What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[MrBarlow]

The Beast In The Cellar. 1971.

Beryl Reid and Flora Robson play two sisters living in a rural cottage in the middle of nowhere, when a army platoon decides to be station in the area, the soldiers begin to turn up gruesomely killed, the dear old sisters may know something about the beast.

This one was great, set in one area that does make you think twice about taking a walk in the woods or countryside to soak in the atmosphere that will be soaked in blood and bodies. The two main female leads are brilliant in this and manage to keep up the secrecy and then it's revealed they know the monster and decide to spill the beans to detective T.P. McKenna who seemed to actually enjoy a bit of late night Jackanory story. Once we find out the beast's identity and the shot of it going up the stairs seems to play a bit of a homage to Nosferatu with only the shadow on the wall being seen.

There is a bit of to much talking and not a lot of kills and we do see the aftermath especially in a shed when a body is found, but does hold your attention and who or what the beast is. One i'd certainly come back and watch again.

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[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Flyboys (2006)

The film follows the enlistment, training, and combat experiences of a group of young Americans who volunteered to become fighter pilots in the Lafayette Escadrille, the 124th air squadron formed by the French in 1916.

Based on the truth but also derided as inaccurate upon release, Flyboys is a film made up of cliches. Thankfully they are cliches created by the greatest films across the decades, and somehow, helped by a decent cast, including James Franco, Jean Reno and Martin Henderson, and themes of friendship, love and racial prejudice, not to mention some superb aerial dogfights, everything pulls together in one hugely enjoyable slice of classic war entertainment.

Watch this to see a Zeppelin shot down in exciting battle scenes and remember this is more a WW1 Star Wars than it is War Horse or All Quiet on the Western Front.

[MrBarlow]

The Street Fighter. 1974.

Terry a skilled martial artist is hired to kidnap a daughter of a oil tycoon, when his price is refused he then decides to protect the daughter and becomes a wanted man.

Sonny Chiba plays the tough mercenary who knows how to look after himself and not one to be messed with or even upset. Rated as the first X rated action flick and it's no wonder why when a guy is thrown from a building and his head bursts open like a piece of fruit dropped from a great height. The dubbing is all over the place but we get use to films like this. The fight scenes are well choreographed and slowed down in parts so we can see a fist or hand making contact. Nice decent Sunday morning action flick.

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[MrBarlow]

Dolemite. 1975.

Rudy Ray Moore plays Dolemite, a wise cracking jive talking pimp who goes after those who framed him and sent him to prison.

The blaxploitation genre certainly produced some bizarre oddities that's for sure. Dolemite is firmly in this category. On a technical level it's appalling, with bad camera work, acting, action and story.The rough and ready style of Dolemite kind of seems appropriate though, given the nature of the central character, who is a shady bad guy in a pimp suit that you still root for.

What makes this film work is the performance from the lead star. Yes, it's not Oscar winning material but it wasn't meant to be. The point of a film like this is to have fun and gotta say that I thought Rudy Ray Moore was a lot of fun and probably enjoyed making it. I may return to this at some point.

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[MrBarlow]

The Human Tornado. 1976.

Rudy Ray Moore returns as Dolemite this time helping a old friend and her girls fend off some gangsters.

The first film was a fun and somewhat well made movie that became a box office hit...seriously, so a sequel had to follow. This sequel is incredibly daft from the opening credit sequence to the final moment and everything in between is just rather nutty and OTT. There's not a single second where anything you're watching should be taken serious and as long as you're in for a good time then you're bound to have one here.

Rudy Ray Moore was certainly a personality and that leaps off the screen here. I'm not going to call him a brilliant actor but there's no question that the camera loved him and his spirit just makes it impossible to take your eyes off of him when he is jiving in rhymes that can make you laugh out a lot.

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[MrBarlow]

The Blood Splattered Bride. 1972.

A newly wedded wife returns to her husband's family home and is haunted by visions of a bride who murdered her husband.

Another story based on Camilla and the Karstein family, Maribel Martin plays the new bride who goes with her husband Simon Andreu to the family home and begins to suspect something is off with no portraits of any female family members. This is an erotic and gore vampire film with an ambiguous story developed in a nightmarish atmosphere, but having a weak conclusion doesn't make it any memorable than the British horror The Vampire Lovers that came out two years prior to this. Not sure if I will return to this one.

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[MrBarlow]

Cannonball. 1976.

A assortment of people and fast cars run a illegal race from Los Angeles to New York hoping to win a big sum of money.

David Carradine races again this time he isn't killing people just hoping to win some big money with Dick Miller placing a big bet on him to win. There is some cheesey acting, tongue in cheek humour, and Robert Carradine with co pilot Belinda Balaski taking her daddy's car for a race and Gerrit Graham along with his guitar and trying to make a song about the race. Not exactly a big known film but does come with it's own entertainment values that does pass by quickly with some well known people providing a cameo appearance.

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[Nosferatu@Cult Labs]

I've recently returned from the cinema after watching The Zone of Interest, the film which won the Oscar For Best Film Not in the English Language and another for Best Sound.

This is the only film in the first category I have seen, so am keen to watch Anatomy of a Fall, 20 Days in Mariupol, Past Lives, and Society of the Snow, to see how they compare. I completely understand why this won the Best Sound Oscar because it's a film that is entirely reliant on the carefully curated and designed sound library that Johnnie Burn compiled and created.

At its core, it's a very simple film, one that chronicles the daily life of the Hoess family: Rudolph, Hedwig, and their five children. Rudolph and Hedwig appear to be a loving couple, doting parents, and people - particularly Hedwig - who really like where they live. This wouldn't be unusual except Rudolph Hoess was Auschwitz camp commandant, a man responsible for crimes against humanity.

It is very much about what Hannah Arendt, writing about Adolf Eichmann, termed the banality of evil, and the ordinariness of the Hoess family, whether they are playing in the garden, swimming in the river, or having a family meal. The mass extermination of millions of people is referred once, and only in terms of how it could be done most efficiently.

Yet, despite this, Johnnie Burn's soundtrack provides a constant reminder that what is on the other side of the brick wall by the house - there is an array of different sounds from gunfire to quiet screams, from boots to machinery - and many shots feature chimneys pumping out smoke from the industrial-scale crematoria.

It's abundantly clear that Rudolph Hoess took great pride in his work, and his wife was similarly proud of the garden she curated, showing off the flowers and vegetables alike, whether it's making conversation with baby daughter Annegret or her mother who came to stay and (initially) was very fond of her daughter's living arrangements.

On that, I was really impressed with the performances, particularly Christian Friedel and Sandra Huller, playing Rudolf and Hedwig Hoess, respectively, and the child actors who portrayed their children were all utterly convincing. The costume design really helped evoke the period, and it was interesting to read that the house was recreated from a derelict building near the real house where the Hoess family lived, enhancing the similar architecture to replicate the real house and sow flowers and other plants in the garden so it was fully developed by the time shooting began.

This is something of a departure for Jonathan Glazer, who made his name with music videos such as Blur's The Universal, Radiohead's Karma Police, and Jamiroquai's Virtual insanity, before making the feature films Sexy Beast, Birth and Under the Skin; I didn't think he would make something so serious, thought-provoking, and unsettling about a real person and one of history's darkest times.

I can't say that I enjoyed the film, but it is one I'm glad I saw it at the cinema where the soundtrack and visuals were my complete focus - there weren't any distractions as there will be when I watch this at home - and it is, with Son of Saul, one of the best films about the Holocaust I've seen since Schindler's List, and one of the most powerful films I've seen in a very long time.

[Susan Foreman]

'The Aristrocrats' (2005) is a documentary where over 75 of the worlds most popular comedians take an offensive joke, explain it's history, expand on it and deconstruct it

The joke / routine in question is known as 'The Aristocrats', but it's unlikely you will ever have seen it performed by a comedian on stage and even less likely you will have seen on television. It is an old vaudeville sketch which has now become 'a secret handshake? and ?a friend of every comedian in the world' - comics would tell the joke to each other as a warm up for their acts. While the setup and punchline remain the same throughout, the middle section is always varied to get their creativity going by throwing in the most they can and trying to keep it funny. Apparently it is not unknown for versions of the joke to last for over an hour!

The basic joke consists of three parts:

• 1: The Setup. A family act or the head of the family goes to see a talent agent about booking their act. The agent asks what their act consists of...
  
• 3: The Punchline. The shocked agent asks what the act is called, and the proud answer is: "The Aristocrats!"

The second part of the act is where it 'comes alive'. In it, the auditionee describes what the act consists of and this is where the comedian telling the joke gets free rein and improvisation runs riot. Anything goes as long as it is taboo-breaking, offensive and transgressive. Elements including (but not limited to) racism, animal cruelty, incest, rape, child sexual abuse, coprophilia, coprophagia, bestiality, necrophilia, cannibalism, and murder are common themes. Anything goes as long as it is so grotesque and despicable that it makes the work of the Marquis de Sade seem like a jolly greeting card!

Comedians in the films, giving their version of the joke, include Jason Alexander, Hank Azaria. Drew Carey. George Carlin, Billy Connolly, Andy Dick, Phyllis Diller, Carrie Fisher, Whoopi Goldberg, Eric Idle, Howie Mandel, Michael McKean, Martin Mull, Penn & Teller, Emo Philips (who looks unrecognisable from the stand-up comedian I used to watch in the 90's), Kevin Pollak, Paul Reiser, Don Rickles, Chris Rock, Rita Rudner, Harry Shearer, Sarah Silverman, The Smothers Brothers, Rip Taylor, Bruce Vilanch, Fred Willard, Robin Williams, Steven Wright
and the cast of 'South Park'

It's an 'interesting' film, but it depends on how amusing you find people swearing. Sometimes the take on the joke is laugh-out-loud funny, sometimes it is sickening. Sometimes it is clever and other times the description of the act is hard to listen to

Rewatch value: Not much. Although it is an eye-opener watching the comedians working on the routine, once you have head the joke there isn't a lot left

[Nosferatu@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Susan Foreman

'The Aristrocrats' (2005) is a documentary where over 75 of the worlds most popular comedians take an offensive joke, explain it's history, expand on it and deconstruct it

The Aristrocrats is an interesting documentary about a piece of comedy of which I was previously unaware.

I have seen it a couple of times and the only delivery/version of the joke which has stayed with me and would still make me laugh is the South Park version. I can't remember much about any of the others.