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44267547

Cancelled
Jul 12, 2016
37,642
42,491
Knives Out (2019). A surprisingly good, engaging movie. Great, funny whodunit.

Really want to see this. Daniel Craig is a great actor, and I’m a fan of Chris Evans as well. The plot looks interesting, satire mixed with suspense.

[Speaking of Daniel Craig, the new Bond Trailer looks freakin fantastic! “No Time to Die”]
 

yaxomoxay

macrumors 604
Mar 3, 2010
7,390
34,168
Texas
Really want to see this. Daniel Craig is a great actor, and I’m a fan of Chris Evans as well. The plot looks interesting, satire mixed with suspense.

[Speaking of Daniel Craig, the new Bond Trailer looks freakin fantastic! “No Time to Die”]

Oh, you'll be surprised by Mr. Craig's acting in this one...
 

D.T.

macrumors G4
Sep 15, 2011
11,050
12,460
Vilano Beach, FL
Revisiting House of Traps (1982) :)

OMG, those stairs are harsh! I have to track this down :D
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Knives Out (2019). A surprisingly good, engaging movie. Great, funny whodunit.


It's been getting outstanding reviews, like 96% on RT, and lots of coverage as a "year's best" on all the podcasts I listen to, plus, I'm a big fan of Rian Johnson (yes, even his SW movie ...).

I like that's it's not a riff/sendup/parody on the who dunnit, it's a straight up take on the genre, but [apparently] does subvert it a bit.
 
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ucfgrad93

macrumors Core
Aug 17, 2007
19,522
10,810
Colorado

Looks good. How about this one?

nakatomi.jpg
 

Mefisto

macrumors 65816
Mar 9, 2015
1,447
1,803
Finland
Bottin went off hard on Rick after Baker won the Make Up Oscar for An American Werewolf. Jealousy really, but there was no need for that. Bottin's creatures were surreal and freaky in ways that complimented Rick's work nicely.

I didn't know that about Bottin and Baker having a tiff, like you said, no need for jealousy really as both of them did a great job. Oh well, such is life sometimes. Thanks for the additional trivia!

Still the opening sequence of The Howling when Dee's reporter meets Robert Picardo's werewolf Eddie in the porno shop was very creepy (and on point sleazy). Interesting what Joe Dante showed and kept off screen in that scene.

Agreed, really great opening all around.
 

RootBeerMan

macrumors 65816
Jan 3, 2016
1,472
5,259
Just watched "Zack and Miri Make A Porno". I love Kevin Smith and this movie hit all the right comedic points for me. It has a great, all star cast of people whom I like!

3445a9e8-896d-4e0a-aec4-5e2bf8bb0b36_1.193e2ba367a49cbed99cdc9be6dbd7b1.jpeg
 
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sman789

Customer Support
Staff member
Dec 25, 2007
2,578
2,177
Richmond, VA
Ad Astra. I was a bit put off by the trailers. I think I really like this movie. The setting/time of the story reminds of the Expanse.
 

Doctor Q

Administrator
Staff member
Sep 19, 2002
39,775
7,497
Los Angeles
I've seen a few horror movies this year, but I just saw the most frightening movie of all. Dark Waters is based on the true story about the decades-long DuPont coverup of how they poisoned most of humanity with cancer-causing chemicals, and may still be doing so.

The movie is based on this New York Times article from 2016.

The Environmental Protection Agency has since issued an advisory saying that PFOA (perfluorooctanoic acid, the chemical at the heart of the matter) is harmful at levels above 70 parts per trillion. But Dupont claimed in court that it's safe up to 150,000 parts per trillion, even though their internal research (which they hid from the public, the government, and their own sick and dying workers) showed it was unsafe over 1000 parts per trillion. Dupont studied 7 pregnant DuPont employees who worked with the chemical, then hid the results. Two of the 7 babies had birth defects.

One study reported by the U.S. National Institutes of Health found that over 98% of people studied had PFOA in their blood. It's a chemical that doesn't break down and never leaves the body. It's probably in all of us.

The movie tells the story from the investigating lawyer's point of view, and perhaps there's another side to the story, but with DuPont still issuing press releases that say they've always valued safety over profits, along with vague accusations that the movie isn't entirely accurate, without disputing any specific details, it's hard to see how anyone can defend the DuPont history covered by the movie.
 

hawkeye_a

macrumors 68000
Jun 27, 2016
1,637
4,381
Spirited Away(2001)
The first Japanese animated movie I ever watched, and the one which introduced me to the works of Hayao Miyazaki. First time watching it in HD. Spirited Away is similar to Alice in Wonderland; a 'dream/nightmare sequence' with its own logic. Amazing hand-drawn animation and music. Trailer(YouTube)
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kazmac

macrumors G4
Mar 24, 2010
10,086
8,627
Any place but here or there....
In Fabric (2019)

Screen-Shot-2019-05-28-at-2.57.52-PM.png


“Imagine, the dress is your image…

one fabric in the recollection of touch…”

So are the seductive, wonky phrases Fatma Mohamed’s creepy retail sales clerk coos to potential buyers of her department store’s unholy wears. (Yes that pun is intentional).

In Fabric is about a demonic dress from the Dentley and Sopers department store. Said dress destroys anyone who wears it.

Which brings us to Marianne Jean-Baptiste’s Sheila, a lonely, single mom whose recent split with her husband and strained relationship with her son Vince weigh heavy. Vince pays her little mind and with nothing else to lose, she answers a dating ad.

Realizing she has nothing to wear on this date, Sheila heads to Dentley and Sopers where Fatma starts casting her witchy Apple-like double speak about Sheila. The sales pitch heightens as the harried mom circles the “artery red” dress with the latin inscription of You who buy me will know me… embroidered on the hem which will change her life.

But Sheila isn’t the only one who will be changed by the dress. There’s Reg Speaks who buys it for his Missues but is forced by his drunken buddies to try it on. There’s also Babs and another customer as well.

Writer/Director Peter Strickland has dipped into the 1970s horror pool before with Berberian Sound Studio, his auditory homage to the gallo. He wades into the deep red of Dario Argento and Mario Bava (particularly in the 1970s style fashion ads that flicker in between scenes, and in how the dress is shot). Then there is the Dentley and Sopers catalogues whose images morph and warp into pictures of death. Ditto the vhs style tv ads.

So a possessed dress may sound quite silly, but In Fabric is not unlike Romero’s Dawn of the Dead which tackled the mindless consumption of consumerism. In Fabric takes the consumerism to its extreme, winking at Apple (Note the sales staff clapping in unison as shoppers enter the store), Nike and other retailers whose products incite a sometimes unexplainable fanatic attachment. It’s both hilarious and a little unnerving. Fatma’s witch-like sales rep has nothing but fantastic dialogue and she moves as if she is fully immersed in her spell craft.

Is this scary? No. Is it ironic? Certainly.

I quite like the idea of playing up consumerism in horror. In Strickland’s case, how he quietly rips Apple’s cult-like vibe in their stores and how crazy people can get when they are shopping for that very popular thing (The whole feeding frenzy moment which erupts at the climax). I think the combination of Fatma’s performance, the visuals and some sounds are what sell this movie along the whole vibe of the Dentley and Sopers store.

Strickland has some very good ideas, but for me the department store scenes are what make this worth watching. These tap into Argento and Bava’s flair for fashion, color and the collective horror in the pursuit of beauty.

I liked this, but when the story moved away from the store and its creepy staff and turned the lens on the customers, the humor and point of the film gets lost.

Worth a rental if you enjoy wonky European horror (and if you love Apple, you'll laugh your head off at the snippets borrowed for the cult-like doublespeak and some mannerisms of Dentley and Sopers' diabolical employees.)
 
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ItsNotaTumor

macrumors regular
Sep 15, 2016
131
132
In Fabric is so much fun. The second half is strongly "brits only" kind of humor, so I don't doubt that it'll put off some viewers. Overall though, this movie leans so hard into the ridiculous that I couldn't help but admire it.
 
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kazmac

macrumors G4
Mar 24, 2010
10,086
8,627
Any place but here or there....
Midsommar (2019) - Wow.

Florence Pugh's Dani joins her somewhat estranged boyfriend Christian and his peers for a summer "festival" in friend's small Swedish village. Dani's life hasn't been easy and she's worried she's leaning too hard on Christian. Her bipolar sister Terri has acted out many times, but a creepy note leads to the unthinkable. Interestingly Ari shoots this opening sequence during a night time snow storm; a rather common horror trope.

Cut to several months later, when Christian and graduate school friends including Pelle talk about going to Pelle's hometown in Sweden to partake in a community midsommar festival. Slowly but surely, the Americans and another couple Pelfe's brother Ingemar invited, realize this festival is not what it seems at all.

Hats to Ari Aster for his script, the world-building, the queasy dread he builds, and the execution. Even though I've seen some very gruesome gore in the many years I've watched that style of horror, and some of the work on display here was Argento levels of excess and very brutal. Showing everything in perpetual daylight makes things even more unpleasant.

The night into perpetual day was a superb choice too. You see every last little thing. There's nowhere to hide except behind closed eyes.

Brutal could describe the movie as a whole.

I can see why Florence Pugh is so admired. She's fantastic. And major props to the folks playing the members of Pelle's community.

Ari Aster and Robert Eggers are delivering some very powerful and intense horror films. Intelligent, slow burners that would make Pupi Avanti, Sergio Martino and other Italian genre filmmakers very, very proud. Not something I'd watch again though as the psychological elements are very rough going.
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In Fabric is so much fun. The second half is strongly "brits only" kind of humor, so I don't doubt that it'll put off some viewers. Overall though, this movie leans so hard into the ridiculous that I couldn't help but admire it.

I could listen to Fatma's Miss Luckmoore on a loop. She was hilarious.
 
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