christiaanb

I saw this movie in theaters simply because all the other movies seemed like worse options, but was pleasantly surprised by it. Obviously the story is still idiotic, because - as Herzog so eloquently put it - nature is vile and base and thus: no, animals do not form peace treaties. Also, they have no interest whatsoever in helping out a boy that is moronic enough to put their habitat on fire. However, I was impressed by the CGI and the film as a whole felt very lively.

75 _46%

The Fog (1980) - Rated 05 Sep 2016

Definitely not Carpenter's finest, but still worth your time. There are some really great shots in here, but overall it fails to do what a good horror movie should set out to do - which is scaring people (or, at the least, make them feel uncomfortable).

74 _41%

The Legend of Hell House (1973) - Rated 05 Sep 2016

The Legend is an enjoyable movie although I spent a lot of time not paying attention to what was happening on screen. There's some really good stuff in here (weird camera angles and careful stage-setting among others), but the narrative arc was way off.

77 _55%

Hail, Caesar! (2016) - Rated 13 Mar 2016

Hail, Caesar! is funny and endearing but in the end also forgettable.

74 _41%

Bridge of Spies (2015) - Rated 15 Feb 2016

68 _20%

Spectre (2015) - Rated 08 Feb 2016

Spectre is certainly one of the least appealing installments of the series I've ever seen. Actually, its opening scene is terrific: great decor, morbid costumes, some baffling, inexplainable camera movements. The problem is that the plot is unintelligible: What are the stakes? What drives the enemy? Where does Bond get his costumes? Why do women react to him the way they do? And so on. The result is a loose series of action scenes that is barely kept together by a framing story.

85 _83%

The Revenant (2015) - Rated 06 Feb 2016

The Revenant's opening scene hits you like an arrow in the throat and from that point on it is clear that no concessions will be made to the viewer and his feelings of basic safety, comfort, or whatever. The plot (man vs. man vs. nature) is very sparse and secondary to the cinematography which is breathtaking, brutal, ruthless, icy. I admire the actors for the simple fact that they survived the filming process; I presume that the pain on screen looks so real because it is actual pain.

72 _31%

Irrational Man (2015) - Rated 01 Feb 2016

Amusing at points, but lazy in execution. These are great actors playing badly written characters in a plot that consists of a predictable romantic storyline and a funny but ultimately illogical murder mystery stoyline.

77 _55%

Lips of Blood (1975) - Rated 23 Jan 2016

Jean Rollin's movies are known to be dream-like, which can be a polite way of saying that his scripts are incoherent and illogical. To be clear: his scripts are all those things and the little structure they do have is provided by the obsessions of his main characters - in this case a man in search of a girl he saw in his childhood (although it is unclear she actually exists). The dialogue was a little too artsy for my (quite artsy) tastes, but I appreciate Rollin's idiosyncratic cinematography.

83 _75%

Don't Look Now (1973) - Rated 23 Jan 2016

Contemporary horror movies typically rely on jump scares in order to give their audiences the kicks they paid for. Nicolas Roeg relies on dread rather than scares; Don't Look Now develops at a lava-like pace as tension builds up and the protagonists lose their senses as the landscape around them - the decaying city of Venice - collapses in on them. Some 10 minutes before the ending the pace picks up and races to a horrifying finale.