Films - Watched and thoughts 2020

[Dimness 308]

The Lighthouse - In this prequel to Clerks, two random dudes work at a lighthouse. I enjoyed it, but if you're aware of any cliches involving sailors or sea adjacent hijinks, you're pretty much going to predict what happens in this movie.

[AlbertA 711]

Drunk Parents - holy hell what a crapstastic movie - Salma Hayek just hams it up to 200%.  Avoid this - don't waste your time like I did - learn from my mistake.

[Dimness 308]

Tenet - Loud as fuck. I liked it, but this movie does not lay down the "rules" of the setting as well as the other Nolan films did.

[Dimness 308]

Yesterday - It's good. Hey Dude got a laugh out of me.

[Carlucci 705]

On 9/13/2020 at 9:32 PM, Dimness said:

Yesterday - It's good. Hey Dude got a laugh out of me.

 

Back in the way, way early days of David Letterman, he did a bit where they faked isolating the sound of Linda McCartney singing live on stage with husband Paul. and she was singing "Hey Dude."  It was hilarious then, still hilarious now.  I have a sister in law that thinks Hey Dude is correct.

 

 

Carlos.

[Dimness 308]

Parasite - Clockwise

[Dimness 308]

Blade Runner 2049: This movie is sad AF. Doesn't emotionally resonate as high as the original, but man this comes close to Arrival territory.

[Dimness 308]

Knives Out - It's alright. In a coincidence with watching Blade Runner 2049, that Ana De Armas is something else.

[Dimness 308]

Seventh Son - I was bored. Is that the correct reaction?

[Dimness 308]

Tinker Tailor Solider Spy - I think if you're from the U.K. and you don't appear in this film, consider yourself a disappointment. Otherwise, the children's rhyme doesn't ring a bell with me.

[dogbert 1,376]

Scream  - haven't watched this in forever, and wow, I'm not sure it's aged well. It felt desperately mean & mean spirited to its cast and frankly deeply cynical. It's not how I remembered it at all. It's definitely funny & ground breaking, it's easy to see why it had such an impact. But I don't feel any need to watch it again. 

 

From Dusk Til Dawn - haven't watched this in forever, and wow, I'm not sure it's aged well. But I don't give a fuck, because it's awesome. I remembered it took a while to change gear, but, man, it took a ton of guys to be so damn cool about the build-up. And Richey deserved everything he got. 

 

 

[Dimness 308]

All I remember is sexy Salma Hayek. And vampires.

[dogbert 1,376]

3 hours ago, Dimness said:

All I remember is sexy Salma Hayek. And vampires.

And sexy Salma Hayek.

[kelley 840]

Holidate on Netflix gave a few giggles but not much else. 

[dogbert 1,376]

1 minute ago, kelley said:

Holidate on Netflix gave a few giggles but not much else. 

 

That's more than what most people have said. 

There's such a crush of cheap filler identical "holiday" films on streaming + the various broadcast channels responsible for the trend... 

[kelley 840]

I’ve got some favorite Hallmark holiday movies, they are pure sugar. Holidate was not that. 

[Magness 498]

On 9/10/2020 at 9:34 PM, Dimness said:

Tenet - Loud as fuck. I liked it, but this movie does not lay down the "rules" of the setting as well as the other Nolan films did.

Finally watched this, I agree that the “rules” were not laid out very well and while the concept is interesting, this one did not work nearly as well as other Nolan films IMO. 

[dogbert 1,376]

Spontaneous - dark teen comedy where kids just spontaneous explode. It wants to be Heathers but can't possibly compare. Carried by an interesting pair of lead character through some obvious "twist" moments, and saved by a final 20 minutes that are filled with pathos. Lead actress played the cypher daughter in Knives Out but is far better in this. I enjoyed this more than I should have from its components because of that last 20 minutes or so. 

[Dimness 308]

The Beastmaster (rewatch) - Still campy fun as ever. And Tanya Roberts was something else.

 

Robocop 3 (rewatch) - I don't think I've seen this in its entirety since when it first came out. It was awful then, and it's still awful now.

 

The Color & The Shape (German) - Cosmic horror is a fucking hard sell, and being asked to be terrified and scared HP Lovecraft tropes is like trying to terrify someone by explaining tax accounting. You'll just get someone bored.

[kelley 840]

Wild Mountain Thyme - it’s about two Irish farming families who die off and leave their side by side farms to their kids. Ones a boy and the other is a girl. You can guess where it wholesomely goes. 

[dogbert 1,376]

Do The Right Thing - it's been years since I last saw this, but wow it's still utterly on point, 30 years on. Wow. And the quotes at the end. Wow. 

 

Run Lola Run - another "it's been years since I last saw this". Clearly rough around the edges, production quality wise, but it still nails the videogame vibe that game-to-movie adaptations have missed. It's tightly plotted, it's well acted, it's mostly well shot + paced, but the momentum its built up over the three lives carries it through to the conclusion/finish line. Loved watching this again. 

[Romier S 5,186]

Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom - The film (based on the play by August Wilson), is surprisingly a very Broadway style production brought to the screen. This is an actors movie and it’s focus is on conversational moments and interplay between its characters. You’re literally a fly on the wall taking in the everyday conversations these people have with one another. Be it the band members ribbing each other over their shoes or Ma Rainey herself making life hell for her manager because it’s the only way she can get the respect she deserves. It reminded me a bit of Birdman in that regard.

 

 It’s follows both the titular Ma Rainey (the ever amazing Viola Davis) as she comes to a recording studio to produce a new album and a member of her band named Leeve (Boseman) who has higher aspirations than being a back-up to Rainey. It touches on issues of race in the 20’s, inequities for black musicians at the time and the tragedies of violence that people of color had to live with and perpetuate amongst themselves. If I were to give any complaint here, it’s that Rainey/Davis is used as more of a vehicle for Leeve and the underlying message of the film. While Viola is herself a powerhouse in the role, Boseman shows why his death was such a tragedy as the man puts on a performance here that is pure, unmitigated /fire/ that should deservedly net him a great deal of post-humous awards. It’s very much worth your time and highly recommend giving it a viewing.

[JoeyN 1,315]

Finally saw Tenant, and agree the rules were not really laid out well. I love crazy time travel stuff, but sometimes things made no sense with how stuff was set up earlier. . Also the mix sound was off.. Some parts were overly loud compared to others, and sometimes the dialog was too low.

 

The Midnight Sky on Netflix was really good.

 

WW84 was ok for most of the second half. The first hour was boring and dragged on, First film is miles better. Don’t see myself watching it again anytime soon. Someone stop letting Geoff Johns write these movies. 
 

If you have kids,  We Can Be Heroes is a fun film by Robert  Rodriguez, best super hero film with Pedro Pascal in it that was released on Christmas. 😀

[Magness 498]

Agree on WW84 - was mostly ok but I got kinda bored. I found Pedro’s character Max more interesting than the others if I’m being honest but nothing was too bad. 

[foogledricks 792]

I have unfairly high expectations for Covid-Delayed movies like Ww84, Top Gun 2, Black Widow, because they have so much extra time to tweak and edit and “fix in post.” WW84 is not a good signal that movies with more time to cook will be better.