What was the last movie you saw?

[AlexH]

One Cut of the Dead (2017)
It starts like a low budget horror (impressively in one take) but becomes a heartwarming and hilarious comedy about indie film making.

It's genius! It drags at times in the first 50ish minutes, but you have you watch it all to get the most out of it. Even if you don't like zombie films or horror (I tend not to), I highly recommend it. It'll probably get made into an English-language film, but the Japanese are best at this sort of comedy. I even watched an hour of it again, and I've never watched the same film back to back before.

Edit: And if you watch this, avoid spoilers.

Unbreakable (2000)
After realising it was related to Split and not The Sixth Sense (which I've seen), I watched this for the first time in preparation for Glass. It's good, and I didn't see the twist coming.

Without a Clue (1988)
I loved the premise of this, with Michael Caine playing a drunken Sherlock Holmes. It didn't hit the heights but was an entertaining 90 minutes.

Avengers: Endgame (2019)
A satisfying conclusion. Ten years ago it would've been awesome, but I've got used to this sort of thing.

 

[BAYLOR]

Godzilla King of the Monsters I enjoyed it.

 

[J Riff]

Thanks for those reviews Victoria, it makes it a lot easier sorting through the B rubbish pile on youTube. )

 

[REBerg]

I Am Mother (Netflix)
Robots destroying Humanity? Sounds familiar. Robots nurturing the new, improved Humanity? Interesting premise.
The ending left me undecided.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

The Alpha Incident (1978)

Short version: The Andromeda Strain with no budget.

A couple of science types have a conversation, giving us our back story. It seems that some stuff came back from Mars on a space probe, and that most of it is being transported to a military facility near Denver. In order to keep everything hush-hush, it's going by train rather than plane, and is being guarded by just one guy. A bad idea, because when the guy goes to sleep, a nosy guy working on the train takes a peek at the secret cargo, breaks a glass vial, and cuts himself. The two wind up at a train station, where two men and a woman work. Everybody has to go into quarantine, because the nosy guy has been infected by the alien stuff. It kills folks who go to sleep; after death, their brains expand, causing them to burst out of their skulls. (We see this happen exactly once, near the end of the film, in our only gore shot.) Almost all of the movie consists of the five characters waiting for the government to find a cure while they try to stay awake, with the aid of amphetamines supplied via helicopter. Since this was made in the 1970's, you've got a cynical ending. It's all talk and deadly slow, with a few tense moments here and there.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Frankenstein Island (1981)

Insane, incoherent mess of a grade Z horror flick. Four guys riding in an unseen hot air balloon (to say nothing of the dog Melvin) wind up on an island. They walk through a cave and find a bunch of "primitive" women in animal print bikinis. We'll find out later that they're the descendants of aliens (!) who landed on the island some time ago. Meanwhile, a couple of disreputable types show up, and they eventually take our heroes to the mansion of the movie's Mad Scientist, who introduces herself as Sheila Frankenstein von Helsing (!!). It seems she's the great-great-granddaughter of the famous Frankenstein, and she's married to the two-hundred-year-old von Helsing, who was Frankenstein's assistant. You see, he's kept alive by a combination of animal blood, primitive woman blood, electronic gizmos, and a brain in a jar. Oh, I forgot to mention that there are also a bunch of "zombies" (guys in black turtleneck sweaters and sunglasses) running around. And there's another guy who has been kept prisoner for seventeen years and who quotes Poe a lot. He turns out to be the father of one of the primitive women. By the way, a double exposure image of John Carradine shows up now and then, to recite incomprehensible dialogue, in the form of the dead-but-still-active Frankenstein. The Frankenstein Monster shows up late in the film, too. This all makes much less sense that I've indicated. Totally random scenes pop up. (Some guy injecting a mannequin with a syringe. The image of two giant green hands, over images of planets, turning into an image of flames surrounding an eye.) On top of everything else, you've got a did-it-really-happen-or-not ending. A mind-blowing experience.

 

[AlexH]

Frankenstein Island (1981)

It's entertaining reading reviews of films I'll never watch. Sometimes I look up the ratings. This scores 2/10 on IMDB.


Super (2010)
Above average vigilante superhero comedy with some good lines, that for some reason has three rape scenes, something I've just read James Gunn boasting about in an interview. Really odd considering the film has a nice ending.

Raining Stones (1993)
Another film from Ken Loach about working class Britain - a father who wants his daughter to have a new dress for First Communion - something he can't afford. It's a good film and quite nostalgic given I grew up in a similar 90s Britain, and it's not as grim as some other Loach films I've seen.

Tully (2018)
I don't know if what's portrayed is post-natal depression exactly, but Charlize Theron is excellent as a struggling mother of three who doesn't seem to get much help from her husband, who's either working or playing video games. For some reason marketed as a comedy, it's actually much darker. Somewhere along the line it lost it's way, and the last part wasn't as good as it was shaping up to be.

 

[Randy M.]

Nora Prentiss (1947) NOIR ALLEY; [...]

5 stars out of five for the last half of this film! The only name I recognized is NC's Ann Sheridan; I never heard of any others.

I decided I'd probably never get to this so I deleted the recording. I do recognize a few names in the cast list: Kent Smith (The Cat People), Robert Alda (The Beast with Five Fingers, also Alan Alda's father), and Rosemary deCamp (Yankee Doodle Dandy, The Bob Cummings Show, among many guest appearances and other recurring roles; one of those rare women during that time who seemed able to still get work after their ingenue period).

Randy M.

 

[Jeffbert]

The Alpha Incident (1978)

Short version: The Andromeda Strain with no budget.

A couple of science types have a conversation, giving us our back story. It seems that some stuff came back from Mars on a space probe, and that most of it is being transported to a military facility near Denver. In order to keep everything hush-hush, it's going by train rather than plane, and is being guarded by just one guy. A bad idea, because when the guy goes to sleep, a nosy guy working on the train takes a peek at the secret cargo, breaks a glass vial, and cuts himself. The two wind up at a train station, where two men and a woman work. Everybody has to go into quarantine, because the nosy guy has been infected by the alien stuff. It kills folks who go to sleep; after death, their brains expand, causing them to burst out of their skulls. (We see this happen exactly once, near the end of the film, in our only gore shot.) Almost all of the movie consists of the five characters waiting for the government to find a cure while they try to stay awake, with the aid of amphetamines supplied via helicopter. Since this was made in the 1970's, you've got a cynical ending. It's all talk and deadly slow, with a few tense moments here and there.

I saw that long ago, & in my recollections of it, thought that fungus sprouted out of the top of the victims' heads. Had to see it again, bought the VHS, watched it with my brother, laughed a bit, then tossed it in the trash. memories lie!


Frankenstein Island! The title says all we need to know about this film. B-grade silliness. But I do appreciate the details. Thanks for the reviews, Victoria Silverwolf!

 

[Jeffbert]

I Am Mother (Netflix)
Robots destroying Humanity? Sounds familiar. Robots nurturing the new, improved Humanity? Interesting premise.
The ending left me undecided.

I think I will watch this one, thanks REBerg!

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Death Walks on High Heels (1971) (La morte cammina con i tacchi alti)

Starts with a one-eyed guy, carrying a gun, on a train. He gets killed by someone whose ski mask reveals nothing but pale blue eyes. Cut to our main character, a Parisian stripper. (One of her routines involves using body makeup and an Afro wig to make the pale-skinned, red-haired woman look as if she's of Sub-Saharan ancestry; a weird touch.) It seems that she's the daughter of the murdered man, an infamous jewel thief. Her live-in boyfriend is an unemployed guy with criminal associates. Meanwhile, a wealthy eye doctor makes rather genteel passes at her. She gets threatening phone calls from somebody with a disguised voice, demanding that she turn over some stolen diamonds. Later the blue-eyed ski mask guy shows up, threatens her with a razor, and says he'll be back and kill her if he doesn't get the jewels. Soon she finds a pair of pale blue contact lenses. Looks like boyfriend might be ski mask guy. She runs off to England with the doctor, and they seem to have a nice love affair. He even wants to divorce his wife and marry her. All of this is just our basic set up, as a bunch of other characters show up and the plot takes many twists and turns. A character I didn't expect to die gets killed, and one very important scene is seen three times, revealing something new each time. It's an enjoyable giallo, with an emphasis on plot rather than gore.

Death Walks at Midnight (1972) (La morte accarezza a mezzanotte)

Same director, same lead actress, etc. This time she's a model. She foolishly agrees to have an experimental drug injected into her while a journalist from a tabloid takes photographs, claiming that if she wears a domino mask nobody will recognize her. As unlikely as that may be, it gets worse, because he takes her mask off anyway when she's as high as a kite. While in this state, she witnesses a guy in the building outside her apartment window killing a woman with a spiked metal glove. Amazingly for a giallo, we see the face of the killer. Everybody thinks she just hallucinated. Her face gets plastered all over the cover of the tabloid, she gets fired from her job. Things get worse when she gets a written job offer, with a meeting to take place in the building where she saw the killing. Of course, the killer tries to murder her there, but she gets away. Things get weirder when we find out that there was a murder in the place six months ago, but neither the victim nor the person thought to be the murderer, now in a catatonic state, resemble what she saw. As usual for this sort of thing, a lot more characters show up, and things get complicated. Again, it's a pretty good example of the genre.

 

[Toby Frost]

Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World's End

I knew that this was going to be bad, but my God. It's awful. Tone ranges from light slapstick to imagery of mass-murder. Plot is pointlessly complex and has galleon-sized holes. Tedious clowning from Depp, and the other two leads are completely dull. Even the lighting is drab. The fight between two ships on a whirlpool honestly looks as if the film is literally going down the plughole. It's as if four directors were told to make a film about pirates, and the results were shuffled together more or less at random. How can a film about pirates looking for treasure be so dreary?

 

[Jeffbert]

Pickup on South Street (1953) A nwly released from prison pickpocket Skip McCoy (Richard Widmark) is seen taking the wallet from a Candy (Jean Peters)'s purse, by an FBI agent, who had been watching her. She was a courier, believing she was working for industrial espionage, but actually, her employer is a Communist. As the event occurred on a crowded subway train, RW escaped, and went home. He lived in a shack at the end of a pier, and stashed his loot in a false bottom of a box he used to keep his beer cold. The box is lowered into the river. Who would think it contained the stuff?

Supporting cast/characters:
Moe (Thelma Ritter), a stool pigeon whom the cops/FBI interrogate to find the pickpocket. She has entire categories of pickpockets' styles. Using the style observed by the agent, she identifies RW's character. Now, the good guys know who done it, but naturally RW denies it, and is confident nobody will find his loot. Eventually the communists come calling, and after torturing her, they kill her. But she keeps RW's name out of it; though they find out somehow.

Police Desk Clerk (George E. Stone !? I failed to recognize this guy; likely because this was 10 years after his recurring role as the Runt, sidekick to Boston Blackie).

Plenty of others, but they are unfamiliar to me.

Anyway, this was NOIR ALLEY, and as usual, interesting stuff.


The Mad Genius (1931) Vladimar Ivan Tsarakov (John Barrymore) is a club footed puppeteer, who saves a young boy from his father's wrath, because the boy is agile and he hopes to make him a dancer. 10 years later, Fedor Ivanoff, the boy, now a man (Donald Cook), is a ballet dancer, and JB is the maestro in charge.
Sergei Bankieff (Luis Alberni) is the drug-addicted director who initially refuses to sign the document JB has written, dismissing the ballerina with whom Fedor has fallen in love. JB believes their relationship will become more important than his career.

 

[Randy M.]

Pickup on South Street (1953) A nwly released from prison pickpocket Skip McCoy (Richard Widmark) is seen taking the wallet from a Candy (Jean Peters)'s purse, by an FBI agent, who had been watching her. She was a courier, believing she was working for industrial espionage, but actually, her employer is a Communist. As the event occurred on a crowded subway train, RW escaped, and went home. He lived in a shack at the end of a pier, and stashed his loot in a false bottom of a box he used to keep his beer cold. The box is lowered into the river. Who would think it contained the stuff?

Supporting cast/characters:
Moe (Thelma Ritter), a stool pigeon whom the cops/FBI interrogate to find the pickpocket. She has entire categories of pickpockets' styles. Using the style observed by the agent, she identifies RW's character. Now, the good guys know who done it, but naturally RW denies it, and is confident nobody will find his loot. Eventually the communists come calling, and after torturing her, they kill her. But she keeps RW's name out of it; though they find out somehow.

Police Desk Clerk (George E. Stone !? I failed to recognize this guy; likely because this was 10 years after his recurring role as the Runt, sidekick to Boston Blackie).

Plenty of others, but they are unfamiliar to me.

Anyway, this was NOIR ALLEY, and as usual, interesting stuff.

Agreed. I watched this over my vacation and enjoyed it quite a bit. I'm iffy about Widmark: When he's good, he's really good, but something about his speech makes me feel like he's winding up before the pitch. Still he's good in this and one I watched a while back, Panic in the Streets. Thelma Ritter reminded me why I like movies with her in them; she was really good whether in a meaty role like this or just dropping in as in Miracle on 34th Street (her debut, I think).

I didn't recognize Stone, but I did notice Willis Bouchey, a face and voice out of my childhood having seen him (not knowing his name until now) in movies and TV from Million Dollar Mermaid to Support Your Local Sheriff and The Jimmy Stewart Show.

Randy M.

 

[Rodders]

The Hunt for the Wilderpeople.

Funny and sweet. A really enjoyable movie.

 

[Rodders]

The Hunt for the Wilderpeople.

Funny and sweet. A really enjoyable movie.

 

[Matteo]

Frankenstein Island (1981)

Curse you @Victoria Silverwolf. You make this sound so good I'm going to have to watch it!

Thanks for the giallo reviews; interesting that they kept the "walks" for the Midnight film - even though it should be "caresses".

Last film I saw was "What we do in the Shadows". Our digital box had given it the French title "Vampires en toute intimité" (it sometimes does this) which is nothing like the English title and so I almost didn't bother to record it. It was fun, but the US series which has been showing on BBC2 recently is better.

 

[Jeffbert]

Shadow on the Wall (1950) Noir Alley; a funny or strange thing with the midnight 6/22 - 23 showing. TCM ran the opening segment of Muller's comments both before & after the film! So, I accessed TCM's website, and found the correct segment as the follow-up to the film, on the streaming version (available up till 7/2): http://www.tcm.com/watchtcm/films. Anyway, the title comes into play at the very end, sorry, no spoiler.

So, David I. Starrling (Zachary Scott) is a widower father who has married a new wife Celia (Kristine Miller), the stepmother of Susan (Gigi Perreau). The stepmom's sister Dell Faring (Ann Sothern), has, since childhood, been jealous of her, believing that she had taken everything from her. So, papa was away on a business trip, & returning early, sees his wife in a car with her sister's fiancee. Daddy & stepmommy have a late night argument, & stepmommy ends up dead. Daddy is convicted & sentenced to the chair. But baby saw the murder, & repressed the memory. I have a book written by Dr. Elizebeth Loftus, titled The Myth of Repressed Memory, but I will let this go, for now.

Dr. Caroline Cranford (Nancy Davis) believes the the kid has been traumatized by something she had seen, & hopes to extract the memory in time to save daddy.

Good show! I had never seen this before, & thoroughly enjoyed it!

 

[Ian Fortytwo]

The Italian Job, followed by the updated version, they both have something, however the original has the edge. 9/10 for the original and 8/10 for the updated version.

 

[Jeffbert]

I have seen both. The guy said that in the original they drove one of those Mini-Coopers spiraling upside-down inside the storm drain. But it was not on camera. Though they tried, they could not do it on purpose. I also think the 1st was the better of the two.