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Post by erik on Jul 15, 2019 5:49:41 GMT -8
LA LA LANDI finally got around to seeing this six-time Oscar-winning 2016 musical of two dreamers (Ryan Gosling; Emma Stone) wanting to make it big in showbiz in the City of Angels. Both Gosling and Stone are quite good, as are the musical numbers, the opening one of which was shot on a real freeway interchange! 9.5/10
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Post by erik on Sept 16, 2019 16:44:04 GMT -8
LINDA RONSTADT: THE SOUND OF MY VOICERob Epstein and Jeffrey Freedman's unbelievably staggering look at the Arizona-born songstress who is arguably the single most influential female singer in American popular music over the last half century. In the span of 95 minutes, all of Linda's musical endeavors are covered; and while we know it concludes with Linda having to deal with the cruel hand that Parkinson's has dealt her, the end result seals the deal of Linda as an American musical treasure for the ages. 10/10.
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Post by erik on Nov 2, 2019 14:55:30 GMT -8
THE DIRTY DOZENLee Marvin is Major Reisman, a man given the unenviable task of assembling twelve of the worst of the worst in the Army to go on a secret mercernary mission against the Nazis near the time of the D-Day invasion in this hugely memorable 1967 World War II opus from director Robert Aldrich. The cast includes a gallery of characters like few films before or since: Ernest Borgnine; Robert Ryan; George Kennedy; Robert Webber; Richard Jaeckel; Telly Savalas; Charles Bronson; Clint Walker; Ralph Meeker; Trini Lopez; Jim Brown; and many more. 10/10.
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Post by erik on Nov 11, 2019 6:44:17 GMT -8
DOCTOR SLEEPEwan MacGregor is a grown-up Dan Torrance, still dealing with the after-effects of his nightmarish childhood stay at the Overlook Hotel in 1979-80 and still dealing with his "shining". Forty years later, he comes into contact with others that share his gift who are now being hunted by a psychotic cult known as "The True Knot"; and the only way he can bring this horror to an end is to return to the now-condemned Overlook. This follow-up to THE SHINING has a fair amount of psychological and supernatural horror, but not a terrible amount of graphic violence. 9.5/10.
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Post by erik on Feb 17, 2020 6:33:23 GMT -8
1917Sam Mendes directed and co-wrote this World War I masterpiece of two soldiers having to cross enemy territory to deliver a message to one of their troops to stop a potentially catastrophic planned attack. A recent multiple Oscar winner (including for Visual Effects), this ranks up there with Stanley Kubrick's 1957 classic PATHS OF GLORY when it comes to this tragically misunderstood war. 10/10.
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Post by DCXMMXVI on Feb 23, 2020 22:44:27 GMT -8
Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood (2019)
4/5
I've wanted to see it since the trailer was out. However, I had NO idea it involved Sharon Tate and Charles Manson. Slow paced at the start, but it definitely had me glued to the TV once Manson's minions became a main focus. I had no idea where the story was heading. The ending was not what I anticipated, as someone who used to obsess over the cultist activities of Manson and his gang of depraved hippie low lifes. But the title of the movie pretty much explains it...it's Hollywood, where nothing is real and reality is manufactured. Its got the typical dark humor of Quentin Tarantino that his fans have come to love over the last few decades, and a great cast to bring his script to life.
The Disaster Artist (2017)
3.5/5
I can't believe it took me 3 years to watch this. I was introduced to The Room (considered the best worst movie ever made) by a friend of mine in 2016, and I planned on seeing this upon its release but never did, and proceeded to forget all about it. I haven't read the book of the same name, but I'm assuming that since Tommy wiseau and Greg Sestero acknowledged the film positively, then it must have been at least fairly accurate. It was great to see what it looked like behind the scenes of the infamous 2003 film. I certainly have a different attitude towards Tommy after seeing this. If you love to hate The Room, or hate to love it, then definitely check out The Disaster Artist if you haven't already!
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Post by erik on Mar 14, 2020 10:47:41 GMT -8
AD ASTRAWell-done 2019 sci-fi film in which Brad Pitt portrays an astronaut sent to find the source of a disturbing series of electrical surges that threaten the Solar System, and possibly reunite with the father (Tommy Lee Jones) whose experiments to find alien life forms beyond Neptune may be the source. 9/10. SLAP SHOTA minor-league hockey league team with a history of losing gets down-and-dirty in this classic 1977 black comedy from director George Roy Hill. Paul Newman stars as the team's veteran coach who goes along with this (along with a then-unheard-of amount of profanity from his mouth) by getting "The Hanson Brothers" onto the ice. Strother Martin co-stars as the team's persnickety general manager. 10/10.
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Post by erik on Mar 16, 2020 5:48:21 GMT -8
CONTAGIONRevisting this 2011 medical thriller...and wouldn't you like to know why? 10/10.
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Post by erik on Mar 25, 2020 16:06:43 GMT -8
THE HOSPITALGeorge C. Scott stars as the chief of an overcrowded hospital where lunacy, incompetence, and murder seem to reign supreme even in a crisis...and not surprisingly he's having a time trying to hold it all together. This absolutely brilliant 1971 black comedy, written by Paddy Chayefsky ( MARTY; NETWORK) and directed by Arthur Hiller ( LOVE STORY), saw the American healthcare system in the early 1970s as slowly stumbling toward a shambles. And just look at where we are now in this country! 10/10.
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Post by DCXMMXVI on Mar 27, 2020 22:46:45 GMT -8
Not a movie...but I'm on episode 3 of Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness. Everyone's been talking about it and I now understand why.
8/10
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Post by erik on Apr 2, 2020 18:56:22 GMT -8
Under a statewide lockdown here in California, I am revisiting my DVD collection in a big way. Today was all about 1973: WESTWORLD9/10PAT GARRETT AND BILLY THE KID9.5/10EXECUTIVE ACTION9/10.
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Post by eaglemaster on Apr 3, 2020 3:04:29 GMT -8
^^Good for you, Eric.
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Post by erik on Apr 3, 2020 15:27:33 GMT -8
And today, it was all about monoliths and malfunctioning computers: 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY: 10/10. 2010 (the woefully underrated 1984 sequel): 10/10.
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Post by erik on Apr 8, 2020 16:30:27 GMT -8
I couldn't help but revisit with these two films: ...plus this brilliant 2005 documentary, which uses as its pretext Eisenhower's farewell address, warning us about the military/industrial complex:
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Post by erik on Apr 10, 2020 15:44:51 GMT -8
Yesterday, it was Steven Spielberg's masterpiece SCHINDLER'S LIST. Needless to say, I give this a 10. It is not an easy film to watch (given that its subject matter is The Holocaust), but it still has a huge emotional and psychological impact even now (or rather especially now [IMHO]): And today, it was these three gems: [/b]
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Post by erik on Apr 13, 2020 13:59:07 GMT -8
Today: THE BIG COUNTRYWilliam Wyler's 1958 sagebrush opus finds Gregory Peck as a merchant sailor who ventures out West and unwittingly gets himself entangled in a range war between two families, one very hightone, the other basically "white trash". Carroll Baker, Jean Simmons, and Charlton Heston co-star, while Burl Ives won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar as Rufus Hennessy, the "white trash" patriarch. But Jerome Moross should also have won for his hugely memorable music score. 10/10. APOLLO 13Revisiting director Ron Howard's big 1995 hit film of the saga of Apollo 13, the flight to the Moon that almost turned tragic when an oxygen tank exploded, crippling the ship and putting its three-men crew in danger of dying in the void. The incident happened fifty years ago on this date ( April 13, 1970). 10/10.
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Post by erik on Apr 15, 2020 16:06:56 GMT -8
Contiuing with my COVID-19 Movie Binge: THE OUTLAW JOSEY WALESClint Eastwood directed and starred in this 1976 Western classic about a Missouri farmer whose home and family are destroyed by a marauding group of Kansas Redlegs at the end of the Civil War, and who thus becomes a revenge-seeking outlaw. The film co-stars Chief Dan George and Sondra Locke. 10/10. THE FOGJohn Carpenter's 1980 horror/suspense classic about the ghosts of a leper pirate colony taking revenge on the Northern California town of Antonio Bay, one hundred years after a firelight onshore led them to a watery grave...and doing so through an ominous fog bank. Adrienne Barbeau, Jamie Lee Curtis, Janet Leight, and Hal Holbrook star. 9/10.
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Post by erik on Apr 17, 2020 18:31:49 GMT -8
My DVD binge continued today with... CARRIEThe original 1976 horror/suspense classic from director Brian DePalma, based on Stephen King's first novel, of a tormented high school student (Sissy Spacek) who is pushed over the line by her tormentors to use her telekinetic powers in the most horrifying way imaginable. Nancy Allen and John Travolta are featured as her principal humiliators, and Amy Irving co-stars as the one repentant student whose good deed is sabotaged. Spacek almost won an Oscar for her performance here. 10/10. LAWMANHighly underrated 1971 psychological Western from English director Michael Winner, with Burt Lancaster as a tenacious marshal out to apprehend (and kill, if necessary) the group of ranchers who went on a drunken spree in his town and, unwittingly, killed an old man without taking responsibility, and venturing into a hostile town where the ranchers hold sway. Lancaster is, as usual, very direct in his performance; and Robert Ryan, one of the most underrated actors in Hollywood history, gives one of his many great performances as a pragmatic sheriff. 9.5/10
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Post by erik on Apr 20, 2020 16:51:01 GMT -8
Today's COVID-19 Lockdown fare: LOLITADirector Stanley Kubrick's ultra-controversial 1962 film version of Vladimir Nabokov's notorious novel (adapted to the screen by the author himself) of a European professor (James Mason) who makes the dubious mistake of falling for a nymphet (Sue Lyon) who is one-third his age. This may seem tame by today's standards, but it wasn't in 1962. 9.5/10. THE OSTERMAN WEEKENDThe final film for director Sam Peckinpah ( THE WILD BUNCH), based on Robert Ludlum's novel of the same name, this 1983 espionage thriller stars Rutger Hauer as a TV news host who has been convinced by the CIA that his three old friends (Craig T. Nelson; Chris Sarandon; Dennis Hopper) are involved in Soviet-sponsored sabotage of America's germ warfare program. Psychological paranoia, and the usual slow-motion violence (though not overtly explicit) result, with a particularly hair-raising episode in a swimming pool. 8.5/10.
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Post by erik on Apr 21, 2020 16:08:41 GMT -8
Today: THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATEOne of the great political thrillers of the Cold War era, this 1962 film examines the psychological brainwashing of a Korean war veteran (Laurence Harvey) by the Red Chinese, and how Harvey's politically twisted mother (Angela Lansbury) is using it to her advantage in a rather nasty way. Frank Sinatra stars as Harvey's compatriot, who tries to break the brainwashing. Brilliantly directed by John Frankenheimer, and based on the novel by Richard Condon. 10/10. INSIDE JOBCharles Ferguson, whose 2007 film NO END IN SIGHT examined America's failure in Iraq, three years later took on the financial crisis of 2008 that led to a worldwide recession, and how the lack of reforms to come from that recession may make another economic collapse inevitable (nowadays, due in no small part to COVID-19, that may very well turn out to be the case). 10/10.
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Post by erik on Apr 23, 2020 15:37:01 GMT -8
SEVEN DAYS IN MAYCan a military coup happen here in America? That's the premise of this classic 1964 political drama, in which the signing of a missile treaty with the Soviet Union makes President Jordan Lyman (Fredric March) the target of a fanatical four-star general (Burt Lancaster). Kirk Douglas, Edmond O'Brien, Martin Balsam, and Ava Gardner co-star in this Cold War masterpiece, directed by John Frankenheimer, and scripted by Rod Serling ( The Twilight Zone) from the novel by Charles W. Bailey and Fletcher W. Knebel. 10/10.
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Post by erik on Apr 24, 2020 18:32:32 GMT -8
HANG 'EM HIGHClint Eastwood's first truly "American" western starring role has him as a former lawman almost lynched in Oklahoma for cattle rustling by a group of vigilantes, led by Ed Begley, who make the mistake of hanging the wrong man and then not finishing the job. He is thus hired on by the local judge (Pat Hingle) to bring his would-be murderers in for a trial...and maybe even a mass hanging. This 1968 western co-stars Ben Johnson, Bruce Dern, Inger Stevens, and Alan Hale, and has a great score by Dominic Frontiere (the title music became a big hit at the end of 1968 in a Memphis R&B version by Booker T. and the MGs). 9/10. FROST/NIXONMichael Sheen and Frank Langella go head-to-head in this 2008 Ron Howard-directed film, based on Peter Morgan's stage play, about how the once-frivolous British talk show host David Frost waggled an interview with our disgraced 37th president in the spring of 1977...and won! This film has the genuinely photogenic look of the 1970s, and really captures the era, not to mention both Frost's seeming frivolity and Nixon's faux aura of invincibility. 9/10.
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Post by erik on Apr 28, 2020 5:41:36 GMT -8
Still keeping on with the DVDs: PASSENGERSChris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence find themselves on a starship headed for a new Earth-type colony 120 light years away...but they have woken up too soon. Well-made science fiction opus from director Morton Tyldum ( THE IMITATION GAME), with Pratt and Lawrence very good as the couple who come together under potentially tragic circumstances, and Michael Sheen as the android bartender Arthur (who looks, not so coincidentally, like Joe Turkel's supernatural bartender Lloyd in THE SHINING). 9/10. GERONIMO: AN AMERICAN LEGENDWalter Hill ( THE LONG RIDERS) directed this fine 1993 retelling of the legendary Apache warrior Geronimo (with Wes Studi in the title role), and the Army's campaign of subjugating him and his people in the Arizona of 1886. Jason Patric and Matt Damon are the two young Army officers charged with bringing him in, and Gene Hackman (as Brigadier General George Crook) and Robert Duvall (as Al Sieber, the veteran Army scout) co-star. 9/10.
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Post by erik on May 1, 2020 15:46:08 GMT -8
Today it was.... SILENT RUNNINGBruce Dern stars as the very determined deep-space botanist out to save the last remnants of Earth's plant life on the Valley Forge out near Saturn, even if it means disobeying orders and killing his fellow crew members. This 1972 science fiction drama marked the directing debut of Douglas Trumbull, the special effects genius behind the Star Gate on 2001, and he managed to make his $1 million budget look more like $10 million. Besides all this, and Dern acting less psychotically than some might want to believe, the film is noted for a music score by Peter "P.D.Q. Bach" Schickele and songs sung by no less than Joan Baez.
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Post by erik on May 8, 2020 15:02:33 GMT -8
Three biggies: ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13John Carpenter's second film as a director (following the 1974 cult film DARK STAR) is this extremely gritty 1976 crime drama in which a soon-to-be-abandoned police station in southwest Los Angeles comes under assault from a multi-ethnic gang known as Street Thunder. Austin Stoker stars as the rookie officer tasked with protecting the remaining personnel and a group of visiting convicts. Something of an urban reworking of the 1959 Howard Hawks western classic RIO BRAVO, this was made for a mind-busting $100,000 (which doesn't even cover the cost of catering on most films these days), and is quite scary, but not overly violent. 9/10. CAPE FEARGregory Peck is the upstanding small-town Southern lawyer who is faced with a menace from his past: a sadistic ex-con (Robert Mitchum) out for revenge for having been sent to prison for eight years on a sexual battery charge where Peck was a prime witness. Mitchum learned a lot about the law while in jail, and he uses it to force Peck to cross the line and to menace Peck's wife (Polly Bergen) and daughter (Lori Martin). Peck and Mitchum are well-matched antagonists in this classic 1962 combination of film-noir and horror directed by the English-born J. Lee Thompson. Martin Balsam and Telly Savalas co-star, and the menacing music score is by no less than Bernard Herrmann. 10/10. PLAY MISTY FOR MEIn his first film as both director and actor, Clint Eastwood stars as a Carmel, California radio disc jockey who unwittingly gets involved with a female fan (Jessica Walter), and, once he gets back together with a former flame (Donna Mills), soon finds out how Walter can react to "bad news"...and it's not good. More or less remade in 1987 as FATAL ATTRACTION, this 1971 thriller is incredibly scary at times; and Eastwood is more nuanced as an actor here than his Dirty Harry/Man With No Name personas might suggest. 9.5/10.
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