Thursday Movie Picks #229: TMP Television Edition Adapted from a Non-English Series

Hello there and welcome to Thursday Movie Picks a weekly series where you share movie picks each Thursday. The rules are simple: based on the theme of the week pick three to five titles and tell us why you picked them. For further details and the schedule visit the series main page here.

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This week's Thursday Movie Picks is TMP Television Edition - Adapted from a Non-English Series

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I've always love these TV edition weeks, but sometimes they can be harder to pick because I don't keep track of the series I've seen. So often I feel I am forgetting a series. Anyway my picks today are ones that I have seen the English remake but not the original series.

The Killing (2011-2014) remake of Forbrydelsen (2007-2012)

A remake of a Danish series, The Killing follows the investigation of the murder of a teenage girl found in in the trunk of a submerged car. I had been looking forward to this since I heard that the original was very good. Unfortunately the remake was a disappointment. The pacing was just glacial; I just could not watch it and only managed about two episodes of the first season.

The Returned (2015) remake of Les Revenants (2012-2015)
A remake of the French series, it's about deceased locals in a small town returning from the dead. I thought this remake was decent. I was quite hooked on it and thus very disappointed when the series was not renewed and we never got the answer as to why the deceased have returned. 

Containment (2016) remake of Cordon (2014)

A remake of a Belgian series, the remake is about a city quarantined after a virus outbreak. Containment was just astonishingly awful; it's like a very juvenile take of an outbreak. The dialogue was very bad, then there was also the whole supposed vaccine research done by a lone doctor in a hospital and the handling of the cordoned area by authorities which were all just so so silly.

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Thursday Movie Picks #228: Non-Linear Timelines

Hello there and welcome to Thursday Movie Picks a weekly series where you share your movie picks each Thursday. The rules are simple: based on the theme of the week pick three to five movies and tell us why you picked them. For further details and the schedule visit the series main page here.

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This week's Thursday Movie Picks is Non-Linear Timelines [Suggested by Mettel Ray]

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This week's theme is a suggestion by Mettel Ray. This theme is both fun and challenging. A lot of films have flashbacks, so I didn't want to pick something that only employ character flashbacks in their non-linear narrative. I suppose I was also looking for those where there are different characters/stories and timelines and they all eventually overlap and converge. Anyway I think I just about manage it and all of them I actually really like.

Dunkirk (2017)
The movie follows and alternates between three different groups of people from three different start off period. The ones that we follow from land that start from one week ago, the ones making their journey by sea that start a day ago and lastly the pilots that start from an hour ago. Their stories slowly start to overlap and eventually fully converge by the end.  

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

This one does employ flashback scenes, in which we discover how two strangers that meet on a train actually do know each other. But it also has a separate but related story arc of a set of characters and how they have affected and would affect the two strangers we meet in the beginning and the story come full circle.

11:14 (2003)
I don't remember much of this other than I liked it when I first saw it and was surprised at how the movie had not received much attention. Basically 11:14 follows different groups of people whose lives overlap and converge at 11:14pm.
 

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Thursday Movie Picks #227: Museum

Hello there and welcome to Thursday Movie Picks a weekly series where you share your movie picks each Thursday. The rules are simple: based on the theme of the week pick three to five movies and tell us why you picked them. For further details and the schedule visit the series main page here.

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This week's Thursday Movie Picks is Museum

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Another tough theme this week.

The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec (2010) 
Set in the early 20th century it follows a young authoress as she explores Egyptian tombs and later mayhem at a museum in Paris. I didn't really enjoy this. I found it a little silly, but I am probably not the right audience for it. My guess is if you like Night at the Museum and the Indiana Jones movies, you might like this.

Russian Ark (2002)
This was the movie that came immediately to mind when I came up with this theme. In Russian Ark the audience sees the world through an unseen protagonist as he is guided by a 19th century man in black as they journey through 300 years of Russian history in the Russian State Hermitage Museum. The movie is best known for its single continuous shot which is a tremendous feat considering the number of actors, dancing scenes and live orchestras.

The Thomas Crown Affair (1999)
A great heist movie that is also perfect for today about a rich playboy who steals priceless art for the challenge and the insurance investigator tasked to get the stolen painting back.
 

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Thursday Movie Picks #226: Political Comedy

Hello there and welcome to Thursday Movie Picks a weekly series where you share your movie picks each Thursday. The rules are simple: based on the theme of the week pick three to five movies and tell us why you picked them. For further details and the schedule visit the series main page here.

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This week's Thursday Movie Picks is Political Comedy

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This week's theme is by Wendell. It is a tough one for me, I haven't watched that many political comedies so there were hardly any to pick from.

The Campaign (2012)
I saw this, but I don't remember a thing about it. So I'd say it is generally forgettable.

In the Loop (2009) 
One of my favourites. Filled to the brim with profanities but also hilarious.

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
Very funny. Like In the Loop, this is a must watch and it has aged very well.
 

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Thursday Movie Picks #225: Gangsters

Hello there and welcome to Thursday Movie Picks a weekly series where you share your movie picks each Thursday. The rules are simple: based on the theme of the week pick three to five movies and tell us why you picked them. For further details and the schedule visit the series main page here.

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This week's Thursday Movie Picks is Gangsters

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I don't watch a lot of gangster movies so I almost thought that I had few to pick from until I remembered two that I recently rewatched.

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998)
Four friends heavily in debt after a card game go wrong scheme to rob a gang of robbers and ultimately have to go against a myriad of other criminals when their paths intersect. I rewatched this and my pick below pretty much back to back. If had to choose, I prefer this better. Four friends totally out of their depth made for a funnier story.

Snatch (2000)
Different story and characters but still very much like the above, involving a bunch of different criminals with their individual schemes overlap and intersect resulting in chaos that is very funny.

Layer Cake (2004)

You know what...I've forgotten the plot to this. The only thing I remember is that I was surprised at how good it was and how much I liked it when I saw it so long ago. This is will be my next rewatch.
 

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Thursday Movie Picks #224: Halloween/Television Edition: The Weird

 

Hello there and welcome to Thursday Movie Picks a weekly series where you share your movie picks each Thursday. The rules are simple: based on the theme of the week pick three to five movies and tell us why you picked them. For further details and the schedule visit the series main page here.

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This week's Thursday Movie Picks is Halloween Edition - The Weird

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Hey it's October again and it's time for the Halloween Edition. Take a look at what's in store for the rest of the month.

October 4 - Halloween Edition: Home Invasion
October 11 - Halloween Edition: The Dark/Night
October 18 - Halloween Edition: Technology
October 25 - Halloween/Television Edition: The Weird

So we've come to the final Halloween edition and as it is the last Thursday it is also the TV edition. This week I'm picking TV series that mixes all sorts of genre making them all weird messy messes that also have a lot of weird stuff happening too.
 
Hemlock Grove (2013 - 2015)

I like vampire/werewolf shows and this one had a very striking poster so I gave it a try. I did end up watching all three seasons, only because the Netflix library was very limited then. I would say only the first season which had a stronger mystery element to it was decent. The other seasons added more science fiction to the show which just didn't make it as good.

Legion (2017 - )
Legion is about David Haller the son of Professor X of the X-Men, who has multiple personalities and each of his personality has its own superpower. That does sound awesome doesn't it? To an extent it is. Weird and crazy stuff happens and the series has this really interesting look that is both retro trippy but also a little futuristic which I do like. However the series is just so inconsistent. To get one brilliant episode, you'd have to sit through like two to three episodes that were just misses. I watched the entire season one, but after seeing the first episode of season two, I gave up. The season seemed it was going to be plagued by the same unevenness.

Fortitude (2015 - )
The setting, a town on the edge of the Arctic Circle, attracted me to the series. It sort of reminds me of White Out, 30 Days of Night and other horror/thrillers set in a similar sort of setting that has a small local police force who have to battle the harsh weather and solve a crime. Fortitude is a mix of crime thriller, science fiction and the supernatural and like my other picks today it has so much weird crazy stuff: man-eating polar bears, weird insects, mastodon remains, witch doctors and that is just what I remember. I would say I enjoyed season one better. I thought season two overstretched itself with all the different stuff that was going on. 

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Thursday Movie Picks #223: Halloween Edition - Technology

 

Hello there and welcome to Thursday Movie Picks a weekly series where you share your movie picks each Thursday. The rules are simple: based on the theme of the week pick three to five movies and tell us why you picked them. For further details and the schedule visit the series main page here.

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This week's Thursday Movie Picks is Halloween Edition - Technology

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Hey it's October again and it's time for the Halloween Edition. Take a look at what's in store for the rest of the month.

October 4 - Halloween Edition: Home Invasion
October 11 - Halloween Edition: The Dark/Night
October 18 - Halloween Edition: Technology
October 25 - Halloween/Television Edition: The Weird

This one was quite tough as I've tried to not pick ones that I've picked too many times before.
 
The Ring (2002)

A journalist investigates a mysterious videotape that causes the person viewing it to die. Technology - video tape, old technology, even by 2002, but I suppose that is why it works here; an almost obsolete technology showing a grainy mysterious footage makes it more scary. Anyway that scene when the girl reaches out was just the freakiest. I know there was a sequel recently, was it still a videotape?

Shutter (2004) 
A young photographer and his girlfriend discover mysterious shadows in their photographs after a tragic accident. Technology - photography. It was remade in 2008 but skip that and just watch this. Shutter is one of my favourite ghost stories and I can't believe I've only picked this only once before. It has some really good scary scenes and like most good ghost stories it has at its center a tragedy and is so incredibly sad.

Chatroom (2010)
5 teens meet in a chatroom and one of them has a dark side. Technology - internet. The only one of my picks today that I dislike. This movie is just like 10 years too late. By 2010 social media had taken over chatrooms, even popular chatrooms like MSN chat had already been shut down a couple of years before.

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