DVDs and Films You Have Watched Recently #2

[Astro Hollywood]

Here's a pretty cool FX reel for The Expendables. I'm presuming, as ultra manly men, we've all seen it already, because most of the good bits are in this video: http://wwfx.net/reel.php

[Stephanie]

Off to see The American tonight...

 

Last movie I saw was Seven Pounds (after seeing someone post about it in the tear-jerkers thread) and it was so heartbreaking! I love Will Smith and he didn't disappoint. Although I really need to stop watching such sad movies. I felt the impact of it for a couple of days, made me think about my own mortality. Rosario Dawson was a great as always too.

 

Saw Karate Kid (remake) last week too. As there was no way I was paying full price to watch it, we went to see it at the cheap theatre. Which is when a movie has been out for a while or doesn't do very well, they play it there. It's only $2 so I'll go and watch the movies I'm not sure about instead of paying $10.

 

I thought it was shit, quite frankly. Far too long and at one point I actually fell asleep.

 

The only other stuff that came out here recently is Takers, Lottery Ticket, Piranha 3D and The Last Exorcism.

 

The first three look like utter garbage. I refuse to pay to see ANYTHING with Chris Brown in it. As for The Last Exorcism, every Exorcism film I've ever seen (except The Exorcist) has been a massive fail.

Edited September 2, 2010 by Stephanie

[Georgie Pin]

On a less testicular note, I watched The Driver, one of the great underrated Hollywood films over the 1970s, in my opinion. At his best in the 70s and early 80s, Walter Hill was an amazing director - 48 Hours, Southern Comfort (which I'm watching tonight) and The Warriors are superb too. and I was hoping that the excellent Trespass in the early 90s might lead to a revival. But this is my favourite of his films.

 

Ryan O'Neill probably isn't the obvious candidate to play a moody and uncompromising getaway driver in a film, but he's excellent in this, and Bruce Dern, someone else who is incredibly underrated as an actor, is fantastic as his pursuer. And then there's a young Isabelle Adjani

 

It's just perfectly paced with a great ending, some obviously great car chases, and a tight plot.

 

9 cowboys out of 10.

 

Just bought The Warriors myself, gonna watch it this weekend. Southern Comfort is a fantastic film. The scene with the knife is brutal - always makes me wince.

[patiirc]

Just bought The Warriors myself, gonna watch it this weekend. Southern Comfort is a fantastic film. The scene with the knife is brutal - always makes me wince.

 

* Clink, Clink, Clink* War-we-ers come out play *Clink, Clink, Clink*

 

Amazing flim!

[Loki]

On a less testicular note, I watched The Driver, one of the great underrated Hollywood films over the 1970s, in my opinion. At his best in the 70s and early 80s, Walter Hill was an amazing director - 48 Hours, Southern Comfort (which I'm watching tonight) and The Warriors are superb too. and I was hoping that the excellent Trespass in the early 90s might lead to a revival. But this is my favourite of his films.

 

Ryan O'Neill probably isn't the obvious candidate to play a moody and uncompromising getaway driver in a film, but he's excellent in this, and Bruce Dern, someone else who is incredibly underrated as an actor, is fantastic as his pursuer. And then there's a young Isabelle Adjani

 

It's just perfectly paced with a great ending, some obviously great car chases, and a tight plot.

 

9 cowboys out of 10.

 

Just bought The Warriors myself, gonna watch it this weekend. Southern Comfort is a fantastic film. The scene with the knife is brutal - always makes me wince.

 

The Driver is truly excellent. You're now the first person apart from myself that's actually seen it to my knowledge.

[Devon Malcolm]

^ I heard that they were supposed to be doing a remake a while back but that rumour seems to have disappeared. There's also a 2 hour version in existence too that hopefully they may bung on a DVD one day.

 

On a less testicular note, I watched The Driver, one of the great underrated Hollywood films over the 1970s, in my opinion. At his best in the 70s and early 80s, Walter Hill was an amazing director - 48 Hours, Southern Comfort (which I'm watching tonight) and The Warriors are superb too. and I was hoping that the excellent Trespass in the early 90s might lead to a revival. But this is my favourite of his films.

 

Ryan O'Neill probably isn't the obvious candidate to play a moody and uncompromising getaway driver in a film, but he's excellent in this, and Bruce Dern, someone else who is incredibly underrated as an actor, is fantastic as his pursuer. And then there's a young Isabelle Adjani

 

It's just perfectly paced with a great ending, some obviously great car chases, and a tight plot.

 

9 cowboys out of 10.

 

Just bought The Warriors myself, gonna watch it this weekend. Southern Comfort is a fantastic film. The scene with the knife is brutal - always makes me wince.

 

Yeah, just watched it now, fantastic film. Cracking cast as well, I never realised that - Keith Carradine, Powers Boothe, Fred Ward, TK Carter - superb. I love the ending too, it's so unusual, but then the whole feel of the film is.

 

I think I'm going to continue the Walter Hill theme and get Trespass, which I would recommend to anyone who likes a bit of quality action, and 48 Hours, which was always better than Beverly Hill's Cop, for me.

[Twatters]

Eraserhead Well i'm not really sure what to make of it. But it's a very interesting film. And one you could talk about and have 100's of different theories for. It covers subjects such as relationships, life and death, depression and fatherhood but all in a very weird way. Strangely, i feel like i want to watch it again soon. I would like to hear other peoples thoughts on the film.

[Surf Digby]

After watching Rated X the other night, I was in the mood for something very sixties, and what was in the HMV bargain bin, but Easy Rider. What could be better?

 

A lot of things, probably. Maybe I had to be there, but I didn't enjoy it very much. It's plot is paper thin, and alluded to very rarely. Basically Dennis Hopper and Edge buy some drugs, then sell them again, then hide money in a motorbike and go riding. They have a few short, not particularly eventful incidents on the way. They meet Jack Nicholson, who's annoying. Then he dies, so Hopper and Rated R Fonda go to a whore house (or rather, they suddenly appear at one, even though they're still a couple of days riding away and they've just been beated almost to death) and decide not to bother shagging the whores, but instead walk around the town, then go to a cemetary and take acid, where one of the whores (played by Toni Basil of "Oh Micky you're so fine, you're so fine you blow my mind, hey Micky" fame) gets naked. Then they do a bit more riding and die.

 

Dennis Hopper is an irritating twat in this. So is Jack Nicholson. So are most of the other characters. Peter Fonda comes across as a nice middle class fella who would probably go back to being a teacher if his hippy mission didn't take off, but in the meantime is trying to look cool and aloof and just looking like he doesn't know how to cope with situations.

 

Nice scenery, lots of pointing the camera directly at the sun so you get rows of coloured polygons across the screen, lots of smoking, stupid Captain Scarlett-esque transitions, and a really filthy print transfer. If the film's so iconic you could make some effort to restore it. Toni Basil's actually quite attractive when not dressed as a mental cheerleader.

 

2 choppers out of 5.

[Loki]

Southern Comfort is a fantastic film. The scene with the knife is brutal - always makes me wince.

 

Yeah, just watched it now, fantastic film. Cracking cast as well, I never realised that - Keith Carradine, Powers Boothe, Fred Ward, TK Carter - superb. I love the ending too, it's so unusual, but then the whole feel of the film is.

 

I think I'm going to continue the Walter Hill theme and get Trespass, which I would recommend to anyone who likes a bit of quality action, and 48 Hours, which was always better than Beverly Hill's Cop, for me.

 

Just stuck the Southern Comfort DVD on my Wishlist. Sounds awesome, though it's been rehashed about a dozen times during this recent horror film resurgence.

 

Speaking of cool films from that era, Gladstone, I take it you've seen Vanishing Point? If there's a cooler man than Barry Newman in that film, I've yet to see him.

[Devon Malcolm]

Southern Comfort is a fantastic film. The scene with the knife is brutal - always makes me wince.

 

Yeah, just watched it now, fantastic film. Cracking cast as well, I never realised that - Keith Carradine, Powers Boothe, Fred Ward, TK Carter - superb. I love the ending too, it's so unusual, but then the whole feel of the film is.

 

I think I'm going to continue the Walter Hill theme and get Trespass, which I would recommend to anyone who likes a bit of quality action, and 48 Hours, which was always better than Beverly Hill's Cop, for me.

 

Just stuck the Southern Comfort DVD on my Wishlist. Sounds awesome, though it's been rehashed about a dozen times during this recent horror film resurgence.

 

Speaking of cool films from that era, Gladstone, I take it you've seen Vanishing Point? If there's a cooler man than Barry Newman in that film, I've yet to see him.

 

Loads of people have said that Southern Comfort itself was a rehash of Deliverance and there are definite similarities, but I actually prefer Southern Comfort.

 

Amazingly, Vanishing Point has so far passed me by but I've always been meaning to watch it. I will be sticking it on my wishlist now though. I absolutely love 70s cinema, almost certainly my favourite film decade.

[Georgie Pin]

After watching Rated X the other night, I was in the mood for something very sixties, and what was in the HMV bargain bin, but Easy Rider. What could be better?

 

A lot of things, probably. Maybe I had to be there, but I didn't enjoy it very much. It's plot is paper thin, and alluded to very rarely. Basically Dennis Hopper and Edge buy some drugs, then sell them again, then hide money in a motorbike and go riding. They have a few short, not particularly eventful incidents on the way. They meet Jack Nicholson, who's annoying. Then he dies, so Hopper and Rated R Fonda go to a whore house (or rather, they suddenly appear at one, even though they're still a couple of days riding away and they've just been beated almost to death) and decide not to bother shagging the whores, but instead walk around the town, then go to a cemetary and take acid, where one of the whores (played by Toni Basil of "Oh Micky you're so fine, you're so fine you blow my mind, hey Micky" fame) gets naked. Then they do a bit more riding and die.

 

Dennis Hopper is an irritating twat in this. So is Jack Nicholson. So are most of the other characters. Peter Fonda comes across as a nice middle class fella who would probably go back to being a teacher if his hippy mission didn't take off, but in the meantime is trying to look cool and aloof and just looking like he doesn't know how to cope with situations.

 

Nice scenery, lots of pointing the camera directly at the sun so you get rows of coloured polygons across the screen, lots of smoking, stupid Captain Scarlett-esque transitions, and a really filthy print transfer. If the film's so iconic you could make some effort to restore it. Toni Basil's actually quite attractive when not dressed as a mental cheerleader.

 

2 choppers out of 5.

 

I tried desperately hard to like this film but just couldn't. It doesn't really have a plot and just seems to lurch from scene to scene with no reason. That could possibly be the point I suppose but it doesn't make for enjoyable viewing. A bit like a visual equivalent to reading Dylan's Tarantuala or that nonsense Lennon came up with.

 

I think it was actually Dylan who said he hated the ending of Easy Rider. He wanted them to ride off into the sunset.

[Loki]

That would spoil the whole film though! It really sounds like you missed the allegorical story altogether.

[Georgie Pin]

That would spoil the whole film though! It really sounds like you missed the allegorical story altogether.

 

I'm aware of what the film is about - the search for freedom and the American dream, the split between the counter-culture and mainstream America and so forth. For me it just didn't have a plot strong enough to hold my interest. Perhaps I see it more of a film for its time. A film for made specifically for young adults in the 60's which hadn't really happened before.

[Gordon_The_Gopher]

Yesterday evening, me and the good lady watched another film. The choice was easy.

 

"My friends on the UKFF have been talking about a film called 'The Human Centipede'..." I said, and after a brief description and 15 seconds decision making, we chose The Spiderwick Chronicles.

 

Flipping the previous day on it's head, I wasn't looking forward to this film but found it really rather enjoyable. It's a nice film, all fairy tale type stuff. One problem is that none of the main goodie characters are that likeable. The boy is a dick, his twin is a pussy and the girl is an asshole. Even the mum is a cunt. Thankfully it had Seth Rogan as a charming pig animal and you can get into the story, if not the characters.

 

3 stars

[Loki]

That would spoil the whole film though! It really sounds like you missed the allegorical story altogether.

 

I'm aware of what the film is about - the search for freedom and the American dream, the split between the counter-culture and mainstream America and so forth. For me it just didn't have a plot strong enough to hold my interest. Perhaps I see it more of a film for its time. A film for made specifically for young adults in the 60's which hadn't really happened before.

 

Do films always need a plot though? Withnail and I doesn't really have a plot, and it's ace. I do think you're right though, your enjoyment of Easy Rider does somewhat rest on how cool you think it is to take loads of drugs and ride a bike across America with a bandana on.