An ongoing record of movies I've seen...

[viscousmemories]

I might've mentioned this somewhere already, but in case I didn't I started a journal (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/journal.php?do=view&journalid=3) here to give a very brief synopsis and rating to the movies I watch. This exists primarily for myself because my memory sucks and I can never remember what I've seen, much less what I thought of it. However it might be inspirational for anyone looking for a movie rental recommendation.

[Dingfod]

Thanks for doing this. I'm going to use it to build a list of movies to rent.

[Cool Hand]

Excellent list and summaries, VM. It occurs to me that we might have similar tastes in films.

I agree with your assessments of and reactions to The Fifth Element, Brazil, Reservoir Dogs, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Blade Runner, The Harry Potter movies, and especially Rabbit Proof Fence.

I highly recommend Rabbit Proof Fence as mandatory for anyone who has any sense of injustice and an attention span long enough to sit through a camera shot longer than 1/2 second. It is a beautiful but heartwrenching story (and it's true, too), it stars 3 unknown and untrained child actors who rise to the challenge and beyond, and it is beautifully filmed with a gorgeous palette and scenery. I recommend watching the making of featurette too. After doing so, if you don't fall in love with the youngest girl starring in the film, then your heart must be made of stone.

Cool Hand

[Farren]

Nice. Perhaps the rest of us should consider it so we could cross-link and provide comparitive ratings. I'd advise you move to a 1-10 rating though. 1-5 is a little too quantized.

[livius drusus]

1-5 is a little too much like an Australian airline?

[viscousmemories]

You're welcome, Warren. I hope it's useful for ya. :)

Thanks, Cool Hand. I was really moved by Rabbit Proof Fence, too. Enough so that I started a thread (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=719) about it as well as posting my little nickel review in the journals. :)

Farren, the cross-index sounds cool but 1-10? No more sauce for you. :P

[HarryLime]

You make a lot of good points, and it's always fantastic to see Brazil get love. In talking about the film with others, I've found that its reputaion among cinema fans seems to be tarnishing, as though it's cool to bag on it now, after a couple of decades have passed. Fuck that, I say. If I were to make a top ten list of films, Brazil would be there. I'd rank it with the absolute best of the 80's, along with The Stunt Man, The Thin Blue Line, The Killer, and The Ninth Configuration.

Will

[viscousmemories]

Thank ya Mr. Lime. Yeah Brazil is definitely on my top 10 list. It's one of few movies I've probably seen 5 times or more over the years. I'm embarassed to admit that I've never seen (or even heard of) any of the others you mention, though. I'll be looking those up.

[HarryLime]

Not a reason in the world to be embarassed of that. I'm a film minor, so I get off on the obscure stuff. They didn't exactly tear up the box office over here, but they're all the very definition of 5/5 films. A quick primer:

The Stunt Man - Peter O' Toole plays a slightly unhinged film director who may or may not have sinister intentions for the escaped criminal he's welcomed onto the set of his new film as a stunt man. Brilliantly blends comedy, drama, action, and satire.

The Thin Blue Line - Errol Morris's documentary about a cop killer. It's powerful stuff, and he was actually able to free a man unjustly imprisoned for the crime. The static shot of a tape recorder playing back an interview about the crime that comes toward the film's end is as chilling as any horror movie ever made.

The Killer - John Woo made the most melodramatic, stylistically beautiful action movie of all time. A lot of people think it's a bit overblown, but I found it to be transcendant. Gorgeous stuff, and Chow Yun Fat shoots the shit out of stuff for 100 mins.

The Ninth Configuration - Stars Stacy Keach (!) as a slightly deranged military psychiatrist sent to a remote castle in the Pacific Northwest to help shell-shocked Vietnam vets work through their delusions. Comedy, religious parable, and one of the greatest bar fights ever captured on film combine incredibly well. It was directed by William Peter Blatty, the writer of The Exorcist. Beautiful film.

In any case, hope you enjoy them if you're so inclined to check any of them out.

Will

[viscousmemories]

Those sound great, Will. I'll definitely be putting them in ye olde Netflix queue today. :yup:

[viscousmemories]

Bumping this because I've updated a couple times this year, so check it out (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/journal.php?do=showjournal&j=3) if you're interested. Reminder: These aren't intended to be comprehensive reviews (or even reviews, in some cases; just opinions). Use IMDB (http://www.imdb.com) or other trusted sources for detailed information.

Glad I'm bumping this, too, 'cause for some reason I never did add HarryLime's recommendations to the Netflix queue. I'll be doing that now, if they're available. :yup:

[viscousmemories]

Okay, The Ninth Configuration and The Stunt Man are at the top of my queue.

The Thin Blue Line won't be available until July 26th, and The Killer has no availability date yet.

[ms_ann_thrope]

may i make a shameless plug for an alternative, local (local to me... SF bay area) online movie rental company? greencine (http://www.greencine.com).

i used to be a netflix customer until i got fed up with receiving the same wrong movie over and over again (i wanted the 1932 joan crawford movie "rain," not the totally unrelated film of the same name from 2001... i enclosed a letter explaining the error each time i returned the wrong DVD... after 4th time, i decided they were incompetent beyond salvation).

anyhoo, i heard about greencine from a friend. they have a much larger selection of foreign / independent / "special interest" films (which are more my cup of tea anyway) than i was finding at netflix, plus they have pr0n. :ffwink: also i have never had a problem with any of the DVDs from them not playing (i had several from netflix that skipped or froze and wouldn't play.... grrrrrr!).

ok, shameless plug over.

[Ari]

Bah, how could you give Fifth Element a 3? You need to watch it a couple more times until that new 4 becomes a 5. :)
Yes the movie was supposed to be a bit campy, it was done in a comic book style. To like the fifth element you can't take any of it seriously.

[viscousmemories]

Great plug, ms_ann_thrope. That looks like a very cool resource. I see they already have The Killer available, which Netflix doesn't yet. If it were my service I'd give it a shot, but it isn't. My roommate is the Netflix customer, I just throw stuff in his queue when I want to see it. He's been a 5-at-a-time customer for a couple years now and with the exception of a few minor glitches never had any problems. Always the right movies very quickly, and rarely defective (although there have been a few occassions where the disk skipped, etc.) But that place does look cool. Thanks. :)

Ari, I'll give it another shot someday. Like I said in the review I really think I missed a lot by not realizing off the bat that it was meant to be campy. Buckaroo Banzai is one of my favorite flicks, and you can't get any more campy sci-fi than that. :)

[Ensign Steve]

I suppose this is as good a place as any to post this:

In case anyone here is my "Netflix Friend" (you know who you are) I cancelled my membership for my two-week vacation to LA followed by my six-week trip to Florida.

Here's an FYI about Netflix: If you search their help files for "suspend" or "vacation" you are directed to a file that suggests if you are going away for an extended period of time, you should cancel your membership. They will save your queue and other preferences for 90 days and also you can ask them to send you an email at a specified date to remind you to rejoin. While I'd rather have simply suspended my membership, they don't offer that, and I thought this was a pretty decent alternative. :shrug:

[viscousmemories]

Weird.

[Ensign Steve]

Hey, Tom, I watched House of Yes yesterday. :)

[viscousmemories]

Oh cool. Did you love it? I loved it. You should see Party Girl now. Parker Posey is Queen of the World.

[viscousmemories]

:bump:

I just added about a dozen movies or so to my journal (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/journal.php?do=showjournal&j=3).

[Stormlight]

No real quarrels with the list, but then:

Alone in the Dark - A fine flick for the videogame based horror genre. 4/5

Thank god, you're kidding! You are, aren't you? Because that was clearly one of the worst movies I have ever seen.

[HighOnHotSauce]

Nice job (as usual). I'm glad to see you gave Princess Bride a 5/5. I've seen that movie a hundred times and could watch it a hundred more. Well, because I know the secrets of the fire swamp and could live there quite comfortably for some time. :wink:

[viscousmemories]

Thank god, you're kidding! You are, aren't you? Because that was clearly one of the worst movies I have ever seen.
I have a whole other scale in my head for videogame-based horror flicks, so when I say 4/5 I mean for a videogame-based horror flick. So it's more like a 2 or 3/5 really. Nice job (as usual).
Thanks!

Yeah, Princess Bride is great. :yup:

[SharonDee]

Have you seen Kung Fu Hustle yet, vm? I don't know how you feel about martial arts or comedy, but the two get together here in a frenetic mish-mash that had me wincing and laughing throughout.

Of course, it's all in Chinese [both Mandarin and Catonese] so it has subtitles. But the site gags are funny enough without knowing what's being said, if you're one of those folks averse to reading a movie.

(Rated :3dkick: and :biglaugh: by me.)

[viscousmemories]

I saw previews for it a week or two ago and added it to my queue, so I'll see it soon. :)