“It’s a Bug’s life’, the weekly post when I tell you what films we’ve watched both on our film Sundays and other parts of the week (I will talk about TV shows elsewhere). Please if you haven’t read the introduction page to this series go take a look that’s where you’ll learn the history of our sorely missed Bug.”
There are no spoilers for the films listed
After finishing last weeks viewing with Godzilla a fitting start to our week was Kong: Skull Island. I really like this film (as I may have said before) it feels like a mixture of Apocalypse now and the Doug Mclure films such as The Land that Time forgot. It’ s a fun ride and King Kong hitting helicopters, what’s not to like?
We actually watched less films than normal this week due to having a very busy week, so our next film ended up being on Friday Evening. We watched the new version of the Lion King, we had pre-ordered the Steelbook off Zavvi a while ago and it arrived last weekend, but unfortunately we had to wait longer than planned due to us both feeling under the weather. We don’t like to rush films like this so we waited until we were both feeling a bit better so we could really enjoy it.
We are unable to get to the Cinema to see films so these are our premiere’s and for big titles we like to make the most of them. We try to recreate that feeling at home, so we usually choose a nice relaxing evening and get some nice food in so we can make it a bit more of a treat rather than how we do most of our films. On a positive note we have no-one kicking the back of our seats and our doggies can join us!
I’d like to say the steelbook is gorgeous, I will be doing some pictures to put on my Instagram and Facebook soon to show it off in all it’s glory. I love the original Lion King, this new version looks beautiful and technically it shows that there is no excuse for using live animals in film (that’s an article for another time). We both really enjoyed it, there were a couple of moments that didn’t quite work for me, but it’s still a lovely film and a great version that stands on it’s own.
The next film’s of the week were on Sunday evening as we didn’t have the whole day as we usually would due to an appointment at home for my wife. We started late afternoon heading towards the evening, where we did a slightly mismatched (but quality) double bill. Robert Zemeckis’s Castaway and the Directors cut of Star Trek the Motion Picture. I think Castaway is my favourite Tom Hanks film, his performance is stunning as is the whole production. Little things you start to notice in the film like there is no music whilst he is on the island, when you do hear the score later it is beautifully put together by Alan Silvestri.
Star Trek the motion Picture, I sometimes think is unfairly criticised. I saw it on release and remember the awe of seeing it on the big screen, it was a couple of years after the release of Star Wars but felt so different. Out of all the Star Trek Films, to me in scope and imagery this feels the most cinematic and it feels like they have moved on from the original series. There have been a few different cuts over the years including a bodged together TV cut, I am always cautious about ‘Directors Cuts’ but Robert Wise the Director always said he never had enough time to edit properly so this is why he revisited it. This Directors cut was put together for the 2002 DVD release with Robert Wise and various other people who worked on the film originally. It includes a few extra scenes that do add something and unusually for a Directors cut removes a few more scenes to make it flow with the new content . Unfortunately this 2002 DVD release is the only way at present you can watch this version, it is out of print but can be found on ebay. I will talk a lot more about this film in the next few weeks when we celebrate the 40th anniversary of it’s release.
I’m not sure what we have planned over the next week but I’m sure there will be a Christmas film on the horizon, as my wife has a few Christmas crochet projects planned and loves to watch Christmas films whilst doing them.
