Film The Redcafe Movie review thread

American Hustle - It may be all the hype but I wasn't impressed at all, it wasn't bad by all means but just average. Bradley Cooper is not very good, how he has an oscar nomination I have no idea, and Jennifer Lawrence wasn't particularly good either and I felt was too young to be playing her role. Jeremy Renner was awesome though and his scenes with Bale were one of the highlights.
meh/10
 
All the big hyped Oscar films I've seen so far (and I haven't seen Slave yet) have been incredibly overlong and indulgent and been a bit short on story and themes and a bit large on actors giving actory award bait performances. I'm not sure Hustle or Wolf will be remembered as really great films in years to come for example. Her is the most interesting one, and even that was a bit meandering and unsatisfactory by the end.

I think this is probably a reaction to TV being so huge now, and being so big on nuanced character development. But TV can do that with its run time, films - bar the truly excellent ones - can't. I love my character based TV, but for my 2+ hours in a movie theatre *cough*cough* give me a great story anytime.
 
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Ivor Ballokov said:
American Hustle - It may be all the hype but I wasn't impressed at all, it wasn't bad by all means but just average. Bradley Cooper is not very good, how he has an oscar nomination I have no idea, and Jennifer Lawrence wasn't particularly good either and I felt was too young to be playing her role. Jeremy Renner was awesome though and his scenes with Bale were one of the highlights.
meh/10
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Completely agree with this. I thought there was a lot of overacting on Cooper's part, and Lawrence just isn't believable as the wifey.
 
The Wolf of Wall Street.

Too long. A lot of brilliant scenes surrounded by a load of decent scenes. It would have been a much better movie if they had cut about forty minutes. You'd have lost some good stuff but everything that was left would've been gold. Some of the scenes here seemed a bit redundant, rehashes of something you'd seen 20 minutes before. It didn't make me lose attention but it does slow the pace and momentum of the film down too much.

Two other problems: 1) None of the characters are likable, 2) the actual story isn't that interesting. It was compared to Goodfellas and I Love You Philip Morris earlier in the thread but Goodfellas was a much leaner film and ILYPM had a lot more heart.

That said, it's really really funny. The quaaludes scene was brilliant, the actors are all great (Margot Robbie :drool:) and it's impeccably made. Definitely recommended, a very good movie.
 
12 Years A Slave Great subject matter, excellent acting and it looked very nice indeed. So why was I a little underwhelmed at the end? I'm not sure. Well worth watching but ..... 8/10

American Hustle Bale was superb and Renner wasn't far behind but it was a tad too long and the ending wasn't especially satisfactory. The film effectively just petered out. Well worth watching but ..... 8/10

The Wolf OF Wall Street Again some great performances, looks fantastic and great fun. However, it was little too long and the ending wasn't especially satisfactory. The film effectively just petered out. Well worth watching but ..... 8.5/10

I'm beginning to see a pattern.
 
Filth

A Scottish Bad Lieutenant. Really dark humour a la Wolf of Street with James McAvoy as a bent copper with mental health issues going completely off the rails. He pretty much carries the entire film and I'd recommend it for his performance alone. The scenes where he's trying to sabotage his rivals for promotion are hilarious. Shame the ' twist' was so telegraphed.
 
Inside Llewyn Davis

There's just something about the Coen brother's movies that are so enjoyable to watch. No matter how serious or depressing the story is there is always uniquely funny and interesting characters. The film looks great and the soundtrack is perfect for the setting, Oscar Isaac is a great performer. It's not their most ambitious movie but it's a quiet, confident movie from a pair of film-makers with incredible talent. I can't wait to see what they do next.
 
Byzantium

A Vampire film with a difference, don't usually watch vampire films but this one was very good.
Residents of a coastal town learn, with deathly consequences, the secret shared by the two mysterious women who have sought shelter at a local resort.
Sairse Ronan was excellent has Eleanor, Gemma Artherton was also good and she also has a cracking body.
I was expecting the usual chessy horror film, but it was much much better, there was blood and a couple of head ripped off, but in keeping with the film.
The story was excellent and the filming very good, the music added to the atmosphere very well.
May be the best Vampire film I have seen.

8/10
 
Keenst said:
Inside Llewyn Davis

There's just something about the Coen brother's movies that are so enjoyable to watch. No matter how serious or depressing the story is there is always uniquely funny and interesting characters. The film looks great and the soundtrack is perfect for the setting, Oscar Isaac is a great performer. It's not their most ambitious movie but it's a quiet, confident movie from a pair of film-makers with incredible talent. I can't wait to see what they do next.
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Yeah it's great. Only the Coen brothers can get away with a film that basically has no plot because it's beautifully shot and perfectly scripted. And really what more do you want from a film?

I was glad the cat came home
 
Scrumpet said:
Someone hasn't seen Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 1.
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pauldyson1uk said:
never really wanted too, I dont really watch vampire films, but I might give them a go.
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The Hunt (Jagten) - 2011

Absolute class, if you watch foreign movies (Danish in this case), this is an impeccable drama. In my top 10 all time I think.

9/10
 
Blood Diamond's just been on. A Di Caprio film about a greedy unlikeable bastard. It's also a much better film than Wolf.
 
I don't think it is, but it's a really good film yeah, a bit underrated maybe. Or maybe underrated isn't the right word cos most people who have seen it like and rate it, but not as high profile as it might have deserved.
 
It is though. It's an actual film, with a story, and characters, who have arcs, and do things, and have conversations about themes, and stuff. Rather than a loose collection of (slightly too many) anecdotes about coke and tits (and I like both coke and tits) released in time for awards season.
 
I love Blood Diamond... it's massively underrated and has two brilliant lead performances.

I also love Glory and Last Samurai - so you could perhaps say I'm a bit biased towards Edward Zwick - but despite the former having a lot of cliche nonsense, and the second having a lot of general Cruise nonsense (but it's so fecking pretty damnit) ... Blood Diamond is a legitimately great film in my book.
 
Mockney said:
It is though. It's an actual film, with a story, and characters, who have arcs, and do things, and have conversations about themes, and stuff. Rather than a loose collection of (slightly too many) anecdotes about coke and tits (and I like both coke and tits) released in time for awards season.
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It's the new Scarface in sense that you really wanna do coke after seeing it.
 
And probably in that a bunch of people will hugely overrated it and 15 year olds and rappers will love it for completely the wrong reasons.
 
Mockney said:
It is though. It's an actual film, with a story, and characters, who have arcs, and do things, and have conversations about themes, and stuff. Rather than a loose collection of (slightly too many) anecdotes about coke and tits (and I like both coke and tits) released in time for awards season.
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I dunno, I think you're being unfair on Wolf of Wall Street. I liked how the film didn't take a moral high ground and try too hard to make a social commentary on what went on. These things happened (allegedly). By showing us the film leaves you to make your own mind up about different things e.g. the nature of wall street, the 'american dream', greed etc. You're either sickened by the excess or jealous of the crazy life he lead.

Plus the energy and humour of the whole thing was infectious. It was brilliantly entertaining.

I saw Blood Diamond but can barely remember what happened, probably says a lot.
 
It's a fantastic piece of filmmaking for me, it has the same energy as Goodfellas or Casino. I'm certain it'll go down as one of Scorsese's best. Not at all surprised by Mockney's stance though.
 
It's nothing to do with insensitivity for me, or it's lack of moralism, it's just far too long and indulgent and doesn't really tell a story, and thus isn't very interesting past the "HAHAHA, DRUGS, TITS, LOLS! It tries to latch onto a sort of Goodfellas type of story, but even that's hugely unsatisfactory. The whole "it doesn't comment so you can" nonsense doesn't explain why it's 3 cocking hours long, and why that run time is just repeated efforts to show mostly the same things over and over.

I'm being unfair on it because I'm attacking it, and thus always coming at it from a position of negativity (rather than if I was defending it) If you look at the last page I actually gave it a 7 or 8. Of course it's good filmmaking, and great acting, but it's not very good storytelling, or anything else beyond the technical aspects.

I have this problem with a lot of Scorsese stuff though (and I seem to be pretty much the only one.) Loads of it is style over substance. RiP you mentioned Casino for example. Casino isn't very good IMO. It's quite a poor Goodfellas rip off remembered more fondly than it deserves to be.

I think Scorsese is exactly that, a master filmmaker, but I tend to be a bit bored and uninvolved by his films. Even Raging Bull is the overlong story of a not very interesting person presented in the most gloriously stylistic and artful way. Great filmmaking, but meh.
Archie Leach said:
Blood Diamond was a little shite though. Jennifer Connelly especially.
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Yeah, the Jennifer Connelly bit was entirely unneeded. We really didn't need a love story between the two pretty white people shoved in there. But still, it's trying to tell a story, not just film a lot of boys own skits.
 
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Mockney said:
I have this problem with a lot of Scorsese stuff though. Loads of it is style over substance. RiP you mentioned Casino for example. Casino isn't very good IMO. It's quite a poor Goodfellas rip off remembered more fondly than it deserves to be.

I think Scorsese is exactly that, a master filmmaker, but I tend to be a bit bored and uninvolved by his films. Even Raging Bull is the overlong story of a not very interesting person presented in the most gloriously stylistic and artful way. Great filmmaking, but meh.
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I dunno, I saw Casino very late myself (a few years ago) and have re-watched it a couple of times since, the latest time was a year ago, it's not nostalgia or it being remembered more fondly than it should, I really love the film. I think Scorsese has a fantastic way to tell stories, yeah most of them are a succession of anecdotes (which in fairness most films are) but he manages to inject energy into it, be it with music, the filmmaking itself, the acting, etc. I find most of his films vibrant and exciting, and I feel Goodfellas, Casino and now Wolf are in that vein of dynamic films with great stories. I'm never bored or uninvolved by his films, I'm usually strongly engaged by them.

I think we disagree on the premise, you say it's a succession of anecdotes and doesn't try to tell a real story, I feel it's a succession of anecdotes that are essentially telling the story of that era and of those people. And I didn't feel it showed the same things over and over at all tbf, I felt it was a film in two parts, essentially, the first being the rise and excesses of that class of people, and the second being how they had to face the consequences of that lifestyle (which is a pretty classic Scorsese film structure).
 
I don't see how it was style of substance. You could say that about a film that looked great but was essentially very boring but the whole point of Wolf was that it was hugely entertaining. The substance was in the entertainment.
 
I'd agree. It also makes no attempt to have any female characters that aren't 2D porn star surrogates. If Michael Bay had made it people would be bending over backwards to call it misogynist. Because it's Scorsese, people are bending over backwards to claim this is thematic, or something. I'm in the middle. I just didn't think it was anything special, and it certainly, unequivocally didn't need to be 3 hours long.
 
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I spent the last hour or so of Wolf just waiting for it to end. It was funny most of the time though, but it wasn't a just comedy, it was a biopic and on that note I don't think it delivered. All I know about the guy now is that he made loads of money and spent loads of it on drugs and whores. A highlight reel of his life, rather than a character piece.
 
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Silva said:
I spent the last hour or so of Wolf just waiting for it to end. It was funny most of the time though, but it wasn't a just comedy, it was a biopic and on that note I don't think it delivered. All I know about the guy now is that he made loads of money and spent loads of it on drugs and whores. A highlight reel of his life, rather than a character piece.
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It wasn't actually a biopic though. It was based on the book which is just Belfort talking about all the shit they got up to, just like in the film.
 
Rooney in Paris said:
I thought the length was perfect. I wasn't bored for a single moment and I thought the duration was justified with how the film was constructed.
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It's longer than 2001, Apocalypse Now, The Godfather, Citizen Kane and every single other Scorsese film. There is no way on earth that film is the perfect length unless, somehow, due to a rare disease, your entire life force depends entirely on watching Scorsese-DiCaprio films and you'll die instantly the second they stop. And even then it's too short.
 
R.N7 said:
Not sure, the consequences of his crimes, something.

I didn't mind the running length much but then I didn't see it at the cinema, so I might have squirmed after a while without a pause.
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Consequences as in a scene of DiCaprio being buggered in prison or some poor schmuck who couldn't afford to pay for his daughters heart transplant operation after DiCaprio talked him into gambling it all away?

I've heard both of those scenes are in the 4 and a half hour directors cut along with more scenes of excessive Class A narcotic consumption and gratuitous tit shots.
 
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