The Family. It's a docu-drama limited series on Netflix based on the books written by Jeff Sharlet. I posted criticisms about the National Prayer Breakfast in other threads, but this takes it to a new level.
Very well done, watch it!
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The Family. It's a docu-drama limited series on Netflix based on the books written by Jeff Sharlet. I posted criticisms about the National Prayer Breakfast in other threads, but this takes it to a new level.
Very well done, watch it!
Fisherman's Friend. Bad fortune made this be projected in the cinema I was at yesterday. Don't bother. In a couple of years it will be on broadcast tv, probably between Christmas and New Year's. And you can have it on while doing something else.
I watched The Matrix. In a cinema. It still held up, but I am not so certain it would after another 20 years. The CGI had lost his luster.
Knives out. I am not certain if I can recommend this one. It was a bit like the makers couldn't decide if they wanted to make an Agatha Christie type of whodunit or a comedy of errors. Daniel Craig wasn't very well casted as the southern gentleman PI.
During this visit I also decided I will try to boycott British movies coproductions and TV series about either of the two great wars. The trigger was a trailer for yet another one of those.
American Son
Superb, with powerful performances from the two leads. Taken from a stage play of the same name with the same writer for both stage and screen. Translating reasonably well to the screen, I feel it would be better to see performed live. Nonetheless, it is extremely watchable. Out on Netflix.
Richard Jewell
Fantastic movie. The guy who played Richard was bloody fantastic. Overall a great show.
I hear Star Wars is bad?
Rise of Skywalker - solid visuals, potential for awesomeness but marred by unhappy actors, unusually bad dialogue, surprisingly disinterested direction, aggressive (and sloppy) editing, janky score. I don't know what happened with this movie but it looks like the product of a decidedly dysfunctional process. Suspect the director's cut or extended edition will be much better. Not garbage, visually better than tLJ, but wrt dramaturgy, much worse.
One positive thing though:
https://i.imgur.com/SrbwCmT.jpg
Marriage Story. Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson.
Ultimately disappointing.
Not very much / 10
The Gentlemen
https://www.fenlandcitizen.co.uk/_me...Y0WTJY1V29.jpg
An in-form Guy Ritchie delivers another stompingly brilliant caper. Great fun.
I saw Episode IX this weekend. Hmm. This is going to be a tough review. It's pretty damned spoilery so:
Spoiler:
Dora and the lost city of gold
One of the most fun movies I've ever seen. Having watched at least one episode and Dora and Deigo is required but holy shit I was not expecting a movie like that.
"Change in the Air". A bit slow in spots, but I wasn't looking for an action-packed movie anyway. Never mind the critic's comments about trying too hard for bird-references, I thought it was a lovely film. :)
Happened to see The Terminal on Netflix. Still as lovely as it was when I first saw it, sixteen years ago. Absolute gem.
Our Disneylife subscription became a Disney+ subscription yesterday with the launch of Disney+ in the UK :) - paid for an annual pass at a discounted rate so its cheaper than Disneylife was and gives much more content too, plus its integrated with our Sky Q box. The Disneylife app was quite crap technology wise and it was clear they'd cancelled all work on it to concentrate on Disney+
Had movie night with the children last night watching Inside Out. Showed Chloe (Five about to turn six) how to access the Disney app using the remote. Woke up this morning to Tangled playing (her favourite movie, she is very much a princess girl and Rapunzel is her favourite Princess). She'd turned the TV on and put it on herself. Her little sister isn't into princesses, but absolutely loves Toy Story, so with schools closed potentially for months I am going to guess there's going to be a fair amount of Disney/Pixar getting watched.
Find the shorts, especially the "Forky asks a question" series and Party Saurus.
Although for some reason Abby seems to like the emotional pixar shorts more
"Knives Out." :up: The only drawback was Daniel Craig's foghorn-leghorn fake southern drawl, but it got mentioned in the movie, so....
Invisible Man, not particularly good. View it when it hits a screening service. It's not worth paying for like I did.
Watched Parasite. It was good - very good. Best Picture of the year good? Maybe. I don't usually seek out Oscar winners based on winning Oscars, but I did see a trailer a few months back when my son wanted to go to a black and white showing in Ann Arbor (which we missed), and based on that it went on my list. Tbh, I think it won the Oscar as a minor fuck you to Trump xenophobia. And, iirc, president shit head complained that the best picture should have been an American made film, so Hollywood got a minor snicker I'm sure.
I thought it was pretty terrible. The last set of 3 were just a little less bad than the 3 prequels, when taken as a whole. It's amazing that one great film, the original Star Wars, followed up by a pretty damned good film, The Empire Strikes Back, and a somewhat crappy third, set the stage for this enormous franchise, which hasn't produced anything really good since that first sequel. Well, Rogue 1 was pretty good, IMO, but otherwise, garbage. Oh, and I thought the Solo film wasn't nearly as bad as the audience treated it....
Not seen it today but excited as I have just seen an advert for Rise of Skywalker coming to Disney Plus on Star Wars Day. Should have guessed that would happen lol but didn't realise it was coming so soon.
Not seen it yet (not been to the cinema since my second child was born) so please no spoilers.
I tried to watch 'Little Women', it's not working for me. The storyline is so chopped up that you barely know if you're seeing something happening in the present or a flashback. It's kinda boring.
Okay I think the London production of Hamilton is probably better than the American production :o
So you got Disney just to watch it?
The Old Guard. Closer to Highlander than a Marvel superhero movie. Not as high quality as the latter, but still a good movie, with a decent plot, and solid acting.
You know? I really enjoyed it. Charlize Theron has a certain intensity of presence that was just perfect; I haven't watched nearly enough of her performances and I'm going to try to rectify that.
The plot wasn't particularly dramatic and I think they overplayed the 'do gooding immortals' a bit (and honestly? The 'bad guys' had a point, at least not the cartoonishly evil ones). But the action was really solid and intense in a way that you don't always get with CGI fests like the Marvel films. It didn't have quite the cinema verite/gritty feel of the Bourne type action, but it was still great. Reminded me a little bit of how Gina Carano (unsurprisingly) had really intense/believable fight scenes in Haywire.
I saw Knives Out with my wife a while back. I'll admit I didn't see all of the twists coming. Daniel Craig is a very, very odd choice IMO, but otherwise it was quite fun. I do think that the 'super eccentric wealthy family' story has been done to death, but seeing this through the lens of the help was a nice touch.
My main issue is that the time between major plot points occasionally lacked both witty banter (Marvel) and suspense. A little more polishing wouldn't hurt. The medium-sized budget also meant that the filming locations were ok, but not great. Those are issues a little bit of experience and a larger budget (for the sequels) should be able to fix though.