Last film watched

[paddy no 11]

Triangle of Sadness is good. I think it could have been excellent but it falls short due to uneven pacing and general randomness.

Failed to stick the landing for me.

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No way the beach pedlar wouldn't have noticed all the flotsam and jetsam, or the fact the stroke-lady was in a life-raft. Highly unlikely that the resort wouldn't have seen the smoke from the wreck; or that a ship like that doesn't have rescue beacons bleeping away like mad.

The rest of the film was good, but not good enough to earn forgiveness for that.

All true, and plenty of unbelievable things on ship before then, really. I think I was taking it more as a slightly surreal satire for that to completely ruin it for me.

I liked it, can forgive the flaws but they should have made a 5 star film

[paddy no 11]

Be interested what ye think of cailin ciuin and aftersun if ye get round to them

Didn't think we learned enough about mescals character in aftersun. I did like that the dialogue was actually how people talk rather than being very written

[Son of Mathonwy]

Got round to watching the new Hellraiser, with Jamie Clayton as the Priest (better known as Pinhead).

Very much a love it or hate it affair, and a bit of a departure from The Hellbound Heart, but honestly, I'd argue that it's a more proficiently made film than the 1987 original - a film that Clive Barker, who directed it himself, has referred to as an "uneven" film.

It could have been better but given the straight-to-video dross we've had since Hellraiser 3*, it's a massive return to form. It may be a bit short but it's a solid horror film with decent actors, script and effects - so maybe, just maybe, can get this story/universe going again. It's definitely more proficiently made than the original, but given the low budget and post-production butchery that suffered from, I guess that's not too surprising!

Clayton's Pinhead was a bit forgettable - more like the Cenobites' spokesperson than their leader - although she did her best. A bit miscast really. As a reboot, the film changed the mythology a little and added some detail - which was all fine. The new rules about the box were interesting and made reasonable sense. My favourite of the films was the imaginative Hellraiser II, so it was nice to see a bit of creativity.


* OK I confess I haven't seen any of the many sequels after 4, so I may have missed an unexpected gem amongst them.

[Son of Mathonwy]

Be interested what ye think of cailin ciuin and aftersun if ye get round to them

Didn't think we learned enough about mescals character in aftersun. I did like that the dialogue was actually how people talk rather than being very written

I've just watched Aftersun. It's good - a serious, worthy film, and is very realistic with good, natural performances from the leads. It's probably not quite my kind of thing - it's very low-key and slow, often mundane. And, as you say . . .

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ambiguous, because we're never told the full story of events before the holiday, nor pretty much anything about what might have happened after that.

I was surprised that we didn't get more time with the adult Sophie to get a better sense of what her life was really like, what the holiday actually meant to her, what (if anything) happened to her father afterwards. My guess is that he killed himself, but we don't really know. Presumably we're meant to mull this over (unless of course I missed lots of subtle clues!).

[paddy no 11]

Yup, feel the same as you. The conclusion you came to is definitely right which is why I'd like to better understand him and his relationship with partner, it hints but doesn't give enough

[Son of Mathonwy]

Infinity Pool is worth watching if you're into weird, trippy, arty horror. Brandon Cronenberg is a little more subtle than his dad and has made a film with echoes of Christopher Priest's The Affirmation and Priest's work in general.

[Mikey Brown]

Infinity Pool is worth watching if you're into weird, trippy, arty horror. Brandon Cronenberg is a little more subtle than his dad and has made a film with echoes of Christopher Priest's The Affirmation and Priest's work in general.

Yeah was definitely an odd one. Some really fantastic moments and the general style and atmosphere was great. I’m unsure how cohesive it was as a whole and some particular character motivations baffled me.

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Why was punching a clone of himself where he drew the line? Having been happy to watch ‘himself’ get murdered? I just didn’t understand why that was his tipping point, and the whole film seemed to hinge on that moment.

Definitely an experience though.

Surge - I really enjoyed this. It follows a man on the verge of a mental breakdown and is a bit of a difficult watch both in terms of visual style (intense shaky cam) and the awkwardness of his interactions. I found it really rewarding and bizarrely funny though. Incredible lead performance from Ben Wishaw, whom I don’t think I’ve actually seen before. On iplayer at the moment too.

Queen and Slim - some really great moments, great lead performances and generally a fun/cool vibe to it, but the weight of the story/themes it was covering really got lost. I feel like this could have been very good but didn’t really land the crucial punches.

Worth a watch (on iplayer too) if you don’t want to take it too seriously, but that feels like a very odd thing to say about a film focused on US race relations and police brutality.

[Numbers]

Infinity Pool is worth watching if you're into weird, trippy, arty horror. Brandon Cronenberg is a little more subtle than his dad and has made a film with echoes of Christopher Priest's The Affirmation and Priest's work in general.

Yeah was definitely an odd one. Some really fantastic moments and the general style and atmosphere was great. I’m unsure how cohesive it was as a whole and some particular character motivations baffled me.

► Show Spoiler

Why was punching a clone of himself where he drew the line? Having been happy to watch ‘himself’ get murdered? I just didn’t understand why that was his tipping point, and the whole film seemed to hinge on that moment.

Definitely an experience though.

Surge - I really enjoyed this. It follows a man on the verge of a mental breakdown and is a bit of a difficult watch both in terms of visual style (intense shaky cam) and the awkwardness of his interactions. I found it really rewarding and bizarrely funny though. Incredible lead performance from Ben Wishaw, whom I don’t think I’ve actually seen before. On iplayer at the moment too.

Queen and Slim - some really great moments, great lead performances and generally a fun/cool vibe to it, but the weight of the story/themes it was covering really got lost. I feel like this could have been very good but didn’t really land the crucial punches.

Worth a watch (on iplayer too) if you don’t want to take it too seriously, but that feels like a very odd thing to say about a film focused on US race relations and police brutality.

Yeah, I saw that when it came out, quite a departure from James Bond's Q and the Paddington films for Wishaw.

[Son of Mathonwy]

Infinity Pool is worth watching if you're into weird, trippy, arty horror. Brandon Cronenberg is a little more subtle than his dad and has made a film with echoes of Christopher Priest's The Affirmation and Priest's work in general.

Yeah was definitely an odd one. Some really fantastic moments and the general style and atmosphere was great. I’m unsure how cohesive it was as a whole and some particular character motivations baffled me.

► Show Spoiler

Why was punching a clone of himself where he drew the line? Having been happy to watch ‘himself’ get murdered? I just didn’t understand why that was his tipping point, and the whole film seemed to hinge on that moment.

Definitely an experience though.

► Show Spoiler

I think (if anything made sense by that point in the movie) our protagonist drew the line there because the group were ridiculing him, not treating him as one of them. But then he was gradually going insane so perhaps anything goes.

Possessor is another one to watch by Brandon Cronenberg.

[Mikey Brown]

That does actually make a huge amount more sense.

[Which Tyler]

[Son of Mathonwy]

Renfield is extremely silly but bloody (very bloody) good fun. Cage and Hoult are perfect for it.

[Puja]

Renfield is extremely silly but bloody (very bloody) good fun. Cage and Hoult are perfect for it.

The trailers did look fun - thought the idea of telling Nicholas Cage to go as extra as he possibly could looked like a good directorial choice, but I was worried that I'd seen all the best bits in the trailers.

Puja

[Numbers]

Barring Raising Ariizona I don't think I'd bother with any Cage films, he is a wooden as they come, perfecting the look of gormlessness. I haven't seen Leaving Las Vegas as thet just looks depressing, is ther any substance to this effort or is it more straight to VHS standard stuff?

[Mikey Brown]

Leaving Las Vegas, Mandy and Pig are all absolutely incredible. He’s done a whole lot of terrible stuff though.

[Son of Mathonwy]

Renfield is extremely silly but bloody (very bloody) good fun. Cage and Hoult are perfect for it.

The trailers did look fun - thought the idea of telling Nicholas Cage to go as extra as he possibly could looked like a good directorial choice, but I was worried that I'd seen all the best bits in the trailers.

Puja

That's pretty much any trailer really .

I avoid them.

[Son of Mathonwy]

Leaving Las Vegas, Mandy and Pig are all absolutely incredible. He’s done a whole lot of terrible stuff though.

He's done a ridiculous number of films:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolas_Cage_filmography

and there's a lot of shite in there, but the occasional nice piece of work. He's more reliable in comedy.

The Colour out of Space is pretty good. Face/Off is so bad that it's good. Con Air is so bad that it's . . . just really, really bad.

[Mikey Brown]

Finally saw Triangle of Sadness and it was excellent. My expectations weren’t that high despite loving Osterlund’s other work, but I feel like a lot of the criticism I’d heard before had rather missed the point.

The ending was oddly abrupt but I thought this was fucking great overall. It does a good job of recognising how ridiculous and shallow many of these multi-million dollar ‘eat the rich’ movies are, whilst still getting a good few jabs in.

I also watched the Menu. Great director, super slick production, amazing star-studded cast, some great lines and some great performances. Awful, awful film. Absolutely fucking hated it. I had suspected this would be the case based on the trailer, but the pleasant surprise of triangle of sadness made me reconsider. The paper-thin “satire” in this is painful.

I appreciate many could watch those two films and probably reverse the viewpoints, or dismiss both completely, but the Menu felt so shallow in comparison. Even the way it posited you can just view it as a cheeseburger, not be taken too seriously, actually seemed pretty wanky.

[Son of Mathonwy]

Finally saw Triangle of Sadness and it was excellent. My expectations weren’t that high despite loving Osterlund’s other work, but I feel like a lot of the criticism I’d heard before had rather missed the point.

The ending was oddly abrupt but I thought this was fucking great overall. It does a good job of recognising how ridiculous and shallow many of these multi-million dollar ‘eat the rich’ movies are, whilst still getting a good few jabs in.

I also watched the Menu. Great director, super slick production, amazing star-studded cast, some great lines and some great performances. Awful, awful film. Absolutely fucking hated it. I had suspected this would be the case based on the trailer, but the pleasant surprise of triangle of sadness made me reconsider. The paper-thin “satire” in this is painful.

I appreciate many could watch those two films and probably reverse the viewpoints, or dismiss both completely, but the Menu felt so shallow in comparison. Even the way it posited you can just view it as a cheeseburger, not be taken too seriously, actually seemed pretty wanky.

I enjoyed them both but preferred The Menu.

Perhaps the difference for me is that while Triangle of Sadness is obviously a satire (but a flawed one) I see The Menu as a comedy-horror and so am not concerned that its satirical elements are unremarkable. For me Triangle of Sadness fell short of its potential but The Menu (aiming for different targets) nailed it.

► Show Spoiler

IMO perhaps the only real failing in The Menu was the judgement on Hoult's character. Shallow and obsessive as he is, he was never claiming to be a chef himself so it seems unfair to be angry at him for being a bad one. Better to have exposed (say) his inability to distinguish between good and bad food, or to reveal that all of his servings were made with putrid/poisonous ingredients.

The praise for the 'honest' cheeseburger was sightly irritating but that's just me being a vegetarian .

[Mikey Brown]

Finally saw Triangle of Sadness and it was excellent. My expectations weren’t that high despite loving Osterlund’s other work, but I feel like a lot of the criticism I’d heard before had rather missed the point.

The ending was oddly abrupt but I thought this was fucking great overall. It does a good job of recognising how ridiculous and shallow many of these multi-million dollar ‘eat the rich’ movies are, whilst still getting a good few jabs in.

I also watched the Menu. Great director, super slick production, amazing star-studded cast, some great lines and some great performances. Awful, awful film. Absolutely fucking hated it. I had suspected this would be the case based on the trailer, but the pleasant surprise of triangle of sadness made me reconsider. The paper-thin “satire” in this is painful.

I appreciate many could watch those two films and probably reverse the viewpoints, or dismiss both completely, but the Menu felt so shallow in comparison. Even the way it posited you can just view it as a cheeseburger, not be taken too seriously, actually seemed pretty wanky.

I enjoyed them both but preferred The Menu.

Perhaps the difference for me is that while Triangle of Sadness is obviously a satire (but a flawed one) I see The Menu as a comedy-horror and so am not concerned that its satirical elements are unremarkable. For me Triangle of Sadness fell short of its potential but The Menu (aiming for different targets) nailed it.

► Show Spoiler

IMO perhaps the only real failing in The Menu was the judgement on Hoult's character. Shallow and obsessive as he is, he was never claiming to be a chef himself so it seems unfair to be angry at him for being a bad one. Better to have exposed (say) his inability to distinguish between good and bad food, or to reveal that all of his servings were made with putrid/poisonous ingredients.

The praise for the 'honest' cheeseburger was sightly irritating but that's just me being a vegetarian .

Fair enough. I appreciate your explanation. I don't want to bang on any further about the things I disliked (agreed on Hoult's character) in it, but I accept that expectations (and over-analysing intent and subtext) of a film probably makes a huge difference. I probably ruin a lot of films for myself in that way.

I found TOS to be far, far funnier. Meta/self-aware humour is generally pretty fucking cringe but I thought it got the balance right between that, the absurd and the poignant.

[Son of Mathonwy]

Finally saw Triangle of Sadness and it was excellent. My expectations weren’t that high despite loving Osterlund’s other work, but I feel like a lot of the criticism I’d heard before had rather missed the point.

The ending was oddly abrupt but I thought this was fucking great overall. It does a good job of recognising how ridiculous and shallow many of these multi-million dollar ‘eat the rich’ movies are, whilst still getting a good few jabs in.

I also watched the Menu. Great director, super slick production, amazing star-studded cast, some great lines and some great performances. Awful, awful film. Absolutely fucking hated it. I had suspected this would be the case based on the trailer, but the pleasant surprise of triangle of sadness made me reconsider. The paper-thin “satire” in this is painful.

I appreciate many could watch those two films and probably reverse the viewpoints, or dismiss both completely, but the Menu felt so shallow in comparison. Even the way it posited you can just view it as a cheeseburger, not be taken too seriously, actually seemed pretty wanky.

I enjoyed them both but preferred The Menu.

Perhaps the difference for me is that while Triangle of Sadness is obviously a satire (but a flawed one) I see The Menu as a comedy-horror and so am not concerned that its satirical elements are unremarkable. For me Triangle of Sadness fell short of its potential but The Menu (aiming for different targets) nailed it.

► Show Spoiler

IMO perhaps the only real failing in The Menu was the judgement on Hoult's character. Shallow and obsessive as he is, he was never claiming to be a chef himself so it seems unfair to be angry at him for being a bad one. Better to have exposed (say) his inability to distinguish between good and bad food, or to reveal that all of his servings were made with putrid/poisonous ingredients.

The praise for the 'honest' cheeseburger was sightly irritating but that's just me being a vegetarian .

Fair enough. I appreciate your explanation. I don't want to bang on any further about the things I disliked (agreed on Hoult's character) in it, but I accept that expectations (and over-analysing intent and subtext) of a film probably makes a huge difference. I probably ruin a lot of films for myself in that way.

I found TOS to be far, far funnier. Meta/self-aware humour is generally pretty fucking cringe but I thought it got the balance right between that, the absurd and the poignant.

Yeah, I try to watch films knowing as little about them as possible (although you have to know something!). Expectations can make a big difference, for better of for worse.

[morepork]

Harrelson and the fat Russian getting wankered and jousting with cliched quotes was great.

[paddy no 11]

I listened to the rest is history podcast on oppenheimer probably spoiled the film a bit

But either way I didn't think it was up to much, nolan should stick to Sci fi as it suits his gimmicky jump around style, an unremarkable film. 5/10

[Stom]

Harrelson and the fat Russian getting wankered and jousting with cliched quotes was great.

That whole 20 minute section with the turdnado was epic wtf. Absolutely glorious.

I also liked the open-ended ending.


I saw Cage mentioned earlier, and we also recently watched The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent...and absolutely loved it.

Just a pure no thought required action romp. Thoroughly enjoyable.

[Donny osmond]

The Taylor Swift concert movie. Actually really good, even one doesn't like the songs or the artist, the production is fantastic.