Recently Watched Movies 2021

[Mano]

Source Code - I've been trying to track down some movies I've missed over the years while we've been in this pandemic and I finally caught up to Source Code. It was enjoyable Sci-Fi, interesting hook, and I like the possibility they opened up in the end. Time travel is always tricky but this one handled it pretty well.

The Gentlemen - Guy Ritchie in his London gangster wheelhouse is usually a snappy, watchable affair. I had a good time. Even if the hip-hop hoods didn't make much sense (how on earth did they turn around and edit their videos so quickly?).

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - Been on a bit of a Fincher kick lately having recently rewatched Social Network, Dragon Tattoo, Gone Girl and Zodiac. Tried to watch this a loooooong time ago when it came out with the wife but she wasn't into it, don't know why I never returned. Silly premise aside I liked it a lot.

21 Bridges - This was one of the most cliche ridden movies I've seen in a long time. Straight shooting lone wolf detective who never misses and always gets his man is embroiled in an investigation thats transparently obvious from the jump. He must then risk his own reputation and life in order to expose those behind it. We've all seen this a million times before.

I Care A Lot - Quality filmmaking at first with how they manage to get you to viscerally hate Rosamund Pike's character. I thought it fell apart a bit with how inept Peter Dinklage's gangster underlings were.

Richard Jewell - Paul Walter Hauser is a really talented actor who I'll be watching out for more and more in the years to come. He was great in I, Tonya and really good in this too. I probably would've skipped this if not for his involvement. Rockwell was very good too.

Coming 2 America - Light on the funny, heavy on the meh. Just didn't do much for me. I did enjoy the nod to Trading Places tho.

mid90s - Very nostalgia inducing what with the music and setting. A lot to relate to even if I wasn’t a skater boi. More than a little weird when the lead (who would’ve been 12yo at most while filming, maybe even 11!) was making out with a 28yo actress. Quality directing debut for Jonah Hill.

Fighting With My Family - I am the furthest thing from a professional wrestling fan but it was a decent "sports" flick. Florence Pugh was my reason for entry.

 

[nwhoopfan]

Tonight tried something different. A fantasy thriller called Night Watch (2004). It‘s a Russian film and part one of a trilogy. Available on Starz. It’s an interesting take on the supernatural. Others exist among us, witches, vampires, seers, etc. They choose light or dark and there is a night watch (light) and day watch (dark) that polices the other side to avoid interference. Not a big budget film, no CGI etc. but it’s a solid story. It’s dubbed, but I’d prefer it wasn’t since I rely on captions anyway. If you like this kind of thing, it’s pretty cool. Side comment, Russian girls are hot.

I saw that a long time ago. I can't even remember if I saw the second one, but I definitely never finished the trilogy. I do remember it being interesting. The director got his shot at a big Hollywood production w/ the James McAvoy/Angelina Jolie action flick "Wanted."

 

[HuskyHawk]

Coming 2 America. Really a slow start, with several penis and vagina jokes that just fell flat. It picks up and becomes enjoyable, largely as a nostalgia piece. Some laughs, but it's not wildly funny. The older princess is a knockout. The middle princess is Eddie's actual daughter, has very few lines. It was cool that they got almost everybody from the original back for this one. Wesley Snipes was great casting for the rival warlord.

 

[nwhoopfan]

There are countless rom coms, hard to do anything that hasn't already been done before. So for me it comes down to if I enjoy the characters. Watched "The Broken Hearts Gallery" and I found it quite entertaining. So what if most of the characters were over the top quirky, it was fun. The lead is Geraldine Viswanathan, who I'd see previously in "Blockers." Most of the rest of the cast was unknown to me, which was okay. Of course I knew Bernadette Peters (come on she is not over 70 years old, get out of here!). Suki Waterhouse appeared in a few scenes and looked pretty and hardly said anything, that seems to be what she does. And then there's Molly Gordon, I love her, I think she steals pretty much everything she's in, should be a much bigger name than she is.


And I don't need to use my standard diatribe. This pretty much centered around 3 roommates, the actresses are between mid 20s to about 30ish, and they were all playing characters of about that age. No 25 or 30 year old high school sophomores in this one!

 

[dbmill]

My Favorite Year (1982) - This movie was produced by Mel Brooks and directed by Richard Benjamin. Brooks was a writer for Sid Caesar’s “Your Show of Shows” in the 1950’s, and that background provides the basic framework for this film, with Joe Bologna playing a Sid Caesar type star of a live television variety/comedy show from the 1950’s. The name star of this film is Peter O’Toole, who plays an Errol Flynn type, a flamboyant drunken swashbuckling movie star whose career is pretty much washed up due to his unreliability and drunkenness who has agreed to appear on the television show. A young writer on the show who seems to be a part composite of Brooks and Woody Allen (who also was a writer on “Your Show of Shows") is assigned the task of basically babysitting O’Toole’s character in terms of keeping him pretty much sober, out of trouble, and make sure he actually arrives for rehearsals and the actual show when it goes on the air. This task forms the bulk of the film, and the babysitting assignment is not exactly an easy one. This film provides O’Toole with a memorable role, as well as a good one for Bologna as well. Most pleasing is what happens on stage when show time finally arrives towards the end of the film. My wife and I quite enjoyed this comedy.

 

[Dove]

Walkaway Joe (2020) - David Straithairn, Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Julian Federstar in a nice little movie about a wayward kid with inherited excellence in billiards. His day runs off again so his son chases him. Along the way he meets Straithairn.

Definitely an enjoyable watch.

Best in Show (2000) - Overall, I found this movie pretty dumb but had some good lols. Fred Willard saying, "That's one happy fella!" killed me.

Directed by Christopher Guest, I felt him and Eugene Levy were the best performances with John Michael Higgins killing it as an overflamboyant dog owner.

My sister in law kept bugging us to see it and my wife and I overall think it failed the hype.

 

[storrsroars]

My Favorite Year (1982) - This movie was produced by Mel Brooks and directed by Richard Benjamin. Brooks was a writer for Sid Caesar’s “Your Show of Shows” in the 1950’s, and that background provides the basic framework for this film, with Joe Bologna playing a Sid Caesar type star of a live television variety/comedy show from the 1950’s. The name star of this film is Peter O’Toole, who plays an Errol Flynn type, a flamboyant drunken swashbuckling movie star whose career is pretty much washed up due to his unreliability and drunkenness who has agreed to appear on the television show. A young writer on the show who seems to be a part composite of Brooks and Woody Allen (who also was a writer on “Your Show of Shows") is assigned the task of basically babysitting O’Toole’s character in terms of keeping him pretty much sober, out of trouble, and make sure he actually arrives for rehearsals and the actual show when it goes on the air. This task forms the bulk of the film, and the babysitting assignment is not exactly an easy one. This film provides O’Toole with a memorable role, as well as a good one for Bologna as well. Most pleasing is what happens on stage when show time finally arrives towards the end of the film. My wife and I quite enjoyed this comedy.

Enjoyable film for sure. O'Toole was great.

As a sidenote, Lainie Kazan had a Playboy spread in the early 70s. Was an absolute knockout. I'd lost track of her and saw she was in MFY, so I was looking forward to seeing her again. Little did I know she'd doubled in size. But she was good in the role.

 

[Deepster]

Cherry - An Apple TV movie starring Tom Holland. He's an army vet who gets hooked on Oxy, then it spirals into an even worse situation. Really well done. The lighting throughout the whole movie is pretty cool and he impressed me with his range. And, I'll also say, the content is limited but everything I've watched on Apple TV has really been top notch. The Morning Show, Greyhound, the Beastie Boys doc, Servant, Ted Lasso and now this? I have Apple Music and got TV free for a year and really enjoyed it.

 

[Bomber36]

Cherry - An Apple TV movie starring Tom Holland. He's an army vet who gets hooked on Oxy, then it spirals into an even worse situation. Really well done. The lighting throughout the whole movie is pretty cool and he impressed me with his range. And, I'll also say, the content is limited but everything I've watched on Apple TV has really been top notch. The Morning Show, Greyhound, the Beastie Boys doc, Servant, Ted Lasso and now this? I have Apple Music and got TV free for a year and really enjoyed it.

Enjoyed this one so much I bought the book.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

I Care A Lot - Quality filmmaking at first with how they manage to get you to viscerally hate Rosamund Pike's character. I thought it fell apart a bit with how inept Peter Dinklage's gangster underlings were.

I can't remember hating the end of a movie as much as I hated the end of this one.

 

[nwhoopfan]

"Promising Young Woman" looked potentially interesting from the trailers. It wasn't exactly what I expected, the ending in particular took a twist. Briefly, no spoiler because it's in the trailers, Carey Mulligan goes out to clubs and bars at night pretending to be totally wasted, waits to see what guy will swoop in to take advantage of her, then turns the tables on him. The movie unfolds at a fairly slow pace, revealing why she does this. At first her actions seem random but then she becomes more focused on certain individuals relating to her past. Mulligan's performance was intriguing. It was tough seeing many actors/actresses I like in unsympathetic roles. I would say it was worth a watch.

While it's certainly different, I can't help compare it to "Joker" at least a little bit. I tried w/ that one, but was bored out of my mind w/in 30 minutes and could not care less about the central character, so I shut it down. I think in both we have a "protagonist" acting in a psychopathic manner. As we learn how and why they behave this way we are supposed to sympathize and maybe even feel they are justified in their actions. Since I couldn't finish "Joker" and stayed interested in this one throughout, I'd say "Promising Young Woman" did a better job of carrying this out.

Reminded me just a tad bit of "Miss Meadows" also, probably very little seen movie starring Katie Holmes.

 

[HuskyHawk]

So here it is Zac Snyder’s Justice League 2021. So I will start by saying I didn’t really understand that this is only sort of a new movie. It’s the footage Snyder shot for Justice League, plus a bunch of new footage. It’s astonishingly long. Four hours. That’s neither a complement nor necessary. Two useful tools were available, editing, which the early part of the film could use, and breaking it into two parts. Both would have worked here. So, that aside, is it better than the earlier version? It’s vastly better. The DC movies aside from the Dark Knight trilogy and Wonder Woman have done a crap job at character building. Man of Steel was ok. But here we get Cyborg and The Flash, who didn’t get their own movie first.

So, Ben Affleck is a decent “old“ Bruce Wayne. It works. The rest if the cast is good. The story, finally has the massive plot holes filled and begins to make some sense. Momoa is a cool Aquaman (and Amber Heard is just stunning as Meera) and I wish his character had a better deep dive. Can I recommend this? If you like the characters and these kinds of movies and have four whole hours, yes. Otherwise, no. They did set up a scenario that may be a bit more interesting moving forward. Seems they are finally getting it.

 

[Deepster]

Best in Show (2000) - Overall, I found this movie pretty dumb but had some good lols. Fred Willard saying, "That's one happy fella!" killed me.

Directed by Christopher Guest, I felt him and Eugene Levy were the best performances with John Michael Higgins killing it as an overflamboyant dog owner.

My sister in law kept bugging us to see it and my wife and I overall think it failed the hype.

Completely disagree on this one. A must watch any time I channel surf onto it.

The busy bee? C'mon. Iconic.

 

[dbmill]

Completely disagree on this one. A must watch any time I channel surf onto it.

The busy bee? C'mon. Iconic.

"Best in Show" is one of the best of the Christopher Guest and company mocumentaries. I like it quite a bit, and my wife just adores it.

 

[Dove]

Completely disagree on this one. A must watch any time I channel surf onto it.

The busy bee? C'mon. Iconic.

That couple was wildly annoying.

I liked when the Catherine Ohara character kept bumping into ex flings. And the utility closet scene was off the charts.

 

[Deepster]

That couple was wildly annoying.

I liked when the Catherine Ohara character kept bumping into ex flings. And the utility closet scene was off the charts.

Fred Willard is worth the watch alone.

 

[Tommyboy]

Saw Love and Monsters tonight. After the turd that was Monster Hunters, I really enjoyed L&M. It is a lot of fun and has some great moments. The lead actor is pretty good as is Michael Rooker in a small part.

 

[nwhoopfan]

Mayhem (2017). Fairly gonzo B grade dark comedy/action flick/revenge drama. Another take on the "rage virus" idea. A large law firm suffers an outbreak, the building is locked down and all kinds of carnage and chaos erupts. Several subplots going on. Decent for what it was. Good production values for a low budget film. Filmed in Serbia, a large portion of the cast and crew are Serbs I would guess by seeing the names in the credits. The only person I was familiar with is Samara Weaving, I'm definitely a fan. She keeps ending up in these kind of movies (I saw Guns Akimbo, didn't see Ready or Not). Definitely some violence and gore, if that's not your thing skip it.

 

[nwhoopfan]

I don't think I've mentioned this one before. I've seen before it but it's been a long time. "Journey to the West." Based on Chinese legends. Directed by Stephen Chow, although he doesn't appear as an actor in this one (seems like he's left that behind). I don't think it measures up to his best, Kung Hustle or Shaolin Soccer. It's a strange movie, but he's got such a visual flair and such a unique way of bringing a film to the screen. Definitely entertaining IMO.

 

[Deepster]

Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012 - Netflix) - Coming of age drama. Emma Watson and Paul Rudd had supporting roles, I didn't recognize the main character. Pretty standard beginning about an awkward freshman in high school figuring things out and finding a group of "misfits" he fits in with. Takes a twist from there that's really well done. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

 

[dbmill]

Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012 - Netflix) - Coming of age drama. Emma Watson and Paul Rudd had supporting roles, I didn't recognize the main character. Pretty standard beginning about an awkward freshman in high school figuring things out and finding a group of "misfits" he fits in with. Takes a twist from there that's really well done. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

In the area of coming to age high school movies in the last decade, my top three favorites are "Perks of Being a Wallflower", "Me, Earl, and the Dying Girl", and "Lady Bird".

 

[HuskyHawk]

So SAS: Red Notice (2021). This stars Sam Heughan from Outlander. It is sort of Jason Bourne meets Die Hard. It is lacking the humor Bruce Willis brought to Die Hard. Sam's character is, for most of the film, not particularly likable. He's more likable than the bad guys, so there's that. They establish the bad guys, mercenaries called Black Swans, via some dirty work they do (at the behest of the British government, off books of course). Plausible? Not really. Then of course they are exposed by cell phone video and become international criminals. They enact an elaborate plan to get revenge on those that hired them. Sam is an SAS guy who gets caught up, and like Bruce Willis in Die Hard, tries to foil their plan while saving the woman he loves.

It's not particularly good. It's just not that well done. I'd give this a 2/4, as it is at least watchable.

 

[nwhoopfan]

I'm switching back and forth between streaming platforms, Netflix and Amazon. Get bored w/ one, go back to the other. So I watched "The Map of Tiny Perfect Things" that came out a few months ago. Yes, it's a "stuck in a time loop" scenario, and yes it's been done many times before. So has time travel, or people switching places w/ each other/body swap, and probably a bunch of other plot devices. You can still tell a unique story with interesting characters within that framework. And I felt like this did. It was a bit slow to start, and dragged a bit a few times, but overall I was entertained and enjoyed it. I continue to be a fan of Kathryn Newton. If you're gonna get stuck in a time loop, there's worse people to be stuck with.

 

[Dove]

Unhinged (2020) - Russell Crowe plays a road ragin' psychopath who targets a mom because she didn't give him a courtesy tap on the horn. Physically, he is huge (read: fat) and is totally psycho.

The ending has a need for suspension of belief.

 

[8893]

Unhinged (2020) - Russell Crowe plays a road ragin' psychopath who targets a mom because she didn't give him a courtesy tap on the horn. Physically, he is huge (read: fat) and is totally psycho.

The ending has a need for suspension of belief.

Is it any good? Did you like it?