R100

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Jordan, Amberly

Hitoshi Matsumoto is just as crazy as his other films, and just as surreal. A father contracts a bondage company to attack him at random over the next year. But things get out of hand. And ridiculous. This is all actually a film within the film made by a 100 year old director, being screened for the ratings board that have a hard time making sense of it. Deeming it only suitable for people over 100, hence the title.

Man it's a really odd film but a joy to get to watch in a cinema with a packed crowd laughing at the bizarre absurdity of it all. Like his other films I have a real problem with the pacing of it. He seems to delight in holding silence and shots far too long. I can get that's funny, especially for him but it can be torturous for the audience. Although one could take the ending of the film to suggest that that is entirely the point of the film. He gets away with plot holes and twists of logic by the explanation that the film is made by a senile old man. It's a bit of a cop out but it does make for some pretty funny stuff.

I definably like his other two films more but there's some really great moments in this one. It's certainly an odd experience.

Guardians of the Galaxy

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Jordan, Amberly

Fun space times the movie! What a bright and colourful and populated universe this film presents. I gotta admit I was hoping James Gunn would slip in some more subversive stuff in there but there's definitely plenty of crowd pleasing moments and funny lines.

As usual with Marvel films, the villains get shafted by less screen time and underwritten parts and the whole film is spent chasing around some mysterious object. But there's a good group of central characters here to follow. And it looks prrdy. Imax 3D was nice. A lot of aspect ratio changes, but not nearly as annoying as in Transformers.

I was hoping to enjoy this a little more than I did but my expectations were pretty high. Still it's a really enjoyable space adventure and Groot is probably the standout. That cameo after the end credits almost knocked me out of my seat too...

I'll give it another look soon and see if I like it any better without the expectations.

Lucy

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Jordan, Natedawg

Luc Besson knows how to churn out a fun b-grade flick. This one has a nice sci-fi tinge and although the premise is ludicrous it's fun enough that you'll just go along with it to see what happens. Pretty effects happen. And a funky car chase. 

It was also fun to see Oldboy pop up in the film as the villain. Scarlett Johansson slowly becomes more robotic, kind of and Morgan Freeman shows up in the same role he had in Transcendence but makes up for that film with this one. 

It's not really amazing but it's certainly a fun ride. It's nice they didn't bother to throw in a love story too.

Wetlands

IMDB

First time viewed: Yes

Current Release: Yes

Wasn't really prepared for this one. I missed it a Revelation Film Festival in Perth so was good to finally catch it here in Melbourne. A German coming of age gross-out comedy that takes the gross-out to new and daring levels. I regretted eating a burger immediately proceeding this one. There were a couple of moments that even made me queazy, and I don't usually get that way.

The comedy works and the drama works. It's visually kinetic from the opening titles that are reminiscent of Fight Club. It's a really fun and pop style that's used to tell a wonderfully outrageous coming of age story front he point of view of a very subversive character. Definitely one that's gonna stay with me a while. Seek it out if you're feeling adventurous. 

Cheatin'

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes

I wasn't really aware of the name Bill Plympton before I saw a kickstarted campaign for this film pop up on a few news sites. It's an intriguing animation style, very rough and fluid with extreme angles. So unsurprisingly, there's a pretty surreal story that goes along with it. Also a very cartoonish story too.

It's a cute little story of a misunderstanding that leads a young and in love couple to start cheating on each other when neither wanted to. Further complicated with the introduction of a machine that lets a character swap bodies...

It's filled with humour and wonderful characterisations for people that don't really speak at all. It's pure animation and it's visually fascinating. Very enjoyable and quite funny.

The Third Side of the River

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes

A slightly dark coming of age story from Argentina. It's very slow paced and takes the majority of the running time to figure out just what they are trying to get at with this one. We follow Nicolás, the eldest son of a divorced couple. He's being forced to grow up and take on responsibility pretty quick which leads to some drastic behaviour for the finale. I really liked all that stuff but the groundwork that had to be laid to get there was hard to get into. It works slowly though and you eventually sympathise with this kid, who barely says anything.

It was a bit of a hard slog at the beginning, especially because I was pretty tired but once I got to the third act and the pieces slowly come together it was far more satisfying.

Irma Vep

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: No

Oh, a film about filmmaking shot and projected on film. A director tasked with remaking the classic Les Vampires hires Chinese actress Maggie Cheung, playing herself, for the lead role. Communication problems is one thing but once the director has a nervous breakdown things get a little complicated.

I'd never heard of this film before so it was a pleasant discovery. It's a slightly nightmarish look at making films and there's a lot of awful people in tho particular cast and crew. It's also quite funny. There's some discussion about french art house films vs hollywood blockbusters which maybe is a little forced but was funny anyway.

Pretty odd ending too. but I'll go with it. Interesting film.

Love is Strange

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes

John Lithgow and Alfred Molina make for a cute gay couple. The film isn't really concerned with heir sexuality though, or their age, they just have trouble getting an apartment in New York and are forced to stay with friends and relatives. It's a slight little drama with an appealing cast. I say it's slight, I guess I mean, it's really simple but it was certainly effective enough. It just wasn't an entirely satisfying story though. Perfectly enjoyable while it lasted but I won't remember much about it.

The Haunting

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Tyler

Recently caught up with the original. But This was the one I saw first. And although I never found it scary as a kid, I did watch it a few times because I was a fan Jan De Bont and Twister and I loved looking at the CG effects and the sound design in the cinema was awesome.

But now I've seen the original and probably know it better than this version I can only see just how horrifically off the mark it is. It's like a total mis-reading of what made the first one so great. Here they remove any ambiguity, suspense or mystery adopt to show everything in bright detail. And it just doesn't work at all.

The late 90's a filled with examples of films that, now they have the technology, decide to show everything, and failed miserably. And now thankfully the backlash to that has past and filmmakers realised that it's always more effective to let the audience do some of the work.

I always liked Lili Taylor, she's far less annoying and more sympathetic a lead than Julie Harris. Even though she's never billed or in any of the advertising. But it's the first time I remember seeing her in a lead role for a mainstream picture. The rest of the cast do what they can. The look like they're having fun in the amazing sets. I like the score too.

As a haunted house film this is a real failure, unless you've never seen a good one. I guess it's a good place to start out if you're really young though, it's goofy but kinda fun. I still have fond memories of going to see it at the cinema. But ultimately it's just a completely hamfisted attempt to be scary.

These Final Hours

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Kate, Lauren

As much as I enjoyed the film it was really really hard to distance myself from the locations and the people I knew in the cast. I was lucky enough to snag an invite to the cast and crew screening, so it was a great atmosphere and despite what I think was a faulty subwoofer that made the last third of the film rather annoying, it was a great night. But it does make it hard to view objectively.

There's a genuine bond that forms between Angourie Rice and Nathan Phillips that's at the heart of the film. If that didn't work then I don't think any of the amazing work by the cast and crew would have mattered, but thankfully they pulled it off beautifully.

It's also very yellow.

Well I hope to see it again when I'm over east, to figuratively and literally distance myself but also to hopefully get a better perspective on the rest of it, watching it with people that aren't involved. I think from hearing about the story when it was filming I had certain expectations or what it might have been but it was far more simpler than I had imagined, so it'll be good to see unburdened by those expectations.

So for now I'll say, I really enjoyed it, it's exciting to have a film like this come from here and get a good release and it's definitely one worth going out to support. Perhaps expect more thoughts on it in a week or two.

The Fall

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Andrew, Kate

Write up.

I'm trying to get people to watch the new TV series Halt and Catch Fire and they just don't understand how awesome Lee Pace is. So this.

Hercules

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Tyler

Big surprise, Brett Ratner made a really boring Hercules film. This is a debugging-the-myth telling, so no awesome creatures, no gods, none of the actual myths. None of the actual fun stuff. No, this is the "truth behind the legend" and if it really was the truth no one would be talking about Hercules today because it's actually just a really average sword and sandles battle movie only there's The Rock in the middle of it.

He's got his group of stock characters, and they follow the usual call to arms, training montages, fighting action sequences and double crossings. He's got your basic tortured backstory and gets his revenge and frees the land. It's all really obviously laid out and at no point did I care about any of it.

And somehow, despite all the sets and action and costumes and the fun cast that have nothing to work with, it all felt really cheap. Using the standard Herculean font for their supers seems really tacky, I wonder if they were trying to be funny?

I didn't actually know that Ratner directed this going in but I was surprised it wasn't getting much of an advertising push. But seeing his name at the end, it suddenly made sense why it was all such mediocre fluff. These poor actors struggle to stay afloat in this one. Probably won't be seeing this again.

The Haunting

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Tyler

Robert Wise seemed to have a go at every genre. I like this one for how simple and effective it is with its haunting. It's really the classic haunted house movie. Some beautiful cinematography and everything scry is conveyed with angles, editing and some sound, relying on the performances of the actors to really sell it and get us worked up with them.

I do find Julie Harris really annoying now though. 

I grew up with the remake and only later discovered the vastly superior original. Now when I think about it it seems like they completely missed the point of how and why this works and just take the scary elements and made them as bombastic as possible. I liked it because of all the then brand new CG effects. The original doesn't need any of that to work and is far more effective. 

It's a great creepy old film though, definitely a must see. 

Deliver Us from Evil

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Beau

Jerry Bruckheimer has made his first horror movie! Well, if you can call it that. It's more of a police procedural but then there's an exorcism at the end. Director Scott Derrickson gives it a few good jump scares but unlike Sinister, or even The Exorcism of Emily Rose this film fails to tell an actual compelling story so I just never really cared. Perhaps just a problem when telling uncinematic true stories, even Exorcism of Emily Rose was like that at parts. But at least that was about something. This just feels like some things that happened one time. 

The cast do what they can. It's just really hard to see Joel McHale in this role. Olivia Munn suffers greatly playing the underwritten wife who's supposed to add some kind of emotional beats to the story but just comes off as nagging and then has to be rescued at the end.

You know how there's some stock sound effects that you hear in a billion movies? And when you hear them it immediately destroys your suspension of disbelief. It's one thing to use that old door creek sound. Unfortunately our main character hears children laughing and playing right before something scary happens. And the sound effect they used for that is one of my all time most hated sounds. So right before anything scary I was immediately frustrated and taken out of the film. Suffice to say, besides the two or three obligatory jump scares nothing here worked for me. 

But it looked pretty. Some nice make up. 

Transformers: Age of Extinction

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: Yes
Watched with: Michael

Write Up.

Wow, it's so much worse the second time. I just wanted to see where the aspect ratio changes at IMAX were, but it was nauseating. It seems they kept the RED footage full frame too? Evidently the cutting between all the camera formats within a scene means the frame jumps every two or three shots and once you notice it that's all you can look at. Because the rest of the film doesn't hold up in any way.