Latest Movie That You Watched!

fljoe0 said:

I watched a couple of early Gus Van Sant flicks last weekend. These movies gave a boost to independent film in the 90s and beyond. The 90's were a great era for independent film and these movies with their big stars helped kick off the era.

Drugstore Cowboy (1989) Matt Dillon, Kelly Lynch

A gritty realistic look at a group of junkies that rob drugstores. Matt Dillon and Kelly lynch are fantastic in this.



My Own Private Idaho (1991) River Phoenix, Keanu Reeves

This is River's movie. He is incredible in this tale that combines Henry IV with the lives of Portland street people and hustlers. The story follows two friends on different paths. River's character is searching for his mother who abandoned him as Keanu's character is trying to distancing himself from his family. When I first saw this in 1991, I didn't totally get it but River's performance is so awesome that it always drew me back to this movie. I've seen it several times now and think it's great. The movie is a bit of a challenge the first time you see it because of the Shakespere mixed with a modern tale.

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Idaho is indeed a great film, even if it does has some Shakespearian lines thrown in the mix. The acting is stellar- River is impeccable. The sad and sobering fact about this movie is that while filming it on location in Portland, River became addicted to the drugs that were being offered from the real street kids that van Sant used in the movie.

I've been rewatching the Harry Potter movies with LilMan. We're onto the last one tonight--so well done!

kingricefan said:

Idaho is indeed a great film, even if it does has some Shakespearian lines thrown in the mix. The acting is stellar- River is impeccable. The sad and sobering fact about this movie is that while filming it on location in Portland, River became addicted to the drugs that were being offered from the real street kids that van Sant used in the movie.

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I was watching some of the bonus stuff and Gus Van Sant said that River Phoenix basically wrote the campfire scene. Gus said River told him that he wanted to shoot the campfire scene last. Then one day during the middle of filming, River came up to Gus and told him he rewrote the campfire scene. Gus had written the screenplay and was cool with River rewriting the scene and so they went with River's rewrite and it became the most iconic scene of the movie (and maybe of River's career).

There's a lot of interesting behind the scenes stories in the bonus material (I saw The Criterion Collection version).

fljoe0 said:

I watched a couple of early Gus Van Sant flicks last weekend. These movies gave a boost to independent film in the 90s and beyond. The 90's were a great era for independent film and these movies with their big stars helped kick off the era.

Drugstore Cowboy (1989) Matt Dillon, Kelly Lynch

A gritty realistic look at a group of junkies that rob drugstores. Matt Dillon and Kelly lynch are fantastic in this.



My Own Private Idaho (1991) River Phoenix, Keanu Reeves

This is River's movie. He is incredible in this tale that combines Henry IV with the lives of Portland street people and hustlers. The story follows two friends on different paths. River's character is searching for his mother who abandoned him as Keanu's character is trying to distancing himself from his family. When I first saw this in 1991, I didn't totally get it but River's performance is so awesome that it always drew me back to this movie. I've seen it several times now and think it's great. The movie is a bit of a challenge the first time you see it because of the Shakespere mixed with a modern tale.

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Both of these movies are very good. My Own Private Idaho is probably my favorite River Phoenix movie, he and Keanu Reeves are both amazing in that movie.

I just thought of some weird trivia. Keanu Reeves is in two movies that get their titles from song titles but neither song is in the movie named for the song.

My Own Private Idaho (B-52s)

Feeling Minnesota (Soundgarden)

Coolallosaurus said:

Wow, Wax Mask looks like a trip! At one point in my life I was really into the Italian Western, but my only experience with Italian horror is Suspiria (which I found pretty fun), so I will have to check out Wax Mask at some point. Thank you for the recommendation!

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Don't expect too much. Like I said, these films are often cheaply made and technically behind those in the UK or US. Also screenplays are usually not great: what you often see is a number of (gory) setpieces and a thin storyline to connect these. But it has a nice old fashioned feel to it.

Actually the remake from 2005 of the Vincent Price movie is an in-name-only remake. Apart from the subject it has nothing in common. The film has no Gothic feel, but starts of more in the vein of a backwoods horrorfilm like Wrong Turn. But it has some nice changes to the theme: this time the wax figures are not famous people or famous murderers, but rather regular people. The central premise in regards to the title is rather silly, but overall it's great fun.
Actually I think it was the last of these wax-horrors, there haven't been any since.

I like the westerns too, but in regards to Italian horror, I'm attracted to them mostly for their look (they're always beautifully shot on luscious locations, and have great art direction) and their sound - they have great soundtracks by Morricone, Cipriani, Rustichelli, Donaggio, and Simonetti/Goblin.
They're on a thin line between art and sleaze. They look artful, but the content is often sleazy: they have immoral characters, lots of sex and nudity, the killer is nearly always referred to as a sex maniac
I love the Gothic and giallo (thriller) pictures from the sixties and seventies mostly. Castle of Blood from 1964 is one of the greatest black/white Gothic films, it has an hypnotic quality.
In comparison with American and British horror they have a more dreamlike quality (although the Hammer films from the fifties and sixties come sometimes close to a similar feel) which is typically Italian - you also find it in Italian comics like Dylan Dog. The mood and atmosphere comes completely before any logic. They can however be slow to modern tastes, but you can get used to that. I think musicvideos have influenced film a lot in the eighties, before the eighties movies and tv were generally slower. Although the unfocussed screenplays of Italian films can make them too directionless for some - they can go wildly from one thing to another, introduce new characters halfway the film, or go into quite unrelated events. So, it's not for everybody.
And there is the dubbing that puts many people off: as a rule they all got dubbed either in English or Italian. They don't use onset sound. Many blu-rays now have the option to listen to English as well as Italian. I always choose the latter, because I find the dubbing less obvious in Italian.

Actually it was the Vincent Price House of Wax that inspired the Italian Gothic Golden Age that started with I Vampiri (1957). Horrorfilms weren't allowed under Mussolini, but in the fifties imported horrorfilms did very well in Italy. Riccardo Freda made I Vampiri as a bet with his producers that he could make a horrorfilm in only twelve days; when after ten days it was clear he couldn't do it, Mario Bava stepped in and had only two days to finish it. Bava scrapped a lot of scenes and replaced them with easy, quick to film dialogue scenes. In fact Bava completed uncredited several films for other directors (foreign directors too) on which he was only hired for cinematography and special effects.
The Italian horrorfilms did better abroad, and it was thought Italian audiences didn't believe homegrown directors could deliver something as dark as a horrorfilm. So the directors took English aliases to fool the audience.
I Vampire didn't do well, but as a reward for saving so many films Bava was allowed to choose his own project. It became Black Sunday (La Maschera del Demonio) which is still regarded the highlight of the genre and started Barbara Steele's career as the Queen of Italian Gothic.

Something else about wax museums that hasn't been mentioned is that originally before there was photography a lot of people didn't know what the rich and famous looked like. Now we go to them because it's fun to take photos next to them and see celebrities up close as real as is possible. Back then the general public hadn't seen celebrities AT ALL yet.
I also always notice that no other wax museums seem to be able to deliver on the level of Tussaud's. A lot of them have rather poor looking figures, that sometimes seem more like charicatures.

Saw Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom today. Forget the critics, this was a fun film. The story does get a little weak in the second half, ironically enough because of the biggest plot advancement in the series so far: the dinos are finally off Isla Nublar. However, it also introduces major elements that sets up what promises to be a very interesting third JW film. These story elements, by the way, hearken back to ideas mentioned in Michael Crichton's first novel, as well as the first JP and most recent JW films. If you've been following the series, you can probably guess what I'm talking about. I was also happy to see director JA Bayona indulge his horror side, as there were several tense scenes involving the creatures. Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard are still a fun couple onscreen and could definitely carry this franchise for another film or two before the inevitable audience fatigue sets in. Overall, I'd rate this 7/10 (I gave the previous JW a solid 10 on IMDB). While it's not as enjoyable as its predecessor and definitely feels like the middle child in a trilogy, it's still a good time at the cinema, especially if you go with friends or family.

Now here's my one serious peeve with this movie. I state this hoping by some slim chance that an executive from the film studio is reading this. This is already out in the public domain if you search online, as the director himself has commented on it. However, I'll still put it in spoiler tags.

It comes at Night. Watched about an Hour, the rest in FFWD, almost dozed off

Did the annual July 4th watch of Jaws and Jaws II

May finally get around to watching Blade Runner 2049 since this is my one free weekend before my next class starts on Monday. The Netflix disc has only been sitting on my dining table sine January..........

Watched I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House (2016) last night. IMDb gave it a 4.6/10 which is very generous IMO. Too many holes and unanswered questions in the story.

Dana Jean said:

The Green Slime

The Green Slime - Wikipedia

How any of the actors kept a straight face on this one, I will never know.

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Funny you should mention The Green Slime. It happens to be directed by one of my favorite Japanese filmmakers, Kinji Fukasaku. Virus (The 1980 disaster film, not the crappy Jamie Lee Curtis movie) is an underrated classic worth checking out, in my book.

Return from the Ashes (1965) Directed by J. Lee Thompson ***
In Paris shortly after the end of the Second World War, a well-to-do Jewish doctor (Ingrid Thulin) returns home after years in Dachau to reunite with her chess-playing, Polish gigolo husband (Maximillian Schell) and her unstable stepdaughter (Samantha Eggar). However, this seemingly happy occasion devolves into an intricate web of manipulation, betrayal, and murder. What could've been a melodramatic howler is instead a very intriguing and slow-boiling examination of the "games" people play in relationships, with solid direction by Thompson and multilayered performances by the three leads, particularly Thulin and Schell.

swiftdog2.0 said:

Did the annual July 4th watch of Jaws and Jaws II

May finally get around to watching Blade Runner 2049 since this is my one free weekend before my next class starts on Monday. The Netflix disc has only been sitting on my dining table sine January..........

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Watched Blade Runner 2049.

It was OK. Way too long and very predictable.

Sicario 2: Soldado - muddled but gripping with great performance from 15 year old Isabel Moner
Tag - gown men continue to play Tag game started in childhood. It would be silly if it weren't true. It's still silly. And funny.
The First Purge - was it the success of Black Panther which made this indifferent prequel mostly black?
Adrift - woman has to sail wrecked boat by dead reckoning to save her life and badly injured boyfriend. Emotional true story with effective kicker towards end.
Uncle Drew - Rocky meets Karate Kid in geriatric basketball underdog comedy. Not particularly funny.
Skyscraper - The Rock in Towering Inferno meets Die Hard with Enter The Dragon climax. Spectacular but dumb.

Incredibles 2 - good sequel
The Secret Of Marrowbone - in the horror genre, but keeps you guessing as to what sort. A good mystery.

I, Tonya (2017)

I thought this one was very good. This movie is Part bio-pic and part comedy and is told in a fictionalized documentary style through interviews with the characters. I like the way the story was told because you get several different sides of this story. We never find out the real truth about the Nancy Kerrigan incident as everyone involved tells a different story. Despite the Nancy Kerrigan incident, it's hard not to feel some sympathy for Tonya as she suffered through childhood abuse and abuse from her husband as well as being a poor person trying to make it in a rich persons sport. It's an interesting bio and very funny at times.

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