coda Posted July 23, 2015 Share Posted July 23, 2015 I fancy watching The Killing Fields at some point. The subject matter interests me, it's a part of world history I don't know enough about, I presume it was one of the leading stories in world news at around the time I was born so I kinda get the jist of what happened just through osmosis but I feel I should know more. Is the movie a decent first step or is it Team America Hollywood bollocks? Although not quite the same part of world history, there are definite parallels with what is depicted in The Act of Killing, which I cannot recommend highly enough. It's a tough watch, yet there are genuinely hilarious and bizarre moments and honestly one of the most astonishing and disturbing scenes I've ever seen in a documentary. I'm yet to see the follow-up, The Look of Silence, which is playing scarcely in jolly old London. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2375605/ I found The Look of Silence a bit more subdued and reflective. A great doc but it didn't have the surreal nightmarish quality of The Act of Killing. Which scene do you mean 'most astonishing and disturbing'? (there were so many...) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stuart_75 Posted July 24, 2015 Share Posted July 24, 2015 Ant-Man. Loved it. Great fun. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theboyangel Posted July 25, 2015 Share Posted July 25, 2015 Watched Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck last night. Whilst some of the unseen footage was excellent, I think on the whole the director missed a trick or two with this and there's still lots 'left unanswered' or untouched. There's nothing from either Chad Channing or Dave Grohl (who only appears in interview footage from back in the day). The family stuff was good but the film took an age to build up to the stardom (which I didn't mind) and then rushed through, almost apologetically the remainder. The film eventually reaches 1994 (although at no point are any dates mentioned) and the coma in Rome but then stops, with a still stating 'a month later he took his life' (apologies for the spoiler!) So there was nothing about the month between Rome and ultimately his death. As I say, an interesting documentary, with some lovely animated touches but sadly didn't go the whole hog and felt incomplete, leaving me thinking what was the point of that! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rugeley Villa Posted July 25, 2015 Share Posted July 25, 2015 went and watched southpaw last night at the cinema, must be going soft in old age as a couple of times i got a lump in my throat. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xela Posted July 25, 2015 Share Posted July 25, 2015 A decent watch 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rjenkins Posted July 25, 2015 Share Posted July 25, 2015 went and watched southpaw last night at the cinema, must be going soft in old age as a couple of times i got a lump in my throat. Went to see this last night, and thought it was very good. Maybe a little short of being a really brilliant film because from a certain point the whole thing was obviously mapped out and a little processional but I agree there were moments where I had a lump in my throat. Gyllenhal is bloody good these days. Thought Forest Whittaker put in a decent performance too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AVFC_Hitz Posted July 25, 2015 Share Posted July 25, 2015 Child 44. Apart from some horrendous Russian accents I found it quite enjoyable. Fast paced and thrilling with quite an accurate view on soviet Russia. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zatman Posted July 25, 2015 Share Posted July 25, 2015 Child 44. Apart from some horrendous Russian accents I found it quite enjoyable. Fast paced and thrilling with quite an accurate view on soviet Russia. fast paced is probably the last thing I would describe it. easily the most disappointing film I have seen in years Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PongRiddims Posted July 26, 2015 Share Posted July 26, 2015 Anyone seen Eden? The film about Daft Punk that isn't about Daft Punk officially but is about the 90s French House scene so is almost entirely about daft punk? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevo985 Posted July 26, 2015 VT Supporter Share Posted July 26, 2015 The Departed last night for about the 10th time. Brilliant film. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PieFacE Posted July 26, 2015 VT Supporter Share Posted July 26, 2015 Watched Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck last night. Whilst some of the unseen footage was excellent, I think on the whole the director missed a trick or two with this and there's still lots 'left unanswered' or untouched. There's nothing from either Chad Channing or Dave Grohl (who only appears in interview footage from back in the day). The family stuff was good but the film took an age to build up to the stardom (which I didn't mind) and then rushed through, almost apologetically the remainder. The film eventually reaches 1994 (although at no point are any dates mentioned) and the coma in Rome but then stops, with a still stating 'a month later he took his life' (apologies for the spoiler!) So there was nothing about the month between Rome and ultimately his death. As I say, an interesting documentary, with some lovely animated touches but sadly didn't go the whole hog and felt incomplete, leaving me thinking what was the point of that! I imagine the complete lack of Dave Grohl was something to do with Courtney. I think a lot of the footage shown was given to the director by Courtney and to me it was apparent they were trying to paint her in a better picture than she actually was. She obviously had an influence over it, and Dave Grohl may have refused to be involved, or she didn't want him to be involved. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xela Posted July 26, 2015 Share Posted July 26, 2015 (edited) Better than I expected.Enjoyable switch your brain off saturday night movie Edited July 26, 2015 by Xela 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chindie Posted July 26, 2015 VT Supporter Share Posted July 26, 2015 Child 44. Apart from some horrendous Russian accents I found it quite enjoyable. Fast paced and thrilling with quite an accurate view on soviet Russia. fast paced is probably the last thing I would describe it. easily the most disappointing film I have seen in years Child 44 is probably more interesting if you know the story that inspired it, the horrific crimes committed by Andrei Chikatilo, how he managed to get away with it for so long, how the state reacted and what the whole horrible saga said about Russia at the time and it's war time past. There is a truly powerful story to be told about that entire case, even following the thoughts Child 44 wants to consider, but Child 44 isn't it. Chikatilo was a particularly vicious sadistic serial killer that managed to get away with his long running crimes in part due to the failings of the Soviet regime, and was arguably partly created by the terrible nature of the USSR he was born into. It's not a bad movie, but it makes odd choices of focus. It wants to focus on the idea, that has some merit, that the Russians at the time simply didn't want to think a good communist nation would develop a serial killer, and wants to mash that up against the idea of the control and fear the regime held over any element of dissent. The problem is that the focus is wrong. The Communist regime stuff works best in this kind of film as the foundation of a story that focuses on the crimes. Instead the movie uses the crimes as the foundation to discuss the politics and ends up with a film that doesn't satisfy in either angle. As a thriller about communist dissent it largely stumbles and is rather dull, as a crime thriller it never gets going. Partly, imo, this is because it neuters the crimes, which take even more of the gripping nature of this story away, this film has it's killer casually referred to as torturing his victims, the real life inspiration of the story committed crimes so horrendous as to make you question the humanity of anything capable of such atrocities. It also isn't helped by not really doing a terribly good job dealing with the politics, it doesn't bring anything new and it doesn't develop the right characters enough to make it interesting. It's a shame because I'm convinced there's a great movie in there. The cast is bang on (bar Noomi Rapace, who remains a terrible terrible actress) and the performances are generally good, it looks right and it's technically well made, but the script is wrong and it ends up telling a dull story with a good premise, whilst a great story with an interesting backdrop stares it square in the face. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dAVe80 Posted July 26, 2015 Share Posted July 26, 2015 Watched Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck last night. Whilst some of the unseen footage was excellent, I think on the whole the director missed a trick or two with this and there's still lots 'left unanswered' or untouched. There's nothing from either Chad Channing or Dave Grohl (who only appears in interview footage from back in the day). The family stuff was good but the film took an age to build up to the stardom (which I didn't mind) and then rushed through, almost apologetically the remainder. The film eventually reaches 1994 (although at no point are any dates mentioned) and the coma in Rome but then stops, with a still stating 'a month later he took his life' (apologies for the spoiler!) So there was nothing about the month between Rome and ultimately his death. As I say, an interesting documentary, with some lovely animated touches but sadly didn't go the whole hog and felt incomplete, leaving me thinking what was the point of that! I imagine the complete lack of Dave Grohl was something to do with Courtney. I think a lot of the footage shown was given to the director by Courtney and to me it was apparent they were trying to paint her in a better picture than she actually was. She obviously had an influence over it, and Dave Grohl may have refused to be involved, or she didn't want him to be involved. I think the lack of Grohl was down to the fact that it only featured the people closest to him. Novoselic was involved, because he was there from the very start, and knew him before Nirvana. With it being the "official" story, with Love and Frances Bean being involved, there was never going to be anything controversial, that could have hinted at any wrong doing in his demise, For what it's worth I enjoyed it, especially some of the unseen footage, and the stories of his childhood, but it was blatantly obvious that it was missing a hefty chunk of the full story, which unfortunately I don't think we'll ever get to know. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted July 26, 2015 Share Posted July 26, 2015 Ant Man with the boy today Better than the standard Marvel formula , a bit more of a film going on with some nice touches of humour Still another Marvel film too many though Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xann Posted July 26, 2015 Share Posted July 26, 2015 Anyone seen Eden? The film about Daft Punk that isn't about Daft Punk officially but is about the 90s French House scene so is almost entirely about daft punk? House isn't really my thing, but that would seem to be a little unfair on Etienne de Crecy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PongRiddims Posted July 26, 2015 Share Posted July 26, 2015 Anyone seen Eden? The film about Daft Punk that isn't about Daft Punk officially but is about the 90s French House scene so is almost entirely about daft punk? House isn't really my thing, but that would seem to be a little unfair on Etienne de Crecy. Ha, only on VT can I have a discussion about the true pioneers of French house and be rightfully corrected Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meath_Villan Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 End of watch .....7/10 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevo985 Posted July 27, 2015 VT Supporter Share Posted July 27, 2015 End of watch .....7/10 Love that film. Those feels! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AVFCDAN Posted July 28, 2015 Share Posted July 28, 2015 Adventureland - great, still like it on 3rd or 4th viewing, even K-Stew is ok. 7.5/10 Terminator Genisys - all over the place, what an absolute mess this film this, its still OK because its in the terminator world but talk about wasted potential. The strangest casting for me was the bloke playing john connor, who the hell is that? I can only assume hes quite well known from one of these american TV shows because he couldn't act, and he really didn't suit the part. 5/10 Ted 2 - Slightly more forced than the first one, but in reality it was probably funnier overall 7/10 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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