Friday 11 May 2012

May movie update

Here are the films that Pete and I have received from Lovefilm.com and watched on TV and DVD over the past few months in reverse order, with my ratings out of ten from my movie list on the IMDB.
    
Stupid story, stupid action, stupid acting.
  
Lifeboat (1944) 7
Classic Hitchcock with the whole film set on a lifeboat during WW2. Gripping stuff!
  
Beautiful Lies (2010) 6
Disappointing film with Amelie star Audrey Tautou.
  
Puss in Boots (2011) 6
Not as good as Shrek, but OK story and wonderful animation.
   
Annoying... really annoying.
  
The Help (2011) 8
A touching film showing how the USA was openly racist.
  
Moneyball (2011) 7
Close to being an 8 - the story of how a Manager re-wrote the rulebook on selecting players for a baseball team.
  
Silly re-writing of history - great action movie! 
  
Las acacias (2011) 6
Very slow road movie. Fine for late Sunday night.
  
True Romance (1993) 6
Violent and not as good as I had expected.
    
A film that really touched me. I reviewed it here.
  
Kaboom* (2010) 7
Crazy movie starring the sexy Thomas Dekker.
  
The Awakening (2011) 8
Scary horror drama - great movie!
  
Long film about the life of the quiet one. Seemed to dwell on some areas and zip through others which meant it didn't quite work for me.
  
* Previously viewed.

5 comments:

  1. Thank you for the run-down. I appreciate the "dreams of a life," movie too. Am looking into that as it really interests me!
    Baron.

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  2. Only seen a measly four on your list this month, Stephen (+ one on TV).
    Wish I'd seen 'The Awakening', it having been one of the casualties on my sad 'only-if-it-can-be-afforded-on-my-pension' regime.

    'Mission Impossible 3': Frankly I was expecting it be pretty dire (or on the way to that, as you clearly thought it) but was reasonably surprised - though I can now remember nothing except the Cruise 'high-wire' turn. On returning home I set it down as a 7.

    'Lifeboat': Haven't seen this since Oxford University were doing a Hitchcock retrospective in a booked cinema way back in the 1970s. I do recall being rather under-impressed (this was way before I started giving scores). If I saw it now, dare say might have a higher opinion of it.

    'The Help': Wrote at length about it on my blog of 3rd of last month, giving it just 6.5, which I'd round down to 6.

    'Inglourious Basterds' - Liked this a lot, once one had taken a deep breath of belief- suspension, and decided to let it just run its course, which was largely good fun. However, I do remember the film seeming to sag rather oddly whenever Brad P. appeared on screen. However, for the bravado of making it and Tarantino's obvious relish in telling the tale I gave it a, for me, very high score of 8.5 - which, for your purposes I'll round.....(let me see)..... DOWN to an 8.

    As for the others, thought I'd seen the Audrey Tatou but apparently not.
    Wish I'd also seen 'Moneyball'. Seen very disparate views on it but it intrigued me.

    Saw the George Harrison when it was on TV a few weeks ago, spread over two nights. I'd like to have said that I thought it was great but actually found it pretty hum-drum - much as I did Scorsese's recent Stones' 'Shine a Light', which, for some reason, so many are raving about. But wouldn't care to see either again.


    Anyway, let's hope there'll be a greater number on your list that I can talk about on your June blog.

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  3. Thanks Ray for your views.

    The George Harrison thing did seem to be lacking and was disappointing. It seemed to dwell on how much he was loved and managed to ignore all of his albums in the 1970s and 80s.

    And as for MI3 - I know I have a dislike for Tom Cruise, so that was bound to have affected my score. The guy cant act!

    As for the Hitchcock film - I liked it, but have come to realise that he did make some crap too.

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  4. p.s. Awakening is a BBC film, so expect it to be on BBC4 soon. I would think that Dreams Of A Life will also be on TV very soon.

    For the record, Pete thought the Audrey film was good - he's a romantic sort though!

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    Replies
    1. Stephen, will certainly look out for 'The Awakening' on TV, but I suppose it's going to be on late-night. Doubly frustrating in that I'm usually in bed by 21.30 and certainly by 22.00 (except for REALLY important events like the upcoming Eurovision Song Contest!) and also annoying that you can't watch films on the BBCiPlayer 'View Again' facility. (Oh, how sad that all our analogue signals have now gone and my video-recorder is now only good for already recorded playback). But thanks for the recommendation. It MAY come round again on one of our local regular cheapo 'Silver Screen' presentation matinees for us O.A.P.s. - where the snores are sometimes louder than the film's soundtrack!

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