What ELSE (other than KUNG FU) has everyone been watching?

[AlbertV]

Sabotage (David Ayer, 2014) - pretty interesting plot involving an elite team of DEA agents led by Ah-nuld who plot to steal $10 million from their latest job only to find it missing. After being suspended and later reinstated, the team members begin to get killed off one by one, but by whom and why? Nice plot twists IMO, definitely am becoming more of a David Ayer fan and am looking forward to his take on Suicide Squad.

[Secret Executioner]

Double feature at the theater last night:

Annabelle (2014)

A Conjuring prequel, it deals with a family that gets haunted by a spirit because of an evil doll.

While I expected this to be rather terrible, I found it quite good. The movie heavily relies on scares, but they are effective all the way through and the doll really looks creepy - this kind of reminded me of Poltergeist actually, which isn't a bad thing since I enjoyed that movie. My main issue however: who in their right mind would want to have this creepy doll in the room of a baby or even find it remotely cute ?! That thing looks like The Joker in a wedding dress, for crying out loud. The name Annabelle seems to come from a little girl who used to own it and killed herself after joining some satanic cult - the movie is set in the late 1960s and a TV program a character watches discusses Charles Manson and his cult.

Watching it you may understand why this cult reference is relevant, but I'd hate spoiling too much as the narrative flows very well.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

One may question why they'd screen two movies so different - I mean, we go from a darker version of Poltergeist (mixed with killer dolls films) to the godfather of slasher movies. Anyway, I went to the double feature for this one and boy was it a pay off. I guess I should rather discuss it in the TCM thread, but here's a little break through.

The atmosphere is delightfully elaborated - unpleasant music, feeling of suffocating claustrophobia and of unbearable heat. I've rarely seen a movie with so much atmosphere since Murnau's Nosferatu, where you got that claustrophobic feeling and uncomfortable mood during the castle part.

The main characters are rather sympathetic and the movie doesn't drag - not like Halloween where I couldn't wait to see the obnoxious brats get killed. Actually, the only character that annoyed me was the hitchhiker/Leatherface's brother. That guy was so irritating. Leatherface on the other end is a bit funny.

Also, the killings feel violent and brutal - not funny or OTT as in the likes Friday The 13th (I mean, when Leatherface hits someone on the head or hooks the chick you go "ouch", but when Jason or his mother hit or stab people, it makes me laugh).

[thekfc]

Watch Queen Kong today.

It is a 1976 comedy movie spoofing King Kong.

It is about a female film crew who goes to Africa and encounter a giant female gorilla who falls in love with the (only) male star and vice versa.

The monsters costumes in the movie are so bad that grade school children can make better costumes.

This movie is so bad, so dumb, so idiotic, so silly, so stupid and even though I wasted 1 1/2 of my life which I will never get back - I enjoyed it.

The end of the movie after Queen Kong is brought to London - how can I say this - is zany, looney, hilarious, offbeat....should I go on?

Watch at your own risk.

.

[paimeifist]

I actually thought the Conjuring was the best horror movie I'd seen in a few years, now I am looking forward to seeing this one too!

Also glad to hear Arnie's recent outing was good. Will have to squeeze this in between the Fu some time.

Double feature at the theater last night:

Annabelle (2014)

A Conjuring prequel, it deals with a family that gets haunted by a spirit because of an evil doll.

While I expected this to be rather terrible, I found it quite good. The movie heavily relies on scares, but they are effective all the way through and the doll really looks creepy - this kind of reminded me of Poltergeist actually, which isn't a bad thing since I enjoyed that movie. My main issue however: who in their right mind would want to have this creepy doll in the room of a baby or even find it remotely cute ?! That thing looks like The Joker in a wedding dress, for crying out loud. The name Annabelle seems to come from a little girl who used to own it and killed herself after joining some satanic cult - the movie is set in the late 1960s and a TV program a character watches discusses Charles Manson and his cult.

Watching it you may understand why this cult reference is relevant, but I'd hate spoiling too much as the narrative flows very well.

[AlbertV]

Snowpiercer (Bong Joon-Ho, 2013) - Finally caught this on Netflix. Now, I'm usually a little bias because I like Bong, Song Kang-Ho, and Chris Evans. However, despite the director and two leads, it was the plot of the film that had me extremely interested. The last of humankind all aboard on a train while the earth is in deep freeze...yet, despite the limit of humankind, everyone is still divided by class. Tilda Swinton had me roaring at times as did Alison Pill as a schoolteacher who while singing a song looks like she's about to get possessed. But the film is truly Chris Evans' and Song Kang-Ho's. Despite the language barrier between the two, these two definitely give some of their best performances IMO.

Persona (Ingmar Bergman, 1966) - Been a long time since I've seen any Bergman films and this was one that I never saw in its entirety...until now. I watched bits and pieces when I was taking film studies classes in college. I think this was one of the best films Bergman made (along with my all time favorite of his, The Seventh Seal), with Liv Ullmann as a mute actress who is taken care of by a woman (Bibi Andersson) at a seaside cottage. While the caretaker constantly talks while the actress doesn't speak...there is just more than what is seen on screen and by the finale, it put me in shock (in a good way). Truly loved this masterpiece!

[masterofoneinchpunch]

Dumb and Dumber To (2014: Bobby & Peter Farrelly)

I went to see Intersteller and ending up seeing this. It was a simple reason – there were technical difficulties with Intersteller. The good aspect of this was that I ended up seeing this for free. Like rewatching Ghostbusters on its thirtieth anniversary in the theater, I saw the original Dumb and Dumber twenty years ago in the theater. Jim Carrey was fresh off the success of Ace Ventura and The Mask (it would be his third 100 million dollar movie of 1994) and could pretty much do no wrong in the public’s eye. So going to see this sequel did feel right – at least monetarily free.

The issues with this film are similar to the ones in Farrelly’s last full film The Three Stooges. The gags are there, I liked the performances and there are certainly some funny spots, but the plot needs work and it leads to a less than satisfying final act (though still better than The Three Stooges taking too much from Fletch and The Blues Brothers – though the “killing off the spouse” routine is in this film and probably should have been avoided.) But two-thirds of the film is hilarious. The pretend twenty year coma which starts off the film (and you can see in the

) and its related scenes still makes me laugh – yes it is stupid but it is sagacious stupid humor I appreciate dammit. So I think I like it (I’m giving it a ***/**** which is a passing grade, but warning mileage may vary with their style of humor, in fact if you do not like the first film, overtly stupid comedy or the Farrelly’s then stay away from this like a vegan to Burger King.)

I do expect the third film to come out in 2034 if everyone is alive. It could take a Bubba Ho-Tep type of plot. Jim Carrey has not aged that much in two decades, though Jeff Daniels has (and Kathleen Turner has aged the most, it took me a while to recognize her, I loved the smiley face gag though.) Bill Murray has one of the more hidden cameos of all-time. I did not know it was him until I saw his name in the credits. I wonder if he got paid?

Now this film does lead me to question who is more stupid: Harry or Lloyd? Is it easier to wax existentialist about the esoteric quandaries of quantum mechanics or to figure out just how many psychiatrists it takes to change a light bulb? *

Yes, there is an after-the-credits sequence. It was funny that no one stayed for that except for me. I had that feeling it was going to be there (chances are increased if it is a comedy, it is now an almost certainly for a comic-book film, still waiting for one for a serious drama based off of William Shakespeare or Jane Austin.)

* One, but the light bulb must want to change.

[DrNgor]

The Outlaw Josey Wales - It was certainly a lot more entertaining than Hang'em High, which I also watched this year. There was more action and the story flowed a lot better. Interesting how my Brazilian movie guide and the cable synopsis describe the plot as being about a man who joins a guerilla movement following his wife and son's death, but how that basically describes the film up through the opening credits. The film itself is more about how a violent man like Wales goes on a journey of redemption of sorts, even has he's been hounded by every bounty hunter in Texas. This was another good example "The things PG movies could get away with in the 1970s," what with its high body count, coarse language, and two attempted rapes, one of which shows us brief glimpses of Sondra Locke naked.

Black Sunday - This must've been pretty hardcore for its time, with two scenes of eye-related gore (love the eye reconstruction scene) and background nudity. I think they should've stuck with the downer ending that the movie was setting itself up for. I just wish that evil Barbara Steele had been a lot more mobile, instead of using her minions. On the same token, it's pretty horrible to think that an otherwise God-fearing person could be the unwitting colateral damage victim of a Satanic curse and become a pawn of Satan in the process. That really hits *me* and scares me more than death itself.

Black Christmas - I think the key to letting this movie affect you or not is whether or not you can accept that nobody thought to look in the attic during two key scenes. If you can accept that, then yeah, this is one downbeat horror movie in which the idea that nobody is safe is taken to the furthest extreme possible. I like how subtle the downer finale is.

Masque of the Red Death - Vincent Price is good as always and the film looks really good. Unfortunately, like Carrie, the film feels like it's spinning its wheels until we can get to the climatic ball sequence. I also felt that the "dance of death" robbed the clímax of its power, as opposed to an entire roomful of people having an agonizing, bloody death in unison. I like the line about the best swordsman not fearing the second best, but the worst, for he would be unpredictable. Anybody who has ever played a fighting game will have probably experienced that before.

[DiP]

Black Christmas - I think the key to letting this movie affect you or not is whether or not you can accept that nobody thought to look in the attic during two key scenes. If you can accept that, then yeah, this is one downbeat horror movie in which the idea that nobody is safe is taken to the furthest extreme possible. I like how subtle the downer finale is.

Amen! There's a bit of dumb stuff that wasn't needed (the forced comedy provided by two of the actresses) but when the murders kicks in, the suspense truly keeps you at the edge of your seat. The best thing about the film is that the identity of the killer is kept a mystery throughout the course using red herrings to add extra thrills.

[AlbertV]

Traffickers (Kim Hong-Sun, 2012) - Well Go USA is releasing this on DVD and Blu-Ray on December 23 (got an advanced BD copy)

http://albertvfilm.blogspot.com/2014/12/traffickers-2012.html

[Takuma]

Interstellar (USA, 2014) [Digital Imax] - 4/5

A bit silly with its corny "love transcends time and space" stuff where the most exiting science fiction should be, but it is a very entertaining film with some of the year's most epic scenes. Also, some parts resemble the terrific Japanese anime short Voices from a Distant Star which also deals with the topic of aging in space vs. the earth. I'm a bit bummed that I couldn't see a film print of Interstellar, but the digital Imax gave a pretty good ride anyway.

[Alexandra]

Reminding Jerry Lewis, the last three months:

just watched The Patsy, The Errand Boy, The Bellboy, CinderFella, Boeing Boeing, Who's minding the store, Hook, Line and Sinker, Disorderly Orderly, Ladies Man, Visit to a Small Planet, Nutty Professor, Hardly Working, Rock a bye baby

I love him since I was a child and will love him forever.

[DrNgor]

Mega Shark vs. Mecha Shark - The movie was practically an 80-minute action sequence and moves at a very fast pace. It felt a little more like a movie than Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus, although it's still not very good in the end. Other than a clever riff on the megalodon-attacking-an-airplane bit from Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus, there's not a lot of creativity to be found in the fights. Meh.

Popcorn - As a horror film, the movie is largely ineffective. The villain is too Jim Carrey-esque (despite Carrey being largely known for his television work at this point) to be scary, the kills lack gore and creativity, there's no exploitive elements, and the film loses its momentum during the last act.

However, the movie succeeds as a tribute to 50s sci-fi movies and to William Castle hucksterism. The movies-within-a-movie make the exercise worth watching:

"Mosquito" - Essentially Them! by way of The Giant Claw. Fans of crappy monsters should fall in love with the giant mosquito puppet. The filmmakers even included an odious comic relief named Corky!!!

"Attack of the Amazing Electrified Man" - A condemned criminal is injected with an experimental "third blood cell" and survives the electric chair. Here we have an homage to films like The Indestructible Man and the like.

"The Stench" - The obligatory Asian import film, this film is shown during the last act, when the script is focusing on the showdown between the killer and the heroine (Jill Schoelen), so it mainly gets the shaft.

The movie is tame enough that it would probably get a PG-13 rating today. It would make a nice double feature with Matinee.

[Takuma]

Guardians of the Galaxy (USA, 2014) [Aircraft] - 1.5/5

An incredibly boring comic book flick in which green people fight blue people in the middle of 15 000 CGI effects and one normal looking dude. Some amusing humour keeps it from becoming a complete snooze fest. Ok, maybe superhero movies are just not my genre. I only like Batman and Rapeman anyway.

Pulp Fiction (USA, 1994) [bD] - 5/5

I hadn't seen this for probably 10 years. Still as amazing as ever. There's been a million copycat flicks since then, but none have used broken chronology as beautifully as this (including Tarantino himself). The same can be said about the perfect balance between cleverness and some sort of movie universe realism enhanced by relatively slow pace, which is also something the followers usually failed at. The only thing that didn't quite live up to my memories was the soundtrack, which has some brilliant moments but pales in comparison to Jackie Brown.

[DrNgor]

Island in the Sky - John Wayne plays a commercial pilot working for the military whose plane goes down in the uncharted regions of NW Canada. He tries to keep his men sane while everybody else is out looking for him. A bit longish, but enjoyable. Wayne puts in a Strong performance as a man who has to keep it together in front of his men so that they don`t give in to despair. There's great moment where he starts to lose it, threatening to shoot them if they leave camp, after which he leaves the snow cave to break down himself.

Blood for a Silver Dollar - Spaghetti Western starring Giuliano Gemma, an Italian actor of Brazilian extraction who apparently had a strong following over here. The film itself was popular in Brazil and got some extra attention in recent years for having its theme used in Inglorious Bastards. The film itself is about an ex-Confederate soldier who leaves Virginia to make his fortunes in the West. He's hired by the town's rich man to arrest a bandit named Black Eye. There's a messy shoot-out that leaves Black Eye dead and Gemma's character almost dead. Black Eye turns out to be his brother. So when Gemma gets back on his feet, he's going to want revenge against the rich guy for killing his brother. I don't know how this movie got so much of a following, since it's pretty standard stuff. It's a decent way to kill 90 minutes, though.

Seraphim Falls - Pierce Brosnan is an ex-Union-officer-turned-trapper who's mercilessly hunted by ex-Confederate soldier Liam Neeson. Entertaining western/survival adventure that makes Pierce Brosnan even more of a bad-a** than he was after watching The November Man. This movie was also a little longer than it needed to be, but I was satisfied after watching it. Great trick with the bear trap, too.

[Secret Executioner]

The Awful Dr. Orlof (France/Spain, 1962)

A Jesùs Franco movie (who's credited as "Jess Franco" on the cover and as "Jess Frank" in the movie's opening credits) dealing with a former doctor named Orlof and his blind deformed (and lobotomized I guess) sidekick Morpho as they go kidnap women so that the doctor can restore his disfigured daughter's face. Meanwhile, a police inspector named Tanner is on the case and he wants to get it over with soon since he plans to marry afterwards. And wouldn't you know it, his girlfriend just happens to look exactly like Orlof's daughter...

The characters are enjoyable (the inspector is no Sherlock Holmes and is even kind of stupid at times to be fair, but he gets help from a vagabond who is quite funny), the villains are creepy (Howard Vernon has a great vibe as the creepy yet kinda tragic doctor and the guy who plays Morpho is just downright creepy with his blank lifeless stare and his deformed face) and the sets look okay - it's just some small French village with a river and a castle nearby, but still...

The story however is an awful lot similar to the 1942 movie The Corpse Vanishes (a little-known yet enjoyable movie starring Bela Lugosi - I think it's available on a Mill Creek set). The main differences are the evil doctor only uses dead women in the 1942 film (when Orlof resorts to get skin off living women when the transplant of dead women's skin fails) and Bela Lugosi's character is trying to cure his wife, not his daughter - I think (haven't seen it in a long time) he's trying to prevent her from aging or something. And, as you may guess, Howard Vernon is no Bela Lugosi - though Bela Lugosi sets the bar quite high in terms of performance, and like I said, Vernon delivers a good performance, and his character is probably the most developed and most interesting one of the 1962 movie so...

Overall: not a bad movie, makes for some nice 80-minute entertainment, but not something I'd revisit soon. But seeing it's a Jess Franco movie produced by Eurociné, one shouldn't be expecting too much.

Footnote for those who don't know (or may have forgotten):

Eurociné is a small French movie company created in 1937 and known for producing many cheap exploitative movies (not to say bottom of the barrel exploitation) since the 1960s - horror, paella western and sexploitation are the usual kinds of film you get from them in the 1960s onwards. If you look up Nanarland, they mention Eurociné productions with Nazi vampires attacking a small French village, a female vampire that eats cum instead of blood (!) or a Count Zaroff knock-off who's a chick hunting human preys in her gardens with a bow and arrows - and I mean ONLY a bow and arrows cause it's literally ALL she has on her when she goes hunting...

(informations and pictures taken from French website nanarland.com)

[DrNgor]

Crank 2: High Voltage - It tries to be a crazy, OTT action-exploitation flick, not too far removed from the stuff HK used to do back in the 70s and 80s. But while the latter kept everything together with stylish camerawork, superior action design and a certain sense of earnestness, this...well...doesn't. The photography is marred by far too many freeze frames, which annoyed me to no end. The action, while violent, isn't very stylish. Outside of the kaiju fight, the fighting is mainly Statham punching people repeatedly in the face. Boring.

Any attempts at cheap titillation through gratuitous sex and nudity are ruined by the early scene when the big-breasted stripped inexplicably gets in on a gunfight and takes two to the chest. Instead of dying, her boobs deflate as the silicone drains from the holes. That sort of tastelessness permeates almost every frame of the film.

Some of the non-sequitur sequences, like the News broadcast, the talk show scene, and the tasteless bit with the hospital worker from the first film, kill the pace.

I'm pretty sure the electric battery in Statham's chest created a magnetic field around him that could deflect bullets, since people fire guns (often sub-machine guns) in his direction and I don't recall him ever getting hit.

[AlbertV]

To end my vacation, I binged on Marx Brothers classics. I will be working this week on a review binge of these classics on my other film blog, but here's what I watched:

Duck Soup (1933)

A Night at the Opera (1935) - my review is Here

A Day at the Races (1936)

Room Service (1938)

At the Circus (1939)

Go West (1940)

[Secret Executioner]

Crank 2: High Voltage - It tries to be a crazy, OTT action-exploitation flick, not too far removed from the stuff HK used to do back in the 70s and 80s. But while the latter kept everything together with stylish camerawork, superior action design and a certain sense of earnestness, this...well...doesn't. The photography is marred by far too many freeze frames, which annoyed me to no end. The action, while violent, isn't very stylish. Outside of the kaiju fight, the fighting is mainly Statham punching people repeatedly in the face. Boring.

Any attempts at cheap titillation through gratuitous sex and nudity are ruined by the early scene when the big-breasted stripped inexplicably gets in on a gunfight and takes two to the chest. Instead of dying, her boobs deflate as the silicone drains from the holes. That sort of tastelessness permeates almost every frame of the film.

Some of the non-sequitur sequences, like the News broadcast, the talk show scene, and the tasteless bit with the hospital worker from the first film, kill the pace.

I'm pretty sure the electric battery in Statham's chest created a magnetic field around him that could deflect bullets, since people fire guns (often sub-machine guns) in his direction and I don't recall him ever getting hit.

Boy, that sounds ridiculously bad.

And now for something completely different... Went to the theater today and saw

Timbuktu (France/Mauritania, 2014)

A contestant at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival and the official submission of Mauritania to the best foreign language film category of the 2015 Academy Awards - the first ever for this African country -, this movie thrilled the critics when it was screened in Cannes (this and Xavier Dolan's Mommy were the two favorites of many critics, yet neither won the Gold Palm as the Turkish production The Winter Sleep - a 3 hour drama directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan - won) and having seen it, one can see why.

It has great performances (from actors who have next to no professional acting background, but who are convincing), a gripping story with a real life background (the movie takes place in Mali in 2012 as Timbuktu has fallen under the sway of extremists) and a grim, realistic feel - clearly, you can tell very early on this film will give you no happy ending (in spite of what some reviewer from IMDb says - seriously, where did that person see anything uplifting ?!). Also, you get at least 5 different languages spoken in the movie: French, English, Arabic (not sure, but there's some at a point IIRC) and a couple of local dialects.

I will try not to give too much away, but this movie depicts the differences between the old and new way of life, the one before (with a farmer living with his family in the desert near the town) and under the extremists (the town). The extremists' decisions and ways are often questionned (sometimes by side-characters, sometimes by absurd stuff - like people playing soccer with an imaginary ball since it's forbidden or a "islamic police" - that's what it says on their outfit - officer wondering whether musicians should be arrest as music is illegal yet they are singing religious songs - or even by the local imam who is very ballsy standing up to them and is also a good reminder of the truth of Islam as opposed to the way the extremists want to enforce it), yet a big focus is given to two of them and they don't seem like genuinely bad people - hell, it seems these two even try to help the farmer out when he gets in trouble.

I'd put this one in my top 5 2014 films easily.

[AlbertV]

12 Years a Slave - Very brutal and realistic film about Solomon Northrup, a New York-based man who is kidnapped and sold into slavery for as the title indicates, 12 years. Chiwetel Ejiofor truly shines as Solomon with Oscar winner Lupita N'yogo showing why she deserved that award. Michael Fassbender gives it his all as a very brutish slave owner while future Dr. Strange Benedict Cumberbatch plays Solomon's previous owner, who is more benevolent than Fassbender.

Hercules - Brett Ratner's take based on a graphic novel. Dwayne Johnson was great as the demi-god who with an army of forces helps a kingdom when they are in danger of losing it all. Reminded me of the whole Scorpion King saga but nonetheless done well.

[Secret Executioner]

12 Years a Slave - Very brutal and realistic film about Solomon Northrup, a New York-based man who is kidnapped and sold into slavery for as the title indicates, 12 years. Chiwetel Ejiofor truly shines as Solomon with Oscar winner Lupita N'yogo showing why she deserved that award. Michael Fassbender gives it his all as a very brutish slave owner while future Dr. Strange Benedict Cumberbatch plays Solomon's previous owner, who is more benevolent than Fassbender.

Saw that when it came out last year. It's truly a masterpiece, and I'm amazed Solomon Northrup made it out of this hell - the first owner was a good man, but the second one... Shit, Fassbender should have had an Oscar for his performance as the worst a**hole ever.

[AlbertV]

Easy Money (Snabba Cash): The first installment of a trilogy of films starring Joel Kinnaman as JW, a middle-class college student who doubled as a rich elitist. However, in order to keep up that double life, he becomes a drug runner. At the same time, Spanish prisoner Jorge has escaped from prison and works for the same guy JW works for. When Jorge ticks off a Serbian mafia enforcer who is forced to take care of his own daughter, the lives of the three characters intersect in a very dangerous game.

Really good Swedish film based on the novel (which I want to read). I believe this was the film that helped bring Kinnaman to American shores with The Killing and recently, the reboot of RoboCop. I heard the sequels weren't that great, but eventually I still will want to see them.

[masterofoneinchpunch]

Think Fast, Mr. Moto (1937: Norman Foster):

This is of interest to martial art fans because the protagonist is a jiu-jitsu expert and is one of the earlier films to feature that art form prominently. Now Peter Lorre did not do any of the stunts that would be Harvey Parry (and possibly Johnny Kascier) who would go on to double Lorre in many films. There is a nice little interview with Parry as an extra on the DVD.

This is based on the John P. Marquand books of Mr. Moto (though you may notice if you read the synopsis that the novel titled Think Fast, Mr. Moto has almost nothing to do with the movie) and is the first of eight films with Peter Lorre as the titular character. Moto as portrayed by him is an interesting character. He sounds like Lorre so there is no forced accent on his part. But Lorre can put nuance and veiled meaning in almost everything he does. His viciousness is especially shown in one scene where he throws an assailant overboard. His scenes with Sig Ruman (a favorite of mine) work well. His make-up does seem to be a bit too dark sometimes, though it does seem to be of different hues throughout the movie. Unfortunately the Chinese characters, with exception of Lela Liu (Lotus Long), are the brunt of ignorant tourist banter that makes you occasionally wince (though one may argue that it might be true to the character of “Ugly American” Bob Hitching.)

The plot is a somewhat meandering “detective” picture with a smuggling operation as the impetus behind Moto traveling to Shanghai (of interesting coincidence Japan invaded Shanghai in the Second Sino War in 1937, literally a couple of weeks before this picture was released) and befriending the owner of the fleet’s son Bob Hitching (Thomas Beck) who is mostly a goof-off and is caught in the middle of the smuggling’s schemes especially after falling for Russian Princess (Virginia Field) in China (reminding me somewhat of Charlie Chaplin’s last film A Countess in Hong Kong) who happens to be working for crime boss Nicolas Marloff (Sig Ruman.)

Obviously the character was doomed for a long existence as a sympathetic Japanese character would not have made it past the Tripartite Pact. I am curious to how this series of films will progress as Lorre was not in it as much as I would have liked. I also wonder if these roles was of benefit to Lorre’s career (always so much to learn.)

[Secret Executioner]

Since I was mentionning Disney in another thread... Recently got myself a Disney double feature. They're more "boys movies" though have the formulaic princess:

Aladdin (1992)

One of the movies from the great late 80s/early 90s cycle, a film I hadn't seen in ages and it's still as strong as it was back then. I first saw this when I was 6, as my grandma had bought me the VHS after I came out of a long hospital stay. And I got it around the holidays in a DVD set with its 2 DTV sequels

Where to start here ? I like a lot of stuff: Jafar is a great villain, the designs and animation are spectacular, the Genie is a pure wonder (voiced by Robin Williams here and by Dan Castellaneta AKA Homer Simpson (!!) in the sequels and in the TV series - only saw the first sequel called The Return Of Jafar which is also a pretty nice film, though the animation is more cartoony and not as good as the first one) and it has some epic stuff (the escape from the cave, the climatic battle with Jafar...). One of the great. I don't remember watching it a lot, though I still remember when and how I first got it and saw it.

Robin Hood (1973)

Got the VHS for my 8th birthday and recently got it on DVD. This re-telling of the famous old legend of the outlaw robbing the rich to help the poor is creative with the anthropomorphic animals (for the record, they originally wanted to make Friar Tuck a pig, but went with a badger instead). I had better memories of this than of Aladdin, likely because I was older and maybe because I saw it more often than Aladdin. Still, this one has great characters (Prince John is one of those hilarious villains, Robin and Little John are enjoyable guys, the Sheriff is a damn bastard that has his moments...), a nice story (though it's a bit slow for a time when the film focuses on the children, but the tournament and the third act in the castle are really great moments) and the climax in the castle is epic. Got that marching music playing when Prince John is first seen and at the tournament stuck in my head now BTW.

[DrNgor]

Yuma - An Aaron Spelling-produced TV pilot starring Clint Walker (who'll show up in B-Fest's Killdozer) as a hard-as-nails marshal sent to Yuma to clean the place up. He gets involved in a murder meant to direct people's attention away from a cattle embezzlement scheme. At 73 minutes, the film moved at a quick pace and hit all the right notes for a cheap TV western. Kathryn Hays looked like a poor woman's Diana Rigg, which meant that she was still EXTREMELY easy on the eyes.

[AlbertV]

Corman's World (2011): A very well shot documentary about filmmaker Roger Corman, whose career spans now nearly five decades. He is considered the "King of the B-Movies" (a title he is not too fond of). It revolves around mainly his early days at AIP, when his film "The Intruder" (which starred a pre-Star Trek William Shatner) was a box office bomb yet many hail it to this day as one of his best films; his work with Jack Nicholson, Peter Fonda, Bruce Dern; to how he lost out on "Easy Rider" because to him AIP offered a terrible deal pertaining to Dennis Hopper; to the formation of New World Pictures and his working with Pam Grier and Ron Howard (who made his directorial debut "Grand Theft Auto" with Corman as producer) up to the culmination that led to his receiving the Oscar Lifetime Achievement Award in 2011.

Great interviews with Allan Arkush, Joe Dante, Eli Roth (a major fan of his whom he met while promoting Cabin Fever), Peter Bogdanovich, former assistant Frances Doel, William Shatner, and Jack Nicholson (who actually cries at the end of his interview); classic interviews with Paul Bartel and others who worked as directors for New World films in the 70's.

If you like Roger Corman, chances are you may want to check this out.