The last movie you've seen thread 2016

[Middle-aged Europe]

The Theory of Everything

Oscar prediction: Best Picture nomination, Best Actor win

[retromike22]

The Grand Budapest Hotel

A-

Interesting and fun. Once in a while it looks like it borders on crazy but the pieces fall together nicely. The R rating was a bit harsh.

[Mr. Smith]

The Prince of Egypt

I had seen it once before,but only bits and pieces not all the way through. Really makes me wish Dreamworks was doing 2D Animation again.

@angus: I forgot that even had a movie adaptation, but the book was an excellent read back in High School.

[King]

The Imitation Game is really smart.

[DemPGH]

I think it was 2012, but the most recent new movie that I have seen is The Conspirator by Robert Redford. It needs to be seen. It's the depressing account of the hanging of an innocent woman following the Lincoln assassination, and it offers a perspective on the "with us or against us" mentality that applied then and now. Best Civil War era movie I have seen in a long time, maybe since Glory.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

I watched White Christmas (on AMC) on Christmas Eve, and then A Christmas Story on TBS on Christmas (although it was edited for time.)

[Lief 🗽]

Snowpiercer

Probably my favorite movie I've seen so far this year (though yet to see things like Boyhood and Birdman). Everything about it was great. And unlike some over-hyped science fiction films this year, it was actually interesting, thought-provoking, and open to interpretation.

Also re-watched Gone Girl last night, and it's even better on re-watch. Really masterful film.

[Eraserhead]

I also just watched Snowpiercer. Definitely enjoyed it, reminded me a lot of those type of sci-fi/action movies that were so prominent in the 80s and early 90s (only with better acting and a better story than most of those had). Good stuff.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies. I saw it about a week ago but since J.R.R. Tolkien came into this world a hundred and twenty-three years ago today I figured I'd mention it now.

BotFA is by far the funniest of the Peter Jackson Tolkien adaptations, and is funnier than most comedies. I particularly enjoyed the unnecessary amount of time spent with the Lake-Town refugees, Thorin's change of heart being communicated via a Neon Genesis Evangelion-style hallucination rather than Richard Armitage's (actually quite good) acting, Thranduil picking up six orcs on his elk mount's antlers, the introduction of Dune sandworms into the setting that went completely unexplained, Legolas grabbing the legs of a giant bat or bird or something to get from a low point to a high point and then shooting his ride so it would let go of him when it got there, Legolas climbing a collapsing horizontal surface like a staircase, the absolute hash made of Middle-earth's geography (Gundabad and Eriador are both presented as being north of Erebor, and it's apparently possible to ride a horse from Erebor to Gundabad and back in the space of a single day), Dain Ironfoot riding a hog into battle, the obviously focus-grouped characterization of Tauriel (who by rights should have been an excellent character and a sorely needed addition to the story), Galadriel going Full Noldor for the first time since the Fellowship of the Ring movie and with only slightly better special effects, how transparently sketchy Saruman was, wonderful dialogue like 'these bats were bred for only one purpose...WAR' and 'will you have peace...OR WAR?', Thranduil's characterization as some sort of cross between Curufin and Thingol, and the fact that Aragorn is apparently already a Ranger of the North at the age of like eight ten or something.

There were parts of it that genuinely worked, though (see, again: Richard Armitage's acting), and a (very) few that I'd even call improvements on the book (changing 'food and cheer' to 'home' in Thorin's death speech was a thematic improvement even if it was a little hamfisted, and the removal of the frankly absurd 'but sad or merry, I must leave it now. Farewell' part was welcome, although I'm sorry that we lost the 'child of the kindly West' part).

[afleitch]

Birdman. Unintentional Oscar fodder but a very solid and unique film.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The Great Beauty (La grande bellezza). Let's just say that the title is accurate, although there's so much more to it than that. For want of a better way of putting it, this is film. Paolo Sorrentino is an obscenely talented director and Toni Servillo is a ridiculously good actor. Go and see it at once.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

the fact that Aragorn is apparently already a Ranger of the North at the age of like eight or something.

Ten, if you go by Tolkien's timeline, but I won't begrudge the decision to have him be a bit older unless it leads to an Aragorn and Legolas film, or even a worse a film in which Tauriel ends up trying to pick up Aragorn on the rebound, leading to a catfight with Arwen.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Invasion U.S.A. (1952)

Easily the worst thing I've seen in a long, long time.

[King]

Invasion U.S.A. (1952)

Easily the worst thing I've seen in a long, long time.

Good MST3K episode, tho.

[Dave from Michigan]

The Big Lebowski

A Serious Man

22 Jump Street

The Grand Budapest Hotel

[SWE]

The Penguins of Madagascar

[Mr. Smith]

Big Hero 6

Decent comedy, excellent animation and voice-acting, but ultimately it was the blatantly clear San Francisco look that I got lost in...even though it was supposed to be a hybrid of San Francisco and Tokyo.

[Frodo]

The Hobbit: Battle of the Five Armies and Selma.

[Middle-aged Europe]

The Homesman

So, the *real* Wild West sucked because the American frontier was basically the 19th century version of present-day Afghanistan...

[Lief 🗽]

Whiplash

I think people are over-rating it a little bit, but it's very good. The editing is technically very impressive, and the performances from both leads are amazing. I think at the end of the day though I'm just not super interested in the trials and tribulations of college jazz band. I do love a movie that evokes a consistent mood in the viewer though, and the whole thing makes you so tense and anxious.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Whiplash

I think people are over-rating it a little bit, but it's very good. The editing is technically very impressive, and the performances from both leads are amazing. I think at the end of the day though I'm just not super interested in the trials and tribulations of college jazz band. I do love a movie that evokes a consistent mood in the viewer though, and the whole thing makes you so tense and anxious.

So would you say it was really good for what it was, but not necessarily your cup of tea?

On a different note, I just saw the Immitation Game and was quite disappointed.  The acting by Cumberbatch was good, but nothing to write home about.  The characters were all very one-note (although Charles Dance and Mark Strong did the best they could with what they were given).  The story was also a great example of a time where a massive amount of artistic license was taken and it made the movie less interesting.  There's definitely a great movie to be made about Turing, but this sure wasn't it!

I'd give it a C-

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Seven

[Lief 🗽]

So would you say it was really good for what it was, but not necessarily your cup of tea?

Yeah, basically.

I actually also watched The Imitation Game and I really enjoyed it. I just thought that Cumberbatch's performance was so, so good. It was really beautiful to me. It is a very formulaic and cliched historical biopic, to the point that a number of scenes are so obviously ahistorical fabrications that it breaks the suspension of disbelief.

And it sort of comes off as a cheap knock-off of something like "A Beautiful Mind." 

[King]

Saw Whiplash tonight. It exceeded my expectations mainly because I had no real interest in the subject so the fact that it held my attention for the full length is an accomplishment in itself. The ending scene was kind of cool but went on a bit too long. I don't know if he needed a love interest.

I agree The Imitation Game does have some very convenient Oscarbait movie formula cliches in it, but Cumberbatch was so good I really sort of glossed over it while watching it. It wasn't until much after did I think back and realize "wow, that obviously did not happen."

[justfollowingtheelections]

The Great Beauty (La grande bellezza). Let's just say that the title is accurate, although there's so much more to it than that. For want of a better way of putting it, this is film. Paolo Sorrentino is an obscenely talented director and Toni Servillo is a ridiculously good actor. Go and see it at once.

The Great Beauty is indeed a truly fantastic film.  It's Californication without the fart jokes, but with a meaningful ending.

I'm planning to go see Inherent Vice this weekend.  While I felt The Master, Paul Thomas Anderson's latest film was all over the place, There will be blood remains the best film of the last 15 years at least.