For the last week I have been watching "The Outsiders" by Francis Ford Coppola (1983).
"You know what a soc is?" "White trash with Mustangs and madras."
I say for a week because my daughter had to read the book for school and do a report. I told her the movie was great,so we went out and bought the DVD.

I love Outsiders. The "stay gold" theme and the cinematography raise it above the average teen movie.

Speaking of Marty (they show him mostly in the beginning), he is kind of unintentionally humourous. He strikes me as very nervous and fidgety (i.e. " All I wanna know is what song they are gonna open with" he says several times during the planning stages or "we definitly can't set Mick on fire" talking about some kind of stage lighting or something. He reminds me of a Joe Pesci character. No what I mean Capo? He does seem like a likeable guy though.

TIS

Watched the Heartbreak Kid last night.

Ha, yeah, he's very concerned about who's going to be where when it all starts; you have to admire his passion and balls. I'm still not sure if we needed that opening black-and-white montage, though (or the end). That kind of thing's better suited to an optional extra on the DVD release; as it is, it comes across as a bit contrived (as interesting as I find it, in itself).

Another decision that I found very strange and strained, as regards portrayal oof the Stones as timeless... did you notice that almost every single person in the front row was some sort of hyperreal blonde lass you'd expect to see on MTV? What was all that about? To show the Stones' lasting sex appeal?

WHAT???! Capo, don't make me start agreeing with RedRocket here... is this true??

Blade Runner is one of my favorite films of all time!! WHAT??

Raiders, sure, it's fun, but whatever... but Blade Runner???

Granted, I don't know which version you've seen. And a while ago I got the DVD set with "all" the versions on it, but, haven't yet watched it. But in any event... please provide a link to your review!

Anyway...

Last night it was Johnny Depp in Nick of Time (1995) -- a film I hadn't heard of, with Christopher Walken, no less. Not terrible. Not great. But seemed to be like a TV Movie. Forgettable, but, worth the watch if you like thrillers (I do!), or JD...

Tonight was Samuel L. Jackson in One Eight Seven (1997) -- not the strongest urban high school stories I've seen, but -- okay, let's face it, a copycat (even as predecessor) of a few greats. This was all right, I guess. (It was no Lean on Me (1989) or anything -- but I saw the same vibe coming) -- but attempting to be, and failing to come thru as, a thriller.

I thought these were both great. I own 187 on DVD but need to pick up NICK OF TIME. Between the two, I'd say I like NICK OF TIME better.

Out of curiosity... why do you have to actually OWN Nick of Time?? I saw it, and don't really need to see it again -- but if I did, I could just rent it again, say, 10 years down the road. But OWN it??

Why??

Don't get me wrong -- I bought A LOT of DVD's in the beginning... the going rate was over $20 so anything less than that I just bought for the fuck of it. lol. But for the past year or so I hardly bought any -- cuz I'm not stupid. HD is coming, and now we know it's Blu Ray rather than HD DVD -- fine, I didn't get into that battle.

Ya gotta know when to hold'em, know when to fold'm, know when to walk away, know when to run! BUT also know when to invest -- HD-DVD is done... Blu-Ray wins... so act accordingly.... And for the love of Christ, STOP buying 20 DVD's a week for NO reason!!! WTF??

Not to be a snitch, but here is what Capo wrote at the FCM joint:

"'Twas the 1992 director's cut. I must say: very unimpressed. I thought it was a load of bullshit, to be honest. I'm not convinced that intelligence can exist independent of emotions. Computers that lack human emotions in cinema seem gifted at sarcasm and teasingly light-hearted wit (are these not human emotions?). Result: "human emotions = able to fall in love".

I found some of it (dialogue, slow-motion, that forced feeling of grandeur) quite risible; it looks beautiful, though, and I love the music too. Also like the surreal pace and lengthy bouts of non-action, but the narrative shifts to the droids were dull and problematic.

Dunno, perhaps it caught me in the wrong mood, or I caught the wrong cut (I'm pretty sure I'd seen the theatrical cut previously, but it's so long ago now I don't remember). You guys wanna convince me otherwise? I can't really articulate why I found it quite as pompous as I did, so I thought I'd just throw some criticisms out there for y'all to chew on."

BLADE RUNNER is a polarizing picture. Either you're in deep bloom love with it, or you fucking want to burn the negative. No real middle-ground.




NICK OF TIME is a decent thriller, though we must remember...that was one of his first major leading gigs outside of 21 JUMP STREET or Tim Burton. Watchable it is, but that's it.

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I didn't like 187 at all. I felt it was a pissy angry story written by one fucking disgruntled teacher who saw DEER HUNTER one too many times. Hell, only thing I remembered regarding that movie was that movie's bold disclaimer at the credits: "This movie was written by a teacher."

As if that excuses for mediocrity.

Blade Runner is too convinced that its central premise, "What does it mean to be human", is the first time it's been asked in the manner that it has. I suppose that's fair enough, and it's fascinating if you want to go along for the ride, but I find the narrative shifts between Deckard (Descartes?) and the drones problematic; it has no consistent subjective gaze, for a film so strongly about 'seeing' (recurring shots of eyes, etc.). It's too convinced that its ending is beautiful, that its elliptical development is intriguing, that its action set-pieces are weird enough so as to be unforgettable, that it has something profound to say...

...which it might (I'd like to read the book), but existentialism alone doesn't make a film unforgettable. I do like the mise-en-scene, but it hasn't dated too well in its aesthetics; baroque grandeur and risible slow-motion. Perhaps the final cut addresses these problems; I found its silences and gestures of inertia dull, and found it most interesting as a conglomeration of cultures and races to the point of humanity losing its identity - and perfection reached only in the machines it makes.

I don't hate it at all, and it's certainly not rubbish as a whole; I just find it underwhelming, a big mighty "meh". I've seen the director's cut twice now, once on the big screen. Will watch the final cut if it ever comes my way.

I'd buy it because it was a great movie, I don't own it and would watch it more than once in the next ten years

I've always found it a curious trend that people who take pride in collecting DVDs seem to be fond of utter mediocrity. It's like they'll settle for anything.

The worst I saw, not the worst period (just like The Godfather is the best film you've seen, and little beyond that). I don't go out of my wway to see films I don't think I'll like, so it's no surprise that I see very few really, really shit films, compared to others on here.

Todd had no merit for me. I sighed ten minutes in and didn't come out of that cynical slumber.

Nowadays I find myself constantly torn between the choice of watching an unseen movie and rewatching a movie that I've seen and enjoyed. Mostly I settle for watching the unseen one. I don't like this trend, as many times I really love the movie and would like to watch it again with director's commentary. But I need to return the movie back to blockbuster in order to watch that other movie that I've been waiting to watch I can't imagine myself buying DVDs. I will, in all likelyhood, NOT watch the movie again. Forget the dilemma of collecting good/mediocre DVDs...

You don't have On-Demand programming then, Mick? On bored evenings when I don't have any NetFlix discs and my DVR viewing is caught up (like last night), I scroll thru the free movies for something new. Granted, a lot of the free movies aren't the best, but I have no problem investing 90-120 minutes of my life with a crap movie -- or, an obscure movie that I might end up really enjoying. And how would you know until you actually saw it? I actually enjoy a lot of crappy films.

As for Blade Runner -- I took a class in college on Artificial Intelligence (the first thing discussed was Descartes! lol), and the book (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Philip K. Dick) was required reading. I'm not a big reader or anything, but it was enjoyable -- check it out. I think the books are generally better than the films they become. But one day I'll have to watch all 4 versions of BR. I still haven't seen the "Final" cut.

As for Irish's DVD buying spree... I'd slow down. I know I have 340 of them, but that started 10 years ago. I now only buy what I consider *critical* titles, because a few years from now HD will be standard and who wants to replace all their DVDs for Blu-ray versions? Imagine the cost! (Luckily for me I never really had much of a VHS collection - it was too shitty of a format, even then, to buy just any movie I liked. I had to LOVE it. Or it had to be in the bargain bin.) Irish has 628 titles! Assuming 100 minutes each, that's almost 44 days of 24/7 entertainment! Not necessary. I was guilty of the same thing ("utter mediocrity": check my list lol), but got over it. Besides, it's an expensive "hobby" after a while... and it never increased my dick size!

I've stopped buying DVDs. I'm tired of investing in a medium and technology that will soon go obsolete. I am in the process of transferring many of my beloved VCR movies to DVD, though. Lets see what happens in the next few years.

I don't think there will be A given format that will last for long. I think DVDs have lasted long enough. Probably Blue rays will be there for another decade, now that the HDDVD format has definitely lost the battle. The Blue ray players will play the DVDs, so nothing goes waste. Unless, all the old films that you've got in DVDs are going to be re-released in Blue Ray. I am not sure if the average movie today has enough high definition content that will make a big difference in Blue Ray. Maybe the movies they make now and in future will be made with Blue Ray in mind.

Its not the quality of the DVDs they buy that matters, but the # of titles they want to brag about owning, like that fucking matters.

In other words, its sizing up our Johnsons....

I have a considerable collection, but its titles I fucking dig, the massive amount of movies I watch more than once. When I'm spent with certain titles, I donate them to my college's library, with the idea that with their free student pass, they could explore alot of quality cinema at that peak age of curiosity.*

*=Which probably by now is about 20 DVDs, ranging from Francis Ford Coppola (DEMENTIA 13) to Ridley Scott (GLADIATOR/BLADE RUNNER) to Martin Scorsese (THE AVIATOR/RAGING BULL/TAXI DRIVER)damn good titles like Bill Paxton's FRAILTY, Joe Carnahan's NARC, and practically my entire Oliver Stone collection. See, I have a charitable dick!

GOLDENEYE
(Nth Viewing)

As of this writing I'd say Brosnan is my second favorite Bond behind only Connery. They seemed to have many similarities with their witty charm, grittiness to get the job done, and appetite for women. This is easily the best Bond in the previous decade before it and it'd dare say since GOLDFINGER. This was also the first film to introduce me to Sean Bean, Judi Dench, Alan Cummings and Famke Janssen. I really enjoyed Gottfried John's work as General Arkady Grigorovich Ourumov.

As of today I'm up to 788

It wasn't that long ago that as a gift for my parents, we transferred all of their 8mm home movies of the family growing up to video. it looks like we should wait before transferring them to dvd.

I bought (a fairly inexpensive) combo player/recorder that allows you to copy a VCR tape to DVD (or vice-a-versa). It has worked fine copying my old VCR movies to DVD plus the main benefit is that the VCR tapes were beginning to "fade" and that doesn't happen with a DVD, so I've "saved" my old movies from fading away.

Thanks, SC. I'm going to buy one and transfer the tapes to disc this year.

my god that is crazy..

That is quite an impressive number, but I looked at your collection some time ago and found only about 50-60 titles that I'd want (or already have).

I have about 200 titles (between VCR and DVD) and even if I could afford to buy whatever I wanted, I'd only be able to come up with perhaps another 100 that I'd want in my collection.

But, I guess that is what makes it special to each of us - it is OUR own tastes that determine what we buy and add.

I have a grand total of 2 DVDs and one of them was a gift

I haven't updated in a while, but I've watched quite a few movies. Ask me if you are interested in knowing more about any of these...

Yi Yi (2000 - Edward Yang) ****
The Son's Room (2005 - Nanni Moretti) ***
Cache (2005 - Michael Haneke) **
Ro.Go.Pa.G(segment - La Ricotta) (1963 - Pier Paolo Pasolini) ***
Hymn (Michael Pattison#) *
Still (Michael Pattison) *
Is Not (Michael Pattison)**
Gwent Jykmel (Michael Pattison) **
Le Amiche (1955 - Michelangelo Antonioni##) ****
La Notte (1961 - Michelangelo Antonioni) ****
Passenger (1975 - Michelangelo Antonioni) ****
Scenes from a marriage (1973 - Ingmar Bergman) ****

# It is Capo's real name
## Any other Antonioni fans here? Given a large number of Italians on the board, I wouldn't surprised though.

I just saw "The Number 23" on tv. Aside from it being disturbing, it was a decent story that could have been presented better on the screen. Jim Carrey was OK as the main character who had become obsessed with the number "23" but the movie just didn't "deliver".

I would not recommend it.

My real real name is Stringer Bell.

TOMORROW NEVER DIES
(Fourth Viewing)

This and the subsequent Brosnan films fail to provide that grittiness that made GOLDENEYE so effective. Also, the script was rather a bit weak with the villain just being an insane media mogul. I understand on paper how it looks but it didn't transition well to the screen or the Bond franchise.