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Review the last film you saw


Ryan Gosling

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The moment she said "Honest to blog!", I checked my watch and groaned on the inside. Thankfully it never got quite as jarringly smart-arsed again - although it kept the tone, which is why I could never really like it that much.

 

Order Of The Phoenix is a stonewall 4 star film.

 

It's class. FACT. :laugh:

 

It's hard to tell if you're being sarcastic because I agree, and think it's the best of the series.

 

:sad:

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Commander Harris

I have to admit I laughed out loud at "honest to blog". :)

 

In the first few minutes I was thinking to myself - this dialogue smells - but it grew on me.

 

I don't mind stylised dialogue, I don't believe everything has to be straight and as it would be in the real world, as long as there is consistency then I believe it works.

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It's hard to tell if you're being sarcastic because I agree, and think it's the best of the series.

 

:sad:

 

 

 

If only.

 

Having never read the books, I decided in the summer to rent out all the DVDs and watch through them. The first couple, directed by Chris Columbus, were fair to average for someone who hadn't read the books and didn't know the mythology.

 

From Azkaban on, though, it has gone from strength to strength (most likely to do with getting serious directors in, rather than a studio man) and the best of the three is without doubt Order Of The Phoenix. Mike Newell did a great job on it, and outshone Cuaron's direction on Goblet Of Fire; no mean feat.

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I have to admit I laughed out loud at "honest to blog". :)

 

In the first few minutes I was thinking to myself - this dialogue smells - but it grew on me.

 

I don't mind stylised dialogue, I don't believe everything has to be straight and as it would be in the real world, as long as there is consistency then I believe it works.

 

I didn't mind it - besides as I've said before, apart from a few examples like 'macaroni - cheese', I and other kids I know have spoken bizarrely like that. Particularly 'silencio!'.

 

If only.

 

Having never read the books, I decided in the summer to rent out all the DVDs and watch through them. The first couple, directed by Chris Columbus, were fair to average for someone who hadn't read the books and didn't know the mythology.

 

From Azkaban on, though, it has gone from strength to strength (most likely to do with getting serious directors in, rather than a studio man) and the best of the three is without doubt Order Of The Phoenix. Mike Newell did a great job on it, and outshone Cuaron's direction on Goblet Of Fire; no mean feat.

 

OMG another fan :D :D :D :D

 

I concur. I loved the first movie when it came out (I was 12 mind), but looking back I find I can't watch the first two. Whilst Cuar?n's film is not the best in the series, it is undoubtedly the turning point because his vision created the 'true' Hogwarts, if you get me.

 

Thought GOF was a fun, 3-star film just because it doesn't have time to include the proper stories but OOTP was definitely 4-star, better performances, tighter story (a shock considering how bloated and dull the book is). I am eagerly anticipating the next film because I consider it to be by far the best book in the series.

 

I've found that OOTP is the first film to surpass the book.

 

Book 7 was definitely written with a film in mind, but not to the detriment of the story. Hopefully they do it justice and release it in 2 parts.

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Last film I saw was Superbad, and it was super bad, really really disappointed. Nowhere near the quality of the Forty Year Old Virgin or even Knocked Up. One maybe two laugh out loud moments, the rest just average gags. One star only from Me.

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I didn't mind it - besides as I've said before, apart from a few examples like 'macaroni - cheese', I and other kids I know have spoken bizarrely like that. Particularly 'silencio!'.

 

 

 

OMG another fan :D :D :D :D

 

I concur. I loved the first movie when it came out (I was 12 mind), but looking back I find I can't watch the first two. Whilst Cuar?n's film is not the best in the series, it is undoubtedly the turning point because his vision created the 'true' Hogwarts, if you get me.

 

Thought GOF was a fun, 3-star film just because it doesn't have time to include the proper stories but OOTP was definitely 4-star, better performances, tighter story (a shock considering how bloated and dull the book is). I am eagerly anticipating the next film because I consider it to be by far the best book in the series.

 

I've found that OOTP is the first film to surpass the book.

 

Book 7 was definitely written with a film in mind, but not to the detriment of the story. Hopefully they do it justice and release it in 2 parts.

 

I didn't realise you were still a teenager, that surprises me for some reason.

 

I enjoy the Harry Potter series, I've read the first four to my four-year old son too and started Order of the Phoenix last night. I agree that the film series improved with the Prisoner of Azkaban which I thought was a quite brilliant movie. I don't think the momentum has continued with the last two films possibly because an awful lot had to be cut from the books, although I think there is a lot of waffle in books 4-6. I agree that book 7 is very filmable and should either be an epic or a two parter.

 

Anyway, the last film I saw was The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. Decent adaptation of the classic children's book, I thought the kid actors were quite likeable, especially the wee-est girl. Not sure about the casting of James McEvoy as Tumnus, nor the voice of Ray Winstone as Mr Beaver, they just weren't as I imagined them. Also, I thought Tilda Swinton's White Witch was just a wee bit underplayed, not scary enough. The battle effects were pretty good as were the mythical creatures both good and evil. My four-year old son thought it was great and he wasn't all that bothered about the book.

 

* * *

 

Perhaps I'll review something a little more highbrow next time but I have my doubts!

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Alpha-Dog.

 

An okay film could have been great if it wasn't made for teenagers(imho).A gang of middle class potheads lose the plot when a kidnapping goes wrong.Funny to hear white boys use the word bitches all the time.:)Based on a true story.Certain age will like it better than others.

 

**1/2

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I didn't realise you were still a teenager, that surprises me for some reason.

 

Because of my remarkable intelligence?

 

:nooo:

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Commander Harris
Because of my remarkable intelligence?

 

:nooo:

 

I remember making the same mistake when I was relatively new to JKB. For some reason I thought you were a lot older - your age is patently obvious now though :P

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I remember making the same mistake when I was relatively new to JKB. For some reason I thought you were a lot older - your age is patently obvious now though :P

 

Shut it poof.

 

:D

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I assumed Chris was a pensioner, only way he could have time to rack up 4,500,000 posts.

 

:laugh:

 

And yet I'm still not the one with the most posts on this board who isn't an admin.

 

:eek:

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Was Dex admin when he made all those though...?

 

I dont think the others have posted on this thread. In fact I dunno if Dexter has either:laugh:

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Nope. :laugh:

 

Dex's are split between Webby and his, and they've been mergerinoed.

 

Webmaster was only on about 1500 though.

 

I've lost the point in this.

 

Chris is 19, not 82. :)

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Webmaster was only on about 1500 though.

 

I've lost the point in this.

 

Chris is 19, not 82. :)

 

Aye but Dex was on 13,000ish!

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Michel Gondry

 

Nothing more than an OK music video director, just like Spike Jonze. The fact the yanks have gone crazy for both kinda proves my point about their love of superficialism.
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ArmiyaRomanova

An odd combination of films today...

 

First up...

MY BLUEBERRY NIGHTS

New from director Wong Kar Wai, and starring MOR chanteuse Norah Jones as an ingenue recovering from a lost love with the occasional help of similarly lovelorn cafe manager (as if) Jude Law.

 

Yup, it's a chick flick.

 

The story is incredibly slight - and arguably fairly trite for an audience with any life experience - but it's engaging enough, with a decent debut film appearance from Jones. Though she's out-performed by every other member of the cast - notably David Strathairn and Rachel Weisz, who do spectacular turns - Jones' naivety fits her part well.

 

Superb cinematography courtesy of Darius Khondji, an extraordinarily refined and ravishing manifestation of Kar Wai's favoured narrow depth of focus approach to shots.

 

 

I was entertained. Not greatly, but entertained.

 

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And the second of the day

 

 

OUTPOST

 

A Scottish horror film with an unrecognisable cast and achieved, apparently, on a fairly minimal (sub 1m) budget. Oh pish, I hear you say, let's leave the cinema now.

 

But it's really not that bad at all. A bunch of mercenaries in the depths of strife-torn Eastern Europe stumble into the remnants of a WW2 Nazi science experiment gone horribly wrong.

 

Yup, that's right, undead and indestructible Nazis, who pick off the hapless mercenaries one by one until... well, you know the genre expectations as well as I do, and I have to say the film delivers professionally enough, with a few genuinely unnerving moments.

 

Although it's direct-to-DVD fodder for late night no-brainer viewing, it's well beyond good enough to succeed in that market.

 

And frankly, I far preferred it to the appallingly nilihistic miserablist mince that Scotland's served up in recent years, to the greater detriment of what passes for an industry up here. Step up, L. Ramsay, D. MacKenzie, P. Mullan et al... and f... off.

 

I was entertained. Not greatly, but entertained.

 

 

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Because of my remarkable intelligence?

 

:nooo:

 

No, your remarkable modesty. :)

 

I think it's probably because you seem to have good contacts at HMFC. I thought the only teenagers Pinigol would talk to would be Freshers with big ti...I think you get the idea.

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Tirez Sur Le Pianiste

 

Truffaut subverting the gangster genre in an uncannily Godard-esque fashion. An ivory-tinkling widower becomes unintentionally tangled up with hoodlums after his brothers pull a job and cut the rest of the gang out of the proceeds. As you'd expect with Truffaut, though, there is a lot more going on underneath the surface.

 

medium_4.gif

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There Will Be Blood:

 

I'm going to have to be a bit negative about it. It was simply too slow paced to ever engage me. Not that I don't like a good thinker, I do, but this just never sparked into anything for me. Daniel Day Lewis was astoundingly good (along the lines of Gangs of New York, where he was the only saving grace of that movie), but that one massive plus doesn't quite pull the rest of it up for me.

 

Obviously people have managed to get into it, and it has rave reviews, but I just struggled from start to finish...which made for a boring 2 hours +. Shame.

 

2.5 stars...mainly due to Day Lewis, and cinematography

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There Will Be Blood:

 

I'm going to have to be a bit negative about it. It was simply too slow paced to ever engage me. Not that I don't like a good thinker, I do, but this just never sparked into anything for me. Daniel Day Lewis was astoundingly good (along the lines of Gangs of New York, where he was the only saving grace of that movie), but that one massive plus doesn't quite pull the rest of it up for me.

 

Obviously people have managed to get into it, and it has rave reviews, but I just struggled from start to finish...which made for a boring 2 hours +. Shame.

 

2.5 stars...mainly due to Day Lewis, and cinematography

 

Not entirely in the spirit of the thread as it's not the last film I saw, but I'm going to weigh into the debate on TWBB.

 

I didn't hate it. I'd go as far as to say I found it entertaining, but when I left the cinema I had zero desire to watch it again, which doesn't say much for its depth.

 

It told me nothing about America, human nature, capitalism, religion, gawd, imperialism or any or any of the other themes Anderson appeared to be tilting at. It appeared to me liked he tapped into one sophomoric idea and then ran with it.

 

Starting the film in 1898 (widely recognised as the first year of American overseas imperialism) before jumping to the early oil days... well it was telegraphing where it was going long in advance of the rest of the film.

 

Interestingly, the book was written in the 20s... a decade with far more in common with the 90s than this decade. Maybe he should have made it ten years earlier if he was aiming for any kind of modern day relevance.

 

There's a few nice scenes - DDL waking up alone in his bowling alley, totally isolated by his wealth and ambition (there was a popular book in the states in the 90s called 'Bowling Alone' documenting the disintegration of modern social groupings etc. compared to the 50s and 60s). Actually that's about the only one that really grabbed me, none of the other scenes alone were particular stand outs - and I'm focussing on scenes as the movie didn't have a particularly smooth flow to it.

 

A lot's been written about the soundtrack... tbh I barely noticed it until the final scene, where the cut in musical style is quite jarring. I'd actually say that's quite comendable.

 

Anyway, I'm pretty mixed on it. Entertaining enough, but by no means a classic. And DDL veers from impressive and commanding to comic far too easily. At times I couldn't help thinking of the Churchill dog. 'Oh yes'.

 

I think Anderson thought he was saying a whole lot more than he actually was. An interesting depiction of a couple of characters that says bugger all about anything else of note.

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I've already tried explaining that big D. Everyone is too infatuated with P.T Anderson to take note of any critisims of the film it would seem. ALL of his films allude to depth but do not posses any, he is far too interested in doing a 'really kewl' 5 minute tracking shot and ripping off (I believe they call it 'paying homage to' these days) his major influences two of which are blatantly Scorsese and Kubrick.

 

Nobody seems to have noticed that he has completely butchered the text he based the film on to suit his own confused message. Upton Sinclair was actually a socialist, investigative writer concerned primarily with highlighting the plight of the working class at the start of last century. His novel about the processed meats industry, The Jungle, even contributed to the US government passing a law to improve working conditions within the industry. Nobody seems completely sure what sort of message Anderson has mangled Sinclair's novel Oil (a story with similar principles to The Jungle) into however because it is far too muddled and overblown to really convey anything IMO.

 

The final scene illustrates why I don't like his style, he completely undermines the tone of his own script with an almost comic/cringe inducing finale, I presume because it's 'so f-ing cool' in his mind. To me this simple minded, cartoonish climax is nothing more than the director crying out for his film to be seen as iconic and up there with Goodfellas and The Godfather, and sure enough everyone seems to have bought it. He done the exact same thing with Boogie Nights and Magnolia, and the critics and general public creamed themselves in the exact same way.

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Juno. (2008)

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Interesting story line, about a girl of 16 whom gets impregnated by a totally immature lad incapable of being a father (although not in a malicious way). The main character, Ellen Page, is brilliant but i reckon it lacks a bit of something special TBH.

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Be Kind Rewind

I'm not someone who is able to analyse films like OEW or Thommo etc.

 

Went and saw this last night.

 

It was funny IMO. :)

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There Will Be Blood:

 

I'm going to have to be a bit negative about it. It was simply too slow paced to ever engage me. Not that I don't like a good thinker, I do, but this just never sparked into anything for me. Daniel Day Lewis was astoundingly good (along the lines of Gangs of New York, where he was the only saving grace of that movie), but that one massive plus doesn't quite pull the rest of it up for me.

 

Obviously people have managed to get into it, and it has rave reviews, but I just struggled from start to finish...which made for a boring 2 hours +. Shame.

 

2.5 stars...mainly due to Day Lewis, and cinematography

 

I agree all the way. Only Daniel Day Lewis's acting was memorable, as in Gangs of New York (the one with the clashng, loud banshee music).

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Charlie Wilson's War - interesting. Of course, I watched it as someone who supported the Soviet attempt to bring Afghanistan into something later than the 6th century. The internal intrigues in the USA seem authentic.

A good film. "Rendition" is my next, I think.

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Brotherhood of the Wolf

 

Awful French action/horror trying to be something more than it is. Monica Bellucci is the only thing good in the film.

 

Nil Points

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I've been laid up with the man-flu the last couple of days so I've watched some gash via BT Homechoice.

 

1408 - with John Cusack and Samuel L. Jackson - an utter pile of ******. Adaptation from a Stephen King short (which should have been the first warning) which singularly fails to be frightening, believable or in any way meaningful. It's a scary hotel room right, and Cusack spends the night there right, and he's like lost a daughter and stuff right, and like is it really happening or is it is subconscious or or or...

 

Gash. Utter feckin' gash. No stars.

 

Bourne Ultimatum - top notch thriller. The Waterloo Station scene is a standout. Four stars.

 

Knocked Up - watchable enough as rom-coms go, few entertaining lines. And I'd definitely like to make the sex with the main bird. Three stars if you can stand that kind of thing.

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I've already tried explaining that big D. Everyone is too infatuated with P.T Anderson to take note of any critisims

:laugh:

 

1408 - with John Cusack and Samuel L. Jackson - an utter pile of ******. Adaptation from a Stephen King short (which should have been the first warning) which singularly fails to be frightening' date=' believable or in any way meaningful. It's a scary hotel room right, and Cusack spends the night there right, and he's like lost a daughter and stuff right, and like is it really happening or is it is subconscious or or or...

 

Gash. Utter feckin' gash. No stars.[/quote']:rofl:

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rudi must stay

Juno

 

Good acting and it was quite funny in bits as well. The middle was pretty dull though, other than that it was well worth watching.

 

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Rescue Dawn

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The (supposedly true) story of an American pilot who crashes in the middle of enemy territory and is captured by the Viet cong. By no means my favourite film based around the Vietnam war, but enjoyable none the less.

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