i absolutely love enter the void. it's ridiculous, preposterous, overblown & far too long, & i love every single second of it.
my week:
good vibrations (2012) 4 the story of terry hooley, a key figure in the belfast punk scene.
teenage kicks is the greatest 158 seconds of music anyone's ever made. i'm ok with this film existing if it was only a testament to that. the moment where we get to hear it is truly magical. really.
it doesn't quite reach that mid-film climax again, but it's still such a fun testament to diy punk spirit. i wish it wasn't soiled with the occasional bit of marxist blather, but it's so joyous otherwise that i can't penalize it too harshly.
i wish the wife and kid didn't disappear from the end of the film, though. did he keep the house? marriage intact?
to this day, i really don't understand what it was those people in ireland were fighting about. i mean, i know it was protestants & catholics & all that, but my knowledge goes no deeper than that. this film didn't enlighten me, but that wasn't what it was put on this earth to do.
touki bouki (1973) 2 one of the first films to come out of africa & be widely distributed i believe, & widely recognized as a classic of world cinema. gotta say, this did absolutely nothing for me. i found it utterly lacking in any kind of drive or energy or anything at all that might have kept me engaged. i was desperately trying to latch onto something, anything, but nothing was there.
the game changers (2019) 3.5 doc on vegan athleticism.i'm slightly uncomfortable giving this a strong recommend, because my reading & personal research has indicated that the record on meat vs vegan diets is not quite as stark as this doc might lead one to believe.
it's certainly the case that high level athletes can & do excel on vegan diets. there's no contesting that. where i don't believe things are so clear are on those issues of heart disease & cancer & direct health impacts.
i'm basically a vegan myself (i still have cheese & eggs at my sunday morning visits with my mom), & i do it because it's clear to me that it's the right thing to do. i think the way we pen innocent animals, brutally subject them to all manner of miseries, is one of the worst things we do as a species, and it is absolutely unconscionable.
that is the argument that compels me, & it's the argument i make to others. meat has been part of human diet as part of our evolution, & i have no reason to think it's innately unhealthy. it is the ethics of the meat industry that drives me & i think should drive everyone away from supporting it.
i'll still give this a good grade for being very well made & compelling & interesting all the way through. i'm just not sure that it's on solid footing.
hush (2016) 3.5 mike flanagan really knows how to make stuff like this work.
it's efficient, brutal at times, & he actually creates characters you can give a shit's dick-ass about.
i still think dr sleep is a misfire, but i'm willing to give it another chance, since i like everything else he's done so much.
mirror (1975) 4 this is my third go at mirror, i believe, and it's still just as impenetrable as ever. google tells me this is autobiographical, which i will accept, but it's certainly not rendered in any way that will mean something to a person expecting something like a coherent narrative.
i like stalker & solaris a lot, and in most ways i don't think they're difficult films, not in the way mirror is. they have characters & plots & you can tell what people are doing and what they'd like to see happen. no such things are available to the audience here.
i have enjoyed mirror every time i watch it, & think it has several great images in it (though not as many as stalker or solaris), but i can't quite give myself over to it, i guess. it is a tough nut to crack. almost like the cinematic equivalent of trout mask replica.
murder made easy (2017) 3.5 a very pleasant surprise found among the chaff that makes up most of what you'll find streaming in the horror section of tubitv - a genuinely fun murder/comedy. no idea who these people are or whether they've made anything else, but this is a tight, funny, & genuinely pleasing time. you could easily imagine this working as a cheerily morbid play, & if there's any justice in the world this will be discovered & seen by more people. i think it's very deserving of a cult audience.
bodied (2017) 4 A progressive graduate student finds success and sparks outrage when his interest in battle rap as a thesis subject becomes a competitive obsession.
the girlfriend in this movie is exactly like twitter troll account titania mcgrath! down to her looks.
bodied is a lot of fun. it's silly, funny & full of energy, & the hyper-woke satire is spot on, but also full of interesting ideas about culture & bias. would be perfect if it wasn't so long.
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[deleted]
5 years ago
the ecstasy of isabel munn (2012) 3 teen girl is seduced by vampires. a bit lacking in any kind of gripping story, & a few of the actors chew the scenery a touch too emphatically, but it has a good look, sound and style, and the lead actress looks very fetching covered in blood.
starcrash (1978) 3.5 as we all know, there is great trash & unwatchable trash.
starcrash is awesome, fantastic trash. some of the effects look like they could have been made by swinging my old battlestar galactica toys on string. joe spinell is completely without embarrassment. caroline munro is stupidly foxy.
& pleasantly enough, it moves nicely. it has lots of ridiculous and completely fun set-pieces that actually have a bit of spark & energy.
the only reason this isn't a perfect b-movie is because munro isn't in that leather swimsuit/fetish gear for the entire running time.
the sacrifice (1984) 4 tarkovsky's final film. has the tone you'll expect if you know his work, but has a humanistic, even emotional feel that surprised me. & it contains an ending shot that is truly one for the ages.
ford v ferrari (2019) 4 for a 150+ minute film, i did think there were a few plot short-cuts here, that a few details were a bit scarce (cars get delivered, we never really find out how lemans is done with multiple drivers), but i had so much fun with this i simply do not care.
i didn't even care that this thing reveled in one of my least favourite tropes: the cinematic insistence that anyone who wears a suit & works for a big company is an amoral, inhuman monster.
i'm a person who doesn't care the least little bit about cars or races or any such thing. i've never owned a car in my life, never want to. but i loved every god-damned second of this thing, loved tracey lett's blubbery ford, the foxy wife & especially christian bale.
& the racing scenes are truly exciting & hypnotic & need to be seen on a big screen.
warriors of the wasteland (1982) 3 if you like road warrior clones, you'll probably find something to enjoy here. the dialogue is ridiculous (& badly dubbed in places, i think), the acting is predictably awful, the woman is reasonably foxy. it alternates between being fairly dull (mostly) and occasionally surprisingly exciting (a few of the chases are fairly well done), & occasionally lol funny.
oculus (2014) 4 this is a great movie, and i will fight anyone who says otherwise.
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StoneKeeper (25029)
5 years ago
Always a good read with you.
Only saw Oculus and I still got my review: This is a superb psychological-horror movie, not only did it freak me out but the story is interesting and constructed by agile hands. Acting is just solid enough, editing is fluid but complex and the script, like I said, was very entertaining. 7.5/10
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