The villain was pretty much Khan, again, Idris Elba was wasted but it was serviceble as building up the crew as a unit was the focus of the film, this was necessary as the past movies lacked the emotional core that has been present in the other generations.

The emotional core in JJ's trek was the way too emotional Spock and his rocky relationship with his best pal Jim and his out-of-his-league girlfriend Nyotta, it was a sitcom packaged inbetween a soft sci-fi action movie. A movie was needed to establish the relationship between the whole crew, though yeah, Krull could've been better.

Krull's story arc was actually better on a second viewing, Simon Pegg was a bit too subtle with his twist, it seemed like it came out of nowhere as the queston of who is Krull was never appropiatedly asked. The hints were there, but if there is a twist you need to make your audience want to know an answer before you reveal it.

I didn't have any problems with the story. The crew being in stranded on a planet with no communication and having to help the locals to get home. That's the plot of like 20 classic TOS episodes right there. My only problem was ...

The sequence where it happen was pretty good however, and it did lead to a good action scene in act 2.

Bummer, I was pretty hyped leaving the theatre. What didn't you like about it?

To put my opinion into perspective, though. First Contact and DS9 were the last Star Trek stuff I truly liked before this one, for me, the series as a whole nosedived in 1999.

I had nearly every important moment in this movie spoiled before seeing it, so that probably hurt it for me. I thought it had a really good script, really good story, and really good performances. I thought the directing was flat, and it felt like a task driven movie for me. I felt it didn't let you take in anything that happened in the movie, meaning that I felt most of the beats were in the wrong places. Again, this was possibly worse for me because I knew everything that was going to happen going in. My favorite performance was actually Gil Birmingham's (the one performance I didn't see much of before seeing the movie). I think in a different director's hands, this would have been a great movie if that was the only thing (his crew, which was him, his cinematographer, and editor) that you changed out. I thought it was a very good movie overall, but didn't live up to the potential of the script. Not sure if anyone would agree with me, but the music was kind of off for this movie/genre. That "offness" pretty much described the whole movie for me (when I first heard the music, I thought it was an odd choice, and wondered if the movie would work because of it before seeing any other material). It wasn't very wrong, but it wasn't right, in my opinion. The massive use of ADR was also very distracting, and hurt it for me, as well.

I'm not sure I see any Oscar nominations for this film (maybe script, but Sicario was stronger), but old white people sure laughed up Jeff Bridges' character in theater, with all his racist jokes and the Academy is full of those types.

Absolutley... Malicks DoH is pure magnificence. Its hypnotic and makes you dismiss any hokie dialog.

Fwiw, the little girl is the Mother in Gummo.

I just got a DoH Print by the incomparable Durieux...

I've seen Inception a few times, and just watched Paprika recently. I didn't get the impression that Nolan stole any of it, in fact a cursory google search shows that he's never seen the movie. Paprika/Inception aren't really that similar except the bit about entering dreams.

Speaking of Paprika, I just marathoned all 4 of Satoshi Kon's movies. Had never seen any. Paprika and Tokyo Godfathers were pretty good. Perfect Blue was rough around the edges, but a great story, recommended. Reminded me a little of Black Swan. Millennium Actress kinda blew me away. Really explored the boundaries of blending drama & animation. It'll be a little melodramatic for some.

Watched Zootopia. It was fun. Not very memorable, but not bad.

I enjoyed this as well. I think we were talking about this a few pages ago? If you did not know, the screenplay was written by David Benoif (co-creator of HBO's Game of Thrones adaptation), based upon his debut novel of the same name. Quite an accomplishment.

Though there may be some critics of GoT who also don't like 25th Hour and now understand why

Paprika is phenomenal... a favorite of mine.


I am also a fan of Ghost in the Shell, specially the broad idea behind the movie and of course the soundtrack, but there is an issue that bothers me that always seems to plaque Masamune Shirows books and movies... and that is the inaine need to verbally explain (thru character dialog) every piece of minutia of technology and plot complication as if the audience is stupid and incapable of acepting his vivid world as presented. And of course he is as terrible at dialog as he brilliant with creating technology and design. Design is really his strong point, storytelling... not so much.

Hopefully the live action GitS will better deliver on plot and dialog.

Knock Knock

Don't answer! This is Eli Roth's version (or response) of Funny Games. Two coeds seduce a happily married man with 2 kids, and then torture him. The premise has potential, and the intention seems to be that of social satire, but the tone of the movie is so uneven, that I just ended up being annoyed instead of titillated.

Reeves ends up having a threesome with the 2 girls (this is not really a spoiler if you have even heard about this movie, and unfortunately, it's the only time in Eli Roth's career that he's used a bit of restraint). That scene was good, but not nearly as great as Wild Things did it. After that, the girls turn a 180, and become bratty, whiny, sadistic little teenage torturers. The shift is so dramatic, that I had a tough time feeling any sort of dread or despair.

In Funny Games, you don't really get a motive for the torturers. They just do it. Here, you sort of get an explanation for everything. One of the girls sort of explains her daddy issues and maybe that's why she's doing this. Keanu tries to resist the girls at first (he did a better job than most would I imagine), which sort of justifies his actions and intentions throughout. That need for explanation cheapens the movie a bit, and brings it much closer to campy as opposed to satirical. Maybe that was the intention, but again, for me it just didn't work.

Keanu Reeves does way better when he's given very little dialogue, aka the Matrix or John Wick. Here, it's very clear that he truly can't act his way out of a box. I think his job was to camp it up, but who the heck knows. It was just plain bad. At one point, Reeves asks girls "What's the point of all of this?" I felt that way the entire movie.

The movie does not even stay true to itself. If you compare what these girls did in the middle of the movie to the end, it just doesn't make any sense.

Eli Roth is the worst of the worst. A complete, unoriginal hack. First he tries to ape Raimi, then Miike, now Haneke.

At least he has good taste in the films he's trying to copy.

Bear Jew though.

Worst part of the movie...it was cringe-worthy

I like the Bear Jew part or at least the concept of the Bear Jew.

Though not as much as the Baer Jew.

ARQ is not good, no idea why it's being recommend, probably cause zomg sci-fi time warp. I would have quit about 30 mins in but gf insisted, and it somehow gets even worse as it goes, becoming convoluted for no good reason (unlike Primer, which I like) and focusing on a dumb love story angle during what should be the climax of the movie.

The actors are about as impressive as a high school drama class, the whole thing feels incredibly cheesy.

Hell or High Water was good, but having just rewatched NCFOM and TWBB the week before, it was hard to judge fairly, as it's very inferior to those 2, but that doesn't mean much since those are the best 2 movies in the last decade imo.

I loved the acting and the mood, but the story/plot was pretty bland with very little specific background to substantiate his motivations, and the suspected motivations were very very cliche. That made it a lot tougher to root for him, I never really empathized with the characters. Just a slight criticism though as I really enjoyed it, probably my favorite so far this year even with all that said.

I have a great time with Cabin Fever, lots of laughs and WTF moments. Like a Troma movie somebody snuck through a studio. Hostel is trash, but maybe average for the torture porn genre. Hostel 2 is despicable by any measure. I have no real desire to see anything else out of him.

I preferred Edge of Tomorrow to ARQ but I like these type of movies

Best part of the film is the difference between the 2 new actresses who can't act, and Keanu Reeves who can't act but looks like he thinks this is his oscar bait piece

But ye, film blows, and it felt like Eli Roth thought he wrote this great speech about, uh, don't be too quick to judge a paedophile, and then tried to build a script around it

That movie's pretty much a remake of the 1977 movie, Death Game, starring Colleen Camp, Sondra Locke, and Seymour Cassel. So you're pretty much wrong about your script theory.

Hunt for the Wilderpeople was great. Good acting, often very funny, and New Zealand is absolutely gorgeous. Had a very Wes Anderson-like feel to it.

I was mildly interested in seeing it and then saw that Stone was directing and suddenly I had zero interest.

Yeah there was about a 5 minute scene that seemed like a direct homage to Wes Anderson. Great stuff.

Rashomon

This is considered a classic, and for good reason. Kurosawa's a master of storytelling, and that's on full display in his simple story that unfolds in very unpredictable ways. The device he uses is one that has been copied quite a few times, from The Usual Suspects to Courage Under Fire. He Just because it's shown to us on the screen, doesn't mean it actually happened that way. This seems like it was a very novel idea at the time this movie was made (1950).

We start with a priest and a woodcutter looking dumbfounded, and when a commoner shows up, they explain to him that a Samurai has been killed, his wife raped, and a known thief is the suspect. From there we get first hand accounts of what transpired, from 4 different sources, and each tells a very different tale. It's not always obvious whether they are intentionally misleading the court, or whether they truly believe the events transpired the way they recall, as each eyewitness claims that they themselves are responsible for the murder. I personally think they all truly believe that the events happened exactly as they testified. The internal struggle that the woodcutter goes through is a wonderful journey, and the pay off is grand.

This is a movie that's not only important to see as a lover of cinema, but also it's just a damn good story.

Will definitely give ARQ a viewing, as it is up my alley, yet the Triangle comparisons have lowered considerably my expectations... Another intriguing low budget time travelling horror thriller that deserves a viewing, is Blood Punch, which deserves more love, me thinks.

What you guys got for best Saturday/Sunday morning hangover movies? As in ones that always seem to be on cable and you can just jump in, you get the idea. Some that come to mind for me are:

Twister
Point Break
Cliffhanger

I'm attending Fantastic Fest again this year. Huge range of genre films, foreign language, action, indies, comedies, etc. This year looks bigger than ever. Highlights include: Arrival, The Handmaiden, The Red Turtle, Toni Erdmann, American Honey, The Bad Batch, Headshot, Raw, Elle, Phantasm Ravager, Phantasm Remastered. They're also playing Ash vs Evil Dead (S2, first 2 episodes) and the series premiere of Westworld. I'm attending as press so I get the chance to get on the red carpet and will fire a few questions at Bruce Campbell. It's always an awesome time. Fellow 2p2er Jay Krantz goes each year, he's one of the coolest movie people I've met. Even got him to guest-review on my podcast here

It's a festival you guys should put on your radar. It's a collection of movie nerds, filmmakers, actors, producers, and everything else in between, all appreciating film. My first year there I was standing outside after seeing a crazy movie then I noticed Elijah Wood standing next to me so I chatted him up about the movie. After nerding out for 5 minutes he introduced me to the filmmaker and I got to thank him for the movie. Probably the most awkward moment was when I was in the hotel lobby and a guy asked, "Did you see my movie, [blank]?" I told him I got shutout, but it was a very bad movie. =( Didn't want to crush him, told him I'd look out for it. I failed as a film critic in that moment. Later that year at another fest I made up for it by being harsh (but fair) to a friend's film that played.

I'll post snippets like mflip did while he was at TIFF. Since I'll be writing reviews I'll include those as well.