How does a thing like this happen?

Me not totally paying attention to what I'm typing and not double checking it :p

Watching "Eastern Promises" and I am not sure if I can overcome the two major obstacles that present themselves immediately.

1. Naomi Watts doing a middle class English accent.
2. Naomi Watts looking dreadful for some reason.

Also the dialogue is so contrived it's very hard to get into. It seems like the sort of supposedly intelligent dialogue you find in literature everybody has heard of but nobody has actually read. The sort of idealised, forced wistfulness over arbitrary non-issues as the world moves around them. It's the sort of thing that kills on Broadway when adapted from a best selling novelist but bares no relation to the coarse hum drum of real life. Every line out of Watts mouth so far just sounds like an actress trying to fit into a pre-existing, moving landscape.
I have to say it's a stark contrast to the other side of the film where Viggo Mortensen and Vincent Cassel feel far more at home, natural apex predators in a world of fierce creatures.

It's always a shame when an actor thinks they are better than they are and I've always thought that was Naomi Watts' biggest flaw. She isn't much of a personality and unless she has her top off there's no charisma.

This is honestly like watching a good film crossover with a fucking shit one.

The narration is mind blowingly bad to the extent that it drives you back out of the movie that Cassel and Mortensen keep pulling you into. Armin Mueller Stahl keeps drawing me into contemplative thoughts about the nature of an ageing career criminal only for the voice over or Naomi Watts and her dreadful mother to haul me right back to the reality of jarring and painful juxtaposition between the sublime and the dreadful.

Trying to think of a performance where she uses an accent besides generic American that doesn't suck ass. She nearly ruined every scene she was in in St Vincent.
I think I went off her when she walked out on Simon Mayo during her promo for that film Diana but I only heard the clip a year or two ago...

I was about to add that there was a complete lack of face melting violence in this Cronenberg picture but then some face melting violence happened and put paid to that idea. Still, when the master finally decides to show his most popular party trick, he does not disappoint. The blood flows quickly and impactfully in a pleasingly kinetic yet realistically sloppy style. This is sort of like watching trained martial artists fight in oil. It's not the grim, graphic but unavoidably cool violence of A History Of Violence, it's actually more like how that choreography should have been done. There's no luck involved, just hard earned honest bloodshed.

I am conflicted by the brilliance of 50% of this film and the infuriatingly abject remainder.

Just watched this. I generally agree with Trips. Movies like this terrify me because everything is so out of control but looks so close to real life. Another example would be Brazil. Just gives me this terrible feeling that everything is fucked and there's nothing to be done. So, other than furthering my current state of existential crisis, :y:

What's going on in your life that "Brazil" looks close to it?!
Do you live near a lot of steam, grime and Rube Goldbergian machinery?

You've obviously never been to Chicago

No but I actually have purchased a coat in Canada for less than $250 so how do you like them apples?

So have I.

Not lately

When did you buy yours?

Tried to watch the puppet movie with Melissa McCarthy (Rosie O' Donell 2.0) and I couldn't. The start of the movie seemed like it could be decent but it went to shit pretty quick and somehow kept getting worse.

Numerous coats over the course of numerous holidays. In fact I am made of Canadian coats.

Ralph Breaks The Internet - 8/10

If there's one movie they should remake...ugh...if there's 2 movies they should remake the 2nd is Brazil (Logan's Run #1)

I'm not a huge Gilliam fan but to remake his most appreciated work would take foolhardy lack of awareness. Only a glutton for punishment would dare.

Creed II - 8/10 maybe. I wasn't thinking that high to begin with, probably not even in the middle of the movie, but then it "picked up" and I actually want to see more of the Drago family's story now.....

Mandy visually was similar to Only God Forgives and The Cell... I'd like to see more films committing to a colour scheme. The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover is a fine example of a colour scheme shifting with the mood of a film.

Crimes of Grindelwald - 8/10

I really liked it. It wouldn't make any sense to someone who hasn't seen the first film and maybe a HP film or two. It's definitely a middle-quel, but it sets up lots of things for future films and the twists were rather unexpected. Also, possibly the most visually impressive of all Potterverse films, which is quite an accomplishment.

Creed 2 - 7/10

Tessa Thompson's nails were kinda distracting. Took away from the scenes...dunno.

Widows - 4.25/5

More than your average heist flick.

Sicario 2 Soldado - 3/4

Everybody says it's not as good as the first film and I'd agree. It has less of a focused plot and a lack of characters to relate to, it's guilty of using action sequences too often despite them being very well done and ultimately it becomes slightly predictable. I guessed the ending a mile off but I will avoid spoiling it for those that have yet to see it. With that said the action is still hard and violent and although not as polished or as well placed and paced as the original you can tell it's written by Taylor Sheridan because the characters feel exactly the same. The only downside is the complete lack of Blunt whom you vicariously live through in the first Sicario.
Ultimately I enjoyed it a lot more than some sequels and at least the two leads stayed as committed to their parts as they were in the first film.

Escape Plan 2 was actually good. The score was one long, perfect John Carpenter impression and I loved it. The plot was completely predictable, the acting more restrained than camp but they made up for it with copious one-liners that had to be written by children for a competition.
I don't know why a critic would review it so badly, it's more fun than the original and it's basically a sci-fi film that embraces cliches and macho stereotypes.
It's ham and cheese and I can always go for that.

For all of it's failings as a comic adaptation and as a piece of entertainment in general, 2004's "Punisher" movie has one of the most entertainingly choreographed fight scenes in it. A fight scene with Kevin Nash.
It's not exactly The RAID 2 but it has kept me watching Punisher any time it's on TV for the last fourteen years.

Ralph Breaks the Internet-8/10

Can't say if it's better or not than that first film as they went a completely different direction. Lots of focus on one's purpose in life and wanting more and another's inability to let go and being self destructive emotionally. It's funny, the internet gags are great, that Disney princesses scenes are hilarious and the focus on the characters and not the gags made it a fun for me and my little one.

The Possession of Hannah Grace - 5.5/10

Just a big nope. Meh.

The Man Who Knew Infinity 7.5/10

The Light Between Oceans 8/10

The Girl on the Train 5/10

I forgot to post this but that was my same basic feeling. Ending was lame.

Lion 7.5/10

Poor Indian Boy grows up to become Dev Patel (at which time the movie comes to a grinding halt and becomes rapidly disjointed, but the ending was p emotional so gained an extra .5)

Bohemian Rhapsody - 6/10

Got Ant Man and The Wasp to watch. Hope it rules.

It ruled in almost every way until Michelle Pfeiffer showed up. That's not a knock on her as an actor, I just hated that part of the storyline. It got weird quickly and never turned back. Just that one area of the plot reminded me of Dr Strange. I don't think it needed to go down that route, a bit mystical and ethereal for a film about a super-thief in a size-changing suit.

I love the Ant Man movies. Michael Pena is so much fun. I hope you saw the two post credit scenes.

Oh shit I forgot about them. I'll stick the DVD back in.

:y: Don't go too far into it.