Recently Watched Movies 2023 | Page 8 | The Boneyard

Recently Watched Movies 2023

Hell or High Water (2016)- Just watched it again and I'm reminded of how much I love this movie. One of the best movies I remember of the past 5-10 years.

Barbarian (2022)- Started off great and the second half started off genuinely great and creepy but then it got dumbed down and too campy for me. I'm sure some people will love it but I wish it continued on the trajectory it was on.
 
Spider-Man - Across the Spiderverse. Sequal to a really good animated Spider-Man movie a few years back. This one again features Miles Morales as SpiderMan, Gwen Stacey as Spider-woman from a different universe, and many other spider people from alternative universes. Some of these are quite clever and they have a lot of fun with it. This is clearly a nod to comic books, and the art in particular. The characters are drawn in a wide range of styles. We've got a cool Indian Spider-man who lives in a hybrid of Mumbai and Manhattan. We've got an awesome punk rock Spiderman, including guitar, named Hobie, who is voiced by Daniel Kaluuya. It's complicated of course, as any of these multi-universe things are, but the ride is certainly enjoyable. It does run a bit long, the longest U.S. animated movie ever.
 
Antman...Quantumania...etc etc. I didn't have high expectations, but I watched it anyway. I think Marvel has painted themselves into a corner. They can't get themselves out of the multiverse now, but none of the movies involving it have really worked IMO. I should probably tap out instead of getting frustrated with the direction they are going.

The movie certainly had a lot of color, and just a lot of stuff going on all over the screen. About half of the movie seemed like an extremely extended cantina scene from Star Wars. And not in a good way.
 
nwhoopfan said:
Antman...Quantumania...etc etc. I didn't have high expectations, but I watched it anyway. I think Marvel has painted themselves into a corner. They can't get themselves out of the multiverse now, but none of the movies involving it have really worked IMO. I should probably tap out instead of getting frustrated with the direction they are going.

The movie certainly had a lot of color, and just a lot of stuff going on all over the screen. About half of the movie seemed like an extremely extended cantina scene from Star Wars. And not in a good way.
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Too much CGI - I found the movie physically tiring. Marvel needs to go back and watch Iron Man and the original Avengers to see how the characters should drive the movie, not the special effects
 
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018)

Another vignette from the Coen Brothers, this time featuring six chapters that take place in the Wild West.

The first chapter, "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs" was absurd, funny and visually stunning but as the film moved on the chapters got darker and bleaker.

Overall, a beautiful piece of film, but not for me. Felt pretty unsettled after, but I guess that was the point.
 
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The Inspection (2022) - Almost changed the channel but kept watching. Pretty good movie. Gay black kid with an ***hole mom signs up with the Marines. Graduates boot camp while surviving the backlash of the platoon.
 
Avatar: The Way of Water

Was expectinh this to be a weak sequel but was very surprised at how great the movie was. Thoroughly enjoyed this one despite it being one hour too long..
 
HuskyHawk said:
Shazam 2. The first Shazam was an unexpected treat. Quite funny and Zach Levi did a great job as a kid thrust into the role of adult superhero. Shades of Big. One of the best DC movies. This one falls a bit flat. It has some funny moments, and it's a nice family movie in the PG13 sense. Plenty of silly CGI action and good villains in Helen Mirren and Lucy Liu. There's more coming of age high school awkwardness and angst here, plus the older foster sister Mary, being a 20s age person dealing with kids and missing her own age group. She's the only one without two actors for the role. Looked at that way, it works well enough.
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Yeah, this one was a "meh" for me. The adults pretending to be dorky 12 year olds gets old really fast.
 
nomar said:
Wanted to like this but, unfortunately, didn’t. Not terrible, just not very good IMO.

Worst movie I’ve seen recently: 65, starring Adam Driver.
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Completely agree. 65 is a dud. I could write a number of paragraphs describing how bad it is, but I don't want to spend time thinking about it. Don't watch it.
 
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Avatar. The way of water. (2022)

It is beautiful. Stunning. Incredible movie making on the largest scale possible. All these things are wasted by a long, long, long, boring predictable plot that treads the same ground as the first film --except everyone get wet.
 
"Wildflower" is just available on Hulu. I saw a preview fairly recently, looked interesting. I think it had a very limited theatrical release. Starring Kiernan Shipka. A bit like "CODA," but instead of deaf parents it's disabled parents that she is basically taking care of and raising instead of the other way around. I thought it was really good. Some of the cast I didn't know, but some familiar faces--Alexandra Daddario, Charlie Plummer, Jean Smart, Jacki Weaver, Brad Garrett. The young actress they got to play a younger version of Shipka, Ryan Kiera Armstrong, did a really good job I thought.
 
Blood Vessel. Low budget horror movie with a different premise. Near the end of WWII several people are on a lifeboat in the North Atlantic. Mix of Americans, Brits a Russian and an Aussie. They encounter a ship and are able to board. It’s a Nazi ship, empty. Those with good eyes will see the Nazi occult logos. Don‘t want to spoil it from there. This wasn’t bad at all. Cast is decent and they made the budget work.
 
HuskyHawk said:
Blood Vessel. Low budget horror movie with a different premise. Near the end of WWII several people are on a lifeboat in the North Atlantic. Mix of Americans, Brits a Russian and an Aussie. They encounter a ship and are able to board. It’s a Nazi ship, empty. Those with good eyes will see the Nazi occult logos. Don‘t want to spoil it from there. This wasn’t bad at all. Cast is decent and they made the budget work.
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NEVER board an abandoned vessel, whether it be the ocean, deep space, or anywhere else! Nothing good ever comes from it.
 
formerlurker said:
I don't feel like scrolling through 9 pages to see if this has been mentioned but this is a really solid rainy/smoky day flick when you're glued to the couch.

Yup, you don't f around with action Allison Janney.



I'm praying for the sequel.
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OK its on my list, along with your reputation

Just kidding, at least you didn't recommend Avatar.
 
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NEforceUConn said:
OK its on my list, along with your reputation

Just kidding, at least you didn't recommend Avatar.
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I stand behind my recommendation.

Side note- I got through 4 minutes of the 1st Avatar blu-ray I bought at Costco when it was released and returned it the next day. Not for me.
 
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Ghosted (Apple). Dumb story, but dumb fun. Chris Evans does a good job playing an agriculturist who gets mistaken for a superspy. Ana de Armas really is a superspy who has to rescue him. Lots of action, much of it implausible, but some highlights are a bit where the world's top bounty hunters one-up each other, and a short but funny Ryan Reynolds cameo near the end. Wouldn't watch again, but it qualifies as solid mindless entertainment.
 
Plane. Gerard Butler, Mike Colter, the lovely Daniela Pineda, other people. The name of this movie stinks. It starts off pretty well. I recently watched a documentary about Malaysia flight 370. This mirrors that in some ways, with a plane disappearing from radar. From there it takes a twist that when I read about I thought "how lame", but the reality of it works much better. The vast thousands of islands in the Philippines means that some are barely governable. They land on one such island (where abductions of foreign nationals have occurred in recent years). Colter plays a guy who was a prisoner being extradited, who teams with Butler against the rebels. While the premise seemed ridiculous, it's actually not that implausible, and the story, acting and action are all pretty good. Better than expected.
 
The New King of Comedy - This is the latest movie by Stephen Chow. No magical realism in this one; it's like he's doing a Hallmark movie. I liked it, it was funny and had a happy ending.
 
Beast. Stars Idris Elba and Sharlto Copley, plus two younger girls as Elba's kids. Saw the trailer several times, thought it looked ridiculous. Another movie hindered by bad trailers and a bad name. Elba plays Dr. Nate Samuels, who is in Africa with his two daughters. Visiting the area where he met his wife, who recently died of cancer. Copley plays Martin, a long time friend of the family who knew Nate's wife from a young age. He works in a wildlife refuge and takes the family out to see wildlife etc. There's a very nice human relationship side of this with Dr. Nate, the kids and Martin. It's a compelling story and these are believable and likable characters. Poachers are in the area, and we end up with something a bit like Jaws, but with a Lion. There's tension throughout and the while some elements seem highly unlikely, it never crosses over to ridiculous. This was much better than I expected, I'd recommend it.
 
HuskyHawk said:
Spider-Man - Across the Spiderverse. Sequal to a really good animated Spider-Man movie a few years back. This one again features Miles Morales as SpiderMan, Gwen Stacey as Spider-woman from a different universe, and many other spider people from alternative universes. Some of these are quite clever and they have a lot of fun with it. This is clearly a nod to comic books, and the art in particular. The characters are drawn in a wide range of styles. We've got a cool Indian Spider-man who lives in a hybrid of Mumbai and Manhattan. We've got an awesome punk rock Spiderman, including guitar, named Hobie, who is voiced by Daniel Kaluuya. It's complicated of course, as any of these multi-universe things are, but the ride is certainly enjoyable. It does run a bit long, the longest U.S. animated movie ever.
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Love the first one and went to see the sequel recently w/ my daughter. Agree with everything you said...loved this one too.
 
Asteroid City - It's Wes Anderson so it gets at least 4 stars to begin with. It's another treat for the eyes and very funny. I'm not putting it in my WA Top 3 yet but I think I'm going to like it even more on repeat viewing. No Bill Murray, I think he would have been in the Tom Hanks role. And I've been a ScarJo fan since Ghost World and she kills it here.
 
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Waquoit said:
Asteroid City - It's Wes Anderson so it gets at least 4 stars to begin with. It's another treat for the eyes and very funny. I'm not putting it in my WA Top 3 yet but I think I'm going to like it even more on repeat viewing. No Bill Murray, I think he would have been in the Tom Hanks role. And I've been a ScarJo fan since Ghost World and she kills it here.
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Looking forward to seeing this one at some point. Yeah, I had noticed Bill Murray was not in it as well, so that is certainly different for a Wes Anderson movie.
 
The Lost King. I'm not sure how the Brits do this, but they have a gift for making these stories interesting and compelling. Sally Hawkis plays Philippa Langley, a woman who struggles to keep jobs due to some illness. Steve Coogan is her ex-husband. She's clearly smart and well educated. She attends a play, Richard III with her son. Becomes interested in the old dead King. Eventually finds a Richard III society, and does a lot of independent research, trying to find the truth of his story. Along the way she sees and talks to a ghostly version of him. His remains have never been found. She becomes convinced that she knows where his remains are, along with the lost Blackfriar's Church in Leicester. Against resistance she pushes for and gets funding for a dig, and sure enough, finds the church and his remains. The University of Leicester of course pushes her aside and claims credit. It's quite a nice story and film, based on a true story.
 
dbmill said:
Looking forward to seeing this one at some point. Yeah, I had noticed Bill Murray was not in it as well, so that is certainly different for a Wes Anderson movie.
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Apparently Bill got COVID and they couldn't wait for him to get better.
 
Waquoit said:
Apparently Bill got COVID and they couldn't wait for him to get better.
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Oops!! Covid ends another long run, this time of Bill Murray appearing in Wes Anderson films.
 
Waquoit said:
Asteroid City - It's Wes Anderson so it gets at least 4 stars to begin with. It's another treat for the eyes and very funny. I'm not putting it in my WA Top 3 yet but I think I'm going to like it even more on repeat viewing. No Bill Murray, I think he would have been in the Tom Hanks role. And I've been a ScarJo fan since Ghost World and she kills it here.
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Asteroid City

I concur with @Waquoit and his review. If you have any interest in Wes Anderson movies, this is a must-see.

Visually stunning, creatively stimulating and one of Anderson's deeper and more provoking movies maybe ever. I left entertained, however, confused in a good way. A+ ensemble cast.

In terms of WA Top-3, it's up there. Definitely Rushmore and The Life Aquatic are in the Top 3, can't commit on a the third one, but I loved this movie.
 
What? "Moonrise Kingdom" and "Grand Budapest Hotel" gotta be on Wes Anderson's best lists. "French Dispatch" easily the worst.
 
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