Sucker Punch.

Oh my god what a piece of crap.

OK the action is alright, but holds no weight whatsoever and I wasn't invested in them one bit. Visually it's pretty to look at in the same way processed canned foods are nice to eat.

Rubbish.

Mov_freak, have you seen it?

This post has been edited by QuickFire: Jun 19 2011, 10:19 PM

Absolute drivel. Worst of the year so far.

And to think I chose to watch such garbage on the eve of my exam lol. I hope the movie isn't a reflection of hoe bad I'm gonna screw up tomorrow. Because Snyder did just that.

Sucker Punch is turd. The story is wafer thin, which wouldn't be such a problem if we had characters we cared about. No. Everything the movie has to say about babydoll is said in the opening 5 minutes, easily the best sequence in the entire movie. Beyond those 5 minutes, the film adds absolutely nothing to her character. We get to see her static sorry sad (and pretty admittedly) face for the rest of the duration. The story is rubbish, it's like Inception meets Shutter Island except there is no meat to it at all. It's simply a premise to fill the screen with stupid CGI fights we don't care about. In fact, Sucker Punch and Inception make a good combo. Both feature multiple layers of dreams/fantasies. One has way too much detail and chooses to convey by means of boring dialogue. The other has absolutely nothing of worth to say. Neither are good movies.

Oh and yeah I agree! The soundtrack is an insult to the original songs. Except Bjork. That was great.

Anyway I finally got around to seeing Super 8. Liked it a lot!

This post has been edited by QuickFire: Jun 20 2011, 10:29 PM

Jurassic Park. For the umpteenth time.

I don't care what people say. I don't care if you say it has a weak story or weak characters. It's not flawless. But I love it to death. It may be superficial fluff, but it's fluff of the highest order. No one constructs setpieces like Spielberg does here. You know that scene in Super 8 where the monster tramples over the bus? Obvious nod to JP, and guess what, Abrams forgot the build-up, forgot the scenes breathe before unleashing the terror, and the result is just another pretty decent action sequence. Watch how Spielberg does it here with the T-Rex attack on the cars. Classic.

Limitless

Entertaining and visually slick. And I do mean slick, as in Fincher-esque slick. In fact, if you think about it, the entire movie is pretty similar to Fight Club, although providing none of the latter's depth or provocation.

Harry Potter and The Philosopher's Stone

First time watching in many years, having seen it probably at least 4 times when I was 13 or 14. Still like it very much. Chris Columbus got the look of the magical world right alright. And it's a delight seeing the main actors back when they were still kids. Their acting isn't the best, but there's authenticity to it. Compare them to Super 8, and you won't get far as far as 'conventional' acting is concerned (the Super 8 kids were pretty phenomenal), but here you really feel they are real kids, some seeing magic for the first time. The story is kiddie fare, but the themes of friendship and bravery, present throughout the series, probably comes through the most here. It has to be said though, despite laying the groundwork of the world of Hogwarts and its visuals down well, Columbus' direction is a little bland and probably too reverential to the books.

Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets

Enjoyed this one as well, but it is too similar in looks, tone, and mood to the first. A good thing Columbus didn't return.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Within the first 10 minutes it will be impossible not to notice this is directed by someone with a far keener eye for visuals and mood. The entire movies looks fabulous and has loads of style to boot. None of the static, sterile and safe direction the first two had, Cuaron employs visuals tricks and fancy camerawork whenever he has a chance, and pulls all of them off spectacularly. It is positively mesmerizing. The story and tone is darker this time, and probably has the best balance between more adult themes and the inherently kiddy magical elements than all the other movies (I do need to revisit the other movies though, and will), and moves at a better pace than the first two. David Thewlis and Gary Oldman are brilliant as Professor Lupin and Sirius Black, and Gambon is more than capable of filling Richard Harris. In fact, Gambon is better than Harris ever was. And John Williams gives us a real wallop of a score. It doesn't develop the themes from the earlier movies, but for sheer individual moments of magic for each scene, the PoA score can't be beat. About the only thing I don't like is the freezeshot at the end. Never liked that. Always thought there should be an extra minute or two at the end.

Thread looks like it's dying... mov_freak where are you.

Win Win. Win indeed. Very good dramedy with the always dependable Giamatti and a great supporting cast. Quietly funny and always honest.

Hanna. Some bright spots but on the whole it was *yawn*. None of the ideas were fleshed out adequately. In the end it's just a half-baked could-have-been-special run-of-the-mill thriller.

Also watched the whole Harry Potter series up to movie 7 over the past month. Watching them in succession made me appreciate the entire series better, though Azkaban is still the best.. but damn, Half Blood Prince's photography looked ravishing. The last few movies still had plenty of flaws and none of them can stand on its own, which probably explains why I liked them more when viewed in succession.

3:10 To Yuma (2007)

This gets better each time I watch it. Love it. Crowe's Ben Wade is one complex and dynamic character whose relationship with Bale's Dan Evans absolutely makes the film and culminates with the brilliant ending which is as explosive as it is emotional.

Never seen the original too. It can't be this bloody good can it?

5/5

Lately I've found myself gravitating towards easy-going, non-challenging movies, probably because of I have less time to myself and when I do have it I'm usually tired.

Probably explains why I didn't like Barton Fink, thought it was borderline meandering (but still decent) in the first half and the second half just completely lost me with its oddball-ness. Perhaps I should re-watch it sometime again, but it is my least favourite Coens film.

I watched Intolerable Cruelty the next day, liked it quite a bit. Breezy and fun, though the last act was too twisty for its own good. Enjoyable nonetheless.

Braveheart. Watchied it for the first time since I saw it in the cinema when I was around 7. I had forgotten what an epic it is.

The Lost World. Perfectly decent for a lazy night.

Blue Velvet. David Lynch's film noir is actually pretty conventional (for a Lynch film) save for a few key scenes (mostly involving Dennis Hopper) which display some truly weird human behavior. Very good film.

Sometimes a movie that is average across the board can be worse than a movie is severely uneven. Heck, I sometimes prefer a movie that is utterly bad to a movie that is utterly average because with the former at least it provokes a reaction out of you.

OK I watched a few movies over the past month or two.

The Conversation. A really good psychological thriller, and the ending can only be labelled as BOLD.

The Guard. Director by the brother of the director who directed In Bruges I believe. It has Brendan Gleeson in top form but the quality of the film does taper off in the second half.

In Bruges. Must have watched this 4 or 5 times now, and it's pretty rapidly shooting up my list of favourite movies ever. Pitch perfect black comedy with brilliant performances from Gleeson, Fiennes, and Colin Farrell, who I've always maintained is a fantastic actor. The movie has some unbelievable dialogue and the sense of location, so often missing in many other movies, is in every frame here. f***ing funny to f***ing boot as well.

Phone Booth. Watched this in a hotel. Engages you from start to finish but I didn't like the ending and felt it reduced the movie to merely decent.

Danny the Dog (Unleashed). Watched only about half hour of this in the hotel but bloody me it was surprisingly very entertaining.

Warrior. I can't resist a good underdog story, much less two underdog stories rolled into one. I don't care if it's manipulative (all movies are), it almost made me shed a tear.

M. Yes, that old German movies from 1931 I believe. And yes, it is deserving of its classic status.

The Game. Like Phone Booth, it is suspenseful and grips you from the start to end, but the ending here is pretty shit, and renders the whole movie pointless in my opinion. Fincher's worst movie.

Kung Fu Panda 2. Surprised by how good this is... and John Powell's score kicked ass.

Snowtown. What an effective movie about Australia's worst serial killer. It is also extremely disgusting and disturbing to watch. It is crass and lacks a certain class that other better movies have, like that other Australian crime movie from 2010 called Animal Kingdom.



This post has been edited by QuickFire: Dec 22 2011, 09:45 PM

Inception. Brilliant first hour that promises an epic second half. Absolutely unimaginative and rubbish second half. That snow fight has to be one of the most boring action sequences I've ever seen. In fact the movie is actually playing right now and I'm so disinterested that I'm typing this post instead. A wasted opportunity.

Kill List. Weird British horror movie that is rather episodic in nature. The ending does make you think for a bit, but I can't decide if the movie is good or just average. Has some some nasty violence in it.

This Is England. A knockout and surely one of the best British movies of the last 10 years.

Les Diaboliques. My first Henri-Georges Clouzot film and I can't say I really liked it. Apart from the last 5 mins which had a Psycho-esque suspense/horror factor to this, the rest lacked a sense of atmosphere and suspense. It was just moving along, not making me feel anything.

50/50. Ooh thought this was a great balance between humor and depressing drama. Seth Rogen is still Seth Rogen, he still can't act but here he's funny as a counterpoint to all the depressive stuff going on. And Anna Kendrick. She's just too cute.

Real Steel. An okay feel good crowd pleaser that has one seriously annoying kid.

Headhunters. Norwegian crime thriller that doesn't quite work. The thin is I'm usually unimpressed with European thrillers. They always cram in a huge script where a lot is happening but without the proper pacing to give it the necessary mood or 'feel'. It's one note pacing, a movie made up of scene after scene and never quite coming together. And then it ends. Not to mention a lot of the plot and events are just downright ridiculous, and not in a good way.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.

I have never seen the BBC miniseries. I have the book but never read it. I was not exactly expecting something like this. The trailer made it look like a very tension-filled film, largely thanks to the editing and Elfman's score from The Wolfman, but it turns out it is very languidly paced, very slow indeed. There is a lot of dialogue, but there are equally a lot of pauses between dialogue, lots of stylish atmosphere and moody photography to take in. This film is filled with silences.

And the thing that strikes me most, the thing that feels utterly unique about it, is that the film almost always holds the viewer at arm's length. There is tension and suspense, but not the usual Bourne/Hitchcock kind. The tension is always simmering underneath, never ever coming to the surface. It never gives your heart the satisfaction for pumping blood and adrenaline at 120 beats a minute. I'm sure this is the aspect of the film that will most likely put off mainstream viewers. It is a cold film indeed, but it does have the humanism element in it, but again it is presented in a very arms-length, detached kind of manner.

The performances are great. Oldman, quiet yet brilliant. Firth, Hardy, Graham, Hurt, Toby Jones, all really good (although I did think Ciaran Hinds was wasted). This was the first time I saw Cumberbatch, he's very good although he has the kind of face that screams "punch me!" But the unsung hero of the film is Mark Strong, he has a very short screen time but he absolutely nails it, and his performance is what gives the final montage sequence the gravitas it needed.

Not the thriller most people will expect, certainly not one a lot of people will like, but it's a very unique, very classy film.



P/S: Thomas Alfredson's previous film Let The Right One In was also pretty cold and detached, despite the warm themes that permeates the film.

This post has been edited by QuickFire: Jan 18 2012, 12:14 PM

If you look hard enough you will find many who aren't swept away by the Inception tide. And that the movie is really all about convincing the son of some energy tycoon to dissolve his father's empire and yada yada yada... seriously who gives a shit? Talk about wasted potential.

I don't mind Hugh Jackman. I like him. He was an ******* at the beginning of the movie though. But he has nothing on that kid, who is a smartass, *******, and whiner all rolled into one small package. Btw Real Steel cemented Kevin Durand as the go-to guy to play assholes we love to hate.

I dont mean here, but in other places on the net you will find many who dislike Inception. Everyone here loves it. Most of my friends love it.

Real Steel was just an above average mainstream crowd pleaser, dont expect to get emotionally engaged with it!

I watched The Rocketeer last night, one of my favourites when I was a kid but I had forgotten almost everything about it. So much fun! And an awesome score from James Horner. Simple, straight-forward, good-natured action movie. No one smiles an evil grin like Timothy Dalton!

I'll have to read the book someday. I'm just not a book person nowadays; I read very slowly, and spare time is becoming a luxury item.

The movie is still jam-packed with details, but unlike other films, it does not accentuate details that should be made known to the audience. In any other conventional thriller, the camera, dialogue, acting, tone of the scene, and/or music, etc will attempt to highlight a particular detail that is important in telling the story. TTSS doesn't do that at all. You could say it has very little respect for the conventional storytelling techniques, or hell, even basic storytelling technique, but I'm thinking it's by design and the result is oddly mesmerizing and captivating, in a very different manner. I can understand if people don't like it though.

Haven't watched many movies over the last week.... uhm, Hard Boiled I guess. Also known as The Movie Where Everyone Has Unlimited Ammo. The body count and time spent on shooting stuff is just ridiculous. I like it, but not enough to declare it a classic like many do.

Watched Woody Allen's Manhataan last night. I've only seen the newer Woody Allen movies (Vicky, Midnight, Whatever), none of the old ones. Loved this. 5/5

The Thing (2011). Has some of the most inappropriate and obnoxious CGI ever put on film.

Thelma and Louise. Great.

The Wages of War. Clouzot's most known film alongside Les Miserables. This is much better and completely deserving of its classic status. A classic it is, and a real white knuckle thrill ride.

Election (1999, Alexander Payne). Great.

Hugo. Hard to believe Scorsese actually directed this. Touching, heartfelt, and simply a joy to watch.

Never seen that. Btw it's the Wages Of Fear. Just noticed I got it wrong.

The Mist (2007) in black and white. An always entertaining B-movie whose triple-whammy ending doesn't quite produce the required shock precisely because it was made in a very B-movie, ultra unsubtle manner. 3.5/5

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Added on March 5, 2012, 10:57 pmThe Muppets. Maybe it's because I never grew up watching them, but I thought this was a real turd. Hated it.

This post has been edited by QuickFire: Mar 5 2012, 10:57 PM

The Muppets. Maybe it's because I never grew up watching them, but I thought this was a real turd. Hated it.

Lolwut. You mean George Orwell.

That's my beef with the movie. Compare it with real dystopian films and this comes off juvenile.