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Watch the Capcom-produced Resident Evil: Degeneration and you'll realize just badly the live-action movies fail at being "Resident Evil." I approached it reluctantly because I'm not into the games and hate the theatrical films, but Degeneration pretty much blew me away. I give it a 5/5. I've never seen one nanosecond of the Resident Evil games, I don't have a desire to, so I don't compare them to the movies. I enjoy the movies as a standalone film franchise and nothing more. I understand the movies are more "inspired by" rather than actually emulating the games themselves and am pretty entertained by them. Another Ghosts of Mars/Vampires conundrum my friend!
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Posted: |
Sep 8, 2010 - 9:33 AM
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By: |
mastadge
(Member)
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Eraserhead (1976) by David Lynch -- I'd only ever seen one Lynch film, so thought I should start to explore his films. And where better to start than at the very beginning? What can be said about this film? It's a surreal, desperately lonely nightmare of a movie, both horrifying and, occasionally, sometimes unintentionally, hilarious. The baby effects are unsettling, to say the least. I don't know that I "get" this movie, nor am I even sure that there's really anything to get, and I don't know that I'll ever watch it again, but as an exercise in atmospheric horror it's certainly a success. I don't know how to rate it: I didn't enjoy it, but neither was I bored by it, and I found it interesting and fascinating. Avatar: The Last Airbender, Book Two – Earth (2006) by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko -- A solid step up from the already very good first season. Zuko finally gets to develop some more, and Uncle Iroh really gets to shine. Appa finally gets his due. Toph was a little obnoxious at first, but they quickly figured out how to use her. This is a good tight season with a solid story, and in which even the standalones all have a purpose. What a great show. (*****) Doctor Zhivago (1965) by David Lean -- David Lean's perfectionism and superb craftsmanship in service of a boring melodrama. This movie just didn't quite work for me. The relationship between Zhivago and Lara never felt quite for-the-ages enough to warrant a 3.5-hour epic against the backdrop of war and revolution, and the ensemble cast of actors let the film down. I didn't buy Julie Christie as a 17-year-old, and I didn't feel much chemistry between her and Sharif at any point, regardless of how epic Jarre's score insisted their relationship was, and Sharif's final scene was more embarrassing than painful. Tom Courtenay and Rod Steiger were very good, though, and Klaus Kinski was a hoot. A wonderfully crafted, gorgeous movie with some amazing scenes, but one that ultimately doesn't really go anywhere. On the Lean-O-Meter, this ranks well below Lawrence and Bridge. (***½) Avatar: The Last Airbender, Book Three – Fire (2007-2008) by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko -- The final season isn't quite as tight as season two. A few too many filler standalone episodes, a very annoying assassin character, an annoying insistence that every character's personality is determined by his or her relationship with parents, and Azula's slightly unconvincing character arc drag down slightly a season with a number of great episodes and climaxes. Still, the end is suitably epic, even as the climactic battles feel slightly unbalanced. A solid end to a great show. (****½) The Baader Meinhof Complex (Der Baader Meinhof Komplex) (2008) by Uli Edel -- 1970s Germany, a number of extremist left-wing militants got together in solidarity with the oppressed of the world and against fascism, US imperialism and the like, and caused a lot of trouble. Essentially anarchists, though they would not have described themselves thus, they were, as portrayed in this movie, kids with legitimate concerns whose ideas of how to address those concerns -- by drawing a clear line between themselves and their enemies, and having no fear of shooting across it -- went way too far and only exacerbated many of the problems they sought to address. This movie, at 2.5 hours, is packed with characters and events covering a decade or more; written by the writer of Der Untergang, it often plays like a historical thriller, and it neither sensationalizes nor plays down the violence. It's remarkably balanced, depicting both sides -- the RAF and the authorities -- sympathetically yet not afraid to show the mistakes made by either. Small liability: Bruno Ganz, who played Hitler in Der Untergang, is in this movie, and while he looks very different here, every time he speaks I heard that Hitler rant meme that's all over the internet. Slightly bigger liability: because it covers so much material, this really is much more an event movie than a character movie; you get the personalities involved, but the movie's about what they did, not what made them tick. Even bigger liability: this movie can be overwhelming at first if you, like I, have not the foggiest idea of who these people are. It throws you right in with a minimum of context. Also, apparently every terrorist is gorgeous. Even so, however, a compelling, exciting, occasionally unsettling film. (****)
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Posted: |
Sep 8, 2010 - 12:08 PM
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By: |
BobJ
(Member)
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Love And A .45 5/10 I wanted to love this film, but there were just too many elements that ruined it for me. The opening robbery was great, until... we find out the gun he handed the kid was loaded. Why would he do that? It's things like that that bothered me the whole film. There isn't a single speech or line in the rest of the film that matches that wonderful bit of dialogue at the beginning. Also, I hate that the writer killed off Star's parents. It was unnecessary to the plot and added nothing to the over-all story. In fact, the two main killers were dead not two minutes later. That whole bit just came off as cruel and pointless. I loved Gil Bellows, Jeffrey Combs and Rory Cochrane and felt they made the film. Though Jeffrey was way under used and his character never truly fleshed out. One other complaint is that there was just too much cursing. I mean everyone cursed like they came from the wrong side of the tracks and I just feel that takes away from the feel of a story. The secondary characters just didn't have identities to call their own. They just cursed and killed and in the end this just made them disposable. Killers and drug addicts I understand the use of bad language, but Mom, Dad, cops and clerks? They all sounded the same. Too bad, there was a lot of promise here. In the end, I think I enjoyed Way Of The Gun better and would recommend it over this.
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Anamorph (2007) -- 7/10 A gruesome, dark and extremely intelligent serial killer thriller.
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Posted: |
Sep 8, 2010 - 7:53 PM
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By: |
Odlicno
(Member)
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The Broken 2/10 - Just when i was after a decent horror flick to watch. Just very, very dull. It reminded me of an M.Night film in the fact that it's a nice idea that would make a good twilight zone episode but doesn't work as a film. The film looks nice, decent actors, takes itself far too seriously and very little of any interest happens. It takes for-e-v-e-r to get going. It's sort of like Invasion of the Bodysnatchers, the kind of film i love, except without any characteris of any interest or any tension. There's a killing in it that reminded me of Garry's in The Thing. The music is actually very atmospheric and good but used too often to replace any real tension, it builds and builds, then nothing happens. Or somebody opens a door with a bang. Or a mirror smashes. Also the car crash is nicely filmed in slow-mo, but then shown several times where it is clear there's a dummy in the driver's seat, which could have been chopped.
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Gran Torino (2008) -- 9.5/10 This movie could've been perfect, but it needed a strong actor for the pivotal role of Thao, and Bee Vang is not a strong actor.
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THE EXPENDABLES = 1/10 I guess I've moved on. This film hasn't. All it did was remind me that they made shit action films in the 80's too. Stallone is looking more like Danny Trejo! Arnie looked digitally enhanced. It felt like an episode of Sons Of Anarchy with some stuff blowed up! The one star is for me leaving the cinema humming the main theme! Unfortunately, the main theme I was humming was RAMBO!
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Gran Torino (2008) -- 9.5/10 This movie could've been perfect, but it needed a strong actor for the pivotal role of Thao, and Bee Vang is not a strong actor. Glad you liked this one. I think it's a masterpiece and the best film of that year. What a perfect choice for Clint's final screen performance. However, though I agree Bee is not a great actor, that's exactly what Clint wanted, a real kid rather than an actor. He achieved the effect he wanted, so I can't really complain about it. Thao seemed like a real kid who could be living next door to me (as did his sister), and I liked that realism regardless of the less-than-stellar acting chops.
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