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SMB Film Thread 2025

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Black Phone 2 7/10
Rated 18 instead of 15 like the original. Can see why, it's pretty gruesome. Anyway we enjoyed it, through the surround sound it had some genuine shit ourselves, cover your eyes bits. Stole a lot of bits from other films, and that was clear but worth a watch

Megan 2.0 6/10
Low expectations as it's all been done before but this was slightly different and a bit more fun than the first one. Spoiler more robots come to life and fight other robots. Daft humans in between.

One battle after another 8/10
Good film, not the 10/10 the reviews gave it but still enjoyed it. 2hrs40 went by no bother
 

Anniversary (2025). American political drama. Extremely heavy handed and filled with stereotypes. Guess its seen as a woke thriller. Just excruciatingly dull because who cares about any of them? Just warning you to avoid it. 0/10. Waste of celluloid.
 
Help! (1965) 8/10
Free-wheeling 1960s surrealism from The Beatles and Richard Lester. Not quite as good as A Hard Day's Night, but still fun.
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Nuremberg (2025) 6/10
Russell Crowe's brilliant as Göring, and at times is a sympathetic character - which is exactly what a thought-provoking film should do. But Rami Malek...oh dear. After this and The Amateur, I don't want to see him in anything ever again. (He was canny as Freddie Mercury - and he went out with the daughter of someone I know - but my God, he gets this one completely wrong.)
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Köln 75 (2025) 8/10
Does for Keith Jarrett's Köln Concert (the best selling solo piano album of all time - and one of my favourites) what Deliver Me From Nowhere does for Springsteen's Nebraska. As with Nebraska, the making-of story is the stuff of legend. In this case, a teenaged German girl set up the legendary concert, but it almost fell apart at the last minute. The film was heading for a solid 9/10, but didn't stick the landing.
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errant said:
Was pretty much what all the reviews said too, which i inclined to ignore. Is the film worth the effort, a 6 is sometimes borderline for me and i was already lining up rereading the magnificent 'East West Street' instead...
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Worth it for Russell Crowe, and the unsettling feeling of being sympathetic - for a while, at least - towards Hermann Göring and his family. Rami Malek is so bad you can't take your eyes off him. It's like his Bond villain has strayed into the wrong film.
 
Lola. 8/10. 65 mins or so.
This is a shortish sc-fi type film on the C4 APP atm. Disappears in a few days. I don’t normally bother with their shorts but was intrigued by this one. It’s a pretendy found footage affair in which film remnants are discovered in a Sussex country house being renovated. In them it’s revealed that two sisters who lived there prior to WW2 invented a machine to see into the future and used it to help defend dear old blighty…….or did they? Give it a go it’s a lot better than it sounds.
David Bowies in it btw.
 
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natinnam said:
One Battle After Another - Decent enough watch, but all I thought about at the end of it was, what is everyone raving on about? Have I missed something, a hidden message, divine enlightenment? It's a 7/10 in my book, as I probably wouldn't rewatch it, one and done film.
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I know what you mean, still thought it was good like but not the best film ever which is what all the ratings gave it.
 
Worrying times for film fans, Netflix buying Warner Brothers. Could always open the door for new studios/distributors mind.
 
13 East Street (1952)

A man gets arrested for robbery and sentenced. He escapes en route and gets offered jobs in a criminal gang. His motives aren’t what they seem.

Watchable B flick with Patrick Holt, Sandra Dorne and Michael Balfour.

6/10

Chain of Events (1958)

Meek bank clerk Kenneth Griffith doesn’t pay his bus fare and gives a false name. A wealthy businessman is summoned to court. Reporter Dermot Walsh doesn’t check the facts, and gets fired when it’s established that the accused has an alibi. The chain of events continues as his editor is blackmailed.

Curious film. Never quite gets going as much as it should. The cast is full of familiar faces - Susan Shaw, Ballard Berkeley, Cyril Chamberlain, Jack Watling, Joan Hickson - and the film was directed by Gerald Thomas and produced by Peter Rogers (of Carry On infamy infamy). So the pedigree was there. It was written by Leo McKern from Rumpole of the Bailey. It watchable but doesn’t make the most of the domino effect of a small decision.

5/10

Fallen Angel (1945)

Drifter Dana Andrews rocks up in a small town. He’s a chancer who is always looking to manipulate people to get a small advantage. He soon falls for a waitress (Linda Darnell) and promises to marry her, but to do so he has to find a way of extracting the riches of Alice Faye, a wealthy spinster who lives with her watchful sister.

I know Andrews isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but I think he’s great in this. He’s a right nasty shit, with a ruthless and selfish streak, but at no point did I hope he got nailed. I wanted him to turn his life around and treat people well. It’s a fascinating noir character - deeply flawed and heading for destruction due to his own actions - but I always held out that glimmer of hope for redemption.

Otto Preminger directs wonderfully. There’s lots of long cuts, tracking shots and camera movement, all done seamlessly and organically. The cinematography is great, with a real small-town feel complemented by shadows and lights.

I know plenty won’t like this, but for me it was an 8/10
 
Everything Went Fine (Tout s'est bien passé) 2021 - iPlayer

Recent French family drama following the struggles of coming to terms with a father who wants to commit assisted suicide in Switzerland after suffering a massive stroke. (Yes, I really know how to entertain myself on a Friday night!)

Interesting, thought provoking story, with some decent acting from the leads. Had an unexpectedly light touch in places. In the end though, the whole thing ended up feeling a bit lightweight for what is really such a weighty topic.

6.5/10

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Humane. Paramount

World is in a eco crisis and every country agree to decrease population by 20%, a father agrees to it and tells his family and it kicks off. Thought it sounded really interesting.
Acting is shocking, can’t even describe how shit, clearly done on a budget of 10 bob and a pack of bensons, script rank.

Amazed I seen it through to the end, diven bother.cobra gives it a 1.5/10 simply for the idea.
 
Straw Dogs (1971) 6/10
I'd long accepted this to be an undisputed classic. But actually it's really clunky, especially the finale, which starts with the bad guys voluntarily leaving the place they then try to get back in. Some uncomfortable viewing in the extras: Susan George says Sam Peckinpah wanted to do the rape sequence unrehearsed, which wouldn't have been far off actual rape. It was eventually done on her terms after she walked off the picture.
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Blue Moon (2025) 9/10
Probably being over-generous with the rating, but I loved this. Fantastic performance from Ethan Hawk - definite Oscar contender. It's like spending an evening hanging out at Sardi's with some of the biggest names of 1940s Broadway.
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Adaptation (2002) 10/10
Just read Susan Orlean's memoir. She originally wanted her character renamed, but was persuaded to roll with it. The ultimate meta screenplay.
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Might have already been posted but...

One Battle After Another (2025) - 8/10

I usually hate long films but this seemed to hold my interest throughout. It's not a modern classic like some reviews make out but it's better than decent in my opinion.

The Roses (2025) - 7/10

I thought this was very good but then it's got Olivia Coleman in it and she's class in pretty much everything I see her in. Good performances from Coleman and Cumberbatch as leads. Apparently it's a remake so the oldies might not like it as much as I did.
 
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Two couples arrive at countryside mansion they booked unknowingly together. They discover strange occurrences during stay.

This movie is very hard to rate but I'll go with 5/10. I thought the build up of suspense was excellent but unfortunatley I found myself looking side to side like Vincent Vega from Pulp Fiction when the credits rolled. It is being absolutely slated in the reviews with 3.4/10 on IMDB. Worth a watch if you like suspenseful thrillers. Its nowhere near as bad as people are making out. I'd watch it again.
 
The Crimson Kimono (1959)

James Shigeta and Glenn Corbett are inseparable homicide detectives who are wartime blood brothers. They investigate the murder of a striptease artist, which leads them to artist Victoria Shaw.

Interesting piece about society in 50s America. I enjoyed the performances and setting. There’s a genuine style to the direction, music and camerawork that makes it feel more modern than other films from the era. The murder investigation is just window dressing to drape around the commentary on society and friendship. It feels very heavy handed in places. I did read one review that said that the film pretends that racism doesn’t exist - just in the mind of the ‘victim’, which is a curious take.

7.5/10
 
And Justice for all.
7.5/10.
Pacino. Corrupt justice system.

Best line - ",You sonofabitch, you! You're supposed to stand for somethin'! You're supposed to protect people! But instead you fuck and murder them!"
 
I have to say it's absolutely crackers how they jumped from silent movies to the talkies. Just seems seemless. Tremendous stuff, Is there a documentary about this change?
 
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