Death Wish (1974) by Michael Winner.
Good exploitation stuff and straight-forward revenge story. The psychological aspect of the movie is pretty good and I like Bronson’s character development. It all makes this even more entertaining. Vincent Gardenia is excellent as an inspector and Charles Bronson is simply one of the best bad-asses in this history of cinema. Not to be missed. 6/10
Finished up Casino Royale - would have been better with at least 30 minutes shaved off. Somehow the action just felt too staged, trying too hard to be impressive. I liked the ending but the rest of the film was a bit of a bore… hopefully Quantum of Solace will be an improvement
Oliver Stone’s recent Savages - I liked it, but didn’t love it. Much of the film just seemed too flashy and cliche, not much substance.
Yeah, the first 2 action scenes felt a bit stagey and like they were trying too hard to me… once he gets to the casino, its very good from then on, imo
If you don’t have a problem with very fast cutting maybe. Otherwise you will probably hate it.
The 2nd half of CR is indeed very good, while the first half is more conventional stuff, but still better directed than any of the old Bonds, save for On Her Majesty Secret Service.
[quote=“Stanton, post:8364, topic:1923”]If you don’t have a problem with very fast cutting maybe. Otherwise you will probably hate it.
The 2nd half of CR is indeed very good, while the first half is more conventional stuff, but still better directed than any of the old Bonds, save for On Her Majesty Secret Service.[/quote]
I agree. And I don’t think that Quantum of Solace has such a fast cutting. The pace is very quick, but it never feels mauled to me just like most of fast edited movies. Good Bond Movie, I prefer Casino though.
I disagree; I consider From Russia with Love the best directed Bond, followed by Skyfall (you’ll probably shoot me down for writing that! ;)).
They all seem pretty consistent in quality and well directed to me (apart from Diamonds are Forever and Die Another Day)
Sorry, I have no gun at hand …
From Russia is just an ok thriller for me. Nothing special compared to other thrillers of the time.
I’m just watching GoldenEye. And this is also better directed imo than the older Bonds. Its the old story, just like from every Bond since Goldfinger, but more modernly done. Martin Campbell would have been the perfect director of all the Brosnan Bonds and for SF also.
I agree about the bit to do with Brosnan. he wasn’t a bad Bond, but under him the series lost direction (in both meanings). As for SKyfall: no! The film would have been good, but would have loost it’s visual poetry.
I haven’t seen Golden Eye in years, but used to love it. I remember seeing it when it came out and it was very impressive at the time. It was like a leap forward in style for Bond movies… and then none of the future entries matched up and I quit paying attention to the series again
Finally saw The Grey Fox as was recommended by scherpschutter and Stanton a while back. I loved it, one of the best Canadian fiction film I’ve seen. Too bad Phillip Borsos’ career didn’t turn out so well, Bethune sort of wrecked it (or so I’ve heard).
The Made Me A Fugitive - Clem (Trevor Howard) recently left the RAF and is finding life dull so he joins a criminal gang led by Narcy (Griffith Jones). One night a heist goes wrong and a policeman is run over and killed by fellow gang member Soapy, they knock Clem out and leave him in the drivers seat. He ends up in prison for the murder but escapes and heads back to London to get revenge.
I really enjoyed this post war crime thriller.
It’s good to see these old, more obscure films getting Blu-ray releases.
I second that (I have to re-watch Skyfall, but I thought it was a great one - great visuals, particularly enjoyed the part set in Hongkong (or Shanghai?)).
And From Russia With Love is my favorite Bond so far as well. Great stuff.
Magakoro (1953) by Masaki Kobayashi.
Well, I’ve yet to see a bad Kobayashi movie. It didn’t let me down as well. It’s a film about a boy who falls in love with a girl. His beloved suffers a lot from a lungs decease and may not leave her flat, so their relationship cannot thrive. There has been made thousands these kind of movies, but I’d still rank it as a really good one. This is one of the earliest flicks of Kobayashi (to be precise his third one) and one can already notice his directional talent. Some really surprisingly great crafted scenes, melancholic, emotional and highly entertaining. Yes, it might lack originality, but I’m very pleased to have this rarity in my collection. It’s a lesser Kobayashi effort, but nonetheless a superb stuff that fascinated me with its ravishing beauty. Almost as good as Black River from 1957, there is no Tatsuya Nakadai though. 6,5/10
Hill Have Eyes
-Remake. Apart from few annoying things here and there and those cliches of the modern horror films it’s pretty damn good film, maybe better than the original. Violent and visually good looking film.
A couple of Antoine Fuqua flicks
BROOKLYN’S FINEST & TEARS OF SUN - Both were extremely enjoyable, I was especially impressed by Ethen Hawke’s perfomance in the first film and the overall grittiness of both films. Two of the most well-made ones of the last decade IMO. On my way to watch the rest of Fuqua’s filmography (I’ve only seen the excellent TRAINING DAY)
Bronson - pretty good, but didn’t like it quite as much as Drive
[quote=“Bill san Antonio, post:8376, topic:1923”]Hill Have Eyes
-Remake. Apart from few annoying things here and there and those cliches of the modern horror films it’s pretty damn good film, maybe better than the original. Violent and visually good looking film.[/quote]
Indeed
It’s a good performance from Tom Hardy and has its moments. The soundtrack is very good (I particularly love Glass Candy’s ‘Digital Versicolor’) and it’s very well directed for the most part. However, it is not Nicolas Winding Refn’s best, I agree. Try Valhalla Rising and the Pusher trilogy; all of which are criminally underrated. The second Pusher is absolutely brilliant as far as I’m concerned.