Saying Star Wars is all about lightsaber fights is like saying any monster movie is all about showing off the monster--sometimes the better film doesn't show the monster at all, yet showing us the monster all the time makes for an extremely shitty movie.

I didn't get that BvS was designed to piss off fans. But they're nothing alike - BvS is a bloated incoherent mess that tries too hard to reach for every kind of serious message and "important" thing it can try to be, not to mention a haphazard, slapdash attempt at starting an Avengers-style universe in one movie. Last Jedi is a sweeping, epic action movie that feels very well put together, obviously with care put into it even if you think there were too many plot threads.

I also didn't really get any vibe that we were supposed to be bothered by the subversions he was doing. They stuck out to me later after I thought about it, but I was sucked into the movie and it felt like a naturally told story when I saw it. It didn't feel like "ooh, look at what we're doing!" so much as just a Star Wars story with some of the extraneous bullshit about fantasy-style familial dynasties and old cliches done differently. It felt respectful to the franchise, though I am sure people will disagree on that too.

Let's hope Disney follows the money, since that seems to be the one thing they care about. The Last Jedi has suffered the worst post-release box office collapse of all 9 SW movies to date. It's total box office take is looking like it'll fall somewhere between Rogue One (which just barely topped $1 billion) and TFA.

It'll still be profitable, no doubt about it. But for a new Star Wars movie to perform more poorly then its predecessor does not bode well. Disney bought Star Wars for $4 billion, half in cash. To recoup that at this rate, they're going to need another 4 or 5 half-assed SW movies. Or, you know, just one fucking good one.

Over the weekend, watched:

"Predestination" - for the second time. Pretty damn good time travel flick, certainly fodder for post-film discussions.
"Creep 2" - very much enjoyed the first one, but this was just not as good. Not really sure what they were going for, but the slow pace plus multiple "twist" endings irritated the hell out of me.
"Crossfire Hurricane" - Great, kind of free-form Rolling Stones documentary. Seeing those crowds back in the day, and hearing about their lifestyles, makes you realize just how crazy it must have been to be in that band during that time period.

I rewatched Rogue One yesterday and enjoyed it more this time around. Maybe being so recently disappointed by The Last Jedi made it look that much better in comparison, but I think I honestly simply enjoy Rogue One now. I kind of think that seeing this kind of movie alone on a small screen is better than seeing it in the theater, because you're not so overwhelmed by the massive visuals and loud sounds. You can pause it when you need to, rewind if you think you missed something, and just take your time with it, like with a book. *shrug* Maybe I'm just getting old and lame.

Rogue One is alright. Better than the prequels but below the rest. I only watched it once, but other than the final scene I can't recall a lot of amazing stuff from it. The characters are for the most part uninteresting and there are far too many. Some had potential sure, but because of the amount of characters in the movie we don't find out much about them before



But yeah, the rest of the movie is forgettable. It suffers heavily from having boring characters and you knowing what's gonna happen to them, and not care. If you're gonna make a prequel to one of the most well known stories, make sure you got characters to back it up.

Yeah! Good movie

Just saw The Last Jedi; fuckkkkkkkkkkkk!!!!!! The Force Awakens was fan pandering rubbish, but this takes the biscuit! What a fuck up!

I'd love to erase ep. 1,2,3,7, and 8 from my memory.

It's strange to me how much hate Last Jedi is getting. Most of my circle likes this better than Rogue One and liked RO better than TFA. It isn't a great film, but Star Wars hasn't been there in a while truthfully.

Arguably only there once, if even.

Consider the fact that there are more bad than good Star Wars movies.

The same realization occurred to me in the wake of my disappointment with Episode VIII

I'm positive that the Han Solo movie will be the most unnecessary, bloated-with-fan-service one yet, so maybe I'll actually be pleasantly surprised if it turns out to even be okay. But I guess Disney will keep pumping out Star Wars movies annually until the sun explodes so the ratio could even out again eventually. Can't wait until we inevitably get a trilogy or TV miniseries of The Old Republic. I guess there's a vague chance Rian Johnson's trilogy will be set during then.

I may get some flack for this but Star Wars should have ended with the Empire Strikes Back. The first film was a good one but the sequel is one of the best sequels ever and is easily the best in the series. Every single film after has failed to deliver the goods the way Empire did. Return Of Jedi was good but, to me, felt unnecessary and came close to crapping on the only film in the series to come close to perfect.

The prequels were the film equivalent of drinking a diarrhea filled bowl of cockroaches all with HIV. Parts 7 and 8 are neither terrible or shitty. They are just overblown pieces of mediocrity capitalizing on brand recognition and not creativity. How good could they be when they involve the talentless hack Jeffrey Jacob Abrams? And to hell with the acronym, I will call him what his parents named him.

Some non Star Wars stuff...

The Big Sick - Really good comedy/drama/romance type of film. Based on a real life account of a Pakistani stand-up who fell in love with a white girl who had a mysterious disease. Shit gets pretty dramatic. But they keep it funny, too, when it has to be, and the whole is an extremely well-rounded, enjoyable and propulsive film.

Downsizing - Utterly ludicrous crap. I wanted this to be good, but it was like they were just making the story up as it went along - like I could tell you what happens in this movie and you'd think I was joking if you hadn't seen it. Matt Damon's character is aggressively unlikable by the end and the comedy is awful.

The Shape of Water - Guillermo del Toro has always been inconsistent for me, but this was really cool. A bizarre star-crossed lovers tale of a mute woman and a fish monster in a laboratory she is a maid at. This was full of personality through its odd humor and great dialogue, and the characters were very memorable and likable - even Michael Shannon as a villain plays it up to 11 and works marvelously. Probably a bit too long. But still worth seeing.

Nah! There had to be a third movie (Return of the Jedi) Luke rescues Han, and his Jedi skills are being realized. He goes back to Yoda and his training is near completion. Then the finale where it cuts between the moon of Endor, Death Star, and Lando's battle sequence, is great. The only issue is that there are too many fucking Ewoks. I's a bad Ewok to rebel fighter ratio–less Ewoks and more rebels over 5'5'' would have been better. It smacks of pandering to the toddler audience.

And, you're analogy of the prequels is bang on; they are fucking atrocious barring the odd light saber battle.

Flatliners 2017 - what a waste of fucking time... The original is worth a revisit if you haven't seen it; ignore this new one.

Just watched Starry Eyes, and bloody hell it's amazing. I think the common criticism of it being all "HOLLYWOOD IS EVIL" is the dumbest, especially because, y'know, Hollywood actually CAN be evil, what with your Allens and Polanskis and Weinsteins and whatnot. It's not even just about Hollywood either, the scenes with her and the restaurant are a portrayal of American society that's just as harsh as it is of the film industry. It gives a nice little insight into millenial life as well as a scathing criticism of the American Dream (TM). Great flick, truly horrifying (and a fantastic soundtrack to boot). The rushed ending ruins it just a tad though, but really just a tad. 8/10 I think.

The Shout (1978) is also great, it's a masterpiece of plot structuring and pacing. Not to mention the rather unusual North Devon dropback similar only to that of its contemporary, The Wicker Man. 8/10

Yeah, ROTJ minus Ewoks is every bit as good as ESB. I never bought the excuse that Lucas really wanted Wookies, but couldn't afford it. It was a toy commercial.

I always try to plug that movie when mentioning the better lower budget horror movies from the last few years. I've seen it more than once, but not since the Weinstein story broke. Yeah, some of those creepy scenes in the middle might be even more disturbing knowing that stuff actually happens.

Apparently the directing duo is doing a Pet Sematary remake next. It's kind of unfortunate that for these younger horror filmmakers to get a decent budget and have any chance of a wide theatrical release, the easiest way is to conform to the sequel / remake / reboot craze. Same thing happened with Adam Wingard.

^ Yeah, but at the same time, the original Pet Sematary movie was awful, so a remake can only be an improvement. I don't have a problem with that because it's technically just adapting a book, like the new IT movie - it's not remaking some storied 80s classic or something truly vital.

So Bright is...a movie. Clearly put together by Netflix algorithms ("the kids like LOTR and adults like gritty crime dramas so let's mix them!"), then shoved through the keyboard of an annoying stooge whose career reeks of nepotism galore...and yet I can't say it's awful.

The performances, especially Joel "I made Timothy Green watchable" Edgerton, are good. So many scenes are shot beautifully, the opening credits are incredible, and even the world itself feels alive though woefully under explored...but JAYYYZUSSSS the tonal shifts ruin it.

In many ways, it's a higher budget version of Spectral, the earlier "eh it's okay" b movie Netflix produced. That suffered from similar tonal and plotting issues as well.

6/10

I think I might have enjoyed the original Pet Sematary. I'm willing to watch another adaptation, it's just that if I had to pick what I'd rather see the Starry Eyes guys do next, I'd prefer an original thing they wrote and directed themselves. But that would probably require years of scraping together money from crowdfunding, and even then it would be hard to get a wide theatrical release. If I were a filmmaker in their position, I'd probably be doing the same thing.

I hope they don't go Full Wingard though. After You're Next and The Guest, he's making 4 movies in a row based on existing properties. And the first two haven't been all that well received, yet they're still giving him money to make two more! Not many people wanted a belated Blair Witch sequel, and Death Note went straight to Netflix and has a 4.6 IMDB rating. Next up is an Americanized I Saw the Devil, then Godzilla Vs. Kong. Jeez.



I watched it a couple days ago and found it OK, but frustrating because it could have been really good. I agree about tone problems, since I kept noticing jokes when I thought it should be getting serious. The middle section of the story was the weakest IMO. After they


it became a series of rather dull, small-scale action scenes. And of course, the elf character can communicate exactly as well as the script requires for the two main characters to remain just confused enough.

Yeah I mean I liked some stuff I saw from Wingard (his VHS short, I guess?), but more of it I've disliked. Not sure he was ever very good to begin with - I hated You're Next and said it was the worst movie of 2013 the first time I saw it, and that Death Note movie was bad because it was a poor movie in every aspect possible, not just because it was an Americanized adaptation - that isn't really a mark of quality or lack thereof by itself.

Hahaha–good one!

You're Next was a blast as a gimmicky microbudget slasher, probably one of the best >$1 million horror movies I've seen. I just watched Blair Witch (2016) and it was absolutely terrible. I don't really know what I expected, but I expected something better than that.

At least it was better than Book of Shadows.

Never saw Book of Shadows, but the recent unnecessary belated Blair Witch sequel was better than the recent unnecessary belated The Ring sequel. Rings had me bored and staring at the clock waiting for it to end in a way that I don't recall Blair Witch doing.

Blair Witch was just a remake and all The Ring did was freak the studios out since it flopped. I forget the movie, but they indefintely delayed or stopped some movie from production due to Rings flopping.

Yep, supposedly Rings is partly to blame for why Friday the 13th Part 13 didn't get made this year. So I have even more reason to dislike it. Let's see, I must have watched something else recently that didn't put me in a foul mood like Rings did.

M.F.A. - I don't think I mentioned this already? It's a passable rape / revenge flick set at a college.

Wonder Woman - Finally got around to it, after hearing months of hype I assumed the movie wouldn't live up to. It mostly delivered though. Other than thinking it took a bit too long to really get going, I don't have many complaints about this. I liked the World War I setting, a nice change of pace from the other superheroes whose origins have to be updated for the post-9/11 world, like Iron Man or the Punisher TV show.

I liked Creep (2014). The plot has a very simple concept, with a ridiculously low budget, but it still manages to leave you feeling uneasy in the end. Aaron is a dumbass but honestly who here doesn't have dumb moments?

Original "Creep" was great.

Over the long weekend:

"The Big Sick" - great movie, the scenes of the family sitting around the table and bringing in prospective wives led to a lot of laughs in my family.
"Seeking a Friend..." - also a very good film, offbeat without being annoyingly offbeat.
"Rage to Kill" - insanely stupid action film about some oiled-up rebels trying to take over an island republic recently taken over by a ridiculous general.
"____ Vow" - forgot the adjective, but enjoyed this laugh-out-loud terrible movie about evil monks that run a winery supposedly "in the middle of nowhere" (though you can see the houses and cars in the near distance). Was missing a group of friends to riff on this one with.

A few anime classics I have watched recently:

Akira: This movie was equal parts fun, compelling, and horrifying. It's like a marriage between action, sci-fi, and horror - it balances all three elements beautifully and never feels pretentious or overbearing in it's message. Despite the pretty dense and involved story, I would say it's actually pretty accessible and easy to follow (at least in comparison to the other films I'm about to talk about).

Ghost in the Shell (original 1995 film): First time I watched this was a few weeks ago, and I ended up falling asleep and basically losing track of the story which ruined the entire experience. When I rewatched it, while the story does seem to be pretty complex I found it much easier to follow what was going on, and I think it's a pretty great movie. My only complaint is the voice actress that played Motoko...maybe it's because I thought she sounded like Leela from Futurama but I thought her performance was kind of bland and uninteresting (I liked the film's epic final line but her awful delivery of it, made it kind of fall flat, if you ask me).

End of Evangelion: I absolutely loved this movie, just as much if not moreso than the TV series it followed. What I love is the kind of cruel and hopeless atmosphere behind it, there's just this overwhelming sense of dread and impending doom - which is reflected perfectly in the lead character Shinji Ikari who is basically an anti-hero who lives in a perpetual cycle of gloom and self-hatred. Naturally it all comes to a head in the ending, which is incredibly haunting and easily one of the best endings to any movie I've ever seen. I also want to point out how the darkest moment in the entire movie (and franchise) is accompanied by such a happy pop song (well...seemingly happy, I guess). Overall I'd consider this film a masterpiece and the best way to conclude this amazing series.

Residue (2017)
Time and reality bend for a private investigator hired to guard and deliver a package. Curiosity gets the best of him and he begins examining its contents: an old, handwritten journal leaking a mysterious black substance.

Ignore the low budget, the cheesy acting (which never reaches mockery levels), and some weaker moments to.focus on the plot unraveling. If The Void is a modern day take on Carpenter's classic style, then Rusty Nixon's third full length feature calls images of Stuart Gordon to mind. There's splatter, an earned feeling of otherworldliness, and some wonderdul special effects, with the best part being how it's all done with a sinister smirk.

6.5/10

Nice. Will check it out.

We saw Adele Hasn't Had Her Supper Yet (Nick Carter in Prague) the other day:
https://www.filmaffinity.com/en/film286364.html


I watched this one during this last Brutal Assault and it's fun!

We Need to Talk About Kevin - A truly miserable, awful film with no redeeming values. Pretty much everything was bad, from the stiff acting to the jumbled storytelling and almost nonexistent characterizations in a story that would seem to need better characters. Instead, this was just one terrible, grueling scene after another, a lot of misery with no payoff or point, and a lot of scenes that were truly irritating, ridiculous and dumb all at the same time. I can barely describe how much I hated this.

Gave Valerian a try and loved it. Makes me wish I saw it in the theater in 3d.

Man, I saw that movie and it stunk. So dumb and predictable with two unlikable leads and a trainwreck of a second half. $180 million down the toilet.

Watch The Toys That Made Us on Netflix. It shows that even the first Star Wars movie was a toy commercial--ushering in the modern era of product licensing for films.

People complain about something being a toy commercial, but any of us who grew up in the 80's or 90's have fond memories of those exact toy-or-gimmick-first franchises. BB-8 was obviously a toy first. That doesn't mean the movie is bad. Usually, having JJ Abrams or Michael Bay's name attached is all you need to know the movie is bad. Bah-zing.

Oh man, the leads were terrible. Jesus.

The intro sequence was the best thing about it.

Valerian was alright. Luc Besson really needs to hire a writer, he just has no ear for dialog whatsoever. Dane DeHaan is actually a really good actor (see the excellent A Cure for Wellness), Besson just gave him absolutely nothing to work with. Anyway, at least it was better than Jupiter Ascending.

Also, it cost a lot more than $180 million.

Whenever I'm feeling down I watch the Honest Trailers for this. I've never seen the movie, but I like to think it's just as entertainingly awful as that trailer makes it look.