Movie opinions thread (what have you seen, what did you think?)

[lithy]

The Mighty Ducks.

These era of Disney 'family' movies (except they say 'bastard' and also make sexual references about not 'knowing what to do with it' while looking at a SI Swimsuit Issue) don't exist any more.

This is no cinema classic, but I miss the kid heavy cast movies of real kids for kids to watch. Everything is just animated now. The hockey is hilariously slow watching it as an adult in a way I did not appreciate as a kid.

Hook

Much longer than I remember, drags a bit. The Boo Box scene was nowhere near as drawn out as I remember. Still fun overall, but the performances really carry the movie I think. Plus the fact that Maggie Smith's looks went from 0-80 in about 5 years I guess. She looks the same here as she does 20 years later in the Harry Potter movies. Maybe they makeupped her?

 

[LoneSage]

I watched Porco Rosso, I told LoneSage in chat it didn't do it for me. Honestly I think Ponyo was a better movie.

The exposition they had of Rosso just talking to himself was awkward, he needed a sidekick. The unsolved mystery aspect of his pig-ness was just bizarre. The stuff with the girl was borderline to being put on a list. The culmination of the fight was a bit of a let down.

It's OK lithy, I'll allow you to continue being my friend

 

[SouthtownKid]

I watched Porco Rosso, I told LoneSage in chat it didn't do it for me. Honestly I think Ponyo was a better movie.

The exposition they had of Rosso just talking to himself was awkward, he needed a sidekick. The unsolved mystery aspect of his pig-ness was just bizarre. The stuff with the girl was borderline to being put on a list. The culmination of the fight was a bit of a let down.

Ponyo holds your hand a lot more, so if that's something helpful for you, that's understandable. Porco Rosso is closer to what we might have gotten if for some reason, Hemingway had tried his hand at writing a cartoon somewhere in the mid-1920s.

 

[terry.330]

Nightmare Sisters- This movie has a nearly 10 minute long scene where Linea Quigley, Michelle Bauer and Brinke Stevens bathe each other in a bathtub.

Three homely geeky sorority sisters invite some equally desperate guys over for an evening and while performing a seance they are magically transformed into super horny demon sluts hell bent of swallowing the guys souls. In all honesty it's barely a movie, basically just an excuse to string together a bunch of nudity, the rest of the movie is all lame comedy and shenanigans. This was made by David DeCoteau on a bet that he could make an entire movie in one weekend shot entirely in his house. Not only did he do it but he even shot extra scenes and released an alternate tame version for TV that played on USA Up All Night.

It also stars a guy named Dukey Flyswatter.

This is S tier late night cable trash. Up there with Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers and Evil Toons.

 

[Tarma]

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire - Most of the reviews I've read for this are middle of the road, and that's pretty fair. I never had huge expectations because Gil Kenan, the director, has zero pedigree, but he does an alright job. I found it entertaining, but it's not as good as Afterlife... but still better than Ghostbusters 2. Nobody really gets a ton of screen time, as the film fights between covering the OG cast and the new cast from Afterlife. Bill Murray can't be on screen for more than 5 minutes total, but I don't think that makes a whole lot of difference to the end product (positively or negatively).
I read someone say the plot is like an episode of the Real Ghostbusters... and I can relate to that, there is a lot crammed into the near two hour run time, just in the same way a lot used to be crammed into the 20 minute cartoon - especially the better episodes.

If they do any more, they need to either restrict the OGs to strict cameos, or perhaps do one more film that focuses on them, and then switch it up... who knows... I don't really want to see this turn into an ongoing forever franchise, but if they do another film they need to decide which cast they want leading the film.

Overall, if you're a Ghostbusters fan I think you'll come away pretty happy - not delighted, but happy. For everyone else, you'll probably just find it "meh".

 

[famicommander]

Ghostbusters Afterlife is literally just a bunch of people walking around discovering props from the first movie with awestruck expressions on their faces.

Should have been one and done. Ghostbusters never needed a sequel.

 

[lithy]

Ponyo holds your hand a lot more, so if that's something helpful for you, that's understandable. Porco Rosso is closer to what we might have gotten if for some reason, Hemingway had tried his hand at writing a cartoon somewhere in the mid-1920s.

I feel patronized. Probably rightly so, but since I have never read any Hemingway, I'll just have to take your word for it.

I'm halfway through Dune 1.

 

[SouthtownKid]

but since I have never read any Hemingway,

You surprise me. Not even Old Man and the Sea or anything? Maybe give the Nick Adams (the Hemingway character, not the currently alive alt-right douchebag) short story collection a go sometime, as a quick, easy entry point.

 

[LoneSage]

You surprise me. Not even Old Man and the Sea or anything? Maybe give the Nick Adams (the Hemingway character, not the currently alive alt-right douchebag) short story collection a go sometime, as a quick, easy entry point.

my guy he didn't like Porco Rosso just, just let him be

I'm still recovering from it

 

[Tarma]

Should have been one and done. Ghostbusters never needed a sequel.

I'd have also been very happy if that had been the case.

 

[famicommander]

I'd have also been very happy if that had been the case.

Haven't seen the 5th movie yet but 2, 3, and 4 are possibly the laziest big budget sequels ever made. Literally all three of them are the same exact movie as the first, except much worse.

 

[dspoonrt]

That's standard practice in Hollywood. I love Jurassic Park, but they've done the same with that series. No new ideas in 30 years.

 

[famicommander]

That's standard practice in Hollywood. I love Jurassic Park, but they've done the same with that series. No new ideas in 30 years.

Jurassic Park 2 and 3 are substantially different from the first movie. They're absolutely fucking horrible and they should never have been made, but at least they're not the same setup and premise.

Every Ghostbusters story starts with the characters all in the same places they began the first movie and then they just do it over again.

 

[Tarma]

Haven't seen the 5th movie yet but 2, 3, and 4 are possibly the laziest big budget sequels ever made. Literally all three of them are the same exact movie as the first, except much worse.

2 is an awful film. By the time it went into development the franchise had become too influnced by the success of the 1986 cartoon series ,and execs clearly wanted to tap into that market and make a "child" friendly film - that's when the series lost what edge it had in the original (which was never ever intended to appeal to kids and was only toned down in language to get a more budget friendly PG rating otherwise it would have been an R). 2 has some good ideas, but the overall film is a live action edition of Real Ghostbusters, and I hate it.

3 - well that'd be the Paul Feig remake... less said about this the better.

4 - Afterlife - I liked it, I can understand the criticism - it is a bit too nostalgia heavy, and the third act is too close to the first film. However, given the gap in time between this and the first, I think it can be forgiven its shortcomings for the most part. And it's way better than 2.

5 - Frozen Empire - see above. But, yeah, could have been better.... could have been a lot worse as well.

 

[famicommander]

Afterlife treating the first movie as if it's some god damn piece of high art is the biggest problem. The characters is the first movie were basically conmen and nerds who stumbled ass backwards with jank ass equipment into saving the city. The movie was just a vehicle for several funny comedians to riff in a cool setting. The props, the lore, the script, the sets, the costumes, etc were all in service of the main joke.

Having all the characters in the movie worship everyone and everything from the first movie misses the point and only appeals to 45 year olds who similarly missed the point of the original movie in real life.

 

[terry.330]

At least GB2 still had a great cast in their prime and some cool effects. It's a bad movie but that alone still puts it above any of the newer ones.

 

[100proof]

Ghostbusters is 1000% in the same boat as Star Wars at this point where most people aren't even angry about it anymore... they just don't give a shit. Like I saw that Star Wars Acolyte trailer and people would've been gnashing their teeth and rending their garments over how embarrassing it is 6 or 7 years ago but it was barely even a blip outside of the people who earn a living getting angry about franchises.

If the stages of grief was still a thing, non-autistic nerd fandom is largely at acceptance at this point.

 

[jro]

OKay, some re-watches and some new watches.
-Terminator - it's still so fun and so dumb. Never gets old, never not going to be recommended.
-Terminator 2 - eh.......... ..... ....... Furlong's performance in this is just incredibly bad. I know a lot of people will argue that his character is supposed to be annoying, but, no, I think it's more like XPac heat, you just want him off of the screen. It's still an incredible movie but man, every scene Furlong is in just blows.
-Lovely, Dark, and Deep - okay this is the one that I'm really not doing fair, it's a really, really good indie horror movie. Very good story, nice script, good acting, very much recommended. Well worth the $7 for a rental.
-Coherence - well yeah I love this movie as I've mentioned. It holds up well to re-watching. Count the fades to black.
-Life - TF was with the stacked cast for this? Dumb fun movie with a great cast.
-When Evil Lurks - still, just, fuck. Nasty in all the best ways. My favorite horror movie since Frontier(s).

 

[SouthtownKid]

Watched the Roadhouse remake on prime. Jake Gyllenhaal is a decent actor and they got Connor McGreggor doing the fighting, I figured how bad could it be? Bare minimum, it would have to be okay.

Wrong.

 

[terry.330]

Watched the Roadhouse remake on prime. Jake Gyllenhaal is a decent actor and they got Connor McGreggor doing the fighting, I figured how bad could it be? Bare minimum, it would have to be okay.

Wrong.

Yeah, it's real bad. I knew it wasn't going to be good but I figured it would at least be some cheesy fun, but nope.

I was really surprised by how cheap it looked. Like things that didn't need to be CG seemingly were for some reason. You can get away with that shit with a lot of night shots or shadow, not the Florida Keys in the middle of they. I don't know if it was a money saving thing of what but it did not work.

Also I'm pretty sure there were a couple shots where you can see Connor McGreggor's roid induced backne underneath the makeup.

 

[SouthtownKid]

Yeah, it's real bad. I knew it wasn't going to be good but I figured it would at least be some cheesy fun, but nope.

I was really surprised by how cheap it looked. Like things that didn't need to be CG seemingly were for some reason. You can get away with that shit with a lot of night shots or shadow, not the Florida Keys in the middle of they. I don't know if it was a money saving thing of what but it did not work.

Also I'm pretty sure there were a couple shots where you can see Connor McGreggor's roid induced bacon underneath the makeup.

They seemed to even use CG in some of the camera moves during the fights, linking one angle to the next. It was weird. The whole thing was weird. And aggressively dull.

 

[dspoonrt]

You guys are dead on. My wife was excited for it, and we wasted a night on it. Just dreadful. No likeable characters or even believable interactions. The dialogue was next-level bad. It reminded me of the straight-to-video stuff Nic Cage has been pumping out in between his occasional larger, better projects.

 

[Average Joe]

It is legit kind of blowing my mind that a Roadhouse movie has any CG in it let alone in it during fight scenes... I can't even begin to understand as to why that would ever need to happen.

 

[terry.330]

It is legit kind of blowing my mind that a Roadhouse movie has any CG in it let alone in it during fight scenes... I can't even begin to understand as to why that would ever need to happen.

There were fight scenes that looked like they were filmed completely with green screen bit by bit, stitched together and then they dropped the guys into an environment. It's a genuinely baffling movie in every regard.

 

[Burning Fight!!]

I watched the boy and the heron last month at the theater (it arrived late here). You might call it a mediocre ghibli movie compared to their other works but compared to everything else these days, it was awesome. It had that big screen movie magic that’s so hard to find now, I don’t know how to describe it exactly but someone told me to write “je ne sais quoi” somewhere to sound smarter. That’s definitely one of the last theater worthy movies for me.

The one thing I didn’t like was the meta wanking to understand the somewhat disjointed storytelling, but it was still fine on it’s own if you let the loose ends be, filling the blanks with your imagination.

I got watery eyes at the warawara scene. Don’t judge me.