Topic: Movie thread.

Watched the trailer for the new Top Gun & Wow! I'm not a huge fan of the original film or anything, but all the aircraft & flight scenes look phenomenal as they're opting for the real thing rather than CGI.

It seems like there has been a growing trend in recent years to use more practical effects & more subdued use of CGI, and I hope it's a trend that continues.

Watched a good one on Sunday.

The Thin Man. The 1938 classic detective story, a light-hearted romp with a socialite couple who solve crimes and drink lots of martinis. Shot in just 12 days! It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture and spawned five sequels, all with the original actors (William Powell and Myrna Loy). For as old as it is, I found it felt very modern, with lots of witty, ribald banter (it was pre-code) and an interesting mystery based on the Dashiell Hammett novel. Highly recommended.

Can't wait for getting End Game on Blue-Ray!
I just really want to watch it again and have my mom see it because she never saw it yet.
soon soon sorta

For those who are fans of independent horror, I would recommend "The Clovehitch Killer."

@RR529 : The vast majority of Hollywood films are CGI-heavy, even for romcoms that you would think are shot on location, but nope, green-screened with CGI environments, and the overwhelming majority of people can't tell the difference. It also explains why so many films, even though that don't appear to have much, if any, CGI contain a long list of CGI crew in the credits, and why even fairly low-budget-looking Hollywood films have budgets in excess of $50 million.

And it makes sense, because the logistics behind using real-world locations can be nightmarish. You'd have to seek council permission to close down roads, potentially recompense local businesses for disrupting their trade, and hire additional crew that would be required for controlling traffic etc. Meanwhile, with CGI, not only do you not have to worry about any of the logistics or red tape, but the producers can exercise complete control over the lighting, time of day (not having to worry about bad weather throwing an entire shooting day down the toilet), among other things. Entire conversations between actors could potentially be shot separately if there are diva-ish types on the set or one happens to fall ill when scheduled for a particular day, for example.

And with movies having their release dates announced so far ahead of time, it stands to reason that producers can meet those deadlines when resorting to CGI rather than being at the mercy of unforseeable circumstances.

I was impressed by how much of Mad Max: Fury Road's effects were real though, but I can't vouch for the new Top Gun, which I will watch in a minute.

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.

@Silly_G, apparently Cruise refused to do it unless they didn't use any CGI, so we'll see.

Species (Amazon Prime Video) - 90's sci-fi thriller/horror that sees government splice alien DNA into a human embryo (after they recieved a message from space detailing how to do so), and after the young girl rapidly ages into an adult and escapes the government facility, they must stop her from breeding with a human male before she can give birth to alien babies that could wipe out humanity.

It's alright. Her alien form was designed by the artist behind Alien's xenomorphs, so she looked like a slightly more human xenomorph, now with boobs, when in her true form. Overall the plot just seemed like an opportunity for lots of nude scenes (there's absolutely nothing wrong with that, but I really didn't think the film was really special otherwise).

Of course, the fact that the resolution constsntly fluctuated certainly didn't help my enjoyment of it. It routinely dropped just under HD resolution (just getting a little fuzzyness about it for a few minutes before recovering), and a few times absolutely tanked into a blurry mess. Especially during the climax (once they went into the sewer it tanked for the longest periods, and even during recovery periods never quite got back up to HD). I expect this from Netflix (which does this to me every once in awhile), but I've never had Amazon do it to me before and I'm really disappointed in them. This is really starting to put me off streaming, and outside of exclusive series, I think I may start buying all my films physical.

@RR529 I have a soft spot for that flick. It really toes the line between a real movie and trashy shlock. There's a lot of great actors too, like Ben Kingsley and Alfred Molina. Haven't seen any of the sequels but I assume they're terrible.

@BougieBeetle, yeah, I can see that. I didn't think it was bad, just a bit average. I probably would have enjoyed it a bit more too if it weren't for the aforementioned streaming issues.

On that note, I just ordered a bunch of Blu-Rays from Walmart, so I should be set for the next month - month & a half when it comes to movies (so no more streaming purchases).

• The Wolverine - I actually like the newer X-Men films, and I've been wanting to see this since it's set in Japan (as a plus, it also comes with the 3D version, which I should be able to watch on my PSVR).
• National Lampoon's Vacation - I enjoy all the Vacation films (except for the reboot) and tend to find myself watching them when they're on, so this was a no brainer. Plus, I won't have to worry about the TV censorship.
• For Your Eyes Only - I like 80's-90's era bond films, so I figured I'll start buying them all from that era.
• Oblivion - This isn't one that's talked about much, but I always find myself really getting into this sci-fi Tom Cruise flick whenever it's on, so I might as well own it.

Of course, as always I'll post detailed thoughts on them when I get to watching them.

Been going through a bunch of ‘80s sci-fi the past few days and my latest was The Terminator. One of my favorites in any genre. Think I’ll watch Tron tonight.

@RR529, I love Oblivion! Very underrated movie. It's the kind of original big budget script idea that just doesn't get made that much anymore.

@Woomy_NNYes, I agree, Tron Legacy is great. I never understood all the negative reviews for that movie, I think it's very watchable and very entertaining, and yeah the music is a big highlight.

finally signed up for netflix. can anyone recommend any good films on there? i tend to like drama / thriller type movies.

National Lampoon's Vacation (Blu-Ray) - Required summertime viewing as far as I'm concerned. As someone whose family used to take annual roadtrips up to Minnesota, so much of this film feels so relatable.

Granted, I'm not a fan of how they handled Edna's death, or rather Clark's reaction to it (he just seems like too much of a butt during this scene, and is hard to empathize with him here), but the rest of the film is just so much fun. Anything that can go wrong does go wrong, and unlike many modern raunch comedies that either overly rely on the F-Bomb way too much and/or get cartoonishly goofy, it usually stays just grounded enough to be believable, which makes it all the better, IMO.

@botk watch Jackie Brown. Quentin Tarintino's third (and if you ask me, best) movie. It's his most normal movie, it doesn't have all the racial slurs and hyper violence. What it does have is an amazing script adapted from an Elmore Leonard novel, amazing acting (Sam Jackson's best bar none), an incredible soundtrack, and just mesmerizing cinematography. Truly one of the best.

Yesterday I watched On the Waterfront for the first time. I'm surprised I avoided such a classic for so long. I guess I never realized how much a of a gritty crime drama it is. Marlon Brando is great, all the numerous supporting actors are great. It takes some abrupt twists and turns, but on the whole I really liked it. The score is interesting. It's good, but so bombastic and invasive that it almost ruins certain moments.

Actually it has the most racial slurs after only Django Unchained from him, I mean it's his take on blaxploitation so it'd be surprising if he didn't. It's one of the films Spike Lee brings up when moaning about Tarantino's racism.

Good film tho, it has some pacing issues but it's still very much worth a watch.

@jump Well I think it ties with Hateful Eight for second most n-words behind Django, but that's not saying much, lol. They don't hit as hard since it's mostly coming from Samuel L. Jackson and other black characters and are not used venomously, as opposed to Django or the infamous scene from Pulp Fiction and etc. And of course there's numerous slurs against other races in other films of his.

Anyway, I don't mean to get all technical about who swore how much where, Jackie Brown is a fantastic movie, folks.

The Wolverine Extended Cut (Blu-Ray) - Film that sees the popular X-Men character travelling to Japan to say goodbye to a friend on their deathbed, a former WWII Japanese soldier turned leader of the most powerful business conglomerate in Japan, but things don't go as planned when a variety of forces target the man's granddaughter (and company heir), and Wolverine is dragged into the mess (all while his healing factor is failing him).

I actually quite enjoyed this one. It's not a transformative film, but the action is visceral & has a satisfying meatiness to it that it seems the MCU films are missing (I quite enjoyed the fight on the bullet train & the final battle with Silver Samurai), it seems to have fun with the Japanese setting (across the neon lit streets of Tokyo, snowy mountain villages, and the tropical setting of southern Japan, wolverine finds himself up against all the staples of Japanese pop-culture in terms of Yakuza, Ninja, and even a small scale Mecha), and it makes great use of color.

I know Fox's X-Men films are often hit & miss, but I'm actually going to miss them now that Marvel has the license back (it'll probably be for the best, but still).

I think Fox gets an excessively bad rap for the X-men films.

Pretty much everything made between First Class and Logan was really good, with the exception of Apocalypse, which, IMO wasn't nearly as bad as the critics made it out to be.

I'm really going to miss the edge that the Fox films had. They weren't afraid to make you hurt. They weren't afraid to make a death real and permanent. DOFP remains in my top 3 favorite superhero movies with the likes of Spider-man 2 and The Dark Knight. And Logan is just so damn soul crushing.

For Your Eyes Only (Blu-Ray) - Releasing in 1980, it's the first 80's entry in the long running Bond series, and this entry sees the famous super spy seeking out a device that can control Britain's nuclear sub fleet, after the spy ship in which it was located is sunk. He'll have to act fast though, as a Soviet linked criminal organization is after it as well.

• I really quite enjoyed the more deliberate pacing of the film, which was a nice change of pace from the thrill a minute pace modern action/adventure films tend to have. This really gave you the time to appreciate all the locales, and I really thought all the underwater scenes, as well as the scenic mountains where the bad guy's lair were located, were quite beautiful (especially at Blu-Ray quality).
• The action scenes were good fun, and all the more impressive that they were handled by real stuntmen & physical props (I really want to recognize the opening helicopter scene, and the ski resort chase).
• Think what you will of me, but I like seeing what they were able to get away with in terms of sexual content in these old PG & PG-13 films, whether they did it intentionally, if they just didn't think resolution would be good enough for people to ever see it, or if things were just more relaxed on this type of content (to me it adds a sort of rawness to them that modern PG & PG-13 films don't have, as it seems like they go through them with a fine tooth comb to make sure nothing slips through), and there certainly were a few of those moments here. As one example, in one scene where our heroes are ransacking the sleeping quarters of the bad guy's henchmen, you can clearly, albiet briefly, see a couple of photos of topless women pinned to the walls, and there are a couple more moments like this as well.

Overall I really enjoyed watching this one (more than I thought I would, honestly) and can't wait to get to the other 80's, 90's, and early 00's Bond films (I plan on buying them up through the Brosnan films).

I recently watched Hellboy (*3/2019), Marvel End Game and Detective Pikachu.

All films I enjoyed, the only complaint was Detective Pikachu was abit short and I found it got tedious during the second half.

Otherwise I think the new actor who plays Hellboy done a better job than previous, don't really want comment on End Game because spoilers.