What Was The Last Movie/Anime You Watched?

[Cartagia]

The American President - Sure, it's proto-West Wing, but that's exactly why I love it. It gets a little shaky in last act when trying to resolve its two major plotlines, but it's still a monumental delight. Michael Douglas is so relentlessly charming in this.

[weirdfeline]

Adventures in Game Chasing - a pseudo prequel to the  Game Chasers' Youtube Channel. If you're a fan of their channel you'll definitely enjoy it. I think even if you're not there is enough relatable things I'd say you should at like try to give it a watch. I'd say it's up there as far as independent movies that youtubers make, it's one I would absolutely recommend to people on this site.

I had been meaning to watch this so I just did. It looks pretty nice. Fairly enjoyable but I also already watch Game Chasers as well as the rest of the cast. Not sure people would get much enjoyment out of it if they don't know the cast.

[Cartagia]

Oppenheimer - Simultaneously too long and too short. It's three movies rolled into one, with only one of them given the space it needs to breathe.

There are too many limited series out there that are too little material stretched over too many episodes.  The opposite is true here.  Its still good, there's just too much material to cover effectively in the runtime.

[kamikazekeeg]

Born on the Fourth of July - A pretty rough and sad war drama about a gung-ho American going to fight for his country, going through the horror of Vietnam, and then dealing with his life afterwards, the return home to crowds of anti-war protests, along with his own physical and mental issues.  Doesn't skimp on showing some nasty elements for sure.  Tom Cruise gives a pretty good performance, especially just a few years after Top Gun, where I thought he was only okay in.  Some of the scenes feel a little "out there" (This is based on someone's memoir), but I think it does a decent job.  Not sure it's something I'd recommend unless you are into this type of drama, but it's a decent film.  Kinda funny to see Willem Dafoe in this, along with John C. McGinley, both previously in Platoon, though you could almost see Dafoe's role as a "What-If" if his character lived on after Platoon.

[kamikazekeeg]

Saving Private Ryan - Still definitely one of the top war films, it's intense, dark, the battle scenes are impressive, good performances all around.  I always forget just how much "Ryan" there is in the move, not showing up till the finale battle.  The D-Day battle scene is still very impressive along with the finale battle.  Makes me want to go watch Band of Brothers, so may consider that and The Pacific next.

Shin Kamen Rider - I have no attachment to Kamen Rider, so I feel like this is a movie that is very much made for specifically Kamen Rider fans and that alone lol I don't mean that in a super negative way, but it's also never a movie that I feel connects with me.  It's a kinda goofy 70's throwback, down to the camera styling, edits, music, very retro, while mixing in some high energy, almost anime-feeling action moments dotted through out, and some excessive blood for no real reason that I can tell.  It's The Boys level of blood, without the gore, but they could've easily done the entire thing without it.  Kinda weird, but interesting I guess.  They do mostly tone down on that after like the first third of the film.

This is meant to be a standalone movie, but because it feels like it's so much for the fans, I feel like for awhile, the pacing of things makes it feel like I should know about the organization and Kamen Rider beforehand, even though there isn't previous story to know.

While I did enjoy some of the retro vibes and man do they sell his powerful climax kick great every single time, there's not much else in this movie for me, probably the last time I'll watch it.  Shin Godzilla was much more for me as a Godzilla fan, and I think I might like Shin Ultraman for it being about giant kaiju, but Shin Kamen Rider is just alright.  Love his design though, that helmet and suit is simple, but dope.  Specifically the ending look is quality.

[Cartagia]

Clueless - This is one of the best screenplays of the 90s.

Tiger Cage - Banger and a half. It's biggest flaw is the never quite lives up to its opening 15 minutes, but it comes close.

Tiger Cage II - There are multiple sequences in this movie that surpass the excellent first film, but it just gets too doofy with the "odd couple" stuff.

Tiger Cage III - What a weird follow-up to the two previous films.  Action is too light and too bogged down in its plot.

[kamikazekeeg]

Shin Ultraman - I definitely enjoyed this more than Shin Kamen Rider, it's not just that it's about kaiju, a thing I love, but I like the movies structure more, it's got a lot less of that 70's throwback editing and shaky cam and all that sorta stuff (Still has some, it's meant to be very nostalgic I feel), but it also has fairly decent CG and even feels like I'm looking at man-in-suit fights with miniature terrain at points.  It does have a lot of slow points, it's much more like Shin Godzilla, where it's dealing with a lot of the Japanese agency's, political stuff, so that can be a big downside for some people.

The biggest fault I have with the movie is that there's so little actual Kaiju action.  They gloss over like 4 or 5 monster battles the humans deal with at the very beginning and I would've loved to see them.  Very frustrating to not have those fights.  We do get a couple decent fights, though only one REALLY good Kaiju battle.  I feel like that's kind of a big mistake personally.  It doesn't make it a bad film, just one that had the opportunity to do more cool giant kaiju fights, because they were generally quite good, as I said before, they almost don't feel CG in certain places.  I just want to see Ultraman fight Shin Godzilla...I mean..."Gomess" lol Love that nod, which is that in the old Ultraman, they repurposed (Or it was meant to be a fun cameo I don't know) a Godzilla suit, added some details and made it an Ultraman monster, so they did the same here with Shin Godzilla.  So good.

Oh well, while I didn't absolutely love the movie, I still liked it.  Shin Godzilla is still the best for me out of these three and I'd only really recommend Shin Ultraman if you liked Shin Godzilla or have a general interest in giant monsters.

[Cartagia]

Oh well, while I didn't absolutely love the movie, I still liked it.  Shin Godzilla is still the best for me out of these three and I'd only really recommend Shin Ultraman if you liked Shin Godzilla or have a general interest in giant monsters.

Sounds like I'm watching Shin Ultraman.

[telly]

I watched Oppenhiemer yesterday and unfortunately I didn't really like it. It felt like two giant movies smashed into one and there was so much story that needed to be told as a result that the characters really suffered. I was really hoping for more about Oppenhiemer as a scientist but Cillian Murphy doesn't really have any room to breathe let alone develop over the course of the movie. The female characters felt particularly shortchanged, particularly Florence Pugh's character. Was just like Imitation Game with really overrwritten dramatic dialogue but there were some surprisingly bad writing in a few moments as well. Also didn't like the way the movie was scored. Most of the film had music underlying the scenes which diluted the impactful moments. There were also some random horror/thriller elements thrown in that felt out of place to me.

I did like a couple scenes, particularly the speech after the bomb is dropped, and the philosophy around scientific pursuits that result in harm to others. But I think the movie should have just been about the atom bomb being developed and the whole investigation side could have an added epilogue and I would have liked it a lot more.

[kamikazekeeg]

Battleship - I tried to watch this...Got nearly an hour into it and dropped it.  I rarely do that, but it was SO boring, and a movie about battleships going up against extraterrestrial threats shouldn't be boring.  I feel like I watched this movie before because I remember that it leads to them taking an old WW2 battleship due to having no digital tech in it, which I think a cool idea, but eh...I was bored and this was a random pick and I can't be bothered lol

Snake Eyes (2021) - I went in with some hesitation on this movie, as I'm big into Snake Eyes as a character.  Sure it was a lot of "Boba Fett" energy, a lot of style over substance for the most part, but I did read the comics and watch the cartoons and he always stood out to me as an interesting character.  So having heard nothing about the movie and that it did poorly in theater, I was kinda worried to watch it.

I'm very mixed on this.  I think it starts out alright, but the longer it goes on, it starts to lose my interest, I don't like the story they are telling for Snake Eyes that much compared to the original story, like it's kind of an interesting twist, but it's not a story I want to see for Snake Eyes at all.  The movie also gets quite boring.  It starts out pretty decent I would say.  His origins, that fight with the Yakuza, I was on board, but once he goes to the actual Arashikage compound, there's not much real training going on for him to become a ninja, he's just already a good fighter who kinda becomes a ninja by virtue of that being the story.  Then they introduce a magic jewel and giant anaconda's and...boy does it not add anything to the movie.  Like I know it's GIJOE, it's a kinda goofy world, but ugghh...

I also don't think the fights are that great as the movie goes on.  They start to add in some like...super leap wire stunt stuff and it feels so out of place when it feels like they should be really emphasizing high quality sword choreography above all else.  The finale is okay, but that's it.  Also Scarlet is in the movie, but she adds nothing.  Baroness was okay.  He doesn't even get his suit till the very end of the movie.  It just doesn't work for me and I see why it failed, which sucks as I would love for GIJOE to figure out something as the previous movies before this didn't really work out either.

Men in Black - Been a long while since I've watched this movie, figured I'd maybe do a run of the series as I don't think I really saw the third or fourth one, just bits I think.  I do love the Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith dynamic, Jones is such a perfect hard edge straight man to the younger high energy Smith.  Vincent D'Onofrio is also fantastic as Edgar, I love the whole creepy almost horror-esque tone to the whole thing.  I can't say the CG holds up as good these days, some things are better than others, but the practical effects are fun.  Whole movie is just a good time.

Men in Black 2 - I found it funny that they end the first movie with Smith getting a cool new look outfit and glasses, but then the sequel is like "Nah, he's just wearing a regular suit again." lol I do sorta feel like this is one of those sequels that kinda rehashes stuff from before, like instead of being a sequel that does something new, they have to bring back Tommy Lee Jones and that dynamic and they kinda hit a lot of the same beats of the previous story in the process.  It's a great dynamic, but half the movie is just about leading to Jones coming back as K, and the McGuffin is another jewel that'll lead to the end of the world and similar stuff from the first movie happens again.  It's not a bad movie, it's just not as good and fresh as the original.

Men In Black 3 - I like this one, I think I did watch it before, don't remember a whole lot, but I like it a lot more than the second one, just because it isn't trying to just rehash the previous movie.  Got some fun, light-hearted time travel stuff, Josh Brolin nails a younger Tommy Lee Jones, there's not a lot of the goofy side character nonsense that was in the sequel, which is a plus.  A funny nod to the era I liked was that in the past MIB HQ, a lot of the aliens and such looked more like old school Star Trek-esque aliens.  There's no real reason for that, but it's goofy.  I dig this one, I would recommend it.  I was gonna watch the last one "MIB International", but it's a subscription only to another channel, so that's not happening.  Overall though, this is a fun series.

Invincible: Atom Eve - They did a special to show the backstory for Atom Eve, which is nice for something to watch until Invincible returns, and it's great, it still has that hard hitting Invincible edge, which makes for a crazy young superhero origin story.  Well animated, good story, quality stuff for sure.  Wasn't expecting another Lance Reddick performance, he'll be greatly missed.  Love Atom Eve's powers, it's like a crazy extreme version of Green Lantern's, able to control molecules, transform objects into different things, or as she uses it, creating physical energy defenses and weapons or anything she can think of.  Her abilities are definitely terrifying, showing that she's incredibly powerful by the end.

[Cartagia]

American Graffiti - I'd trade pretty much everything Star Wars post-1983 if it meant that George Lucas had made more movies like this.

Horse Feathers - Marx Brothers shenanigans.  Not as good as Duck Soup, but it has some good laughs.something.

A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors - The setpieces are incredible and third act is pretty great, but it doesn't do enough to really develop the actual Dream Warrior crew outside of their single personality traits. Does not help that a couple of the kids are almost outright bad. If it had a bit more depth it could easily go toe to toe with the original.

Barbie - Kinda blows my mind that the big budget Barbie movie was this surrealist and existential. It has some slight internal consistency issues, but those are ultimately just minor niggles in what is colorful blast of fun and excellent filmmaking.

Pineapple Express - The genre mixing here walks a very precarious tightrope, but it manages to stay shockingly balanced throughout.

[kamikazekeeg]

Guardians of the Galaxy 3 - A great sendoff to the Guardians, whether they come back to any major degree or not, this was a great time, probably my favorite of the Marvel films in awhile, like I enjoyed No Way Home and Multiverse of Madness, but this all around just good and it got me to tear up a couple times throughout.  Not sure if this is my favorite of the Guardian films or not, might take a few more goes perhaps before I can say, as I think all three do a great job telling their story and keeping themselves distinct.  James Gunn just nailed this stuff, I hope he can do a great job managing the DC movies coming up.

[Cartagia]

The Fugitive - Straight-forward, no nonsense, tightly-paced, and greatly acted. Genuinely can't believe TLJ won an Oscar for this.  Not that he's bad.  He great. It's just such an understated matter-of-fact performance.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem - Easily the second best TMNT film.  Very wise decision to lean hard into the family aspect of the group and to have kids / teens voice the team.  Lots of laughs, terrific action, amazing art style.

[weirdfeline]

Mutant Mayhem was really good. Looking forward to the sequel + show.

[kamikazekeeg]

Transformers: Rise of the Beast - Overall I thought this was fairly decent, it sorta feels like a mixture of what Bumblebee was doing and the Bay films, but kinda the best of both I guess.  Real solid Transformer designs, decent enough story, I thought Maximals were handled well enough and I was thrown for a slight loop at the ending reveal, which was fun.  It's nothing amazing I feel, comes across abit by the numbers, but I didn't have any major complaints and it has none of the stuff I hate from the Bayverse films.

Also I'm so glad they held back on putting "No Sleep Til Brooklyn" in this movie.  I've heard it twice this year in other movies, even if this movie made sense to put it in lol

Jardhead - Random war movie watch, a very depressing take on the Persian Gulf War of the early 90's, how miserable and useless it all was, the lead up, being stuck over there for a half a year, doing absolutely nothing, before having a couple days of war, and then having it all end, and being sent back home like it was nothing.  This one of those movies that I wouldn't "recommend", it kinda has to be something you want to see, because it's kinda just a sad watch, there's no likeable characters, everyone sort of just an asshole soldier...I guess it can at least be said to be a movie that is absolutely not trying to glorify a single thing about what happened.