What are you watching and enjoying?

[KnightWing]

Blood: The Last Vampire (live action)

It's really, really entertaining, in a super-cheesy, super-violent kinda way.

[Venneh]

Watched the Prestige tonight. Loved it.

[Koete]

Watched the Prestige tonight. Loved it.

Still my favorite Nolan film.

[MaxPower]

Gotta watch that again, knowing the ending I think it will be a more enjoyable movie to watch the second time around.

[Stavros]

Watched the Prestige tonight. Loved it.

Still my favorite Nolan film.

Mine too.

[dc20willsave]

Watching The Pink Panther Strikes Again. My favorite in the series and a great example of the awesomeness of Peter Sellers.

[Koete]

Zombieland - Not very deep, but fun enough. I think it suffers a bit from comparison to Shaun of The Dead. All of the cast members are great, especially Woody Harrelson. I've thought of Jesse Eisenberg as Michael Cera-lite, but, after seeing him in this, I think he's actually better than Michael Cera.

The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day - Awful film. I don't have the love for the original Boondock Saints that a lot of people have, but I thought it was okay. When the sequel was announced, I figured that writer-director Troy Duffy would have had enough time to realize what hadn't worked and make a better sequel. Yeah, I was probably expecting too much. I don't even think the people who love the original will like it much, as it's pretty much the first film again without the best parts. Instead of Willem Dafoe, there's Julie Benz (who I think is a good actress) with a terrible southern accent. Instead of Rocco, there's another sidekick who's pretty much Rocco-lite. Duffy tries to make it deeper, but those bits are miniscule next to the forced profanity, dick jokes, and gratuitous violence.

Brick - Great film that recasts a Dashiell Hammett detective story in a high school setting. The unusual combination works because the detective dialogue is matched with normal scenes such as the characters being served orange juice by a mother. The more films I see Joseph Gordon-Levitt in, the higher he goes up on my list of favorite actors.

Bubba Ho-Tep - An elderly Elvis and black JFK (or are they?) fight against an ancient Egyptian mummy terrorizing their nursing home. If you can go with that premise and/or think Bruce Campbell as Elvis sounds awesome, you'll have fun.

Horror of Dracula - The first Hammer horror film I've seen (outside of Captain Kronos) after avoiding them due to my affection for the Universal films. After watching it, I look back on my avoidance as an irrational error. Hammer crafts its own Dracula mythos and the result is a great fifties horror flick. As opposed to Bela Lugosi's aristocratic Dracula of the Universal films, Christopher Lee's Dracula is a silent and savage creature of the night. Peter Cushing's Van Helsing is, in a word, badass, staking his friend after he is turned into a vampire and burning a cross on a female vampire's head. Comic book trivia: Michael Gough, Alfed of the four 80s-90s Batman films, has a prominent role.

Dark City - I wanted to love this film after everything I've heard about it, but I found it to be only good. While there are some cool ideas here, the film feels more plot driven than character driven. The visuals are great, but the amount of homage in it is to the point where it feels a bit too close to swipe. I don't think it's a terrible film like Boondock Saints II, but it didn't blow my mind either.

[KnightWing]

I've thought of Jesse Eisenberg as Michael Cera-lite, but, after seeing him in this, I think he's actually better than Michael Cera.

I thought the exact same thing when I watched Zombieland for the first time yesterday.

[Molly]

Kick-Ass Totally underwhelming. Cage's Adam West impression was pretty funny, but the rest of the movie was so damn mean spirited that I couldn't get into it.

[Molly]

Batman: City of Scars: Remarkably well done fan film, with Joker, Harley, Zsasz and The Ventriloquist. Admittedly, the Joker isn't very good, but everything else is pretty well done. It all goes pretty well until it starts doing what every Batman fan film does: starts lobbying for why Batman should have killed Joker years ago. It's got it's fair share of problems, but it's pretty well done.

Batman: City of Scars

[dc20willsave]

I continue to find Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated to be awesome. It showed itself to be, while in a slightly seperate continuity than the original series, very respectful of its mythos. We had a callback to The Creeper, one of the ghosts from the original series, as well a few cameos from Vincent Van Ghoul, the character voiced by Vincent Price from The 13 Ghosts of Scooby Doo. All that and Daphne's sister is in the military and I think she might be a lesbian.

[Koete]

Dr. Mabuse, The Gambler - A four hour silent epic by Fritz Lang. On the surface, Dr. Mabuse is a prominent psychologist, but underneath that cover is a criminal mastermind. Its four hour length is a little intimidating for a silent film, but the plot, murders, car chases, and special effects keep things compelling throughout. Most compelling is probably Rudolf Klein-Rogge's performance as Dr. Mabuse, whose intensity is the highlight of the film.

The Testament of Dr. Mabuse - The sequel to Dr. Mabuse, The Gambler, also directed by Fritz Lang. A few notches below the first film, it is still a very effective early thirties thriller.

The Wackness - An offbeat coming of age film about a teenage drug dealer's relationship with his psychiatrist and romance with his psychiatrist's step-daughter during the summer of 1994. Apart from a couple of forced cliche' moments, this is one of the better coming of age films I've seen. The story is enhanced above the norm by the film's humor and its capturing of New York in the 1990s. Den Kingsley and Olivia Thirlby turn in great performances as the psychiatrist and his step-daughter, but most effective is Josh Peck as the teen drug dealer. Peck comes from a career of Nickelodeon teen comedies, but turns in a performance well above most of the actors that come from a Disney/Nickelodeon background. Highly recommended.

[KnightWing]

Watchmen.

Haven't seen it since it was in theaters. Upon this viewing, I really think it went a bit too over-the-top with its violence. It somewhat distracts from the actual brilliance of the story.

[Molly]

SNL: The Best of Christopher Walken: He's a terrible, awful, actor. But he's still more entertaining than Jimmy Fallon. And he's charismatic enough that I don't care how bad he is.

Seeing Chris Rock, Adam Sandler, Will Ferrel and Phil Hartman is kind of mindfuck, at this point. I kind of forget they were on SNL.

[Koete]

Watchmen.

Haven't seen it since it was in theaters. Upon this viewing, I really think it went a bit too over-the-top with its violence. It somewhat distracts from the actual brilliance of the story.

Yeah, the over the top slo-mo violence and obvious villainy in Veidt's performance really hurt the film IMO.

[Molly]

I honestly like violence. Nite-Owl and SSII would cripple those gang guys. Doc Manhattan exploding you, would likely leave a bloody pile of guts. The violence worked, Veidt, however... didn't.

[KnightWing]

Most of my friends who haven't read the book thought the movie was just sensationalist garbage. I tried to explain how it's actually a great story, but they couldn't see it past the piles of torn-up human flesh.

I thought they were just crazy, for a while. Now that I'm watching it again, I'm actually finding it a little difficult to see the brilliance through the unnecessary gore. I would've preferred a little more subtlety.

[SuaveStar]

Requiem for a dream: I went in not knowing what to expect. The synopsis said "The last half hour of the film is among the most harrowing of any film ever made" I would deny that, and say it's the last ten minutes that are really fucked up, though "The most harrowing of any film" is a bit of a stretch.

I always seem to find one person in films that I think deserves special mention, or to be followed, or in my mindset, when other characters are on screen, I like to ask what they are doing at that moment. And for this film, that person was the drug addicts mother Sara Goldfarb.

The mothers story of just wanting to be on TV and look her best, while slowly diving into madness was fantastic, the best parts of the film. The rest of the cast didn't slouch, even Wayans was tolerable, however you could actually feel for her. Most of us have never and will never be addicted to heroin. But, most of us know what it is like to have a goal and to do anything to achieve it, and if possible, use things to our advantage.

I really liked the close camera work, in certain shots, Marlon after she prostitutes herself for the first time and Tyrone when he was being chased by the police. Although this camera work of the camera being tight in on the person has became somewhat common now, and almost a joke, here it is not played up for laughs, and it is meant to make you the viewer almost feel like you are apart of the incident, you cannot help but be absorbed in the horrors that are unfolding.

The endings for some of the characters fell flat for me, well to be honest, the mothers story is the only one I took too, I couldn't care less about drug addicts trying to get ahead, while still doing drugs themselves, I could feel no empathy for them. So matter how bad their situations got, all I could feel was that they got their comeuppance. One of the final scenes with Jennifer Connoly is incredibly graphic, but then again, it needed to be, just to show how far she has fallen. And the final shot of her lets you know, she, unlike the rest, has further depths that she can plunge.

Star of the show was Christopher "Shooter" McDonald as the gameshow host.

All in all, it was a good film. But not something I want to go out of my way to see again. There was no repeat viewing justification for me in this movie. I took everything in the first time, and don't see the need to watch it all again.

The music had a very kinetic energy to me, and needs a mention, it was so strong, and really took a life of it's own. Usually I don't think about the music, but here it added to every scene.

All in all, a good movie, but not something I want to see twice.

[SuaveStar]

Broken Flowers: If your main character doesn't give a shit about the plot of the movie, then why should I give a fuck? Another Bill Murray film that I just ask why. Murray is awesome as usual, but he is given fuck all to play with, and is so apathetic, that watching this movie, I am asking myself "What is the point of watching this"

Another film that wants to be the next lost in translation. Another film I just didn't get.

Edit: Just finished the film. Although I liked the idea of the ending. That does not stop this film from not actually being able to justify why it exists bar giving Bill Murray another pay check.

[KnightWing]

On a random whim, I decided to watch 17 Again.

Despite starring the obnoxiously-popular Zack Efron, it's actually pretty good. I like it.

Also, it has a lightsaber battle. Seriously.

[dc20willsave]

Just watched The Losers last night. It was pretty sweet. It's one of those action movies I can see myself throwing in for the fun of it. Since I'm not big on that genre, that says something.

[SuaveStar]

Annie Hall for the first time yesterday afternoon. It was very average. It had no real grounding to me, and it was all meant to work around the performances of Allen and Keaton, who weren't really that believable as a couple to me, and the jumping around just made me lose all interest in what was going on.

[Molly]

Annie Hall for the first time yesterday afternoon. It was very average. It had no real grounding to me, and it was all meant to work around the performances of Allen and Keaton, who weren't really that believable as a couple to me, and the jumping around just made me lose all interest in what was going on.

Are you high?

[SuaveStar]

Annie Hall for the first time yesterday afternoon. It was very average. It had no real grounding to me, and it was all meant to work around the performances of Allen and Keaton, who weren't really that believable as a couple to me, and the jumping around just made me lose all interest in what was going on.

Are you high?

Nope, just didn't really enjoy the film.

[Koete]

Annie Hall for the first time yesterday afternoon. It was very average. It had no real grounding to me, and it was all meant to work around the performances of Allen and Keaton, who weren't really that believable as a couple to me, and the jumping around just made me lose all interest in what was going on.

Are you high?