What Movies Have You Seen Lately?

Quote: Nareed

Has anyone seen Tomorrowland? Is it worth the price of admission?

Disney's attempt to turn it's theme park attractions into movies have met with very mixed success. The Pirates of the Caribbean is one of the biggest franchizes of all time, but "The Haunted Mansion" movie with Eddie Murphy sold 12.5 million tickets when it opened on Nov, 2003.

Other theme park based films with modest success were:
Mission to Mars (2002)
The Country Bears (2002)
Tower of Terror (1997)

Tomorrowland looks like it is going to make "The Haunted Mansion" seems like a success. It is not as bad as the Disney movies with historical sources like "John Carter of Mars" or the "Lone Ranger" or "The Alamo" or "King Arthur".

"It's a Small World" is now over 50 years old, so we can presume it is next on the list.

Quote: Pacomartin

"It's a Small World" is now over 50 years old, so we can presume it is next on the list.

One of the worst earworms ever. And kinda creepy in this video experience without humans.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=7tbm4Au3dZ0

Imagine tying someone to a boat and sending them round and round for days through that ride.

Quote: rxwine

One of the worst earworms ever.

We saw Pitch Perfect 2 yesterday. Light. Sort of cute. Fun enough. Next up will be Mad Max: Fury Road.

Quote: Mosca

Next up will be Mad Max: Fury Road.

Had no plans to see it, but it seems to be getting good reviews.

Quote: rxwine

Had no plans to see it, but it seems to be getting good reviews.

Good reviews is an understatement. They are phenomenal. George miller has never gotten bad reviews, just mediocre ones for Happy Feet.
His Nightmare segment is a classic.
https://vimeo.com/30119989

Saving Mr Banks. An odd Disney movie. Two
stories being told at once, the back story
being quite depressing. Emma Thompson
saves the movie, she is over the top good.
Hanks plays a good Disney. If you're looking
for upbeat, this isn't it. The scene near the
end, where the author of Mary Poppins is
seeing the movie, is an actors nightmare.
Emma Thompson pulls it off to the degree
she was nominated for the Academy Award.
Just seeing that makes the movie worthwhile.

What people don't realize is, one minute the
actor is eating a bagel and chatting, 5 min
later she is falling apart emotionally for the
camera. Over and over. Hard work, that's
why they get paid so much.

Saw the first movie Martin and Lewis were in.
1949, My Friend Irma. They were brilliant,
you get a flavor of what their fabulous nightclub
act must have been like. Never the same twice.
In the sequel, the last third of the movie is in Vegas.

Jerry Lewis had lots of problems later from all
the physical comedy he did early on. He did
a couple of prat falls here that made my jaw
drop. It's a wonder he didn't kill himself.

Plane ride meant for more films:

Unfinished Business : sloppy, by the numbers comedy starring Vince Vaughan. Sales guy quits to start his own business, a year later he's failing but does a gutsy last swing with his team to close a deal. Blah, blah, blah. Tom Wilkinson as the aging sales deputy puts in a decent performance, but otherwise, this is only good for filling time on a long plane ride.

Ex Machina : Alex Garland writes a film that doesn't end badly. Tense, claustrophobic movie about the nature of intelligence. It's got a couple of big holes (the overall idea of the AI test seems flawed to me) but the twists weren't obvious, and those you were expecting, they show you why you were wrong.

Best Exotic Marigold Hotel : English feel good movie about retiring to India. Tom Wilkinson is in it with a veritable 'who's who' of aging British character actors. Great stuff.

Attended a screening of a small film titled, "Dope", it's a coming of age movie about three "geeky" high school seniors in the predominately black community of Inglewood, California. Think, "Boyz in the Hood" meets "Weird Science" with a twist of "Pulp Fiction". This movie is hard "R", full of expletives, drugs, nudity and gunplay (all involving minors). I had to double check to see if Quentin Tarantino was attached. His fingerprints are all over the negatives.

Too bad, considering it carries an interesting, "You Can Overcome" empowerment message with an in your face, "White/Black Man's Guilt" middle finger designed to challenge everyone's (including the minority community's) stereotypes and expectations. The message is timely considering the recent bruhaha regarding the white woman heading up the Spokane, WA office of the NAACP resigning over passing herself as African-American.


I give it two wizard hats out of 11.