Last Movie You Saw, Name & Review Movie • Page 202

Collateral - 4/5

One of my favorites from Mann. Maybe Foxx’s best performance?

 

Recently watched Cage list:
Moonstruck
Mandy
Pig

Color of Outer Space

Bringing Out the Dead
Gone in 60 Seconds
The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent

 

One of Tom's too, great movie

 

Mandy, Pig, Bringing out the dead and gone in 60 seconds are all great movies.

 

He’s always serviceable and occasionally great

 

Moonstruck is such an odd but fun movie.

 

Mandy is GOATed

I should rewatch Pig. And probably Moonstruck.

 

Mandy is my favorite movie. a fantastic experience, and if you ever get the chance to see it in theaters, do it.

 

9 - 8/10 (I know)

I get why people don't think this is a great movie -- it's light on characterization and plot, while the rules it establishes throughout are never fully explained -- but man, revisiting this was total comfort food. The character/creature design is still cool as hell, you get some really great recognizable voices (Wood, Reilly, and Landau in particular), and the whole thing wraps up in about 75 minutes. Strong animation and action sequences in a unique setting with just enough thematic darkness to set it apart from similar young adult films. I don't expect anyone who didn't see this in middle school to love it quite like I do, but as soon as we hit the reveal regarding The Scientist in the third act, I knew this was a movie that would hit more for me than most people. (Duality of man and all that jazz.) The ending sequence is beautiful. Definitely recommend a rewatch.

 

probably my favorite theater experience ever tbh

 

I never understood the hate this one got. I saw it in theaters when it came out and thought it was very solid.

 

Jack (1996)

Fucking masterpiece, you guys.

 

Can you imagine being 10 years old and getting to kiss Jennifer Lopez AND Fran Drescher?

 

Have yet to write my reviews, but I'm getting ahead of the fact now that I enjoy Mother's Day (1980) and The Stepfather (1987) more than Vertigo and some folks in here are gonna be mad about that lol

 

Blown Away - 3.5/5

they don’t make em like this anymore, give me all the cheesy 90s action movies.

 

I have this on vhs

 

jealous

 

you can buy it from me on eBay

 

I’m good

 

Tire kicker

 

Sunset Boulevard (1950, Billy Wilder)
We all got to cope. Get comfortable, get crazy. We love to look down on the depraved but without the means and access we have no idea how weird we would be or even what for. How something you never dreamed of becomes something you can't live without.

The writing! For starters we get a lick of that fast, punchy dialogue holding us over while the delicious characters open up slowly for the main course where we just enjoy spending time watching it happen, and for dessert we are served a perfect ending.


The Searchers (1956, John Ford)
The depths of hatred. We often lump hate, racism, and ignorance together. They often flow into each other and express similarly suggesting a causal relationship. Johns hating on another level. There is no ignorance clouding the waters, he doesn't just go with the crowd or follow orders, he's here for the hating, living the life. His niece follows along and we see the effect it has. After years on the road they briefly return home where he gets into a brawl, the opponent is looking to settle with honor yet he attacks him like an animal biting and gouging to the disgust of the onlookers his former piers and family.

John has been hating all the way up to the point of killing his own daughter but in the moment he transcends his hatred and returns her to the family. Instead of a complete John Wayne redemption, the final shot lets us know that one moment does not unlive a life, that he is an outsider not fit to rejoin society.

 

Oh damn. Two all time 10/10 classics back-to-back.

 

I Saw the TV Glow - 7/10

there’s a lot to like here and the themes the film deals with are handled with a lot of care, it just kind of falls apart at the end for me. visually stunning and bleak af. it certainly won’t be for everyone (not really sure it was so much for me) but I’m happy that it’s reaching the audience that it should be reaching.

 

Strange Cargo (Frank Borzage, 1940)

It's not going to be for everyone but holy shit I loved that. I think I'm becoming a Frank Borzage stan. Moments of epiphany are so difficult to depict convincingly but this one made all my hair stand on end. There's no way Scorsese isn't a huge fan of this. I only wish it had been made outside the Hayes Code so it could have gone even further in the way it sets the table.

 

Mother's Day (1980) - 8/10
A truly unhinged picture, especially for the time. It's a proto-Troma feature with a sense of humor and one particularly bleak scene that will give you tonal whiplash. It shouldn't work, but something about the way it oscillates between slapstick horror-comedy and mean-spirited brutalism is captivating, like an unintentional precursor to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2. It's easy to see why this one went on to influence so many modern horror directors, specifically those who love B-movies.

The Stepfather (1987) - 7.5/10
I'm young enough to only really know Terry O'Quinn as Locke from Lost, which is a complete disservice considering how good he is here. I'm not sure if it's particularly scary, but O'Quinn's anger and obsession with the perfect American family is played realistically until he nearly mirrors Michael Meyers as a homicidal killing machine in the film's final act. It's a solid psychological thriller with a lot of cat and mouse games to keep the audience interested between O'Quinn's outbursts.

Vertigo - 7.5/10
A first watch for me. In all honesty? It's dry. Good, but dry, with little reprieve between long conversations and driving sequences with the exception of some absolutely breathtaking visual effects in between scenes. That has to be the appeal here; Hitchcock presents an interesting story with an somewhat unbelievable twist and a runtime about 20-minutes too long, but his eye for unique cinematography and visual effects is as strong today as it ever was.

Spaceballs - 8/10
I was in need of some comfort food and this absolutely hit the spot. It might not be one of Mel's best, but nearly a dozen rewatches later, it's not a bad later-career film. There are a number of moments that still make me laugh (particularly the desert sequence in which John Candy comments directly on the film's editing) and the merchandising jokes hold up just as well today as they did upon original release. Strong, iconic bits supported by great and memorable performances, Moranis in particular. I'm really glad this one still made me smile as much as it did. Time to rewatch Young Frankenstein now.