General Entertainment ~Rate The Last Movie/TV Show You Watched Thread~

[Greatoneshere]

15 hours ago, Nokra said:

It legitimately impresses me with how many movies you watch pretty much every weekend. I can barely cook my meals.  

 

I'm glad someone's reading the posts!  Because I have to keep up with anime, games, movies, TV, books/manga/comics, politics, sports, working out, etc. I live a pretty regimented life so I don't fall behind on anything and I get as much done as possible per week so I do try to get at least four-five movies every weekend (usually don't do movies on weekdays, that's for TV, etc.).

[Keyser_Soze]

9 minutes ago, Greatoneshere said:

I'm glad someone's reading the posts!

 

I read them! But it's only something you recently started doing, well posting them anyway. Seems like mostly a lot of sure bets and watching stinkers like Jurassic Park 3 before you see the first movie.

[Greatoneshere]

1 hour ago, Keyser_Soze said:

I read them! But it's only something you recently started doing, well posting them anyway. Seems like mostly a lot of sure bets and watching stinkers like Jurassic Park 3 before you see the first movie.

 

Yeah watching the Jurassic Park movies out of order was my younger brother's fault. And yeah, definitely some stinkers in there trying to catch my younger brother up on some franchises he fell behind on.  A good number of rewatches in the posts but new films as well. And yeah I did start doing it recently, I used to be far more thorough and write reviews wayyyy back but didn't seem like worth the work. But a simple rating seems easy enough. If someone is genuinely curious about a film or a rating I gave they can always follow up and I can elaborate at that point.

[TheLeon]

I probably watch an average of 4-5 movies a week (and often a fair bit of TV), but I don’t like giving numerical ratings and don’t have it in me to give “real” reviews most of the time, so I’m not nearly as active in this thread as I could be. 

[Greatoneshere]

43 minutes ago, TheLeon said:

I probably watch an average of 4-5 movies a week (and often a fair bit of TV), but I don’t like giving numerical ratings and don’t have it in me to give “real” reviews most of the time, so I’m not nearly as active in this thread as I could be. 

 

You're actually a really good film watcher! I've noticed you're always watching (or know of) even the smaller stuff like Nyad, etc. I get not bothering but you should participate more! I wish @Zeluge was around more too.

[TheLeon]

1 hour ago, Greatoneshere said:

 

You're actually a really good film watcher! I've noticed you're always watching (or know of) even the smaller stuff like Nyad, etc. I get not bothering but you should participate more! I wish @Zeluge was around more too.

My thing is that after most movies that I watch, my entire reaction is “yeah, that was fine”. The other day I watched The American Friend, a fairly deep cut, because I wanted to see another take on the Ripley character before watching the new Netflix series with Andrew Scott. Other than thinking it’s really funny that Dennis Hopper and Matt Damon played the same character 20 years apart, I don’t have much of anything to say about that movie, good or bad. 

[Greatoneshere]

12 minutes ago, TheLeon said:

My thing is that after most movies that I watch, my entire reaction is “yeah, that was fine”. The other day I watched The American Friend, a fairly deep cut, because I wanted to see another take on the Ripley character before watching the new Netflix series with Andrew Scott. Other than thinking it’s really funny that Dennis Hopper and Matt Damon played the same character 20 years apart, I don’t have much of anything to say about that movie, good or bad. 

 

I mean, that's most movies. Almost every movie I watch ranks between a 6 to a 7.5. A movie being below that is usually abysmal, and a film being above that is a must watch. It's very rare for any film I watch to break that range of score (mostly because I know the bad movies to avoid so I don't end up watching them to begin with and great movies are hard to come by). That being said, it's still at least worth scoring and giving maybe a one sentence blurb about to let others know. But I agree, most movies just kind of come and go. I mean, I love discussing films, but most here just talk about the big, obvious, straightforward stuff like comic book films, etc. There's nothing to really talk about there, so I would love to get into better/stranger/more interesting films with someone more. Like discussing how How to Blow Up a Pipeline is basically a realistic, live-action Final Fantasy VII? That's a conversation worth having.

[Fizzzzle]

I know I've brought it up before, but I base my ranking system on RT average scores (tomatometer is useless, IMO)

 

0 = Hypothetically the worst movie ever. I don't think any movie has ever scored less than 1

1 = Very, very few movies are this bad. Future World or 365 Days

2 = Still in horrible territory. Most of the movies in this category are things like Bio-Dome, Scary Movie 5, or Larry the Cable Guy's Witless Protection. Like Adam Sandler movies if they can't afford Adam Sandler's production company or schlocky spoof movies.

3 = Still bad, but we're getting into the territory of "I could watch this if I'm stuck on an airplane." Jonah Hex. The Love Guru. Speed 2. Gods and Generals (better be a long flight)

4 = Now we're getting to a point where it's not actively bad, just... forgettable. Prime "I don't know what to watch, fuck it" territory. Gone in 60 Seconds. Punisher: War Zone. Bulletproof Monk. Basically any Jason Statham movie or any Nicholas Sparks movie.

5 = The bad parts outweigh the good parts, but still enjoyable. Kingsman: The Golden Circle, Pain & Gain, Riddick (the last one), Alien 3.

6 = The good parts outweigh the bad parts, but there are bad parts. Horrible Bosses, I Am Legend, The Old Guard, Sleepy Hollow

7 = These movies are great, but we're not talking about these movies in 30 years. A Beautiful Mind, Crimson Tide, Gosford Park, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Michael Clayton.

8 = Now we're getting into deserving Oscar territory. Black Swan, Hero, Pig, City of God, Beasts of the Southern Wild, Blade Runner 2049.

9 = Very, very few movies are this good. At least from what I can look up in my spreadsheet (yes I have one, but it's not complete and even then it only goes back to 1990): Moonlight, The Tale, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Goodfellas, L.A. Confidential, Past Lives, Toy Story, Hamilton (disagree on this one), Boyhood, Pulp Fiction, Parasite.

10 = Hypothetically the best movie ever. The Godfather Part II and Citizen Kane are both 9.7.

 

[Greatoneshere]

I more or less agree with your system. Unduly harsh with some of your examples compared to what I'd score them but broadly, on point.

[Keyser_Soze]

[Plex]

 

Meltdown / High Risk: 7/10

 

This is a goofy movie. I guess it's a parody but it doesn't come off that way initially. The film begins with Jet Li as an army guy who has to disarm a bomb on a bus full of school children (nothing's preventing the kids from walking off the bus but we have to disarm the bomb anyhow) and the sinister doctor (that sounds an awful lot like Chris Parnell) tricks him over the phone and the bus explodes. Seems pretty serious but the tone isn't that way at all. Fast forward two years and Jet Li is now a bodyguard for an action star that is actually a bit of a fraud, also maybe he is supposed to resemble Jackie Chan or something. In any case they go to Nakatomi Plaza... uh I mean some fancy hotel in China, and that evil doctor is back and then it's just filled with good but very odd action scenes. The whole movie was so wacky that I was confused and put off at first but the more I watched the more on board I was with what was going down.

[TwinIon]

Sunshine - 4/5

 

First time I’ve seen this in years. I’ve long been pretty down on Sunshine, but I think I’ve finally come around. First of all, an incredible cast. I’d forgotten who all was in this film, but there aren’t any slackers here. Two future Oscar winners, a pair of MCU vets, and plenty more. The other thing that struck me is how confident it is. It’s beautiful and strange and it takes a lot of swings, and even when it doesn’t connect, I can appreciate the try.

 

Something I didn’t love was the sound design. I was constantly wishing it was more restrained; more quiet, or even silent. Half the sound effects are of light, which really didn’t register as anything more than unnecessary and annoying. Maybe it’s just a personal preference for overblown visuals and a restrained soudscape, but I consistently was bothered by the overwrought audio effects.

 

It’s a difficult complaint to make while the soundtrack has some truly great tracks, but the two audio channels really are on different levels.

 

Still, even if I enjoyed Sunshine much more this go-around, I still don’t think the psycho killer twist was for the better. The film really is at its best as a pesemistic sci-fi adventure. The addition of a crazed killer after 3/4 of the way through is not to the films’ benefit.

 

Also, I completely didn’t realize this was written by Alex Garland.

 

[Keyser_Soze]

[Netflix]

 

The Makanai: Cooking for the Maiko House: 9/10

 

This show kind of flew under the radar but probably should have garnered more attention. It's a show written and directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda for Netflix and based on a Manga Kiyo in Kyoto. It follows two best friends, Kiyo and Sumire, as they both travel to Kyoto to a Maiko house to become Maiko (which is an apprentice Geisha). Kiyo isn't quite suited for the role but Sumire emerges as a prodigy and Kiyo instead becomes the makanai (which is basically the chef of the house). So the show is a lot of the goings on of becoming a maiko and all the relationships between all the people who live there. Unlike Kore-eda's other works (from what I've seen) this show is a lot more uplifting and happy. Kore-eda always seems to make movies that feel so natural that you feel like you're not even watching anything scripted and that feels like this show too. The acting feels so natural. The show is gorgeous to watch as well. It's shot so well and it looks so good, you'll never see a piece of boiled broccoli look so good in your whole life. Overall a pleasant surprise for me. Pro tip if you do watch it, make sure you always watch the opening credits as they show whatever is being cooked in that episode.

 

[Dre801]

Tokyo Vice,  Season 2, and possibly, Series Finale - I was quite satisfied with how it ended as both a Season Finale or a Series Finale.

[EternallDarkness]

gave 2016 Ghostbusters another try...not sure how it's possible but it was even worse than I remembered  

[Keyser_Soze]

[Plex]

 

24 Hours to Live: 6/10

 

If you had told me a movie that has both Ethan Hawke and Rutger Hauer could somehow be bad I wouldn't have believed you, but here we are. This movie is like Crank meets [insert movie where guy is the best spy/secret agent ever]. Hawke plays Travis, a mercenary / hitman, that is on hiatus until a megacorp comes to call upon his services. The mission is to kill a whistleblower that is going to spill their secrets to Interpol. Now the reason that Travis was on hiatus is because he was mourning the loss of his wife and son, so when one of his additional tasks is to kill the female Interpol agent that also has a son he begins to second guess himself. This second guessing leads to his death but he's brought back to life by some scientists and this is also the big revelation of what the whole hubbub is about the whistleblower and this and that. It feels kind of silly and also the film doesn't seem to make it feel like a big deal even though this whole resurrection thing is the entire purpose of the movie. But this is just many of the problems the film has with many aspects of the film is that it glosses over anything that's important. Sure it's sad Travis' family is dead but the film never lets us emotionally connect with them so we don't really care. All the movie cares about is going from point A to point B with some cool action stuff, and the film is pretty good at that. However, the rest of the movie feels like it's trying to punch above it's weight and not succeeding.

[silentbob]

9 hours ago, EternallDarkness said:

gave 2016 Ghostbusters another try...not sure how it's possible but it was even worse than I remembered  

It’s a bad movie but a blast in 3D. They did some great pop outs and screen breaks that really played out well. Plus it’s worth at least seeing Hemsworth be the funniest thing in the movie. Hope we get him into more comedy movies one day 

[EternallDarkness]

5 hours ago, silentbob said:

It’s a bad movie but a blast in 3D. They did some great pop outs and screen breaks that really played out well. Plus it’s worth at least seeing Hemsworth be the funniest thing in the movie. Hope we get him into more comedy movies one day 

 

you thought he was funny? Nothing about his character or performance was even remotely amusing 

[silentbob]

23 minutes ago, EternallDarkness said:

 

you thought he was funny? Nothing about his character or performance was even remotely amusing 

You should know by now how I watch my movies  Especially on such a HIGH holiday as today. 

[Greatoneshere]

The weekend recap (this is from the past two weekends combined; note that the Dragon Ball Z movies are being ranked on a bit of a curve on whether they are a  good DBZ movie or not to some degree since they are only 45 minutes to an hour each):

 

-American Fiction (2023; dir. Cord Jefferson): 7.5/10

-Sin City: A Dame to Kill For (2014; dirs. Robert Rodriguez/Frank Miller): 5.5/10

-Shortcomings (2023; dir. Randall Park): 7/10

-Ambulance (2022; dir. Michael Bay): 7/10

-Burn After Reading (2008; dirs. Joel and Ethan Coen): 8.5/10

-American Made (2017; dir. Doug Liman): 7/10

-The Taste of Things (2023; dir. Anh Hung Tran): 7.5/10

-Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (2023; dir. James Wan): 5.5/10

-The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare (2024; dir. Guy Ritchie): 6.5/10

-Dragon Ball Z: Movie 2 - The World's Strongest (1990; dir. Daisuke Nishio): 7.5/10

-Dragon Ball Z: Movie 3 - The Tree of Might (1990; dir. Daisuke Nishio): 7/10

-Dragon Ball Z: Movie 4 - Lord Slug (1991; dir. Mitsuo Hashimoto): 6.5/10

[Keyser_Soze]

[Plex]

 

Dog Soldiers: 6/10

 

Here we go, a Liam Cunningham movie two weeks in a row!

You could probably tell from the cover this one has something to do with Werewolves and Soldiers. Although from the title you would assume they are soldiers that are werewolves (how cool would that be?). Instead the movie would be more accurately titled, "Werewolves vs Soldiers," It's basically about a group of soldiers that have been dropped into a forest for a training operation but they soon find out they're being hunted by werewolves and make their way into a house and it turns into one of those hunker down and survive the night type movies. In fact this movie is so by the book I feel like I've seen it before. Decent creature effects, though the werewolves look kinda weird. Cast is pretty good and probably carry the movie more than anything else. A fair amount of gore and maybe a few jump scares. The biggest issue is it feels like every cliche in the book is on display here including a "keep your eye on the opening scene because it might be important later in the movie" type thing. Also, how tired is the trope of in universe characters not having heard of / believing the creature that is hunting them exists? Surely in a modern day setting someone has heard of a werewolf by now.

[elbobo]

Late Night with the Devil

The concept is solid but it just did not come together for me at all. The first and last 10 minutes are particularly egregious, starting with 10 minute straight exposition dump and ending with a "dream" sequence.

[Greatoneshere]

The weekend recap: 

 

-Kill Bill: Vols. 1+2 (2003; dir. Quentin Tarantino): 10/10

-Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (2023; dir. Steven Caple Jr.): 6.5/10

-Monkey Man (2024; dir. Dev Patel): 7/10

-Wrath of Man (2021; dir. Guy Ritchie): 7.5/10

-Lord of War (2005; dir. Andrew Niccol): 8.5/10

-Casino (1995; dir. Martin Scorsese): 7.5/10

-Rye Lane (2023; dir. Raine Allen-Miller): 7/10

[Keyser_Soze]

[Plex]

 

American Virgin: 5/10

 

There was a moment in 2005 when virgin humor was all the rage and arguably peaked with The 40-Year-Old-Virgin. This film, American Virgin, came out four years too late and also seemed to miss the point of what made 40YOV good, being funny or having actual comedians/funny people in the movie. When Rob Schneider is the headliner for your movie you know you've got a problem (although I guess Bo Burnham is considered funny there's not much here for him).

 

The movie follows a woman named Priscilla who took a purity vow to get a college scholarship. She's very devout, uptight and judgemental. She gets matched up with a roomate, Naz, who is very much the opposite. You can pretty much tell where this is going. In any case Rob Schneider is Ed Curtzman, a guy who runs a video company called Chicks Go Crazy (obviously a parody of Girls Gone Wild) and Priscilla ends up getting drunk off Jello shots and getting naked and then the rest of the movie is trying to hunt down Curtzman to convince him to give him the video back.

 

As a comedy it is a failure, the jokes are crude and not very funny. The story is predictable and you pretty much know what's going to happen to the characters. But there was something captivating enough about it that makes it appealing enough to see it all the way through. I was surprised to see that the director is actually a woman, Clare Kilner, and she directed one of the episodes of Fallout so maybe she's the magic touch that keeps this movie from being truly awful.

 

Also, stick around for the post credits boob chart that is mentioned earlier in the movie!

[Keyser_Soze]

[Amazon]

 

Fallout (Season 1): 9/10

 

I think everyone has seen this by now so I don't think I need to recap the whole spiel. I spent a lot of time thinking why this show succeeded while others mostly fail. It certainly nails the aesthetic. The show is not only faithful looking but also has the tone down. Even a lot of fan service moments (like fans of the game not like showing chick's asses, you know. ). Then on top of all that is a good story and perhaps that's all you need, at least for the show the game is based on. It's based on an open world RPG and that gives so many possibilities. It probably even surpasses the games in a lot of respects. The story of the game suck (with the exception of the first two), because who goes into a BGS game and comes away feeling good about the story. The acting is great and you'll never see anything of that caliber in the games, especially the way they are presented. Then the action set pieces are much more exciting than the game as well. Using vats to make someone's body explode is fun but in general it feels limp compared to this show.

So I suppose the secret sauce is to have an IP that gives you the freedom to do something good, while something like Resident Evil (which is a lot like this show) gets panned because it doesn't follow the characters of the game, or you get sick people hating on Lance Reddick because Wesker can't be black, too many women in power on that show, too many women of color. But Fallout, you can get away with that I suppose. In any case, Fallout so good, hard to imagine they could make a second season just as good. Fingers crossed 🤞

[TheLeon]

A fun trio in the last couple days (opposite of watched order):

Perfect Blue - A+
Unfrosted - Trash

The Beekeeper - A+ Trash

[Greatoneshere]

The weekend recap: 

 

-The Tomorrow War (2021; dir. Chris McKay): 6.5/10

-Mass (2021; dir. Fran Kranz): 7.5/10

-Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes (2020; dir. Junta Yamaguchi): 7/10

-Papillon (2017; dir. Michael Noer): 6.5/10

-Inglourious Basterds (2009; dir. Quentin Tarantino): 10/10

[TheLeon]

The Idea of You - new Anne Hathaway movie on Amazon. I was expecting this to be a fairly disposable rom-com, something I can really enjoy when I’m in the mood. Unfortunately, It’s really light on the com, which is a little surprising considering it’s directed and co-written by Michael Showalter. 
 

A 40 year old divorcee and mother of a teenage daughter strikes up an unlikely romance with a 24 year old Harry Styles-like member of a boy band. This causes all the problems and conflicts you would easily predict, a lot of which don’t make a ton of sense when the divorcee in question is played by an incredibly beautiful and charming movie star, but whatever. There are too many tearful “this isn’t going to work” scenes, but the leads have enough charisma and chemistry that it goes down smoothly enough. 
 

Overall - 

[EternallDarkness]

Backdraft...hadn't watch this one in so long. It still holds up.

[Dre801]

Justice League: Crisis of Infinite Earths Part 1 - 7/10.   Good, not great.  Wasn't too crazy about the "Archer" style animation.

[Keyser_Soze]

[Plex]

 

Prom Night in Mississippi: 7/10

 

Prom Night in Mississippi is a documentary about a particular town in Mississippi that for around 40 years since schools became integrated have had a segregated prom. Interestingly enough it is a Canadian movie, perhaps Canadians are better equipped to observe inequality. In any case Morgan Freeman lives in Charelston (where this was filmed) and heard the prom was segregated and thought that was dumb and decided to make history by funding an integrated prom. He had to ask twice but finally they took him up on the offer in 2008.

I think the tone of the movie is mostly upbeat, it's not really a hit piece. The issue of segregation seems to be because of the parents because most of the kids seem fine. It seems to offer a glimmer of hope that when the old heads die off perhaps there's a chance that people might be a little less racist. It also tells us everything we already know about racists, they are cowards. The film highlights a few white folks, a girl who basically survived racism from her parents and stands up for her black friends, a guy who has no problem with black people but has to remain anonymous because his parents would disown him if they heard him saying anything good about them, and then a father who says he's not racist but for the love of his daughter is trying to steer her clear of being in a relationship with them because of how they would be perceived by others. He went out of his way to punish her for having a black boyfriend and even wishing that in the future they grow apart. But man, if you really care about your daughter you should probably stand up for her and tell the bigots to go suck eggs if they have a problem with her and a black guy. But like I said mostly a good time, seems like mostly good kids (they didn't really show the bad kids because they didn't want to be filmed) and maybe for one year (there was no follow up) something good happened.

[gamer.tv]

Watching Ponyo with my daughter. I read it as a good recommendation for kids that moved away from Disney and we’ve enjoyed it.

[thewhyteboar]

My daughter went through a phase where she just LOVED Ponyo. She could sing a good chunk of the Japanese version of the song. 

[Keyser_Soze]

[blu-ray]

 

Keijo: 7/10

 

At some time in the future a new sport is formed called Keijo where ladies fight on the water and can only use their boobs or butts to push their opponent into the water. The show follows Nozomi Kaminashi and her friend, Sayaka Miyata, as they train to become pro Keijo players. So a lot of the show is a lot of over the top and stylish Keijo battles, each girl using some special technique. Sure this one garnered a lot of attention because of the butt battle thing but it's actually not really all that lewd. It's a show with a lot of heart about camaraderie and good sportsmanship and stuff like that. The show takes the subject matter, though silly, seriously enough to actually make a compelling show.

Animation is by studio Xebec who I've actually seen a lot from dating back to Martian Successor Nadesico and the show has a nice bold look to it. In particular it uses some thicc lines which is pretty cool looking. I would say the worst part of the show is it ends at graduation. I would be interested to see this go through the professional ranks.

 

As a side note, I couldn't really stand the dub. Alexis Tipton is in it but it just felt so flat to me. Subbed all the way

 

As a second side note, props to this show for teaching language you can only learn on the streets. 尻 (Shiri) meaning butt.

[EternallDarkness]

Spent the weekend watching every Planet of the Apes movie

 

[Phaseknox]

28 minutes ago, EternallDarkness said:

Spent the weekend watching every Planet of the Apes movie

How many are there?