BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 » Recently watched movies.

Dramagod · June 13, 2012 11:23 pm

What have you seen lately? Anything worth recommending?

I think it's suitable that I start off this topic by saying that I just watched "Sherlock Jr." starring Buster Keaton. Made in 1924. A great silent film. Funny and witty. There's a lot of money shots that even now, almost 100 years later, make one think "how the hell did they do that?". I've only seen "The General" from Keaton before and I think this was just as great. I'm sure Woody Allen used this as an inspiration - subconsciously if nothing else - when he made "Purple Rose of Cairo". He's said he prefers Keaton over Chaplin so it wouldn't surprise me.

There's a full version of "Sherlock Jr." in Youtube and many many others. Including old Sherlock Holmes films and I thought I'd watch the 1939 version of "The Hound of the Baskervilles" next as I haven't seen that one and supposedly it's the best movie made from the story.

Other movies I've watched this week: Caddyshack, The Terminator, Star Trek, E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial, Graduate, The Man from Earth.

Davina · June 14, 2012 6:17 am

They used to show the old silent films on TV here but never seem to do that anymore. Woody Allen is, i believe correct, I have always peered Keaton to Chaplin, I just adore the expression on his face. (Woody wasn't talking about Diane Keaton though was he? Joking!) I also used to like films by Harry Langdon ( I think that was his surname) and the earlier Laurel and Hardy movies.

Dramagod · July 8, 2012 10:31 am

Watched yesterday this british comedy called IN THE LOOP. I think it was really great. Maybe the best political satire since DR.STRANGELOVE and I'd call it a cross between that movie and THE OFFICE. I'm a fan of swearing in movies (if done right and it's funny) and this surely had swearing. Some of the characters were absolutely hilarious. Remember that scene in STRANGELOVE when Peter Sellers tries to make a phone call to prevent a war but he doesn't have coins for the phone booth? The dark humor of that scene, when stretched to 100 minutes equals to IN THE LOOP. Highly recommended.

Dramagod · October 22, 2012 6:50 pm

Watched in the past week or so.

SPOORLOOS - The original VANISHING that was remade in 1993 with Kiefer Sutherland and Jeff Bridges. Ok film, better than the remake but I didn't like the antagonist at all. Didn't seem credible to me. Nice little film.

WORKING GIRL - Harrison Ford was charming as always but Melanie Griffith was just too much of a push-over. The movie was totally unbelievable. Griffith did look surprisingly nice in lingerie. Decent.

CONTAGION - Good cast but the movie was nothing special. What it did well was to show what kind of panic such an incident would start and how it would affect things. The last scene was unneeded. Average.

ROCKETEER - Hadn't seen this in almost 20 years and it wasn't as good as I remember it to be. Too tongue-in-cheek and too Disney. Jennifer Connolly was cute. Decent.

FISTFUL OF DOLLARS - OK, but nothing compared to the next two Leone films starring Clint. Morricone's music is the strongest aspect. The film's like an interlude that paves way to the rest of the trilogy just like BATMAN BEGINS did.

DEJA VU - Totally different than I expected. Nice script. Scott's best film since TRUE ROMANCE.

KILL LIST - The last 20 minutes of the movie; what the hell did the movie turn into. What a disappointment. Took me a while to realise the other guy was the "bike messenger" from SPACED.

Last edited by Dramagod (October 22, 2012 6:50 pm)

veecee · October 22, 2012 6:59 pm

Is this thread for new movies or DVDs, Netflix, etc? Just asking so I don't post something that doesn't belong here.

Dramagod · October 22, 2012 7:30 pm

It's about movies you've seen. Could be DVD, Netflix, in theaters, TV. Anything.

SusiGo · October 22, 2012 8:03 pm

Last week in Berlin I watched "Die Wand" (The wall), an adaptation of Marlen Haushofer's 1968 novel. It is about a woman visiting a hunting lodge in the Austrian Alps who finds herself suddenly and inexplicably surrounded by a transparent wall. She can see the outside world in which people seem to have turned frozen, rigid and lifeless. She starts to build a life on her own with only a cow, a dog and a cat for company. I was skeptical how the novel translated to the screen but it is done very well. The woman is played by the excellent German actress Martina Gedeck. There is much room for interpretation as the author doesn't give an explanation for the strange happenings.

veecee · October 23, 2012 1:54 am

I'm going to mention two movies, not because I've watched them that recently, but because they both remind me of Sherlock. The first time you watch them you're just swept up and amazed at the outcome. Then each successive time , you see (and observe) more.

Memento: A man with short-term memory loss tries to find his wife's killer. The scenes run backward in time.

Moon: A guy in charge of a one-man moon station has strange experiences as his assignment approaches its end.

Susi, reading your description of The Wall made me wonder how they would make The City and The City into a movie. In fact, it is a play now, which I plan to see in Chicago next year. I can't wait to see how they handle it. http://www.theatreinchicago.com/playdetail.php?playID=5516

SusiGo · October 23, 2012 6:11 am

veecee wrote:
I'm going to mention two movies, not because I've watched them that recently, but because they both remind me of Sherlock. The first time you watch them you're just swept up and amazed at the outcome. Then each successive time , you see (and observe) more.

Memento: A man with short-term memory loss tries to find his wife's killer. The scenes run backward in time.

Moon: A guy in charge of a one-man moon station has strange experiences as his assignment approaches its end.

Susi, reading your description of The Wall made me wonder how they would make The City and The City into a movie. In fact, it is a play now, which I plan to see in Chicago next year. I can't wait to see how they handle it. http://www.theatreinchicago.com/playdetail.php?playID=5516

Yes, an interesting idea, Veecee. In The Wall it was very easy as there was only one person and a lot of landscape. But to do it in a city - or two cities - full of people and to make the complicated situation clear sounds much more difficult. A challenge for any director and production designer.

Ivy · October 23, 2012 7:36 am

Last film I saw was "Che" with Benicio del Toro, on TV. Well, I recorded it, 4 1/2 hours!

Last edited by Ivy (October 23, 2012 7:49 pm)

veecee · October 23, 2012 6:42 pm

Dios mio!

veecee · October 27, 2012 11:35 pm

All the President's Men -- I stayed up last night to watch it yet again on TCM. It is so interesting to see the detective work Bernstein and Woodward used before the Internet, cell phones, etc. I also noticed that at one point Bradlee calls for them as "Woodstein!"

For anyone who doesn't know, this movie portrays the true story of two Washington Post reporters breaking open Watergate, which eventually caused Richard Nixon to resign as president of the US in the early seventies. It's based on the book of the same name.

221B Baker Street · November 1, 2012 4:19 am

Recently I watched "Ex", Italian-French comedy. It presents several stories about loving couples, and has much in common with "Love Actually", but it is lighter and funnier version.
In fact, I don't like comedies as a genre, but this one is an exception. It is very light, good-humoured, romantic, very funny and sometimes sad film. A good choice for a lazy evening under a plaid with a mug of tea and biscuits.

Davina · November 1, 2012 8:05 am

Thanks for the recommendation. I'll see if I can get it.

harleyq · November 3, 2012 10:52 pm

I recently watched Prometheus. It was okay for a sci-fi flick. Nothing particularly new or earth shattering. It just gets annoying sometimes when scientists always think they've discovered a way to find out all the truths in the universe and then do whatever it takes to hunt them down. And when they find out they were wrong, which they usually are, it's the innocent who pay the price. Sorry, reading a lot into a fluffy sci-fi flick.

Dramagod · November 3, 2012 11:10 pm

LOOPER. Good old-fashioned character-driven sci-fi flick. At times Gordon-Levitt spoke so much like Willis that I thought Willis dubbed some of his dialogue. I love time-traveling stuff with a piece of action and this had both. Some very cool scenes. There was a snoozy 25 minutes in the middle, though. But I still think it was a very good film. From earlier films by Rian Johnson I've seen the great high-school film noir BRICK which was very good as well, also starring JG-L. Out of 6 movies I really want to see in theaters late this year, I've seen now two. LOOPER and SKYFALL. Next up ARGO, CLOUD ATLAS, DJANGO UNCHAINED and THE HOBBIT part uno.

veecee · November 4, 2012 2:58 am

DG, I just started reading Cloud Atlas and i love it. I'm only hoping I can finish it before the movie is out of the theaters. I don't think it's getting great reviews, so I'd love to hear your opinion.

Dramagod · November 11, 2012 8:49 pm

Here's what I've been watching so far this month.

JERICHO - It took me a few years but I finally finished watching the second season. The show was decent and I don't mind it ending after only 29 episodes. Not very memorable.

THE KILLING - First half is quite slow but then it ups the ante and the final half is pretty great. It's quite obvious the robbery itself was an inspiration for such movies as HEAT and THE DARK KNIGHT. 4/5

WAKING LIFE - Some of the conversations were quite interesting but it's gets nauseating to watch it after a while. When you put the director's earlier films SLACKER and SCANNER DARKLY together, this is what you get pretty much on the point. 3/5

DARK ANGEL aka. I COME IN PEACE - A rather shitty science fiction/cop movie starring Dolph Lundgren. The disc-throwing blonde alien was pretty funny to watch I admit. 2/5

PATHS OF GLORY - A gloriously shot war film. Great performances all around especially by Kirk Douglas. I love it how you won't get to see the enemy once in the entire movie. I've yet to see LOLITA and then I've seen all of Stan's movies. 4/5

LÅT DEN RÄTTE KOMMA IN - It hurts me to say this but swedish know how to make movies so much better than us. I don't generally like vampire flicks myself but this was so different with great young leads that I really enjoyed it. Some really cool scenes. 4/5

THIN BLUE LINE - A documentary of an incident from the seventies in the US where a man shot a cop when he pulled him over on the side of the road and an innocent man was put in jail. 3/5

GHOST OF MARS - You'd never believe the director of this movie made such classic movies as HALLOWEEN and THE THING. Everything about this movie sucks except Henstridge's figure. Ice Cube is such a bad actor, oh dear. Pam Grier was totally wasted in this movie. 2/5

NEAR DARK - Early Kathryn Bigelow movie about vampires. You have the ALIENS/TERMINATOR trio here, Lance Henriksen, Bill Paxton and Jenette Goldstein. Beautifully shot and a bit different than your average horror films from the 80s. 3/5

V2 - JÄÄTYNYT ENKELI - This lousy finnish detective movie shot partly in my old film school. 2/5

EXORCIST - I hadn't seen this in like 15 years and it was just as great as I remembered it to be. This truly is one of the scariest films ever made. So damn well directed by Friedkin. 4,5/5

THE GREAT DICTATOR - Can't believe it took me this long to see this classic of a movie. Some very funny scenes, but I prefer for instance GOLD RUSH quite a lot over this. 3,5/5

THE BOX - A really disappointing movie from R.Kelly who made his impressive debut DONNIE DARKO back in 2001. Starts off decent when it's a basic thriller but then when the supernatural kicks in it goes downhill fast. 2,5/5

Last edited by Dramagod (November 11, 2012 8:49 pm)

harleyq · November 12, 2012 1:29 am

I finally got around to seeing The Avengers. It was good, but not as good as I thought it would be considering everyone raved about it. It was just as good as the individual films the heroes had done before it and I would certainly see any future sequels they make. The individual heroes personalities are the best part, especially Robert Downey Jr.'s Iron Man. Though it does get old to see every time they destroy a city in a film it's always Manhattan. Are there no other cities with tall buildings and lots of people?

horserider99 · November 24, 2012 12:09 am

I saw October Baby last week; everyone else in the room was crying, except me. Talk about feeling heartless.... anyway, it was an incredibly good movie and it's now one of my favourites.