TODAY I WATCHED (TV-series, Movies, Cinema Playlists) 2013

Yeah, it was okay.

Smackdown

Duck Dynasty

When Harry Left Hogwarts -- A quiet, sincere documentary on the final shoots of Harry Potter: The Deathly Hallows. Huge fan of the books here, but not of the movies too much (except David Yates handled the last few exceptionally well). However, it's nice to see such an honest and disarming documentary with so many fly-on-the-wall shots rather than the usual enthusiastic marketing material that comes standard with Harry Potter features. Interviews with the cast reveal that most of them were already aware how limited their career potential could be after the films. Best part of this? Interviews are conducted with the secondary crew, such as hard hats, extras, painters, carpenters, asst directors, even the f*cking runner, and they're all highly transparent and engaging. You rarely get to see big-budget filmmaking stripped down to this. Highly recommended.

EDIT: Interesting; found out the runner was Gary Oldman's son. Total nerd too.  

Emma Watson has nothing to worry about on the career front, she's going to be a big star.

I Spit On Your Grave 2

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

And I'll probably watch Requiem For a Dream (2000) next.

Married...With Children

The original Faces of Death:



Saw the first five minutes or so of this as a kid and found out what true fear was. Revisiting it today, I can understand why. Laughable today, yes, but there's something about 1970's low budget horror that can get under your skin. Anyway, did some detective work on this and the sequels it spawned. The director of all five films did it to appease a Japanese studio and break into Hollywood. The latter never really happened. None of the crew were union and total creative control was at play. If no one here didn't know it already, 40% real 60% fake (allegedly). And yes, it was banned in several countries, but only for a short time--ban was lifted when a number of the sequences were unveiled to be fake. Most interesting quasi-snuff film in the history of exploitation cinema, if you ask me.

EDIT: forgot to mention that the director and his wife do a series of ongoing youtube videos called twojewsonfilm. You can see them through their website twojewsonfilm.com. He's a sharp guy, but his wife is so obnoxious (and possibly loaded) that I can't even finish a video.

AM Raw

Hero At Large

Double Feature Saturday Night:

"Tourist Trap" (1979)



In this cult 70s horror flick, a group of stranded travelers find themselves at a run-down roadside wax museum known for its extremely lifelike mannequins. One by one they start to disappear before the secret behind those mannequins (which you'll figure out way before the characters do) is revealed. The movie starts off strong with some decent creepy atmosphere but falls apart as it goes along. This is the sort of movie where the main characters are such complete idiots that they deserve everything that happens to them. Side note: one of the unlucky travelers is played by a young, pre-"Charlie's Angels" Tanya Roberts, and she looks absolutely SMOKIN' throughout.


"The Last Stand" (2013)



A Mexican drug kingpin escapes from U.S. Marshals in Las Vegas and heads for the border in a souped up sports car. Unfortunately for him, his path to freedom takes him right through a small Arizona border town where Arnold Schwarzenegger is the sheriff, and he and his small crew of deputies are not about to let the guy slip through.

This formulaic but fun shoot-em-up was supposed to be Ahh-nuld's big comeback flick following his foray into politics. It didn't do very well at the box office but I enjoyed it. Arnold's looking kinda leathery nowadays, maybe that's why the younger characters in this one do the bulk of the heavy lifting.

If you favorite vampire film is Blade then this probably isn't for you. It is a good film though.

Boris2008 wrote:

If you favorite vampire film is Blade then this probably isn't for you. It is a good film though.

Absolutely loved this one, was fortunate enough to catch it in the theater (it got a very limited US release). It was nice to see an adult vampire film again.

Oz The Great and Powerful

John Carter

I didn't think this movie was nearly as bad as people made it out to be. Yeah, it's not perfect but I found it to be perfectly enjoyable.

tohostudios wrote:

John Carter

I didn't think this movie was nearly as bad as people made it out to be.  Yeah, it's not perfect but I found it to be perfectly enjoyable.  

I too enjoyed it.

^^ I haven't seen "John Carter" yet (I keep meaning to borrow it next time I'm in the library) but everyone I know who has seen it has said that it was not particularly bad, it was just not good enough to justify its $200 million budget.

Fat Freddy wrote:

^^ I haven't seen "John Carter" yet (I keep meaning to borrow it next time I'm in the library) but everyone I know who has seen it has said that it was not particularly bad, it was just not good enough to justify its $200 million budget.

That's it exactly. Forget what you know about its budget and just watch it for what it is.

Breaking Bad.

...

Midnight In Paris (2011)



Utterly charming, Woody gets the tone just right.

S.D. wrote:

Midnight In Paris (2011)



Utterly charming, Woody gets the tone just right.

Great movie. I could relate.

Saw Star Trek Into Darkness this weekend I thought it was a good movie but there was a block near the end where they took it from Star Trek 2 the Wrath of Kahn