Rate The Last Movie You Watched

[ISiddiqui]

Coraline 3D - 9/10: It gets 1 to 2 extra points for the 3D and how well it worked. It wasn't gimmicky, like I thought it might be (like things flying out at you to scare you), but fit effortlessly into the story and really imparted a wow factor to the proceedings. The story was also very well done and a great "be careful what you wish for" type of tale. Some great secondary characters and excellent voice acting. Also a movie like this shows just how awesome stop motion is, even in the age of near perfect CGI.

[AgustusM]

Slumdog Millionaire 10/10 -- Was wary because of all the hype, but it surpassed all my expectations. Brilliant

[DataKing]

Pathfinder (5 / 10): Karl Urban plays a viking who is left behind on the shores of North America as a child, and is then raised by adoptive Native American parents. The themes are unimaginative (revenge vs. love, finding one's own path, blahblahblah) but I found the fight choreography to be passable. The level of graphic nature may put some people off, but I found it acceptable to get across the brutal nature of melee combat, without going over-the-top (see my second review below). Overall a very average movie. The one true redeeming factor was seeing The Kurgan role (from Highlander) reborn to some degree by Clancy Brown, only this time as a Viking (and not immortal).

Rambo - 2008 (5 / 10): Sylvester Stallone takes on the role as John Rambo once again. This time John is motivated to help a group of mercenaries rescue Christian missionaries captured by militants in a remote portion of Burma. Overall the movie was about what I expected: a violent military-action affair with lots of gunfire and Rambo being his usual ass-kicking self. But the one thing that keeps me from rating this film higher is the violence, or rather the graphic nature of it. Now don't get me wrong, I'm no prude when it comes to showing graphic violence in movies (Braveheart and Saving Private Ryan are two favorites of mine), but this movie takes things too far. It's one thing for a film-maker to show you some brutal images to get across the point of how nasty and violent things can get. It's quite another to be repeatedly bludgeoned with the same level and graphical detail again-and-again. Let's just say that by the end of the movie (and it's only about 90 minutes long) I was tired of it.

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by ISiddiqui

Coraline 3D - 9/10: It gets 1 to 2 extra points for the 3D and how well it worked. It wasn't gimmicky, like I thought it might be (like things flying out at you to scare you), but fit effortlessly into the story and really imparted a wow factor to the proceedings. The story was also very well done and a great "be careful what you wish for" type of tale. Some great secondary characters and excellent voice acting. Also a movie like this shows just how awesome stop motion is, even in the age of near perfect CGI.

I agree with your points here. It was really well done. My mental hit puts it at about an 8/10, though, for me, but that might be a personal scale thing.

I think what it brought it down a little (and 8/10 is not a bad score from me) is that, while I enjoyed the experience, I never really felt emotionally connected to the story.

But it was definitely a quality made film, and I am sure kids would get a kick out of it (older kids, it can bee scary for young kids, IMO).

[Alan T]

Originally Posted by Chief Rum

I agree with your points here. It was really well done. My mental hit puts it at about an 8/10, though, for me, but that might be a personal scale thing.

I think what it brought it down a little (and 8/10 is not a bad score from me) is that, while I enjoyed the experience, I never really felt emotionally connected to the story.

But it was definitely a quality made film, and I am sure kids would get a kick out of it (older kids, it can bee scary for young kids, IMO).

Yeah, I took my daughter (who is 8 1/2) out to see Coraline. I kind of regret it as she did get a bit scared during part of the movie (about 10-15 minutes of it). She was fine afterwards and I had asked her if she wanted to leave, but she said no.

I think I had the movie at 7/10 myself because it felt to me like they had a bunch of cool animation that they wanted to do and then pieced the story on top of it. It was a nicely done movie, and I thought it was a neat concept. I don't think it is a repeat watch type of movie though.

[ISiddiqui]

Well, like I said, I gave it 1 to 2 extra points for the 3D. I was just kinda wowed by how far 3D had come.

[Buccaneer]

Originally Posted by DataKing

Pathfinder (5 / 10): Keith Urban plays a viking

Make that Karl Urban, place. Keith Urban is rockstar, not movie star.

[DataKing]

Originally Posted by Buccaneer

Make that Karl Urban, place. Keith Urban is rockstar, not movie star.

Fixed. Thanks for the catch. I must have been thinking about that atrocious opening set of his before the Daytona 500.

[DataKing]

Batman - Gotham Knight (7/10): A collection of six short animated films with the Batman. Some of the stories were better than others (Working Through Pain was my personal favorite). Overall it does a good job of showing different sides to the Batman, especially his dark nature and troubled psyche (the main reason why he's one of my favorite superheroes). The one thing keeping me from giving this a higher rating is my criticism whenever I see one of these "compilations"; the shifts in style and voice are distracting. I would rather see one team do the entire work, rather than a number of different artists' and voice actors' efforts strung together. I find myself spending too much time getting used to the new art style and voice acting every 15 minutes to truly enjoy the stories that are being told.

[Lorena]

Sicko - 8/10

Yikes

[Mustang]

Eagle Eye - 7.5 - Nothing fancy, just a typical action/suspense type movie.

[Pyser]

rock n rolla - 1/10

i was lost 90 seconds in. gave up after 30 mins. didnt like anything about it. felt like ritchie was parodying himself

[Buccaneer]

Live Free or Die Hard - 8.5/10 - Really enjoyed this one - good, tight action. It also has one of the best sidekicks I've seen in any action movies (which is the Mac guy in the ads).

[Alan T]

The wife and I went to see Slumdog millionaire tonight. We both enjoyed the movie, but both of our expressions afterward was,"That's it?"

There has been so much hype about this movie, everyone saying how it was 5 stars, etc... In the end we both felt it was an interesting story, but easily have liked other movies in the last year better.

[Lorena]

Originally Posted by Alan T

The wife and I went to see Slumdog millionaire tonight. We both enjoyed the movie, but both of our expressions afterward was,"That's it?"

There has been so much hype about this movie, everyone saying how it was 5 stars, etc... In the end we both felt it was an interesting story, but easily have liked other movies in the last year better.

Uh oh, u dun piss every1 off now.

[rowech]

Body of Lies (3/10) -- Pains me to say it but this is really just a horrible movie. I think Leo and Crowe did the best they could but the story drags forever and at times you will be completely lost. It ties together in the end but the payoff wasn't worth the time invested.

[Julio Riddols]

If no one here has seen "Chocolate" - holy sh9t, what a great martial arts movie. - 11/10

No wires, none of this "flying" bullshit, just an autistic girl collecting old debts for her former mob boss aunt after the aunt comes down with cancer. Yeah, thats right. The final fight scene is INSANE.

Trust me, if you like martial arts films, this movie kills.

[Buccaneer]

Congrats to Heath Ledger and his family. His performance was truly one of the greatest I had ever seen in my lifetime.

[DanGarion]

So what this the Oscars thread this year?

[ISiddiqui]

Apparently there wasn't one... shame because this was an utterly jawdropping show performance. Just amazing.

[Grammaticus]

Originally Posted by DanGarion

So what this the Oscars thread this year?

Does anybody care?

[sabotai]

Originally Posted by Grammaticus

Does anybody care?

Since no one started an Oscars thread, I'm going to go with no.

[DanGarion]

Originally Posted by ISiddiqui

Apparently there wasn't one... shame because this was an utterly jawdropping show performance. Just amazing.

Yeah I have to say I was extremely impressed with the show this year, it was exceptional, probably one of the best ones ever. From the selection of Hugh Jackman, to the personalized presentations of just about everything, top notch.

[ISiddiqui]

And the change in sets as you go from one part of the movie to another.

You had the amazing costume/makeup stuff looking like backstage and then post production was all those screens hanging in the air. Just wow.

And the hanging crystals were really neat.

[NoSkillz]

Agreed on all counts. Likely my favourite Oscar broadcast ever and I especially loved the personalized introductions for the acting awards. Really a great, great touch that showed how much of an accomplishment it is to just get nominated.

[Karlifornia]

I thought the Oscars were pretty bad..I did like the nominee introductions. They should keep that around.

[mrsimperless]

Originally Posted by Buccaneer

Congrats to Heath Ledger and his family. His performance was truly one of the greatest I had ever seen in my lifetime.

+1

I didn't get to see the show tonight as I'm overseas as per normal, but I haven't seen a result that I disagreed with really. I was hoping for Rourke to take actor, but I haven't seen Milk yet, so I'll have to give that a shot. I'm guessing penelope cruz won for hotness? I'll have to go check out that movie as well along with Slumdog. Even though I have been fighting the urge...

[Chief Rum]

I only caught bits and pieces, but what I did see, I really liked. I was lmao @ Ben Stiller doing the Joaquin Phoenix thing (only thing would have been better would have been Natalie Portman dropping the "I wish Ben Stiller were here tonight to help me present this award" line, which while it would have been expected, still would have been hilarious), and Jack Black got some laughs out of me with his presentation with Jenn Aniston.

I, too, really liked the nominee intros. That's a nice touch they should keep.

When Heath Ledger won, I thought that was a really good moment, expected as it was. The family going up there to accept the statue was touching, and I'll admit I was at least a little emotional watching them accept that and say what they said about Heath.

I would have liked to have been around to catch Danny Boyle accept his director award and to see Slumdog get its statue, but I had to step away from the TV at the time.

[Logan]

Can someone explain these nominee intros for those who didn't see a minute?

[Butter]

For each acting award, they had 5 past winners of that award present sort of a personalized introduction to the nominees one by one... talking about why the role was good, why the actor was good in the role, etc. Hard to tell with some if they were written for the presenter, or if the presenter wrote it himself. Some were awkward, but it mostly worked very well. It worked as a way to get more star power into the show, and to build more suspense for the acting awards, which are the show's glamour awards anyway.

[ISiddiqui]

I think the default was the intro was written for the presenter, but if the presenter knew the person and was friends with them (like it seemed DeNiro was with Penn), they could change it up.

And of course, they were some of the best use of the moving screens.

[boberot]

the best part is that each presenter directed their remarks right to the nominee. Some were really powerful, while some fell a bit flat.

Still a great touch on a great Oscar production that did, unfortunately, seem to go on and on and on . . . .

[Butter]

Originally Posted by ISiddiqui

I think the default was the intro was written for the presenter, but if the presenter knew the person and was friends with them (like it seemed DeNiro was with Penn), they could change it up.

Yeah, I was thinking about this, and I wondered how many were pre-written by someone other than the presenter. Because many of the nominees seemed pretty moved by the introductions, and I thought it would be highly cheesy and even offensive if it turned out that the statements that the presenters made were not authentic (i.e. "I thought your performance was electric", or things like that. I mean, did Shirley MacLaine really watch Rachel Getting Married? If so, great. If not, BOO.)

[boberot]

Speaking of Oscars / great films, I finally got around to seeing The Pianist.

9/10 -- This was the best movie I've seen in a long, long time. Brody's performance was amazing. The story [based on real events] was about a world-class Polish pianist [who was also Jewish] who survived the German occupation of Poland during World War II. The pacing was brilliant. The use of violence was perfect -- just enough to show how harsh the conditions were and how brutal the Nazis could be, but nothing overly graphic. The music is almost worth the price of admission alone. Highly recommended.

[Qwikshot]

The Wrestler

Never be said that casting doesn't count for something, there have been tons of movies where miscasting has been the death of the film. This past year we got to see a few movies do it right, taking risks and providing not just a great film but a great showcasing of acting.

You could argue that Robert Downey Jr. scored big twice this year with Ironman and Tropic Thunder, but after watching the Wrestler, I saw two great artists bring their characters alive. Mickey Rourke gets all the notice, and you can't not notice him in this work. You cannot feel anything but sadness for a guy who is a failure now still grasping for the glory days. Who he may have been in his prime, as you don't know other than his posters of days of yore, you know that he is basically is a good guy, trying to make ends meet, trying to survive, trying to find a way to get back to that pinnacle. But he keeps giving himself, he's respectful to the fans, he's respectful to his opponents, he refuses to admit that he's a shell of himself. To see Rourke as Randy the Ram, is to see a man giving his all to a chracter that gives his all. It's an awesome performance.

But let's not forget Tomei, she is just as fearless, she's still trying to relive or ignore that the years have past. And the duality of the fallen wrester and the old showdancer, is while shown to you quite loudly, it's still okay, because the story and the characters drive it forward with respect and realism.

I won't go into more than to say that it moved me, I'm not a fan of wrestling but when I was young and Hulk Hogan, Iron Sheik, Junkyard Dog, the Animal, Andre the Giant, and a ton of others were so big as to spawn games, movies, action figures and Saturday morning cartoons were a staple of every growning boy's life, you can respect and understand why Randy and Cassidy/Pam (Tomei's character) refuses to give up the ring, the show, the lights, the crowd not matter what the cost.

10 out of 10

[clemsonfan]

Just finished watching Fireproof with Kirk Cameron. Yes, it's a christian movie. But beyond that, it's a really good movie about marriage. A classmate of mine recommended it to me because there is a tendency to get divorced when you are in the nursing program because of the amount of pressure and strain it puts on a marriage. While the acting was not good (except for Kirk Cameron), the story was fabulous. I highly recommend it to anyone that is married and doesn't mind a christian theme.

8/10

[Big Fo]

Little Miss Sunshine - 8/10

A good comedy, I loved all the shots it took at pageants for kids that age. All the characters were funny in their own way.

Helvetica - 7/10

Pretty good considering it's a documentary about typefaces/fonts. Lots of good interviews with various graphic designers. I'm still not that fond of the lower-case t's though.

[bob]

Originally Posted by clemsonfan

Just finished watching Fireproof with Kirk Cameron. Yes, it's a christian movie. But beyond that, it's a really good movie about marriage. A classmate of mine recommended it to me because there is a tendency to get divorced when you are in the nursing program because of the amount of pressure and strain it puts on a marriage. While the acting was not good (except for Kirk Cameron), the story was fabulous. I highly recommend it to anyone that is married and doesn't mind a christian theme.

8/10

This movie was done by a Baptist church in the town i lived in for about 10 years. Most of the actors in it are church members, not professional actors, thus the crappy acting. I still need to rent it, just so I can see some of my high school classmates trying to act.

[Pyser]

wristcutters - 7/10

enjoyable dark comedy about where people who commit suicide go (a slightly shittier version of earth, where no one smiles). very end was a letdown, but a good ride the whole time

[Crim]

Originally Posted by clemsonfan

Just finished watching Fireproof with Kirk Cameron. Yes, it's a christian movie. But beyond that, it's a really good movie about marriage. A classmate of mine recommended it to me because there is a tendency to get divorced when you are in the nursing program because of the amount of pressure and strain it puts on a marriage. While the acting was not good (except for Kirk Cameron), the story was fabulous. I highly recommend it to anyone that is married and doesn't mind a christian theme.

8/10

I liked it okay, and most of the message was good. But the dialogue and the acting were truly horrendous.

[Logan]

Body of Lies - 6.5/10

This movie should have been much better, and when I first saw the previews I expected it to be an upper echelon type. Heard some pretty average to bad reviews so I held off, and it was warranted. Leo was really good, as was the guy who played the main dude in Jordan, but the plot wasn't real strong and I didn't like the direction it took towards the end (related to Leo's character). Good pacing though and some nice explosions.

[Lorena]

Click - 7/10

I was expecting a comedy but got a semi-funny drama. First half was alright, the second was touching.

[RainMaker]

Pride and Glory (3 out of 10) - I really wanted to like this movie. Some great actors in it including my favorite Edward Norton. But it was slow moving and too long. Some storylines just never went anywhere. What was the point of going into his relationship with his ex? The sister with cancer? Not to mention one of the most laughable fight scenes I've ever seen. The story is also a played out, predictable police plot with the family of officers that we've seen a dozen times. I don't know how you can screw up a movie with such a solid cast.

[rowech]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Pride and Glory (3 out of 10) - I really wanted to like this movie. Some great actors in it including my favorite Edward Norton. But it was slow moving and too long. Some storylines just never went anywhere. What was the point of going into his relationship with his ex? The sister with cancer? Not to mention one of the most laughable fight scenes I've ever seen. The story is also a played out, predictable police plot with the family of officers that we've seen a dozen times. I don't know how you can screw up a movie with such a solid cast.

I thought Norton was up to the task in this one but the rest of the cast was generally bad.

[RainMaker]

Originally Posted by rowech

I thought Norton was up to the task in this one but the rest of the cast was generally bad.

Norton is always great. Voight was a disappointment to me since I really like his work. I just didn't get all the side storylines that went nowhere. What was the point of the scenes with his ex? His sister with cancer? The scar on his face? It just seemed like a movie that could have killed about 10 scenes and been halfway decent.

[rowech]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Norton is always great. Voight was a disappointment to me since I really like his work. I just didn't get all the side storylines that went nowhere. What was the point of the scenes with his ex? His sister with cancer? The scar on his face? It just seemed like a movie that could have killed about 10 scenes and been halfway decent.

I thought Voight was average at best. I thought Farrell was also horrible. Agree with you on a lot of the scenes. That and Body of Lies are two movies I've watched recently and both had every reason to be good and they were both bad.

[rowech]

Last King of Scotland (9/10) -- Loved everything about it.

[Pyser]

choke - 4/10

book was better, but i never thought it would translate into a good movie. i was right.

[Logan]

Originally Posted by rowech

I thought Voight was average at best. I thought Farrell was also horrible. Agree with you on a lot of the scenes. That and Body of Lies are two movies I've watched recently and both had every reason to be good and they were both bad.

Agreed (see a few posts up), meant to review this one too. I'd probably give it the same rating. Norton was good, but there were a bunch of pieces that didn't make sense. For example,

Spoiler

we see that the older brother/sergeant doesn't know that his guys, including Farrell, are dirty, and he confronts them about it. Then he runs around the rest of the movie saying things like "I'm responsible, I knew what was going on" and it wasn't one of those "they were my responsibility, so it's on me" admissions. Then the laughable scene towards the end when one of the rogue cops robs/shoots the store owner and then gets shot. His partner then storms in and starts a hostage situation. Um, why? Your buddy fucked up, you had nothing to do with it. Just call it in. Then a riot starts where the neighborhood is pissed that these cops are killing people, when there was no indication at all that they were cops since they were in normal clothes and driving a normal car.

More wasted potential.

[terpkristin]

Street Fighter - The Legend of Chun-Li 1/10

Went with friends for what we knew would be a horrible movie. We weren't let down. We sat in the back of the theater and made fun of it. What confused me most was that there were some people who were apparently there because they thought it'd be a good movie. The story made no sense, the acting was thin at best and even the fighting wasn't all that great. I gave it 1, though, because that's all I expected, and it could have been worse. I do not know what Chris Klein was doing in that movie. His entire side story made even less sense than the main plot. And he kept saying "Nash Out" which quite frankly was too damn funny. Without the entire Nash sub-plot, it might have gotten a 2. The scariest part of the actual movie is that it looks like they've left it open for Street Fighter - The Legend of Ryu.

Wish the fighting had been better. It's the first movie I've seen to STILL sit at 0% on rottentomatoes.com

/tk