DVDs and Films You Have Watched Recently 3 - The Final Insult

[Mr_Danger]

Anyone seen Housebound? If not seek it out. I won't give anything away but when the pace picks up in the final act it's as good as any of the kiwi comedy horrors out there.

[LaGoosh]

A good chunk of the cast from The Wire are Brits. Didn't realy notice them in other things until the wire, and always got a shock when I saw them In brit stuff.

 

It's only Dominic West and Idris Elba who are Brits isn't it? 

 

The bloke who plays Freamon is an American but has lived in Britain for decades doing theatre work.

Edited December 26, 2014 by LaGoosh

[Thunderplex]

Had a quick scan through the cast in IMDB, and counted 4 Brits and 2 southern Irish. Not as many as I'd first thought, but not too bad.

[bAzTNM#1]

"Red Road" is a class film. Gave it a rewatch yesterday. Followed up by the thoroughly average "Nina's Heavenly Delights".

[Rob Lowe]

 

Went to see Dumb and Dumber To, last night. It's a woeful effort by all involved. There are a couple of decent jokes, but there are too many rotten ones that die on their arse, so it all becomes a little sad.

 

The only good thing about it is the Empire Of The Sun soundtrack. I regret agreeing to watch it, tbh.

 

Everyone knew it was never going to be as good as the first movie. That was just too fucking funny. Plus I think they had left too long of a gap for this sequel. I think Ace Ventura 3 would've been better received.

 

 

I adore the first film and was terrified about seeing this, the Farrelly Brothers track record over the last 15 years has not been great to say the least. Overall I thought the film was okay/decent, which I genuinely consider a miracle.

 

I did laugh out loud multiple times, but there are some stinkers in there. They also seemed to make the characters more mean in this, which I didnt like. The bad guys were completely ridiculous too, in the original they were a serious threat, but in this film any reality was thrown out the window.

 

I'd give it a 5 or 6/10. Nothing compared to the original, but worth seeing if you're a fan of the first.

[HarmonicGenerator]

Advance warning: This is a really long and rambling post. I wrote it partly for my own benefit but hopefully others enjoy reading too.

 

So, for the past couple of years I've done a post in these threads where I rank my films of the year. It probably started off because Astro did it so well on his blog, but I found it quite handy for myself, if not for getting my thoughts in order, then just for remembering what films I actually saw in a given year. As well as that, it usually surprises me how low certain films I was really anticipating ended up, and how high others ended up (I think my top 3 for 2013 were Les Mis, Rush and Captain Phillips) As I've now seen pretty much everything I plan to see as far as new films go this year (I don't think I'll get to Exodus before January), here's 2014's edition. Just for awareness, I tend to see blockbusters most of the time so this is by no means a reflection on the best films of the year. Just the ones I saw.

 

 

The filmy year for me usually starts off with my girlfriend and I trying to catch as many of the Best Picture Oscar nominees as possible - I think we ended up with 6 out of 9 for 2014. 2014 kicked off with 12 Years A Slave, which was a worthy winner. There are moments that are seared into my memory from that film - the attempted hanging, the bottle thrown at Patsey, Solomon's 'forgive me' when he returns to his family - but I can't say I 'enjoyed' watching it, though I'm glad I did. The following weekend, we caught Wolf Of Wall Street which the word 'enjoyed' definitely applies to. Great film - and early film of the year contender. However, it got surpassed the weekend after that by Inside Llewyn Davis, which I loved. Instantly one of my favourite Coen brothers films - brilliant music, Oscar Isaac was superb, compelling to watch, and I loved how it was structured like a folk song (though to be honest that didn't click until I read the liner notes of the soundtrack, which is also brilliant).

 

Films of the year after January

1. Inside Llewyn Davis

2. The Wolf Of Wall Street

3. 12 Years A Slave

 

 

Valentine's Day traditionally means going to see a non-Valentine's-Day-ish film. Last year we went to the latest Die Hard, and it was bad. This year, we picked The Lego Movie, which was not bad at all. Very, very good in fact. I knew nothing about the surprise cameos or catchy songs or best lines or plot twists going in, so it was all very fresh and funny. And holds up on repeat viewing. A week later, Oscar time again with Her. I liked Her, it looked good, Phoenix and Johansson were good, interesting premise. Can't say I'm eager to watch it again though.

 

The only new film I saw in March was Muppets Most Wanted. The Muppet bits were fine, but that film goes to show how important the humans are in a Muppets film. If you've not got good humans there's only so much good will the Muppets can live on. I admitted at the time that Gervais didn't ruin it, but that's as far as I can go. Jason Segel and Amy Adams were a massive miss, and the film was a disappointment. No songs on a par with the first film either.

 

Films of the year after March:

1. Inside Llewyn Davis

2. The Wolf Of Wall Street

3. The Lego Movie

4. 12 Years A Slave

5. Her

6. Muppets Most Wanted

 

 

April was superhero month. First, Captain America: The Winter Soldier which has probably turned out to be one of my favourite Marvel offerings. I really liked First Avenger but this was an improvement - and better than any of the Iron Mans or the second Thor. Added sense of paranoia due to the fact that when it got to the point where all the Swat guys pile into the lift with Cap and he looks around, the screen went off and we were all escorted out of the cinema through back staircases and things. Felt like SHIELD had been compromised and we were being evacuated but it was actually because some chav had pulled the fire alarm. Anyway… The Amazing Spider-Man 2. I've read loads of hate for this online but I prefer Andrew Garfield to Tobey Maguire so much that I didn't mind this at all. Spider-spoilers below:

 

 

I know enough about comics to know about the Gwen Stacy character most likely being killed, but the Garfield-Emma Stone scenes were my favourite parts of this film so killing her off also killed off my wanting to see any more Spider-Man films for a while.

 

 

Finally for April, we went to Pompeii. I quite liked Pompeii. It was Jon Snow and Adebisi fighting Jack Bauer and a volcano. How could that not be entertaining?!

 

Films of the year after April:

1. Inside Llewyn Davis

2. The Wolf Of Wall Street

3. The Lego Movie

4. Captain America: The Winter Soldier

5. 12 Years A Slave

6. Her

7. Pompeii

8. The Amazing Spider-Man 2

9. Muppets Most Wanted

 

 

Onward to May. Godzilla. Liked it at the time. His roar sounded good on IMAX. In retrospect, it wasn't that great. I wanted more Bryan Cranston and more Godzilla, and less Aaron Taylor-Thingy and less Mutos. X-Men: Days Of Future Past was better, but again, I wanted more Future and less Past. I get that the franchise probably needs to go forward with McAvoy, Fassbender and Lawrence (who are all good), but it was seeing McKellen, Stewart and the rest of them again that I enjoyed most - and I maintain Kelsey Grammer's a better Beast than Nicholas Hoult could hope to be. Blink and Bishop were fantastic in that opening fight with the Sentinels, I wanted more of them, dammit! Better than Spider-Man, though, and I'd happily watch it again.

 

And now it's summer time! A bit after release, we saw Noah which I wasn't fussed about beforehand, but actually really liked. Aronofsky did some really interesting things with that story, I'm glad I saw it. Similarly, when I first heard about Edge Of Tomorrow I couldn't have been less fussed. Don't like Tom Cruise, don't like Doug Liman (Jumper… I still shudder), and it had a silly name (sorry, purists, All You Need Is Kill is a rubbish name for a film). The more they played the trailer before other films, however, the more I started to want to see it. Marketing doing its job. So I saw it, and loved it. Best surprise of the year, Edge Of Tomorrow. Cruise is really great, Emily Blunt's fantastic, the tone's just right, it's just really, really good fun. Straight into the top 3.

 

Finishing up June, 22 Jump Street. Girlfriend reckoned it was funnier than the first, I'd go with 'as funny'. Which means very, very funny. Two hits for Lord and Miller in 2014!

 

Films of the year after June:

1. Inside Llewyn Davis

2. Edge Of Tomorrow

3. The Wolf Of Wall Street

4. The Lego Movie

5. Captain America: The Winter Soldier

6. 22 Jump Street

7. X-Men: Days Of Future Past

8. Noah

9. 12 Years A Slave

10. Her

11. Pompeii

12. Godzilla

13. The Amazing Spider-Man 2

14. Muppets Most Wanted

 

 

July was a good month. I've sung the praises of Boyhood on here before, and I maintain everything I said about it. Glorious piece of filmmaking. Loved it. Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes had a bit of a different tone to Boyhood. It was also good, but… I don't know. I know it was good, but a lot of what I really liked about Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes was how much better it was than I'd expected. With Dawn… I was already anticipating it would be good, and it was as good as I'd anticipated. Not better. As good. That's no bad thing, of course, and there was loads of good stuff, it just left me feeling a bit… 'That was good'. Hmm. Closing out the month, Guardians Of The Galaxy. YES. Again, I'm pretty sure I've rambled on about how much fun Guardians was on here, but how much fun was Guardians?! Sorry Captain America, Star-Lord's got you beat. And there I was in January, thinking how hard it would be for any film this year to be better than Llewyn Davis, and I saw two I liked more in one month...

 

Films of the year after July:

1. Boyhood

2. Guardians Of The Galaxy

3. Inside Llewyn Davis

4. Edge Of Tomorrow

5. The Wolf Of Wall Street

6. The Lego Movie

7. Captain America: The Winter Soldier

8. 22 Jump Street

9. X-Men: Days Of Future Past

10. Noah

11. Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes

12. 12 Years A Slave

13. Her

14. Pompeii

15. Godzilla

16. The Amazing Spider-Man 2

17. Muppets Most Wanted

 

 

Our only cinema trip in August was to How To Train Your Dragon 2. I like dragons. I liked the first one. I liked this one. Really liked it at the time, actually, but the memory of it's kind of dulled in my mind a few months on. Didn't expect the ending at all. We did watch a couple of 2014 films on DVD in this month, though - The Book Thief (alright, but not a patch on the book), and The Grand Budapest Hotel (didn't like it as much as Life Aquatic, but liked it more than pretty much any other Wes Anderson I've seen).

 

Carrying on the DVD watching in September, Frank. We did get tickets to see Frank at the local indy cinema a few months earlier but they cancelled the showing because we were the only ones who'd bought tickets. It was therefore an eagerly anticipated DVD viewing and it was great. Fassbender was brilliant, Domnhall Gleeson also very good, great script, and 'Coca Cola Lipstick Ringo' is in my head right now. I should point out that I know nothing about the Frank Sidebottom character that this was (I assume) very loosely based on but I think that probably helped me enjoy the film for what it was. Also saw The Riot Club, which I think generally got quite average reviews but fuck, I thought it was brilliant. Would have loved to have seen the play it was based on. Girlfriend hated it, but I thought it was an excellent watch. 'Rich people get away with things because they're rich' was a bit of a theme in films this year.

 

October. Dracula Untold. Went because Luke Evans was good in the second Hobbit film, but he didn't save this. Could have been so much better than it ended up being, and if I remember correctly, the final cut loses all the scenes with Samantha Barks, which is an absolute outrage. REINSTATE BARKS. And Snowpiercer, which, okay, wasn't technically released over here but was a 2014 film in America so it counts. That's another one I stuck loads of thoughts about in this thread - absolutely great, but wasn't keen on the ending, basically. Still, it became my new favourite Chris Evans-starring film of 2014. Sorry again, Captain America.

 

Films of the year after October:

1. Boyhood

2. Guardians Of The Galaxy

3. Inside Llewyn Davis

4. Edge Of Tomorrow

5. The Wolf Of Wall Street

6. The Riot Club

7. The Lego Movie

8. Snowpiercer

9. Captain America: The Winter Soldier

10. 22 Jump Street

11. How To Train Your Dragon 2

12. Frank

13. X-Men: Days Of Future Past

14. Noah

15. The Grand Budapest Hotel

16. Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes

17. 12 Years A Slave

18. Her

19. Pompeii

20. Godzilla

21. The Amazing Spider-Man 2

22. The Book Thief

23. Dracula Untold

24. Muppets Most Wanted

 

 

November! The attempt began to try and predict the Oscar nominees for 2015 and not bypass them completely like Silver Linings Playbook, or American Hustle, or The Fighter, or whatever thing David O Russell has coming out this year that'll swallow up loads of nominations despite the fact it's now December and I haven't heard a thing about whatever film it might be. Has he even got one coming out this year? Anyway, tangent. Forget Russell, it's all about Mike Leigh and Mr Turner. Beautifully shot, masterful performance from Timothy Spall that should guarantee him the Bafta if nothing else, and a cracking scene in the Royal Academy with Constable… but with hindsight I think it's going to get ignored by the Oscars. Happy to have seen it, though.

 

Back to blockbusters the following week with Interstellar. I've always been a Nolan defender - I fucking love The Dark Knight, The Prestige and Inception. But if it hadn't been for the Muppets, this would have been a runaway winner for most disappointing film of the year for me. The first two hours were great, really liking it. But my girlfriend and I both pinpointed the scene where

 

 

Matt Damon shows up

 

 

as the point where it starts to go off the rails. From there, I felt like it dragged and dragged and dragged, whereas she was visibly itching for it to be over, and she's never like that with films. Except that time we put Young Adult on on Netflix. Never in the cinema, anyway. Had it not been for that final third, I'd have liked it a lot more. But, then again, it was raining buckets that day so we were able to dry off during the two-hours-forty runtime.

 

Things picked up later that weekend with The Imitation Game. Really liked that. Knew very little about Turing or about Enigma beforehand, but both fascinating subjects. Finally for November, What We Do In The Shadows which is undoubtedly the funniest film I saw this year - and the best vampire film. Absolutely hilarious. Loved it. Absolutely one I'll be getting on DVD and lending to as many people as I can. Spinal Tap for vampires is not far off.

 

Films of the year after October:

1. Boyhood

2. Guardians Of The Galaxy

3. What We Do In The Shadows

4. Inside Llewyn Davis

5. Edge Of Tomorrow

6. The Wolf Of Wall Street

7. The Riot Club

8. The Lego Movie

9. Snowpiercer

10. The Imitation Game

11. Captain America: The Winter Soldier

12. 22 Jump Street

13. How To Train Your Dragon 2

14. Frank

15. X-Men: Days Of Future Past

16. Noah

17. The Grand Budapest Hotel

18. Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes

19. 12 Years A Slave

20. Her

21. Pompeii

22. Mr Turner

23. Godzilla

24. The Amazing Spider-Man 2

25. Interstellar

26. The Book Thief

27. Dracula Untold

28. Muppets Most Wanted

 

 

We're nearly done now. December! I didn't think I'd get around to seeing Gone Girl in the cinema. I had wanted to, but only after reading the book, which was brilliant - finished it in a weekend, and that's very rare for me these days. I've spent the last five months on the same book, so a two-day page-turner's a real hit. Anyway, some cinemas round here were still showing Gone Girl, so I managed to get along. I preferred the book, but can't decide whether that's because it's legitimately better or because whatever medium you see first is always going to be better due to the twisty-turny nature of the plot.

 

We saw Paddington the night after Gone Girl. Slight change in tone. Paddington is, as I said in here I think, a treat of a film. Joyous, and now one of the girlfriend's all-time favourites. I wouldn't go that far, but I can understand why. The day after that, it was time for The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies. In a bit of a recurring theme, I'd been going back and forth about how much I wanted to see this one. Of course, I was always going to go (and I'll probably go again) but I hadn't been looking forward to it. The trailer didn't fill me with keenness. What did was the music video they released to Billy Boyd's 'Last Goodbye' song. I was all in from then on.

 

The film itself was … I swing between 'alright' and 'great'. The sentimentalist in me really wants to go with 'great'; the last few scenes were really great, and that song over the end credits… it gets me every time I hear it. Every fucking time. Even thinking about it… that's a good film song. Hope it gets a bit of award time devoted to it. The realist in me, meanwhile, doesn't want me to go above 'alright'. It turns out that the Hobbit series really didn't need a third instalment, they could have quite easily packed it into two. The battles weren't on a par with the Rings films, and there was a huge over-reliance on CG which is especially depressing when you consider how good Rings was without needing so much of that. I think my inner sentimentalist wins out on this one, mainly due to that bloody lovely song. And Martin Freeman, actually, who's really good in this one.

 

Last film of the year… Night At The Museum: Secret Of The Tomb. These Night At The Museum films get away with a lot with me, because I just love the premise so damn much (same reason Ben Stiller took the part, apparently). This is probably the weakest of the three, but I still really liked it. Ricky Gervais was kept to a minimum. There were super cameos from

 

 

Dick van Dyke, Mickey Rooney, and Hugh Jackman, which was both unexpected and hilarious

 

 

You get to see the British Museum and the Trafalgar Square lions come to life, and you get to see Robin Williams on the big screen again, which makes you realise how much of a miss he is (even if he didn't get much to do in the Museum series).

 

Which means the final ranking for my films of the year is:

1. Boyhood

2. Guardians Of The Galaxy

3. What We Do In The Shadows

4. Inside Llewyn Davis

5. Edge Of Tomorrow

6. Paddington

7. The Wolf Of Wall Street

8. The Riot Club

9. The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies

10. The Lego Movie

11. Snowpiercer

12. The Imitation Game

13. Captain America: The Winter Soldier

14. 22 Jump Street

15. Night At The Museum: Secret Of The Tomb

16. How To Train Your Dragon 2

17. Frank

18. X-Men: Days Of Future Past

19. Gone Girl

20. Noah

21. The Grand Budapest Hotel

22. Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes

23. 12 Years A Slave

24. Her

25. Pompeii

26. Mr Turner

27. Godzilla

28. The Amazing Spider-Man 2

29. Interstellar

30. The Book Thief

31. Dracula Untold

32. Muppets Most Wanted

 

 

 

Final thoughts: Once I'd seen Boyhood, I had no doubt what my film of the year was going to be. It's a bit of a masterpiece. Guardians was great fun too, and What We Do In The Shadows rounds out a top three that I'll definitely be rewatching plenty of times. The big surprises for me - in a good way - were Edge Of Tomorrow, Paddington and Snowpiercer. I didn't expect to like any of them as much as I did. In a negative way, the surprises were probably Interstellar, Godzilla and Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes. Two were disappointments, and the third was genuinely good but just didn't have that extra intangible that Rise… did. Muppets at the bottom, sad but inevitable (I didn't expect Dracula was going to be up to much).

 

I don't expect many/any to agree with my assessments, but there we go!

Edited December 27, 2014 by HarmonicGenerator

[Bettencourt]

Just seen St. Vincent. Enjoyed it quite a lot. First film in which Melissa McCarthy has come out somewhat likeable.

[Tommy!]

Clockwise has just started on itv. Watch it damn you.

[Surf Digby]

I'm finally watching it. I remember the trailer looking funny when I was young, and I've never seen it despite saying I will every time it's on TV.

[Nick James]

Fantastic post by Harmonic Generator, there. Will be sure to check out quite a few films from that list that I didn't get round to watching this year.

[WyattSheepMask]

So, the 20 most pirated films list has been released (studio, theatrical release date)

 

1. “The Wolf of Wall Street”: 30.035 million (Paramount, Dec. 25, 2013)

2. “Frozen”: 29.919 million (Disney, Nov. 27, 2013)

3. “RoboCop”*: 29.879 million (MGM, Feb. 12, 2014; and Orion, July 17, 1987)

4. “Gravity”: 29.357 million (Warner Bros., Oct. 4, 2013)

5. “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug”: 27.627 million (Warner Bros., Dec. 13, 2013)

6. “Thor: The Dark World”: 25.749 million (Disney/Marvel, Nov. 8, 2013)

7. “Captain America: The Winter Soldier”: 25.628 million (Disney/Marvel, April 4, 2014)

8. “The Legend of Hercules”: 25.137 million (Summit, Jan. 10, 2014)

9. “X-Men: Days of Future Past”: 24.380 million (20th Century Fox, May 23, 2014)

10. “12 Years a Slave”: 23.653 million (Fox Searchlight, Oct. 18, 2013)

11. “The Hunger Games: Catching Fire”: 23.543 million (Lionsgate, Nov. 22, 2013)

12. “American Hustle”: 23.143 million (Sony/Columbia, Dec. 13, 2013)

13. “300: Rise of an Empire”: 23.096 million (Warner Bros., March 7, 2014)

14. “Transformers: Age of Extinction”: 21.65 million (Paramount, June 27, 2014)

15. “Godzilla”: 20.956 million (Warner Bros., May 16, 2014)

16. “Noah”: 20.334 million (Paramount, March 28, 2014)

17. “Divergent”: 20.312 million (Lionsgate, March 21, 2014)

18. “Edge of Tomorrow”: 20.299 million (Warner Bros., June 6, 2014)

19. “Captain Phillips”: 19.817 million (Sony/Columbia, Oct. 11, 2013)

20. “Lone Survivor”: 19.130 million (Universal, Dec. 25, 2013)

 

* Combines data for both 1987 and 2014 versions.

Source: Excipio

Edited December 29, 2014 by WyattSheepMask

[The King Of Swing]

Nightbreed: The Directors Cut is on the US Netflix if anyone is interested. Gonna check it out tonight.

[Loki]

Ooh, might give that a try, cheers!

 

I watched Devil the other night, a low-budget horror written by Shymalan (but not directed), about a group of people trapped in a lift with the Devil.  Pretty good - short, suspenseful and kept you thinking.  Worth a watch.

[Scott Malbranque]

HGs post is wonderful!!!! Thoroughly enjoyed that read, sir.

 

EDIT - The ending of Devil took me by surprise when I first saw it. Really enjoyed that movie.

Edited December 31, 2014 by Scott Malbranque

[HarmonicGenerator]

HGs post is wonderful!!!! Thoroughly enjoyed that read, sir.

 

Cheers Mr Malbranque, very kind of you to say! 

 

 

Kicked off 2015's films with The Theory Of Everything. Film is good, Eddie Redmayne is astounding. You hear reviews all the time go on about performances being 'transformative' and 'revelatory' and everything, but this really is. The physicality, the changing voice, the tiniest expressions, he's incredible in this film. And you don't realise until just before the end how much he's changed since the start - the degeneration of Hawking's disease comes about gradually in the film, which creates a very different pair of effects. See it for Redmayne, and for Felicity Jones, who's excellent as well.