I'm way behind, so these will be short.
The Pirates: Band Of Misfits - New film by the Wallace & Grommit team. The Pirate Captain and his lovable crew want to be taken seriously and try to win their captain the Pirate of The Year Award, so the other pirates will stop making fun of them. Hijinks ensue. Lots of fun, with more adult humor than I'd been expecting, and by adult humor I don't mean sexual humor. I mean intelligent laughs that are likely above the head of the target audience. I liked it.
Chronicle - Three high school kids find a mysterious glowing crystal thingie that gives them superpowers. Can they handle it? I was really impressed with this movie. The special effects were really well done and they did a great job keeping it fairly realistic feeling most of the time. I enjoyed the way the filmmakers kind of took their time and let the story and characters develop. I'm not sure I'd buy it, but I definitely recommend giving it a watch.
Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol - Even better the second time. The stunt work is incredible. ****ing love it.
Exit Through The Gift Shop - I was under the impression that this was a documentary about the graffiti artist Banksy, whose work I like, but it turned out to be much more about this other guy, Thierry Guetta. In that, I was disappointed. Guetta comes off as a bit of a douchebag, and I wasn't all that enthralled with his story, but beyond that the film had some good and interesting bits. Definitely recommended if you're in to or curious about the whole street art thing. If you aren't, then skip it.
Feast - Another movie about a bunch of people stranded in a location while they're attacked by monsters. Not the most original idea, but this flick was a lot of fun. I've had a copy for a while, but gave it a high priority after reading something about they're being a monster face ****ing scene. Wouldn't you? I definitely enjoyed the flick, but I'm not in any real hurry to watch either of the sequels. Someday. And the face ****ing scene was pretty great, although it went by really fast. I had to spin it back and watch in slow-mo.
The Thin Blue Line - I forget who it was that watched this here recently (Diehard?), but after that person's recommendation and then seeing Errol Morris' more recent documentary, Tabloid, I decided now was the time to give this one a look. And, without thinking about it too much, I think it's safe to say that this is my favorite documentary of all time. Maybe. If not, it's close. The story is about a murdered cop and the innocent man who was wrongly convicted of the crime, despite all evidence to the contrary. I read afterward that the doc did, in fact, help get the conviction overturned. Also, the score by Philip Glass is excellent.
Bunny Lake Is Missing - A single mother and her child move to a new neighborhood. Mom takes her kid to the new school. School's out, mom goes to pick her daughter up, she can't find her and no one at the school remembers seeing her. Is mom crazy or is their a conspiracy? A pretty decent thriller. The ending/reveal doesn't quite live up to the tension, so I was a little disappointed. Not every missing person movie can be The Vanishing, I guess. Solid performances and nice cinematography, though. Worth a watch, but not a buy.
Motel Hell - Cheesy 80's horror flick about a remote inn run by a couple who also have the best barbecue in the state. You'll never guess what it's made of, I bet! This movie was ok. It's not really gorey enough or funny enough to really be worthwhile except at the very end, when the crazy dude is wearing the giant hog's head and swinging a chainsaw. That **** was ****ing awesome. Maybe you can find that part on YouTube and just watch it without watching the rest. I'm not saying it was bad. It has it's moments and there's a good amount of WTF in here, but... ehh. I just liked the ending.
River's Edge - Decided to give this a shot after reading a bunch of reviews that said it was one of the best of the 90's indie film genre. It's about a bunch of high school kids, including Keanu Reeves and Crispin Glover, who are kind of hooligan-ish. They ditch school a lot, they drink beer, they say bad words, they defy their parents, etc. Anyway, one day one of their buddies kills his girlfriend just because and he shows the whole crew the body. And the movie is about the way they reacted. Apparently, it's supposed to be some sort of statement about the disaffection of the youth of today, but mostly I just thought it was boring. None of the characters are particularly likable except for Dennis Hopper who plays a crazy drug dealer the kids buy pot from. Crispin Glover was really annoying, even though I like him. He felt miscast to me. Anyway, meh.
Fire Of Conscience - Leon Lai is a Hong Kong cop who recently lost his family. He's struggling with alcoholism and depression. He's assigned to a case involving a car accident and the death of a prostitute which helps break him out of his funk because of conspiracies and murder. This movie was alright. It was better than the last Dante Lam film I saw, The Viral Factor, but it wasn't anything special. Some good action and nice cinematography. Not entirely sure why everyone loves this guy so much at the moment.
Equinox - Who says Criterion doesn't have a sense of humor? This movie about two couples who go out to some big park to meet with a scientist and instead find something else is one of the campiest, weirdest movies I've seen in a while. I bet this movie ****in' kills at midnight screenings. Would definitely like to own this at some point.
Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion - An innocent woman is used by a corrupt police detective to put himself in a position to be successful in his corruption. She attempts to kill him, but is stopped and imprisoned, where she has to deal with abusive guards and evil convict bitches all while plotting her escape and revenge on the man responsible for her imprisonment. This is the first installment in one of my favorite series of all time and I love this movie to death. If you have any interest at all in Japanese exploitation/trash/pink/retro cinema, this should be the first movie you watch. It's ****ING AWESOME. Lots of blood, lots of sex and constant visual experimentation that works really ****ing well. I love this movie and it's star, Meiko Kaji.
Female Convict Scorpion: Jailhouse 41 - The second installment in the series, this one sees Nami back in prison after the events of the first movie. The guards and warden of the prison are none too happy about what she did last movie and they go the extra mile to make her regret what she did. But she escapes with a bunch of other prisoners and the group of them make their way towards freedom trying to outrace the cops on their trail. This is actually my favorite of the series, and one of my favorite films of all time, despite the almost complete absence of nudity. It's got even more weird, experimental **** in it and more of a slow burn with an immense pay off after all the build up. Should be required viewing.
Female Convict Scorpion: Beast Stable - And the third movie in the series. Nami is on the run and hides with a prostitute who helps her out. Not as good as the first two, but still awesome. She cuts a dude's arm off at the beginning and runs down the streets of Japan with a severed arm handcuffed to her wrist. It's awesome. There is a 4th movie in the series with Meiko Kaji, but it has a different director and isn't as good. Still worthwhile, but completely inferior to the original trilogy. The series actually continued without Meiko Kaji for a little while, but I have yet to see any of the post-Meiko ones. Supposedly, they bring a lot of the sex and violence back, so they're probably pretty great. Someday...
Mommie Dearest - I'd seen most of this before in pieces, but actually got through the whole thing in one sitting recently. Faye Dunaway plays Joan Crawford in the movie based on the book by Crawford's daughter. The book basically accuses Crawford of being an abusive psycho and Faye Dunaway does a great job with it. The movie really walks a fine line between being a compelling drama and an over-the-top so bad it's good. Apparently, this movie is another midnight screening favorite. It's got some pretty hilarious dialogue, but... something about it still draws me in in a serious way. I don't know what. I guess the DVD has a commentary by John Waters that I hear is ****ing hilarious, so I might buy it someday.
Paperhouse - Do you like Guillermo Del Toro movies? Then this is for you. A little girl draws a house in her notebook and then dreams about the house she drew. When she wakes up, she draws more details about the house, including a resident, which then also appear in subsequent dreams. And slowly these dreams turn into nightmares. I was pretty sure when I saw this was showing on IFC that GDT had a production company called Paperhouse, but now I'm having second thoughts because googling "Paperhouse guillermo del toro" isn't bringing anything up. So maybe I'm wrong, but that's weird then because this is such a GDT-like movie that I could totally see him loving enough to name a production company after. Hrm. Anyway, it's very fairy-tale goes bad and it's really, really ****ing dark and scary at a couple points. It's like one of those kids movies that would seriously traumatize any kid that watches it. Loved it. Highly recommended.
The Fury - Kirk Douglas' kid has powers. He can do things with his mind that no one else can. So this shady government agency wants him and they try to kill KD to get him. With everyone thinking he's dead, KD begins the search for his son and comes across a young lady who has powers similar to the ones his son has. Together, they look to find out what happened to his son. This movie was pretty decent. It's Brian DePalma, so I expected to enjoy it, but you can kind of tell that it's early in his career because it's not quite as good as some of the stuff he did just a little bit later. For some reason, I had a really tough time accepting Kirk Douglas as a macho badass, but otherwise the movie was pretty good. Some good kills.
Sneakers - Man, I hadn't seen this since it came out, and I remembered really liking it so I decided to watch it again. Robert Redford leads a security company comprised of hackers of various types. His crew include Dan Akroyd, Sydney Poitier, David Straithairn, River Phoenix and Mary McDonell (sort of). Redford gets blackmailed into helping what he thinks is the NSA steal something, but once he finds out who they really are and what it was they really stole, they decide they need to steal it back. Immediately. Very enjoyable heist/caper film. Great cast, good laughs and it's pretty smart. All around, a good time. Definitely recommended.
The Haunting Of Julia - Mia Farrow's daughter dies choking on a piece of apple while she and her husband, Keir Dullea, panic, unable to save her. Apparently, the heimlich maneuver wasn't well known in London in 1981. Anyway, Mia doesn't take her daughter's death very well and is hospitalized because of it. She's released a couple of months later, but doesn't go home to her husband and buys a whole new house to live in alone. Is the house haunted? Is her husband terrorizing her? Or are the strange noises and weird occurrences something else? This is a damn good haunted house movie. It's got tons of creepy atmosphere and actually does a decent job of keeping you guessing most of the way. The ending is especially excellent, as it's both creepy and doesn't answer every question you might have. It's too bad this hasn't been released on DVD because I'd buy it.