Recent Viewings

[dean]

Yippee, more good movies watched [and some terrible ones thrown in as well]  I'll keep this relatively short though.

First off I saw Jarhead the other day.

I really enjoyed that film, lots of fun [until the end really] and it must have been one hell of a film shoot.  The end was a bit lacklustre considering the rest of the film, and some may argue that that's the point, but I think it failed a bit.  Other than that the film was fantastic.  Alot of the dialogue is great [especially from Jamie Foxx] and you really have to laugh at the ridiculousness of the scene when they're watching Apocalypse Now.


The very next day I watched Hostel.

It was really funny watching this movie, because one of my friends, who went to see it with me, is going back-packing around Europe this year [about June] and he, understandably, got all excited by the first half of the movie.  It's funny just because I know he's looking foward to Amsterdam after watching that film and I don't know whether I should tell him that it's just a movie, I don't know whether I have the heart for it.  Anyways...

Like other people have said in another thread about this, the first half of the movie was pretty interesting, but the second half kind of fell flat.  Sure it was gory, and I loved the story about 'Elite Hunting' but the gore itself wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, and the tension wasn't as thick as, say, Wolf Creek, which I think, despite their differences in style, are two very similar films to a degree, what with a long first half of travelling and 'getting to know the characters' and the thriller style ending.   But one is very Americanised [what with the constant tits and arse and over the top gore] and the other isn't as stylised.

But regardless, I'm comparing two films I liked and enjoyed [and I did enjoy both Hostel and Wolf Creek] so I guess it doesn't matter.  I still find that scene in Hostel with the gang of kids really silly [but a good kind of silly]


I also re-watched Army of Darkness last night, Along with American History X and Kingpin.

Army of Darkness is always fun.  You gotta love the word Groovy because of this film.  It's really just plain ol' good entertainment for me!

American History X on the other hand, is a ball of emotion.  Edward Norton is a favourite actor of mine, who played his part really well.  I really enjoyed how this film also changed in style, from black and white to colour, which I found to be really effective.  This also makes you want to slap the ever-living hell out of Neo-nazis and their like.

Kingpin is an ok film, with some really stupid moments, but it's really just average.  I didn't even know it was a Farrely brothers film until the end.  Basically it is about bowling, and stars Randy Quaid as an Amish with some bowling talent and Woody Harrelson as a former champion who was knocked off his pedestal.  Also has Bill Murray in it, with a great role as well.

Worth a bit of silly entertainment, but that's about it really.  Oh and Woody Harrelson's landlord scares the hell out of me.  Watch it and find out why!


Anyway that's it for now.  Been a good batch of last viewings.  Till next time...

[The Burgomaster]

JARHEAD - I enjoyed it.

HOSTEL - Disappointing.

ARMY OF DARKNESS - I have the "Boomstick" edition DVD.  Lot's of high-energy fun.

AMERICAN HISTORY X - I love it.

KINGPIN - The first time I saw it, I thought it was hilarious and outrageous.  It loses a lot of its impact during repeat viewings, but I still like it.

[dean]

Hmmm, what is exactly special about the boomstick edition?  Just curious because it sounds good!

When we watched Army of Darkness my friend pointed out that the ending on his vhs version was different to the one we just watched, and of course this alternate ending wasn't on the dvd.  From what I understand I may probably like the ending that wasn't on the dvd better.


Anyways, I also watched A History Of Violence last night, which I quite enjoyed, though the acting was a little odd in some places.

It also got alot of laughs over how ridiculous things were, in some moments which were probably meant to be quite serious.  Viggo is good at the whole facial expressions thing, and William Hurt's scene is fantastic, it's just great.

Overall I think the movie failed to find the right sort of tone for the most part, but I still quite enjoyed it despite this: it had some nice Cronenberg gore and some great moments between some of the characters which was nice.  Though the little girl was way too blonde, she just seemed so out of place [kind of an odd thing to pick up on, I know, but it was a bit distracting.]

Oh and another odd thing was the fact that one of my friends was eating the History of Violence pamphlet we picked up at the cinema during the whole screening.  Apparently the paper tasted good... sure this friend is quite often very odd [and god knows I love him for it] but that was just a little unusual!

Anyways...

[The Burgomaster]

DEAN:

The "Boomstick Edition" DVD is from Anchor Bay.  It is a 2 disc set, and contains 2 versions of the movie:

* The U.S. theatrical version (81 minutes) - special features on this disc include (among other things) the original ending (shown separately)

* The director's cut (96 minutes) - special featrures on this disc include (among other things) 4 deleted scenes (shown separately)

[dean]

Thanks Burgo,

Speaking of special edition Evil Dead stuff, I remember seeing a while back a dvd of the original Evil Dead with a special cover which looked like the necrominicon and, if put in the fridge or freezer or something, is supposed to feel like real flesh!  

Hehe, I wish I bought it at the time, but now it seems a little silly.  But that's a good kind of silly I guess: good packaging is so hard to find these days.

Oh and also Burgo, I've been meaning to ask you [and Scott if he pokes his head in]: how good [in terms of value and both in price and entertainment] is the Scifi 50 movies mega pack.  I've just noticed that they've finally released the 50 packs here [though no horror one to be found unfortunatley] and I'm very excited.  Enough to actually spend money on this!

Anyways, just wondering whether I'll be spending too much time pulling out my hair in pain from the dvd or whether there are some worthy 'classics' [and I do use the term very loosely] on this mega pack dvd.

[The Burgomaster]

Dean:

I think all of the 50 movie packs are worth the money.  I paid about $20 for most of them . . . and even less than that for a few.  Each movie ends up costing you about 40 cents!  Of course, for that price, here are the drawbacks:

* Very few of the movies are widescreen.
* Sometimes the color is a bit faded (but sometimes it is pretty impressive)
* Sometimes there are a couple of frames of film missing, causing the picture to jump.
* Sometimes the picture is a bit scratchy in a few scenes.
* Sometimes the audio is a bit muffled.

The above drawbacks aren't as bad as they seem.  They only occur on a portion of the movies, not every one.

I was VERY skeptical before I bought my first 50 movie pack.  But after I bought it and found that the movies were very watchable (and in more cases than you might expect, the quality is above average to excellent) I ended up buying 5 more 50 movie packs.

I'd say the average quality of each movie is VHS quality or better.  In fact, I have probably watched around 100 movies from these packs and I'd say only 2 or 3 of them were what I would call "poor" quality.  But you can't beat the price.

[dean]

Beautiful.  I'm sold.  Next time I'm in a spending mood I'll seek it out [they have the western and drama, and possibly comedy ones, but I'd only be interested in the Scifi or the Horror]

On a side note I saw Cherry 2000 in the bargain bin, nice and cheap, the other day.  I was thinking of picking it up [it looks right up my post-apocalyptic alley] but when I went back it wasn't there and am now kicking myself.

What a pain: I really hate it when that happens!

Anyways, thanks for the info Burgo.