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#41
Bad Movies / Re: Generate Movie Poster with...
Last post by bob - November 23, 2025, 10:50:33 AMChatGPT
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#42
Good Movies / Re: Recent Viewings, Part 2
Last post by Rev. Powell - November 23, 2025, 10:49:48 AMSurprised at the lukewarm response to STALAG 17 above. It's one of my favorites. I do like that cynical war-comedy genre (M*A*S*H and--especially--Mike Nichols' CATCH-22 are also big favorites).
ARCO (2025): A boy from the future accidentally time-travels to the past--2075, to be exact--where a girl helps him find his way back to his own time. It's two futures for the price of one in this well-paced French kid's animation with lots of thrilling escapes and touching characters. 3.5/5.
ARCO (2025): A boy from the future accidentally time-travels to the past--2075, to be exact--where a girl helps him find his way back to his own time. It's two futures for the price of one in this well-paced French kid's animation with lots of thrilling escapes and touching characters. 3.5/5.
#43
Good Movies / Re: favourite mid 90s movies?
Last post by M.10rda - November 23, 2025, 10:43:55 AMBecause the Rev very correctly contributed ED WOOD to the conversation, here's another I think has been overlooked - not because it's a personal favorite but because of its historical significance:
QUIZ SHOW (1994)
Directed by the late Robert Redford; starring Ralph Fiennes, Rob Morrow, and John Turturro.
This was an awards-season darling in late '94/early '95, and for many it was their underdog contender against FORREST GUMP and PULP FICTION - a serious, intellectual period drama about Real Issues - yawn! - instead of, uh, whatever those other two movies are about. I saw it in the theater when it was released and liked it - my Dad, an English and sometimes History teacher - loved it and insisted it was the best of those three films. It was nominated for Best Picture (and many other Oscars). I've only seen it once subsequently, maybe in the mid-00s - but I would now agree with my late father that it is (if not better than FG and PF at least) more timely (or timeless) today than those films. As QUIZ SHOW is about media representation, journalistic ethics, propaganda, corporatism, truth, honor, charlatanry, et al........ actually it's extremely relevant today!
QUIZ SHOW (1994)
Directed by the late Robert Redford; starring Ralph Fiennes, Rob Morrow, and John Turturro.
This was an awards-season darling in late '94/early '95, and for many it was their underdog contender against FORREST GUMP and PULP FICTION - a serious, intellectual period drama about Real Issues - yawn! - instead of, uh, whatever those other two movies are about. I saw it in the theater when it was released and liked it - my Dad, an English and sometimes History teacher - loved it and insisted it was the best of those three films. It was nominated for Best Picture (and many other Oscars). I've only seen it once subsequently, maybe in the mid-00s - but I would now agree with my late father that it is (if not better than FG and PF at least) more timely (or timeless) today than those films. As QUIZ SHOW is about media representation, journalistic ethics, propaganda, corporatism, truth, honor, charlatanry, et al........ actually it's extremely relevant today!
#44
Good Movies / Re: What is your first Horror ...
Last post by M.10rda - November 23, 2025, 10:35:16 AMWHAT A COOL STORY about reading James Herbert to a newborn! 
I am unclear on my early childhood relationship to THE BLOB but my Mom (who was 11 or 12 when it was released) says she was terrified that it would come under the door while she was in the bathroom and devour her on the toilet.
I am unclear on my early childhood relationship to THE BLOB but my Mom (who was 11 or 12 when it was released) says she was terrified that it would come under the door while she was in the bathroom and devour her on the toilet.
#45
Good Movies / Re: favourite mid 90s movies?
Last post by Rev. Powell - November 23, 2025, 10:33:47 AMOther great ones from the era this thread reminded me of: THE USUAL SUSPECTS, ED WOOD (surprised I forgot that one), SHOWGIRLS (so bad it's good category).
#46
Good Movies / Re: Recent Viewings, Part 2
Last post by M.10rda - November 23, 2025, 10:22:04 AMSTALAG 17 (1953):
This - the first big American POW movie, which surely influenced THE GREAT ESCAPE and directly inspired "Hogan's Heroes" (as proven in a court of law) - was a big hit upon its release, got Oscar noms and a statue for William Holden, and today receives almost unwavering hyperbolic commendations from everyone who's reviewed it on Letterboxd. It's okay, with a few parts that are above average, but it ain't no GRAND ILLUSION... a film Billy Wilder pretty clearly had seen and admired.
If you've ever seen or are aware of "Hogan's Heroes", there's no need for me to provide a plot synopsis, though I'll add that STALAG 17 only attempts to be funny about 3/4ths as much as an episode of "Hogan's Heroes", and succeeds approximately as often as a single episode (which is to say, imho, not too much). There is some legitimate suspense and drama in STALAG 17, though the lame comedy tends to interminably delay the compelling bits. (I suspect STALAG 17 also influenced Altman's M*A*S*H, a later film I also find laboriously unfunny.)
Holden plays a cynical, unpopular angler in the American officer's stockade. (Again, it's easy to identify elements of both Milo Minderbinder and Yossarian from Joseph Heller's outstanding Catch-22, published in 1961.) The best parts of the film are where Holden plays chess (literally and figuratively) with Peter Graves, playing one of the camp's ranking American prisoners. Holden is cagey in a way that's mostly fun to watch, sometimes tiresome (even he didn't think he deserved an Oscar for this performance). Graves, though, is very well-cast - it's hard to think of him as anything other than the smiling, upright AIRPLANE! Captain who likes talking to little boys about gladiator movies, so oddly he works quite well in a serious role as a man with something to hide.
Robert Strauss (star of THE NOAH) was also nominated for an Oscar, more evidence that audiences and the Academy luuurved STALAG 17 and seized any slender excuse to reward it. Strauss' slovenly, sex-crazed funnyman role probably deserves an Oscar nomination just as much as John Belushi deserved an Oscar nom for playing "Bluto" in ANIMAL HOUSE - though honestly Belushi was much funnier - but you can still tell Strauss is a good actor trying his best with thin material. Harvey Lembeck plays the Jerry to Strauss' Dino, and although I'm a lifelong Erich Von Zipper stan, Lembeck's got nothin' to work with here. Neville Brand (much later of EATEN ALIVE fame) does make an impression as a prison tough guy. Some guy named "Don Taylor" is 2nd-billed after Holden and spends most of the movie crouched silently in a water reservoir - ah, the Hollywood system!
Finally, as long as I'm name-dropping "Erich Von"s... it's inescapable that Erich Von Stroheim showed GRAND ILLUSION to Wilder (or reminded Wilder of it) while they were making SUNSETBLVD, and Wilder quickly decided he could do better than Jean Renoir. Maybe Wilder even offered Von Stroheim STALAG 17's scene-stealing role of "Von Schurbach", the "Colonel Klink" character on "Hogan's Heroes" as well as essentially the same role EVS played in GRAND ILLUSION, minus the depth and nuance of Renoir's finely written characters. EVS passed so Wilder cast Otto Preminger, the other German director he had in his rolodex.
Preminger has a couple of very interesting scenes here - Letterboxd users love the boots! - but I'd have been better off just rewatching Renoir's masterpiece.
3/5
Classic Hollywood's favorite funny German Sig Rumaan plays the "Sergeant Schultz" role here - and the character's name is Colonel Schultz....... which probably clinched Billy Wilder's lawsuit!
This - the first big American POW movie, which surely influenced THE GREAT ESCAPE and directly inspired "Hogan's Heroes" (as proven in a court of law) - was a big hit upon its release, got Oscar noms and a statue for William Holden, and today receives almost unwavering hyperbolic commendations from everyone who's reviewed it on Letterboxd. It's okay, with a few parts that are above average, but it ain't no GRAND ILLUSION... a film Billy Wilder pretty clearly had seen and admired.
If you've ever seen or are aware of "Hogan's Heroes", there's no need for me to provide a plot synopsis, though I'll add that STALAG 17 only attempts to be funny about 3/4ths as much as an episode of "Hogan's Heroes", and succeeds approximately as often as a single episode (which is to say, imho, not too much). There is some legitimate suspense and drama in STALAG 17, though the lame comedy tends to interminably delay the compelling bits. (I suspect STALAG 17 also influenced Altman's M*A*S*H, a later film I also find laboriously unfunny.)
Holden plays a cynical, unpopular angler in the American officer's stockade. (Again, it's easy to identify elements of both Milo Minderbinder and Yossarian from Joseph Heller's outstanding Catch-22, published in 1961.) The best parts of the film are where Holden plays chess (literally and figuratively) with Peter Graves, playing one of the camp's ranking American prisoners. Holden is cagey in a way that's mostly fun to watch, sometimes tiresome (even he didn't think he deserved an Oscar for this performance). Graves, though, is very well-cast - it's hard to think of him as anything other than the smiling, upright AIRPLANE! Captain who likes talking to little boys about gladiator movies, so oddly he works quite well in a serious role as a man with something to hide.
Robert Strauss (star of THE NOAH) was also nominated for an Oscar, more evidence that audiences and the Academy luuurved STALAG 17 and seized any slender excuse to reward it. Strauss' slovenly, sex-crazed funnyman role probably deserves an Oscar nomination just as much as John Belushi deserved an Oscar nom for playing "Bluto" in ANIMAL HOUSE - though honestly Belushi was much funnier - but you can still tell Strauss is a good actor trying his best with thin material. Harvey Lembeck plays the Jerry to Strauss' Dino, and although I'm a lifelong Erich Von Zipper stan, Lembeck's got nothin' to work with here. Neville Brand (much later of EATEN ALIVE fame) does make an impression as a prison tough guy. Some guy named "Don Taylor" is 2nd-billed after Holden and spends most of the movie crouched silently in a water reservoir - ah, the Hollywood system!
Finally, as long as I'm name-dropping "Erich Von"s... it's inescapable that Erich Von Stroheim showed GRAND ILLUSION to Wilder (or reminded Wilder of it) while they were making SUNSETBLVD, and Wilder quickly decided he could do better than Jean Renoir. Maybe Wilder even offered Von Stroheim STALAG 17's scene-stealing role of "Von Schurbach", the "Colonel Klink" character on "Hogan's Heroes" as well as essentially the same role EVS played in GRAND ILLUSION, minus the depth and nuance of Renoir's finely written characters. EVS passed so Wilder cast Otto Preminger, the other German director he had in his rolodex.
Preminger has a couple of very interesting scenes here - Letterboxd users love the boots! - but I'd have been better off just rewatching Renoir's masterpiece.3/5
Classic Hollywood's favorite funny German Sig Rumaan plays the "Sergeant Schultz" role here - and the character's name is Colonel Schultz....... which probably clinched Billy Wilder's lawsuit!
#47
Good Movies / Re: What is your first Horror ...
Last post by Alex - November 23, 2025, 10:19:58 AMAccording to my mum, as a toddler I loved watching The Blob and The Wolfman on a projector they received as a wedding present. I don't remember that, but I guess one of them would have been my first.
I do know Ash's first horror film (Howl. He woke up early one morning while I was watching it and the rest of the house was sleeping). The first story I read to him was James Herberts The Dark, because again everyone else was sleeping and it was the only book I had to read to him while he lay on my lap in the hospital.
I do know Ash's first horror film (Howl. He woke up early one morning while I was watching it and the rest of the house was sleeping). The first story I read to him was James Herberts The Dark, because again everyone else was sleeping and it was the only book I had to read to him while he lay on my lap in the hospital.
#48
Good Movies / Re: Recent Viewings, Part 2
Last post by M.10rda - November 23, 2025, 09:42:06 AMA lovely idea and a really natural one, Rev. After DOWN BY LAW and COFFEE AND CIGARETTES and other projects with Waits, it's surprising that never occurred to Jarmusch!
#49
Good Movies / Re: favourite mid 90s movies?
Last post by HappyGilmore - November 23, 2025, 09:24:12 AMA few I left off that I liked:
Lion King
Reality BitesIt's
Ed Wood
Mars AttacksIt's
12 MonkeysIt's
Se7enb
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie
Clueless
There's so many films released in the 90s I saw. I started the decade at 6 and was 15/16 when they ended.
Lion King
Reality BitesIt's
Ed Wood
Mars AttacksIt's
12 MonkeysIt's
Se7enb
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie
Clueless
There's so many films released in the 90s I saw. I started the decade at 6 and was 15/16 when they ended.
Quote from: zombie no.one on November 23, 2025, 04:55:54 AMI can see that about Mallrats. Seems like an even split on people who hate it and love it. I feel his three best films are Clerks, Chasing Amy and Dogma.Quote from: HappyGilmore on November 23, 2025, 12:46:07 AMChasing Amy
think this might be the only Kevin Smith film apart from CLERKS that I actually enjoyed... gotta be honest I was really disappointed with MALLRATS
#50
Bad Movies / Re: Generate Movie Poster with...
Last post by claws - November 23, 2025, 06:22:15 AM