Last Movie You Saw, Name & Review Movie • Page 215

The Fifth Seal (Zoltán Fábri, 1976)

A hypothetical moral debate late night in the bar, and the long running consequences and implications of this. The decision between unquestioning tyranny, or conscious victimhood and innocence haunts the men long after they have left the bar, because once you begin to question and consider this, it shapes your life.

Set during the second world war, when questions of integrity and complicity were not fanciful thought experiments, but genuine day-to-day choices for ordinary citizens. Facing the idea that your morality may not stand up to questioning, and how you respond when a hypothetical becomes a reality.

It's structured part like a stage play, central locations and held up by some incredible dialogue, but weaves surreal and fanciful moments in between to brilliant effect.

 

Mary Poppins came out in 1964.

 

Nostalgia is a fine line. You can have some fondness for your childhood favorites and maybe you share them with your own kids some day, but more and more it seems like people want to stay in that bubble forever. It seems like a more recent phenomenon; in high school we thought it was weird when our teacher said he was tired from going to the midnight release of Star Wars, but no one really bats an eye at that stuff now.

 

I am 14 (I had 50 picked) films into my project, but school starts today and I am really invested in Paper Mario and Skyrim right now so I don't know if I can sit through more of this stuff. Some accolades so far:

Best film of the series: Thelma and Louise
Worst film of the series: The Parent Trap
Better than I expected: The Talented Mr. Ripley
Worse than I expected: Girl, Interrupted
Film I should have seen by now but will put off the longest: Ran
Film I know will be bad and will put off longer than Ran: Hocus Pocus

 

I'm aware. I'm talking about the screaming irony of someone who decided that the first half of film history can be dismissed because it doesn't have enough auteurs taking about being artistically incurious.

 

I would agree that it would be unfortunate to find someone who never chooses to expose themselves to new kinds of art in favor of comfort classics, but I would argue it is just as sad to find someone who refuses to allow themselves to embrace those nostalgic favorites as the films that helped form them and their tastes. There is room for nuance here. E.T. is still in my top 10 films. So is Eyes Wide Shut or whatever.

Perhaps people tend to gravitate towards nostalgia and escapism more and more because the world we live in continues to become increasingly Hellish. I would argue that it's not only okay, but healthy to seek that sort of reprieve out, occasionally.

 

I agree that too many people make very safe comfort choices in art, which I do also think is probably a retreat from some of the worst parts of the world around us, in addition to how willing corporate studios/labels, etc. are to provide it.

That said, using LB at a quick glance and filtering out for shorts and TV, I've seen something like 5,200 movies. That makes a top 10, what, .01% of what I've seen? Even if my top 10 are crowd-pleasers, it doesn't mean Ikiru and Black Orpheus aren't in the top 50 somewhere or that I haven't seen a half-dozen Bressons, Antonionis, etc. That small a sample is zero indication of someone's "artistic curiosity".

The Pink Panther, Ghostbusters and Clue are in my top 10. I've also seen the entirety of Fassbinder's Berlin Alexanderplatz. Not that difficult to comprehend.

 

What are you talking about? There is a lot more than just Disney movies from the first half of film history.

 

This isn't about Disney? It's about you having said on multiple occasions that you've watched a small amount of older movies because the directors who matter hadn't gotten started yet and then making wide-swath statements about not just other people's artistic curiosity but their "completeness" as a person. So what does that make your lack of curiosity about movie history prior to a certain date? Does it also say things about you as a person?

 

I was talking about Disney movies. When I see adults say their favorite movie is something like The Lion King or Toy Story it suggests a very unrefined palette. Since the vast majority of Americans don't read books, film and television is the main method that people consume art.

These things don't exist in a vacuum. Mook said that nostalgia can work as an escape from the miseries of the world, but the rise of the adults consuming childrens' media has coincided with the increasing comfort and security of the modern world. The movie blockbuster exploded shortly after the end of the American military draft, and pop culture got even more coarse and immature a few months after the "nothing will ever be the same" feelings of 9/11. I am part of it, as well; I have been mostly focusing on video games the last few years, a medium that was considered just for children not long ago and still carries some stigma today. However, whether it is music or film or games or books or food or leisure activities or anything else that makes life enjoyable, I would be worried if I was the same person I was at eight years old.

 

Jumping off Aaron's point; for many people media is primarily a coping mechanism and artistic curiosity a privilege. I resent our current media landscape but criticising "lazy viewers" is unfair and unproductive. The target should be the people creating and exploiting art. Im explicitly talking about the people incharge of remake, sequel, IP, line go up, safety first, movie making and streaming and media platforms in general.

@cshadows2887 noone thinks your an uncurious disney adult, im looking forward to your pick in movie club!

 

Lolol

 

^^^^^

 

I don't watch old movies, but I'll have you know I'm an uncurious Disney adult who just happens to also like horror.

 

I tend to do first-watches from my watchlist during the week, horror on the weekends, and a Pixar movie or something classic/black and white on Sundays to ease my anxiety.

 

never thought about sequencing it like that. that's a really good idea

 

My watching is basically dictated by if my wife wants to watch a film that night. If she does, it’ll either be a kung fu film, anything whatsoever from Hong Kong, a nasty horror or a mainstream American comedy.

If she’s not in the mood for a film, I’ll usually pick something old-ish to chip away at some of my personal blind spots. Blind spots just grow bigger, they never reduce though.

 

Trying to agree on a movie is harder than trying to pick where to go eat.

 

feel this. to remedy this, i've been going through my watchlists on various services to come up with a concrete list of movies and shows to go through and import into my Google TV watchlist (since i haven't cleaned it up in a while). once that's finished, we might have a reasonable selection of picks, but for now, we're primarily sticking with a couple shows with occasional space for a movie.

 

I offered to buy someone lunch if they picked me up while my car was at the dealership. I asked them where they wanted to eat, they said wherever, and they turned down my first three options.

I generally don't watch movies with other people, but during vacation last night we were watching a movie at night. I try to pick things I know they would like. I would never have the tolerance to watch a show with someone because I would inevitably move ahead.

 

Tremors

Such a classic! The practical effects are awesome. Corny ass dialogue. Some really funny kills. Just a gem

 

Tremors kicks so much ass

 

THIS is a fucking fact. The more you know, the more you realize there is to see. It never ends.

 

Old - 5/10
Pretty goofy, but the twist ending was neat. I’m always up for original movies from Shyamalan.

 

Dial M for Murder - 8/10
Another Hitchcock blind spot that I found to be dry, yet cozy. As an adaptation, you're obviously looking at this feeling like a stage play, and between Hitchcock's camerawork and the performances given, that's not a bad thing. Most if not all of his twist endings still feel unbelievable to me in a way that doesn't ruin the ride at all, but does hold them back slightly from being the classics they're touted as. Still, I'd describe this as a very good dialogue-driven before-bed thriller.

Death Game - 8/10
Wow, I had no idea one of the worst movies I've ever seen -- Eli Roth's Knock Knock -- was actually a remake, so imagine my surprise when I finally see the source material and it totally whips ass. (How he fumbled an erotic thriller with Keanu Reeves and Ana de Armas, I'll never know.) Death Game almost mirrors the original Texas Chain Saw Massacre (or House of 1000 Corpses) in its descent into madness; there's not much actual violence here, and what is there isn't particularly gruesome. Instead, you have two young actresses largely improvising taking a man to task for accepting their advances despite having a family. These kinds of cautionary tales about infidelity really are my bread and butter. There's chaotic makeup and sound design, giallo-like lighting, and an unintentionally hilarious ending that might ruin the film if it weren't so audacious. Just the kind of 70s psychological erotic thriller that needs to be seen to be believed.

Alone - 6.5/10
A minimalist abduction-thriller-turned-survival-horror flick that relies on realism to set it apart, something that becomes both the film's biggest strength and weakness. Jules Willcox and Marc Menchaca both turn in excellent performances in a mostly straightforward plot. It's a dark and mean-spirited film that will turn some viewers off by the halfway point, even if nothing particularly graphic happens, but things really rev up in the film's final third. Absolutely worth a watch, even if it may not be particularly memorable in the long-run.

Old - 5/10
Still very bad in terms of dialogue, which is unsurprising; performances, which is a little surprising; and camerawork, which is very surprising given that directing really does seem to by Shyamalan's strength. On second watch, I think I get what he's going for a little more. And I respect it. There are some terrifying themes here, and the sliver of hope that usually underlines Shyamalan's brand of fantasy-horror is really hard to find. Unfortunately, the execution just isn't there, but taken as one long, fucked up, nightmarish episode of Lost, Old is definitely sporadically effective. And hey, points for Mid-Size Sedan still being so funny.

Roadgames (1981) - 7.5/10
Chosen for Chorus.fm's Horror Flick of the Week club, which is funny in retrospect given how little this feels like a horror film. You would expect a story about a trucker and hitchhiker (played by Jamie Lee Curtis) hunting down a serial killer in the Australian Outback to have more thrills to it, and I suppose some come in the film's final act, but by and large, Roadgames feels like a comedy, romance and thriller all wrapped into one. It's the kind of well-rounded story one would expect from Spielberg, albeit with a less notable ending. Still, in a movie about trucking, it's the journey that matters, and Stacy Keach is so impossibly charming that by the time the film ends, you won't even be upset by it's final unearned horror sting. This one is a good time.

Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers - 7.5/10
I unabashedly love these movies and the fact that the queer community has been able to reclaim them for their gonzo politics/implications. It's so funny that this sequel starts with a jock correcting someone's use of pronouns because "she underwent a sex change operation that OUR PARENTS' TAX MONEY PAID FOR." It seems impossible for a film with a transgender killer to be this self-aware in 1988, but then again, how else can you possible read into that kind of dialogue? Anyways, this sequel isn't the classic its predecessor is, but more of a curiosity starring Bruce Sprinsteen's sister in a campier take on familiar slasher tropes (morality and punishment). It's still a total blast. I don't know if it would be possible to remake these movies in a clever way in today's climate, but I'd be very curious to see a queer or trans director take a swing. I could absolute see Kathryn Newton playing a rival counselor in a remake or sequel.

Toy Story 2 - 8/10
I have a really nice memory of seeing this in theaters with my mom and us being the only two there. It was likely my favorite Pixar film for a long time, at least rivalling the first one. On rewatch, it loses just a little bit of the magic and adult tones that underlined the first film. (Woody causes problems again, but after all, The Prospector might have a point here?) Some of the jokes feel quirkier or more childish this time around, and there's a noticable lack of Randy Newman, but even as some of the story beats feel slightly recycled, the animation is just dazzling for the time, and most of it still looks great today, particularly during the toy store adventure sequences. Joan Cusack and John Ratzenberger take the cake in this one. It may sound like I'm comparing this unfavorably to the original, but in all honesty, it's a great sequel that justifies its existence. You know Pixar had something special during a time where a film that might not hit the highs of its predecessors still happens to be this good.