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Post by Deleted on Dec 10, 2020 1:33:10 GMT -5
toei - afraid it's just one of those cheap and cheerful sets where they take the original DVD's and stick a naff slipcase around them. Those Arrow Blu Rays all look really nice (I love the covers), but they're a bit expensive for me just now.
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Post by toei on Dec 10, 2020 11:28:20 GMT -5
Oh, I see. Yeah, Arrow always seem to release expensive limited-edition stuff. Anyway, you'll be fine with DVDs, unless they somehow found some crappy dub somewhere and it's the only option (very unlikely, but that's usually a problem with cheap Sonny Chiba karate flick sets).
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Post by Woody Alien on Jan 22, 2021 11:39:51 GMT -5
I don't know, if you have seen them, but if you are interested in european animation or stop motion and if haven't seen them, then I would recommend "La planete sauvage" (also known as "Fantastic Planet") or "The Pied Piper" from 1986. I saw them 10 years ago, thus I don't know, if they are actually good.
I ended up seeing The Pied Piper during the holidays. It was nice, but I wish people would stop saying that claymation/stop motion is "the creepiest thing ever". Sure, it's a fairly dark movie, and the designs of the characters don't help (what's with Eastern Europeans and their obsession with making everyone look like robots?), but I've seen a lot of drawn 2D stuff far darker and more disturbing than that. Where was I? Oh yes, it was a fairly good and interesting movie and I bet it took a lot of work to build the sets and puppets, and make them look like Medieval art.
The other day I saw Megamind on Netflix. A nice affectionate parody of the Superman characters and mythos, with some good gags and a soundtrack full of classic rock songs that I bet costed a lot of money. It's also interesting to see what happens to the villains when finally they get rid of their hero nemesis, what they can do to fill that void, and I wish more stories would explore this angle. Another interesting thing (that is probably more relevant now than 10 years ago) is how the klutzy dumb secondary character would just be the bumbling sidekick in any other kids' film, while here he turns out to be a lying "nice guy" scumbag creep and the only truly "evil" character in the movie.
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Post by Woody Alien on Jul 5, 2021 16:40:11 GMT -5
I followed Netflix's algorhythm suggestions and ended up watching Love and Monsters, a sci-fi dramedy about the "monsterpocalypse", an event that turned most non hot-blooded creatures (bugs, worms, amphibians, fish etc.) into huge mutant creatures that almost exterminated humans, who now live in underground bunkers. The "love" in the title is about the protagonist who starts the trip alone to reach the outpost where his former girlfriend now lives, a dangerous journey among the beautiful but abandoned landscapes. The ending is kinda preachy and annoying but I liked the rest, something of a mix between Zombieland and I Am Legend plus other sci-fi tropes. The creature designs and effects are excellent and I especially liked the monsters that look like a hybrid of the Graboids from Tremors and the Boreworms from Splatterhouse. I can easily see it being turned into a roguelike game of sorts... if anyone cared about it of course.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2021 9:30:01 GMT -5
I've been watching quite a lot of movies lately. Mostly what I'd seen before. Last night I rewatched an old favourite. I'm just going to leave an exert below since it always makes me laugh. I'm sure you'll all recognise it. Marge: Okay, I want you to tell me what these fellas looked like. Hooker #1: Well, the little guy, he was kinda funny-looking. Marge: In what way? Hooker #1: I dunno, just funny-lookin'. Marge: Can you be any more specific? Hooker #1: I couldn't really say. He wasn't circumcised. Marge: Was he funny lookin' apart from that? Hooker #1: Yeah. Marge: So, you were having sex with the little fella, then? Hooker #1: Uh-huh. Marge: Is there anything else you can tell me about him? Hooker #1: No. Like I say, he was funny lookin'. More n' most people even. Marge: And what about the other fella? Hooker #2: He was a little older. Looked like the Marlboro man. Marge: Yeah? Hooker #2: Yeah. Maybe I'm sayin' that cause he smoked Marlboros. Marge: Uh-huh. Hooker #2: A subconscious-type thing. Marge: Yeah, that can happen. Hooker #2: Yeah. Hooker #1: They said they were goin' to the Twin Cities? Marge: Oh, yeah? Hooker #2: Yeah! Hooker #1: Yeah. Is that useful to ya? Marge: Oh, you betcha, yeah.
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Post by windfisch on Aug 20, 2021 17:34:04 GMT -5
Having been to Minnesota once, we got gifted a couple of native VHS tapes. Among those were the above quoted mystery movie, Grumpy Old Men and this:
"Minnesotan is not a musical language."
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2021 21:04:27 GMT -5
Having been to Minnesota once, we got gifted a couple of native VHS tapes. Among those were the above quoted mystery movie, Grumpy Old Men and this:
"Minnesotan is not a musical language."
I didn't think I could learn new ways to be more negative but apparently the Minnesotans have me beat. It seems they were well prepared for life in times of Corona. Looks like there's a book too which would make for a nice quick reference guide should I forget how many times to reject a beverage or even need the recipe for a nice generic hotdish. Video is hilarious and I really hope it was turned into a full series. "Well, I'm sure you've got places to go and things to do and errr..... you don't...."
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Post by windfisch on Aug 21, 2021 16:44:30 GMT -5
Well, it may not be completely unamusing compared to most other self-proclaimed "how to"-video-guides out there. One could've been caught smiling even. Can't really complain. If I were a Minnesotan I'd probably describe the dirty C-word situation as follows:
Our politicians' and their top-scientologicians' integrity is not too good. But they're not using nuclear bombs on the population - yet. So it could be worse. Whatever.
Edit:
So I actually did watch a movie yesterday: Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero. It's basically an episode of The Animated Series only three times as long. Just don't compare it to Heart of Ice, probably the shows best episode and a tough act to follow. That one ended with a regretful Freeze, giving him back a bit of his humanity. In SubZero his transformation from peaceful hermit back to ruthless villain comes rather abruptly. It would've been more believable if we saw him actually struggle, if he showed some inner conflict and ambiguity in his actions.
However, as a standalone story SubZero is still very enjoyable: It offers more of that classy animation (some so-so cgi not withstanding), music and voice acting that the show is known for.
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Post by windfisch on Sept 24, 2021 21:51:18 GMT -5
Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker
Compared to SubZero or Mask of the Phantasm (easily the best animated DC hero movie) the artstyle has become more "angular", colours and lines look cleaner. It lacks texture and a certain handmade quality, "warmth", if you will, that the aforementioned movies and the original series had. Still, the animation is pretty solid, even great at times and so is the voice acting. Not so solid however, is the writing. While I think that the Joker is too overused as a villain, it actually starts off rather decently. But it does falls apart towards the end. Even if the series is known for its more fantastical elements, the big Joker "reveal" is just too far fetched and way too lazily done. If that wasn't enough, they also felt the need to add a "threat to the whole world" element on top of that (that creaking sound is me rolling my eyes very, very hard). I also didn't like that it sometimes felt violent for the sake of edginess, trying a bit too hard in that regard. Overall it's watchable, but somewhat dissapointing.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 25, 2021 0:54:43 GMT -5
windfisch - When I saw your name attached to this thread the words 'please don't be about Baby's Day Out' were repeating through my head. What? You think I believe a movie with this poster is anything but a bona fide classic? Well apparently I do.
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Post by windfisch on Sept 25, 2021 7:34:34 GMT -5
C'mon ex, even I have standards, as low as they may be. Now, if it had Dennis Hopper and Raul Julia outhamming each other in the villain department, that'd be a different situation.
Seriously, I never cared for the likes of Home Alone and this strikes me as similar. So the chances of me ever checking it out are close to zero. You're safe... for now.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 25, 2021 21:03:02 GMT -5
C'mon ex, even I have standards, as low as they may be. Now, if it had Dennis Hopper and Raul Julia outhamming each other in the villain department, that'd be a different situation. Seriously, I never cared for the likes of Home Alone and this strikes me as similar. So the chances of me ever checking it out are close to zero. You're safe... for now. I have had to learn to enjoy Home Alone since I am more or less expected to watch 1&2 every Christmas time. I find a bottle of red makes it easier, but I have grown to accept them. On the other hand should I want to watch my chosen Christmas movie, Gremlins, I have to do so alone. Back on the Bat front, I never gave Beyond a go. I think growing up as a comic book geek...err, I mean fan, I grew to expect a certain amount of faithfulness in any adaptation, so I prefer to stick to the classic animated series. It's always strange to me when a license is used but then completely changed for TV and movies. Seems like that's only going to create disappointment.
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Post by windfisch on Sept 26, 2021 6:23:21 GMT -5
Oh Gremlins, it has been ages since I last watched those movies. Time for a rewatch, I suppose. My Christmas movie of choice would probably be Batman Returns, though it's been a while, too.
Back then I had fun with the Batman Beyond series (aka "... of the Future"). The main concept is fine - an aged Wayne mentoring a Peter Parker-type protege, sure, why not. But in hindsight I think they could've fleshed out the characters a bit more. The world also felt too sterile and villains oftentimes were less interesting variants of the classic ones. All in all it was a bit more run-of-the-mill than TAS.
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Post by 🧀Son of Suzy Creamcheese🧀 on Nov 1, 2021 7:08:03 GMT -5
Anyone watch anything spoooooky this Halloween? I managed to squeeze in three horror movies at the last minute.
First one's Carrie (the 70's one, obviously). Very interesting movie. I knew about That Famous Scene, of course, but the rest of it was completely different from what I expected. I'd say that the rest is actually stronger than that scene (the surprise factor is gone since it's so well known, and it's honestly kinda cheesy). I liked the turns this took in the ending, and it was neat that the Tommy Ross character actually turned out to be a nice guy, which kind of goes against trope expectations. Sissy Spacek can actually kinda pass for a high schooler, which is something you don't see often in movies.
Second one I've watched was The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad. I thought this was going to be a collection of two horror stories, but only the second segment is horror-y, and only in the last third or so. But it was fun enough and a nice change of pace coming off all those Disney package films of the 40's (I'm watching them in order, you see...). There's one scene in this that's like the 40's version of the Crazy Frog, which kind of made me laugh.
Last one's Child's Play (1988 one). This one's a bit all over the place, with some good and bad acting, some good and bad effects, and overall the final act was a lot stronger than what came before. Pretty enjoyable watch overall.
So, not a bad run this year.
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Post by Woody Alien on Nov 1, 2021 8:34:04 GMT -5
Only spooky film I saw these days was Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark on TV yesterday. The book these stories are based on is totally unknown here, so I judged it purely as a horror movie for a general audience, and quite liked it. Settings and effects are pretty nice, the main character kids are believable and not annoying and some of the creatures are genuinely unnerving, with the sequence in the hospital standing out for being almost Shining-like.
I'm going as far as to say that it's better than It - Chapter 2, that came around at the same time, that I saw in the theater and found uneven and over-long.
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