movie version, but let me tell you, in the comics it's absolutely no problem whatsoever-at-all.

[MysticGohan]

U.S. Citizen who knows and watched Tin Tin  the animated series based on the comics. So it is known here, not because of the movie hehe.

[BlackNMild2k1]

I watched Tintin the other day. The CG was pretty amazing. the only thing that gave it away to be an animation was the faces. all the inanimate objects looked so real in the beginning that you could have been fooled until they showed a face.

Couple of funny moments (like the plane burp) and I'm not really familiar with the source material, but overall I thought it was a pretty good action/adventure movie

[Halbred]

I loved the Tintin books growing up, so I was excited to see the film. Unfortunately, I found it exhausting. It's all action, all the time. No character development or investigative moments that the books had. I thought the most "Tintin" moments in the movie didn't involve Tintin at all, but Tompson & Thompson investigating the wallet thief.

[BlackNMild2k1]

to all those John Carter fans out there
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118051647
don't expect a sequel.

[Kairon]

Can us Avatar: The Last Airbender fans expect a sequel?

[broodwars]

Can us Avatar: The Last Airbender fans expect a sequel?

Yes, it's called The Legend of Korra, and it'll be airing next month.   

Now, if you're talking about a sequel to that intensely mediocre (at best) M. Night The Last Airbender (note the lack of the "Avatar" name), I really hope we don't see one if the sequel would just be more of that.  I just know M. Night would find a way to screw-up my favorite Avatar character: Toph, whose awesomeness can't be described by mere words.