What was the last film you watched?

[Asterix, the former Gaul.]

Legend.  Violent but not as violent as the Krays really were.  Robert Hardy put in a great double act as both twins at once and overall it was a reasonably good film altho' it was a cameo, as to tell the whole story it'd need a lot longer and to start earlier in their evil lives.

Mesrine  Violent real life story of the French criminal (or 'Robin Hood'!) a contemporary of the Krays, mostly operating in Paris.  Although sub-titles are needed unless you understand French very well, it was a better, more serious portrayal of an intelligent but ruthless individual. In two parts as it showed his brutalisation and descent into crime starting when he was a young serviceman and continuing to his sticky end.   

[Mr Larrington]

IIRC Bernard Bonvoisin, singer of shouty French lefty metaillists Trust, used to go out with Jacques Mesrine's daughter.

[TimO]

Avengers: Age of Ultron

It's released on Bluray tomorrow, so I watched it today. You've got to love delivery on the day of release, that arrives early.

It's good fun and silliness.  I'd never claim that the Marvel Cinematic Universe films are works of outstanding cinematic worth, but they're all easy and enjoyable to watch.

I think I've found the films involving groups of people, like the Avengers and the Guardians of the Galaxy films, to be the better ones.  There are more characters to play off of each other.

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I'm still not entirely sure why Ultron seemed to think that destroying the planet was the way to save it.  I think the underlying concept is that the human race needs to evolve, and he's the next evolution, partly because he's inherited a certain amount of hubris from Tony Stark, but that seems a little bit of a weak and obscure justification for him going over to the "Dark Side"

[Mr Larrington]

I'm pretty sure I've filled up with "gas" containing an additive called "Ultron" on this trip

[mrcharly-YHT]

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I'm still not entirely sure why Ultron seemed to think that destroying the planet was the way to save it.  I think the underlying concept is that the human race needs to evolve, and he's the next evolution, partly because he's inherited a certain amount of hubris from Tony Stark, but that seems a little bit of a weak and obscure justification for him going over to the "Dark Side"

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He doesn't want to destroy it utterly, he wants humans to suffer.

[mrcharly-YHT]

The worlds end

I'm going to ignore the end, because that was carp.

The rest of the film is brilliant, easily their best. Simon pegg plays a blinder, helped by a great cohort. I bet they had a lot of fun making this.

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Bilbo gets composted!

[fuzzy]

United 93- A dramatic reconstruction (as opposed to a documentary) around the hijacking of the flight on 11/9/2001, the activity in various air traffic control and command and control centres and the subsequent intervention by the passengers of the flight.

A good insight into to the chaos that ensued in ATC and C&C as the attack developed.

[LEE]

Legend.  Violent but not as violent as the Krays really were.  Robert Hardy put in a great double act as both twins at once.

This made me laugh a lot.

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I think you mean Tom Hardy.

[Chris S]

United 93- A dramatic reconstruction (as opposed to a documentary) around the hijacking of the flight on 11/9/2001, the activity in various air traffic control and command and control centres and the subsequent intervention by the passengers of the flight.

A good insight into to the chaos that ensued in ATC and C&C as the attack developed.

Thanks!

I watched this. I was affected.

The Fog of War. Yay! 

[essexian]

Straight outta Compton.

An everyday story of a group of black lads from “da hood” who made it big; forgot where they came from; lost their friendship to money, power, sex and drugs, but who came back together on the death of a friend.

Enjoyable if you like the music and can accept the casual sexism, racism and violence as being of the time. From what I remember from the news and music magazines, LA was not a nice place to live back then, as the Rodney King attack showed.

Not a movie for the Sunday afternoon on Channel 5 but worth £8 of my money.

[Asterix, the former Gaul.]

Legend.  Violent but not as violent as the Krays really were.  Robert Hardy put in a great double act as both twins at once.

This made me laugh a lot.

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I think you mean Tom Hardy.

Thanks, I'm not great at remembering actors!  Never mind directors:-[   Winston Churchill was of course Robert Hardy.

[Pancho]

Fight Club, because I read the book* while bored in Basingstoke the other week, and I'd not seen the movie for years, and the ever erudite Citoyen mentioned David Fincher. Takes mostly from book which is no bad thing, and is still brilliant with the everyman Norton, the brash Pitt, and the scatty catty Bonham-Carter. Good god, was that 1999.

Indeed. This film has been on my "should watch it sometime" list since its release. Watched it a couple of months ago at my daughter's instigation and couldn't believe it was that long. What happened to the years?

It's above mentioned daughter's favourite film and, I have to say, I liked it. Not often I say that about films - which I generally find a far too short format.

[Riggers]

Prometheus. Now then.

With the robot ( he of: "Ooh, look out Dr Shaw, he's coming to get you") who is bodiless at this point in the film, informs Dr Shaw that they can still escape the planet, because "There are other spaceships they can use."

That's all very well.

My point is: given the chaps and ladies were in a state of 'human suspension' for their two-year trip to the planet, relying on Mr Robot to 'waken' them, then how exactly is Dr Shaw going to achieve this then?

[ian]

Nothing in Prometheus makes sense. It's a movie entirely constructed from things that don't make sense. It's what happens if we sent the planet's most stupid people, a robot that's stupid, to annoy a really a stupid alien. It's supercritical stupid. A big juddery volcano of stupid. A whirly planet of stupid orbited by moons of stupid and ringed with rings of stupid. A  straining neutron star of stupid where every teaspoon of its matter is more stupid that can ever be comprehended even by a giant AI built to understand stupid. It's the swinging, clanging, banging Newton's Balls of stupid. It's the big black hole of stupid, so stupid that only stupid can escape its stupid grasp. Pumping out giant waves of cosmic stupid that fry your brain into slices of popping and spitting frazzled stupid. That's how stupid that movie is.

[spesh]

Would you like to come down off the fence and tell us what you really think? 

[Jakob]

I actually just watched it again last week, thinking that it couldn't have been *that* bad..but it really is. It makes me upset how bad it was. All that amazing IP completely wasted.

[mrcharly-YHT]

I actually just watched it again last week, thinking that it couldn't have been *that* bad..but it really is. It makes me upset how bad it was. All that amazing IP completely wasted.

Agreed.

It is quite incredibly horribly bad. One of the very few times I've come out of the cinema actually angry.

[Riggers]

Thank you for those considered views chaps.With a few pints under your belt, that sort of rationalisation makes perfect sense.

I've remembered another point that left me saying: "You stupid women!," even as they were still doing it. When the two women were attempting to run away from the crashed 'alien' spacecraft, rather than run at an 90 degree angle from it, they ran with it. Maybe it was the Director's point to show the boys and girls in the cinema, just how fit these actresses are. It also showed how gullible the Director suspects we are.

Often in film, you can accept a certain 'suspension of disbelief', allowing that "It's only a film," but surely they should have had a 'show-of-hands' on set, and asked how many would, if "A car was chasing them", for example, would continue to run directly in front of it, rather than go to one side.

[Chris S]

If the YACF politburo ever need to torture Ian, they need only lock him in a cell and show him Prometheus and The Martian on a 24 hour loop  .

[mrcharly-YHT]

My anger started when they reached the planet.

A whole planet to search. They are in a spacecraft, in orbit. So what happens next?

They land the spacecraft. Co-coincidently right next to what they are searching for. Wow, how lucky was that?

The interstellar spacecraft that turns out to be remarkably good at landing on planets. Offs

[ian]

It's hard to know where to start when you've an entire galaxy of stupid to contend. But firstly, you're planning a mission to the stars, I dunno, wouldn't you like pack some actual scientists that know science and stuff. Why's the robot even there? Why the old bloke? Why not get an actual old bloke to play an old bloke (I've seen old people, I know they exist). Why? Why? Why? The 'whys' just bubble up until you're frothed and overflowing with whys. I'll tell you why. Because it's stupid, that's why.

In a movie that less jumps the shark than performs trapeze over the top of them the defining moment – and perhaps the most stupid moment in modern cinema, and there's not exactly a shortage – is when the scientist on discovering a the alien snake thing starts to couchie-coo it.

[citoyen]

I've never felt much need to see Prometheus but I'm beginning to feel like I'm missing out.

[mrcharly-YHT]

In a movie that less jumps the shark than performs trapeze over the top of them the defining moment – and perhaps the most stupid moment in modern cinema, and there's not exactly a shortage – is when the scientist on discovering a the alien snake thing starts to couchie-coo it.

No I think that is surpassed by the caesarian section followed by sit-up like movements. 

[ian]

I'll raise you the alien head. Imagine you're a top scientist and you, as the first person in human history, find a bonafide alien head. What do you do with it?

Take it back home and wire it to the mains? Because it might re-start it? Well, I suppose it worked for Dr Frankenstein.

Oh and then it blows up for not much reason either. I suppose the lesson we should take home from this is that if you find an alien head don't simply wire it to a HV source. Try a 9v battery first. Or, I dunno, do some biology on it because in the grand scheme of science dead things generally don't re-animate.

[red marley]

I saw Prometheus in the first week of release, and was, like everyone else on the planet, annoyed by teh stupid and disappointed by the lost potential.

I am also a regular Secret Cinema attender (immersive cinema experience with dressing up, live actors, imaginative set and a film unknown in advance). Usually, the films they put on are of the quality cult variety (Battle of Algiers, Miller's Crossing, Third Man, Brazil etc.) You can imagine my delight when two days after seeing Prometheus I turned up at Secret Cinema only to find it was Prometheus.

Although I did get to kiss an android. Which was nice.