that is how i secretly introduce people to hideaki anno btw
Movies seen over the weekend
I watched X-Men: Days of Future Past last night. Twas okay. It had its highs and lows. Certainly better then the last X-Men movie. It’s too bad they haven’t used Mister Sinister. He’s one of my favorite comic book villains.
ya it was p good.
I’ve watched so many movies lately & I can’t remember any of them. Fack.
Escape from New York | John Carpenter | 1981 | USA | 99 min | Action | Sci-Fi | BEST EVER
I like slow and boring movies just fine as long as there are aesthetics and ideas to contemplate. Escape from New York is by-the-numbers dystopian art direction ineptly underlit in an attempt for ominous atmosphere, gross undertones of blacks and gays as villainous tribal pack animals jealous and threatening to white individualist organization and ingenuity, and scene after excruciatingly slow scene of characters knowing things they can’t plausibly know. There’s a wrestling match in the middle of it, in case it’s been too cerebral for you up to that point.
I actually just caught this scene as a friend was watching it. It intrigued me enough to sit down and take a gander for a while, but I quickly realized this is just another bland comic book movie and that scene in particular is pretty out of the norm as far as the rest of the film goes.
Some movies I’ve seen recently:
The Grand Budapest Hotel - 2014 - Dir. Wes Anderson
Only God Forgives - 2013 - Dir. Nicolas Winding Refn
Enter the Void - 2009 - Dir. Gaspar Noe
Also, if you haven’t seen this German film Wings of Desire before you definitely should watch it. Here’s the full thing on Vimeo.
Sin City: A Dame to Kill For | Frank Miller, Robert Rodriguez | 2014 | USA | 102 min | Crime | Thriller | MEH
Three weaker stories with three glaringly bad anticlimaxes (particularly the last one). A few good action moments peppered in but uninspired overall this time around–and what the hell happened to Mickey Rourke’s face?
Season six of Parenthood started this week. The first episode was pretty good and it introduced enough subplots to last most of the season.
Contagion | Steven Soderbergh | 2011 | USA | 106 min | Drama | Thriller | LIKED
Solid, if not decreasingly average/middling film after the first 30-40 minutes. Minor issues aside, the photography is really good, and all the actors seemed to be game for it. Still not sure why Soderbergh felt making this film was necessary, but even still, I had a decent time with it.
Before I watched Contagion I listened to an interview with their scientific fact checker. Apparently, the movie was supposed to be more realistic than the typical Hollowood product. It’s not terrible or anything although I would have preferred something more sciency.
I was just watching an episode of Gotham. It was pretty cool. It captures the grit and dark side of Gotham City. I love the idea of having the main character be a young Jim Gordon when he was a detective.
@chapel: Transparent is a show on the Amazon Prime service. It’s about an older father who comes out as a woman after his kids have grown up.
It’s really, really good.
Looper | Rian Johnson | 2012 | USA | 118 min | Action | Crime | Sci-Fi | GREAT
Good stuff. Great as a time-travel movie, great as a Bruce Willis actioner, great as a Rian Johnson sleight-of-hand genre game. If its special effects are lackluster and its plot leans on earlier time travelers, its execution, pace and vibe are agile enough to make-up for it. Speaking of makeup, it lessens in noticeability w/in a few scenes. Lots of fun.