This honestly surprises me since I consider you to be quite a film buff. On occasion I've had incidents where I would have to go back during a dialogue-heavy scene so i could read the subtitles again but overall I've not had any major issues with subtitles.

I guess in a perfect world it would be great if I was fluent in Japanese, German and Russian so I wouldn't need to read subtitles on some of my top favorite films of all time but alas, subtitles will have to suffice.

I've gotten to the point, that I always have subtitles on. I watch so much UK content, I just have gotten use to it. The wife squawks sometimes, when we watch something together.

Ok maybe I'm missing something here but if it's UK content why are you using subtitles?

Must be one full of Scottish actors, nobody can understand them.

Because they talk fast sometimes. Their english is different that my Canadian version . Lots of different slang etc.

Чёрная акула, Black Shark, an early 90s Russian movie starring the KA-50 helicopter.

It's vaguely reminiscent of an episode of the '80s T.V. shows Air Wolf and Blue Thunder.

Bad, but has some great helicopter shots.

LOL! Thank you for that explanation since it does indeed make sense. I guess my UK viewing experience has been very different since the shows I've watched from there seem to always be done in the standard "RP" or "BBC News" accent.

I saw two movies this weekend:

1) "Benny Loves You" -- I love independent film. Low budget doesn't matter so much so long as the director tells a cohesive story. This one was... interesting. Slasher stuffed animal? Check. Dazed and confused owner? Check? The animal is doing the killing for love to win the hearts of their owner who doesn't want them to kill... check?!? This was a good movie but had some annoying directing and editing choices that could have been better in more capable hands. If Wes Craven of Stephen Spielberg had directed this, it truly could have risen to classic levels--there was that kind of potential there, what with the lore of these stuffed animals being thrown in the trash(yeah, yeah, we've seen the alligators flushed down the toilet thing, but kids don't pour years of their heart and soul building a bond with their baby alligators before they're flushed, not like their best stuffed pals), only to feel rejected and later seek their former owners. Lots of potential. I had a grin most of the film, often saying, "WTF" aloud. This is one that if is ever remade, perhaps they'll dig up Wes Craven, zap some life back into him and have him give a proper go. Because of the uniqueness of this film and the love the director/creator/writer/actor had in his own material, I give a quarter star to my final rating, ultimately scoring this *** out of **** stars.

2) "Silent Running" -- In a world without forests and trees, buildings of concrete and asphalt streets cover the Earth. People are happy. Jobs are plentiful. Prosperity is... everywhere. But far out past the moons of Jupiter, orbiting the rings of Saturn are a fleet of men aboard ships preserving the last of Earth's natural history. Forests, gardens, wildlife in biodomes... in space? I have no idea how this 1972 sci-fi film was rated G.

*Spoiler warning* There was a lot of crap sci-fi in the 1970s--a lot of camp, a lot of cheese, and occasionally something that was truly good. This one lies in the "What the heck?" zone. The main character is the head arborist of these biodomes that preserve the last of Earth's wildlife and plants in biodomes on starships that seem to have inspired what these structures look like in every piece of science fiction that has been produced since. The film is beautifully shot at times, others--typical 70s camp. The robots are fantastic! Some of the articulation of these machines likely influenced how the droids worked in Star Wars, but they were impressive, nonetheless. The main character, however, manages to murder his crewmates about a half and hour into the film because they've been ordered to call it a day by Earth--to literally nuke all biodomes, wrap things up and head home. This arborist... ain't havin' that. So he kills them all. Little to no remorse, no sympathy. He presses the button, breaks their necks... and wastes them. Then forty five minutes pass of him spending his time alone aboard the ship, of which I slept through most of, until ultimately he reprograms the droids to tend to the nature in the last remaining dome and then commits suicide. HOW WAS THIS RATED G? I would never allow a young child to watch this nonsense. I can see where environmentalists get their crazy from. This film was full of it! But I love sci-fi, so in this regard is worth watching. The plot is unique--but accepting that he's a good person after what he did is... darned near impossible to believe. He didn't even try to save all the biodomes, just one--nor did he try and spare his crewmates. No protests. No please. Just waste 'em all for the bunnies so they can eat their cabbage. If you love sci-fi and haven't seen this, maybe a skim would be worthwhile. Bizarre. What a weird movie. The uniqueness of the film adds an extra star to my rating. ** out of **** stars.

It depends on the genre. Coincidentally, low budget works VERY well with the horror genre because what makes a horror movie compelling are the actual scares, tension and foreboding that the film-maker can arouse in the audience. You really don't need a big budget for that and it's no accident that most of the horror movies you see coming out in theaters for a long time now are low budget movies.

Concerning "Silent Running", I haven't seen it since the 80's so I only remember some basic plot points and major scenes. Was it ever explained in the film how food is produced if there is no longer any photosynthesis occurring on Earth?? For me that would be a major plot hole.

They did a very poor job with their worldbuilding. Short of some expository dialogue from the crew members, very little else was revealed of the Earth. It was implied that they were eating "processed artificial food" instead of natural fruits and vegetables, but never was any depth given to why those processed foods may or may not be worse than the natural ones. In hard science fiction I expect this kind of explanation, but here none was given. Instead, we were treated with ear cringing Joan Baez singing and sympathetic bunny shots. Hippies must have produced this. So the film fails from a hard science standpoint. Even the light bulbs that were used to light the forest were questionable, for even in the 70s everyone knew that they burn out. This felt like an activist recruitment film.

I love nature, I love wildlife, but please, if you're going to try and get me to be sympathetic about something then provide context, data, logic and reason.

What's funny is that even processed artificial food has to consist of some kind of processed protein or vegetable-based "goo". Heck, all you need to look at are the "meats" that are used by most fast food places and you'll realize right away that even processed fake meat has to have some actual natural ingredients that you can only get via photosynthesis.

I love Silent Running, I saw it first at about 12 or thereabouts. It's "message" was rather obvious I should say, so much so that I would say a given. No need to provide more context to not destroying all plant & animal life

In other news, it was my turn to provide the movie for film night recently, I chose The Blues Brothers, a new film to the rest of them. I've seen it many times before. That's a film that just doesn't, maybe even cannot, get old or obsolete.

Agreed. It's one of my top 10 comedies of all time. The casting for that film was absolutely brilliant and it created the often sought after "lightning in a bottle".




A short but funny scene with a quote that I find myself using quite often in my every day life.

Yeah, it was pretty obvious. I'm only being critical from a writer's perspective, although I'm glad the movie was only 90 minutes. Far too many modern films exceed the two hour mark for no good reason.

Blues Brothers is timeless.

I'm London English but often switch subtitles if the film or TV show is set in the North of England, Scotland or 'Norren Erlan' (Northern Ireland).
There has been much rumbling and criticism of poor diction or overbearing incidental music masking dialogue in British dramas in recent years.

And of course, being in my dottage may have some bearing on the requirement of subtitles: "Wot's 'e say? 'Oose that? Isn't that Wotsit 'oo was in that thingummy, you know, a while back?"

Thinking way back to the late 70's when I was a young child, I distinctly remember having no problems at all understanding what was being said on "Benny Hill" and "Doctor Who". So even at a young age my ears didn't have much of a problem understanding different accents.

Right but those shows didn't include the thicker, rougher accents, instead they were typically fairly refined. Some of those thick Irish or Scottish accents are out there.

British TV generally has "softened" accents when accents are used. Notable exceptions are Rab C Nesbit, and Still Game. Both Scottish comedy series that don't do much to soften their accents

I was under the impression that all Scots sound like Sean Connery?

Shertainly