Movie Thoughts/Reviews Thread

[ian]

Skynets second spoiler could indeed have made me call this a good ghostbusters movie.
But yeah. The movie doesn't do fan service as well as afterlife, isn't as interesting, isn't as funny. It does have elements that work though.

I feel slightly bad that this is the second Ghostbusters I've seen in a cinema (saw the first one at the Astor a few years ago where they show a lot of classic movies) if I could go back in time I'd see 1, 2 and afterlife in cinema and skip this one.
Better off re-watching the original for the 40th anniversary in a few months though...


In other news and talking of the Astor. I'm probably going to go there again tomorrow to see Young Frankenstein, which is 50 this year.
One of the biggest tragedies of all time is that I'm far too young to have seen most of Mel Brooks work in a cinema. It's all hilarious and over the years I've had to settle for TV and VHS, and low resolution clips on the net and DVD's and Blu rays.
So usually when I get a chance to see his work on a big screen I take it.
It helps that I know his work is timeless and always worth the admission, and even worth large distances to travel just to see something I've seen many times before.

[ian]

I've been watching Terminator movies, all of them except Dark Fate (which I'll get to after I watch Sarah Connor Chronicles again)

I finally watched 3 from start to finish in one go. Which I had never done. Y'know, T3 is a good movie! and Salvation in retrospect is fucking dog shit.

Salvation was always a bit shit whenever fucking batman talked, but watching now? God damn it's a bad movie. At least while T3 didn't have Furlong, John was still well cast. And at least all the other movies have The Terminator in them, not just 2 seconds because they can. Even the forgettable, confusing and entirely pointless Genisys is a better film. It makes no sense why Genisys exists, but it's still better than Salvation.

I predict nothing could happen to John Connor in Dark Fate worse than what they did to him in Salvation. (And yes I already know what happens in Dark Fate, it still couldn't be as bad)

But as good as the movies are, the whole Franchise is simply a support mechanism for T2. T2 is THE movie. everything else is just prequels and sequels and extended lore to Judgement Day.

I watched the "extended super deluxe extreme ultimate enhanced cut" of T2 for like the 8 millionth time, and even with a runtime of 8 million hours, it's simply a fantastic film.

[Bandit]

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I watched the "extended super deluxe extreme ultimate enhanced cut" of T2 for like the 8 millionth time, and even with a runtime of 8 million hours, it's simply a fantastic film.

T2 has to be the best action movie of all time. I legitimately can't think of anything I'd rank above it. Granted, older folks will revere it because of how massive it was in the early 90s. You couldn't escape it!

How can you make a good sequel to one of the greatest movies of all time? I can't think of another franchise that is so irrepressibly fucked by the sheer success of its best movie.

[Bandit]

I watched the "extended super deluxe extreme ultimate enhanced cut" of T2 for like the 8 millionth time, and even with a runtime of 8 million hours, it's simply a fantastic film.

T2 has to be the best action movie of all time. I legitimately can't think of anything I'd rank above it. Granted, older folks will revere it because of how massive it was in the early 90s. You couldn't escape it!

How can you make a good sequel to one of the greatest movies of all time? I can't think of another franchise that is so irrepressibly fucked by the sheer success of its best movie.

Arnold was desperate for another hit movie because he had been putting out flops for nearly a decade by that point and Will Smith had turned into the guaranteed summer blockbuster guy.

[Skynet]

This might come as a bit of a shock, but I'm somewhat of a T2 fan myself. Crazy, I know, but it's true.

I've legitimately lost count of how many times I've watched it, just saying lines along with the characters as they go but man, whenever I re-watch I generally skip the early Pescadero parts because my god I cannot be bothered watching those parts again. Not until John and the Terminator go in, anyway

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I think chapters need to make a comeback with streaming. Everyone should be encouraged to go back and watch parts of movies that've been seen before. I'm a fan of the early scenes with Budnick in them, quintessential 90s nostalgia rush right there.

The other problem is the franchise needed James Cameron to keep things coherent.

[ian]

Hundreds of Beavers (either 2022 or 2024 depending who you ask)
It was FUCKING FANTASTIC!

A movie relying entirely on slapstick should have become unfunny in about 15 minutes.
A movie with basically no dialogue should have become boring in about 30 minutes.
A movie entirely in black and white should have become pretentious in about 1 minute.

Not only does it not do any of those things, it is made even better because it really, REALLY should be an unfunny, boring, pretentious mess.

And while this absurd movie has a slow start and you start wondering when it gets good, and you might not even notice the exact point it gets good, it does get good.
It gets very good.

Its just so stupid. The only time I've laughed like this in recent memory was Weird, the Al Yankovic story, but before that it was probably 2001 which delivered Rat Race and Zoolander. I have no hesitation to call Hundreds of Beavers one of the funniest movies I have ever seen, thus it's one of the best movies I have ever seen.

The dingyness added charm to its loony tunes like tendencies and it threw in enough unexpected wackiness with its predictable outcomes to keep me on my toes waiting for the next thing.

I can't pick a favourite part, and without spoilers I had an absolute blast.

If I get a chance to see this in a cinema and buy it on a 4K Bluray, I will absolutely take both chances.
Amazing!!!


Also I watched Ferrari from 2023.
Not quite as amazing. Adam Driver did a good job, he's like a good actor which I never really noticed before. The film covers a very specific timeframe that lends itself to being boring for its run time. It has serious drama, and a little bit of cars.
But oh my god, this movie was ruined by its CG crashes.
I'm not usually one to complain about effects, but this had BAAAAAAD effects. If you go to the trouble of trying to make a serious movie about a man and his cars, you really need to make the action shots less comical. Showing decapitated bodies in your film is fine, but if you're going for that kind of scope, you could at least make the car crashes look somewhat more realistic.

I audibly laughed at how bad the crashes were.
This is supposed to be a serious movie that just depicted people fucking dying, and it was so bad I couldn't help but laugh.
The film would have been better off not showing the crashes at all and showing the actors reactions while some tyres screech and some stock audio of generic car crash sounds played.

The film would have even been better off fading to black implying a crash had just happened and then cutting to a 5 minute musical montage with sad music and everyone looking sad.
I fucking HATE!!!!!! musical fucking montages in Dramas, they are a crutch for shitty writing and the creatively spent, so for a musical montage to be a better alternative than the CG crashes... Yeeesh!

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Couldn't have happened to a better company

[Dr. Zoidberg]

Boy Kills World

Really good. Really violent. H. Jon Benjamin!

I actually like a new movie. Very new: 2023. It's worth checking out. Worth a buy even.

Escape From New York

I hadn't seen this one for a long time. Since the 90s? Probably. I'd forgotten a lot of it. It's aged really well. Ox Baker!

Used Cars

I don't think I'd ever seen this one before, at least not all of it. Don't know why I bought it on 4K blu-ray. Watched the trailer and thought I'd like it. It was OK. Worth more of a download than a buy. Some funny bits. Tits from 1980.

Sixteen Candles

Another one I haven't seen for a long time. Probably 20+ years. I might have only ever seen this on TV, and it must have been censored, because I don't remember the swearing, the usage of fag or the boobs. And that's just in the first 10 minutes.

The main thing I remember was the delightful Asian stereotype of Long Duk Dong, who becomes less of a stereotype as the movie goes on.

It's still a fun, funny movie.

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Sixteen Candles

Another one I haven't seen for a long time. Probably 20+ years. I might have only ever seen this on TV, and it must have been censored, because I don't remember the swearing, the usage of fag or the boobs. And that's just in the first 10 minutes.

The main thing I remember was the delightful Asian stereotype of Long Duk Dong, who becomes less of a stereotype as the movie goes on.

It's still a fun, funny movie.

I watched that earlier this year, which led me to watching a week's worth of John Hughes/80s teen movies. They're all still good, even Some Kind of Wonderful.

And this is going to sound dumb, but I wish there was a way to still watch those TV edits without restoring to cable TV. 10-year-old me got to watch so many movies that I normally wouldn't have. Speeding up the movie is bullshit, but editing for content was okay (as long as the evangelicals here in the U.S. don't make censoring mandatory).

It's how we saw the first two Child's Play movies and my mom thought it'd be fun to rent the next one. She ran and got that tape ejected a few milliseconds after Chucky said "DON'T FUCK WITH THE CHUCK" and stabbed a guy.

[Dr. Zoidberg]

I watched that earlier this year, which led me to watching a week's worth of John Hughes/80s teen movies. They're all still good, even Some Kind of Wonderful.

I'll be watching a bunch of John Hughes movies over the coming months. Probably not Pretty In Pink or Some Kind Of Wonderful, unless I see them very cheap on blu-ray.

It's how we saw the first two Child's Play movies and my mom thought it'd be fun to rent the next one. She ran and got that tape ejected a few milliseconds after Chucky said "DON'T FUCK WITH THE CHUCK" and stabbed a guy.

[Hawq]

Watched that new Crow last night, it was more than half way though the film before he Crow'd properly for gods sake. Even after the revenger starts the character doesnt look right until near the end, granted the last 20 minutes or so are quite good but most of that good bit is in one long fight tat the opera mowing down henchmen. I mean it killed a couple of hours but if they'd only got to the action sooner it would have been so much better, the original didnt need to sow us Erics life before being killed in much detail at all, this one lingered on it for way too long. Credit to the guy playing Eric he didnt do a bad job once the revenge started but he didnt have much to work with really, all in all I can see why it went straight to streaming as in a cinema people would probably riot to get their money back, though a quick google seems to show a theatrical date of a about a week after the streaming release if so what are they smoking? everyone will know what its like by then

[pixel]

I had a free day so I went to a matinee showing for Megalopolis. The reviews are correct. The most depressing thing is that it isn't interesting, even on an ironic level.

In full disclosure, I fell asleep for 5 to 20 minutes near the beginning of the movie. I could've missed the key scene that makes this a great movie, but I doubt it.

Trigger warning: Shia LaBeuf shows his pubes during a strange sex scene with Aubrey Plaza.

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[ian]

From how bad people are saying it is, I kinda think I want to see it.

People love a train wreck. It can't be THAT bad can it?

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From how bad people are saying it is, I kinda think I want to see it.

People love a train wreck. It can't be THAT bad can it?

Yeah Megalopolis is pretty bad because it's also so boring. But I did go to see it because I wanted to know how bad it was. Jon Voight steals a couple scenes but those few moments don't make up for the slow part.

The movie recasts New York City into New Rome and asks whether it can survive like old Rome. I hate this comparison because it's so overused. Then you meet the main three characters: Adam Driver as the architect, Giancarlo Esposito as the mayor, and Jon Voight as the banker. The architect has this new miracle material called megalon and wants to rebuild New Rome. Yadda yadda yadda, the three enter into a power struggle throughout the movie. The ending is so trite. It boils down to "the architect (or artist) needs to supported by the government and banks to thrive. It would be more interesting if Coppola took the piss and the whole thing was an incomprehensible mess. But instead, we got what we should've always assumed Megalopolis is. It's a half-baked, unfinished political opera created and financed by a man who should know better. It's not even the first time he's done this! I'm sure Megalopolis will have its fans and maybe could develop into a cult classic, but at least something like One from the Heart was more endearing.

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I miss Siskel and Ebert so much, I always watch this clip a few times because I love Gene spirals as he listens to Roger.

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