Official last movie you saw thread

I'm not a big fan of movies but the last one I watched was Terrifier 2. Way better than the first one, but still not great.

The Sword of Doom (1966)

Japanese action thriller drama film. It's about a sociopath samurai who builds a trail of vendettas that follow him closely. Funny how in that trilogy I watched last Tatsuya Nakadai's character was so human and caring and here his character just murders a random elderly Buddhist pilgrim within the first 20 seconds he's on screen. But of course Tatsuya Nakadai could pull it off. This is a great movie. I mean... Tatsuya Nakadai AND Toshirô Mifune in a great samurai movie? What else do you need? I personally don't need much more. I thought this was great and I can highly recommend it.

Ghost in the Shell - the new movie

Lear on the Shore (2017)

Japanese drama film. It's about a dementia-ridden old man who was once a great leading actor who is sent off to a retirement home by his daughter, but the first chance he gets he escapes from the place. So this is the first recent movie I've seen Tatsuya Nakadai in (the most movies I've seen him in are from the '60s) so he looks like a completely different guy here. But even in his 80s he was still a force to be reckoned with. It's a great performance. There's a part where Tatsuya Nakadai starts a one-man monologue mostly directly into the camera, so you could say that he’s blatantly performing directly to the audience, and it just left me in awe. Overall this is a great, albeit slow, late-career success that at times feels like it's about Tatsuya Nakadai himself. Highly recommended.

Yojimbo (1961)

Japanese samurai action period drama film. It's about a rōnin who arrives in a small town where competing crime lords fight for supremacy and each try to hire him as a bodyguard. Rewatched this yesterday. This was actually the movie that got me into Kurosawa, Mifune and Japanese cinema as a whole. Of course back then I was more captivated by the main character played by Toshirō Mifune than by Tatsuya Nakadai's character who just plays one gang leader's son who happens to have aquired a gun somewhere and mainly uses that. So yeah, on my first watch my focus was mainly on the main character, but on this rewatch it was on Tatsuya Nakadai's character as well. As I might've already mentioned before, whenever I rewatch a movie on a saturday evening it's not just a rewatch for myself but I'm showing my dad these movies that I love. Sometimes he'll hate them (he really wasn't a fan of Catch-22 (1970) for example) but most of the time he enjoys them too. There's always a bit of doubt going into a movie with my dad. But with this one it became clear to me pretty quickly that of course he likes it, it's basically like those '60s Westerns he grew up with (the first movie he watched at the cinema was The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966), his older brother had a poster for A Fistful of Dollars (1964) in his room, which is of course a remake of this movie). Might have to show him some more of these old samurai movies at some point. Like I said, this is the movie that made me fall in love with that whole part of cinema so it'll always be near and dear to my heart. It's also a bit more comedic at points than I remember it. Overall it's still extremely entertaining and of course also extremely well made. Highly recommended.

Mickey 17 https://www.imdb.com/title/tt12299608/ Great as usual with Bong Joon Ho films.

1000 Players Simulate Civilization: Rich & Poor

2 hours and 34 minutes of peak cinema and it's not scripted AND its free on youtube!?! 15/10 watched it twice

Joined the family kids in watching The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild this morning. Big mistake. 😭
I was tempted to show them Frankenstein afterwards because they deserve better.

Kikyo – The Return (2019)

Japanese historical drama film. It's about an old outlaw and gambler who has fallen ill so he returns to his hometown after 30 years of traveling and sets out to help a young woman. Well, this wasn't Tatsuya Nakadai's last movie (that would be another samurai movie from 2020) it was the last one I could find. And this was his last lead role, so I'll count it. Of course this modern samurai movie is nowhere near as good as the ones from the Golden Age of Japanese Cinema (which Tatsuya Nakadai was of course a huge part of). So I can't really recommend this one.

Tatsuya Nakadai was genuinely one of the greatest actors to ever live and you could easily make a case for him to be the single greatest actor ever. He was incredible in style and versatility, his screen presence was just off the charts, even into old age. A lot of movies he was in are all time greats, some even required watching for anyone who likes movies. Tatsuya Nakadai was a legend. Definitely the last great lead actor of Japan's Golden Age of Cinema. His passing is a massive loss. RIP

Hexen bis aufs Blut gequält/Mark of the Devil (1970)

West German historical folk horror drama film. It's about a witch-hunter's apprentice who has doubts about the righteousness of witch-hunting when he witnesses the brutality, the torture and the arbitrary killing that go with the job. Very graphically violent, so despite the dated nature of the special effects still nothing for the faint-hearted. This movie reminds me a lot of Witchfinder General (1968), but that's to be expected. The cast is very good (Herbert Lom, Udo Kier, Reggie Nalder and more). Overall I thought this was good so I can recommend it.

And just like that I've started Udo Kier Memorial Week. Another great, versatile actor who sadly passed away recently. This isn't quite Udo Kier's first movie, but actually his second (because I couldn't find his first one anywhere). Similarly I won't be able to watch his final movie The Secret Agent (2025) (still in cinemas, but nowhere near me), his second to last movie By Design (2025) (which is gonna be released next February) and the one before that Skeletons in the Closet (2024) (because it's rated 3/10 on IMDb) so my last Udo Kier movie on Sunday will be his fourth to last one.