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VHS and Betamax You Have Recently Rented


Frankie Crisp

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5 hours ago, Merzbow said:

I really don't want to spoil this too much but Saiko! The Large Family which is suddenly gaining traction online many years after it was released, a Canadian mockumentary set in Japan following a seemingly normal family, it get's real creepy. Video is in the spoiler, I don't think there's a legit way to watch it right now.

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I watched this last week and then watched a deep dive Video essay on it straight after and I was so glad I did considering I missed so much on the first watch, apparently either this is a sequel or the 2nd film on the family is a prequel I’m not 100% sure as unable to find it.

Heres the video essay if you’re interested.

 

Edited by TildeGuy~!
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Posted (edited)

Emily The Criminal (Netflix) - Good ittle Indie thriller about a young woman, struggling in LA who turns to petty crime in order to keep her head above water.

Excellent lead performance by Aubrey Plaza, 'Juice' from Sons of Anarchy is great too & reminded me of a young John Turturro. Some genuine moments of tension & it's only 90mins too. 

Edited by Dead Mike
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2 hours ago, Dead Mike said:

Emily The Criminal (Netflix) - Good ittle Indie thriller about a young woman, struggling in LA who turns to petty crime in order to keep her head above water.

Excellent lead performance by Aubrey Plaza, 'Juice' from Sons of Anarchy is great too & reminded me of a young John Turturro. Some genuine moments of tension & it's only 90mins too. 

Watched this a week or two ago and thought pretty much the exact same. Glad I gave it a whirl. 

Also, some of you might be glad to know that Indicator have a big sale on for the next week (including a pretty great 3 for £15 deal).  Some cracking films to be found in there.

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Posted (edited)

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire (cinema)

Harmless fan service nonsense. A shame it just went back to New York and shoved the kids into support after at least doing something different with Afterlife. This series has been rudderless since the first one though, what did anybody expect.

Infinite (Film 4)

I'm glad they didn't release this at the cinema because I'd definitely have gone to see it and I would have been livid. One of those awful films where everybody's forgotten how to act and the director has given up on it halfway through the shoot.

Muppets from Space (Film 4)

Shame the human cast is full of cunts (Ray Liotta innocent) but this is very funny, it's the Muppets ffs. Beaker will always be the Muppet MVP though.

Midnight Special

Still excellent. A shame it's become somewhat forgotten but it's easily one of the best sci-fi films of the last decade. Joel Edgerton is great, isn't he? Let's hear it for him. Love that guy.

Village of the Damned (1995)

One of the very few John Carpenters I hadn't seen and it's perfectly decent. Not a patch on the original (or its sequel) but a good time. The bit with the barbecue is awesome.

Inseminoid (Talking Pictures TV)

Judy Geeson gets knocked up by an alien so 5 stars obviously.

Yannick (Mubi)

The latest film by Mr. Oizo, by his standards almost normal but also still hilariously stupid. Like all his films. Raphael Quenard is going to be one of the best actors on the planet, save this tweet.

Universal Soldier / Universal Soldier: Regeneration / Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning

So for those of you who don't know the chronology of this series, the latter two titles are direct sequels to the first film, both made by John Hyams who recently made the excellent Alone and Sick. His dad, the also great Peter Hyams, was director of photography on them! Anyway, the first one is obviously great but these two are genuinely superb, too. Especially the last one, which is about as weird and risk-taking a DTV action sequel as I've ever seen. I expected nothing and got loads from them both. 

Snack Shack

Coming-of-age comedy that's getting a lot of critical attention. In truth, it's nothing more than alright. You've seen it dozens of times before but it's still funny and an easy watch.

Stopmotion

Disappointing new British horror, badly paced and acted and a waste of a pretty decent idea. It's about trauma, you know!

Starman (Film 4)

Possibly John Carpenter's most under-appreciated film after Prince of Darkness? Yes, I think it is. 

Edited by Devon Malcolm
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On 4/7/2024 at 10:21 PM, TildeGuy~! said:

I watched this last week and then watched a deep dive Video essay on it straight after and I was so glad I did considering I missed so much on the first watch, apparently either this is a sequel or the 2nd film on the family is a prequel I’m not 100% sure as unable to find it.

Heres the video essay if you’re interested.

 

I watched it this week too and then discovered that same video essay which I think is the only way to fully appreciate it! I've never known a film as subtle as this where the full story is hidden away in blink and you'll miss it shots. Still not entirely sure if that's a good thing or not, but it's incredibly brave filmmaking.

From what I can gather, there's a TV series that contains the prequel and sequel to this (along with some unconnected episodes). I think some of them are available but haven't been subtitled.

I think the only reason this one is fully subtitled is to fit in with the awkward western NHK World presentation (which they absolutely nail).

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Posted (edited)

I watched Top Gun Maverick for the first time last night, and thought it was bang average.

I have no real nostalgic connection to the original, so found a lot of it cloying and irritating. The action scenes were really impressive, but every character was irritating, none of it was believable, half the dialogue was clunky exposition, and I'm just utterly burned out on not on remakes and sequels per sé but on remakes and sequels that just obsessively fetishise the iconography of the original film. The film is full of lingering shots on Maverick's jacket, or anything else you might recognise from the original film, because REMEMBER TOP GUN? 

I found it hard not to laugh out loud every time there was a photo of characters from the original film displayed on the wall - stills from Top Gun framed on the walls of Naval offices, or Maverick's locker door covered in photos of his old friends like he's a teenage girl - or every time characters in the movie recapped the events of the original in conversation; it's been thirty years, and none of these people have had a single new photograph taken, or had any of these conversations in the meantime. Outside of Val Kilmer's scene, which was at least genuinely moving though more for Val Kilmer's real life health issues than for any narrative significance, there's no sense that any of the characters from the original film had any kind of lived experience or internal life in the intervening thirty years. They just sat around waiting for a sequel. 

As three stars a movie as ever exists, genuinely do not understand all the love it got on release.

Edited by BomberPat
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Maverick was everything that big budget Hollywood filmmaking should be more often. Just an unapologetic feelgood great time at the movies, absolute escapism from a guy who just wants to cheer us up by nearly killing himself. I was really upset I didn't get the chance to see it on IMAX.

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If I watched Top Gun Maverick at home I wouldn't have given two shits about it at all but it was as fun and pure and old fashioned as a night out at the cinema gets. Pure escapism and a good time.

I'll definitely never watch it ever again. 5 stars.

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I've never been a huge Top Gun fan. I liked it but it's not something I've watched that many times, so I really wasn't bothered about it getting a sequel.

But Maverick is one of the best examples of why we need cinemas in a long time. There will always be a place for movies like it and the spectacle and experience on a big screen is everything I could ever want from that.

I have to be very picky with my time and cinema visits and I'm really glad I took the chance on it.

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Posted (edited)
23 hours ago, Devon Malcolm said:

Universal Soldier / Universal Soldier: Regeneration / Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning

So for those of you who don't know the chronology of this series, the latter two titles are direct sequels to the first film, both made by John Hyams who recently made the excellent Alone and Sick. His dad, the also great Peter Hyams, was director of photography on them! Anyway, the first one is obviously great but these two are genuinely superb, too. Especially the last one, which is about as weird and risk-taking a DTV action sequel as I've ever seen. I expected nothing and got loads from them both. 

Complete the set and "treat" yourself to Universal Soldier II and Universal Soldier III starring Burt Reynolds from the late 90s.  Straight to video sequels with none of the leading actors of the original film.  Two of the worst films I've ever had the misfortune to watch.  The budget must have been in the pounds.

Edit: Both films should have 0% on Rotten Tomatoes, but a positive review of Regeneration has been attributed to III in error.

Edited by johnnyboy
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1 hour ago, johnnyboy said:

Complete the set and "treat" yourself to Universal Soldier II and Universal Soldier III starring Burt Reynolds from the late 90s.  Straight to video sequels with none of the leading actors of the original film.  Two of the worst films I've ever had the misfortune to watch.  The budget must have been in the pounds.

One of them's got Goldberg in it, hasn't it? How have I not seen it yet.

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