What was the last film you watched?

[James from London]

Oh wow. I'd love to know more about this. If memory serves I've only ever done this twice. And only one of those was purely down to my enjoyment of the film.

It was just me realising "Oh no, this film is not for me." Life is Beautiful was another one.

 

[Willie Oleson]

Another good choice! I think I'm finally getting the hang of it, although my movie binge was more like a therapy to get Sons & Daughters out of my system.
But now it's time to Return To SoapLand.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

it's time to Return To SoapLand.

In the most dramatic fashion possible, let's hope.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

It was just me realising "Oh no, this film is not for me." Life is Beautiful was another one.

It took me by surprise because it's difficult for me to think of anything not being for you, James.

And I mean that in the most complimentary way. It's a testament to your open-mindedness.

 

[James from London]

It took me by surprise because it's difficult for me to think of anything not being for you, James.

And I mean that in the most complimentary way. It's a testament to your open-mindedness.

Ha, thanks! Well, there's a certain type of cloying, whimsical humour that leaves me cold. If I remember correctly, that's what Greek Wedding and Life is Beautiful had in common, but it's a very long time since I (didn't) watch them so I can't be totally sure.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

Ha, thanks! Well, there's a certain type of cloying, whimsical humour that leaves me cold. If I remember correctly, that's what Greek Wedding and Life is Beautiful had in common

I've never seen either. And now I don't think I'd care to.

When it came out I mentally added MBFGW to my viewing bucket list. Now I've removed it, so that's one less thing for me to feel guilty over not having done. Thanks.

 

[Willie Oleson]

This movie blew me away.

 

[Willie Oleson]

 

[Mel O'Drama]

I was expecting this to be one of those "re-imaginings" so was surprised to find it was almost a frame by frame remake of the original:

 

[JROG]

INSIDE OUT (for the second time. Still a wonderful, creative, imaginative film).

 

[Toni]

I watched a seemingly insignificant little movie, "S1m0ne". As the title may imply (for the 1 and 0), it´s about CGI, A.I.´s and what not. To sum it up in a sentence, it´s "Tootsie" but instead of the protagonist cross-dressing, we have him using a revolutionary program to "invent" an actress and do movies with her. The guy is a director in crisis whose last films have been bombs and the story doesn´t exactly know what it wants to be until the last half-hour: it becomes a Capra-esque tale with touches of Billy Wilder all around, and not too much of a budget, aside from the program to reproduce the image of the title lady.

I thought it would be much worse, but actually it´s one of these non-Christmassy movies that would be good to watch in the Christmas holidays

Spoiler

(happy ending! everybody´s happy!)

. Just the kind of films that Dustin Hoffman used to do in the 80s and 90s, before becoming the (wonderful) supporting actor he currently is. Of course, there is a slight critique of the movie industry, but obviously its makers didn´t want to go there, though it really reminded me of a few Blake Edwards´ movies like "S.O.B." or "Ten". Funny that the guy´s daughter is played by a teenage Evan Rachel Wood, the girl with the lovely eyes, who I must admit I didn´t recognize at first, and I say this because almost two decades later, she went on to play herself a character very likely to S1m9ne in the TV show "Westworld".

Pacino tries very hard to turn all the scenes into gold (he succeeds 75% of times) but at least he leaves his touch of class and dignity in the movie, with no overacting here. With a better director, this could have been memorable though.

PS: More up-to-date today than in 2002, with all the fuss about the "Rogue" CGI´d actors, "Fast & Furious" resurrected one, and, what else, the shameful disaster that is (they say) the "Cats" movie.

 

[Seaviewer]

I was expecting this to be one of those "re-imaginings" so was surprised to find it was almost a frame by frame remake of the original:

I don't really get it. Live-action remakes of animated movies are bad enough but this one is just another kind of animation.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

I don't really get it. Live-action remakes of animated movies are bad enough but this one is just another kind of animation.

It was a little bizarre to get a little way into a film I was watching for the first time and realise I knew the rest of it almost verbatim.

At one point I began to wonder if they were even using the audio from the original version, but it seems not.

 

[Richard Channing]

Considering the awards it's won and been nominated for, and the fact that I am a Tarantino fan, I had high hopes for this, but I was a bit disappointed. It's visually impressive and the performances are good, but at the end of the day, a good chunk of those 2 hrs and 40 mins were kinda boring. Sure, there's some pretty exciting (actually pretty awesome) stuff in the last half an hour, but it took forever to get there and the last thing I expect to be in a Tarantino movie is bored. Despite some great scenes and elements, there just wasn't much of a story driving the movie forward.

 

[Ange]

A fall from Grace

 

[Mel O'Drama]

Into The Blue (1950)

 

[James from London]

I was completely gripped throughout. This quote from a review of the film sums it up for me:

"At any one time, nothing is happening, and everything is happening."

I´m talking about the gay favorite of 2018 "Call By Your Name". It should better be titled "Call Me Bi". I only liked the Italy scenery. Both leads are pathetically unexpressive and their characters are even more pathetic and undefined, and the writing is as outdated as Miss Piggy´s fake eyelashes. I didn´t expect this from such a talented writer as James Ivory but hey, I think the director here is the one to blame.

I didn´t buy the love story and most characters seem to be stupid in one or other way, which makes the film itself rather stupid too.

Gosh, I had the exact opposite reaction!

I also loved the songs in the film written and sung by Sufjan Stevens.

The song at the end is especially haunting (except I thought he was singing "Is it a video? Is it a video?" which I actually prefer).

 

[Ange]

Black & Blue

 

[Angela Channing]

Jojo Rabbit (2019).

Some of the reviews I read about this film said people will either love or hate this film. They were correct, I hated it. Even the stunning performance of the child star who had an engaging screen presence and was a brilliant actor, couldn't save this film for me.

 

[Angela Channing]

A Beautiful Day In The Neighbourhood (2019)

I don't know if this film was written with Tom Hanks in mind but there is no current actor that is better suited to play Fred Rogers than he.

I saw he recent documentary on Fred Rogers last year and was looking forward to see how they were going to make a film of his life. However, this isn't really a biopic, more of a story to illustrate how Mr Rogers could make anyone he met feel special and how he used his goodness to touch people's lives to help them become better people. I really liked this film and Tom Hanks didn't disappoint.