Thursday, April 11, 2019

Thursday Movie Picks #248: Let's Start at the End



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 Let's Start at the End

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Today's theme is all about those movies that start at the end. While they might not all be fully told in reverse, the opening shots are usually of those from the end of the story. It was really quite tricky trying to recall which movies were told that way.

Shimmer Lake (2017)
The local police investigate what happened in a recent bank heist that went wrong involving people in their small town. I really enjoyed this one. It's a small town mystery crime drama that also has a little bit of humor in it.
 
Arrival (2016)
A linguist works with the military to communicate with the alien lifeforms that have arrived in 12 spaceships around the world. This is one of my most recent watch and it's so different from what I expected it to be. I actually rather love it. It's such a quiet contemplative sci-fi movie.

Memento (2000)
A man with short-term memory loss attempts to track down his wife's murderer. Memento is here because as far as I remember it was told in reverse and that is the only thing I remember. I haven't seen this in nearly 2 decades and would love to rewatch it.

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9 comments:

  1. I haven't seen your first pick but I loved the other two.

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  2. Arrival was a surprise to me. I've gotten so weary of scifi outer space movies with monsters and such. It was nice to see a thought-provoking film about ET visitors.

    Arlee Bird
    Tossing It Out

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I don't mind sci-fi movies with monsters and such. That said Arrival was such a breath of fresh air.

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  3. We match on Memento which is very popular today. Very fine film, I saw it twice in the theatre when it first came out before I fully understood it.

    Your first is new to me but I'm intrigued. I've avoided Arrival because of my general allergy to Amy Adams.

    Besides Memento I went with two classics from Billy Wilder who used this storytelling device about as well as it could be done.

    Memento (2000)-Leonard (Guy Pearce) is tracking down the man who raped and murdered his wife. The difficulty however of locating his wife's killer is compounded by the fact that he suffers from a rare, untreatable form of memory loss. Although he can recall details of life before his accident Leonard cannot remember what happened fifteen minutes ago, where he's going, or why. His solution is to tattoo clues onto his body to arrive at the answer. Complex mystery begins at the end and works in fractured time lines throughout.

    Sunset Boulevard (1950)-As the film opens failed screenwriter Joe Gillis (William Holden) is found floating face down (but facing the audience) in the swimming pool of former film queen Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson). Harking back we then learn how things came to such a sorry pass. Brilliant, tragic, pitch black Billy Wilder masterpiece of broken dreams and dashed hopes with vivid performances from the entire cast and a dazzling iconic one by Swanson.

    Double Indemnity (1944)-Los Angeles insurance agent Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray) stumbles into his office late one night with a bullet in his shoulder falls into his office chair and starts recording his confession for his boss and friend Barton Keyes (Edward G. Robinson). We then flashback to how his foolish involvement with the amoral, heartless Phyllis Dietrichson (Barbara Stanwyck) lead to duplicity, deception and murder. Another Billy Wilder noir classic.

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    1. Arrival is very good. Amy Adams is front and center of course but her character in this is one of the more subdued ones that she has played.

      I like Sunset Boulevard too...and I totally about how it start.

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  4. I've seen all of your picks. I really dislike Shimmer Lake but I adore the other two, especially Arrival.

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  5. I have not seen Shimmer Lake but I really enjoyed Arrival which was very different from the normal alien movies. We match with Memento which is popular today and I want to re-watch it as well.

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