What Was The Last Movie/Anime You Watched?

[Reckoning]

The Raid - The only movie other than Mad Max: Fury Road that might have a claim on best action movie since 2000.

If you haven't watched Dredd, I would implore you.  The Raid is what happens when your script (in this case, the script for Dredd) leaks online and other people (allegedly) make a different movie (The Raid) based on it.

[Cartagia]

I saw them both in theaters.  Dredd is the better overall film, but as a pure action spectacle The Raid takes it.

A Little Princess - One of the more technically impressive films for children I've ever seen. I suppose that's to be expected when you've got Cuaron and Lubezki on set.

The Baxter - Kinda clever anti-romcom that doesn't do enough with its central conceit.

Inherent Vice - Clever and engaging hippie noir.  Amazing performances, wonderfully put together, but drags a bit in the third act.

Splinter - Solid and nasty little low budget body horror.

Beauty and the Beast (2017) - The musical half does its damnedest to make this movie worth the runtime, but the plotting pulls it way down. I appreciated the indulgence up front to give things a bit more context, but pretty much every other addition drags things to halt each time they come up.

Incredible set and production design, though!

StarTrek: The Motion Picture - True to the spirit of the original series, but not necessarily the tone. A decadent exercise in exorbitance and hubris. It's a true "every dollar is in the screen" picture. I just wish it was more engaging.

[burningdoom]

I saw them both in theaters.  Dredd is the better overall film, but as a pure action spectacle The Raid takes it.

A Little Princess - One of the more technically impressive films for children I've ever seen. I suppose that's to be expected when you've got Cuaron and Lubezki on set.

The Baxter - Kinda clever anti-romcom that doesn't do enough with its central complete.

Inherent Vice - Clever and engaging hippie noir.  Amazing performances, wonderfully put together, but drags a bit in the third act.

Splinter - Solid and nasty little low budget body horror.

Beauty and the Beast (2017) - The musical half does its damnedest to make this movie worth the runtime, but the plotting pulls it way down. I appreciated the indulgence up front to give things a bit more context, but pretty much every other addition drags things to halt each time they come up.

Incredible set and production design, though!

I'm the one guy that liked the 90s Judge Dredd movie.

And I have that Beauty and the Beast movie memorized. My daughter must have watched it over 100 times when it was her favorite movie. I swear Staley Tucci looks coked out of his mind as he's playing piano at the end of the movie.

[Cartagia]

Jurassic World Dominion - Worse than Fallen Kingdom because while that movie is just as monumentally stupid as this one it really knew how to have fun with a dumb premise in a way this film only makes passing contact with.

Better than Jurassic World because it at least tries to have have some kind of new overarching message (or two). It fumbles the hell out of them, but at least it tries.  Plus the action is better here.

This is the disappointing trilogy of the 2010s, not Star Wars.

Kiki's Delivery Service - Totally cute and fun.

The Princess - Just dumb enough with some nice brutality to make it entertaining... barely.

Lost Bullet - Lots of terrific action sequences, but it's a ltlle bit of a struggle to stay engaged between them.

Pearl - Bigger, more ambitious, and arguably better than X. Mia was good in dual roles there, but is incredible here. 2022 is a banger year for horror, and it's not even October yet.

The Heat - Supreme tactical deployment of Melissa McCarthy. It's well worn territory, but it works. The club sequence is terrifically staged, as well.

Support Your Local Sheriff! - This was really fun!  James Garner was insanely charismatic back in the day.

13 Assassins - It either needed to spend more time with each member of the crew or have fewer samurai.  It's one best in its genre, otherwise, with the few moments of true Miike weirdness helping it stand out from the crowd.

[telly]

Moonage Daydream - Expectations killed this movie for me. I'm not very familiar with Bowie and was hoping this would be a documentary that would help me learn more about him as an artist. Was sorely disappointed. While there is a part of the film that dives into his philosophies about art, life, music, and spirituality, the film was a perfect example of style over substance, consisting primarily of indulgent imagery and music video footage over maybe 20 narrations from Bowie. Some of the special effects were extremely irritating and seizure inducing. Almost no context was given to any of the the parts of his career or music. There was nothing from band members or people who knew him. Chronology wise the movie was all over the place, skipping between the 70s 80s and 90s and was very hard to follow. It was way too long. Some aspects about his life that I was familiar with like the circumstances around his final album and death were pretty much completely absent from the film. TLDR: really didn't enjoy it. My fiancé is a huge Bowie fan and she didn't like it either.

[Cartagia]

That was definitely the vibe I got from the trailers for the movie.  There are too many projects about high profile celebrities that have that problem, lately.

Prince of Darkness - Kicking off October a lil early this year! Prince of Darkness might actually be Carpenter's most unnerving film.   It just oozes atmosphere and Poppa John absolutely delivers with the score.

Beavis and Butt-Head Do the Universe - Incredibly funny, but really starts running out of steam about 2/3 of the way through.

Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight - Exactly the kind of mid-range high profile studio release you don't see anymore. Low budget, terrific sense of style, nothing but character actors, and monsters in rubber suits. What's not to love?

In the Mouth of Madness - Filled in my biggest gap in Carpenter's filmography. Love the opening, that fever dream of an ending, and most of what is in between.

Terminator 2: Judgment Day - In 4K.  Still one of the best to ever do it.

Thunderball - Uneven, but fun. Also radically horny. James just straight up asks the bad guy if he can borrow his woman for a bit. Wild.

The Devil's Backbone - Plays to all of GdT's strengths.  Memorable setting, beautiful aesthtics, hateable villains, shocking violence. Excellent film.

[kamikazekeeg]

Couldn't watch a ton the last few days due to the hurricane, but before it showed up, I decided it was a decent time to watch some anime since Crunchyroll lets you download stuff to watch offline.  I decided since I was so big into Gundam Evolution at the moment that I should really dive into Gundam properly.  I've seen Gundam Wing in the past, I watched Iron Blooded Orphans, and I watched the recent Hathaway movie, but not much else, which is surprising really as I'm big into mech stuff. 

So I started with the original Mobile Suit Gundam.  I was a little worried that it wouldn't hold up being an anime from 1979, but it's way better than I was expecting, like it still has some wonkyness to characters and some of the writing, but action is decent enough, the re-use they still do makes sense and isn't like a lot of other shows of the time, and it doesn't pull back on the politics and horror of war, just in a PG rated way.  I managed to watch about 20 episodes and definitely gonna keep watching.  I was gonna kinda pick my way through all the Gundam series, but I might try and watch as much as I can now along with the newest Gundam series that just started.

[Cartagia]

The Wolf of Snow Hollow - The parts of this that work for me really work, but there's a total lack of tension that makes it tough to get invested.

[aliensstudios]

Watched B.J. Novak's (that douche from The Office) directorial debut, Vengeance. This film is incredible. It hits the nail on the head so hard and I really hope more people see it. It is so much better than the vapid crap Hollywood has been shilling out in the past 5+ years.

[Cartagia]

Dracula: Prince of Darkness - Were they paying Lee by the word?  Wish I liked it more, but it takes too long to get going.  Great atmosphere and some terrific individual sequences, though.

Piranha 3D - The last gasp of big Hollywood funded sleaze? Gratuitous, violent, and a ton of fun.

[kamikazekeeg]

Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury - Been abit since I watched weekly anime, but with my Gundam hype lately, I thought I'd get into this from the beginning and I think it's got a solid start.  I could see the teen/school aspect rubbing some folks wrong if they don't handle it right, but it's clearly not trying to be a light, fluffy, show with what happens in the prologue and the quality of the animation they are doing, especially with the mobile suit battles, is very nice.  It's mostly regular animation for all of it too, with I think only some instances of CG mobile suits, which is nice to see as a lot of mech stuff now is done with CG.  I don't hate CG in anime, it just has potential more often than not to clash with everything else, especially if it's not handled right.

[Cartagia]

Piranha 3DD - Trashier, dumber, and way cheaper than the previous film. Appreciate the extensive use of rubber fish, though.

VFW - Close to my platonic ideal of a low budget horror flick.  Great cast, terrific synth score, loads of practical effects.  Real fun time.

[kamikazekeeg]

Cyberpunk: Edgerunners - Sick anime, I heard good stuff and wasn't disappointed, I mean it's Studio Trigger, they know how to freaking bring it and it was way more hardcore than I was expected, even with what its based on.  It's sorta like if you crossed Ghost in the Shell with Gurren Lagann.  Highly recommend it if you want a crazy anime.

[Cartagia]

I got to see Scream in theaters for the first time last night.  Still one of the GOATs.

Watched an anime series for the first time in forever... I got through the very first saga in Dragon Ball and I kind of hated it?  It's so weirdly sexual about children and is obsessed with showing you Goku's penis.  I know Z outgrows it, so maybe this series does, too?  I'll get back into it eventually.

Hellraiser (2022) - Intellectually and thematically a Hellraiser film through and through, while bringing something aesthetically and tonally new to the franchise.  Best entry to the series in decades.

You Only Live Twice - It's a shame about the, um... issues with this one, because otherwise it is a very fun Bond adventure.

The Burning - Incredible summer camp slasher. Deserves more recognition.

[burningdoom]

I got to see Scream in theaters for the first time last night.  Still one of the GOATs.

Watched an anime series for the first time in forever... I got through the very first saga in Dragon Ball and I kind of hated it?  It's so weirdly sexual about children and is obsessed with showing you Goku's penis.  I know Z outgrows it, so maybe this series does, too?  I'll get back into it eventually.

Hellraiser (2022) - Intellectually and thematically a Hellraiser film through and through, while bringing something aesthetically and tonally new to the franchise.  Best entry to the series in decades.

You Only Live Twice - It's a shame about the, um... issues with this one, because otherwise it is a very fun Bond adventure.

The Burning - Incredible summer camp slasher. Deserves more recognition.

The opening scene of The Burning and raft scene were awesome. But there was a whole lot of filler in that movie.