A few films recently watched.

[baph]

Tyler Perry's Cosmos is going to suck. I'm looking forward to Gurinder Chada's Powers of Ten, though

[Guest zaphod]

a separation - 8/10

midnight in paris - 4/10 extremely overrated

like crazy - 3/10 who gives a shit about these people

war horse - 7/10 not really that bad, just old fashioned

beats rhymes and life - 7/10

 

also watched 28 days later for the second time. it sucks. the action scenes are incomprehensible screaming and camera shaking. i guess they're supposed to induce panic in the viewer, but it just looks like shit. danny boyle is the worst. only redeeming factor is the opening couple of minutes. 4/10

[Guest Jimmy McMessageboard]

like crazy - 3/10 who gives a shit about these people

 

indeed. furniture maker is the new popular profession for film characters (magic mike!). but did it used to be?

[geosmina]

Dracula (Coppola): well that was one serious piece of shit... well, not that bad, but not that awesome 6/10

 

yeh. a nightmare before christmas was directed by henry selick, just had to say.

you do know that Tim Burton wrote and Produced it? so it can still be considered his moive. Though i always found it interesting that he didn't direct it. its the only movie that he wrote but didn't direct.

 

yeah and he's best known for that movie (which I love)

[Candiru]

Ted was actually much better than you'd expect, but a lot of people won't want to admit how much they laughed watching it, so the mixed reviews are definitely misleading. Like, no shit it wasn't When Harry Met Sally with a raunchy teddy bear. No fucking shit. I recommend it if you like Kingpin.

 

LOL/10. Seriously, laughing is good for you even if it's low-brow humor.

[keltoi]

Kubrick made Alex the focal point, the wonder of the movie, but i am sure he just wanted us to hate him

 

i take it you haven't read the book then? cos it would be extremely strange if kubrick didn't put alex at the centre of the film cos he is the focus, told in the first person, he is "your humble narrator" throughout the novel...

 

i always thought kubrick did a great job of portraying the characters, atmosphere and setting of the book (which imo is down to burgess' skill of painting a vivid scene with words)... apart from the omission of the so-called "extra chapter" which apparently kubrick didn't read until after making the film... but this last chapter (the author's intended ending) wasn't published in america until well after the film was made so the ending is not faithful to the book.

[keltoi]

aye, spoiler...

 

 

the american publishers didn't think american readers would appreciate seeing him reformed at the end so they forced burgess to leave out the last chapter... the pre '86 USA version(and the film) ends with the realisation that the ludovico technique has failed and alex is back to his evil old self... but the last chapter has a few extra twists... a more complex and satisfying end to the story imo.

 

[lumpenprol]

I thought he deliberately left off the last chapter...which I think the book would have been better without, too. But I haven't read since I was a teen. It just felt like a cop out...

[Guest Jimmy McMessageboard]

Ted was actually much better than you'd expect, but a lot of people won't want to admit how much they laughed watching it, so the mixed reviews are definitely misleading. Like, no shit it wasn't When Harry Met Sally with a raunchy teddy bear. No fucking shit. I recommend it if you like Kingpin.

 

LOL/10. Seriously, laughing is good for you even if it's low-brow humor.

 

and I laughed a good few times and have pretty low-brow humour level but things like norah jones saying she fucked a teddy bear just didnt work for me. which i found odd because usually i love stuff like that, but maybe ricky gervais raised the bar on people playing themselves and acting dumb. maybe 1/3 of the humour fell flat for me I'd estimate.

[eugene]

im supposed to be studying so i just watched random stuff on tv

half of terminator 3 - 3/10

last 30 minutes of space cowboys - 2/10

catch me if you can - 9/10

[Guest zaphod]

thin red line - 9/10 i think i've seen this three times now. still moves me. the voiceover is a little ridiculous, it's not really what war was like, but as a statement it's pretty beautiful. the initial scenes with witt in the village are perfectly shot. i think malick needs a subject with inherent drama to make a great film or he flounders too much in personal explorations of mundane subjects.

[Squee]

im supposed to be studying so i just watched random stuff on tv

half of terminator 3 - 3/10

 

Most entertaining movie ever.

[Guest Mirezzi]

thin red line - 9/10 i think i've seen this three times now. still moves me. the voiceover is a little ridiculous, it's not really what war was like, but as a statement it's pretty beautiful. the initial scenes with witt in the village are perfectly shot. i think malick needs a subject with inherent drama to make a great film or he flounders too much in personal explorations of mundane subjects.

 

Totally. Whereas every whispered line of shitty open mic poetry in Tree of Life made me cringe virtually every fucking time I heard it, I somehow thought it worked in Thin Red Line; or, at the very least, I didn't want to throw a brick into my screen. Perhaps, as you've alluded, it's because something was at stake in TRL? After all, that particular conflict, the Battle of Guadalcanal, was utterly fucking horrifying. Conversely, it's difficult for me to experience existential dread and therefore tolerate the poetry just because Daddy Was A Mean Capitalist.

[Guest zaphod]

his movies are essentially poetic musings on large subjects, but as you said, something needs to be at stake. i love thin red line for its panoramic view of men at war. it turns something visceral and removed from common experience into something universal. his films are very emotional, almost to a fault, and seem improv'd in the editing room. it just doesn't work when he's trying to tell a small story about a family. he's one of the few directors where more might be better, in terms of subject matter and scope.

[Guest Mirezzi]

Agreed. I have the Blu-ray of Pocahontas. I need to watch it as I've only ever seen it once, on a 30" screen, in standard def.

[Guest ruiagnelo]

thin red line - 9/10 i think i've seen this three times now. still moves me. the voiceover is a little ridiculous, it's not really what war was like, but as a statement it's pretty beautiful. the initial scenes with witt in the village are perfectly shot. i think malick needs a subject with inherent drama to make a great film or he flounders too much in personal explorations of mundane subjects.

 

Totally. Whereas every whispered line of shitty open mic poetry in Tree of Life made me cringe virtually every fucking time I heard it, I somehow thought it worked in Thin Red Line; or, at the very least, I didn't want to throw a brick into my screen. Perhaps, as you've alluded, it's because something was at stake in TRL? After all, that particular conflict, the Battle of Guadalcanal, was utterly fucking horrifying. Conversely, it's difficult for me to experience existential dread and therefore tolerate the poetry just because Daddy Was A Mean Capitalist.

 

TRL is the most wonderful and delicate film about war ever. I always keep in mind this scene of a shooting through the tall green plants, explosions happening everywhere, corpses falling down, and suddenly a blue butterfly pops flying gently in front of the camera, and for an instant, it really doesn't feel like war. I know Terrence Malick is a perfectionist so that might have been exhaustively planned and tried, but i prefer to think it was a happy coincidence. the blue against the green of the plants and the red of the fire, what a beautiful image! it is just a sweet surprising image in such a hard context.

i love the movie because it talks about the small, truly good things that humans feel and communicate during war.

 

I have seen Paths of Glory the other day, for the first time, and got a similar, but in a way very different, feeling. The pace control is really well achieved i guess, because i love how it manages to present the raw, cold side of war as purely a game, and right in the end you get an unexpected emotional turn. it's like the hope is back, you can believe it all once more. it's really about hope for me. i got really surprised with the last sequence and it might have gotten stuck permanently in my mind...

[kinski]

the invention of lying -

who would guess gervais would make a 90 minute pisstake directed at religion?

it wasn't bad. banal but funny. edward norton cameo was fun, and i don't know what surprised me more about louis ck - lack of facial hair or no word about jerking off.

[Guest Jimmy McMessageboard]

thin red line - 9/10 i think i've seen this three times now. still moves me. the voiceover is a little ridiculous, it's not really what war was like, but as a statement it's pretty beautiful. the initial scenes with witt in the village are perfectly shot. i think malick needs a subject with inherent drama to make a great film or he flounders too much in personal explorations of mundane subjects.

 

Totally. Whereas every whispered line of shitty open mic poetry in Tree of Life made me cringe virtually every fucking time I heard it, I somehow thought it worked in Thin Red Line; or, at the very least, I didn't want to throw a brick into my screen. Perhaps, as you've alluded, it's because something was at stake in TRL? After all, that particular conflict, the Battle of Guadalcanal, was utterly fucking horrifying. Conversely, it's difficult for me to experience existential dread and therefore tolerate the poetry just because Daddy Was A Mean Capitalist.

 

maybe you can see it once (thin red), maybe twice (new world) but then thats it (tree of life) i cannae take no more whispering over beautiful shots!!!!!!

 

or did i forget another film?

[Guest zaphod]

i don't even know what that post means.

[baph]

fun fact: if you rearrange the nonsense syllables Lisa Gerrard is singing in that scene where Russell Crowe runs his hand through a wheat field in Gladiator, you can sound out "ALL THINGS SHININ"

[YEK]

akira: mind blown confusion out of 10.

[Atop]

I love Akira.

 

 

 

YOU ALL DO RIGHT?!

 

 

Lars Vor Trier hates all cartoons.

 

But he is a dick.

 

Fuckin Antichrist right? What?!

 

Akira.

 

One hell of a cartoon.

 

Princess Mononoke is better?

 

I cannot say.

 

Music is your copilot.

[Silent Member]

yeh. a nightmare before christmas was directed by henry selick, just had to say.

you do know that Tim Burton wrote and Produced it? so it can still be considered his moive. Though i always found it interesting that he didn't direct it. its the only movie that he wrote but didn't direct.

 

yeah and he's best known for that movie (which I love)

 

U mad. Do you consider all the shitty action films Luc Besson wrote and produced Luc Besson movies as well then? It doesn't work like that.

[kinski]

don't know about besson, but i always considered 'play it again, sam' a woody allen flick and he did not directed it. and NBC got burton all over it. so yeah.

[cruising for burgers]

akira: mind blown confusion out of 10.

1st time?