Last movie you watched......

About halfway through an HBO movie called "Sugar".

About a fictional Dominican baseball prospect struggling to get used to his new life in the States, in Single-A at Quad Cities. The baseball scenes are kinda choppy, and the Spanish is pretty basic, but it paints a pretty good picture of that experience. I like it so far.

 

I loved "Sugar." I meant to post about it here. I think the guy who played Sugar wasn't an actor; they found him playing baseball and asked if he wanted to audition.

 

derailed ...

really good thriller with clive owen, jen aniston, vince cassel, rza, xzibit, et al.

lots of twists and turns. i wish they let clive and jen build their chemistry a little longer before the armed robbery/faux rape, because they had a nice little buildup going. i'd never heard of cassel, who's big in france. he's a nasty villian, one of the better ones i've seen lately.

never really thought i'd see aniston in a role that calls for her to get shot, so that was a cool twist. and i always enjoy listening to rza talk.

good movie.

 

Saw Revolutionary Road last night....not nearly as funny as I expected.

 

You should see him in Irréversible. Doesn't get any nastier or villian-ier than that.

 

Just went to screening of 'The Road.'
Very good, but I don't think it will have any commercial success.

 

-- Saw "Paranormal Activity" last night. Very suspenseful. Some decent humor, too.

Also didn't hurt that I saw it with a great crowd in the theater -- easily spooked women all around, plenty of groans when a character makes a horror movie no-no and a guy who jumped up and yelled "Aw hell naw!" at the end.

-- Caught "Incendiary" on DVD last week. It's about a terrorist bombing of a soccer game (ahem, football match) in London, focusing on a woman (Michelle Willliams) who loses her 4-year-old son in the attack. She has a hard time coping with his death, and has relationships with a journalist investigating the attack and the head of UK's antiterrorism force.

There's some interesting scenes, but it doesn't add up to a good movie as a whole. There's too many coincidences, and the movie doesn't really decide between being a drama or a thriller until about halfway in.

Williams is great and nails the English accent. Ewan McGregor is wasted as the journalist, who is more of a plot device than a character.

 

the matador ...

so-so movie, but pierce brosnan is excellent. totally opposite character of 007.

 

He does the same thing well in "The Tailor of Panama."

 

raiders of the lost ark ...

i'm a bit late to this one. no one can call me stubborn because i planned never to watch this. had no desire as a kid and no desire to see it as an adult. but piotr said any movie fan ought to see this.

it's not without its charms, but it's campy. i guess it's one of those had-to-be-there movies. just didn't do much for me. not sure who's more annoying, margot kidder as lois lane or karen allen as marion. the adventure wasn't so bad, so it has that going for it.

tarantino's nazi killing was eons more enjoyable. cannot wait till that comes out on dvd.

that said, thanks, piotr for expanding my cinematic horizons.

 

Jesus, Xan. Large portions of my entire childhood revolved around Indiana Jones.

"Raiders" runs circles around "Inglourious Basterds."

 

indiana jones is fluff compared with the basterds.

but that's what i mean of having to have been there back in the day. it's not going to have the same impact on a 38-year-old. and i really did go into this with an open mind, ready to embrace it had it been worthy of embracing. as i said, the adventure part isn't so bad. everything else, eh.