Friday

Machete - loved it.....just tons of fun

Catfish - disappointing...misleading advertising...would have been a brilliant discovery channel documentary of lifetime movie though...

Resident Evil 4 - blah..i'm over the series...

Would've expected nothing less from producer David Lynch and director Werner Herzog, than a screwed up film. This is a story of madness, and Michael Shannon plays it so well, that you want him to do nothing for the rest of his career than to play this off-center characters. That's why Herzog was the perfect choice to direct this, he has a knack for being able to harness crazy into a frame like no other. Lynch's touch is seen as well with momentary interludes of music, which feature the characters staring blankly at the camera, or the bizarre suburbia of San Diego. Everything falls into place here, even the normally questionable Udo Kier.

Also on the disc was a short film featuring Herzog narrating the life of a plastic bag--that is, the plastic bag's voice. I wish all my plastic bags spoke with a Bavarian accent.

The Best Years of Our Lives. so this is the quintessential movie about readjusting to life post-ww2, huh? this didn't blow me away, but i enjoyed it. i didn't have a good grasp on the pacing, though. the first hour is essentially just their first night home. then the next two hours are over a few weeks, months, a year? i also thought the affair was a bit hokey, but most of the other relationships held my interest. i'm guessing harold russell was quite a sight to audiences when he took off his hooks the first time.

The Day of the Jackal. at some point i must've been told this was based on reality. but after watching it, i learned it was just a novel. still, this was really good in that 70s crime film way. the slow burning tension was done very well. the preparation scenes were terribly interesting. it was just fun to watch, seeing how relatively minor things opened up to progress the plot.

the town. i was bored out of my mind for the last 10-15 minutes, but i liked this apart from that. the heist scenes were shot really well, as if someone had watched "heat" in preparation. top-notch acting in support roles from chris cooper and pete postlethwaite, as always. i'm still not really impressed with ben affleck as an actor, but he's making a nice little career as a director. oh, and even trashed up blake lively looked pretty good.

Saw it this weekend. Solid B-. Will be a great Saturday afternoon on Spike nap movie in a couple years.

Ditto on Don Draper the Fed. I enjoyed his undercurrent of douchebaggedness.

This was interesting. It wasn't anti-people with HIV/AIDS, but rather saying that there could be misdiagnoses. Don't know that it changed anything in my mind, but it did make me stop and think about what is going on.

You can watch it online:

Check out Since You Went Away for a similar kind of movie (and just as long). Made a few years earlier and set during the war, it's more interesting as a time capsule/perspective to what life was like on the homefront than it is a good movie, per se, but it's still well made. Features a teenage Shirley Temple among a lot of pretty good actors.

I've always read that in historical context Best Years might as well be Coming Home or Born On The Fourth of July, and when I watched it, it really affected me... I'm sure it s searchable, but I remember Derris bitching at me about needing too much narrative or music or something.

Palm Beach Story. the first 30-40 minutes of this is slapstick. (i didn't really follow the opening credit sequence. why is she tied up in the closet??) the funniest parts are between claudette colbert's character and the old man in the apartment. there's some excellent writing during that scene. i'll even say it's really funny up through the ale & quail club shooting up the train, but once the movie gets to the title destination, it sinks and becomes a drab 40s romantic comedy.

Dog Day Afternoon. somewhere between knowing this was about a botched bank robbery and the movie's most famous quote, i thought it was split between the robbery and prison time. anyway, this was pretty well-done. pacino plays a great exasperated sonny. (strange that pacino plays a character named sonny?) i liked the little turns it took. and now i've completed john cazale's filmography. seriously, there'll never be someone whose career is free of misses.

Dial M For Murder. i've meant to watch this for years and finally got around to it over the weekend. there're a few holes here, but overall it was pretty enjoyable. with all hitchcock, the tension is presented in a top-notch fashion. it's not vaulting into my favorite hitchcock list, but i certainly didn't waste my time.

Just a Jim Jarmusch enquiry really. Do you have a particular favourite?

I've downloaded all of them, bar Permanant Vacation & Night On Earth, ready for a weekend viewing.

I did watch Limits Of Control for the third time last night, and I'm still baffled by all the poor reviews as i really love it. Obinions?

Limits of Control would've been great if it was done by someone else--but it wasn't and so, I think it was judged harshly on that fact.

Down By Law has always been my favorite of his, but I hold Dead Man and Stranger Than Paradise pretty close to my heart as well. Criterion really needs to put out Dead Man.

ditto FR. not the most popular selection but i still gots love for ghost dog too.

Quick run-down of my recent viewings:

Children of the Corn
--a nice melding of two things that terrify me: unsupervised children and cults. 4/5

The Mummy
--Nothing original, but really fun supernatural action movie. 3.5/5

Sherlock Holmes
--Much better than I was expecting. While the idea of Action Holmes still makes me squirm a bit, they make it feel relatively natural. 4/5

Friday the 13th (remake)
--Middle of the road slasher that is entertaining without being entirely likable. 2.5/5

Halloween (original)
--Nearly perfect slasher. Loved the shot composition through the movie. 4.5/5

Don't Look Up
--Bad movie based on a Japanese horror by the same guy that did Ringu. Has some similar elements as The Ring without ever being frightening or creepy. None of the characters are appealing. Just very skipable. 2/5

I Sell the Dead
--Amusing little tongue-in-cheek look at grave-robbing and ghouls. Nothing too original, but cute. 3/5

Saw this the other night. Probably the least ridiculously over-the-top Oliver Stone flick I've ever seen. Never been a huge fan of Transformers Kid, but he was tolerable. Douglas was solid, but Brolin steals the show. Not quite a great movie, but nestled solidly in between good and very good.

Carey Mulligan is one of the few actresses I can recall who looks much better in extreme close-up than from a normal vantage point. I'm kinda digging Natalie Morales these days. She's the poor man's Rosario Dawson, and she's in this somewhat briefly as a co-worker of LeBufu. I look forward to her returning as Aziz Ansari's new bartender girlfriend on Parks and Rec, once Amit and Andy (Outsourced) finally gets cancelled.

Saw "The American" last night. Knew what to expect going in. Slow pacing, not much dialog, etc. I actually really enjoyed it. Not a Top 10 of the Year movie for me, but definitely enjoyable. I think Clooney is a fantastic actor. Of course, I already thought that going in.

Looking forward to trying to find a way to see three movies this weekend (or sometime next week)...

"The Social Network"
"Let Me In"
"Catfish"

Might be able to make a midnight showing of something called "Tucker & Dale vs. Evil" at the Milwaukee Film Festival as well. Supposed to be a satirical take on massacre films in the same vein as "Shaun of the Dead" for zombie films.

And, with the reviews that Fincher's movie is getting, I've got very high expectations for that one!!!

Wasn't it determined that Catfish was about as "authentic" as the Joaquin Phoenix "documentary?"

This is probably my favorite Sturges film. Or close to it. It's been awhile since I've seen the whole thing but I always looked at it as a satire on marriage.

Limits of Control was shit. Do agree that these three are the best, along with Ghost Dog, as Moxie said too.

I enjoyed Catfish though it does seem a little too slick to be a documentary.

Public Enemies was boring. Christian Bale was good but I would've liked to have seen them go a bit more into Dillinger's background.

Harry Brown - great film. I never felt it got ridiculous in a geriatric Jason Bourne way. That dude he bought the guns from skeeved me out.

Whiteout was alright. Not sure why it got such bad reviews other than it was kind of average.

Prince Of Persia - Eh, I don't see this becoming a series. It's not as easy of a sell as pirates. Gemma Arterton is ridiculously hot though.

Repo Men - Not sure if this was meant to be an action movie or a comedy. It tries for both and fails miserably.

Wall Street - Watched this on Netflix Instant. It was alright. The ending seemed really rushed and kind of left things hanging with most of the characters. John C. McGinley is really annoying in this. Only reason to really see it is for Michael Douglas.

Devil was a little better than I thought it was going to be. It's a good time waster.

The Devil's Backbone is, I think, my favorite Guillermo Del Toro movie. I saw it last week after a talk with Del Toro and Chuck Hogan about the book trilogy they're doing together. Del Toro is really funny.




going to see that tomorrow night. i'll let you know how it is.

I'm dying to see Tucker & Dale vs. Evil....trailer is great!

I enjoyed the hell out of that one; much moreso than I expected to. It's kinda like the Pirates of the Carribean films, in that, without its star it would be nothing. Robert Downey made that movie work. I hope that they can keep it working (unlike Pirates) when they do the sequel.

WAAAAYY too much time spent with the chick. And while she is smoking hot, her English wasn't good enough to carry a third of the movie.

Like all Mann movies, it is beautifully shot, and the costuming, etc was great, but I agree - overall it was MEH

Heh, I watched this immediately after getting engaged and remember pretty much nothing about it, but I'm guessing the DVD's start menu music could induce some version of an emotional Pavlovian response from me. It played for about 20 minutes over and over again while we called our families with the news.

this was really funny. not quite as good as shaun of the dead but i enjoyed it a lot.

The Social Network. first of all, the theater was packed for this even at 2:30 while a lot of good college football games were on. from a programming perspective, it's excellent. they really dive into a lot of code that means nothing to most people, though they do a decent job to not make it completely greek. otherwise, it's fine. it's overhyped, but that's to be expected. no one really impressed me, but nothing was terrible either.

just finished "get him to the greek". Way, way funnier than I had expected.