Rate The Last Movie You Saw

Sure. Many of the sequences of very upsetting things happening are shot from Lilya's point of view, literally the camera as her POV. This means that the icky stuff is "on screen", but it also means that you aren't repeatedly seeing her body or the sex acts themselves. I thought it was a very effective way of showing the horrors of sexual exploitation while avoiding the film itself feeling exploitative in those scenes.

It got me thinking about what "needs" to be on screen (yes, obviously this is very subjective), and how filmmakers can portray violence/sexual violence/abuse.

Oh, this isn't new. Remember the see-through floor rape scene in Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion (1972)? Gives the same POV result.

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Look, I'm not judging you - after all, I'm posting here myself, but maybe, just maybe, if you spent less time here and more time watching films, maybe, and I stress, maybe your taste would be of some value. Just a thought, ya know.

It may not be new, but it was the first time I'd seen violence portrayed in that way. I felt like it gave an inherently more empathetic view to what was happening.

Smile (2022)

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[ J ] - [ S ] - [ F ]

One of my favourites.

A hapless family man finds his life turned upside down when millions of strangers suddenly start seeing him in their dreams.

Nicolas Cage continues his recent run of good inde films playing a washed up Professor who has to deal with a bizarre occurrence of people dreaming about him. Dream Scenario is a play on the trappings of fame. cancel culture and crippling self doubt. There are both horror elements and plenty of black comedy, the latter of which seem to be a real forte of director Kristoffer Borgli, who gave us 'Sick of Myself' earlier this year. He's a director to watch. This is a thoroughly enjoyable film.

7.6/10

Lovely film this one. Very Jim Jarmusch.

Psychic Killer (1975)

Pretty effective low budget thriller about a man wrongly convicted of murder and sent to a pshychiatric hospital. On release after being proven innocent he uses his Astral Projection powers (I know) to even the scores with the people who wronged him and his mother while he was incarcerated. I think this is serious with a bit of tongue in cheek thrown in and it's a good watch unless you take it too seriously. The death of the opera singing lawyer is particularly entertaining

Paint
6/10.
It must come close to the most number of subtle sexual innuendos.

I prefer Ryan Reynold's (Deadpool) parody.

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Boldly going.

Gilda follows Johnny Farrell (Glenn Ford), a small time gambler that ends up down on his luck in Argentina, which puts him in the path of the titular character (Hayworth) with whom he might have had a past we're not so sure about. To complicate things further, Gilda is now married to Ballin Mundson (George Macready), a shady casino owner that happens to be Johnny's new boss. Will decency prevail among them?

Although Gilda is often labeled as a romantic drama, the truth is that 85% of the film is Farrell and Gilda just taking jabs at each other as they are each filled with seething hatred. The toxicity of this relationship is quite bleak and probably one of my favorite things on the film. What does that say about me? I don't know, but I really loved seeing these two trying to take down each other. The dialogue and the lines were so pointed and sharp that I couldn't help but gasp and laugh at some of them ("Statistics show that there are more women in the world than anything else. Except insects."). Still, the delivery of these is never light, but extremely serious.

Grade:


Full review on my Movie Loot and the Film Noir HoF.

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1st Rewatch...Richard Lester's breezy direction of what was, for my money, the first feature length music video, makes this movie as fun as it is. Not interested in providing a full story or realism, its only mission was to give the Beatles a chance to play their music on a 40 foot screen. Love the scene where John, Paul, George, Ringo, and Paul's uncle (Wilfred Bambrell) are on a crowded pullman car and the audio for one of their songs begins and as the song progresses, the boys' instruments just start magically appearing in the pullman car, while screaming females appear magically outside the car screaming and drooling.

Wilder stepped into what would become a famous mainline style purely from the desire for artistic exposition, and to make a good film. His famous quote: “I never heard that expression film noir when I made Double Indemnity ... I just made pictures I would have liked to see. When I was lucky, it coincided with the taste of the audience. With Double Indemnity, I was lucky.”

Most fans know the story: an insurance salesman mentored by a tough, moralistic, wily claims examiner falls for an enticing woman who later enlists him for a murder plot of her husband in order to collect the life insurance benefit from the company who employs both the salesman and the mentor. “Double Indemnity” refers to a clause is some life insurance policy that results in double payment as the result of an accidental death. Many characterize the story as one of a scheming femme fatale who uses her lover’s emotions against him in order to bring off the crime. And that’s true in part. But the real story is how the salesman tries to outwit his long time mentor, and to pull off the crime while fooling his hero. It’s as much a cat & mouse game as it is a doomed love story-- two men bound together in an intrigue, with only one of them knowing the truth until the end. Curiously the audience is inclined to sympathize with Neff, which is interesting given the matrix of mid-’40s morality.

MacMurray and Stanwyck had worked together 4 years earlier in Remember the Night, a romantic comedy. And now each was the highest paid actor in Hollywood of their respective sexes. Stanwyck didn’t want the role, and had to be coaxed into it, whereas MacMurray --being a light comedy actor-- didn’t believe he could handle the part. He too had to be convinced. Their pairing for DI turned out to be one of the best in film history. And Robinson also wowed audiences with his portrayal. One of his best known scenes was the “method of suicide” monologue, which is one of the most memorable from the era.

Wilder’s direction was masterful, as he reportedly was trying to out-do Alfred Hitchcock in excellence. But it was the pregnant and rough clipped dialogue --chiefly written by the great Raymond Chandler-- that set the mood up on a pedestal, never to be knocked down. Chandler’s hard boiled word interplay was to be a master class in dialogue for future film noir writers. Wilder rewarded Chandler with a cameo, visible 16 minutes into the film, looking up as he sat outside the door of the insurance office reading a newspaper as Neff passed by. That cameo remains as the single instance of Chandler visible on film.

Cinematographer John Seitz brought with him years of experience from a catalogue of fine films to photograph the shadows and set design necessary to this picture. He was to follow it up with other top Wilder films such as The Lost Weekend and Sunset Boulevard. Also at a high level was Miklos Rozsa’s alluring score. He typically set moods by use of leitmotif musical passages representing the main characters, and also for surreptitious meetings between the two principals.

James M. Cain had written the novel on which the film was based, and many of the studios wanted the rights. But when Paramount finally acquired the rights the Hays office objected that the film was too tawdry, and that MacMurray’s character (Walter Neff) hadn’t received a decisive enough demise. Wilder had initially written and filmed an ending at great expense that showed Neff being executed in the gas chamber while his mentor looked on. But yet that ending was thought to be too gruesome by the censors. On reconsideration Wilder realized that the way Neff’s end was shown in the final cut was perfectly proper, given the nature of the two characters’ relationship, so he omitted the gas chamber ending entirely, and we all can be grateful for Wilder’s decision.

DI is one picture on a small list of films which would be difficult to imagine anything added or subtracted. It’s one of those happy convergences that have occurred over the decades that bring just the right people together at just the right time. Double Indemnity is not only arguably the finest example of film noir, but is on its own one of the great films.

Doc's rating: 10/10

Freaks - I was expecting another moody psychological thriller and it does indeed start out in claustrophobic fashion with 8 year old Chloe (Lexy Kolker) holed up in a dilapidated house with her father Henry (Emile Hirsch). He constantly drills her on her cover story. Her name is Eleanor and she has a sister and she likes baseball etc. The windows are covered up and the front door has countless locks on it. She's not allowed to look out the windows much less step outside.

Director/Writers Zach Lipovsky and Adam B. Stein seem to be going for a Room like melodrama. It's not that easy a tell though because it's all taken in and largely processed through Chloe's eyes. She does eventually manage to slip away from her father's overly protective and paranoid control and venture outside. That's where she makes the acquaintance of Alan AKA Mr. Snowcone (Bruce Dern), who operates an ice cream truck that's been loitering outside her home. When the admittedly creepy old guy invites her into the back of his truck you genuinely start fretting about where they're taking this. But never fear, it's merely the first step in revealing what's what.
This is low budget with a direct to video look to some scenes but the cast is strong and young Lexy Kolker does an admirable job of basically carrying the movie on her little shoulders. There's enough story, interesting characters and visual FX here to make this a worthwhile watch.

80/100

Sabata follows the titular character (Lee Van Cleef), a lone but skilled gunman as he tries to protect the residents of the small town of Daugherty, Texas from their corrupt leaders. In the process, he sides with several colorful characters, including a Confederate veteran (Pedro Sanchez) and a mysterious drifter called Banjo (William Berger).

What I liked about the film is how evident it is that Van Cleef is having a blast with the role. What possibly separates him from the above two gunslingers is that his portrayal of Sabata is more charismatic and fun. Like them, Sabata's pretty much invincible; he's rough and tough, but he's usually seen smiling and is not above a wisecrack or two.

Grade:


Full review on my Movie Loot

Think I'll need to search this one out, I'm a fan of Lee Van Cleef.

Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=20132447

The King and the Clown - (2005)

Reviewed on my watchlist thread here, The King and the Clown is an excellent historical film from South Korea about a troupe of performers who end up playing in front of the king (if he doesn't laugh, they'll be executed) and then becoming embroiled in palace intrigue. Performances, story, costumes, visuals - everything about this film is pitch perfect, and I completely lost myself within it. South Korean director Lee Joon-ik is another to add to the heady list of great Korean filmmakers.

9/10


Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=20132447

Trances - (1981)

It didn't immediately grab me, but by the time I'd watched this Moroccan documentary about music group "Nass El Ghiwane" and the special features on the DVD it's on I'd grown in appreciation. This is one that absolutely demands another watch down the road. There's a nice pace to it, and I can see why it's admired the way it is.

7/10

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Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971)

amazing

Acidman -

If you're interested in UFOs like I am, this may disappoint you since despite the plot summary, they're tangential to the story. Instead, it ends up being a decent father/daughter reconciliation drama. Acidman is what the local teenage hooligans call Lloyd (Haden Church), a retired engineer who became a hermit in the Oregon wilderness to spend the rest of his days watching the skies. Without warning, his adult daughter Maggie (Agron), who has been searching for him for a long time, shows up at his doorstep. Did she just want to see how he's been or is something else going on?

There are times when we think we've come to an understanding with ourselves, if you will, but sadly, we still end up doing things we thought we have removed from our systems, a subject this movie explores pretty well. I don't want to say too much about why Maggie put everything aside to find her dad, but it's borne from the same impulse thar brought Lloyd to the middle of nowhere. While I wish the movie did more with its UFO angle, I approve of how it makes Lloyd's search to be about one for a place where things make more sense. Haden Church is convincing as a man who believes the truth is out there and who will not buy any arguments to the contrary, but Agron's performance makes it worth watching most of all. It's the kind of performance you hope the right kind of people watch so that she sticks around for a while, in other words. I also approve of the subtle, blink-and-you'll-miss-it touches that build Maggie and Lloyd's characters such as the titles of Lloyd's UFO recordings of the Maggie's middle school basketball diary.

The movie did make me think of the things about me I wish I could run away from, but when all is said and done, there's not much to it. Am I looking too much into its promise of UFO study and its unusual title? Maybe, but the end result still resembles a dish without its secret ingredient. Plus, it's too reliant on two tropes that I know I am not alone in hating. I still recommend it, especially if you're a Dianna Agron fan. With that said, if you're in the mood for a movie like this, check out 2022's Aftersun first.