Motion Definition of Motion at Dictionary.com

Hello, FGers. The weekly thread is here.
I got time to watch a lot of stuff all through the previous fortnight. All first viewings. A number of these titles are quite well-known and chances are you may have seen at least one of them. Don't forget to leave your comments!
Angels with Dirty Faces (1938, Michael Curtiz)
This is my first James Cagney feature. yes, had never seen him in a film before, though I had heard a lot. This one seemed to me like pretty much a typical gangster feature of that era. Cagney tried his best and was reasonably memorable but the supporting cast were all below par. Pat O'Brien as the holier-than-holy priest was dull, the heroine was non-existent and unnecessary and those Dead End Kids were super irritating. The final scene did a lot to lift this film and help it achieve the reputation it has. Otherwise it would have been a pretty generic and forgettable gangster flick. It does not have the pizzazz of Scarface for sure.
5/10
Ram Jaane (1995, Rajiv Mehra)
This is the Hindi language remake of AwDF with Shahrukh Khan playing Cagney's role. "Ram Jaane" literally means "God knows" which is what the main character, an orphan, is named in his childhood.
It is like watching an "extended cut" of AwDF, with all the plot points that were either condensed or left outright to the viewers' imagination in the original, expanded. We get more childhood scenes of the main characters. We get to see more of how Ram Jaane rose in the criminal underworld. We get to see more of his romantic interest.
Shahrukh Khan entirely dominates the film with his super-manic swagger. A lot of people will call his acting as hamming but I beg to differ. A good actor can find nuances even within overacting and Shahrukh plays the character exactly the way it is written. What's more, this film actually gives the heroine something to do unlike the original where she was there just to show that the lead wasn't a homosexual.
5/10
One, Two, Three (1961, Billy Wilder)
Now, this film is enough to turn me into a Cagney fan. I am planning on watching a lot more from him. I also used to think that Wilder was better at serious narratives than comic ones - all my previous top favourites from him have been in the serious vein. Well, not anymore - I can now say with complete certainty that he did make at least one outright masterpiece of comedy and that's this one.
This is the kind of manic, steroid-fuelled, hyperspeed farce that I was expecting Bringing Up Baby to be. That one did not quite manage to it to the finish line but this one did and with a lot more charm. Not only is it consistently funny but there are so many satirical jibes at virtually all political ideologies - capitalism, communism, nazism and then some more - that I am sure I missed quite a few. This one deserves multiple viewings just to soak it all in.
9/10
The Lost World (1925, Harry O. Hoyt)
This one is more interesting from a monster movie history standpoint than as a movie. It is a showcase for stop-motion monsters from the factory of Willis O'Brien which is nominally supported by a story. Which is a shame, because Arthur Conan Doyle's source novel is truly rich entertainment with great characters and dialogue apart from the usual dinosaur-heavy attractions.
Those who are interested in this due to the poster of a rampaging T-rex or allosaurus in London, be forewarned: the poster is a half-lie. A dinosaur does indeed run loose in London at the end of the movie, but it is a brontosaurus, a herbivore. So those who are expecting some sort of precursor to the final act of Spielberg's The Lost World will be disappointed.
6/10
The Lost World (1960, Irwin Allen)
Now this is just awful in all respects. Fox slashed their budget so they couldn't afford stop-motion, so they went for the bad-ol' "lizards with stuff glued on to their backs" technique. And there are very few of those things visible in the film and only one monster fight! Curiously, that monster fight is the only scene in the entire film that works. As fake and ridiculous as these 'dinosaurs' look, there is not much about their fighting that is fake. The lizard and the juvenile alligator actually go for it with everything they have got and it's very probable that one of both of these animals were injured to some degree during the spectacle. It works because it is very much real.
Sadly, that is just one scene lasting for around 3 minutes. The rest is more reminiscent of H. Rider Haggard than Arthur Conan Doyle, what with a hunt for diamonds and a cave of lava and such. There is zero suspense and the acting is quite mediocre despite casting veterans such as Claude Rains and Michael Rennie. Overall, there is just very little fun to be had in this film.
2/10
Body and Soul (1947, Robert Rossen)
Boxing is far from being my favourite sport and the ever-present mafia connections make it even more unpleasant to me. I came away a bit disappointed with this because I had expected something like another The Hustler. Instead I got a pretty straightforward boxing movie. However, I admit that a lot of stuff I saw as boxing movie cliches, in fact, originated with this film. Raging Bull might have not existed or might have turned out to be a different sort of film, had Body and Soul not existed. I won't be in a hurry to rewatch it but I do concede that it is worth watching once as it is an important step in the evolution of the boxing movie over the years.
6/10
Dark Passage (1947, Delmer Daves)
Blecch. This one had a story and plot so stupid that my head reeled and hurt. Nothing, and I mean absolutely NO-THING, follows any semblance of logic in this one. It is the very definition of randomness and lazy hackiness. Don't let the allure of the names of Bogart and Bacall fool you. Bogart spends the entire film merely reacting to stuff that's being done to him and Bacall's flaring and twitching nostrils are the only animate thing about her. Can't believe there are so many people who can bring themselves to like this. If made today, this would be the laughingstock of the internet in the vein of those wretched Neil Breen movies.
2/10
Heart and Souls (1993, Ron Underwood)
I select this as the standout pick from the fortnight. One, Two, Three is the better film of the two but it also has altogether better pedigree and reputation. Had it not been Robert Downey jr.'s post-2007 comeback, this one would have been forgotten today.
It is a nice, heartwarming, feel-good type of movie which is carried mainly by actors, though even the script is no slog. It takes around half an hour for Downey jr. to appear but after that, it's mainly his show. In the supporting cast, Tom Sizemore is a total hoot. True, the script has a number of incosistencies and the syrup is laid thick in many parts but that's the nature of this genre. It's not for everyone but if you are in the mood for something that you can enjoy without taxing your brain much, give this one a go.
9/10
Speechless (1994, Ron Underwood)
I guess Ron Underwood needs a decent script to make a good film. With such a hackneyed, meandering, going-nowhere kind of plot, there is not much that the director or the actors can do. I did laugh at two scenes in the film, one involving wrong messages on a teleprompter and the other about a botched television broadcast. The idea behind both these comic scenes is the same.
4/10
Monsters, Inc. (2001, Pete Docter)
Feature-length animation is usually not my thing unless it has got more focus on a good story and less on quick movements and flashiness. Wall-E, for example. My favourite sub-genre within animation is claymation, because with that I am more ready to acknowledge and respect the hard work that goes in it.
With Toy Story, I could but the idea of sentient toys. With Monsters, Inc. I was utterly unable to understand the idea that children's screams power an alternate universe. Can soundless fear not be collected? So many screaming children all over the world would surely begin some investigation by the adults, I think.
Another problem I have with animated films is that they cannot sit straight and take it easy even for a second. Each and every second there has to be something flashy, constant movement all over the screen. It's like they think the viewers are babies satisfied by waving shiny rattles before them. There is no difference between this approach and Michael Bay style modern action movies. Yet, animation films get praise all over while those action films are termed low class. I just don't understand it.
3/10
Monsters University (2013, Dan Scanlon)
It did not turn out to be worse than the first. I was not expecting it to be better either, so that low bar was cleared. They completely wasted Steve Buscemi and his character. He was introduced as a much friendlier being but ended up as the same he was in the sequel, without any buildup to his change of character.
3/10

(Obligatory 'first post here, mobile formatting, etc' note)
So this was 2-3 years ago in India, and my father and I were driving home from a wedding. I don't know how much y'all know about weddings over there, but this was a 3 day event that involved the entirety of two middle-of-nowhere-nothing villages...it was a huge deal. And we were the only white people the majority of these folks had ever seen, so beyond the bride and groom themselves, we were The Best Guests.
This meant near constant attention, no relaxation or any time to ourselves, and 'sleep' came in the form of a concrete slab of a bed with a thin blanket over it, nestled snuggly in between apparently every drunk uncle the village could hold, all passionately arguing for hours about SOMETHING in Hindi. I think it was maybe the music, which also constantly blared from concert-sized speakers through the whole village. It was safe to say by the time we left the wedding we were already extremely sleep deprived and out of it. This isn't even the fun part though.
Through an odd chain of events that isn't totally related to this story, while driving home on the single-lane road that had traffic in both directions, dodging donkey carts, groups of scooters, and other drivers at about 120kph (72mph for us Freedom Unit-ers out there), we get in a head-on collision.
I remember realizing what was going to happen a few seconds before it did. Closing my eyes, loosening my body, making sure my tongue would be ok and then-BAM. The world turned upside down. And then again. And again. And one more time.
Our car flipped four times, landing upside down in an overgrown field near the spot of the accident. The other car was mostly gone, and what was left of it was still on the road.
Glass was everywhere, my dad was unconscious, my lehenga was ripped to shreds, and there were suddenly voices all around me. I remember being extremely confused and dazed. And I hurt. Why did I hurt?
Dozens of people had apparently stopped to flip the car back over to help The American Tourists out. A few people pulled me out through the left-hand broken window and immediately went back in to help my father on the driver's side. I, extremely confused, exhausted, and scared, most likely concussed (I later found out definitely concussed), wandered over to the road and the other demolished car. I could hear a siren in the distance. An ambulance? Cops? I didn't pay attention. Where were my shoes?
Suddenly a man had his arms around my shoulders and was ushering me to an unknown white car a small distance from the wreck. "I will take you to the hospital" he said. I asked where my father was and a few other questions. He mostly ignored me.
"He is fine, come on"
He pushed me forward, and in a daze I followed, asking about my things, my shoes, my dad. All I had was my phone, which was still in a death grip in my hand. He ignored me.
"Do not worry. Hurry, get in the car"
I did as I was told, though I remember asking a few more times about my shoes. I was barefoot and limping. I remember being focused on my right foot, how it wouldn't work, basically ignoring the guy guiding me away from the accident and the rest of the people. Why did it hurt so much? And where was my bag? The man urged me forward some more, making promising that my things were fine, he had them already, just get in the car. I was barely paying attention, slowly following. Where was my dad?
At that point I guess the man decided I wasn't moving fast enough. He wrenched my phone from my hand, maneuvered me into the back seat, and slammed the door behind me. He was walking around to the driver's side when an ambulance pulled up. I struggled with the door, saying I'll get into the ambulance instead, that my dad must be there. And where were my things?
"NO." He slammed the door again, locking it this time. "BE QUIET." At this point I started crying and was still confusedly trying to open the locked door, blubbering that I needed my things. He insisted he was helping and to shut up. shut up. shut up.
He rushed around, opened the driver's side door and was about to get in when I heard an almost roar-like sound errupt to my left. Suddenly my father was there, bleeding, limping, ignoring the chaos all around us, and angrier than I've ever seen him.
"GET MY FUCKING DAUGHTER OUT OF YOUR FUCKING CAR."
He grabbed the man (who was halfway in the vehicle at that point) and threw him to the ground, unlocked the backseat door and rushed around to pull me out.
"Dad where are my shoes...does he still have my phone?" I obliviously asked to thin air, as my father was already back a few feet away shouting, hands around the man's throat, demanding my phone. With a terrified look the man pulled it out of his pocket and threw it several feet away, causing my dad to drop him on the pavement in oneswift motion and bound after the device.
At that point the man hurriedly climbed into his car and sped away while I made my way to the back of the waiting ambulance, still not really processing what just happened. My dad materialized on the bench next to me a few seconds later, my cracked phone in hand, and enveloped me in a huge hug while saying how scared he was, the paramedics moving all around us, securing everything and preparing for the drive to the hospital.
Everything after that is a story for another time, but to the random Indian man who most likely tried to abduct me from the accident, let's not meet again.