I got halfway through The Spirit before I got too tired and had to get to bed.

I'm not sure what was going on… It was in the super stylised black and white high contrast neo-nior comic-book look of Frank Miller's Sin City but a bit less violent and more comical, almost in the style of the 1960s Batman. Staring Scarlet Johansen and Samuel L Jackson as the bad guys- Jackson's character is silly but he acts it well, Johansen's is too but she acts it badly (it seems like that so far anyway).
I don't know what to make of the film. Visually it looks good…

ozoneocean wrote:
I got halfway through The Spirit …. Visually it looks good…

Yes, that's what I took from it - the visuals. Sin Cityish. Been some years since I watched it…

Playing catch-up with Disney's The Owl House. I like the humor of it, especially when it pokes fun at other fantasies and tropes.




The funny thing is I found out about it because Million Moms was trying to block it from airing because it features a witch and a demon as two of the main characters and they are teaching a teenage human magic. I thought to myself, ‘I usually like anything those guys hate, so I’ll give it a shot.'

Owl House has been fun so far, hope no shipping shenanigans happen though.

That's not on the Australian service of Disney plus :(

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@BearinOz - yup! Very SinCity but less misogynistic. Scarlet's acting didn't improve. I think she was doing a very stylised performance because it was a slightly cartoony film, but everyone else was doing a more sincere job so her performance didn't fit.

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I saw Sausage Party.
It was ok, reasonably funny. It was mainly fun for being an adult spoof of Pixar movies. Really though it was peak Seth Rogan with really dumb drugs and anal references. Pure Rogan. He doesn't have much range.

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I watched Van Wilder last night for some reason.
I felt like watching an old style sex comedy… I think I'd heard about the title of Van Wilder once and I was mildly curious. This was a 2000s film actually, the style reached its highest point in the mid 1980s so this was a throwback. It aped the style perfectly but I don't think 80s style sex-comedies work outside of that era UNLESS you're setting your story IN the 1980s because we just don't have the same attitudes to sexuality anymore or the role of women in society, so it just cannot work the same way.

It's like if you made the original versions of Get Smart, Bewitched, or I Dream of Jeanie and set them in the present day without updating the roles or characters: they fit ok in their original times but those social roles are massively outdated now- everything is different.

I recently watched a Youtube play-through of “The last of us, part 2”. True, it's a video game, but there has been a sub- genre in video games for many years now of games that have a significant narrative component. The story line of “The last of us” was very controversial within the gaming community to say the least, but I found the story much more emotionally moving and philosophically provocative than most Hollywood fare.

fallopiancrusader wrote:
I recently watched a Youtube play-through of “The last of us, part 2”. True, it's a video game, but there has been a sub- genre in video games for many years now of games that have a significant narrative component. The story line of “The last of us” was very controversial within the gaming community to say the least, but I found the story much more emotionally moving and philosophically provocative than most Hollywood fare.

I've heard a lot of people saying that the game is a playable film.

The Mass Effect series was like that- a really enjoyable massive space opera story that gave you the illusion of interactivity. Definitely not really clever, or nuanced like the Last of Us is, but still very much a cinematic experience.

Rewatched Sleepless In Seattle last night, and when Tom finally meets Meg atop the Empire State Bldg. I'm afraid I lost it big time, could barely see them get in elevator thru all those tears, sure glad I wasn't in a movie theatre. That one final scene gets film a 4 1/2 on the Moizmeter.

THE EQUALIZER 2 - Denzel Washington, Pedro Pascal, Ashton Sanders, Melissa Leo, Bill Pullman, Orson Bean. Former CIA agent Denzel now works driving a Lyft cab, but he still keeps his hand in whenever something unjust happens. His old friend Melissa gets killed and it's something the bad guys will soon regret, one of which is Denzel's old partner, Pedro. Gets a 3 on the Moizmeter.

Just finished watching an HBO show called Euphoria. My daughter had already watched it but wanted to watch it again with me because she thought I would love it and I absolutely did love it. This is a great show about finding your way in the world as a teenager and dealing with a plethora of dick pics.

moizmad wrote:
Rewatched Sleepless In Seattle last night,

He did three films with Meg Ryan that I know off…
Joe Vs the Volcano, Sleepless in Seattle and You've got mail. They cover different aspects of relationships…
In Joe Vs Meg is sort of a dream girl.
In Sleepless I think it's her stalking om's character, using the radio talkshow…
In Mail it's Toms character stalking her instead, using email.

I love it :D

I saw whole bunch of things but Yesterday what stood out bigly was Disney's 1997 Hercules.

It was basically shit. Strangely so.
OK, so Hercules is a pretty well known myth. It's super easy to find out about. It's a fun story. Hercules is a big, important figure in Western myth and he's part of modern pop-culture too.

So why would you ignore 99% of his story and make up a totally new one, just with his name on it?
The story in the movie is your typical boilerplate heroes journey, boring and very uninspired in this form… Various Greek myths from other stories are just randomly peppered in anachronistically as mentions, but the story seems based on a sort of Christian/nordic thing I'd say.

The animation is pretty bad, especially the character faces.

And it's about the worst version of any Greek myth I've ever seen, as well as being a dull story. Even Xena and Kevin Sorbo's Hercules was better XD

ozoneocean wrote:
I saw whole bunch of things but Yesterday what stood out bigly was Disney's 1997 Hercules.

It was basically shit. … the story seems based on a sort of Christian/nordic thing I'd say.

And it's about the worst version of any Greek myth I've ever seen,

…and yet you made it to the end !!??? B-)
It sounds like the kind of Disney “doing over an existing thing” I've always hated.

ozoneocean wrote:
Even Xena and Kevin Sorbo's Hercules was better XD

“Even”? They are the yardsticks that have to be beaten! Both were epic series!

There was just this time in the late 80s early 90s when everyone did Hercules. There was a serious miniseries about the labors, there was Kevin Sorbo, Lou Ferrigno a resurgence in fandon for Sword and Sandal movies, barbarian queens and Disney's utterly forgettable thing. Other than the voice work of Danny De Vito and James Woods is it even a thing?

Been desperate for stuff and YouTube is not disappointing. Found the war movie classic Malta Story, They were not Divided and then decided to watch Chinese kung-fu vampire movies. Pure idiotic fun.

dpat57 wrote:

ozoneocean wrote:
Even Xena and Kevin Sorbo's Hercules was better XD

“Even”? They are the yardsticks that have to be beaten! Both were epic series!

What about Michael Bay's Hercules? >:)

13 cameras - low budget, with a creepy villain. Really good performance by that dude. The ‘hero’ characters were unlikable and a bit underwritten, I would pompously say. I like low budget horror, though, and I liked it. I will watch the sequel, appropriately called 14 cameras!

Also, there was “1br”. I liked it a lot. Good performances and a clever idea. Quite unbelievable but quite chilling!

Also, there was “1br”. I liked it a lot. Good performances and a clever idea. Quite unbelievable but quite chilling!

I saw that but wasn't my cup of tea, gave it a 1 on the Moizmeter.

That's fair - I looked back a few pages for your review but couldn't find it. One of the ones that got glitched? Or was the Tenant's Association behind the deletion?

I don't review all the movies I watch here, just score them on Netflix.

Re-watching My Last 5 Girlfriends.
Last time I saw it I was flying to or from somewhere… No idea where, The USA, Turkey, Thailand, Darwin?

Anyway, I wanted to to watch it again and now I finally have! It's just as good as I remember if not better.
It's about a guy recalling his last few relationships and how they went. It's good in an arty, stylised way using the metaphor or fair ground rides for some of it. It's really, really well done and very relatable!
I recommend it massively 😁😁😁😁

Watching two scifi series from the early 2000s:
Andromeda and the Battlestar Galactic reeboot.

They compliment each other in a strange way:
Battlestar was a super cheapo production with cheap costumes and props but very good writing, acting and unconventional story structure.
Andromeda was a very expensive production with very good props, sets and costumes, but the writing isn't that clever, he acting isn't that great and the stories are very conventional.
The CGI is bad on both.

Funnily enough though I'm enjoying Andromeda more. It might be because with the better production values it's easier to immerse myself in it, but I think it's mainly because of the more conventional story structure which means I can sit back and let it wash over me while I draw, which I can't do with Battlestar which requires more concentration.

Funny though… all the Star Trek franchise shows from the 90s had better production and CGI, and so did Farscape, both with great acting, stories and movie level effects. So these two series are like a step backwards, they have more in common with Babylon 5, which was a cheaper show.

WHITE BOY RICK - Matthew McConaughey, Richie Merritt, Bel Powley, Jennifer Jason Leigh. Should have had sub-titles on as I could barely understand what most were saying, but no matter, watched for about 45 minutes, couldn't make head nor tail of story, didn't like any characters and gave it the kybosh, a royal goose-egg on the Moizmeter.

PRIME SUSPECT - Helen Mirren series, tobacco co's must love this show with endless smoking scenes, almost like a fetish, is there anyone over there that doesn't smoke? I'm finished season 4 only 3 more to tough out.

Aggressive Restuko season 3, just started episode 10 - I'm a huge Aggressive Retsuko fan since the shorts because being both cute and relatable on a “wow, that is annoys me too” way, and was pleasantly surprise the second season was not just story driven but also hits close to home on so many fronts. Season 3 pushes the relatable factor from ultra to uber, it honestly made me cry in some places.

moizmad wrote:
PRIME SUSPECT - Helen Mirren series, tobacco co's must love this show with endless smoking scenes, almost like a fetish, is there anyone over there that doesn't smoke? I'm finished season 4 only 3 more to tough out.

Jeeez, that's an old show ! Yeah, there was too much ‘retro’ smoking in it

I re-watched Ghost in the Shell
It's really a very clever, very deep film. I get more out of it each time. I love how it sucks you in with the action and sexiness and then hits you with deep ideas about post-humanism, survival, evolution, and change. I always wanted to do that sort of think with my work.

Narnia, Prince Caspian
This was a very good version of the story. For a fantasy movie aimed at kids it was surprisingly well done! Far, far better than something like The Hobbit. The weapons are armour were realistic, the plotting was clever and interesting, there was death and tragedy too so it didn't pull many punches either. - except the obvious one of not showing blood.

Undone
This series has an interesting aesthetic… It has a CGI render over live footage to make it look like cell-shaded animation. The purpose was so that dream sequences and unnatural things could seamlessly blend with the imagery so there's no jarring transition of effects.
The series is about a woman accessing a part of her brain so she can travel in time and space and solve the mystery of her father's death- her father is played by the excellent Bob Oldenkirk.
The style is quite reminiscent of the dream-based movie Waking Life, for similar reasons and the theme is related too. I wouldn't be surprised if there was a connection.
Anyway, it was very good, I liked it.
There were only 8 episodes and it ended on a cliffhanger. I hope there will be more.

The platform. A sci fi horror/capitalism allegory. Good stuff well worth a watch.

Criminal. Interrogation based cop thriller series, I watched some last year but watched the new episodes and non English ones. Again very good and well worth a watch.

MEGAS XLR Never given this show a chance since when I was a kid, I never given any show like this a second look. Thought it was not my thing. But…BOY was I wrong!…and late…like 10+ years late. Good show though.

Genejoke wrote:
The platform. A sci fi horror/capitalism allegory. Good stuff well worth a watch.

Did you also catch that it was Don Quixote? ^_^

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I saw…
Dream a Little Dream 1989
Staring Corey Haim and Corey Feldman.
It was the most boring bodyswap movie ever. Not even Feldman's Mich Jackson dance/outfit could save it.
Funny but I thought I'd never seen it before till one of the final scenes when a kid was threatening others with a gun.
I remembered my sister got it out on video decades ago and I thought it was sort of clever t the time. Not patience for it now though. Not even the 80s fashions and hair interested me.

Raffles 1939
Starring David Niven.
This was great for the mannerisms and the gorgeous 1930s clothes, especially the white tie evening dress (tails), that the men were wearing in the beginning.
Really disappointing if you're a fan of Raffles though. Like modern films now they took an old story set in the late 1800s and moved up the setting to when the film was made in 1939. The relationship between Bunny and Raffles is eviscerated and they swapped it so Raffles hs a relationship with his sister instead and Bunny is almost not even in it!!

-Bunny and Raffles are best friends, Bunny idolises Raffles, who treats him like a sidekick. It's a very, very close platonic relationship, haha, both men are straight. (Bunny is a private school nickname).
Raffles (the film) really totally shits all over the concept of the character and his stories.