Recent Movies
Some recent NetFlix delivered movies I’ve watched at home, from best to worst.
The Departed
We watched this Friday night. Sure, it was violent but still a nice story, though a bit contrived in places. The ending was a bit of a surprise. We watched one of the extras and it’s interesting how a tightly-knit community will resort to self-policing.
I scanned through the plot summary of Internal Affairs, the Hong Kong movie this was based on, and I’m surprised at how much the two fit together.
HD-DVD notes: I didn’t really get any sense of increased quality given that this was on HD-DVD.
Children of Men
Another dystopian society movie, though not too far in the future. I never really connected with the main character. Two things I appreciated was the high-tech touches of the future that they didn’t dwell on (mostly interactive ads playing on any flat surface) and a deep appreciation for the terror of occasional random bullets passing through an old building.
HD-DVD notes: a wee bit increase of quality. Funny thing was: this started out very jumpy and slow in my Xbox HD-DVD player. This was after being paused for a long time. I ejected & started over and all was well.
Clerks 2
Profane. Very very profane. Though touching, too. I didn’t have high expectations for this and it delivered more than I was expecting. I’ve sort of exited my Kevin Smith man-child fanboy phase and this was a nice way to wrap it up. I first watched Dogma and then Chasing Amy, Clerks, Mallrats, and Jay and Silent Bob Strikes Back.
My favorite scene was Star Wars fan vs. Lord of the Rings fans fighting it out – verbally – which was a better film trilogy. Anyway. A film specifically for the View Askew film universe fans and no-one else.
HD-DVD notes: wow, I noticed a lot of increased video quality here. Second to V for Vendetta. Which is kind of strange for a movie pretty much all shot in a fast-food restaurant.
The Grudge 2
Another movie I had very, very low expectations for. The original The Grudge had succeeded in creeping me out… to the extent anytime I heard my squeaky door leading to the garage I’d think of Kayako’s croaking haunting.
Wow, this movie sucked. How does something like this get made, let alone edited and finalized and released? And under Sam Raimi’s watch? It was a mess with no chance for any sort of redemption avoiding the curse. I was getting more and more pissed off as the movie went that I really didn’t care for any of the booga-booga supposed-to-be-scary moments.
It could have been so much better with just one story line vs. three. Of course, The Grudge 3 is going to happen. Oy.
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