What movies have you seen recently?

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Room at the Top (1958)


In the mid-1950s, John Braine wrote a novel with this title which introduced the reading public to the character of Joe Lampton, a working class 'anti-hero' from West Yorkshire who worked his way up into the dizzy heights of the business world and at the same time had a series of tempestuous relationships with women.

The film is set in the late 1940s, when Lampton pursues Susan, the daughter of local textile magnate Abe Brown, but his real passion is for Alice Aisgill, an older married woman played by the French actress Simone Signoret. Lampton gets Susan pregnant and opts to marry her, with tragic consequences for Alice.

This was one of the earliest British 'New Wave' films of the late 1950s and early 1960s, a very different product from the continental New Wave from the likes of Jean-Luc Godard and company, and the British version was often referred to by the titles of 'Kitchen Sink' or 'Angry Young Men' dramas.

Definitely one of the best films of its era. Lampton is played by Laurence Harvey, an unlikely choice for the role of a blunt Yorkshireman as he grew up in Lithuania and South Africa, and many people have criticized his accent here, but I think he made a pretty good job of it.








LOL, Joe Lampton's father-in-law, Abe Brown, played by renowned Shakespearean actor Donald Wolfit. Leonid Brezhnev eat your heart out!

Last night we watched:

Babylon 5: The Road Home [2023]



If you like Babylon 5 [1993-1998] you will almost certainly like Babylon 5: The Road Home.

If your are unfamiliar with Babylon 5 but you like watching Science Fiction then you'd very likely enjoy the whole Babylon 5 franchise! It is one of the best Science Fiction TV shows ever! (You just have to accept the 1990s special effects. They're not bad, but it's just that today we have TV special effects that are more special. That's OK—Babylon 5's great writing will be holding your attention!)

We both enjoyed the movie a lot!

GREAT SHOW! *!*!*V E R Y*!*R E C O M M E N D E D !*!*!*

The Babylon 5 franchise has been airing stuff for 30 years. Sadly, a number of key actors have died over that time. Unlike earlier works in the franchise, this movie is animated so that characters previously played by the now-deceased actors could still appear.

I watched of these yesterday and today with commentary by RiffTrax

In Pursuit (2000)
riffed by Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, Kevin Murphy
Daniel Baldwin is a lawyer framed for murder. Why is it called In Pursuit? Because he escapes from jail and he is in pursuit of the killer and the authorities are in pursuit of him. Claudia Schiffer is in the movie too.

Moon of the Wolf (1972)
riffed by Matthew J. Elliott and Ian Potter
Made for TV move with Bradford Dillman and David Janssen. I remember watching this in 1972, but I could not remember any of the plot.
Matthew and Ian are wonderful British comedians who have handful of videos they've riffed for RiffTrax.

The Castle of Fu Manchu (1969)
riffed by Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, Kevin Murphy
Christopher Lee as Fu Manchu, attempting to take over the world by turning the oceans to ice.

Inspector Mom (2006)
riffed by Bridget Nelson, Mary Jo Pehl
Danica McKellar is a mom and a newspaper reporter, married to a pilot who has an office. There is a murder, and there are plenty of suspects. At first I wondered if this was a Hallmark movie, but it featured ethnic minorities and people who were not so squeaky clean. Turns out it was a Lifetime movie. Lifetime, Hallmarks black sheep cousin.

Bog (1979)
riffed by Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, Kevin Murphy
It was the 1970s. There is a bog monster that first attacks a guy fishing in with dynamite. What the bog monster really wants are "human females."

Life at the Top (1965)

Based on John Braine's 1962 novel, the sequel to Room at the Top. This reprises the story of Joe Lampton in the late 1950s. His character is still played by Laurence Harvey, but his wife Susan (now played by Jean Simmons, who has replaced Heather Sears) seems to have had a personality transplant and is now into adultery, a far cry from her incarnation as a passive figure in the first film.

This puts poor old Joe into a bit of a spin, especially as he's now fallen for TV presenter Norah Hauxley (Honor Blackman of 'Goldfinger' and 'The Avengers' fame). Joe moves to London to join Norah, but it doesn't work out, and at the end he returns up North to take up again with Susan and manage Abe Brown's business empire. We are invited to conclude that Lampton's capacity to 'get to the top' was always a bit of a mirage, and that he was never more than a puppet of Brown (and a prisoner of his own social background, come to that).







LOL, just check out that Soho night club scene at the 31:48 mark. I don't think that'd go down too well these days.

Last night we watched:

Attack the Block [2011]
<=>"Inner City vs. Outer Space"



A small teen gang in London ends up at war with aliens.

Overall, reasonably well done. I thought it was OK and my bride thought it was good.

The movie has a creative explanation of the aliens' motivations.

Not great but */\*O K*/\*

There is drug use. And there is pervasive bad language...most, but not all, coming from the teen gang.
And there is violence...the movie starts with the teen gang mugging a woman walking home.

All of these were watched through RiffTrax.

Charlie Chan: Dark Alibi (1946)
riffed by Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy
Sidney Toler plays Charlie Chan.

The Man Without a Body (1957)
riffed by Bridget Nelson and Mary Jo Pehl
The B movie was good in a 1950s B movie way. The riffing was very funny.

Fatal Combat (1995)
riffed by Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy
AKA No Exit

People die.

The Careless Years (1957)
riffed by Bridget Nelson and Mary Jo Pehl

A young (21) Dean Stockwell looks brooding with his eyes and brooding mouth. He's a proto-James-Dean character. So much angst.
A young (17) Natalie Trundy looks in love with her eyes and sweetness in her nature, but dreams of a day she can portray and underground mutant, a scientist along side an ape, or the girl friend or wife of a talking ape. (Natalie and Roddy McDowell were both in four of the five Planet of the Apes films.)
A youngish (42) Barbara Billingsley, mother of Natalie, is very sensible.
A middle aged John Stephenson, father of Natalie, is very 1950s dad sensible. He throws Dean Stockwell out when Dean and Natalie tell them they want to get married.
Dean Stockwell's mom is Virginia Christine, better known as Mrs. Olsen for some of you. I don't recall if she makes coffee once.
Dean Stockwell's dad is John Larch who is just a working stiff (no zombies involed), but later in life he will be Father Nuncio in The Amityville Horror.
They were all directed by Arthur Hiller, who would perfect his young love direction and eventually direct Love Story.

Police Academy

After seeing a number of posts here saying positive things about it, last night we watched:

Asteroid City [2023]



If you only know the title then you probably don't understand the movie.*
If you only know a little about the movie you probably don't completely understand the movie.*
If you've watched the movie you probably don't completely understand the movie...but you probably liked it.*

We thought it was good! Try it! Recommended!Try it!   But if pressed to say more it would probably be something like: weird, strange, odd...

If you watch the trailer above, note who is in the movie. Impressive!

Note: Apparently they used a body-double for Scarlett Johansson's nude scene.

Okay. This is weird... because Double_Retired just watched it too. If I hadn't paused it to make some chicken nuggets...

Asteroid City (2023)
Every shot is like an exquisitely composed painting. Wonderful film.

And yes, a body double was used.

^{Oh, my! One of the characters in the movie kind of looks like pcgoblin's avatar!}

The Raven (A 1936 adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe's poem starring Bela Lugosi & Boris Karloff)

Metalocalypse: The Army of the Doomstar.
It was epic.

Equaliser 3- I saw it at the theatre and it was about what I expected. Densely Washington is once again put into a situation where he has to use his particular skill set, this time in Sicily. Intense action followed by extended scenes of people doing what they do when feelings are involved. It was moderately enjoyable, but also nothing special.

Cured.

Irish horror film in which zombies who have been changed back to human try to come back and reintegrate into society, even though they and everyone else remember what they've done. Facing backlash and prejudice by the public, law enforcement, and the government, some ex zombies choose to retaliate.

I've seen something like that in Dead Rising 4 about "cured" zombies. They may not be infected anymore, but their humanity is long gone that they can no longer return to who they used to be. They live in constant feral agony.

12 Dogs of Christmas.
Really sweet film. Lots of cute dogs and one cat.