What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Gallowwalkers (2012)

Wesley Snipes hybrid film. Part western, part horror, totally incomprehensible.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Wild (2014)

Reese Witherspoon stars in a chronicle of one woman's 1,100-mile solo hike along the Pacific Crest Trail, undertaken as a way to recover from a recent personal tragedy.

Wild felt like Easy Rider for the hiking generation and in a way it is. Except in Wild, Witherspoon is leaving a life of sadness, death, heroin and dangerous sex and seeking redemption from herself along the way. Witherspoon gives a terrific, soul baring performance in a film that captures the emotional anguish and pleasures of one woman as she attempts to heal herself.

Based on the true story of Cheryl Strayed, Wild isn't the bubbly, clean cut Witherspoon we've come to know, Strayed is an unlikable character with a gritty past but as the hike goes on we get into her head and begin to feel warmth for her, especially in seeing how out of her depth she is on her own in the remote wilderness. Her former life is played out in flashbacks as she comes to terms with her misdemeanors along the way.

Beautifully photographed the film captured the loneliness of the great outdoors and the anxiety that hits you when you meet someone - at one point when she meets a hillbilly type farmer in his pick up who offers her a hot meal and a shower she says 'I was scared of you, i thought you were going to kill me', to which he replies kindly 'I know you did'. Therein lies the difference between Wild and Easy Rider.

I have to say i really enjoyed Wild. It isn't an easy watch but i found it very rewarding and is a film i'll definitely go back to.

[Justin101]

Originally Posted by gag

Also doesn't help any when cinema with eg 10 screens show one particular film on 2\3 screens for the first week.. When they could be showing other films on these screen.
Not everyone into superhero films ..

50 Shades Darker is on so many screens in Liverpool it's ridiculous. So, it's not only super hero movies.

[Demoncrat]

Malone (1987, Harley Cokliss)
Burt Reynolds and his wig take a detour into Yojimbo territory, with some smut and Cliff Robertson as some sort of survivalist (?) thrown in. Fairly violent (for the time) romp, from the director of The Glitterball and Battletruck. Not as much fun as Stick.

Jack Reacher: Never Go Back (2016, Edward Zwick)
Never Read Lee Child. Never Saw The First Film. Can Barely Stand To Look At Cruise In The First Place.
Verdict? Somewhat troubling overlong film. Easy to see why TC picked this one out of the myriad, as it is a "family" film cough. Always with the running still.... He doesn't look as haggard as he did in the last MI film either. Next!!

The House With Laughing Windows (1976, Pupi Avati)
Shriekingly weird film from the bloke who brought you Zeder Cough! As he admits, he doesn't like horror films, so so many of the tropes and cliches we find so darn comforting, are whipped away from under you, leaving you unstable and vulnerable. Or it could be the drink. Restoring a mural in a rural church uncovers dark and twisted secrets. Look, I live in one of these, and quite frankly would believe anything involving yokels haha.

To finish...another from 76
Marathon Man (John Schlesinger)
Dustin jogs. Schneider schemes, Olivier is unflinching. Oh, and the chap from Rolling Thunder gets shot. Based on William Goldman's nipply paced novel, this rather wacky farrago involving McCarthy, diamonds and shadowy government agencies is prime post Watergate stuff. From the modern eye, a pair of old codgers in a car chase would no doubt seem "post modern" somehow, but here there is just the spectacle. Still quite a gripping wee film, and a revelation (Paramount WS dvd) as most TV screenings were cut for language I find out!!

[Make Them Die Slowly]

Harvest Lake

Blimey, not sure what to make of this so here is a lazy review...HP Lovecraft gets knobed by early David Cronenberg after watching Possession with special effects that look like leftovers from Zontar and It Conquered the World. This has the making to be a mini left field classic but is let down by script and ?*cting that jolt the viewer back to reality as the film gets increasing weird as it goes along making the erotic edge that is constantly being built come across as crude and fumbling. Still that said, it looks great and at times slips into its own dream world and becomes totally convincing in these scenes.

Contains scenes of graphic fungi fingering and spoor sucking. You have been warned.

[SymbioticFunction]

Suspiria.

Watched the new Italian 4K restored Suspiria blu-ray. Happy to report that it comes with lossless 5.1 English sound (with correct music levels and all sound effects present) and no forced subtitles. It cost me just 15 pounds including delivery (via courier) to the UK. What can you say about the film itself? It is a stone-cold horror classic. Beautiful colours, stunning photography, wonderful music by Goblin, great performances and some really good violent special effects.

The film has never looked so beautiful, it frequently looks fantastic - the 4K mastered restoration by TLE Films finally produces a HD print with all details intact, correct colours and no flawed high contrast shots. The easiest way of describing it, would be to mention that it pretty much looks like the excellent PQ of the Anchor Bay dvd only this time, it's in stunning high definition (but with a far more pronounced colour scheme).

There's some forthcoming German 4K versions which will feature encoding by TLE Films themselves so it may be worth waiting for that. Superior encoding will result in even more fine detail being presented. But German versions are also frequently pricey so the current Italian blu-ray has a lot in it's favour - picking this up was cheaper than the wife and I going to the cinema and it's something which I also get to keep.

Worth mentioning that the end credits use a different font this time around (the same font as the opening credits). Purists may balk at that but according to TLE Films, this is a reconstruction of the original Italian credits that were lost along the way. So it's a change which I can support. btw I never noticed the brightly lit McDonald's logos before, during the airport opening.

Highly recommended bd. Link for ordering:

https://www.amazon.it/Suspiria-Versi...spiria+blu-ray

[Nosferatu@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

Wild (2014)

I'm glad you seem to have enjoyed this as much as I did, when I saw it at the cinema and reviewed it here (What Films Have You Seen Recently?) back in January 2015, the day after I watched American Sniper, also reviewing it here (What Films Have You Seen Recently?. I have seen and enjoyed Wild since, but haven't felt any desire to revisit American Sniper.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Nosferatu@Cult Labs

I'm glad you seem to have enjoyed this as much as I did, when I saw it at the cinema and reviewed it here (What Films Have You Seen Recently?) back in January 2015, the day after I watched American Sniper, also reviewing it here (What Films Have You Seen Recently?. I have seen and enjoyed Wild since, but haven't felt any desire to revisit American Sniper.

I really did like Wild. Without wishing to sound like Trebor, i wasn't expecting an awful lot from the film and was more than pleasantly surprised. It's a film that's lingered in my head as well. Not so much moments from it but the film as a whole.

[Nosferatu@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Demdike@Cult Labs

I really did like Wild. Without wishing to sound like Trebor, i wasn't expecting an awful lot from the film and was more than pleasantly surprised. It's a film that's lingered in my head as well. Not so much moments from it but the film as a whole.

Same here. I would really like to do something like that and just get away from everything for them extended period of time, but it's just not possible.

[Justin101]

Originally Posted by Nosferatu@Cult Labs

Same here. I would really like to do something like that and just get away from everything for them extended period of time, but it's just not possible.

It's funny because there is a sketch bit in the Gilmore Girls revival series (I'm not sure if you watch/have seen it) where Lorelei decides she wants to 'do Wild' and she gets to the trail and there are 20+ other women there wanting to get away from it all and 'do Wild' haha. They even got into the debate book vs film.