Refreshing movies worth watching

[Adaboy4z]

We really enjoyed "Sheep Detectives" last night!!

 

[J. Lohmann]

Not sure if this is "refreshing" or not, but last night it was...


RIP SAM NEILL...

 

[LTig]

Not sure if this is "refreshing" or not, but last night it was...


RIP SAM NEILL...

​

This time I agree - it's one of my favorites. With one exception you don't see blood - it's playing in your mind only. On the other hand there are many beautiful scenes.

 

[J. Lohmann]

This time I agree - it's one of my favorites. With one exception you don't see blood - it's playing in your mind only. On the other hand there are many beautiful scenes.

Ahhhhhhh....okay. So blood is one of the underlying factors when deciding whether a film is "refreshing" or not (in terms of posting here).

I'll try to keep that in mind and avoid the horror I view a lot of. I started a thread for anyone who wants to contribute regarding physical media they're watching (DVDs, Blu-rays and 4K Blu-rays), but as far as I'm concerned, anything goes there in terms of genre.

 

[JeffS7444]

Ahhhhhhh....okay. So blood is one of the underlying factors when deciding whether a film is "refreshing" or not (in terms of posting here).

I'll try to keep that in mind and avoid the horror I view a lot of. I started a thread for anyone who wants to contribute regarding physical media they're watching (DVDs, Blu-rays and 4K Blu-rays), but as far as I'm concerned, anything goes there in terms of genre.

@amirm left it open to interpretation, submitting The Banshees of Inisherin in his opening post, and that has blood and self-mutilation scenes. But it's unlike anything I can recall watching before, both in terms of setting and situation. It's the sort of film that the big Hollywood studios generally won't touch, and I can't see it working as a franchise!

 

[Power Pop 23]

Warner Bros. announced today Gone with the Wind will be available on 4K disc on November 3, 2026 in three variants, a collectors edition exclusive to Walmart - with pre-orders starting today, a Steelbook, and a standard case. WaterTower Music will release the score on vinyl.

Gone with the Wind Collector's Edition 4K Blu-ray

www.blu-ray.com

 

[Chrispy]

Warner Bros. announced today Gone with the Wind will be available on 4K disc on November 3, 2026 in a three variants, a collectors edition exclusive to Walmart - with pre-orders starting today, a Steelbook, and a standard case. WaterTower Music will release the score on vinyl.

Gone with the Wind Collector's Edition 4K Blu-ray

www.blu-ray.com

Have never desired to see that one. I seriously doubt there are enough old people to buy this (and I'm pretty old).

 

[Power Pop 23]

Have never desired to see that one. I seriously doubt there are enough old people to buy this (and I'm pretty old).

Perhaps....

Titles deemed unlikely of large sales are often licensed to boutique labels featuring editions catering to collectors and fervent fans.

 

[Chrispy]

Perhaps....

Titles deemed unlikely of large sales are often licensed to boutique labels featuring editions catering to collectors and fervent fans.

I have seen parts of this film and definitely wouldn't buy it, historical reasons not mattering....

Perhaps....

Titles deemed unlikely of large sales are often licensed to boutique labels featuring editions catering to collectors and fervent fans.

For me it's more the movie's content....just not relatable.

 

[Power Pop 23]

I have no idea how many copies of Gone with the Wind on 4K disc that Warner Bros. thinks they can sell.

One deterrent will the 'black bars' of the 4:3 aspect ratio and one incentive will be the vividness of the 3-strip Technicolor film in HDR.

I perceive many older film titles would not get the budget necessary for restoration if they had to rely solely on income from streaming and not also the income from the sales on physical media - especially for titles entering the public domain 95 years after their release.

 

[J. Lohmann]

Sorry if this isn't "refreshing" enough, but I just got the disc so I wanted to share my thoughts...

Purchased this through Walmart.com and it seems to have been shipped from somewhere other than America; it bounced all over the world, according to our package tracking, before getting to us, and I was concerned when I saw the "foreign" rating labels on it and the Warner Bros. logo (because this was initially distributed by 20th Century Fox). But, like the Paranormal Activity 2 Blu-ray I recently picked up via Walmart.com (which also boasted "foreign" packaging), the disc played fine in my Cambridge UHD BD player.

Upon doing some additional research, it seems that some Blu-rays are now being reissued without region coding, even though the package may not look Region 1-esque; of course, we all know 4K Ultra HDs are region-free, but this wasn't the case with DVD or Blu-ray. Strange. Additionally, you can see from the image I posted how weird the disc art itself looks -- this is quite different from the disc that comes in the original US Blu-ray package (from Fox), and the audio track for the main feature is in DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (this edition I received, with the "foreign" packaging, originally came with a Dolby TrueHD 5.1 track, while the US Fox disc got the DTS-HD mix; for some reason, this particular reissue received the Master Audio track).

This film was originally a Fox/Warner co-production (the first time it happened in Hollywood, if I'm not mistaken) so it makes sense that Warner would now take over distribution rights, but what happened to Disney being the distributor for 20th Century Fox titles? Weren't THEY in charge of that?

Like I said...weird.

The 2.35:1 widescreen transfer on this Blu-ray looked mostly excellent (I hadn't seen the film since I taped it off TV a LONG time ago when I was a kid), with a clean aesthetic that showcased nearly zero noise or film grain for that matter -- some ISO sensor noise could be seen in shots of the San Francisco skies, but I do not believe Warner used any kind of DNR here. It really did look pretty awesome for a film this old, shot in the midst of the disaster epic era; in comparing it to Earthquake in 4K from Universal, I'd say they were about equal, with Earthquake having the added benefit of an HDR pass (though Towering Inferno didn't seem to need any HDR highlights, I thought). Colors were actually saturated and rich, blacks were deep and detail was what you'd expect from a 1080p presentation of a 70s blockbuster. No complaints, really.

I never saw the DVD transfer on the Special Edition DVD, so I can't compare, and of course Fox (or Disney) never put out a 4K, but this is probably the best the film will ever look save for a full-bore 2160p reworking of all visual elements and an aggressive HDR pass. I actually think the transfer Fox gave the Special Edition DVD of Irwin Allen's other awesome disaster yarn, Poseidon Adventure (which I own and watch every New Year's Eve), was excellent and super-clean, so I have no plans on replacing it (plus, it's a REALLY cool two-disc package complete with lobby cards and a host of other collectibles).

On the audio side, there was a bit of a disappointment, though most cinephiles would tell me "I'm trippin'" (mainly because I shouldn't be expecting more than what I experienced for a mono soundtrack that's been reworked into surround); this DTS-HD 5.1 track came across as glorified mono on my system, and I really didn't even detect any spread to the left and right mains. Just about all the dialogue, effects and score came from the center, but I will do some more testing to see if I agree with that after some time. In the plus column, dialogue was nice and punchy for the most part, so I didn't have to crank the AVR volume up to ridiculous levels like you need to do with a lot of older films on disc.

Was Towering Inferno actually released in something OTHER than mono originally? Now, it has me thinking.........

​

 

[Timcognito]

Seems like this thread is stuck in the well known and tried true at the moment. Enough with nostalgia. And if you think the Odyssey might be a long disappointing adventure this little gem from 2025 might cheer you up in your own living room. A dark, adult, twisting plot comedy with plenty of humor set in the 50s about ping pong completion where Shark Tank's Mr Wonderful is type cast into a sinister financier in a non stop fast paced romp. Acting is supreme by all. If it sounds like your thing don't miss it. Marty Supreme, steaming now.

 

[J. Lohmann]

Sorry if this isn't "refreshing" enough, but I just got the disc so I wanted to share my thoughts...

Purchased this through Walmart.com and it seems to have been shipped from somewhere other than America; it bounced all over the world, according to our package tracking, before getting to us, and I was concerned when I saw the "foreign" rating labels on it and the Warner Bros. logo (because this was initially distributed by 20th Century Fox). But, like the Paranormal Activity 2 Blu-ray I recently picked up via Walmart.com (which also boasted "foreign" packaging), the disc played fine in my Cambridge UHD BD player.

Upon doing some additional research, it seems that some Blu-rays are now being reissued without region coding, even though the package may not look Region 1-esque; of course, we all know 4K Ultra HDs are region-free, but this wasn't the case with DVD or Blu-ray. Strange. Additionally, you can see from the image I posted how weird the disc art itself looks -- this is quite different from the disc that comes in the original US Blu-ray package (from Fox), and the audio track for the main feature is in DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (this edition I received, with the "foreign" packaging, originally came with a Dolby TrueHD 5.1 track, while the US Fox disc got the DTS-HD mix; for some reason, this particular reissue received the Master Audio track).

This film was originally a Fox/Warner co-production (the first time it happened in Hollywood, if I'm not mistaken) so it makes sense that Warner would now take over distribution rights, but what happened to Disney being the distributor for 20th Century Fox titles? Weren't THEY in charge of that?

Like I said...weird.

The 2.35:1 widescreen transfer on this Blu-ray looked mostly excellent (I hadn't seen the film since I taped it off TV a LONG time ago when I was a kid), with a clean aesthetic that showcased nearly zero noise or film grain for that matter -- some ISO sensor noise could be seen in shots of the San Francisco skies, but I do not believe Warner used any kind of DNR here. It really did look pretty awesome for a film this old, shot in the midst of the disaster epic era; in comparing it to Earthquake in 4K from Universal, I'd say they were about equal, with Earthquake having the added benefit of an HDR pass (though Towering Inferno didn't seem to need any HDR highlights, I thought). Colors were actually saturated and rich, blacks were deep and detail was what you'd expect from a 1080p presentation of a 70s blockbuster. No complaints, really.

I never saw the DVD transfer on the Special Edition DVD, so I can't compare, and of course Fox (or Disney) never put out a 4K, but this is probably the best the film will ever look save for a full-bore 2160p reworking of all visual elements and an aggressive HDR pass. I actually think the transfer Fox gave the Special Edition DVD of Irwin Allen's other awesome disaster yarn, Poseidon Adventure (which I own and watch every New Year's Eve), was excellent and super-clean, so I have no plans on replacing it (plus, it's a REALLY cool two-disc package complete with lobby cards and a host of other collectibles).

On the audio side, there was a bit of a disappointment, though most cinephiles would tell me "I'm trippin'" (mainly because I shouldn't be expecting more than what I experienced for a mono soundtrack that's been reworked into surround); this DTS-HD 5.1 track came across as glorified mono on my system, and I really didn't even detect any spread to the left and right mains. Just about all the dialogue, effects and score came from the center, but I will do some more testing to see if I agree with that after some time. In the plus column, dialogue was nice and punchy for the most part, so I didn't have to crank the AVR volume up to ridiculous levels like you need to do with a lot of older films on disc.

Was Towering Inferno actually released in something OTHER than mono originally? Now, it has me thinking.........

​

Case in point, once again...

 

[JeffS7444]

Sorry if this isn't "refreshing" enough, but I just got the disc so I wanted to share my thoughts...

​

More youthful memories for me: Just as my grade school class got to see "Earthquake", we also got to check out The Towering Inferno, and The Poseidon Adventure on separate occasions. Great fun for us, because our teachers didn't even try to justify the movies as anything but entertainment. In one of those movies (Earthquake?) the scene where one of the stars, (Charton Heston?), utters the s-word caused a minor sensation.

IIRC 2-channel optical movie soundtracks existed, but weren't known for particularly awesome sound: The next big step was magnetic audio tracks, in the THX era. But were they originally recorded with something more? The music was for sure: You have only to find old stereo LP soundtracks as proof.

 

[J. Lohmann]

Thanks for the feedback.

 

[mrbungle]

A Poet (2025). Charming dark comedy from a young Columbian director using only non-professional actors. Won a well-deserved nomination at a Cannes Festival track. Subtitles and artsy topic, but I think it still fits the thread. Not really art house.

 

[JeffS7444]

Minions and Monsters was cute, pays homage to legends of the silent movie era, and avoids shoutouts to the adults in the audience, which was funny the first hundred or so times I saw it done, but which has since become groan-inducing.

 

[noisey]

Seems like this thread is stuck in the well known and tried true at the moment. Enough with nostalgia. And if you think the Odyssey might be a long disappointing adventure this little gem from 2025 might cheer you up in your own living room. A dark, adult, twisting plot comedy with plenty of humor set in the 50s about ping pong completion where Shark Tank's Mr Wonderful is type cast into a sinister financier in a non stop fast paced romp. Acting is supreme by all. If it sounds like your thing don't miss it. Marty Supreme, steaming now.

Over here in Germany Marty Supreme was in cinemas in early 2026 and this far I'd rank it as this year's best movie. That doesn't mean a lot for this year in film, however, because everything else I saw was decent at best, haha.
Marty Supreme, however was a bold, thrilling and at times hilarious tour-de-force, a 2 1/2-hour meltdown of the protagonist. I could barely believe some of those lines he was spouting. That certainly was Chalamet's best performance so far and great acting by the entire cast for that matter.
While director Josh Safdie's last film, Uncut Gems, was excruciatingly thrilling already, I think Marty Supreme is the better film in every way.

 

[stalepie2]

 

[Fahzz]

Ditto what Amir said.
Just watched "Project Hail Mary" on Amazon. Highly recomnended!

I had read about this movie, and I wasn't very interested in watching it, but now I highly recommend it as well.