Movies I've Recently Watched

Ramblings on 12 films I've seen the past month or so...

Won't You Be My Neighbor?

This documentary is centered around Fred Rogers who gave up becoming a biblical scholar to become the host of a TV show for kids. It was truly inspiring to see this genuinely kind-hearted person try his very best to be there for kids. The tragic irony was that many kids did not learn good things, if any, from their parents. Instead, they learned important lessons (& even controversial ones like death) from Fred Rogers' show. A very interesting part of the documentary talked about how Fred grew up from an era where self-expression was taboo & those close to him noticed that he expressed some suppressed feelings & emotions when using his puppets on the show. This goes to show that everyone needs an outlet. Anyway, Fred eventually was exhausted (material wise, & mentally) hence he stopped, only to come back for 9-11 to talk about death which was a super ballzy move. Props to the man. What a pure human being. 9/10

Pacific Rim: Uprising

Enjoyed the action & effects used in the original movie. I had very low expectations for this movie, knowing that it had poor critical reception. Despite the terrible plot and characters written in the film, I watched it and skimmed through it on Netflix for the sole purpose of catching a glimpse at the action scenes. As such, it was not all that bad after all. 5/10

Jumanji: The Next Level

Another underwhelming sequel that I somewhat skimmed through on Netflix. Comedic moments were a hit or miss for me in this film, and most of them did not land. It's one of those movies where it's best to turn your brain off and just enjoy it. 5/10

The Wrestler

Had very high hopes for the movie as my brother loved it a lot. All in all, it was just quite a depressing movie showing how one can be destroyed by trying to live for past glories. Mickey Rourke was really good in this film though. 7/10

Apollo 11

This documentary about the first moon landing surprisingly had amazing video quality. Like most documentaries, the only way to truly appreciate & enjoy it was to first be fully invested in the topic at hand. Case in point was the fact that I was on the edge of my seat til the very end, while my dad just slept half way through. Should have chosen something more interesting whoops. Anyway, the documentary felt very American-centric, as one would expect, despite them claiming this was for mankind. Seeing footage from the 60s was jarring and very interesting to a gen-z kid like myself. I found myself being intrigued by the most inconsequential things that I found 'retro-looking'. The sheer scale of the mission was also something that I found intriguing. The movie may put off many with it's highly technical & real content that was high in attention to detail as well, yet a complete novice like myself found it all so immersive & so interesting. 8.5/10

Apollo 13

Tom Hanks is my favourite actor & he did not disappoint in this movie. However, having watched a documentary on Apollo 11 right before viewing this film, I could not help but feel underwhelmed & almost cheated by this film being overly dramatised. These kind of movies are crossroads between documentaries & fictional movies. Most tend to sacrifice facts for emotion & drama. I used to buy into it, but now it just comes off as a film that portrays itself as fact yet does clichés for the sake of drawing in crowds who consume surface level movies. If I want the facts, I will watch a documentary. If I want the drama & emotions of a fictional story I will watch well thought-out & well-executed film. Nevertheless, this feel-good movie does barely enough to warrant a viewing. Moreover, I genieuly did not know what happened to Apollo 13 so there was the element of surprise & suspense for myself. 7.5/10

In Bruges

I had given this movie a try in secondary school & I gave up. I remember being utterly bored from the movie, hence I was quite hesitant to return to it. I must say that my taste was poor back in the day. For instance I liked trashy shows like Friends, How I Met Your Mother & Big Bang Theory. Perhaps my taste was just different back then. Anyway, the movie progressively got interesting & I thoroughly enjoyed the story & dark comedic moments. The movie looks that morality in a post-modern world where it gets harder to define measures of right & wrong. Characters with rigid moralities & beliefs are portrayed as the most cruel. Unyielding faith in such beliefs is also similar to Catholic imagery is littered throughout Bruges. Lessons of paintings in the movie on punishment, retribution & Catholicism (for those raised in that tradition) never really leave you entirely. This is similar in Western culture rife with human morality. Ultimately, just like how we get to decide the ending of the movie, we have to decide our own morality. (P.s. this is paraphrased from a review by Nerdwriter) 8/10

Train to Busan

I would not have thought that I would be crying in my army bunk upon seeing my first Korean horror film which was about zombies. But this movie was genuinely so immersive thrilling & melodramatic (which is apparently a trope for the Korean horror genre). On the surface this is just another zombie movie, except that it is Korean & it is situated in a train. However, I could not help but appreciate the character growth in the main character. He starts off as a selfish white collar worker who looks out for mostly himself & his daughter. Ultimately, he sacrifices himself in the most emotional scene I've seen in a very, very long while. Beyond his character arc, the one about the father-to-be was nice to see though it was not that deep. Nevertheless, couple the emotional high at the end of the movie with great cinematography & action, & you have yourself an immensely entertaining zombie movie, despite the presumption that zombie movies are dead. 9/10

Trainspotting

A movie about Heroin addicting & outgrowing friends. Rather interesting movie. The movie has Ewan McGregor jump into a nasty toilet for his pills. We then see him seemingly take a leisurely swim in the vast ocean. This represents the fact that heroin addiction is grotesque, degrading & dehumanising, yet it is filled with serenity & nirvana. It can make you feel like a rockstar & like garbage. Other addictions in the movie includes food, fighting, sex & friendships. All of them feel good for awhile but do not last long, and can sometimes be detrimental. Ewan ultimately puts all these aside, and 'chooses life' like buying a television. They may be eluding to the fact that 'choosing life' is simply fixating on superficial things, or maybe life is just a series of hits, just to pass the time. (P.s. this is mostly from Wisecrack) 7.5/10

Scarface

All this time, I had no idea that Tony Montana from Scarface was Cuban. Anyway, we see he has nothing to lose & is willing to do whatever it takes to succeed in America. This is the American dream. This drive & initial care for others draws us to him as it makes him human. He succeeds after coming from nothing, but his true nature later in the film unravels & his greed, drive & pride leads to chaos, which ends in tragedy & death. The action was cool & the movie was decent. 8/10

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

It’s funny how I decided to watch this movie based off the meme where James Franco is about to be hanged and says “first time?”. I was surprised to find out that it was a collection of short stories, after seeing the first character Buster Scruggs die. That was quite shocking. The short stories seemingly had no link besides being set in the wild wild west. I came to realise that it was all about death after the second last story when a girl who was in a love story kills herself. That was the weakest story and I skipped through it, though I wish I did not. Turns out that the movie is about dealing with death. It was different, and thus refreshing to have 6 short stories with 6 endings that became progressively darker. Initially death is not so dark and in fact, the story is almost cartoonish. This makes sense because mortality is something you think about more often only when you are older & thus closer to death. The next story shows James Franco get hanged and he makes the joke that became a meme. He laughs at the face of death, a common trait among others sentenced to death who make quirky remarks before their demise. Or at least that is how it has been reported. We may never know for sure if James French did in fact say “How’s this for a headline: French Fries” before he was electrocuted. Perhaps we re-write history to inject humour in such dark moments. The first 2 characters seem to believe that death only happens to others. In the tragic next story, our main character sees his death coming from a mile away but he is unable to stop it. His life is ultimately worth less than a chicken. It reminds us how helpless & insignificant we are. In the last story, 5 passengers ride in a carriage & 3 of them start to bicker over their own philosophies on human nature. Ultimately their argument is completely redundant as they realise that the other 2 passengers are grim reapers & they 3 are entering the afterlife. He tells a story & comments “They're easily taken when they're distracted people are. So, I'm the distractor with a little story, a little conversation, a song, a sparkle. And Clarence does the thumping while their attention is on me." "People can't get enough of them, like little children... they connect the stories themselves, I suppose, and we all love hearing about ourselves, so long as people in the stories are us, but not us. Not us in the end especially.” "I must say... it's always interesting watching them after Clarence has worked his art, watching them negotiate... the passage. From here to there. To the other side. Watching them... try to make sense of it as they pass to that other place... I do like looking into their eyes as they try to make sense of it. I do... I do..." "Make sense of what?" "All of it." "Do they ever... succeed?" "How would I know? I'm only watching."

A Lady who would never cross paths with someone as rough as the Trapper still shares the same stagecoach with him. They’re still going to the same place. That doesn’t mean they’ve “figured it out”, but the destination remains the same. This last story, "The Mortal Remains" slowly reveals itself as a supernatural tale. It is honestly breathtaking. 9/10

The Host

Feels like this movie had more potential. Besides the fact that the effects are very dated, the story itself is rather saddening & not in a fulfilling way. 5/10

Kung Fu Hustle

As I was browsing Netflix for something to watch, I stumbled upon this movie which had a short runtime (which is always a plus) and I remembered that there was a fight scene that was broken down in detail by Corridor digital. On the get go, you know what kind of movie you are in for. It's slapstick + kung fu. Interestingly enough, I found myself absolutely enamoured frame by frame with the classical music in the background as wild & unrealistic stunts and fights had begun. It just felt so foreign to watch something like this as a very much westernised Singaporean-Chinese. And yet, it felt like I was watching something from my roots in a weird way. I appreciated the fight choreography & the story was just passable enough to keep me vested throughout. The slapstick humour was more often hit than miss for myself but I'm sure it may have ruined the movie for others. Nonetheless, I had gone in with quite low expectations and was pleasantly surprised. 8/10