What Movies Did You Watch in August 2022?

12 Angry Men: 6.25/8

Not sure how they managed to stretch the simple concept to 90 minutes, but they do reasonably well.

Kind of disappointing that you don’t find out who really committed the murder, but I also understand that it wasn’t really the point of the movie.
 
Belfast (2021)- wonderful movie about a young boy growing up in the 60's during the upheaval in Belfast and the pressures it places on him and his family. Very well done. 6.5/8.
 
Bloodbeat (1982)

Horror: We are at a wooded farm house in Wisconsin during X-mas time and the adult kids have returned to visit mom and her boyfriend who insists they get married. The boy brings his new girlfriend who has an unsettling connection to his mother to the point where she pretty much is out of it in bizarre ways throughout the film. OK, so this is a low budget horror so something has to happen and it does not take long before something starts to slash up residents. This film is extremely bizarre and has a European style score that honestly makes this film work. 80's horror made in Wisconsin.... Oh boy, it is gonna have some Cheeze and boy does it!!!!!!!!!!!! I will say it, this is probably the best bad movie I have seen in a long time and did I mention it is really strange???? .... 5.5/8
 
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12 Angry Men: 6.25/8

Not sure how they managed to stretch the simple concept to 90 minutes, but they do reasonably well.

Kind of disappointing that you don’t find out who really committed the murder, but I also understand that it wasn’t really the point of the movie.

which one did you watch? (year???)
 
Mary Poppins Returns (2018) - a sequel to the 60s classic. Emily Blunt is a natural as the title character, despite not having much to do in the third act. About four or five "show stopping numbers" on the soundtrack. What's really impressive are the visuals of 2D and 3D animation layered with live action throughout the middle of runtime. Perfectly passable way to spend a movie night with your kids.

5.5/8
 
Escape Room 2: Tournament of Champions (2021)

Action/Horror: Survivors of other Escape Rooms find themselves once again in another one. Saw wannabe was entertaining enough I guess .... 4.0/8
 
Unforgiven: 5/8


It was good, but I'm not a huge Western person, and this one didn't really grab me like say Tombstone, The Magnificent Seven, 3:10 to Yuma, The Quick and the Dead, or other quasi-Westerns like Sicario or Hell or High Water.
 
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Unforgiven: 5/8


It was good, but I'm not a huge Western person, and this one didn't really grab me like say Tombstone, The Magnificent Seven, 3:10 to Yuma, The Quick and the Dead, or other quasi-Westerns like Sicario or Hell or High Water.
Never was a big Unforgiven fan, for modern westerns Tombstone and Young Guns II do it for me!
 
Hannie Caulder (1971) - Midnight, not sleepy. Western. Raquel Welch. Maybe, I should stop there but, I'll go on.

Imagine taking parts of four films and splicing them together. Part one: The voluptuous RW seeks revenge after her husband is murdered and she is repeatedly raped. (This is the tired, oft-used hook). Part two: The perpetrators were three: Ernest "McHale's Navy" Borgnine - the head clown - and his two clown brothers - Jack Elam and Strother Martin. Part three: Gunslinger Robert "I Spy" Culp reluctantly agrees to teach Hannie how to shoot and exact revenge. (It was hard for me to see RISC as a cowboy). Part four: The "mysterious" man in black who appeared only briefly in a few scenes yet, thankfully, helped bring this mish-mash to an end. Low budget, weak dialogue. Only ninety minutes, a positive!

5/8 with two points for the smoking Raquel Welch.
 
Top Gun Maverick: 5/8 -2 for too predictible, taking any drama out of it. - 1 for "no no no no no," I've decided from now on, every movie that uses this line of dialogue gets a -1. -1 because Miles Teller. +1 Kilmer leaving 5 because it was still fun and they managed to make Jennifer Connelly not annoying..
 
Top Gun Maverick: 5/8 -2 for too predictible, taking any drama out of it. - 1 for "no no no no no," I've decided from now on, every movie that uses this line of dialogue gets a -1. -1 because Miles Teller. +1 Kilmer leaving 5 because it was still fun and they managed to make Jennifer Connelly not annoying..

Miles Teller is very hit or miss for me, but I thought he was very much “hit” here.
 
The Reef 2: Stalked (Australia-2022)

Horror: 9 months after a traumatic event 4 friends go on a kayak/diving adventure in the pacific to find themselves being stalked by a great white. This one was pretty stale but it did keep some tension going. The shark scenes were a mix of real shark footage and CGI. With the exception of one silly CGI moment it wasn't that bad. The story though wasn't that good.... too much dribble and not accurate bite wounds. I mean come on, this was a pretty big shark yet the bite was maybe a few inches... nah, that leg would of been gone... lol, oh well..... if there is nothing better to do then this middle of the pack is worth the watch..... 4.0/8
 
"Hercules In New York" (1970) - 2/8, also 4/8 (so bad, it's not too bad)

Starring Arnold Stang (best known as the voice of Top Cat) with a very young Arnold Schwarzenegger getting second billing

It's a weird premise, but think 2011's "Thor" on a $300,000 budget, and then you can see its blockbuster potential. Der Ahnold plays the son of Zeus, determined to go on a vacation and live with mortal earthlings in the Big Apple for a while. He is befriended by a milquetoast pretzel stand owner (Stang) and gets mixed up with Mafia wrestling promoters. Meanwhile, back at the Olympus ranch Juno, Nemesis, and Pluto conspire to punish Hercules at the behest of Zeus.

A little hilarity ensues. Very little. Schwarzenegger's accent was so thick at the time, this movie should have come with subtitles.

But Arnold Stang drives the flick with a very touching performance as the earnest yet streetwise underdog whose life is energized by his new friend. The last dialogue exchange between the two must have been the inspiration for the end of "ET".
 
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Licorice Pizza (2021)- this movie has garnered some critical acclaim but I thought it was just okay. The movie just wanders all over the place for two hours then gets the young couple together in the end. Interesting to see Phillip Seymour Hoffman's kid as the star of the movie. 5/8.
 
Roadracers (1994) ... 4.5/8

Did not know what this was trying to be and did not care for it at first but it grew on me as it went on.
 
Top Gun, Maverick - Very entertaining film. As others said, "it hits all the buttons". I was surprised that much of the nostalgia I was feeling was for Star Wars (1977) not the original Top Gun (1986). Every time I heard Cruise say, "don't think" I was thinking "use the force Luke" and I felt he was channeling Yoda when he said "don't try, do". On top of that, the mission itself was straight from the DeathStar.

I might be a bit of a military nerd, but it did bother me to see Maverick restoring a P51 Mustang when a Navy guy, and a carrier pilot at that, would obviously prefer a Corsair.

Great fun.

6/8
 
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One thing I failed to mention regarding Top Gun, Maverick. Although very subtle, there was a clear message about the relationship of NCO's to their commanding officer and young officers who come under their care. This important relationship is, unfortunately, rarely featured in contemporary films. I would have liked to have seen this fleshed out more, but it was good that those relationships at least got a nod in this film.
 
Resident Evil 7: Welcome to Raccoon City (Canada-2021)

Horror: Never played the game and not really a fan of the series. I guess this one takes us back to the origins as the Umbrella Corporation is leaving Raccoon City which is pretty much a dead town but it is going to get a bit deader as there is a breach and some local townies have to try and survive before the whole place gets blasted. This one wasn't that bad and a bit of a surprise. Not my favorite of the 7 but comes in tied for 2nd..... 4.5/8
 
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