'Fasten your seat belt, Dorothy, 'cause Kansas is going bye-bye.' 😜🙃
Neon's IT ENDS (2026, THEATER), which just opened this weekend, blew me away. Such a simple premise and execution, such a complex web of emotions and feelings it drew out of me from its "Twilight Zone"-esque mise-en-scène. Four young friends (early post-college) hop on a Jeep for a late-night food run, and a wrong turn in the woods results in a road that never ends. That's the first 5 minutes, and I won't spoil what happens after because this movie lives/dies by how well (or not) you can relate to the foursome as they gradually realize the supernatural pickle they're in. It's no "Backrooms" (A24) or "Obsession" (Focus Features), but it's nice to see Neon getting into quality micro-budget dramas that further prove you don't need huge budgets or big actors to engage an audience (a mostly sold-out opening night crowd) for 90 mins. and leave them thinking afterward. Highly recommended. 😎👍
I was in the mood for some 80's cheese, so into my LG player went Richard Fleischer's RED SONJA (1985, ARROW 4K UHD), which either I've never seen or I've forgotten about. Despite being clearly inferior to the two "Conan" movies that preceded it (one of them, "The Destroyer," also helmed by Fleischer the year prior), I thoroughly enjoyed the mix of impressive practical/old-fashioned special effects (in-camera matte paintings, giant sets that shook and fell apart on command, underwater monsters, etc.) and old-fashioned choreographed sword fighting (with PG-13 head/limb removal payoffs). The pedigree of this being an American studio production made by Italian filmmakers, Arnold Schwarzenegger's Kalidor character pushing up against the Conan character's copyright infringement, a fun bunch of supporting characters (loved Paul L. Smith's Falkon, didn't care for Ernie Reyes Jr.'s bratty Prince Tam, wished Sandahl Bergman had been given more to do than mad rants, etc.), and Brigitte Nielsen's presence/body compensating for her lack of acting skills, all result in a fun waste of 90 minutes.
Arrow went above and beyond with its Limited Edition "Red Sonja" 4K packaging. Not only are the picture/sound dynamite and the best this film has ever looked/sounded (uncompressed Mono for the win), but the extras are plentiful (two commentaries, lots of interviews and a thick booklet) and paint a picture of AAA Italian craftsmen (cinematographer Giuseppe Rotunno, production designer Danilo Donati and composer Ennio Morricone) giving this big-budget-for-'85 action flick more class than it deserved. Loved the Renato Casaro feature (22 min.), not as in-depth as the documentary on the Studio Canal 4K release of "RS," but good enough to appreciate the artist's skills (loved the "Rambo III" artwork/sketches). Got my money's worth with this bad boy... I mean, girl. 🥰🤓
MUTINY (UK/USA, '26, THEATER), Jason Statham's latest vehicle, is a major disappointment unless you lower your expectations to the bottom. More of a slow-paced action thriller (shootouts/fights are sporadic and infrequent), it follows Statham's Cole Reed bodyguard after an ambush in Bangkok results in the death of the rich industrialist (Ramon Tikaram's Tibu) he was protecting. Cole boards a cargo super tanker that one of the shooters worked for, where he stumbles upon (a) the conspirators to his friend's murder and (b) human trafficking. At least it's shot in an actual boat, which makes it eons better than Lionsgate's previous "Expend4bles" bad CGI fest. Other than Roland Møller (playing the corrupt captain) giving Statham an unexpected hard time toward the end, "Mutiny" plays it safe 'till a very unsatisfying finale. Wait for streaming, or just rewatch an old (and guaranteed to be better) Statham action flick. 😟🤫
Most times when I buy new movies, they go on 'the pile' (you know which one, don't act like you don't have one yourself! 😉🤠) waiting for me to eventually get around to watching it. Not Quentin Tarantino's KILL BILL: THE WHOLE BLOODY AFFAIR (2004/2025, 4K UHD). Bought this sucker on Tuesday evening, started watching at midnight, and right around 4:25 AM it was over and time for me to go to work. I remember some early scenes in "KB: TWBA" looking soft in the 70mm screening I attended in 2025, the result of a digital intermediate that wasn't 4K at the time the movie was made and then split into two parts. Those same scenes that looked soft in theaters were razor-sharp and pleasing on my 65" TCL. I was ready to start skipping scenes that were slow (Michael Parks' double roles) or went on for too long (the extended anime story of O-Ren Ishii's origins as a young assassin), but I just let the whole thing play and was mesmerized from beginning to end. There are no extras in the non-steelbook version of "KB: TWBA" (except for the 'Missing Chapter' done in Unreal Engine by QT, available only in disc 1), and I don't need posters/book for me to be overjoyed and satisfied with my purchase. Gordon Liu came across in this rewatch as a bigger badass than I remembered. What a time to be a physical media lover. 😎😺
A burning question I have about this movie...is it edited significantly different than just watching Vol 1 and 2 back-to-back in sequential order? Similar to Mad Max Fury Road: Chrome and Steel Edition, i can't find anyone that can explain if its any different than watching the normal movie but switching your TVs built in monochrome setting on. Thanks in advance.
"TWBA" is about 97.6% (my biased number) identical to "Vol. 1/2" in chronological order for pace and editing. The biggest changes are listed here: https://nofilmschool.com/kill-bill-whole-bloody-affair-changes
Most of the changes are on "Vol. 1" ("Vol. 2" is almost unchanged, with the few changes only in how the closing credits unfold), and they're either extensions of existing scenes (O-Ren Ishii's anime flashback) or removal of B&W with color footage during the climactic House of Blues sword fight. And obviously no recap of "Vol. 1" at the start of "Vol. 2" on the 2nd disc, since "TWBA" also comes in 2 discs that match the narrative star/end points of the theatrical volumes. Hope this helps. ✌️😊
A less 'juicy' "Pineapple Express" meets "The Secret World of Alex Mack"-lite in THE WRONG GIRLS ('26, THEATER), the latest from Neon and Seth Rogen/Evan Goldberg's factory of low-budget stoner comedies. Kristen Stewart and Alia Shawkat play Frankie and Molly, L.A. hetero life partners and besties who work dead-end jobs to pay the rent and get high. At a rave where Frankie confronts her ex dating a lookalike girl (Frances, also played by Stewart), a hi-tech drug mule (LaKeith Stanfield) mistakes Frankie for Frances and hands the former a case full of an experimental drug. Naturally the two girls drink it to see what it'll do to them to see if they can sell the rest, and develop the power of listening to their cats Dio and GG (Seth Rogen and Kumail Nanjiani, respectively) as well as telekinesis whenever they focus their minds into it... which is a lot harder to do when you're constantly chasing the glowing purple squid of life. 😶🌫️👽 It's on par with "Y2K" in being a lot more clever and funnier than you'd expect from Rogen/Goldberg, plus the two leads are super likable and the supporting cast (Cate Blanchett as an important VO, Kate McKinnon, Geena Davis, Tony Hale, etc.) terrific when they don't trample over one another. Worth chasing after if fun, cinematic drug humor appeals to you.
I rarely purchase blind buys anymore, but something about THE SURVIVOR (AUSTRALIA/UNITED KINGDOM, 1981, INDICATOR 4K UHD) made me want to take a chance. An Australian/UK production that never made it to U.S. theaters (direct to video/TV back in the early 80's!), it bears a passing resemblance to M. Night Shyamalan's "Unbreakable" in that it follows the lone survivor (Robert Powell's Keller) of a plane crash that killed everyone else on board. "The Survivor" peaks early with a stunning-for-its-time practical effects airplane crash, then becomes a somewhat low-key supernatural slasher as people making money from the crash (mostly a couple of photographers and... someone else) are mysteriously killed. That's a distant 'B' story to Keller and a clairvoyant woman (Jenny Agutter's Hobbs) trying to get the former to listen to the latter passing on the voices from the dead passengers seeking justice. It's a mixed bag overall (the filmmakers and actors admit in the bonus features it's not as good a movie as the James Herbert novel it's based on), but between its obscurity and wealth of supplemental features (typical Indicator 4K release) I enjoyed "The Survivor." If you could rent it give it a try. 🤓🤔
SHEEP IN THE BOX (JAPAN, '26, THEATER) is basically a low-key, sentimental and ultimately uplifting remake of Steven Spielberg's "A.I." without the Hollywood histrionics. "In the near future," 🙄architect Otone Komoto (Haruka Ayase) and her construction worker husband Kensuke (Daigo Yamamoto), qualify for a free sample from a company that specializes in humanoids for people that have lost loved ones. They receive a boxed version of their dead son Kakeru (Rimu Kuwaki, pretty good at playing a self-aware robotic entity) that, while initially healing, eventually opens deep emotional wounds the couple had struggled to hold back. While it veers into fantasy (discarded robots team-up with Kakeru to build a space where they can be themselves and not who their human owners want them to be), "SITB" is as grounded and emotional a sci-fi drama can be without flashy special effects or action set-pieces. Worth seeking online/streaming, as this was in/out of theaters faster than you can say 'Spider-Man.' 👊🤠
John McTiernan's remake of THE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR (1999, AMAZON PRIME) was a fun watch-along with Jury 4.0 members that told me having Pierce Brosnan in the role of the bored, Wall Street playboy that likes to steal artwork from well-guarded NYC museums for fun is a vast improvement over Steve McQueen's 1968 original (which I've never seen). Brosnan and Rene Russo (an insurance investigator for the owners of the stolen museum painting) have great chemistry during their cat-and-mouse games and romantic escapades, the ultimate middle-aged fantasy that McTiernan edits and scores (Bill Conti score and a handful of well-chosen tunes) like a then-modern-day cinematic jet set travelogue. NYPD detective Denis Leary is stuck with a bad haircut, Faye Dunaway (from the '68 OG) has a fun cameo as Brosnan's therapist, production values are excellent and the supporting cast (Fritz Weaver, Ben Gazzara, Frankie Faison, Mark Margolis, etc.) fun the few times the camera focuses on them over Rene or Pierce. Sad that this is the last great McTiernan movie that was a hit before the Pelicano affair and a slew of bombs ("The 13th Warrior," "Rollerball" remake and "Basic") ended his career on the sourest of notes. 😢😪
All 5 Death Wish movies: the funniest part of the first 4 is there's always a then-unknown actor in a small tug part (Jeff Goldblum in the first movie, Dany Trejo in the fourth). I won't deny the quality of the first movie, but it was not the k!ll-em-all blood fest that the series would become. The second movie has an extended r@pe scene that's way too long (unrated cut probably, I didn't watch the theatrical cut). The third movie is obviously the best. By the fourth movie, Bronson's age is starting to show (he was already 50-something in the first movie), but there's a dude getting blown up by a grenade by the end, so it's fine. For a long time, the fifth movie was hard to find, but thanks to Kino, we now have access to it. It was the first time I ever saw it and I loved it.
Popeye (1980): In glorious 4k. I love that movie. They built a really extensive set and you can see all the great details. Not the kind of story you'd expect from Robert Altman, and yet it's very much in his style of movie
Exit 8 (2025): Following the release of Backrooms, this movie was often mentioned as another great psychological horror featuring liminal spaces. At first the movie seems repetitive, always going up and down the same corridor, turn the same corners, and yet it never feels padded or too long.
I remember seeing "Popeye" in a movie theater at age 7 or 8 and hating it because, well, it was a musical AND inspired by the comic strip, not the TV cartoons l was used to. On a rewatch years later l appreciated the method behind Robert Altman's madness, Williams' committment to the Popeye personality, Pal L. Smith as a real-life Bluto (Falkon in "Red Sonja"! 😲), and the amazing production design... but l still thought the movie sucked. 3rd rewatch for the win? 🤔🙄
All 5 "Death Wish" in a row? You just witnessed Junesploitation! royalty in all shapes and sizes. I rank them (knowing full well they're wildly different from one another) 3, 1, 4, 2 and 5. Chuck Bronson rules! ✊️😎
4K of "Aliens," or are we still rocking the ol' 'Quadrilogy' Box Set BD? 🙃 "Pump Up The Volume," l had such a crush on Samantha Mathis. 😍🥰 Great early use of Leonard Cohen's 'Everybody Knows,' a tune that kind-of lost its edge and power from too much media overexposure.🥸😕
Tobe Hooper is the only non-coward in Hollywood with the guts to make Ted Levine a leading man. Levine gives a bizarre and frightening performance (I mean that as a compliment). He's scarier in this than Silence of the Lambs! Robert Englund is also hilarious turning the ham-o-meter up to 11. You can tell he's having a blast in this. Also hats off to whatever lunatic(s) designed the look of the actual steam press laundry machine. Thank you Tobe Hooper for making this excellent black (red) comedy. And I really enjoyed the colors.
Indeed I did get the Vinegar Syndrome 4K #Blessed. The picture and sound is phenomenal. It's such a gorgeous movie to look at. Can't wait to dive into the extras.
Looker (1981): Albert Finney, action hero... Didn't see that coming. Until recently, I didn't realise Michael Crichton directed other movies than Westworld. I know, IMDb was right there. Anyway, he was still ahead of technologies, it's about CGI actors, and directed another cool little sci-fi. The bad guys have some kind of memory-wiping gun like the flashy-thing in Men in Black, that gives you some very fun fights and car chase scenes. I would've paid good money to see Crichton direct something on a bigger budget and scale.
Coma (1978): Another Crichton, another good movie from the man. There are no sci-fi elements, instead we got a medical conspiracy thriller, featuring a bunch of cool cameos. Tom Seleck is here for maybe 2 minutes, and the first movie role of Ed Harris.
There's another Crichton I want to get, Runaway with Tom Selleck, but there's only a UK blu-ray, so it'll take a few days before I get it.
Crichton was a book author that wanted to be a Hollywood movie player, and his literary success allowed him to play in the movie sandbox for decades ("The Great Train Robbery" with Sean Connery and Donald Sutherland's very underrated) before the 1-2 punch of "Jurassic Park" (the book first, then the movie phenomenon) and "ER" on NBC finally made him an A-lister writer/producer. I love "Coma" (it's like nightmare "ER" on body horror steroids), an early showcase of young Michael Douglas leading man chops and Geneviève Bujold sensuality. 🥰
Don't get the disc just yet (KL put out a BD a year or two ago). It's streaming on Pluto, watch it first to see if you like it, then buy the KL BD if you must have it. 🙄😜
The Great Train Robbery is not like most of the Crichton's films I have seen. I found the film amusing, but the slow pacing and period piece aspects can make it drag at certain spots.
I found the chemistry between Connery, Sutherland and Lesley-Ann Down appealing, not to mention the train stunt with Sean atop the train a tension-raising action highlight. But your opinion, Casual, is why I'm pushing for Kunider to watch "TGTR" on streaming before buying it on disc. 🥶😬
My spending spree continues, but it has reached new lows as I've had to dabble in foreign copies. Recently received copies of 187 on 4k and The Descent 4k, both from Germany. And I'm patiently awaiting my Korean Blu-ray copy of Monster. I fucked up and bought a copy from Second Sight first, thinking it was 4k only to get it in mail and realize it was region blocked. That's on me though. Also waiting on my preorder of Arrow's Identity that I got on discount from Barnes and Noble. Lastly, I ordered the fantastic Austrian flick, The Robber on Blu-ray from Kino 2 weeks ago and it still hasn't shipped. Is that normal for Kino?
It's happening more and more. But i have a handful thet were never done in Region A, and i'm very happy to be able to watch them. I have upgraded a few just because they were finally released in north america.
With 4k it's no longer an issue, thank god, but sometimes i'll get a 4k from UK and the accompanying blu-ray is Region B.
Yeah the accompanying Blu-rays with special features being region blocked is really annoying. On a better note though, it looks like Commando is finally getting a 4k release. Apparently it's already up for pre-sale on some French website along with some other great titles. All steel books though.
Yeah, Disney/Fox just announced a bunch of new 4K titles: The Rock, Con Air, Mrs. Doubtfire, Commando, Strange Days, a couple others I think. Hope they don't do too much DNR like they have in the past.
Not having my computer (I spend too much time on it) with me for pet sitting this week gave me a good opportunity to indulge my love of Japanese cinema. I have intended to get to some Japanese films for a while.
THE GOOD WIFE (1987, dir. Ken Cameron) – My Sam Neill tribute watch is a romantic drama known as The Umbrella Woman in Australia. I picked the DVD up for a dollar at a dollar store years ago. He portrays a roguish womanizer in the 1930s coming to a small Australian town to manage the bar at the local hotel. He quickly catches the eye of Marge (Rachel Ward). She becomes infatuated with him and does not even try to hide it. Marge's struggles with her marriage are at the center of the film. Though sometimes feeling like a Lifetime movie, The Good Wife shows a lot of craft that went into shooting the film.
THE TALE OF THE PRINCESS KAGUYA (2013, dir. Isao Takahata) – A gorgeous animated film from Studio Ghibli based on one of the oldest folktales of Japan. The story of the bamboo cutter who finds a mysterious child in a bamboo shoot and raises her to be a noblewoman in feudal Japan is full of sadness, fitting for the director of the emotionally brutal classic Grave of the Fireflies. The beautiful minimalist hand-drawn style (a lot of watercolors) and refusal to cater to short attention spans are just a couple of reasons why I really enjoyed the film. The slow pacing is not for everyone, though.
DEMON POND (1979, dir. Masahiro Shinoda) – Coming from a director like Shinoda (a personal favorite), of course the film looks great. A scholarly traveler in early 20th-century Japan makes his way into the countryside to visit the infamous Demon Pond, where a Dragon God supposedly resides and has a supernatural pact with nearby village not flood it. The best parts of the film consist of the otherworldly mood of the early scenes and the whimsical and stylized depiction of the yokai inhabiting the pond. It is the heavy-handed handling of the themes – science vs. superstition for example- that drag the film down by the conclusion. There was more of the good side than the bad, making this a worthwhile watch.
SAMURAI 1: MUSASHI MIYAMOTO (1954, dir. Hiroshi Inagaki) – Inagaki’s famous Samurai trilogy has been on my watchlist for many years now. Toshiro Mifune portrays Musashi, the most revered historical samurai in Japanese culture. This telling of his life was adapted from a 1930s novel, which took a lot of liberties with the real story. The film is a large-scale production shot in color with crowd scenes and a handful of impressive but short battle sequences. The main flaw of MUSASHI is a clunky narrative, but the very 1950s-style overacting can be distracting as well. Probably not a film that I would feel a need to rewatch. I am looking forward to the next entries, though.
I watched that sequence a few times, Kunider. It is great. Another sequence that had me going back was when Kaguya disappears during the Emperor's unwelcome visit.
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ReplyDelete'Fasten your seat belt, Dorothy, 'cause Kansas is going bye-bye.' 😜🙃
DeleteNeon's IT ENDS (2026, THEATER), which just opened this weekend, blew me away. Such a simple premise and execution, such a complex web of emotions and feelings it drew out of me from its "Twilight Zone"-esque mise-en-scène. Four young friends (early post-college) hop on a Jeep for a late-night food run, and a wrong turn in the woods results in a road that never ends. That's the first 5 minutes, and I won't spoil what happens after because this movie lives/dies by how well (or not) you can relate to the foursome as they gradually realize the supernatural pickle they're in. It's no "Backrooms" (A24) or "Obsession" (Focus Features), but it's nice to see Neon getting into quality micro-budget dramas that further prove you don't need huge budgets or big actors to engage an audience (a mostly sold-out opening night crowd) for 90 mins. and leave them thinking afterward. Highly recommended. 😎👍
I was in the mood for some 80's cheese, so into my LG player went Richard Fleischer's RED SONJA (1985, ARROW 4K UHD), which either I've never seen or I've forgotten about. Despite being clearly inferior to the two "Conan" movies that preceded it (one of them, "The Destroyer," also helmed by Fleischer the year prior), I thoroughly enjoyed the mix of impressive practical/old-fashioned special effects (in-camera matte paintings, giant sets that shook and fell apart on command, underwater monsters, etc.) and old-fashioned choreographed sword fighting (with PG-13 head/limb removal payoffs). The pedigree of this being an American studio production made by Italian filmmakers, Arnold Schwarzenegger's Kalidor character pushing up against the Conan character's copyright infringement, a fun bunch of supporting characters (loved Paul L. Smith's Falkon, didn't care for Ernie Reyes Jr.'s bratty Prince Tam, wished Sandahl Bergman had been given more to do than mad rants, etc.), and Brigitte Nielsen's presence/body compensating for her lack of acting skills, all result in a fun waste of 90 minutes.
ReplyDeleteArrow went above and beyond with its Limited Edition "Red Sonja" 4K packaging. Not only are the picture/sound dynamite and the best this film has ever looked/sounded (uncompressed Mono for the win), but the extras are plentiful (two commentaries, lots of interviews and a thick booklet) and paint a picture of AAA Italian craftsmen (cinematographer Giuseppe Rotunno, production designer Danilo Donati and composer Ennio Morricone) giving this big-budget-for-'85 action flick more class than it deserved. Loved the Renato Casaro feature (22 min.), not as in-depth as the documentary on the Studio Canal 4K release of "RS," but good enough to appreciate the artist's skills (loved the "Rambo III" artwork/sketches). Got my money's worth with this bad boy... I mean, girl. 🥰🤓
MUTINY (UK/USA, '26, THEATER), Jason Statham's latest vehicle, is a major disappointment unless you lower your expectations to the bottom. More of a slow-paced action thriller (shootouts/fights are sporadic and infrequent), it follows Statham's Cole Reed bodyguard after an ambush in Bangkok results in the death of the rich industrialist (Ramon Tikaram's Tibu) he was protecting. Cole boards a cargo super tanker that one of the shooters worked for, where he stumbles upon (a) the conspirators to his friend's murder and (b) human trafficking. At least it's shot in an actual boat, which makes it eons better than Lionsgate's previous "Expend4bles" bad CGI fest. Other than Roland Møller (playing the corrupt captain) giving Statham an unexpected hard time toward the end, "Mutiny" plays it safe 'till a very unsatisfying finale. Wait for streaming, or just rewatch an old (and guaranteed to be better) Statham action flick. 😟🤫
ReplyDeleteI'll give it points for the no-cgi boat. I needed something to watch while folding laundry, it was perfect for it.
DeleteMost times when I buy new movies, they go on 'the pile' (you know which one, don't act like you don't have one yourself! 😉🤠) waiting for me to eventually get around to watching it. Not Quentin Tarantino's KILL BILL: THE WHOLE BLOODY AFFAIR (2004/2025, 4K UHD). Bought this sucker on Tuesday evening, started watching at midnight, and right around 4:25 AM it was over and time for me to go to work. I remember some early scenes in "KB: TWBA" looking soft in the 70mm screening I attended in 2025, the result of a digital intermediate that wasn't 4K at the time the movie was made and then split into two parts. Those same scenes that looked soft in theaters were razor-sharp and pleasing on my 65" TCL. I was ready to start skipping scenes that were slow (Michael Parks' double roles) or went on for too long (the extended anime story of O-Ren Ishii's origins as a young assassin), but I just let the whole thing play and was mesmerized from beginning to end. There are no extras in the non-steelbook version of "KB: TWBA" (except for the 'Missing Chapter' done in Unreal Engine by QT, available only in disc 1), and I don't need posters/book for me to be overjoyed and satisfied with my purchase. Gordon Liu came across in this rewatch as a bigger badass than I remembered. What a time to be a physical media lover. 😎😺
ReplyDeleteA burning question I have about this movie...is it edited significantly different than just watching Vol 1 and 2 back-to-back in sequential order? Similar to Mad Max Fury Road: Chrome and Steel Edition, i can't find anyone that can explain if its any different than watching the normal movie but switching your TVs built in monochrome setting on. Thanks in advance.
Delete"TWBA" is about 97.6% (my biased number) identical to "Vol. 1/2" in chronological order for pace and editing. The biggest changes are listed here: https://nofilmschool.com/kill-bill-whole-bloody-affair-changes
DeleteMost of the changes are on "Vol. 1" ("Vol. 2" is almost unchanged, with the few changes only in how the closing credits unfold), and they're either extensions of existing scenes (O-Ren Ishii's anime flashback) or removal of B&W with color footage during the climactic House of Blues sword fight. And obviously no recap of "Vol. 1" at the start of "Vol. 2" on the 2nd disc, since "TWBA" also comes in 2 discs that match the narrative star/end points of the theatrical volumes. Hope this helps. ✌️😊
A less 'juicy' "Pineapple Express" meets "The Secret World of Alex Mack"-lite in THE WRONG GIRLS ('26, THEATER), the latest from Neon and Seth Rogen/Evan Goldberg's factory of low-budget stoner comedies. Kristen Stewart and Alia Shawkat play Frankie and Molly, L.A. hetero life partners and besties who work dead-end jobs to pay the rent and get high. At a rave where Frankie confronts her ex dating a lookalike girl (Frances, also played by Stewart), a hi-tech drug mule (LaKeith Stanfield) mistakes Frankie for Frances and hands the former a case full of an experimental drug. Naturally the two girls drink it to see what it'll do to them to see if they can sell the rest, and develop the power of listening to their cats Dio and GG (Seth Rogen and Kumail Nanjiani, respectively) as well as telekinesis whenever they focus their minds into it... which is a lot harder to do when you're constantly chasing the glowing purple squid of life. 😶🌫️👽 It's on par with "Y2K" in being a lot more clever and funnier than you'd expect from Rogen/Goldberg, plus the two leads are super likable and the supporting cast (Cate Blanchett as an important VO, Kate McKinnon, Geena Davis, Tony Hale, etc.) terrific when they don't trample over one another. Worth chasing after if fun, cinematic drug humor appeals to you.
ReplyDeleteI rarely purchase blind buys anymore, but something about THE SURVIVOR (AUSTRALIA/UNITED KINGDOM, 1981, INDICATOR 4K UHD) made me want to take a chance. An Australian/UK production that never made it to U.S. theaters (direct to video/TV back in the early 80's!), it bears a passing resemblance to M. Night Shyamalan's "Unbreakable" in that it follows the lone survivor (Robert Powell's Keller) of a plane crash that killed everyone else on board. "The Survivor" peaks early with a stunning-for-its-time practical effects airplane crash, then becomes a somewhat low-key supernatural slasher as people making money from the crash (mostly a couple of photographers and... someone else) are mysteriously killed. That's a distant 'B' story to Keller and a clairvoyant woman (Jenny Agutter's Hobbs) trying to get the former to listen to the latter passing on the voices from the dead passengers seeking justice. It's a mixed bag overall (the filmmakers and actors admit in the bonus features it's not as good a movie as the James Herbert novel it's based on), but between its obscurity and wealth of supplemental features (typical Indicator 4K release) I enjoyed "The Survivor." If you could rent it give it a try. 🤓🤔
ReplyDeleteSHEEP IN THE BOX (JAPAN, '26, THEATER) is basically a low-key, sentimental and ultimately uplifting remake of Steven Spielberg's "A.I." without the Hollywood histrionics. "In the near future," 🙄architect Otone Komoto (Haruka Ayase) and her construction worker husband Kensuke (Daigo Yamamoto), qualify for a free sample from a company that specializes in humanoids for people that have lost loved ones. They receive a boxed version of their dead son Kakeru (Rimu Kuwaki, pretty good at playing a self-aware robotic entity) that, while initially healing, eventually opens deep emotional wounds the couple had struggled to hold back. While it veers into fantasy (discarded robots team-up with Kakeru to build a space where they can be themselves and not who their human owners want them to be), "SITB" is as grounded and emotional a sci-fi drama can be without flashy special effects or action set-pieces. Worth seeking online/streaming, as this was in/out of theaters faster than you can say 'Spider-Man.' 👊🤠
ReplyDeleteJohn McTiernan's remake of THE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR (1999, AMAZON PRIME) was a fun watch-along with Jury 4.0 members that told me having Pierce Brosnan in the role of the bored, Wall Street playboy that likes to steal artwork from well-guarded NYC museums for fun is a vast improvement over Steve McQueen's 1968 original (which I've never seen). Brosnan and Rene Russo (an insurance investigator for the owners of the stolen museum painting) have great chemistry during their cat-and-mouse games and romantic escapades, the ultimate middle-aged fantasy that McTiernan edits and scores (Bill Conti score and a handful of well-chosen tunes) like a then-modern-day cinematic jet set travelogue. NYPD detective Denis Leary is stuck with a bad haircut, Faye Dunaway (from the '68 OG) has a fun cameo as Brosnan's therapist, production values are excellent and the supporting cast (Fritz Weaver, Ben Gazzara, Frankie Faison, Mark Margolis, etc.) fun the few times the camera focuses on them over Rene or Pierce. Sad that this is the last great McTiernan movie that was a hit before the Pelicano affair and a slew of bombs ("The 13th Warrior," "Rollerball" remake and "Basic") ended his career on the sourest of notes. 😢😪
ReplyDeleteI'm stole my 13th Warrior DVD from my sister and she'll never get it back, until they do a blu-ray.
DeleteSo you're saying your sister's never getting back her DVD. 😉😭
DeleteLooks like it
DeleteHopefully we're both dead wrong. 🤑😏
DeleteAll 5 Death Wish movies: the funniest part of the first 4 is there's always a then-unknown actor in a small tug part (Jeff Goldblum in the first movie, Dany Trejo in the fourth). I won't deny the quality of the first movie, but it was not the k!ll-em-all blood fest that the series would become. The second movie has an extended r@pe scene that's way too long
ReplyDelete(unrated cut probably, I didn't watch the theatrical cut). The third movie is obviously the best. By the fourth movie, Bronson's age is starting to show (he was already 50-something in the first movie), but there's a dude getting blown up by a grenade by the end, so it's fine. For a long time, the fifth movie was hard to find, but thanks to Kino, we now have access to it. It was the first time I ever saw it and I loved it.
Popeye (1980): In glorious 4k. I love that movie. They built a really extensive set and you can see all the great details. Not the kind of story you'd expect from Robert Altman, and yet it's very much in his style of movie
Exit 8 (2025): Following the release of Backrooms, this movie was often mentioned as another great psychological horror featuring liminal spaces. At first the movie seems repetitive, always going up and down the same corridor, turn the same corners, and yet it never feels padded or too long.
I remember seeing "Popeye" in a movie theater at age 7 or 8 and hating it because, well, it was a musical AND inspired by the comic strip, not the TV cartoons l was used to. On a rewatch years later l appreciated the method behind Robert Altman's madness, Williams' committment to the Popeye personality, Pal L. Smith as a real-life Bluto (Falkon in "Red Sonja"! 😲), and the amazing production design... but l still thought the movie sucked. 3rd rewatch for the win? 🤔🙄
ReplyDeleteAll 5 "Death Wish" in a row? You just witnessed Junesploitation! royalty in all shapes and sizes. I rank them (knowing full well they're wildly different from one another) 3, 1, 4, 2 and 5. Chuck Bronson rules! ✊️😎
Not in a row, but over 2 days 😁
Delete1974-1994 for the 5 Bronson "DW" flicks to come out. 2 days? Might as well be 2 meals in-between the r@pey/killing marathon. 🫡🤫
DeleteTHE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR (1999)
ReplyDeleteBrosnan steals the painting, but Rene Russo is the one who steals this movie!
TRUE GRIT (2010)
This is just one of the all-time greats, isn't it?
ALIENS (1986)
"She turned me into a newt!"
QUEENS OF EVIL (1970)
The opening scene, where the young hero gives a lengthy speech defending his shaggy haircut, firmly sets this in the year 1970.
PUMP UP THE VOLUME (1990)
Did this movie unintentionally invent podcasting?
SPIRITED AWAY (2001)
Miyazaki goodness!
FINAL DESTINATION 2 (2003)
To watch this on the internet, first you have to... log on.
4K of "Aliens," or are we still rocking the ol' 'Quadrilogy' Box Set BD? 🙃 "Pump Up The Volume," l had such a crush on Samantha Mathis. 😍🥰 Great early use of Leonard Cohen's 'Everybody Knows,' a tune that kind-of lost its edge and power from too much media overexposure.🥸😕
DeleteI've said it many times, but I have to repeat every time, just to make sure... DO NOT get Aliens 4k!!!
DeleteQueens of Evil is a fun watch. The Italians produced some interestingly weird movies around that time. I have the Mondo Macabro blu-ray.
DeleteThe Mangler (1995, dir. Tobe Hooper)
ReplyDeleteTobe Hooper is the only non-coward in Hollywood with the guts to make Ted Levine a leading man. Levine gives a bizarre and frightening performance (I mean that as a compliment). He's scarier in this than Silence of the Lambs! Robert Englund is also hilarious turning the ham-o-meter up to 11. You can tell he's having a blast in this. Also hats off to whatever lunatic(s) designed the look of the actual steam press laundry machine. Thank you Tobe Hooper for making this excellent black (red) comedy. And I really enjoyed the colors.
Did you get the Vinegar Syndrome 4K of "The Mangler," Matt? Or are you just whistling Dixie? 🙂😘
Deletethis movie is a gem
DeleteIndeed I did get the Vinegar Syndrome 4K #Blessed. The picture and sound is phenomenal. It's such a gorgeous movie to look at. Can't wait to dive into the extras.
Delete#LuckyB@stard 😉😪
DeleteDef wish I could have done a commentary for that one. Love that movie.
DeleteI had a fun morning....
ReplyDeleteLooker (1981): Albert Finney, action hero... Didn't see that coming. Until recently, I didn't realise Michael Crichton directed other movies than Westworld. I know, IMDb was right there. Anyway, he was still ahead of technologies, it's about CGI actors, and directed another cool little sci-fi. The bad guys have some kind of memory-wiping gun like the flashy-thing in Men in Black, that gives you some very fun fights and car chase scenes. I would've paid good money to see Crichton direct something on a bigger budget and scale.
Coma (1978): Another Crichton, another good movie from the man. There are no sci-fi elements, instead we got a medical conspiracy thriller, featuring a bunch of cool cameos. Tom Seleck is here for maybe 2 minutes, and the first movie role of Ed Harris.
There's another Crichton I want to get, Runaway with Tom Selleck, but there's only a UK blu-ray, so it'll take a few days before I get it.
Crichton was a book author that wanted to be a Hollywood movie player, and his literary success allowed him to play in the movie sandbox for decades ("The Great Train Robbery" with Sean Connery and Donald Sutherland's very underrated) before the 1-2 punch of "Jurassic Park" (the book first, then the movie phenomenon) and "ER" on NBC finally made him an A-lister writer/producer. I love "Coma" (it's like nightmare "ER" on body horror steroids), an early showcase of young Michael Douglas leading man chops and Geneviève Bujold sensuality. 🥰
DeleteFine, I'll try to get Great Train Robbery too 😎🤪
DeleteDon't get the disc just yet (KL put out a BD a year or two ago). It's streaming on Pluto, watch it first to see if you like it, then buy the KL BD if you must have it. 🙄😜
DeleteIt's like you don't know me at all 🤣
DeleteJust trying to save you some $$$, not to mention you might not like the movie at all. 🤨
DeleteIt's part of he fun, i'm not doing all that overtime just to play it safe 🤣
DeleteThe Great Train Robbery is not like most of the Crichton's films I have seen. I found the film amusing, but the slow pacing and period piece aspects can make it drag at certain spots.
DeleteI found the chemistry between Connery, Sutherland and Lesley-Ann Down appealing, not to mention the train stunt with Sean atop the train a tension-raising action highlight. But your opinion, Casual, is why I'm pushing for Kunider to watch "TGTR" on streaming before buying it on disc. 🥶😬
DeleteMy spending spree continues, but it has reached new lows as I've had to dabble in foreign copies. Recently received copies of 187 on 4k and The Descent 4k, both from Germany. And I'm patiently awaiting my Korean Blu-ray copy of Monster. I fucked up and bought a copy from Second Sight first, thinking it was 4k only to get it in mail and realize it was region blocked. That's on me though. Also waiting on my preorder of Arrow's Identity that I got on discount from Barnes and Noble. Lastly, I ordered the fantastic Austrian flick, The Robber on Blu-ray from Kino 2 weeks ago and it still hasn't shipped. Is that normal for Kino?
ReplyDeleteWe all make mistakes
DeleteI got a region-free player a long time ago. Best decision of my life as a movie collector
I have a region free player but very few discs from other regions because every time there's one I want it gets announced in the US. I gave up.
DeleteIt's happening more and more. But i have a handful thet were never done in Region A, and i'm very happy to be able to watch them. I have upgraded a few just because they were finally released in north america.
DeleteWith 4k it's no longer an issue, thank god, but sometimes i'll get a 4k from UK and the accompanying blu-ray is Region B.
Yeah the accompanying Blu-rays with special features being region blocked is really annoying. On a better note though, it looks like Commando is finally getting a 4k release. Apparently it's already up for pre-sale on some French website along with some other great titles. All steel books though.
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DeleteWhat?!? Commando!!! What?!!??
DeleteIt's not showing up on blu-ray.com 😵💫
Yeah, Disney/Fox just announced a bunch of new 4K titles: The Rock, Con Air, Mrs. Doubtfire, Commando, Strange Days, a couple others I think. Hope they don't do too much DNR like they have in the past.
DeleteNot having my computer (I spend too much time on it) with me for pet sitting this week gave me a good opportunity to indulge my love of Japanese cinema. I have intended to get to some Japanese films for a while.
ReplyDeleteTHE GOOD WIFE (1987, dir. Ken Cameron) – My Sam Neill tribute watch is a romantic drama known as The Umbrella Woman in Australia. I picked the DVD up for a dollar at a dollar store years ago. He portrays a roguish womanizer in the 1930s coming to a small Australian town to manage the bar at the local hotel. He quickly catches the eye of Marge (Rachel Ward). She becomes infatuated with him and does not even try to hide it. Marge's struggles with her marriage are at the center of the film. Though sometimes feeling like a Lifetime movie, The Good Wife shows a lot of craft that went into shooting the film.
THE TALE OF THE PRINCESS KAGUYA (2013, dir. Isao Takahata) – A gorgeous animated film from Studio Ghibli based on one of the oldest folktales of Japan. The story of the bamboo cutter who finds a mysterious child in a bamboo shoot and raises her to be a noblewoman in feudal Japan is full of sadness, fitting for the director of the emotionally brutal classic Grave of the Fireflies. The beautiful minimalist hand-drawn style (a lot of watercolors) and refusal to cater to short attention spans are just a couple of reasons why I really enjoyed the film. The slow pacing is not for everyone, though.
DEMON POND (1979, dir. Masahiro Shinoda) – Coming from a director like Shinoda (a personal favorite), of course the film looks great. A scholarly traveler in early 20th-century Japan makes his way into the countryside to visit the infamous Demon Pond, where a Dragon God supposedly resides and has a supernatural pact with nearby village not flood it. The best parts of the film consist of the otherworldly mood of the early scenes and the whimsical and stylized depiction of the yokai inhabiting the pond. It is the heavy-handed handling of the themes – science vs. superstition for example- that drag the film down by the conclusion. There was more of the good side than the bad, making this a worthwhile watch.
SAMURAI 1: MUSASHI MIYAMOTO (1954, dir. Hiroshi Inagaki) – Inagaki’s famous Samurai trilogy has been on my watchlist for many years now. Toshiro Mifune portrays Musashi, the most revered historical samurai in Japanese culture. This telling of his life was adapted from a 1930s novel, which took a lot of liberties with the real story. The film is a large-scale production shot in color with crowd scenes and a handful of impressive but short battle sequences. The main flaw of MUSASHI is a clunky narrative, but the very 1950s-style overacting can be distracting as well. Probably not a film that I would feel a need to rewatch. I am looking forward to the next entries, though.
That sequence when Kaguya flees around the middle of the movie is one of my favorite moment in animation
DeleteThe Samurai trilogy is very uneven, but very well worth the watch for any samurai movie fan
I watched that sequence a few times, Kunider. It is great. Another sequence that had me going back was when Kaguya disappears during the Emperor's unwelcome visit.
Delete