Category: Movies

I hate paying money and buying an original DVD and then being forced to sit through half a dozen movie trailers which I can’t skip before I can watch the movie I purchased. Just gives me more reason to download movies instead of buying them.

This is a list of the worst movies of the year put together by Rotten Tomatoes: (numbers in brackets are IMDB ratings)

Get Rich or Die Tryin’ (2.3)
Domino (5.6)
Doom (5.3)
Into the Blue (5.1)
The Dukes of Hazzard (4.6)
Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo (4.1)
Supercross (3.3)
Undiscovered (2.4)
9 Songs (5.1)
Stealth (4.6)
House of Wax (5.4)
Guess Who (5.5)
Elektra (5.1)
Hide and Seek (5.5)
Alone in the Dark (2.3)
Ma Mere (5.0)
Aeon Flux (5.3)

[source rotten tomatoes]

I just watched the trailer for Miami Vice and I think its going to rock. I had my doubts before because of Colin Farrell but watching the trailer now I think he fits the part very nicely. The only downside to the trailer is the music, I was hoping for a remake of the original theme, maybe that will be there once the movie gets released. If you haven’t watched the trailer yet you can do so on the official movie website. [Link]

Here is a list by the Guardian Unlimited of the best movies of 2005, I watched three movies, Sideways, A History of Violence and Downfall. I really loved Downfall a lot, one of the best World War related movie I have ever seen but I found both Sideways and A History of Violence very subpar.

January: Sideways
February: The Woodsman
March: 5 X 2
April: Downfall
May: The Consequences Of Love
June: Kung Fu Hustle
July: Dig!
August: The Last Mitterrand
September: Innocence
October: A History of Violence
November: The Beat That My Heart Skipped
December: Lower City

[source Guardian Unlimited]

Just got back from the movies. King Kong was 3 fucking hours long!! Peter Jackson must wake up and realize not every movie can be made into a grand adventure like Lord of the Rings. I swear if it was up to him I am sure he would have turned King Kong into a trilogy. The first 1 and half hour of the movie was extremely slow, like super slow and then the ending of the movie kept on dragging on. By the 2 and a half hour mark I was ready kill King Kong myself. This movie could have easily been made into a regular sized 90 minute flick.

On the bright side the effects were the best so far. You will spend the whole movie thinking King Kong is real. His facial expressions, his fur, his movements, there is no way you could tell its a 3D rendering. Also for people who hate insects I warn you there is one scene in the movie that will gross you out, but again the insect graphics were super.

Overall though I would not recommend anyone watching this movie unless they enjoy long, boring and predictable 3 hour films.

While in the US, King Kong comes out tomorrow, in Kuwait its getting released tonight. It’s not the first time that this happens and I like it when it does.. it gives Kuwait an edge. So I went ahead and booked 2 tickets for tonight, its been a while since I have gone to the movies so it should be good. [Link]

Fucking Åmål
I watched two movies this weekend which were very good and thought I would share them with you. The first movie I watched was Fucking Åmål. Its a Swedish movie with nothing to do about fucking so don’t let the title fool you. They mean fucking as a sign of frustration. Here is the plot summary from IMDB:

Åmål is a small insignificant town where nothing ever happens, where the latest trends are out of date when they get there. Young Elin has a bit of a bad reputation when it comes to guys, but the fact is that she has never done *it*. Another girl in her school, Agnes, is in love with her but is too shy to do anything about it. For different reasons, Elin ends up at Agnes’ birthday party as the only guest. They have a girl’s night out together but after that Elin desperately avoids Agnes, refusing to even consider her own homosexuality.

Fucking Åmål is one of the best movies I watched this year. There is no nudity, there is no violence, there is no sex and there are not hot Swedish blonds, but nevertheless it was a great movie to watch and it never felt slow or dull. The story was very well written and watching Agnes go from sad and lonely confused girl to a confident and happy lesbian was somehow exciting to watch. I guess the fact that she was Swedish AND lesbian could have made things more interesting but I think it had to do more with the fact that the movie is Swedish and so it was interesting to watch the lifestyle of their high school students. If this was an American movie I don’t think I would have enjoyed it as much. Anyway watch it if you can, I am giving it a 4.5 out of 5.

Ichi the Killer

The second movie I watched was Koroshiya 1, (Ichi the Killer). I had had this movie on my wish list for over 2 years now and I was finally able to watch it. The reviews I had read about the movie said this was one of the most violent movies ever made and I have to agree with them. I don’t think I am going to go to Japan anytime soon after watching this movie since I no longer think of them as quiet polite people but more like psychotic violent killers (I am joking here don’t send me hate mail). Here is the plot summary from IMDB:

Yakuza boss Anjo disappears with three million yens. His loyal gang members, lead by the masochist Kakihara, start a search, but their aggressive and gory methods worry the other yakuza gangs. Kakiharas most scary counterpart is the mysterious Ichi, a psychopathic killer with a dark childhood secret, who is controlled by a retired cop.

If the site of blood makes you queasy, if torture scenes make you feel sick and if watching internal organs get splattered all over the wall makes you puke then I would not recommend you watch this movie. You will see allot of everything I just mentioned and more. The director Takashi Miike is one sick mother fucker and I think thats why his movies are so incredible and like nothing else out there. Quentin Tarantino’s movies look like a school girl dressed in pink carrying a Hello Kitty backpack when compared to Takashi’s movies. The torture scenes are extremely gruesome and even if you cover up your eyes theres no escape since the sound is just as horrifying. Ichi the Killer with all the violence and blood had a good plot and the star, Ichi is just really fucked in the head. The whole movie was fucked in the head and thats why I couldn’t take my eyes off the screen for a single moment. It took me a while to get a hold of this movie but I am really glad I was able to since it was really worth watching. I am soo watching more of Takashi’s movies now..

Yesterday night I watched Coming to America. I watched it for the first time back in 1989 and really liked it so I figured I would watch it again since I had completely forgotten it.

Anyway the movie wasn’t bad the second time around but the coolest thing about the movie were the very famous actors who played very small roles in the movie because they were nobodys back then. For example it was the first movie Cuba Gooding Jr. acted in. Cuba played the role of a “Boy Getting Haircut”. He was an extra with no talking part or anything! It was really funny watching him in such a crappy role! Second cool actor was Samuel L. Jackson. Coming to America wasn’t his first movie but it was one of his early ones. In the movie Jackson plays the role of a “Hold-Up Man”. Again he didn’t have a name but at least he did have a talking part. Eriq La Salle who plays Dr. Peter Benton on the TV show ER had a major role in the movie playing the part of Daryl, the boyfriend of the chick Eddie Murphy gets a crush on. The final person who isn’t as famous but looked very familiar turned out to be Victoria Dillard (her pic). I checked her out on IMDB and turns out she used to be in the TV show Spin City. In the movie she played the role of a “bather”. She basically was topless in the bath tub bathing Eddie Murphy. Its really weird watching very famous actors act in movies were they were still very unfamous. I guess everyone does start as a nobody.

If you have an iPod Video and you don’t want to spend time converting your movies to work on the ipod then just download them in the iPod format via torrents. You could try search sites such as torrentspy and thepiratebay for ipod videos but an easier way would be to go to Podtropolis, a 100% pure iPod Video tracker. Its a bit quiet there now since its still new but it should start getting more popular soon. [Link]

Update: Here is more ipodvideotorrents.com and videoipodder.com

Fucking Åmål, Untergang Der, Ichi the Killer, 2046, Top Gun, History of the World Part 1, Shi mian mai fu, Blue Velvet, Coming to America, Raging Bull, Nochnoy Dozor and Last Days.

I watched the horror movie Shutter the other day. It was my first Thai movie I had ever watched and it left me impressed. I don’t know why I keep watching these horror flicks, they freak the hell out of me, seriously.

Shutter is about this guy and girl who run over a girl one night while they were driving back home and then they leave her to die in the middle of the road. The guy and girl are both photographers and so the girl starts haunting them in their pictures. They start finding weird shadows and ghost like forms in all the pictures they take which start to freak them out. If that wasn’t enough they start seeing the dead girl in real life. It was a really freaky movie with allot of creative moments which I had never seen before in any other horror movie.

This movie also convinced me to make my own horror movie except mine will be realistic. In my movie when you see a dead girl come out of your sink in your photography dark room, you run away and you never step foot into that dark room again! Seriously I can barely watch scenes like this while the people in the movie seem to find it freaky for 5 minutes and then act like it never happened. There was one really cool scene in the movie where the guy would be sleeping and then wakes up to find someone at the end of the bed is slowly pulling away the cover, he looks down and sees the dead girl! I told Nat that was pretty cool and I might try it on her one day, she told me if I did it would also be the last day I see her! No sense of humor at all..

I don’t know how easy it is to find this movie in Kuwait and its also not available on Amazon but you could download it the way I did via torrentspy. Its a great horror flick with a really cool ending, something thats just really fucking freaky and just goes to show how creative this horror really is.

Revolver
I usually like Guy Ritchie’s movies (haven’t watched Swept Away yet) but I didn’t like Revolver. It was very entertaining to watch in some places and Ray Liotta was really good but my problem was that the movie was trying too hard to be weird while I would have rather it tried to look funky.

Straight into Darkness
This was a war movie about two American deserters during World War II. I hadn’t heard of the director Jeff Burr before this movie and I hadn’t heard of any of the actors either. This movie isn’t like Platoon or Apocalypse Now and you won’t be seeing any large military battles between the American and the Germans etc.. There is only one small battle near the end of the movie but I won’t give more details so I don’t ruin the movie. The movie was interesting but nothing spectacular.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
A beautiful story that was somehow ruined by Tim Burton. The movie was dark and not as colorful as it should have been. There should have been more exploration in the factory. Too much time wasted on getting to know Charlies family. Even more time was wasted on Wonka’s flashbacks to his past and him making good with his father. Movie ruined even more with the Tim Burton signature direction.

Wedding Crashers
Funniest movie since Old School. Vince Vaughn is fucking hilarious and I think he is a better match with Jennifer Aniston then Brad Pitt was. Owen Wilson, Christopher Walken and Will Ferell also were great. The story was original and it was really fun to watch. The coolest thing is the movie is 2 hours long!

Me and You and Everyone We Know
Really good movie. All the characters were really interesting. Most memorable quote.. “You poop into my butt hole and I poop into your butt hole… back and forth… forever.” Nat didn’t like the movie, said it was pointless, she didn’t like The Station Agent either though.. ))<>((

First interesting trivia:
Francis Ford Coppola made a commercial for Suntory whiskey with legendary Japanese director Akira Kurosawa in the 1970s. This event later influenced a salient plot point in his daughter Sofia’s movie, Lost in Translation.

Second interesting trivia:
In the movie Lost in Translation while shooting the whiskey ad in the movie, the director kept telling Bill Murray to make expressions more like Sean Connery. Turns out Sean Connery actually did do whiskey commercials and you can watch them by clicking here.

I watched a movie yesterday called Simple Lies. From the minute it started I hated the movie. The first scene involved 2 guys and a girl near a cliff during sunset dancing as if they were listening to rave. For me thats trying too hard to be cool. The whole movie was like that, trying too hard to be cool or trying too hard to be weird or even trying too hard to be cult. The acting was bad, the lines were terrible, the story uninteresting and the ending was stupid. I do not recommend this movie. Simple Lies is Simply Crap.