I've seen a bunch from
@thetrooper list. The red ones I've not seen.
From among the red ones, I'll recommend
In the Mood For Love and
Trainspotting.
@thetrooper apparently enjoys hard-to-watch movies.
Requiem For a Dream (2000) in particular was, imo, overrated and seemed to be trying to punish its audience, for the sake of it. From among that subset of movies, Emily Watson in
Breaking the Waves (1996) is one of the best performances I've ever seen in a movie. I will never watch it again, and I think Lars von Trier needs therapy regarding his feelings about women, but Watson was phenomenal, so I would recommend that one, just for her. Between
Waves and
The Boxer (1997) she became one of my favorite actresses.
Romper Stomper (1992) is an Australian indie with a youngish Russell Crowe playing a neo-Nazi skinhead.
Australian History X, if you will. You can imagine that ends well for everyone. Again, great performances. That was where I discovered Jacqueline McKenzie. She did another Aussie indie drama called
Angel Baby (1995) that was pretty good, then came to America for a bit. She starred in a show called
The 4400 here, then went back 'dine undah.' I saw her in an Aussie techno-thriller show called
Pine Gap a few years ago, and I see that there was a sequel to
Romper Stomper in 2018. Daniel Pollock, the 3rd star of
Romper Stomper, died by suicide at age 23 a few months before the film premiered.
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In other news,
A Quiet Place: Day One (2024), The Fall Guy (2024) and Another 48 Hrs. (1990) were all good.
A Quiet Place: Day One was the best of them. Like
Arcadia, it didn't really add anything to the "monster apocalypse" subgenre or to the lore of the
A Quiet Place franchise, but unlike
Arcadia, it was a very good character drama. Lupita Nyongo'o should be a star. I don't know why she isn't a star already. Maybe she just hasn't found her breakout role?
The Fall Guy tries to do a little too much, but it almost succeeds at everything and is generally fun as [heck]. It's a rom-com and an action-comedy, with a little bit of behind-the-scenes Hollywood movie-making, and some Hollywood parody as a garnish. Gosling and Blunt are stars, but their chemistry was a little weird, for me. They kind of had a "friend zone" vibe that didn't gel with the rom-com elements, even though they did those scenes really well. There were two rom-com scenes that I thought were great, though: The
on-set bull-horn conversation and the
talk in his truck, when he was listening to Taylor Swift. The action-comedy portion worked a little better, reminiscent of
The Nice Guys (2016). The one place
The Fall Guy distinguishes itself is in the stunts, which are freaking insane. If you're a fan of Hollywood stunts - using mostly practical sfx, I think - then this is a must-watch.
Another 48 Hrs is, indeed, another
48 Hrs. Not quite as good as the first one - Nick Nolte's Jack Cates isn't quite such a raging [donkey] anymore - but still good. If you're into that sort of thing.
The ladies are the only reason I would see it, and I probably will one day. And I don't mind ballet either. I think the basic story did not grab me enough to watch it yet.
