I'd planned a longish post but work ended up going long last night and I'll have to just post as I think of things today.
I had a triple-feature a couple of weeks ago in an attempt to see a ton of movies this month. I'm pretty sure they ended up being the only three...sigh.
Okay, so I guess I saw four:
The Adventures of Baron Munchausen. This was on my radar from the second it hit Netflix, as I've seen most of Gilliam's films. It was as visually arresting as I hoped, even if it was a little scattershot, and not always in a good way. I enjoyed myself enough and the actors were up to it. It's always good to get an excuse for more Oliver Reed.
Dredd. This is my guilty pleasure of the month, as I think this was one of the more enjoyable action movies I've seen in recent years. Lena Headey (Cersei on GoT) was excellent as the vicious villain, as was Wood Harris (Avon Barksdale in The Wire) as her sidekick. The heroes were played ably enough, and the action scenes were well shot (with buckets of blood and guts, so be aware if you're squeamish).
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. I meant to see this years ago and just finally got to it. It's a French film about former designer and Elle editor-in-chief Jean-Dominique Bauby, who had a stroke that left him unable to speak, though as his health failed a nurse devised a way for him to "speak" and he wrote a book about his life. The film is told mostly from the perspective of Bauby's eyes, which does a good job of driving home his plight.
Grabbers. This is a silly Irish movie about aliens who need water and blood to survive, but cannot metabolize alcohol, so the heroes devise a plan to get the entire little village blasted in a pub one night so they can fight the mama grabber. This was surprisingly well-acted for a horror(ish) movie and there were a lot of funny moments throughout. Maybe I was just in a good mood, but I really liked all four movies I saw this month.
Some TV, too...
The first episode of "Blacklist." Sigh. This has gotten a lot of hype but it's as "network TV" as anything I've watched in a while. The whole storyline was pretty predictable, and at the end when James Spader is giving his speech about how he's only just getting started and reveals his master plan, it was a lot like the Simpsons episode satirizing TV action where Chief Wiggum says "Ah, let him go. I have the feeling we'll meet again, each and every week...always in more sexy and exciting ways."
I still have one episode left on the BBC drama "Happy Valley" and I'm so afraid of an unhappy ending, I'm putting it off. I can deal with unhappy endings, but this protagonist deserves a good one.
I binged through the fourth season of "The Walking Dead." This is the ultra-rare show that started out terrible and slooooowly became pretty strong. The villains are still laughable in their cartoonery (and I don't mean the zombies), and that's true tenfold through season five's first two episodes, but the scenes containing nobody but the main group (and the occasional zombie) are usually pretty good.
I've just begun the second season of "House of Cards" after a long layoff between seasons. I knew what was coming due to some very careless Facebook commenters, and it was a little...tough to believe, frankly, but the scene itself still delivered.
Otherwise, as always, I'm watching Survivor, though I really don't feel the need to mention a 13-year-old game show here.
Someone else has actually seen Munchhausen! Like pretty much all of Gilliam's films, I enjoyed it and was disappointed. Funny how he's able to do that.
I watched Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, and then went to the library and checked out the late 70's British miniseries with Sir Alec Guinness. The miniseries was more faithful to the book (which I'm reading), but there wasn't much art being practiced by the foley -- sound was mixed too loud and not all that well done at times. The acting was more "stage" than "screen", and I kept waiting for Sir Alec to make a comment about the residents of Mos Eisley spaceport.
I have the new X-Men from the library and hope to see it shortly.
I felt no guilt about thoroughly loving every minute of Dredd.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZrsJsvL30g
I started to watch Grabbers a while back but didn't get real far. Of course, I was kind of drunk myself and fell asleep. Someday I'll get back to it.
I think my guilt is based primarily on expectation. It really was quite good.
The Stallone version really screwed up our brains with regards to Judge Dredd, which is a shame because this version should have done way better when it was released than it did.
Oh, I didn't watch the Stallone version. Even so, I expect very little from ultra-bloody comic book movies. This one had real teeth, though.
That's fair. I also strongly recommend you continue to not see the Stallone version, although I don't I really need to tell you that.
RE: The Walking Dead
After season one piqued my interest and season two's middle third nearly killed off that interest, I'm quite glad that I stuck with it.
Agreed. I enjoyed season one and nearly gave up during season two, but I'm glad I stuck with the show. A looong time ago, spooky posted here about zombie shows not having any longevity, because there's only so many ways to kill a zombie. So, I'm glad the writers have had the main group bump into other humans along the way, cartoony as they may be. Abraham!
The first episode was good, but otherwise I loathed season one. So much Sarah Wayne Callies and Jon Bernthal. BRUTAL. The writing ran in place, too. There was no writing team at the time - just hired guns for each episode - and it showed as storylines were constantly introduced and dropped.
Sarah Wayne Callies's facial expressions during Rick's speech at the end of season two is one of my favorite moments of unintentional comedy ever put to film.
Captain America: The Winter Soldier - Nothing special here. I keyed into the identity of The Winter Soldier pretty early and predicted the later interaction with Captain America. Also saw the Nick Fury twist coming. Even so, it was fun.
Jackie Brown - Been a few years since I watched this one but it really holds up well. I'd forgotten the role that Micheal Keaton plays, but otherwise enjoyed what I didn't remember about it. Side note, I've read a few reviews of this and look forward to checking it out.
The Grand Budapest Hotel - No need to rehash this one, I'll simply second everything positive everyone's said about it here. I really liked it.
The Family - De Niro, Pfeiffer & Tommy Lee Jones in a predictable (but somewhat entertaining) movie about a mob family in witness protection. It was more blackly comic and sensationally violent than I initially expected. However, once I realized Luc Besson was the director and writer, it made more sense. Unfortunately, the soundtrack may have been the best thing about it.
GoT: Season 3, Episodes 1-4 - Even when straying from the books, this series just gets better and better.
Firefly, Episodes 1-11 - A guy at work mentioned he had the DVD's so, in order to better understand cheaptoy and avoid further insults from brianS, I borrowed them. So far, so good. I share the sentiment that it's too bad this didn't get more support from Fox - would have been fun to see more of the story play out.
Movies we brought with us and watched in the hospital:
Goonies
The Princess Bride
Shag
An American Tail
Jackie Brown is by far my favorite Tarantino flick, and in my all time top 10. It's a great flick.
I too am excited to see Birdman but it isn't opening here until mid-November. Ugh.
My wife dislikes Samuel L. so she dismissed Jackie outright. I think she'd enjoy it though.
Highly recommended that you also watch Serenity when you've finished Firefly.
Also, its a shame Adam Baldwin has shown himself to be pretty awful these days.
Serenity is all queued up in Netflix for when I finish the show.
I don't know what Baldwin has been up to - don't catch much entertainment news and wouldn't have known him by name until I started the show. Fillion's about the only one I recognize.
I ended up watching Serenity first because I didn't realize there was even a show. But, both are so well made that it didn't matter.
This is the way I came to it, as well. It didn't affect my love of the movie or the series.
I agree completely.
Baldwin was the first person who used the #GamerGate hashtag.
Ahh...got it. I'm not on Twitter, rarely on FB and don't play video games. Based on that link, if Baldwin is advocating with those clowns, I'd have to agree with cheap's "awful" assessment.
I rewatched Pulp Fiction for the first time in ages this week. It's still really good, but maybe in the middle of the pack if I was going to rank his films. Uma is a goddess, and watching this reminded me why I've crushed on her hard for 20 years.
We watched Obvious Child on J's birthday. I liked it a lot. It was nice to see a funny, romantic movie that wasn't all a bunch of romcom tropes.
Most of my other viewing this month was TV. J & I powered through the first season of Broad City. I'd seen most of the episodes, but it was good to watch it all straight through. I found the show pretty hilarious, but it's definitely not for everyone's taste. It's awesome to see a comedy TV show written by & starring women, especially one that can be crass without being "just one of the boys" kind of humor.
This weekend I watched all of Fargo. It was very good. I'm pretty exhausted of male anti-hero shows, but this was good enough that I stayed interested. I think it did a good job in capturing some of the most important tones from the film but made itself its own creation. I'm very interested in seeing how the next season goes, and I'll definitely be watching it.
The movies I've watched lately have generally been coming from Deadspin's Netflix Action Movie Canon entries. The most recent was The Man From Nowhere. It was solid and a lot "heavier" than most movies on the list.
Mostly though, its been Tangled pretty much on repeat.
That's a fun list - I've seen quite a few of them and will definitely check out Dredd as soon as possible. Snowchaser is available through Redbox, so that's my next, "Go to McDonalds/Cub Foods specifically for the kiosk" trip.
I may have to stop in to the grocery store for Snowchaser. Probably next week though, since I've got a spiel this weekend. Its going to cut into my action movie time, too.
The guy who writes this column is pretty much my favorite music writer. He's real cool.
We just cut the cord so getting into shows through amazon, netflix, and hulu.
I have one episode left of True Detective. I an a little disappointed. Maybe my expectations are too high. It feels like there is still enough unknown for this to go on for another 5 episodes. Not sure how they will wrap it up in one.
I watched the first two episodes of Orange is the New Black. Does it get better? I don't care about the main character.
I watched the pilot episode of Cheers. Is this the best pilot ever? Introduces most of the main characters well and I still laughed out loud at Coach.
You will never care about the main character. You either enjoy the supporting cast or you turn it off. It does focus more on them as it goes.
Yes, Cheers does have one of the best pilots.
"Is there an Ernie Pantuso here?"
Season two sort of (with limited success) blended Piper into the background. Again, it didn't always succeed, but it made her charactr a little better.
He's on the short list of my least favorite characters in fiction.
I had seen the "Ernie Pantuso" scene a dozen times and I still cracked up. Timing was perfect.
I bailed on Orange after two episodes, so I'm curious about your question but not enough to try episode three.
LOST is just about done and Sheenie has pretty much tuned out. Still, the episode about Richard's backstory is phenomenal.
Brooklyn Nine Nine has started the season incredibly well. Last week's episode was possibly its best ever.
Season three of Homeland is... ugh.
Philomena was excellent. Much better than I was expecting.
Anybody else watching Blackish? It's raw, but has had a couple of killer jokes.
Just the two minutes that are on the DVR after Modern Family. It seems better than I would've expected, but probably not enough for me to pick up another new show.
Drunkenly watched Expendables 3 (haven't seen the first two, and likely won't) and Blended at a guy's weekend a couple weeks ago. Both were execrable, but that was to be expected.
Both were hilarious to watch with one of the guys present, though. He was completely taken in by the atmosphere of both of them. He kept exclaiming "incredible!" during Expendables' fight scenes. Watching both movies with someone who was, against all odds, really into them made them somewhat more tollerable.
I have a bunch of baggage with Blended. I bought a reasonably expensive set of games and a Japanese Dreamcast from this guy who lived in Buford, GA where they shot the movie. He told me that there'd be a delay in shipment because they couldn't get to the post office because of the filming. He continued to string things out to get past the PayPal dispute window but he was unsuccessful. I consider myself a pretty decent judge of character, but I can end up maybe trusting folks a little too much. This case was definitely the latter since he was stringing along half a dozen others. I got my money back after about two total months. The return of this money plus being forced to sell tickets to Mr. Show in Chicago allowed me to buy a game I never expected to, but I'm still bummed I never ended up with a Japanese DC.
Every time I see promotion for the movie I get mad thinking about this jackass.
The first Expendables is alright. The second is pretty terrible.
That's pretty much my thoughts exactly as I would word them.
Watched Adjustment Bureau. My word that was terrible. A movie that has no narration cuts in at the ending to give us a lesson about love and faith. As if the allegory wasn't overwhelmingly obvious the entire movie, now you're explaining the allegory. I'm grateful Emily Blunt got more active roles in her next two sci-fi movies, which are much more awesomer.
Some good tracks on the OST. At least some so-so flicks have a listenable soundtrack.
Linds and I went to see Gone Girl tonight. That is an unsettling and well done movie. We both really liked it.
The thing that kept popping into my head was how Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross need to score even more movies than they already do.
We haven't watched many movies lately, at least nothing new, but we did catch the season debut of The Walking Dead on Sunday. I'm pretty sure I'm not cut out to survive a zombie apocalypse.
I can't sleep on planes, so:
Captain America: The Winter Soldier: Like someone said earlier, I guessed the big surprises right away. Which was fine for an action movie. Plus I'm a sucker for superheros.
Chef: I loved this one, but I'm also addicted to cooking shows, food trucks, and startup stories. So if you hate those things probably skip it. Still haven't had a Cuban Sandwich. Might have to get on that next week.
Begin Again: Keira being Keira, Ruffio being Ruffio, and Adam Levine being a dick. I enjoyed this too.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes: Meh. Still couldn't sleep and wouldn't watch again. Some solid CGI though.
Tammy: Better than I thought it would be; given my low expectations I didn't mind this as much as I should have.
Wolverine Goes Back In Time: How could you go wrong with that plotline? ...
Dude, you got to remedy that pronto. Some options in DC.
dudeS, I'm hitting up Ray's the Steaks tonight. So good.
Yeah I need to get on it. I've been to 6 or seven of those spots and some of them were good, just never got the cuban. I have a goal for next week now! My boss will be so proud!
I never made it to The Steaks, but Hell Burgered several times. Yum.
Hell burger has closed and reopened like 3 times in the last 2 years. Which is a shame because those are some great burgers. Its open again now, in its more original form of a burger joint.
Although its not my favorite current DC burger. That goes to Good Stuff Eatery. But if I could have HB's Diable Sauce at GSE I'd probably weigh five thousand pounds.