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SMB Film Thread 2025

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Tin Star (1957)
8/10

A young naive recently appointed sheriff (Anthony Perkins) learns some hard lessons as he looks to keep a town under control, believing in his badge and what his (dead) predecessor always did. An experienced bounty hunter (Henry Fonda) takes pity and begins offering the young sheriff tips and advice to help keep him alive.

I’ve not seen Perkins in these types of roles, and I think he carried it off quite well. Fonda, as always, is just great to watch. A good supporting cast too.

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The Batman (2022)

This very much fits in with my current tastes. It’s got bagfuls of thematic and visual noir stylings, and looks absolutely fantastic in many scenes. The flawed hero trope is played to the full. It’s not really a superhero film. It’s a detective/crime/mob film, featuring a protagonist and antagonist who are too close for comfort and separated by class privilege. It’s about the corruption of authority. It’s about replacing vengeance with hope. It’s about a PTSD battle that involves hiding behind money and a mask. It’s about a vigilante finding his place. There’s not much superheroey about it at all.

There’s some classy supporting work from a good cast, but the main star for me is the world/atmosphere building. As such, I’ll dive into The Penguin soon. The story is decent enough. I’ve always enjoyed Zodiac style stuff. I didn’t find it too long like some have. I’ve watched a lot of B movies recently and they usually clock in at half the running time of this, so in theory my attention span has been conditioned to struggle, but I didn’t flag once.

Pattinson is a fine actor and played a different type of Batman very well indeed. I’m glad that they didn’t tread over the same character cliches yet again. I enjoyed this immensely.

8.5/10
 
September 5

Cracking little film! I knew very little of the facts of the event (all happened 10 years before I was born), but this was a fascinating concept of to tell the story. Essentially, it tells the story of the Munich Olympics hostage affair through the eyes of those who brought it to the world's eyes - the ABC sports news crew who threw together the live coverage of the siege completely on the hoof.

Short, punchy little thriller that kept me hooked throughout.

8/10
 
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Making a record of people forced out of their homes is incredibly brave. Doubt Trump will have this on his playlist. He'll probably fancy a nice golf course on this land. 8/10.
 
This weekend:

Battle of Britain (1969) ITV4
Michael Caine, Christopher Plummer, Susannah York, every British actor of the age, good afternoon my a**e dakkadakkadakka, one of the best soundtrack. You know the score

Waterloo (1970)
Orson Welles the size of Versailles, Christopher Plummer, Ron Steiger giving that fine line between great acting and hamming it up a good kicking (8.5 on the Shatner scale), the massive battle scenes, hundreds of extras marching through smoke, drums blasting, Dan O'Herlihy stealing it as Ney, Nino Rota’s 3rd best film score (coincidentally My dad had the LP and I must have played it to death as a kid) 9/10

Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) Disney+
Kicking myself for never having watched it sooner. 10/10
 
Watched Trap, there should have a been a decent movie in there but some of those leaps were plain daft. The bulk of the movie was telegraphed, given the producers father I expected something better (even though he hasn't made a good movie for years...) 5/10
 
Winchester 73 (1950) 10/10
One of the great Westerns. James Stewart and Dan Duryea as cowboy adversaries, Rock Hudson as an Indian chief, all linked by a prize Winchester rifle.
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Kiss Me Deadly (1955) 6/10
Adaptation of a novel by Mickey Spillane, the pulpiest of pulp writers. The plot's full of holes, the dialogue is clunky, and the acting isn't great. Radical directing from Robert Aldrich, which makes it worth a watch. Not sure it's quite as brilliant as the likes of Alex Cox claim.
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Bad Day at Black Rock (1955) 10/10
Neo-Western in which one-armed WWII veteran Spencer Tracy steps off a train in a remote settlement asking questions about a Japanese resident who disappeared there. I saw a crappy VHS copy years ago, but loved it then. Even better in pristine HD.
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Companion (2025). Pretty good black comedy thriller. I didn't know too much about it which I guess improved it somewhat. 7/10.
 
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Thunderball (1965) 6/10
Gradually rewatching them all.
Really wanted to like this. I absolutely loved the first three. But this is so baggy. The underwater scenes made me drift off and lose interest. The plot was hard to follow too. At least the Bond girls were canny fit! 🤣
 
cluffy said:
Thunderball (1965) 6/10
Gradually rewatching them all.
Really wanted to like this. I absolutely loved the first three. But this is so baggy. The underwater scenes made me drift off and lose interest. The plot was hard to follow too. At least the Bond girls were canny fit! 🤣
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Aye poor, the "remake" is worse.
 
Heart Eyes at the cinema tonight with my daughter. As far as horror/romcoms go, it was thoroughly enjoyable and obviously doesn't take itself too seriously. Had some proper gore and laugh out loud moments. A solid 8/10.
 
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