Do The Right is good, nice to watch but nothing great, plot is not strong enough, but very nice, nonetheless.

sexton said:

Silence (2016) - Two priests travel to Japan in an attempt to locate their mentor and propagate Catholicism.

Unnecessarily repetitive and overlong. I can see the appeal in the underlying themes and cinematograpy, it just wasn't enough for me. 2/5

it was this movie more than anything else that kept me from following through on watching every oscar nominee. i just don't have it in me to endure 161 minutes of grinding monotony. hats off to you for taking a bullet.

wild tales - a truly great argentinian anthology comedy, all stories centered around revenge, that manages to be biting & dark yet somehow lighthearted, complete fun & full of some great laughs. not one weak story in the bunch, and there were at least two that i think might just be flat out brilliant. 4/5

[Edited 2/8/17 19:59pm]

214 said:

Do The Right is good, nice to watch but nothing great, plot is not strong enough, but very nice, nonetheless.

If you mean Do The Right Thing (1989), I disagree. Many of us who came of age in the 80's would say that it was actually one of the great movies of its time, and really does encapsulate the hope, fear, and ugliness that are race relations in America.

namepeace said:

214 said:

Do The Right is good, nice to watch but nothing great, plot is not strong enough, but very nice, nonetheless.

If you mean Do The Right Thing (1989), I disagree. Many of us who came of age in the 80's would say that it was actually one of the great movies of its time, and really does encapsulate the hope, fear, and ugliness that are race relations in America.

Yeah that, perhaps you're right.

damosuzuki said:

sexton said:

Silence (2016) - Two priests travel to Japan in an attempt to locate their mentor and propagate Catholicism.

Unnecessarily repetitive and overlong. I can see the appeal in the underlying themes and cinematograpy, it just wasn't enough for me. 2/5

it was this movie more than anything else that kept me from following through on watching every oscar nominee. i just don't have it in me to endure 161 minutes of grinding monotony. hats off to you for taking a bullet.

I can't remember the last time I looked at my watch that many times at the cinema.

Sully (2016) - The story of Chesley Sullenberger, an American pilot who became a hero after landing his damaged plane on the Hudson River in order to save the flight's passengers and crew.

Perhaps because of the New York City connection, I liked this movie much more than I thought I would. 3.5/5

RodeoSchro said:

Ladies and gentlemen, I want to give a tip of my hat; a bow of appreciation; and my most sincere thanks to purplethunder3121!

P3121 hooked me up with a link to watch "Porky's" online! I am forever grateful, purplethunder3121!

BECAUSE I JUST WATCHED "PORKY'S"!!!!!

To show you how important that is, here is the Porky's Viewing And Command Center I set up, just for this ocassion:

You need to get a TV! Porky's is better on a big screen. Everything is.

ufoclub said:

RodeoSchro said:

Ladies and gentlemen, I want to give a tip of my hat; a bow of appreciation; and my most sincere thanks to purplethunder3121!

P3121 hooked me up with a link to watch "Porky's" online! I am forever grateful, purplethunder3121!

BECAUSE I JUST WATCHED "PORKY'S"!!!!!

To show you how important that is, here is the Porky's Viewing And Command Center I set up, just for this ocassion:

You need to get a TV! Porky's is better on a big screen. Everything is.

Ha! I agree! We have a giant TV at that house, along with a surround-sound set-up. But I was alone and wanted to watch this one by the fire, and the fireplace isn't in the same room as the big TV. So I improvised!

sexton said:

damosuzuki said:

it was this movie more than anything else that kept me from following through on watching every oscar nominee. i just don't have it in me to endure 161 minutes of grinding monotony. hats off to you for taking a bullet.

I can't remember the last time I looked at my watch that many times at the cinema.

It's that bad!? Even for film legend Scorsese?

Ace said:

damosuzuki said:

it's really pretty amazing that you can have so many seemingly incendiary elements in a movie, yet somehow manage to create something so trivial & boring.

.

and as a much more interesting counterpoint, i watched 'diary of a teenage girl' this evening, a film that mostly revolves around a hormonal 15 year old girl having an affair with her mother's 35 year old boyfriend. there's a fair bit of boobs & drugs here too, but the people, even at their worst, all manage to act like recognizable human beings, & it ends up being a touching film. life-affirming, even. 4/5

Yeah, I think I heard good things about this.

I coincidently know the teenage girl (the author of the original book on which it was based), now grown and a mother of two. But I still haven't seen this.... Don't tell her!

ufoclub said:

sexton said:

I can't remember the last time I looked at my watch that many times at the cinema.

It's that bad!? Even for film legend Scorsese?

Most of the reviews I've seen for Silence from both critics and general audiences are actually good so my opinion is in the minority. But the few bad reviews I read echo my sentiments.

ufoclub said:

Ace said:

Yeah, I think I heard good things about this.

I coincidently know the teenage girl (the author of the original book on which it was based), now grown and a mother of two. But I still haven't seen this.... Don't tell her!

hah, that's really neat. i'm actually heading down to the library this morning to pick up her book - i put it on hold immedediately after finishing the movie.

.

if you have 102 free minutes this weekend, i'd cast a vote for trying to see the movie. it's really great.

berberian sound studios - british sound engineer travels to italy to work on what he believes to be a film about horses, but is in fact an italian slasher movie. definitely has a strong 'mulholland drive' feel - by the end, you're no longer sure whether you're still watching the movie or the film within the film. pretty good. 3.5/5.

[Edited 2/11/17 6:47am]

Trolls (2016) - After the Bergens invade Troll Village, Poppy, the happiest Troll ever born, and the curmudgeonly Branch set off on a journey to rescue her friends.

My blood sugar rose to dangerous levels after watching this sickeningly sweet concoction. 1.5/5

The Salesman (2016) - Forushande (The Salesman) is the story of a couple whose relationship begins to turn sour during their performance of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman.

Near excellent like every other film I've seen directed by Asghar Farhadi. 4.5/5

Last night we settled in to watch "Central Intelligence". Turns out that movie is no longer on pay-per-view but is on HBO. And allegedly Directv lets you restart a program, no matter how long it's been on. So that's what we did with "Central Intelligence", which had started about an hour ago on HBO. Score!

But just as we got to the part where The Rock had reconnected with The Kevin Hart, the movie jumped to live TV. The Rock had gone from Fat The Rock to The Rock, while The Kevin Hart was still The Kevin Hart, but they had advanced to killing bad guys. WTH?!? And I couldn't be kind and rewind! Major bummer.

So I went to the next showing of "Central Intelligence" and hit the Record button. You'll have to wait until I watch it to find out how much carnage The Rock and The Kevin Hart create.

Now I had to pick a new movie. Using Directv's absymal Search function, I found "Mechanic: Resurrection". Here's all you need to know about "Mechanic: Resurection":

But first, have you ever seen a sentence that had two correctly-used colons? Me neither! Did I just make grammatical history?!?!?

So anyway, here's all you need to know about "Mechanic: Ressurection": (I did it again! )

My review of the movie I didn't watch is going to be longer than the movie I did watch.

If you want to watch "Mechanic: Resurrection" then turn off your brain. You won't need it. It's a boring, by-the-numbers hostage movie. Jason Statham kills many bad guys. The only unanswered question about this movie is - (note my restraint in NOT using a colon there)

Why isn't Jessica Alba our biggest female movie star?!? She is 100 times more attractive and screen-worthy than any of the Jennifers (Lawrence, Garner or Lopez), and she blows away all the Female Actors Who've Been Around For Fifteen Years But I Never Watch Their Movies (Scarlett Johannsen, Kate Beckingsale, Emily Blunt, Emma Stone and all that group).

She's like a hot Meryl Streep!

I rate "Mechanic: Resurrection": thusly: (I am The King of Colons!)

One and one-half colons out of five colons. Which, upon further reflection, actually rates it as a colon and a period. And get your mind out of the gutter!

.

[Edited 2/12/17 6:33am]

The next-to-last movie I watched (or second-to-next-to-last movie, if you count that small portion of "Central Intelligence") was one that surely had Major Hit written all over it. It was a boxing movie, and it starred Sylvester Stallone, Robert DeNiro and Kevin Hart! (BTW, he's not "The Kevin Hart" unless he's paired with The Rock. In fact, anyone paired with The Rock also gets The in front of their name, just because).

I watched "Grudge Match"!

Here you have a movie about two dudes who hate each other and who had both been Light Heavyweight Champions of the World. They are both from Pittsburgh and - trust me, this cannot be said enough - they hate each other. They fought twice. DeNiro barely beat Stallone the first time, going almost the entire 15 rounds. Then Stallone beat DeNiro to a pulp in the rematch, knocking him out in four rounds.

Which means they HAD to have a third match, right?

Wrong!

It turns out that Stallone's love of his life, Kim Basinger, had slept with scumbag DeNiro and got pregnant. This made Stallone really, really mad, which lead to his four-round beatdown of DeNiro. Of course as we find out later, Basinger only slept with DeNiro because she mistakenly thought Stallone had fooled around on her, but he hadn't. Rather than trying to find out the facts, Basinger boinks DeNiro and basically ruins everyone's lives.

Stallone is so mad that he decides to take away the one thing DeNiro wants more than anything in the world - a chance at redemption. So he retires from boxing, leaving DeNiro to a life of "I could have beat him!" ravings.

DeNiro goes on to be a financial success in industries associated with scuzzballs - used car lots; bars and restaurants; etc. He's not a man of any discernable morals but I guess he's not a crook.

Stallone immediately goes broke and goes back to work at the steel mill, where he is the beloved "Champ".

Fast forward 30 years. Some video game dudes have a boxing game and they want to film Stallone and DeNiro for a throwback "What Would Have Happened?" feature in their game. They approach Kevin Hart, whose father had been the movie version of Don King, and who had managed both Stallone and DeNiro back in the day. In fact, Stallone asserts that movie Don King stole all his money and that's why he's broke. So he doesn't have a favorable first impression of Kevin Hart.

But he needs money, and DeNiro figures this is his way of getting that third bout, so they both agree, Hart tricks them into showing up at the video shoot at the same time and of course, they get into a fight. This gives Kevin Hart a brilliant idea - how about a REAL fight? The third bout, albeit thirty years later! We'll call it...

GRUDGEMENT DAY.

Stallone is against it but then he gets laid off at the mill so in desperation, he agrees. DeNiro, of course, was ready to go from the outset. So now we have the standard training montages. Stallone is in great shape and really all he needs to do is work on his legs. DeNiro, on the other hand, is fat and portly, so he needs to work on everything. There's only one person who can do that:

The son he had with Kim Basinger, who he has never met!

The son shows up at the gym and says, "I'm your son". So they have coffee. DeNiro explains that he stayed out of the son's life because Basinger asked him to. "I respected her wishes!!!!" he screams but all the really means is "To me, that was awesome because it meant I could continue drinking, gambling, whoring and carousing without having to worry about some kid all the time!" DeNiro probably wouldn't have been a very good dad.

But the son is. He has a Precocious Male Child™. The Precocious Male Child™ knows all the answers, except that he doesn't get why DeNiro thinks his father going by the initials "BJ" is funny. So DeNiro explains what a "BJ" is to the Precocious Male Child™ although he uses the euphemism "Butterscotch Jellybeans" for what it really means. It's hard to believe that a guy once thought of as the greatest actor on the face of the earth does stuff like this now.

We go through a bunch of stuff, none of which is remarkable except that we find out that broke Sylvester Stallone has a $250,000 1970 Ford Shelby Mustang in his garage. He breaks it out when he re-connects with Kim Basinger. All is going well until some idiot rams into Stallone, wrecking the awesome car. "I never saw him!" says Stallone. You know what that means, right?

Stallone is blind in one eye. In case you aren't aware, that's not good if you're a boxer.

Unlike "Rocky II" his blindness didn't come from boxing but rather from an industrial accident at the steel mill. Which begs the question - why didn't he get a lawyer and get boodles of money from the steel mill for costing him an eye? But I digress.

Wait, here's another digression. During the promotional phase leading up to the fight, Stallone and DeNiro show up at an MMA event. They are not impressed. They tell the crowd that when they were growing up, they had a name for guys that used their feet when they fought - girls. The crowd boos.

And then Chael Sonnen shows up! If you know who Chael Sonnen is, you don't like him. If you DON'T know who he is, you don't like him anyway because who the heck is named "Chael"?!?

Chael Sonnen is a not-very-successful MMA fighter but a VERY successful loudmouth. He's a smack talker extraordinaire, even winning Jim Rome's Smack-Off one year (which is one of the reasons I don't listen to Romey Rome much any more. No respect). But Sonnen is also a real-life scuzzball.

His day job is/was as a Realtor. He got indicted and convicted for mortgage fraud.

His night job is MMA fighter. He got caught and banned for using steroids.

But he's a world-class loudmouth, so he shows up to defend MMA. Stallone makes a pithy comment and Sonnen slaps him. Bad move! Any devotee of the sweet science will tell you that a professional boxer would kill an MMA fighter in a fist fight - which is what Stallone does to Sonnen.

He knocks him out with one punch. Most satisfying scene in the movie!

Basinger, who has fallen back in love with Stallone, insists he not fight and he agrees. This REALLY makes DeNiro mad. Now, I don't remember exactly why, but Stallone changes his mind and the fight is on.

Amazingly, the fight has captured America's heart. They sell out the biggest arena in Pittsburgh, and sell the pay-per-view rights. They're all going to be rich! If Stallone survives. But luckily, DeNiro doesn't know Stallone is blind in one eye.

They box and it's pretty even, except that DeNiro is a cheater and hits Stallone after the bell. For some reason, DeNiro never figures out that the reason his left hand is so damaging to Stallone is that Stallone can't see it. He just thinks he's God's Gift to Old Man Boxing.

Stallone's right eye is about to fall out but he won't quit. Kim Basinger is distraught and figures the thing to do is tell DeNiro's son/trainer about Stallone's blindness. Incredibly, the son tells DeNiro and tells him, "You have to come right at him, It's not fair to beat him with punches he can't see". Of course DeNiro says to heck with that! But then he remembers that a week ago, he was placed in charge of the Precocious Male Child™ and left him in a bar while he was boinking a cocktail waitress in his Escalade. Here's what happened:

The Precocious Male Child™ got tired of waiting for DeNiro so he goes out to the Escalade and turns it on. Now, even though the Precocious Male Child™ cannot reach the brake pedal, he is able to take the Escalade out of Park and into Drive. It's at this point that DeNiro and the cocktail waitress realize that the Precocious Male Child™ is in the car and that they'd better stop boinking and get the Precocious Male Child™ to hit the brakes.

The Precocious Male Child™ does, just before they ram a car. "No harm, no foul!" says DeNiro, except the car they almost rammed was a cop car. DeNiro gets busted for various offenses, and his son has to come to the police station to pick up his Precocious Male Child™. The son breaks up with DeNiro but somehow they get back together in time for the fight.

I wrote the previous two paragraphs to solidify my trademark of the phrase "Precocious Male Child™".

Back to the fight. DeNiro wants the Precocious Male Child™ to respect him. Now even though the Precocious Male Child™ knows nothing about boxing (but plenty about Butterscotch Jellybeans!), and won't remember any of this a year from now, DeNiro decides to be honorable and go right at Stallone for the last round.

Stallone pummels DeNiro and wins the fight on a split decision. And gets to keep his eye, so it's a win-win all the way around.

He buys a TV so his trainer, Carl Reiner, can watch "Dancing With The Stars". He settles down with Kim Basinger. Kevin Hart ends up trying to set up another rematch, but this one is with Evander Holyfield and Mike Tyson.

And they all lived happily ever after!

"Grudge Match" is really only for the die-st of diehard Stallone/boxing/KimBasinger/Kevin Hart/Precocious Male Child™ fans. It's really not very good, which is why I don't feel guilty for not telling you there was a spoiler coming. This review is all you need.

"Grudge Match" is like watching Molly Hatchett. You remember Molly Hatchett? They were an awesome Southern rock band in the '70's and all their albums had covers like this:



I never saw the actual guys in Molly Hatchett back then but I have to assume they were all big tough hombres, with long hair and thick mustaches. But today?

Here's their lead singer:





You don't want to see five guys that look like that, do you? Well, even though Stallone has kept in incredible shape for a dude his age, it all goes away when he takes off his shirt. It's horrible! He looks great with a shirt ON, creepy with a shirt OFF. They painted over most of his tattoos or he'd have looked even worse, what with an entire back and two shoulders' worth of saggy tattoos.

And the Precocious Male Child™ will wear your nerves OUT.

Therefore, I have to give "Grudge Match" only one Left Jab You Can't See Coming out of five Left Jabs You Can't See Coming.

RodeoSchro said:

... Jessica Alba ... and she blows away all the Female Actors Who've Been Around For Fifteen Years But I Never Watch Their Movies (Scarlett Johannsen, Kate Beckingsale, Emily Blunt, Emma Stone and all that group).


.

[Edited 2/12/17 6:33am]

i just pictured under the skin, love & friendship & la la land with jessica alba in the lead. that makes for quite a mental image.

blow out (1981) - i tend to revisit brian de palma's 'remake' of blow-up far more often than i watch the original. i'd never say it's a better film, but i do think it's really great, filled with memorable images & moments. 4.5/5.

damosuzuki said:

RodeoSchro said:

... Jessica Alba ... and she blows away all the Female Actors Who've Been Around For Fifteen Years But I Never Watch Their Movies (Scarlett Johannsen, Kate Beckingsale, Emily Blunt, Emma Stone and all that group).


.

[Edited 2/12/17 6:33am]

i just pictured under the skin, love & friendship & la la land with jessica alba in the lead. that makes for quite a mental image.

I know, it's better, right?!? I'd maybe even watch a Ryan Gosling movie if Jessica Alba was in it.

damosuzuki said:

blow out (1981) - i tend to revisit brian de palma's 'remake' of blow-up far more often than i watch the original. i'd never say it's a better film, but i do think it's really great, filled with memorable images & moments. 4.5/5.

I really liked that movie.

RodeoSchro said:

damosuzuki said:

i just pictured under the skin, love & friendship & la la land with jessica alba in the lead. that makes for quite a mental image.

I know, it's better, right?!? I'd maybe even watch a Ryan Gosling movie if Jessica Alba was in it.

hahaha... we are all entitled to our preferences.

split - definitely elevated by a very uninhibited performance by james mcavoy. a little too long, maybe, but good fun. 3.5/5

With all the outrage about Netflix's upcoming Dear White People I decided to rewatch the movie.

Sure it's preachy, but that's the point. And sure the characters are stereotypical caricatures, but that goes for all the characters black and white, so any outrage would seem unfounded.

Overall, an excellent film, highly recommended! I like it better than most Spike Lee movies.

That said, I'll be skipping the Netflix series. Not because it offends me but rather because I'm tired of tv shows that adapt feature length movies by stretching the story into a whole season. The movie made it's points perfectly, it's unnecessary to retell the same story or even continue it.

Don't wait for Netflix. Watch the movie!!

[Edited 2/12/17 11:57am]

damosuzuki said:

blow out (1981) - i tend to revisit brian de palma's 'remake' of blow-up far more often than i watch the original. i'd never say it's a better film, but i do think it's really great, filled with memorable images & moments. 4.5/5.

I would say Blow Out is better than Blow Up. Much better.

damosuzuki said:

split - definitely elevated by a very uninhibited performance by james mcavoy. a little too long, maybe, but good fun. 3.5/5

Are you a fan of Unbreakable? I'm looking forward to future movies in the new Shyamalan "universe"!!

djThunderfunk said:

damosuzuki said:

split - definitely elevated by a very uninhibited performance by james mcavoy. a little too long, maybe, but good fun. 3.5/5

Are you a fan of Unbreakable? I'm looking forward to future movies in the new Shyamalan "universe"!!

i haven't seen unbreakable since it was released, and i don't really remember anything about it, so the final scene of the movie didn't really mean anything to me. i guess almost everyone knows the link between the movies now, so it's not all that spoilery to discuss their connection.

.

when mcavoy's character did some of the things he did in split, i thought it seemed really out of step with everything that had happened up to that point. having read a little further, i now get it - but at the time, it seemed to come out of a completely different film.

[Edited 2/12/17 11:51am]

damosuzuki said:

djThunderfunk said:

Are you a fan of Unbreakable? I'm looking forward to future movies in the new Shyamalan "universe"!!

i haven't seen unbreakable since it was released, and i don't really remember anything about it, so the final scene of the movie didn't really mean anything to me. i guess almost everyone knows the link between the movies now, so it's not all that spoilery to discuss their connection.

.

when mcavoy's character did some of the things he did in split, i thought it seemed really out of step with everything that had happened up to that point. having read a little further, i now get it - but at the time, it seemed to come out of a completely different film.

[Edited 2/12/17 11:51am]

In addition to that final scene, there's a short scene in the middle of Unbreakable that features Mcavoy's character as a child with his mother. It made no sense at the time, but 17 years later we get the payoff...