What Movies Are You Watching Lately

[Biscotti]

I will track it down! Thx. Trying to build up a decent library for the next possibly six months away, so suggestions are appreciated!

 

[beargonefishing]

Michael Bay put himself in Bad Boys 4 or V, whatever the latest one is.

 

[double00]

watched Super, rain wilson and the adorable ellen paige. a pretty strange riff on the superhero genre. ended up really liking it.

 

[Biscotti]

Ms .45 (1981): Loved it. Beginning scenes are a bit difficult to get through. Awesome female vengeance film; I also love seeing movies in early 80s NYC. 9/10

Magnolia (1999): I finally made it through this movie last night, after about half-a-dozen times in which I've fallen asleep around the halfway point. I thought it was a pretty stupid movie; albeit with some very memorable scenes. I either love or hate Paul Thomas Anderson's movies. 3/10

Cruising (1980): I mostly enjoyed this. But like, was Pacino's character secretly gay? But then he returned to his GF at the end, so he wasn't? Wasn't sure what the point was for the beginning scene, or why the officer popped up again at the end, or why the perp. committed the crimes. Plot full of holes (no pun). 5/10

Chinatown (1974): 10/10 duh. Masterpiece.

I am le bored.

 

[imatlas]

watched Super, rain wilson and the adorable ellen paige. a pretty strange riff on the superhero genre. ended up really liking it.

Good film. Pair this with Special with Michael Rapaport, another strange riff on the genre.

Ms .45 (1981): Loved it. Beginning scenes are a bit difficult to get through. Awesome female vengeance film; I also love seeing movies in early 80s NYC. 9/10

I think this is the only Ferrara that I haven’t seen. Grindhouse fanatics obsess over this one.

 

[Biscotti]

I think this is the only Ferrara that I haven’t seen. Grindhouse fanatics obsess over this one.

This is the only Ferrara movie I've seen so far. I loved it--looking forward to exploring his filmography.

 

[imatlas]

Watch Bad Lieutenant next, then. It’s amazing.

 

[imatlas]

And Jesus **** he’s made like a dozen movies in the last 20 years that I’ve never heard of.

 

[Biscotti]

Yep, I found Bad Lieutenant and China Girl. Going to save these for later. ?

 

[noob in 89]

#88 TRICKS OF THE TRADE (1988)

When a man is in despair, it means he still believes in something. So says Dmitri Shostakovich, who may as well have been talking about 1988’s Tricks of the Trade. Here, director Jack Bender has seized on the concept, and with fumbling hands, dropped it into a strange funhouse mirror where everything is as it seems.

The film opens on Donald Todson (Jack Tripper), a blank but amiable yuppie whose boredom with wealth and sunshine leads him to seek out the darker corners of a hooker’s bedroom. It is in these dim lights that Jack, the comfortable face of patriarchy, can relax. And so can we, the audience, for we know what awaits us: a simple comedy, full of zany hijinks, uneven laughs, and — one suspects — a surfeit of ****. Then Jack dies in a hail of bullets, and the rug is pulled.

What follows is a true epistemological nightmare, distinctly American.

Echoing Hitchcock’s Psycho, Jack is supplanted by a new protagonist, his virginal wife Cindy (Cindy Williams of Laverne & Shirley fame). When Cindy confronts the whore that cuckqueaned her (Night Court’s Markie Post), two familiar archetypes collide — but it’s not revenge that Madonna wants from the whore. It’s “answers”. And this is where a Sartrean malaise sets in.

Answers. The whore would prefer a punch to the mouth, but she will suffer the gentle pugilisms of Cindy’s questions instead. These quickly dilate from the mundane (“What did Jack like in bed?”) to the existential (“What is my place in the world?”), forming a kind of black hole that sucks both women in, obscuring everything — even the fact that they’re now being hunted by drug dealers.

More fascinating than the action that follows are the bizarre postmodern overlays to a basically feminist script. In casting Markie Post, TV’s sexy mainstay, in her first feature role, the director sets up a burning parallel mystery of his own: Will Markie Post show the goods? He teases the possibility in every possible variation. Breasts are glimpsed — whole breasts — but never at once — only in parts. Multiple outfits offer glimpses in piecemeal: some cleavage here, the top there, the sides, the undersides. As the women pile up clues, so does the audience, all eyes toward that larger piece, collage’s completion. But will the moment arrive? Is that even the right question...

It’s the despair that reels you in, that conceals as it reveals.

Early Me: [Not allowed to watch]

Current Me: 5

 

[ter1413]

watched Super, rain wilson and the adorable ellen paige. a pretty strange riff on the superhero genre. ended up really liking it.

Do check this out....

 

[Biscotti]

#88 TRICKS OF THE TRADE (1988)

This looks amazing--and, as I figured, seemingly difficult to track down!

 

[noob in 89]

This looks amazing--and, as I figured, seemingly difficult to track down!

It’s not amazing, unfortunately. More of an 80s relic. It is on Amazon Prime, though.

I’m thinking Skin Deep would be a suitable alternative. Surely this streaming somewhere...



Have you seen it? It was funny as a kid. Hopefully, it holds up OK.

 

[Kaplan]

Art of Noise

On a scale from 1 to 5, that movie looks like it's no 10.

 

[SixOhNine]

Blake Edwards had a lot of movies that were not good.