What was the last film you watched?

[citoyen]

The Girl With All The Gifts

Meh. I'd expected something a lot more interesting from the reviews but it's a fairly by-the-numbers modern zombie thing. Too much Basil Exposition stuff about why everyone has turned into zombies - not interested, just get on with blasting their heads off, please.

Sennia Nanua is very good though.

[andyoxon]

Whedon's Serenity - enjoyed it, almost Guardians-esque -without the aliens.

[T42]

Allende.  Waste of time: 10 minutes of content blown up into 90 minutes of rushing about and not-very-illuminating yakkity along the lines of "leave me!/I'll never leave you!/FFS get on with it".

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He dies at the end

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and they still don't say if he was murdered or topped himself

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and that pullover was just terrible.

[mrcharly-YHT]

Hidden Figures

I'm sure this was given a bit more fluff than needed - we didn't need the romantic side-story for example.
However the extremity of the truly ridiculous endemic racism imposed on these women was just ridiculous, offensive and makes you want to scream.

They overcame incredible obstacles to become truly amazing significant figures in the space race. Well worth watching.

[Kim]

Hidden Figures

I'm sure this was given a bit more fluff than needed - we didn't need the romantic side-story for example.
However the extremity of the truly ridiculous endemic racism imposed on these women was just ridiculous, offensive and makes you want to scream.

I didn't really like the caricature of 1960s racist NASA, which was by all accounts heavily embellished^[1] to make up for the lack of wider cultural context.  But that's because it was a story about the amazing women involved, not a documentary about 1960s NASA.

File with "The Right Stuff" for awesomeness and historical inaccuracy.


_{[1] http://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelfaces/hidden-figures/}

[T42]

Dr. Strangelove. Needs watching every 10 years.

The B52 sequences were excellent for the time, but lack of wing flex gives them away.

[Wascally Weasel]

Hidden Figures

I'm sure this was given a bit more fluff than needed - we didn't need the romantic side-story for example.
However the extremity of the truly ridiculous endemic racism imposed on these women was just ridiculous, offensive and makes you want to scream.

I didn't really like the caricature of 1960s racist NASA, which was by all accounts heavily embellished^[1] to make up for the lack of wider cultural context.  But that's because it was a story about the amazing women involved, not a documentary about 1960s NASA.

File with "The Right Stuff" for awesomeness and historical inaccuracy.


_{[1] http://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelfaces/hidden-figures/}

Having read the book "The Right Stuff" and Yeager's (ghostwritten) autobiography, it's kind of amusing how the film effectively recreates the very issues that Wolfe writes about in his book, namely the way the press oversells the daring of the original Mercury astronauts.

[Jakob]

Having read the book "The Right Stuff" and Yeager's (ghostwritten) autobiography, it's kind of amusing how the film effectively recreates the very issues that Wolfe writes about in his book, namely the way the press oversells the daring of the original Mercury astronauts.

Wolfe took the most amazing material and turned it into a boring pile of crap.

[Jaded]

Grimsby

I can see why Americans didn't like it. 

[fuzzy]

The Last Starfighter A revisit of more awesome 80's cheese

[mrcharly-YHT]

The Last Starfighter A revisit of more awesome 80's cheese

Excellent

I recommend you now sample 'Flight of the Navigator' and 'Short Circuit'.

[Kim]

'Short Circuit'.

Much as I loved it as a child, that one (and particularly the sequel) hasn't dated well.

[fuzzy]

'Short Circuit'.

"No dissasemble!"

[robgul]

Dunkirk. in 70mm. I'm a Nolan-sceptic.  He's got a huge talent and ego to match, that will often ruin things. I mostly went to see if for the 70mm experience.
I thought the trailers were a complete mess*, but this was easily one of the best movies I've seen in years, with jaw-dropping cinematography. (And a Hans Zimmer score that actually worked, rather than ruining things).

Absolutely awesome cinema experience that I doubt will carry through on the small screen.


*In context of the movie, the messiness of the trailers makes sense.

Hmm, I've just come home from the cinema having seen this film - I was tempted to ask for a refund it was so bad. 

Perhaps I'm old fashioned but some sort of story and/or structure would have been useful .... it was loads of dramatic film sequences linked together with Kenny Branagh standing on a pier that seemed to miraculously repair itself having been bombed to bits several times.

It would have been useful to have had some stuff about the why, the strategies that the operational command had in place and their implementation and co-ordination - think of the Battle of Britain film with the command people, Uxbridge bunker and the action stuff (and Susannah York's suspenders!)

The Mark Rylance sequences in his little boat worked - but even that wasn't an obvious fit.

It's worth watching the original Dunkirk film from 1958 which did illustrate the actual story in a realistic way.

To me it was an ego-trip for the film makers - some of the aero scenes verged on the ridiculous - the gliding Spitfire at the end looked line an Airfix kit superimposed on a picture of the sea (although you couldn't see the strings!)

Rob

[T42]

Couple of nights back, La Belle Histoire, being a 204-minute Claude Lelouche assemblage covering bees, reincarnation, petty crime, Christ, funfairs, bees, institutionalized cruelty, gypsies, corruption, coincidence,  bees, destiny, fate and bees; with lots of music. Starts with a great timelapse of pl. de la Concorde, with Brel.

[Jakob W]

Ant-man. Very enjoyable nonsense; far less po-faced than many recent superhero flicks.

[Pickled Onion]

Chinatown

A rather good film, with a rather young Jack Nicholson.

Not sure about the ethics of watching a film made by a convicted fugitive paedophile.

[epa611]

I, Daniel Blake.   Should be compulsory viewing for all.

Sent from my D5803 using Tapatalk

[Wascally Weasel]

Ant-man. Very enjoyable nonsense; far less po-faced than many recent superhero flicks.

I l liked it.  It's basically a heist film, probably why I liked it!

[LEE]

Dunkirk

It does what it says on the tin.

It's about Dunkirk.  it's not about character development, you won't learn about anyone's family back home or any troubled upbringing.

It starts as you follow a soldier legging it onto the beach and it ends as he leaves the beach.  In between there is much gunfire and bombing.  It's relentless.

Tom Hardy plays a supporting role to a Spitfire in some stunning dog-fight scenes.

I fail to see how you could do it any better than Christopher Nolan has.

It's a 12cert so there are no dismembered limbs flying about but, in my opinion, adding Harry Styles and making it a 12cert, will introduce the story to millions of people who otherwise would have gone to see a "popcorn" movie instead.

[mrcharly-YHT]

I saw it at the cinema.

My grumbles with it are:

It doesn't show the 'little ships' making repeat trips. Not at all.

The soldiers disappear. 300 000 of them. There are crowds shown at the start then suddenly the beach is almost deserted. Where did they go? Supposedly the vast bulk were awaiting evac, but suddenly the beach looked deserted?

The little ships mostly ferried soldiers out to waiting RN ships. NONE of that is shown in the film

At one point in the film a character explicitly says "They've sent one destroyer"
What bollocks. There were 39 Royal Navy destroyers ships just off the shore. That's a libel on the royal navy, Christopher Nolan better not walk near any RN sailors in the near future.

[LEE]

I saw it at the cinema.

My grumbles with it are:

It doesn't show the 'little ships' making repeat trips. Not at all.

The soldiers disappear. 300 000 of them. There are crowds shown at the start then suddenly the beach is almost deserted. Where did they go? Supposedly the vast bulk were awaiting evac, but suddenly the beach looked deserted?

The little ships mostly ferried soldiers out to waiting RN ships. NONE of that is shown in the film

At one point in the film a character explicitly says "They've sent one destroyer"
What bollocks. There were 39 Royal Navy destroyers ships just off the shore. That's a libel on the royal navy, Christopher Nolan better not walk near any RN sailors in the near future.

So it was a film of complete negatives for you?
The film actually centres around the sinking of the Hospital ship.  The 3 timelines converge on it.
At some point Nolan needed to decide whether it was a documentary or based-on-real-events entertainment.  Documentaries are available.

[mrcharly-YHT]

I saw it at the cinema.

My grumbles with it are:

It doesn't show the 'little ships' making repeat trips. Not at all.

The soldiers disappear. 300 000 of them. There are crowds shown at the start then suddenly the beach is almost deserted. Where did they go? Supposedly the vast bulk were awaiting evac, but suddenly the beach looked deserted?

The little ships mostly ferried soldiers out to waiting RN ships. NONE of that is shown in the film

At one point in the film a character explicitly says "They've sent one destroyer"
What bollocks. There were 39 Royal Navy destroyers ships just off the shore. That's a libel on the royal navy, Christopher Nolan better not walk near any RN sailors in the near future.

So it was a film of complete negatives for you?
The film actually centres around the sinking of the Hospital ship.  The 3 timelines converge on it.
At some point Nolan needed to decide whether it was a documentary or based-on-real-events entertainment.  Documentaries are available.

Not complete negatives, but implying that there was only one flight of spitfires and explicitly stating that there was only one destroyer was taking too far, IMO

[Wascally Weasel]

I saw it at the cinema.

My grumbles with it are:

It doesn't show the 'little ships' making repeat trips. Not at all.

The soldiers disappear. 300 000 of them. There are crowds shown at the start then suddenly the beach is almost deserted. Where did they go? Supposedly the vast bulk were awaiting evac, but suddenly the beach looked deserted?

The little ships mostly ferried soldiers out to waiting RN ships. NONE of that is shown in the film

At one point in the film a character explicitly says "They've sent one destroyer"
What bollocks. There were 39 Royal Navy destroyers ships just off the shore. That's a libel on the royal navy, Christopher Nolan better not walk near any RN sailors in the near future.

So it was a film of complete negatives for you?
The film actually centres around the sinking of the Hospital ship.  The 3 timelines converge on it.
At some point Nolan needed to decide whether it was a documentary or based-on-real-events entertainment.  Documentaries are available.

Not complete negatives, but implying that there was only one flight of spitfires and explicitly stating that there was only one destroyer was taking too far, IMO

The "Miracle" of the little ships is fine for wartime propaganda but repeating it in present day is unhelpful.  The vast majority of people evacuated were done so from ships on the Mole.

French involvement is virtually non-existent, in fact their navy played a big part.  French troops were initially not evacuated because their government did not give orders agreeing they should be evacuated until part way through the operation - from that point on equal numbers of French and Commonwealth soldiers were evacuated

I think my main complaint is that it repeats the national myth of Dunkirk being victory from the jaws of defeat and that the troops saved were brought back to prepare for invasion defence.

In actual fact Britain sent a further expeditionary force to France after Dunkirk in an attempt to keep France in the war.

I very much enjoyed it as a piece of film making and think it got across the individual experiences that people would have gone through quite well but there were too many things wrong with it.  We shan't go in to the unlimited ammo hack that Tom Hardy seemed to have patched into his Spitfire...

I think my main complaint was that Nolan's antipathy for CGI worked against the film on this occasion - it just wasn't 'busy' enough, not with men, planes, ships or smoke.

[mrcharly-YHT]

I think my main complaint was that Nolan's antipathy for CGI worked against the film on this occasion - it just wasn't 'busy' enough, not with men, planes, ships or smoke.

Yes, I agree

I would have rather seen the moles crowded with ships, and the 'little ships' amidst chaos, ferrying a few soldiers off the beaches.
The vast bulk of soldiers embarked on double-moored ships from the moles. The little ships took off many hundreds but were ferrying them off the beach to waiting ships, not all the way back to England.