Thread: What are you watching?

Last night I watched this cool little horror flick directed by the same guy who also directed the first original 'Saw', James Wan.

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* Based on some true case files.

Last night I re-watched this gem (French flick), for the third time now:

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--------------- Click on ^ for just one review.

* Je recommande, beaucoup.

forbidden planet

the bestof the science fiction interstellar productions of the 50s

World Series tonight!

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* Total pure crap! ...Gimme my life back! ...That 90 minutes in time stolen from me.

Bob,

First I saw two bad movies. The Mummy Returns had nothing original or compelling in it. I never feared for the safety of the stars and can just appreciate special effects so much. Rachel Weitz was the only reason for watching, a great actress and a beautiful woman, but she is no action star. Here fight scenes were badly done.

And Jennifer Garner was in “The Odd Life of>>>” I forget, but I hope I can forget this entire boring movie. As you said, "Total pure crap! ...Gimme my life back!"


Bob you and I are about the same age, but I wonder if anyone else reading this is old enough to hate Top Gun, which I will try to watch this weekend. (World Series comes first).

The hatred has little to do with the movie although Tom Cruise is in it. If you were “into” stereo in the late 1980s this movie was on in every Audio and Video store on a continuous loop. First Audio stores, which sold quality two channel stereo components were separate from “video” stores that sold TVs, radios, Laser Discs and some inexpensive audio components. These stores have really merged, but before Home Theater and 5 channel sound they were mostly separate.

But both stores were moving into four channel sound, two in front and two in the back. (A fifth would be required when THX became popular) They were NOT discrete, but the signal for the back was carried in the stereo channels of the front.

But for ten years it seemed that EVERY store had this damn movie on, day in and day out, to show off the new stuff. Then, I thin k Terminator II became the favorite.

So I have avoided this movie but will try to watch it.

Barry, I'll be applying for my pension in 2015 (first quarter).

- 'The Mummy Returns'? ...Kid's stuff. ...Rachel Weitz; I like her, not in love with her but I like her.

- Jennifer Garner? ...Anything and everything she's in I stay away of.
...So I really doubt that I ever saw 'The Odd Life Of'

- 'Top Gun'? ...What's that? ...Any good? ...I only like the intro: the jet's take-off from the jet carrier ship. ...The rest is of no importance to me, now at my age, and even when younger because they made a big deal of it in playing it everywhere and all the time where they were selling large screen TVs and surround sound systems. ...I got sick of it!

- Tom Cruise; weird guy, and not a good actor. ...But rich!

- 'T2 - Judgement Day'? ...Not bad at all back then (Cameron & Arnold), but lost its sex appeal now.
...That was in the prehistoric age of cinema effect. ...Similar to 'Poltergeist' (Spielberg).

>>> Got everything on Blu, except Jennifer Garner's flick mentioned just above.

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Last night I re-watched (few times now) this Blu-ray flick; @ 3D ::: (Baz Luhrmann & Leonardo):

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* And I disagree with most movie reviewers; for me this is real scale cinema! ...Amazing pictures! ...Colors! ...Music! ...And all that jazz.

Last night I revisited this flick (on Blu) mainly for the picture quality, cinematography, sumptuous decors and locales, Angelina, and all that beautiful jazz.

* This is a very fine picture quality with very natural tones and colors (nature and human; trees, sky, faces, city, train, ...), and good details.
-> Good to calibrate your display.

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* The film itself (story, acting, ...); nothing to sweat about (low value). But it's all the surroundings, the cinematography, the photography, Angelina's beauty (very well photographed) here that is the main attraction.
...Tres tres naturel et remplie de purete; couleurs de tout. ...Meaning: Very natural and full of purity; colors of everything.

The music? Nothing memorable (James Newton Howard).

Last night I listened; I didn't watch this time. ...To this Blu-ray Audio, and the four CDs included in this Deluxe Edition ::

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=> The BD has two audio soundtracks, both recorded in hi-rez audio (lossless) Dolby TrueHD (192kHz-24-bit);
one in surround 5.1 and the other in stereo 2.0 hi-fi.
And the four CDs contain several takes, sessions, and the remastered 'Moondance'.

* You can click ^ on the above picture cover (as always) for some info plus one review from one reviewer (I mainly agree with him).

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Felt sleepy at times; no fireworks, no artifices, no magic, just old 1958 Halloweenish/cartoonish Ingmar Bergman's dark strange eerie atmospheric nightmarish introverted 'booms' in aurora borealis cold of the cinematic black and white night.

Not for everyone, mainly for people who are harrowing endlessly on lonely nights only.

Living Las Vegas....Love the sound track as well.

Hey, this thread is reserved, for me and Barry only.

Jk Paul, of course. ...Nice seeing you watching movies. ...And that's a very cool/powerful flick too.
...Directed/written and music composed by Mike Figgis. ...He did it all, except acting (actually he did that too in that flick; mobster #1). ...A complete type of guy.

La Notte (1961) - by Michelangelo Antonioni

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- For people who love to study the master on a study of noncommunication between empty and alienated people.
Not for the faint of heart or someone who easily fall in love with everyone and the entire universe.
Watch at your own perils of equilibrium.

Originally Posted by NorthStar

Hey, this thread is reserved, for me and Barry only.

Jk Paul, of course. ...Nice seeing you watching movies. ...And that's a very cool/powerful flick too.
...Directed/written and music composed by Mike Figgis. ...He did it all, except acting (actually he did that too in that flick; mobster #1). ...A complete type of guy.

I'm so sorry Bob............................................... .....

One Night Stand



Another Mike Figgis's .....

Wow, you like that guy! ...He's good too!

Thanx for the mention. I watching the seventh game of the World Series tonight!!!

Who's playing who?

I watched this last night; @ 3D :::

By the way:

Happy Halloween everyone, kids included!

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* Not as good as the other one which wasn't very good to start off with except for that little girl screaming (Boo),
but technically impeccable. Of course it's a PIXAR animation flick for kids (us).

I watched the first film ever directed by John Cassavetes (1959) last night, from this five-film boxset:

-- ______________________ This one:

------------------------------------------------------------- I enjoyed it; it had ^ natural panache.

--* And as usual, ^ it's a 'click-on' thing. ...Anywhere, everywhere; for info, and all ^ that cinematic jazz.

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* A 1968, 16mm (very grainy but 'clean' quality film grain) black & white flick.
...A character's study (lots of face's pictures; camera close-ups).

Punkin Chunkin on Science Channel!

Originally Posted by GaryProtein

Punkin Chunkin on Science Channel!

This show is crazy....in a good way....

Originally Posted by Mike

This show is crazy....in a good way....

If you think that's crazy, wait until next week when LDRS is on.

That's Large Dangerous Rocket Ships.

What could go wrong? It's a rocket!

Originally Posted by GaryProtein

If you think that's crazy, wait until next week when LDRS is on.

That's Large Dangerous Rocket Ships.

What could go wrong? It's a rocket!

We're all big kids at heart!

First Jennifer Garner:

She is certainly a pretty actress, but with a very limited range. I first saw her in “Catch Me If You Can” where she was attractive, but not convincing. She has a childish take to her that made he perfect for “13 going on 30.”

She was fine as Electra in Daredevil, where she met, fought, married and had children with Ben Affleck. First he knocks her down then he knocks her up. But she was unable to carry the movie. In fact, all super-hero movies have failed because of bad writing or an actress who cannot carry the part. (Supergirl, Catwoman and Electra.)

While she was very good in Juno, I notice she is NOT in big movies anymore, just smaller ones and often does not have a “lead” part. I think many people feel similar about her husband.

When I was watching the “Mummy Returns” and seeing all those scenes with thousands of fighters (CGI) UI started to think of the “spectaculars” of the 1950s and 1950s where they used thousands of extras. That, of course, quickly became too expensive and faded away.

So I turned on the blue ray of Ben-Hur, complete with 10 minutes of introduction and intermission music. I hadn’t seen this movie in 40 years, and NEVER on a big screen, just a small regular TV. Now that I understand that Boyd was given certain instructions on how to play his part, as a rejected gay potential lover, parts of the movie make better sense. He was told this by the director, Heston was not.

The movie is a bit corny if you are NOT religiously compelled by it and was interesting to watch. The Chariot race, made before CGI, is still great, but loses some impact because, frankly, we can visually do better these days. It was easy to see the blue screen parts and such, but it was fun.

The picture was fine but the sound is not great compared to the next two movies I saw.

The Life of Pi: A better movie than I expect, it is about a boy who survives a shipwreck and is left 277 in a lifeboat.

The 3D was some of the bet I ever saw and the surround sound was just incredible. I often say that good movies are always too short and bad ones were alays too long. But this was a good movie that could have been 15 shorter for me. I enjoyed the Rashomen and it was a good experience.
Iron Man tony stark.jpg
I fully reviewed Iron Man III at
Barry's Pearls of Comic Book Wisdom: Iron Man III: A Review and a Look back at the Comic, the Commies and the Mandarin

On second viewing, The movie is fine until last half hour where common sense leaves and CGI takes over. But a fun ride nevertheless.

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-> A 1974 flick (recorded in Mono, and also reproduced in original Mono audio: LPCM), about a realistic relationship between a man and a woman.
Starring 'Columbo' Peter Falk as one of the two main culprits.

Please don't watch this alone, but preferably with your better half (and no kids in the room).
Not for everyone (sensitive people who are easily affected by tumultuous exchanges between a couple).

well, it was a quiet night so i went to my bedroom Home Theatre and saw "This is Forty." it should be titled "This is Awful." It had grat potential and starts off very adult and potentially funny. But it ends up like a TV sitcom, with a similar structure to the movie "Parenthood" when everything, inexplicably, comes together at he end.

Barry, did you mean 'The 40-Year-Old Virgin' ?

No, but the same director (I think) did "This is Forty"

Originally Posted by Lefisc

No, but the same director (I think) did "This is Forty"

That's right; it is the same director, Judd Apatow. ... => Judd Apatow - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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* Filmed in 1976, and starring Ben Gazzara.
And two years later (1978), cut shorter by twenty-seven (27) minutes (most likely for TV showing).
I watched the original 1976's cut (135 minutes). ..I like Ben, as an actor.

Sigh, no baseball.

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* Filmed in 1977, and starring again Ben Gazzara, and John Cassavetes, the director himself is acting in it too.
{This was the last one from my boxset, and the most disturbing one too.}

...Only people from a higher learning of level caliber can watch in full security. ...It is truly that disturbing!
...Good thing it's only a film.

Still no baseball.

They lost the ball Barry?

I just saw the right stuff. Full report Tomorrow. tonight shield and ncis

Originally Posted by Lefisc

I just saw 'The Right Stuff'. Full report Tomorrow. tonight shield and ncis

Released today on Blu-ray (DigiBook). ...I'll pass on this one (got the DVD) for now, and I'll hit it at the right time and 'feel'. ...Important film, and with great cinematography.

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The Right Stuff is a good movie and a long one at 3 hours.

We accept distortion of the truth only in movies, we don’t accept it in books, documentaries, encyclopedia, yet many “truth life” movies bend it badly. For example, Argo’s ending never really happened in real life.

Here both Gus Grissom (because he was dead) and LBJ are cartoon characters of what they really were and that bothers me. Grissom was the only astronaut hosen for all three Space programs: Mercury, Gemini and Apollo. When his capsule was discovered just a few years ago, they learned that he was telling the absolute truth. In real life, no one disputed his claim, but this movie made him look a childish and inefficient.

Movies mean fictional. ...Not accurate reality, just interpreted depictions (the director's view). ...Books too (the writer).
The true reality is the one outside, in real life, surrounding us, and them. We can even touch it.
...And that, is our own right interpretation of the moment, and it can certainly change with time (our interpretation). And there as many interpretations as there are people witnessing one event; depending of our seat (viewpoint, angle, and distance from that event), and our rationality (way of thinking based on education and personal life's experience; uprising). ...Plus how we assimilate this with that, and how old we are, of course.
Because, with time we see more clearly too, we understand much more deeper and better, if we do take the time to do so, evidently. And what we narrate in our own words in books is just that, our own description with the vocabulary we're familiar with, and each person imagine in his own mind what each word means when put before and after another one.
We visualize the narration, the story, in our own mind with our own pictures.

And at just over 3 hours it still ain't LOTREE, at roughly 4 hours each one of the three in the trilogy. ...Pure fantasy though.

How long is a baseball game?

You mixing apples with oranges. A Baseball game is not a movie and it is a live event. Movies tend to be about two hours. Thirty years ago so were baseball games. But a Broadway show can be three hours, but that’s not a movie.

I went to the OED. A no time does it say a movie means fictional. In fact, documentaries are movies that are Not fictional.

No, Books are often meant to be factual. Fiction is fiction and nonfiction is nonfiction.

I am glad you are happy with your definition of reality. There is a lot of reality I cannot touch, I need reported to me or explained. And I want it accurate. Or as accurate as anyone can legitimately do.

There is a tremendous difference between a researcher trying hard to be factual and reporting it and someone making it up as he goes along. And let us NOT forget that many of the people in the Right Stuff were alive at the time the movie was made and could of and should have been sued for reference. They only picked on the guy, at the time, Gus Grissom, who died. And he died a hero!

History is rewritten all the time. There were hundreds of books out about how we won WWII by the 1970s. And many, many books about D-Day.

Then the Enigma Machine, the Ultra Secret was revealed. That is, we had broken the German codes and were aware of much of what they were doing and all those books on D Day were wrong. People had to write new books with the newly revealed information.

"Django Unchained" for me tonight

Originally Posted by Lefisc

You mixing apples with oranges. A Baseball game is not a movie and it is a live event. Movies tend to be about two hours. Thirty years ago so were baseball games. But a Broadway show can be three hours, but that’s not a movie.

I'm just making conversation Barry. ...A baseball game like you just said is a reality sport event.

I went to the OED. A no time does it say a movie means fictional. In fact, documentaries are movies that are Not fictional.

Documentaries aren't movies.

No, Books are often meant to be factual. Fiction is fiction and nonfiction is nonfiction.

Even factual books can be fictional (lots of examples here with non-accurate facts or twisted truth: lies).

I am glad you are happy with your definition of reality. There is a lot of reality I cannot touch, I need reported to me or explained. And I want it accurate. Or as accurate as anyone can legitimately do.

There is a tremendous difference between a researcher trying hard to be factual and reporting it and someone making it up as he goes along. And let us NOT forget that many of the people in the Right Stuff were alive at the time the movie was made and could of and should have been sued for reference. They only picked on the guy, at the time, Gus Grissom, who died. And he died a hero!

History is rewritten all the time. There were hundreds of books out about how we won WWII by the 1970s. And many, many books about D-Day.

Then the Enigma Machine, the Ultra Secret was revealed. That is, we had broken the German codes and were aware of much of what they were doing and all those books on D Day were wrong.
People had to write new books with the newly revealed information.

Just like I said before.

Originally Posted by TruthSpinner

"Django Unchained" for me tonight

That's a virulent/funny type of flick. ... Tarantula's tartar

Last night I revisited this 1956 flick by Kubrick ::

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It's not a baseball game; for me it is much more educational/essential. ...Sorry Barry, I'm just telling it like it is for me.

I watched the first Blu-ray disc last night; it's a 4-disc set with just over 640 minutes total (from the first season).
Oliver Stone is one of my favorite directors from the United States of America.
This is a Must See Documentary, for everyone living in this country and abroad.

It's an History school book, it's an essential read (vision).

I am not a fan of “lists” especially since everyone decided to have one on the internet. That, is, for me, there are great movies out there and there are more then 10, 15, or 25. I mean there might actually be 57 great movies but it has to be a round number.


And people get “great” confused with their favorites. One of my favorite movies is “The Summer of 42” but it is not necessarily a great movie. And when it comes to great movies, I don’t want to argue whether Casablanca was better than the Godfather, 2001 or Fantasia.


But last night I saw one of the greatest and moving movies of all time, “The Brest Years of Our Lives.” It is a totally absorbing, current, never outdated movie that draws you quickly and keeps you for almost three hours.


It is the story of three men, of three different economic and social backgrounds, returning from WW2. The opening scenes immediately shows you that now that the war is over, society thanked them and then pushed these men aside.


Homer, comes home having lost his hands in the war and he is played by a “new” actor who really did loses his hands during the war. What happens to him and to the others both breaks your heart and moves it. Dana Andrews plays a vet so important in the war, yet cannot find a job at home. And there is no one there to help him.


The issues they face are current, timeless. They talk throughout the movie that this will be the last war. Nuclear weapons are so terrible there can never be another. Yet, at the end they acknowledge that this is not true, there will be others and more men will have to go through this.


You can see this happening to the men who have returned from Korea, Viet Nam, Afghanistan, and Iraqi (twice).


If you haven’t seen this movie, please see it. Video and Sound are 4 and 3.5 out of five. I did not find the Blu ray to be much better than the DVD. It is in black and white, Full screen, mono, no LFE no nothing. But great writing and acting and directing are there and I have seldom been moved as much.

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