Ah, thanks, Victoria. I'd meant to mention Detour but rambled long enough to lose track of it. I've only seen it once and that so long ago all I recall is it is very dark. In a way Ulmer reminds of Cornell Woolrich and Philip K. Dick, artists who in their medium were good at dramatizing nightmares. there are points where you think it doesn't logically hold together, but there's some dream logic that makes it real in the moment and disturbing.
Low budget suspense flick which borrows the title of the popular book series/radio program. A woman on a train has a conversation with an eerie fellow (Fritz Leiber, father of the great writer of the same name.) He makes a few strangely accurate predictions, then tells her a story, leading to our main plot. A man kills a woman at a train station. A young boy is the only person around, making him the only witness. However, he doesn't know he's seen a murderer. The killer is forced to stay at the local boarding house due to a flood preventing him from leaving. Besides several eccentric folks, providing the comic relief, the residents include a tough-as-nails blonde who wants to go away with the guy, even when she figures out he's the murderer. The kid also lives there with his mother. He doesn't recognize the fellow. Attempts to kill the kid follow. At the end we go back to Fritz Leiber for an ending which adds a touch of the supernatural. The bad guy is calm and taciturn to the point of blandness, which actually makes him creepier. Notable for some slightly suggestive dialogue which must have got past the censors. (Woman looking at her watch: "I'm a little fast." Man, after meaningful pause: "I believe it.") Only an hour long, so worth a look.
Wow! What great story-telling! And Ana Wagener is my new favorite actress! A great performance and an excellently written script!
A murder mystery for the ages! A "locked room" murder mystery - or is it? More than one story is made up by these participants - and each of them are brilliant! Just when you think you have it all figured out - voila! A curtain is pulled and the last act is changed - twice!
Easily one of the best movies in a decade, and the best mystery I've seen in quite a while. Now, if we can get Hollywood to make more movies like this, the industry is saved!
Guardians of the Galaxy 2. A very fun film and a worthy successor to the first film in almost every way. I wonder if they can keep this sort of quality up for the next film.
Back to School (1986). Probably my favourite Rodney Dangerfield film and packed with great one liners. Plus Kurt Vonnegut appears.
The One-Word Descriptor for this movie? Disappointing.
There was so much possibility here! The story was a god one, but it was destroyed, obviously, by a nincompoop director (Carol Reed). With Joseph Cotten as the protagonist, and Orson Wells as the villain, how can you miss??
By giving Wells very few lines, and no ample opportunity to show his best acting.
By making even the dramatic moments go slow* as possible, with no suspenseful buildup at all, even in what should have been an exciting finale!
By not pressing on the romance angle.
By revealing the "surprise" too early.
Not many can say they had been given such great tools - and failed. Congratulations, Carol.
*"Slow" is another descriptor for this movie - the whole thing was slow and unstimulating.
I didn't care much for this movie the first time I watched it. The combat scenes are too unbelievable, with characters performing feats they certainly weren't capable of in the comic books! And at times, the CGI is too noticeable. There seems to be violence simply for the sake of special effects.
I also disliked how they treated Spider-Man as a secondary superhero! Okay, that one, it was the same in the comics when he first interacts with the Avengers - which I felt the same about.
But I just watched the movie again - and found myself liking it a lot more.
There is an excellent story here, though you have to listen beyond the sound and fury of the movie to hear it! There are several dynamics to the story: friendships, morality, political, the human condition.
I might've given this movie a 7 out of 10 before, but now I think we're up to an 8.5!
Low budget crime film made during one of the low points of real-life tough guy Lawrence Tierney's on-and-off career. He plays a crook who gets out of prison to go back to his mother and good-guy brother (played by his real brother.) Not only does he almost immediately plan an armored car robbery with his criminal buddies, he seduces his brother's girlfriend and gets her pregnant, leading to her suicide. Notable mostly for Tierney's intensity. In some ways it feels like a throwback to Thirties gangster flicks.
Well-acted police drama about a serial killer targeting Russian prostitutes in Los Angeles. So, naturally, they send to Moscow to get help, right? And then, of course, they partner him with a rookie female detective/profiler.
Besides these silly contrivances, the movie also had the type of ending that drives mystery fans (like me) mad: The clues that might have led us (the audience) to the answer were not given, until after the bad-guy was dead. Bad form.
Actually, this movie played more like the pilot of a television series. Perhaps that's what the producers were hoping for? Still, it was, as I said, well-acted, and that counts for quite a bit. If you watch, don't try to figure out who the murderer is. And maybe it'll yet be a series?
Ultra-low budget time travel flick. Michael Rennie stars as a guy with some robot parts who gets zapped back in time. It seems that a telepathy machine invented in 1967 has led to an oppressive government in 2087. He tries to stop the gizmo from existing. Meanwhile two government guys from the future try to track him down. The story isn't stupid but it's ruined by terrible special effects, costumes, and music. Co-stars include one of Mudd's Women. Breaks down into hilarity in the middle when some extremely clean cut teenagers, who must have seemed old-fashioned even in 1966, show up at a dance party.
If your feeling blue, and you want to feel a whole lot... worse... this is the movie for you!
Well-acted yarn about an ex-cop who just finished a six-year stint in prison for crimes he took the fall for, for a police-ran crime ring. He wants to put his life back together, and make amends - but his past is getting in the way.
It's a story about a semi-intelligent man who has made some bad decisions - and continues to make them. Nothing goes right for anyone in this movie, and the end is just as sad as the man's life.
WARNING: If you're feeling the least bit suicidal, DO NOT see this movie!
As I follow the path of a Celtic Druid, I was afraid this movie, starring Nicolas Cage, was going to show us as evil/bad. Actually, though, I don't feel it did.
I can even understand the Celtic woman's (from the 1600s) curse upon the city, as they burned her and her children at the stake, blaming her and her family for the plague that had struck the city. Every year, she returns on Halloween, to take three living children, to replace her lost ones. A year after his own child is taken, Cage's character discovers he has until midnight to save his son. After that, it is too late.
I appreciate the effort to acknowledge Celtic symbolism, but they got some things wrong.
> Samhain does not end at midnight on October 31st. It is a three-day celebration, beginning at sundown on the 31st, and ending at sunrise on November 2nd (there are differences of opinions on this issue, but my extensive research leads me to believe this is the correct time frame).
> The buzzard is not the symbol of death - the crow is. But in this case, the meaning seems to be entwined with crossing the barrier between this world and the Otherworld: In that case, white hounds would have been more appropriate - though not as cinematically frightening.
> They used the word "crone". But in Celtic lore, though she was indeed ugly, the Crone is beneficent.
They were quit right to make the number three prevalent, though, as it - and all numbers divisible by three - are Holy.
The movie is, of course, well acted. It keeps a high tension level, and the special effects were not overbearing, as many movies today make them.
This has humour, pathos, and a great sound-track - from the tense, "Sky takes the soul," (the Sky takes the soul/and the Earth takes the clay/ Could be tomorrow, could be today), through Jane Horrocks' heart-breaking rendition of the title track, to the exuberance of the glorious finale - a breathtaking dance version of, "I'm gonna be (500 miles)."
From a squaddie who can't quite adjust to civilian life, his girlfriend who's just been offered the opportunity of a lifetime, a father regretting a long-forgotten affair, and a Scot coming to terms with being in love with an Englishwoman, the gags (and the moments) come thick and fast ("I'd come wi' ye, and I widnae mind. A'right, that's a lie, I wid mind, but I'd dae it.")
Oh, and Jane Horrocks - despite being English - actually makes a decent attempt at a Scottish accent, being the Mum who holds her family together.
Okay, most monster movies tend to be a bit on the ridiculous side, but this one took the cake and ran with it!
A group of young Americans go on a "last vacation" before adulthood. They learn from a local girl about a pristine waterfall and pool, in a "forbidden jungle". And that's where it got stupid.
First, one pair goes off on their own to make out. They are startled by a rustling coming from the jungle growth.
Seriously? You heard A rustling noise and got scared? Let me explain something: You're in a JUNGLE. The time to start getting scared is when you DON'T hear any rustling noises!!
But this jungle has no creatures, evidently. No birds, no snakes, no insects!! Only the monster.
So, in order to get to the pool, they park their cars and walk a short distance - only that "short distance" becomes miles when they run back to it in fear!
Then, after driving a short distance, for reasons not explained, they get OUT of the car again! They're soon moving quickly, and one guy has to stop for five seconds to get his flashlight to work again (because, as everyone knows, you have to stop to shake a flashlight). In those five seconds, his friends get so far ahead of him, he can't see their flashlights, and can barely hear them!
Again, they race back to the vehicle - which is, again, miles away.
One of them posts a frantic video to Facebook (because the jungle provides such excellent reception), which goes viral, and soon, everyone and their brother are looking for them. They hear a helicopter, and one of the girls races ahead to catch it (because, of course, running in a thick jungle is so much faster that flying above it). She comes to a clearing, where the helicopter is coming down - only, she stays just inside the thick jungle growth, rather than run into the clearing!
Meanwhile, her two surviving friends are following - the guy carrying the girl who suffered a compound fracture (bone protruding through the skin) by jumping over a six-inch wide log. They hear a rustling in the bushes...
... and of course stop and wait. After all, it's only a monster that has already killed three of their friends!
I have just finished wasting 84 minutes of my time - hopefully, so you won't have to.
Sky Blue 2142 A.D. (a.ka. Wonderful Days) The world has suffered an ecological catastrophe but the organic city of Ecoban survives. Its needs are met by an underclass known as the Diggers. But exploited and struggling to survive, the Diggers are on the verge of revolution. A rebel fighter remains their best hope for freedom.
Despite its fairly standard dystopian storyline, this Korean animation is really worth watching. It overcomes its own plot mediocrity through the sheer brilliance of its animation and the stunning impact of its combination of sound and vision. The very end of the film is simply a thing of sheer beauty.
Anybody with an interest in Asian cinema or animation in general should really give this movie a chance.
Not in the story; which, as usual for Ghost, was very good. But this was early-80s animation - 30 years and no improvements? Bad lip synch, poor graphics displays, and virtually no background, save for the immediate action.
C'mon, guys! You're working on one of the most popular franchises in the industry, and this is what you offer? Truly sad.
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