amedia

When Father Was Away on Business, Pusher, Weirdsville, Black, Pusher 2, Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind, Six Against the Rock, and Surfwise.( Read more... )

Free from Jaman as a Hallowe'en movie, Woh Kaun Tih? ("Who was she?") is an eerie ghost story/murder mystery from 1964 about a doctor haunted by a mysterious woman. It moved very slowly; TODS and I worked out the twist long before it was revealed. Beautiful settings and costumes and a very atmospheric filming style, although it was sometimes just way too dark for too long. They seemed to be playing with putting an Indian twist on conventional Hollywood ghost cliches--the beautiful woman who vanishes into the graveyard, the deserted house with the dying woman who isn't there when the doctor comes back with the police--but the most surreal moment, in my opinion, was when the action stopped so that the hospital staff could put on a musical show that looked an awful lot like American Bandstand: Tiki-Tiki-Tiki-Takori.

Free movies from Jaman that I wasn't interested in, but that TODS watched. ( Read more... )

We watched Igor a week or so ago, actually; I'm just behind on posting. Loved it. Both TODS and I have a thing for Frankenstein and have seen a lot of variations - this one was playful and entertaining, with a delightfully gruesome sense of humor. Got it from Netflix.

Chameli was a Bollywood flick we got free from Jaman. Shorter than most (less than two hours) and very serious, although I think there were some scenes that would be very funny to a more knowledgeable audience. The plot is very simple; a businessman stranded in the rain is drawn into the dark world of a fascinating prostitute. Very interesting, lots of layers. ( more observations, some spoilery )

There are a few different movies with this title; this was the one from 1993 (according to the credits) or 1994 (on the IMDB). We got it free from Jaman. It's a sort of murder mystery that takes place in an alternate 19th century. And before you go, "WAY COOL!" let me say that while I desperately wanted to love this movie, I couldn't even bring myself to like it. :-(
( Non-spoilery comments )

We went to see the movie last night with a friend from work, his daughter and one of her friends, and we all enjoyed it. I had started rereading the book earlier in the week, and hurried to get through as much as possible, though I didn't quite finish (I finished this morning - I had about 80 pages left). ( spoilers )

We got Tales of the Black Freighter from Netflix and the sleeve said it was an hour and forty minutes. TODS, who has read The Watchmen (the story of the Black Freighter is a comic book that someone reads within the novel, that reflects the main plot and themes in interesting ways), was wondering how they were going to make it that long. Well, they didn't! It was twenty-some minutes long; the IMDB says 26 but I think it was actually more like 21. It was very well done, not for the squeamish, and it really did add to my enjoyment of The Watchmen to talk with TODS about how different characters in the Watchmen echo the events of the Black Freighter. The disc also comes with a twenty-five-minute quasi-animated comic book version of the first part of the Watchmen and a sort of mockumentary interview about the first Nite Owl's autobiography, Under the Hood. Really some nifty meta-media. There was also a documentary about an upcoming movie on the Green Lantern.

The Cooler was another free movie from Jaman. It was touching, funny, frightening, sweet, cynical - all by turns. Very enjoyable. Plus we got to see William Macy's butt (and an awful lot of Maria Bello). Maria Bello was really good in this (she was the ersatz Evelyn O'Connell in the third Mummy movie); so were William Macy and Alec Baldwin. Like Finding Amanda, it took place in Las Vegas, but we enjoyed it so much more. The characters were older and more world-weary, and their relationships, adventures, and outcomes were generally very satisfying.

We got Flawless free from Jaman on our TiVo.

This movie starts out rather drab and dull, then gets very interesting. Unfortunately it's got plot holes you can drive a truck through, and while it pretends to address gender issues, it really whiffs on the chance to explore them meaningfully.

As an aside, one of the important secondary characters is played by Derren Nesbitt, who was in a memorable episode of UFO called "The Man Who Came Back," which also starred a post-Rat Patrol Gary Raymond.

( spoilers )