sorry mate but it looks like a rare film - none of the streaming providers I surfed or the sites I use had it for download.
There is supposedly a torrent of the DVDRIP at http://www.trendx.info/udnmovies3/trans ... -bluray-3d
Back to business.....
SEPTEMBER ELEVEN 1683
Polish/Italian (but in English language) historical drama flick about the Ottoman siege of Vienna in 1683 which uses a combo of CGI and real extras to portray what was one of the truly spectacular battles between East and West.
Following their inglorious defeat at sea at the Battle of Lepanto the Ottoman Turks want revenge, and so the Sultan orders his most accomplished general Khamal Mustafa to take his massive army on a head chopping tour of the European capitals, the aim being to fly the green flag over Rome itself. Opposing him are the fractious states of early Europe, distrustful of each other and busy playing their own games of thrones. The Holy Roman Emperor decides, on the advice of a miracle making monk, to make his stand in Vienna behind its walls, but help is not forthcoming till the King of Poland rides his famous Winged Hussars and heavy artillery in to save the day.
The Italian pro-Christian anti-Islam slant does taint this otherwise interesting film at times way too far, and Mustafa is portrayed as a somewhat two dimensional religious fanatic who despises the Church of Rome - which is utter cack - but F Murray Abraham saves the day acting wise and it is thus a very watchable and interesting history film. That said compare it to the excellent Turkish made film FETIH 1453 about the earlier fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans, that treated both sides equally, and you can see the difference. Still, it covers a part of history mostly ignored by the western film makers, and so is well worth a solid watch.
Out and about in lovely DVDRIPs at all the usual places. Two cheers and a keeper.
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
Denzel Washington plays an alcoholic pilot that saves an airliner from crashing. Shades of Leaving Las Vegas in this one and a very close look at addictions and how they mess up lives. John Goodman is also superb with a little injection of humour here and there that a movie like this needs.
Just watched or rather skipped through 'Sushi Girl'. Binned after 30 mnis of crap IMO
RICHARD OF LOXLEY
It’s none of my business what people say and think of me. I am what I am and do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. It makes life so much easier.
Ok....a couple of tasty Chinese dishes off the rotating table
THE GUILLOTINES
CGI heavy classic Chinese Wuxia fantasy swordplay and wire fu fun in this revisit to the old Hong Kong Shaw Brothers Studio staple
The Guillotines are a crack squad of assassins and bodyguards set up to protect the throne and remove the heads of inconvenient enemies using their slicy dicy frisbee like spinning wheels of death. But after decades of privilidge and getting away with murder they have become corrupted and arrogant. The new Emperor to be sees this and decides they and their antiquated methods and weapons are no longer required. So he sends them out to track down a rebel who has taken refuge in a Han stronghold. Just to make sure they fail he attaches the head of the new Firearms Squad to the mission as well. So now our plucky assassins must fight enemies both from within and without.
Its good stuff, even with the odd annoyingly jerky camera work, and your classic wire fu madness combined with head chopping CGI. One problem tho is that most versions doing the round have very crappy machine translated hard subs rather than proper translated script subs, and so you miss out on a lot of the story. This was a problem with a flick I reviewed a while back called THE ASSASSINS. However, give it a few weeks and a proper version will be available. When it is it will be a hot drop and solid gold three cheers keeper. That or, if one is available, drop an unsubbed version and get the subs file separately from OpenSubtitles.
and next on the menu
CHINESE ZODIAC
I like Jacky Chan films because they combine fun, a good story (usually) and some mad stunt work with top class kung fu.
When the British invade China at the end of the second Opium War they burn down the Summer Palace and make off with the Emperor's prize statues of the twelve zodiac animals. Fast forward to the present and a business tycoon who deals in antiquities decides to corner the market and "obtain" the statues by fair means or foul. So he calls in his crack acquisitions agent JC to track them down and remove them from their rightful owners. Along the way JC meets a foxy French countess and gets involved in her search for the bones of her shipwrecked great grandad, one of the guys who nicked the statues in the first place. Thrills, spills, and kung fu mayhem ensue....
It lays it on a bit thick at times about the nasty Brits stealing what wasnt theirs....yeah the hypocrisy of that coming from a Chinese film approved by the PRC govt that destroyed Tibet's cultural history wholesale and has made IP theft a national industry chokes. But if you can ignore that its otherwise an excellent light hearted action martial arts adventure in the mold of Indiana Jones full of the usual JC slapstick kung fu fun and stuntwork. Well worth a drop and watch, especially as its fully subtitled in English, and there are excellent quality copies about on YouTube as well as at all the usual sources. Three cheers, despite the drastic overplaying of the two dimensional version of colonial history care of JC and the PRC govt, and a keeper.
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
ahhhh....so good to combine two of my loves....foreign cinema and medieval films about knights. And this little offering I came across care of YouTube adds a dash of the jousting epic A KNIGHTS TALE and injects comedy fantasy into the mix
1 1/2 RITTER (aka One and a Half Knights)
Like A KNIGHTS TALE this German comedy action flick takes the age of knights and princesses and spins it through a comedic modern world double wash cycle.
The great and noble knight Lanze is deeply in love with the lovely princess Herzelinde. Unfortunately the wicked Count Trumpf has his eye on her, and employs a dark knight to kidnap her. So Lanze sets off on a quest to rescue her, along the way collecting the helper and follower Halb, a Turkish emigre. Thrills, spills and slapstick epic deeds ensue.
Its a great little light hearted bit of fun, and has some funny bits as well as some less funny bits, but that's humor for you. What makes you laugh may well leave me cold. I liked it a lot - daft eye candy to keep your brain amused. It also stars my favorite Teutonic toothpick - the incredibly foxy fun size Julia Dietze, as well as the always great character actor Udo Kier and solidly reliable Til Schwieger (Stiglitz from Inglorious Basterds).
I really liked it, and for me at least its a solid gold keeper of a three hearty hurrahs standard. Give it a try....maybe it will ring your bell.
Ill even make it easy. Go to and download the 380p version. Then go to http://www.opensubtitles.org/en/subtitl ... zelinde-en and download the subs. Stick both in one folder...and open it with GOM or any other non Windows Media Player media player.....there you go.
Another reason I like it, in retrospect, is reading the IMDB comments from spotty faced teenage Yank knob jockeys too pig ignorant to get the Euro humor, and too thick to watch a comedy flick with subs. I know that Yank IMDB cockmonkeys automatically hate film with subs.... its not their fault after all....as the laughable comments sections show the illiterate bastards can't spell let alone read and watch at the same time. And considering that Hollywood's idea of top hole comedy is the spasmodic Adam Sandler continually gurning while being hit in the stones with a baseball bat its no wonder they don't get satire and irony.
Enjoy. I did.
Three cheers and a solid keeper.
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
Watched 'The Liability' tonight. Enjoyed it and as SM reviewed a gritty Brit Gangster movie with Tim Roth excelling
RICHARD OF LOXLEY
It’s none of my business what people say and think of me. I am what I am and do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. It makes life so much easier.
As soon as I saw this was a WW2 movie inspired by a video game I thought: "AHA! Uwe Boll!" (Uwe is the infamous worlds worst director who makes a living turning video games into flicks) But no, its someone else. But that said, shades of Uwe abound - the cut price production, the hammy acting, the nonsense script..... but unlike most of Uwe's efforts this is at least entertaining.
A platoon of US troops in the Ardennes Forest get ambushed and stranded way behind the German lines during the Battle of the Bulge. On their way back to the base they stumble into a camp that has been devastated by a massive explosion. Turns out old Adolf is a lot closer with his mini-nuke program than anyone knew, and now it is down to our plucky band of brothers a likes, helped out by a Russian prisoner of war and a downed RAF pilot come total hardcase (played inevitably by Vinnie Jones) to save the day, rescue the imprisoned nuke scientist and his foxy daughter, and send the calipre wearing Nazi SS bad guy to hell care of Uncle Sam.
Utter nonsense, but at least it provides the eyes with some low brainer chewing gum for a hour and a half. It was exciting in bits, totally hammy in more, but its not a keeper. But in a dearth of owt else to watch its worth a download.
Out and about in direct to DVD rips all over the shop.
One and a bit cheers
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
Ah birthday insomnia...still....more time to watch films...and heres a threesome of greats
BLOOD LETTER
Great example of the fantasy martial arts genre, and all the better as its highly unusual...its from Vietnam!
Adapted from a popular novel by Bui Anh Tan, the film begins with a young boy arriving at the shore of a remote monastery. The boy grows up under the care and martial arts tutelage of the lone monk who cares for the temple. Twelve years later, Nguyen Vu discovers his true identity, that he is the lone descendant of the nobleman Nguyen Trai, who was beheaded, along with the rest of his family, when he was implicated in the death of the King. Two Eunuchs from the Royal Court learn the truth and when they try to escape are hunted down. One of the eunuchs writes his testimony in blood before he dies and this Blood Letter disappears. Nguyen Vu then embarks on a quest to find this letter so that he may clear his grandfather's name. Along the way he meets two sisters who are also on a quest to carry out vengeance against the Royal Court
Its really good stuff, full of the usual eye popping colour and lovely sets and costumes, some excellent wire fu fun, and a ripping little story line. Definitely a recc for a drop and watch, and as its Vietnamese you can find it easily on YouTube....such as at (hit the "turn on captions" button on the player for english subs).
Three very solid cheers and for me a proper keeper
aaaaaaaand from the Land Of Ice And Snow and Horny Helmets
KON-TIKI
Norwegian bio pic of the Thor Hayedal epic journey across the briny blue on a big raft to prove his theories of Polynesian migrations were possible. Its proper interesting stuff, and based on his classic book and documentary film of the voyage, and adds in the struggles he went through in the early stages to get the boat afloat so to speak.
Wonderfully filmed with some epic stuff and lovely cinematography, and fine performances all round. Proper Boys Own adventure stuff, and all the better if, like me, you are an admirer of the man and his contributions to the field of exploration and experimental archaeology.
Solid gold keeper all the way, three hearty hurrahs, and out and about in fully english subbed versions or dubbed for the lazy.
and finally a epic from the past I had totally missed out on
THE SAND PEBBLES
It is 1929, and China is in the early throws of its Civil War, being torn apart by warlords and fighting factions within, and the foreign devil occupiers from without. In the midst of the chaos Steve McQueen plays a sailor who is transferred to one of the steamer gunboats that patrol the upper lengths of the Yangtse River. Unfortunatly years of isolation and neglect have seen the boat and its crew fall into bad ways, and Steve just rubs everyone up the wrong way. Caught up in the internal and external strifes, the boat and its crew are blockaded, and then called on to make one last desperate rescue run to save some missionaries stranded at a remote mission outpost upriver.
This is proper epic cinema at its finest with the cast of thousands, more stars than the milky way, and even a old school 5 minute orchestral Intermission in the middle. Its great, and I cant believe I never heard of it before. If you like your tapestries rich and multi layered, and your films long and detailed, this is your heaven.
I dropped my copy from http://www.1channel.ch/ (i used the Putlocker link on the relevant film listing page).
Three rousing hurrahs and a definite solid gold old blue eyes keeper.
Right, im off for a nap before waking up and starting to get solidly drunk all day in an attempt to forget my age and impending exile.
chin chin chums
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
SM, don't get too drunk. you have to prepare your speech for tonight
On the subject of drunk and coked I watched 'Flight 2012' last night. Denzel Washington at his best and a great story. For those of us who have been through a period of excesses in our time this film say's it all. When addicted to something (cigs, booze or drugs) it is so easy to cheat and lie.
RICHARD OF LOXLEY
It’s none of my business what people say and think of me. I am what I am and do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. It makes life so much easier.
Another film that tells the orrible sleazy true life tale of the infamous Essex Boys drug gang in the early 90s, and their eventual shabby end shot to bits in a Range Rover in a lonely field in Rettendon. As such it drags on the coat tails of the excellent RISE OF THE FOOTSOLDIER and the "dramatised" version of the tale ESSEX BOYS, and it is a pale and pathetic shadow of either.
Badly acted, filmed on a two bob budget, and with a messy annoying soundtrack this is a pain to watch, and not worth the effort of downloading, let alone sitting through. Avoid like a dose of clap.
Three solid THBBBBBBBTS
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
A slow lazy so thought I'd revisit an old controversial movie.
So out came 'A Clockwork Orange' after many years on my movie backup drive. Still enjoyable and of course controversial. 'If' next. Reminds me of school
RICHARD OF LOXLEY
It’s none of my business what people say and think of me. I am what I am and do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. It makes life so much easier.
richard wrote:
So out came 'A Clockwork Orange' after many years on my movie backup drive. Still enjoyable and of course controversial. 'If' next. Reminds me of school
I read recently that Kubrick wasn't satisfied with the home breakin + rape scene after he'd filmed good versions of all the coverage he needed. So he gave Malcolm McDowell the simple direction to 'play with it'. Malcolm's first idea was the keeper - Singing in the Rain.
Seven Psychopaths. is a Brit movie and entertaining and about as close as you can get to a Tarrantino film.
Sort of film though, that you can only watch once IMO
RICHARD OF LOXLEY
It’s none of my business what people say and think of me. I am what I am and do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. It makes life so much easier.
