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What Non-New Films Have You Seen? (2021 Edition)

Started by zomgmouse, January 14, 2021, 11:12:22 AM

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Dr Rock

The poker bit is the worst bit. 'It's ok, I've discovered his really obvious tell'' Oh no, the tell was a bluff! No shit.

The rest of the film is the other worst bit. How is it great, honestly?

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: Dr Rock on September 25, 2021, 09:23:59 AM
The poker bit is the worst bit. 'It's ok, I've discovered his really obvious tell'' Oh no, the tell was a bluff! No shit.

The rest of the film is the other worst bit. How is it great, honestly?

I'm with you as it goes, it's not the worst Bond I've seen but I found it fairly boring in places, and can't say I particularly like Craig in the lead role, so far the only film of his I did like was Skyfall.

Dusty Substance


Casino Royale is terrific. Not just a terrific Bond film, a terrific action film. 

Sebastian Cobb

I watched Black Bear which was enjoyable but it became apparent about halfway through I must've seen it before and forgotten nearly all of it.

Small Man Big Horse

Young Frankenstein (1974) - Gene Wilder, Teri Garr, Peter Boyle, Cloris Leachman and Marty Feldman star in this parody filled with a fair few daft gags, innuendo, silly face pulling and mugging to the camera, it's adored by many but I only mostly liked it when I watched it as a teenager and feel the same way now. The performances are strong but some of the jokes can be seen a mile off, the gag rate isn't particularly high, it takes too long for the creature to be up and about and messing about, while the ending is a bit bland for my liking. 6.1/10

Small Man Big Horse

The Hourglass Sanitorium (1973) - A man visits his dying father in a sanitorium and enters in to a dreamlike world where he stumbles from one unusual location to the next in what is a surreal, strange and odd journey. I found it intriguing for the first hour or so but in the second half found the confusion exhausting rather than captivating, and there were chunks where I had absolutely no idea what the meaning was supposed to be. Visually it's often unforgettable, and I enjoyed the bits I think I understood, but I can't say it's a film that worked for me as a whole. 5.4/10

Rizla

Noticed horror western Bone Tomahawk (2015) was on 'zon prime, gave it a whirl and was glad I did. Seemed to generate faint praise on here at the time, but I loved it. Scary and gory in just the right measure, superb script, lovely performances all round - Nite Owl's well good.  Is old Kurt Russell > young Kurt Russell? I'm starting to think he might even be. 9/10

PlanktonSideburns

Yea been re watching zhalers films recently, even read one of had books. There's something about him alright
Quote from: Rizla on September 25, 2021, 11:02:28 PM
Noticed horror western Bone Tomahawk (2015) was on 'zon prime, gave it a whirl and was glad I did. Seemed to generate faint praise on here at the time, but I loved it. Scary and gory in just the right measure, superb script, lovely performances all round - Nite Owl's well good.  Is old Kurt Russell > young Kurt Russell? I'm starting to think he might even be. 9/10

chveik

Quote from: Small Man Big Horse on September 25, 2021, 10:32:14 PM
The Hourglass Sanitorium (1973) - A man visits his dying father in a sanitorium and enters in to a dreamlike world where he stumbles from one unusual location to the next in what is a surreal, strange and odd journey. I found it intriguing for the first hour or so but in the second half found the confusion exhausting rather than captivating, and there were chunks where I had absolutely no idea what the meaning was supposed to be. Visually it's often unforgettable, and I enjoyed the bits I think I understood, but I can't say it's a film that worked for me as a whole. 5.4/10

the book's great though, if you like kafka-type short stories

Dusty Substance

Quote from: PlanktonSideburns on September 25, 2021, 11:06:14 PM
Yea been re watching zhalers films recently, even read one of had books. There's something about him alright

He's a fantastic film maker. All his films have been excellent. Kind of like a 70s New Hollywood director but working in the modern era. Tough, uncompromising and each of his films have had genuinely shocking moments.

Dusty Substance

Quote from: Small Man Big Horse on September 25, 2021, 03:27:28 PM
Young Frankenstein (1974) -  it takes too long for the creature to be up and about and messing about, while the ending is a bit bland for my liking.

Both of Brooks' big films of the 70s - Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein (released in the same year, which is remarkable) have disappointing endings which kind of let the rest of the films down.

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: chveik on September 25, 2021, 11:31:52 PM
the book's great though, if you like kafka-type short stories

I do, so I'll have to give it a shot at some point, if only to see if it helps me understand the film more.

Quote from: Dusty Substance on September 26, 2021, 02:15:40 AM
Both of Brooks' big films of the 70s - Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein (released in the same year, which is remarkable) have disappointing endings which kind of let the rest of the films down.

I didn't mind the Blazing Saddles ending too much, it's nothing amazing but it's amusing enough, whereas YF ends
Spoiler alert
on a "Oh, he has a big cock now" gag
[close]
which just felt lazy. It's strange as I've been working my way through Brooks' films recently and really enjoying them, but YF didn't click with me in the way the others did / it has for millions of others.

Small Man Big Horse

Birdboy: The Forgotten Children - Alluringly animated Spanish post-apocalyptic fare where a group of animals wish to escape their miserable lives, but doing so is far harder than they anticipated. It's perhaps not the most subtle of films when it comes to how it deals with greed, addiction, climate change, pollution and abuse, but it was one I found captivating
Spoiler alert
and loved the way the ending offers up hope without suggesting everything can be easily solved
[close]
. Should have had more of the sentient alarm clock though, I loved that little fella and could happily have watched an entire movie based around his antics. 7.8/10

Dex Sawash


Blazing Saddles has the best ending of any film ever.

Inspector Norse

Source Code Zowie "Duncan Jones" Bowie's second film after a good debut with Moon, this is a tight, pacy sci-fi thriller featuring a solid Jake Gyllenhaal as an army pilot who wakes up on a train in someone else's body, and is forced to relive the eight minutes leading up to the train going KABOOM again and again in order to identify the bomber so that [some military-type people in an office] can capture them before another larger attack later in the day.
Very watchable, dynamically handled although the details are a bit foggy and the contrived happy ending doesn't really make sense. Also a little bit too much of the old GOD BLESS THE US ARMY bollocks but this proved Jones wasn't just a hack who lucked out with Moon; strange that he chose the career suicide of a video game adaptation as his next move.

Small Man Big Horse

Detective Dee: Mystery of the Phantom Flame (2010) - It's 689AD and Wu Zetian is about to become China's first female emperor, and is building an enormous statue of buddha to celebrate this, when people start to burst in to flames and die and so she turns to the long exiled Detective Dee for help. A rollicking romp with lots of over the top action scenes this is extremely entertaining, plus I solved the mystery and so get to feel smart for once, the only negative is some slightly dodgy cgi but it's not bad enough to spoil it in any way. 7.8/10

Dusty Substance

Quote from: Dex Sawash on September 26, 2021, 04:27:35 PM
Blazing Saddles has the best ending of any film ever.

I probably ought to rewatch BS (it's been a decade or so) but it sort of smacked of "we don't know how to end it so let's do something wacky and meta". A bit like when Spike Milligan would a sketch on Q by breaking the fourth wall and saying "What are we going to do now?".


famethrowa

Quote from: Dusty Substance on September 26, 2021, 08:38:28 PM
I probably ought to rewatch BS (it's been a decade or so) but it sort of smacked of "we don't know how to end it so let's do something wacky and meta". A bit like when Spike Milligan would a sketch on Q by breaking the fourth wall and saying "What are we going to do now?".

I always thought it was a rip of the Holy Grail ending, but looking at the dates, maybe it's the other way round!

Famous Mortimer

Traxx

The original is a classic, but for some reason the star, Shadoe Stevens (a guy most famous for being a radio DJ and doing the announcements for game shows - he's got a hell of a voice), decided to re-edit it himself in 2014 and just stick it on his Youtube channel. It's now an hour long and, to be fair, is very entertaining, although I don't think it should be anyone's introduction to it. I'm still not entirely sure why Stevens decided, for his one and only starring role, to make such an odd movie, but I'm very glad he did.

EDIT: Actually, he did a TV movie a couple of years earlier called "Shadoevision", and the IMDB description is impressively strange.

QuoteAll television, all over the world, is suddenly interrupted by someone who looks like a cross between Mark Twain and Albert Einstein. Again and again he says cheerfully, "This is NOT Mind Control. Think about it." In the streets, panic ensues and Norman Jones finds himself racing out of control, through doorways through other dimensions, and finally falling through the universe and into the Jules Verne designed "WorldView Auditorium." Plummeting into an open seat, he finds himself in the middle of the talk show broadcast of one, Djony Dakota. Here he learns that his girlfriend, Faith Pate', has been kidnapped, and is being held for ransom and some good times. He also learns that, in his panic, in his haste, he left an interdimensional doorway open. Now, the fate of Faith, and the entire Universe, hangs on whether Norman can change the future, by closing the door to his past. And the clock is ticking. Do you understand: LAUGH NOW, THINK LATER? PSYCHIC INTOXICATION? BRAINWORMS? Did you know that you have "Laughter Glands" that periodically need to be squeezed? IF NONE OF THIS MAKES SENSE TO YOU, IT MAY ALREADY BE TOO LATE.

zomgmouse

Had a bit of a Wim Wenders catchup the past several days and saw:

Don't Come Knocking. Sam Shepard writes and stars as an aging Western actor having a midlife crisis tracking down his son he's never met.

Every Thing Will Be Fine. James Franco as an author who accidentally kills a child on the road, with Charlotte Gainsbourg (excellent as always) as the mother of said child. Apparently this was released in 3D which would have been interesting to see. Something really haunting about this one even if it's not him at his best.

Palermo Shooting. Photographer has a near-fatal experience and goes to recuperate in a small Italian town.

Lisbon Story. Quasi-sequel to The State of Things, this sees a sound recorder go to Lisbon to track down an old friend and colleague who's making a film about the city.

Kings of the Road. By far the best of the bunch. Incredible reinvigoration of the road movie, a couple of strangers roaming round in a van, one's a cinema projector repair person and the other has just split with his wife.

The Million Dollar Hotel. And the worst of the bunch. Didn't hate this by any means but it's a definite misfire. I blame Bono. Great in tone as usual but the content is kind of woeful (mentally ill inhabitants of a rundown hotel embroiled in a suicide/murder investigation) - though could easily have been done much better.

Struck by how sensitive Wenders' films are, even when full of melancholy there's always a gentle hope amongst it, even with smirks they're incredibly earnest. Every character bares their soul. (Also lots of narratives of creative types losing their way.)

Famous Mortimer

"Shadoevision" is certainly something. Kind of a mix of "Max Headroom", "Amazon Women On The Moon" and those old, weird MTV ads, I just discovered it's part of the "Cinemax Comedy Experiment", which gave comedians complete carte blanche - it's where Chris Elliot did "Action Family" and also featured Jasper Carrott and Spitting Image (I presume they bought and repackaged some British stuff to save money).

A topic for CC, perhaps, but Shadoe Stevens clearly had some pretty interesting comic ideas.

zomgmouse

Inadvertently gave myself a Spanish double:

Peppermint Frappé by Carlos Saura. Spellbinding satire of male obsession starring Geraldine Chaplin in a dual role. Really good.

Broken Embraces by Pedro Almodóvar. Typically richly melodramatic - stretches out a little but it's one of his better ones I think.

dissolute ocelot

Muriel (1963) - typically enigmatic Alain Resnais film about memory and war and a middle-aged woman selling antiques. It probably makes sense with enough viewings, but it has something to do with atrocities in Algeria and also with World War Two. Lots of gambling, borrowing money, debt, buying and selling: something to do with capitalism too. Amazing photography of the unlovely port of Boulogne by Sacha Vierny: modernist towerblocks, port, casino, wartime ruins. Fascinating due to its disorienting, fast-moving, fast-cutting style (allegedly 1000 cuts in a sub-2-hour film), and weirdly melodramatic musical cues. You can see its links to the French New Novel (not that I've read any, but I know British versions like Ann Quin); but can also see why Resnais spent a lot of his later years filming Alan Ayckbourn plays.

Spotlight (2015) - engrossing Catholic sex abuse movie, it's well-acted and looks naturalistic, but also a bit drab and functional. It's less emotionally traumatising than it could be: there are some "think of the children" moments but it's focused on access to sealed legal documents and looking through old records and navigating the Boston establishment. I love a nice library or archive. It's the first time I've seen Michael Keaton not over-acting, plus the always-great Mark Ruffalo and Stanley Tucci, the underrated Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber not being a cartoon animal, etc. Definitely worth a watch (Amazon Prime) if you want some serious, gripping drama (and to see smug Bostonians and Catholics getting their comeuppance).

BASEketball (1998) - Farrelly-brothers-esque hit-and-miss comedy from the South Park boys, and several episodes of South Park covered similar themes better. Proper American sports are equally stupid (and equally un-woke), but less funny. As well as terrible hair, it has the worst soundtrack ever, a mix of intentional badness, cheerleader pop, and frat-boy ska.

Sebastian Cobb

I really liked Baseketball as a boorish youth and it reminds me of that time a bit. I think it can be filed next to Kevin Smith stuff in that I can see no good coming from a rewatch.

frajer

Gemini Man (2019) which is fairly recent for a non-new film, but feels like something straight out of the early 2000s.

Saw it had been added to Netflix and it seemed like a brainless high-concept action film to veg out to on a Friday night, but unfortunately as well as brainless it's also bland and dull. I'm not sure how you make 'ageing assassin vs a clone of his younger self in his prime' boring, but Ang Lee and everyone involved pull it off. Will Smith tries to bring charm to a cardboard character (and his younger, equally cardboard clone) and doesn't manage it, while Mary Elizabeth Winstead does ok in an utterly thankless role. As you could all probably guess, Benedict Wong is by far the best thing about it in the comedy sidekick role.

There is also one cool creepy bit where they found out Dick Dastardly Clive Owen has even more clones of young Will Smith and is making them all re-enact Fresh Prince episodes for his own amusement. No that's not true, he's
Spoiler alert
lobotomised them to make them ruthless killing machines which obey his commands without doubting or questioning his villanous motives. I thought this reveal was going somewhere, and the final set-piece was going to be loads of highly trained Will Smiths pitted against each other, but instead the old Will Smith kills Clive Owen and then the film finishes 5 minutes later with them merrily meeting up with his young clone who's stopped being an assassin and is having a nice time at uni.
[close]

It's not exactly bad so much as it is completely pointless and pisses away what could have been a fun premise. Don't watch it.

Blumf

Quote from: frajer on September 27, 2021, 04:58:08 PM
Gemini Man (2019) which is fairly recent for a non-new film, but feels like something straight out of the early 2000s.

Not really surprising, as it had been in development hell since the late-90s.

zomgmouse

The Lady Vanishes. Mustn't've been in a particularly receptive mood but I found this rather underwhelming - shot well of course, some engaging acting, but it all had a rather odd pacing/unfolding of the narrative, together with lacklustre editing. I read the book so I knew what was going on but it just seemed to plod along.

Used Cars. Also a profound disappointment. For the most part incredibly unfunny. Everyone (in particular Kurt Russell) was doing a great job but the script/direction were an absolute mess.

Air Doll. Kore-eda film of a sex doll come to life. Really moving - quite simple and poetic.

Symbol. Another Japanese film, an absurdist ode to meaning(lessness?), reminiscent of Jim Henson's The Cube. The bulk of the film portrays a man who wakes up in an odd white room peppered with little cherub dicks and balls on the walls which if you press eject some random object. Eventually he tries to create an exit. All this is interspersed with a narrative of a luchador in Mexico. Really inventive and the final montage sequence is quite extraordinary.

The Maid. Second film I've seen of Sebastián Silva (after Nasty Baby, which I really enjoyed). This is another super dark comedy filmed in an ultra realist style. A long-time maid of an upper middle class family starts lashing out.

Enrico Palazzo

Quote from: zomgmouse on September 28, 2021, 08:26:21 AM


The Maid. Second film I've seen of Sebastián Silva (after Nasty Baby, which I really enjoyed). This is another super dark comedy filmed in an ultra realist style. A long-time maid of an upper middle class family starts lashing out.

Haven't seen The Maid but Tyrel and Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus are well worth checking out.

phantom_power

The Landlord (1970) - Very 1970 film about a white trust fund kid who buys a house in a black neighbourhood and learns a little bit about how real people live. Social satire ensues. An odd tone that starts out quite light and quirky and then gets quite dark and serious. Hal Ashby's first film and you can see his style in there but it is not quite fully formed yet

zomgmouse

Quote from: Enrico Palazzo on September 28, 2021, 08:39:34 AM
Haven't seen The Maid but Tyrel and Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus are well worth checking out.

Oh yes this reminds me I have seen Tyrel! Pretty good I thought although maybe the weakest of the ones I've seen so far. Been trying to find his latest, A Fistful of Dirt, for a couple of years now to no avail.