Topic: The Movie Thread

@Th3solution hey it was the 60's, what can i say the producers were probably high on something

Only when I'm lonely.

Also, I won't hear a word said against Batman '66. Nobody was high on anything; it was, and still is, a pitch-perfect parody of the superhero genre and comic books of the era. It was created in a way that entertained kids as a slapstick adventure whilst totally nudging and winking at their parents. I grew up on re-runs in the early 90s and loved it. I've got the whole series on Blu-Ray and its inclusion in LEGO Batman 3: Beyond Gotham was the best part of the game.

For all the same reasons I love the Roger Moore Bond films, the late and great Adam West's self-aware "Bright Knight" is just as valid as any other portrayal of Batman.

@RogerRoger i have it on blu-ray too, i love that show even if it did falter in it's last season a bit

also did you get the animated follow up films, the even got Adam West and Burt ward back to voice their characters and they were pretty good too

@FullbringIchigo ...and William Shatner voices Harvey Dent / Two-Face in the second one. Loved them; shame they never got to make it a trilogy before Adam West passed away.

The last season is a victim of studio meddling, but it's still watchable. It turns it from "tongue-in-cheek laughable" to "so bad it's good laughable" because of the budget cuts (the episode where Batman, Robin and Batgirl guide all those rats back into the river, and they're just standing on a soundstage with cardboard rats... yeesh) and that's where I'd start to agree with some of its reputation, but the first two seasons are solid.

Also, I should just point out that whilst the clip above famously shows the shark exploding with zero context, there's a follow-up scene with dialogue which explains that the Riddler tricked the shark into swallowing a bomb, which failed to detonate on contact with Batman as it was supposed to.

The good name of sea creatures everywhere is restored later in the film, when a brave porpoise swims into the path of a torpedo to save Batman and Robin when they're magnetised to a buoy.

It's all carefully thought through.

@RogerRoger yeah i would have loved a third film but after Adam West's passing it wouldn't have been right to do a third

@RogerRoger Oh... I didn’t realize the Adam West stuff was parody. It makes more sense now. I thought it was coming off as goofy because of the limits of storytelling in the 60’s. I was watching the clips through the lens of the 2000’s Dark Knight super serious and tragic Batman. If it’s supposed to be campy, then I can respect that. I remember vague images of the TV show as a little kid when my dad would watch it, but I don’t remember ever really paying attention.

I watched No One Lives this weekend. It is a little known slasher flick from 2012. I can't remember how it got reccomended to me but it has been on my list for a couple of years now and I kept moving it down.

I'm not usually a fan of slasher films as I think I have seen all they can offer, but this one had enough interesting twists to the formula for me to recommend it. The only real star is Luke Evans, I'm not a huge fan of his but I thought he was really good in this. I've watched a few films recently that have taken soooooo long to set everything up, I've almost lost interest. But No One Lives it was all set up in about 15 minutes which I appreciated. The special effects were mostly physical too which I prefer to the over reliance on cgi blood in recent times.

The only negatives i found was that the acting was a bit stiff at times and the was almost no character development or back story. One character there is hardly any explanation to why she is turned out like she has.

Mixing things up a little, I've started on a chunk of Blu-Rays I recently picked up from the shelves of HMV. Some new releases, some older from the back end of the store. All hopefully good.

Cold Pursuit justifies its existence by being one of the more off-beat, darkly comic entries in the otherwise-overstuffed "Liam Neeson Hurts People" genre. There's a welcome rarity in its approach to focus on the quirky intricacies of each and every character; henchmen fall in love, villains micro-manage their children's diets, and even an early trip to the morgue elicits an uncomfortable chuckle when one man's life-changing experience is subtly-yet-painfully highlighted as a staff member's everyday mundane. It could do with shaving twenty minutes off the runtime, although I'm not quite sure from where because I enjoyed all the separate elements. Colorado looks gorgeous, too. This one was a welcome surprise, especially for an impulse buy.

The Hunt for Red October remains a steadfast classic (I've also got Patriot Games and Clear & Present Danger to enjoy later in the week). As much as I might've once poked fun at Sean Connery playing a Russian, nobody says "Engage the caterpillar drive!" better than he. His performance is top notch, as is pretty much everybody else's in a film which, despite some solid efforts since, has never been bettered. The Cold War submarine thriller to end all Cold War submarine thrillers, there's a steady crescendo throughout the entire thing, building to a pulse-pounding final sequence which still holds up today, special effects and all. Whilst I'm glad that Alec Baldwin's Jack Ryan was recast for the sequels, I've got nothing against his performance; he just doesn't quite do "everyman" as well as Harrison Ford, but he's still a sympathetic hero. Gorgeous music helps when necessary, but isn't always there either, knowing when to dial back and let the sound design do the work. Cracking stuff.

Beyond the aforementioned Tom Clancy sequels, I've also got Independence Day and The LEGO Movie 2 sitting on my desk. I haven't had the time for full-length features much lately, so I'm looking forward to ring-fencing a couple hours here and there as the week progresses.

Finally watched Spider-Man: Far From Home. Another genuinely fun and charming Spider-Man movie that, incredibly tired genre trappings aside, managed to deliver a surprisingly down-to-earth and character-driven narrative. The mundane manner in which people are coping with spectacular supernatural events such as 'the snap,' Peter feeling overwhelmed by all the responsibilities being piled at his feet, his yearning for a normal life with a girl he's almost scared to talk to, the manner in which his yearning for a father figure in his life allowed him to be taken advantage of by a man whose only superpower appears to be the almost complete lack of a conscience... it's a refreshing approach after the dramatic group poses on the battlefield, DBZ-esque fights where characters ramp up their power levels to absurd heights, and the tedious lack of self-awareness in Avengers: Endgame. There was certainly a lot of humor here, but, unlike many Marvel films, it didn't feel like a crutch to support a mediocre story.

Universal Soldier (Amazon Instant Video) - 90's action flick starring Jean-Claude Van Damme & Dolph Lundgren as Vietnam War soldiers who, after killing each other during the war, are brought back to life in a clandestine government program to create super soldiers, but things don't go quite as planned when the two start regaining their memories.

It's not art by any stretch of the imagination, but there's just something fun about all the cheesy machismo, overdesigned super soldier uniforms, and explosions to turn your mind off to.

Is anyone else burnt out on the Marvel films or is it just me, looking at the new slate of upcoming MCU movies the only one that caught my interest is Doctor Strange: Multiverse and Thor Love and Thunder (and that's only because i'm interested in how Jane gets to wield Mjolnir when it was destroyed in Ragnarok

it's been 23 films in 11 years, that's too much

@FullbringIchigo I've been burnt out on superhero films for years.

It's why I appreciate the ones that try something different. Like the relatively low-stakes Spiderman films. I enjoy their relative mundane-ness.

@FullbringIchigo I was burnt out 20 years ago. Absolute tripe.

@Ralizah yeah that's why i'm looking forward to Doctor Strange exploring the multiverse, something new

@FullbringIchigo Yeah, since Superhero movies have never really been my thing, I've been a bit bemused by the popularity of the Marvel films these last few years.

Not that I dislike them. I'm just surprised that people keep going to see them in their droves. When I watch one of them, I tend to slip into a sort of trance. I enjoy them while they last but then I can't remember anything about them afterwards.

Can't go wrong with The Crow... The first one at least, not the low budget straight to DVD sequels

Though for current Suoerhero films... I've enjoyed most of them. I think for me it helps that each film usually has a distinct sub genre to it as well being a superhero film

Like Antman being a heist film, Winter Soldier being more of a thriller... But I'm good not seeing them again for like a year or so and usually wait til I can get it on DVD or Blu-ray before I actually watch it anyway.

In fact I watched Doctor Strange for the first time on ITV a few weeks back... 😅

The DC films since The Nolan Bats though... The less said the better. Though Shazam actually looks kinda decent...

I continue to really enjoy Superhero movies in general. Whether DC or Marvel, I like the escape. Obviously there are plenty of bad ones though. The MCU’s next phase is a little underwhelming, but I think it’s mostly because of the unknown commodities like The Eternals, Shang-chi, and Blade. I don’t read the source material so I am not familiar with these, but I didn’t know who the Guardians of the Galaxy were before the movies and the films were highly entertaining.
I’m still running the gauntlet of watching all the MCU movies again in rapid succession (I already did the Nolan Batmans and I’ll do the new Justice League films later), I stalled after Incredible Hulk. I will say that they seemed to get better over time but Iron Man was pretty great.
But I look at superhero movies as the modern day Westerns / Cowboy movies. I look back on those copious number of Western movies made back in the 50’s, 60’s, and 70’s and I think they all look the same and so boring. But a couple generations ago they loved that genre. Now you rarely ever see a big budget Western. I’m sure our grandkids will wonder why we liked these superhero movies so much, but I’ll just sit in my rocking chair and tell them about the good ol’ days and how stupid their VR haptic suit based immersive movie theaters are.

I was an avid comic book reader, spent 20 each week on new comics. Most of them superhero comics.

The superhero movies have burned me out on the genre so hard, that not only did I stop watching the movies pretty quickly, I also stopped reading comics entirely.

Someday I hope to pick up that hobby yet again (reading, not the movies!).

I got burnt out by the time Infinity War came out and I've not enjoyed any of the DC stuff since the Nolan Batman films.

But I enjoy reading the graphic novels, but I've only recently started in the last five or so years.

@Kidfried reading is for dorks!