Bad Santa, the movie about a foul mouthed department store santa/ thief (Billy Bob Thornton). Every holiday season he goes to a new city and new mall and recieves a job as he has super low wages and has his own elf. Then on one of the nights his elf partner in crime will hide in the store and stop the security system from activating.

I found this movie utterly hilarious although a lot of the swearing was unnessecary but doesnt detract from it overall.

The acting is brilliant with Billy Bob Thornton actually pissing himself and having chocolate actually sneezed on him. The main chil actor is surprisingly good (I don't have much faith in child actors) and fufills the part to a T.

I recommend this to people who arent easily offended (five people walked out of the screening I saw :D) as some of the material is quite harsh.

I laughed my ass off the whole way through so it gets a 91/100 from me

hello

well i saw one film which was okay i suppose, it was called Break of Dawn its about these two guys who get hired to die but end up being blamed for all the killings in the city of Bucarest (sp?) it ok to watch if there nothing else but not really much to shout about.

I was hoping to start watching Broken Saints but never got around to starting it. can't wait to see how the voice acting goes since i'm a huge fan of the non talky version.

anywho bye bye for now

Hey you guys whats up?

Just wanted to tell you all of a great movie website with a fun forum where we just talk about movies. At least check it out for a while. Thanks.

http://movieweb.com/forums/index.php

At 11/19/04 05:42 AM, gfoxcook wrote: So MOVIES are the reason you're never around Wi/Ht? anymore, eh biteme? #;-}>

Well, movies and other such things. It's not just the Where Is/How To? forum either. It's all of Newgrounds. I just haven't had the time. In between schoolwork, watching as many movies as I do, trying to start a new screenplay and me quite possibly having a girlfriend now, I've been sorting out my priorities and Newgrounds is one of the things I had to cut. Besides, everyone else in those threads is doing much better than me stat-wise so I figured I'd quit while I was still ahead. Don't worry; I'm not going to disappear or anything. I'm still racking up blam/protect points whenever I can, right?

Oh, and as for me sounding a little elitist, that's just me being passionate about something. I just don't think Shrek 2 belongs in the same category with Fellini and that's the way it is. Sorry for sounding like a jackass there but I'm just sounding off. I have pretty strong opinions about things I like and dislike. Makes me sound a little narcissistic at times, I know, but it's who I am, you know? Still, I apologize.

Now, to get into the movies I've seen since my last post here. There's eight of them and five of them are listed, bringing me up to having seen 87/250 movies off The List. Nothing compared to gfoxcook having seen exactly half the list, but I'll work my way up there. I think I'm running along at a nice clip anyways and hell, it's more than most other 16-year-old kids have seen. I'll try and keep this post really short, by the way. Truth is, I have better things to do right now. I'm really just posting here right now to both check in and appease the obsessive-compulsive side of myself. It's been too long since my last post.

So, to start off, let me just say that I finally got around to watching One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. At the time, I was just watching it with one of my chick friends, but that was the night that it all kind of turned around for me. Long story short, due to the revelations of that night, I'm now sort of dating the girl. But enough about that. The movie was what we were talking about. LordRobbo, I agree entirely. One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest is an excellent film. Nicholson's second best role, in my opinion. I still think he was at his best in Chinatown. Second up, Finding Neverland. I saw that with the same girl I mentioned above, by the way. The National Board of Review has already handed it the Best Film of the Year award, but I don't know about that. It's good, but it's noticeably heavy melodrama. It's better than Pay It Forward though, I'll give it that much. At the very least, it's worth your money. That was the only movie I saw in theatres this time. Most of the flicks I caught this time around I got from the library. Like Psycho and Roger & Me. Psycho's a personal favourite now but Roger & Me, well, let's just say there are better documentaries out there. It's classic Michael Moore though, so fans should love it. I just like watching documentaries where you can come out of it having learned something. Roger & Me didn't have that for me.

The next two films I managed to borrow off my friends. Seriously, these days, we have an entire network set up so we can all lend movies to each other without ever having to pay for them. And that's how I managed to get my hands on The Sting and The Graduate (just by lending out Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind out twice to two different people). The Sting was quite clever and has my favourite Redford role to date whereas The Graduate is my favourite Hoffman role to date and is now on my mental Top 10 List. The Graduate's just hysterical though: "So old Elaine Robinson got started in a Ford." Lines like that make me want to own that movie. Only $9.99 too, down at my local video store. Maybe that'll be my own personal Christmas gift to myself. I'll love it. The seventh film I watched this time was something I almost regret putting so much time into. Watching, that is. It's just that I had so many people telling me that Election was a good movie that I just kind of broke down and got my chick friend -- calling her my girlfriend still seems kind of odd to me for some reason -- to rent it for us to see. And see it we did. She didn't think it was anything special either. It kind of reminded me of Rushmore actually. Maybe that was the reason I didn't like it so much. There's just something about underdog movies that I can't quite stand. Even though, technically, all protagonists are underdogs in their respective stories, but I'm sure you all know what I mean. I'm interested in checking out the other Alexander Payne stuff though. I really want to see both About Schmidt (Nicholson, yay!) and Sideways. If you guys know anything about either of those, I'd be glad to hear what you have to say. Know if those are any good? Now, for the last film I watched, remember how I was going on about Redford and Hoffman just a second ago? All the people in here who know their movies probably already knows what I'm hinting at. Another library movie; All The President's Men. Political drama at its finest. It defines the whole damn genre. Besides, Redford and Hoffman! How can you not want to watch this?

I just realized. I think I have a very different definition of "really short" than most people. Well, I tried. The thing is, my definition just meant that I wasn't going to go out of my way to include synopses of all the movies I talked about tonight. I'll leave that to you guys. For all the movies you don't know the plots of anyways. But seriously now, who doesn't know the plot of The Graduate? Most of these movies speak for themselves. See all you guys next time. Keep up the popcorn munching.

(Scene from "The Graduate", 1967)

At 12/4/04 02:44 AM, biteme2514 wrote:

:About Schmidt (Nicholson, yay!) and Sideways. Know if those are any good?

I watched half of About Shmidt then I had to go out but what I saw was very good and in two reviews of Sideways that I have seen one person gave it 4 1/2 stars and the other 5 out of 5.

And I would like to reccomend the purchase of an Ennio Morricone CD, he did the musical scores for The Untouchables, Once Upon A Time In America, Once Upon A Time In The West and The Good, The Bad and The Ugly among others.

I was going to post a review of The Grudge a bit earlier this week but I got banned for three days so here it is now.

Firstly I would like to note that I probably didn't recieve the full experience of the movie as there were some people talking loudly and screaming the whole movie.

But from what I got it seemed like another generic horror. All it's frights were based around surprise so msot of it was people walking down a dark cliche hallway after hearing a strange noise, the music (which was pretty good) builds up rapidly, they go to open the door at the end of the hallway as the music reaches its peak........and then something grabs their ankle or a face appears. The screen the procedes to go black and cuts to another place and person. Unlike Ridley Scott's classic Alien where for its scares the Alien was hidden for most of the movie. And this is what modern horror directors need to learn, quick movements and overuse of CGI does not make a film scary. As per usual average acting. 67/100.

Well I'm gonig to end this post now with one final question. Do you like my new sig?

Bye everybody and have a good weekend

hello one and all

good to see you back ben. well i managed to drag my other half to see The Incredibles and he's glad i did. the film was excellent and i fell in love with Jack Jack. oh i want to adopt him lol. but beside that this film is way to good for kids, it tops all other films like that i've seen. hats off to pixar again.

i also saw The Hard Word an australian film that should've stayed in australia (no offence). there was about 5 minutes of action in it if that but don't waste your time on it. this is going back where it belongs lol.

i saw a couple of trailers and the cinema too. one was for another cgi film called Robots the kids were laughing but none of us adults were so if you have any little cousins or anythin look out for that one. also Jim Carreys new film A Series of Unfortunate Events which looked quite good, got that kinda Tim Burton feel going on. and of course Spongebob Squarepants *shivers* one i'm gonna avoid like the M25 at xmas.

also anyone seen Blade: Trinity yet, as usual the critics over here are sending mixed messages, just like they did with the second one. i'd like to know if i should go and see it.

anywho that's all for now, also just htought u'd like to know that Leonardo De-Cappucino was crowned king of the cheesy lines for when he said "i'm king of the world" in titanic. woot made my day lol

tata for now

Lo Everybody

Yeah most Australian movies are crap but if you get your hands on The Road Warrior or He Died With A Felafel In His Hand you'll see that once or twice we get it right

They are both excellent, with He Died With A Felafel In His Hand proably my favourite of the two. It is a black comedy arthouse flick based on a book. I am not sure whether it managed an international release though.

Oh well 'spose I'll be off then. Bye all

Wo, I just noticed this thread and realize its the one for me. I go to the theaters at least once a week and my family has a staggering movie collection (probably several thousand dollers in worth...and thats just the VHS) so ya, I can see pretty much one frame of any movie and I would probably recognize it.

Hey Hello!
I'm finally back,
here's my new review,
Kevin Smith's Clerks (USA, 1994, rated R)
Hands down, one of my favorite films of the early ninties, this is so witty that people who like dumb and quick laughs will just hate it, to exprience this best, screen this for an actual clerk, I am a total slacker, so the film really struck a chord with me, there is so much offensive language in the film that it initially recieved an NC-17 rating which appealed to an R before it was shown in theaters, it is best expirienced on the 3-disc Tenth Anniversary DVD, with the Cannes Film Festival version of the film, with extended scenes, an alternate and rather sad ending and a hilarious epilogue involving Silent Bob,
100/100
Note: This film is not appropriate for anyone under 17 or stupid people, viewer discretion is strongly advised while watching this,
(Scene from Clerks, 1994)

At 12/6/04 04:17 AM, babydumdum wrote: anywho that's all for now, also just htought u'd like to know that Leonardo De-Cappucino was crowned king of the cheesy lines for when he said "i'm king of the world" in titanic. woot made my day lol

Ohhhhh, it should of been Kevin Costner in The Untouchables when he said, as they were about to raid a storehouse, " Let's do some good!'.

ello once again

well got to see one film called Thought Crimes its about a girl who is hired by the nsa because she's a telepath...hmm sound familiar? anyways quite gd one to watch if it free on telly, we got it for £5 so not really a lot lol.

also started watch Broken Saints got through 4 chapters. tell you what, you think the internet version is good, you haven't seen anything yet. and its kinda wierd with the voices coz everyone has their own way of thinking what someones voice will sound like. but they are gd, i'll just have to get use to it lol. i'll report back on the rest of the episodes.

might go see Blade: Trinity this weekend, if i can be bothered to get out of bed after 2 days of drinking lol.

cya all soon

At 12/4/04 02:44 AM, biteme2514 wrote: trying to start a new screenplay

Do you write screenplays? Do you have any hints for writing them because whenever my friends and I make a movie I'm always the writer and co-director. And anything to improve our films would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

At 12/9/04 04:07 PM, CoachDante wrote: Clerks is awesome!

Hey, wow i forgot all about this crew. I was an old member, I'm glad to see you're back. I will post more often in here soon.

At 12/4/04 02:44 AM, biteme2514 wrote: In between schoolwork, watching as many movies as I do, trying to start a new screenplay and me quite possibly having a girlfriend now, I've been sorting out my priorities and Newgrounds is one of the things I had to cut. Besides, everyone else in those threads is doing much better than me stat-wise so I figured I'd quit while I was still ahead. Don't worry; I'm not going to disappear or anything. I'm still racking up blam/protect points whenever I can, right?

Yep. Better than nothin'. Here's hoping you find it easier to juggle shit in the future, though. :::holds up imaginary glass:::

Oh, and as for me sounding a little elitist, that's just me being passionate about something. I just don't think Shrek 2 belongs in the same category with Fellini and that's the way it is. Sorry for sounding like a jackass there but I'm just sounding off. I have pretty strong opinions about things I like and dislike. Makes me sound a little narcissistic at times, I know, but it's who I am, you know? Still, I apologize.

I never said it belonged in the same category. I said there is art and there is entertainment, and both have their place within the larger realm of movies/film. Many people use the word film to refer to the former and the word movie to refer to the latter, in fact. The makers of Shrek 2 weren't seeking to produce a great film that would stand alongside the century's best, so... don't blast them for producing a pop culture satirical movie with some fun in it. That's what they were setting out to do, yanno? If you don't think it was as funny as the original Shrek or something, as I seem to recall you may not have... that's a different matter, and a much more valid criticism because it doesn't attempt to compare apples to oranges.

Now, to get into the movies I've seen since my last post here. There's eight of them and five of them are listed, bringing me up to having seen 87/250 movies off The List. Nothing compared to gfoxcook having seen exactly half the list, but I'll work my way up there.

Oh, I can assure you I'd seen less than 87/250 when I first got on IMDB around the time I was 18 or 19 or so. Keep in mind that the makeup of the top 250 was very very different back then (and that I didn't have access to IMDB when I was 16, as I didn't get online until I was 17, in 1994).

I personally owe a lot to my friend, Derek Lam, who I was in the Foreign Film club with during high school... were it not for him, I don't think my love for various films and movies would be as far and wideranging as it is today.

So, to start off, let me just say that I finally got around to watching One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest.

Excellent choice.

I still think he was at his best in Chinatown.

I've seen Chinatown 2 or 3 times and OWOTCN only once, so I don't feel comfortable comparing them that much.. but needless to say from that statistic, I do loves me teh Chinatown.

Psycho's a personal favourite now

It's okay... better than the Birds. But my fave Hitchcock films have to be Rope, Rear Window, North by Northwest, and Vertigo, in more or less that order (if you haven't seen Rope, you must see it... it's an experiment with insanely-lengthy single-shot cinematography, and features a great premise, too... it's constrained by being set in a single manhattan apartment, but that's part of the charm).

Hm... come to think of it, those might be the only 6 I've seen. Need to see... MORE... MORE HITCHCOCK!

I had so many people telling me that Election was a good movie that I just kind of broke down and got my chick friend -- calling her my girlfriend still seems kind of odd to me for some reason -- to rent it for us to see. And see it we did. She didn't think it was anything special either. It kind of reminded me of Rushmore actually. Maybe that was the reason I didn't like it so much. There's just something about underdog movies that I can't quite stand. Even though, technically, all protagonists are underdogs in their respective stories, but I'm sure you all know what I mean.

I saw Election BECAUSE someone compared it to Rushmore. And on that basis, I was somewhat disappointed. Broderick is great in movies like the Freshman and Ferris Bueller, but he isn't exactly a great stand-in for Rushmore's Jason Schwartzman (Max) and Bill Murray (Herman). Plus, the crotch-washing scene is funny but nothing you'd find in a Wes Anderson film.

Speaking of Wes Anderson, my fellow Houstonian (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0027572/)... Bottle Rocket, Rushmore, and the Royal Tenenbaums is about to be joined in quirky comedic genius by the Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, which kinda follows up on the Jacques Cousteau angle from Rushmore (if you don't remember, Max had a book about him that linked him to his crush because her husband was a seaman or whatnot).

Wes Anderson co-wrote it with some new guy instead of Owen Wilson, and I've heard that the writing isn't as good as that of the other films, BUT... it's got Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, Cate Blanchett, Anjelica Huston, Willem Dafoe, Jeff Goldblum (wearing an "I'm a pepper!" t-shirt, no less!), Bud Cort, and so on and so forth. Now tell me that you can resist a cast like that! Anyway, I'll refrain from REALLY pushing it on ya till I've seen it for myself, but it comes out X-mas day and you can be assured I'll be seeing it before 2004 has died.

The Graduate is my favourite Hoffman role to date and is now on my mental Top 10 List. The Graduate's just hysterical though:

Graduate is good indeed. But regarding that bit about underdog movies... man, you say you don't like Election and Rushmore because they're underdog movies... but you liked--no, LOVED--the Graduate? Do you not think Dustin Hoffman's character was nearly the ultimate 60s underdog?! Crikey. "PLASTICS, man! PLASTICS!" in his ear as he grows disillusioned and jumps underwater in the swimming pool. And I might point out the numbed-Bill-Murray-underwater-in-the-swimming-pool scene in Rushmore (an intentional homage, I assure you!).

Stories of disaffected youth and being torn between apathy and idealism and so forth... pervade much of cinema, and as you kinda pointed out, turn many a film into so-called "underdog movies." The underdog, if you hadn't discovered yet, IS the everyman. And that's why he's often the protagonist, to be our eyes in the world of any particular film that he is suited to deliver us.

At 12/15/04 02:58 AM, gfoxcook wrote: I never said [Shrek 2 and Fellini] belonged in the same category. I said there is art and there is entertainment, and both have their place within the larger realm of movies/film.
Graduate is good indeed. But regarding that bit about underdog movies... man, you say you don't like Election and Rushmore because they're underdog movies... but you liked--no, LOVED--the Graduate? Do you not think Dustin Hoffman's character was nearly the ultimate 60s underdog?!

Shrek 2 and Fellini might both be parts of the same medium, but that's all they have in common. To me, it's like comparing the SpongeBob Squarepants movie novelization to Salinger. Both having to do with books, but that's the only thing they share. As for The Graduate, you're right, that is an underdog movie. So I did some thinking and I came to the conclusion that it's not underdog movies that I hate, per se, but rather, high school underdog movies. The Graduate had an underlying theme of sexual maturity. Rushmore and Election were more about the done-to-death idea of "fitting in", something that exists in just about every high school movie done since the days of John Hughes. I just can't bring myself to watch those anymore. I saw the first half of Napoleon Dynamite recently and I had more fun watching the minutes pass by on the lower right-hand side of the screen. It's just become a really hackneyed genre, you know?

Oh, and to LordRobbo, if you're serious about writing screenplays, look into some Robert McKee. Once you learn the rules from his book, start breaking them and see what you can come up with. That's what I'm doing and I'm pretty satisfied with the results. You need a working knowledge of cinematography to write a good one though. Try to sign up for any Video Arts courses in your area and start messing around with a camcorder. Just remember, less is more. Screenplays are about onscreen imagery. As tempting as it is, don't fill your pages with dialogue and try to come up with a story linking them all together. It just forces you to use up a lot more of your time. Good luck.

Now, since my last post here, I've actually seen ten films. Once again, because I actually have better things to do tonight, I'll just go over them in brief. No synopses. I'm sure you guys know how to find those anyways. The first one I caught this time was an old Cary Grant classic, His Girl Friday. One of the very first films to have the characters overlap their lines to create a more realistic sense of conversation. Unfortunately, the movie is all dialogue, and as a result, it plays out like nothing more than a series of one-liners. Only the true Grant fans will get a kick out of this, but I will admit, some of the jokes are pretty funny. I just didn't like the fact that I practically had to strain myself to get what I could out of this movie. The next one was a French film that I borrowed off a friend; Criminal Lovers. François Ozon's modern retelling of the Hansel and Gretel story, only this time, involving rape, murder, pedophilia, cannibalism and a healthy dose of homoeroticism. Foreign film at its more twisted. Number three, a Canadian mockumentary called The Delicate Art of Parking. One of the more well-done Canadian films I've seen in recent memory but I doubt one would get the same effect watching it if he or she did not live somewhere in British Columbia. It's very local humour. Of course, I get the feeling that I only enjoyed it so much because a few scenes in it were filmed just a little down the street from me. Then again, I, Robot had that too, but that movie just plain sucked. Nothing but eye candy. Next up, Linklater's Before Sunrise. Runs on dialogue, but not in a bad way. It's somewhere between Lost In Translation and a Nora Ephron flick. Great choice for a movie date. And so is The Sure Thing, a Rob Reiner-directed John Cusack film. This is romantic comedy done right, people. I'm hard-pressed to come up with a time when I wasn't laughing through this.

Film #6; In America. Touching family melodrama that totally redeems itself at the end. Perhaps a little overrated, but it's still one of the better films that I've seen this year, and I've seen hundreds. Following that, Cool Hand Luke. My friends liked it, I didn't. I just found it hard to empathize with the guy. I mean, when you have nothing to lose, how can you make me care? Oh, who knows. Maybe I'm just a cynical jackass. The one after that, an Ingmar Bergman flick by the name of The Seventh Seal. A knight plays a chess game with Death while the Black Plague sweeps through medieval Europe. Now, this guy's a screenwriter. Awesome use of onscreen imagery here. Even though a certain scene involving a hacksaw kind of cracked me up and spoiled the mood. You'd understand if you watched it. Which I totally recommend you do. Right after that -- in the same day, as a matter of fact -- I watched Kubrick's Paths of Glory. Very powerful film about the injustice of war. Made all the more powerful by the fact that it actually happened. And finally, a ne'er-been-heard-of film from BBC Films, a movie about the friendship and rivalry of Coleridge and Wordsworth called Pandaemonium. Note, that's not a typo. That's how it's spelled. I enjoyed it just because I'm a bit of a Coleridge fan, but if you've never heard of either of those two poets, then this film's probably not for you. One should also note that this film is not historically accurate at all. It's merely the director's interpretation of the poets' inspirations and the resulting works that followed.

So, five listed films plus the fact that Finding Neverland just bumped its way onto the list brings me up to having now seen 92/250 listed movies. Think I can watch eight in twelve days coupled with all the work I need to do this holiday season? I don't know if I'll be able to do it. But I'll be damned if I don't try. Wish me luck. Oh, and Merry Christmas, guys.

(Scene from "The Seventh Seal", 1957)

hello one and all

First off Merry Christmas!

Secondly, i did manage to get outta bed on saturday and rolled down to the cinema to see Blade: Trinity it was ok, not as good as the other two, there was something missing or too much of something, couldn't quite figure out what. i just had to laugh at HHH being in it, haha i thought he'd be the last wrestler to make a move into movies.

Carried on watching Broken Saints and i'm starting to remember why i love this film/ comic. reminded me gotta change my profile.

anywho that was it really, i'm sure with christmas coming around very soon there will be lots of films on, but probably ones i've already seen like Shrek and Harry Potter. probably be watching films bought for christmas since i know my dad (yes my dad) has got Prisoner of Azkeban for a pressie.

have a gd one and i'll see you all in the New Year.

At 12/19/04 06:08 PM, biteme2514 wrote:

Oh, and to LordRobbo.......

Hey, just got back from holidaying but I'm going back up for another couple of days tomorrow.

Thanks for the advice. I'm not sure how serious I want to take screen writing, because the two films I have been involved in have just been short movies that are really cheesey. One was a 4min movie set kinda like those old movies you always see in cartoons. You know the ones with the sort of half camp- half eccentric voiceover 'Why hello there Billy!', which I wrote and voiced. And another one based around A Midsummer Night's Dream which went for nine minutes which I wrote but due to lack of time only got to do about half then we just gave our actors the lines a few minutes before shooting which they were cool with. I co-directed it too.

But since I was working with another person, once we had an outline, the different perceptions of the locations of scenes, angles and other stuff began.

I doubt I will ever become a screenwriter, and I don't think I have a great desire to. Do you think it is still worth me studying writing since once we have the outline, the gist of scenes and what's going to happen we rarely even glance at the script.

This is not to say that I am not interested in writing, quite the opposite ( I once wrote a 3000 word, 10 A4 page Size 12 text novel just for the hell of it) but it seems futile as I have no technical knowledge of film equipment. Hell we only used a tripod for the longer movie.

Thank you for your help and if my desire grows stronger to write, I will check out the author you suggested.

By the way you can call me Rob instead of LordRobbo, everyone else does and it's shorter to type.

Oh yes and one last thing. I don't think I ever asked this but can I join the MVA? I would like to know before I add a link to my sig.

Next film from me : A really cheesey pay out of Little Rascals Movies.

Bye everybody and I hope you had a Merry Christmas and have a great New Year

At 12/25/04 07:11 AM, LordRobbo wrote: Thanks for the advice. I'm not sure how serious I want to take screen writing.
Oh yes and one last thing. I don't think I ever asked this but can I join the MVA? I would like to know before I add a link to my sig.

You know, everyone always asks if they can join, but the way I see it, you're already in. For one thing, madhatt3r, the guy who started all this, hasn't made a post in here since just about the Spanish Inquisition and on top of that, we've been running off nothing but regular responses from me and Tracy for months now. So, Rob, the answer is yes. You're in. But really now, were you ever really otherwise?

As for screenwriting, I'm getting back in the game. Yesterday, struck by sudden inspiration, I took off to my favourite coffee shop, Blenz, and wrote up a few scenes before heading off to watch Monty Python's The Meaning of Life with my girlfriend. What I'm going for is kind of a minimalist character drama, centering on two couples; one middle-aged, the other teenaged. The middle-aged couple consists of Richard, a 38-year-old writer who coincidentally also spends a considerable amount of his time writing in coffee shops, and Alisha, his slightly younger wife who can't help feeling neglected. The teenaged couple consists of a 17-year-old slacker named Malachy (who just so happens to be loosely based on myself, character-wise), and the object of his affection, a 16-year-old bohemian girl with dyed-orange hair named Zoe, both of whom are also regulars of local coffee shops. Over the course of the story, Richard and Alisha's relationship deteriorates almost entirely, as in a drunken night of emotional distress, Alisha manages to find herself in the bed of Richard's brother, a business arriviste at the age of 29. Meanwhile, after Zoe's initial rejection of Malachy, they begin to grow more and more together as the film progresses. So, in a sense, both couples kind of go through a reverse parallel shift in the screenplay. Things start out good for Richard, end up bad, and things start out bad for Malachy, but end up good. It's not going to be quite as simple as that though. I've already decided on an ending, and it's going to be kind of bittersweet for both of them. It's not all melodrama either. I actually based some of the side conversations in the coffee shop scenes on ones that I've actually heard while writing, and some of them are pretty damn hysterical. The movie opens on a college student having a discussion with her Human Rights professor over whether or not it is discriminatory for airport staff to weigh overweight people prior to boarding and then limiting the amount of baggage that they're allowed to take on so that no complications during takeoff will occur. That, and most of the protagonists' conversations are all delivered with rapid-fire subtle humour and sarcasm, a la Gilmore Girls, if you've ever seen it. In any case, I'm happy with the way it's going. I'll be working on it much more over the next week and yes, I do plan on someday filming it.

Now, to cover the ten movies I've seen since last in brief. Trainspotting; surprisingly effective, especially given the fact that the film is sold as a comedy. There are scenes in that one that still haunt me to this day, and I saw it a week ago. Brilliant take on drug culture in the UK, but personally, since drug culture movies aren't really my thing, I wouldn't call it one of my favourites. It's smart though. Worth watching. Harvey; a black-and-white feel-good classic about a man who has an invisible 6-ft. tall white rabbit as his best friend. Classic James Stewart. Nothing like Donnie Darko either. Wild Strawberries; the film that made me fall madly in love with Ingmar Bergman. Yes, it's a road movie, but in my mind, it ties with Y Tu Mama Tambien for the best. Perfect cinema for the thinking person. Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events; fun family fare. Deliciously dark and almost kind of Burton-esque. Metropolis (1927); kicks the crap out of most of the movies of 2004, and does so without a single word of spoken dialogue. You can't call yourself a real movie buff and not have seen this movie. The Gold Rush; good ol' Charlie Chaplin. Without films like these, Bugs Bunny and the rest of the Looney Tunes gang would be nowhere near as funny. Chaplin pioneered the whole damn genre of slapstick comedy. Vittorio de Sica's The Bicycle Thief; conveys virtually every angle of human desperation in only 90 minutes. Some argue that this is the best Italian film of all time. Between this and Fellini's La Dolce Vita, it's difficult to choose. The Phantom of the Opera (2004); dreadful opening, but once the music starts, Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical score completely saves the film from being just another example of typical Schumacher pretension. The Day The Earth Stood Still; easily one of the greatest sci-fi films of all time. A little convenient that the aliens all know how to speak English though. And finally, Monty Python's The Meaning of Life; funny, but I don't see how any of it is connected. It doesn't matter what I think though. All of you guys have probably already seen it.

So, seven listed films, minus one because X2 finally got kicked off, brings me to 98/250 listed films. Need to see two more in the next three days to hit the triple-digits. Guess I'm off to the library now. Happy New Year, people.

(Scene from "The Day The Earth Stood Still", 1951)

Hey guys, I thought I'd start posting again in this club.

I got the Blockbuster movie pass, so I'll post reviews of the movies I've seen.

The Terminal
Tom Hanks and Steven Speilburg. An Incredible actor and a great director. What do you get when you put them together for a comedy based loosley on a true story? A Dissapointment. Sure there were a few laughs, but overall there were too many plotholes and unbeleivable aspects about this film. Also, it was too long. 2 hours. It wasn't funny enough to keep me interested. I almost fell asleep to this...

So I wouldn't see it again. 4/10

Super Size Me
Morgan Spurlock decides to show everyone how bad fast food is by eating nothing but McDonald's for 30 days. This Documentary is pretty good. It's really funny. You should rent this. 7/10

Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgandy
I like Will Ferrel. But this movie was not good. I thought it was stupid. A lot of people liked this movie though, I just don't know why... Although Will Ferrel's acting in this is great, he's always in character. I did not enjoy this. I wouldn't recommend it. 5/10

Saved!
I liked this movie. I thought it was a good look at the christian teen society. It had some funny moments. Machaly McCoulkin is great in this movie. Mandy Moore does pretty good in this too. I'd recommend it.

7.5/10

RE: Apacholypse
I love the Resident Evil video games. When I heard a movie was coming out in 2002 I got very excited. I saw the first one, I thought it was ok... and now I saw the sequel. Milla Jovovich returns once again as Alice, this time now with advanced reflexes and strength (like Albert Wesker in Code Veronica). Unlike the first film, this one had a lot more to do with the video game. This movie is mainly focused on RE 2 and RE Nemisis. Jill Valentine and Carlos Overela must avoid nemises while trying to get out of the ZOMBIE infested city. I thought this movie was better than the first, but it still wasnt all I hoped it would be... I'll still see the sequel when it comes out in 2006.

6/10

I'm doing letter grades from now on in my reviews.

Napoleon Dynamite
An big film over the summer. I saw it and I laughed a few times. Kip and Pedro were the best characters in the films. The film reminded me of Ferris Bueler's Day off and Revenge of the Nerds. It was a fun film to watch, and you should pick it up sometime.

B-

Memento
This movie is number 20 on the IMDB. The way the story was told was amazing. The movie is backwards. It's incredible. The plot was good, and the acting was well also. I would put this in the top 100 movies of all time, but maybe somewhere in the 200s. It was an interesting film and a brand new concept of story telling.

B+

Trainspotting
Wow. This film was EXCELLENT. It's about a group of 5 friends live in scotland who choose Heroin as a lifestyle. This movie is sooo great. The characters are really well played out by the actors. You have Ewen Mcgregger, Jhonny Lee Miller, and Robert Carlyle. It is an amazing film. It's now my 10th favorite film.

A

Happy New Year!

ah back to work again :P damn hard after two weeks off 10 hour sleeps lol.

anywho to films. i managed to see quite a few but of course being christmas you will since the tv channels go mad. first two were xmas pressies for my dad.

Two Brothers a film about two tiger brothers who are separate and youngsters only to find each other again. pretty good, thankfully they don't talk, good film to watch and chill out too.

Harry Potter: The Prisioner of Azkaban very good, slightly different to the other two, alot darker (and no i don't mean light wise). however i didn't like the new Dumbledore should've got someone else i think.

Star Wars: 5 & 6 classics of course, love star wars mind you watching them you can kinda see the corny parts in it now lol, but still one of my favs.

Anna and The King a proper version of The King and I excellent film and likes yanking at those heart strings. i'm a big fan of Chow Yun-Fat anyway so thumbs up from me

Broken Saints yes we have finally finished and i'm once again in love with this story. if you can see it you should

i think thats it lol, mind you i'm pretty tired at the mo and may have missed some.

anywho hope you all had a good holiday

tata for now

I just wached Dogma. It was alright, just a little cheesy and unbelievable. Oh well, it had some really funny moments, but meh.

I'd like to join. Watching films have always been something part of my life. I really am a huge fan of cult and independent films, internacional films, and many other films of different genres. I rely on choosing films that contain great quality, and not that "recycled crap" and annoying "teen" films, or usless and overdone sequels for every film made that are coming in recently. I don't have much more to say right now, and I hope to have some great conversations about films here.

Hooray 201st post! I forgot that my last one was my 200th! YAY!

Anyway,

Platoon, Black Hawk Down and Saving Private Ryan are all war movies. This is where, on the most part, the similarities end.

Platoon, directed by Vietnam veteran Oliver Stone, is set in Vietnam during the war. It follows Charlie Sheen's character, a 'grunt' the lowest rung on the metaphorical ladder. It does not glorify war, but shows its destruction emotionally and physically. A harrowing display of the horrors of war. Charlie Sheen, Willem Dafoe and Tom Berenger do fine acting jobs. Berenger won an Oscar for his role

Black Hawk Down. I didn't like this nearly as much as I thought i would, but still good. Used the same close up of someone dying, spraying blood on to the camera lens that another one of Ridley Scott's movies, Gladiator, used. It was very rah-rah and I really hate that in films. That and, in agreement with biteme, underdogs well in serious films at least. Eric Bana's fake American accent wasn't a positive either and overlength nearly raises the hammer to seal the coffin. But it was enjoyable, mostly implausible, and the violence wasn't too gratuitous

I am not usually a fan of Steven Sbielberg's generic Hollywood flicks. But Saving Private Ryan, I thought, was great. Chances are I probably didn't take it seriously enough, but that was probably becuase it tried to be inspirational and glorify war. Which may be fine with some people but it just bores. It was a long movie, and some parts dragged on but it kept the entertainment level reasonably high throughout. With the opening scene mindblowing, and the movie very replayable. The acting was spot on.

At 12/31/04 07:01 PM, -Frank- wrote:
Super Size Me
Morgan Spurlock decides to show everyone how bad fast food is by eating nothing but McDonald's for 30 days. This Documentary is pretty good. It's really funny. You should rent this. 7/10

It was really interesting, 8/10

Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgandy
I like Will Ferrel. But this movie was not good. I thought it was stupid. A lot of people liked this movie though, I just don't know why... Although Will Ferrel's acting in this is great, he's always in character. I did not enjoy this. I wouldn't recommend it. 5/10

It was dumb as hell, but Jack Black had a fantastic uncredited cameo and some of it was witty, 7.5/10

Headaches blow. But at least I managed to hit the triple-digits with the List before 2004 came to a close. New Year's was interesting this year though. I finally rung it in properly for once. For anyone who cares, feel free to check out my blog by clicking on my BBS sig picture. Be forewarned: There's a great deal more swearing there than here. I vent more there, that's why. But still, I spent just about my entire Christmas holiday catching old listed flicks. And after watching another ten since my last post, I'm now up to having seen 104/250 listed movies. So, here I am again to rant a little about them. Hopefully, by the end of all this, my headache will be gone and I'll finally be able to sleep. If not, then I'll still be sufficiently stoned from this aromatherapy candle I have going. It even smells like it contains THC.

The first one this time is now my favourite movie from the 40's. An old Cary Grant classic that has him discovering that he's related to three serial killers right after getting married. Black comedy at its finest; Arsenic and Old Lace. It's all situational humour, but it's still funny as hell. What was that line again, "I'm not a Brewster, I'm the son of a sea cook!"? God, the last time I laughed that hard was when I saw the ending of Dead or Alive. And that was just because the ending was so bad. The one I watched after that coincidentally also came from the same year as Arsenic; 1944. Just some slightly overrated film noir by the name of Laura. The few jokes there were were written far better than the rest of the movie. I'm actually kind of surprised it's even listed. The one I saw after that was something I caught on New Year's Eve because my lady friend wanted to see it; The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. I very much enjoyed it though. Just surreal and subversive enough to be one of my favourite films of 2004. Unlike the insipid Napoleon Dynamite, which I actually did get around to watching in its entirety. To be fair, it did get better towards the end, but just the fact that the end is so predictable is a bit of a turnoff. I won't ruin it or anything, but please, it's been done. (By Jersey Girl, About A Boy and Rushmore, just to name a few.) But that's nowhere near as bad as Spice World. Take it from me, guys. Never, ever, let your girlfriend's friends pick which movie they're going to watch. Especially if they happen to be tenth graders. How we even know them is a mystery to me. Later that day though, she redeemed herself by renting Pumpkin for us all to watch. Indie film from 2002 that has Christina Ricci falling for a mentally challenged boy. The director knew what he was doing so instead of endangering the credibility of the film by making the drama of the piece far too melodramatic, he exaggerated everything in the movie to mirror the false sympathies that the majority of the characters in the film were expressing towards the title character. In any case, brilliant. Adam Larson Broder, I salute you. A few days after all that, I somehow managed to pack three movies into just one day: Bride of Frankenstein, Life Is Beautiful and The 39 Steps. Didn't think much of the first one, loved the second, and was pleasantly surprised by the third just because the film features a Canadian protagonist. Steps is kind of riddled with plot holes though. I'm sorry, but how did that girl get stabbed again? And finally, I just got back from watching Being There with Ori, which if you haven't picked up by now, is my girlfriend. It's a shame that this was Peter Sellers' last film. Great actor, that man. And Being There is a great movie too. The pacing is slow but the payoff of the movie itself is worth it. Just like me, he likes to watch. Guess that's why I love the guy so much.

So, to wrap things up: Tracy, I know exactly how you feel about getting back to work after sleeping in for two weeks; NightCobra, there really isn't much of a club here but you're welcome to post here whenever you want; and LordRobbo, congrats on the 200th post. I just hit my 10,900th one a few nights ago. My God, I wonder how many hours I've blown here. Do you know how many movies I could have watched in all that time? Haha!

(Scene from "Being There", 1979)

Hey thanks,

200posts and only one ban. Not too bad. I think.

What you said about Napoleon Dynamite was true, very predictable, but seriously what recent .Hollywood movie that isn't adapted from a book isn't? They all follow a structure. Comedies and rom-coms are particularly bad at this, with the majority having the ending obvious from the start. But then some have very weak plots (eg. Starsky and Hutch, Anchorman) but are very funny and have good characters so this makes up for it.

Where as if you have a predictable drama, thriller or arthouse, it's just going to plain suck.

Napoleon Dynamite was predictable, it was an underdog movie and the main character was pretty annoying but some bits were pretty funny. Each to his own I guess

I've seen a lot of films lately, but I will, for now, give a review of what I thought of them after the viewing. Here are one of the films:

- Dodgeball -

I don't know how I ended up allowing myself to watch this film in the first place. I kept listening here and there that the film was hilarious, and it was filmed with non-stop humor and jokes and other positive statements, so that is probably how I got into that mess.
First of all, the film isn't even "funny" as people say a little too much. In fact, it was one of the movies I've seen last year that I would love to add to the "total annoyance catagory that-you-need-an-advil-to-follow-after-viewing" list. The film, with some decent actors like Vince Vaughn [that has, thus so far, not been in any films that I have enjoyed yet] and Ben Stilller, do not give any "real" smiles to broad on the audience's faces, even if the general public does laugh.
The sexual jokes and other non-related gags added that have nothing to do with "Dodgeball" do not help. They are practicaly the main elements that spoil the quality of the film. The storyline is about an owner, Peter La Fleur (Vince Vaughn) of a gym called the "Average Joe's", where he has to pay a deph of $30.000, or his bank goes out of buisness. Meeting up with his wierd teammates, they head for a compitition is Las Vegas to win the prize money that will give them enough to win. Then his rival gym "Globo Gym", headed by White Goodman (Ben Stiller), decides to enter the compitition and win.
I guess the film could have been a little funnier for what it was ment to be, but I guess lots of things ruined it. Also, I don't really like films in this sort of genre. But the phrase "If you can dodge a car, you can dodge a ball!" makes me laugh from time to time, but that's about it. It gets a genrous 5.8/10 from me, because there was some things that could have been better.
I will be posting about about other films I saw like "Dogma" and "Collateral" in the next one or/and two days. Tchau!

I added A Clockwork Orange to My DVD collection. I now have 9/10 of my favorite movies on DVD. I just need Not Another Teen Movie.

Harold and Kumar Go to Whitecastle
From the director of Dude Where's My Car comes a stoner buddy flick about two best friends who get the munchies and want to go to Whitecastle. This movie was pretty funny. It has some great gags, and jokes. I laughed out loud a few times. I enjoyed this more than Dude Where's My Car. It's a good movie, and I suggest you renting it sometime when you have a few friends over.

B