MUST-SEE MOVIES

[homer]

Juror #2 was solid. Straightforward courtroom drama...with a twist.

[RobertR]

I'm a fan of the new Nosferatu. Gorgeous. No real surprises, other than Orlok looks like book Dracula, but about as good as you can do this story.

[TURBO]

A Complete Unknown

Good movie, a must if you are a true fan of Dylan.  I consider myself a so-so fan, and I must say, being as familiar with his music as I am, it really enabled me to relate to the movie more than if I only knew his hits.

I have some other opinions about the movie, but to share them might cause me to spoil some things for those who haven't seen it, so I will abstain.

[TURBO]

Cape Fear - Meh.  There was a time when I thought this was a good movie.  That time has passed.  Goner

Cedar Rapids - Funny little flick, worth seeing if you haven't.  Keeper

Chloe - keeper

[wallus]

Went to see A Complete Unknown with my girlfriend. It was a little disappointing honestly. I wish they would have spent more time on his life instead of making it mostly a big concert. It would have been pretty bad without Timothee Chalamet as he is an outstanding actor.

[TURBO]

On 1/1/2025 at 3:01 PM, RobertR said:

I'm a fan of the new Nosferatu. Gorgeous. No real surprises, other than Orlok looks like book Dracula, but about as good as you can do this story.

Saw it today, and it was great!  Great acting, believable storyline, just a solid take on a classic.

[homer]

Wife is out of town so a couple of movie nights for homer.

Finally got around to watching Oppenheimer (wife can't make it through a 3 hour movie). It was very good but I had the same qualms with it that I do with most Nolan movies....too much exposition. Dude thinks he has to explain every little detail to the audience through dialog. It's annoying. I didn't care for the editing either but I guess to keep a modern day audience's attention for three hours you need to quick cut almost the whole time. I really dug the way the final act played out story-wise. It was almost like a "whodunit meets courtroom drama".

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice - it was fine. I'm not sure Burton's visual style works as well as it used to. It was so unique and singular back in the 80s, 90s but now it's "we've seen this before". I didn't think Keaton had the same energy as the first one. To be expected since he's in his 70s (wow, I feel old) but that drove a lot of the pace and humor of the first movie and it just didn't quite get there this time around. 

A Quite Place II - Loved it. I thought it was on par with the quality of the first film. The premise is a good one and Krasinksi uses it to his advantage, particularly with the sound design. We've seen the "person with headphones doesn't hear the killer coming before" but this takes it up a notch. His jump scares are also more complex than "cat jumping out of closet, then a beat later the killer busts through a window".  I hope he keeps making horror movies. 

[sveumrules]

RIP David Lynch.

Can only imagine what him and Ueck are talking about in line.

[homer]

On 1/16/2025 at 1:50 PM, sveumrules said:

RIP David Lynch.

Can only imagine what him and Ueck are talking about in line.

I watched The Fablemans on my day off yesterday. He has a cameo as a curmudgeonly John Ford, which was pretty epic. 

[sveumrules]

1 hour ago, homer said:

I watched The Fablemans on my day off yesterday. He has a cameo as a curmudgeonly John Ford, which was pretty epic. 

Haven’t seen the whole movie yet, but did watch his scene. Perfect casting.

Also really enjoyed his performance in Lucky as one of the local characters opposite Harry Dean Stanton,

One comforting thing about Lynch passing is he had plenty of longtime collaborators waiting for him on the other side with HDS, the Log Lady, Jack Nance, and the rest.

Also thought it was somewhat apropos that fire was so elemental to his work and it was a fire of almost unbelievable intensity and scale that more or less took him out and was one of the last things he experienced.

[TURBO]

DVD Purge:

Cat's Eye - Back in the day, I liked this movie.  In this day, it is just meh.  Gone

Clerks - When this was released, it may have been different than anything before it.  Today, it doesn't deserve the praise that it still gets.  Goner

Clerks II - Goner

Clerks III - Goner

[pitchleague]

Surprised that there was no Oscars thread this year.  Not that I have seen many of the nominated films (I haven’t; only a few).

I will admit that it’s difficult listening to Nick Offerman as the announcer and impatiently waiting for some sort of Ron Swanson-type of commentary.

[Outlander]

I'm already annoyed with the Oscars because Bob Uecker wasn't even included in the online in memoriam.

https://aframe.oscars.org/news/in-memoriam

 

[RobertR]

On 3/2/2025 at 7:40 PM, pitchleague said:

Surprised that there was no Oscars thread this year.  Not that I have seen many of the nominated films (I haven’t; only a few).

I will admit that it’s difficult listening to Nick Offerman as the announcer and impatiently waiting for some sort of Ron Swanson-type of commentary.

I thought about it, but didn't think there was much interest this year.

As far as the Oscars go, I like and respect ANORA so I was okay with it winning even if I'm not passionate about it. After a big studio blockbuster winning everything last year, it was the right year for a little independent, imo.

As far as the ceremony went, I was hoping for a few more surprises, but nothing egregious won, albeit I thought both "Supporting" winners were category fraud.

I thought the ceremony itself was fine. Conan was silly and non-controversial and while it wasn't his best, he was always welcome. They presented the In Memoriam segment so that you could see and read everything, without annoying cutaways to on stage performers, which is a low bar, but one they passed this year. Yes, Uecker and a few others would have been nice to see included, but there were some huge names this year so I understand if not everyone could be included. I liked the return of clips. Starting at 6 and finishing before 10 is a plus. I didn't really understand why we had a 7 minute Bond medley though in a year without a Bond film.

 

Not the best ceremony but far from the worst.

 

[TURBO]

Went and saw The Monkey today.

Not a must see, but I found it to be pretty good.  Kept me interested anyway.

Not DVD worthy, but glad I went and saw what all the buzz was about.

[RobertR]

12 hours ago, TURBO said:

Went and saw The Monkey today.

Not a must see, but I found it to be pretty good.  Kept me interested anyway.

Not DVD worthy, but glad I went and saw what all the buzz was about.

Yeah, not great but it knew its story was silly and embraced it. 

I had fun. I did wonder what a Sam Raimi version would be like though.

[RobertR]

Went and saw Black Bag yesterday and had a great time. Kind of a combination of Le Carre' and The Thin Man. Lean and fun. See it with your spouse or significant other.

 

Saw Mickey 17 earlier in the week and while it's not the weakest Bong Joon-ho film, it's also well below the best. It's kind of like someone wanting to meld Brazil and Star Wars. It plays like something of a greatest hits package, Okja meets Snowpiercer and has a fine lead performance,but it's very messy and runs a good 15 to 20 minutes too long.

[RobertR]

This seems to be the right place to mention that I saw EEPHUS over the weekend and I think people here would enjoy it. It's fairly bittersweet, albeit not overly sentimental about an end of an era for a pair of rec league teams that are losing their field for a school sometime in the '90s. Undoubtedly it's for the overall good, but the love of the game holds part of this community together, even if their time playing is coming to a close. There's lots of trash talking, abeit it's good natured. Especially compared to the coming internet era. Lots of subtext to read, even if it doesn't build to a rousing ending.

[wallus]

Saw Alto Knights (apparently I was one of the few). Great sets but I don't know if the story was interesting enough for a movie 

[RobertR]

I haven't seen it yet, but it's been awhile since I've heard buzz on a film like for Sinners.

[nate82]

I am kind of excited for this movie: 

It released earlier this month and I just haven’t had the time to see it yet.

[TURBO]

Double dip at the movies today.  Makes a great day when you can catch two movies and both were GREAT!

Sinners:  Thought it was an awesome and new take on a vampire movie.  Long, but didn't feel that way.

The Amateur:  Loved this movie from start to finish!  It was hard to get used to Freddie Mercury turning into a kickass killer, but I got over it.

[RobertR]

The Milwaukee Film Festival started yesterday and goes until May 8th.

The Shrouds is on my list, but not until next weekend.

[wallus]

The Amateur is fantastic. Smart, well written and no pointless down time. If you haven't seen it, put it on your list. Rami Malek is great as usual.

[homer]

Finally got around to seeing Anora over the weekend  I had no idea it was that funny. I was laughing out loud quite a bit. A very good movie but seems like an odd Oscar winner, tbh, compared to a lot of best pictures winners over the years.