[Genteel Death 2]

 

I've enjoyed this. I like it reminded me of a milder 'Buffalo 66' with a teen (?) delinquency love story to match. Recommended by friends. I am the least knowledgeable person about movies ever, so it made for nice Sunday evening viewing. David Yow is in it!

[Diesel]

+1 Buffalo 66

Originally Posted by Genteel Death 2

I've re-watched 'Threads' on Thursday on the BBC iPlayer because it was on the day before, so it was still available to view in good quality. The first time I've watched it was some years ago, I think I may have bought some VHS copy of it from some second hand shop after someone tipped me off to it. It's very bleak and still shows perfectly the chaos and destruction the capitalist system brings to human existence in colour. Everything leads up to misery. I can only compare it in terms of bleakness to watching a Channel 4 drama called 'No Child of Mine' I've seen some years ago, or a feature film like 'Lilya 4-ever'.

 

I'm going to watch Threads at the weekend via iPlayer, been wanting to see it for a long time after hearing how bleak it is and how it still holds up despite it's age. I'm thinking it will be similar to Raymond Briggs' When the Wind Blows.

Speaking of bleakness, I watched The Coffee Table. It handles taboo subjects but in an abnormal humorous way. Billed as horror but is possibly, without hyperbole, the darkest comedy I have ever seen.

[tw2113]

In the Mouth of Madness.

[tw2113]

Jumanji 1995

[choc e-Claire]

 

The greatest movie I've ever seen? Possibly.

[_tunic_]

I watched the 3rd Jumanji thinking i was rewatching the 2nd Jumanji (and not knowing that they ever made a 3rd), and then thinking what the hell, this all didn't happen the previous time I saw this movie a few years back.

[Rob Instigator]

watched Hannibal, then RED DRAGON

[Antagon]

 

Watched it after having heard some glowing recommendations by fans of more eerie and psychological Horror. And that's exactly where it excels. The presentation is very quiet and the unease lingers. The ending is especially effective in its sad and haunting conclusion.


I can't really call it a masterpiece though. Unfortunately, the narrative gets a bit muddled - plot points are introduced that don't add much to the overall movie. And its strong point - the mockumentary framing device - ultimately becomes a bit of a detriment as well. The way it is told seems somewhat lifelike, but the actions of its characters seem far-fetched. The documentary tone makes it harder to suspend your disbelief. Still, a pretty solid movie - especially for the small budget it was made with.

[Diesel]

I do enjoy a good low budget found footage horror. Lake Mungo is a bit of an exposition dump-fest delivered through interviews but is worth watching for that one scene alone.

Some I've seen lately:


In a Violent Nature - What could probably be best described as ambient horror. Imagine Friday the 13th but instead of watching the teen characters smoke pot and shag you get to watch from Jason's POV, strolling through the woods. Quite the surreal experience and subversive.

The Devil's Bath - Harsh historical reality.

Stop Motion - This movie is English, so naturally is the best on the list.

Oddity - This movie is Irish, so naturally is the worst on the list.

Divinity - This movie is American, so naturally replaces Oddity as the worst movie on the list.

The Houses October built (2011) - Found footage, mediocre.

Chime - This was too vague, even by Kiyoshi Kurosawa's standards.

Skinamarink - Ambient analogue horror. I had to watch this twice due to falling asleep and not knowing what was going on due to the no-fi audio quality. With subtitles enabled and possibly uppers, I highly recommend.


So, bear witness these cinematic marvels, throw your Fellini and Godard in the bin. The Season of the Witch is upon us, let's be avin' yer horror recommendations.

[tw2113]

The City of Lost Chidren

[Genteel Death 2]

Watched the 'Human Centipede 2'. The first one I've watched a few years ago and liked it. I know Tom Six bangs on about the film being a series of pop films meant to offend God knows who. The first one is good and shows what you can do with ridiculous ideas and eating shit from someone's arse. The second one I thought was stunningly filmed. My partner, who's a horror freak, told me it's a reaction to how some people think watching a lot of these movies influence behaviours, which is not normally true. He has one called 'The Onania Club' about a bunch of women masturbating on people dying of cancer, world poverty and such things. Apparently nobody will put it out because of the contents. Johan Waters was one of the few people to watch it a few years ago, liked it, but advised it's best for most people not to watch it. Here's the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Xon...nel=ASRAFMASUM

[Diesel]

The Onania Club: come and see, see and come Looks like a similar people wanking over inappropriate things vibe to Cronenberg's Crash.

I enjoyed the first 2 Human Centipede movies, not so much the 3rd. I heard somewhere Tom Six was going to make a 4th, but this could be Insomnia kicking in. A horror obsessed colleague of mine who used to love a good live autopsy told me about some of the banned scenes in Human Centipede 2, which are quite extreme.

[Rob Instigator]

Psycho

then


Psycho 2

[tw2113]

Scream - in theaters


Scary Movie - at home


Had to happen.

[choc e-Claire]

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a brilliant film, even though it made me want to throw myself into traffic.

[Toilet & Bowels]

The Substance, very good fun. Not as extreme as reports would have you believe though

[choc e-Claire]

Originally Posted by Toilet & Bowels

The Substance, very good fun. Not as extreme as reports would have you believe though

The fact that I could handle it suggests it's not that bad.
I thought it was a good, but not great, film - the writers couldn't resist going for an obvious comment or joke that kind of cheapens what they're trying to say. The ideas were interesting, and I was impressed with a few of the effects, but I think the ending sinks it a bit.

I watched Basic Instinct tonight, which I had a pretty good time with.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by choc e-Claire

I watched Basic Instinct tonight, which I had a pretty good time with.

i can't quote all your previous posts but you've been on an amazing roll lately with cronenberg and john waters and lynch. and yes multiple maniacs is right up there with the greatest... while pink flamingos is his most canonical, dont miss desperate living either

i did a stupid thing with mulholland drive which was to "solve" it as a dead person who doesn't know she's dead wandering through the bardo (my own obsession from a different time and place). and that narrative unfortunately works too well

basic instinct is of course the great paul verhoeven. see if you can find "the fourth man", which is a very unusual movie hahaha. showgirs is often panned as trash but i think it's pure genius. and if you watch starship troopers try to remember that it was satire--problem is reality has exceeded satire by now. we are so degraded, we are beyond satire

[Bertrand]

I've seen the Substance too and really enjoyed it ; colors are wonderful, frames are great, and I'm glad Demi Moore accepted to play in it


Saw Hundreds of Beavers in a packed theatre, with everybody laughing. I wondered whether the film could keep on being surprising and wasn't disappointed at all.

[choc e-Claire]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

i can't quote all your previous posts but you've been on an amazing roll lately with cronenberg and john waters and lynch.

I've been trying to get "into film" in the last few months, to go along with my music hipsterdom - most of my movie watching history has been on Friday movie nights with my family, but there's a lot of things I wouldn't want to watch with them in the room, so I'm branching out on my own (and fortunately the sorts of movies for weirdos like me are very well established). TV Glow was really the inflection point for this, because it's very much not a film for a mass audience and it provokes more thoughts than your usual popcorn flick, and that's a feeling I really liked! Also a bunch of it was similar to what I'd gathered Videodrome was about, and a lot of my friends are huge Cronenberg fans, so I got to it a few days later (and yes, Schoenbrun took a few things from it very distinctly). Since then I've seen Crash (loved the book (and it's the weakest of the Ballard I've read), can't stop thinking about the film) and Scanners (definitely reads as a proto-Videodrome sort of production, though the effects are sick); will do either Dead Ringers or Crimes of the Future next (my friends think the last one would really hit me).

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

and yes multiple maniacs is right up there with the greatest... while pink flamingos is his most canonical, dont miss desperate living either

Waters was an inevitable one for me too; I needed to see the precursor for all the pervert fetishism that lights my cultural lamp. I wasn't quite sure I could stomach Pink Flamingos, from all I'd heard about it, so I decided to take on the earlier one and it was incredible, so funny. It's over fifty years old and the politics are still so combative to this new puritanical age we're headed towards - the scene at the start where his audience is as repulsed by two men kissing as they are by puke eating is the best motivation you'd ever find to stop stifling yourself. Also loved how much the Jesus Christ figure looked like Kurt Cobain (apart from the neckbeard).

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

i did a stupid thing with mulholland drive which was to "solve" it as a dead person who doesn't know she's dead wandering through the bardo (my own obsession from a different time and place). and that narrative unfortunately works too well

I've gathered enough about Lynch - it's kind of hard to avoid him being talked about - that I knew trying to make sense of the film linearly would be a bit foolish, so I just wanted to ride it out. And I'm glad that I did, such a great ride to go on. One of my friends feels like it's quite simple, especially given the "clues" that were included in the DVD release, but I wasn't going to take the coward's way out and read an interpretation! A cinema in Melbourne is doing Lost Highway in a couple of weeks, so might go to that one next.

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

basic instinct is of course the great paul verhoeven. see if you can find "the fourth man", which is a very unusual movie hahaha. showgirs is often panned as trash but i think it's pure genius. and if you watch starship troopers try to remember that it was satire--problem is reality has exceeded satire by now. we are so degraded, we are beyond satire

I've seen Starship Troopers, my dad got us to watch it (he's a fan of that film) - I knew it was satire going in but jesus christ, the American people are so dumb to have not picked up on it. I very much like the analysis that says it's an in-universe version of Triumph of the Will, and how Neil Patrick Harris figured out the joke immediately and played into it (the homoeroticism of the Übermensch, god bless) - mad respect to Verhoeven for realising that RoboCop hadn't gone hard enough and really leaving it in no doubt. Gotta get to Showgirls soon.

I was talking with a friend about what some of my favourite films say about my psychology - the four I came up with were Dog Day Afternoon, Videodrome, Back to the Future, and Parasite, and his interpretation was that I have this fascination with a very idyllic, capitalist, normative depiction of suburbia and the way in which things are always fucked up beneath the surface. Which I think is pretty fitting for me!

Other films I've watched in the last few months that I haven't mentioned here yet: Lost in Translation (technically very good film that I still found a little muted and underwhelming; will probably get more out of it if I rewatch it in a few year's time), Pulp Fiction (a lot of fun, very obvious why it's such a big obsession with a certain demographic, and I have to respect Tarantino for writing a film that's so obviously drawn from his obsessions alone), Fargo (very well written to make the violent crime scenes and goofy workplace drama scenes not feel out of place with each other; my Midwest fangirlism continues unabated), and a couple of nights ago Lady Bird (brought me to tears thinking about my relationship with my own mother). Sorry for such a long post but this is fun to get passionate about!