Topic: Thread of totally awesome Netflix Instant recommendations

My friend came up last night & recommended Blood & Bone, so we watched that.

It was alright I suppose, but not really my type of thing. Story features a man, who just out of prison, decides to get involved in underground fighting in order to avenge a friend who was killed in prison.

Though, the sight of seeing a group of "Gangstas" sitting around playing a Samurai Warriors game was humorous in a really out of place kind of way, lol.

Watched Rocky III the other night still my favorite Rocky besides the first one. Think tonight I will watch Who Framed Roger Rabbit in honor of Bob Hoskins.

Rocky 4 is soo cheesy and so silly, yet so awesome

After a hiatus, I'm getting back into it, and watched a couple of things tonight!

G.I. Joe: Retaliation - The textbook example of a summer popcorn flick. The world on the brink of nuclear destruction, guns, explosions, bigger guns, jaw dropping special effects, and... ninjas! I know nothing of the old cartoon, so I don't know how faithful it is to the source material, but what I do know is that it was fun from beginning to end, and since that's all it ever set out to do, I can't think of a reason to give it anything other than a perfect score. I watched it alone, but I'm sure it'd be a blast with some friends on a Friday or Saturday night. (5/5 Stars)

Also watched an episode of Heroes.

I've kind of been away from Netflix lately. Just haven't had the desire to watch anything but I'm getting back into it.

Watched Breakfast at Tiffany's last night. One of my all time favourite films. It always cheers me up when I'm down. I don't know why I don't own a copy of it, but thankfully it's on Netflix. Check it out if you're into classics and/or romance comedies and/or Audrey Hepburn.

Continuing my binge watching of Dexter this afternoon.

Don't know what I'm going to watch tonight... maybe Farscape.

Been watching Luther with my dad, which started off a little "meh" but has gotten better every single episode, and now it's actually great. I get why it has an 8.6 on IMDB now. I suppose the problem was that I was expecting a realistic show, but in fact it's almost as ridiculous as Sherlock.

The same can be said for Bob's Burgers, the first episode didn't really captivate me but now (only 3 episodes in) I'm smiling and laughing all the time. Great little show.

Also re-watching Arrested Development for the... 8th time? On Netflix, but I have it on DVD.

Got on again tonight!

Ip Man 2 - Just as the others in this series I've watched, the martial arts action in this one was choreographed beautifully and was edge of your seat intense. They changed up the theme this time too, as instead of feeding upon the Chinese/Japanese tension of the early 20th century, they focused on the contrast between eastern and western martial arts, as he faced off against a champion British boxer. If you liked the first one and the prequel, you'll like this one as well. (4/5 Stars)

Had some extra time this afternoon, so I hopped on.

Emperor - Wow, this was a great film. Starred Tommy Lee Jones as general Macarthur at the end of WWII, and chronicled the investigation that went into deciding whether or not to charge emperor Hirohito with war crimes. On one hand, letting him off would help Macarthur foster good relations with the Japanese people which would allow him to rebuild Japan as an ally of the US. While finding him guilty would risk an uprising of the Japanese people (which would mean more American and Japanese deaths, and risk Soviet intervention), but it would help Macarthur's presidential ambitions (since the US population wanted the emperor to be charged).

Really interesting watch, especially if you're into WWII stuff, or history in general. (5/5 Stars)

Orange is the New Black: Season 2 starts June 6. I can't wait!

I started watching Young Justice. A lot better than I expected. It's on the same level as Spectacular Spider-man. At times it feels like it was written more for adults than kids.

I had some free time this afternoon, so I got on.

Ip Man: the Final Fight - Well, this is it, the final chapter in Ip Man's story. It was good, though the weakest of the bunch, IMO. You knew who the villain was going to be fairly early on, but the fight between the two (while great, as always) felt forced in context, as they really had nothing to do with each other until the end. Other than that, it was a much more somber story than the other films in the series, as this film chronicled his later years, and the challenges that come from age. Still, if you liked the others, there's no reason to skip this one. (3/5 Stars)

Got on again this afternoon.

Saints and Soldiers: Airborne Creed - WWII film about a small group of stranded American paratroopers who landed outside their intended landing zone, and now must make a dangerous trek through enemy territory, to get to the town of Les Arcs (where other Americans are). Really good watch, especially if you're into WWII stuff. (4/5 Stars)

Had some extra time tonight, so I snuck something in...

Godzilla Raids Again - This is the second Godzilla film, and while it's not as good as the first film, it's still a pretty good time. This is the first time we see the big guy battle another monster, and I found it unique in the way it played out. They didn't have the special effects for their special attacks (other than the occasional Godzilla radiation breath), so they litterally just roll around in a brawl, lol. This film is just so campy in all the right ways, especially the cheesy dubbing (3/5 Stars)

Got on again tonight!

Saving General Yang - Chinese film set during the era of the Song Dynasty. During a war with the invading Khitari empire, a revered Song general of the Yang clan is abandoned by his ally (who has a personal grudge with the family), and his forces are now outnumbered & surrounded in an old fortress. With the emporer's blessing, it's now up to a small group led by Yang's 7 sons to save him. It's a really good film if you like this sort of thing, and they kept the super "floaty" martial arts to a bare minimum, being exciting without ever being campy, which I liked. (4/5 Stars)

The Craft - I saw this when I was a teenager, and it's stood the test of time. Definitely the quintessential witch flick. Remember, power corrupts, and absolute power makes you a crazy <censored>.

Now that series 7 is up, I've decided to re-watch (new) Doctor Who from the beginning. It's been so long since I've given some of these earlier episodes my full attention - I often just have the show playing in the background while I'm doing other things - that I'm either noticing lines I don't remember or appreciating other aspects of the show in a new light. For instance, I have a newfound love for Mickey's arc from late-season 1 through season 2.

After all these years though, I still hate the way Mrs. Moore dies in "The Age of Steel". It's not so much that her death is cruel and almost pointless (those are nothing new for the show, and it's an especially common end for characters that are there for a single story), but there's just no way any of those loud, slow, clanky Cybermen should've been able to sneak behind her & the Doctor for an incredibly cheap stealth kill.

Got on again last night:

Machete Kills - The name really says it all. It's a purposely campy action flick with an over abundance of silly, over the top violence (at one point the main character, Machete, rips out an opponent's intestine and tosses it up into the rotating blade of a helicopter, which then pulls him up into it). It's nothing more or less than advertised, and would probably be a decent watch if you're in the mood for stupid action. (3/5 Stars)

Anything in the Trailer Park Boys series. Literally the best show to come out of Canada, ever.

Time for an update:

The Grandmaster - Very disappointing watch. At first, I was expecting this to be a western take on the story of Ip Man (which would have been interesting to compare to the 4 Chinese originals), but it was yet another Chinese film, and it was a series reboot, which felt really pointless, since the first of the original films is only like 5 or six years old). Other than that, the film just seemed badly made overall. Even watching in HD, the picture was about as dark as it could be, making it tough to see what was going on most of the time. Also, know when movies occasionally slow down the frame rate to be more dramatic? This movie overuses that to the extreme, even doing it when two characters are getting ready to sit down and TALK (the framerate seems to switch up like every other scene). There's also the fact that they tried fitting the story into one movie (instead of the original four), which made it feel rushed, but oddly slow at the same time (due to the filmmaking techniques used). I guess the martial arts action was still good, but you'll literally get 4X the amount if you go through the originals, and they're well made films to boot. (2/5 Stars)

Disney's Tarzan - It's been years since I last watched this, so I figured I'd give it a go. Oh goodness, no matter how many times I watch one of these 2D Disney films, I still can't get over how breathtaking they look in HD (moreso than almost any CGI film I can name). The movie itself was very enjoyable. Typical Disney stuff, which is never a bad thing (I liked spotting the references to their other cartoons, lol). (4/5 Stars)

Gladiator - I decided to go a bit outside of my usual zone (pure blockbuster popcorn flicks) and try out something a bit more critically acclaimed, so I picked this, seeing as how it seemed it could keep my interest theme wise. I'm glad I tried it out, because it was insanely good. The sense of scale was truely epic, the story was gripping (if sad at times), and when they got around to it, the action was great (though a bit bloody, so be warned). I thought that maybe it was a tad long, but other than that an amazing watch. (5/5 Stars)

I saw both World War Z and The Raven the past few days on Netflix both of them were really good. The Raven was a great suspense movie and I was quite surprised by it. World War Z was a good action flick as well.