Recent Viewings, Part 2

[zombie no.one]

fellow (!) actress-of-certain-age Sally Field, who I also recently objectified lasciviously in the Farmland Horror thread.

well in your defence, started it. :)

fair play for enduring an entire movie length dose of Harry Styles... thanks to a certain work colleague I was subjected to his album Harry's House on a daily basis last year, but I'm slowly getting over it

[M.10rda]

In defense of all of us, she was asking for it by being a foxy nun. 

No no, I jest of course.      Happy to hear about your "Harry's House" recovery.

[Alex]

Star Wars Episode I. The Phantom Menace.

I thought, you know what. It's been 25 years. Let's watch it again and reevaluate it.

Yeah, still s**t.

[Rev. Powell]

MST3K: THE SPACE CHILDREN: A blob from space takes over the minds of kids at a military base to sabotage a rocket launch. At Castle Forester, Pearl is trying to install a teleconferencing system, then launch Bobo into space. There's also a short from 1962 where they demonstrate advanced telephone technology like primitive pagers and call waiting, stuff that they could apparently do back then but wouldn't become common for a couple of decades. Overall, with a short and a black-and-white sci fi film, this scifi era show feels more like a comedy central era show. It's forgettable, and I'm not too upset that, for whatever reason, they weren't able to get the rights to release it on physical media. 3/5.

[Dr. Whom]

City Hunter (2024)

What if John Wick had a serious sexual obsession and is tasked with protecting a sexy cosplayer to prevent a shady syndicate from turning her into a superweapon.

I was only vaguely aware of the original manga/anime, so I don't know how many liberties they have taken with the source material, nor do I care. This is simply silly fun. Contrary to the Cowboy Bebop adaptation, where they tried to make it grim and edgy, this movies leans into the silliness of it all and runs with it. Ryohei Suzuki is having the time of his life as the lead and carries the movie single handedly. None of the other cast really register much, but they are decent enough. The plot is even remarkably coherent for a manga adaptation.

Recommended

[FatFreddysCat]

"Burial Ground" (aka "Nights of Terror," 1981)
Three couples arrive at a secluded Italian villa for a weekend of fun and fornication, which is rudely interrupted by a horde of gut munching zombies unleashed from an archeological dig on the property. Yes, that's the entire plot.

This nonsensical Italian gore fest is best known for the casting of 25 year old midget Peter Bark as a creepy 12 year old kid who has an unhealthy fixation on his boob-a-licious Mom. This eventually leads to the film's most notorious scene, which I will not spoil, but it made me say, " Damn, I can't believe they went there."

"Burial Ground" is definitely not a "good" movie by any means, but it's a fun watch if you're simply in the mood for some mindless splatter.

[RCMerchant]

^ My favorite Italian zombie film!

[Trevor]

^ My favorite Italian zombie film!

I just watched the trailer of that on YouTube: sleeping with the light on tonight for sure 😳😉

[Jim H]

Late Night With The Devil - Mostly consists of a live broadcast where a 70s talk show host brings on a supposedly possessed little girl - also intercut with "behind the scenes" footage and a few sequences that are just for the audience.  Well-made, well-acted, good characters.  David Dastmalchian is one of the best character actors working today, love that guy.  Feel like this sub-genre needs a name (live broadcast gone wrong), there's at least four of them now, Deadstream, Late Night With the Devil, Ghostwatch, and the WNUF Halloween Special.  It's a sub-sub genre, of found footage I guess, but they have their own uniqueness to them.  Ghostwatch is still the best, and the original as far as I know, but they're all good!

The Beekeeper - This is one of those "what it says on the tin" type of movies, but it's a well made one.  If you miss 90s style dumb, violent action movies, this is what you've missed.  A super badass guy has someone close to him hurt, and he takes it to the top killing everyone in the way.  Very well paced in particular, and not overly long. 

Point in fact, this feels like it was cut heavily to reduce the running time, one bad guy in particular (a stereotyped Afrikaner and his buddies) comes out of nowhere but has enough dialogue seems like his introduction must have been chopped out.  But it was probably the right call, as most of the character stuff isn't great.  In particular, the cop tailing Statham is blah and not very well acted, and gets some bad dialogue.  But just seeing scumbags get chopped up and shot, you'll get that with decently entertaining action sequences and a pace that doesn't stop for much.

[indianasmith]

TALES FROM PANDORA'S BOX, VOL. 2 (2023)

A series of horror/suspense shorts, some better than others.  Moderately entertaining; could do with a bit more gore.  3.4/5

[FatFreddysCat]

^ My favorite Italian zombie film!

This was my 3rd or 4th time seeing it. It's crap, but it's entertaining crap. :D

[Alex]

Jojo Rabbit.

A movie that has been on my to watch lists for a few years now, but one that I felt I had to be in the right frame of mind to watch. Set in the dying days of the 3rd Riche, Jojo is a young boy who has Hitler for an imaginary friend and wants to grow up to be a member of his personal elite bodyguard. He discovers his mother is hiding a young Jewish girl which throughout the film slowly brings a change in his perspective of the world. By turns sweet and heartbreaking, this movie could pretty much define the term black comedy.

[Dr. Whom]

"Burial Ground" (aka "Nights of Terror," 1981)
Three couples arrive at a secluded Italian villa for a weekend of fun and fornication, which is rudely interrupted by a horde of gut munching zombies unleashed from an archeological dig on the property. Yes, that's the entire plot.

What more plot would be needed?

[Alex]

Late Night With The Devil.

I've been hearing a lot of hype about this one. I thought it was good, but the ending was given away far too early in the movie. One death in particular is practically shoved in your face with its foreshadowing. Worth a watch if you are a horror fan, but not so much if you like your blood and gore splashed everywhere.

[RCMerchant]

A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE (1952)

"STELLLLAAAA!"
An aging southern woman (Vivien Leigh) moves from her estate in Mississipi to New Orleans with her dam sexy sister (Kim Hunter) and her caveman husband (a young Marlon Brando) after the bank takes her home. Stanley, the slob husband immeditaly makes it clear he doesn't care for her high faulting hoighty toity attitude. He wants her out. He shouldn't worry, because it's revealed that she had been selling her fancy ass to pay bills, and these revelations known to all drive her mad. As she's led to the fruit factory she quips "Whoever you are—I have always depended on the kindness of strangers."

Gawdam! Whatta movie! Brando is fantastic as the brutish Stanley Kowalski, the factory working lout. You always sit on edge whenever he enters a room, just anxious to see what he does next. Vivian Leigh is so far removed her from GONE WITH THE WIND (1939)-which I finally forced myself to watch- it's an amazing transformation into the mad Blanche. Kim Hunter, as she slowly, sulks down to a stairs to Brando after his anguished cries of "STELLAAA!" is one of the sexist things put to film, bar none. DAM! Kim Hunter is hot!
All in all, after finally seeing this classic, it has to be in my top 10 films of ALL TIME.

"STELLAAAA!"