Movie opinions thread (what have you seen, what did you think?)

[SouthtownKid]

Universal Soldier- I remember my friends all loving this when it came out but I just didn't like it and never felt the need to watch it again. I had no idea it was directed by Roland Emmerich but that explains a lot. It just feels like something is missing, it's dull. It's also extremely stupid. This is the type of movie that should have been directed by Albert Pyun or someone like that who could really put some gritty flavor on it. It might actually be Emmerichs best movie all things considered, It's a perfectly serviceable B level action flick. The main reason I don't like it is because of the female lead, she is instantly unlikable. Plus I'm just not that big of a JCVD fan outside of Bloodsport and Cyborg.

Hard Target is pretty good. Although less good than it seemed in the '90s. I still think it's the only somewhat decent american movie John Woo ever made, though.

 

[terry.330]

Hard Target is pretty good. Although less good than it seemed in the '90s. I still think it's the only somewhat decent american movie John Woo ever made, though.

Yeah his record in Hollywood is pretty spotty. The love for Face Off has always baffled me, I don't even find it enjoyable on a bad level.

Apparently his new one Silent Night is getting pretty bad reviews as well.

 

[DevilRedeemed]

Woo became immortalized thousands of years ago for his Hong Kong period, no one really cares if he's still making films or not.

 

[LoneSage]

John Woo is older than John Carpenter, it's a surprise he's still directing. Good for him though.

 

[wataru330]

Time Cop is my favorite JCVD movie. The Woo flicks I like the best, have less to do with him…and everything to do w/ Chow Yun Fat.

 

[Hattori Hanzo]

Rewatched Loving Vincent for the 7th time since 2019. I probably love this movie.
One of the best animations I've seen so far. A beautiful oil painting in movie length.

 

[LoneSage]

That came out in theaters here surprisingly. I'm glad I saw it. What a piece of work.

 

[Hattori Hanzo]

What a piece of art.

 

[Average Joe]

Godzilla Minus One

The most character-driven Godzilla movie to date and it is quite engaging because of it. All the characters are likable, fleshed out (to varying degrees), and have you rooting for their well-being. Godzilla himself is incredibly terrifying, but less like his Shin incarnation and more like his original form. He's once again a true force of nature that is hell-bent on just being pure destruction. I have some issues with the ending, but overall it's a fun as hell ride with another scary incarnation of the big green guy.

 

[terry.330]

Winners & Sinners- I believe this is the first of the "Lucky Star" movies from Samo Hung and his posse. It's uh shall we say a little rough. It's about 80% comedy, 10% action and 10% shit I just didn't understand because of the culture barrier. Some of the gags are pretty funny but they're overly complicated for what amounts to fairly basic punchlines and the payoff is usually not worth the effort. It has a lot of Samo's trademark quirkiness with a lot of self deprecation, also a lot of the kind of weird gadgets and goofy life hacks he's so fond of coming up with.

The movie is a veritable who's who of familiar faces, unfortunately Yuen Biao is only in one brief scene and while Jackie gets to do some crazy roller skating stuff he doesn't do much actual fighting. Most of the action is in the finale and Samo really gets to show his stuff.

The movie really feels like a warm up for what would come in the next few years when all those guys really established themselves and made some truly incredible stuff. It's also lacking in the fashion, cars and locations that would come to be signatures later. Still if you can put up with all the goofy humor and complete lack of logic there's some fun to be had.

 

[LoneSage]

@terry.330 Review request for The Bridges of Madison County

 

[Yamazaki]

The Guest

Very nice action and thriller (?) flick with Dan Stevens.

Although I knew a bit about the story from friends and YouTube it's still nicely made with the plot twists.

 

[SouthtownKid]

@terry.330 Review request for The Bridges of Madison County

Don't do it terry

 

[LoneSage]

Terry330, it's me, your old pal The Lone Sage, do it for your old pal, DEW IT

 

[SouthtownKid]

 

[terry.330]

@terry.330 Review request for The Bridges of Madison County

Nah.

 

[roker]

Cop Land - I waited way too long to see this. Stallone delivers a solid performance. I had the advantage of not seeing it when it was released, back when many considered it a questionable attempt by Stallone to return to more serious acting. Nevertheless, I found the characters well-written, and the story was enjoyable. Is it the best movie I've ever seen? Hell no. But was it a good movie to watch on a Sunday morning before football? Absolutely. You should see it, especially if you're a fan of gangster-type movies from the late '80s and early '90s.

Godzilla Minus One - WOW. Just wow. Why the WOW? Well, I wasn't expecting this to be so good. Most Godzilla movies follow the format of science fiction fluff with bad acting filler, while you wait for the last half-hour for the final battle. Now, don't get me wrong; it has some fluff, but what makes this so different is the story and acting (a bit melodramatic, but still). My wife said it was better than Oppenheimer because, although both movies took place during/after WWII, Godzilla put more care into the characters and their motivations—everyday normal people dealing with post-war trauma and loss, rather than a story about a man who became part of the war industrial complex with the creation of the atomic bomb. Without spoiling it, it does a good job of showing the Japanese mindset during that time. I didn't see Oppenheimer, but I'll take her word for it.

 

[Average Joe]

Door (1988)

Japanese home invasion thriller that is oozing with creepy tension. First half is an excellent slow burn of increasingly deranged behavior from the stalker character, while the second half goes full-on violent slapstick. It sounds like such an odd juxtaposition that wouldn't work, but the music and creative shooting towards the end pull off something really damn interesting. I'd never heard of this one prior and it seems like most other people haven't either so I'm inclined to say this is an underrated gem.

 

[rarehero]

Over the Top
Equal measures shit and great. Kids in the 80s where creepy. Soundtracks by and large vomit inducing, so bad it goes straight past good and wades into swampy oblivion.
Arm wrestling is ridiculous
And yet.
It's a 7

I actually love the soundtrack. It's total cheesy eighties music, but it fits the movie well. The kid was annoying, but the movie was fine despite that. It's one of my favorite Stallone movies, the whole arm wrestling tournament at the end is great.

 

[DevilRedeemed]

Early 2000s horror films like Final Destination 2 have aged brilliantly. The opening accident scene is a brilliant bit of cinema, the build up and execution. Stunning by any measure. Rest of the film is solid.

I think Texas Chainsaw 3D is the last great film of this particular strain of horror movie. Panned when it came out, I highly recomend it if you like over the top, cheesy but well made big budget horror films of the late 90s and early to mid 00s.

Scream birthed it, the Saw series murdered it

 

[terry.330]

Arena- This movie is a lot of things but mostly it's just a guy in a gold singlet punching big dumb rubber monsters. On paper mixing the cantina scene from Star Wars and Kickboxer sounds like a good idea but pulling it off is another matter. They tried, it's got tons of effects, sets and costumes but it's all just so cheap and half assed. More importantly they forgot that the fighting still has to be cool, the prosthetics and creatures can't carry a movie that revolves around fighting. Watching the main character flail around clumsily with goofy puppets and guys in monster suits is borderline embarrassing. The plot is so thin you could cut yourself on it so that's no help either. Still there's a certain charm to it all and if the fights had been better it could be a schlock classic.

 

[terry.330]

Wheels on Meals- Jackie and Yuen Biao go to Spain and run a pimped out food truck. This is probably the first of their movies that check all the boxes and transition to making movies for an international audience. You've got the locations, the clothes, the cars, the babe and the humor is far less culturally specific. The action, especially the fight between Jackie and Benny the Jet set a new standard. Plus you've got Samo with a full on jerry curl and even small roles so they could get the other Lucky Star members in there. Thoroughly entertaining.

 

[Average Joe]

Cat Sick Blues

A guy deals with the death of his beloved cat by dressing as a cat complete with claws and giant erect barbed penis and proceeds to murder nine people to bring the cat back to life after collecting their blood. At the same time a lady famous on social media via her cat is dealing with the loss of her own cat and having been raped by the same person that killed her cat.

So those were two crazy-ass sentences I just typed there.

This had probably the cruelest depiction of rape since the I Spit on Your Grave remake and it made me legit uncomfortable.

The film is almost pure chaos--the story, music, characters, and tone are just fucking batshit insane. It surprisingly had really excellent gore, which I was not expecting in something so low budget. Been a while since I felt inclined to watch something as bonkers as this, and while it isn't my usual anymore, a part of me still digs movies that just go full fucking nuts.

 

[LoneSage]

Wheels on Meals- Jackie and Yuen Biao go to Spain and run a pimped out food truck. This is probably the first of their movies that check all the boxes and transition to making movies for an international audience. You've got the locations, the clothes, the cars, the babe and the humor is far less culturally specific. The action, especially the fight between Jackie and Benny the Jet set a new standard. Plus you've got Samo with a full on jerry curl and even small roles so they could get the other Lucky Star members in there. Thoroughly entertaining.

The butterfly effect of Wheels on Meals leading Irem to make Kung Fu Master which changed gaming forever is one of those things that makes you think. Like Goku telling Krillin to not kill Vegeta, imagine the timeline if Wheels on Meals didn't exist.

 

[wyo]

Wheels on Meals is awesome. One of the first HK films I saw in the 80s.