@BearsEatBeets The two main problems with the original were John Wayne just being a slightly grumpy John Wayne and the girl who played Mattie being way over there on the wrong side of insufferable. The lead pairing in the remake was completely perfect.
@LN78 I imagine playing a character that's supposed to be insufferable to the people she meets but not the viewer is quite a balance to perform, even more so for a child actor. And for those moments to be so engaging in the remake is great testament to the quality of the actors, and their directors, and the writing.
Watched and enjoyed the semi good Scoob movie last week. To be clear it was the new animated Scoby-Doo movie from 2020. Scoby-Doo have become something of favorite entertainment thing for me as of late. Besides video gaming.
@oliverp I was under the impression that Scoob! wasn't worth watching, which I was disappointed to hear at the time, as I was kinda interested. I'll take "semi-good" as an endorsement, though!
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
By a route too circuitous to describe, we ended up watching a Joel Schumacher legal drama called "A Time to Kill" from 1996. It has an absolutely barnstorming topline cast (Matthew McConaughey, Sandra Bullock, Samuel L.Jackson) and great secondary players (Donald and Kiefer Sutherland,Oliver Platt,Kurtwood Smith) but an unbelievably godawful screenplay by "Batman and Robin" hack extraordinaire Akiva Goldsman from one of those popular-in-the-nineties legal potboilers by John Grisham. Beyond the reams of caricatures where the characters were supposed to be and the hackneyed courtroom drama cliches, from what we (a group of a people completely ignorant of the intricacies of the American jurisprudence) could make out, the legal "dilemma" central to the proceedings was fundamentally a complete nonsense. A really strange (often disturbing) movie with a racial harmony coda so patronising that it would make Stevie Wonder blush.
@XandertheWise Hope you enjoy what Netflix did to Designated Survivor more than I did. I really enjoyed the first two seasons, but thought its third was atrocious, and a grave warning about the "freedoms" afforded shows on unregulated streaming platforms. Sorry to be so negative about something you're watching as I type and, like I say, I hope it lands better for you, but I'd be interested in your reaction.
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
@RogerRoger Well thats your opinion. I happen to like Designated Survivor. I got tired of suffering through Season 4 of Stranger Things and the stupid characters in Riverdale in Seasons 1 and 2
Despite being aware of a certain infamous scene I've actually never seen this until now. Actually a pretty decent murder mystery film with a couple decent twists all things considered (and yeah... I enjoyed all the trashy sex bits, sue me, lol).
City Hunter: Magnum of Love & Fate (Blu-Ray)
Movie in the City Hunter franchise that sees the cast finding themselves protecting a concert pianist who gets caught up in an espionage struggle between West & East Germany (well, it calls them Gariela... but they're Germany) when she begins looking for her father.
It pretty much feels like a longer, somewhat better animated episode, of the City Hunter/City Hunter 2 era. It does make some good use of the higher budget when they assault the bad guys' HQ during the climax though, and is still a fun time if you're a fan of the series.
Also commonly subtitled as .357 Magnum, but I think we can all agree that Magnum of Love & Fate stomps.
City Hunter: Bay City Wars (Blu-Ray)
Movie in the City Hunter franchise where terrorists take over a newly built hotel in order to take command over the supercomputer which controls the facility, because it can give them control over US military systems for some reason (okay, maybe it doesn't make complete sense, but this is just an excuse to have Ryo do a "Die Hard", so let's forgive it, lol).
Maybe a bit short than what you'd typically expect from a movie, but I think that works in it's favor in this case. It takes no time at all to get into the thick of it & is pretty much wall to wall action from beginning to end (though of course it takes just enough time out to get in some of the series' trademark gags). This is elevated by a level of animation that's becoming of the format & noticeably a couple steps above any of the TV series at their best, which really makes the action shine.
It may not be as transformative as some of the Lupin films are for that franchise, as it's still ultimately something best appreciated for existing fans, but it's about as good as it can be for that type of project. Just really super fun.
City Hunter: Million Dollar Conspiracy (Blu-Ray)
Yet another City Hunter movie. This time Ryo gets hired by an American woman who claims she's being hunted by the Mafia, & promised him $1 million for the job. Of course things aren't as simple as they seem, and he finds himself embroiled in a mystery involving the CIA.
Quality wise it's a lot like "Bay City Wars" which I also recently watched. A bit short, but it really knows how to use it's budget & animation to be an entertaining watch. Preference will probably depend on whether you want more wall to wall action (Bay City Wars) or a bit more mystery with a little more time dedicated to Ryo's antics (Million Dollar Conspiracy).
Unfortunately I couldn't find a good trailer for any of the City Hunter stuff.
Currently Playing:
Switch - Blade Strangers
PS4 - Kingdom Hearts III, Tetris Effect (VR)
@XandertheWise Oh hey, that's cool. I was just curious, s'all. Like I said, I adored the first two seasons, so I'm glad it hit the spot for you after you'd struggled through those other shows.
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
Rewatched "Tenet" for the first time since it came out. John David Washington is still a total non-entity, Branagh is still ham sliced thick and the sound mix is still laughably bad but the plot actually stands up better on repeat viewing than "Inception" (even if the action sequences don't) and Elizabeth Debicki is fantastic. I was surprised how much more I appreciated this second time around - so much so that "Interstellar" is back to the bottom of my Nolan ranking. Sorry, Murph.
@LN78 I could never get past how unintentionally laugh out loud funny the backwards fight scenes were for me. It was like something out of a comedy sketch show.
Life is more fun when you help people succeed, instead of wishing them to fail.
Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.
@JohnnyShoulder They are why I singled out the action sequences as not being particularly great - "Red Dwarf" did backwards fights better! I've really warmed up on the film overall, though - walking out of the cinema I thought it was a nonsensical disaster and it really isn't. The picture quality on the 4K blu-ray is absolutely splendid and I got it cheap, so that probably helped.
A City Hunter movie which sees Ryo hired to protect a secret service agent who herself is part of a detail protecting a visiting South American political candidate (she is secretly his daughter, and his political opponents are targeting her to get to him).
It's not as tightly paced as the shorter films (Bay City Wars, Million Dollar Conspiracy), but it's still a fun time if you're a fan of the series.
Fun Easter Egg: at one point late in the film, right before the big climax, a character opens a map which holds some "Star Trek: TNG" references. If you pause & look at it, you have Mount Picard, Riker River, Jean-Luc Point, & Worf Point (you can see the former two again, & more clearly, whenever someone else opens the map again a few minutes later).
Currently Playing:
Switch - Blade Strangers
PS4 - Kingdom Hearts III, Tetris Effect (VR)
With all the buzz around "Creed III" we decided to dig into the "Rocky" sequels for the first time in about a decade, starting with "Rocky II". It's essentially a direct continuation/modified remake of the first movie with a ton (and I mean a ton) of quasi soap operatic sentimentality added for good measure by writer/director/star Sylvester Stallone who throws every cheap trick in the book at the audience in order to elicit an emotional response. Sometimes it works (the training montage and the big fight are rousing and kinetic) and sometimes it doesn't (the wife in a coma and job hunt sequences are cloying and slow) but overall as good a follow up to the brilliant original as one could've hoped for.
Forums
Topic: The Movie Thread
Posts 7,761 to 7,780 of 8,938
Please login or sign up to reply to this topic