What Was The Last Movie You Watched?

[MisterCairo]

The Hallowe'en cavalcade continues. I was on my own for some time, so I started off watching Zombie Apocalypse 2012, a low budget cheese fest cashing in on the Walking Dead craze developing at that time. I gather the SyFy network makes these things.

Anyhoo, the family arrived back home, we watched a wee bit more but then changed over to Hocus Pocus, one of our absolute favourites. After the family outing, my wife and I watched John Carpenter's The Fog. My wife prefers it to The Thing by Carpenter, but I love both.

 

[Lean'n'mean]

' Sweet Country ' (2017)....Haunting, desolate, pessimistic,
The Aboriginal actors are all remarkable but a special mention for Natassia Gorey Furber who ripped me heart out.

 

[Fading Fast]

That's a pretty good summation of Reagan's acting style. I was aware of him as an actor before I had any real awareness of him as a politician, and I always thought of him as being a Jack Carson type -- good looking in a bland, blurry sort of way, and fine in roles that called for the kind of character who was probably the BMOC in a small-town high school when he was younger, but, shall we say, lacked cultural sophistication. I've never actually disliked him in a movie -- he rarely stands out, but he's not as bad as he's often made out to be either. I think he comes across even better on radio, where he was also a frequent presence thru the 1940s.

A fun novel revolving around early Reagan is "Time On My Hands" by Peter Delacorte, published in the late 90s. The premise is that a lefty-leaning mad scientist type recruits a blase travel writer to go back to 1938 in his time machine and alter the course of Reagan's life so that he never becomes president. The writer accepts the job, makes the trip, and ends up befriending young "Dutch Ree-gan" in spite of himself. Despite the premise, it's not a political story as much as it is a rather engaging portrait of an aw-shucks young actor from the midwest trying to find his place in Hollywood, and there's a real sense of the atmosphere of the Warner lot at the time, with several real-life personalities besides Reagan making key appearances in the story. Delacorte did his homework and puts together a pretty convincing slice of Hollywood life.

Plan to start "Time on My Hands" tonight or tomorrow. I'll report back in the "What Are You Reading" thread when done

 

[Touchofevil]

Malone (1987) starring Burt Reynolds was on. We didn't change the channel. Our mistake, it was really bad from the first moment it was on until the end.

 

[Worf]

"Gettysburg" - Say what you want about Ted Turner... but he earned a lot of points with me for this one. Third or 4th viewing as I own the DVD. As an ex-soldier it still gets me. I know that had the South prevailed I'd probably not be sitting here writing this but man what bravery. I don't know if I could've crossed that field that day. If the South didn't give up after being so soundly defeated and losing Vicksburg all in the same week... what made Lee think that the north would've quit after one more defeat, even if they'd taken Washington would the rest of the nation have capitulated so easily?

"Bayonets!"
Chamberlin at "Little Round Top".

Worf

 

[Touchofevil]

A cup of coffee and The Hunted on TCM’s Noir Alley this fine Sunday morning.

 

[HanauMan]

Watched Deadpool (2016), a really funny movie. I'm not a big fan of the X-Men, or Marvel characters (always been a DC kinda guy), but I find Deadpool's lack of seriousness rather charming, in a cartoon character kind of way. And his feelings towards the X-Men reflect my sentiments as well, so not a bad thing for an anti-hero.

A little violent here and there (!!) but I really like the performances by Ryan Reynolds and, of course, Morena Baccarin. And the bad guy, Ed Skrein, aka Ajax, was a treat and you couldn't help but feel bad for him just a tiny bit at times.

 

[Edward]

Last night I had the honour of performing doctor Everett (Von) Scott as part of a global Rocky Horror Picture Show floorshow cast marking the 30th Anniversary of TimeWarp, the UK's only official RHS/RHPS fan club. Richard O'Brien himself was in attendance and enjoyed himself thoroughly (my 'Eddie note' used during the show is now signed). This was Richard's last and final appearance in the UK, likely to be his last visit to the UK ever.

 

[Fading Fast]

A cup of coffee and The Hunted on TCM’s Noir Alley this fine Sunday morning.

Turned it on in the middle, but decided to wait until it is on again to watch from the beginning. What did you think of it?

 

[Zombie_61]

Last night I had the honour of performing doctor Everett (Von) Scott as part of a global Rocky Horror Picture Show floorshow cast marking the 30th Anniversary of TimeWarp, the UK's only official RHS/RHPS fan club. Richard O'Brien himself was in attendance and enjoyed himself thoroughly (my 'Eddie note' used during the show is now signed). This was Richard's last and final appearance in the UK, likely to be his last visit to the UK ever.

I was in high school when The Rocky Horror Picture Show hit theaters here, and more than a few of my schoolmates were crazy about it. I had seen the trailers and decided it wasn't my "thing", so I didn't make the effort to see it. A few years later I stumbled across it on television, so I thought I'd give it a chance just to see what all the fuss was about; definitely not my thing. Halloween 1981 my wife and I threw a party, and one of our friends talked everyone into going to a special midnight screening at a local theater. I'd heard about the movie's cult following and the various levels of audience participation, so I went with an open mind but was still unprepared for what we'd see. This audience was mostly veteran fans, and the floor show that accompanied the movie was brilliant! We were fully immersed in the Rocky Horror experience, and these fans didn't miss a beat.

 

[Edward]

The full shadowcasting experience really brings something else to the mix. Funny thing is, among the shadowcasting community, while most of us love the source material itself, there are always those who have viewed the film as a largely coincidental bit of fluff on which the fan cult hangs its thing - kitsh appeal, so ad it's good kind of thinking.

 

[Winston Carter]

Halloween (2018) Saw it opening day last Fri. Excellent slasher with old school feel.

 

[HanauMan]

Just watched one of my old time favorites, namely Panic in the Streets (1950).

Yeah, yeah, Richard Widmark and Paul Douglas are a good 'buddy - buddy team and Barbara Bel Geddes is swell as Widmark's wife but for me it is the bad guys which make the film such a great movie watching experience. Jack Palance and Zero Mostel, as the gangster and his flunky, are almost a comic act if it wasn't for the pure evil menace Palance oozes from every pore in every scene. And you just can't help but warm to Mostel's character. I've watched this film many times and nowadays tend to fast forward the preachy Widmark / Douglas and Widmark / Bel Geddes scenes and head straight to the Palance / Mostel gems.

 

[Winston Carter]

The Hallowe'en cavalcade continues. I was on my own for some time, so I started off watching Zombie Apocalypse 2012, a low budget cheese fest cashing in on the Walking Dead craze developing at that time. I gather the SyFy network makes these things.

Anyhoo, the family arrived back home, we watched a wee bit more but then changed over to Hocus Pocus, one of our absolute favourites. After the family outing, my wife and I watched John Carpenter's The Fog. My wife prefers it to The Thing by Carpenter, but I love both.

Carpenter's The Fog is excellent.

 

[Touchofevil]

Turned it on in the middle, but decided to wait until it is on again to watch from the beginning. What did you think of it?

I came in late and enjoyed it enough to keep it on, but as of today, do not remember much about it.

 

[MisterCairo]

My brother was over, he wanted to watch a Netflix thing, or at least a thing on Netflix, about Roberto Duran, Fists of Stone I think it was called. Robert De Nero was in it. Fairly entertaining for a boxing flick, not usually my thing.

 

[Julian Shellhammer]

A dvd double-header of The Phenix City Story and Dial 1119. The former is probably well-known as the fact-based story of a town that managed to overthrow the criminals that ran city hall, the police, and all modes of vice. It starts with a newsreel type set up with Clete Roberts interviewing the actual folks who lived through the story.

The latter stars a young Marshall Thompson, light-years away from Dr. Marsh Tracy, who plays a disturbed young man who holds a bar's patrons hostage until he confronts the psychologist who had him institutionalized. Although an MGM product, it feels like a B picture - back lot bound and confined mostly to the setting of the bar.

Leon Ames is in this, not as star, and for about 4 lines of dialogue, it's Barbara Billingsly as secretary to a newspaper editor. Doing what he does best, making even small parts enjoyable for us, it's William Conrad as the bartender.

In there somewhere over the past couple of weeks it was Ivan the Terrible (Part 1), off of Filmstruck.

 

[Zombie_61]

The Return of the Vampire (1943). During the London Blitz of 1940-41 the coffin of a vampire (Bela Lugosi) is unearthed, he is inadvertently resurrected, then sets out to get revenge on the descendants of the family who killed him in 1918. Co-starring Frieda Inescort, Roland Varno, and Matt Willis, this feels very much like a sequel to Dracula (1931) because that's what it was intended to be. Made by Columbia Pictures, Universal Studios threatened a plagiarism lawsuit so Columbia changed the characters' names and made the movie anyway.

Cry of the Werewolf (1944). This one's a bit of a muddled mess, something about a woman who was raised by gypsies and sometimes turn into a wolf. If you ever see it on cable, watch something else.

 

[Fading Fast]

Just watched one of my old time favorites, namely Panic in the Streets (1950).

Yeah, yeah, Richard Widmark and Paul Douglas are a good 'buddy - buddy team and Barbara Bel Geddes is swell as Widmark's wife but for me it is the bad guys which make the film such a great movie watching experience. Jack Palance and Zero Mostel, as the gangster and his flunky, are almost a comic act if it wasn't for the pure evil menace Palance oozes from every pore in every scene. And you just can't help but warm to Mostel's character. I've watched this film many times and nowadays tend to fast forward the preachy Widmark / Douglas and Widmark / Bel Geddes scenes and head straight to the Palance / Mostel gems.

Based on this - I just set the DVR to record "Panic in the Streets" on Nov 3 on TCM at 12pm

 

[MisterCairo]

The Hallowe'en cavalcade continues. One of my absolute favourites, Monster House. The banter between the kids is very funny. Plus, the end credits include this: