Movies 2025 Movie Discussion Thread

[Tabe]

Alright, let's finish off that trilogy!

Scream 3 - Neve Campbell is back and this time she's hiding in the woods or something.  They're making yet another movie (after the first one in Scream 2 and a sequel that was released between the events of these two movies) based on the events in Neve's Sidney Prescott's life.  People start dying and soon enough it's a reunion with Courtney Cox and David Arquette as they try to survive and solve the mystery all at once.  What follows is a mostly entertaining mess of a movie that seems to be less grounded in reality than the first two.  The killer in this one uses a voice changer to perfectly imitate the voices and mannerisms of numerous people - sorry, that just wasn't happening in 2000.  Overall, not bad, and Jenny McCarthy gets bumped off early in the movie.  6/10.

[Brian Fowler]

I really hate Scream 3 personally, but at least it's the bottom of the franchise.

[FourPostMassacre]

21 hours ago, Curt McGirt said:

Thing was, the Whiteshirts weren't explicitly a Mexican gang, they were a mixed gang like Folk Nation. It wasn't like those Crips were going up against the Mexican Mafia. In fact they were pretty much presented as small timers and thus it wasn't an issue feuding with them. But I'm just going by the plot of the movie itself instead of a hypothetical real-world situation... 

Anyway if Ice says it's bullshit then fine. We can agree to disagree on the quality of the movie, same with me and C.

When they hold up two fingers on one side that is a V and the one on the other side is a L for Vatos Locos. The whole ending scene is the crips having it out with them. Despite the presentation in the movie they are not small timers. I know they have one brother in the gang but he could be mixed and dressed the part. The white guy we were supposed to think was not white because Hollywood.  

 

I am not saying the movie is bad or anything just putting this information out there. Despite my disdain for Sean Penn I actually have seen this movie about a million times and still enjoy it. 

[Curt McGirt]

So I guess ginger dude was a Mexican albino? 

[Tabe]

12 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

I really hate Scream 3 personally, but at least it's the bottom of the franchise.

I aim to finish the franchise this week. Well, the ones released so far anyway. 

[(BP)]

15 hours ago, Tabe said:

They're making yet another movie (after the first one in Scream 2 and a sequel that was released between the events of these two movies) based on the events in Neve's Sidney Prescott's life.

The Stab franchise continues to play a pivotal role in the rest of the series. Also, I should have listed Parker Posey among the positives in my previous rundown of the movie.

[Dolfan in NYC]

DOGMA will get a theatrical re-release on June 5.

Smith is going to do a tour with it beginning the 20th (Easter Sunday)

[Andrew POE!]

Movies today....not as much as usual due to work stuff.

Rose Plays Julie (Mubi, leaving on 4/6) - 3.5/5 stars

Spoiler

Haunting story about woman who was born in the aftermath of a rape. Ann Skelly (who looks like Renate Reinsve's younger sister) plays Rose, a veterinarian student in Ireland. She researches her birth mother Ellen (the always gorgeous Orla Brady) and finally meets her.

Both Skelly and Brady display the apprehensiveness and fear of never meeting before yet being related. Rose is almost obsessive as she quietly watches Ellen doing her acting gigs.

Rose adopts a disguise as Julie (her birth name) and meets her biological father Peter (Aidan Gillen).

I find it interesting that Peter attempts to rape Julie and during the attempt finds out they are related. The movie does a lot of dulled silence as Rose is lost in her thoughts and either fantasizes about murdering Peter during the attempt.

Rose/Julie doesn't go through the euthanize but her mother does.

What's a standout is the cinematography that has a sullen overcast look to it and the usage of voiceover in a lot of scenes.

Megan Leavey (Netflix, leaving on 4/7) - 4/5 stars

Spoiler

Megan Leavey reminded me a bit of The Inspection, which I saw last year. The character Leavey (Kata Mara) is running away from her past and issues in her past to join the Marines. She's misunderstood, mistrusted, and is about to wash out in the Marine Corps. That is until she meets Rex, a German Shepherd.

What I like a lot about this movie is the fact that the movie kept the focus on Leavey and her relationship with the dog. It could very easily have made it about the relationship between Leavey and Matt Morales (Ramon Rodriguez). Instead, their relationship is put to the side as Leavey and Rex go through tours in Iraq. Eventually, Leavey and Rex stay together as Rex retires in a really emotional scene.

It's as though Leavey and Rex are both misunderstood, yet understand each other.

The movie is more of a lower budget military movie compared to Jarhead and some of the Michael Bay movies, but it makes for it with character writing. Mara portrays Leavey as spunky yet damaged as a person. Having the character have a relationship with Morales wouldn't have helped her.

I did like the needle drop of Band of Horses' "The Funeral" as Leavey has an emotional breakdown over Rex. The media campaign scenes weren't quite as good as they should have been otherwise. Also, the guy portraying Chuck Schumer doesn't look like Schumer at all (he looks more like Kevin McCarthy).

Edie Falco as Leavey's mother and Common as Gunnery Sgt. Martin had nice scenes. Falco and Mara's scenes between the two was a bit underdeveloped, although their argument after Leavey completes basic training was a great scene.

Megan Leavey isn't a bad character-based military movie.

 

[The Natural]

21 hours ago, Tabe said:

Alright, let's finish off that trilogy!

Scream 3 - Neve Campbell is back and this time she's hiding in the woods or something.  They're making yet another movie (after the first one in Scream 2 and a sequel that was released between the events of these two movies) based on the events in Neve's Sidney Prescott's life.  People start dying and soon enough it's a reunion with Courtney Cox and David Arquette as they try to survive and solve the mystery all at once.  What follows is a mostly entertaining mess of a movie that seems to be less grounded in reality than the first two.  The killer in this one uses a voice changer to perfectly imitate the voices and mannerisms of numerous people - sorry, that just wasn't happening in 2000.  Overall, not bad, and Jenny McCarthy gets bumped off early in the movie.  6/10.

Cheers. Where's your review of the first? Must have missed it.

20 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

I really hate Scream 3 personally, but at least it's the bottom of the franchise.

Mind if I ask what you hate about Scream 3? I'd rank them:

6. Scream 3.

5. Scream 4.

4. Scream 2022.

3. Scream VI.

2. Scream 2.

1. Scream.

It's very close between Scream and Scream 2. Love both. Scream VI gets bonus points over 2022 as it was my first Scream film at the cinema and going with my Sister. It's rare my Sister goes to the cinema.

7 hours ago, Tabe said:

I aim to finish the franchise this week. Well, the ones released so far anyway. 

Nice one.

[Tabe]

8 minutes ago, The Natural said:

Cheers. Where's your review of the first? Must have missed it.

Couple pages back:

Tonight's movie:

 

Scream - Neve Campbell is Sidney, the star of Wes Craven's slasher movie designed to turn slasher movies on their head. From the famous opening where Drew Barrymore is the first victim - after being a big part of the advertising for the movie - to the comments throughout mocking horror movie tropes, this one was different. I haven't seen it in almost 30 years. Liked it then, liked it now. The acting is surprisingly good and the twist is semi-decent. 7/10.

[The Natural]

1 hour ago, Tabe said:

Couple pages back:

Tonight's movie:

 

Scream - Neve Campbell is Sidney, the star of Wes Craven's slasher movie designed to turn slasher movies on their head. From the famous opening where Drew Barrymore is the first victim - after being a big part of the advertising for the movie - to the comments throughout mocking horror movie tropes, this one was different. I haven't seen it in almost 30 years. Liked it then, liked it now. The acting is surprisingly good and the twist is semi-decent. 7/10.

Thank you.

[Tabe]

Took a break from the Scream franchise for a moment:

Doc Hollywood - Michael J Fox is Ben Stone (insert Law & Order joke here), a big city ER doctor on his way to Los Angeles for an interview with a big money plastic surgery clinic. He wrecks his sports car and is stuck in small town Grady while awaiting repairs. He's been sentenced to community service for the wreck and serves it by working as the town doctor. He meets Julie Warner's Lou and is instantly smitten - as would be, well, anyone. What follows is a fish out of water learning his lesson story. The townfolk are a sweet bunch, earnest and simple. The movie walks a fine line between mocking the simple people and relishing their simple ways and generally succeeds. This is a pleasant movie - with oddly out of place f-bomb and extended nudity in one scene - that doesn't aim high but hits all the marks it tries for. Entertaining. 7/10.

 

This movie is a great reminder that Fox never quite got "there" as a movie star. He was a gigantic star at the time of this movie but he never really had any big hits on the big screen other than the Back to the Future series. He was clearly talented but the resume just doesn't really show it. 

Edited April 2 by Tabe

[odessasteps]

I remembered enjoying it when I reviewed it all those years ago. Young Bridget Fonda is also quite fetching. 
 

Maybe my favorite scene, because of the meta. Even better when you heard the story about Woody at the premiere.

[J.H.]

Invitation to Hell - There's just something about sticking Robert Urich in a movie with Susan Lucci as the Devil. Even better is the fact is that Wes Craven directed this thing. See our boy Bob Urich is Matt Winslow, who relocated his family to SoCal for work. He's joined some tech R&D firm to help them build a thermal lyrics reinforced space suit.

Hey! It's a pre-Sreet Hawk Joe Regal utmost playing Matt's best friend Tom. Basically, everyone invtown works for the company and everyone in the company joins the local spa run by Jessica Jones played by Lucci. Look man, they make it very obvious that Lucci is evil. Turns out she gets people to join the spa and have them take a shvitz. Of course this is no ordinary shvitz, tbis shvitz is a direct portal... TO HELL!!

Matt suspects something is wrong after his wife and kids take a shvitz while he's at work. His nice boy son becomes an abusive bully. His daughter (played by, no less than Soleil Moonfrye) takes a firepoker to her dolls and his wife?

His wife actually has sex with him!

Who knew Joanna Casdidy had this range?

In the end Matt uses the thermal reinforced space suit to enter the spa/Hell for a showdown with Erica Kane... eerrrrr I mean Susan Lucci.

Oh the cheese on this movie is so magnificent, it's like telling your Olive Garden waiter to keep grating until you say "Now that's enough cheese!"

James

 

 

 

[Curt McGirt]

8 hours ago, odessasteps said:

the story about Woody at the premiere

Do tell.

[(BP)]

8 hours ago, Tabe said:

 He was clearly talented but the resume just doesn't really show it. 

He got pigeonholed into being the fast talking little stinker, which just came off smarmy once he was in adult leading roles. The same thing happened to Broderick.  It was less than a decade after the last BTTF and he was a TV actor again.

I think the back half of his movie career would’ve turned around as he aged into more mature roles if not for his illness. 

Edited April 2 by (BP)

[Mister TV]

1 hour ago, J.H. said:

Invitation to Hell - There's just something about sticking Robert Urich in a movie with Susan Lucci as the Devil. Even better is the fact is that Wes Craven directed this thing. See our boy Bob Urich is Matt Winslow, who relocated his family to SoCal for work. He's joined some tech R&D firm to help them build a thermal lyrics reinforced space suit.

Hey! It's a pre-Sreet Hawk Joe Regal utmost playing Matt's best friend Tom. Basically, everyone invtown works for the company and everyone in the company joins the local spa run by Jessica Jones played by Lucci. Look man, they make it very obvious that Lucci is evil. Turns out she gets people to join the spa and have them take a shvitz. Of course this is no ordinary shvitz, tbis shvitz is a direct portal... TO HELL!!

Matt suspects something is wrong after his wife and kids take a shvitz while he's at work. His nice boy son becomes an abusive bully. His daughter (played by, no less than Soleil Moonfrye) takes a firepoker to her dolls and his wife?

His wife actually has sex with him!

Who knew Joanna Casdidy had this range?

In the end Matt uses the thermal reinforced space suit to enter the spa/Hell for a showdown with Erica Kane... eerrrrr I mean Susan Lucci.

Oh the cheese on this movie is so magnificent, it's like telling your Olive Garden waiter to keep grating until you say "Now that's enough cheese!"

James

 

 

 

Damn, I remember watching maybe the first half of this then having to go to bed when it aired, tv movies were totally nuts back then.

[FourPostMassacre]

22 hours ago, Curt McGirt said:

So I guess ginger dude was a Mexican albino? 

That is specifically the guy I was chalking up to “Well Hollywood”

Feel like every Hollywood movie depicting chollo gangs is guilty of this. 

[Curt McGirt]

Gotta have that token white guy...

[Log]

On 3/31/2025 at 11:34 PM, Andrew POE! said:

Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri (Hulu, leaving on 3/31) - 3/5 stars

  Reveal hidden contents

There's a town in Georgia called Whitesburg. About the only one thing truly significant about the town is if you got 10 miles over the speed limit or your car even touches the yellow median, you'll get hundreds of dollars of tickets and fines.

Ebbing, Missouri in this movie appears to be much like this town.

For this movie, it's obvious that Martin McDonagh barely spent any time in American small towns much less Ebbing, Missouri. It's obvious that the characters involved are operating as caricatures of Americans and local rural police departments.

In a lot of ways, this movie operates as a very dark comedy, much likes McDonaugh's later The Banshees of Inisherin. Mildred Hayes (Frances McDormand) harbors a similar grudge except it's because of inaction rather than action. Instead of cutting off three fingers, it's three billboards being put up.

Mildred stays angry at Sheriff Willoughby (Woody Harrelson). Willoughby as it turns out has cancer and later kills himself. He even pays for the billboards to stay up before his suicide. That should be over but it isn't.

On the other side of the narrative is Jason Dixon (Sam Rockwell), who works for the police department. In a great but brutal scene, the camera follows Dixon as he goes to Ebbing Advertising, breaks a window, goes upstairs, beats up the owner, and tosses him out the window then punches out the assistant.

For the most part with these two characters, they do not think anything through. They are completely driven by anger and by emotion. It makes it hard to relate on a humanistic level and instead forced me to laugh at the absurdity of it. An example of a pitch black hilarious/absurdness of the movie is when Dixon is reading Willoughby's suicide letter in the police station while it is on fire.

For the most part with the movie, a lot of what shines is the cast (Peter Dinklage, Kerry Condon, Samara Weaving, and Abbie Cornish). The movie is technically well made, but is a bit empty.

The ending is indicative of the movie. Mildred and Jason have a plan, but they aren't sure if they do it and they'll just figure it out.

 

I had an extremely small part in the production of this movie. Used to work at a tv station. One day, one of our anchors asks me to help her record something and then get her the sound file to email to someone. We do it, I ask her what it's for, and she says someone she knows is working on a movie and wanted her to record something that would be used as a news report in it. Kinda forgot about it, a year or so later I'm watching this movie and hear a familiar voice. Then I remember that I recorded that. Somehow, my name wasn't on any of the awards submissions for the film.

[J.H.]

5 minutes ago, Log said:

Somehow, my name wasn't on any of the awards submissions for the film.

Yet another DVDVRMB Member snubbed by the Academy!

First they ignore Dennis Farina dying and now this!

James

[J.H.]

1 hour ago, Mister TV said:

Damn, I remember watching maybe the first half of this then having to go to bed when it aired, tv movies were totally nuts back then.

I first saw this as a kid on..  I wanna say WNBC Channel 4 New York at like 1AM. NBC loved putting bad horror TV movies on Sunday nights/Monday mornings. I remember watching Richard Crenna in Devil Dog: The Hound From Hell on that late air time. That movie was exactly as good as you expect a movie with that title to have!

James

[Tabe]

9 hours ago, odessasteps said:

I remembered enjoying it when I reviewed it all those years ago. Young Bridget Fonda is also quite fetching. 
 

Maybe my favorite scene, because of the meta. Even better when you heard the story about Woody at the premiere.

Fonda did a nice job in that scene. She conveyed her disappointment well. 

[Technico Support]

2 hours ago, (BP) said:

He got pigeonholed into being the fast talking little stinker, which just came off smarmy once he was in adult leading roles. The same thing happened to Broderick.  It was less than a decade after the last BTTF and he was a TV actor again.

I think the back half of his movie career would’ve turned around as he aged into more mature roles if not for his illness. 

I remember liking him in The Hard Way and Secret of My Success in the 80s and I'm one of the handful of people who enjoyed The Frighteners.  

He had an amazing two episode arc on Curb Your Enthusiasm.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zI4lFjWoFqc

 

[Mister TV]

1 hour ago, Technico Support said:

I remember liking him in The Hard Way and Secret of My Success in the 80s and I'm one of the handful of people who enjoyed The Frighteners.  

He had an amazing two episode arc on Curb Your Enthusiasm.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zI4lFjWoFqc

 

He had a decent run of non-Back to the Future flicks until Life with Mikey and For Love or Money, those were both really bad, so bad that they must have given Blockbuster a ton of money to keep them on the in store reels for about a year each.