Patlabor (1989) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100339/
Nice! You must not be afraid of anime though, some scenes are a bit weird and the music, oh well...
The story is really great, the style too. It was kinda hard to follow for me (watched the english dub and did not understand much of the first important minutes). Recommended if you like such movies.


Is the tv series watchable? I'd like less robots for sure, heh. 

Rocco and His Brothers (1960) - the second greatest italian film I have come across, Vicsonti's movie deals with a family from the south that moves to the industrial north and is slowly disintegrated by its different rules and necessities. It should be, but never is, a distracting and curious blend of neo realism and melodrama but Visconti handles it with very restrained and subtle direction that prevents a clash of styles. The performances across the board are excellent and the film manages to realistically show the lives of distinct people at a particular time in Italy's history and also have characters that are universally recognisable at the same time.

8-8.5/10


Kiss Me Deadly (1955) - quintessential film noir that rides on exceptional direction and scripting to cover up a routine plot and average performances. Robert Aldrich and his scriptwriter go out of their way, and with tremendous success, to make sure each shot and each character is memorable and relevant. Shame about the performances because better acting would have propelled this to sit with the greats.

Also, it is obviously something that Tarantino, Lynch and Spielberg all admire as there are direct references in at least Pulp Fiction, Lost Highway and Raiders of the Lost Ark.

7.5/10


This is England (2007) - Funny, touching but also disturbing movie set in 80's England and focusing on a particular part of the childhood of a 12 year called Shaun who, due to circumstances, becomes involved with a neo nazi group of teenagers who become his friends.

From there on, it's a bit of a rollercoaster ride as Shaun first appreciates, then is confused by and eventually doubts his new found friends and what they stand for. Shane Meadows' objective view of the topic from the point of view of an unpopular 12 yr old is a refreshing and personal take on the material that is not for everyone but well worth watching.

7-7.5/10


Mad Men Season One - Most definitely the best show (not) on tv. Set in 1960's New York and utilising the lives of advertising executives as a way of exploring the psyche, makeup and fabric of America at a time when prosperity and success masked and repressed identity and a darker world, the show is as good as any of the drama heavyweights that have come and gone in recent years.

The attention to period detail is superb, the multitude of characters very interesting and the show also benefits from a delicious strain of blink and you miss it understated humour.

8-8.5/10


Shanghai Express (1932) - probably the best of the Josef Von Sternberg and Marlene Dietrich collaborations, this is a great little movie that works equally well as a thriller and a drama. Dietrich is at her iconic best here, magnetic in every scene and every shot, and von Sternberg has a field day with a pre-code script that he brings to life with vivid imagery and precision. I personally found the very end to be a little problematic in terms of believability but everything else is of a very high standard.

7.5/10


You Cant Take it With You (1938) - the first real misfire from Capra that I have come across which apart from a few scenes is too reliant on eccentricity for its drive (in much the same way as the Coen bros can be guilty of). Most of the characters are poorly etched and the scripting, save a few great lines, is predictable both in its plotting and its tone.

5/10


Vagabond (1985) - sort of like the nihilistic european version of Into the Wild, and faring only slightly better in my book (mainly because even though the main character is a twat, she's not turned into some sort of idol like in Penn's film). Agnes Varda has a very distracting and noticeable style which disconnects you from the material at crucial stages and despite some very good acting, particularly from Sandrine Bonnaire in the title role as a female drifter in self-imposed exile, its hard to really care about what's happening. However, there are some inspired scenes, including one involving some sort of strange french town ritual that will definitely make you sit up and take notice.

5.5-6/10 

proper comments later but fuck this is good! 

 

before finishing the first one :) 

imdb comment: ... The best thing about this movie are probably the CGI generated cats, that feature of this movie deserves huge praise. The CGI shows that this director is capable of making really great movies but he needs to use it a lot more. I understand that they did not have enough money but I hope that the next movie will at least have 50% of the scenes with some form of CGI. That's all from me. :D

for this weird thing http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1139797/ It has fantastic ratings and comments, but i don't get why at all. pacing / shockers don't work at all for me, or anyone in the cinema. I couldn't really care less about the shallow characters; some of the supports were nicer, though. The 'coming of age' story is clichee at best, and the vampire stuff naturally is the same, and mostly doesn't fit into the story at all. The only purpose of the plot seems to be support of the finale - it doesn't offer anything over the course of the movie besides the occasional WTF. pictures/sound were okish, but nothing stood out, really. The shocker scenes were mostly.. laughable, because everything else was that much like a child-movie. It's basically shocker-10mins of child-story-shocker-repeat

Everyone in the cinema continued joking and laughing at the movie (though it didn't intend to be funny at all, i think).

Somehow i'd still rate it a 4/10 though. weird. 

joking and laughing about the movie :) 

from usually reliable sources. Very curious about it, especially after your comments. 

the only thing i'd heard of it is that i should see that instead of Twilight. 

usually i like unusual movies, and i also like slow paced movies (25th hour is my favorite movie, and it's quite slow imho). This one MIGHT have been off to a bad start, because everyone in the cinema was constantly WTFing right from the start, but i don't know. should probably rewatch it, just that it wasn't particularly entertaining :( 

among my favorite movies, too. Really love the pacing and the atmosphere as well as the acting in that one. 

25th hour was great. I should watch that again. 

Assassination (1967)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061367/

This movie would be great if there was a plot a human mind could follow and understand. Feels like if the script was complex and meant for a book rather than a movie. (Or like a director trying to put a overly complex book into 90 minutes of film.) A shame, really. 

The Testament of Dr Mabuse (1933) - the second in Fritz Lang's Mabuse series of films and the only one I have seen. The story is meant to continue on from the first film, at the end of which the evil genius Dr Mabuse turned insane and escaped prison by being committed, and basically concerns the investigation into a number of crimes that all seem to have the Mabuse touch.

It�s a mishmash of genres, part socio-realist observation, part thriller, part horror and part police procedural and while it does not quite fit together all that well, when it works its very very memorable. As in M, Lang uses sound exceptionally well which when combined with his expressionistic noiresque visuals, lend particular scenes a very eerie touch.

Its also easy to see why this was banned by Goebbels on initial release, references and criticism of the rise of Nazism are all over the place even if they were not necessarily intended.

7.5/10


Red River (1948) - what should have been a great film is brought down to only a good level with a ridiculous and silly ending. Till then, Howard Hawks' absorbing western is one of the best in its genre with excellent characterisations, interesting themes and tight plotting. The unravel at the end makes a joke of the 2 hr psychological buildup and puts to waste the effective performances of John Wayne and Montogemery Clift, who play a rancher and his adopted son leading a cattle drive from Texas to Missouri via the Chisholm Trail.

Still, overall, its another effective film from Hawks who proves once again that there was no genre he could not make a good film in.

7/10


Short Cuts (1993) - a very watchable 190 min from Robert Altman, but given the runtime I was expecting something a little more substantial. Tracing 22 characters through 9 of Raymond Carver's short stories, Altman mounts and weaves together a very impressive production that is impeccably acted, always interesting and with no real dead space.

But at the end of it, it all feels a little slight and unfinished with a sense that perhaps Altman took too much on and would have perhaps been better served with a more focused approach on the more interesting stories and characters.

7/10 

Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1974) - rewatch and I still cant get into the Python humour which is far too hit and miss for me. The funny bits are admittedly quite hilarious but they are surrounded by too much stuff that just isnt funny in my book. And since that's all that this is, a 90 min string of mostly unsuccessful jokes, I cant really say I enjoyed it.

4/10


Vengeance is Mine (1979) - films about serial killers are a dime a dozen these days, but few match the ambition and execution of Shohei Imamura's japanese film about Iwao Ekonizu, a sociopath on the run from japanese police for 78 days during the early 1960's. The strength of the film lies in Imamura's decision to not focus on either the motives/past of Ekonizu nor the police investigation on his trail but to simply show you the man, his actions and the crumbling society around him in a fairly observational manner and then ask whether he is all that different from everyone else.

It's an approach that has one limitation, being a distance from the characters, but when ideas are this strongly drawn and executed, that flaw is only a small distraction in an otherwise great film.

7.5-8/10


Freaks (1932) - Todd Browning's notoriously butchered film about sideshow/carnival performers is not quite as shocking today as it was back in the day, but it still contains numerous memorable moments mainly due to the casting of real people with deformities as sideshow 'freaks'. Whether it crosses the exploitation/entertainment line is debatable but as a film its above average despite its numerous flaws.

Whilst the non-professional actors lend the whole thing with a distinct air of authenticity that could never be achieved by makeup and effects, they also come across as stilted and amateur in a number of the key dialogue scenes. Still, Browning uses their presence to good effect and the climactic scene is justifiably famous as one of the great horror scenes.

6.5/10


The Wire season one - Baltimore. The drug trade. One of the greatest seasons of tv ever. It's hard to actually find words to describe this that are not understatements. If it has one flaw, and this is really searching for a fault, it's that its way too dense for casual viewing. It demands a lot of attention but pays off in ways which most films, let alone tv shows, can only dream of. The writing and characterisation are of an extremely high standard and each episode has staggering scenes of brilliance and originality. I cant wait to get to seasons 2-5.

9.5/10 

i guess you pretty much need to watch flying circus first ;) 

I think that is the best one. Which is just like a 2hour long flying circus.

Thats MY juniper bush! 

Fight Club.

Good, entertaining, interesting, dark humour and decent style. I knew the plot and premise, but it was quirkier and pacier than I expected. The idea could have been a bit more refined but I think it's pretty cool.

errr there was something else....oh yeah...

Quantum Of Solace.

Not bad, pretty entertaining. The criticisms I'd heard - lack of sexiness, lack of humour, lack of gadgets, bit too grim - were all valid, as was the all-too-common too-quick-editing syndrome, but there was enough Bondness and enough class in some areas (the opera in particular) to make it worthwhile. Quite like Daniel Craig as the new Bond, his pretty-boy-blue-eye icy coldness suits the role. 

Both those reviews are a bit vague in conclusion. I'd put FC as a properly good film and QOS as an okay one. 

for me... Which is good - the best infact!
QoS havent seen. I liked Casino Royale tho, but was only inclined to watch it the one time. 

fight club seems like one of those essential 1990s movies to me, so it's suprising to hear about someone just watching it now for the first time :) 

Yes fair point. I really don't watch films though, well pretty rarely. Maybe a bit more these days, mostly for the social side. There's a lot I haven't seen, from ET through to Heat...

More into drum'n'bass. And Quake. 

the fuck is Quake? 

would you say all five seasons are worth watching? 

Yeah, for sure. The show changes a bit for each season, but all of them deliver a great story, and highlight a new problem. I'd probably rank season 4 as my personal favourite, and season 5 climbs down a bit from that, but all of them are good.