What Was The Last Movie You Watched?

[LeeVanTeeth]

12 hours ago, Christophe said:

(186)

Peterloo 4/10

Mike Leigh at his broad brush worst, loads of inspirational speeches and northern patronising, good on historical accuracy and rabble rousing, embarrassing on most else. Lost me totally when Maxine Peake was being all matronly with a fat bloke from Wigan, the pages of my life up for display. (cinema)

Mike Leigh is always hit and miss with me.  This is a miss.

[accies1874]

Based on what I've seen, I'd go with that too. Only got my unlimited card in July though so basically saw nothing that came out in the first half of the year

Suppose it's better to miss out on the first half of the year so you can still catch up.

[jimmy boo]

On the best of 2018 question, I'd go with Blackkklansman for now. I'll give it more thought at the end of the year though.

I nearly watched this the other day. Will get round to it this week.

[D.A.F.C]

It follows was on film four last night. Good idea but the sex thing seemed a bit daft. Also why knock on the door if they can quite obviously break it down?

[welshbairn]

"Sorry to bother you". Starts well but thought it lost its way in the second half with too many inserted tick the box references instead of sticking to a storyline. What do I know though, could hit a black audience like Alasdair Gray's Lanark resonated with me. Bit sci fi weird, and very funny on occasion. 6-7/10.

[LeeVanTeeth]

Kin. Which is possibly short for ***kin Crap. Just couldn't believe anything about the storyline and the film didn't seem to know what it wanted to be. Sci-fi? Road movie? Crime drama?

2/10

[MSU]

Lanark. Ooft. That's a life changer right there.

Just back from A Star Is Born, and I have to say the performances were magnificent. Story was a bit sketchy and the mumblecore improv dialog got a bit boring but it wasn't bad. Infinitely better than Bohemian Rhapsody which I saw yesterday which proves why existing band members should never be involved in biopics about that band. 7/10 for Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper. 3/10 for BR.

[MSU]

Looking through my blog reviews, the only film I've declared to be a triumph so far this year is Lady Bird. So I guess that's my movie of the year.

[GrahamJags]

Looking through my blog reviews, the only film I've declared to be a triumph so far this year is Lady Bird. So I guess that's my movie of the year.

Same here, and can’t see it changing before the years end.Phenomenal film.

[BFTD]

Overlord - an American parachute regiment on a vital sabotage mission uncover Nazi experimentation, upon which could hinge the outcome of World War II.

Saw this yesterday, which seemed both apt and in poor taste - just my cup of tea, in other words. The first half is an airborne Saving Private Ryan, displaying the horror of being dropped in to a war-torn hellhole, but it's the Nazi experiments we've paid money to see, and it's all a bit generic. Horror fans will have seen much of this before, notably in films like Frankenstein's Army and The Keep (or the Wolfenstein video games), and it all gets a bit silly by the end. Not bad, but needed a bit more imaginative work in the second half of the script.

Incidentally, I spent much of the film thinking that one of the main characters was really channelling early-Eighties Kurt Russell, and it turns out that it's his son, Wyatt Russell. He must have spent a lot of time watching his dad's films with John Carpenter.

[Christophe]

(187-188)

Computer Chess 7/10

Ultra indie B&W film about the goings on at a 1984 computer chess conference. Odd, philosophical, and probably merits a second watch, but obviously not Citizen Kane either. (Amazon Fandor)

Star Wars Episode II: Attack Of The Clones 2/10

Re-watching all these with the missus. Done Ep.1 a few weeks back on here and original meant to watch them all over a few nights but givn the slog watching that one again was we’re doing it slow burn style whenever we can be arsed! There are lots of reasons to absolutely hate this film. If nothing else, Lucas compounds the error of seeing Darth Vader as this annoying little child by showing us Boba Fett as an even more annoying, obnoxious little shit. There were so many interesting things you could do with the backstory of such a wonderfully mysterious character (even though act of doing so u does that wonder  of that mystery), so hamfistedly levering it into this story was a massive mistake. I’m not one of them lame Boba Fett fanboys, but it demonstrates the flaws in the obsession with origin stories and over-explaining everything (more of this if I get to Solo). But onto the actual film. It creaks right from the beginning - the horrifying lack of chemistry between Obi Wan and Anakin when they’re doing their matey act is a huge problem. The fact that I don’t believe in any of their anecdotes or their “I hate it when he does that” stuff means there’s no tension or anything when there’s frostiness between them. The overarching story of a separatist movement attempting to split up the republic is also clanged in from a great height with little to no explanation - briefly having the trade federation appearing to be involved somehow is the only thing that even tenuously ties it back to the first film. Then there’s this whole piece where Obi Wan traces Jango Fett’s jar and it unravels this whole bigger story - it’s terribly, terribly dull. It’s confounded by the other story strand running at that point being even more boring (like having Paul Collingwood at one crease and Geoffrey Boycott at the other). It is, without question the worst and least convincing love story in history. There’s zero chemistry again (spotting a theme here, Hayden) but in fact his entire attempts to woo her are nothing but creepy and weird: “I don’t think she liked me watching her sleep”. Mrs C makes the point here that no wonder there’s a generation of maladjusted incels if this is their template for how to win a lady’s heart. I’m not even going to go into the horrors that are the playful romance montages. Just dreadful. Anakin’s descent into anger and darkness should be the central theme here, but it’s played out on the sidelines and it’s executed badly by a terrible actor and he just comes across as whiney and pathetic rather than brooding and dangerous. The film has some redeeming qualities - it becomes clear that the whole thing has been a long game in which Palpatine and Dooku have been playing the republic and the jedis for absolute chumps, and they’ve been puppet mastering the whole thing. The logic to get to that point is flawed, but as a principle it works well, though once again, none of this is at all dependent on anything that happened in Phantom Menace, which is increasingly looking like a completely pointless film. It would also have more logical sense if Dooku was the bad guy for the first two and then Maul for the third one. But all of that falls flat on its arse for the final act. Where Phantom Menace was a terrible, terrible film with a nuts and bolts, competent action film finish, this is a very bad film with an end that’s fucking all over the place. The factory sequence with Anakin, Padme and RDR2 belongs in a straight to video CGI kids animation. It’s really, really bad. The mass fight with the Jedi should be stirring and exciting (like the x-wings shooting across the lake to come and save the day in The Force Awakens) but it’s actually really, really dull. There’s so much that’s bad about this film. There’s a big debate about which is worst between the first two, but in reality there’s not much in it. They’re both dreadful and I’m calling it a no-score draw for the pools panel. (DVD)

 

[paul-r-cfc]

Thought Bohemian Rhapsody was excellent. Never really got into Queen but will definitely try to rattle through their back catalogue now.

Really well made - the band members were all spot on with Malek hitting full Mercury by the time of Live Aid. Which, on the topic, was absolutely incredibly. So well done - didn't expect them to show the whole set. Some critics claiming it sanitised Mercury's life story. Can't say I know enough about him to comment on it but thought it did quite well depicting the loneliness of his life away from the stage.

Get it watched fans of Queen and the rest

[Silverton End]

They Shall Not Grow Old (2018)

Director Peter Jackson re-masters old b&w WW1 footage into colour film.

Voiced by men who were there.

Horrific yet riveting viewing

9/10

[killiepiemuncher]

They Shall Not Grow Old (2018)
Director Peter Jackson re-masters old b&w WW1 footage into colour film.
Voiced by men who were there.
Horrific yet riveting viewing
9/10

Powerful stuff. At the start the old black and white footage with the usual speeded up frame rate makes it look like every WW1 documentary that you’ve seen dozens of times. Then it slows down to real life speeds and the colour and sounds kick in, wow it takes your breath away. I have to admit the emotions took over from then on. A must watch. It’s only on for a week on BBC iPlayer, not to be missed.

[Silverton End]

4 hours ago, killiepiemuncher said:

Powerful stuff. At the start the old black and white footage with the usual speeded up frame rate makes it look like every WW1 documentary that you’ve seen dozens of times. Then it slows down to real life speeds and the colour and sounds kick in, wow it takes your breath away. I have to admit the emotions took over from then on. A must watch. It’s only on for a week on BBC iPlayer, not to be missed.

Spot on.

A remarkable film

[DA Baracus]

12 hours ago, Christophe said:

(187-188)

Computer Chess 7/10

Ultra indie B&W film about the goings on at a 1984 computer chess conference. Odd, philosophical, and probably merits a second watch, but obviously not Citizen Kane either. (Amazon Fandor)

Star Wars Episode II: Attack Of The Clones 2/10

Re-watching all these with the missus. Done Ep.1 a few weeks back on here and original meant to watch them all over a few nights but givn the slog watching that one again was we’re doing it slow burn style whenever we can be arsed! There are lots of reasons to absolutely hate this film. If nothing else, Lucas compounds the error of seeing Darth Vader as this annoying little child by showing us Boba Fett as an even more annoying, obnoxious little shit. There were so many interesting things you could do with the backstory of such a wonderfully mysterious character (even though act of doing so u does that wonder  of that mystery), so hamfistedly levering it into this story was a massive mistake. I’m not one of them lame Boba Fett fanboys, but it demonstrates the flaws in the obsession with origin stories and over-explaining everything (more of this if I get to Solo). But onto the actual film. It creaks right from the beginning - the horrifying lack of chemistry between Obi Wan and Anakin when they’re doing their matey act is a huge problem. The fact that I don’t believe in any of their anecdotes or their “I hate it when he does that” stuff means there’s no tension or anything when there’s frostiness between them. The overarching story of a separatist movement attempting to split up the republic is also clanged in from a great height with little to no explanation - briefly having the trade federation appearing to be involved somehow is the only thing that even tenuously ties it back to the first film. Then there’s this whole piece where Obi Wan traces Jango Fett’s jar and it unravels this whole bigger story - it’s terribly, terribly dull. It’s confounded by the other story strand running at that point being even more boring (like having Paul Collingwood at one crease and Geoffrey Boycott at the other). It is, without question the worst and least convincing love story in history. There’s zero chemistry again (spotting a theme here, Hayden) but in fact his entire attempts to woo her are nothing but creepy and weird: “I don’t think she liked me watching her sleep”. Mrs C makes the point here that no wonder there’s a generation of maladjusted incels if this is their template for how to win a lady’s heart. I’m not even going to go into the horrors that are the playful romance montages. Just dreadful. Anakin’s descent into anger and darkness should be the central theme here, but it’s played out on the sidelines and it’s executed badly by a terrible actor and he just comes across as whiney and pathetic rather than brooding and dangerous. The film has some redeeming qualities - it becomes clear that the whole thing has been a long game in which Palpatine and Dooku have been playing the republic and the jedis for absolute chumps, and they’ve been puppet mastering the whole thing. The logic to get to that point is flawed, but as a principle it works well, though once again, none of this is at all dependent on anything that happened in Phantom Menace, which is increasingly looking like a completely pointless film. It would also have more logical sense if Dooku was the bad guy for the first two and then Maul for the third one. But all of that falls flat on its arse for the final act. Where Phantom Menace was a terrible, terrible film with a nuts and bolts, competent action film finish, this is a very bad film with an end that’s fucking all over the place. The factory sequence with Anakin, Padme and RDR2 belongs in a straight to video CGI kids animation. It’s really, really bad. The mass fight with the Jedi should be stirring and exciting (like the x-wings shooting across the lake to come and save the day in The Force Awakens) but it’s actually really, really dull. There’s so much that’s bad about this film. There’s a big debate about which is worst between the first two, but in reality there’s not much in it. They’re both dreadful and I’m calling it a no-score draw for the pools panel. (DVD)

 

I think  it's easily the worst Star Wars film. Like you say it's so boring.

I would actually have The Phantom Menace as the best of the prequels, although of course it's still shite.

[SweeperDee]

Bohemian Rhapsody 9.9/10

The only downside was that it had to end. Was bloody perfect in near enough every way.

[accies1874]

I think  it's easily the worst Star Wars film. Like you say it's so boring.
I would actually have The Phantom Menace as the best of the prequels, although of course it's still shite.

I dunno, I think I found Phantom Menace the worst simply due to the other two having more action sequences you can zone out of (from recollection, anyway), whereas TPM requires you to listen and take in the utterly dreadful dialogue more often.
It's not a particularly solid reason to like one more than the other, but the more you can zone out of this pish better.
Dem love scenes tho...

[Bully Wee Villa]

Phantom Menace is easily the shittest Star Wars film. Attack of the Clones is better but still poor, Revenge of the Sith is okay apart from Portman/Christensen's "acting" . Never quite sure why he gets all the criticism when she was every bit as bad as him in those films. 

[KnightswoodBear]

1 hour ago, Bully Wee Villa said:

Phantom Menace is easily the shittest Star Wars film. Attack of the Clones is better but still poor, Revenge of the Sith is okay apart from Portman/Christensen's "acting" . Never quite sure why he gets all the criticism when she was every bit as bad as him in those films. 

I put TPM above AOTC for the simple reason that it has that sequence with Obi Wan and Qui Gon fighting Darth Maul.  Everything about it is spot on.  It's like it's been ripped from a much better film.

AOTC is just hateful rubbish.