Monday 30 April 2012

April Round-Up: Part 1


This month, despite the pouring rain that never stopped, I only managed 22 films.  Here is the bottom 11.  Please check back tomorrow for the top 11 featuring classics with strangely similar titles such as The Vanishing,Vanishing Point, A Night to Remember and Night of the Hunter.  And then there's the new films including 21 Jump Street, Tomboy and Cabin in the Woods.  But what will take the top spot?  Come back tomorrow to find out!

22. Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark (Troy Nixey, 2011)
...or this movie.  Actually no do be afraid.  Be afraid that you have just lost a precious piece of your life sitting through it.  It’s ok really.  Just a bit dependent on little CGI monsters that aren’t scary.  And Katie Holmes.  No offence but how does she keep getting work?


21. Apollo 18 (Gonzalo Lopez-Gallego, 2011)
Found footage from space.  Whenever a franchise or trend gets tired, they make the next instalment in space.  Jason X was ridiculous fun.  This is a bit too serious for its own good.  Not the worst ‘found footage’ horror ever made but still not that good.


20. Episode 50 (Joe Smalley, Tess Smalley, 2011)
Another found footage horror.  Not great but like most of them, it has a couple of pretty scary moments.  Looks like this and the recent Grave Encounters are very similar.  TV crews in an abandoned hospital full of spooks and the cameras keep rolling to capture all the fun.


19. Human Centipede 2: Full Sequence (Tom Six, 2011)
Sick Six Sucks.  But you might admire the director for taking horror to extremes.  If you want to watch sick stuff, this film really pushes the boundaries of taste.  If you know the idea, you’ll be pleased or disturbed to know that this time there are laxatives involved.  Lots of laxatives.  Truly and unbelievably sick stuff.  And this is the cut version fortunately.  Thank you BBFC.


18. Field of Dreams (Phil Alden Robinson, 1989)
Found this quote from IMDb: ‘Field of Dreams is one of the strangest films I've seen, and possibly one of the best. When it throws its subject matter at you, you wonder how a story so preposterous can ever work’ No I don’t.  It didn’t.  Preposterous, overly sentimental and weird.  Not quite sure what the fuss is about.


17. Semi-Pro (Kent Alterman, 2008)
The weakest of Will Ferrell’s sports movies.  Then again I haven’t seen Kicking and Screaming yet. Hoping to right an article about Ferrell's sports movies and their representation of masculinity.


16. Southland Tales (Richard Kelly, 2007)
Flawed but fun.  Timberlake lip syncing to The Killers is the stand out scene but The Rock also delivers a funny performance throughout.  Great music and some stunning visuals but neither can hide the films obvious messiness.


15. Saturday Night Fever (John Badham, 1977)
Great dancing but deeply disturbing raping.  Despite the still hugely impressive dance scenes and the social realist vibe, the scene where a girl gets raped but then totally forgotten about as the action moves to bridge stumbling antics reeks of misogyny.  Yes the film is about certain attitudes held by many members of society and does tackle this with the father telling the son washing up is ‘women’s work’ but then this rape scene comes along and is almost completely forgotten about moments later.  It felt ridiculous that the girl in question would stick with these guys after being mistreated so badly.  Left a bad taste in my mouth.


14. Weekend (Andrew Haigh, 2011)
Graphic gay romance.  I might be being a prude as I’ve not seen a lot of gay sex in films before but this film delved deep into two interesting characters before delving deep into their sexual activities.  It’s sweet and engaging but nothing too special.  A very real modern romance.


13. Martin (George A. Romero, 1976)
The magic of vampires takes a stake to the heart in Romero’s realist take on the monsters.  It is dated but still an original and interesting take on the vampire.


12. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (Rob Marshall, 2011)
Killer mermaids, Captain Jack and the hunt for the Holy Grail.  BIG DUMB LOUD FUN.


That's it.  See you tomorrow with the top 11 films I watched in April.  What did you think of these movies?  Any surprises here?  Anything controversial?  Let me know below...

18 comments:

  1. I haven't seen Field Of Dreams, but I thought it was a very beloved film. I'll probably see it anyway, but its quite far behind in the queuing order. Me having no interest in baseball somewhat contributes to that.

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    1. No I have no interest in baseball either and that probably didn't help. It seemed to start out well and I thought right from the opening minutes that I could see how people hold it up as a classic. But then it got sillier and sillier and I totally lost interest.

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  2. Wow, you're brave for seeing the new Centipede film, I'm into horror films but this one is a little bit too much for me.

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    1. It's too much for anyone who's right in the head. I had to see it as I liked the way he made the main character obsessed with the first film. It sounded unusual and a little different. But it's unspeakably horrible too. Really depraved.

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  3. I loved Field of Dreams. James Earl Jones was brilliant, I thought! I can see how it would be thought overly-sentimental, but it gets me every time :)

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    1. I had no problem with the cast. It's just the story that I found too silly and sentimental. Just not for me I'm afraid.

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  4. I saw Don't Be Afraid Of The Dark and agree with you that it really wasn't very good.

    I am a bit concerned though when you say that the story from Field Of Dreams is preposterous. I thought it was a documentary? Does this mean that if I build it they might not come? Hahaha!

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    1. LOL yep I'm afraid it's just a piece of fiction. I'm gutted to be the one to break this to you. Elf is also just a story.

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  5. I have seen quite a few of these. I look forward to your next list.

    I remember loving Field of Dreams as a kid. But as we know I do like sentimental tosh!! HAHAHA

    You can keep the centipede for yourself.

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    1. Aah well I'm glad it's made so many happy, perhaps I needed to see it as a kid! Yeah the centipede has images I'll never be able to wash away!

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  6. I'm really glad you got to watch Weekend, I liked it! Southland Tales sounds fun, I'm putting it on my To See list!

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    1. Yeah it was sweet and felt very real but I think it will fade from my memory pretty quick. Southland Tales is odd as hell. Don't say I didn't warn you!

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  7. Hey, 22 films is quite a lot man! I've only seen 'Field of Dreams' from your list, oh and 'Saturday Night Fever' a long time ago. Eh, so that's what the demon looks like in 'Don't Be Afraid of the Dark?' Doesn't look that scary to me, disgusting more like, ahah.

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    1. Yeah I think I'm going to start limiting myself to 20 films as I'm starting to lose my memory of them too quick. Getting old! Mmm DBAOTD is not scary. It might be to small children but otherwise it's just silly.

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  8. only 22 films? That's quite a lot for most people (but maybe average in the movie blogging community)

    As asrap virtuoso notes, Field of Dreams does have that air of belonging amongst contemporary classics, I can't believe I haven't seen it yet. And I call myself a cinephile...Your review doesn't exactly have me running to rent the dvd.

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    1. Haha yeah exactly I'm trying to keep up with the bloggers who watch nearly two films a day! Well it took me a long time to get to Field of Dreams but it wasn't worth the wait!

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  9. I enjoyed Don't be Afraid of the Dark. Had some good moments. Thought it was Katie Holmes better performances in a while. Guy Pearce looked like he just couldn't be arsed!

    Apollo 18 - now that was a precious waste of my time. Rocks!? Rocks?!

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  10. I do agree it did have a few good moments. I think if I'd seen it as a kid I might have found it more scary as it was so much about being a kid and being scared of the dark. Yeah Apollo 18 was pretty lame... not the worst found footage horror I've seen though.

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