What Was The Last Movie You Watched?

[Doctor Strange]

Nocturnal Animals. A fascinating, beautiful, and at times terrifying film directed by clothing designer Tom Ford. (Whose earlier feature, A Single Man, is also very good.)

Wealthy, reserved, uber-glamorous LA art gallery owner Amy Adams, whose marriage to Armie Hammer is failing, receives an advance copy of her ex-husband (Jake Gyllenhall)'s new novel, which is dedicated to her and called "Nocturnal Animals" - his old nickname for her alluding to her insomnia, which is now even worse. Unable to sleep, she reads the book and we enter the story... wherein an ordinary family - Gyllenhall again, Isla Fisher (*), and their daughter - is terrorized on a Texas highway. Later, a near-retirement lawman, Michael Shannon, figures in the aftermath. Outside the book - disturbed by its parallels - Adams flashes back on her brief first marriage.

(* This is meta casting. For years, Fisher and Adams - same-age redheads both known for comic roles at first - were frequently confused, and often in competition for the same parts.)

This is a serious, disturbing film. (Full disclosure: I fast-forwarded through some of the highway sequence, which I found painfully dread-inducing.) Made with a designer's eye, it's beautifully shot and costumed. Gyllenhaal and Adams are both superb in their dual roles - younger Adams and older Adams are almost different characters - and they're believably 20 years younger in the flashbacks... so much so that I wonder if some digital de-aging was used. Shannon is also excellent - not that that's a surprise, he always is - and received an Oscar nomination.

Recommended... but I warned you about that highway scene.

(What a year Amy Adams had last year, with outstanding performances in this film and Arrival. Unfortunately, she also had Batman V Superman: Dawn of Dreck, where her whip-smart Lois Lane - one of few pleasures of Man of Steel - was required by the awful screenplay to do one inexcusably stupid thing after another!)

 

[Zombie_61]

A neat touch was that the stern of Logan's limo immediately made me think of today's Chrysler 300. When the car is revealed to be a Chrysler in later scenes, it fitted beautifully -- as if the automakers of 2029 in Logan's world were deliberately echoing design cues from the 300 of our day...

I've read the limousine in Logan was allegedly a stretched and modified Chrysler 300, but I don't know how true that is. I did like the way they kept the design modifications on that car simple and reasonable--different from what we see today, but not ridiculously so. Of course, there are those "critics" who have complained about the cars and wardrobes being "too 2015" for a movie set in 2029, but it didn't bother me at all.

...Logan/Wolverine, as I understand it, was originally inspired by Clint Eastwood's Dirty Harry films. To do justice to the character, you'd need somebody with the ability to deliver dialogue in that same level but effective fashion. Jackman's got it. In fact there are moments in this film where he very much reminds me of the younger Eastwood.

That's interesting. The first movie I saw Jackman in was X-Men (2000), and he immediately reminded me of a younger Clint Eastwood; so much so that I thought he'd be the perfect choice to play Harry Callahan if they ever decided to reboot the "Dirty Harry" franchise.

 

[AmateisGal]

I caught some of it as I had TCM on "in the background," and was intrigued with what I saw, but didn't have time to watch it. Darn, wish I had recorded it.

Can you use the TCM on Demand site? That's where I catch all the movies I missed.

 

[AmateisGal]

Just finished 36 Hours with Eva Marie Saint, Rod Taylor, and James Garner. Great WW2 movie.

 

[green papaya]

GLORY (1989)

Matthew Broderick, Morgan Freeman and Denzel Washington star in the true story of America's first black regiment, the 54th Massachusetts Voluntary Infantry.

 

[Fading Fast]

Can you use the TCM on Demand site? That's where I catch all the movies I missed.

My stupid (hateful, over-priced, poor-service-model) cable company only offers about five TCM movies at a time On Demand. Years ago, it used to be a lot of them, then they "upgraded" the system and now I only get a few options at a time. I checked and "Janie" isn't one of them.

Just finished 36 Hours with Eva Marie Saint, Rod Taylor, and James Garner. Great WW2 movie.

Yes - it's a good one. James Garner, IMHO, would have been a bigger star if he had come around in the '30s / '40s when his style fit the style of leading men of that time; whereas, he feels like a bit of a throwback in the "method" actor madness of the '60s which probably held his career back.

 

[Fading Fast]

"State of the Union"

• Despite being a Tracy-Hepburn movie, it doesn't have a lot of the T-H movie dynamic as those two aren't on screen together that much and, when they are, there isn't much of the lightning-fast dialogue they do so well
• Angela Landsbury and Adolphe Menjou, as manipulative political operatives, all but steal the movie from Tracy and Hepburn
• Being a Capra movie, I was ready for the happy-slappy idealism speech - which came (Tracy gave it his all) - and, as always, it had me rolling my eyes
  • Heck, proving how liberally ahead of his time he was, Capra, with serious earnestness, was calling for a "world" government to perfectly solve mankind's problems all the way back in '48

"Kitty Foyle"

• The basic story (from the novel) - girl from the wrong side of the tracks and upper-class society boy fall in love, but he doesn't really want to marry her (and lose his inheritance); whereas, she's willing to marry him without it - gets all twisted up by the code because the affair, pregnancy, abortion from the book have to be reinvented on screen as a quick marriage, still-born child and divorce
  • And that's why the movie doesn't really work - life can't always be forced into the code's parameters
• That said, Ginger Rogers does her best to hold it all together with an impressive performance that almost make you believe she was passionately in love with empty suit "rich boy" Dennis Morgan

"The Animal Kingdom"

• This movie is why pre-codes are worth watching (they don't have to be forced into a morality box like "State of the Union" and "Kitty Foyle" had to be)
• The fits-no-profile-but-it-works-anyway leading man Leslie Howard marries a society girl and not his free-spirit girlfriend during a lapse in judgement
• The rest of the movie is about Howard realizing that he made a mistake and wants to return to his artistic girlfriend and her community and exit the society world his wife is working hard to force him into
• Nothing gratuitous is shown, but nor is it hidden that life is bumpy, sex happens out of marriage, spouses manipulate each other and following the "approved" path is not necessarily a path to happiness
• And it's fun to see a very young Myrna Loy and a very young Ann Harding - looking awesome - shine as antagonists who never fight openly but passionately and with style try to freeze the other one out

 

[MisterCairo]

Cold Comfort Farm, a great trip to early 30s rural Sussex and the wacky characters therein!

"Over-sexed sons on farms are always called Seth and Reuben!"

 

[Worf]

"Shin-Godzilla" - The first serious Japanese Godzilla flick since... "Godzilla Raids Again". I waited almost a year to see this flick and I wasn't disappointed. This film totally reboots the series but harkens back to its original as well. First, they use the old "Toho" opening credits, but they don't stop there. Almost all the music is from the original film soundtrack! The fight theme, the Naval theme, they're all here and used, including some of the themes from the later schlock fests. S.G. then takes an entirely different path from the original and the current American reboots. Most of the action is shot inside the bowels of the Japanese Bureaucracy. The focus of the film are the attempts of younger, less hidebound Japanese ministers to convince their old, corrupt and moribund superiors that this is a living creature and that they need to act decisively and quickly. Godzilla is changed as well. He does not arrive fully formed but mutates throughout the movie to adapt to life underwater, then life on land and learns how to counter every modern weapon thrown its way. By the end he is his typical fire/lazer blasting self. I found it to be a fantastic reboot paying both homage and striking out with a bold new telling of the Godzilla mythos. It can be rented on Amazon.

I recommend watching the original un-dubbed version as the dubbing is awful with little differentiation between the male vocal characters.

Worf

 

[MisterCairo]

Amelie.

I had not seen it in a few years (and we own the DVD!). What a lovely little film it is...

 

[AmateisGal]

My stupid (hateful, over-priced, poor-service-model) cable company only offers about five TCM movies at a time On Demand. Years ago, it used to be a lot of them, then they "upgraded" the system and now I only get a few options at a time. I checked and "Janie" isn't one of them.



Yes - it's a good one. James Garner, IMHO, would have been a bigger star if he had come around in the '30s / '40s when his style fit the style of leading men of that time; whereas, he feels like a bit of a throwback in the "method" actor madness of the '60s which probably held his career back.

That is awful!!! My cable company puts on all the movies after they air, but they're only available for a certain amount of time. I'm SO glad my cable company does this otherwise I'd miss a lot of movies!

 

[Fading Fast]

That is awful!!! My cable company puts on all the movies after they air, but they're only available for a certain amount of time. I'm SO glad my cable company does this otherwise I'd miss a lot of movies!

Our only saving grace is the DVR and since ours is pretty new (rented from said stupid and hateful cable company) we have a lot of storage and have a ton of TCM movies recored on it. So it acts a bit like our own on demand. That said, a good on demand election would be easier (stupid hateful cable company).

So, what are your thoughts of Jame Garner as an actor? I really enjoy him in movies and used to think he was just a notch shy of what the best leading men have, but have revised my opinion as per my prior post to he's just a man out of his time. He would have been a bigger star, IMHO, if he had been acting in the '30s and '40s. He was a classic Hollywood star stuck in a method-actor period.

 

[Benzadmiral]

Our only saving grace is the DVR and since ours is pretty new (rented from said stupid and hateful cable company) we have a lot of storage and have a ton of TCM movies recored on it. So it acts a bit like our own on demand. That said, a good on demand election would be easier (stupid hateful cable company).

So, what are your thoughts of Jame Garner as an actor? I really enjoy him in movies and used to think he was just a notch shy of what the best leading men have, but have revised my opinion as per my prior post to he's just a man out of his time. He would have been a bigger star, IMHO, if he had been acting in the '30s and '40s. He was a classic Hollywood star stuck in a method-actor period.

My impression of Garner is that he was a big star, period. He moved easily from TV (Maverick and Cheyenne) to leads in major films both serious and comic, came back to TV in a loser show (Nichols), then made it big again in Rockford Files, and made a surprise appearance in the movie of Maverick. The American public adored him for, what, 40 years?

He was best known for his "Crusader Rabbit" roles, as he called them in a TV Guide interview once: the guy who uses his quick wits to get himself out of trouble. He could have done really well in the "screwball comedy" era. Imagine him in Bringing Up Baby or The Awful Truth, or Arsenic and Old Lace, or later in Monkey Business, instead of Cary Grant!

 

[Fading Fast]

My impression of Garner is that he was a big star, period. He moved easily from TV (Maverick and Cheyenne) to leads in major films both serious and comic, came back to TV in a loser show (Nichols), then made it big again in Rockford Files, and made a surprise appearance in the movie of Maverick. The American public adored him for, what, 40 years?

He was best known for his "Crusader Rabbit" roles, as he called them in a TV Guide interview once: the guy who uses his quick wits to get himself out of trouble. He could have done really well in the "screwball comedy" era. Imagine him in Bringing Up Baby or The Awful Truth, or Arsenic and Old Lace, or later in Monkey Business, instead of Cary Grant!

All good points, and maybe my point is too narrow (or just plain wrong). Yes, as you note, he was a big star and had a long, successful career, but it seems to me that the biggest stars of that period - the ones taken most seriously as "actors " or considered the "defining" stars of the time - were the method guys, Brando, Newman, etc. Whereas, as you note with your list of screwball comedies, had Garner been of that earlier period, he would have been in the first-tier like Grant was in that day or McQueen was in Garner's day.

 

[Angus Forbes]

Saw The Razor's Edge last night (Somerset Maugham's book). It's a serious story, nothing like what comes out of Hollywood (mostly) today. Good cast, an especially well done black-and-white production, lots of film-noir technique, although a bit too long for my taste (2hr 30 min). Enjoyable -- I had forgotten how good it was.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Cold Comfort Farm, a great trip to early 30s rural Sussex and the wacky characters therein!

"Over-sexed sons on farms are always called Seth and Reuben!"

I love this movie, and frequently refer to rain as "nature's fecund blessing."

And remember, "thar'llll be noooooooo buttttter in HELL!"

 

[Worf]

Saw The Razor's Edge last night (Somerset Maugham's book). It's a serious story, nothing like what comes out of Hollywood (mostly) today. Good cast, an especially well done black-and-white production, lots of film-noir technique, although a bit too long for my taste (2hr 30 min). Enjoyable -- I had forgotten how good it was.

I love this film. Tyrone Power... heck all the cast is top notch, particularly Clifton Webb as everyone's favorite Uncle (NOT). Still he went out as he lived, with a curse on his lips... gotta love that! For @#!$'s and giggles I watched the Bill Murray remake... God's above that's 2 plus hours I'm gonna wish I had back someday.

Worf

 

[Benzadmiral]

All good points, and maybe my point is too narrow (or just plain wrong). Yes, as you note, he was a big star and had a long, successful career, but it seems to me that the biggest stars of that period - the ones taken most seriously as "actors " or considered the "defining" stars of the time - were the method guys, Brando, Newman, etc. Whereas, as you note with your list of screwball comedies, had Garner been of that earlier period, he would have been in the first-tier like Grant was in that day or McQueen was in Garner's day.

Perhaps you're right. The acting zeitgeist was different in Garner's time, especially after Easy Rider came out, and a star no longer had to be well-groomed or conventionally good-looking. Jack Nicholson, for example, though quite a handsome fellow, made his big splashes in Rider or Carnal Knowledge. Twenty-thirty years before, he'd probably have been relegated to "hero's pal" or character roles.

 

[MisterCairo]

I love this movie, and frequently refer to rain as "nature's fecund blessing."

And remember, "thar'llll be noooooooo buttttter in HELL!"

"The good Lord WILL provide!...Or not, according to His will..."

 

[Harp]

I love this film. Tyrone Power... heck all the cast is top notch, particularly Clifton Webb as everyone's favorite Uncle (NOT). Still he went out as he lived, with a curse on his lips... gotta love that! For @#!$'s and giggles I watched the Bill Murray remake... God's above that's 2 plus hours I'm gonna wish I had back someday.

Worf

Saw The Razor's Edge last night (Somerset Maugham's book). It's a serious story, nothing like what comes out of Hollywood (mostly) today. Good cast, an especially well done black-and-white production, lots of film-noir technique, although a bit too long for my taste (2hr 30 min). Enjoyable -- I had forgotten how good it was.

Maugham's biographical narrative style aced literary technique in The Razor's Edge, yet Power's character take seemed a tad antiseptic, contrived
not really convincing; whereas Murray-if his comedic persona can be discounted-captured a deeply introspective troubled veteran more so with some edge.
In The Sun Also Rises Power used a similar approach achieving a discernible distance from the protagonist; while still not fully stepping inside the character.
Murray, warts and all, seemed to have brought some personal currency to the role of Larry Darryl.