Movie Record 2024 Edition - The Bear and Badger

nick_md

I enjoyed that too, Mark Rylance, always quality. It's on Netflix.

nick_md

poprock wrote:

The Outfit
Nice little slow-burn gangster thriller set in a tailor’s* shop in 1950s Chicago. Beautifully played, understated, but not subtle. Nods to all the good clichés. Could easily have been staged as a play instead of a movie though.

*He’s not a tailor, he’s a cutter.

b0r1s wrote:

Liked the look of this from the trailer. What’s it available on?

davyK

Yojimbo has been on my Kurasawa watchlist for ages. Not sure why I took so long to get around to this - the samurai with no name film that inspired the Eastwood Westerns. Stunning cinematography - the street standoff scenes are as beautfiul as they are atmospheric and iconic.

Toshiro Mifuni puts in a superb showing here and the soundtrack is magnificent. A true classic and another reason why the BFI sub is well worth it.

Gremill

What's the rabbit like?

Gremill

6. Renfield
Hugely disappointing horror comedy that, despite some entertaining fight scenes, never really works either as a horror or a comedy. Nic Cage is excruciatingly bad as Dracula, not so much crossing the line into OTT campness as nuking it from orbit. Any goodwill that some inventive action carnage and great practical makeup effects generate is squandered by awful digital gore and dreadful direction. Pretty poor stuff which could have been so much better. 4

Olimite

I watched the last Ant Man film last night. Not as bad as I had been led to believe it was but not great. Jonathon Majors was chilling. Shame he thinks abusing his partners is an okay thing to do.

tin_robot

Past Lives
Watched this as a Valentines thing. I wasn't particularly keen going in as I'm a curmudgeonly bastard who has no interest in anything "romantic". However, this is really good. It's that very rare creature - a genuinely romantic, but extremely grown up, film about love and relationships.

It follows two Korean childhood sweet hearts who are separated when Na Young (Greta Lee) moves to Canada with her parents. They then meet again at 12 year intervals, each time having to reconsider who they are with relation to each other and their divergent lives, and wrestling with the obvious feelings they have for one another.

There are essentially only three characters of note in this film, and all three actors are superb. This is director Celine Song's feature debut and she does extraordinary work here, particularly in knowing exactly when to show restraint - allowing us to track the subtle shifts in emotion that her actors convey so beautifully.

It's a film that offers truth in a genre that rarely wishes to see it. Absolutely worth your time.

ShabbyMcCrabby

It is very good. Interesting that she's been a stage director before this but seems to want to be a film director going forward. I hope she manages to continue to quality she set with Past Lives.

LarryDavid

Overlord

Low key story of an ordinary Tommy training for and then going off to land on a Normandy beach, juxtaposed with lots of original Imperial War Museum footage from WW2 mixed around it. The non-documentary stuff is shot on b/w so it fits in nicely. No heroics, just the day-to-day grind & tedium of being in the Army at that time, counting down to something historic, but something so far beyond you as an individual you might as well be a grain of sand on those beaches. Affective, and affecting with quite a dreamlike passive quality. Or something. The original war footage is very good. May as well use that than bother CGI'ing it all up and it looking unconvincing - this was made in 1975, so that wasn't an option anyway. [7]

acemuzzy

Hypnotic

A director who's done some decent movies but... this was not one of them. A fun opening scene but drops off a cliff fairly soon after. Plot, special effects, acting, story line all pretty piss poor. It's like a Mickey mouse Inception, and yeesh that ending.

Not recommended.

Olimite

The Zone of Interest

Incredibly unsettling, as one would expect. The sound effects/ design and soundtrack were excellent. Won’t forget about this one for a while.

Cos

14. American Fiction
An author’s latest work receives little interest from publishers as it’s deemed ‘not black enough’ so he sets about writing a satirical, over the top novel to highlight hypocrisies in the industry. Inevitably, it’s a huge success. The satire at the heart of this film is on point but slightly dragged down by the family melodrama that makes up the other plot strands as they don’t always mesh. Thankfully Wright is superb in the lead and Sterling K Brown pops up intermittently to steal scenes. It’s clever and funny, clearly enjoying poking fun at pretentiousness and insincerity in publishing and wider society, with melancholic moments for balance. [8]

15. The Zone of Interest
An incredible view of the holocaust following the commandant of Auschwitz and his family who live in a house directly abutting the walls of the camp. There is very little direct view of the activities within the camp, instead significant elements are told through the unsettling sound design and visuals, conversations in the families house or meetings discussing the ‘efficiency’ of the camp. It’s devastatingly delivered in a casual manner, the family carrying on with their lives whilst noises of the suffering emanate from the camp and the palpable fear of those ‘employed’ by the family. There are several moments that really felt like a gut punch even in context of the atrocities happening. I can’t over emphasise how vital this feels. The impact will undoubtedly sit with me but it’s an absolute must watch piece of cinema. [10]

The Daddy

12. Robot Dreams.

Dog is lonely. Dog buys robot. An emotional rollercoaster of an animated film. [8]

Cos

Is that Robot Dreams? Interested if that’s streaming or high seas.

Cos

16. Parallel Mothers
Two women form a bond after meeting in hospital and giving birth on the same day. I’m generally a big fan of Almodovar but this is one of the weaker efforts as it tries to splice in the storyline about the two mothers with an investigation into potential mass grave from the Spanish civil war and the impacts still being felt from that. The latter is much more interesting but is secondary whilst the main plot seems to falter. Decent overall not one to search out. [5]

17. The Equalizer 3
AKA Denzel retirement fund. Probably no accident DW spends most of the movie half crocked or in the shadows so his stunt double can do most of the work. A bit daft even by the series standards, much more limited action though still a few enjoyably brutal kills. The new ‘sidekick’ and expanded characters helped but it’s still weakest of the lot. [4]

18. Fast X
Can a franchise jump the shark more than once? The last few entries have been wild but the attempts to continuously tie everything back to previous movies is lame. Thankfully, that does give us Jason Momoa having the absolute time of his life in this role and genuinely lifted it above an otherwise forgetful entry. You know what you’re getting by this point in fairness but still it feels lazy at times.

Spoiler:

[4] but Momoa gets an [8] for himself.

The Daddy

Cos wrote:

Is that Robot Dreams? Interested if that’s streaming or high seas.

Shit, how did I forget the title? Yeah, Robot Dreams. Still thinking about it today. I got it from the high seas, it's only 2gb though.

Cos

Nice, cheers.

hylian_elf

6. Joint Security Area - 17 Feb
One of Park Chan-wook's earlier films, a surprsingly emotional mystery-drama about the interaction between North and South Korean border guards. Told through a mixture of present day investigation and interviews and flashbacks of the past events slowly revealing the truth. Recommended.
[8]

7. Nobody Knows - 18 Feb
Based on a true story / real-life events, Koreeda tells the tale of four siblings having to live by themselves in poverty in a suburb of Tokyo while the world remains oblivious to their suffering (for various reasons). Having children of my own, I just couldn't watch this without being an absolute mess. Shocking that this sort of thing actually happens in a lot of places all over the world but you wouldn't imagine it in Tokyo.
The child lead was fantastic, and at 13/14 he deservedly became the youngest winner of the Best Actor award in the history of the Cannes Film Festival.
[8]

LarryDavid

Blast of Silence

Short-ish noir. Story carried more by voice over than any real conversations of length, the lead character is the usual conflicted, silent type. A contract killer sent to hit a mob underboss who scopes out his target through the streets of NY as the Xmas shoppers go about their business. Kind of washed over me more than engaged me really, though it looks nice - late-50's New York especially. Good ending, nice and bleak. [6]

EvilRedEye

EvilRedEye wrote:

Kinda ignored movies last year but I’m gonna try to do 50 this year.

1 - Bonnie and Clyde (1967) - No review - 01/01/2024 - ★★★★☆
2 - Saltburn (2023) - Review - 09/01/2024 - ★★★☆☆
3 - Shin Godzilla (2016) - Review - 12/01/24 - ★★★★☆
4 - Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters (2017) - Review - 13/01/24 - ★★★★☆
5 - Godzilla: City on the Edge of Battle (2018) - Review - 20/01/24 - ★★★☆☆
6 - Teorema (1968) - Review - 25/01/24 - ★★★★☆
7 - Bloodsport (1988) - Review - 26/01/24 - ★★★★☆
8 - Godzilla: The Planet Eater (2018) - Review - 27/01/24 - ★★★☆☆
9 - King Kong (1933) - Review - 03/02/24 - ★★★★★
10 - The Shop Around the Corner (1940) - Review - 04/02/24 - ★★★★☆
11 - The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms (1953) - Review - 08/02/24 - ★★★★☆
12 - The Marvels (2023) - Review - 09/02/24 - ★★★★☆
13 - Dune: Part One (2021) - Review - 10/02/24 - ★★★★☆
14 - Casablanca (1942) - Review - 18/02/24 - ★★★★☆
15 - Them (1954) - Review - 18/02/24 - ★★★★☆
16 - The Zone of Interest (2023) - Review - 19/02/24 - ★★★★★
17 - All of Us Strangers (2023) - Review - 19/02/24 - ★★★★★
18 - Poor Things (2023) - Review - 20/02/24 - ★★★☆☆
19 - The Taste of Things (2023) - Review - 21/02/24 - ★★★★☆
20 - The Iron Claw (2023) - Review - 21/02/24 - ★★★★☆

I’ve been watching too many films. I work all day and then I go to the cinema and my second job begins: enjoying movies.

hylian_elf

Making my way through Koreeda's work. Trying to catch some before they leave Mubi. This one was on BFI but I wanted to watch it before Like Father, Like Son which leaves Mubi tomorrow I think.

8. Still Walking - 23 Feb
A family drama set during an annual reunion to commemorate the death of one of the family members. Very reminiscent of Ozu is all I can say. Fans of Tokyo Story and other Ozu greats should definitely give this a watch.
[9]

Gremill

7. Get Shorty
A reminder that John Travolta used to be a very watchable screen presence in this funny, smart and breezy satire of Hollywood as a racket. What a cast as well - Gene Hackman, Rene Russo, James Gandolfini, Danny Devito all look like they're having a grand old time. 8

Cos

@Elf Looks like I missed that, shame. I’d be keen to know what other stuff you have in your mubi watchlist though, would like to make the most of it.

Cos

19. The Flash
Well now. I didn’t have particularly high expectations for this going in and it was certainly a mixed bag. I’m a bit of a sucker for time travel and alternate universe type stories so enjoyed parts of that - Keaton’s alt Batman was great - but I found Miller was just a bit off somehow and didn’t really seem to carry the film. The final third sequence of rehashing Shannon’s Zod from MoS was pretty weak too. A couple of good speed sequences (prob not matching Quicksilver in X-Men though) weren’t enough to make it any more fun. Saved by Keaton for the most part, another DC letdown. [4]

hylian_elf

Cos wrote:

@Elf Looks like I missed that, shame. I’d be keen to know what other stuff you have in your mubi watchlist though, would like to make the most of it.

Sorry, probably unclear what I was saying - Still Walking is on BFIplayer and is still there. Like Father, Like Son is on MUBI and leaving tomorrow.

I Wish was on MUBI and has gone.

I've got a list of Asian films I want to watch and which service is sreaming them - vast majority are not streaming on anything at all! Re MUBI: I just randomly check what is leaving MUBI and catch anythng of interest.

Only film on my current list that MUBI have is Uncle Boonmee... by Apichatpong Weerasethakul.

So far I've made a list of films by Chang-dong, Koreeda, Johnnie To, Hsiao-Hsien, Kurosawa (Kiyoshi) and Weerasethakul.

Will expand the list to include more directors, like Abbas Kiarostami and Oliver Assyas and others, it helps to keep me focused.

LarryDavid

6. Mikey & Nicky

Peter Falk & John Cassavetes are old friends, and small time hoodlums. Nicky calls Mikey cause he's in trouble, someone's put a contract out on him and he needs his old mate to help get him out of a jam and get the hitman off his back. Mutual distrust flows between them, but the friendship is there too, though fraying. Hard to explain the story without giving it away, but most of the film is just them squabbling, remembering, and playing off one another over the course of a night/morning. There's probably quite a bit of what they now call 'toxic masculinity', although in that era was presumably just another day of being an everyday bloke. But there's also pathos, and the sense that these clowns would have liked to have been better if they'd only known how. Funny too, at times. I liked this, went in assuming because Elaine May directed A New Leaf this would be more of a comedy knockabout but that was just one element of it. Pretty good. [8]

Cos

Cheers, Elf. I’ll check out Still Walking on BFI and noted some of those other directors. Still getting used to Mubi so I’ll keep an eye on the leaving soon section.

Cos

20. Kimi
An agoraphobic woman who reviews Alexa-like recordings hears a potential violent crime in one but struggles to get anyone to take it seriously. A slow start ramps up into a pretty tense investigation only to descend into conspiracy thriller with a few OTT moments that were too much of a stretch. Decent enough ending but all very light and felt a bit of a waste of good potential. [5]

acemuzzy

Duel is quite fun then. Kinda one trick but shows his camera style well.

davyK

Aftersun Morose and charming in equal measure. Brilliantly echoes depression and how people can hide it with the underlying sadness of the film despite the happy appearances.

Very smart film and two great performances.

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