Recently Seen in 2019

[ZooCougar]

Agreed that it's missing something - and I believe the thing it's missing is entertainment. It's basically a straight storytelling of something we mostly know all about. For me, what held my interest for awhile was the telling of the Mercury and Gemini programs and all that went wrong, along with what they learned. From there it was pretty much anticlimactic as well all know how it ended. It's a good watch if one is really into the science and details of the missions. Not so much for character and plot.

The movie was too Canadian.

 

[ZooCougar]

The director has proven to be capable enough with action films, hopefully he can improve a little in that regard. I thought his Kong flick was only ok, but still pretty watchable. He certainly seems to feel strongly about the MGS property.

I like very much the idea about Oscar Isaac but I guess they would make Solid Snake a little younger, most likely an origin story.

I get a bad feeling though that they’ll feel the need to make some of the characters more “hollywood”. Revolver Ocelot, Psycho Mantis, Liquid Snake, Big Boss, etc. can’t imagine them using some of the screwier names Kojima came up with.

Watched “The Man Who Killed Hitler and Then Killed Bigfoot” and it dawned on me that Sam Elliott ought to be Big Boss, or even and old Ocelot. That would be about perfect.

 

[nwhoopfan]

Never got around to seeing "Mortal Engines" while it was in theaters, just caught it on DVD. It's okay, nothing great. The book it was based on was somewhat mediocre as well, so it's not necessarily a case of being a bad adaptation. There were some significant changes from book to film that didn't seem necessary and weren't an improvement in storytelling or more streamlined I didn't think.

 

[Walker11]

I watched Triple Frontier last night on Netflix. It was o.k. but I felt like it lost steam halfway through. Like everyone else, I really like Pascal and Isaac. It was worth watching but very forgettable.

I also caught MI Fallout over the weekend and I thought it was overrated.

 

[Husky25]

I watched Triple Frontier last night on Netflix. It was o.k. but I felt like it lost steam halfway through. Like everyone else, I really like Pascal and Isaac. It was worth watching but very forgettable.

I also caught MI Fallout over the weekend and I thought it was overrated.

Did the same (Third Frontier). Downloaded it for the plane ride to FLA. I thought it spoiled itself, in that the ending was obvious with about 45 minutes to go. Afleck seemed miscast as well.

 

[nwhoopfan]

Some times I'll add a film to a list, figure I'll watch it eventually but have a hard time actually getting around to it. If it comes from Netflix I kind of have to force myself to so I can send it back and move on to the next flick. Had one of those, "Columbus." I like Haley Lu Richardson, John Cho and Parker Posey, so it had that going for it. I've watched plenty of slow paced, character driven indies. This was beyond slow paced, this was glacial. Almost nothing happened. There wasn't much character development. More than 1 long lingering shot of a character just sitting there, doing nothing. Looking out a window, or smoking a cigarette, or...? I almost shut it down several times, it was hard to get thru. If you like architecture it might float your boat. Apparently the small town of Columbus, Indiana is well known for its architecture that is completely beyond what you would expect for a town of that size. Posey had a small role and they did the nearly impossible of making her uninteresting and generic, literally any actress could've played that role. Cho's character was fairly dull and hard to connect to. Richardson fortunately breathed life into the film, I think she's fantastic. She's on the borderline now of needing to move on from playing teenagers (she's 24 now, although this was filmed in 2017). I'm looking forward to seeing her career develop. This is not at all meant as an endorsement of the film, it was just barely interesting enough to stick with, and that was because of one character only.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

I watched Triple Frontier last night on Netflix. It was o.k. but I felt like it lost steam halfway through. Like everyone else, I really like Pascal and Isaac. It was worth watching but very forgettable.

I also caught MI Fallout over the weekend and I thought it was overrated.

I liked it a little more than you did. Similar to a lot of Netflix content, the writing and editing was a little lazy. They go through all this trouble to set up the heist, and present the team as super-disciplined and efficient, but then have them start making huge mistakes 10 minutes into the heist. Either tease that those kind of mistakes are possible, or don't have the characters make them. This is Writing 101 kind of stuff.

I was willing to look past that, and liked the movie right up to the last 5-10 minutes. I didn't hate the ending, but I thought it was a little cheesy.

Still, I would recommend Triple Frontier to anyone looking for a simple, fun, action flick.

The acting was fine. Pascal better cash in soon, because he looks like he is aging in dog years.

 

[Deepster]

Watched Triple Frontier this weekend. Meh. Called a good chunk of the final outcome halfway through to where my girlfriend asked if I had already seen it.

I feel like non-networks really pushed creativity for a while with the Sopranos, Breaking Bad, The Wire, etc. Over time, they really made the half hour NBC sitcom or hour long cop drama almost obsolete. I wonder if the pendulum has swung now where the non-networks are really pushing out a lot of crappy content and what lies ahead.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Re: Triple Frontier

Spoiler

To all the Nostradamuses claiming they called the ending...it was a heist film. The plot is going to be linear, and either they get away or they don't. What are the other options? As for Affleck's character dying, he is even money to die whenever he is in an ensemble cast.

 

[Deepster]

Re: Triple Frontier

Spoiler

To all the Nostradamuses claiming they called the ending...it was a heist film. The plot is going to be linear, and either they get away or they don't. What are the other options? As for Affleck's character dying, he is even money to die whenever he is in an ensemble cast.

I don't claim the prediction as being something extraordinary. If anything, it's an insult to how rudimentary the plot was.

Spoiler

I also called the kid in the yellow shirt coming back to kill Affleck, the helicopter not being able to carry the money over the mountains and the helicopter crashing. For what it's worth.

 

[ZooCougar]

Triple Canopy was really bland. They spent money on an A List cast but they should have bought a better script.

 

[Waquoit]

I wonder if the pendulum has swung now where the non-networks are really pushing out a lot of crappy content and what lies ahead.

I caught what I guess was supposed to be a comedy-mystery with Jeff Garlin on Netflix. The timing was so bad that the few laughs really didn't land. Clearly done on the cheap, it makes me question other Netflix content. I haven't watched an original since.

 

[Husky25]

Re: Triple Frontier

Spoiler

To all the Nostradamuses claiming they called the ending...it was a heist film. The plot is going to be linear, and either they get away or they don't. What are the other options? As for Affleck's character dying, he is even money to die whenever he is in an ensemble cast.

Spoiler

There is a third option, which is get away with it, but not get to enjoy the fruits of their labor. Not entirely anyway. When the meticulous planner who never misses a hard out, misses his own hard out you absolutely can foresee a successful failure situation.

Also the helicopter detail. No way they all don't know the weight capacity and altitude requirements of or for the aircraft well in advance.

They left themselves an out for a sequel, I'm not sure there is much opportunity.

 

[Husky25]

While I was in FL, I stumbled across a 6 part mini-series called Bad Blood on Netflix that would be a 4.5 hour movie, running time. It's apparently based on real events about the Rizzuto crime family in Montreal. Very well done with Paul Sorvino, Anthony LaPaglia, and Kim Coates.

Also saw Paddleton, which is a dark drama starring Mark Duplass and Ray Romano. It's about two awkward friends and one of them is diagnosed with cancer. The laughter is few and far between, but the story was complex and compelling. Romano has developed into an above average dramatic entertainer.

 

[dbmill]

While I was in FL, I stumbled across a 6 part mini-series called Bad Blood on Netflix that would be a 4.5 hour movie, running time. It's apparently based on real events about the Rizzuto crime family in Montreal. Very well done with Paul Sorvino, Anthony LaPaglia, and Kim Coates.

Also saw Paddleton, which is a dark drama starring Mark Duplass and Ray Romano. It's about two awkward friends and one of them is diagnosed with cancer. The laughter is few and far between, but the story was compelling. Romano has developed into an above average dramatic entertainer.

I thought Ray Romano did very well in a supporting role in "The Big Sick".

 

[Mano]

I haven't seen Triple Frontier yet, but it seems to be continuing the pattern of Netflix buying up fringe movies that don't have much of a chance in the normal studio system as they likely wouldn't be big BO winners because they would either need to be massively retooled or heavily marketed, then loading them up with big talent while looking the other way on their shortcomings. Someone somewhere listed it out, but Bright, Cloverfield, Bird Box, Triple Frontier, The Titan, Hold the Dark and others I'm missing. Wish they would do more Roma's where they give the means to true talents than this frivolous stuff.

 

[nwhoopfan]

Someone somewhere listed it out, but Bright, Cloverfield, Bird Box, Triple Frontier, The Titan, Hold the Dark and others I'm missing. Wish they would do more Roma's where they give the means to true talents then this frivolous stuff.

Bright had potential, I was excited to see it, but my goodness that was so clunky. Just terrible.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Bright had potential, I was excited to see it, but my goodness that was so clunky. Just terrible.

Watership Down should have been impossible to screw up, yet it ended up kind of awkward because the animation was so bad.

 

[Mano]

The Wolfman - Actually saw this some time ago and was reminded of that. Wasn't too bad for a while, but the predictable conclusion and climactic fight was kind of laughable.

Midnight Run - Saw this was playing one night and decided to record it since it seemed to be so highly regarded by some posters in the Tourney thread. It was ok. I was likely too young when it first came out, but I could see how it would've had a bigger impact then. De Niro and Grodin's rapport was pretty engaging and it had it's moments of levity.

Overlord - I loved the direction this one was going in. The buildup, the setting, set and costume design, the intrigue of the first two acts, and then it got to its climax. While serviceable, it was just missing something. Still, very much worth watching if the subject matter grabs you.

 

[nwhoopfan]

The trailers for "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" didn't really interest me. Saw mostly really good reviews for it though, so I reconsidered. Watched it on DVD tonight. Really different than any comic book/superhero based movie previously. Definitely enjoyed it. Visually very inventive, good story line, good vocal cast (I didn't recognize some of the voices and was surprised to find out at the end who they were--although Nic Cage was 100% pure Nic Cage, so there was no mistaking him).

 

[nwhoopfan]

Finally saw "Aquaman." Entertaining, a bit goofy, also really convoluted plot and a very busy movie, so much going on, sometimes it was hard to follow everything on the screen. Jason Momoa is certainly charismatic and pulled off the lead role well. Amber Heard looks nice as a red head.

A bit of a side track. I know there was a fair bit of chatter (both before and after its release) about the size of the main character's eyes in "Alita: Battle Angel." Uh...did you the size of Black Manta's helmet? I couldn't get past that. Maybe it's consistent with the comic character, but it was just so freaking big. To me he looked like he got lost and was actually supposed to be villain in a Power Rangers show.

Dolph Lundgren is having a bit of a career revival. Between this and the Creed sequel he's been more visible recently than he has been for decades (other than some of the Expendables flicks I don't recall seeing him anything).

IMO DC is doing a much, much better job with their solo movies than the team ups. Batman vs. Superman and Justice League were both steaming piles of garbage. Man of Steel, Wonder Woman and Aquaman have at least been decent. They have so much material to draw from, they really should be expanding their cinematic universe. And where are all their villains? We got fairly weak attempts at Lex Luther and Joker, but there have to be some more main bad guys they haven't brought to screen yet.


edit--did they steal the Kraken from Clash of the Titans?


another edit--frickin' sharks with frickin' lasers attached to their heads; sorry Dr. Evil, those Atlanteans put you to shame!

 

[Deepster]

Saw Mommy Dead and Dearest on HBO. Documentary about Gypsy Rose Blanchard who, along with her boyfriend, killed her mother. The story is beyond bizarre with the mother having Munchausen by proxy syndrome. Wait til you see what she put her daughter through over the years. Insanity.

 

[nwhoopfan]

The new Mary Poppins movie got me curious to see the original. I know I've seen it, but probably not for 30 years or more. I basically only remember a couple of the songs from it. Movies were just made so differently back then. The pacing, the cinematography, the acting, everything. I have a bit of a hard time with it.

Anyway, the thing that really jumped out at me is that the King Candy character from Wreck it Ralph is a dead ringer sound alike for Uncle Albert. Turns out that was exactly what they were going for, the character even bears a resemblance to actor/comedian Ed Wynn. Alan Tudyk did a great job with that impersonation. So I learned something new today.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct...6-2ijn4.html&usg=AOvVaw0990ZRrLpIejDlbFXN32Au

 

[Mano]

American Assassin - Barely, barely, above direct to DVD quality. Looked like they had semi-high hopes for the script and thusly gave it a decent production budget which allowed for some quality international location filming. But the intrigue within the plot never materialized and altogether it was a pretty by the numbers spy/thriller flick.

The Meg - Zoocougar's description is apt, but I think he liked it a bit more than I did:

I saw the latest Transporter sequel. This time Jason Statham battles against giant sharks. It’s decent.

Mary Poppins Returns - If it were just me and the wife watching I probably wouldn't have dug it as much, but seeing how taken with it and the sense of wonder and awe at times that my kids had while watching added a lot to our viewing. Super derivative of the original but it was a pretty sweet film while not being too saccharine.

 

[Letsgohuskies11]

Anyone see "Us"? Saw it Saturday night, thought it was pretty good. Felt more like a black mirror episode