Share your unsung movie
Ben Lott
United States
Mason
Michigan
It's time to play the music, It's time to light the lights...
Wocka Wocka Wocka!!
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If anyone has followed the different geeklists I have created, you probably have noticed a theme. I am not the most experienced "gamer" on this site. I can't challenge all of you guys who have played 90% of the new releases. I'm still trying to catch up on all the great games that I have missed.
Because of this lack of expertise in the gaming front I like to talk about my other passion a whole lot. MOVIES! In particular I've focused on the Star Wars movies, because those are my personal favorites.
But recently I was watching a movie and I thought "I don't hear many people talking about this movie." Which got me to thinking, perhaps some people don't know about it. So that's what this geeklist is going to be about.
Add an item for your favorite movie that you think others need to know about. Avoid those movies that EVERYONE has probably heard of. I certainly don't need to waste time singing the praises of Star Wars, but use those movies that you love and you think other BGG members might love too.
If possible include a picture and a favorite quote or two. If you see someone else has posted a movie you love then maybe take the time to share your comments on that movie as well.
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1.
Board Game: Sneaks
[Average Rating:4.85 Unranked]
Ben Lott
United States
Mason
Michigan
It's time to play the music, It's time to light the lights...
Wocka Wocka Wocka!!
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Sneakers is a great movie that I have enjoyed since I was a teenager. It is a great combination of comedy, and action. The actors are all top notch and the humor is so strong, it's one of the few movies that can make me laugh out loud even when watching it alone.
Favorite Lines
[i]Martin: Come on, the FBI'd give him twins!
Mother: It's the same setup that NASA used when they faked the Apollo moon landings.
Whistler: I want peace on Earth and good will toward men.
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Michael B.
Canada
Stratford
Ontario
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In Legend of 1900, Tim Roth plays an agrophobic piano genius living all his life aboard a cruise ship plying the Atlantic route. The film's narrator, Max, is his best friend, a man with shifty eyes and a gift for trumpet. This is the Age of Jazz, and the music envelopes the film in beauty and magic.
1900: "Take this piano: keys begin, keys end. You know there are eighty-eight of them. Nobody can tell you any different. They are not infinite. You are infinite... And on those keys, the music that you can make is infinite. I like that. That I can live by.
...Land? Land is a ship too big for me, it's a woman too beautiful, it's a voyage too long, perfume too strong."
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Dave Lartigue
United States
Springfield
Massachusetts
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Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
Someone decides to make a science fiction movie that isn't all the usual crap. No thumping techno soundtrack and black leather and slow-motion gunfights. There's a great sense of style and homage to past masters. It's a lot of fun, for a change, instead of the usual grim and dour stuff.
And suddenly geeks, who will go see ANYTHING, decide to display a heretofore unknown idea that they have some kind of standards to maintain. The same people who raved about the idiotic Matrix movies decided that Sky Captain didn't have enough characterization and plot for them. The hell?
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Kevin Li
United States
Kansas
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Children of Heaven
A very charming movie about a boy who loses his sister's shoes.
Roger Ebert's review:
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19...
Roger Ebert wrote: It lacks the cynicism and smart-mouth attitudes of so much American entertainment for kids and glows with a kind of good-hearted purity. To see this movie is to be reminded of a time when the children in movies were children and not miniature stand-up comics.
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Mike Cooper
United States
Flower Mound
Texas
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The Wizard of Speed and Time
This 1987 film started out as a live-action stop-motion sequence that was called "Wizard Run", which eventually became one of the last sequences of the film. The rest of the film is basically a true-to-life account of the making of the sequence, and to a larger extent, the movie itself. The stop-motion sequences are out of this world (sometimes literally  ) and there are many, many hidden messages/imagery throughout the film.
Unfortunately, Mike Jittlov got screwed out of just about everything except the final print. The movie is only available on VHS if you *can* find it, but unfortunately Mike doesn't get any money from it, and according to him, it's also an inferior cut of the film.
Years ago, in alt.fan.mike-jittlov, there was at least one person who had a laserdisc copy of the movie and was dubbing them onto VHS tapes with Mike's blessing. I haven't kept up, so I don't know if that service is still available. I seem to recall there was a mention of getting the film onto homebrew DVD at some point, but, again I have no information on that. I still have my copy of the above-mentioned *inferior* VHS version.
As of the time of this post, as far as I know, Mike is still looking for the time/money to finally release his true vision of The Wizard of Speed and Time.
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6.
Board Game: Astronaut
[Average Rating:5.00 Unranked]
Nathan Beeler
United States
Seattle
Washington
Really? Hovertext? Whatever.
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American Astronaut(2001)
A black and white science fiction musical comedy. Director and star Cory McAbee fronts the band The Billy Nayer Show, who also did music for the soundtrack (which is a lot of fun). The plot, as such, is pretty bizarre. It involves our hero, the titular Samuel Curtis, ferrying things around the galaxy while avoiding his nemesis who is trying to forgive him so he can kill him. Features a character named "The Boy Who Actually Saw a Woman's Breast".
Old Man: Hey. Is it just me, or do my balls itch?
Samuel Curtis: I think it's you.
Old Man: Good. For a minute, I thought my balls itched.
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❇Ⓢ❈Ⓝ❈Ⓞ❈Ⓦ❇
United States
Columbus
Ohio
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Big Fish
Director: Tim Burton
Starring: Ewan McGregor, Albert Finney, Jessica Lange, Helena Bonham Carter, Steve Buscemi, ...
Plot Outline: The story revolves around a dying father and his son, who is trying to learn more about his dad by piecing together the stories he has gathered over the years. The son winds up re-creating his father's elusive life in a series of legends and myths inspired by the few facts he knows. Through these tales, the son begins to understand his father's great feats and his great failings.
Memorable Quotes:
Young Ed Bloom: There's a time when a man needs to fight and a time when he needs to accept that his destiny's lost, the ship has sailed and that only a fool will continue. The truth is I've always been a fool.
Will Bloom: We have to take Glenville to avoid the church traffic because the damn church people drive too slow.
Young Ed Bloom: It was that night I discovered that most things you consider evil or wicked are simply lonely, and lacking in the social niceties.
I really enjoyed this movie. The father's stories and the son trying to making sense of it all. Brought a tear to my eye on several occasions thinking about how little I know about my own father's life.
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Junior McSpiffy
United States
Riverton
Utah
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BRICK (2005)
[size=7]Oh so very full of good goodness. Think hard-boiled detective film noir like The Maltese Falcon but set in high school. Joseph Gordon-Levitt (the youngest kid from 3rd Rock From The Sun) does a great job of being the guy who knows all the angles and would play any and all of them, except he hates everyone else and doesn't care to fit in. Nora Zehetner (recently from Heroes) is the high school fashionista femme fatale and Emilie de Ravin (Claire from Lost) is the girlfriend whose killer must be found.
Fun little verbage they create for the subculture. Don't feel guilty if you have to watch it the first time or two with subtitles on.
I went back and saw it in the theaters three days in a row. After all, who doesn't love the idea of Humphrey Bogart worrying about acne?
Laura Dannon: Do you trust me now?
Brendan Frye: Less than when I didn't trust you before.
Or the best one-liner I've heard in a long long time:
Brendan Frye: Throw one at me if you want, hash head. I've got all five senses and I slept last night, that puts me six up on the lot of you.
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Dread Pirate Roberts
United States
Rochester
Minnesota
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Kelly's Heroes. 1970.
I've seen this movie several times, and still enjoy the opportunity to watch it again. Clint Eastwood leads troops behind enemy lines in WWII France to pull a bank heist. Once you get past the weird 70s theme song, you'll be treated to the likes of Clint, Donald Sutherland, Telly Savalas. Hell, even Don Rickles and Gavin MacLeod! But the actor who really steals the show (IMO): Carroll O'Connor. I believe his role as an American general in this film may be his best work.
Find this on DVD, pop some corn, and prepare for some laughs.
You'll even get to see how the GIs deal with the “Tiger” tanks guarding the bank.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065938/
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Kevin Brown
United States
Macon
Georgia
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Suture
Michael Harris and Dennis Haysbert as identical half-brothers who take each others place, sort of. Of course Harris is a skinny little white man and Haysbert is a tall, athletic black man but nobody seems to notice. Really slickly done. It challenges preconceptions about race, class, and identity.
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❇Ⓢ❈Ⓝ❈Ⓞ❈Ⓦ❇
United States
Columbus
Ohio
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The World's Fastest Indian
Starring: Anthony Hopkins as Burt Munro
Plot Outline:
The life story of New Zealander Burt Munro, who spent years building a 1920 Indian motorcycle -- a bike which helped him set the land-speed world record at Utah's Bonneville Salt Flats in 1967.
Okay, I'll admit there are some cheesy scenes and some questionable dialog but I still really enjoyed this movie. Seeing a no-nonsense, hard working, and eccentric guy, fulfill his dream after years of effort. Neat.
Having driven through Invercargill on a recent trip to New Zealand makes it extra sweet.
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Mike Hollihan
United States
Memphis
Tennessee
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Six String Samurai
In the Fifties, the Russians launched their nuclear missiles at us and attempted an invasion. They only made it partway into the West from Alaska. Elvis moved to Las Vegas and was made the King. It was stalemate.
Now it's decades later. The US is a nuclear wasteland filled with strange cultures. Elvis has died and young men from all across the land are streaming to Las Vegas, katanas and guitars slung across their backs, to claim the throne.
The hero looks like a cross between Clint Eastwood and Buddy Holly. It's low budget but very, very well done; a mix of Fifties apocalytic, end-of-the-world movies and Seventies Chinese kung-fu movies. Incredibly funny, too.
Bad Guy: If I were you, I'd run.
Six String Samurai: If you were me, you'd be good looking.
Death: Only one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me!
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Michael Bachelor
United States
Washington
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Not Carter but CARPENTER.
They live is a great popcorn movie that I think is underappreciated (Along with "Big Trouble in Little China")
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096256/
"I have come here to chew bubblegum or kick a**, and I'm all out of bubblegum"
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Andy K.
United States
Norman
Oklahoma
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Primer (2004)
A real thinking-person's time-travel movie. As soon as I'd watched it the first time, I immediately watched it again to try to figure it all out. I couldn't fill it all in, but I'm pretty sure it makes sense.
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Mike Banks
United States
Camp Hill
Pennsylvania
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FAST, CHEAP, AND OUT OF CONTROL (1997)
Director: Errol Morris
Synopsis: What do an elderly topiary gardener, a retired lion tamer, a man fascinated by mole rats, and a cutting-edge robotics designer have in common? Both nothing and everything in this unconventional documentary directed by Erroll Morris. Fast, Cheap & Out of Control ) interplays, overlaps, and interrelates these four separate and highly specialized documentary subjects in order to in truth study all of humanity, raising questions about the future of mankind.
A wonderfully endearing documentary -- with great music from Caleb Sampson
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Tim Thorp
Spain
Granite Falls
Washington
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SERIES 7: THE CONTENDERS (2001)
A clever, low budget movie satire from a few years back, filmed as a "Best of" package for a fictional series called The Contenders. (It's the 7th season of the show). The premise is: a group of people from across the US are chosen randomly to participate. They are given a gun and an accompanying cameraman (the contestants have no choice; federal law states that they must participate). The object is to find the other contestants and kill them before they kill you. The whole thing is filmed and broadcast "Cops" style, with accompanying bumpers ("you are watching The Contenders")...
This movie is sort of like an updated "10th Victim", with a couple of interesting twists: every contestant knows who the others are and where they live and work, and you don't have to kill them with the gun. There's a few others, but I don't want to give away everything.
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DK Kemler
United States
Sacramento
California
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DARK BLUE WORLD
A fantastic movie about Czech pilots fleeing German invasion to become fighter pilots for the RAF during the battle of Britain. Powerful movie, nicely scratches the historical itch, and fantastic flight scenes. Highly recommended.
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18.
Board Game: Faces
[Average Rating:6.10 Overall Rank:3560]
Daniel Danzer
Germany
Stuttgart
southwest
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FACES (1964/1968)
Director / actor John Cassavetes did a handful of films with his buddies and his wife Gena Rowlands, mostly done without any company to give mones, but filmed in their own house, artistically 100% independent. His most radical IMO and best of all is FACES, made between 1964 and 1968. The first version lasted over four hours, the finally release 2:10. It`s worth any single second.
I best quote the main entry of imdb, because it is so well done (Author: jzappa):
"When I began watching Faces, I realized that I never knew just when the present scene was going to end. I then realized that I wished that it would last forever. I found myself so engrossed in the scene that I was fascinated with it by itself. Then the next scene began, and the next scene, and within each one, there is a whole single movie with characters and a story arch. Faces is a film that does not allow any given scene to simply be a communication of plot information. Cassavetes created an entire universe for his actors in every scene. Each scene is a million years of passion spliced together, each demonstrating brazenly his brilliant recognition of human exchange and in conversation and conflict what is exchanged and what is left to be desired.
The film has moments of great pain because miniature struggles are so real and they tend to be vocalizations of a person's deeper fears in social interactions and in the structure of life. The film has scenes of furious drama because characters will experience blind unleashing of their ids as middle-aged people. Faces also delivers highly during moments of happiness and fun because, the situation's comfort level gracefully allowing, the characters will show the fieriest, grandiose, extroverted parts of themselves."
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062952/
One of my all-time favourites that almost nobody has ever seen ...
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Chris Geggus
United Kingdom
Brentwood,
Essex
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Snatch
A 2000 film by Guy Ritchie that's a real slow burner. Don't know what impact it had in the States, but this was a sort of follow up to Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels i.e. same convergent stories leading to a grand finale etc.
Had the added bonus of Brad Pitt looking very fit as a Gypsy bare knuckle fighter and Vinnie Jones just being Vinnie Jones. Jason Statham plays the lead.
The first 10 minutes seem boring, but stick with it and the whole film begins to open out. Some great lines and great characters (Mad Russian, Four Fingers, Bullet Tooth Tony, Brick Top etc.). Listening to Vinnie expounding the virtue of a Colt over some drippy little replicas is worth the admission fee alone. And is Brick Top one of the most unpleasant villains ever? He abuses dogs!!
Give it a try.
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20.
Board Game: Scan
[Average Rating:5.71 Overall Rank:5636]
L. Stitz
Germany
Lüneburg
Tee-hee-hee-hee-hi-hihihi-hu-hua-huar-huarrrRRRrrrrrr.
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A Scanner Darkly (2006)
Based on the sci-fi drug cult paranoia schizophrenia novel from the 70's by Philip K. Dick, which still is a masterpiece on its own, this movie by Richard Linklater wasn't even shown in the cinemas here in Germany. Even though this Warner Independent Movie starred a lot of big actors (like Robert Downey Jr.) a was experimenting with a brilliant new production technique! (See some stills here.)
A pity, that.
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Mike Ricotta
United States
Norfolk
Virginia
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MEET THE FEEBLES
Directed/written by Peter Jackson (yes THE Peter Jackson) and only uses puppets...puppets that do drugs, have sex and kill...
the tag line?
Hell hath no fury like a hippo with a machine gun.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097858/
Bletch: Do you really think people are interested in nasal sex?
Trevor: Sure, boss. It's the next big fad.
[url] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxhzjL7JGzE [/url]
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Robert Rossney
United States
San Francisco
California
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THE FIVE OBSTRUCTIONS (2003)
This is a movie that has everything you can possibly think of going against it. It's directed by Lars von Trier, whose movies range from the unbearably depressing (Breaking the Waves, Dancer in the Dark) to the flat-out unwatchable (Dogtown).
And it's a documentary (sort of).
About an avant-garde 1967 Danish experimental film that you've never heard of (unless you're a film student). A slow-moving, heavily mannered, black-and-white short that is exactly the kind of movie my friend Dan Marcus was thinking of when he coined the phrase "pompous, doom-soaked art film."
Oh, and both the avant-garde art film and this movie are in Danish, with subtitles.
Seriously, I don't know what else I could say about it to make it sound less appealing. Okay, it's not a Jerry Lewis comedy about the Holocaust. That's about it.
It's hilarious.
So, Lars von Trier approaches Jorgen Leth, who directed the aforementioned pompous, doom-soaked art film, a 12-minute black-and-white short called The Perfect Human. And he challenges Leth, who's been living in obscurity in Haiti for the last couple of decades, to come out of retirement and remake his famous (if you're a Danish film student) movie.
Five times.
Also, each time he makes the movie, he'll have an obstruction to deal with. The obstruction for the first movie is that it has to be made in Cuba, with non-professional actors, and no shot in the movie can be longer than half a second. Amazingly, Leth does this. And in fact he makes the movie again four more times, under increasingly horrible limitations. (The second obstruction, for instance, is that he has to make the film in the most squalid and desperately poor place that von Trier can think of, which turns out to be the middle of the red-light district in Calcutta. That version is almost shockingly depraved, though not in ways that the phrase "shockingly depraved" would lead you to think.)
The end result is one of the weirdest and most hugely entertaining movies I've seen in the last decade. And it's had some very strange and unexpected fallout, as film-school teachers around the world have assigned their students to make their own impossible remake of The Perfect Human. (Search youtube.com for "The Perfect Human" - my favorite is the version remade as a fight scene.)
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Ben Lott
United States
Mason
Michigan
It's time to play the music, It's time to light the lights...
Wocka Wocka Wocka!!
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Noises Off! would probably fall in the category of funniest movies I've ever seen. I literally laughed so hard at this movie, that my face hurt. It's an adaptation of a stage play that stars an amazing group of actors. Just look at the picture (Yes that's John Ritter, Carol Burnett, Michael Caine, Christopher Reeves, and Nicollette Sheridan) The plot is about a small theater company trying to put on a show as strife and turmoil abounds backstage.
Favorite Lines
Dottie: No, I haven't, I haven't forgotten the sardines. I remembered the sardines. Well, what a surprise, I guess I'll just go into the kitchen and fix some more sardines to celebrate.
Lloyd: Alright, I'll give you a reason then. You carry those groceries into the study, Freddy honey, because it's just slightly after midnight, and we're not going to be finished before we open tomorrow night - Correction. Before we open TONIGHT!
Usher: Mr. Fellowes, uh, is there anything wrong with your seat?
Lloyd: Yeah, it's facing the stage!
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Cpl. Sadler 8-0
United States
Rockville
Maryland
Hey, MMP! I want Marines, not Finns! RISING SUN NOW! HAAKAKAKAKA PALAAAAAAA LATER!
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Equilibrium.
This movie is a heavy handed "homage" to Fahrenheit 451 and 1984. It was swamped at the box office by the heavy handed "homage" to philosophy 101, the Matrix.
And this movie rocks like it has no right to.
With absolutely no budget (by Hollywood blockbuster standards) this movie creates some of the best action sequences as they show us the devastating effects of the Grammaton Cleric's Gun Kata.
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Mike Kollross
Canada
Carvel
Alberta
Pew pew pew!!!
I'm a member of the Game Artisans of Canada
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The Beast of War or The Beast
During the war in Afghanistan a Soviet tank crew commanded by a tyrannical officer find themselves lost and in a struggle against a band of Mujahadeen guerrillas in the mountains. A unique look at the Soviet 'Vietnam' experience sympathetically told for both sides.
Awesome film with some very powerful scenes.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094716/
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Film Noir in a high-school. Probably one of the most original screenplays of the last few years. Rent it now. 
Buddy: Who Are You?
