I don't know what letterboxd is, and would prefer to run my watchedlist myself anyway.
I don't know what letterboxd is, and would prefer to run my watchedlist myself anyway.
*My sister site
Like Many sites on neocities, this is very actively under construction. Some links may be broken. Few links may have correctly responsive CSS, especially for mobile devices.
My name is Indy and this is a diary so that I can remember all the many films I watch. I write a little note just to remember what I felt or what bits i enjoyed or to remind me what the film was even about. Admittedly, this blog is full of takes that are probably cringe but I how can that be avoided. I've put stars next to the films I most seriously reccomend out of all below. I also used to have comments on every film, but some of them got lost in a redesign and frankly, it is too much work to keep the watchlist uptodate like that.
The main list used to be dvd hires exclusively and this was cinema, though now i put them all in the same big watchlist.
Journalist David Farrier stumbles upon a mysterious tickling competition online. As he delves deeper he comes up against fierce resistance, but that doesn't stop him getting to the bottom of a story stranger than fiction.
The best, and by best i mean worst, true crime is these documentaries on the immoral crimes people get away with with lots of money, litigation and lawyers. Plus a good few drops of homophobia. A viscerally horrifying watch.
Multiple animals and insects experience the sleazier side of show business while working on a variety show.
Peter jackson proves his talent in his back catalogue, and the diversity of his works might prove him one of the most talented directors. This film is incredibly crude and gross, but you cannot deny how incredibly well delivered it is. I was almost lost halfway through but SO glad i stayed for the end.
Five bizarre stories with no apparent connection to one and other eventually become intertwined, resulting in surreal circumstances.
The director allegedly used to work in advertisements, and the narrative shows. This film might take the award for most attention grabbing film i have watched this year; at no point does this film follow expectations. The soundtrack is incredible, and amongst the 5 stories is a strange japanese love-letter to britpop and the hippy yeah-yeah scene. This film is nearing lost media, having not been distributed officially in some time, track down a copy if you can!
Criminals plant a bomb on a high-speed train. It will explode when the train slows down, unless a ransom is paid.
This film pioneered many tropes for the action thriller genre, Keanu Reeves 'Speed' was a western ripoff. While engaging, it is three hours long, and not to say that this is poorly paced or slow but wow yeah no thats my limit.
Released from jail, Lang returns to his hometown in Northwest China. As part of a dog patrol tasked with clearing stray dogs before the 2008 Olympics, he bonds with a black stray. The two lonely souls embark on a new journey together.
This one is an emotional journey, but it has very good dog actors and is quite enjoyable. Watched this at the Alice Springs arthouse cinema night, and this narrative about returning to a country town hit perfectly.
In a dystopian future Australia, a health nut and his tag-along girlfriend become trapped in a drive-in cinema that has become a concentration camp for delinquent youths and refugees.
My favorite dystopian films are set at the beginning of the decline, Dead End Drive-In feels at home in headcanon a year or so before Mad Max 1. Mostly an action film with an indictment of Australian racism slipped in. Banger 80's soundtrack.
Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence [1983]
During WWII, a British colonel tries to bridge the cultural divides between a British POW and the Japanese camp commander in order to avoid bloodshed.
Nagisa Oshima takes us on an incredible anti-war journey, documenting how culture of honour and masculinity was doomed to clash and produce atrocity without understanding and reconciliation of eachother. Homosexuality is also a massive theme, the transgressions of traditionalist samurai Yanoi and 'man's man' Celliers becoming an atrocity for the camp not for their nature but their compassion unto their enemy. Beautifully scored, I picked the vinyl up from the most wonderful stall at a country market. Brilliantly acted, Bowie delivers a stellar performance as does Takeshi (and the other leads) this film might be the best christmas film produced.
The 36th Chamber od Shaolin [1978]
A man studies kung fu at the Shaolin Temple to fight back against the oppressive Manchu government.
A Shaw Brothers film, beloved as one of the greatest kung fu training films and thrusted the studio into notoriety and fame, perhaps isn't everything i look for in a martial arts film (I probably prefer fights over training montage). That being said, any film that uses kung fu and class consciousness to fight for a unified china is a trope that I absolutely love.
On a dark, wet night a historic and regal Chinese cinema sees its final film. Together with a small handful of souls they bid "Goodbye, Dragon Inn".
A film where nothing happens, but is so well shot I was completely gripped and glued to the screen, and has fundamentally changed my appreciation of cinema.
A cursed dancer and a musician stun society with electrifying concerts in this animated rock opera.
If rock and roll actually was invented in feudal japan, it wouldve absolutely popped off. Rock opera and anime make for incredible storytelling. Masaaki Yuasa's catalogue deserves my full recognition.
Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! [1965]
Three go-go dancers holding a young girl hostage come across a crippled old man living with his two sons in the desert. After learning he's hiding a sum of cash around, the women start scheming on him
Very girlboss feminist for its time, and for a sexploitation film. The heterosexual characters are very much not the protagonists of this film.
During a long English summer in the early 1980s, two schoolboys from differing backgrounds set out to make a film inspired by First Blood (1982).
I maybe expected a plot or movie about young boys and their idolisation of hypermasculine hypermilitaristic films and the detriments that has, but really rambo is just a stand in for adventure, and this film is a send up of amateur fan filmmaking from theatre kids. Like be kind, rewind and school of rock combined but missing jack black.
Little Dieter Needs to Fly [1997]
German-American Dieter Dengler discusses his service as a U.S. naval pilot in the Vietnam War. Dengler also revisits the sites of his capture and eventual escape from the hands of the Viet Cong, recreating many events for the camera.
Werner Herzog really found a character to study here. Dieter's narrative of his capture, torture, and escape as a POW in vietnam is unreal and horrifying, and yet while joining the war incidentally, he seems a strange and deeply traumatised man proud of his service failing to condemn the purposelessness of the vietnam war itself.
This film surveys the disaster of the Kuwaiti oil fields in flames, with little narration and scarcely any interviews. Hell on Earth is presented in such transcendent visions and music that one can only be fascinated by it.
"Two figures are approaching an oil well. One of them holds a lighted torch. What are they up to? Are they going to rekindle the blaze? Is life without fire become unbearable for them?... Others, seized by madness, follow suit. Now they are content. Now there is something to extinguish again." - Werner Herzog
Aside from the very occasional interjection, this documentary by Herzog is almost purely visual. Oil is truly a horrifying substance, both materially and for the greed and conflict it has created. This footage is a must see.
The Night is short, Walk on Girl [2017]
As a group of teens go out for a night on the town, a sophomore known only as "The Girl with Black Hair" experiences a series of surreal encounters with the local nightlife - all the while unaware of the romantic longings of Senpai, a fellow student who has been creating increasingly fantastic and contrived reasons to run into her, in an effort to win her heart.
Drunk on homemade eggnog at a kicking houseparty, I find myself in the 'cinema room', where at the stroke of midnight we begin this beautifully animated film about a girl's own surreal experiences on her nights out that thankfully I remember from this one.
Simon, a deeply religious man living in the 4th century, wants to be nearer to God so he climbs a column. The Devil wants him to come down to Earth and is trying to seduce him.
An ascetic monk on a pillar, originally quite thoughtful and sensible about his biblical interpretations, is increasingly revealed to be insane, selfish, sinful, irrational in his teachings and eventually succumbs to the greatest sin of all; rock and roll.
A collection of expertly photographed scenes of human life and religion.
At some point in Jiro Dreams of Sushi, music from Baraka was sampled, and my parents suggested we put this on as well to recollect. I can enjoy the artistry, but i find it quite unsubtle. Perhaps this film suffered from its mimics between its inception and my viewing. The viewing was a pretty fun geoguessr into the world and history.
A documentary on 85-year-old sushi master Jiro Ono, his renowned Tokyo restaurant, and his relationship with his son and eventual heir, Yoshikazu.
A rewatch, this time i was less impressed by the relentless pursuit of perfection and probably more abhorred by the stress and pressures Jiro has placed on his family. I like the idea of enjoying the pursuit of perfection, but I think one should concede to be able to achieve at some point. I tickle myself to imagine Herzog making this documentary..
The Great Ecstacy of Woodcarver Steiner [1974]
A study of the psychology of a champion ski-jumper, whose full-time occupation is carpentry.
This Werner Herzog Criterion documentary has a delightfully short runtime, and was a delightfully accessible work. Not that much about his carpentry, this was much more about ski flying and the pursuit to defy death, or at least the skijumping comittee.
A business commuter is pursued and terrorized by the malevolent driver of a massive tractor-trailer.
Hate on his late stuff all you want, Spielberg had a really good early catalogue with some really good filmmaking. I love a film with a simple premise like this, and the extended cut still had a lot to explore and tension to build that I really enjoyed.
At an archaeological dig in the ancient city of Hamunaptra, an American serving in the French Foreign Legion accidentally awakens a mummy who begins to wreak havoc as he searches for the reincarnation of his long-lost love.
Enjoyed on a VHS copy a friend picked up at a op shop for me. Brendan Fraisier's The Mummy is probably best enjoyed this way, Early CGI loves the medium.
Braindead [1995] (Alt title: Dead Alive)
A young man's mother is bitten by a Sumatran rat-monkey. She gets sick and dies, at which time she comes back to life, killing and eating dogs, nurses, friends, and neighbors.
Peter Jackson is a madman (compliment). I don't know how to articulate my reaction to the most impressive gore flick ever created coming from the same talent of everyone's favorite Lord of the Rings. Maybe I have slept on horror?
A cyborg policewoman and her partner hunt a mysterious and powerful hacker called the Puppet Master.
A rewatch, enjoyed with at least one friend who hadn't seen it before. I haven't seen anything else in the franchise, and feel i know very little about the concepts or background of the film and manga. What I do know, is I deeply enjoy the soundtrack, the aesthetics, and the pauses in action that just show scenery and let the music shine. It sends me to a happy place.
Tashi, a former tennis prodigy turned coach, turned her husband into a champion. But to overcome a losing streak, he needs to face his ex-best friend and Tashi's ex-boyfriend.
I was promised a very fullon love triangle movie that depicted tennis as just a raw sexual metaphor and went to go enjoy a movie with little other reccommendation and what I got was definitely a very fullon love triangle movie with incredibly sexual tennis. Forgive me for becoming more invested in my sports and athletics after this bisexual masterpiece.
The legendary Forty-seven ronin plot to avenge the death of their lord, Asano Naganori, by killing Kira Yoshinaka, a shogunate official responsible for Asano being forced to commit seppuku.
My love of samurai movies met my disdain for 3 hour films, and I don't think it won. The DVD cover promised me one of the greatest swordfight scenes in early cinema but it took 2 and a half hours to set up stakes, and I really wasn't awake anymore.
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring
A boy is raised by a Buddhist monk in an isolated floating temple where the years pass like the seasons.
Maybe, being raised in an isolated floating temple isn't a healthy upbringing, actually. This film felt very well cut and paced, and made a very catching drama.
The rape of a bride and the murder of her samurai husband are recalled from the perspectives of a bandit, the bride, the samurai's ghost and a woodcutter.
This is a rewatch of the first kursawa film I saw, screened while i was breifly in a film studies degree. While the depiction was relatively tame, I remember being shocked back then that they did not forewarn our class about the rape plot, and got really unsettled. This rewatch was very enjoyable having forgotten all the layers to what really isn't just a whodunit plot.
After a dinosaur-like beast - awoken from undersea hibernation by atom bomb testing - ravages Tokyo, a scientist must decide if his similarly dangerous weapon should be used to destroy it.
1954 Godzilla is just as incredible today as it probably was back then. Most of the reboots are their own trashy joy, but the original here is just an awesome super powerful film about atomic testing, the destruction of the world and a cautionary tale about weapons that would obliterate mankind, even if they could stop Godzilla/Gozurah. I wanna watch the U.S. cut at some point, allegedly its terrible; they cut out all the direct allusion to atomic bombing and world annhiliation. The U.S. Still refuses to apologize for the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to this day. Also, Oppenheimer and the manhattan project team were cowards for not flying the Enola Gay and taking themselves out with the bomb like our hero Dr. Daisuke Serizawa.
See the Sea is a 1997 French thriller film written and directed by Francois Ozon and starring Sasha Hails as a young British mother living in a small seaside village in France who takes in a malevolent homeless drifter (played by Marina de Van) while her husband is away on business.
Its a really good, rather short but gripping thriller that holds onto the tension for the full hour and lets you play in your mind every possible disaster. Unfortunately, I was completely rooting for the homeless backpacker the whole time. You can be nomadic and have an abortion and be queer coded and a little bit schizotypal and not be a bad person at all. You can also maybe be forgiven a little bit for putting someone's toothbrush in the toilet if that person is a strange sexually frustrated housewife who gave up her aspirations of travel to be a stay at home mum and fuck strangers while your husband is away. Can't quite forgive the director for that camera shot though.
The Tale of Princess Kaguya [2013]
Kaguya is a beautiful young woman coveted by five nobles. To try to avoid marrying a stranger she doesn't love, she sends her suitors on seemingly impossible tasks. But she will have to face her fate and punishment for her choices.
I didn't just cry at the end honestly i shut down and shrunk into my own child self from thinking too much about running around playing in the forest (In a beautiful, cathartic way). I'll say this every time, I think this might be Joe Hisaishi's best work (man never does less than his best). Im lost for words to comment, uhhh this was pretty and beautiful and serene and passionate and hit something near my heart.
Two bumbling store clerks inadvertently erase the footage from all of the tapes in their video rental store. In order to keep the business running, they re-shoot every film in the store with their own camera, with a budget of zero dollars.
My knowledge going into the film was that it was film about jack black and co recreating popular films on a budget after accidentally wiping a video store, but that this movie never got huge acclaim because audiences wanted more of the sweded films and less of the plot surrounding how the films got wiped or needed to be replaced. But by gosh, thats an incredible story, about community and jazz and expression and rights to creatively edit and riff on work and make art as a community and also racism and the abuse of power held by studios and labels. I cried at the end and did not at all expect to. I see jack black as an artist a lot here, and his work having always been tribute and homage and built upon the world before him but only trapped in the digital millenium copyright age. This might be the best movie i have ever seen if the metric is to leave and want to go and make art myself, which honestly it probably should secretly be. Also, it was just fun watching a plot about a dvd store when I too, go to a dvd store.
A rogue reporter trailing a runaway heiress for a big story joins her on a bus heading from Florida to New York and they end up stuck with each other when the bus leaves them behind at one of the stops along the way.
Got taken to the cinemas to see a rescreen of this. Absolutely incredible. Fast paced witty film that had me gripped from the very beginning and paying attention the whole way through (fuck you, DUNE franchise). Entendre, slapstick, setup, denied setup, humour, tragedy. My friend is a classic romcom evangelist but I get it. This film is a masterpiece. Another friend cried at the drunk driver singing and I want to include that in my notes to remember.
Intimate Confessions of a Chinese Courtesan [1972]
Intimate Confessions Of A Chinese Courtesan is a 1972 Hong Kong film directed by Chor Yuen, produced by the Shaw Brothers, and starring Lily Ho. The story follows a young girl, kidnapped and sold into prostitution, who soon becomes the primary focus of a police chief's investigation when a series of murders occur at the brothel where she works.
In theory this should be a great film, its a raw 70s kung fu film by the shaw brothers with a raunchy lesbian brothel owner. Intimate confessions of a chinese courtesan was cut really weird though, in a very hollywood style that reminds me of enter the dragon where I feel like the audience is talked down to a little and the genre conventions are snubbed a little. Maybe the sub was quite horrible, it felt like a bunch of story was cut out or not told. It is fun having the funky 70s music but it isn't quite the campness i like. Allegedly, the shaw brothers later cut this into a different film, lust for the love of a chinese courtesan which hopefully would break free of this a bit and I should've borrowed instead had I known. I'm sure in that one the lesbian brothel owner dies as well, its a Shaw film. Everyone has to. Even though you root for her as a gay icon despite being straight up sexually abusive. We as a community need to unpack our queer icons sometime maybe.
Arrietty, titled Arrietty the Borrower in Japan and The Secret World of Arrietty in North America, is a 2010 Japanese animated fantasy film directed by Hiromasa Yonebayashi as his feature film debut as a director, animated by Studio Ghibli, with the screenplay by Hayao Miyazaki and Keiko Niwa based on the 1952 novel The Borrowers by Mary Norton. Arrietty is about a family of tiny people who live secretly in the walls and floors of a typical household, borrowing items from humans to survive, and tells the story of a young Borrower (Shida) befriending a human boy (Kamiki), while trying to avoid being detected by the other humans.
'not studio ghibli's best one' a friend tells me, well honestly they set the highest bar and to not be on that rung you can still be an amazing film. Arrietty is a storybook film about being tiny and small and borrowing things from a house while trying not to be noticed and I would have absolutely loved this film as a kid because I loved the idea of being 3 inches tall and hiding in the cracks of furniture and using little things as tools. plus Arrietty herself is an awesome heroine. Also spiller was cool.
A pragmatic paleontologist touring an almost complete theme park on an island in Central America is tasked with protecting a couple of kids after a power failure causes the park's cloned dinosaurs to run loose.
I had seen this film before, but only recently read Micheal Crichton's novel. The novel does a really good job of making a story about chaos theory and the butterfly effect and cautioning genetic experimentation. Speilberg's film adaptation however, is just an incredible action thriller with a way better story about Alan Grant learing to be more fatherly and the hubris of man especially the shortcuts of man and big coporations. The dinosaur puppets and limitied use of CG hold this up to time flawlessly, especially on VHS. My only fault is the things this film got wrong about newman.
The Land Before Time V: The Mysterious Island [1997]
Littlefoot and his friends the gang in their next when a swarm of leaf gobblers had destroyed their homes and this forces them to find a new home but yet find an mysterious island.
I never touched these films as a kid. I had a good dinosaur phase but felt too old for them quite young. Plus, the dinosaurs were just really lumpy and they really weirded me out. Anyway, we follow a collection of dinosaur children as they inherit dinosaur racism from their parents and use it to be dinosaur racist against a carnivore friend they met several movies ago but it's ok because the carnivore forgave them. I learnt too many dinosaur slurs in this one film. Jenny Nicholson alleged this one was the best and given its the only one I'll probably ever see, I'm inclined to agree.
The Princess Bride [1987] (rewatch)
A bedridden boy's grandfather reads him the story of a farmboy-turned-pirate who encounters numerous obstacles, enemies and allies in his quest to be reunited with his true love.
This is my first rewatch after reading the book. The book is incredibly witty and clever and also goes on a many more tangents or world building, and writes the layer above the text about reading it to a kid with much more wit and clever prose. Despite this, princess bride is still one of the best 100% perfect films and adaptations. Goldstein cut just the right darlings from the book to have such a fantastic screenplay.
After being rejected by the Confederate military, not realizing it was due to his crucial civilian role, an engineer must single-handedly recapture his beloved locomotive after it is seized by Union spies and return it through enemy lines.
Buster Keaton why did you decide to be historically faithful to this civil war story kinds cringe larping as the confederacy.
I was going through Joe hisaishi's scores on IMDb and saw this one out of place 1926 film 'uncredited' which like he wasn't even alive? But naturally this was a silent film and this DVD included a score by him which really elevated it. Allegedly train films were getting boring back in it's day but it really stands out today as an incredible Keaton film with great setup and payoffs and remarkably nonlinear train heist. It's just a shame he plays a Dixie.
It's pretty hard to see the shot of the river bridge and not know what it's building up to, with that later shot of the train wreck being sampled in so much cinema studies throughout time.
Kids is a 1995 American coming-of-age drama film directed by Larry Clark in his directorial debut and written by Harmony Korine in his screenwriting debut. It stars Leo Fitzpatrick, Justin Pierce, Chloë Sevigny, and Rosario Dawson, all in their film debuts. Set in 1995, Fitzpatrick, Pierce, Sevigny, Dawson, and other newcomers portray a group of teenagers in New York City. They are characterized as hedonists, who engage in sexual acts and substance abuse, over the course of a single day.
To say its like watching a car wreck is probably unfair simile. It's like watching a culture of adolescents groom and rape underage women and also Lynch an African American man with nobody around to even attempt to give guidance or recompense to their behaviour. I think the feminist critique is fair, we only really get to read the true victims of this film with our own existing awareness of male violence and the film is kind too fly on the wall to make the comment it should. The narrative is this constant unfolding disaster for Jenny and all the women and minorities around these boys really, but something kinda actually happens in the script where Casper exposes himself to HIV and I guess that's all the recompense we give him for harbouring his groomer friend. It's just kinda yikes to use cishet HIV as a punishment like that, without really unpacking the violence and stigmatisation it's been already given to the gay world.
Six queer teenagers struggle to get along with each other and with life in the face of varying obstacles.
Gregg araki continues to just put my strange adolescent world into film. It's wild to see this world going back through the 90s as well, and that we as queer youth have been going through the same shit year after year. Growing up and coming out in the 2010s it really felt like us queets and our scene had just born out of nowhere, and it kinda did. We'd all just been killed off.
Several yakuza from Tokyo are sent to Okinawa to help end a gang war. The war then escalates and the Tokyo drifters decide to lay low at the beach.
I really came into this thinking it's just a hardcore Yakuza film and thought Takeshi had done something conventional for once and that's why it had so much acclaim. Instead, beat Takeshi quietly builds down these hardcore Yakuza thugs to just guys, just boys. His comedy is just so real, and it's incredible to me how he sets everything up and just plays with it. He just wanted his little vacation boys weekend. Was that top much to ask? Got blown away at the end when I found out that was a Joe hisaishi score; why did he not bust that banger out when I saw him live???
After Po is tapped to become the Spiritual Leader of the Valley of Peace, he needs to find and train a new Dragon Warrior, while a wicked sorceress plans to re-summon all the master villains whom Po has vanquished to the spirit realm.
I knew it could never live up to the first film, or even the first trilogy. But I do like that DreamWorks has raised where the bar now needs to be after they blew us away with 'the last wish'. The dad plot brought me much joy too. While it's cool they tried master student arc, but I almost think they should do a IP man/fearless and have po lead the boxer rebellion against the British trying to colonise China and destroy Kung Fu.
Fallen Angels, a Hong Kong neo-noir crime comedy-drama film written and directed by Wong Kar-wai, featuring two intertwined storylines—one tells the story of a hitman wishing to leave the criminal underworld (Leon Lai), the prostitute he starts a relationship with (Karen Mok), and his agent (Michelle Reis), who is infatuated with him. The other story is of a mute ex-convict on the run from the police (Takeshi Kaneshiro) and a mentally unstable woman dumped by her boyfriend (Charlie Yeung). Set in 1995 pre-Handover Hong Kong, Fallen Angels explores the characters' loneliness, their alienation from the situations around them, and yearning for connections in a hectic city.
Somehow, Tarantino plagiarised this film despite pulp fiction coming out first. This one is way way better though. Just like chungking express, I love how the colours pop and blow, and the music makes me feel, and I get to stare Into this world of the 3am liminal urban space. I used to love mute characters too as a kid, and I love stories that are not about overcoming mutism. I was very close to shutting my mouth forever when I was young, I really hate the way people would go off at you. I wound up listening to the sountrack for a month.
A defense officer, Nameless, was summoned by the King of Qin regarding his success of terminating three warriors.
Rewatch. Friend has a film assignment coming up on it. Yimou Zhang has some incredible critiques of Chinese culture but also dam can be also make some incredible pro Chinese unification propaganda. WHY DOES TYHE TITLE SAY TARANTINO PRESENTS HE HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS??
Forgotten Silver is a 1995 New Zealand mockumentary film that purports to tell the story of a pioneering New Zealand filmmaker. It was written and directed by Peter Jackson and Costa Botes, both of whom appear in the film in their roles as makers of the documentary.
Peter Jackson has a pretty cool backlog actually. Fake documentary goes hard. Picked it up as a random grab out of the criterion collection.
A French actress filming an anti-war film in Hiroshima has an affair with a married Japanese architect as they share their differing perspectives on war.
It's largely a story about a French girl who fell in love with a German in the war, and the mistreatment she faced for loving the enemy and wanting peace. Hiroshima is not really just there as a backdrop to this film, we're shown a lot of the footage and story from the bombing and given that to mediate over for the film, even seeing Hiroshima 10 years after is wild. America did a lot to try and not have us remember what they did to Hiroshima. I broke later in the week hearing that more hospitals have been bombed in the news, and how everyone just ignores it. I never think about the doctors and nurses that die in those explosions too, and how it just takes away every other survivors option to survive. The pictures of the city just gone are so hard to take in because was just truly turned to dust. It did get weird how long the two lovers just followed eachother everywhere though.
Humans, in a fascist militaristic future, wage war with giant alien bugs.
Finally got around to this one, though its having a resurgance in the zeitgeist for the release of helldivers. It was a bit much watching the hard R scenes, but I'm glad they're there when I think about it. That's probably there to stop kids seeing this film and completely missing the satire, I hope. A good movie.
Gohatto, also known as Taboo, is a 1999 Japanese film directed by Nagisa Oshima. Its subject is homosexuality in the Shinsengumi during the bakumatsu period, the end of the samurai era in the mid-19th century. The production was Oshima's final film before his death, thirteen years after Gohatto's premiere. At the start of the movie, the young and handsome Kano Sozaburo (Ryuhei Matsuda) is admitted to the Shinsengumi, an elite samurai group led by Kondo Isami (Yoichi Sai) that seeks to defend the Tokugawa shogunate against reformist forces. He is a very skilled swordsman, but it is his appearance that makes many of the others in the (strictly male) group, both students and superiors, attracted to him, creating tension within the group of people vying for Kano's affections.
Rewatched with a friend, glad to know other people enjoyed this film as much as me. They're just all so gay, and it's so fun watching the drama of them all trying to hide it but not for homophobic reasons. And Kano, for crushing on the one straight dude there.
Japan is plunged into chaos upon the appearance of a giant monster. Politicians struggle with bureaucratic red tape in order to deal with the sudden appearance of Godzilla, that evolves whenever it is attacked.
A really cool film about beauracracy being really shit at taking action and saving people's lives. Big respect to the acting pm. Man just wanted a ramen bowl. Big love to the team for using the rubber suit for Godzilla, and for doing the fun camera angles that was also in shin Ultraman for otherwise dull meeting Supercuts. Also respect for the cuts of the concrete dome at Hiroshima. Very good movie.
Paul Atreides unites with Chani and the Fremen while seeking revenge against the conspirators who destroyed his family.
Watching both dunes in one day was a mistake. I already didn't get the first, and I had to take a ritalin to try and focus on this one. I couldn't; a lady had a syncope in the row in front of me and it ruined my immersion. Paul spends the whole movie not wanting to cross the equator because he thinks bad things will happen and then he just crosses the equator anyway? I think the author did want me to think the bloodline eugenics stuff was gross and by God it was, but I was also thrown out and disgusted by the implication that a foetus is real and can have psychic powers and be time travel future Anja Taylor joy. Idk. The black and white sequence was cool. I was with friends though, so I had fun.
A noble family becomes embroiled in a war for control over the galaxy's most valuable asset while its heir becomes troubled by visions of a dark future.
I watched dune 1 and 2 really knowing nothing about the book or film. And such, I really got stuck the whole time not getting the real world systems that the science fiction is supposed to tell us about. The feudal houses are bad but the arakis are good because they tried to stop those people from the worm that one time? So much stuff gets set up and goes nowhere. I really hate 3h films.
In this poetic and atmospheric horror fable, set in a village in war-torn medieval Japan, a malevolent spirit has been ripping out the throats of itinerant samurai. When a military hero is sent to dispatch the unseen force, he finds that he must struggle with his own personal demons as well. From Kaneto Shindo, director of the terror classic ONIBABA, KURONEKO (BLACK CAT) is a spectacularly eerie twilight tale with a shocking feminist angle, evoked through ghostly special effects and exquisite cinematography.
This house sorry was a delightful twist on the samurai tales I'm used to watching. Kuroneko actually also had some incredible wire effects that fit seamlessly into it's ghosts. well deserving of is Criterion collection.
Mother, this is your son, Roger Thornhill...No, no, Mother. I have not been drinking. No, no. These two men, they poured a whole bottle of bourbon into me. No, they didn't give me a chaser.
Alfred Hitchcock you let me down. I really was expecting a round the world chase of Kerry Grant being chased by a biplane because that's the only scene I know, but the plot of him just being horny for a girl the whole time. Kerry Grant did do pretty good though, the film just wasn't what I wanted.
Sing is a skilled Shaolin kung fu devotee whose amazing 'leg of steel' catches the eye of a soccer coach. Together they assemble a squad of Sing's former Shaolin brothers inspired by the big-money prize in a national soccer competition. Using an unlikely mix of martial arts and newfound soccer skills, it seems an unbeatable combination ... until they must face the dreaded Team Evil in the ultimate battle for the title.
I really love Kung Fu will unite and save the world plots. Kung Fu hustle was a better piece of work but Shaolin soccer is a fantastic flick for anyone wanting more, and I want more.
Jim Hawkins is a teenager who finds the map of a great treasure hidden by a space pirate. Together with some friends, he sets off in a large spaceship, shaped like a caravel, on his quest.
A rewatch, but also my first rewatch since reading the book. This movie remains so beautiful and an incredible piece of work, probably Disney's best.
A grand-scale adventure as only Akira Kurosawa could make one, The Hidden Fortress stars the inimitable Toshiro Mifune as a general charged with guarding his defeated clan’s princess (a fierce Misa Uehara) as the two smuggle royal treasure across hostile territory. Accompanying them are a pair of bumbling, conniving peasants who may or may not be their friends. This rip-roaring ride is among the director’s most beloved films and was a primary influence on George Lucas’s Star Wars. The Hidden Fortress delivers Kurosawa’s trademark deft blend of wry humor, breathtaking action, and compassionate humanity.
Hidden fortress took me a while to really get hooked but it really just takes its time to set up these incredible stakes that our heroes must go on. Beautiful scenes and incredible score. this was the best Kurosawa so far in terms of sheer enjoyment.
Andrew returns to his hometown for the funeral of his mother, a journey that reconnects him with past friends. The trip coincides with his decision to stop taking his powerful antidepressants. A chance meeting with Sam - a girl also suffering from various maladies - opens up the possibility of rekindling emotional attachments, confronting his psychologist father, and perhaps beginning a new life.
Garden state really missed me. I was told by a few people going in that yeah it's a cult film but with some stuff that's aged poorly. That's usually true for a lot of experimental stuff, but yeah. But I really couldn't just ignore it in this movie, it really took me out of this film. I really struggled with the premise, it's not some film about going off your meds and having a manic pixie dream girl fix you but also that's exactly what it is?
Kurosawa's follow up to YOJIMBO sees the return of Toshiro Mifune as Sanjuro. Nune young and naive samurai are attempting to stop corruption in their local clan with the evidence of the strange sanjuro to guide them. With plenty of action amongst this light-hearted comedy, Sanjuro is an examination of the manners, protocol and politics in feudal Japan- and also boasts one of the fastest and most breathtaking climactic duels in cinema history.
Toshiro Mifune does an incredible performance and has an incredible character here, but by my knowledge it got stitched together into the narrative after Yojimbo, which was better. Sorry to compare them, but having watched the previous and unfortunately for knowing that peice of trivia I felt distracted knowing hwo good the original Yojimbo was. Thats my general take with film trivia, I love more to watch things blind. Its great, but you dont get as much of that action and movement and wind there is in the other Kurosawas, which is GOATed and probably unfair that we always expect.
The tale of an eccentric band of culinary ronin who guide the widow of a noodle-shop owner on her quest for the perfect recipe, this rapturous “ramen western” by Japanese director Juzo Itami is an entertaining, genre-bending adventure underpinned by a deft satire of the way social conventions distort the most natural of human urges—our appetites. Interspersing the efforts of Tampopo (Nobuko Miyamoto) and friends to make her café a success with the erotic exploits of a gastronome gangster and glimpses of food culture both high and low, the sweet, sexy, and surreal Tampopo is a lavishly inclusive paean to the sensual joys of nourishment, and one of the most mouthwatering examples of food on film ever made.
This is a rewatch. I saw it once and elevated this to my top 5 films of all time. I got shown this last year and fell in love. I love ramen, I love the blind pursuit of perfection, both to cook and both to taste. I like the lustfulness of good food. I truly beleive that cooking is all there is to life. This is a heist film, this is a samurai film [westerns are just bootleg samurai films], this is an impressionist film, and i love all these layers but my god its just a sendup of what it is to eat, to live, to cook and why thats important. everything stitches together to that message in the end.
The Flavour of Green Tea over Rice [1952
Takeo, a bored and flighty socialite, is sick of her dull husband who was raised in the country. Cruelly referring to him as "dull-chan", Takeo leaves for a giggly weekend away with some girlgriends, where they swap stories about their husbands over cups of sake. Takeo's neice setsuko - who is visiting while her mother arranges a marriage for her - accompanies the owmen on their retreat and disturbed by this glimpse of her own future, becomes disenchanted with the prospect of arranged marriage. The films title refers to an inexpensive japanese dish, with the reference serving to remind the characters and the audience about life's simple pleasures. Just as the characters appreciate the delicate flavour green tea over rice, so may we enjoy the delicacy of Ozu's masterful direction, and marvel at the simplicity of his minimalist approach.
These Yasujito Ozu films are incredible. so little gets spoken to how much we get painted of these people. In our character study, we go from loving to hating to loving characters, and they need only the lens not any force of character change for these moments. I think our takeaway is that yeah arranged marriage is tough but it is very important that we cook together actually, this couple is from a class where they never step into their kitchen at all. Titling the film about the dish is no accident, Im glad this metaphor was explained on the back of the cover because it really sets up out conclusion here. I knew this would be a good borrow because I've watched the DVD get some traffic in and out of the DVD store these past months.
The true story of the inseparable Von Erich brothers, who made history in the intensely competitive world of professional wrestling in the early 1980s. Through tragedy and triumph, under the shadow of their domineering father and coach, the brothers seek larger-than-life immortality on the biggest stage in sports.
I'm so glad hes not my dad. This film is sad and tragic and depressing but I felt pretty good just knowing that I have a really good dad and I don't have to go though this constant torture he put his kids through. Though, at the end, I realise maybe he's my granddad. Maybe there is something here my dad has suffered, and I did bawl my eyes out. Did not notice that was zac effron. I also did not comprehend how that was not Gene Wilder. They remade a Wonka film and they didn't use this guy???? fr.
Mary "mouse" Bradford has just arrived at Perkins Girls College. For the first time in her sheltered life mouse must now fend for herself away from home. her two senior roommates, the striking, sharp-witted Paulie (piper perabo) and the charming and beautiful Tory (jessica Pare_), quickly adopt mouse. the three girls bond and soon create their own universe within the school. But this world comes crashing down when Tory and Pauli are inadvertently found to be lovers. Tory can't handle the pressure from her parents and peers while Paulie can't handle losing Tory. Mouse is caught with the role of accomplice and confessor and is left torn between her two friends. Through this sensual and violent struggle, Mouse is about to discover what it means to be in love and how far her friends will go to save that love.
Spoilers, one of them dies. I spoil it because like, its kinda a late hayes code twist. We could be really sympathetic towards paulie and for almost all the movie tori is really painted as the villian for denying her sexuality. Having paulie die though and suffer all the consequences really flips that though, and sends a distasteful message imo. Our side characters even confess, that its current year [2001] and its fine to be gay. This speaks to me though, because I mean my own experience being gay in a world thats reaady to be accepting but you still kinda have the trauma from growing up in a world thats not, and by god even though im a bit of a critic they kinda do get the manic breakup nervous breakdown pretty accurate. every lesbian has one of these its like character building. I think thats why the spinster teachers dont actually intervene properly, assuming its all normal and healthy for paulie to be going through. Maybe thats it, it left a bad taste in me because I have been through the exact drama. The film is actually really nicely directed, cast and performed, its just that the story is an old book from 1993 and kinda weird. plus also, this film got me back on the violent femmes, which a friend listened to on repeat the summer we hung out. hes gay now, and so am I, but we didnt know back then.
A group of teenagers try to sort out their lives and emotions while bizarre experiences happen to each one, including alien abductions, bad acid trips, bisexual experiences, suicides, bizarre deaths, and a rape by a TV star. All of this happens before "the greatest party of the year".
I've been to this party like 80 times. I've experienced half the nights of what these characters have gone through. Its the late 2010s/20s and even though this is like the most nineties bisexual film ever it is still just culture today. That yin and yang between self insulgence and self destruction. Also, I love how everyones bedroom is just this surrealist space. I had a good weekend after watching this film..
tokyostory>
A profoundly stirring evocation of elemental humanity and universal heartbreak, Tokyo Story is the crowning achievement of the unparalleled Yasujiro Ozu. The film, which follows an aging couple’s journey to visit their grown children in bustling postwar Tokyo, surveys the rich and complex world of family life with the director’s customary delicacy and incisive perspective on social mores. Featuring lovely performances from Ozu regulars Chishu Ryu and Setsuko Hara, Tokyo Story plumbs and deepens the director’s recurring theme of generational conflict, creating what is without question one of cinema’s mightiest masterpieces.
There were tears. This old couple is so sweet and so nice. And this feels like such a cinefile thing to say and I hate that but my god the shots the composition the simple cameras the frames the idk this one kinda actually deserves that claim as the GOAT of films. No more comment, watch this gorgeous piece.
Legendary Japanese actor Toshiro Mifune returns for his 9th collaboration withmaster director Akira Kurosawa in Yojimbo, a film that has inspired countless filmmakers. The plot of this film was literally stolen by the great 'spaghetti western' director Sergio Leone and remade as the classic 'a fistful of dollars' in 1964'. Yojimbo is the story of a samurai who wanders into a town in turmoil. pitting the town's two warring clans against eachother, the mysterious samurai plays a profitable yet dangerous game. Yojimbo is laced with expert swrodplay, black humour and a wonderfully atmospheric score from Masura Sato. Toshiro Mifune gives a towering performance as the samurai who is equally deadly with his wits as with his blade.
God Akira Kurosawa films just go so hard. Where does he actually get all the wind for his shots?? Yeah seven samurai was great but I'd continue to recommend everything else first because the 3 hour runtime was hard, this feature is a palatable 110 minutes and the score is incredible.
I'm a Cyborg but that's Ok [2006]
With his masterful, multi-award-winning vengeance trilogy, Park Chan Wook won accolades at home and abroad, and became the object of cult for many film fans, from the grindhouse aficionado to the arthouse purist. Following the anger and violence of Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, Sympathy for Lady Vengeance, and Old Boy, however, Park was ready for something new - a romantic comedy, albeit one like no other. For his whimsically titled I'm a Cyborg, But That's OK, the director enlisted versatile actress Lim Soo Jung (Lump Sugar, Tale of Two Sisters) and film newcomer Jung Ji Hoon, better known to fans across Asia as Rain, as his mentally ill romantic leads. A cyborg romantic comedy starring Rain? If anyone can pull it off, it's Park Chan Wook!
He could fix me.
When a powerful new internet Digimon hatches and begins to consume data at an alarming rate, the Digidestined kids chosen to save the digital world must put an end to the destruction beore the damage becomes irreversible and worldwide communication halts forever. As computer-based missiles are launched, and a wayward Digimon kidnaps the digidestined, only the combined efforts of a worldwide netwrok of kids and a new group of Digidestined can rescue the others and stop global disaster.
I didn't grow up with digimon, the only think I knew was that unlike pokemon they have to poop. This was an important detail that the film also did explain to me. Thankfully I had friends with me who did grow up with digimon to fully hype me for this film and i'll be honest, digimon kinda does go way harder than pokemon. Shoutout to Val for the VHS tape.
kids in america goes so hard.
Get set for an unforgettable adventure featuring all-new Pokemon! an ancient legend comes true when powerful Pokemon Articuno, Zapdos and Moltres are disturbed after centuries of harmony. As the very forces of nature come unbalanced, life on earth depends on the unlikely teaming of the mythical pokemon Lugia and a mysterious "chosen one" foretold in the legend. Can Ash Ketchum summon the ocurage to save the day? See how one person can make all the difference. VHS Includes the mini movie: Pikachu's rescue adventure.
Shoutout to this VHS tape from Evie, this is possibly in the worst condition of any VHS I own. Pikachu's rescue adventure is a fever dream; this is the second time I have watched the film actually however I still sort of lose my mind and get distracted by other things.
Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah [2001]
The horror of the Pacific War and specter of Godzilla have all become a distant memory for Japan. However, the destruction of a US submarine raises alarms for Admiral Tachibana. His estranged daughter Yuri, is working on a pseudo documentary when she comes across the legend of the three guardian monsters. The guardians are awaken by an old man, Hirotoshi Isayama, who informs Yuri that Godzilla, embodying the restless souls of the victims of Pacific War, has returned to destroy the nation for having forgotten the suffering of the war. As Yuri and her colleagues investigate, Admiral Tachibana and the guardian monsters attempt to defeat an unstoppable and vengeful Godzilla
they made mothra less fluffy! grr!. boo. I thought godzilla v mothra had such a nonsensical filler plot with the two little women from outer space but there was still kinda a message trying to happen there about like maybe don't pollute the planet? maybe, godzilla v mothra v kind ghidorah is better by virtue of having seemingly no underlying theme; an hour of plot happens and then mothra and king ghidorah still just -show up- and just fight. I still totally had a good time watching this but also have to dock it points for not having the o.g. godzilla orchestral hook play every time he shows up.
Lupin the Third: the Mystery of Mamo [1978]
Sometimes, being able to put together a world-class art collection takes a thief... this time it takes an extraordinary thief! In Transylvania, Lupin III, the notorious international thief, is hung and no one is more surprised to learn of that than Lupin III himself, who was alive and well and nowhere near that area at that time. The answer to that mystery, begins to surface when Lupin gets a seemingly ordinary pebble from an Egyptian pyramid for his would-be girlfriend, Fujiko, the mercenary thief, who is in the employ of a mysterious figure known only as Mamo. Intrigued by this bizarre request, Lupin decides to get involved and finds himself in an international chase that has a greater scope and danger than he has ever faced.
I watched this straight after coming back from getting my wisdom teeth out under general anasthetic. Safe to say I don't remember much at all, but this was still a great expereince I am sure.
A documentary following German auteur Werner Herzog as he deals with difficult actors, bad weather and getting a boat over a mountain, all in an effort to make his film Fitzcarraldo (1982).
After I watched fitzcarraldo, the greatest horror of film of all time (just due to the anticipation of watching that cable under tension for so long) I learnt that they actually used a bulldozer to pull the boat. The documentary points out that actually, the bulldozer only /helped/ pull the boat, and barely did so. its still being manually winched by the tribe present, and its still a miracle that Werner Herzog didn't kill everyone on set. man went so hard for making this film despite all setbacks and odds.
