Rate The Last Movie You Saw

A great classic film. I think Colin Clive was probably the best portrayal of Dr. Frankenstein. In some cuts, the scene where the monster throws the little girl into the lake, drowning her, is deleted. But to me it's a very important scene which is critical in understanding the monster.

To the Devil a Daughter 1976 I enjoyed this a lot more on rewatch. I liked the performances and there are some good memorable moments.

It was in the cut I saw this time, but it wasn't in the ones I saw years ago. I believe I read it is in most modern prints.

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Fracture - (2007)

I've seen it, but I remembered very little about Fracture before watching it again, aside from it's ending, which I remembered in fine detail. Such a great ending - one that makes me ponder how many viewers guess where it's heading. Despite me not remembering much, it's a first-rate movie - Anthony Hopkins really goes places with his smug, self-satisfied wife-killing villain. Ryan Gosling had already broken through a few years previously with The Notebook, but 2007 was a great year for him - aside from this he appeared in Lars and the Real Girl. This stands head and shoulders above the other thrillers I've been watching lately. It sets up Willy Beachum (Gosling) as a man on top of the world - a great prosecutor who has hit the big time with an offer from a high-priced law firm, and then slowly undercuts everything he has and has achieved via the machinations of his latest opponent, Ted Crawford - who at first glance looks like a klutz trying to represent himself in a murder trial. He's already confessed to the crime - but nothing is as it seems, and Crawford has a cunning plan which will catch Beachum out at every turn. In fact, he makes the prosecutor look so bad that his new job and love slip through his fingers, along with the case. All the while he taunts, and Hopkins, as I said, is in exceedingly top form. Ahh the folly of a young person who is overconfident - the lesson here is pretty obvious, and never more fun to explore as in Fracture.

7.5/10


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Breaking and Entering - (2006)

Breaking and Entering was the last film the great Anthony Minghella directed - it didn't do so well with the critics, but I feel it's more average than outright bad. Perhaps it's an expectations thing. I will admit though - it feels long, even though it just clocks in at an even 2 hours. Will Francis (Jude Law) is an architect, step-father to an autistic daughter and in a rut with partner Liv (Robin Wright) - when chasing down a person who's been burgling his office, he meets the boy's mother, Amira (Juliette Binoche) - a Serb living in London. The two start a complicated affair. It all sounds so simple on paper, but there's nothing simple about Will's life - the most interesting aspect of it being his autistic step-daughter, whom I wish we'd seen more of. Also, I think maybe we could have had an actor better at showing more vulnerability - perhaps Martin Freeman, who plays Will's business partner, would have been better in the lead role here. Jude Law is far too cool, and plays conflicted and in turmoil like he's got a slight tummy-ache. That brow-furrowed look of concern he gives is as far as he's willing to go.

6/10

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I saw Oppenheimer - 8/10 Really good

Casino (1995)

There were some small parts that I remember but its been since the 90's that I've seen Casino. Forgot about Sharon Stone, she was a big name back then. She plays a hustler girl turned junkie that plays all the men around her. According to the linear notes on the screen this movie is based on true events of the Las Vegas scene, I'm guessing during the 80's. Definitely a full-on Vegas movie that gets into the dirty details. Been a while since I've seen a Pesci film but when I was a kid he was all over the big screen. Top of the list for flicks about Las Vegas.

9/10

Saboteur (1942)

Public Enemies (2009)

Here's a movie I missed when it was in theaters and had I known about it and circumstances were different I would've gone to see it. Now that I know about it and have seen it I say it's a bit meh and long and quiet. Some classic style 1930's gun battles and all that. Not a lot of music and usually time pieces about this era are filled with contemporary tunes. I think this movie for the most part is an accurate biopic on John Dillinger, the bank robber, and his associates. Nothing over glamorized or given a hype treatment, conservative for a big budget film.

7/10

Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964)

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[ J ] - [ S ] - [ F ]

Quite enjoyed this documentary about an Australian town of 11 people. One night, one of them, plus his dog just disappears. The documentary (produced by the Duplass brothers) interviews most of the inhabitants, most of whom are constantly drinking beer and blaming each other for the disappearance.

It's sad in a way that there's so much disharmony in the town, but some of the interviews are truly hilarious.

7.1/10

Angry Black Girl and Her Monster
An adaptation of Frankenstein set in a gang-infested ghetto.
5/10.

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The Creator
7.5/10
If you like science fiction, I recommend this original tale.

Everything Has to Go

A very moving movie about people in severe states of stress. I liked it very much.

Margin Call

Re-watch of an excellent ensemble movie.

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Chato's Land (1972)

Pretty standard Michael Winner film of the 70s, it's far too long and the dialogue is pretty shabby, luckily Chuck Bronson doesn't have to worry about that. It's watchable for Palance and Bronson but underuses the rest of the cast. The revenge theme is well done but it's the script that is a bit stinky.

Love this movie.

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Dersu Uzala - (1975)

Watching Akira Kurosawa's Dersu Uzala has been a long time coming, and I was pretty expectant of a masterpiece - it wasn't disappointing, and is very much worthy of being watched again. Be warned though - there are only a couple of scenes you could possibly label as "exciting", because this is more a reflection on the meaning of friendship - making it a mood-based movie. It's based on the memoirs of Vladimir Arsenyev (played here by Yury Solomin) - and more specifically, on a native hunter he met, Dersu Uzala (Maxim Munzuk) who guided him through the Sikhote-Alin region of the Russian Far East. Uzala is completely integrated into his natural habitat, and needs nothing from civilized society - he knows how to survive any situation, and on multiple occasions saves Arsenyev's life. The two become close friends, and depend on each other in ways that kind of make them closer than they are to their families (Uzala's wife and two children have died of smallpox some time ago.) Uzala is so in tune with the Earth and nature that he holds a special kind of transcendent wisdom, but as he gets older he's shocked to realise that he now has to depend on Arsebyev to survive himself. This is a vast, operatic tale of survival - one of Kurosawa's great epic films.

8/10


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Attack on the Iron Coast - (1967)

This war film is as bombastic as it's poster - even scenes with husband and wife melodrama are as over the top as you can get. Lloyd Bridges plays guilt-plagued Maj. Jamie Wilson - he's seen death on a brutal scale, but his next mission will be almost certainly suicidal. He's to blow up a Nazi naval base on the French coast by ramming through it's perimeter with a ship loaded full of explosives. He's partnered with his greatest critic, Capt. Franklin (Andrew Keir) of the Royal Navy, whose son was killed under Wilson's reckless command. The biggest surprise of Attack on the Iron Coast though is Wilson's training methods. He simulates "battle conditions" with real bullets and mortars - and I swear more of his troops are killed in training than in combat! At one stage his second-in-command is blown to bits, which is a new one for me. I've never seen training carnage like that in a war film. Other than that, this is pretty standard stuff, and therefore most scenes are completely indistinguishable from any other second-rate war film going around. There's a nice huge explosion at the end though.

5/10

The Endless (2017)

The startup was good and I anticipated something else but the movie settled for timeloops and that was disappointing as the whole thing seemed to anti-climax with an ending that seemed too easy. I thought maybe the cult thing would develop more but the protagonist was a surreal unseen entity. This looks like a pilot for a TV series, honestly. I liked Santa Claus vs. The Martians more.

4.5/10