CM&C:XCVI A History of Violence

A History of Violence. David Cronenberg. 2005. ★★★☆☆☆

Look at this list of movies: Scanners, Videodrome, The Dead Zone, The Fly, Dead Ringers, Naked Lunch, M. Butterfly, Crash, eXistenZ.

Not only are they all excellent and fascinating — they’re also thematically consistent, sort of. Cronenberg had some obsessions, and he wasn’t shy about putting them on the screen.

And then what happened? I haven’t seen all of his post-eXistenZ movies, but the ones I’ve seen have basically been competent and somewhat boring. And they have nothing in common with all of his previous movies.

What happened? Did he just get over it? Go for the money? What?

This movie has a surprising budget of $33M. And you can see exactly none of it on the screen.

Rum Smash: 😃

CM&C:XCV Inglorious Basterds

Inglorious Basterds. Quentin Tarantino. 2009. ★★★☆☆☆

Not so much a movie as a collection of “cool scenes”. If the scenes that didn’t work (the cellar scene, for instance, which went on for 253 minutes (I timed it!)) had been edited out, it might have been a good movie. But how many “does the Nazi know!11!!ONE!!!” scenes can you sit through?

But the ending was pretty good.

Bourbon Crusta: 😃

Brandy Crusta: 😃

CM&C:XCIII Theodora Goes Wild

Theodora Goes Wild. Richard Boleslawski. 1936. ★★★☆☆☆

This movie follows the standard “(happy-go-lucky) man persistently wooing a (repressed) woman” plot, but the “wooing” sometimes tips over into stalking. With a different sound track, some of the scenes could have been from a horror movie instead of a comedy. “He’s inside the yard… and he won’t stop whistling!” And the animal abuse humour hasn’t aged well. A dog getting its paw caught in a mouse trap, and Our Heroine just laughs. A door slamming the tail of a cat (and the cat looked like it was really in pain). So much not fun.

There are funny scenes here and there, though. It’s not bad.

Bloomsbury: 😃

CM&C:XCII CBGB

CBGB. Randall Miller. 2013. ★★☆☆☆☆

I liked bits of this movie. That era in music was fascinating, but this movie makes bizarre choices. What’s up with using studio versions of the songs the actors are miming to? What’s up with the comic book thing? Why try to fit history like this into a three act structure? Did anybody not have to hide behind the couch during the final scene, just out of embarrassment?

The movie is on the verge of being awful, but I guess it’s just plain bad. Too bad this movie will probably make it impossible to make a proper movie about CBGB.

Aviation: 😒