Victoria & Abdul (2017) - Queen Victoria strikes up an unlikely friendship with a young Indian clerk named Abdul Karim.

While Judi Dench played the queen very well, I was unable to connect to her friendship with Abdul. Even the more emotional scenes between them didn't move me at all. 2.5/5

damosuzuki said:

sexton said:

Loveless (2017) - A couple going through a divorce must team up to find their son who has disappeared during one of their bitter arguments.

Long stretches of slow-moving beauty culminate to a final, emotionally-charged confrontation. 4.5/5

this is also at the top of my 'need to see' list.

are you going to get all the nominated films in this year?

What I love about Loveless as well as Andrey Zvyagintsev's previous movies Leviathan and especially Elena is the detailed look he gives contemporary life in Russia. It's a hole rarely filled compared to the abundance of films that make it across the ocean from other nations like France, Sweden and Germany.

I'm much more behind this year in viewing all the nominated films than in the past due to going to more concerts and watching more TV series. And since I don't have a Netflix account, their increased presence among the nominated films means I'm locked out of those selections for the most part. Many nominated films will just have to wait until later in the year when I have more time to catch up. Sorry, Boss Baby.

Brendan said:

And I agree completely that Sydney Pollack was right-on-the-money casting.

He was excellent in Husbands and Wives. Have you seen that?

Even the very first image of Nicole Kidman completely undressing before your eyes seemed apart of this campaign. This has become my favorite image of female beauty

She's not my type (but I know that a lot of people seem to find her super-beautiful).

As soon as the credits rolled in my second viewing of EWS, a person behind me turned to his wife as said, “I told you we should’ve gone to Big Daddy.” Absolutely nothing wrong with that to me. I have loved Adam Sandler since his first appearance on SNL, a show I still watch to this day with enormous passion. I love comedy skits, even if some shows in some years require you to sit through a majority of misses just to catch one or two gems that make you laugh so hard you cry. Back then I was insecure enough that this “Big Daddy” episode made me cringe. Today I would instantly smile at this spontaneous insight that I can use to better me.

sexton said:

damosuzuki said:

this is also at the top of my 'need to see' list.

are you going to get all the nominated films in this year?

What I love about Loveless as well as Andrey Zvyagintsev's previous movies Leviathan and especially Elena is the detailed look he gives contemporary life in Russia. It's a hole rarely filled compared to the abundance of films that make it across the ocean from other nations like France, Sweden and Germany.

I'm much more behind this year in viewing all the nominated films than in the past due to going to more concerts and watching more TV series. And since I don't have a Netflix account, their increased presence among the nominated films means I'm locked out of those selections for the most part. Many nominated films will just have to wait until later in the year when I have more time to catch up. Sorry, Boss Baby.

War for the Planet of the Apes (2017) - After the apes suffer unimaginable losses, Caesar wrestles with his darker instincts and begins his own mythic quest to avenge his kind.

The apes' adversaries were maybe dispatched a little too conveniently, but otherwise this was a respectable end to the Planet of the Apes trilogy. 3.5/5

Brendan said:

And I agree completely that Sydney Pollack was right-on-the-money casting.

He was excellent in Husbands and Wives. Have you seen that?

Even the very first image of Nicole Kidman completely undressing before your eyes seemed apart of this campaign. This has become my favorite image of female beauty

She's not my type (but I know that a lot of people seem to find her super-beautiful).

I’m likely closer to one of those people you mentioned, but I totally love the difference, in both opinion and women.

I think any female in decent shape (countless millions or billions) photographed in this perfectly unnatural, almost pedestal-like ambience, bathed in exquisite lightning is going to make me weak at the knees. Perhaps this was in part the audience’s dream being depicted, at least it served that purpose unbelievably well in me. And this crazy, out-of-place image, the film’s first, is then jarringly ripped away from the Mona Lisa on your wall.

Instantly we’re shaken back to the daily normality of doctor examinations, dressing and going to the bathroom. Perhaps this signifies the 7-year itch they’re in that eventually ignites this film forward (with perhaps some help from pot’s honesty elixir) causing them (us) to reach back to this unreality of our hidden fantasies, culminating in that secret society mansion that leaves nothing to the imagination.

Is this really what we want? It’s complicated. No one has all the answers. We love wildness, but we cannot survive here. We love stability, but there has to be more. Perhaps if we were kinder to each other the spark would never leave, or at least kindly realize that we couldn’t offer it anymore.

***
[b][Edited 3/4/18 13:59pm]

Dunkirk (2017)

Christopher Nolan once again puts on a filmmaking clinic with one of the better war movies in film history, brimming with drama and suspense. Tom Hardy and Kenneth Branagh make the most of limited roles. If it won the Oscar I'd be just fine with that, because my guess is that along with Billboards this one will hold up the best.

Beauty and the Beast (2017) - An adaptation of the fairy tale about a monstrous-looking prince and a young woman who fall in love.

I liked this more than I thought I would. The incredible production values at the very least should be respected. 3/5

Ace said:

2freaky4church1 said:

I have still not watched it. Oddly I watched Caligula all the way.

that BJ scene is tops

luvsexy4all said:

Ace said:

that BJ scene is tops

I love that scene so fuckin hot.

Brendan said:

Ace said:

He was excellent in Husbands and Wives. Have you seen that?

*** I’ve loved and seen it twice. I’ve seen every Woody Allen movie, save for his first, and the last three, at least two or three times. This is the flip side of my love of SNL. One provides hit-and-miss, off-the-cuff spontaneity, while the other the most consistent brilliance at that which hides many of its warts behind month’s of sweat and editing. He is to me unequaled in terms of comedic writing since the invention of the motion picture camera, and also quite brilliant to a lesser extent at drama. And I haven’t read the “Underrated Actors” thread yet, but it would seem to me that Sydney Pollack would be a great candidate. But perhaps he’s even too known for the purposes of this thread?

Even the very first image of Nicole Kidman completely undressing before your eyes seemed apart of this campaign. This has become my favorite image of female beauty

She's not my type (but I know that a lot of people seem to find her super-beautiful).

*** I’m likely closer to one of those people you mentioned, but I totally love the difference, in both opinion and women. I think any female in decent shape (countless millions or billions) photographed in this perfectly unnatural, almost pedestal-like ambience, bathed in exquisite lightning is going to make me weak at the knees. Perhaps this was in part the audience’s dream being depicted, at least it served that purpose unbelievably well in me. And this crazy, out-of-place image, the film’s first, is then jarringly ripped away from the Mona Lisa on your wall. Instantly we’re shaken back to the daily normality of doctor examinations, dressing and going to the bathroom. Perhaps this signifies the 7-year itch they’re in that eventually ignites this film forward (with perhaps some help from pot’s honesty elixir) causing them (us) to reach back to this unreality of our hidden fantasies, culminating in that secret society mansion that leaves nothing to the imagination. Is this really what we want? It’s complicated. No one has all the answers. We love wildness, but we cannot survive here. We love stability, but there has to be more. Perhaps if we were kinder to each other the spark would never leave, or at least kindly realize that we couldn’t offer it anymore. *** [b][Edited 3/4/18 13:59pm]

A fellow Woody fan! And, yes - I'm going to add Pollack to the "Underrated actors" thread! Good call!

I love your thoughts on Eyes Wide Shut. Interestingly, you say, "We love wildness, but we cannot survive here. We love stability, but there has to be more." This put me in mind of the following from Husbands and Wives:

GABE (V.O.)

Pepkin married and led a warm,

domestic life. Placid, but dull.

Knapp was a swinger. He eschewed

nuptial ties and bedded different

women. Nurses... Housewives...

Students... A doctor... A

salesgirl... They all held Knapp

between their legs. Pepkin, from

the calm of his fidelity, envied

Knapp. Knapp, lonely beyond

belief, envied Pepkin. What

happened after the honeymoon? Did

desire grow? Or did familiarity

make partners want other lovers?

Was the notion of ever-deepening

romance a myth along with

simultaneous orgasm? The only time

Rifkin and his wife experienced one

was when they were granted their

divorce. Maybe, in the end, the

idea was not to expect too much out

of life.

Ace said:

Brendan said:

Ace said:

That means a lot to me. I had never made that connection. Now I will never not make that connection. Thank you!

Thank you!

been hittin' the 'neo-noir' playlist on filmstruck....

night moves - gene hackman as retired nfl superstar-cum-private dick from LA, hired to retrieve aged b-list actress' runaway harlot daughter (excedingly youthful melanie griffith) from south florida. murdery hijinks ensue.

4/5

tequila sunrise - overrated in his younger days kurt russell as cop opposite mel gibson as high school friend/renowned cocaine dealer. michelle pfeiffer is the meat in their love triangle. some people get killed, including (spoiler) raul julia (who turned in the best performance in this package).

3.5/5

the onion field - this was a real good one. james woods is utterly creepy. sad stroy of PTSD before it was called that.

4.5/5

also checked out the documentary short 'ladies and gentlemen, mr. leonard cohen', a sort of 'day in the life of...' episode about cohen before he turned to music (circa 1965). i've always been intrigued by cohen, by have only dipped my toes into his music. witnessing his beginnings as a renowned poet/writer has intrigued me doubly.

4/5

6/10 Tried too hard to be funny, only succeeded a quarter of the time.

peedub said:

also checked out the documentary short 'ladies and gentlemen, mr. leonard cohen', a sort of 'day in the life of...' episode about cohen before he turned to music (circa 1965). i've always been intrigued by cohen, by have only dipped my toes into his music. witnessing his beginnings as a renowned poet/writer has intrigued me doubly.

4/5

I'd recommend the albums I'm Your Man (1988) and The Future (1992). Better yet, watch Live in London (2009)!

american honey (2016) 3.5/5 i was put off by the running length of this thing for the longest time (unless you're tarkovsky, does your movie really need to be 160 minutes long?), but i finally gave it a watch earlier this week, and found i settled into its rhythm & barely gave the running time a glance all the way through. it's languid & shambolic, but in a way that i found incredibly appealing. the florida project would be a fairly obvious comparison, in the way both tell rambling stories of lives on the fringe. i don't think american honey is nearly as great - it's ultimately just a bit too baggy & a bit less heartwrenching - but it's really good.

the breadwinner (2017) 4/5 deeply sad, felt very realistic - as sexton said, it's a bit like grave of the fireflies in their common depictions of children living in unthinkable conditions.


i also went back to see annihilation for a second time despite not quite loving it at my first viewing. i had the feeling that i was a bit too tired the first time i saw it to fully appreciate it.

the ending of this movie seemed much more intense and trippy to me this go-around, and in particular a scene at the midpoint with a bear played much more powerfully to me.

i still think some of the things that seemed a bit too slick and digital didn't really work - the flower effects, the look of the shimmer's exterior, and the deer creatures in particular still felt flat & glossy.

but i definitely under-rated this last week. i'd now rate it a 4. i still don't think it's the sci-fi masterpiece some have called it, but it's much better than i initially thought. and it's definitely a film that ought to be seen on a big screen if you can catch it there, particularly if you have any kind of love for chilly, remote 70s sci-fi.

8/10! Michael B Jordan acting was alright, rest of it was great!

Valerian and the City of a thousand planets.

I can't really rate this movie because I turned it off after the first 5 minutes. The previews looked incredibly bad and it was mostly panned by critics. But I gave it a shot because of Luc Besson and the huge budget. But those first five minutes of the film are so god awful I just had to shut it off. It's like sci-fi made by someone who hates sci-fi or doesn't get it. As cringe-worthy as anything, I have ever witnessed.

A Wrinkle In Time 3/5 Very visually pleasing, wish there was a lot more adventure, good message for middle-school girls.

paisleypark4 said:

8/10! Michael B Jordan acting was alright, rest of it was great!

This was my last too - loved it!

Una Mujer Fantástica / A Fantastic Woman (2017) - Marina, a transgender woman who works as a waitress and moonlights as a nightclub singer, is bowled over by the death of her older boyfriend.

I very much liked director Sebastián Lelio's last movie Gloria and this one is even better. It definitely earned the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film this year. 5/5

Gainsbourg (Vie héroïque) / Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life (2010) - A glimpse at the life of French singer Serge Gainsbourg, from growing up in 1940s Nazi-occupied Paris through his successful song-writing years in the 1960s to his death in 1991 at the age of 62.

I liked the surreal elements and Serge's music was interpreted and used well, but being used to modern biopics which focus on a shorter time frame for the subject, I likewise felt this one reached a little too far trying to cover almost the entirety of Serge's career. 3.5/5

sexton said:

Gainsbourg (Vie héroïque) / Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life (2010) - A glimpse at the life of French singer Serge Gainsbourg, from growing up in 1940s Nazi-occupied Paris through his successful song-writing years in the 1960s to his death in 1991

Has it really been that long?! Holy smokes, time flies!

The Shape of Water. 8/10. I was ready to write it off as a total Creature from the Black Lagoon ripoff when I first heard about it ,...but del Toro tweaked it a little. And given hints about Elisa's back story/scars, the ending makes sense and explains her obsession with the creature and water. Regardless if people hated this movie or thought it was overrated, you have to admit, the creature's design was freakin' gorgeous.

Gosford Park (2001) - The lives of upstairs guests and downstairs servants at a party in 1932 in a country house in England as they investigate a murder involving one of them.

It's interesting to see Julian Fellowes' proto-Downton Abbey murder mystery after the success of the TV series. It's much more salacious and rapid-fire than the show and the characters' analogues in the film more acerbic (Kristin Scott Thomas is Her Ladyship here). It's like watching a movie-length episode of the show through a twisted mirror. 4.5/5

liberation day (2016) 3/5 documentary on slovenian electronic art-terrorists laibach playing the first show by a western 'rock' group in north korea. this documentary held a few fairly enormous surprises for me, the first one being that laibach still exist. i used to listen to them a little bit back in the day, in that era when wax trax records seemed like the coolest thing in the world and all the bands i listened to had throbbing, ugly electronic bass-lines with vocalists trying to sound like demons screaming on top of them. and the other surprise being that laibach played a show in north korea in 2015 in honour of korean independence from japan. and during that show they played songs from 'the sound of music.' did everybody but me know that this happened? did i just sleepwalk through this event?

all of that is really weird, so very, very weird, and i live for weird. i swim in it. but the documentary itself is a bit of a snooze unfortunately. not surprisingly, we see very little actual footage of north korean life, and definitely no more than the nicely sanitized areas where you would expect them to allow filming to occur. we get a lot of rehearsal footage in its place, rather too much i would say. as a representation of laibach's nk excursion, this is a passable document, but it gives a very sanitized representation of north korea itself. perhaps they could have edited out some of that rehearsal footage and dedicated a bit of time to detailing the misery of the north koreans.

l'avventura (1960) 4/5 a fairly conventional first hour or so that plays as a relatively straight-ahead thriller that then goes defiantly off course, resolutely refusing to give a conclusion to the mystery. i found myself just a bit detached by the end, and definitely think this could have benefited from a tighter running time. yet it's chock-full of great, bizarre moments that leave me suspecting there's more here that a second viewing might unveil.

[Edited 3/15/18 19:19pm]

Seances (2016)

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http://seances.nfb.ca/

Was just watching a bit of this again (I've seen the film several times - it's one of my favorites) :