Forrest Gump #71 on the AFI Top 100 List

I hadn't seen this movie in years and it was such a joy to view it again. It's not a movie that I can watch over and over in a short span of time but I did enjoy it tonight. Absolutely great performances put on by both Tom Hanks and Gary Sinise. Glad Zameckis won his Oscar for this classic. I think it's utterly impossible to view this movie without crying. Another movie that I'm glad I saw in the theaters!

God forbid we allow substance-rich, masterpiece works of film be made. Why would we want substance when we can have twelve explosions and a peak at this years glamour girl's tits? :rolleyes:

Anywho, to get this rolling back on topic...

***Please note that I've recently changed my rating system from five stars to four stars, to accomodate the popular four star system used on the site.***

The Machinist (Anderson, Brad; 2004)
After an accident to his fault, an insomniac-machinist is left to question his own sanity.
*** of ****

Lets cut to the chase. This was an ok film. Above mediocre, but far from anything special. It was going great, until the truth began to come forward, with about forty-five minutes left of the film. At which point, I had to curse out loud, and say to myself, "This is a carbon copy of bloody Fight Club!" Luckily, once I encountered the climax, I found there was a larger twist. Thank god. Plenty entertaining, although a lack of originality, along with maybe a tad shortness of substance, gave me the feeling of a B three-star film.

You say that as if it was 3 seconds long. *BANG* cut to credits.

Did you ignore the whole atmosphere of the scene, and the character's faces when she kept saying "Kill me" over and over. I can't say you have to like it, but you're whole reasoning sounds ridiculously simplified. While I'm on it, I'll do the same.

Schindler lets the Jews go. Wow, great plot there. I was deeply affected by that movie.

Michael lies to his wife. Wow, great plot there. I was deeply affected by that movie.

Blondie kills Sentenza and gets the gold. Wow, great plot there. I was deeply affected by that movie.

Ben stops the wedding and gets on a bus with Katie. Wow, great plot there. I was deeply affected by that movie.

It's a sled. Wow, great plot there. I was deeply affected by that movie.

Reading those things I just said, you're probably thinking the same thing I thought when I read your post.

Samurai Fiction

I was bored 1 day at work last week and was looking through the movies that Blockbuster Online offered and saw this movie. It sounded and looked interesting and after reading some praises on it from amazon.com, decided to rent it. I watched about half of it and that was tough. I'm tired and not interested in it so I turned it off. The directing was good but that's all I can say about the film. It was a comedy samurai movie that was just disappointing and didn't live up to the reviews IMO

Purple Noon - (René Clément;1960;France/Italy) - ****
Tom Ripley kills his playboy friend while in Rome and takes his identity, however the facade proves to be difficult to keep.
An excellent adaptation of the popular novel The Talented Mr. Ripley. The film feels almost Hitchcockian from the opening credits to the combination of fascination and suspense that makes the film flow perfectly. Alain Delon greatly shines as Ripley, the envious sociopath compared to the supporting cast, which is good in supporting the film nevertheless. One of the finer things to admire is the beautiful Italian cinematography. My only complaint is the music, which was good when present, but out of place.
#25

I can see your point Don Vercetti, and I respect your opinion, but everything in the 2nd half of the movie that led up to the ending just didn't make any sense. The whole structure of the movie is messed up. The ending was too abrupt. I was thinking it was going to show how Joker's life afterwards was affected by the war, but then BOOM, credits. I was disappointed.

I guess to some that would be a good thing, although I thought the open ending worked better. This discussion oddly makes me wanna rewatch The Deer Hunter, if only my DVD wasn't fucked up.

Full Metal Jacket's point is the pointless of war, the insanity inside war, the violence and brutality of war which catalyse the worst instincts in men. This is pretty obvious to me.

it is possible! :p

Just wonderful, I forgot TCM was playing Cagney films all day and missed over an hour of Each Dawn I Die.

Gosford Park (Altman; 2001)
A shooting party on the 1932 English countryside is disturbed when a murder occurs.
***1/2 (Under new four star rating system.)

Excellent film. Very carefully put together, exploring multiple stories... Overall, it was an interesting watch.

Fantastic Four

This ws my 2nd time viewing this movie and even though I didn't enjoy it as much as I did the first time around, I still did enjoy it very much. I thought the whole cast did a very good job. Michael Chiklis was easily my favorite and Chris Evans was my biggest surprise. Ioan Gruffudd and Jessica Alba were both good even though most people don't give them credit for it. And with what he had to work with I thought Julian McMahon did a fine job as well (even if the writers screwed him up). This movie is still in one word Fantastic

I just watched The deer Hunter again. It's so much better than Full Metal Jacket it's hilarious. By far my favorite movie of all time.

Hey DVC, check out YEAR OF THE DRAGON sometime.

Whatever, THE DEER HUNTER is a great movie...but sorry, FULL METAL JACKET is a superior movie in other ways that I might want to explain to you, but you'll never understand so forget about it.

The Hobbit

I wanted to see this after reading the book and I didn't think it was that good. It shows its age (1978) and they try to make the book into an hour cartoon. Besides, Gollum looks like a frog or something!

I watched parts of White Heat on TCM, but I had to turn it off because I want to watch that movie from beginning to end. It was tough to turn it off because I was really enjoying it.

One of my favorites.

Mickey Rourke gives one of his three great performances (along with The Pope of Greenwich Village and Angel Heart), and the supporting cast, particularly John Lone, is excellent as well.

And not only did Cimino direct, the screenplay was by Oliver Stone.

Purple Noon - (René Clément;1960;France/Italy) - ***1/2
Tom Ripley kills his playboy friend while in Rome and takes his identity, however the facade proves to be difficult to keep.
I was surprisingly less impressed with my second viewing, but without a doubt this is still a great film. Out of place music and a butchered ending are the problems in this film. Otherwise, the cinematography is excellent, and Alain Delon's performance is dead-on for Tom Ripley. And fascinating, suspenseful, and Hitchcockian film.
#25

Not Another Teen Movie Unrated Extended Director's Cut

I hadn't seen this version yet since buying it, but there was 10 minutes added to it. Not a great comedy at all but a very good "spoof" kind-of-a movie. I liked it a lot

A reminder to anyone who hasn't seen it.

TCM is playing Lawrence of Arabia tomorrow at 4 or 4:30 PM.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

My 2nd favorite movie of the trilogy. Another enjoyable viewing that helped me understand the story more and appreciate Alfonso Cuarón's directing more. I think he did a better job than Chris Columbus (but I still loved the job that Chris did). This was the first truly "dark" movie of the series thusfar and I think Alfonso started it off beautifully. At first I liked the warm/fuzzy feeling that years 1 & 2 gave you, but after watching this movie tonight, I really dug the darker approach. Hopefully the rest will be equally if not better than Azkaban.

SPOILERS! BTW, has anyone noticed how Snape always seems to know everything? He knew that Quirrell was going after the Sorcerer's Stone in year 1, he knew Lockheart was a fraud in year 2 and now he knew that Luppin was a wherewolf in year 3. Could this lead to something big in the later films? END OF SPOILERS

Adaptation. (2002) - ****
Director: Spike Jonze
Screenwriter Charlie Kaufman stumbles when he plans to adapt a novel into a film with aboslutely no character arcs or resolution.

Wow. What can I say. This was amazing, and one of the years best, if not the best. This was far superior to Being John Malkovich (1999), which was also amazing, and so original! Kaufman's work is some of the best drama-work I've ever seen, which is brought to life flawlessly by Spike Jonze. Nicolas Cage himself gives an amazing performance as both Kaufman and his fictional twin-brother Donald. But I think what really made this film work for me, was the truth behind Kaufman's representation in the film, and his attitude. I, myself, feel I can relate to his characterization in this film more than any other movie character. This is a must see, along with Being John Malkovich.

The Island
Yeah I didn’t get around to seeing this movie (The Island) till a few weeks after it was released. Why, well basically I only really like to see movies with at least one of my friends, it is just part of the experience for me. However none of my friends really wanted to go and see it, it baffled me.
I’ll say that it does fit in the mold of a Michael Bay movie. The story is well not the highlight of the film. If’n you don’t know it, The Island is about a colony of clones that are created under the false pretence that the world is a desolate place, covered by some type of infection. They are all hoping to go to “the island” the one place on earth that is contaminate free. Well of course a couple of them get out and they must bring down the evil corporation that has these clones imprisoned and is violating international law. Said evil corporation must go through all the extreme measures to make sure that the clones don’t do that so that they can stay in business and continue to make billions of dollars. Like I said it is not the highlight of the film.
The Island stars Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson as the two leads. As far as sci-fi/action movies go they do excellent jobs, particularly McGregor. There were two supporting roles that I was more interested in that of Steve Buscemi (whom I never tire of) and Djimon Hounsou (whom I can’t get enough of). Steve plays a worker at the clone colony who befriends the Ewan clone, doesn’t say why he does this but just so you know it is so the clones have someone to go to when they break out of the colony. Not the best written character but every moment that he is on the screen it makes the movie better, Steve just has this weird charisma and ability to really nail these little niche type characters, he has an oddity and eccentricity that is great on the screen. Djimon Hounsou plays an ex-delta merc whom the evil corporation hires to hunt down and “solve” their security breach. I’d seen Djimon before in movies like Gladiator and Deep Rising but it wasn’t until In America that I became enamored with him and his screen presence. He can dominate a scene and in the Island he does just that.
As for Bay’s direction well it is what you would expect from Bay provided you’ve seen his other movies. When you see his name in the trailer or on the poster you kind of know what to expect, like when you see Spielberg on them you expect greatness. Well when you see Bay you expect slick big Hollywood action- unfortunately this summer those posters seem to be lying to us. (Yes if your keeping tabs that was a double slam on Bay/Spielberg) The Island is like Bay light; no it is like Bay lite. There were some major action pieces but they all seemed like steps back from the content of Bad Boys II (yes I liked that movie and it was one of my favorite of last summer). During the escape of the clones from the facility there was one scene that stuck with me as far as action and truth be told it was pretty tame, but the rest of the action was well pretty white bread if you ask me.
This movie was somewhat disappointing, even for a Bay fan I give it a 63 D-.

I rewatched Dying young (1991) yesterday night. Gosh, I had forgotten how beautiful this movie was! Ok, it may be a tearjerker, a chick flick and everything. But I think it's most of all a movie about life, about love. With a superb Julia Roberts (delightful and intense as usually) and an outstanding performance by Campbell Scott (I wonder why this actor is so underrated!! ). They are both so credible in their roles. Scott's eyes are so desperately hungry for life and love. I rarely saw that intensity on screen.

Add a fine photography (San Francisco is shown in all its magnificence, no wonder they say it is one of the most beautiful cities of the world!), a good direction (Joel Schumacher), an excellent screenplay and a wonderful music (the love theme is heartbreaking, literally). A must see, definitely.


Quotation:

Because I love you. And if you come back with me to the hospital and fight for us. Fight for us, I will never leave you Victor. But you have to fight. And if you get well, when you get well, I'll be there with you. And if you die, I will hold your hand. I'll hold your hand and the last thing you will ever see will be me because I love you.

Oh, and an advice for my female friends on the board: never watch this movie with your make up on!

Lawrence of Arabia - (David Lean;1962;UK) - ****
A biopic on T.E. Lawrence, a British military figure who assisted Prince Feisal during the Arab Revolt in WW1.
A magnificent epic from start to finish. Lean uses the desert cinematography not just for looks, but as an important part of the film. Maurice Jarre's score is also wonderful. Peter O'Toole gives an excellent performance as Lawrence. The supporting cast is also great, which includes Alec Guinness, Anthony Quinn, Omar Sharif, Jack Hawkins, and even Claude Rains. Although they couldn't noticeably bring up the rumored homosexuality at the time, the film does a very good job of showing Lawrence's masochism. I've heard people say this was boring, but for me the film never lacked admirable qualities in any scene, and it surprisingly went by faster then I thought. One of the greatest epics of all time.

Lawrence of Arabia is proof that film is art, not solely entertainment. I have it on DVD, and watched it only once. I think I'm due for another viewing pretty soon.

Not Another Teen Movie Unrated Extended Director's Cut

Had nothing else to watch tonight that I was in the mood for because I didn't get a new DVD in through Blockbuster.com and the Yankee game was going slow

In the Cut
Starring Meg Ryan and Mark Ruffalo
Jesus Mary and Joseph wtf is going on with the cinamatography in this movie. May Don V or Capo can explain that to me but the camerea is always shakey and allmost every shot is partially focused or half focused I don't know what was going on with that, was that some intricate part of telling the "story" or what. I hated this movie. 53 out of 100 (it had some highlights)but not enough for me to recomend it to any one

I never saw it Suspect. However, your description reminds me of the horrible Man on Fire, and the soon to be technical remake Domino. :p

What made you decide against 62% or 64 %? Why not give it D, instead of D-?

Mick