What movies have you seen recently?

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The Triumph of Sherlock Holmes (1935)

This movie begins with the dumbest thing I've ever seen in a Sherlock Holmes movie. Even dumber than Holmes going undercover in blackface in The Spider Woman. Even dumber than Holmes having a threesome in Sherlock: Case of Evil. Even dumber than the scene in Young Sherlock Holmes in which Watson hallucinates that a bunch of cupcakes are coming to life and shoving themselves in his mouth. At least all of that silly BS made sense in context.

So, Holmes is preparing to retire. He tells Watson that his only regret is that he never put the evil criminal mastermind Professor Moriarty behind bars. Moriarty pays Holmes a visit, warning him that he'd better be serious about retiring, or else! The basic idea behind this scene, and a lot of its dialogue, is taken from one of the original short stories, "The Final Problem." But in that story, M visited H because H was actively pursuing M, and M was trying to convince H to abandon his pursuit, or else M would be forced to kill H. In this movie, H is ready to retire and seems to have given up on M. So why the hell would M show up, just to threaten H one last time? This is a criminal genius? To quote Harvey Keitel: "Are you so much a f***ing loser you can't tell when you've won?" The dialogue from "The Final Problem" ends up being completely nonsensical, as M still sounds like he's pleading with H to drop his pursuit, even though H isn't pursuing him at all in this context. Adaptation means change, Mr. Screenwriter.

Anyway. It's no different than the other Holmes films starring Arthur Wontner. In other words, Wontner is very good but he's surrounded by crap. The movie looks like it was made on a budget of $1.50 (adjusted for inflation), the writing is crap, and nearly every actor who isn't named Arthur Wontner is a total joke. He seems to be taking the material seriously, but everyone else apparently thinks they're in a Saturday morning cartoon. It's an inappropriate tone for a story about a detective solving the murder of a guy whose face was blown off with a sawed-off shotgun. Like so many other early Holmes films, it makes the mistake of revealing the who, why, and how of the crime before Holmes starts his investigation, making the second half of the movie redundant for the audience as they wait for Holmes to discover what they already know. I had seen this movie once before, but that was a long time ago, before I had read the book that it's mostly based on (The Valley of Fear). Seeing it a second time didn't make me like it any more. This is for psychotic Holmes fans like me and nobody else.

Random thoughts:

* The existing prints of the Wontner films are in awful condition. In his review of The Sign of Four, James Lileks says: "Unfortunately, the print seems to have been duplicated by projecting the worst copy they could find on a bed sheet, and having someone sketch it with pencils." He's only exaggerating a little. (Click here to see proof). The sound is so bad that I can barely make out half of what's being said. As a result, it's practically impossible to understand the movie without reading the book.

* This movie is either a reboot of the Wontner series, or the writers just didn't care about continuity. Holmes laments that he never caught Professor Moriarty, but he did exactly that in the first movie of the series, The Sleeping Cardinal. Holmes calls Moriarty "the brains behind the biggest criminal organization in Europe," but Watson thinks he's mistaken and calls Moriarty a "harmless old professor of mathemathics." Funny, because Watson saw for himself in The Sleeping Cardinal that Holmes was right about Moriarty, and he witnessed the professor being led away by police at the end.

Kidulthood is one of the better british movies ive seen.

Storyline

A day in the life of a group of troubled 15-year-olds growing up in west London.

The Tag Line for the movie is.

Before adulthood comes...

Lifted

(on netflix streaming)

Seriously, I recommend it. It's a really really good movie, with a surprise twist --but a GOOD one.
And that kid...really can sing and puts a new spin on some well known songs.
it's an inspirational movie. just go rent it now!

I saw Ide's of March this past Friday. Very dark movie showing just how twisted and dirty politics can get. With the fact, that someone is willing to betray everyone they've worked for in the past just to get ahead in their career. The main charter is a young up and coming campaign manager who does indeed end up betraying someone. The movie was engaging and had enough plot twists that were good to keep you watching until the end of the movie. With the ending being left open ended for your own interpretation of what's going to happening.

The King's Speech

Plot: With his father dead and his older brother resigning due to scandal, Prince Albert, Duke of York (Colin Firth) must ascend the throne. But he is reluctant because his speech impediment makes public speaking enormously difficult for him. So his wife Elizabeth, Duchess of York (Helena Bonham Carter) enlists the help of eccentric speech therapist Lionel Logue (Geoffery Rush) to help her husband.

Review: Wow... just wow. It's not hard to see why this movie was nominated for so many awards. It's a period piece that feels epic in scale, similar to Amadeus (but more historically accurate... I think). I laughed, I cried, and when the credits started rolling, I stood up and clapped. All of the actors and actresses are so perfect in their roles, and the sets are so lush that you feel as if you're right in the middle of the action (or drama, as it were). If you have made the mistake of waiting this long to see this movie (as I have), go grab the DVD (or Bluray), park your bum in front of the television and watch it right now! You'll thank me.

I saw Ides of March too!

Acting, writing, and directing were all top-notch
and Clooney should direct more often.

My name is Khan

Page Eight - loved it! Bill Nighy's acting kicks so much ass. awesome dialogues too!

rented netflix: Temple Grandin

watched it with Mum last night.

Mad Max

Super 8 - Saw in cheap theatre's earlier in the week. Was very entertaining and not what I was expecting. It's like a fun amalgam of The Goonies and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Especially close encounters, where it starts off very much like a scary movie but takes a whole different route 'bout half-way in.

The Hunt for Red October - A classic that was on TV so had to DVR it and got around to watching it tonight. Still love the russians all with english or scottish accents lol. Have never read any Tom Clancy and the few movies made after this I've never had much more than an indifferent view of but will always love this one.

Rounders. Very underrated movie.

Scream 4. It was okay.

Little shop of horrors. Watched it when i was a kid sometime so it wasnt totally new but i didnt remember much.

friend made me watch Crazy, Stupid Love. I thought it was awful and dialogues were bad and the humour wasn't funny at all. on the other hand - shirtless Ryan Gosling. totally worth it

Check out 'Poolhall Junkies'
It's technically the original Rounders. The guy who wrote and stared in Poolhall Junkies originally pitched it to Miramax and they decided it would do better as a movie about poker hustlers instead of poolhall hustlers, poker was just rising up as a big sport then in the late 90s, espn had just started showing some tournaments and such.

A few years later, Mars Callahan got the funding to do the film he originally wanted and made Poolhall Junkies. You'll see they are virtually the same movie but obviously Rounders had the bigger budget, but Poolhall has some great scenes with Chazz Palminteri and Christopher Walken. You'll probably also notice, that while both are good, Poolhall Junkies flows a little bit better with the story telling, it'll make you think about some plot aspects in Rounders that just seem wierd and out of place that some execs must have forced into it that you don't get in Poolhall Junkies.