Last Seen Contemporary Movie

[TheBossInTheWall]

Crimson Peak 2015

4/10

[Sculpt]

Netflix specials...

Nightbreed: The Director's Cut 2 hrs (1990)
3/10

If you would like to watch really cool costume designs for two hours, this film is for you. If you don't mind if a film doesn't make much sense, you might like it as well.

Let me talk about how it doesn't make sense. If you want to see the film, you might want to stop reading this, as I'll get into some plot points. It's about a young man, Aaron, who's had nightmares about killing 20-some people, and about a place called Midian where real nonhuman monsters live, a place where human serial killers can go to "be forgiven" and "find redemption". Aaron goes to his psychiatrist, who convinces Aaron that he really did kill a bunch of people. Aaron goes to Midian, but the story never describes how serial killers get forgiveness or redemption there, and that theme isn't addressed again.

The Midian monsters have a law, they can only eat humans who aren't real serial killers, even though there are no human serial killers in Midian. Makes sense, right? Aaron tells two monsters he's a serial killer, so they should accept him in Midian. But one monster says Aaron is not, and the Midian law reads they can eat him. The other monster protests, saying it's against their law to eat him, but doesn't explain why it's against the law. So a monster bites Aaron, changing him into a real nonhuman monster, and he's now accepted. But Midian never gives Aaron forgiveness or redemption, apparently we're supposed to forget about that.

The rest of the film a group of evil humans are trying to discover and kill the Midian monsters, who keep to themselves and hide in Midian, with Aaron leading the defense. Which sounds fun, but was rather marginal. The imagery indicates it's christianity that hunted down the real nonhuman monsters. Which I assume is symbolism, but for what is not revealed. Christ offers forgiveness to serial killers, and commands christians to love and help the outcasts, whereas human nature is to do the opposite. Seemed odd to me to insinuate the opposite.


Must Love Dogs (2005)
6/10

Romance with very light comedy, starring the always capable John Cusack and Diane Lane. It was just OK.

The opening kitchen scene was very stage-play to me, but the rest of the film was not. Cusack has a very funny line when he refuses to sell a boat to a buyer. Other than that, I'm afraid everything is rather forgettable. Despite warm performances, I thought the relationship presented is relatively shallow. Film has the usual romance trope (plot device) of something keeping our lovers separated for a time -- and it seems extremely unlikely, as most are. This is it in white text: Lane has great romantic connection with Cusack, and while she knows Cusack is coming right back, she lets a guy kiss her on the mouth for many seconds in the doorway of her house, and it's a first kiss from a man she can't date for professional reasons. And Cusack sees it, walks slowly away, and she doesn't say anything like, "he kissed me, but I want to date you" or something obvious that keeps them dating. End.


The Da Vinci Code
6/10

Surprising lack of fun and suspense. There's some puzzles, intrigue on conspiracies relating to christendom, an assassin, and a reveal, but I didn't find it engaging, fun or suspenseful. The puzzles were especially dull and unengaging for the audience. Even the character narratives were too shallow for me. As a comparison, National Treasure was far superior, where it has fun engaging puzzles, and enjoyable characters one can care about.


Spanish Lake (2014)
6/10

Documentary covering how small Missouri community changed when, in 1970s, government policies lead to influx of poor blacks into middle class white neighborhood. Mostly interviews with people from both sides, with some key info on what caused the situation.

I thought there was too much unrelated material in the interviews; where it was showing people having a good time, reminiscing about the good old days, and personal issues; so much so it's almost more of a fan-film. There's some subtlety relating to the main issue in those scenes, but overall it wasn't nearly tight enough for my tastes.


30 for 30: The '85 Bears (2016)
10/10

Excellent documentary on the 1985 Superbowl Champion Chicago Bears. Insightful interviews, well presented information, news and sports clips. It was upbeat, fun, but also plenty of emotional content of the players and coaches. Although, I must declare, I was a huge Bears fan at the time. That might make me a little more interested.

[The Bloofer Lady]

DOUBLE BOOKED 2014


Kept waiting for this movie to go somewhere but....
A group of friends are help captive by two "sort of" strangers at a rented cottage. It was too hard to follow and i still don't know what happened at the end.

[Ferox13]

Baskin (2015) - the Turkish Horror where the cops stumble across a Cult. Didn't expect much from this as the reviews were poor , so I eneded up really enjoying. Characters were a little better than the usual fodder in a film like this and the main bad guy is kinda cool (in a Angelo Rossitto meets Michael Berryman sorta way)..

[roshiq]

The Girl in the Photographs (2015)



>>: C

[Roiffalo]

Uncaged

I think Baron brought this to my attention last year...? Anyway Netflix got it, so I checked it out.

It wasn't the worst werewolf movie I've seen... But at the same time it could have been better. I really REALLY want to say it was good. It had decent characters, but sadly all the best ones were rarely on screen. Decent story. But my God that family! I can understand leaving your child with another family if you killed your significant other and may be on the run from the law and are afraid you'll accidentally kill it during your next round of carnivorous lunar activities, but at least have the DECENCY to come back to the kid when you know he's going to suffer the same fucking way you did when you could help him!

He also has an uncle who suffers the same fate (btw why wasn't the kid brought to him to be raised with his parent?!), and invites the kid up when he knows he's going to go through werewolf puberty too. That's all well in good... UNTIL HE LEAVES. WHY. WOULD. YOU. LEAVE. He even had a cage and shackles he could of well fucking shared, and he just takes it all and leaves! Like... "fuck you kid, I'm looking after my own ass, see you when the moon's no longer a bitch".

As it was his nephew had to figure shit out on his own, his mom only helping him on the first night but while he was asleep and he didn't even know she was there... I don't know why she didn't just walk up to him during the day and explain shit. Granted he wouldn't have believed her and she probably would have had to do the same thing that night with drugging him and taking him away, but she records the change and after seeing that I'm sure he would have came around!

The pacing just sucked. They needed so many full moons to tell this story and I don't think that was necessary. They didn't even focus on a full moon for long! Soon as he changed we went back to him trying to figure shit out the next morning! I realize this is pacing and build up, which is all well and good. They did something similar (but of course done WAY better) in American Werewolf in London. But here's the big difference. The build up to that was to reveal a horrifying climax with this masterpiece of a monster they created to show as the werewolf. This... This was a shaved Chewy. I mean if you're going to build up to something, give us more than a half-assed Jack Pierce knock off! Actually, no, that would be a compliment. It wasn't even that well detailed. The cover art is the werewolf equivalent of a cock tease.

There was also a lot of new werewolf myths that were thrown at us that they didn't even bother to explain and made the ending really vague. It's going to get a little spoilery here now but at the final battle scene, the kid is stressing to his psycho friend that silver bullets won't work unless he uses them before he turns. This wasn't mentioned before. And when he IS shot with them, it of course cuts to the next morning with the victim alive but he's either dead or unconscious. We don't know if he lived from what he said or if he was full of shit and actually kicked the hypothetical bucket... THAT WAS ANNOYING.

I would rate thissss... 2 out of 5 full moons.

[DeadbeatAtDawn]

The Boy, 2016. 7/10



This was kinda awesome, especially the ending. Make a Part 2 and focus on this ending and I'm there! ;)

Thanks Repo'd for the rec!

[horcrux2007]

Originally Posted by DeadbeatAtDawn

The Boy, 2016. 7/10



This was kinda awesome, especially the ending. Make a Part 2 and focus on this ending and I'm there! ;)

Thanks Repo'd for the rec!

I remember thinking this was going to be awful and thrn somewhat liking it.

[roshiq]

Don't Grow Up aka Alone (2015)



A group of six adolescents in a youth facility suddenly discovers 'freedom' when they realize that everyone who should be taking care of them has disappeared and then they leave the facility and heads to town looking for supplies but things take an unexpectedly horrific twist when any adult they encounter tries to kill them.

Now, a movie with a plot like that where a group of youngsters trying to survive against the adults who are just acting like rampaging zombies, I expected it at least to be a fun & exciting flick like The Children or Eden Lake (just switching the per-adolescent monsters to adults). But the movie just losses it all at the last act where it strangely becomes dull, slow and tries to be a more serious & pretentious flick all of a sudden.

>>: C

Pandemic (2016)



>>: C

[Roiffalo]

Mega Shark vs. Mecha Shark

I thought this was a SciFi crap classic, but it's from Asylum. That was unexpected. Doesn't make it that much better of a film though, the CGI is just as shitty as SciFi's. Characters are better with a love interest already established between a married couple. I loved that. Got all the googly eyed teen love nonsense out of the way.

The movie wastes no time in getting to the point. That being a Megaladon was released from some ancient ice that melted, so they made a large robot shark to combat it. All within the first ten minutes! No build up what so ever. Any feeling they try to get out of the audience they throw out in random exposition with, 'my brother/son/friend/second cousin twice removed on my uncle's side was killed by this thing'. Not even a flashback to show it. Just a partial sentence spewed out.

That aside the Mecha Shark is actually pretty awesome. It's like JARVIS and Jaws had a love child, and it's great to watch in action, even making a superhero move by intercepting the mega shark from attacking a plane. The thing is run by a AI and yet it needs a human pilot. Thankfully the AI (called Nero), has to point out it can pilot it alone after the driver is almost killed halfway through the movie, and is given permission to do so.

A couple of ships are lost at this point, without even a scratch on the shark. Which makes me wonder WHY WEREN'T ALL THE SHIPS CALLED BACK WHEN WAY BEFORE THIS POINT PEOPLE WERE ALREADY DYING FROM THIS FUCKER. The people in this are more stupid than the mayor from Jaws.

The two sharks get in a fight and somehow the mecha gets launched out of the water and ends up in the middle of fucking Sydney. The thing got over ridden by a 'kill all' system, which fucking sucks cause Nero was almost a better character than half the characters. Mecha goes on a rampage after acquiring tank feet by going amphibian mode, and they have to get it back in the water in hopes the two monsters will take each other out.

I'm not going to ramble about the rest cause honestly, it wasn't that bad. It was bad but in comparison to SciFi films it's a classic. If you asked me for a movie recommendation, I would probably recommend something good and not this. But if you asked me if this was okay to watch, I'd say ''if you like SciFi channel movies, but don't like a lot of stupid, sure''.