At the request of Auntie Pam I’m going to do a monthly thread for movie updates. CD, TV, in the Theater, whatever you wish.
Let us know what you’ve seen and if you liked it. Please do be courteous about spoilers though.
I went to The Spirit last week and as I mentioned in another thread, I thought it was bad. I didn’t know the source material, I was just looking for a fun, fast movie.
I nearly fell asleep. There were some smokin’ hot women though. That is worth something. But I recommend against seeing it.
I am in the middle of *Cashback *which is a quirky little film where the narrarator believes he can stop time. I’m not sure, to be honest, if he *believes *he can or *actually *can. I watch when I’m on the elliptical machine and lately I’ve been either not walking (far too often) or walking outside, so I have no idea when I’ll finish it.
I’ve all but stopped seeing movies in theatres. From Netflix and Blockbuster, I’ve been watching mostly TV series: Nip/Tuck, Battlestar Galactica, Wildfire, Eli Stone, Point Pleasant, St. Elsewhere, Party of Five.
Were you aware this movie was based on an 18 minute short film by the same guy? You can see it on the DVD A Collection of 2005 Academy Award Nominated Short Films.
I’m working my way through the 1967 BBC adaptation of The Forsyte Sage. I remember when I started reading the books. I hated Soames and hoped he’d be a minor character. I’m glad he wasn’t. His makeup is great, but old Soames sure looks like Boris Karloff.
I haven’t seen the newer adaptation but I can’t imagine that it could be better. Now I want to get Upstairs Downstairs and The Pallisers. And Poldark!
I was given a bunch of DVD’s for Christmas and heartily recommend:
The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada There Will Be Blood The Orphanage – Guillermo del Toro produced – it’s billed as horror but it’s really a mother-child love story and it’s brilliant.
Prince Caspian is my least favorite of the books, but they managed to make the movie even worse than I was expecting. Peter Dinklage’s performance was the best thing about the movie.
I’m halfway through watching the single season of Freaks and Geeks. It’s growing on me. My husband was in high school in 1980 and he’s getting a kick out of the period stuff.
When I’m finished with that I’m going to try Supernatural, recommended by jsgoddess.
You have all that goodness in front of you? Congrats.
All shows are on hiatus, so I’ve been catching up a little. **Legend of the seeker **is only worth it because of Bruce Spence, but even he can’t save this trash. I’m getting to like Crusoe. It’s a bit corny, but the production values are good (except the CGI ships on the horizon), but I’m sure it’ll die soon. Curious, since good looking men and women mixed with pirate topping should draw a big audience, and there’s no arc problem either.
I’ve also caught a BBC show called **Apparitions **which is… different. About a Catholic Priest in the UK who performs excorcisms contrary to the orders of the Holy See.
In a few weeks everything is gonna get rolling again and I’m giddy about the awfulness that is **24 **and cautiosly optimistic about the resolution of BSG. Hopefully **Lost **will continue the good momentum they had last season. Will never get all the answers, but it looks like they’re gearing up for some kind of resolution that won’t suck.
Nothing really, as I’ve given up on Desperate Housewives and the pending return of Lost is not exactly blowing my skirt up, but I am awaiting the return of The Closer and Burn Notice.
My brother and I have found a new obsession (House MD), and I’ve seen the second season and half of the third. We bought all four seasons on DVD, so I’ll be watching those for a while.
I’ve also been trying to “catch up” on old, classic movies that I’ve never seen. I saw The Wizard of Oz and To Kill a Mockingbird (both fantastic). I watched Gladiator on a whim, expecting it to be really boring. But I was actually amazed at how good it was. I didn’t look away from the screen once, the characters and story were so engaging. Also saw 300, which was both better and worse than I expected. I saw Poltergeist, or rather half of it. I just couldn’t get into it for some reason. Troll 2 (which some say is the worst movie ever made), and yeah, it was pretty bad (and funny). The Exorcist, which was a little bit over the top for me (though I can see how it was scary in the '70s). And last night we caught Benjamin Button and Seven Pounds. I was blown away by BB, thinking it would be endlessly slow and uninteresting. It was funny and sweet and sentimental and really lovely; I’d definitely see it again. Seven Pounds was actually not that great.
I’ve discovered that I prefer to watch series DVDs (Netflix) rather than movies, I guess because they’re shorter. The problem is that I’ve run out of really good series, so I’m starting with Season One of X-Files and hoping for the best. I’m also watching NUMB3RS, which isn’t wonderful, but it’ll do until something better comes along.
Watched Live Free or Die Hard last night, am in the middle of watching the Mitchell and Webb comedy Magicians right now.
Telly-wise, I’m going through *Scrubs *from season one and am interested in looking at a new series starting on ITV tomorrow night called Demons, which stars Phillip Glenister from Life on Mars / Ashes to Ashes. I do suspect it might be really bad, though.
There was a Planet of the Apes marathon this weekend on one of the movie channels. I watched the first one with my kids last night, and they had more patience with it than I expected. The final scene was mostly spoiled for them because they’ve seen parodies of it in various cartoons.
I had forgotten how pathetic the spaceship looks in the opening scenes (guess they used all their budget on costumes) and I didn’t remember Heston’s bizarre overacting in places.
I bought myself a portable DVD player and have been watching DVD’s as I work on jewelry lately. I bought the series ‘Firefly’, and have watched the first two episodes. Good so far – I know there’a a lot of love out there for this series.
Watched Lars and the Real Girl the other day, and ended up liking it a whole lot. Definitely not the smutty humor I half expected from the bare-bones version of the premise – it was a wonderful meditation on the nature of love. Some people might find it sappy, but I gave it 4 stars (and I’m very sparing with my stars).
For the benefit of you foreign-types, think of a televisual blend of Buffy and Sanctuary with just a hint of Torchwood. In this case, Buffy is a boy and Glenister sports one of the worst US accents these ears have ever heard.
I am enjoying Leverage on TNT. I also got caught up on Private Practice thanks to a marathon. I also got my brother hooked on How I Met Your Mother.
Movie-wise, over the holiday break, I basically wore out On Demand. *Don’t Mess With Zohan *was actually much funnier than I expected! National Treasure 2 sucked sooo bad. Did the writers really think that mentioning random Indian tribe names with no regard to geography would fly? Hellboy 2 was pretty good too.
Not really TV or movies but I have been adoring Drunk History on funnyordie.com