159 - Doll Graveyard

    A kid unearths a spot where a girl was buried, along with her dolls.  The dolls resurrect, and the girl's spirit inhabits the kid who found the dolls.  His older sister is having a party while their father is out.  The girl's spirit wants to kill off the people attending the party.
    This was a cheap movie.  I wish I could find the budget, but it's clearly made very cheaply.  But they didn't skimp where they needed it.  The sound is clear.  The picture is decent.  And the editing doesn't annoy.  You can always tell what's happening.
    The script isn't great, but the acting is entirely appropriate for this level of material.  I never felt like the movie was trying to reach beyond what it should be.
    There was one moment in this that I thought was hilarious.  A doll is about to bite the cheek of a girl.  At the start of the shot, it's clear that the girl already has the makeup on her face for the wound.
    I picked up three DVD sets at Best Buy today, so now I have 24 horror movies across six DVDs.  All for the low, low price of about $15.  Normally I don't like these types of compilations.  They usually rely on public domain material to flesh things out, and many of those are nearly unwatchable.  These all seem to be reasonably modern, and not public domain.  So I expect more horror to fill up my time.

158 - Paycheck

    A guy makes a living by reverse-engineering projects, followed by having his memory wiped so that he can never give the secrets away.  He works on a long-term project, and finds that when he's done, there's an effort made to kill him.  To continue explaining things would ruin some of the surprise of the movie.
    This was based on a story by Philip K. Dick, which was part of why I wanted to see it.  The plot is excellent, and would make a remarkable movie.  Except that this was directed by John Woo, and starred Ben Affleck.  And it suffers so badly under this direction.
    The problems with this movie are really difficult to explain.  The script isn't terrible, but it's not great.  The movie is very brightly lit.  There aren't many parts that are in shadow.  But the editing and the framing of the shots are really confusing.  We often get poor views of people or things, and it just makes things confusing.
    The action is lackluster.  It alternated between being absurdly gimmicky, or intolerably predictable.  And like everything Woo does, there are some birds mixed in there.
    I actually figured most of the story out pretty quickly.  I did make one bad prediction later on.  While the story played out as I expected it to, I can credit most of that to another directorial choice.  The foreshadowing is ridiculous!  Every single thing we see pays off in an obvious way.
    I would like to see this story told with a more polished script, and with a more visionary director.  In the meantime, this is a very sad disappointment.
    And one other observation.  The guy is a reverse engineer.  And he gets his memory wiped after each project.  Wouldn't he become obsolete really fast?  He wouldn't learn anything.

157 - Against the Dark

    In some kind of apocalyptic scenario, a few groups of survivors run into each other in a hospital.  They try to find their way out of the building, dealing with some kind of strange vampire/zombies.
    This stars Steven Seagal.  When I started the movie, I wasn't sure what was going on in it.  The introduction only establishes the world that it takes place in.  None of the characters are introduced, and their motivation is not explained. They go into the building, because it's too dangerous to be out in the open during the night.  Their difficulty in getting out doesn't make sense either.  Most of the routes out through lower levels have been blocked off.  So why don't they leave the way they came in?  This is mentioned, but it isn't addressed.
    (I found an explanation for why the characters are in this hospital.  One of the groups is looking for penicillin to treat pneumonia, the other group is hiding there because one of them is familiar with the building.  Not much of a reason.  Also, their incentive for getting out soon is that the power is failing in the building, and if the emergency power runs out, the main exit will be permanently locked.  We'll ignore that it doesn't make sense.)
    The movie does create a ticking clock scenario, by making it so that the military will be bombing the building at dawn.  The reason that the building has to be bombed at that point in time is unclear.  Wouldn't they have all day to do that?
    Even though most of the population seems to be vampire/zombies, there's still a functioning government?  They refer to one of the characters as being from the State department.
    The direction is borderline.  There are slow motion shots that are sloppily done, and don't seem to even focus on something of interest.  The editing is awkward, and makes the action hard to follow.  The action isn't exciting, either.  I don't think I expected much from this, but the action seemed dull, and usually nonsensical.  Sometimes, a single bullet would be enough to kill of the infected.  Other times, a dozen hits were needed.
    The movie was brave in one regard - there are two instances of infected children being killed.  These are both done off-screen, but it's nice to see them being willing to go that route.  Plus, there's a scene where one of the heroes gets bit, and Seagal expresses some sadness and regret, but quickly kills that person off, and moves on.  This is a stereotypical scene in any of these types of movies, and it was nice to see it handled in the most matter-of-fact way possible.
    None of that is to say that this is a good movie.
    You know, The Room had a budget of around 6M.  This had a budget of around 9M.  And this one used plenty of footage appropriated from other sources.  Despite the technical problems of The Room, I'd say that they made a better use of their money.  This movie was hard to watch, only because it wasn't engaging at all.  None of the characters are worth remembering.  The tension in the movie feels forced.  The script is scattershot, with scenes and dialogue having no particular connection to everything else that happens.
    There are plenty of recycled sets in this movie.  We see the same hallway many times, but at least they were willing to change the decoration.

    It isn't clear how long the infection has been going around.  When they raid the cafeteria, they make mention of the food being a couple months old.  I'll assume they were talking about the prepared food.  None of it was moldy.
    Despite the infection only being about "a couple months old" they make several references to the infected "evolving."  They aren't reproducing.  There has only been one generation of the infected.
    I'm sure I'm nitpicking that one.  For an action movie to feel this dull...

156 - Night of the Living Dead (1990)

    Something is making the recently deceased re-animate, and attack the living.  A handful of survivors hole up in a farmhouse, where they argue with each other, and try to figure out how to survive the evening, and find help.
    This was a remake that was directed by Tom Savini.  The story is effectively the same as the original, but the characters have been changed a bit, and the arguments play out differently.  Some people really have a lot of contempt for this version, but I've always thought that it was an important companion piece to the original version.
    As I've gotten more discerning about movies, I've felt a little more disappointed with this version.  The ideas are still great.  Some of the performances are strong, and are over-the-top in just the right way.  There are two roles that are the exception.  Tom, and Judy Rose are both just horrible.  She spends most of her time screaming.  They have some stilted dialogue, but otherwise, they only exist in order to get killed off.

    I have a collection of other thoughts about watching this movie though.  This disc was released by Twilight Time, which put out a limited run of 3000 copies.  They price at a premium, and after shipping, it was about $34 and change.  It's usually worth it though - if you think you'll want a copy of the movie, the prices shoot right up.  They released a Blu-ray of Fright Night, which usually commands about $100 on the secondary market.
    So I preordered this disc.  I was happy to get it.  Then I started reading a bit more about it online.  It has a blue tint, making most of the movie really, really dark.  Then I saw some other reviews claiming it wasn't so bad.  Now that I've seen it, I can say that they're both right.
    The movie starts off looking fine.  Then once the first dead appears, the blue tint kicks in.  By the time Barbara is trying to get away in the car, it's not right.  There's too much muddy black on the screen.
    So I make a bunch of adjustments to my picture settings.  I pick the brightest, most vivid mode possible.  Then I bring up the brightness.  It makes the picture a bit better, and most of the rest of the movie still has the blue tint, but it isn't as powerful.  The strength of it varies, and it's hard to tell if I was just getting used to it.
    Regardless, the print used in this, despite any approval from anyone in authority, is not right.  The darkness of shots doesn't make it more scary, or somehow more mysterious.  It just makes it hard to tell what I'm seeing.

155 - The King's Speech

    The younger son of the king has a strong stutter, and since public speaking is a big part of his duties, he tries a variety of speech therapists, before landing with an "unorthodox" one.  As his father dies, and his brother ascends to the throne, George VI realizes that he will likely have to take the throne.  Along with the throne comes duties of making speeches on the radio.
    I had a few reservations on my way to seeing this.  I had heard that it was very good.  And it is very good.  But I also had read some praise of it on Conservapedia.
    Of course, Andrew Schlafly made a bizarre jump.  There isn't much political about this movie.  If anything, the reluctance to go to war is made palpable.

    This is much more just a movie about two things.  The effect that an impediment can have on even the very rich and powerful, and the friendship between a man of royalty and a working-class Joe.  Both of these ideas are handled well.
    I did feel like something wasn't complete about the movie.  We never learn as much as we should about the psychological elements that contribute to the stutter.  There are several instances where they bring it up, but it doesn't get addressed as fully as it should be.  I suppose that just speaks to the privacy that George feels the need to maintain.
    There was one other scene that felt forced.  When Lionel is confronted over his lack of credentials, that wasn't earned.  It was never an issue before, and it isn't an issue afterward.  It simply existed to create a conflict at the appropriate moment in the story.

    Despite these complaints, it is a very engaging movie.

    And to tie back to what Conservapedia had to say about it, The Social Network was actually more interesting, and not because of the Facebook angle.  It was a more complex, and more flawed character that was being dealt with.

154 - Beauty and the Beast

    I'm sure no one needs a summary of the story of Beauty and the Beast.  This was the 1946 French version by Jean Cocteau.
    There are some really amazing touches to this version.  The effects are really well done, especially for the time period.  The photography is usually very enjoyable.  The design for the Beast is excellent.
    But there are some weaknesses.  I don't care for the dialogue too much.  Some of it seems more hammy than it should be.  And I had a big problem with the way that the ending works.  Beauty's brother attempts to break in to the house that holds the Beast's treasure, as the Beast lay dying.  A statue near the treasure shoots the brother with an arrow, turning him into a Beast.  Suddenly, the original Beast is perfectly fine, and is back to being his human self.  The implication is that there is only one Beast at a time.  So… Beauty's love has nothing to do with turning Beast back.  Even though this is talked about in the dialogue, it seems that the message is that greed turns people into being a Beast, and only letting go of that greed allows them to regain their humanity.  Love has little, or nothing, to do with it.

153 - Looper

    In the near future, an unusual assassin runs into the older version of himself, who wants to prevent his wife from getting killed.  From there, things get more complicated, and more difficult to talk about without spelling too much of the movie out.
    The plot of the movie is nowhere near as complicated as I thought it would be.  It does involve time travel, and the effects that events in the present have on the future, or on future versions of specific people.  But there's some dialogue near the middle of the movie that addresses this, when Bruce Willis tells his younger counterpart not to talk about it.  It's just a big distraction from getting things done.
    There are a few interesting things to consider about this movie.  First, it involves the murder of a child.  Second, because of that murder, the audience is put into an unusual situation regarding who they are supposed to root for.  I found this to be an interesting ambiguity.  Every character has reasonable motivations, so their conflicts make perfect sense.  And since no one seems to have a broader plan than achieving their immediate goal, it's hard to say that any character achieving their goal would fix things.
    It's rare that movies write conflicts this well.  If it doesn't seem like anyone is being unreasonable, everything plays naturally.

    The world building of the movie is handled really well.  It's much more familiar than a movie like Blade Runner is, but it's also got just enough small twists and details to suggest that a lot of things happened in the meantime.  I noticed a detail late in the movie, that a truck has a hose connected to the gas tank, which runs around the back bumper.  It isn't clear what this does, but it implies that there was some innovation.
    I was very happy with this movie, but I also wonder how well it holds up to repeated viewings.  I think I might like to see it every now and then, as I forget about how it plays out.

152 - Downfall (Der Untergang)

    The last several days of World War II, told primarily from Hitler's bunker.
    I didn't see the extended version, but this was still a massively long movie.  I only saw one that was about 2:40.  The longer version is about 20 minutes longer.  It's a good movie.  It's well made, but the adherence to chronology and the facts of the event make this movie an unusual structure.
    We follow several different characters, and not just in the bunker.  In some cases, paths cross, but never in a very meaningful way.  The huge cast, combined with a lot of characters not being named in an explicit way, makes following every story a difficult task.
    But the real reason to watch this movie is Hitler.  A clip of this circulates heavily online, with altered subtitles to show Hitler flipping out about a variety of things.  But the portrayal, and handling of Hitler here is fascinating.
    He's erratic.  He's prone to ignoring bad news.  He tends to blame other people for not being able to carry out orders.   Most of his actions could be taken as him just being in too deep of a situation to get out.  But he doesn't try to get out of the situation.
    Throughout the movie, he gets constant advise to leave Berlin.  He refuses to do this.  He contemplates a variety of other actions, all of which are absurd.  He acts as though armies that no longer exist are under his control.  He considers that he can make the Allied attack more difficult by destroying Germany's resources.
    While he's completely irresponsible as a leader, he's not as cold and calculating as he tries to be.  There are a few instances of him showing genuine appreciation for a few people, and being surprisingly gentle and easygoing with some people.
    But Goebbels is the one who comes out looking really nuts.  He's devoted to Hitler beyond question, to the point where he refuses to recognize facts.  After Hitler dies, he and his wife poison their children, then leave the bunker, where he shoots her, then himself.
    Prideful suicide is all over the last forty-five minutes of this movie.  And it always seems a little puzzling.  Their conviction in feeling that they were right would normally preclude this kind of thing, and suicide seems like more of an admission of guilt.

    It's a fascinating movie, and it's well made, but it needs a little more of a focus to make the jump to greatness.
    And I leave you with my favorite Hitler video.  Enjoy.

151 - The Avengers

    Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, Black Widow, Hawkeye, and the Hulk are brought together by Nick Fury, to address the threat caused by Loki stealing the Tesseract.
    I didn't want this movie to be the one that I matched last year's record with, especially since I've been trying to watch more movies for the first time.  But Downfall, which will probably be next on my list, Cathy wants to watch as well.  So I substituted this.
    And man, it's better than I remember.  For a movie of this scale, there are usually some parts where it's easy to just tune out, and not actually pay attention.  On a second viewing, I found that this was still packed very tightly.  There's no fat on this one.  At least, no fat that isn't delicious.
    I also watched the gag reel, the deleted scenes, and listened to the commentary on this.  All of those are worthwhile.  Stan Lee had a different cameo that was trimmed, but I really loved that one.  I found the commentary smoothed over some of my doubts about the movie.  Whedon is a nerdy guy, but he's also remarkably clear about how little responsibility he has for the quality of the movie.  He tosses out a lot of praise for a bunch of editors for handling the story, and making it come together in a way that made sense.  He doesn't take credit for things that other people did that he kept.  He also reiterated how awkward the process for making the movie was - that they had to start filming before they finished a script.
    I'll probably see this again before the year is out.  It's so much fun.

150 - Tourist Trap

    A bunch of teens are driving to some touristy spot, and they get a flat tire.  They wind up finding the destination, and a run down gas station.  They're greeted by the resident.  Gradually the teens are being dispatched by a masked, telekinetic killer, who uses mannequins to do his bidding.
    I wasn't expecting too much from this, but I've been pleasantly surprised.  It's not bad.  In fact, it's kind of interesting.  That isn't to say that it's especially good, but it is memorable.
    This movie has a 6.1 on IMDB.  That's very good for a horror movie - especially for a horror movie from 1979!  Even better for a cheap horror movie from 1979!
    The performances from the teens are generally fine.  No one stands out.  The villain is handled very well, and he seems just creepy enough for most of the movie, before cranking things up for the last reel.
    The telekinetic angle is very interesting.  They don't try to explain it at all, but it provides a great explanation for mannequins moving on their own.  And mannequins are creepy enough without moving.  There are plenty of really creepy bits, where the mannequins have jointed mouths, and they drop open and scream.
    Most of the movie has this very strange feeling, like the whole thing is a nightmare.  It's a very detailed nightmare, and it's the sort of thing that would have a really powerful impact on younger viewers.
    And another peculiar detail about the movie - it's rated PG!  There's a fair amount of blood.  No real gore.  There's an asphyxiation, as well as a death by knife to the back of the head, as well as another with an axe.

149 - Live Free or Die Hard

    John McClane returns.  This time, he protects a white-hat hacker as they try to deal with a cyber-terrorist who takes over traffic, communications, and utility networks.
    This one doesn't have the same buddy cop vibe that Die Hard With a Vengeance had.  But this one is much more pleasing.  The guy that McClane has following him around is surprisingly likable, and there's a nice odd couple feeling going on.  None of the racial elements of the 3rd one, they've been replaced with a generation gap.
    There was a strong sense of terror during the 3rd one, when the subway station is taken out.  In this case, this movie almost exclusively uses moments like that.  The prospect of losing all utilities, and not being able to communicate is much more serious.
    In contrast though, the action seems campier than before.  As is shown in the trailer, he uses a car to jump a ramp, hitting a helicopter.  This is just hilarious, and it's hard to take that kind of action seriously.  There's a sequence near the end, when he's driving a truck and trying to deal with an airplane that's shooting at him.  That's even sillier.
    The villain is a little more interesting.  He seems less comfortable.  Even though he's confident in his plan, his mannerisms seem a little strange.
    I want to point one thing out - and this is a spoiler.  McClane beats the villain by taking the gun being held to his chest, and shooting through his own shoulder to hit the villain.  This is very similar to how Darth Vader beat Darth Maul in one of the Star Wars comics.

    One other minor detail.  Something about the lighting in this movie really looks artificial to me.  It isn't constant, but the light reflected off Bruce Willis's head doesn't look right.

148 - Zelig

    Presented as a documentary, Leonard Zelig is a peculiar man, who takes on the characteristics of those around him.  This manifests as both physical and personality changes.  During the 1920's, Zelig becomes a celebrity, then falls out of favor, all the while, working with a doctor to try to cure him of his uncontrollable changing.
    I've only seen one other Woody Allen movie - and that was a slightly more serious one, Sweet and Lowdown.  Despite not being aware of much else that Allen has done, this played out exactly as I expected.
    This is a comedy, but it's so gentle.  Most of the jokes are funny, but they feel a little predictable.  Almost like Mel Brooks, but less risqué.
    I enjoyed this movie, but I didn't feel like it was great.  It's pleasing.  It's framed as a documentary, which gave a good amount of flexibility in how the story would be presented.  I suppose the weakness may have been that there didn't seem to be much plot.  It was almost entirely just a character study.
    There were some nicely handled issues of identity, and the need to blend in.  And the romance is peculiar.  It doesn't seem that interesting, but it ended very well.

    As I watched this, I kept thinking that it would be much funnier to me at a younger age, when the jokes he delivers are more fresh.