Last Movie You Watched

[Karl Henning]

Vincent Price inherits the world in The Last Man on Earth, the first of three movies based on Richard Matheson's I Am Legend.

[Karl Henning]

Vincent Price inherits the world in The Last Man on Earth, the first of three movies based on Richard Matheson's I Am Legend.

Mister, there are a lot of daughters in there, including my own!

[aligreto]

The Game





A man receives a birthday present from his brother. The brother claims that it will be a life changing experience. The game can begin at any time and one does not know when it will or what to expect. However, what starts to happen and how quickly it all spirals out of control was something the man had not bargained for. It was a good thriller and a good watch again and it stood the test of time reasonably well.

[Karl Henning]

John Huston's The Man Who Would Be King. Hadn't seen this in forever.

[milk]

I hadn't seen this in many years. My memory is that I hadn't liked it as much as the critics. In a way, I've connected to Woody's kind of "realism" side more than his idea-type films. Broadway Danny Rose - my favorite - is more of an homage to borscht-belt comedy, as well as realism in European cinema; Annie Hall a mix between absurd comedy and a real deconstruction of a relationship, Hannah and Her Sisters...etc. On the other hand you have films like Midnight in Paris and Purple Rose, films that Allen clearly thought were clever ideas in the abstract. Having said all that, I quite enjoyed Purple Rose of Cairo after all these years. It's a pure fantasy, extremely well filmed by Gordon Willis, who perfectly captures the aesthetic of early black and white talkies, and it's uproariously funny and inventive (Zoe Caldwell, who was a tony-award winning Broadway Actress rarely appearing on film, is hilarious as the countess).   

[Karl Henning]

Brian de Palma's The Untouchables

[George]

Really enjoyed this. The ending comment by Barry was particularly touching.

[Karl Henning]

Soylent Green

[SimonNZ]

Documentary on the short unhappy life of playwright Andrea Dunbar (author of Rita, Sue And Bob Too), told largely through the memories of her equally troubled daughters, with taped interviews recreated on location by actors lip-syncing. Actors also performing scenes from her social-realist plays on the street she grew up on as neighbors look on and comment.

Highly original and deeply moving.

[steve ridgway]

That sounds particularly interesting; we lived very close to the Buttershaw Estate for a year and walked through it (there are some nice woods and countryside on the south side). Bradford was a strange, racially divided place, although we found both populations very friendly in casual encounters and some unusually open and honest. People round here wouldn't just tell you on first meeting that they had the big Akita dog to stop their junkie sister and boyfriend from robbing them and the dents in their car were from said boyfriend kicking it.

[SimonNZ]

^ I watched that with a friend for the second time in two days tonight, and he admired it as much as I did.

Interesting you should mention how candid the people are, because one of the remarkable things about the film is how open and honest the family are about these snowballing tragedies.

[aligreto]

Page Eight





This is the story of political intrigue and it is an example of what British film can excel in. It was not high budget, has no special effects but has an excellent and credible story line and very good acting.

[Florestan]

Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ

(Not the first time).

I very much appreciate the authenticity given by being spoken in Aramaic and Latin, although it shows that the actors are struggling with these languages --- there is no single fluent line in the whole movie, except for one liners. They all speak as in a foreign language read (very well, admittedly) at first sight. Then there is the faithful account of how neither Pontius Pilate nor Herod Antipas found any fault with Him and deferred the whole matter strictly and exclusively to the Sanhedrin and the Jewish crowd (quite possibly the first referendum ever). And then the carrying of the cross by Simon of Cyrene. All those are pluses.

The minuses, now.

The sadistic --- sorry, I find no other way to put it --- side of the movie is wholly repellent to me. Firstly, the Gospels allow for no such extreme reading. Secondly, if Jesus Christ had indeed suffered such hard flogging, He'd have died long before He'd even take up the cross. Thirdly, the whole point of this vivid description is moot --- Jesus Christ Himself said while on the cross: Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do!. Fourthly (and this is a point made by Giovanni Papini in his Life of Christ, with which I happen to concur) --- the Romans themselves were not prone to such mockery and debauchery in the face of impending death, and it's hard to understand how and why the troop could have behaved the way they did --- unless one takes into account that they were unwitting tools of the Divine Mercy.

Bottom line, an impressive, albeit flawed, movie. AFAIC, Zefirelli's movie remains unsurpassed and unsurpassable.

[Karl Henning]

Impressive but flawed is entirely fair.

[aligreto]

Page Eight





This is the story of political intrigue and it is an example of what British film can excel in. It was not high budget, has no special effects but has an excellent and credible story line and very good acting.

Turks & Caicos





This is the sequel to the excellent film Page Eight. This sequel is, as often happens with these things, a disaster. There is no character development, the story line is good but badly managed and the dialogue is actually appalling.

[milk]

I could only take about 20 minutes of this hullabaloo. I'm gonna use a word here that I've never used before. I'm just going to try this word on and see if it works: jejune. 

[SurprisedByBeauty]

Victor/Victoria


Watched it, because we were looking for films that won "Best Original Score".
For the whole time watching this saucy little flick, I had entirely forgotten that it was, of course, a remake of the 1933 Viktor und Viktoria... which is probably the film that I wanted to see, when picking this one... but didn't think of. Seems very forward, these days - but also cute and quaint... but times were so different back in the early 80s, that I suspect that I can't quite understand how it would have come across in its time.

[Brahmsian]

Soylent Green

This is why I don't like green pea soup. 

[Brahmsian]

Soylent Green

I was curious as to who had conducted the symphonic music (Tchaikovsky 6, Beethoven 6).  It was Gerald Fried.

[steve ridgway]

We've decided to try Netflix and I've just watched Oblivion on it, starring Tom Cruise and Morgan Freeman, an excellent Sci-Fi film.