What Have You Watched Recently?

[Spence]

I tried to watch Cloverfield again, but 30 minutes into it I was feeling nauseated (just like when I saw it originally in the theater), and had to stop. On the one hand, I sort of feel that the induced nausea and disorientation work cleverly to amplify the feeling of dread from the events you are witnessing. On the other hand, they also make me stop watching, which is utterly counter-productive to the telling of the story.

 

Well apparently without the nausea it is just "stupid".  Not quite worth the label "idiotic", but close.  Trust me, you didn't miss anything except lost time.  I saw it in the theater and after friends kept raving about it, suffered through the video to see if maybe I had missed something.  I didn't.   Boring and uninspired followed by meh fleeing......

[tkdguy]

I'm watching this now:

 

[DasBroot]

I'm rewatching Harmony Gold's port of Robotech for the first time in 30 years.

 

So bad (dialogue). So good (themes, mecha, battles). So nostalgic.  

 

The ability to skip any time Minmei is/was on screen (save for "We Will Win" due to her singing over the final epic confrontation and all) probably saved my sanity. On to the Southern Cross saga ... the one I'm least familiar with since I've read novelisations of Macross and the Invid Invasion but the book shop on base skipped that trilogy of novels for some reason.

[bigdamnhero]

Electra Woman & Dyna Girl, the 2016 film. Better than I expected, actually. A very light-hearted comedy along the lines of Dr. Horrible (but without the singing). Silly, but some clever nods and a few genuine LOL moments. Worth the 80 minutes, tho probably good they didn't try to stretch it any further than that.

 

Also just started in on Season 1of The Expanse, which is absolutely brilliant!

[csyphrett]

Watched Moana. Who knew the Rock could sing? 

CES

[tkdguy]

The Scent of Rain in the Balkans - Based on the novel, the series features the life of a Sephardic Jewish family in Sarajevo through the World Wars.

 

Murders at Barlume - A comedy about a bar owner who helps the police solve crimes.

 

The Undertaker - A police detective becomes an undertaker, but he can't stop fighting crime.

 

Corp+Anam - A crime reporter uncovers a lot of dirty secrets, some of it involving his family.

 

Inspector Winter - Your regular police procedural.

[DasBroot]

One Punch Man 

 

Loved it for what it was - a nice superhero / shonen parody with some occasionally neat super-heroic deconstructions.  I can now officially say I don't understand people who took it 'seriously'.

[Matt the Bruins]

Just caught The Big Short on loan from the library. It was informative, but I'm glad it didn't win many Oscars, and I think Brooklyn definitely should have gotten Adapted Screenplay over it (I also suspect that the same could be said of Carol and Room.)

[Ternaugh]

Rogue One--Caught a few things that I missed the first time around in the theater, added the Blu-Ray to the home collection.

 

Rollerball--The one from 1975, where, "in the future" (Wikipedia claims 2018, though the film never directly mentions any dates), corporations have replaced governments, and where the individual is supposed to be subsumed into the group. Found this one used on DVD, and it fits into my 1970s dystopian movie collection.

 

Happily N'ever After--A "villains take over the fairy tale" story. Wasn't too bad, but I found myself actually rooting more for the villains.

[Grailknight]

My Hero Academia- I haven't had this much fun with an anime since FMA:Brotherhood.

[death tribble]

The first episode of the new series of Dr Who. We get the new companion and the Daleks guest as the Doctor tries to outrun a creature which is like a Water Weird or a Water Elemental

[winterhawk]

The first five episodes of the new incarnation of Mystery Science Theater 3000 on Netflix.  The new crew takes a little getting used to, but they do a good job of carrying on the legacy.

[bigdamnhero]

Colossal with Anne Hathaway and Jason Sudeikis. Absolutely brilliant, crazy & original - hands down the best movie I've seen so far this year.* It doesn't seem to be in very wide release, so check your "art house" theaters, or the Alamo Drafthoue if you're lucky enough to have one in your area, but go see it! One word of warning: the trailer makes it look like this is a lighthearted hi-jinks comedy with monsters, and it is...for the first hour. The second half gets pretty dark; brilliantly so, but totally not what I was expecting going in. And it's more monster-as-metaphor than it is a straight-up Kaiju Smash movie (hence art house...). But totally worth seeing.

 

* Yes, recognizing it's only April, but still.

[Doc Shadow]

I have to start this out by saying I do not like rubber-faced moron comedians. I find them completely unfunny. And for that reason I have never cared for Mr. Rowan Atkinson. I've seen some commercials for Mr. Bean and about 5 minutes of The Black Adder, and was throughly put off by them. Didn't care for him in Never Say Never Again either.

 

But this past week I have watched all six episodes of Blackadder Goes Forth, a couple of Blackadder the Third episodes, Blackadder: The Cavalier Years, and the little gem that was the last appearance of the character in Blackadder: Back and Forth. 

 

I have to say I loved the wry wit and biting satire, particularly in Blackadder Goes Forth. 

 

I would love to see Mr. Atkinson in a serious role. If he did any I'll have to try and find it. 

 

Anyway here's Back and Forth.

 

[bigdamnhero]

I'm with you, Doc. I love Blackadder, but it's the only thing I've ever been able to watch Atkinson in without cringing. You should definitely check out the rest of the 2nd & 3rd series. (Tho I'd suggest skipping the 1st.)

[tkdguy]

Rowan Atkinson has played Chief Inspector Maigret for a couple of TV movies. I haven't seen them yet, but I'm curious to see him in a serious role.

 

Edit - Here's a trailer:

 

[zslane]

Just watched Arrival on blu-ray. A very long, drawn out way of conveying a rather simple concept, but I give it high marks for having the courage to tell such a high-concept sci-fi story. I didn't quite care for the way it was shot though. I am really tired of movies where they pull out all the color in post and leave it just looking lifeless and drab.

[Michael Hopcroft]

Rowan Atkinson has played Chief Inspector Maigret for a couple of TV movies. I haven't seen them yet, but I'm curious to see him in a serious role.

 

 

I want to see that! I want to see it NOW!

[tkdguy]

I watched three movies with my sisters today. Here are my thoughts about them.

 

Rogue One: I agree with my sister's claim that character development was sacrificed in favor of action. But I still enjoyed it more than The Force Awakens.

 

Magical Beasts: I thought this was almost like a Doctor Who adventure. The protagonist certainly reminded me of the 11th Doctor.

 

Hidden Figures: It was great to see how the main characters succeeded despite being faced with racism and sexism at every turn. Still, it got me thinking: How many great minds were prevented from making valuable contributions to society because of bigotry in all its forms?

[Nolgroth]

Started rewatching Season One of Dexter. I was amazed by how well it has held up. The last couple of seasons were difficult to sit through. This one was fun again. One of the biggest mistakes the creative team made was to remove Doakes from the line-up. The casual tension between him and Dexter is/was TV gold. In later seasons, it was Deb that held the show up. The last season had no real pillars to rest itself on, having removed anything or anybody that could act as a foil for Dexter's homicidal tendencies. 

[Joe Walsh]

I finally got around to watching Avatar. After all these years, it turns out it's just another movie about dumb people doing dumb things (and, yeah, a retelling of Pocahontas). There might be a decent 90 minute movie in there somewhere, but I'm not sure I could find it if I tried. It really needs better writing. The characters are mostly cardboard cutouts and the dialog, while delivered as well as can be expected, is mostly B-movie worthy.

 

We also watched Rogue One. On the third viewing (twice in the theater; this time at home on Blu-ray) it was just as great to watch.

[DasBroot]

Star Trek Beyond

 

I really liked it.  So much so that I'm ashamed that the reason I didn't see it until now is that its horrible first trailer and boring title turned me off of the movie.

[bigdamnhero]

Avatar was way overrated.

Trek Beyond was fun, as long as you think of it as "Alternative Trek From The Action Movie Dimension!!!" (Bolding and at least 3 exclamation points mandatory.)

[DasBroot]

There's really no other way to look at the newest Trek movie series.  If they were released in the 90s as a TV show it would have been called "Star Trek: Extreme!".

 

Which I'm ok with because overall the new actors are pretty faithful to their characters (Kirk was the weakest but he's pretty Kirk-like, finally, in Beyond) and the action IS pretty good: I love the pulsed bursts of the new movie phasers, though I know it's kind of polarizing in the community - too frantic compared to the 'stately' or 'dignified' long pulses of the series (a complaint about the Defiant on DS9, too, so it's an old one).

[Cassandra]

Cannonball Run