What have you watched lately?

[jjreason]

I saw Brave last night. It was definitely a great movie, but darker than I expected. Quite possibly the most realistic backgrounds in any animated pic, ever.

My only comment to the negative would be that it felt I had seen most of it before, like they borrowed a few too many things or something.To expand, the bear fight was Uncle Scar vs Simba, the dark magic aspects have been done & redone (but that's Disney so I don't decry its use or anything) and the mom-bear being hogtied felt like an homage of sorts to the classic animated Lion, Witch & Wardrobe.

It also seemed to me that there were less "shockingly funny" moments, those ones where you suck in a breath before you laugh because you're at least partially mortified they went there. The bum & boob jokes were fine, but not surprising at all. Pixar is usually great for nailing at least a few of those for the parents. All that being said, I would still VERY highly recommend going to see Brave.

[RoIIo Tomassi]

I saw Brave on Tuesday. Pixar's record remains unblemished (I haven't seen Cars Deux, so I can't comment on it).

And I saw Moonrise Kingdom today. Wes Anderson continues to be quirky and enjoyable.

[anarky]

Don't believe what anyone says. Cars 2 is a million times better than Cars 1. It has a mostly original story and isn't a remake of Doc Hollywood. Also, though Mater being in the movie more sounds like a bad thing, they actually tried to make him a character and not just a pathetic running joke.

[RoIIo Tomassi]

All I know is, adjusted for inflation, Cars 2 is at the bottom of the Pixar list.

[Diabolical]

I never have and probably never will watch either Cars movie.

[anarky]

Finally saw Spartacus over the past two days (I started watching late last night, and got to the point where I was unable to stay awake no matter how good it was), and it was well worth it. I'll not be too concerned with spoiling a 50-year-old "based on a true story" movie and say it has the happiest ending I've ever seen where the main character is crucified in front of his wife and baby, shortly after being forced to kill one of his closest friends. (Hey, he most likely got off easier than the historical Spartacus.)

Seriously, they don't make 'em like that anymore. It bordered on melodramatic at times, and the history was a touch wonky, but never enough to bring it down (and it was millions of times more accurate than Gladiator).

[RoIIo Tomassi]

I saw The Fugitive for the first time in quite a few years. Still holds up very well. Tommy Lee Jones totally deserved his Oscar. Also, Jane Lynch and Neil Flynn had small roles in the film. It's funny how Julieanne Moore got third billing even though she only has 1.5 scenes in the movie and about 4 minutes of screen time.

[Diabolical]

I saw The Fugitive for the first time in quite a few years. Still holds up very well. Tommy Lee Jones totally deserved his Oscar. Also, Jane Lynch and Neil Flynn had small roles in the film.

Love this movie. Ford deserved an Oscar too.

Scrubs once made a joke about Flynn (as Janitor) being in it.
Flynn is also briefly in Major League as the dockworker who says "Who are these fuckin' guys?"

[Ran]

Saw a couple John Wayne movies on AMC today. Rio Bravo, which I've seen several times, was the first. John Wayne with Ricky Nelson and Dean Martin. Martin and Nelson actually sing a couple songs back to back while they are sitting in the Sheriff's office. That's what cowboys do. You just don't see that in movies anymore. Probably for good reason.

The second was The Shootist. I had never seen that one before. It was John Wayne's last film. James Stewart, Ron Howard, Harry Morgan, and Lauren Bacall were the co-stars. Harry Morgan had a few good lines. Good movie.

[RoIIo Tomassi]

Rio Bravo is one my favorite westerns for that very reason. It's like the quintessential western from the era before Sergio Leone and Clint Eastwood pretty much reinvented the genre. C'mon, the sheriff's name is John T. Chance! Back then, that wasn't even ironic or tongue in cheek! Howard Hawks is one of my favorite directors ever. And Walter Brennan as Stumpy is a pimp.

[anarky]

Puss in Boots. Well, not exactly. I dozed off for a good chunk of it, then left the room to do something more interesting. Those Shrek movies just get worse with every installment. Only reason I bothered with this is because the Puss character was initially funny, and the marketing made it look like it was a return to form after the last couple of movies. Don't waste your time. It's not even anything I can rip to shreds. It's just dull.

[Ran]

Mars Attacks. First time I've seen it. Amazing how many celebrities they had crammed into that film.

[Slicker]

The Campaign. It was...okay. It had it's funny parts but with it being less than an hour and a half long they couldn't cram much into it. At most it should've been a Red Box grab.

[RoIIo Tomassi]

Went to Bourne Legacy. It was a very enjoyable follow to the Damon films. Much like the third film, this one picks up sort of midway through the earlier films and runs parallel to them. Tony Gilroy wrote the first three films, and graduated to writer/director for this one, so the continuity is tight and smart. Also, Rachel Weisz has sold her soul because she looks exactly the same as she did 15 years ago when she started making films. The woman does not age.

[anarky]

The Return of the Seven (AKA The Return of the Magnificent Seven).

Don't waste your time sullying the memory of the original. They kept Yul Brynner (and perhaps the woman who played Petra; if not, she looked the same). They re-cast Chico, actually with an Hispanic actor this time, and Vin, with some guy who sounded a bit like Steve McQueen but looked nothing like him. They decided Vin was younger and less experienced than Chris (guess they didn't see the beginning of the first, eh?) and tossed in a few extras who might've been interesting if they'd been developed at all (a womanizer, a suicidal killer, a former outlaw, and some random kid who didn't even know where he was from). Then they added villains so stereotypical that I'm surprised the (Hispanic) actors they hired, even in 1966, didn't take one look at the script and throw it on the ground, saying, "Dude, that's just wrong." And an absurdist plot by the bad guys to rebuild a ruined village by kidnapping hundreds of farmers from other villages, and made the primary strategy of both sides be "ride at them shooting at random." They couldn't even be bothered to make Chico's village look even remotely like it did in the original.

This could've been a passable, albeit cliched, western, except it's the sequel to one of the best movies ever made. Save your time and watch the first one a few more times. I plan to soldier through the other two sequels since I DVR'd them, but my hopes were already low, and just got even lower.