Thirith on 13/7/2019 at 11:51
I don't think it's exactly the same, though. The recent Twin Peaks season is a very different beast from the series, just like th film already was a different beast, in terms of style and tone. From the look of it, the new Veronica Mars episode's will be much more in line with the original three seasons.
henke on 14/7/2019 at 16:18
Been watchin some gooooood movies, folks!
Good Time - Robert Pattinson plays a psychopath on a downward spiral who pulls as many people with him as possible while he's swirling towards the drain. Very compelling. Also, do you have to have played a psycho to be allow to play Batman? Probably can't hurt, right?
Widows - After their career criminal husbands die, their widows decide to do an all-female reboot of their latest planned heist. Not as wacky as it sounds. In fact it's very grounded, and the performances are great.
Upgrade - A tale of a guy who gets a chip installed in his neck that turns him from a quadriplegic into a super-assassin. This B-grade action/sci-fi movie doesn't have a single recognaizable actor, the production values are underwhelming, but the plot, pacing, and actionscenes are all top-notch. Entertaining from start to finish. Destined to be a cult-classic. I suggest you go ahead and UPGRADE your next movie-night, with a Blu-ray copy of UPGRADE!!
demagogue on 15/7/2019 at 02:38
I watched I Am Mother yesterday. The premise from the opening scene is that humanity has been wiped out by some I guess biological or toxic weapons in a war (wasn't ever very clear to me), and it triggered a facility with backup humans to make its first test tube baby to try to repopulate the earth. And it starts off with the baby girl being taken care of & taught by an AI Mother and growing up into young adulthood when things, uh, get interesting. I guess Moon is the movie it can be compared too. It's a kind of bottle movie; most of it happens in the one facility, but occasionally we get hints and glimpses of what's going on off the reservation in the bigger world. And the uncertainty about what's really going on drives a lot of the plot. I'm a big fan of these kinds of hard scifi thought-experiment movies, and this basically delivered. I might put it on par with Moon; Moon had the better dialog & pacing but I Am Mother has the better action & tension. Both are great.
henke on 15/7/2019 at 05:30
Quote Posted by icemann
For Upgrade, you didn't recognize the main character? He's been in a few things.
Initially I did recognize him, and said "Wow, I can't believe they could afford to get Tom Hardy for this!". But then I realized it wasn't Tom Hardy.
Looking the actors up on imdb now I see they have had some minor parts in a few movies I've seen, but nothing I could remember.
Gray on 19/7/2019 at 01:49
The Handmaid's Tale.
I first started watching it when it was out, but then due to real life interfering, I didn't get to season 2 until this week, and I now just started season 3. I always liked the show for its dystopian bleakness and overzealous insanity, but it just took a step up to being a pure joy to watch. Why? (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_Whitford) Bradley Whitford, as commander Joseph Lawrence. I've always thought he was good in everything I've seen him in, but sheesh, he certainly stepped it up a few notches now. Sweet merciful crap, he's excellent in it.
I'll say his name again, just to get my point across at how brilliant he is.
Bradley Whitford.[Edit: wiki link]
(Also, demagogue, I watched I am Mother as well, and found it quite interesting)
Gray on 27/7/2019 at 12:30
A couple of years ago, I started watching (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Expanse_(TV_series))
The Expanse. I liked it, but after season 2, it went off Netflix. That annoyed me, I wanted to rewatch it.
Now, a couple of years later, I had an urge to watch more sci-fi, and went through quite a lot of mediocre stuff, some quite awful. I eventually found Expanse season 3 elsewhere, and I just finished watching it. It's just so much better than most other current sci-fi out there, and I would strongly urge other people to watch it if you're into the genre. It has been described as
Game of Thrones in space, but that's not really fair to either show. They do share some similarities though: vast range of characters, multiple settings and viewpoints, complex story lines, sudden unexpected deaths, no good vs evil but people acting in the best interest from their perspective, which may or may not trigger sudden changes in the main story.
Season 4 should be out on Netflix in December, and right now, I can't wait to see it.
As a side note, quite a lot of scenes remind me of System Shock 1 or 2, but also (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solaris_(1972_film)) Solaris which System Shock clearly stole bits from.
[Edit]
On a more personal note, I found it very easy to connect with the character Amos, not only because he looks like a younger version of me (nose, forehead, crazy eyes) with 30 pounds more muscle, but also because we share many of the same personality flaws. I can't claim to have any of his strengths, though, it just makes me wish I had them. Go Freud.
[Edit again]
Seriously, if I was to show a photo of the actor who plays Amos to my family, they'd say it was me 20 years ago, but won't remember me being so fit.
demagogue on 27/7/2019 at 13:22
This morning I watched Exam. Basically I made a queue from a list some thread in some forum was making of the "best plot-twist movies", and now I'm just going down the queue in alphabetical order. And first up was Exam. It was... an legit interesting idea. Not a great idea, but one of those ideas one thinks is going to be great when one comes up with it waiting in line at the supermarket or wherever.
Anyway the elevator pitch is just that 8 people are put into a room for an exam to get the "best job ever", and the moderator just tells them more or less "there's one question and one answer we're looking for, and don't spoil your paper or try to talk to us or you're out. You have 70 minutes. Good luck." and he leaves the room. But none of them know what the actual question is, and their paper is blank except for their candidate number.
So they team up to explore the room looking for the question, and then things go downhill in interesting ways from there. I can believe they did about the best they could do with the concept, which granted played out a few cool ideas. But it's not as rich a vein as one might think it should be, and I thought it lost a lot of its mojo by the endgame part. I think I would have set it up a bit differently to give them a little more of a direction and sense of "progress" as they explored different possibilities. But it was interesting enough as it was, so I was okay with it.
As for the plot twist part, yes, technically there was a mystery (what's the question, what's the answer) which gets resolved in a surprising but obvious way, which is what good twists are supposed to be. But even though it was the setup from the start ("what's the question?"), I wouldn't say it was the "central element" or even an important element of the story by the end. The central element really was how they went about trying to find the question and deal with each other. So that kind of took the wind out of that sail. (As opposed to a classic twist like Usual Suspects, where the main twist really stabs at the heart of the central mystery of the whole story, the very hub to which everything else in the whole story is connected. That's what I think makes a great twist, and that wasn't what Exam had.) But it was still a "Huh... Ok. I get it." moment. So I could see why someone who doesn't watch movies that much might want to pick it for a list of "great plot twist" movies.
Gray on 27/7/2019 at 13:36
I agree with Exam, I saw it and thought the same thing, but you put it better. 3/5.
Here in the UK, it was billed as "starring Gemma Chan from Humans", but she was only briefly in it. Humans was a pretty good show, though, about androids.
rachel on 27/7/2019 at 13:42
Late to the party, but I finally finished watching Sense8 yesterday, by the Wachowskis and JM Straczynski of Babylon 5 fame.
I had started watching the first episode I think last year, but I wasn't in a good place for it and quit midway through. Caught it again earlier this year and this time got hooked. The second season finale was pretty phenomenal, it's a shame there's gonna be no more of it. Each character is fleshed out, they all complemented each other really well and the supporting cast is pretty solid too. The fact they filmed everything on location every time is impressive and really adds to the atmosphere.
Good show, would have loved to see more.
rachel on 27/7/2019 at 15:28
It's kinda run-of-the-mill but I liked it. A nice touch was how they expand a bit on the effect of the Snap on every day people. Agreed that the Peter/MJ bits were probably the best part.