Films I watched this week

[jammy_basturd]

Cotty said:

jammy_basturd said:

Having walked the Camino I'll have to check out the film!

You certainly live up to your name, I would love to walk the Camino but I would never be able to take off the 5 or so weeks it takes to walk from Saint Pied de Port. I know there are different and shorter routes or you can just do the last 100 kilometres to get your Compostela certificate. But the 780km French route just seems the right one to do.

It was an amazing trip, probably the best travel based thing I've ever done. Though I'm not lucky enough to have walked the whole thing - my brother and I took 2 weeks off to walk from Ponferrda to Santiago. We did it quicker than expected and went on to Fisterra (definitely recommend heading on to Fisterra). We met people who had walked from the Pyrenees, from France, from the Netherlands. Two brothers had spent three years walking from Jerusalem and had just got to Santiago just a week before we got there. Quite a number of people we met had done a week or two every 6 or 12 months - much easier to break the walk down into chunks like this and certainly fits in better with the whole job/wife/kids malarkey! Would love to go back and do the whole thing. Maybe one day.

[Cotty]

jammy_basturd said:

It was an amazing trip, probably the best travel based thing I've ever done. Though I'm not lucky enough to have walked the whole thing

This is a great Youtube vid of someone walking the whole French route. Really makes me want to walk it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvElrX--hN4

I know this thread is "Films I watched this week" but I think this counts as one persons film of the trip. Production values, music, commentary, locations, highs, lows, potential romance etc its a really an enjoyable half hour.

[smithyithy]

Hush

Watched this on Netflix last night, it was pretty good. A bit of a typical plot, nothing really groundbreaking but watchable. Only 1:20 long too so worth a go.

[BRISTOL86]

Room

Mixed feelings on this. It thoroughly depressed me in places and uplifted me in others so clearly hit the right notes, but found it hard to overlook what I thought were a couple of major flaws in the plot.

7/10

[maccas99]

BRISTOL86 said:

Room

Mixed feelings on this. It thoroughly depressed me in places and uplifted me in others so clearly hit the right notes, but found it hard to overlook what I thought were a couple of major flaws in the plot.

7/10

What flaws did you think existed in the plot?

[maccas99]

digimeistter said:

Batman vs Superman

Much, much better than I was expecting judging from the reviews and the premise. A bit silly towards the end and at 3 hrs long is a bit bum numbing.

Enjoyed it though 7/10

Edited by digimeistter on Monday 4th July 11:49

Watched this last night, the story line doesn't really flow and it tends to jump around quite a bit. All the same I quite liked it for entertainment value.

6/10

[gregd]

A Bigger Splash.. Ralph Fiennes is entertaining but it felt self-indulgent... bit like if Ab Fab was an arthouse movie not a sitcom. 6/10

[BRISTOL86]

maccas99 said:

What flaws did you think existed in the plot?

Just off the top of my head...

I found it hard to buy into that a guy keeping secret prisoners would have them in a shed with a skylight, for one. Minor point but why risk it? Not beyond the realms of possibility that it could lead to discovery - especially as the shots when they escape show they live in basically terraced housing with plenty of nearby neighbours.

On that note, this guy was going in and out with food and provisions for 7 years and no one noticed/thought it odd?

The escape was far fetched to say the least, would the guy seriously have not checked that it wasn't a trick? This is a guy keeping secret prisoners and he doesn't think 'hmmm I wonder if there's a plot afoot here' ?

Then surely, after the kid escapes and is with the police, he'd have raced back to the shed to cover his tracks (ie kill the woman) but several hours pass and he's not been back there?

And all that is before considering how a single police officer basically located the shed based on about three words the kid says. It would have taken them an eternity to locate that place.

Edited by BRISTOL86 on Tuesday 5th July 11:28

[generationx]

Watched Sin City - A Dame to Die For at the weekend.

After the first one it was a bit "more of the same" but Eva Green did spend most of it walking around in the nip

[maccas99]

BRISTOL86 said:

Just off the top of my head...

I found it hard to buy into that a guy keeping secret prisoners would have them in a shed with a skylight, for one. Minor point but why risk it? Not beyond the realms of possibility that it could lead to discovery - especially as the shots when they escape show they live in basically terraced housing with plenty of nearby neighbours.

On that note, this guy was going in and out with food and provisions for 7 years and no one noticed/thought it odd?

The escape was far fetched to say the least, would the guy seriously have not checked that it wasn't a trick? This is a guy keeping secret prisoners and he doesn't think 'hmmm I wonder if there's a plot afoot here' ?

Then surely, after the kid escapes and is with the police, he'd have raced back to the shed to cover his tracks (ie kill the woman) but several hours pass and he's not been back there?

And all that is before considering how a single police officer basically located the shed based on about three words the kid says. It would have taken them an eternity to locate that place.

Edited by BRISTOL86 on Tuesday 5th July 11:28

I agree with most of what you have said, however, it's a true story. Not that it would have happened in this exact way but most of the way it happened must be true?

[BRISTOL86]

maccas99 said:

I agree with most of what you have said, however, it's a true story.

It's not a true story. It's a film adaptation of a novel.

[renmure]

I saw Hugo again on the big screen last night as "something to watch" when some relatives were visiting.
Think it must be my favorite movies. The 3D version is superb.
I might even invite more relatives over sometime so I can watch it again

[maccas99]

BRISTOL86 said:

It's not a true story. It's a film adaptation of a novel.

You are right, I stand corrected, the novel was based on the Fritzl case which is far more disturbing.

[jbudgie]

Halb said:

Cotty said:

A Walk in the Woods
Comedy/adventure tale of two friends hiking the Appalachian Trail. It was ok, couple of laughs 5/10
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1178665/?ref_=fn_al_tt...

Really wanted to watch that at the flicks.

I wouldn't bother, not a patch on the book.

[Adam B]

The Nice Guys - brilliant film, on the face of it an old fashioned 70s PI buddy movie, but it's quirky, modern and genuinely funny, one of the best films I have seen this year, also some great period cars
9.2/10

Edited by Adam B on Wednesday 6th July 00:56

[crossy67]

The Boss.

Melissa Mc Carthay plays a ruthless boss brought low.

I tend to like McCarthay films despite them usually getting a crap review, like Identity thief only getting 2* on IDMB etc but this one was a 4.5/10 for me, a few laugh out loud moments but in general, not funny.

4.5-10

[TCEvo]

Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation

Thought this was OK, if a little busy and, as ever, too long.

Usual MI fare though: silly plot, interesting locations, decent set-pieces (although car chases were over CGI'd), and humour.

BMW product placement grated though.

[durbster]

Spy
Melissa McCarthy vehicle. The laughs are a bit too sparing and it's too long (again!), but it's entertaining enough. Jason Statham carries it, and it was a surprise to see Jude Law playing a character that wasn't Jude Law for a change.

Vacation
A sort of remake of the National Lampoon film. It didn't review well - which I understand - but we quite enjoyed it and got a lot of laughs out of it, particularly early on. It did feel like an 80s comedy with the exception of a few parts that are really nasty; as if they felt they had to go to extremes to get the laugh. It really stretches the disbelief at times but I let that go because the cast and writing carried it.

And it was the correct length

[Watchman]

maccas99 said:

digimeistter said:

Batman vs Superman

Much, much better than I was expecting judging from the reviews and the premise. A bit silly towards the end and at 3 hrs long is a bit bum numbing.

Enjoyed it though 7/10

Edited by digimeistter on Monday 4th July 11:49

Watched this last night, the story line doesn't really flow and it tends to jump around quite a bit. All the same I quite liked it for entertainment value.

6/10

I watched the 3-hour "ultimate" version last night.

It was... OK. But there were issues with people's motives I couldn't really understand.

1. Why do prisoners kill other prisoners with "bat" branding?
2. Why did Superman want to shut-down Batman's activities? Why would he care in the context of everything else going on in the world?
3. Superman didn't try hard enough to stop Batman from trying to kill him. He only needed to hold him while he convinced him they should work together
4. I know there's a WW film coming next year but her motivations weren't explored at all
5. Why did the senator's aide/jr help Lex?
6. Why was there even a programme built into the Kryptonian ship to create a monster? What purpose would that have served?

It was a bit like a typical forum-post. A contributor writes his stream of consciousness and then presses "send" without reading what they've written. A simple proof-read enables their point to be reviewed - what story they want to tell. It's so much more than spelling and grammar. Someone at DC needs to proof-read what's written.

The Man of Steel film was much more coherent. Within a 3-hour film, you'd like to think the characters could be explored a bit more. I've sometimes wondered what being Superman on a day-to-day basis might be like - when he's not fighting to save the world. Those moments were explored a bit better with Christopher Reeve, and even Brandon Routh (to a point).

And Batman... his story has been told so often - to the point where I failed to understand why his "origin" was portrayed yet again. It was a waste of time.

Overall, it was a bit hit-and-miss, which is a shame. All for the lack of someone reading the script with a more critical eye.

5/10

[popeyewhite]

Watchman said:

A simple proof-read enables their point to be reviewed - what story they want to tell. It's so much more than spelling and grammar. Someone at DC needs to proof-read what's written.

Well they'd only have to proof read the title then. The entire plot (apart from some predictable superhero crisis of identity) was based around getting two fantasy figures to fight. Which Superman didn't do. In the bit tacked on at the end of the film they fought the same cgi monster that featured in one of the Spiderman or Avenger or somesuch films. How much more generic superhero rubbish can the studios chuck out?