A few films recently watched.

Super 8 - meh

edit* not sure if I included spoilers, but just in case:

yeah the "mint" thing annoyed me too. he kept saying it too. i thought that was an english slang term from 10 years ago. i enjoyed it more than you though.

i just wish they gave the lead kid role to the really nerdy one (who answers the phone in the scene by the train tracks) i liked him most

Transformers 3 9/10 (for what it is)((a mindless & soulless action movie with faults but incredibly entertaining action)) - The action was way holy shit fuck yeah impressive, some bad ass shit went down, the comedy was actually kind of laughable unlike the Rise Of The Fallen and it was paced a lot better. It's a fucking Michael Bay film and I feel guilty about enjoying it so much and giving big big dumb dumb Hollywood & Co my money but it was worth it for me.

A Scanner Darkly

Much darker than I remembered it. Quite a depressing and frightening film if you think about it.

Still has some good humour in it though, and the animation/film technique still holds up well in giving everything a sheen of confused reality.

  On 6/30/2011 at 11:59 AM, Blanket Fort Collapse said:

Transformers 3 9/10 (for what it is)((a mindless & soulless action movie with faults but incredibly entertaining action)) - The action was way holy shit fuck yeah impressive, some bad ass shit went down, the comedy was actually kind of laughable unlike the Rise Of The Fallen and it was paced a lot better. It's a fucking Michael Bay film and I feel guilty about enjoying it so much and giving big big dumb dumb Hollywood & Co my money but it was worth it for me.

wow, really? I might see it now.

mean girls

didnt realise this was written by tina fey. was pretty good except for the redemption ending of course.

i had seen it before on a plane without sound on someone across the aisles' tv.

outlaw star - 8/10 - ok not a film but FU - v good, reminded me of just about every anime ever, takes bits from all and is overall very enjoyable.

the crow - 7/10 - still a great film, epic soundtrack, dark as fuck visuals, wincott being a badass - love it - shame about the unfortunate circumstances tho.

bowling for columbine - lies/10 - i remember watching this back when it first came out, didn't know shit about the story or michael moore, re-watching it now holy shit how did this ever get an oscar in the documentary category? i mean seriously? the fucker just cuts up a shitload of stuff and re-arranges it to suit the story/propaganda, ugh.

  On 6/30/2011 at 12:42 PM, gaarg said:

  On 6/30/2011 at 11:59 AM, Blanket Fort Collapse said:

Transformers 3 9/10 (for what it is)((a mindless & soulless action movie with faults but incredibly entertaining action)) - The action was way holy shit fuck yeah impressive, some bad ass shit went down, the comedy was actually kind of laughable unlike the Rise Of The Fallen and it was paced a lot better. It's a fucking Michael Bay film and I feel guilty about enjoying it so much and giving big big dumb dumb Hollywood & Co my money but it was worth it for me.

 

wow, really? I might see it now.

Yeah if you embrace the ridiculous there's plenty here. The silly bits are actually quite funny and the epic showdown at the end is like all the best fighting bits of the first two films x10 so you don't feel short changed even with the £10.50 it cost with 3D glasses and speaking of which the effort has really been made to have things flying around and spitting in your face.

OK no oscar winning acting, plenty of cheesy gun-ho Americanism and the continuity in some scenes is in the traditional rushed Bay style confusion but you don't feel short changed for the visual onslaught which is all out, forget about the second film this more than makes up.

I liked Nimoy's "the needs of the many...." phrase popping up towards the end.

9/10

I'm really looking forward to seeing this with, like, ten of my friends on Saturday.

  On 6/30/2011 at 8:40 PM, Benedict Cumberbatch said:

mean girls

didnt realise this was written by tina fey. was pretty good except for the redemption ending of course.

i had seen it before on a plane without sound on someone across the aisles' tv.

homo

The Matrix - first time seeing it. "Really, Really Awesomely Rad"/10

  On 7/2/2011 at 9:57 AM, Capsaicin said:

The Matrix - first time seeing it.

You must have missed out on a lot of pop culture references around 1999-2003.

  On 7/2/2011 at 9:57 AM, Capsaicin said:

The Matrix - first time seeing it. "Really, Really Awesomely Rad"/10

now, don't forget to NOT watch the others...

The President's Barber - A Korean film about a guy who was the barber for Park Jung-Hee (dictator from 1961-79). Some great character acting, insights on Korean political culture at the time and a really touching story about family. 8/10

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

7/10

beautifully shot but the pace was way too slow. Also Ive always hated Cate Blanchett for some reason but after watching this movie, I want to punch her in the face.

  Quote

In 2D the big-pile-of-garbage character design style of the robots blends together so you can’t tell where one ugly robot ends and the other begins. In 3D your eye can easily distinguish between the different piles of garbage because one is in the foreground and one is further back. You still don’t necessarily know who the different robots are or what they’re supposed to be doing, but you definitely have a better idea of where they’re situated within the smashed buildings, which is a major breakthrough for this series.

Vern, of course

omg

Moon - 6/10

Saw this last night as a rental.

There were a few points that put me off a little: the plot within the first 15-20 minutes of the film was quite predictable. Surprises were few and far between and the acting by Sam Rockwell wasn't too impressive for me. There were a few holes in the storyline and how it played out here and there, where I asked myself "common sense" questions like, well, "why didn't he do this?" moments. I won't give away too much on the story itself however I was left thinking that if what the actor experienced was "real life", I thought things would have played out a little differently compared to the sequence of events in the film. Hard to explain what I mean without giving away too much - but anyway besides those points, I'd still recommend anyone who is into sci-fi films to watch this.

There are elements of Solaries and 2001: A Space Odyssey amongst other well-known sci-fi films which this film takes hold of and does something interesting with. Great CGI as well and bears some truth in the way our current economic system is operated on Earth (namely, the negative consequences of capitalistic pursuits).

I think the thing about Moon that's easy to forget is that it was made on $5M budget. Yes, that's right. $5M. For Green Lantern (the budget of which was $200M), Warner Brothers spent $5M whitening Ryan Reynolds' teeth.

That's not to excuse its shortcomings, but it was a very personal, low key film.

for being as big of a fan of Sam rockwell as i am i was really underwhelmed by his acting in Moon. I don't think it was his fault though i think it was more a problem with his character in the script, how unreactive he was especially to encountering his own clone was very hard for me ot believe. If you saw a clone of yourself you would be utterly shocked,unsettled and probably a little scared. He reacted to him as if he was just some random guy he found on the moon. For being done on 5 million, the effects are very well done you would never know it was that cheap

on a completely different tangent, i was a little intrigued to hear that chris nolan is having a random guy(or so i thought) direct a supernatural thriller for him. Turns out this guy was the main actor in the Carpenter 'Christine' film adaptation, Kieth Gordon, i knew i recognized him from this picture

and i was pleasantly surprised to see that he directed probably the only 'good' (not great) adaptation of a Vonegut novel, Mother Night. Im looking forward to whatever this project turns into

When I first watched moon I really liked it, my family rented it out and so I re-watched it, I was so underwhelmed. Like you guys say, you pick holes in it and the story is too predictable..

  On 7/3/2011 at 2:02 AM, beatfanatic said:

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

 

7/10

 

beautifully shot but the pace was way too slow. Also Ive always hated Cate Blanchett for some reason but after watching this movie, I want to punch her in the face.

Ugh that was awful! also, why did we get to see Brad Pitt as a foetus I am disappoint.

  On 7/3/2011 at 11:21 PM, rixxx said:

When I first watched moon I really liked it, my family rented it out and so I re-watched it, I was so underwhelmed. Like you guys say, you pick holes in it and the story is too predictable..

Yeah, things are much more predictable when you've already watched them. ;-p

--::

Rango - terrible/10 , it could have been alright if they had cleaned up the storyboarding/found a straighter line in the plot/got rid of the pointless terrible dribble suggestions of staff and hangers on that weren't funny at all/taken the odd moment to breath, develop characters.

I did watch the extended edition so maybe it was tighter in the theatrical release, but still i would have been a giant sad steamy mess.

Hm, I thought Rango was pretty good, though I agree it was bloated.

I've been scraping the bottom of the barrel for new movies to watch, so checked out The Adjustment Bureau and Source Code. Both were sort of what I expected, mediocre. I liked Adjustment Bureau more. Source Code was way wacky...I didn't even understand the premise. How did they project dude's mind back into some dead guy's mind for 8 mins? Something to do with after-images stored in the dead dude's memory? But if thy are just after-images, how can they be interacted with? I just didn't get it at all...and why did they need to use Mr. Heroic half-dead US chopper pilot as their guinea pig, rather than someone else? Just because the situation was high risk, potentially lethal? His love interest on the train was also annoying as hell, mrs. robotic colgate smile.

I don't mind things being left vague - oftentimes I prefer it - but it just seemed the film was built on a false premise. Either it's like watching a surveillance video and you can't interact with it, or its time travel. Seemed like they wanted to have it both ways.

So source code isn't "the thriller of the year" as imdb or something stated. hrmm. Will still grab it thought, even though the premise and preview looked pretty shaky.