I've caught a few movies over Christmas holidays in between the mince pies and fireworks. A few thoughts.
Black Christmas: an all-time fave from 1974 with the brilliant John Saxon, Olivia de Hussey, Margot Kidder and Keir Dullea. Fabulously festive and grim in equal parts, it's self-contained Seventies world is a perfect Yuletide horror.
Christmas Horror Story: a modern addition to my Yule ghouls, this anthology anchored by the superb William Shatner has everything: Krampus, sprites, possessions and a warrior Santa. An annual treat.
Murder by Decree: Sherlock gets to grips with Jack the Ripper and uncovers a conspiracy of Freemasons, royals and bloody murder. Chris Plummer makes a great Holmes, as does James Mason as Watson.
Rocketman: a musical biopic about Elton John. Really ace central performance of Elton, plagued with another useless Dad ( a la the recent Bruce Springsteen biopic too) at the stories troubled heart. The songs are just majestic.
Elvis: what can I say. Colonel Tom screwed the King. This flick made me angry. A very sad tale of unimaginable talent and an evil manager who kept Elvis chained up.
All I need now is Scrooged to complete my holidays.
Have you seen any of these films readers?
Seen Rocketman and Elvis. Both were good but sad in parts. I wanted to watch Oppenheimer but found the dialogue almost inaudible in places. It's not like nuclear fission isn't complicated enough!
ReplyDeleteYes, they were a bit sad Kevin. Not sure all that fame was worth it. Certainly not for Elvis. Bruce Springsteen's biopic is good but he's quite a miserable guy in his youth. Oppenheimer was OK. You'd like the physics! And it allegedly saved Cinema.
DeleteOur Hoilday viewing turned out to be a Stop Motion festival!
ReplyDeleteWe watched the Rankin Bass, Rudolph the Red nosed Reindeer ( I never knew it was animated in Japan!)
And the ENTIRE Wallace and Gromit catalogue (including the recent Netflix, Vengeance most Fowl.)
It got to the point, where when I glimpsed my hands moving, they seemed to have that animation flicker to them!
...and don't get me started on CHEESE!
Don't know that Rankin Rudolph Looey! As for Nick Park, he's a genius and from Preston, where I hail from too! Did you notice how his films got longer over time? Grand Day Out was just over 20 minutes. Nowadays they're way over an hour! That's showbiz!
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