Film The Redcafe Movie review thread

Wing Attack Plan R said:
Rise of Skywalker got the pan because I felt the makers of that film didn't even understand what their mission was. I can't imagine you or I or anyone who was (at one point in the distant past) passionate about Star Wars creating that story. Return of the Jedi made me feel like I'd been pranked, the fecking Ewoks would remain the worst things in the Star Wars extended universe until Jar Jar and Young Anakin came along. Space teddy bears. Carrie Fisher was totally strung out in that film too and looked 10 years older than she was.

Of the TV stuff, I watched The Mandalorian (first season very good), Book of Boba Fett (dreadful). These two competing Mandalorian shows seemed to be operating from different mythologies. Didn't see Andor or Obi-Wan Kenobi. Watched some of Star Wars Clone Wars with the lad. Better than a lot of the live action stuff.

I think the thing that's missing in all of these now is the sense of awe and wonder. My mind was blown wide open when I saw the first Star Wars, all these new technologies, ships, alien worlds, droids, evil knights in black armor. It was amazing. Then Young Annie took over and everything got dumbed down. Compare and contrast with the new Dune movies: there are all kinds of ships and tech they don't even bother to explain, they just show you something that looks dope. The Star Wars Universe went back to the Tatooine well a few too many times, and its whole aesthetic.
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I have to admit , not seen any of the animated stuff, I know I should just not got round to it.
Ewoks, mmm yeah I can see where your coming from and last time I watched it I knocked points of for them, but this time, they did not actually bother me that much.
Agree about the young Annie comment, Portman for me saved that Trilogy.
Tatooine is the spiritual home, started there and rightly ended there.
Surprised you found Boba Fett dreadful.
 
pauldyson1uk said:
I have to admit , not seen any of the animated stuff, I know I should just not got round to it.
Ewoks, mmm yeah I can see where your coming from and last time I watched it I knocked points of for them, but this time, they did not actually bother me that much.
Agree about the young Annie comment, Portman for me saved that Trilogy.
Tatooine is the spiritual home, started there and rightly ended there.
Surprised you found Boba Fett dreadful.
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Did I mention I watched Return of the Jedi on LSD? That probably had something to do with it. Instead of enhancing it, everything looked so unbelievably fake.
 
pauldyson1uk said:
I saw the first Star Wars when I was 13, loved it saw it 3 times in the first week it was released at The Mayfair in Whitefield.
I have watch most of the new stuff, Andor is brilliant 9/10 very close to a 10 , The Mandalorian, first 2 seasons also 9/10 3rd was not as good 7/10 , Obi-Wan Kenobi I thought was very good 8/10,
The Book of Boba Fett also very good 8/10.
Scores for the films are not a million miles apart, A New Hope yeah there is a case for higher than an 8, but not a 10 , Return of the Jedi is better than a 6.
Rise of Skywalker only a 4, harsh I think.
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I'd say 4 is generous for Rise of Skywalker. Thought it was hideously bad. A shameful embarassment to be attached to. In adam sandlers worst movies territory.
Saw the Phantom Menace in the cinema a few days back for its anniversary. Pod racing elevates the movie, really is a fantastic scene. I can say it misses the mark in parts but its basically a functional movie with some mixed execution. Even on my harshest day i probably wouldn't drop below a 5. Id rate Rise of Skywalker about a 2.
 
caid said:
I'd say 4 is generous for Rise of Skywalker. Thought it was hideously bad. A shameful embarassment to be attached to. In adam sandlers worst movies territory.
Saw the Phantom Menace in the cinema a few days back for its anniversary. Pod racing elevates the movie, really is a fantastic scene. I can say it misses the mark in parts but its basically a functional movie with some mixed execution. Even on my harshest day i probably wouldn't drop below a 5. Id rate Rise of Skywalker about a 2.
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WOW a 2 , that is really harsh.
The Pod race really is the only decent part of Phantom, but agreed it is a functional films, every sage has a start and it did that.
 
pauldyson1uk said:
WOW a 2 , that is really harsh.
The Pod race really is the only decent part of Phantom, but agreed it is a functional films, every sage has a start and it did that.
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I think decent undersells it to be honest. Think theres a huge amount of imagination and character in that 15 min scene.
I think i just like George Lucas to be honest. I think he made the movie as an excuse to feck around with cgi and I'm completely on board with that really. Hes a good enough, imaginative enough director to get away with that for me. Theres a lot of weak elements and its not a great movie by any means but it bounces along at a decent pace and has enough quality spread throughout to keep me entertained.
I dont like JJ Abrams much. I didn't like him much before Rise of Skywalker and in terms of budget vs quality i think its amongst the worst movies i've ever seen. I think it was so bad it made the previous 2 films, which i quite enjoyed, retroactively terrible. I was about 15 mins into it before i considered leaving. I wouldn't have sat through it if i wasn't in the cinema with a few others.
 
Sweet Square said:
Godfather 2

Coppola gives us a critique of hollow bourgeois family clap-trap. The rise of American 20th century capital with it’s reshaping of old traditions into new wealth is side by side with the 70’s stagnating and individualistic future.

As much a horror film as a gangster flick. Also correctly pro Fidel Castro. Masterpiece.


10/10
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It's pretty much as close to perfection as a film could be - I also enjoy how all your reviews take a sociological and/or political view of the films :lol: It's like if Bourdieu was at the cinema
 
caid said:
I'd say 4 is generous for Rise of Skywalker. Thought it was hideously bad. A shameful embarassment to be attached to. In adam sandlers worst movies territory.
Saw the Phantom Menace in the cinema a few days back for its anniversary. Pod racing elevates the movie, really is a fantastic scene. I can say it misses the mark in parts but its basically a functional movie with some mixed execution. Even on my harshest day i probably wouldn't drop below a 5. Id rate Rise of Skywalker about a 2.
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Agree. It was like the latest 007 movie, where they killed him off at the end, passively, just waiting around. The whole point of 007 is that he gets in these life or death situations against unbelievable odds, and still finds a way to beat them because he's 007, that's why he was written in the first place, and that's why there have been like 27 Bond films. Rise of Skywalker was the same, in terms of not understanding what the character was. To be fair, Lucas himself seems to not have understood his own characters, based on what arc he came up with for Darth Vader. Both of those movies (Skywalker, No Time To Die) pissed me off.
 
apart from the original trilogy which is very memorable, and the second trilogy which is kinda memorable for being so shit, all the other star wars are completely forgettable and now mushed into one giant boring mess in my head (I haven't seen any of the tv shows though)
 
Frontiere(s)
A group of bank robbers hideout at an isolated motel where things take a sinister turn for them. Had I watched this at the time I was really into French extreme horror, I would have enjoyed it more but at this stage in my life, it was fine but didn't really move the needle for me too much. It's basically Texas Chainsaw Massacre if that film decided to leave less for the imagination and just had blood and guts on the screen at all times. It does try to use the narrative as a political allegory but I doubt the audience for such a film will care too much about that. It gets a bit tiresome but for what it is (a violent horror film), it does an ok job to satisfy those looking for such a film 6/10

Abigail
A group of people steal a young girl and hold her ransom for a big payout but soon realise that they have put themselves in grave danger. By Radio Silence, who rejuvinated the Scream series. The problem is, this is very similar to their previous film, Ready Or Not. I really enjoyed the first half, it was quite funny and the characters were really fun. Well acted too considering the type of material. With that said, it drags in the second half and the directors just thrown more and more violence to cover up the thin plot, which was a shame as this was feeling like a future cult classic until the second half. Shave 20 minutes off and this would have been much better but it's still enjoyable enough to watch 6.5/10
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Ok, film nerds. Help me out with something. A podcast I listen to has a clip which features a line from a movie... "he's already dead!" (woman's voice) I know this well from the Simpsons but can't work out what film the original clip is taken from. Any ideas?
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Sarah Connor in T2?
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Ok, film nerds. Help me out with something. A podcast I listen to has a clip which features a line from a movie... "he's already dead!" (woman's voice) I know this well from the Simpsons but can't work out what film the original clip is taken from. Any ideas?
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Any idea on the genre?
 
Made in Britain (1982)

Tim Roth plays Trevor, a 16 year old Neo-Nazi skinhead who has just put a brick through his local Pakistani corner shop window and is too young to be sent to jail. He winds up in a kind of residential evaluation centre - basically a maisonette-style accommodation block - where he'll be assessed by social workers and other professionals before deciding what happens next. Angry at society or his parents or just authority (we're never told what exactly), Trevor continues to be a social pariah. Stealing cars, sniffing glue, throwing bricks through jobcentre windows, Trevor is never not busy being a cnut.

Attempts at scaring him straight don't work. The carrot fares no better as, after treating him to an evening driving around in stock cars, Trevor repays his case worker by stealing his office keys and then pissing all over the filing cabinet containing all the juvenile delinquents' personal files. Despite being a racist little shit, Trevor manages to get a young black lad to tag along, encouraging him to sniff glue, steal cars, brick windows, hurl racist abuse and shit in filing cabinets. He is rewarded by Trevor smashing the car they stole together into some police vehicles right outside the station and being left to take the blame.

The whole film is bleak, the anger is palpable, and Roth is fantastic in his screen debut. It has echoes of Scum, in that angry young men, whose past catches up with them, are caught in a cycle of violence and offending that is difficult to get out of. Where it differs from Scum, is that the authority figures in Made in Britain aren't brutal, sadistic jailers. No, they're much softer and they appear to genuinely want Trevor to turn away from the dark side before it's too late. Only problem is, Trevor doesn't want to.

8/10
 
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The Godfather Pt 3

Get rid of your Tommy guns and pick up a subscription to The Economist. Capitalist decay has turned the Corleone Family into the Trumps.

They are now nothing more than stupid rich incest obsessed asset managers. Micheal with his cheap brochure on how much the pope loves him. Connie is completely alone and plays almost the role of the wife. Andy Berbatov Garcia is a shit for brains level 1 grunt who gets lucky and Sophia Coppola puts in the film best performance as Ivanka Trump.

The Feast Of San Gennaro has been reduced from a social gathering of the Italian working class to a large sized food court. The Virgin Mary once handcrafted from wood and covered in dollars is now made of plastic. Meetings of mob families takes places in a casino which has 80’s wallpaper along with giant analog tv’s. The generational rot has fully kicked in and it’s glorious to see.

However the film fails in the end as Francis Coppola is simply too good of a traditional film maker. There’s opera, there’s lost nostalgia, characters at times reflect on past mistakes, the film looks beautiful at times. It’s essentially far too respectable. Coppola never full embrace the trash for it to be a classic. Still it’s very good.

8/10
 
Meantime (1983)

Another Mike Leigh TV movie starring a young Tim Roth, this time supported by Gary Oldman in his debut, Phil Daniels and Pam Ferris.

Following the struggles of the working-class Pollock family in Thatcher-era London, Meantime isn't a fast-paced narrative, but rather a series of scenes depicting their life in a cramped East End tower block flat.

The family grapples with unemployment. The father, Frank, is angry and bitter, while the mother, Mavis (Pam Ferris), shoulders the burden of being the sole earner. Their sons, Mark (Phil Daniels) and Colin (Tim Roth), cope with the harsh reality of life without prospects in different ways. Mark is the outspoken and rebellious one, while Colin is withdrawn and shy (there are also hints that he has some form of learning difficulty).

The film explores the tensions that arise when Mavis' suburbanite sister offers Colin a job. This opportunity disrupts the family dynamic, breeding jealousy and resentment. Meantime doesn't shy away from the social and economic anxieties of the time. It portrays the dehumanising effects of unemployment and the Thatcher government's policies on a personal level.

8/10
 
Badunk said:
Made in Britain (1982)

Tim Roth plays Trevor, a 16 year old Neo-Nazi skinhead who has just put a brick through his local Pakistani corner shop window and is too young to be sent to jail. He winds up in a kind of residential evaluation centre - basically a maisonette-style accommodation block - where he'll be assessed by social workers and other professionals before deciding what happens next. Angry at society or his parents or just authority (we're never told what exactly), Trevor continues to be a social pariah. Stealing cars, sniffing glue, throwing bricks through jobcentre windows, Trevor is never not busy being a cnut.

Attempts at scaring him straight don't work. The carrot fares no better as, after treating him to an evening driving around in stock cars, Trevor repays his case worker by stealing his office keys and then pissing all over the filing cabinet containing all the juvenile delinquents' personal files. Despite being a racist little shit, Trevor manages to get a young black lad to tag along, encouraging him to sniff glue, steal cars, brick windows, hurl racist abuse and shit in filing cabinets. He is rewarded by Trevor smashing the car they stole together into some police vehicles right outside the station and being left to take the blame.

The whole film is bleak, the anger is palpable, and Roth is fantastic in his screen debut. It has echoes of Scum, in that angry young men, whose past catches up with them, are caught in a cycle of violence and offending that is difficult to get out of. Where it differs from Scum, is that the authority figures in Made in Britain aren't brutal, sadistic jailers. No, they're much softer and they appear to genuinely want Trevor to turn away from the dark side before it's too late. Only problem is, Trevor doesn't want to.

8/10
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So is it like A Clockwork Orange without the social experiment angle, just non-stop one man horror show?
Badunk said:
Meantime (1983)

Another Mike Leigh TV movie starring a young Tim Roth, this time supported by Gary Oldman in his debut, Phil Daniels and Pam Ferris.

Following the struggles of the working-class Pollock family in Thatcher-era London, Meantime isn't a fast-paced narrative, but rather a series of scenes depicting their life in a cramped East End tower block flat.

The family grapples with unemployment. The father, Frank, is angry and bitter, while the mother, Mavis (Pam Ferris), shoulders the burden of being the sole earner. Their sons, Mark (Phil Daniels) and Colin (Tim Roth), cope with the harsh reality of life without prospects in different ways. Mark is the outspoken and rebellious one, while Colin is withdrawn and shy (there are also hints that he has some form of learning difficulty).

The film explores the tensions that arise when Mavis' suburbanite sister offers Colin a job. This opportunity disrupts the family dynamic, breeding jealousy and resentment. Meantime doesn't shy away from the social and economic anxieties of the time. It portrays the dehumanising effects of unemployment and the Thatcher government's policies on a personal level.

8/10
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I really liked this film and love Mike Leigh's films. I often use an example from this film when I talk about how to treat minor characters. Remember the scene in the elevator with Roth and the other young guy, and a black man walks in with an empty pram? The camera then goes with the guy to his apartment, he shows the pram to his pregnant wife, and she screams at him, "I don't want a used pram!" or something like that. It was the bleak little window into their lives.

Hozierstanks said:
Not sure why anyone would watch this as you are just watching a sex offender getting away with it.
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Almost watched this the other night, now curious what you mean by this?
 
Wing Attack Plan R said:
So is it like A Clockwork Orange without the social experiment angle, just non-stop one man horror show?

I really liked this film and love Mike Leigh's films. I often use an example from this film when I talk about how to treat minor characters. Remember the scene in the elevator with Roth and the other young guy, and a black man walks in with an empty pram? The camera then goes with the guy to his apartment, he shows the pram to his pregnant wife, and she screams at him, "I don't want a used pram!" or something like that. It was the bleak little window into their lives.


Almost watched this the other night, now curious what you mean by this?
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Yeah, there's no hero arc. No redemption.
 
Nomadland

I know some found it dull, but I thought it was a great film, beautifully shot and acted. The unflinching and unsentimental portrayal of the nomads and the use of documentary style brief pieces to camera work so well. Despite the minimalist plot, it's a moving film -bleak, yet interspersed with acts of kindness, particularly with the community supporting each other- obviously elevated by Frances McDormand's excellent performance.

8/10
 
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