Official last movie you saw thread

Big Hero 6 (2014)

American animated superhero film. It's about a young robotics prodigy and the healthcare-provider robot his late brother built forming a superhero team to combat a masked antagonist responsible for the brother's death. 10 years ago, when this movie was released, I was in my early 20s and thought "I'm too old to watch kids movies and this one also seems a bit silly." but now I'm in my 30s and thought "why the hell not?" so I finally watched this movie. And it's actually really good. The story is very good, the movie looks amazing with some really incredible shots and I can see why it's such a beloved movie. It's something kids and adults can both enjoy. Definitely a movie I can recommend.

The Machinist (2004)

Spanish-British-French-American psychological thriller film. It's about an industrial worker who hasn't slept in a year who begins to doubt his own sanity. I went in pretty much blind, the only thing I knew about this movie beforehand was that Christian Bale famously lost a whole lot of weight for the role. The movie is actually really good and Bale is obviously brilliant in it. This is the type of movie that would've become my whole personality if I watched it when I was like... 16 or so. But even now I still enjoy movies like this. So yeah, I can very much recommend it.

Thelma (2024)

Really good movie that shows that life doesn't have to be so dreary and lifeless even if ur retired, ill or Old! I recommend you to watch this with your parents or grandparents. Do also tell them after, that the Lead Actress is alive and still kicking at 94! Enjoy their amazement :)

Chungking Express (1994)

Hong Kong arthouse romantic comedy-drama film. It contains two stories told in sequence, each one about a lovesick Hong Kong policeman mulling over his relationship with a woman. Very stylish movie, but it's not style over substance, more like substance with style. (And I gotta say, the soundtrack (which includes songs like "California Dreamin'" by The Mamas & the Papas and a Cantonese cover version of "Dreams" by The Cranberries (by Faye Wong, who plays one of the main characters in this movie) fits the tone very much. I think this movie is great, so I can definitely recommend it.

The Climb (2019)

Enjoyable movie about friendships and relationships in general, not the funniest movie for me even though is a comedy. Wonderful one-shots and great acting. Even though it's short it still felt a bit long at times but still worth a watch.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024)

Long awaited sequel to the original Beelejuice and a worthy movie to boot. Movie was HILARIOUS! One scene in particular to me was brilliant. I will not spoil it though.

Was it as good as the original? Almost.

8/10

Moscow on the Hudson (1984)

American romantic comedy-drama film. It's about a Soviet circus musician who defects while on a visit to the United States. This definitely leans more on the dramatic side, but Robin Williams was still great in dramatic roles, as you can see in this movie. Overall this was a very interesting watch. Can recommend.

The Conversation (1974)

American neo-noir mystery thriller film. It's about a surveillance expert who faces a moral dilemma when his recordings reveal a potential murder. Great cast (Gene Hackman, John Cazale*, Harrison Ford, Frederic Forrest, Cindy Williams, Elizabeth MacRae and more). Brilliant movie, highly recommended!

*This was the last John Cazale movie that I hadn't watched yet. And now that I have, I can say that he truly was one of the greatest actors ever. What a shame that he ever only got to be in 5 movies before he passed away, even though they were all masterpieces. I would've preferred to see him in some bad movies if that meant he didn't die so young.

The Pawnbroker (1964)

American drama film. It's about a concentration camp survivor who suffers flashbacks of his past Nazi imprisonment as he tries to cope with his daily life operating a pawn shop in East Harlem. It's definitely some heavy stuff, but brilliantly written and portrayed. Great movie.
Here's a little excerpt from this its Wikipedia article that I wanted to share: "The film was the first produced entirely in the United States to deal with the Holocaust from the viewpoint of a survivor. It earned international acclaim for Rod Steiger, launching his career as an A-list actor. It was among the first American films to feature a homosexual character and nudity during the Production Code (also known as the Hays Code), and was the first film featuring bare breasts to receive Production Code approval. Although it was publicly announced to be a special exception, the controversy proved to be first of similar major challenges to the Code that ultimately led to its abrogation." So it's safe to say that this is not just a great movie, but also a very culturally important one.
And it was also Morgan Freeman's first movie, even though he wasn't credited for it.
Overall I can definitely recommend this one.

Sansho the Bailiff (1954)

Japanese period drama film. It's about two aristocratic children who are sold into slavery. I can't say much about this apart from that it's a great movie by the great Kenji Mizoguchi. Just watch it and experience it for yourself. It's very well made. (It's also free on Youtube with English subtitles, if you need some incentivizing.) Highly recommended!

Ministry of Fear (1944)

American spy thriller film. It's about a man just released from a mental asylum who finds himself caught up in an international spy ring and pursued by Nazi agents after inadvertently receiving something they want. Great story, very entertaining, Ray Milland plays the main character brilliantly, overall a really good movie that I can definitely recommend.

Dos Monjes/Two Monks (1934)

Mexican expressionist horror mystery melodrama film. It's about two monks who, after a physical altercation between them, each tell the story about why it happened, which includes the woman they both loved. I think it's a masterpiece of Mexican cinema. Definitely helps that I love German Expressionism (which had its heyday in the 1920s) and this movie is pretty much that but made in Mexico in the 1930s. It also has flashbacks of the same events being told from different viewpoints, like another movie I love, Rashomon (1950) by the great Akira Kurosawa. But of course that came out 16 years later. Modern viewers might also be reminded of Challengers (2024) a bit (because of the love triangle) but in this movie the two guys were just best friends. I'm definitely surprised by how great Dos Monjes (1934) is. It's probably my most surprising discovery out of this year's Decade Countdown Movie Challenge so far. I already kinda thought Big Hero 6 (2014) was gonna be fun, or that The Conversation (1974) would be fantastic, but with this movie there were just no expectations at all. This is why I watch most movies blind, why I don't read up on something apart from a basic premise, which is also why I put a short one sentence summary at the beginning of my reviews. My interest for this movie was piqued when I read "1934", "Mexican" and "horror movie" (which is sometimes all it takes for me), but I wasn't prepared for it to be this great. Overall I can highly recommend this masterpiece.

He Who Gets Slapped (1924)

American silent psychological thriller film. It's about a bitter clown who endeavors to rescue the young woman he loves from the lecherous count who once betrayed him. The main character is played by the legendary Lon Chaney, almost unrecognizable, as usual. If you're afraid of clowns this movie might be a bit of nightmare fuel for you, especially when there are over 60 clowns on screen, laughing, making faces, dancing. The movie is very entertaining. 70 minutes long but they go by like 30. Overall this is another masterpiece and one of the best sad clown movies I've ever seen. Highly recommended!

The Avenging Conscience (1914)

American silent horror film. It's about a young man who falls in love with a beautiful woman, but he is prevented by his uncle who raised him since childhood from pursuing her, so he decides to kill him. This is based on Edgar Allan Poe's 1843 short story "The Tell-Tale Heart" and his 1849 poem "Annabel Lee". While I hadn't read "Annabel Lee" before watching this (I did just now, afterwards) I have read "The Tell-Tale Heart" and seen multiple adaptations of it and I gotta say, those were better. This was a bit creepy for what it is (the use of double exposure to make someone look like a ghost certainly wasn't a new technique, but it worked well here), but I wasn't a fan of the "it was all a dream" thing in the end. Overall this was still good, so I can recommend it.

Dog Factory (1904)

American silent comedy short film. It's about two inventors who run a "Dog Factory", where strings of sausages can be fed into a machine, and turned into actual dogs (and weirdly also the other way around). There have been sausage making films before this one (starting almost 10 years prior with the Lumière Brothers' La Charcuterie mécanique (1895), and the whole concept was famous as a vaudeville sketch even before movies were a thing, so this one is hardly original. It's funny but with a runtime of over 4 minutes the joke gets old quickly. Overall I can't really recommend this.

Annie Oakley (1894)

American silent Western documentary short film. It's about Annie Oakley performing trick shooting. Yes, that is THE Annie Oakley, famous Wild West figure, American sharpshooter and folk heroine, who beginning in the 1880s toured with William Frederick Cody, better known as Buffalo Bill, in his Wild West vaudeville shows. Buffalo Bill was coincidentally friends with Thomas Edison so they decided to film Annie Oakley shooting some targets, so in this short film you can see her shooting her Marlin 91 .22 caliber rifle 25 times in 27 seconds. I don't know much about guns but that sounds impressive. It's awesome to be able to see an actual Wild West hero(ine) and one of the most legendary sharpshooters ever on film, even if it just runs for 30 seconds. If you're even just a little bit interested in the Wild West, I can highly recommend this.

And with that my 2024 Decade Countdown Movie Challenge comes to an end. There were definitely some great and interesting movies in this one. I'll list this year's movies here:

Monkey Man (2024)
Big Hero 6 (2014)
The Machinist (2004)
Chungking Express (1994)
Moscow on the Hudson (1984)
The Conversation (1974)
The Pawnbroker (1964)
Sansho the Bailiff (1954)
Ministry of Fear (1944)
Dos Monjes (1934)
He Who Gets Slapped (1924)
The Avenging Conscience (1914)
Dog Factory (1904)
Annie Oakley (1894)

And if you want to know which movies I've watched for my Decade Countdown Movie Challenge in previous years, I'll link it here.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024)

American dark fantasy comedy horror film. Just watched this at the cinema. It's about three generations of the Deetz family returning home to Winter River after a family tragedy, but it's still haunted by Betelgeuse and Lydia's life is turned upside down when her teenage daughter accidentally opens the portal to the Afterlife. There's a lot this movie does very well. It looks, feels and sounds like a Tim Burton movie. Directed by Tim Burton, scored by Danny Elfman, lots of awesome claymation stuff, nods to other horror movies (the Psycho (1960) reference was spot on) A few actors from the original were in this one (Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder, Catherine O’Hara), some from the original didn't return for one reason or another (Alec Baldwin's and Geena Davis' character (who died in the original) have "crossed over" (and if we would've seen them in this movie they would've needed to look like they did in the first one, and 2024 Alec Baldwin and 1988 Alec Baldwin look like two different people, no amount of de-aging could've fixed that), Jeffrey Jones' character's death is an important plot point in this movie (and I don't even want to start about Jeffrey Jones, look it up if you want to)), some were completely new to the franchise (Jenna Ortega, Monica Bellucci, Willem Dafoe) but overall I liked this cast and I think they played their respective characters very well. Especially Michael Keaton. It's as if Betelgeuse never left. The story might not be perfect but it's still very enjoyable. So if you're in for a bit of a nostalgia trip this is definitely one of the better legacy sequels out there. I can recommend it.

The Comedians (1967)

American political drama film. It's about a cynical Welsh hotel owner who secretly romances a diplomat's wife in Haiti, under the violent reign of a despot. Great cast (Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, Alec Guinness, Peter Ustinov, Roscoe Lee Browne, Lillian Gish, James Earl Jones and more). I've already seen James Earl Jones' first film appearance (and you've probably done so, too) in Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), so this is his second movie. Overall this was very good, albeit maybe a bit too long at 160 minutes. Still, can recommend.

Excessive Force (1993)

American action film. It's about a detective who is accused of robbery and murder and must prove his innocence with before the Chicago mob and his law enforcement partners catch him. Very good cast (Thomas Ian Griffith, Lance Henriksen, Tony Todd, James Earl Jones and more). I'm not a big action movie fan, but this one was actually surprisingly decent. Good story, interesting characters, overall I can recommend this.

Speak No Evil (2024)

American psychological horror film (it's more drama than horror), a family goes on vacation and makes friends with another couple that is at the same hotel. The family goes to the new friends house and thats where the movie starts.

Cast is good and the acting is really well done (James McAvoy, Mackenzie Davis, Aisling Franciosi, Alix West Lefler, Dan Hough, and Scoot McNairy), one of the reasons the movie is really enjoyable.

Despite knowing that something doesn't seem right since the first 10 minutes of movie, you want to keep watching because of the acting.

As every movie it has some plot holes that push you little back, because if it was trying to represent a real experience there is no way anyone would act like that.

Claudine (1974)

American romantic comedy-drama film. It's about a garbage collector Roop who feels intimidated by the idea of dating a single mother of six on welfare. James Earl Jones and Diahann Carroll play so well off each other. It's just a very good drama but with Black characters which really showed a different side of Black cinema during the height of blaxploitation. Overall I can very much recommend this.

Downfall (2004).

Highly recommend

The Meteor Man (1993)

American superhero comedy film. It's about a mild-mannered schoolteacher who becomes a superhero after a meteor hits him. Good cast (Robert Townsend (who also directed this), James Earl Jones, Don Cheadle, Eddie Griffin, Robert Guillaume, Marla Gibbs, Bill Cosby, Luther Vandross, Sinbad, Tommy Lister Jr., John Witherspoon, Frank Gorshin, Wallace Shawn and more). This isn't the best superhero movie you'll ever see but it's silly and fun, so I can recommend it.

Field of Dreams (1989)

American sports fantasy drama film. It's about a farmer who builds a baseball field in his cornfield that attracts the ghosts of baseball legends. I'm not that big of a sports movie fan, so I've viewed this less as that and more as a fantasy movie. And it's a damn good fantasy movie at that. Great cast (Kevin Costner, Ray Liotta, James Earl Jones, Gaby Hoffmann, Burt Lancaster (in his last movie) and more). I also feel like this could've been longer, it definitely left me wanting more, especially because it has some great performances by some giants of cinema who are no longer with us. Burt Lancaster, Ray Liotta, James Earl Jones...
Overall I can highly recommend this movie, even if you don't care about baseball at all.

The Great White Hope (1970)

American biographical romantic drama film. It's about the life of a Black champion boxer in the 1910s and his struggles with racism, in part because of his wife who is white. This is probably James Earl Jones' best performance. Or at least the best I've seen of him. He's fantastic in this, playing the main character, who's based on Jack Johnson, who is regarded as one of the most influential boxers in history; he had a big influence on Muhammad Ali for example. Overall this is a great movie and I can definitely recommend it.