I Just Watched (Films)

[Lenny Solidus]

Nope

Jordan Peele, Jordan Peele. The modern Hitchcock of our time? Nope. A writer and director who most certainly has some great ideas, but for me just as the case with Us his aspirations always far exceed his execution - once the 'big reveal' happens everything goes to hell and loses my firmly intrigued amount of interest. I really enjoyed the first thirty or so minutes of Nope, I was all in but as we all know Peele loves to fake out his audience along giving crappy fake jump scares my issue being he always then proceeds to move everything he had so nicely built up in a direction that while yes - unexpected, doesn't always pay dividends. Nope's second half and final act was...not even just ok wtf and far more wtf was that? That's what we get? It fell apart so swiftly I had whiplash.

It's a considerable shame, everything about Nope was as if it was written for me, especially as someone who had his own mystery object in the sky in person observation when I was all but ten years of age, which birthed my they are out there obsession. This should have been the movie I always wanted someone to make and up until a certain point it almost was, then it ended up as something that severely disappointed went in a direction I couldn't take at all seriously – maybe next time Mr Peele.

4/10

[Rusty]

That review has piqued my interest. I'm going to have to watch it now. 4 out of 10 be damned. I love a good failure film.

[Achtung Englander]

The Northman

Its basically a Norse remix of The Gladiator. Yeah - it was fun, but 300 and The Green Knight did the whole mythological thing better. It was interesting to see a whole bunch of Americans try their Icelandic accents. Not sure if I will see it again. Its too long.

7/10

[Snowy]

The Northman

Its basically a Norse remix of The Gladiator. Yeah - it was fun, but 300 and The Green Knight did the whole mythological thing better. It was interesting to see a whole bunch of Americans try their Icelandic accents. Not sure if I will see it again. Its too long.

7/10

Hated it myself.

Watched The Black Telephone last night, which was a truly unpleasant horror film about a guy who abducts and murders kids in an American town, and a pair of the kids living there. What it did it did very well, but there are some disturbing scenes of child abuse in it that made for very uncomfortable viewing. Watch it by all means, but it is not nice.

[Achtung Englander]

Yes The Northman is a real marmite sort of film.

[Achtung Englander]

one of the decent original shows on Britbox is a documentary series called Reel Britania. It covers the British film industry since the 60s and every episode focuses on one decade. It is excellent, I learned so much but the biggest benefit is the education on films I have never heard of. So I am tracking them down.

The Servant (1963)

A compelling drama that is like the film Parasite but obviously focuses more on class. I always liked Dirk Bogart and this film only reinforces my admiration in his acting. Its about an insidious butler who easily takes advantage of a fop rich man. Way ahead of its time.
7/10

Slade In Flame (1975)

This was a recommendation of being a good film. Really! Slade! The Christmas guys. Nobby! So going in expectations were pretty low, but you know what, its brilliant. I am not keen on Slade music, but their music plays background to a fascinating story that picks up in the second half. It is more about exploitation and business. I was very intrigued on how it was going to end and it delivered. Again some of it has to do with class, but it is more about crossing the Ts and dotting the Is of a contract. I actually enjoyed it a lot.
7/10

[Animalmother]

Blonde
The new Marilyn Monroe biopic on Netflix. I only watched the first 15 minutes before turning it off, not because it was bad but because it's so fucking grim. I'll come back to it again but at over 2 hours it will be an exhausting watch. Ana de Armas looks amazing (well obviously...)

[Achtung Englander]

Blonde

Similar to Animalmother, I gave up at the 1 hour mark. My partner gave up 30 minutes later. What an utterly idiotic film. The entire exercise is to wallow in all the negative beats in Marilyn Monroe's life without addressing any of the psychology that drove to her to become one of the famous women in history. It was one episode after the next of horror. No joy or any semblance of character building.

Perhaps one of the worst biopics I have seen. The actress who played her did a sterling job but the script is an absolute disaster.

I came away learning nothing.

1/10

[Raid]

A few recent watches;

Tenet - As someone that really likes time travel / time displacement / time manipulation fiction, this was a dismal disappointment. I had absolutely no interest in the plot because they didn't seem very keen on explaining anything unless I was just being incredibly unobservant. They repeatedly tell you what the main threat isn't. I'm usually really stubborn when it comes to finishing bad films, but I was so bored by the two hour mark that I didn't even finish the last half hour.

Fury - I'd say other than an overly sappy and predictable pre-finale conversation, it's a really good war film. I don't remember seeing a film concentrating on a tank crew before, and it manages to make it feel every bit as brutal and intense as an infantry film would.

Alien: Covenant - I was surprised to find I hadn't actually seen this before given how big a fan I am of the franchise. It's also better than I expected it to be, although despite the name it feels far less an Alien film than something set in the same universe. The Xenomorphs do feature, but they feel like they're there to put on the poster, and it's a perfectly decent sci-fi film without them.

[Wrathbone]

A few recent watches;

Tenet - As someone that really likes time travel / time displacement / time manipulation fiction, this was a dismal disappointment. I had absolutely no interest in the plot because they didn't seem very keen on explaining anything unless I was just being incredibly unobservant. They repeatedly tell you what the main threat isn't. I'm usually really stubborn when it comes to finishing bad films, but I was so bored by the two hour mark that I didn't even finish the last half hour.

You didn’t miss anything. Woeful film.

[Raid]

Good. I'll clear it off my "finish watching" list on my Fire TV, which it's been on in case anyone were to tell me "oh, the last half hour explains everything and it makes up for the entire two hour trudge before it!"

[Maturin]

Although I don't think it's a bad film - it's really well-shot and on a second watch it all comes together slightly better - it is the first Nolan film where I've thought he really needed a co-writer to help him reign it in and keep the story more focused.

I've always loved Inception because it's so well-written that its plot convolutions all marry up perfectly in its storytelling. Tenet is like "What happens if you try and write a film like Inception but you get really carried away".

Oppenheimer is an adaptation of a book I think, so we'll see how that turns out. I think Nolan's pretty level-headed though, I wouldn't be surprised if he secretly knows Tenet got out of hand.

[Wrathbone]

For me the problem's not even that it's a convoluted mess, but more that the core conflict is never given any detail, so by the end I still didn't know what the film was about or why anyone was doing anything. I can appreciate a film with an open-ended finale or where something complex is given a vital moment of clarity at the end in which the whole thing suddenly makes sense, but Tenet achieved neither of those. It's not a story - it's a flawed sci-fi concept with some pretty action scenes thrown around it.

Arrival (probably my favourite sci-fi film) used a very similar concept of time and causality that was far more successful, and with the science behind it given the seal of approval from physicists, it seems.

[Achtung Englander]

Morgan! A suitable case for Treatment (1966)

This film is way ahead of its time. Its a comedy that focuses on whacky person only for you to find out he is actually lost in his own imagination to escape depression. Stayed with me post credit.
7/10

My IMDB review

https://www.imdb.com/review/rw8586144/?ref_=tt_urv

[Animalmother]

The Poseidon Adventure 1972
Back in the 80's if you turned on the tv on a weekend afternoon either Zulu, The Great Escape or this was almost guaranteed to be on somewhere. I've probably seen it several times in the past but remember barely anything about the film. It's your typical 1970's disaster flick about a cruise ship that gets hit by a tsunami and is left upsidedown. A few people try to escape and unintentionally hilarious deaths occur along the way. Lots of angry acting with Gene Hackman and Ernest Borgnine yelling at each other. It's pretty good fun and worth a watch. Bonus points for Leslie Nielsen playing a serious role but still somehow managed to be hilarious.

Sleepy Hollow
Another one I haven't seen in a very long time and was worried it wouldn't hold up. It's still great, probably one of Tim Burton's best if I'm honest. The effects have held up extremely well for a late 90's film even with the cgi at the time. Manages to be funny and genuinely creepy in places. Definitely worth a rewatch if you haven't seen it in a while.