Movies you've been watching...

[Mathemagician]

There's like a 20 min video with the composer of the X-Men Animated Series theme song and they talk about the series and what made it so loved; ultimately it came down to not treating it like a "kids" show, because the second you do that, it dates it for when they're older and won't want to watch it. If you approached stories/concepts at a level that's basic enough for everyone to understand but still well written, then that's what will sell (and it did).

And the theme song is fucking godly.

 

[Bloody_Inferno]

I think saying Batman ‘89 is better than the Bale movies is a minority/contrarian position mainly pushed by aging millennials who have a lot of nostalgia for it. It’s really not very good. Batman Returns is at least incredibly interesting and has one of the most intricate scores ever in a blockbuster, but I wouldn’t call it a classic either. That’s not to say they’re bad movies, but especially the 89 one fails pretty hard in a narrative sense imo and I find Nicholson’s presence overpowering and mostly annoying. Not to say he’s bad, the movie just can’t handle him. It ends up working best as a really stylish music video almost. Speaking of which, I hate the Prince songs on the soundtrack’s prevalence as much as the repeated Nirvana needledrops in this newest one.

This is an interesting topic that will get a lot of resistance. Funny since I speak to my film buff friends a lot about it too. Batman 89 is the definitive influential superhero movie of all time... well the other one after Richard Donner's Superman 1 (arguably more so). It cast aside the 60s TV camp and put the Frank Miller/Allan Moore aesthetic to life and looks amazing. The whole superhero bloat of today won't exist without Donner and Burton.

Which is why a lot of fans will refuse to admit that Batman 89 is a disjointed mess. It takes an embarrassing amount of time for Batman to realise and foil Joker's plot for one, and making the Joker as the killer of the Wayne parents was dumb here as it was in the recent Joker. Jack Nicholson is good fun, but was the start of stunt casting that plagued the next 3 movies, and also highlighted that Batman as a character has never been that interesting to begin with. It was fun, and I enjoyed it as a kid but we all know that nostalgia is a deceitful mistress.

I have fond memories of Batman Returns, but it's a magnified version of 89 where all the good is better and all the bad is even worse. The plot makes even less sense and there's very little for the title character to do. I do appreciate how much WB panicked when they realised they're making Maccas Happy Meals and other toys to tie in with what is essentially nightmare fuel.

 

[wankerness]

Batman Returns stops even pretending to care about Batman and just goes full Burton in the celebration of the grotesque and weird. I admire it for that. I haven't seen it in a while but I remember quite liking it. Again, not a cohesive masterpiece or anything, but there was way more to like about it than the first one, especially for someone like me that has a lot of affection for some of Burton's other stuff.

And yes, the look and sound of the first movie are incredible and were wildly influential. But the plot and action are SO thin. I remember being confused the first time I saw it - "that was it?!" From what I remember, the plot is like, "Batman punches some street toughs, a gangster gets dumped in some waste and becomes the joker, Batman drives his car once, then the joker threatens to gas people, including Batman's girlfriend, and then he shoots down Batman's plane, so Batman makes him fall off a roof" with a couple of flashbacks mixed in. To be fair, I didn't see it till probably about 2010. I'm sure it would have had a different impact as a kid who hadn't already seen many of its superior successors. But I was kind of blown away by just how little action or plot was in there.

I did see a fun montage video a couple weeks ago of all the times Batman turns in those Keaton movies (since he couldn't turn his neck and very dramatically has to pivot his entire body like some kind of statue).

Anyway I stopped playing videogames for a week so I did a lot of movie watching. Went on a Dan Curtis binge for some reason:

Trilogy of Terror - last segment is better than its rep, really classic
Burnt Offerings - interesting as a Shining-style haunted house movie, not that great
The Night Stalker/The Night Strangler - these are awesome and obvious templates for The X-Files, Darren McGavin is so good at being an annoying asshole

Watched a bunch of old movies I've been meaning to see for a while:

Cruising - weird slasher/Giallo style thing set in New York City in 1980. Al Pacino is a cop that goes undercover in the extreme gay scene of the time to catch a serial killer, he gets warped, things get confusing, it's awesome.
The Andromeda Strain - the most dry and clinical alien outbreak movie imaginable, pretty cool and feels really ahead of its time
Deranged - from the same year as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre but it feels about 10 years older, tries to be a more accurate story about Ed Gein (with names changed), succeeds in that regard I guess, lots of gross and nasty stuff, central performance is pretty good, a couple good scenes
Cannibal Apocalyse - sorta disappointing, was hoping for something insane and large scale like Nightmare City where zombies are everywhere in the city and multiplying like crazy, instead the "cannibal virus" here results in like three guys biting like 10 people, most of whom die shortly afterwards, and then it's just "three vietnam vets get chased around by the cops for a while the end." John Saxon's cool.


Then watched Last Night in Soho and Censor yesterday, for a double-dose of movies about loner women that take heavy inspiration from old Italian flicks. Both are good, neither are great. I was amused to find that Censor had a direct reference to Deranged and tons of clips from old "Video Nasties" that I recognized.

Also watched The Giant Spider Invasion since I'd been watching some other Bill Rebane (really cheap Wisconsin-based genre filmmaker). This one is by far the best and is utterly hilarious, especially all the attack scenes with the truly giant spider. The MST3K episode is a classic, too, thanks to the incessant Wisconsin jokes, but I was glad to find it's almost just as funny without the MST3K commentary.

 

[nightflameauto]

My love for the Keaton Batman movies will never die. Yeah, they're cheesy and dumb as far as movies go, but they were big, had at least some level of seriousness to them, and the one-liners are ridiculous. Come on, the presentation on "This town needs an enema" is so goofy, how could you not love it? And "Where does he get those wonderful toys" has been reused in movies ever since as varied as Jay & Silent Bob to hardcore porn. It's integrated itself into the very fabric of what little culture we have in America in that way.

 

[Rosal76]

Burnt Offerings - interesting as a Shining-style haunted house movie, not that great

It was very average. Trivial info. The house that they used was used in a lot of other movies/t.v. shows including one of my favorite horror movies, Phantasm (1979).

Top picture is from Burnt Offerings and bottom is from Phantasm. Pretty cool.



Cannibal Apocalyse - sorta disappointing,

It had potential. On script, I liked it. Actual film, it could have done better. Not gonna lie. The beginning scene where John Saxon gets bit by the P.O.W. was kinda scary.

 

[Rosal76]

Cruising - weird slasher/Giallo style thing set in New York City in 1980. Al Pacino is a cop that goes undercover in the extreme gay scene of the time to catch a serial killer, he gets warped, things get confusing, it's awesome.

If you like that movie you should definitely, if you didn't already, watch his movie, Sea of love from 1989. Pacino, as always, did a awesome job. The movie also has John Goodman, Ellen Barkin and Michael Rooker.

 

[wankerness]

If you like that movie you should definitely, if you didn't already, watch his movie, Sea of love from 1989. Pacino, as always, did a awesome job. The movie also has John Goodman, Ellen Barkin and Michael Rooker.

Hmm, I don't actually know that one. I'll have to look it up. I've seen a few other seedy 80s NYC thrillers like Crime of Passion but not that one.

 

[KnightBrolaire]

Fantastic Beasts 3: Dumbledore likes peepee - I couldn't even make it 20 mins into it. It's just boring as fuck.

Halloween Kills- very meh. The kills were done well and there are some black comedy moments but overall it just meanders along with zero resolution.

 

[Spaced Out Ace]

Fantastic Beasts 3: Dumbledore likes peepee - I couldn't even make it 20 mins into it. It's just boring as fuck.

Halloween Kills- very meh. The kills were done well and there are some black comedy moments but overall it just meanders along with zero resolution.

"EVIL DIES TONIGHT!" has to be the most unintentionally ridiculous thing to happen in Halloween, besides the fact that Michael is now old enough for AARP.

 

[KnightBrolaire]

"EVIL DIES TONIGHT!" has to be the most unintentionally ridiculous thing to happen in Halloween, besides the fact that Michael is now old enough for AARP.

my headcanon is michael has dementia and got sundowner strength. It makes the movie way funnier. But yes there was a lot of cringe dialogue.

 

[Spaced Out Ace]

my headcanon is michael has dementia and got sundowner strength. It makes the movie way funnier. But yes there was a lot of cringe dialogue.

Lol. Once I found out that no only was everything but H1+H2 was retconned, but even H2 as well, I was done. That plus "What is the best horror film" polls always resulted in unanimous votes for Halloween. It is played out to me. H20 was bad enough ignoring 4-6. Now we have 40 years, not 20, between films, and only 3 kills to base the trauma on. Really goofy. I think H20 would've worked ignoring the Thorn shit, which would be easy to do, because Laurie has no clue about that. You could have her knowing about the "copycat" killings, as she's trying to convince herself they are, but trying to pretend it is over. Meanwhile she is dealing with the abandonment and death of her daughter Jamie. That makes for a much better story.

Instead, we got John and Laurie arguing like a bad fucking drama show from ABC or whatever. Boring.

 

[Seabeast2000]

Old---- It was The Happening meets The Village but by gum it was pretty clumsy. We all know there is going to be MNS Twist....but jeez it was just scripted weird with awkward dialog for most of the movie. It was like a TV series where all of the plot devices were thrown in for exhibition.
The Torment phase of the movie was pretty exhausting as well but the Twist end was condensed and absurd.

Edit: The Twist was decent in and of itself, but there was a part right after Twist Reveal that was just plain old silly.

Spoiler: Spoiler

OK they explain why hair and nails don't grow but wouldn't you be shitting and pissing seconds after consuming liquid or solid? Likewise, wouldn't you be starving to death in a few minutes?

 

[mastapimp]

Old---- It was The Happening meets The Village but by gum it was pretty clumsy. We all know there is going to be MNS Twist....but jeez it was just scripted weird with awkward dialog for most of the movie. It was like a TV series where all of the plot devices were thrown in for exhibition.
The Torment phase of the movie was pretty exhausting as well but the Twist end was condensed and absurd.

Edit: The Twist was decent in and of itself, but there was a part right after Twist Reveal that was just plain old silly.

Spoiler: Spoiler

OK they explain why hair and nails don't grow but wouldn't you be shitting and pissing seconds after consuming liquid or solid? Likewise, wouldn't you be starving to death in a few minutes?

The most egregious error in this movie thinking a character named "Midsize Sedan" could be taken seriously.

I agree with your review and thought the movie was average. I enjoyed one of his previous films, "The Visit" much more.

 

[RevDrucifer]

I love the Keaton Batman flicks and it’s certainly related to nostalgia. I saw the first one in the movie theater with my dads ex-girlfriend and loved it, I was 7. I love the Batmobile in both, the Batmobile is a huge part of any Batman flick for me and I really prefer the 90’s versions to anything that came before or after.

That said, the best Batman scene ever is this one-

 

[Kaura]

Freaky Friday

This is definitely one of the movies. Seriously, way funnier than I remembered.

Also, the Telecaster Lindsey Lohan plays is rad.

 

[KnightBrolaire]

Blair Witch Project- I haven't seen this movie since I was a little kid and it does not hold up at all. It does a good job of building tension and dread by basically not showing anything, but beyond that it's just obnoxious. It's 90 minutes of people being annoying and screaming at nothing, blurry camera angles or shots of people's feet, literally everything I hate about "found footage" films .

The main thing that irritates me is that the kids in it are saying shit like "there's no wilderness in the USA left, we destroyed all our natural resources" while they're literally lost in the fucking woods with no understanding of orienteering or what heading they came from. They're literally trapped in the woods by their own stupidity.

 

[Spaced Out Ace]

Blair Witch Project- I haven't seen this movie since I was a little kid and it does not hold up at all. It does a good job of building tension and dread by basically not showing anything, but beyond that it's just obnoxious. It's 90 minutes of people being annoying and screaming at nothing, blurry camera angles or shots of people's feet, literally everything I hate about "found footage" films .

The main thing that irritates me is that the kids in it are saying shit like "there's no wilderness in the USA left, we destroyed all our natural resources" while they're literally lost in the fucking woods with no understanding of orienteering or what heading they came from. They're literally trapped in the woods by their own stupidity.

I don't know who was stupider: The dimwitted dweebs in the film or the idiotic adults at the time certain it was real. Then again, people were convinced most/all of the Faces of Death film was true. To my understanding, FoD was not real. As a wrestling fan as a kid at the time, I could smell it was a work a mile away. It was sad to see grown adults swearing it was real.

 

[KnightBrolaire]

I don't know who was stupider: The dimwitted dweebs in the film or the idiotic adults at the time certain it was real. Then again, people were convinced most/all of the Faces of Death film was true. To my understanding, FoD was not real. As a wrestling fan as a kid at the time, I could smell it was a work a mile away. It was sad to see grown adults swearing it was real.

I'm used to idiotic protagonists in horror, but they take the cake for being exceptionally dumb. Hmm yes let's go to the creepy death house to look for our missing friend, who conveniently keeps beckoning us deeper into it.


Yeah I watched Faces of Death as a kid and it was blatantly obvious it was fake. I'm honestly surprised no one has made an updated faces of death with all the cell/liveleak footage of people actually dying floating around.

 

[TheBlackBard]

Eh, I still love The Blair Witch Project, even if the protagonists are annoying.

Besides, not only that, it wasn't just their lack of orienteering that kept them in the woods. That can be blamed for some of it, but there was also some fucky shit going on as well.

 

[nightflameauto]

I'll never forive the Blair Witch Project for making the whole found footage thing popular. God damn have there been some absolute horrible stinkers released as found footage movies. And most of them wouldn't have been made at all if they had to have a real budget because somebody would have read the script and went, "Ah, how 'bout you try again, dumbass."