Last Movie You Watched

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Ladyhawke is from 1985, War Games is from 1982/1983.

Sorry, I should have said "early"...I was thinking at the time of his later movies/work.   

PD

[Cato]

Sorry, I should have said "early"...I was thinking at the time of his later movies/work. 

PD

No problem!   

There are some curiosities in his career: Ferris Bueller's Day Off was a monstrous hit.

The Road to Wellville, ten years later, however, was a bomb, full of "colonic cleansing" jokes based upon John Kellogg's theories on nutrition.  Then there was the eugenics theory of c. 1900.



The movie is something of a cult favorite, however: e.g.  I have a friend, a doctor, who thinks it is hilarious.

[Karl Henning]

And, more Matthew Broderick

And what proved to be an extremely over-optimistic idea of Artificial Intelligence.

A talented young hacker who really only wanted to play a hot new game.

Oh, right: Ally Sheedy would later be in Breakfast Club.
It's a funny thing: I feel sure-ish that I was in the movie house for this, but I don't remember forming an opinion about it. WOPR("Whopper") is a bit amusing almost in spite of itself. Oh, the annoying twerp from 1941 is here with Maury Chaykin. And Maurice from Northern Exposure. Directed by John Badham. Stephen Falken was played by John Wood, who was also the Bishop in Ladyhawke. Dabney Coleman is tough, but not an actual heel. I now wonder if I ever saw it before; I feel that if I'd seen it, I should have liked it a lot. 

[JBS]

No problem!   

There are some curiosities in his career: Ferris Bueller's Day Off was a monstrous hit.

The Road to Wellville, ten years later, however, was a bomb, full of "colonic cleansing" jokes based upon John Kellogg's theories on nutrition.  Then there was the eugenics theory of c. 1900.



The movie is something of a cult favorite, however: e.g.  I have a friend, a doctor, who thinks it is hilarious.

I remember liking Wellville.  Broderick also played Eugene Jerome, the character who represents the playwright, in the second of the two studio films made from Neil Simon's autobiographical trilogy, Biloxi Blues. (The third was filmed for TV.)

[Cato]

A talented young hacker who really only wanted to play a hot new game.

Oh, right: Ally Sheedy would later be in Breakfast Club.
It's a funny thing: I feel sure-ish that I was in the movie house for this, but I don't remember forming an opinion about it. WOPR("Whopper") is a bit amusing almost in spite of itself. Oh, the annoying twerp from 1941 is here with Maury Chaykin. And Maurice from Northern Exposure. Directed by John Badham. Stephen Falken was played by John Wood, who was also the Bishop in Ladyhawke. Dabney Coleman is tough, but not an actual heel. I now wonder if I ever saw it before; I feel that if I'd seen it, I should have liked it a lot.

Barry Corbin played a top Air Force general modeled (it seems to me) on General Curtis LeMay, who was in charge of The Strategic Air Command for about 10 years, the main "World War III" strike force from the air during the Cold War.



An interesting story tangential to War Games: Senator Barry Goldwater, who ran for president in 1964, once asked General Curtis LeMay about U.F.O. evidence kept at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base (in my hometown of Dayton, Ohio).

"(One day) I called Curtis LeMay and I said, 'General, I know we have a room at Wright-Patterson where you put all this secret stuff (about U.F.O.'s). Could I go in there?' I've never heard him get mad, but he got madder than hell at me, cussed me out, and said, 'Don't ever ask me that question again!'

Was he angry because there was such a room...or because he thought Senator Goldwater was wasting his time? 


https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/UYn5CxytwsU

[Karl Henning]

Criterion has created a monster!

[Karl Henning]

Criterion has created a monster!

I've started at a side entrance, a brief film about radiation victims aboard the fishing boat Lucky Dragon #5 from the Castle Bravo test which vanished the Bikini Atoll.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Seven Samurai. Akira Kurosawa.

[Karl Henning]

Criterion has created a monster!

I'm enjoying Godzilla very much more than I had ever suspected I might. Definitely going to revisit with the commentary.

[LKB]

I'm enjoying Godzilla very much more than I had ever suspected I might. Definitely going to revisit with the commentary.

I've never known Criterion to release anything that wasn't ne plus ultra. I have their Godzilla blu-ray, and several of their other titles in that format.

[Cato]

I'm enjoying Godzilla very much more than I had ever suspected I might. Definitely going to revisit with the commentary.

Raymond Burr standing in the rubble...!

One of the few times in movies that he was able to play a hero!

Apparently in radio he played the hero more often: before television killed off radio drama completely, he starred in a show called Fort Laramie.

YouTube has one of my favorite episodes:

[Karl Henning]

Raymond Burr standing in the rubble...!

That's actually an American remake from two years later (and in my mind/from my experience, too) that was Godzilla.
Per Wikipedia:

Godzilla, King of the Monsters! (Japanese: 怪獣王ゴジラ, Hepburn: Kaijū Ō Gojira)[8] is a 1956 kaiju film directed by Terry O. Morse and Ishirō Honda, with special effects by Eiji Tsuburaya. It is a heavily re-edited American localization, or "Americanization", of the 1954 Japanese film Godzilla.[9] The film was a Japanese-American co-production, with the original footage produced by Toho Co., Ltd., and the new footage produced by Jewell Enterprises. The film stars Raymond Burr, Takashi Shimura, Momoko Kōchi, Akira Takarada, and Akihiko Hirata, with Haruo Nakajima and Katsumi Tezuka as Godzilla. In the film, an American reporter covers a giant reptilian monster's attack on Japan.

In 1955, Edmund Goldman acquired the 1954 film from Toho and enlisted the aid of Paul Schreibman, Harold Ross, Richard Kay, and Joseph E. Levine to produce a revised version for American audiences. This version dubbed most of the Japanese dialogue into English, and altered and removed key plot points and themes. New footage was produced with Burr interacting with body doubles and Japanese-American actors in an attempt to make it seem like Burr was part of the original Japanese production.

Godzilla, King of the Monsters! was theatrically released in the United States in late April 1956, and was followed by an international release. In the U.S., it received mixed reviews from critics and grossed $2 million at the box office against an estimated $100,000 production budget. The film was responsible for introducing Godzilla to a worldwide audience, as the 1954 film remained unavailable officially outside of Japan until 2004.

The American release is one of the supplements on this first disc, so yes, I'll watch that at last, too.

[Karl Henning]

Seven Samurai. Akira Kurosawa.

Magnificent!

[relm1]

I just saw Escape from New York (John Carpenter, 1981) and it was lots of fun if you like early sci-fi genre.  Very low production values but great characters.  Kurt Russell was great as expected.  I liked how slimy all the characters were such as having ulterior motives or only being interested in their own survival and to hell with everyone else's.  I liked the idea of time pressure because he had 24 hours to rescue the kidnapped president otherwise dies.  By the end, all enemies and gangs were trying to stop him with mass blood loss.  Lots of fun.  Lots of famous stars in this too.  Lee van Cleef, Ernest Borgnine, Donald Pleasence, etc.
   

[Karl Henning]

Godzilla (1954) was imaginative, finely crafted, and an ultimately terrifying metaphoric film from those who lived through that nuclear experience and the anxiety of that time.

Yes, indeed!

[LKB]

Magnificent!

Agreed, times seven.

[Papy Oli]

Monsters, inc. 





Boo!!!!!

 

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Monsters, inc. 





Boo!!!!!

 

I trust that the "Boo!"  Is a reference to the little girl character and not how you felt about the movie? 

PD

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Magnificent!

Yes, Magnificent Seven! 😄😄
Naturally the movie inspired The Magnificent Seven, as Kurosawa's Hidden Fortress did Star Wars.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Godzilla (1954) was on tv and I found it to be a very compelling historical document and sci-fi thriller.  I'm sure I've seen it before, probably when I was a kid and loved all things dinosaur related but hadn't seen it in a while so experienced it like it was a first viewing.  I had just seen the 1953 film, "The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms" and can imagine Godzilla owes much to that quite good film.  One thing I was struck with was how the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were just nine years earlier than Godzilla which carries the metaphoric weight of that trauma heavily (as does the excellent Godzilla Minus One from 2023).  This was just 79 years ago and one can imagine how much that horrifying event must still impact the culture.   

Godzilla was reborn from H-bomb explosions as his footprints contained radiative signatures from the unimaginable power of the thermonuclear bombs first tested just two years before the film premiered.  Just imagine, the first H-bomb was detonated in 1952 and was already 700 times more powerful than Hiroshima detonated just 7 years earlier and only 7 years after this film, the Tsar Bomba was detonated at 4,000 times more powerful than Hiroshima!  It must have been a terrifying time to live through.

I was surprised to discover the director of the original film, Ishirô Honda, directed so many sequels.  I haven't seen that many of the other Godzilla films but definitely loved what I saw as a kid (come on, who didn't love "Destroy All Monsters"?) so perhaps I should pursue some of the others.   I'm aware there is an Americanized version staring Raymond Burr which I've not seen understanding it's a watered down version.  I don't really like the modern CGI fest godzilla movies, but I felt Godzilla (1954) was imaginative, finely crafted, and an ultimately terrifying metaphoric film from those who lived through that nuclear experience and the anxiety of that time.

Some people think that it was a metaphor of a forthcoming nuclear war caused by the military alliance with the USA.