Me too. When I read 'Aimless' I was preparing to come charging in to defend it, but it turned out ok.

La confidential, one of Russell Crowes best films.

He is absolutely terrifying.

Webbins wrote:

36. The VVitch: A New England Folktale
Compelling, unnerving and unsettling period debut horror from Robert Eggers. A banished Puritan family encounter an unnatural evil from the woods by their homestead. Great performances all round and a wonderfully authentic script. 9

Would you like to live deliciously

After talking about vampire films and me mentioning Herzog's version of Nosferatu I gave it a second viewing last night. Watched it many years ago but I still have a Herzog-Kinski boxset.

It was made in 1979 but it has aged well, although I think it would benefit from a remaster as the version I watched on DVD has that 70s feel to it that comes from the transfer most likely. 

The Jonathan Harker role is played by a young Bruno Ganz - which I hadn't realised before. I suppose I hadn't seen Downfall back when I first watched it. He plays the part well - playing the young hero while being believable as a victim too.

His wife is played by someone called Isobelle Adjani who is beautiful in it. Her makeup is used to make her look like a silent film actress and her acting in places is reminiscent of it too - with dramatic poses in the style of silent films.

Kinski is great in lead - playing pitiful and threatening as and when required. It's a superb performance actually.

The makeup of Dracula is close to the original but so are some of the shots with the use of shadows in places. So with that and the performances, overall the film feels like a tribute to the original. 

It's set as a period piece - so is horses and carriages etc and is filmed in an range of atmospheric locations in Europe. The soundtrack is unsettling and very effective.

I still believe it's a great version of the story - with the vampire armed with an army of plague spreading rats - it adds enough variation to make it well worth watching. I recommend this if you want to see a good vampire film that's a bit different.

But if you have a thing about rats be warned - there's a lot of them.

Gotta say, the sex scene between Pike and Gonzalez had no reason to exist at all. I mean, I enjoyed it, and maybe that’s reason enough, but it did fuck all for the plot and was only there for titillation.

I’ll happily watch Pike do anything, so watching her do that was lovely. But completely gratuitous. No need for it at all.

Sounds like it was a tick box exercise for diversity and inclusion purposes??

I watched Inside Man (for the first time).

It was ok. Nothing too special tho.

HEATHENS

No, I have taste. You lot would watch any old shite if it has an explosion in it.

Explosions and robots hitting each other.

Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom - It’s clear the film is based on a play, and never really moves beyond that. But it’s one hell of a play, and Boseman in particular is incredible.  Powerful, potent, and depressing as hell.  (It also sent me off to read up on the real Ma Rainey, who was, by all accounts, an interesting woman...). 9/10

Monster Squad - I wanted to see this as a kid, but somehow never managed it until now.  It’s...not great, though I suspect the kid version of me would have liked it.  It’s about as 80s as it’s possible for a kids movie to be.  Classic Movie Monsters rise up to...do something... and only a bunch of kids and an old German guy can stop them.  6/10

Restless Natives - Now this was a film I did watch as a kid, and haven’t seen since.  My own children bought it for me as a birthday present after I told them about it. A comedy about two men in Edinburgh who set out on their motorbike to rob tourists.  As a kid I used to watch this back to back with Eat The Peach (an Irish comedy in which two men set out on a motorbike and build a wall of death) - to the point that they’d largely merged in my head.  Like Monster Squad, the film’s a little of its time (there’s a warning to that effect at the start of the new remastered version) but it’s sufficiently charming and good natured to get away with it I think.  8/10. (It’s probably a 7, but nostalgia upped the score) 

El Ascensor - Spanish time loop movie about a couple who are trapped in a lift, always returning to floor 10 when it gets to the bottom.  They fight, they lie, they solve inter dimensional time travel conundrums. My wife liked it, I thought the fictional movie they reference throughout sounded more fun that the one we actually got.   5/10

Barb and Star Go To Vista Del Mar - I’m not sure how we ended up watching this, and on paper I think I ought to have hated. However, it’s easily the silliest film I’ve seen in a very long time, and it landed at precisely the moment I needed it.  Everything about it is stupid.  The characters, the jokes, the sub-children’s TV plot. And yet, I had fun - which is, after all, the point. Whilst the stars are clearly Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo, it’s surprisingly Jamie Dornan who comes close to stealing the film, simply by embracing the ridiculousness of the whole thing.  So yeah, hard to recommend, and inevitably runs out of steam towards the end, but I had a good time.  7/10

Webbins killing it with his recent watches. Kudos.

You watched The Lighthouse yet?

ShabbyMcCrabby wrote:

Webbins killing it with his recent watches. Kudos.

You watched The Lighthouse yet?

Aye that was last year. Brilliant. This Eggers chap is a bit good.