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SMB Film Thread 2025

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Menace II Society (1993)

Saw this in the 90s and it's on Netflix so thought I'd give it another go as I couldn't remember much about it.

A brilliant opening few minutes, a terrifyingly pointless drug store robbery with Wire-like levels of authenticity. I don't think the rest of the film lives up to that although it was very watchable, looks brilliant and is indebted to Goodfellas.

You can have the same arguments about whether it's glamorising or condemning certain lifestyles too, although this is kids in the ghetto rather than older gangsters. Also slipped into Friday/Boyz N The Hood tropes although I don't know how cliched that was in the early 90s.

The writing was interesting as the narration makes out like the main character has no options in life yet he has loving grandparents and a smart girlfriend who is inexplicably obsessed with him. The lead actor was easily the weakest of the main cast as well but the supporting actors were great, especially O-Dog.

7/10 - flawed but definitely worth a watch.
 
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Top Gun - Had never seen it before but Val Kilmer’s passing brought it to my attention again. Thought it was bloody awful :lol: Can see how it would’ve been popular in the 80s, but hasn’t aged well at all.
Hated it when it came out and time has mellowed me a bit, but I still hate it now. A couple of my mates love it, but they'll also cite Wham! as their favourite band.

Strangely, I still went to see the second one and although it's a bit of a pastiche of the first I actually quite enjoyed it.
 
Hated it when it came out and time has mellowed me a bit, but I still hate it now. A couple of my mates love it, but they'll also cite Wham! as their favourite band.

Strangely, I still went to see the second one and although it's a bit of a pastiche of the first I actually quite enjoyed it.
Same, and probably an unpopular opinion, but I enjoyed the second one more than the first.
 
Hated it when it came out and time has mellowed me a bit, but I still hate it now. A couple of my mates love it, but they'll also cite Wham! as their favourite band.

Strangely, I still went to see the second one and although it's a bit of a pastiche of the first I actually quite enjoyed it.
Had no interest at the time but finally saw it a couple of years ago. Thought it was absolutely shite.
And that scene with semi naked blokes playing volleyball was one of the gayest things I’ve ever seen!
 
Finally caught up with The Critic the other evening. It’s a strange one. The 1930s period detail is terrific, so too (naturally) the acting of Ian McKellen. But the plot falls off to the extent that the film becomes a paper thin potboiler.
 
Had no interest at the time but finally saw it a couple of years ago. Thought it was absolutely shite.
And that scene with semi naked blokes playing volleyball was one of the gayest things I’ve ever seen!
Aye but it didn't stop a sudden surge in skinny white teenage lads with fake aviators bopping a ball about on beaches all over the place :lol:
 
I decided to watch all the Marvels I haven't watched after giving up on most of them a few years ago as the multiverse crap was doing my head in...

Eternals [2021] 7/10
I liked a lot about this - mainly the fact it didn't look like a Marvel film (natural light/real locations). The script is a bit clunky at times, though.

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever [2022] 2/10
Two hours, forty minutes of rambling, unfocused wank.

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania [2023] 0/10
Utter, utter chod. CGI hell. Turned it off after 40 minutes. Not even my eternal love for Michelle can earn it a point.

The Marvels [2023] 4/10
Inoffensive but forgettable. Good chemistry between the leads.

Captain America: Brave New World [2025] 4/10
Love Harrison Ford but, again, maybe spend less on CGI and more on the script.
Black Panther 2/10 is about 1.99 more than it deserves. Your description is perfect though.
 
Master Gardener (2020) 7/10
Another in the well-known-actor-covered-in-Nazi-tattoos genre. This time, Joel Edgerton as a former neo-Nazi now head gardener at a Southern estate owned by Sigourney Weaver. A black girl is taken on as an apprentice, forcing Edgerton to face his past. So-so, written and directed by Paul Schrader.
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I've just reread two books by Ken Kesey, and then rewatched the movie adaptations.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) 10/10
If anything, better than the book. Jack Nicholson is mesmerising. Filmed on location in an actual mental hospital with some of the patients in bit parts. Rare chance to see Danny DeVito with a full head of hair. Louise Fletcher, as Nurse Ratched, is one of the great movie villains.
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Sometimes a Great Notion (1971) 8/10
Paul Newman directs and stars. Henry Fonda plays the patriarch of the Stampers, a renegade Oregon family of loggers at, er, loggerheads with the local town during a strike. Impossible to do justice to the massive, complex novel, but Newman gives it a good go. Full movie here:
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Brad Dourif in OFOTCN, too. Class.

I remember seeing Louise Fletcher in DS9 as a teenager and being continually annoyed by her wet fart of a character. Then I watched One Flew… and couldn’t watch DS9 again without seeing her as a sinister maniac.
 
Hated it when it came out and time has mellowed me a bit, but I still hate it now. A couple of my mates love it, but they'll also cite Wham! as their favourite band.

Strangely, I still went to see the second one and although it's a bit of a pastiche of the first I actually quite enjoyed it.
I’m the same. Hated the original. Really enjoyed Maverick.

I always considered TG was made for lasses.
 
Never seen TG but I watched Maverick and he's doing handbrake turns in a fighter jet 😂

I think Hot Shots might be more realistic.
 
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