WHY'D I WATCH IT?
For the Sci-Fi Movie Countdown.

In the spirit of total transparency, I don't watch many black and white movies. In fact, the number of black and white movies I've seen can probably be counted on one hand.

Even less so for silent films. In fact, I've never seen one.

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*

I've long since been turned off by movies that lack recorded dialog because they're fundamentally less engaging if I'm distracted by the fact that black cards with text need to be put up after long periods of mute talking between characters. That and a complete lack of color only really serve to remind me that I'm watching a movie and reminding me that I'm watching a movie during anything other than an attempt to lampshade the fourth wall only serves to break my immersion.

Suffice it to say, I don't hold very high expectations for old movies, and it's not like Metropolis would convince me it isn't stuck in the past if it were in sound and color either.

Metropolis has a number of qualities indicative of very old movies such as the unrealistic speed the movie plays at, the erratic overacting to compensate for lack of being able to hear the urgency in their voices, and the eye makeup which I'm pretty sure exists only to emphasize facial expressions in the face of extreme contrast.


I don't think I was ever totally immersed in Metropolis,
but to honest, I was totally engrossed.


German Expressionism is a term I hear thrown around a lot and it's always been a sort of vague term used to refer to a sort of exaggerated presentation where reality is abstracted to appear surreal. If I was asked prior to watching Metropolis what German Expressionism looks like, I think I'd have trouble describing it, but now having seen it, I feel comfortable now simply pointing at the opening shot of the movie.


We're offered brief glimpses of whirring machinery and a ticking clock prior to a title card that informs us that it's "Shift Change" and we're presented with the image of rows of men, all in black, all downcast, all marching in uniform beat into one set of gates, while another row of men, leave them a second set of gates identical in every way save the fact that their march is just slow enough to be noticeable.

Instantly, I have a strong impression of what this world is like: the working lower class has been beaten into submission and obedience, there's no joy in what they do, and however gloomy they may be going to work, they're even worse coming out. These people are clearly oppressed and I haven't even seen the oppressors yet.

THIS is the style of film-making I appreciate most. It's artificiality is just barely realistic, but it telegraphs so much to me in it's focused approach that I can't not understand exactly what the movie wants me to think and feel about what's going on.

This style persists throughout much of the movie as we learn that these men are workers who live in "The Depths", a city beneath "Metropolis", where they work on the "Heart Machine", which powers the city and enables the wealthy upperclass like the so-called master of Metropolis, Joh Fredersen and his son, Freder (amusingly named Freder Fredersen). Even the names for things beyond the characters are pleasingly generic. We needn't have to open up a Tolkien Dictionary to understand that Metropolis is the city, The Depths are it's underground, and the Heart Machine runs it all, they're named to be convenient and straightforward.

Not that it would be even remotely difficult to understand anything if they were given actual unique names other than descriptors, but generic names like these serve not only to identify, but to specify: Virtually nothing is told to us about what the Heart Machine is or what it does, but it's purpose is easily inferred.

Sure enough, we're given insight into the luxury of Freder and his life under the thumb of the hard-edged businessman Joh and we get a distinct impression of the classist inequalities in the system he manages through his demeanor and interactions with people.

A big thing I appreciate about the dialog cards is that they're ignored entirely during conversations where body language sufficiently portrays the characters' reactions and relationships with each other. There's no need to hear what's being said in most cases throughout the movie because only key lines of dialog are necessary to drive the plot or make sense of the action on screen. Honestly, I sort of wish the dialog cards were phased out further as the movie went on, but they're sparse as it is, so that's really only a nitpick.


Less of a nitpick is the overacting. As the movie goes on we learn that the workers are attending gatherings where they meet Maria, a woman who tells them a variation on the story of the Tower of Babel. She informs the masses that "the mediator between the head and hands must be the heart" which is a somewhat unsubtle metaphor about the morality that is necessary for a top-down government to work, which is made explicitly clear by the end of the film.

The overacting comes in where one of these gatherings is observed by Joh and his mad scientist buddy/rival/person, the unfortunately named Rotwang, and they conceive to sow discord in the underclass by replacing Maria with a robot body double.

When Rotwang pursues Maria with no clear intentions beyond shining a flashlight on her, we're witness to some of the most hilariously bad overracting I've seen. Maria goes mad with fear and the sped up footage only makes the chase look silly.

I'd be inclined to say this makes for the weakest performance in the movie, but the actor playing Maria goes on to steal the show when she also portrays the disturbingly lusty "Man-Machine" body double.


Frankly, the overacting is only really distracting insofar as you can suspend your disbelief that the Man Machine has an unrealistic ability for persuasion, which is honestly easier to accept when you can't hear what she's actually saying most of the time.

She inexplicably manages to both rile a mob and incite nearly all of the upperclass men to lust after her in blind infatuation. In this regard she must easily be one of the most destructive femme fatales ever put to film.

Whatever you think happens next is probably what happens, Metropolis isn't a terribly surprising movie, but what it manages to do with a predictable plot is tell a largely compelling, important, and coherent story about classism where the low rise up and the high fall down.

"Coherent" is perhaps the most arguable point there given Metropolis's tendency to venture directly into hallucinatory symbolism with little real regard as to why. Near the beginning of the movie, Freder witnesses an explosion in The Depths and the intriguingly designed machine that the workers are running becomes that of a giant gaping devil's maw which workers are being thrown into.

The symbolism is pretty obvious here, but similar incidents later on are just confusing and just raise the question of whether or not Freder is even mentally sound.

The Man Machine's dance sequence appears to come out of nowhere and lasts much longer than it really has any need to be, which is something I would say about much of the first two-thirds of the movie as well.

Many scenes are drawn out longer than necessary to get the given point across and it only hammers home the fact that Metropolis runs for a wicked 2 hours even in it's incomplete form.

I felt like the halfway point in this movie should have been about the time it was wrapping up, but even so the 2 hour runtime managed to also holster my previous assumptions about the movie due to it's age and limitations.


I've been watching the critically lauded Kara no Kyoukai series and despite full voice acting, sound effects, color, exceptional animation, and even a run time averaging half the length of Metropolis, they bored me to tears.

I was never bored with Metropolis, and to think I didn't even see the whole movie since many scenes were missing in the version I watched. The whole movie runs approximately 30 minutes longer and I can't really say I wasn't missing them.


It's a shame that Fritz Lang would go on to say he was disgusted with the movie, I'll admit it was perhaps overly simplistic in it's message, but it's still an important message, if not the best movie I've seen to tackle the topic. Supposedly the Nazis were a big fan of Metropolis and I can see why given their stylistic preferences, but hopefully that's the real reason Fritz disparaged it as much as he did, no one wants to admit they like the same thing as a Nazi.

It's kinda funny when you say it out loud though.


All told, I really liked Metropolis, and based on my impressions of the unfinished version, I'm certain I'll like the Restored Version when I see it.

I'm looking forward to it.

REWATCH UPDATE:
Heron, Peacocks, Kissing.

I've now seen an improved version of Metropolis with a couple different scenes restored. It helpfully bridges the gap between events and elaborates on all but one of the biggest scenes I missed before (I still haven't seen the fight between Joh and Rotwang).

A couple flaws have caught my attention this time around including a couple continuity errors. The message for Assistant Guy and Worker Guy is practically identical and contains only a glimpses' necessity of information, but it's shown repeatedly on screen to little benefit.

The relationship between Hel and Rotwang's robot is also tenuous at best given it's never explained. Was the Man-Machine inspired by her? Is that the implication? They put a fair amount of narrative weight on this point given this among other things including the cause for Rotwang's estranged relationship with Joh is unknown to us.

Perhaps most egregious is just how heavyhanded it winds up feeling when it contrives to have every worker in Metropolis forget about their children. Didn't they know that destroying the Heart Machine would drown the city? Wasn't abandoning the city part of the plan? You're gonna abandon it without your children? Fricken' morons.

I really can't overlook this point since I really can't adequately explain it away.

Besides that though, I still enjoyed the movie. Even longer this time, it still managed to keep my interest, but I'm still reluctant to sign off on it without having seen other Fritz Lang/German Expressionist movies like M or The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.

We'll have to see.


Final Verdict:

[Pretty Good]

In one scene where a character gets killed with a flurry slash attacks they cut to the guy's daughter who witnesses it. We're obviously supposed to care about him since he gets all this set up so the music is all sorrowful and she's crying and she runs up to each guy who fought him and weakly flails at them in a similar manner. It's just unintentionally funny since I can totally imagine stock slashing sound effects while she does it.

Unfortunately, I feel that in this case, where the environments are intended to be fantastical it is perhaps sometimes best to leave them up to our imaginations, especially when Metropolis is mainly set in industrial locations which would likely be grey to begin with.

This shot appears a lot brighter and more cheerful than the scene really calls for, probably because it wasn't being shot in color.

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
When I hear people talk about B-Movies, they too often drift into "so bad it's good" territory which is just not a territory I'm familiar with or interested in. I get why you'd laugh at something really bad, but that's not enough to convince me your movie is worth my [reassessment] time.

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
No, when I think of B-Movies, I think of Dragon Tiger Gate, a movie that tries SO HARD to be cooler than it is that it ALMOST gets there.

Take the following screenshot for example:

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
You could say I've had my eye on it for a while, but the bizarre existence of two people named Cole with American Psycho avatars and American Psycho listed as their favorite movie ever and my personal fascination with drop-dead insane characters push me over the edge to watch it.

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
"This MOVIE meant nothing!"

The rating's tough for me since with a couple small tweaks to this movie, I think I probably would have been able to say I enjoyed it.

My main issue is that the movie takes way too much time away from dropping hints as to realism of what we're seeing (which is the crux of the movie). If more scenes included degrees of questionability then I would have been able to appreciate it for more than what they were. And mostly what they were was a lot of scenes where Bale babbles inanely about music which just bores me, or he's chatting with his friends which just reminds me I don't like any of the characters, or a neapolitan mix of sex and violence.

Hehe, get it? Cause it's a fancy word, but I'm actually talking about something horrible?

It's weird to me that people call this a "satire" of the upper-class since it's not really funny or even a parody if it's true. And enough Donald Trump hate nowadays certainly reinforces that.

I did get one big laugh out of the movie though, what scene was it...?

I also got a huge kick out of Paul's death scene. Bale was just a nut.

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
After seeing Patrick Bateman almost murder his secretary it reminded me, "Hey! The Secretary! I was meaning to watch that!" Mainly because I've heard it suggested over 50 Shades of Grey and hey, it'd be interesting if an SM-centric relationship drama managed to sell me, huh?

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
I really liked the first hour of this movie. It set up an interesting relationship between our main girl and Mr. lawyer dude. I was pleased to see that he wasn't going to be a total dick, but instead seemed legitimately concerned about her well-being, especially with regards to her cutting and family problems.

That was until the movie stepped out onto the railroad tracks and got hit by the stupid train.

The spanking scene comes on way too suddenly, and out of friggen' nowhere we're right where the beginning of the movie flash-forwarded to. They're just suddenly in an SM relationship now. Okay.

I would have preferred to have them more gradually slide into it with Mr. lawyer guy's punishments snowballing into the SM stuff rather that just *SPANK* "OH MY GOD I LOVE YOU NOW."

The rest of the movie gets really awkward, especially when Mr. lawyer guy pulls the, "I MADE A MISTAKE, YOU'RE FIRED" card which is always a rational and well-intentioned end to a workplace relationship, right?

All of it results a scene where our main girl runs away from her wedding and agrees to a test of her obedience by starving herself in his office chair where she pisses herself.

-1 point for the wedding. I hate weddings.

x2 MULTIPLIER! for bailing on a wedding when you had already agreed to it. Dick move.

x4 MULTIPLIER!! for urinating on camera. I didn't want to see that.

x8 MULTIPLIER!!! for urinating on an innocent woman's wedding dress. What'd she do to you?

x16 MULTIPLIER!!!! for another wedding.

Blegh. I've seen better endings to pornos.

By the way, I know the main lead's name is "Edward Grey", but we learn virtually nothing about him while we learn a lot about "main girl". And her name doesn't stick, so why should his?


Final Verdict:

[Just... Bad]

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
Saw it in Miss Vicky's favorites and that reminded me that I'd been meaning to watch it since I like surrealism and surrealism seems to be the name of the game here.

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*


Jackson Pollock comes to mind. And Family Guy. And South Park.

Basically this movie feels to me like a mess of ideas all written onto the sides of bananas and then thrown at a dartboard that's attached to a beluga whale skating on rollerblades down the New Jersey Turnpike.

Everyone wants to have sex with everyone.

There's a monkey.

And John Malkovich stars in The Truman Show on pay-per-view.

So many disparate elements fail to coalesce into any single coherent vision, purpose, or point that I'm so lost as to the meaning of anything that I feel like the whole movie just wasted my time.

Okay, I take that back, American Psycho wasted my time, it even admitted it. But at least American Psycho was genuinely enjoyable at times, Being John Malkovich was just... vaguely amusing.

I was hoping for the more-that-slightly-off elements like the 7 1/2 floor, the speech impediment, and the roundabout conversations to amount to something. But no. I think they really just dragged a poor monkey into this movie so we could rationalize making one character act implausibly hysterical and have a monkey cage on hand to lock his girlfriend in.

I don't evudeuidnueihdsnteumidmuriimduiqvimduimdvmm

Look, here's the deal: I was never bored with Mean Girls. That's not something I can say about American Psycho, Being John Malkovich, or Taxi Driver.

It keeps up the pace, it remains consistent, and the character arcs all follow logically so I'm not waiting for the next plot beat, I'm not lost as to meaning of what's going on, and I'm not confused about character motivations.

That's not a point in Mean Girls' favor, though, that's just what I want bare minimum, at least from a comedy.

What IS a point in Mean Girls' favor though are these:

WHY'D I WATCH IT?

Omnizoa: Haven't see A Clockwork Orange.
gboodies: I would say don't bother...
Miss Vicky: Don't bother.
Sexy Celebrity: Bother.

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
I've heard a lot of crap about A Clockwork Orange.

I knew it contained some really twisted stuff and I've read about people who've had nightmares after seeing the movie.

But I watch anime. So I'm pretty used to seeing twisted **** by now.

After seeing A Clockwork Orange, I honestly feel I must reduce my score for Taxi Driver to a [Just... Bad].

Why?

Because after over 2 HOURS of this movie at least I wasn't BORED. At least there was always something HAPPENING, at least the PLOT WAS MOVING ALONG or doing something interesting.

[Meh...] is usually my rating for a competent movie that bores me, but even though Taxi Driver didn't irritate anywhere on the same levels that other movies have, what pitifully little it does spend it's time on I can poke holes in.

Travis' romance? Stupid and unrealistic.

Travis' motivations? Limp and unexplained.

The entire story? It feels like someone took the ideas of a "vigilante taxi driver" and a "hidden wrist gun" and didn't know how to combine the two for most of an entire movie. That SUCKS.

Clockwork Orange didn't bore me, but it falls into my alternate reason for giving a [Meh...] rating: What I liked about the movie is largely offset, but not overwhelmed, by what I didn't like about the movie.

Or more accurately, what I didn't like was offset by what I liked, because A Clockwork Orange starts off REALLY WEIRD.

And goofy.

And kind of appalling.

And I really cannot take their outfits any less seriously.

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
Cause I'm stupid. THERE.

Okay, fine. I mentioned in my The Secretary "review" (I don't like calling these reviews) that I'd seen better stories in pornos. Well, "Nana to Kaoru" was what I was thinking of. That's when I discovered they actually made a live action movie.

WHAT'D I THINK?*SPOILERS*
Nana to Kaoru is originally an erotic comedy manga.

You can tell because it's obvious that no one involved with this movie knows how to adapt a manga to live-action.

Nana underacts, Kaoru overacts, and the whole movie HAD ONE JOB.

The basic premise is that a generally uptight and stressed out council president and her skeevy SM-geek distant friend from way back live next to each other and go to the same school. After a realistic altercation they find themselves in a platonic SM relationship which serves to relax both of their chilly personalities, build trust in each other, and eventually develop into a romantic relationship.

It SOUNDS weird, but this manga managed to gain enough traction with non-SM readers it's now published alongside Berserk, which is a cult classic grimdark fantasy series.

The concept and basis was strong enough, but the transition to live-action was terrible.

Kaoru's basically been flanderized into a stereotypical over-the-top Japanese pervert, and Kaoru couldn't act to save her life.

Inner monologue becomes outer monologue and whatever isn't mood-breaking spoken out loud isn't told to us which damages our ability to understand both character's motivations which are far deeper and more appreciable in the manga than in the movie.

Also the pissing scene. They left in the pissing scene.

I don't get that. Why is that supposed to be sexy? Jus-CUT THAT OUT! I DON'T WANT TO THINK ABOUT THAT!

Nana and Kaoru is spared an [Irredeemably Awful] from me because it managed to get a brief chuckle out of me, both intentionally and unintentionally.


Final Verdict:

[Just... Bad]

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
I quoted it in foster's Movie Quotes thread (mainly because I was thinking of David Bowie). I haven't seen it in like... over 5 years though. Reassessment time!

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
My opinion of Labyrinth has certainly improved over the years.

I think every time I've seen it I've been inclined to directly compare it to other fantasy movies of the time. Problem there is, that's not really fair, since most other fantasy movies try to have a plot, or... SOMETHING.

As I was watching through Labyrinth this time, I think I was finally clue'd off to what I've been missing: Labyrinth isn't like most fantasy movies because it isn't trying to tell a typical fantasy movie story, at least in the modern sense.

It's a more of a fable, it's a lot more like The Wizard of Oz or Alice in Wonderland. The purpose of both of these narratives is to entertain through their presentation, themes, amusing peculiarities, and occasionally insightful dialog.

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
Saw it mentioned once or twice in orestb333's Your Favorite Dark Comedy Movie thread and bearing in mind that I haven't seen it for over 5 years I thought I'd give it a rewatch and see if my neutral/boring feelings towards it have changed.

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
And thus ended the only romantic comedy that's ever made me cry.

I'm SUUUPER HARD to sell on romance movies, ESPECIALLY romantic comedies, so I suppose the fact that this one got to me by approaching the general concept so unconventionally makes sense.

I hate so many things about romance movies mainly because I hate so many things about dating and "love" in real life. That **** just gets under my skin in a bad way and I hate it.

The only vague whisper of any of that is Harold's plan to marry Maude.

Say what you will, but that's a checkbox ticked on my list of "Stupid Things You're Wasting My Time With".

That part of the movie is infinitesimally small compared to everything else though.

The idea that the two love interests take a wild stab at taboos by featuring a social recluse and a criminal with an extreme age difference of at least 60 years sounds like a weak shock material. But while young Harold's obsessed with death and suicide and retreating into his own head, Maude brings a frightening counterbalance by being a 79-year-old woman high on life and living in the moment in the truest sense of the phrase.


I like how the two contrast and complement each other in their various ways, Maude to Harold moreso than Harold to Maude though, that would be a criticism of mine. Harold seems to offer Maude little more than what is probably some overlooked attention while Maude serves to enlighten Harold to the little things, small joys, and the thrill of living in the moment, rather than mulling in the distant past or the future.

Neither character is entirely respectable on their own, Harold just seems to miserably loiter around and Maude clearly jacks cars on a regular basis (with the purest of intentions of course), but the relationship, if anything, manages to even out at least one of them by the end.

The humor is so incredibly deadpan that many of the gags throughout just kinda hang (in an incredibly punny way) and while I laughed a few times, most of the humor was very very mild so while I wasn't exactly bored this time around, I didn't feel a whole lot of punch from what was onscreen.

A few scenes are exceptional of course, the scene in which Harold explains why he pretends to kill himself and the finale are very memorable. The scheme to get Harold out of the military was also memorable although for very different reasons.


Something that I noticed this time around is that this romance develops over the course of a week.

Generally I'd be inclined to call BS on an Overnight Romance, but considering that neither of these characters have anything but time, both find each other totally atypical, and Maude's live-in-the-moment philosophy is conducive to it, I'm gonna let it slide.

Not only these things, but unlike the vast majority of romcoms I've seen, both characters legitimately develop their relationship with one another throughout the movie, both by learning about each other AND sharing the same interests (even if they are funerals) without devolving to those ******* "rules" I hate so much.

Harold and Maude breaks rules, it doesn't make them.

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
I keep revisiting it so often, that I just bought it.

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
Underrated sci-fi classic.

Aside from the cool premise of crashlanding on a planet where creepy crawlies come out during the eclipse, and the many many opportunities the movie takes to make Vin Diesel, Riddick, a badass without ever venturing into cheesy territory (humor is definitely intentional), a big reason I like this movie is the morally ambiguous characters.

The movie knows we want a good guy to root for, but nearly everyone with major screentime is flawed or portrayed negatively in some way which makes it difficult to ascertain everyone's intentions.

Fry's character opens the movie making the selfish decision to jettison all of the passengers of her ship to save her own life. It doesn't work, and we see her struggle to come to terms with the people grateful for saving their lives despite her concealed intentions not to.

As the movie goes on, Fry's eventually redeemed through her actions and the bigger question becomes which of the two characters, Riddick or John, his bounty hunter, can be most trusted since they clearly don't trust each other for good reason.


Riddick's motivations remain questionable nearly all the way into the final scene of the movie, but even then you've been given enough evidence to know what to expect from him by this point. Before this point, the questionability of his motivations as well as his relationship with John (which is valuably improved the Director's Cut) serve to create a constant tension throughout the movie even when there isn't any action on screen, and it's a real treat to see all of the "weak" characters make an effort to hang around one or the other in an attempt to curry favor from the two "powerful" characters even when their intentions aren't entirely transparent and doing so may get them killed.

Among my limited criticisms would be the noticeably weak CG which skates by largely because the most glaring effects are used in dark shots. By biggest complaint would be the bottled glow-worms.

Poor glow-worms. They didn't do anything to you, and yet you stuff a family of them into an old booze bottle and then just left them to die trapped in there. ********.


For the record, I would give the sequels, Chronicles of Riddick, a [Meh...] and Riddick a [Just... Bad].

Chronicles suffers by removing Riddick's ambiguity and... just generally having a weaker plot and themes (points for death by teacup though). Riddick suffers by being a carbon copy of Pitch Black except way way way way worse.


Final Verdict:

[Friggen' Awesome]

REWATCH UPDATE 1/1/2023
It has been 6 years that this movie has sat on my shelf, long awaiting an overdue review, to confirm that it truly is worthy of the lustrous prestige of sitting amidst my all-time favorite movies.

I'm honestly surprised that I rated this 5 stars.

While it's still certainly my favorite Vin Diesel movie, and still the best of the Riddick trilogy, and did not sport nearly as poor of CG as I recall, this movie falls well short of an exceptional review.

Not that it does anything particularly poorly, but it really doesn't excel in any great respect. Riddick himself is equal parts amusing and enigmatic, but the rest of the cast carries personality about on par with the guest characters of a weak Stargate episode (or Farscape, for that matter). The music is serviceable, but in no way memorable, and the monster design is quite frankly boring and unappealing.

Perhaps the biggest issue comes down to how the movie is structured. The first half takes place in the day time, during which we're hyping up the threat of Riddick, teasing at the night to come, and very minimally developing Captain Lady and Fake Cop. All of the outdoor shots are also inconsistently presented with a bright yellow or blue filter and overexposed in an effort to convey how bright it is on a planet with 3 suns. That's just not appealing to look at. This isn't the deep blue and orange saturation of Mad Max: Fury Road, it's just ugly and difficult to watch.

The second half of the movie takes place at night and they basically let the cat out of the bag in the most literal sense because when you establish that the monsters are innumerable and everywhere, and then you have them randomly pick off the characters, it really just feels like a deus ex character death.

Not so with the Archaeologist(?) character, he was so unreasonably ****ing stupid that he not only left the biggest source of light, which was the best defense the cast had against the monsters, dragging it with him, destroying it, and getting himself killed while endangering the cast. Absolute big-brained genius, no wonder the monsters took a big 'ol bite out of it.

The dialog, mainly involving Riddick creepin' on Captain Lady, still has it's moments, but it's few and far between and I feel like I disproportionately overweighted these relationships the first time I watched it because, as seems to be the case with me at times, I end up drooling over inspirational concepts. If something happens in a movie that sounds like a crazy cool idea or there's a character dynamic that plays out in a way that really appeals to me, I go all in on that, but having that first impression dulled over the course of few years and revisiting with these conceits in mind, I'm left less than impressed.

This is good solid movie, there's not a lot to actually complain about, but there's relatively little to commend it for, unless I'm trying to give a rating relative to the average sci-fi/monster movie... in which case it gets high marks.

Final Verdict:

[Good]

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
I think this is supposed to be the quintessential 50s sci-fi movie, right? Other then that, I saw the poster and how can I NOT want to see the movie after a poster like this?:

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
Mmmmm.... that's some good retrofuture.

I thought it was decent. Most generously I would say I'm shocked by how ahead of it's time this movie feels considering it's over 60 YEARS OLD HOLY DAMN.

It got a few intended chuckles out of me and I'm surprised I liked the plot as much as I did despite a few inconsistencies (how'd that last guy die anyway? He just sort of keeled over offscreen.) though my main complaints would OF COURSE have to go towards the one female character.

She's... just sorta there. To tempt the male protagonists. Because apparently they've been secluded from women for over a year for some stupid reason. She's been secluded too so it's apparently a lot of horny men seeking kisses (and only kisses? man, these guys get off easy) from a woman who doesn't even get the concept of kissing.

I really liked the "Nope, I still don't get it" scene where the one guy keeps kissing her and she's not getting anything out of it. Kissing is one of those things that bothers me in romance movies (thank you, Harold & Maude), but unfortunately the movie takes all of that goodwill when the one guy asinine enough to yell at her FOR BEING A WOMAN ends up kissing her and ooooohhh I totally get that kissing thing now.

Collection Update:

Pitch Black

Glad I got the Director's Cut of Pitch Black.

Clue
Shame Clue is almost as barebones as it gets. No insert at all and special features on the back of the box include the UNRATED TRAILER and 3 SURPRISE ENDINGS. Ooooohhhh... fancy ****.

I like my DVDs with Production Commentaries, Cast Commentaries, Making Ofs, Bloopers, and Animated Screen Tests. None of this "Special Features Include: Subtitles" crap.

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
It's been mentioned all over the place on here. Derek Vinyard brought it up in the Natalie Portman Vs Keira Knightley thread. Reminded me that I need to watch it again and REASSESS.

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
It's just a great movie. It's paced well, it makes sense, the music's good, the visuals are consistent, the atmosphere is spot-on, and it all-together keeps me engaged in an important parable about government that totally speaks to me.

I HATE modern government, so it's cool to see a movie not only on the same page as that, but actively fighting against it.

Altogether, I have difficulty thinking of a better vigilante movie, especially considering vigilantism exists in direct contrast to government influence and vigilantism can have no more powerful a target than the government itself.

When I think of Taxi Driver as a vigilante movie, this is what I'm comparing it to.

I have gripes though, as I do for every movie.

Strikes against the movie for me include:
+ Eggs on Toast
+ Kissing
+ "There are no coincidences"
+ V’s illusion is both a stretch and tough to totally rationalize
+ "I fell in love" *GROANS*
+ Valory "loves" her totally unknown cell neighbor (what?)
+ Cheesy blood effects and inappropriately hilarious slow-mo screams
+ Bizarre over-emphasis on homosexuality (was that, like, Sutler's whole campaign: "Pray the Gay Away?")

Yeah, I'm weird. Anyway, props to a fun and memorable movie with a immeasurably important reminder that "people shouldn't be afraid of their governments, governments should be afraid of their people".

Besides which it's easily one of the best roles I've seen Hugo Weaving in and probably one of the best comic book adapted movies out there.

WHY'D I WATCH IT?
Ignoring the fact that I used a gif of it already on this very page, it was most recently brought to my attention with this recent post from Mojo Filter's Top 10 Jim Carrey Movies thread:

I've seen it before, but it's been years. REASSESSMENT TIME.

WHAT'D I THINK? *SPOILERS*
On one hand, it's got Jim Carrey in it, but on the other hand, it's got Jim Carrey in it.

I've seen Liar Liar before, but now more than ever do I empathize with people who say they can't stand him. There are numerous scenes where plausibility just flies out the window and we're left to watch Carrey grunt and make faces and... I'll admit it gets hard to watch.

I've seen the basic plot of father-too-into-his-work before so many times that I'm kinda put out from the get go. The only bit of plotting in this movie that still feels fresh and exceptional is the arc that seeks to dissect the ethical nature of Carrey's character's work, that being the conflict of interest inherent to the job of lawyers.

When it all culminates in the "I HOLD MYSELF IN CONTEMPT!" moment, I'm really into it, but not mere seconds afterward do they try to undercut it with a joke that isn't even all that funny.

The compulsion to tell the truth rings dead similar to Carrey's later movie Yes Man, where he plays a character irrevocably compelled to agree to anything, and while both concepts get a few great moments (Liar Liar much more so than Yes Man), both stumble over their concepts is a couple ways. The plot and performance scarcely intersect and awkward moments abound.

I used to think that Liar Liar was my favorite Jim Carrey movie, but having seen it this time, I think my opinion has changed. I think this is Jim Carrey's funniest movie. It certainly got a few laughs out of me, and it features some of my favorite comedic moments out of any of his movies, but the setup doesn't appeal to me, everyone save Carrey and his character's secretary, Gretta (how come I remember Gretta's name, but not Carrey's?), is pretty lackluster, and the plotting makes unnecessary sacrifices for the sake of humor. It doesn't earn it's whimsical ending even if Carrey plays a pretty likable dad.

At least the cast was clearly having fun with it. There's obviously no attempt to hide what they're selling (the cover art is just Jim Carrey spread-eagled on a white background o_O) when the credits end with a blooper of one of the characters calling Carrey an over-actor. No one really cares, that's what we're here to see, but as I said I think he pushes my comfort level here so at this point I think my favorite Jim Carrey movie will have to be The Truman Show.

Which I also have to watch again.

1980's Movie Help thread:

Sexy Celebrity's Metalheads Song Tournament:
Omnizoa's EDM Song Tournament:
wildboy's WHAT IS YOUR BEST MIND BOGGLING MOVIE??:
Well now just look at what you've done! You've forced my hand Derek!

I HAVE to watch your favorite movie!

I HAVE NO CHOICE!</foreshadowing>

Locke is a nice guy. Even though we barely venture outside his car and never see him speak to anybody face to face, our impression of him is built not just on the sneaky exposition that holds him up as a hard worker at his job, but largely on how he interacts with people over the phone.

He's pleasant, he's calm, and he has every reason not to be.

He bails on the advent of the biggest job of his career to go attend the birth of a baby of a woman he had a one-night fling with. During his drive to the hospital he tries his best to break the news to his employer and wife, Katrina, while also attempting to maintain the peace amidst Bethan, the mother-to-be, and his co-worker, Donal, who he leaves the majority of his work.

Far less important than what actually happens in the movie is why anything happens in the movie. And why anything happens in the movie is simply that Locke is a brutally honest guy.

Say what you will about his "cheating" in the first place, this movie is his counter-argument. The point is he's trying to do the right thing. Even when he gets fired from his job, he still tries to keep the cement project on track. Even when his wife 'kicks him out', he never falters in his barely calm demeanor. Sure he freaks, and it's thanks to Tom Hardy's performance that I buy that any of this actually affects him despite the facade of a rational mediator, but it's never in response to people he's talking with. They freak out on him, and he just takes it all on the chin.

Why is he doing this? Because he doesn't want to be like his dad.


He regularly rants at his dad who he pretends is in the backseat and through that, despite initially sounding like fairly transparent exposition, really best serves, more than any other dialog, to cement (no pun intended) Locke as a righteous character.

It's all out of guilt, not out of love for the other woman, he tells her this repeatedly, and I appreciate an absence of white lies for once. JUST BE HONEST! Reality hurts, sure, but it's better than deceit!

And this element seems prevalent throughout the movie, especially when he struggles to reconcile his wife who goes HARDCORE MONOGAMY SYNDROME.

I HATE Monogamy Syndrome, and for the first time ever, I feel like something I'm watching agrees with me. This movie could easily be presented as Locke's punishment for his indiscretions, but it comes across far more clearly as a tragedy. Locke's a noble character, and his intentions are nothing but for the best, and yet despite his plain efforts to articulate himself and make things right, he drives heedlessly into an assault of






gimme a minute






Wow, that was surreal. I don't think I've ever broken up AFTER watching a movie before.

...well, I guess you could say this movie hits kinda close to home for me.

****! This totally threw off my groove! COMEDY! Let's get some COMEDY in here!

I don't think it was worth the time.

Mr Minio's favorite is Werckmeister Harmonies which seems to be circus-related. This reminded me of The Devil's Carnival which I didn't care for, but was made by the same guys behind Repo: The Genetic Opera which I really liked. Made me want a really good dark carnival-themed movie, preferably one where the dark carnival represents hell or some kind of purgatory. That's when I found this.

Immortan Joe isn't quite as hateable as other lower-key villains since most of his villainy is just extremely chauvinistic shock material. The "breeder wives" and tanks of breast milk honestly just gross me out and I'm glad the story never turned into a "war against men" even though it would have been extremely easy with a couple bad lines of dialog.

Instead we get about 3 to 4 outstanding male characters and nearly twice as many female characters with all of them cooly slipping into the logic of the world with their resourcefulness and mechanical improvisation.

The improvisation is huge point in favor of this movie since everything we see looks like it's been cobbled together from scrap or designed to fulfill unconventional functions out of practicality from the warboys with traffic signs for literal shields to the War Rig dropping it's plow to dreg up sand to put out the fire on it's engine, it all clicks.

The CG is really sneaky in this movie too. Plainly a lot of practical effects went into this movie which goes a long way to selling the action, but it's so prevalent that CG ranges from nearly impossible to notice to very obvious.

The really obvious CG is generally brief though and some of the best CG you need to take double takes to notice like- wait a second, Charlize Theron's missing an arm!

But even as someone who utterly loathes the age rating system, I'm appalled to see what might otherwise be a fun-for-the-whole-family throwback action-adventure-comedy feature a scene in which someone's intestines are graphically dragged out of him with a bicycle wheel.

****in' sick.


Final Verdict:

[Meh...]

Well, it was OBVIOUSLY a satire of... something... I think...

Is this The Running Man? Is this supposed to be like the Running Man? Alright...

This whole movie is weird. We spend the first half of the movie following around what anyone would naturally assume is the bad guy only for him to turn into the protagonist by literal process of elimination and all throughout we're given this bizarrely twisted perspective of the world which inexplicably felt more believable in The Hunger Games.

We get cartoony plots, strange dialog, and surprise twists in the form of dead-on-arrival puns. A HAND GRENADE? Really? And they say it so casually like OF COURSE his hand is also secretly a grenade! Jus' go with it, jus' go with it!

I can only assume this was supposed to be some sort of comedy, but everything from the obviously fake blood to the plastic looking cars to the double agent x double agent romance just made me go, HUH??

I was less baffled by Being John Malkovich!

At least now I know where The Tooncinator got his stock car explosion clip.

The action is easily the best thing the movie has going for it though, so as much as will argue that it's a better movie than both Turbo Kid and Death Race 2000 as a whole, it has neither the nostalgic charm or comedic edge of those movies.

I don't think it really needs them though, as I said Death Race 2000's attempts at humor don't really work and Turbo Kid's graphic bloody violence ruins it's more childish ambitions. That said, The New Barbarians doesn't exactly offer anything else in exchange.

The story is so stock that the bad guy's motivations can be basically explained away as "they're godless homosexuals who love death".

At least I THINK that's what I'm supposed to be getting out of this.

I won't go into why the whole lack-of-women thing doesn't make sense here, but I will say that a homoerotic undercurrent becomes a homoerotic OVERCURRENT by the end of the movie.

After the barbarians (all men) are offhandedly called queers, the villain anally rapes the protagonist and the protagonist gets back at him by literally shoving a drill up his ass, which somehow causes him to explode.