What's on your Daily Viewing List? (1 Viewer)

[Dave Moritz]

September 4th, 2019 Wednesday

Caught up with Cobra Kai watching 8 episodes on there free viewing on YouTube. Very good show and very well done! Am looking to maybe get it on iTunes sometime soon.

 

[JohnRice]

Tangled (2010): Disney's charming animated musical version of Rapunzel. I never watched many animated movies, but I've seen a handful of the Disney ones from the last ten years or so, and they really have it figured out, even if they kind of do the same things repeatedly. Such as anthropomorphizing animals. Still, they're a lot of fun. Plus, I swear I could listen to Mandy Moore all day long. She has the most wonderful voice, both talking and singing.

Lifeforce (1985): Blame it on @bujaki ! I saw this in the theater when it came out, and maybe once since then. You know you're in for something special when the Golan-Globus credit shows up. What a weird, cheesy movie. Lots of outrageous animatronics, and of course, Mathilda! I mean, why else does anyone ever really watch Lifeforce? Other interesting names in the credits. Dan O'Bannon, which made me consider whether the alien ship was actually a living creature, an O'Bannon specialty. The most surprising name was Henry Mancini (!). Really? BTW, the new steelbook remaster looks amazing.

 

[bujaki]

Tangled (2010): Disney's charming animated musical version of Rapunzel. I never watched many animated movies, but I've seen a handful of the Disney ones from the last ten years or so, and they really have it figured out, even if they kind of do the same things repeatedly. Such as anthropomorphizing animals. Still, they're a lot of fun. Plus, I swear I could listen to Mandy Moore all day long. She has the most wonderful voice, both talking and singing.

Lifeforce (1985): Blame it on @bujaki ! I saw this in the theater when it came out, and maybe once since then. You know you're in for something special when the Golan-Globus credit shows up. What a weird, cheesy movie. Lots of outrageous animatronics, and of course, Mathilda! I mean, why else does anyone ever really watch Lifeforce? Other interesting names in the credits. Dan O'Bannon, which made me consider whether the alien ship was actually a living creature, an O'Bannon specialty. The most surprising name was Henry Mancini (!). Really? BTW, the new steelbook remaster looks amazing.

Interesting double feature. Rapunzel sucks the breath out of you with her tresses, and Mathilda sucks the lifeforce out of you with her kiss. Theme for an essay: Does death suck?

 

[bujaki]

My triple feature:
Fun and Fancy Free (TCM HD) 1947. It looked so good. Nice to revisit. And to follow Disney what else but
The Babadook (Scream BD) 2014. Aussie psychological horror movie. Quite effective. Director has The Nightingale on screens as I write. After horror I went to cutting satire with
Topaze (Kino BD) 1933. Pagnol's play adapted to the screen with one of John Barrymore's most polished performances. Myrna Loy looks wonderful and plays sympathetic before Nora Charles. And who can forger Jackie Searle as Charlemagne Latour-Latour? I'd last seen this film in a beautiful 35mm print a long time ago. The film holds up remarkably well. Cynical to the last drop of Topaze Sparkling Water.

 

[Robin9]

Last night I watched Coffy, Pam Grier in her prime. It's a gormless movie but I always enjoy it.

Today I'm going to watch Classe Tous Risques, a film I much admire with Lina Ventura and Jean-Paul Belmondo.

 

[Mike Frezon]

It's a gormless movie

My favorite genre!

 

[bujaki]

Yesterday I received the Universal Horror Collection Volume Two from Scream, so I watched all 4 BDs in this order:
The Mad Ghoul 1943. Entertaining zombie Jekyll/Hyde story with George Zucco pulling the strings and all stops.
Murders in the Zoo 1933. Pre-Code and most entertaining with Lionel Atwill at his sexually sickest. Well shot.
The Mad Doctor of Market Street 1942. Directed by Joseph H. Lewis, already showing some of his trademark shots and compositions. Great to see some of my fave female leads from the '30s here: Una Merkel and Claire Dodd. Atwill is once again the villain at large.
The Strange Case of Doctor Rx 1942. The weakest and most confusing of the 4 entries. Not even sure why it's included here s

 

[Mike Frezon]

Finally got to this.

A great story told lousy. Clint made some bad choices with this one. Not just using the actual heroes as actors...but some of the dialogue is insipid and there was way too much time wasted watching them plan to go on the trip...then actually go on the trip...sight-see on the trip...etc. Not very much of that was interesting or added to their back story.

The potential was massive. The reality of what happened is nearly unimaginable. It's too bad it came up so short in actually telling what could have been a most compelling tale.

 

[Robert Crawford]

On Kino Blu-ray in which it looks gorgeous to me:

 

[JohnRice]

Allegiant (2016): Third in the never-to-be-completed four part Divergent series. I said it before. I like this series. Tris, Four, and the gang finally escape the walls of Chicago to discover what is outside. OK, maybe that is part of the problem with the series, because everything is more of the same. Every snake that has its head cut off is replaced with another. Still, I think it's good sci-fi/action and it keeps my interest a lot more than virtually any of the superhero movies I've seen. I still wish it would be completed the way it should be, not with a proposed TV miniseries, but I doubt either of those options will ever happen.

What to watch now?

 

[bujaki]

I began the evening watching PBS HD:
The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in Greece
A Tribute to Harold Prince, the great producer/director who died earlier this year.
Then two French beauties:
Maria Chapdelaine (TCM DVD-R from a single broadcast from 2011) 1934. Directed by Julien Duvivier; based on a French-Canadian novel. Starring Madeleine Renaud, Jean Gabin, Jean-Pierre Aumont, etc. Lots of music in this film. Brilliantly directed and edited, winning special mentions at the Venice Film Festival (1935) and awarded a mention by the National Board of Review as one of the Top Foreign Films of its year. The print was ragged and may have been missing a few minutes, but this was its only airing on TCM and who knows if something better will ever play. Very glad to finally have caught up with this one.
Leon Morin, Priest (Kino BD) 1961. Directed by Jean-Pierre Melville; based on a Prix Goncourt winning novel. Starring Jean-Paul Belmondo and Emmanuelle Riva. Longer than the Criterion version, so I'm glad that this was my first experience with this extraordinary film. A film of faith of rare power.

 

[Dave Moritz]

September 7th, 2019 Saturday

Godzilla: King Of The Monsters
4K UHD Blu-ray (Dolby Vision)
7.1.4 Dolby Atmos to Auro 3D

 

[JohnRice]

It (2017): I enjoy a good horror flick, and I know most of them aren't very good. Still, my first viewing of It was a surprise, because it seemed like a fairly safe bet. FWIW, I've never seen the miniseries version either. What was that? Because I didn't notice much of a story, rather than a random series of more or less disconnected horror moments. It has a partial skeleton of a story, but that's it, as far as I can tell. I also have to say, the single most tired horror moment of all time involves blood gushing from a sink/bathtub/shower/toilet. The second most tired one involves vomiting rivers of black goo. This had both of those. In fact, I think it had the second one several times. And it's 135 minutes long to boot. Ugh.

I broke It up with the fourth quarter of the Colorado/Nebraska football game, which was about 1,000 times more exciting than It was.

 

[Robert Crawford]

It (2017): I enjoy a good horror flick, and I know most of them aren't very good. Still, my first viewing of It was a surprise, because it seemed like a fairly safe bet. FWIW, I've never seen the miniseries version either. What was that? Because I didn't notice much of a story, rather than a random series of more or less disconnected horror moments. It has a partial skeleton of a story, but that's it, as far as I can tell. I also have to say, the single most tired horror moment of all time involves blood gushing from a sink/bathtub/shower/toilet. The second most tired one involves vomiting rivers of black goo. This had both of those. In fact, I think it had the second one several times. And it's 135 minutes long to boot. Ugh.

I broke It up with the fourth quarter of the Colorado/Nebraska football game, which was about 1,000 times more exciting than It was.

If you watch the second movie that just opened, you're going to love that run time of 169 minutes.

 

[JohnRice]

If you watch the second movie that just opened, you're going to love that run time of 169 minutes.

Well, let us know what you think of it.

 

[Toronto Argonauts]

My second viewing of a very good movie.

 

[bujaki]

My second viewing of a very good movie.

Extraordinary both in IMAX and 70mm formats.

 

[bujaki]

Jezebel (WA BD) 1938. Wow, what a transfer! I first saw this film on TV when it was probably less than 25 years old. I last saw it at MoMA in a 35mm nitrate print. This presentation has so much detail that I could see a skin blemish on Bette's face. I liked the film when I was child, I like it now.
Zatoichi and the Chess Expert (Criterion BD) 1965. A woman and her band bent on revenge follow Zatoichi, who happens to fall in with a samurai chess player. Is the samurai a noble man or a cad? Does the woman change her mind and relents? Does Zatoichi restore order in the world?

 

[Robert Crawford]

Two more John Wayne (1942) movies with Marlene Dietrich and Randolph Scott from Kino on Blu-ray:

 

[Robert Crawford]

As I begin my 3-D movie challenge for the rest of the year up next is Beowulf (2007) on 3-D Blu-ray: