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Monster movies and movie monsters


chrisjpainter
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What are people's best and worst? I love a good creature feature, and a really bad one too and I'm sucker for a giant shark and some dinosaurs. 

As a genuinely great movie, I find it hard to beat Jurassic Park. The dinosaurs still feel fresh and realistic, despite it being 27 years old. Jaws' fiberglass shark feels awful now.

As a bad movie, I highly recommend Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus. The plot's ludicrous, the acting shambolic and the directorship is dreadful. But it's got a massive octopus and a giant shark that jumps out of the sea and bites an air liner flying over. what's not to love?! 

Any other favourites or appalling efforts?

Edited by chrisjpainter
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Not really into monster movies. Jurassic Park though is a very good movie. We have the bad shark to thank for Jaws being so good. Had it operated better Spielberg may well have used it more. Despite the shark being the eponymous bad guy it's not the star of the film. The film is a classic because of the tension and the acting of the 3 lead characters.

Peter Jackson did a great job with King Kong.

Alien and Aliens are both amazing films and Predator is an 80's classic.  I don't know if you count them as "monster movies" though?

The only one I've seen recently is Underwater. It's a little like Alien but set, well . . . underwater. A decent enough film.

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Where do I start? 😀

Back in its day I thought ‘The Thing’ ( the Kurt Russell remake ) was brilliant, but the more recent version was even better. 

I am surprised, given today’s technology, that there aren’t even more remakes. I recall as a young lad being hugely disappointed with the animated Lord of the Rings in the 70’s, but Peter Jacksons rendering of the various monsters in that trilogy ( hugely influenced by the wonderful work of artist Alan Lee, and others ) was everything I hoped it would be. Fabulous work. 
There are scarier monsters admittedly; for me this generally consists of those which inhabit deep water. I have a healthy dislike of deep water, which has just reminded me of ‘Deep Rising‘, not a particularly frightening film, but good fun and completely entertaining nonetheless. 
Now I’ve started where do I stop? 
 

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16 minutes ago, Scully said:

Back in its day I thought ‘The Thing’ ( the Kurt Russell remake ) was brilliant, but the more recent version was even better. 
 

Loved the John Carpenter version and always deliberately steered clear of the latest remake as it got such bad reviews. Might check it out now 👍

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1 minute ago, washerboy said:

I have never seen any of the Lord of the rings films, started watching the hobbit and 20 minutes in I thought its like a made for TV kids film. 

 

I can understand that. Both were written for adults but I’m pretty sure the darker aspects were understandably toned down for commercial reasons. Still too scary for younger viewers though, I would think. 

1 minute ago, MrPhantom said:

Loved the John Carpenter version and always deliberately steered clear of the latest remake as it got such bad reviews. Might check it out now 👍

I doubt the new version will diminish your enjoyment of the John Carpenter version; it doesn’t mine. 

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9 minutes ago, washerboy said:

I have never seen any of the Lord of the rings films, started watching the hobbit and 20 minutes in I thought its like a made for TV kids film. 

 

The Hobbit is definitely made for a younger audience.

LoTR films are outstanding and I say that as someone who doesn't like the books. 

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3 minutes ago, washerboy said:

I have never seen any of the Lord of the rings films, started watching the hobbit and 20 minutes in I thought its like a made for TV kids film. 

 

Your right. The hobbit was a disgrace compared to lotr. Why they chose to do so much in cgi, and let's be honest, b movie grade cgi apart from smaug, the previous films were stunning as so much of it was done with amazing extras and makeup. The main baddie in the hobbit looked like a character out of a badly done 90s computer game. Watch the lotr, honestly it's a stunning set of films that only get better with each one. 

As for other movies, I do like a lot of commercial junk, the new godzillas I love, pacific rim 1 was ok, no 2 rubbish, cloverfield was alright, as said in the other thread Trollhunter was great, aliens was great (1,3 were OK, 4 was pretty good). I like all the tremor movies, obviously the first the best. 

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Just now, strimmer_13 said:

aliens was great (1,3 were OK, 4 was pretty good). I like all the tremor movies, obviously the first the best. 

I recently rewatched all the Alien series. Alien Resurrection , number 4 is by far the worst, so bad in fact that I didn't bother with the last 15 minutes.

Tremors is a great series. 

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3 hours ago, chrisjpainter said:

What are people's best and worst? I love a good creature feature, and a really bad one too and I'm sucker for a giant shark and some dinosaurs. 

As a genuinely great movie, I find it hard to beat Jurassic Park. The dinosaurs still feel fresh and realistic, despite it being 27 years old. Jaws' fiberglass shark feels awful now.

As a bad movie, I highly recommend Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus. The plot's ludicrous, the acting shambolic and the directorship is dreadful. But it's got a massive octopus and a giant shark that jumps out of the sea and bites an air liner flying over. what's not to love?! 

Any other favourites or appalling efforts?

Here’s some movie trivia you definitely don’t need to know, Megashark vs Giant Octopus stars Debbie Gibson the former 80’s pop star, and they went for broke with the sequel of Mega Shark vs Crocosaurus by casting Tiffany of “I think we’re alone now” fame! You can smell the low budget in both films by the fact so many scenes are shot in the same location and despite being days/weeks apart in the story there are the same people hanging around in the background! Things you notice when production is your job.

1 hour ago, Scully said:

How could I forget Tremors! Brilliant film. Haven’t seen the one set in the Wild West. 

An absolute classic, I could watch that again and again as a teenager!

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10 minutes ago, The Mighty Prawn said:

Here’s some movie trivia you definitely don’t need to know, Megashark vs Giant Octopus stars Debbie Gibson the former 80’s pop star, and they went for broke with the sequel of Mega Shark vs Crocosaurus by casting Tiffany of “I think we’re alone now” fame! You can smell the low budget in both films by the fact so many scenes are shot in the same location and despite being days/weeks apart in the story there are the same people hanging around in the background! Things you notice when production is your job.

An absolute classic, I could watch that again and again as a teenager!

Priceless stuff. I do love the weird and wonderful world of IMDB's 'More Like this' section:awdawd.JPG.dea8fe968688a9bb229c0dc072b9c8f3.JPG

 

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On 05/07/2020 at 19:29, Scully said:

 

Back in its day I thought ‘The Thing’ ( the Kurt Russell remake ) was brilliant, but the more recent version was even better. 


 

It wasn't a remake it was a prequel, explained the beginning of the original, why they where trying to shoot the dog from the helicopter. And the thing it self was a prisoner on the ship when it crashed. You briefly see the ships dead crew. when they go on board.

Love the Alien films Aliens was by far the best even better than the original Ridley Scott film. All the Mega Shark films are just pure 24 carat gold rubbish but strangely watchable. 

But for questioning why and how. It has to be house shark, why they even bothered to make it and how the hell they found someone to fund it. The worse film I have ever had the misfortune to watch (all the way through) purely for research to discover if it can get any worse, it does.

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1 hour ago, fatchap said:

It wasn't a remake it was a prequel, explained the beginning of the original, why they where trying to shoot the dog from the helicopter. And the thing it self was a prisoner on the ship when it crashed. You briefly see the ships dead crew. when they go on board.

Love the Alien films Aliens was by far the best even better than the original Ridley Scott film. All the Mega Shark films are just pure 24 carat gold rubbish but strangely watchable. 

But for questioning why and how. It has to be house shark, why they even bothered to make it and how the hell they found someone to fund it. The worse film I have ever had the misfortune to watch (all the way through) purely for research to discover if it can get any worse, it does.

You’re right, it was a prequel, I’d forgotten.

I liked the big prehistoric shark thingy in the latter Jurassic films, and the troll in Snow White and the Huntsman is very impressive, but the only CGI creatures I find disturbing are well rendered sharks, probably because I know sharks actually exist. 
I too really enjoy the Alien films, but regard Aliens as just a ‘shoot up’ really. Alien 3 was ponderous but ok, but I really enjoy Resurrection. 
I was impressed with Deep Blue Sea when I first saw it as it was the first shark film really, that I’d seen with believable sharks. 
There are some quite impressive creatures in King Kong and Skull Island. 

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The Shallows is a great shark movie although spoiled a little by the ending.

American Werewolf In London is a classic and the effects (although terrible now) were cutting edge at the time!

Not monsters per se but I love the War of The Worlds remake with Tom Cruise. The absolute destruction caused by the “Wally-around alien machine things” is scary.

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12 minutes ago, Munzy said:

The Shallows is a great shark movie although spoiled a little by the ending.

American Werewolf In London is a classic and the effects (although terrible now) were cutting edge at the time!

Not monsters per se but I love the War of The Worlds remake with Tom Cruise. The absolute destruction caused by the “Wally-around alien machine things” is scary.

Omg.. Hated that film

Decotta fanning stole that film, rest of it us truly awful. 

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