Continuing my foray into the world of Westerns, this weekend I have watched The Wild Bunch and The Searchers. Both were fantastic films.
I had seen most of The Wild Bunch before, but had never watched the whole film. It was one of the finest film experiences I have had recently. Peckinpah's action scenes are phenomenal, especially the opening scene. The cast are great too - I really enjoyed Holden, Borgnine and Ryan. I also particularly enjoyed the scene where they robbed the train. The film is quite a complex beast, which I think will only improve on subsequent viewings.
The Searchers is another great film. The only John Wayne/John Ford collaboration I had seen previously was Stagecoach. I thought John Wayne's character was brilliant - morally ambiguous, but magnetic. At times utterly despicable, at others quite heroic. And one cannot discuss the film without mentioning the scenery - I wish I could see the original VistaVision version of the film, it must look absolutely spectacular. The Monument Valley cinematography was eye-popping. From the very first shot I was blown away by the look of the film - one of the most beautiful I have ever seen.
One very interesting comparison between the two was the depiction of violence. The Wild Bunch is famous for its graphic violence - quite shocking in its day. The Searchers on the other hand keeps the violence offscreen, yet Ford's directorial genius shows in that the violence of the West is no less shocking despite the fact that we never see it. The power of suggestion is very strong indeed.
I rate both films 9 out 10, and put both in my top 5 westerns.
Inception hasn't got many comments here, but so far it's the blockbuster of the summer, it upgrades on from films like Total Recall, The Last Action Hero (alternate reality) and Minority Report. It does this through amazing effects and a dark, brooding tone. It's got a brilliant ensemble, though we don't learn much about the characters we kinda know what they're about just to look at them.
I mean, the Scarecrow off TDK actor (name escapes me) as the slimy limey young executive (who we strangely warm to), he would have been far better as the Greene QoS villain imo, because he just looks horrible, it's a visceral reaction. No lengthy dialogue or set-up to show us why he is. Ellen Page :x Movies need more Jewish chicks... ;%
Not sure I totally buy DiCaprio as a lead, he's okay but still a little bland. Better than Tom Cruise however, but Cruise did have more star power. The gang in Inception aren't that agreeable/ultimately virtuous and in that sense it would have worked better as a Continental film, without the need for that Anglo-American strong moral compass but more a fatalistic pessimism derived from being on the wrong end of two world wars.
I mean, the Scarecrow off TDK actor (name escapes me). . .
Cillian Murphy. Anyway. . .
Last night I watched The Road, based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy. If anyone believes the best way to make a movie adaptation is to slavishly follow the novel, this film will show that person wrong. Basically, everything that happens here occurs in the book, but the results are lifeless and ponderous. Apparently, the world will end not with a bang but a yawn.
Most of you will have seen this by now. I'd give it a solid B+. It wants to entertain you and mostly it does. Aaron Johnson gives a very enjoyable, winning performance as the nerdy lead, with a voice borrowed off Tobey Maguire. I much preferred him than as Lennon. But all the cast do very well here, Vaughan is great with actors.
I'm not sure Vaughan is so great with humour, the laffs here aim to be a bit like The Big Bang Theory sitcom, but you need a director with real comic flair to make them work. When the bad guys get offed sadistically I didn't find it so funny, not on principal, but just the comic touch sometimes wasn't completely there. I even felt sorry for them sometimes. Then again, if you have all-out comedy it can just seem a bit silly.
The shoot em up climax was a bit too staple, as critics pointed out at the time it wants to have its cake and eat it, send up superhero flicks and yet also be one.
Documentary about the Stones' concert at Altamont during which a fracas broke out near the stage, which was meant to be guarded by the Hells Angels, and a black guy pulled a gun and got stabbed by one or a few of them, captured on film.
It's kind of a culture clash; all that hippy free love free concert stuff mixed in with the undoubtedly dark music of the Stones and the Hells Angel presence ready to kick off. You also have a glimpse of black dudes in the crowd of middle class hippy chicks, as if to say, hey! they can dig our music too! When of course the Stones stole R&B from blacks and made a fortune from it. You have Tina Turner looking on heat and putting on the best performance by far, while the Stones open the documentary with tinny pub band versions of Jumping Jack Flash and Satisfaction. They didn't quite have that rock sound that The Who would adopt within a few years.
Angelina Jolie as a CIA operative, maybe. Film is action packed and Jolie is believable as a agent with exceptional skills, much like Jason Bourne. Films gets off to great start with a scene that could have been taken from DAD and takes you on a roller coaster ride full of chase scenes and gun battles. The film has some plot surprises and it did keep me guessing who was good and who was bad. I enjoyed it for what it was, a summer action thriller with some attention given to plot.
I have desired to this one for some time. Roman Polanski's The Ghost Writer is a great thriller in the vein of Alfred Hitchcock's The Man Who Knew Too Much or North by Northwest; This is a god send due the garbage being made today.
Ewan McGregor stars as a writer who replaces a recently deceased "ghost writer" who was working on the memoirs of a contriversal former British Prime Minister named Adam Lang, played in good spirit by Pierce Brosnan. Mc Gregor's character was brilliantly written because you feel his place in the world as an anonymous person, you actually never learn his name during the entire film. McGregor gets caught up in Lang's quest to not only preserve his legacy for prosperity but also fight political scandal; The film shows the power of words in the game of politics and in an ego-maniac's case, it never ends.
I also adore the settings of the film, everything is purposely cold and disdant and McGregor is essentially swimming in shark infested waters and never knows where the danger comes from.
The film builds to a gripping climax when Mcgregor investigates Lang's possible connections to the CIA and is hunted down by people who don't want him to find out; At one point a brilliantly staged low-speed chase occurs. Again, this is a welcome change from the standard thrillers of conspiracy without substance, characterization, and usually has everything occuring in public view as opposed to into the shadows.
Roman Polanski returns in top form here as a director and co-writer; Surely one of his masterworks.
W - Oliver Stone's surprisingly sympathetic (well, by his standards) biopic of George W. Bush.
Normally I hate any movie with even a hint of political overtones to it, but I happened to catch this one on one of my satellite system's movie channels and I was pulled in by the performances. The film tells the story of Bush's rise from college washout to the presidency and subsequent fall from public favor, all the while trying to rise up from under the shadow of his father who always seemed to favor his other son Jeb.
While the film clearly takes a dim view of his presidency, Stone surprisingly deflects a lot of the blame to Bush's underlings, specifically vice president Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. Stone paints a relatively sympathetic picture of Bush as a well meaning but misguided and stubborn person who comes to rely on the wrong people and is ultimately unable to take any criticism or learn from his mistakes.
Josh Brolin delivers a really strong as George W. Bush, channeling the former president's every physical mannerism while nailing his speech patterns; it would have been easy for him to fall into parody here but he walks a fine line and balances the mannerisms with lots of introspective and downright tender moments with Laura Bush (played competently but not particularly memorably by Elizabeth Banks). Richard Dreyfuss and Thandie Newton likewise disappear into their performances as Vice President Dick Cheney and Condoleezza Rice. Jeffrey Wright plays Colin Powell, often the lone voice of reason in Bush's first cabinet, who's warnings and counsel fall on deaf ears. Scott Glenn as Rumsfeld and James Cromwell and Ellen Burnstyn as the elder Bush and his wife round out the cast.
Many sections of the movie are of course dramatizations and speculations based secondary sources, but taken as entertainment (I repeat, entertainent) it did hold my interest.
Monsters vs. Aliens - A 3D CGI animated movie about ... well ... monsters versus aliens
On the day of her wedding Susan is hit by a glowing meteor; before you can say Attack of the 50 Foot Woman, Susan grows to enormous size and is promptly locked up in a top secret government facility. Incarcerated with her are a group of good natured 'monsters': The Missing Link (who looks like the first cousin of the creature from the black lagoon), Dr. Cockroach (a scientist who's experiments in harnessing the abilities of insect had gone horribly wrong), B.O.B. (a genetically engineered tomato who was zapped some chemicals and gained intelligence and indestructibility) and Incectosaurus (a giant caterpillar who can somehow communicate with Link). Things look bleak for our new friends but when the evil alien Galaxxar threatens to destroy the earth, the previously ostracized monsters may just be our only hope.
This movie was just a lot of fun; it's peppered with lots sly references to sci-fi classics and B-movie guilty pleasures of every era. The voicework is uniformly excellent and the dialog is crisp and funny (Galaxaar's explanation of why he is evil is hilarious). Along the way our heroes all learn valuable lessons about who they are and come to believe in themselves and see themselves as more than monsters.
This is also one of the first 3D features to be released to the home market and if you have the necessary equipment the 3D effect works really well and adds a new ... wait for it ... dimension to the film. The sense of depth is dramatically improved and objects like giant robots and spaceships have real mass and size to them.
Normally movies like this are more suited to the little ones, but the pop culture references and smart dialog help it to appeal to kids of all ages. Whether you catch it in 2D or 3D, it's definitely worth a look.
The Expendables a bitter disappointment, Schwarzenegger and Willis are tiny cameos,the story is rubbish, the editing awful and bizarrely, there isn't much action until the end. Not worth paying to see.
Army of Crime, French film about the French resistance. It grew on me, and there are some nice shots of Paris, always thrown into contrast with Nazi uniforms in the foreground I find, but it was a rather routine treatment and didn't for me quite rise above the usual cliches of the genre. (Young, hotheaded punk of an assassin, that sort of thing).
Found this to be very enjoyable, not just as a 'Carry On' film, but also as a very early Bond spoof. This is probably the first of the deluge of 60s spy spoofs. Interesting that Bond was already being parodied after the release of only 2 Bond films! The plot involves a villain called Dr. Crow and a villainous organisation called S.T.E.N.C.H ... no doubting where the inspiration came from! Perhaps one of the more surprising (and most enjoyable) elements of the film is that it is filmed in black and white and spoofs film noir in certain scenes - particularly The Third Man which is a personal favourite film. Another nice touch is that it stars Bernard Cribbins who has always been one of my favourite comic actors of that era. He also appeared in Casino Royale 67. However, unlike that film, Carry On Spying is a well paced, well made spoof which is full of laughs and plenty of injokes for Bond fans and typical Carry On inuendo and slapstick. Also, I love the FRWL-esque poster!
I have desired to this one for some time. Roman Polanski's The Ghost Writer is a great thriller in the vein of Alfred Hitchcock's The Man Who Knew Too Much or North by Northwest; This is a god send due the garbage being made today.
Ewan McGregor stars as a writer who replaces a recently deceased "ghost writer" who was working on the memoirs of a contriversal former British Prime Minister named Adam Lang, played in good spirit by Pierce Brosnan. Mc Gregor's character was brilliantly written because you feel his place in the world as an anonymous person, you actually never learn his name during the entire film. McGregor gets caught up in Lang's quest to not only preserve his legacy for prosperity but also fight political scandal; The film shows the power of words in the game of politics and in an ego-maniac's case, it never ends.
I also adore the settings of the film, everything is purposely cold and disdant and McGregor is essentially swimming in shark infested waters and never knows where the danger comes from.
The film builds to a gripping climax when Mcgregor investigates Lang's possible connections to the CIA and is hunted down by people who don't want him to find out; At one point a brilliantly staged low-speed chase occurs. Again, this is a welcome change from the standard thrillers of conspiracy without substance, characterization, and usually has everything occuring in public view as opposed to into the shadows.
Roman Polanski returns in top form here as a director and co-writer; Surely one of his masterworks.
The Expendables a bitter disappointment, Schwarzenegger and Willis are tiny cameos,the story is rubbish, the editing awful and bizarrely, there isn't much action until the end. Not worth paying to see.
sad to hear that. I'm still gonna go with my guys, if only, as my friend puts it, "for the history lesson" (all those actors in one place) and as our end of summer movie.
That's a shame - getting all those action stars together looked brilliant. Probably still check it out, but wait for it on Sky Box Office in a couple of months instead of going to the cinema.
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The Expendables a bitter disappointment, Schwarzenegger and Willis are tiny cameos,the story is rubbish, the editing awful and bizarrely, there isn't much action until the end. Not worth paying to see.
sad to hear that. I'm still gonna go with my guys, if only, as my friend puts it, "for the history lesson" (all those actors in one place) and as our end of summer movie.
I really, really wanted to like this. Hope you enjoy it more than I did
That's a shame - getting all those action stars together looked brilliant. Probably still check it out, but wait for it on Sky Box Office in a couple of months instead of going to the cinema.
1945 swashbuckler/pirate movie starring Paul Henreid (Casablanca) and the always lovely Maureen O'Hara :x. Henreid is the Captain of a Danish ship that crashes off the coast of Cartagena. The local Governor, played very well by Walter Slezak, shows no compassion and in fact imprisons Henreid. Henreid escapes and begins a Robin Hood like career of pirating ships. O'Hara plays Contessa Francesca , who is sailing to meet and marry Slezak in an arranged marriage. Her ship is pirated by Henreid, to save a sister ship from the pirates she agrees to marry Henreid. From there the movies has a series of double crosses as Henreid seeks his revenge against Slezak, O'Hara tries to avoid being forced to marry Slezak, and Slezak tries to force O'Hara to marry him and capture Henreid.
The movie is great fun, Slezak is perfectly cast as a despicable yet powerful man and O'Hara is her fiery yet beautiful self, a woman of spoiled means who also has some backbone. If the movie has a weak character it would be Henreid who seems a little soft for a pirate. For fans of ships and sea battles, they are limited here and only one scene contains any real excitement. Still the film was great fun and I enjoyed it.
I have seen four O'Hara/pirate films, The Black Swan, Against All Flags, Sinbad the Sailor and The Spanish Main. They are all good, but I believe Against All Flags is the best.
1945 swashbuckler/pirate movie starring Paul Henreid (Casablanca) and the always lovely Maureen O'Hara :x. Henreid is the Captain of a Danish ship that crashes off the coast of Cartagena. The local Governor, played very well by Walter Slezak, shows no compassion and in fact imprisons Henreid. Henreid escapes and begins a Robin Hood like career of pirating ships. O'Hara plays Contessa Francesca , who is sailing to meet and marry Slezak in an arranged marriage. Her ship is pirated by Henreid, to save a sister ship from the pirates she agrees to marry Henreid. From there the movies has a series of double crosses as Henreid seeks his revenge against Slezak, O'Hara tries to avoid being forced to marry Slezak, and Slezak tries to force O'Hara to marry him and capture Henreid.
The movie is great fun, Slezak is perfectly cast as a despicable yet powerful man and O'Hara is her fiery yet beautiful self, a woman of spoiled means who also has some backbone. If the movie has a weak character it would be Henreid who seems a little soft for a pirate. For fans of ships and sea battles, they are limited here and only one scene contains any real excitement. Still the film was great fun and I enjoyed it.
I have seen four O'Hara/pirate films, The Black Swan, Against All Flags, Sinbad the Sailor and The Spanish Main. They are all good, but I believe Against All Flags is the best.
Nice capsule review, Barry. I've been wanting TSM for a while. Long Caribbean moons ago I caught the last act when it played on TCM or AMC. (can't remember which now).
Did you buy or rent this? I'd be thrilled to find a copy.
Thanks Alex, I actually recorded the movie when it appeared on TCM last Tuesday. In honor of Maureen O'Hara's 90th birthday, they had a Maureen O'Hara marathon. The Spanish Main was one of the films I had not seen so I recorded it. The Spanish Main was RKO Studios first color film, filmed in Technicolor it looks great.
Arrrr! That sucks! I used to keep track of their listings in case something returned. Well, I wasn't ready this time!
Last thing I watched was Dawn Of The Dead saturday night. I enjoy the atmosphere and music in this one, especially during the over head helicopter view. A movie from 1979 where everything fell into place perfectly. It had been some time and I like to keep it fresh. Avoid overexposure.
Oh, and I also got a kick from this fun extra that was on my 50th anniversary House On Haunted Hill dvd. Over an hour of Vincent Price sketches from the Jack Benny and Red Skelton shows. Golden Age Price! And Benny was a frickin' riot!
Vault of Horror, a camp 1973 portmanteau horror from cult film studio Amicus. The film begins with shots of the Houses Of Parliament. As the titles draw to a close we move in on a high-rise tower block by the Thames and meet the cast one by one as they enter a lift. You can't help smiling when you see they include Carl Stromberg from The Spy Who Loved Me and Tom Baker with one of the funniest beards in cinematic history. These characters are slightly perplexed when the lift takes them all the way down to the sub-basement and shuts the door on them. As sub-basements go though this one seems quite roomy and lavish with marble floors and a table and chairs. Tom Baker suggests they might as well make the most of it so they all sit down and pour themselves a glass of something. They've all had very vivid dreams recently that seemed very real.
There are five spooky tales in the film. Midnight Mass stars Daniel Massey and his real life sister Anna. There is also a brief appearance by Mike Pratt of Randall and Hopkirk fame as a private investigator and Pratt deserved an award of some sort just for his seventies outfit. Daniel Massey is a thoroughly unpleasant piece of work in this story. He tracks down his sister, for reasons I can't reveal for fear of spoilers, to a strange town where there is talk of murders and warnings not to venture out after dark. Massey has some supper in a very odd restaurant as the secrets of the town are slowly revealed. The Neat Job stars Terry Thomas as a rather mature bachelor called Gritchit with a fondness for huge cravats and classical music. He lives in the most seventies house ever put on film with extensive use of the colours brown and yellow. In fact, even his pots and pans are yellow. Gritchit's bachelor days are ended when he ties the knot with the somwhat clumsy Eleanor (Glynis Johns) and she moves into his groovy abode. Tension soon arises because Gritchit is an obsessively tidy and neat person to the point of being slightly mad, as Eleanor discovers.
This Trick'll Kill You is a bit obvious and predictable but it's mildly interesting not least for the presence of one of my favourite Bond baddies, Curt Jurgens. Jurgens is Sebastian, a magician mooching around India (though it's obviously a series of sets) looking for new tricks to perform in his act. He watches an extraordinary performance of the Indian rope-trick and asks the girl who performed it to demonstrate the trick to him and his wife in his hotel room. Bargain in Death is a strange segment that never quite seems to decide what it wants to be. Michael Craig plays Maitland, a horror writer who cooks up a fake your own death/get rich with the insurance scheme to make money because (nice in-joke) there is "no money in horror." Bargain in Death has one or two twists and turns, a bit of gore, and guest stars Robin Nedwell and Geoffrey Davies from the Doctor sitcoms (sadly, no Richard O'Sullivan) and Arthur Mullard as a gravedigger.
Vault Of Horror ends on a high with Drawn and Quartered starring the bonkers Tom Baker as a bearded artist with big hair living in a bamboo hut in Haiti. Baker visits a local exponent of voodoo and is granted some of its power. Whatever he draws will now happen. If he draws a scar on his cheek then something will happen to give him a scar on his cheek. If he draws a picture of someone and destroys the picture that person will be killed in real life etc. This new talent comes in handy when he discovers a bunch of poncy art people in London have been ripping him off. Drawn and Quartered is a fun segment with hokey Haitian locations, a wonderfully smug and nasty Denholm Elliot, and Tom Baker with his giant beard and seventies outfits. With an effective score by Douglas Gamley, Vault of Horror is tremendous fun and a must for anyone with a sweet tooth for British horror films - especially camp seventies compendium ones with lots of famous faces.
1960 black and white thriller adapted from a novel by Grahan Greene. Film stars Alec Guinness as a British citizen selling Hoover vacumn cleaners in Havana. He has a beautiful daughter, played by Jo Morrow, who enjoys all the finer things in life, like horses, country club memberships, clothes and perfume. One day he is approached by a British agent, played by Noel Coward, looking to recruit an agent in Havana. At first he finds the idea silly, but a friend advises him to take the well paying job and make everything up so that no one gets hurt. Unfortunately he uses the names of real friends and acquintances. When one of his cables gets intercepted by a spy from the other side, his fake agents start winding up dead and now Guinness is in the spy game whether he wants to be or not.
This is Alex Guinesses's film, he is in just about every scene, the other cast members, Burl Ives, Maureen O'Hara, Ernie Kovacs and Noel Coward are all supporting players. Guinnesses does well as someone in a game over his head, but at times he seems a little too relaxed as his everyday life starts to crumble around him. The film has some drama and some dark comedy which made me laugh a couple times. Overall I like the film, but when it was over I felt like it could have been better. I think a little more suspense and danger may have helped.
a teenager who has always dreamed of being a super hero buys a suit and starts trying to stop crimes in NYC under the guise KICK ASS. soon, he gets mixed up in some big trouble, and meets a pair of cold blooded killers, BIG DADDY and HIT GIRL, who are trying to bust up a local branch of the Mob. Another wanna-be hero, RED MIST joins them, and then more trouble kicks up.
BOY were my room-mate and I wrong about this movie. I mean, we knew it was violent but GEEZE! I haven't hidden my eyes during a movie that much in YEARS!
the film was visually stunning, but I don't think my stomach could ever handle it again.
a teenager who has always dreamed of being a super hero buys a suit and starts trying to stop crimes in NYC under the guise KICK ASS. soon, he gets mixed up in some big trouble, and meets a pair of cold blooded killers, BIG DADDY and HIT GIRL, who are trying to bust up a local branch of the Mob. Another wanna-be hero, RED MIST joins them, and then more trouble kicks up.
BOY were my room-mate and I wrong about this movie. I mean, we knew it was violent but GEEZE! I haven't hidden my eyes during a movie that much in YEARS!
the film was visually stunning, but I don't think my stomach could ever handle it again.
Is it more graphic than Kill Bill or Watchmen ?
Anyway last movie I watched was:
A Face In The Crowd (1957)
I assure you if you watch this film, you'll never look at Andy Griffith the same way again. Griiffith stars as the boorish, seemingly innocent, sociopath named Larry "Lonesome" Rhodes who quickly becomes the most popular man in America. Marcia Jefferies (Patricia Neal), who hosts a radio show called "Face in The Crowd", discovers Rhodes in a prison in Alabama and convinces him to appear regularly after recording and broadcasting his humorous antecdotes and songs. His popularity sky-rockets in the state in a short amount of time and one day, after pulling a public prank on the local sheriff with the help of his listeners, Marcia asks him how it feels to sway people to do his bidding and breifly, but calmly, realizes that he can. As the film progresses, The "Good ole boy" starts to reveal his true colors; Particularly when he becomes very close to his primary tv show sponsor who wants to see a senator in the oval office. The sponsor and senator appoint him to become an un-official "image consultant" and his ego grows to an all time by starting a new show which is the equivalent of today's political pundit shows but just not ashamed of being light-hearted entertainment. Mad with power he one night confesses to Marcia how truely feels about his audience, they are stupid sheep who he will manipulate to vote for the senator into the whitehouse and as a result he would be given a position of "Secretary for National Morale"; The very backbone of the president's power. I won't spoil the ending because it's just good. Andy Griffith was terrific as this maniac who may be a country bumpkin but he knew the power of entertainment and the power of words and naturally gets drunk off this power; Twisting and turning not only his "sheep" but his closer friends. He's a user in the strongest sense of the word and truly a sheep in wolves clothing. This a great illustration of how powerful the media can be if someone could be that manipulative.
a teenager who has always dreamed of being a super hero buys a suit and starts trying to stop crimes in NYC under the guise KICK ASS. soon, he gets mixed up in some big trouble, and meets a pair of cold blooded killers, BIG DADDY and HIT GIRL, who are trying to bust up a local branch of the Mob. Another wanna-be hero, RED MIST joins them, and then more trouble kicks up.
BOY were my room-mate and I wrong about this movie. I mean, we knew it was violent but GEEZE! I haven't hidden my eyes during a movie that much in YEARS!
the film was visually stunning, but I don't think my stomach could ever handle it again.
Is it more graphic than Kill Bill or Watchmen ?
in my opinion, yes. Kill Bill I can handle. Watchmen, eh...just comic violence to me (but still good)
a teenager who has always dreamed of being a super hero buys a suit and starts trying to stop crimes in NYC under the guise KICK ASS. soon, he gets mixed up in some big trouble, and meets a pair of cold blooded killers, BIG DADDY and HIT GIRL, who are trying to bust up a local branch of the Mob. Another wanna-be hero, RED MIST joins them, and then more trouble kicks up.
BOY were my room-mate and I wrong about this movie. I mean, we knew it was violent but GEEZE! I haven't hidden my eyes during a movie that much in YEARS!
the film was visually stunning, but I don't think my stomach could ever handle it again.
Is it more graphic than Kill Bill or Watchmen ?
in my opinion, yes. Kill Bill I can handle. Watchmen, eh...just comic violence to me (but still good)
this was just...gross.
Ah I see. Well, I can't stand any of those films personally. Just curious.
Comments
I had seen most of The Wild Bunch before, but had never watched the whole film. It was one of the finest film experiences I have had recently. Peckinpah's action scenes are phenomenal, especially the opening scene. The cast are great too - I really enjoyed Holden, Borgnine and Ryan. I also particularly enjoyed the scene where they robbed the train. The film is quite a complex beast, which I think will only improve on subsequent viewings.
The Searchers is another great film. The only John Wayne/John Ford collaboration I had seen previously was Stagecoach. I thought John Wayne's character was brilliant - morally ambiguous, but magnetic. At times utterly despicable, at others quite heroic. And one cannot discuss the film without mentioning the scenery - I wish I could see the original VistaVision version of the film, it must look absolutely spectacular. The Monument Valley cinematography was eye-popping. From the very first shot I was blown away by the look of the film - one of the most beautiful I have ever seen.
One very interesting comparison between the two was the depiction of violence. The Wild Bunch is famous for its graphic violence - quite shocking in its day. The Searchers on the other hand keeps the violence offscreen, yet Ford's directorial genius shows in that the violence of the West is no less shocking despite the fact that we never see it. The power of suggestion is very strong indeed.
I rate both films 9 out 10, and put both in my top 5 westerns.
I mean, the Scarecrow off TDK actor (name escapes me) as the slimy limey young executive (who we strangely warm to), he would have been far better as the Greene QoS villain imo, because he just looks horrible, it's a visceral reaction. No lengthy dialogue or set-up to show us why he is. Ellen Page :x Movies need more Jewish chicks... ;%
Not sure I totally buy DiCaprio as a lead, he's okay but still a little bland. Better than Tom Cruise however, but Cruise did have more star power. The gang in Inception aren't that agreeable/ultimately virtuous and in that sense it would have worked better as a Continental film, without the need for that Anglo-American strong moral compass but more a fatalistic pessimism derived from being on the wrong end of two world wars.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
Cillian Murphy. Anyway. . .
Last night I watched The Road, based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy. If anyone believes the best way to make a movie adaptation is to slavishly follow the novel, this film will show that person wrong. Basically, everything that happens here occurs in the book, but the results are lifeless and ponderous. Apparently, the world will end not with a bang but a yawn.
Most of you will have seen this by now. I'd give it a solid B+. It wants to entertain you and mostly it does. Aaron Johnson gives a very enjoyable, winning performance as the nerdy lead, with a voice borrowed off Tobey Maguire. I much preferred him than as Lennon. But all the cast do very well here, Vaughan is great with actors.
I'm not sure Vaughan is so great with humour, the laffs here aim to be a bit like The Big Bang Theory sitcom, but you need a director with real comic flair to make them work. When the bad guys get offed sadistically I didn't find it so funny, not on principal, but just the comic touch sometimes wasn't completely there. I even felt sorry for them sometimes. Then again, if you have all-out comedy it can just seem a bit silly.
The shoot em up climax was a bit too staple, as critics pointed out at the time it wants to have its cake and eat it, send up superhero flicks and yet also be one.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
Documentary about the Stones' concert at Altamont during which a fracas broke out near the stage, which was meant to be guarded by the Hells Angels, and a black guy pulled a gun and got stabbed by one or a few of them, captured on film.
It's kind of a culture clash; all that hippy free love free concert stuff mixed in with the undoubtedly dark music of the Stones and the Hells Angel presence ready to kick off. You also have a glimpse of black dudes in the crowd of middle class hippy chicks, as if to say, hey! they can dig our music too! When of course the Stones stole R&B from blacks and made a fortune from it. You have Tina Turner looking on heat and putting on the best performance by far, while the Stones open the documentary with tinny pub band versions of Jumping Jack Flash and Satisfaction. They didn't quite have that rock sound that The Who would adopt within a few years.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
Angelina Jolie as a CIA operative, maybe. Film is action packed and Jolie is believable as a agent with exceptional skills, much like Jason Bourne. Films gets off to great start with a scene that could have been taken from DAD and takes you on a roller coaster ride full of chase scenes and gun battles. The film has some plot surprises and it did keep me guessing who was good and who was bad. I enjoyed it for what it was, a summer action thriller with some attention given to plot.
Recommend
I have desired to this one for some time. Roman Polanski's The Ghost Writer is a great thriller in the vein of Alfred Hitchcock's The Man Who Knew Too Much or North by Northwest; This is a god send due the garbage being made today.
Ewan McGregor stars as a writer who replaces a recently deceased "ghost writer" who was working on the memoirs of a contriversal former British Prime Minister named Adam Lang, played in good spirit by Pierce Brosnan. Mc Gregor's character was brilliantly written because you feel his place in the world as an anonymous person, you actually never learn his name during the entire film. McGregor gets caught up in Lang's quest to not only preserve his legacy for prosperity but also fight political scandal; The film shows the power of words in the game of politics and in an ego-maniac's case, it never ends.
I also adore the settings of the film, everything is purposely cold and disdant and McGregor is essentially swimming in shark infested waters and never knows where the danger comes from.
The film builds to a gripping climax when Mcgregor investigates Lang's possible connections to the CIA and is hunted down by people who don't want him to find out; At one point a brilliantly staged low-speed chase occurs. Again, this is a welcome change from the standard thrillers of conspiracy without substance, characterization, and usually has everything occuring in public view as opposed to into the shadows.
Roman Polanski returns in top form here as a director and co-writer; Surely one of his masterworks.
Normally I hate any movie with even a hint of political overtones to it, but I happened to catch this one on one of my satellite system's movie channels and I was pulled in by the performances. The film tells the story of Bush's rise from college washout to the presidency and subsequent fall from public favor, all the while trying to rise up from under the shadow of his father who always seemed to favor his other son Jeb.
While the film clearly takes a dim view of his presidency, Stone surprisingly deflects a lot of the blame to Bush's underlings, specifically vice president Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. Stone paints a relatively sympathetic picture of Bush as a well meaning but misguided and stubborn person who comes to rely on the wrong people and is ultimately unable to take any criticism or learn from his mistakes.
Josh Brolin delivers a really strong as George W. Bush, channeling the former president's every physical mannerism while nailing his speech patterns; it would have been easy for him to fall into parody here but he walks a fine line and balances the mannerisms with lots of introspective and downright tender moments with Laura Bush (played competently but not particularly memorably by Elizabeth Banks). Richard Dreyfuss and Thandie Newton likewise disappear into their performances as Vice President Dick Cheney and Condoleezza Rice. Jeffrey Wright plays Colin Powell, often the lone voice of reason in Bush's first cabinet, who's warnings and counsel fall on deaf ears. Scott Glenn as Rumsfeld and James Cromwell and Ellen Burnstyn as the elder Bush and his wife round out the cast.
Many sections of the movie are of course dramatizations and speculations based secondary sources, but taken as entertainment (I repeat, entertainent) it did hold my interest.
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Monsters vs. Aliens - A 3D CGI animated movie about ... well ... monsters versus aliens
On the day of her wedding Susan is hit by a glowing meteor; before you can say Attack of the 50 Foot Woman, Susan grows to enormous size and is promptly locked up in a top secret government facility. Incarcerated with her are a group of good natured 'monsters': The Missing Link (who looks like the first cousin of the creature from the black lagoon), Dr. Cockroach (a scientist who's experiments in harnessing the abilities of insect had gone horribly wrong), B.O.B. (a genetically engineered tomato who was zapped some chemicals and gained intelligence and indestructibility) and Incectosaurus (a giant caterpillar who can somehow communicate with Link). Things look bleak for our new friends but when the evil alien Galaxxar threatens to destroy the earth, the previously ostracized monsters may just be our only hope.
This movie was just a lot of fun; it's peppered with lots sly references to sci-fi classics and B-movie guilty pleasures of every era. The voicework is uniformly excellent and the dialog is crisp and funny (Galaxaar's explanation of why he is evil is hilarious). Along the way our heroes all learn valuable lessons about who they are and come to believe in themselves and see themselves as more than monsters.
This is also one of the first 3D features to be released to the home market and if you have the necessary equipment the 3D effect works really well and adds a new ... wait for it ... dimension to the film. The sense of depth is dramatically improved and objects like giant robots and spaceships have real mass and size to them.
Normally movies like this are more suited to the little ones, but the pop culture references and smart dialog help it to appeal to kids of all ages. Whether you catch it in 2D or 3D, it's definitely worth a look.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
Found this to be very enjoyable, not just as a 'Carry On' film, but also as a very early Bond spoof. This is probably the first of the deluge of 60s spy spoofs. Interesting that Bond was already being parodied after the release of only 2 Bond films! The plot involves a villain called Dr. Crow and a villainous organisation called S.T.E.N.C.H ... no doubting where the inspiration came from! Perhaps one of the more surprising (and most enjoyable) elements of the film is that it is filmed in black and white and spoofs film noir in certain scenes - particularly The Third Man which is a personal favourite film. Another nice touch is that it stars Bernard Cribbins who has always been one of my favourite comic actors of that era. He also appeared in Casino Royale 67. However, unlike that film, Carry On Spying is a well paced, well made spoof which is full of laughs and plenty of injokes for Bond fans and typical Carry On inuendo and slapstick. Also, I love the FRWL-esque poster!
I absolutely agree
sad to hear that. I'm still gonna go with my guys, if only, as my friend puts it, "for the history lesson" (all those actors in one place) and as our end of summer movie.
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http://apbateman.com
I really, really wanted to like this. Hope you enjoy it more than I did
good plan.
1945 swashbuckler/pirate movie starring Paul Henreid (Casablanca) and the always lovely Maureen O'Hara :x. Henreid is the Captain of a Danish ship that crashes off the coast of Cartagena. The local Governor, played very well by Walter Slezak, shows no compassion and in fact imprisons Henreid. Henreid escapes and begins a Robin Hood like career of pirating ships. O'Hara plays Contessa Francesca , who is sailing to meet and marry Slezak in an arranged marriage. Her ship is pirated by Henreid, to save a sister ship from the pirates she agrees to marry Henreid. From there the movies has a series of double crosses as Henreid seeks his revenge against Slezak, O'Hara tries to avoid being forced to marry Slezak, and Slezak tries to force O'Hara to marry him and capture Henreid.
The movie is great fun, Slezak is perfectly cast as a despicable yet powerful man and O'Hara is her fiery yet beautiful self, a woman of spoiled means who also has some backbone. If the movie has a weak character it would be Henreid who seems a little soft for a pirate. For fans of ships and sea battles, they are limited here and only one scene contains any real excitement. Still the film was great fun and I enjoyed it.
I have seen four O'Hara/pirate films, The Black Swan, Against All Flags, Sinbad the Sailor and The Spanish Main. They are all good, but I believe Against All Flags is the best.
Did you buy or rent this? I'd be thrilled to find a copy.
Last thing I watched was Dawn Of The Dead saturday night. I enjoy the atmosphere and music in this one, especially during the over head helicopter view. A movie from 1979 where everything fell into place perfectly. It had been some time and I like to keep it fresh. Avoid overexposure.
Oh, and I also got a kick from this fun extra that was on my 50th anniversary House On Haunted Hill dvd. Over an hour of Vincent Price sketches from the Jack Benny and Red Skelton shows. Golden Age Price! And Benny was a frickin' riot!
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Superbly written superbly cast movie about two disconsolate hitmen holed up in Bruges awaiting instructions from their boss.
That said, on telly I prefer films to change scene occasionally, this one was understandably visually repetitive.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
There are five spooky tales in the film. Midnight Mass stars Daniel Massey and his real life sister Anna. There is also a brief appearance by Mike Pratt of Randall and Hopkirk fame as a private investigator and Pratt deserved an award of some sort just for his seventies outfit. Daniel Massey is a thoroughly unpleasant piece of work in this story. He tracks down his sister, for reasons I can't reveal for fear of spoilers, to a strange town where there is talk of murders and warnings not to venture out after dark. Massey has some supper in a very odd restaurant as the secrets of the town are slowly revealed. The Neat Job stars Terry Thomas as a rather mature bachelor called Gritchit with a fondness for huge cravats and classical music. He lives in the most seventies house ever put on film with extensive use of the colours brown and yellow. In fact, even his pots and pans are yellow. Gritchit's bachelor days are ended when he ties the knot with the somwhat clumsy Eleanor (Glynis Johns) and she moves into his groovy abode. Tension soon arises because Gritchit is an obsessively tidy and neat person to the point of being slightly mad, as Eleanor discovers.
This Trick'll Kill You is a bit obvious and predictable but it's mildly interesting not least for the presence of one of my favourite Bond baddies, Curt Jurgens. Jurgens is Sebastian, a magician mooching around India (though it's obviously a series of sets) looking for new tricks to perform in his act. He watches an extraordinary performance of the Indian rope-trick and asks the girl who performed it to demonstrate the trick to him and his wife in his hotel room. Bargain in Death is a strange segment that never quite seems to decide what it wants to be. Michael Craig plays Maitland, a horror writer who cooks up a fake your own death/get rich with the insurance scheme to make money because (nice in-joke) there is "no money in horror." Bargain in Death has one or two twists and turns, a bit of gore, and guest stars Robin Nedwell and Geoffrey Davies from the Doctor sitcoms (sadly, no Richard O'Sullivan) and Arthur Mullard as a gravedigger.
Vault Of Horror ends on a high with Drawn and Quartered starring the bonkers Tom Baker as a bearded artist with big hair living in a bamboo hut in Haiti. Baker visits a local exponent of voodoo and is granted some of its power. Whatever he draws will now happen. If he draws a scar on his cheek then something will happen to give him a scar on his cheek. If he draws a picture of someone and destroys the picture that person will be killed in real life etc. This new talent comes in handy when he discovers a bunch of poncy art people in London have been ripping him off. Drawn and Quartered is a fun segment with hokey Haitian locations, a wonderfully smug and nasty Denholm Elliot, and Tom Baker with his giant beard and seventies outfits. With an effective score by Douglas Gamley, Vault of Horror is tremendous fun and a must for anyone with a sweet tooth for British horror films - especially camp seventies compendium ones with lots of famous faces.
1960 black and white thriller adapted from a novel by Grahan Greene. Film stars Alec Guinness as a British citizen selling Hoover vacumn cleaners in Havana. He has a beautiful daughter, played by Jo Morrow, who enjoys all the finer things in life, like horses, country club memberships, clothes and perfume. One day he is approached by a British agent, played by Noel Coward, looking to recruit an agent in Havana. At first he finds the idea silly, but a friend advises him to take the well paying job and make everything up so that no one gets hurt. Unfortunately he uses the names of real friends and acquintances. When one of his cables gets intercepted by a spy from the other side, his fake agents start winding up dead and now Guinness is in the spy game whether he wants to be or not.
This is Alex Guinesses's film, he is in just about every scene, the other cast members, Burl Ives, Maureen O'Hara, Ernie Kovacs and Noel Coward are all supporting players. Guinnesses does well as someone in a game over his head, but at times he seems a little too relaxed as his everyday life starts to crumble around him. The film has some drama and some dark comedy which made me laugh a couple times. Overall I like the film, but when it was over I felt like it could have been better. I think a little more suspense and danger may have helped.
a teenager who has always dreamed of being a super hero buys a suit and starts trying to stop crimes in NYC under the guise KICK ASS. soon, he gets mixed up in some big trouble, and meets a pair of cold blooded killers, BIG DADDY and HIT GIRL, who are trying to bust up a local branch of the Mob. Another wanna-be hero, RED MIST joins them, and then more trouble kicks up.
BOY were my room-mate and I wrong about this movie. I mean, we knew it was violent but GEEZE! I haven't hidden my eyes during a movie that much in YEARS!
the film was visually stunning, but I don't think my stomach could ever handle it again.
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Is it more graphic than Kill Bill or Watchmen ?
Anyway last movie I watched was:
A Face In The Crowd (1957)
I assure you if you watch this film, you'll never look at Andy Griffith the same way again. Griiffith stars as the boorish, seemingly innocent, sociopath named Larry "Lonesome" Rhodes who quickly becomes the most popular man in America. Marcia Jefferies (Patricia Neal), who hosts a radio show called "Face in The Crowd", discovers Rhodes in a prison in Alabama and convinces him to appear regularly after recording and broadcasting his humorous antecdotes and songs. His popularity sky-rockets in the state in a short amount of time and one day, after pulling a public prank on the local sheriff with the help of his listeners, Marcia asks him how it feels to sway people to do his bidding and breifly, but calmly, realizes that he can. As the film progresses, The "Good ole boy" starts to reveal his true colors; Particularly when he becomes very close to his primary tv show sponsor who wants to see a senator in the oval office. The sponsor and senator appoint him to become an un-official "image consultant" and his ego grows to an all time by starting a new show which is the equivalent of today's political pundit shows but just not ashamed of being light-hearted entertainment. Mad with power he one night confesses to Marcia how truely feels about his audience, they are stupid sheep who he will manipulate to vote for the senator into the whitehouse and as a result he would be given a position of "Secretary for National Morale"; The very backbone of the president's power. I won't spoil the ending because it's just good. Andy Griffith was terrific as this maniac who may be a country bumpkin but he knew the power of entertainment and the power of words and naturally gets drunk off this power; Twisting and turning not only his "sheep" but his closer friends. He's a user in the strongest sense of the word and truly a sheep in wolves clothing. This a great illustration of how powerful the media can be if someone could be that manipulative.
in my opinion, yes. Kill Bill I can handle. Watchmen, eh...just comic violence to me (but still good)
this was just...gross.
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Ah I see. Well, I can't stand any of those films personally. Just curious.