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Post by Ish Kabbible on Jan 2, 2016 13:17:32 GMT -5
Jungle Book (1942) Sabu Directed by Zoltan Korda
Live action adaptation of the Rudyard Kipling classic of a young Indian boy lost in the jungle and adopted by a wolf pack
One of three films included in Criterion's Sabu box set and the movie looks absolutely stunning. A sharp, pristine print with magnificent color imagery. I'm a fan of the Disney 1967 animated feature but this is my first view of the original version and it blew me away. Sabu owns this role. Along with his appearances in Arabian Night, Drums, Jungle Boy and Thief Of Baghdad, he became an international star. The fact that this is live action makes this more compelling to me over the Disney film even without the cool songs the latter included. The tiger, Sere Khan (probably misspelled on my part) is truly frightening. The fire scenes are spectacular. A must see
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Jan 2, 2016 13:32:14 GMT -5
Imitation Of Life (1934) Claudette Colbert, Louise Beavers, Warren Williams, Ned Sparks, Rochelle Hudson
Claudette exploits Beaver's recipe to become the Pancake Queen
Holy shit, what a movie. I'm sure it was viewed as being progressive regarding race relations back in the 1930s but today- not so much. Here we go:
Claudette is a widow with a very young daughter and is struggling to get by. Along comes Louise Beavers, house servant, willing to work for next to nothing for room and board. So Claudette takes her in. Beavers has a very young daughter too that looks white ("I married a very light skinned negro"). Claudette loves Beaver's pancakes. Beavers confides to Claudette the family secret recipe. Claudette double talks her way into getting enough credit to open a pancake house. Beaver's daughter Peola, hates to be thought of as black and doesn't want to be seen in public with her mother. Claudette meets Ned Sparks who acts like he gets a lemon enema every day but gives her the idea of packaging the pancake mix and selling it in stores. Claudette earns a million dollars. Beavers is just happy continuing to be the housemaid. Peola hates her black mammy. Claudette falls for an ichthyologist. Claudette's daughter also falls for the same ichthyologist. Peola runs away. Beavers is dying of a broken heart. Ned Sparks gets a double lemon enema. My head is spinning.
One day I need to watch the 1959 version with Lana Turner to see what they did there
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The Captain
CCF Mod Squad
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Post by The Captain on Jan 2, 2016 16:00:26 GMT -5
Watched The 7th Voyage of Sinbad this afternoon while my wife and daughters were out shopping. The movie starred Kerwin Matthews, Kathryn Grant, Richard Eyer, and Torin Thatcher, with the real stars of the movie being the Ray Harryhausen creatures.
Pretty standard adventure tale with Sinbad (Matthews) being forced into helping an evil sorcerer (Thatcher) recover his magic lamp, complete with genie (Eyer), from a cyclops that lives on his island; the sorcerer accomplishes this by shrinking the lovely Princess Parisa (played by the beautiful Ms. Grant) to the size of a mouse and telling Sinbad the only way to change her back was to help him recover his lamp, at which point he will mix a potion to undo the spell. It progresses as one would expect, with Sinbad overcoming all obstacles to save his lady-love, and it wraps up with the usual "happily ever after" ending.
For the movie, Harryhausen created a cyclops, a roc (both adult and hatchling), a serpent woman (unnamed but probably a lamia, based on Middle Eastern mythology), a dragon (my daughters, who caught the tail-end of the movie thought it was cool), and a skeleton with whom Sinbad has a sword duel.
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Post by Hoosier X on Jan 2, 2016 16:04:03 GMT -5
Imitation Of Life (1934) Claudette Colbert, Louise Beavers, Warren Williams, Ned Sparks, Rochelle HudsonClaudette exploits Beaver's recipe to become the Pancake Queen Holy shit, what a movie. I'm sure it was viewed as being progressive regarding race relations back in the 1930s but today- not so much. Here we go: Claudette is a widow with a very young daughter and is struggling to get by. Along comes Louise Beavers, house servant, willing to work for next to nothing for room and board. So Claudette takes her in. Beavers has a very young daughter too that looks white ("I married a very light skinned negro"). Claudette loves Beaver's pancakes. Beavers confides to Claudette the family secret recipe. Claudette double talks her way into getting enough credit to open a pancake house. Beaver's daughter Peola, hates to be thought of as black and doesn't want to be seen in public with her mother. Claudette meets Ned Sparks who acts like he gets a lemon enema every day but gives her the idea of packaging the pancake mix and selling it in stores. Claudette earns a million dollars. Beavers is just happy continuing to be the housemaid. Peola hates her black mammy. Claudette falls for an ichthyologist. Claudette's daughter also falls for the same ichthyologist. Peola runs away. Beavers is dying of a broken heart. Ned Sparks gets a double lemon enema. My head is spinning. One day I need to watch the 1959 version with Lana Turner to see what they did there I set up the DVR to record the 1934 version. I think that's tomorrow. I liked the 1959 version a lot more than I thought I would. It's got a great cast! In addition to Lana Turner, there's Sandra Dee, and the young woman trying to pass as white is Susan Kohner, who you might remember trying to pass as an Arab boy in The Big Fisherman (with Howard Keel as the apostle Peter). Movies are silly. I saw Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) last night. Very silly. If you thought the original series desperately needed Sinead O'Connor on the crew, then this is the movie for you!
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Jan 2, 2016 18:12:36 GMT -5
Imitation Of Life (1934) Claudette Colbert, Louise Beavers, Warren Williams, Ned Sparks, Rochelle HudsonClaudette exploits Beaver's recipe to become the Pancake Queen Holy shit, what a movie. I'm sure it was viewed as being progressive regarding race relations back in the 1930s but today- not so much. Here we go: Claudette is a widow with a very young daughter and is struggling to get by. Along comes Louise Beavers, house servant, willing to work for next to nothing for room and board. So Claudette takes her in. Beavers has a very young daughter too that looks white ("I married a very light skinned negro"). Claudette loves Beaver's pancakes. Beavers confides to Claudette the family secret recipe. Claudette double talks her way into getting enough credit to open a pancake house. Beaver's daughter Peola, hates to be thought of as black and doesn't want to be seen in public with her mother. Claudette meets Ned Sparks who acts like he gets a lemon enema every day but gives her the idea of packaging the pancake mix and selling it in stores. Claudette earns a million dollars. Beavers is just happy continuing to be the housemaid. Peola hates her black mammy. Claudette falls for an ichthyologist. Claudette's daughter also falls for the same ichthyologist. Peola runs away. Beavers is dying of a broken heart. Ned Sparks gets a double lemon enema. My head is spinning. One day I need to watch the 1959 version with Lana Turner to see what they did there I set up the DVR to record the 1934 version. I think that's tomorrow. I liked the 1959 version a lot more than I thought I would. It's got a great cast! In addition to Lana Turner, there's Sandra Dee, and the young woman trying to pass as white is Susan Kohner, who you might remember trying to pass as an Arab boy in The Big Fisherman (with Howard Keel as the apostle Peter). Movies are silly. I saw Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) last night. Very silly. If you thought the original series desperately needed Sinead O'Connor on the crew, then this is the movie for you! Shatner just needed to take off the toupee and could have played both parts
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Jan 3, 2016 15:29:58 GMT -5
Kill Bill Vol. 2 (2004) Uma Thurman, David Carradine, Daryl Hannah The Bride continues on her murderous quest, dispatching those involved in her marriage massacre and leading up to dispatching the man behind it all, Bill Tarantino successfully provides the finish to his epic tale that was initially released the year previous. A homage to so many 70s exploitation films. This part reveals all the background story regarding the Bride's training and details of the murderous marriage ceremony. Bill delivers a long and insightful dissertation on the uniqueness of Superman and his secret identity. The two parts were originally to be released together as one super long movie but in actuality they were not film simultaneously with much of Part 2 finished after the first part's release. I've yet to see The Hateful Eight and until I do I regard The Kill Bill Saga to be the epitome of Tarantino's oeuvre.
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Jan 4, 2016 12:29:58 GMT -5
My Stepmother Is An Alien (1988) Dan Aykroyd, Kim Basinger, Jon Lovitz, Seth Green
Aykroyd works for some science institute and accidentally projects some force beam to another galaxy, damaging a civilization's gravity. The alien planet sends a beautiful woman to earth to find out how Aykroyd did it and prevent it from reoccurring. She finds out what a kiss means among other earthly pleasures
I recall having a free pass to see this movie's premiere in the theaters and thought it was very disappointing. Here I am again, 27 years later, watching it once more and now feeling its horribly disappointing. There were 10 different writers involved with the screenplay (not all got credit) and as the saying goes "Too many cooks". Not a lot of funny stuff, just a lot of tired jokey clichés seen many times before. Aykroyd is a widower with a young daughter (who at first I thought looked like a young son) and despite the title of the movie, the film is not told from her perspective. Basinger looks great, the special effects are rudimentary, the music is decent, Lovitz is given nothing to work with and its no more than a time waster.
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Post by dupersuper on Jan 4, 2016 13:32:59 GMT -5
Kill Bill Vol. 2 (2004) Uma Thurman, David Carradine, Daryl Hannah The Bride continues on her murderous quest, dispatching those involved in her marriage massacre and leading up to dispatching the man behind it all, Bill Tarantino successfully provides the finish to his epic tale that was initially released the year previous. A homage to so many 70s exploitation films. This part reveals all the background story regarding the Bride's training and details of the murderous marriage ceremony. Bill delivers a long and insightful dissertation on the uniqueness of Superman and his secret identity. The two parts were originally to be released together as one super long movie but in actuality they were not film simultaneously with much of Part 2 finished after the first part's release. I've yet to see The Hateful Eight and until I do I regard The Kill Bill Saga to be the epitome of Tarantino's oeuvre.
The Superman dissertation was really cool (very silver age specific, but that matches Bills age), but the line about the Superman comic not having the best art always bugged me as a comic book fan. Which Superman title? Superman? Action? Worlds Finest? Super Team Family? Lois Lane? Jimmy Olsen? Supergirl? DC Comics Presents? Justice League? Adventures of Superman? Man of Steel? Man of Tomorrow? Which artist? Schuster? Boring? Swan? Anderson? Kirby? Kane? Presumably Byrne, Ordway, Jurgens, Perez, Gammill, Grummet et al would be far too late given his pre-Crisis viewpoint...
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Post by Arthur Gordon Scratch on Jan 4, 2016 13:45:01 GMT -5
Well I guess no one considers Kane or Kirby the ultimate Superman artists, and none of the others really made a name for themselves outside of the pre-crisis last son of Krypton. In that regard I understand that POV. Just saw the Hateful Eight, and it feels like a 2 1/2 hours version of the pub scene of Inglorous Bastards, which is fine by me
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Post by Hoosier X on Jan 4, 2016 18:10:13 GMT -5
Just saw the Hateful Eight, and it feels like a 2 1/2 hours version of the pub scene of Inglorous Bastards, which is fine by me That's a good description. I can't say I loved The Hateful Eight but the time flew by. And I felt like I was trapped in that cabin with those awful awful people for almost three hours. When it was over, it took me a while to adjust to the non-Tarantino reality. Of the films I've seen, it was the best of 2015. But I feel weird saying "I loved it" the same way I would have trouble saying "I loved Hotel Terminus."
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Post by Arthur Gordon Scratch on Jan 4, 2016 18:32:43 GMT -5
Yeah, I also think I really liked it, even if it was somewhat underwhelming. It was great theatre though. But all in all, 2015 was one of the weakest film year ever IMHO. All the movies I enjoyed were flawed. And this one maybe was the least flawed one, that tells a lot!
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Post by Hoosier X on Jan 5, 2016 1:08:14 GMT -5
I loved Ant-Man too. I especially loved the ending, with two tiny men battling it out on a train set!
Original just for having very low stakes as opposed to EVERY OTHER RECENT SUPER-HERO MOVIE where evil Kryptonians are destroying Metropolis or Bane is about to nuke Gotham or hordes of generic aliens are attacking New York. (It's a good thing Hawkeye has those arrows!)
I could hardly believe it when Zack Snyder said every recent DC movie is transcendent while Ant-Man was just a flavor of the week. I thought singling out Ant-Man was just about the worst example he could have picked to call "flavor of the week."
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Post by Arthur Gordon Scratch on Jan 5, 2016 9:10:54 GMT -5
I see what you mean, even if I thought Ant-man was really really bad (lamest villain, super bland direction), but at least I could see kids enjoying it. Its only reedemable quality was for me Michael Pena and the likeability of Paul Rudd. But other than that, I really struggles
Only movies that had some impact on me were those :
Trudno byt bogom (best movie of this year), Mad Max, Foxcatcher and the Michael Mann movie. I was sad to be let down by Sea Fog...
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Jan 5, 2016 15:11:23 GMT -5
The Accused (1988) Kelly McGillis, Jodie Foster
Based on a true life crime in New England, a drunk, dope smoking party girl is gang raped inside a bar with witnesses shouting out approval and encouragement to the rapists. The girl's lawyer, fearing that the victim's background could cost her the case in court, agrees to a plea bargain with the rapists getting minimum sentences for reckless endangerment only.
Powerful indictment concerning the travails of women getting justice for rape in our court system in the recent past (if not the present as well). And yes, Kelly McGillis as the lawyer got top billing for this film. At this time, Jodie Foster was a former child star and struggling as an adult with getting good parts. She performed well in small films such as Carny, Five Corners and Stealing Home but she believed her actress career was nearing an end. She was the producer's 4th choice for playing the role of the rape victim. Lo and behold, Jodie turned in a magnificent job and netted herself several awards including an Oscar for best actress. From this point on, ensured by her part in 1991's Silence Of The Lambs, she was a superstar
The Accused is an enthralling court room drama and a well paced film as well
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Post by Hoosier X on Jan 6, 2016 11:49:34 GMT -5
Imitation Of Life (1934) Claudette Colbert, Louise Beavers, Warren Williams, Ned Sparks, Rochelle HudsonClaudette exploits Beaver's recipe to become the Pancake Queen Holy shit, what a movie. I'm sure it was viewed as being progressive regarding race relations back in the 1930s but today- not so much. Here we go: Claudette is a widow with a very young daughter and is struggling to get by. Along comes Louise Beavers, house servant, willing to work for next to nothing for room and board. So Claudette takes her in. Beavers has a very young daughter too that looks white ("I married a very light skinned negro"). Claudette loves Beaver's pancakes. Beavers confides to Claudette the family secret recipe. Claudette double talks her way into getting enough credit to open a pancake house. Beaver's daughter Peola, hates to be thought of as black and doesn't want to be seen in public with her mother. Claudette meets Ned Sparks who acts like he gets a lemon enema every day but gives her the idea of packaging the pancake mix and selling it in stores. Claudette earns a million dollars. Beavers is just happy continuing to be the housemaid. Peola hates her black mammy. Claudette falls for an ichthyologist. Claudette's daughter also falls for the same ichthyologist. Peola runs away. Beavers is dying of a broken heart. Ned Sparks gets a double lemon enema. My head is spinning. One day I need to watch the 1959 version with Lana Turner to see what they did there I saw this last night and found it mostly watchable and very entertaining at times. I lost interest in the love triangle between Claudette, Warren (the ichthyologist) and Rochelle. (Although Rochelle Hudson is one of my favorite obscure 1930s actresses.) We've seen this story before, 1930s Hollywood! I found Peola's story very compelling, and very gutsy, that's for sure. I wish there had been more of it. That scene where Louise Beavers comes to get Peola (who was passing for white at 8 years old) out of school and gives her secret away to her classmates, and then she shows up at home soaked to the skin from the rain because she wouldn't even stick around long enough for her mother to give her the boots and raincoat, that's powerful. Most of Peola's scenes are pretty good (though she does come off as a bit of a whiner after the money comes rolling in on the Pancake Empire).
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