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LoganCrews (2861 KP) rated 47 Ronin (2013) in Movies

Jan 12, 2021 (Updated Jul 4, 2021)  
47 Ronin (2013)
47 Ronin (2013)
2013 | Action, Drama, Sci-Fi
7
6.5 (17 Ratings)
Movie Rating Watch
As expected this is a lot of eye-popping visual work in service of a story void of even a single drop of weight. Too much gorgeous design fetish on display to truly dislike in spite of it being executed as plainly as can be otherwise - for every mechanical, generic expository beat there's a splashpad of stunning locales, vibrant costumes, luscious CGI, sweeping sets, excellent props, and fully realized art backing it up. It's super atmospheric and the money is *definitely* on the screen but everything underneath the hood is not only lackluster but genuinely problematic. The idea to take one of the most legendary events in Japanese history and not only turn it into another passive whitewashed popcorn flick is gross all on its own, but to frame the entire thing around a bunch of wronged Japanese men + women having to constantly praise and apologize to a white man for bullying him or whatever is - quite frankly - beyond insulting. As much as I won't soon be forgetting the pop aesthetic experience this delivered upon, I'm also glad it bombed. A screenplay this goofy has no right being so tame. And see the skull guy on the poster? He's only in the movie for like 30 seconds so fuck you.
  
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LoganCrews (2861 KP) rated Three... Extremes (2004) in Movies

Oct 28, 2021  
Three... Extremes (2004)
Three... Extremes (2004)
2004 | Horror
8
8.5 (2 Ratings)
Movie Rating Watch
Miike's segment is the best - just this viscerally atmospheric showcase in artsy horror from someone who clearly has an intimate knowledge of all the ins-and-outs of the genre (and features a mack daddy score from Koji Endo, who has a career full of them). Chan's is second place - just as brutally gross as everyone else has already mentioned. Wook's is my third favorite (I refuse to call it the worst, since they're all pretty awesome) - a good ole' fashioned exercise in mental torture with expectedly cool camerawork and a deeply weird tone that always keeps you on your toes. The kind of simple, nasty, and twisted histrionics you can always count on - if this were made today in the tired 'elevated horror' age it would either be 81 minutes or 3 hours long and be a monotonous, purposefully unsatisfying, rote, blatantly obvious metaphor for trauma or some similar bullshit. Meanwhile this is the type of film to show you a fetus getting chopped up in the first ten minutes then following it with Lee-Byung Hun being forced to dance in his underwear and a woman making out with her father in a Circus Big Top. Just plain sick and I loved it, speaks for itself.
  
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ClareR (6067 KP) rated The Lamplighters in Books

Mar 14, 2022  
The Lamplighters
The Lamplighters
Emma Stonex | 2021 | Contemporary, Horror, Thriller
8
8.0 (2 Ratings)
Book Rating
The Lamplighters is a locked room (lighthouse!) mystery, which had me gripped up to the last page. How could three men go missing from a tower lighthouse, with no way off back to land. There’s no boat, no-one visited them - and what’s more, the lighthouse is locked from the inside when the investigation team arrive.

This is a mystery that affects their wives and partners even 20 years later. A writer contacts the three women and asks them to cooperate with him as he writes a book about the mystery. It seems that all three women held back secrets during the original investigation - but will the uncovering of these secrets make any difference?

The Lamplighters is told in flashbacks, alternating between the present day with the women, and the lead up to the disappearance with the men in the lighthouse. The lighthouse chapters in particular are seriously atmospheric, threatening, even. I had so many ideas as to what could have happened, my opinion changing constantly as more information was revealed. I didn’t guess the actual ending though, even after I’d described the basic storyline of the book to my husband, and he got it in one (note to self: do not discuss mystery books with the husband, AKA “Dr” Poirot…)

Highly recommended.