Welcome to Lario's Movie Opinion Database! This is where I log my opinions about movies. Ratings are based on my enjoyment of the movie and not a statement of objective quality.

13/05/23 Sound of Metal
12/05/23 Fargo
03/05/23 Good Time
26/04/23 F for Fake
25/04/23 The Evil Dead
20/04/23 Liquid Sky
17/04/23 The Mario Bros. Movie
11/04/23 Spetters
03/04/23 Twilight
20/03/23 Showgirls
11/03/23 Donnie Darko
08/03/23 Resevoir Dogs
04/03/23 Zodiac
21/02/23 Senseless
15/01/23 The Pale Blue Eye
09/01/23 BSD: Dead Apple

Sound of Metal
☻☻☻½

This was really great. A masterclass in effective sounddesign and handling the community your film is about with care and dignity. Riz Ahmad and Olivia Cooke display some incredible naturalistic acting performances. I completely believed them as humans and I especially loved the way relationship between them was portrayed. It was raw, and real. I would have loved to see more of Ruben interacting with the community while he's learning instead of it feeling like a very slow montage sequence. Conversely, parts outside of this moment often felt drawn out too much. Other than that it was beautiful, visually, audibly and performance-wise, though ultimately a little forgettable.

Fargo
☻☻☻

I liked this a lot, but clearly not as much as everybody else seems to. Maybe it's because my dad hyped this movie to hell and back, maybe it's because I didn't grow up in Mid-West USA. The characters were fun, their dialogue was fun. I loved Frances McDormand's performance and Steve Buscemi is always a joy to watch. There were moments that made me giggle. I especially didn't expect to love the soundtrack as much as I did. However nothing about this movie makes me want to watch it again, not just yet. I thought it was perfectly okay and fun.

Good Time
☻☻½

This was one of the hardest watches in a while, but not because it was bad by any means. The cinematography for one is vibrant and unique and matches the films electricity perfectly. The writing and blocking of certain scenes was also really well done, and very much succeeded in conveying this suffocating, sinking feeling that lingered throughout this movie. But that's precisely what I didn’t like.

It was just this relentless, gruelling dread all the way through. At certain points I had pause to give myself time to cope with the increasingly terrible things Robert Pattinson was doing. One scene between him and a 16 year old was particularly hard to watch and left me feeling awful. Obviously this was exactly what this film set out to do and my reacting this strongly to it is certainly a testament to its immersive capability, but it was not an experience I particularly enjoyed.

F for Fake
☻☻☻½

Orson Welles could be speaking gibberish and it could lull me to sleep. And even though I couldn't follow this film for one bit which did go at the cost of my overall enjoyment, it was still a fun and fascinating watch.

With this film, I feel that Welles made the first true video essay, in a way that is not so different to how we make them today. The editing, for one thing, is about 40 years ahead of its time and the film is humorous in a way that is unique to Welles, whom despite his age and archaic tone, always felt to me like a young, and slightly mischievous voice within media.

The speech he does by the Chartres might be one of my favourite pieces of spoken word poetry ever, and the most important to me as an artist, whenever I feel like calling myself one.

"Our songs will all be silenced, but what of it? Go on singing. Maybe a man's name doesn't matter all that much."

The Evil Dead
☻☻☻☻

I went into this knowing next to nothing about it apart from its cult status and oh man, this was so much fun. Raimi's childlike enthusiasm really oozes through every bubbly orifice of this film and it's a joy to watch.

While the first half was enjoyable for its silliness, the third act legitimately had me amazed. The pace picks up, the effects get gorier, you're shown iconic shot after iconic shot and Bruce Campbell gives a terrifically expressive performance that made me physically feel his dread, it all had me jumping up and going "oh wow!" every few minutes.

This must have been a blast to film. How I long to dress up like zombies and writhe around in the mud with the girlies.

Could have done without the tree rape scene though.

Liquid Sky
☻☻☻☻

I wasn't even sure I was gonna finish this film since it starts out pulling no punches, bombarding you with the most abstract of its offerings. It picks up its narrative and pace around the halfway point though and from there on out it's an absolute treat. This film's cinematic identity is progressive in a way that is rare for its time (even still today!) and was clearly born out of a deep love for the underground subcultures that served as its inspiration.

It's got some of the most charmingly stilted performances I've ever seen and some cool as hell visual effects. The "orgasmovision" effect segments are right up my alley and there’s a couple of blink and you'll miss it stop motion sequences of people turning into aluminum foil and disappearing that work so wonderfully well. All of this is punctured by some great lines throughout, most uttered by Anne Carlisle who plays both her characters with a visceral electricity that captivated me all the way through.

All in all a regular night out with the gays.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie
☻☻☻

This was a fun watch with friends to scream and point at the screen with, though it was quite flawed story and pacing wise. It's a very consistent stream of fan service and most of it is good fun. I enjoyed certain references like the nods to punch-out and some of the original sfx being used.

The storyline often felt directionless and the constant action on one end interjected by Bowser doing his thing on the other was jarring at times. The music choices were by far the worst though, the shoehorned in recognisable 80s songs with no relevancy to the plot felt incredibly uninspired.

Bowser was a very entertaining villain and Jack Black expectedly kills his voice performance. The rest of the cast was just "okay", maybe if they were given some interesting lines they would've had more of an opportunity to show off their talent. Sadly, the dialogue is so bland at points that it made me (for lack of a better term) physically cringe. Peach has been girlbossed to hell and completely robbed of a personality which really sucks. The banter between the brothers was admittedly very cute though.

Speaking of, Luigi was somehow kind of perfect? His personality was very faithful to the games which definitely made him the most fun character to follow for me. The scene between Bowser and Luigi was so so gay and the best moment in the film by far.

That's all I've got. It was better than expected, still just fine.

Spetters
☻☻☻

A look into the lives of some terrible people, framed as a provocative coming of age film in the Dutchest way imaginable.

It's very clear that there was a genuine attempt to create something truly progressive and modern here. With Verhoeven at the helm, celebrated as a provocateur among directors, it's hard to deny. And there are points in this movie that the reality of it truly being that was so close I could almost taste it. Overall, it is very well paced and the performances were all charming in that specific way Dutch acting from the 80s often is. Sadly, this film just reeks of privelege. The blatant racism, constant misogynistic objectification and the genuinely harmful way gayness is handled is awkward at best, hard to sit through at worst.

Seen through a modern lens it is horribly outdated. But seeing it for what was at the time, I have to give it credit for at least attempting to cover pretty much all of the themes that Sex Education was praised for covering 39 years later, though the latter did so with infinitely more grace.

Fientje really heard "gaslight gatekeep girlboss" and took that 100% literally.

Twilight
☻☻☻☻½

This is actually one of the most insanely entertaining pieces of media ever made and I believe it to be my generation's equivalent to Showgirls. Just like that movie it started out as the most ridiculed film of the year but decades later found itself being praised as a subversive comedic masterpiece. I believe it fully deserves that praise. But where the follow-ups dip into full on so-bad-it's-good territory (which is equally enjoyable), this film can be genuinely great sometimes, or at least in theory. It's got an undeniably recognisable visual style with some inexplicably captivating cinematography, Robert Pattinson's performance is absolutely unhinged and deservedly iconic and the soundtrack has no right slapping as hard as it does. This is one of those rare films that wont ever lose its magic on rewatch, ever.

showgirls
☻☻☻☻

After years of laughing my ass off at the poster I finally decided to sit down and watch this thing.

The morals and motivations of most characters in this film are a complete fucking mystery as is the direction of the plot, it's got the most unbearable ADR I've ever experienced, and as much as I normally adore Kyle MacLachlan, I physically could not get through one scene of him without having to resist the urge to scream into a pillow.

But even with all that, there's just something captivating about the utter insanity of this film. It couldn't all have not been on purpose, I refuse to believe that. I fully expected it to be another so-bad-its-good cult film that would be enjoyable for the wrong reasons, but I was surprised to find myself enjoying it for what seemed to be the right reasons. Because true camp is never an accident, and this film is true camp.

Donnie Darko
☻☻☻☻½

Aw man, I loved this.

Watching this film consciously separated from its status as a problematic film bro favourite (aka being super fucking tired and just wanting to escape into some weirdo shit), it really struck all the exact right chords with me. Wacko Lynchian plot, awesome soundtrack, terrifying lead performance, and an atmosphere as thick as pea soup. I love a movie that I can just watch and enjoy without having to think much. What a delicious daydream of a film.

English teacher Drew Barrymore is also the hottest thing I've ever seen probably

Resevoir Dogs
☻☻☻☻

Allright yeah, I get it now. I totally see why this hailed as a classic.

The character dynamics, they're just so delicious. This movie is basically a 1,5 hour long ridiculous bitch fight and I enjoyed every moment of it.

Some scenes were definitely a bit too long and a bit too heavy on the Tarantino-dialogue, but I have to admit that his writing style does work for me most of the time. I like it when I need to take a second to process what I just heard, whether good or bad. It's engaging in a camp sort of way, though it can also get obnoxious very quickly in it's smart-assery.

However, I think what I enjoyed most was the genuine joy in low-budget filmmaking that this film exuded. It's a rare, but very endearing quality that charmed me to the end.

Also: glad to see I'm not the only one to simp for Tim Roth in this film. Orange is my favourite flavour of Resevoir Dog.

Zodiac
☻☻☻½

This is such a strangely paced film, but stranger still is that it manages to work? Even with the dialogue being this ever constant info-dump it never feels forced or expository, though it’s sometimes a little inhuman sounding in its mannerisms. Even so, I was hanging on to everybody’s words from start to finish and miraculously, I managed to follow along with the plot. This film makes you feel like a genius about it too. It lets you connect the dots on your own, which is always greatly appreciated and the mark of an excellent thriller.

Jake Gyllenhaal gives an outstanding (and endearingly auDHD-coded) performance that I enjoyed a lot, just a little sad that his story only properly starts two thirds into the movie. Final act is legitimately great though, just not as nail-bitingly, heart-destroyingly tense as I had hoped from seeing Finchers other films in the same genre.

Senseless
☻½

As most did, I came here because I saw some pictures of a punk Matthew Lillard on Pinterest and "man takes fluorescent ass potion that makes him neurodivergent" was definitely not what I expected the plot to be.

Matthew Lillard steals this film, as is to be expected. His character is the only charming thing about this movie. The rest is genuinely hard to sit through at times. Admittedly, a couple of moments made me laugh out loud, albeit more out of sheer bewilderment to what I was seeing rather than the film pulling off actual comedy. I seriously can't believe this was directed by a woman.

I do genuinely love that he gets a bunch of punk study buddies by the end.

The Pale Blue Eye
☻☻

The blandest thing I've seen in a while. This movie tries so hard to be The Name of the Rose, but it lacks the charm, character and camp-factor of that movie to be considered nearly as enjoyable a watch.

However, my praise goes out to Harry Melling's portrayal of E.A. Poe, who I was very endeared by and was ultimately the only thing that pulled me through to the end.

Bungou Stray Dogs: Dead Apple
☻☻☻

Uhhh... um I uhh wh what... I don't, uhhh...

Bungo Stray Dogs is a stunning anime but it's also just fucking stupid sometimes. Somehow, it happens to be one of the few anime that really clicked for me. I am aware of its flaws, but I am also just way too invested in its strange world and the wonderful idiosyncratic characters that inhabit it to be stopped by a film as genuinely overzealous, melodramatic and convoluted as this one. I don't care, I enjoyed the hell out of it.

If this is the kind of story it wants to tell, I will gladly let it tell it if that means I get to soak in more of those gorgeous visuals.

[TITLE]
☻☻☻☻

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