What I've Been Watching: The Catch-All Film Thread

Alien: Covenant - Loved it (my favorite genre though, so i get it if most won't agree). 8/10. Liked it better the Prometheus (which was great too, but had some annoying moments)

I really disliked Prometheus (as a huge fan of the original Alien films) and I'd certainly agree that Covenant was much better. I still didn't like it all that much, though.

I was recently looking at - THe Wizsrd Of Oz.

To me, it looks horribly dated, but I believe it could still be a wonderful movie for school children.

The tricks and FX used there must have been very impressive at that time. Looking at the fact that the movie is from 1949, I was impressed by the FX myself - trying to emulate the view of an movie watcher of that time.

But not only the FX is impressive, the costumes are as well, and the use of colours as well. (I don't want to spoil anything.)

The songs in the movie are quite catchy. I think everybody knows the title song, as it has become one real classic.
However, the song "Ding Dong, The Witch Is Dead" has receives some popularity as it was used in Great Britain to celebrate the death of Mrs. Margaret Thatcher. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ding-Dong!_The_Witch_Is_Dead#Usage_as_a_meme_in_politics

Result : In my opinion, it is very well regarded to be a true classic, and that even although it looks horribly dated in places in the eyes of watchers from today.

In my personal opinion, it would be a good itead to make an computeranimated movie out of that, but with a high standard in quality. To portrait a lion with an human actor is a bit "out of place" these days, this is what I personally think, because of the possibilities of computergenerated pictures/movies these days.

As a side-note, I won't be in the forum for the next 7 days, because I'm on vacation during this time.

Last movie I watched (on blu-ray) was Alien Covenant. Didn't enjoy it as much as Prometheus but it's nice to see how consistent and reverent Ridley Scott wanted to remain to the original Alien. Nothing felt too much out of place or revisionist. And I quite enjoyed the idea of David as

..he came off as H.R Giger himself in a particular scene i liked that.

Don't Breathe - disappointed. It was ok but doesn't qualify as horror for me. To be horror the threat should be mythic ( usually supernatural, but not necessarily so) but here we are just dealing with a blind vet with a grudge. Pretty mundane.

vurt said:

Alien: Covenant - Loved it (my favorite genre though, so i get it if most won't agree). 8/10. Liked it better the Prometheus (which was great too, but had some annoying moments)

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Ripper said:

I really disliked Prometheus (as a huge fan of the original Alien films) and I'd certainly agree that Covenant was much better. I still didn't like it all that much, though.

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I finally got around to watching it last night, and I don't think it was much better than Prometheus. I didn't think it was horrible, but I was definitely disappointed.

I loved the opening scene with David and a young Peter Weyland, but it was mostly downhill after that. Too many things left unexplained.



I also think the cast was a significant step down from Prometheus. Fassbender was the highlight once again, but Prometheus also had Noomi Rapace, Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce, and Idris Elba turning in decent performances. I didn't care for any of the supporting actors in Covenant.

I'd agree that Prometheus had a stronger cast - but I actually thought their performances were mostly awful. Idris Elba's character just reminded me of Robert Downey Jr in Tropic Thunder.

I thought that Covenant was pretty mediocre, overall, but I found that the narrative was at least coherent, if still full of holes. I can suspend disbelief to a certain extent, but in Prometheus I found that the character actions made no sense, and the entire thing was a narrative jumble. It smacked of a script that had been buggered about with for too long, by too many chefs. So, Covenant I found reasonably diverting, while Prometheus just actively irritated me.

I found them equally irritating, but I think I was more disappointed with Covenant because I expected certain things to finally be explained. Instead, the entire movie felt like a cop-out.

At least we now know which came first (the chicken or the egg)

One thing I never understood in Prometheus was when the Creator is revived and kills Weyland and the others for no apparent reason other than for Ridley Scott to pay homage to both Howard Hawks' The Thing From Another World and Scott's own Bladerunner and the scene with Roy Batty and his creator Dr. Tyrell. It turns out Scott decided to delete the Creator's only dialogue in the film that explains he's simply disgusted with Weyland's arrogance and comparing himself to a god for creating the androids in His Image.

JackOfOwls said:

One thing I never understood in Prometheus was when the Creator is revived and kills Weyland and the others for no apparent reason

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Think wider.
What was it those species do? What was it our species want and asked from creator(s)?
No dialogue is needed.

Honestly? I'd grant 'em (us) what was asked - in belly of a sarlacc. But then again, I'm evil.

Anyway, I still didn't watch the sequel. But I said before, to me Prometheus is a masterpiece.

joxer said:

Think wider.
What was it those species do? What was it our species want and asked from creator(s)?
No dialogue is needed.

Honestly? I'd grant 'em (us) what was asked - in belly of a sarlacc. But then again, I'm evil.

Anyway, I still didn't watch the sequel. But I said before, to me Prometheus is a masterpiece.

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Prometheus is not terribly profound or original in its ideas of aliens creating the human race then seeming to either discard them (Prometheus) or continue experimenting upon them (2001: A Space Odyssey) but I did like that nasty set-piece with the hammerpede and the important role it played in the xenomorphs' final DNA. A nice addition to the Alien mythos. Sequels should only be made if they actually add something to the original.

I think they should probably have let the Aliens movies rest after the first two, and not tried to exploit it as a franchise. It was an amazing ghost train ride, but once it had sprung its surprises, there's only diminishing returns. Trying to explain all its mysteries with this contrived nonsense just diminishes it, for me.

Ripper said:

I think they should probably have let the Aliens movies rest after the first two, and not tried to exploit it as a franchise.

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I don't have a problem with Alien 3. I just finished watching it again, and I still think it's underrated even if it's a little boring compared to Aliens.

Alien: Resurrection on the other hand is just terrible. Ironically, I think it has the best cast of any Alien movie, but the plot is so bad it's embarrassing.

Alien 3 "assembly cut" is what I would consider a decent sci-fi film. Too bad the Alien itself looks like ass. I won't even get into the Bishop droid sequence.

But the premise is cool and the cast is very strong. The atmosphere is particularly compelling - and I enjoy the ultra bleak take on the story. While I'm not one to whine about killing off main characters, I do think the way it utterly shits on Aliens was a very, very bad decision.

I agree that Resurrection is a very bad joke, though I can't say I think the cast is very good. Winona Ryder and Dan Hedaya are both horribly miscast, in my opinion.

Prometheus and Covenant are both beyond terrible - with some of the worst scripts I've ever experienced in high-profile films.

The best thing I can say about Covenant is that it managed to be exactly as bad as I expected, which means at least it didn't disappoint me. Prometheus ranks as one of the most disappointing experiences I've ever had in the cinema - and I was prepared to be disappointed.

NewDArt said:

Alien 3 "assembly cut" is what I would consider a decent sci-fi film. Too bad the Alien itself looks like ass. I won't even get into the Bishop droid sequence.

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For a movie filmed in 1991, I think it still looks great for the most part. The exception would definitely be Bishop though. I was cringing during that scene.

NewDArt said:

I agree that Resurrection is a very bad joke, though I can't say I think the cast is very good. Winona Ryder and Dan Hedaya are both horribly miscast, in my opinion

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Agree about Hedaya, but I still think it's the most diverse and interesting cast out of the original movies. Not that it mattered in the overall scheme of things.

JDR13 said:

For a movie filmed in 1991, I think it still looks great for the most part. The exception would definitely be Bishop though. I was cringing during that scene.

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Well, I think the Alien looked much better in 1979 The CGI is abysmal and the hand-puppet is worse still. It looks very good when it's a suit, though, which is what I think they should have focused on. Worked great in both Alien and Aliens.

Beyond the creature and Bishop, I agree it looks very good.

I haven't seen Covenant yet. Prometheus left a very bad taste in my mouth so I skipped it at the cinema. I'll watch it on DVD at some point. Probably.

The 79 alien generally looked awesome because you almost never see it, and rarely in full. It's often just a close up of a mouth or a very quick cut shot like in the air vents. When you see it for a sustained period at the end, when it's outside the spaceship, it looks ok but not great. Still by far the best of the early films imho, although the second one was an entertaining blast of course. Third one was just a bit too miserable for its own good. But yeah suit better than cgi in this case.

Alien 3 is by far is the worst one in the series. I don't know what the fuck an "assembly cut" is but it sounds horrible, like some grainy slapdash fan-edit you might find on youtube. Nothing could save that film. Resurrection at least had some entertainment value unlike A3 which was boring and had some genuinely laughable performances.

I enjoyed the Alien rip-off Life a bit. It reminded me of the new Outer Limits but with a 200 million dollar budget. The idea of the alien as a survivor was actually done better here than in any of the official Alien films but not as well as in The Thing, of course.