Last Movie You Watched

[vandermolen]

FMJ

[George]

About to sit down to watch this now.

Earlier, my girlfriend and I watched this classic:

[Ken B]

The Lady Eve (1941) w/ Barbara Stanwyck, Henry Fonda, Charles Coburn, Eugene Pallette, and William Demarest; Preston Sturges, director - a screwball comedy w/ Fonda in an hilarious comedic role and Stanwyck/Coburn as father-daughter con artists - Dave

 

A nearly perfect movie. My favorite Sturges is Morgan's Creek, but this one is his most perfect.

[SimonNZ]

liked this more than I was expecting to

[Todd]

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.  With the holidays come visits from family members who live out of state, and with them come children of the appropriate demographic that mandates attending a screening of one of the latest blockbusters.  At times, as I watched, I thought The Last Jedi was clearly worse, yet at others it became clear that The Rise of Skywalker is worse.  In the end, they're both crap.  And how on earth does a director hire Keri Russell and show only her eyes in one brief scene?  The interminable length magnifies the crappiness.

[vers la flamme]

The Godfather Part II. Amazing, but I preferred Part I, which I watched last week.

[SonicMan46]

A nearly perfect movie. My favorite Sturges is Morgan's Creek, but this one is his most perfect.

Hi Ken - love The Lady Eve more than my wife did, who seemed mildly entertained - despite us being the same age, she did not grow up watching these old B&W screwball comedies.  The Miracle of Morgan's Creek is in my DVD-R collection but have not watched in a long time (nor do I think Susan has ever seen the film) - I'll see if she is interested - usually we start pulling out some holiday favorites this time of year?  Dave

[Christo]

What's your favorite worst film of his? I think mine is Soldier of Orange. Starship Troopers is on my all time trashterpiece list.

Good one, didn't know provincial stuff like Soldier of Orange (1977) had ever passed beyond our (narrow) borders. I watched it in Germany, Winter of 1983, in the midst of the 'New Cold War' that caused high tensions during these months (we now know we passed through two 24-hours countdowns that year, one in November, the other somewhere in Spring.

While stationed in a village near Lüneburg, every NATO partner took care of a specified zone at the GDR border, the Dutch Army had its share in the Northern part. The movie was meant as an entertainment for us, Military Police conscripts, and I saw it in a public space, a hall, shared with a couple of dozens of German civilians. I spoke German, felt & feel at home in Germany, and still recall the horror & shame - watching Soldier of Orange, about the most stereotypical thing imaginable about 'bad, screaming nazis' that Hollywood was capable of producing too, through "German eyes".

GRRRR.   
                       

[drogulus]

Good one, didn't know provincial stuff like Soldier of Orange (1977) had ever passed beyond our (narrow) borders. I watched it in Germany, Winter of 1983, in the midst of the 'New Cold War' that caused high tensions during these months (we now know we passed through two 24-hours countdowns that year, one in November, the other somewhere in Spring.

While stationed in a village near Lüneburg, every NATO partner took care of a specified zone at the GDR border, the Dutch Army had its share in the Northern part. The movie was meant as an entertainment for us, Military Police conscripts, and I saw it in a public space, a hall, shared with a couple of dozens of German civilians. I spoke German, felt & feel at home in Germany, and still recall the horror & shame - watching Soldier of Orange, about the most stereotypical thing imaginable about 'bad, screaming nazis' that Hollywood was capable of producing too, through "German eyes".

GRRRR.   
                       

     I love the film. What appealed to me is Verhoeven's complex moral view which is bound to offend everyone not already offended by his other forms of uncouthness. I don't think any other film has quite the insight on how the occupation scarred the people in it as some become heros, others traitors, while most just try to survive.

     Some of these fault lines are depicted in the French TV series Un Village Français.

[Christo]

     I love the film. What appealed to me is Verhoeven's complex moral view which is bound to offend everyone not already offended by his other forms of uncouthness. I don't think any other film has quite the insight on how the occupation scarred the people in it as some become heros, others traitors, while most just try to survive.

     Some of these fault lines are depicted in the French TV series Un Village Français.

We seem to differ. 

[Madiel]

I've meant to see Dangerous Liaisons for 30 years. Finally got around to it.

[SonicMan46]

Few nights ago on Netflix:

The Two Popes (2019) w/ Anthony Hopkins and Jonathan Pryce; short synopsis below (much more at the link) - excellent reviews and we enjoyed - highly recommended - Dave

The Two Popes is a 2019 biographical drama film directed by Fernando Meirelles and written by Anthony McCarten and Frank Cottrell-Boyce (uncredited), adapted from McCarten's 2017 play The Pope. It stars Anthony Hopkins as Pope Benedict XVI and Jonathan Pryce as Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio (later Pope Francis). (Source)

 

[Cato]

For those who do not know about Franz Jaegerstaetter: he was a young Austrian Catholic, a farmer, who refused to join the Nazi army, refusing to help the Nazis in any way, including hospital service.  He also refused to take any oath involving the support of Hitler.

Jaegerstaetter's protest was immediately hushed up, and the Nazis were successful in keeping the man's example confined (mainly) to his village n the Austrian Alps.  Twenty years later, an American named Gordon Zahn came across Jaegerstaetter's case in surviving archives and decided to write a book about him.  Nevertheless, from what I have been able to determine, very few people know about him even today, even in the German-speaking world.


Terrence Malick has written and directed a movie about Franz Jaegerstaetter called A Hidden Life.     

Unfortunately, this film is (apparently) being released as a "small" movie with little to no advertising: we happened to see a small ad for it (bought by a Catholic group) in a free neighborhood newspaper.

The movie is anything but small!  It is a spiritual epic.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5827916/

Mrs. Cato said the movie was "fantastic."  Other members of the audience said it was one of the most beautiful movies they had ever seen.

https://www.youtube.com/v/t8Xjn50ycjY

The movie is taciturn, oracular, aphoristic, with long sequences of natural scenes as a mute Greek chorus commenting upon the action.  It will also disturb you with the ultimate question: could you do what the hero did?

[Cato]

For those who do not know about Franz Jaegerstaetter: he was a young Austrian Catholic, a farmer, who refused to join the Nazi army, refusing to help the Nazis in any way, including hospital service.  He also refused to take any oath involving the support of Hitler.

Jaegerstaetter's protest was immediately hushed up, and the Nazis were successful in keeping the man's example confined (mainly) to his village n the Austrian Alps.  Twenty years later, an American named Gordon Zahn came across Jaegerstaetter's case in surviving archives and decided to write a book about him.  Nevertheless, from what I have been able to determine, very few people know about him even today, even in the German-speaking world.


Terrence Malick has written and directed a movie about Franz Jaegerstaetter called A Hidden Life.     

Unfortunately, this film is (apparently) being released as a "small" movie with little to no advertising: we happened to see a small ad for it (bought by a Catholic group) in a free neighborhood newspaper.

The movie is anything but small!  It is a spiritual epic.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5827916/

Mrs. Cato said the movie was "fantastic."  Other members of the audience said it was one of the most beautiful movies they had ever seen.

https://www.youtube.com/v/t8Xjn50ycjY

The movie is taciturn, oracular, aphoristic, with long sequences of natural scenes as a mute Greek chorus commenting upon the action.  It will also disturb you with the ultimate question: could you do what the hero did?

From a review by John Anderson of the Wall Street Journal

...The elegiac tone of the film, which runs nearly three hours, is amplified by the fact that Mr. Malick's screenplay is written mostly in past tense and delivered mostly in voiceover. The imagery, much of it breathtaking, tells a parallel story, in present tense. The overall effect is of dreamy distance and isolation within the conscience of Franz, a kind of slowly waning moon in a universe of compliance and collaboration. The Jägerstätters and their fellow villagers live in a valley that rolls and heaves, and the imagery of the film contains much that might be considered visual non sequiturs—the overall sense being of a world askew. (The editing, by Rehman Nizar Ali, Joe Gleason and Sebastian Jones, is superb likewise the cinematography of Jorg Widmer. ) The one stationary object is Franz, who to our admiration and dismay refuses to budge.

Every frame of "A Hidden Life" has been worried over, every decision is intentional and meaningful; the archival footage, including clips from "Triumph of the Will" and what appeared to be Jean Renoir's "La Bête Humaine," are in the antiquated 1:65 aspect ratio while the rest of the film is in glorious widescreen; most of the dialogue is in English though the rantings of Nazis are delivered in unsubtitled German. This seems less a slur against the German tongue than it is a statement about people not speaking the same language, and yet understanding each other too well.

"Do you judge me?" asks Lueben ( Bruno Ganz ), one of the presiding officials at the tribunal deciding Franz's fate. Ganz (who makes his last appearance in this film, as does the Swedish actor Michael Nyqvist ) has the film's defining line: The people persecuting Franz don't do so because they disagree with him. They do so because he is a reminder of their moral failing. As such, he is an enemy of the people, heroic and doomed.

[ritter]

First approach to this classic:



Wow! WOW!!!! I had recently watched Jean Renoir's La règle du jeu and Le déjeuner sur l'herbe, and found both admirable, but La grande illusion is something else. One of the greatest films I've ever watched. Un chef d'oeuvre! 

[André]

First approach to this classic:



Wow! WOW!!!! I had recently watched Jean Renoir's La règle du jeu and Le déjeuner sur l'herbe, and found both admirable, but La grande illusion is something else. One of the greatest films I've ever watched. Un chef d'oeuvre! 

+1.

An incredible trio of actors and Renoir's caustic view of social classes contribute to make it as remarkable and socially abrasive as La Règle du jeu IMO.

[SimonNZ]

not downright essential, but refreshingly original in its structure and themes and avoidance of storytelling cliches

[André]

Apart from the date of the Agincourt battle (1415) the film gets every single historical detail wrong. The slow motion shots in the battle scene in the mud reminded me of Bresson's Lancelot du Lac, only without the latter's genius. I wish Chalamet had more than one facial expression at his disposal. At one point he almost cracks a smile, but past that momentary weakness he was back to his robotic self.  The film has a decent collection of armours and helmets.   

[Todd]

Apart from the date of the Agincourt battle (1415) the film gets every single historical detail wrong.

It's not an historical film; it's a mashup of the Henriad.  It has Falstaff in it. 

[Todd]

Us.  Meh.  Kudos to Jordan Peele, who has apparently discovered the trick to making medium budget, high concept (entirely unscary) horror films that rake in the dough.  He should continue to strike while the iron is hot.