Yeah, Vacancy was pretty decent as well.  I liked both of them much better than all teh crap we seem to get these days, but both didn't thrill me either.  But for low budget flicks, neither was very low...Starngers was $10 million, and I don't see where it all went.  I'm not sure about Vacancy, but I bet the budget was $7-8 million or so.

I've been lurking these script clubs since countdown because I never really had anything to say. But if you're going to review The Strangers, a movie I thoroughly enjoyed, I definitely want to try and be apart of the discussion this time.

Quoted from The Mick I've been lurking these script clubs since countdown because I never really had anything to say. But if you're going to review The Strangers, a movie I thoroughly enjoyed, I definitely want to try and be apart of the discussion this time.

Cool, I would love to hear what what it is you think that made this film enjoyable.

Hmm....time for a quick mod-moment here.  I'm surprsed George hasn't said something already.

The topic at hand is Script Club, and what will be read next.

The virtues of the Hostel franchise or lack thereof have their very own thread on the movie board.

Quoted from Dreamscale ...and was for the most part, very critically acclaimed.

Have you gone mad, Jeff?  That is so not true haha.  This is the statement that finally pulled me off my chair.

Anyway -- Script Club discussion, yes -- Hostel discussion, take it to the thread where it should go.

Yeah, good call. I about replied with a clever something more about Hostel (which actually has its own thread), but we do need to consider getting back to a script to talk about. Last moment we had was doing the Strangers screenplay and kicking that off on the 19th. Any objections or other ideas.

EDIT: And I resurrected the Hostel thread from the archives of October 2007... and merged the comments from this thread  to that one.

saw that, yes guys we need to get back to the strangers, looking forward to the 19th

Yes, looking forward to The Strangers on the 19th as well.

PS  Bert, Hostel recieved 59% acceptance rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which is very, very high for a horror movie and especially a gore soaked one such as this.

Quoted from Grandma Bear ...  this script was a quarter finalist

What competition was it a quarter finalist in Pia?

Nicholls...

Bumping this up on purpose... Maybe some more people will be interested in participating in the SC.

Since In Bruges was suggested in this thread, I just wanted to add that I started watching it tonight. All I can say is that I'm glad we did not go with this one. I found it extremely boring. I hated all the characters and was offended by the charyctarization of the "ugly American tourist". Sure there are obese people here, but there are obese people in most western countries. Also the truly obese do not tend to travel too much.

Anyway, I know I might come across as cranky here. I'm not. Just happy we didn't chose this script.  Very boring with non likeable characters... at least in the first 35 minutes.

I know where you are coming from Pia, I suggested it to some friends and they never got past 1/2 hour either, said they were very bored with it.

A very long first act concentrating on character and little plot but It is worth sticking with though, once the plot kicks in it is a wonderful film. My favorite screenplay of any film released last year, Ralph Fiennes was hilarious when he makes his appearance. To be honest I enjoyed the first act, I thought the dialogue was brilliantly written and funny with two great actors delivering it.

It really is a film not just of 3 acts but three different genres almost in each act and I think it really works. I honestly would recommend watching the rest of the film.


* If anyone does like In Bruges there is a short entitled "Six Shooter" on iTunes. This was Martin MdDonagh's first film, also starring Brendan Gleeson, it won the Oscar for best short a few years ago and is a very, very good short. Well worth a watch.

EDIT: Not on iTunes anymore, maybe need to do some googling. clip below...

I watched The Strangers last weekend. Haven't read the script yet - will do that closer to the 19th.  I gotta tell you though, I didn't think the film was brilliant.

Quoted from mcornetto I watched The Strangers last weekend. Haven't read the script yet - will do that closer to the 19th.  I gotta tell you though, I didn't think the film was brilliant.

I've had that same impression from some other "apparently" great films. Is there something that we're missing? ...

Or are they just... too literary, ...

I'd wager to guess that that's it. ...

Once a person gets their head in the clouds above the rest and if their making movies, writing books or painting pictures, there just might be that slip when the world falls into an extreme but meaningful haze that only the 'insiders" can understand.

At that point, "Who the hell wants to be an insider anyways?"

But then again...

What's on the outside? ...

Go back in.

I didn't find the Strangers to be a great film either. They made a great atmosphere, but when you've seen a couple hundred horror movies, good and bad, you pray the next one doesn't have those same old cliches. I loved the setup with the unknown people terrorizing for the sake of terrorizing. That was great. I enjoyed the couple. I thought their story was decent. What killed it for me was the predictability. As soon as the friend pulled up outside, it was painfully clear what was going to happen. I full predicted the next five minutes of the movie. Come on! Surprise me already! And then suddenly, it's ok to leave their special hiding place? And then they commit the ultimate cliche. "Wait here ALL BY YOURSELF while I go get myself killed, or whatever." We already know they're in the house if they want to be, but it's completely safe. Naw, we should stay together and hope there's more safety in numbers.

All right, I wasn't going to go there before we read it, but someone else said it, and I digressed. Maybe the script is better. It was going so well, too. I had no issues with the ending. That was fine.

I've seen the great films, and they have something really good about them. There are supposedly great ones that aren't, in my opinion. There are supposedly bad ones that I have liked. Not all films are for everyone, but if you can pull one off that has some appeal or most, you've done something good.

And we're closing in on the end of the 2WC. Did we want to read what the Strangers could have been? I'm still interested, and we can totally compare it to the film when we've discussed the script. I think that will be interesting. We can decide what they SHOULD have done. Maybe learn something ourselves.

Haha, I thought the movie was an improvement on the script!

But still interested in seeing where the discussions goes, after all this thing got optioned from a first time writer and he ended up directing it too. Would be good to try and figure out why.