Last Movie You Watched

[SimonNZ]

Second viewing.

Such a deep bench of high quality actors in even the smallest of roles. Even more impressive on this viewing as many have since been more visible in various celebrated productions.

Interestingly there's no overlap at all in scenes with Killing Lincoln, and the two might make a good double feature.

[Todd]

The Death of Stalin.  Armando Iannucci applies his standard approach that worked so well in The Thick of It, In the Loop, and Veep to the aftermath of Comrade Stalin's death.  Delightfully miscast actors and actresses include Olga Kurylenko as Maria Yudina (!), Michael Palin as Molotov, Jeffrey Tambor as Malenkov, and Steve Buscemi (!) as Khrushchev (!!).  The movie is filled with Russian orchestral music and British satire.  Some of the bits are coolly funny - all the casual, um, liquidations - and the scene of the first meeting of the Central Committee after Stalin's death is hilarious.  The darkness of some of the humor is really quite remarkable, especially pertaining to Beria.  All of the actors and actresses are game, with Jeffrey Tambor and especially Steve Buscemi the standouts.  A most enjoyable flick.

And of course, one must marvel at the very Soviet change of one of the main posters that occurred after accusations of sexual impropriety were leveled at Jeffrey Tambor.  I just wonder if Iannucci had a hand in it, especially given the end credits of the movie.

[TheGSMoeller]

The Death of Stalin.  Armando Iannucci applies his standard approach that worked so well in The Thick of It, In the Loop, and Veep to the aftermath of Comrade Stalin's death.  Delightfully miscast actors and actresses include Olga Kurylenko as Maria Yudina (!), Michael Palin as Molotov, Jeffrey Tambor as Malenkov, and Steve Buscemi (!) as Khrushchev (!!).  The movie is filled with Russian orchestral music and British satire.  Some of the bits are coolly funny - all the casual, um, liquidations - and the scene of the first meeting of the Central Committee after Stalin's death is hilarious.  The darkness of some of the humor is really quite remarkable, especially pertaining to Beria.  All of the actors and actresses are game, with Jeffrey Tambor and especially Steve Buscemi the standouts.  A most enjoyable flick.

And of course, one must marvel at the very Soviet change of one of the main posters that occurred after accusations of sexual impropriety were leveled at Jeffrey Tambor.  I just wonder if Iannucci had a hand in it, especially given the end credits of the movie.

One of the funniest movies I've seen in recent years. And yes, the "miscast" actors and actresses help to enhance the absurdity of the film. I'm not familiar with Simon Russell Beale, who plays Beria, but he's fantastic, and a real standout for me.

[Brian]

It's also Michael Palin's first movie role in 20 years. He clearly hasn't lost a bit of his edge, and I hope gets a similar chance to shine again before another 20 years are up.

[SimonNZ]

By chance making it a Lincoln trilogy with a first viewing of this.

Excellently done, I thought.

[listener]

CAPRICCIO    Germany 1938
starring Lilian Harvey
music is not by Koechlin.. This is a very funny gender-bender like Victor/Victoria parody of old-style operettas with Gilbert & Sullivan speed.
A very pleasant and unexpected surprise.

[Ratliff]

Watched a guilty pleasure, Desperato, featuring Antonio Banderas.



I like the cartoonish gunfights, in which the necessity for Banderas to constantly reload his guns is used create a sort of comic relief.

I also like the line at the end, "Just in case. It's a long ride to the next town."

After seeing this film, it was my ambition to get a black jacket with a scorpion on the back. Not the sort of thing I could pull off...

[aligreto]

The Bodyguard





This was huge in its day. I cannot remember the last time that I saw it. It still held up well for me.

[greg]

Watched a few from The ABCs of Death.

The letter L deserves some applause because it actually feels like true horror. Genuinely disturbing. Much more effective than all those "shh look this house is haunted, boooo" movies. 

[drogulus]

It's also Michael Palin's first movie role in 20 years. He clearly hasn't lost a bit of his edge, and I hope gets a similar chance to shine again before another 20 years are up.

     Palin did a ghost story TV thing in 2014, Remember Me. I liked it.

     https://www.youtube.com/v/nKaAyyuvCTA

[aligreto]

Ex Patriot





Good action packed thriller based around double crossing. Worth a watch.

[aligreto]

A Quiet Place





This is the finest Horror film that I have seen in a long time. It is well paced and filled with tension. It made me jump a few times. It is quite different and comes well recommended. 

[Madiel]

A Quiet Place





This is the finest Horror film that I have seen in a long time. It is well paced and filled with tension. It made me jump a few times. It is quite different and comes well recommended.

It's one of the few horror films I'm actually a bit interested in seeing. Though the problem with well-made horror is it's more likely than poorly-made horror to scare the hell out of me.

[aligreto]

It's one of the few horror films I'm actually a bit interested in seeing. Though the problem with well-made horror is it's more likely than poorly-made horror to scare the hell out of me.

It is not so much about horror blood and guts type. It is far more insidious with its build up of tension. This is remarkable due to the fact that the great proportion of the film is actually silent; no spoiler, hence the name.

[SonicMan46]

Over the last week, we've had a Clark Gable festival w/ three films from various stages in his career:

Call of the Wild (1935) w/ Gable, Loretta Young, Jack Oakie, et al - of course, based on the Jack London book which I read as a boy.  The film is probably more famous for Loretta's & Clark's 'Love Child', described below in first quote.

Mogambo (1953) w/ Gable, Ava Gardner, & Grace Kelly - see second quote below and the link about filming on location in Africa - John Ford, the director, seem to love going on location (such as much of the film The African Queen w/ Bogart & Hepburn).  Gardner & Kelly were at their 'pulchritude peaks' and Gable still great - all films highly recommended.

The Misfits (1961) w/ Gable, Marilyn Monroe, Montgomery Clift, Eli Wallach, & Thelma Ritter - see last quote below and link; superb performances from all in this poignant film - Dave

This was famously the last film released under the 20th Century imprimatur before its merger with Fox, and it perhaps is even more famously the film where co-stars Clark Gable and Loretta Young kept each other warm against the frigid location shoot, resulting in Young's hushed up pregnancy and birth of her daughter, Judy Lewis, shortly after film wrapped. (Source)

Mogambo is a 1953 Technicolor adventure/romantic drama film directed by John Ford and starring Clark Gable, Ava Gardner, and Grace Kelly, and featuring Donald Sinden. Shot on location in Equatorial Africa, with a musical soundtrack entirely of actual African tribal music recorded in the Congo, the film was adapted by John Lee Mahin from the play Red Dust by Wilson Collison. The picture is a remake of Red Dust (1932), which also starred Gable in the same role. (Source)

The Misfits is a 1961 American drama film written by Arthur Miller, directed by John Huston, and starring Clark Gable, Marilyn Monroe, and Montgomery Clift. The supporting cast features Thelma Ritter, Eli Wallach and Kevin McCarthy. The Misfits was the last completed film for both Clark Gable and Marilyn Monroe. For Gable, the film was posthumously released, while Monroe died in 1962. (Source)

   

[aligreto]

Red Joan





This was a bit of a yawn for me I am afraid. There are not many of these OxBridge spy tales that offer much to differentiate one from the other. And so it is with this one for me. I am also not a big fan of Judi Dench anyway.

[Madiel]

It is not so much about horror blood and guts type. It is far more insidious with its build up of tension. This is remarkable due to the fact that the great proportion of the film is actually silent; no spoiler, hence the name.

Yes I know the basic premise: make sound and you're dead, essentially.

[Karl Henning]

Yesterday, The Omen (Gregory Peck, Lee Remick, David Warner, dir. Richard Donner) again. great score by Jerry Goldsmith

[aligreto]

Yesterday, The Omen (Gregory Peck, Lee Remick, David Warner, dir. Richard Donner) again. great score by Jerry Goldsmith

Great film. The rest of the series went rapidly downhill, unfortunately.

[George]