What is The Last Movie You Watched?

[Lovecox]

Battleship Earth

[celticgrafix]

finally just saw hunger games. thought it was great. def worth checking out

[Prospero]

"Take This Waltz" directed by Sarah Polley, the director who made her debut with the hugely moving film"Away From Her." (about Alzheimers) By contrast this rom com cum serious film about marital decay is twee, irritating, shallow and way too long. Michelle Williams is good and so too is Seth Rogen (in a near straight role for a change) but otherwise it is tiresome.

[HbgDon]

Thor

The Avengers

[Stavros]

Deliverance (John Boorman, 1972)

I hadn't seen the whole of this film for a very long time, and re-visiting it I am pleasantly surprised at how well it has stood up -I now appreciate it more than I did at the time it was released. The photography is particularly superb and recreates the pristine beauty of the Appalachians into which the ugly side of human life is seen as an intrusion, just as the city boys appear to be intruding on the secret world of the Appalachian folk. It might be considered prejudicial to depict them as inbred weirdoes, but its a plot device to place the city boys in a lawless world and discover, superficially, that can kill or be killed regardless of the law. The key point is that having discovered the 'masculine' thing to do in extreme situations is to kill the one trying to kill you, the first killer -Lewis, spends the last third of the film crippled and incapable, while the other two survivors, instead of 'manning up' and telling the truth to the sherrif, tell as many lies as they can to avoid the due process of law. The film thus presents a subtle argument about man and the wilderness and survival, whereas when I saw it on its release in 1972 I mistook it as just a film about macho men in a hostile environment. The film is famous for the 'duellin' banjos' scene at the beginning of the film, even though this was dubbed, as the banjo on the soundtrack is of a different kind to that played by the boy. Other than a few variations on the banjo melody, there is no music in the film where the sound of the forest and the river dominates, another positive aspect of the film. Brilliant film, worthy of a revisit again and again, and also proves the 1970s was not a dud decade for films.

[Dino Velvet]

Deliverance (John Boorman, 1972)

I hadn't seen the whole of this film for a very long time, and re-visiting it I am pleasantly surprised at how well it has stood up -I now appreciate it more than I did at the time it was released. The photography is particularly superb and recreates the pristine beauty of the Appalachians into which the ugly side of human life is seen as an intrusion, just as the city boys appear to be intruding on the secret world of the Appalachian folk. It might be considered prejudicial to depict them as inbred weirdoes, but its a plot device to place the city boys in a lawless world and discover, superficially, that can kill or be killed regardless of the law. The key point is that having discovered the 'masculine' thing to do in extreme situations is to kill the one trying to kill you, the first killer -Lewis, spends the last third of the film crippled and incapable, while the other two survivors, instead of 'manning up' and telling the truth to the sherrif, tell as many lies as they can to avoid the due process of law. The film thus presents a subtle argument about man and the wilderness and survival, whereas when I saw it on its release in 1972 I mistook it as just a film about macho men in a hostile environment. The film is famous for the 'duellin' banjos' scene at the beginning of the film, even though this was dubbed, as the banjo on the soundtrack is of a different kind to that played by the boy. Other than a few variations on the banjo melody, there is no music in the film where the sound of the forest and the river dominates, another positive aspect of the film. Brilliant film, worthy of a revisit again and again, and also proves the 1970s was not a dud decade for films.

Deliverance is a great film. Not sure if I had mentioned this or you have already seen it but Southern Comfort is worth watching too. Walter Hill directed film about Louisiana National Guard getting stuck and having to find their way out of Cajun Country. Film is more about than just the exact storyline.

[Stavros]

Dino I haven't seen Southern Comfort since its release, its one of those films I am going to revisit although as I recall it wasn't as tightly woven as either The Warriors or his superb masterpiece, The Driver. But I had moderately negative memories of Deliverance before seeing it again; I think as the years have passed I have become lenient in some cases, harsh in others....I would never have watched a 'Spaghetti western' ten or 20 years ago whereas I now see how subversive they can be, which is something in its own way Deliverance is -would a re-make or a new film handle male rape in the same way? And not just because of its implied bestiality....
Incidentally, 24 Hours retains its magic, and is still Eddie Murphy's best film (not a hard choice considering most of his films are worthless rubbish)...

[Dino Velvet]

Dino I haven't seen Southern Comfort since its release, its one of those films I am going to revisit although as I recall it wasn't as tightly woven as either The Warriors or his superb masterpiece, The Driver. But I had moderately negative memories of Deliverance before seeing it again; I think as the years have passed I have become lenient in some cases, harsh in others....I would never have watched a 'Spaghetti western' ten or 20 years ago whereas I now see how subversive they can be, which is something in its own way Deliverance is -would a re-make or a new film handle male rape in the same way? And not just because of its implied bestiality....
Incidentally, 24 Hours retains its magic, and is still Eddie Murphy's best film (not a hard choice considering most of his films are worthless rubbish)...

Anything directed by Walter Hill before 1990 that you have any kind of interest in I usually find worth seeing. I do admit to not being the biggest fan of The Warriors but The Driver and Hard Times(Bronson, Coburn) are very good. The Long Riders is another one to see that has a lot of Peckinpah-type action sequences. Extreme Predjudice is a battle of the bad-asses(Nick Nolte vs Powers Boothe). I even liked Last Man Standing even though it's another Fistful/Yojimbo remake.

[Prospero]

A trite new comedy called "hope Springs" with Meryl Street and Tommy Lee jones.

[danthepoetman]

I’m not surprised: the trailer was showing a desperate succession of clichés. The subject itself condemned the movie to mediocrity.

Have you seen the film by Lars von Trier, Prospero, Melancholia? The title reminds suspiciously that of Tarkovsky’s masterpiece, Nostalghia. How is it? Always seem to me Von Trier can do good and then, the worst, terrible melodramas…
(Prospero? Stavros? Dino?)