Miscellaneous Movie Musings

[Strangler Lewis]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

I'm certainly not going to see Pirates 3 absent authoritative opinion that it's the Citizen Kane of pirate movies.

You mean a beautiful bore? I think that's a safe bet.

[Freaky Tiki]

I saw Shrek 3 last night.

I was right in thinking the franchise should've been put to rest.

[mousepod]

After returning, disappointed, from PotC 3, I decided to cleanse my palate with a selection from my unwatched DVD pile.

So I cracked the plastic wrap on my copy of Alex Cox's Revenger's Tragedy, which I picked up for a couple of bucks at the Tower Records "Going Out of Business" sale, and popped it in my DVD player.

What a fun flick. The source material is the Jacobean revenge play of the same title originally published in 1607 - and much of the dialog comes straight from the play. Cox updates the setting to a near-future dystopian Liverpool, and by doing so gives himself license to pay homage to all of his favorite genres and directors, like Sergio Leone's westerns and Ken Russell's twisted sex sci-fi fantasies.

The mostly outstanding cast, featuring Christopher Eccleston as Vindici, the Revenger of the title and Derek Jacobi and Eddie Izzard as the father and son objects of Vindici's plot, respectively, eat up the script and spit it out in an over-the-top fashion which rarely verges on ham (and even then, it's reminiscent of Derek Jarman's Jubilee, so that's ok).

In all, a 109 minutes well-spent.

[flippyshark]

Originally Posted by mousepod

In all, a 109 minutes well-spent.

Sounds like my kind of fun. I'll have to put it in the queue.

I saw Pirates 3 last night at the Silver Moon Drive-in of Lakeland Florida. The lot was packed, and the night had a festival atmosphere, to which the movie was almost secondary. Even with lo-fi sound and state-of-the-eighties projection, I think I liked the movie better this way, rather than in a tightly packed modern movie-house with ear-splitting digital sound. I was able to hike around, socialize a bit, stargaze and watch trains go by, and occasionally pay attention to POTC III.

[Prudence]

Today I watched Golden Door (Nuovomondo), an Italian film being shown as part of the Seattle International Film Festival. The festival gave it an A+ grade, which was definitely a bit over generous.

I wasn't totally thrilled with it as a movie. It had some amusing parts (lots of super large carrots), but was a bit over-odd. Although I think the end of the movie puts the beginning better in context, I'm not sure I like that approach.

Regardless, what the movie *did* do was get me once again thinking about what it must have been like for my great grandparents when they came here (also on an Italian boat) from Switzerland. Having just recently been to Ellis Island and seen the various exhibits, it made that portion of the film more meaningful to me.

It's not a movie I would probably watch again, but I will be thinking about it for awhile.

[Alex]

I haven't been watching many movies lately, most of my spare time has been taken up slogging through the 1983 mini-series of Herman Wouk's The Winds of War. About 10 hours in and the Germans and British just started shooting at each other. Started well but the last four hours have been pretty slow.

But this was a three movie weekend.

Mr. Brooks - Nothing truly fantastic but a pretty good movie starring Kevin Costner as a high-functioning serial killer. It has a pretty tight ending, but the epilogue makes the movie's first serious misstep and it was a pretty bad one, slightly redeemed by the last words.

Knocked Up - Lani and I enjoyed this a lot. A comedy targeted squarely at adults that is still raunchy enough to be fun. Certain parts of the set-up didn't ring true, but once you accept them the rest flows in a reasonable manner.

Damage - A 1992 psychological sex drama starring Jeremy Irons and Juliette Binoche. First, it is amazing that a movie with so many explicit sex scenes could leave me falling asleep out of boredom. They are the most unerotic (somewhat by intention) I've suffered through. Second, other than some sympathy for Irons' wife in the movie, there isn't anybody to even care about. A review at IMDb says it is a fantastic satire of overwrought sex dramas that give good thoughtful movies a bad name when critics go gaga over them.

That's true, except any satire would appear to be unintentional.

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Did I post this earlier? I tried to watch Meet the Feebles and failed. Just not funny.

We saw Bruce Almighty last night, and it wasn't awful, but it sure could have been better. I mean, he didn't even try to cure cancer or end world hunger. Isn't he supposed to try to do away with at least one worldwide ill and of course have it ruin the planet? Saying "yes" to the prayers of one neighborhood seemed lame and tiny for the guy given the job of GOD. Way too much Jim Carrey - any other comedian would have made the movie much more watchable.

Every time I watch I heart Huckabees again, I think in existential terms for a month afterwards...

[Ghoulish Delight]

We also saw Night at the Museum. About what I expected, fairly enjoyable movie. Nothing amazing, but I wouldn't have complained having to sit through it with a kid. There was one scene, however, that made me want to hurt people.

[Gemini Cricket]

Originally Posted by Ghoulish Delight

There was one scene, however, that made me want to hurt people.

:taps fingers on desk waiting for more info:

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by Gemini Cricket

:taps fingers on desk waiting for more info:

Oh, it was just a stupid Ben Stiller scene that was not funny to start with and went on way....too...long.

But seeing that it's a Ben Stiller movie and there was only one of those, I'll count my blessings.