rate the last movie you saw

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BobaMike
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2941 Post by BobaMike »

La La Land 10/10

Amazing! The best movie I've seen all year. I'm not much of a musical fan, but this one knocked me over. I was actually in tears from the middle of the movie onward (tears of joy, and sad tears). Not sure why. My wife laughed a bit when I told her. I guess the combination of the acting, the incredible long takes (I broke out into a huge smile when I realized they weren't cutting during a loooong dance and song scene.) Emma Stone is perfect, and Ryan Gosling, who I never much cared for, was great.

The ending, was perfect, happy and sad at the same time. I can't really explain this movie- it's just a treat!

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Monterey Jack
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2942 Post by Monterey Jack »

Yep... La La Land is my favorite movie of the year...and I hate musicals.

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AndyDursin
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2943 Post by AndyDursin »

The ending, was perfect, happy and sad at the same time.
Didn't see it yet, but I'm guessing it's an UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG riff.

I will def catch up with it when it hits video. Ryan Gosling singing and dancing does nothing for me. Funny thing is all the people who seem to REALLY love it tell you they hate musicals right off the bat -- that, too, is an endorsement that also does nothing for me, because I actually like musicals. lol

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Monterey Jack
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2944 Post by Monterey Jack »

AndyDursin wrote:Funny thing is all the people who seem to REALLY love it tell you they hate musicals right off the bat -- that, too, is an endorsement that also does nothing for me, because I actually like musicals. lol
I've never been able to warm to them in live-action form (for animated movies, it's easier, because the inherent artificiality of the process makes me more agreeable to the idea of talking animals and inanimate objects also being able to sing & dance at the drop of a hat :P ), so I could probably list all of the ones I do like on the fingers of one hand...Sweeney Todd, Little Shop Of Horrors, Across The Universe (because who doesn't love the Beatles, right?), and now La La Land. Do Muppet movies count? I can usually deal with those, too, although they're kind of in the wheelhouse of animated movies.

Eric Paddon
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2945 Post by Eric Paddon »

I'm the opposite. I love Broadway musicals (I think living in close proximity to them helps) and the musical theater as a genre as well as film musicals, but I have ZERO interest in animated musicals.

jkholm
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2946 Post by jkholm »

SILENCE
9/10

Martin Scorsese’s latest film is set in the 17th century and tells the story of two Portuguese Jesuit priests (Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver) who travel to Japan to find out what happened to their former mentor (Liam Neeson) who reportedly has abandoned his faith. Upon their arrival they encounter small groups of Christian converts in hiding to escape the brutal persecution of the government. The film follows the priests as they struggle to understand why their fellow believers are so harshly treated and why God is apparently silent (hence the film’s title) on the subject.

Scorsese is much more restrained than usual here with very few shots that call attention to themselves. The meaning of the title extends to the sound design as well. There’s no score to speak of and the movie is mostly dialogue and natural sounds.

Not everyone will like this movie. Four people walked out at my screening. Whether that was because they couldn’t take the torture scenes or were just bored I don’t know. There are many philosophical conversations so if you don’t like that sort of thing you might find it a little slow. I was fascinated however. The internal struggle of Father Rodrigues (Garfield) is profound. He is initially supremely confident in his faith but has to contend with the harsh realities he sees. The viewer hears his prayers in voice-over and often these prayers are followed by contradictory actions on his part. Why is God silent? Why has Christianity not “taken root” in Japan like it did in Europe? I’m sure non-Christians will have a different reaction than Christians and Protestants may see the events differently than Catholics.

It’s too bad this is shaping up to be one of Scorsese’s lowest grossing movies. Even if it bombs and doesn’t get recognition at the Oscars, it’s still a Scorsese film and therefore will continue to be seen years from now.

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AndyDursin
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2947 Post by AndyDursin »

THE SICILIAN CLAN
7/10

A slick French production starring three big draws at their domestic box-office at the time – Jean Gabin, Alain Delon and Lino Ventura – THE SICILIAN CLAN (118/125 mins., 1969) is an interesting, if sometimes too leisurely, crime drama that was co-produced by 20th Century Fox a few years before “The Godfather” would re-define the “mob movie.”

Delon plays a dashing thief who engages the notorious Manalese crime family – overseen by patriarch Gabin – to help him escape from prison. While incarcerated, Delon’s Roger Sartet uncovered information from a fellow inmate about a diamond exhibition that, as the group finds out, proves too difficult to plan a robbery around. Instead, a daring plan is concocted including hyjacking the plane carrying the diamonds to the U.S., all the while the group is tailed by an irrepressible local cop (Ventura).

“The Sicilian Clan” is stylishly shot in widescreen and memorably scored by Ennio Morricone. Kino Lorber’s Blu-Ray, available this week, looks spectacular with both a 4K restored transfer of the movie’s U.S. version and a 2K restoration of its French release print. The latter runs several minutes longer, the result of the movie having been slightly spruced up for its English language version, which although mostly dubbed as well, was shot a second time, specifically in English (among the stars, only Delon’s actual voice reportedly appears).

Under the direction of Henri Verneuil, “The Sicilian Clan” is marked by European craftsmanship, almost to a fault: there are times the film proves fully captivating, but others when far too much time is exhausted on introducing a litany of supporting characters. The pacing, as a result, never really develops a head of steam, though fans of the actors – and the genre – should still be sufficiently interested in the material, which is heightened here by Kino Lorber’s superb HD presentation. Extras include a commentary with Nathaniel Thompson and Howard S. Berger, an hour-plus featurette from 2013, trailers, an image gallery and a tribute to the film by director Fred Cavaye.

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AndyDursin
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2948 Post by AndyDursin »

ARRIVAL
7/10

In terms of where the intergalactic drama ARRIVAL lies in the sci-fi/fantasy realm, “Sicario” helmer Denis Villenuve’s much praised picture falls somewhere between solid and not quite out of this world. Certainly the film provides Amy Adams with one of her strongest roles to date: a linguistics professor, suffering from the loss of her daughter, who’s tapped by the military to translate the sounds of extraterrestrial visitors, currently camped in over a dozen ships around the globe.

What the aliens’ motives are and what they are attempting to say is priority number one for Adams’ Louise Banks, teamed with a physicist (Jeremy Renner) under the command of a stalwart American colonel (Forest Whitaker) who tries to balance their scientific approach with the suspicious intentions of a CIA operative (Michael Stuhlberg) who’s watching as other nations question what the aliens are doing here.

“Arrival” is, unquestionably, a tight, well-acted, compelling film. Adams is convincing and keeps you interested from start to finish in her character’s plight, the movie bouncing back and forth from the scenes of her daughter’s life and death to what’s transpiring in the present. Eric Heisserer’s script, adapted from Ted Chiang’s story “Story of Your Life,” has some issues, however, in extending the core drama out to feature length, opting to add a throwaway “suspense” element in a trigger-happy soldier trying to sabotage the scientist’s efforts, as well as the entire component of the aliens on the brink of being exterminated by foreign powers. This superficial element stands in stark contrast to the believable scenes of Adams and Renner working to translate the strange sounds and language structure of the visitors, and is given so little development that you can just feel it being shoehorned into the script in order to give the movie more "tension."

Ultimately, the subplot detracts a bit from what’s an otherwise solidly constructed – if surprisingly downbeat – picture that's entirely reliant on a "big reveal twist" that's part Shyamalan, part soap opera. Your mileage may vary, as they say, once Villenuve introduces this element into the picture, but while it makes sense and is fairly effective as a storytelling device, it also ends up becoming the main thrust of the film -- not so much mankind's first contact with extraterrestrials, leaving awe and inspiration to take a backseat to a maudlin Lifetime Movie of the Week message.

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AndyDursin
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2949 Post by AndyDursin »

THE EDGE OF SEVENTEEN
7/10

Kelly Fremon Craig’s well-received teen drama provides a plum role for Hailee Steinfeld, playing a high schooler whose placement at the bottom of the social food chain is compounded when her best friend (Haley Lu Richardson) starts dating her more popular, seemingly perfect older brother (Blake Jenner). While life at home following this predicament disintegrates, her relationship with an understanding teacher (Woody Harrelson) and a classmate (Hayden Szeto) who holds a crush on her provides some stability – even if Steinfeld’s heroine Nadine doesn’t always recognize it.

“Edge of Seventeen” is appealingly performed but comes off, ultimately, as being awfully familiar: from Nadine’s relationship with an equally awkward soul mate she can’t see, to her inability to connect with her widowed mother (Kyra Sedgwick), the older brother harboring his own emotional pain, and the best friend who gains entrance into a popular clique, there’s nothing in Craig’s film you haven’t seen before. It’s also a film that netted an R rating just for a few, fleetingly raunchy lines of dialogue, as the picture is otherwise appropriate for younger teens and likely should’ve been released with a PG-13 (not unlike another STX release from last year, “Bad Moms”). It’s all pleasant and entertaining – backed by Steinfeld’s lead performance – but also forgettable, even considering the genre.

Universal’s Blu-Ray combo pack, out this week, includes deleted scenes and a gag reel, a 1080p (1.85) AVC encoded transfer and 7.1 DTS MA sound plus a Digital HD copy and DVD.

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Monterey Jack
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2950 Post by Monterey Jack »

-John Wick Chapter 2 (2017): 9/10

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Smashing sequel is in that rarefied, Die Hard 2 class of being an action movie follow-up that's successfully "bigger" than what came before, without sacrificing the specific "beats" that distinguished its predecessor. As much as I enjoyed the first Wick, I felt it was just a tad overrated by action fans starved for unpretentious, Meat & Potatoes 80's-style revenge flicks in an era where every movie has to cost $200 million, but Chapter 2 gives us all of the first film's best attributes (a gleefully unhinged body count, action scenes -- whether gunplay or hand-to-hand combat -- that were crisply and coherently shot with a minimum of Paul Greengrass shakey-cam bullcrap, a wry sense of humor about its own absurdities) and amps it up with an even more merciless gauntlet run by Keanu Reeves' weary hitman, with direction that's sleeker and more streamlined (this film evokes the hypnotic visual sheen of vintage Michael Mann, or Nicolas Winding Refn shorn of his obtuse arthouse pretentions), and with more intriguing details about the hitman syndicate that Reeves is a former member of (I liked the detail about how called-in hits are processed by what appears to be a phalanx of 60's-era telephone operators). There's also a visually-sensational climax that plays out like an extended homage to Bruce Lee's Enter The Dragon. Brutal, exciting, mordantly funny, and insidiously baiting the hook for a third installment I can't wait for, John Wick Chapter 2 is the best kind of "Guy Movie" mayhem, and one of the best pure action movies since Max Mad: Fury Road. Whoa...! :D

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AndyDursin
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2951 Post by AndyDursin »

If Mother Nature can spare us a blizzard this week, I hope to get out to see JOHN WICK!

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Monterey Jack
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2952 Post by Monterey Jack »

AndyDursin wrote:If Mother Nature can spare us a blizzard this week, I hope to get out to see JOHN WICK!
I'm sure your reaction will be...

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Eric Paddon
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2953 Post by Eric Paddon »

Suddenly Last Summer (1959) 5 of 10.

-It gets this much only for a terrific Elizabeth Taylor performance (and getting to see her in that flashback scene in the swimsuit). Otherwise this movie is deathly dull, failing to properly open itself up from its stage origins as we get non-stop monologues that were putting me to sleep (punctuated by a couple over the top cinematic sequences of showing disturbed patients in the asylum), a terrible performance by a miscast Montgomery Clift (his delivery is halting and he sounds like he has an accent. We needed a much stronger presence in the role but La Liz I know insisted on him). I'll also say that I have always had something of a dislike of Katharine Hepburn over the years and this film really lets us see her at probably her most dislikable character-wise but it highlights the reasons why I never found her an engaging screen presence.

-Gary Raymond, who I like from "Rat Patrol" reveals the problem of so many British actors when they're cast as Americans (this because of the London shoot). He lays the southern accent WAY too thick. British actors for some reason always love to give us caricatured versions of southern and Texas accents that they genuinely believe are authentic. But all they're really doing is giving us the flip side of Dick Van Dyke's Cockney.

Duel (1971( 9 of 10

-Spielberg's breakout film that I finally saw in Blu-Ray. It's still a classic to me but I guess maybe for the first time after seeing it a half dozen times in the past, I couldn't help but ask myself, "Why didn't he just turn around and drive home?" (especially if he knew he was going to miss his appointment anyway!) :) But that said, if you love "Jaws" as Spielberg's greatest masterpiece you can't give "Duel" a lower rating since "Duel" is what led to "Jaws."

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AndyDursin
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2954 Post by AndyDursin »

LA LA LAND
5/10

For me the bedrock of any musical is its score -- and this Oscar favorite is in severe need of what we used to call "tunes." In fact, there wasn't one melody I could remember after the film concluded from its copious musical numbers -- which is somewhat fitting, since this is a musical that's all artifice, from its in-your-face colors, stylized "world" and one-note characters. Judging from the reaction people have to this, you either love it or hate it, and I didn't buy any of it -- not the performances, the music, or really anything in the picture. And hearing Ryan Gosling warble through his vocals was painful -- right along with the bloated two-plus hour running time. Emma Stone is scarcely better, but at least she sounded in-tune -- for the most part.

For those who hate musicals -- you would be better off watching a real one, with a real score, like Jacques Demy and Michel Legrand's "Umbrellas of Cherborg" (which this resembles in several facets). Or something else where people can, you know, actually sing AND dance!

For me this is all style over substance, a chore to sit through, and a sheer bet to win a handful of undeserved awards in a couple of weeks, seeing as Hollywood always loves honoring movies -- about themselves.

sprocket
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Re: rate the last movie you saw

#2955 Post by sprocket »

Poongsan (2011) 7/10

A South Korean popcorn movie with a tragic heart, both in terms of the fate of its protagonists and as a wider commentary on the relationship between North and South Korea.

An unnamed man risks his life running the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea, to pass messages and belongings between families separated by the border. Eventually, he comes to the attention of the South Korean Intellegence Service, who decide to use him to bring over the lover of a North Korean defector...

This movie suffers from the usual action tropes: an indestructable hero; fight scenes which would be over in a second if someone had a gun. Luckily, the setting is unfamiliar and everything is refreshingly skewed off-center by a script which goes to unusual places. Is our hero the strong silent type? Yes - he doesn't say a word in the whole movie. Is our hero accused of being a spy and graphically tortured? Yes - by his side - the South Koreans. Does the hero get the girl? Of course not.

How many South Koreans does it take to unscrew a light bulb? Just one - except when there are an equal number of North Koreans in the room.

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