Luis' Movie Log for 2018 (excluding new releases)

I recommend the movie, The von Trapp Family: A Life of Music (2015) it's not a musical. It's very well done and filmed beautifully. It's told from a different perspective, the story is from the oldest daughters perspective.

In the past year I've actually discovered something about myself, that being that I LOVE musicals. Most of them just really make me smile and I find them to be food for the soul. Since I already have my list, it would be tough to cram so many in there, but I'm hoping that maybe in the summer when I have more free time, I could just sit back and watch a load of them.

I'll check out the movie, the true story is very intriguing.

This was an enjoyable and overall decent flick.I don't think I will ever think about this movie as often as some of the others on the log, but I didn't mind watching at all. The murder plot was intriguing and it fueled some of the better parts of the movie, it is also always nice to see Harrison Ford, and there are a few great sequences sprinkled here and there. As far as everything else... Well, I did find the characterization to be a little bit weak, none of the main characters really went anywhere interesting, and the romance didn't feel as natural as one would hope. The murder plot-line, is overall very interesting as mentioned, however, the latter part of the film didn't really captivate me as much, and overall I felt it was a bit unfocused to were the former plot line felt inconsequential until the third act. Overall an interesting story that I really didn't mind at all, I just wish it had better writing, especially with the characters.

I wonder how many people in the forum would regard this as Scorsese's best. It's truly admirable how well-crafted this film is; I could look at any moving piece and not find any overbearing flaws. I would first like to point out how consistent it remains, not only with the plot progression, but the shot construction, this film achieved a level of edge-of-your-seat suspense that not many films pull off, and it was achieved by the great direction of course, but also the fantastic editing; only great editing can stand out the way this did.

Catapulting off the fact that the film's consistency is mind-boggling, I also love the character work. Scorsese knows the kind of characters these people are, and he keeps them likable, while at the same time not undercutting their ambiguity. Also, with the assemble established very early on, I never really caught my breath, I could never pinpoint who would be the next to go, or how, or when; which was fantastic for keeping the film intriguing and unpredictable. The ending was a bit incomplete for me, however, this being a true story, you can never really tell which kind of resolution would best fit the circumstance while still making sense in the narrative, so I can't really blame the filmmakers. Overall, I thought Goodfellas was a near-flawless film, with fantastic direction, great character work, and exemplary editing, and plot progression. Really loved this one.

Yeh me too. I said for so long I dont like musicals. Realised after a conversation with gideon and a few other mofos there are a lot of musicals I do like. Have you seen La La Land? I want to see all that jazz now after seeing Gideon's vid in the movie introductions thread.

Glad you really liked Goodfellas. It's my second favorite Scorcese. And I think we feel about the same on Witness! This could be my favorite thread of the year and I'm jealous of all these first time watches. Reminds me of the year I joined this site (2010).

Yeah! I'm the same way. And I have seen La La Land, it's actually in my top 10 on my profile lol. I adore that film. And the more i think about sound of music, the more I love it, it's already becoming one of my favorites.

Woah! Thank you so much, I'm glad you like my thread and what I have to say about the films. I've been looking at your log as well as of late, I enjoy your reviews so much. Again, thank you for sticking by!

This was fantastic! I've never seen a movie like this, much less one executed this well. Obviously, the most interesting thing in one of Nolan's earliest features, is the story structure and how Nolan presents a narrative that is told in a disjointed series of sequences; it is normally the highest point of praise you'll hear when one discusses the film, and there is no rebuttal from me, it is great, jaw-dropping at times even, how Nolan finds a thrilling and gripping way to execute a film that is told in reverse order.

Once I saw the ending play out, I thought the film would take a solid, straight, and clear approach to demonstrate why it resolved the way it did, but what I got was so much more. This film doesn't just display the film in reverse order for novelty, but it was a perfect tool for delivering character information in such an impactful way, I can not think of a single character that did not play fantastically well into the story. The way the character sequences pan out not only keep our protagonist guessing, but also the audience, and like that, I was glued, surprised, and thrilled throughout its entirety. You never really know if any of the other people are fooling our protagonist, hell, sometimes you never really know if the protagonist is fooling himself. By the time the ending came, I was floored with how much character complexity there was with such a demanding screenplay. I'm impressed with how Nolan executed a film of this caliber so early in his career.

I've talked about this film more than once on the forum, so I will make this short. This has always been my favorite animated film of all time. It is super rewatchable, extremely fun, has some fantastic sequences, and is also surprisingly very mature with its themes, characters and plot progression. I cannot wait for Incredibles 2 coming out in 4 months.

SCORE - 100/100

It's really an interesting story as it can ONLY work being told backwards, while a reverse-chronological order film like Irreversible for example could be told forwards and it wouldn't change too much. Memento on the other hand would be pretty damn boring to watch in order.

One of the best films from the 21st century.

I agree! I can't see Memento having the same impact if I were to watch it Chronologically. How would you rank this film among the rest of Nolan's filmography?

I was never a big Memento guy. But I am a big Nolan guy, with The Prestige at number 1 and Dark Knight at 2.

Hven't seen Prestige yet, it's later on in my list. Dark Knight is definitely a top 2 comic book film of all time. I'm now just sitting down to watch Inception, what are your thoughts on it?

His best one.

That's my third favorite. I love it and it's in my top 100

Just watched it, I'll post my review tomorrow so I can let it marinate a little bit but....wow.

I haven't watched it, but there's a version of Memento in Chronological Order on Vimeo.

10. Inception (2010)

I know its become kind of cool to label this film as overrated and to undercut its efforts at building a complex story, but to hell with it, I loved this film. Christopher Nolan took his love for crafting original and complex stories and has expanded it to full-on blockbuster glory. I can also see this becoming a favorite, however, being a film that has so much happening at the same time, I still have to let it marinate, and I definitely have to watch it a few more times.

That being said, I was never really all that confused while watching this, I think Nolan does a fantastic job at communicating to the audience how exactly the narrative functions, while never fracturing just how complex it is, as opposed to a later effort of his, Interstellar; while it is a wondrous film, Nolan never really built the story around its complexity as well as this, and I felt he left the audience in the dark. This, however, is a perfect film to dissect and examine, I can't really find anything in this narrative that was overwhelmingly unstructured. I loved DiCaprio's performance and Ellen Page was a charming counterpart. The visuals are fantastic, and yes I also mean the shot above, which has become an iconic visual in modern cinema. In the film fan community, every time there's a popular director, it may become the popular thing to label them as "overrated", but one thing is for sure, an idea of this caliber can only work this well in the hands of a truly fantastic filmmaker. Even though I'm making this sound like a masterpiece, I'm going to give it a slightly conservative score, as I still need to re-watch to see if any overwhelming plot holes unveil themselves.