Finally got around to seeing Spotlight. Recommended. I especially liked the very matter of fact way they handled the subject matter. It didn’t get overy melodramatic or preachy. Parts were quietly devastating: Rachel McAdams interviewing that former priest on his doorstep; Michael Keaton’s Robby realizing he had all the information to blow the whistle decades before.
I really liked that they filmed it in harsh light. The office scenes made the people look like they were in ugly fluorescent lighting. The outside scenes also had a sharp almost washed out edge. No pretty camera angles and soft lighting for this movie.
Also, did Mark Ruffalo run in every single scene he was in???
True Lies 1994 Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis.
I had seen pieces of it channel hopping on tv. This was the first time I’ve watched the entire movie.
It’s amazing how well Schwarzenegger does in comedy scenes. Jamie’s transformation from housewife to funny spy is equally good.
Next year will be the 30th anniversary. Hope James Cameron releases something special. True Lies is still not available for streaming on Amazon. I tried to rent it tonight. Had to use an alternate source. There is a blu-ray import on Amazon.
Finally got around to watching BARBARIAN. What a lot of fun that was, and it twisted and turned quite a bit. The acting was great, in particular Justin Long was a terrific asshole.
Event the title is 100% irrelevant to the plot. They literally wrote “barbarian” on the top of a page for the script and it ended up the title despite having zero connection.
It’s funny, after they said it was located on Barbary Street, I didn’t think anymore about it. And 100% agree that you should know nothing about it when you see it.
It’s OK, but a rather slow opening 25 minutes or so. I don’t know. I just didn’t find the whole thing all that engaging or funny. Or fun. It was a middling success, but I doubt I will think much of it in a week.
It was OK and I admit, the ending was terrific. But I found the whole thing to be less than its parts. I really found Greatest Showman to be the best musical movie I’ve seen the past decade or so. Perhaps I’m just too grumpy and settled at this point, but the whole thing didn’t make the impact to me I bet it made on others.
Just a miss for me, but I do see how impactful and impressive it could be for others.
An animated movie from the good, but not quite always great, director Makoto Shinkai. Some are enamored with him and worship his movies, but I have found him to be highly hit or miss. This is a 65 minute movie, quite short, and it is nothing but a slice of life movie. Nothing too special here and even the animation is only OK.
I do recommend his movie “Your Name”, though. Very good. Skip this one.
I just finished watching The Warriors (1979) for about the millionth time. It’s my favorite movie; it has been since I saw it in the theater when I was 14. They just featured it on the Scott Hasn’t Seen podcast and it warmed my nostalgia cockles. They came up with some cogent analysis that I enjoyed, even when they were laughing at the absurdity of things. Luckily, they all loved it so I was happy.
The other day I watched From Here to Eternity (1953) for the first time. Great performances by Burt Lancaaster, Frank Sinatra and especially Montgomery Clift, who always delivers, but good god what a sappy chick flick. For most of the movie I was rooting for the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor to start. I suppose they did the best within their limitations, but the book apparently is much grittier and profane so it had to be scrubbed for the times.
by the way, since the original was mentioned up thread but I remember this :
@Spice_Weasel you should read the book Granted the Johnny Fontaine/Lucy/Las Vegas subplots aren’t considered great there are a few things that the book explains better and I think the book version of Kay was better than the movie version…
One of my faves, and possibly Arnold’s best film! I think I may be due for a re-watch even though I’ve seen it at least twice!
This is the kind of stuff I look for in this thread – tips on movies that maybe I should have heard about but didn’t. I love horror movies and will give this a watch. Thank you.
I’d agree with you on La La Land. It was good, I enjoyed it, but all the fuss over it? A bit OTT for me. The best musical I’ve seen in recent years is Sing Street. Thoroughly enjoyable.
Charade (1963) (Amazon Prime). Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn; directed by Stanley Donen as a Hitchcock-lite. Bad guys think Audrey has something valuable but she has no idea.
Cary is charming, Audrey wears lots of Givenchy, lots of scenic Paris locations. The way the Maguffin is hidden is quite clever. A lot of fun.
If it was re-made (and given a PG-13, which it would have been back in the day); I’d make the villains (George Kennedy, James Coburn) more menacing instead of just being buffoonish. And give Audrey more agency, rather than just a damsel in distress.
And raise the stakes to account for inflation. All this fuss is over something worth $250,000…which now just seems kind of silly.
I tried to watch Charade recently on Prime, but the picture and sound quality were so poor I gave up within 5 minutes. I’m not sure if that is a problem with the copy available to Amazon or if all media of the film are poor.
Hairspray (1988). We did our monthly outdoor movie night last night and I had the not so easy task of finding a movie entertaining and suitable for the usual 13 adults and one visiting seven-year-old. This was perfect. The most shocking things (even to some adults) were anachronistic words like “negro” and “retard” which were explained to the kid by his stepdad. There are some wonderful progressively subversive scenes in this film that got initial uneasy chuckles that quickly turned into uncontrollable laughter. The scene with Penny’s mom stranded in the black ghetto had them rolling in the aisles. I was surprised at how few of the adults had never seen this movie or had only seen the musical with John Travolta. This was probably our best received movie night of the year so far. (Still trying to shake loose that “Mashed Potato” ear worm, though.)
