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Aw come on, 1408 is perfectly fine. Not a masterpiece by any means, but a nice, tight piece of moviemaking. Nothing to write home about, but Cusack is great.
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Apr 5, 2011 16:42
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It's not a bad movie, it's a serviceable movie.
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Apr 5, 2011 20:25
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I enjoyed it too, mostly because it didn't fall into some lame explanation like "a witch died in the room." It did have a few cliches later on, but Room 1408 still felt more malevolent than most ghost stories. Also, Cusack beating up a mini-fridge.
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Apr 5, 2011 21:31
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It was a much better movie than I was expecting. Not great, but not bad. I remember the feeling after the escape fakeout reveal was really gut-wrenching.
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Apr 5, 2011 23:23
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regulargonzalez posted:Which is too bad because I honestly think the short story is some of Stephen King's best writing. After he gets in the room the narrator starts off thinking normal type thoughts and there's such a slow, subtle transition that you can't even point to one specific place where he goes off the rails, but all of a sudden it hits you -- he's talking about some crazy poo poo now (due to the hallucinatory power of the room). Just perfectly executed by King. No joke, that story has the same sort of "Oh poo poo I woke up and somehow I'm in Hell" feeling that The Shining had; it's one of the few things I've read that has really stuck with me. The idea of a consciously evil building is just scary as poo poo. Come on in, stay for awhile...
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Apr 6, 2011 02:31
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Gravy Jones posted:You should do this. It's such a good film. I just want to add my general dislike of Pacino as well; mostly because whenever I try to bring up the fact that he's not good people look at me like I'm crazy. Yes, he's AMAZING in Godfather 1 and 2 and Dog Day Afternoon but that's it! While that may be enough to make a career it isn't enough to make you a legend. In fact everything he's done since then should have made him a joke in Hollywood but somehow he escaped that. The handwriting was already on the wall when he made Serpico for what he would turn into. Scarface is massively overrated and his acting awful. But the thing that should have KILLED any good will he had developed is his shameful performance in Godfather III. That movie is terrible despite Pacino but then for him to take the character that made him famous and forget what made Michael so drat badass/awesome/evil is criminal. I'm undecided what I think of Scent of a Woman. On some levels I really want to try and like it, but I'm so jaded on Pacino that it's hard for me to get by him. On the other hand I don't think his "rage" thing hurts that movie as much as it hurts other movies. It's sad to me when you see these "legendary" actors but when you stop and think about it their primes were short and a loooonnngg time ago.
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Apr 6, 2011 05:26
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SpitztheGreat posted:I just want to add my general dislike of Pacino as well; mostly because whenever I try to bring up the fact that he's not good people look at me like I'm crazy. Yes, he's AMAZING in Godfather 1 and 2 and Dog Day Afternoon but that's it!  Serpico Scarface Glengarry Glen Ross (might actually be his best role, his performance in the opening bar scene is astonishing) Insomnia Donnie Brasco The Insider
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Apr 6, 2011 05:31
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regulargonzalez posted:
Chinese Coffee Angels in America The Panic in Needle Park Cruising
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Apr 6, 2011 05:33
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Vulpes posted:It was a much better movie than I was expecting. Not great, but not bad. I'm the opposite, I thought that and tiny Samuel L. Jackson in the fridge going "I WARNED YOU ABOUT
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Apr 6, 2011 05:36
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penismightier posted:Chinese Coffee Uh oh, he joins the list of actors who weren't great in every role. Population: every actor ever.
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Apr 6, 2011 05:45
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I have no idea why he disowned Cruising because he played that part (no pun intended) to the hilt.
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Apr 6, 2011 05:46
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regulargonzalez posted:Uh oh, he joins the list of actors who weren't great in every role. Population: every actor ever. No you jackass, those are all movies he's great in.
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Apr 6, 2011 05:46
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Also anyone who remembers Raul Julia from Street Fighter, The Addams Family and Overdrawn at the Memory Bank should watch Panic in Needle Park because he owns in that. Pacino is also great in his production of Merchant of Venice.
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Apr 6, 2011 05:48
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penismightier posted:No you jackass, those are all movies he's great in. Only one of those I've seen was Cruising and ... eh. So I extrapolated from that to the rest. My mistake! 
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Apr 6, 2011 06:00
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HUNDU THE BEAST GOD posted:Also anyone who remembers Raul Julia from Street Fighter, The Addams Family and Overdrawn at the Memory Bank should watch Panic in Needle Park because he owns in that. You take The Addams Family off that list 
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Apr 6, 2011 06:03
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penismightier posted:Chinese Coffee I also count Heat (some have given good reasons for disliking his performance, but it was pitch-perfect for the character he was playing) and The Devil's Advocate (he's a drat good Prince of Darkness).
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Apr 6, 2011 06:06
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You assholes are forgetting Devil's Advocate -Pacino -Charlize Theron (+ titty) But really. I like this movie.
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Apr 6, 2011 06:17
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Robokomodo posted:You assholes are forgetting Devil's Advocate Oh?
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Apr 6, 2011 06:27
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regulargonzalez posted:Only one of those I've seen was Cruising and ... eh. So I extrapolated from that to the rest. My mistake!  Pacino has been playing a caricature himself since Scent of a Woman (although I liked him as Jack Kevorkian, even if the movie was sort of dull), but he has made some fantastic loving movies. I can't even come up with a top billed actor with such a non-lovely career span. I think Simone was his first *bad* film, and that was in 2002 (although I haven't seen Author! Author!, Revolution and Bobby Deerfield.
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Apr 6, 2011 10:09
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HUNDU THE BEAST GOD posted:Also anyone who remembers Raul Julia from Street Fighter, The Addams Family and Overdrawn at the Memory Bank should watch Panic in Needle Park because he owns in that. Are you really saying The Addams Family is bad? Because The Addams Family and Values are both amazing, wonderful movies.
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Apr 6, 2011 10:22
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scary ghost dog posted:Are you really saying The Addams Family is bad? Because The Addams Family and Values are both amazing, wonderful movies. Yes. Addams Family Values is, in my opinion, a truly excellent film. Really high quality in absolutely every regard (the first film is very good, but the sequel, unusually, tops it). And Raul Julia is superb! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IR7a8rPlAao VVV Yeah, but funny - clearly just in for a day to have fun and shoot one scene. therattle fucked around with this message at 11:16 on Apr 6, 2011 |
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Apr 6, 2011 10:53
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therattle posted:Yes. Addams Family Values is, in my opinion, a truly excellent film. Really high quality in absolutely every regard (the first film is very good, but the sequel, unusually, tops it). And Raul Julia is superb! Nathan Lane is extremely strange casting for that cop.
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Apr 6, 2011 11:04
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The line about the Buick slays me every time.
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Apr 6, 2011 12:03
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I love both Addams Family movies. I'm just saying those are the 4 movies people know Raul Julia from and he's been great in other stuff, too.
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Apr 6, 2011 13:22
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scary ghost dog posted:Nathan Lane is extremely strange casting for that cop. That's the thing- the movie is full of great comedy actors just ducking in for a little bit. Tony Shalhoub is in it for like 5 seconds as a sailor partying with Debbie.
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Apr 6, 2011 15:23
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Robokomodo posted:You assholes are forgetting Devil's Advocate It's on tv right now and it's loving awful. Pacino as self-parody self-parody.
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Apr 6, 2011 15:29
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90% of the movies Pacino has made since he got his Oscar is so he can go and do stage work and help student filmmakers get little tiny shorts and features made and generally hang around the Actor's Studio and teach the next generation of actors how to, y'know, act. The man still lives, eats, and breathes his craft. I'm almost positive he wants to die in the middle of a performance, that's how dedicated he seems to be. Of course, post-Oscar Pacino still managed to do Heat, Donnie Brasco, The Insider, Insomnia, The Merchant of Venice, Angels In America and You Don't Know Jack. Calling Pacino overrated or a bad actor because you haven't seen nearly enough of his work over a forty year career is pretty loving stupid. It's like basing your entire view of Dustin Hoffman off of Mister Magorium's Wonder Emporium.
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Apr 6, 2011 16:24
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The Cameo posted:90% of the movies Pacino has made since he got his Oscar is so he can go and do stage work and help student filmmakers get little tiny shorts and features made and generally hang around the Actor's Studio and teach the next generation of actors how to, y'know, act. The man still lives, eats, and breathes his craft. I'm almost positive he wants to die in the middle of a performance, that's how dedicated he seems to be. Yeah I think a lot of people just don't get that a lot of Serious Actors don't care about making lovely films if it subsidises their other interests. Like Kevin Spacey with his theatre stuff.
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Apr 6, 2011 16:45
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HUNDU THE BEAST GOD posted:I love both Addams Family movies. I'm just saying those are the 4 movies people know Raul Julia from and he's been great in other stuff, too. I think The Addams Family movies are vastly underrated. There's so much love and fun and care and ACTING!!! put into it that I could watch it multiple times in a day every day for a month and not get bored of it. Raul Julia is part of the reason for that. He's so brilliant in the role, so wonderful to watch. If any other actor were Gomez Addams then the movies could very well have been worthless.
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Apr 6, 2011 16:58
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scary ghost dog posted:I think The Addams Family movies are vastly underrated. There's so much love and fun and care and ACTING!!! put into it that I could watch it multiple times in a day every day for a month and not get bored of it. Raul Julia is part of the reason for that. He's so brilliant in the role, so wonderful to watch. If any other actor were Gomez Addams then the movies could very well have been worthless. I like you. This is becoming more general chat than questions, but yes, I agree: I think they are very underrated (especially Values). they are really excellent films on every level. So, that does lead to a question: I think that comedies are often underrated as high-quality pieces of filmmaking. (For instance, I think Zoolander is an absolutely brilliant film - costume and production design, writing, acting, filming - superb). However, they don't seem to get the respect that more serious films do. it's as if viewers look at the form of the film and judge it accordingly: a comedy, being frivolous, cannot be seriously well-executed. Any other thoughts? Why are comedies under-rated as filmic achievements?
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Apr 6, 2011 17:03
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therattle posted:I like you. I, too, have wondered about this. As someone who uses IMDB as the holy bible (not sure if this makes me A Bad Person), it is notable how rarely comedies are rated 8.0+ compared to other movies.
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Apr 6, 2011 17:10
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therattle posted:I like you. Comedy also tends to sacrifice pure quality and consistency for humor's sake at times. Part of the reason Black Dynamite is so good is that it's chock full of jokes that it's impossible to see them all in one viewing, and I've had to watch it with commentary multiple times to fully comprehend the amount of references to Blaxploitation cinema included in it. More mainstream comedies would be extremely daring to make such vague references and jokes that would go over the head of 80% of viewers, so they choose instead to make a more obvious joke that's either less funny or not funny at all. So basically what I think is that comedies pander more than any other genre, and you can't pander in art. Also, art isn't "supposed" to be funny. Some people would say that the only good comedies are the ones that make a social point or have a subversive moral. edit: Another comedy that I think is Truly Art is Observe & Report.
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Apr 6, 2011 17:10
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scary ghost dog posted:I think the quality ratio for comedies is significantly skewed towards "bad." Every time I go to see a comedy in theaters I assume it will be bad unless it has serious credentials. The last really great comedy I saw was Black Dynamite, which was such a stellar effort that it transcends comedy and is re-categorized as Art. http://www.imdb.com/chart/top How many films on that list are "art'. Films don't have to be considered as works of art to gain high ratings, critical acclaim, and respect. And while many comedies do pander (I agree with that point), we are talking about the ones that DON'T pander - that are really good - but don't get acknowledged as such. Edit: let's move this to Cine D general chat - I'll repost my comment there.
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Apr 6, 2011 17:34
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scary ghost dog posted:edit: Another comedy that I think is Truly Art is Observe & Report. I like you. And I really need to see both Addams Family movies again, I worry sometimes if I love them so much purely from nostalgia. I also love Joan Cusack.
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Apr 6, 2011 17:40
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I think the main reason people don't value comedy as much as drama and tragedy is just historical. It has been that way since arguably Aristotle. I don't agree with it, but I don't think it will ever change. However, I think there is one legit reason why there are less "classic" comedic films than dramatic films: comedy is often much more topical, and as such it often doesn't age as well as drama. That isn't to say that there aren't great timeless comedies - there are just less of them. Edit: that is also why I probably overrate great classic comedies as well. Trouble in Paradise is better than any Hitchcock film. It is also better than any Kubrick film. I said it. I just picked Hitch and Kubrick because I know they both have multiple films that would probably appear on a Sight and Sound-ish top 20 Voodoofly fucked around with this message at 17:58 on Apr 6, 2011 |
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Apr 6, 2011 17:55
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scary ghost dog posted:I think The Addams Family movies are vastly underrated. There's so much love and fun and care and ACTING!!! put into it that I could watch it multiple times in a day every day for a month and not get bored of it. Raul Julia is part of the reason for that. He's so brilliant in the role, so wonderful to watch. If any other actor were Gomez Addams then the movies could very well have been worthless. Underrated by who? I've never met anyone who didn't like the Addams Family movies and they were well-received by most critics at the time. Voodoofly posted:However, I think there is one legit reason why there are less "classic" comedic films than dramatic films: comedy is often much more topical, and as such it often doesn't age as well as drama. That isn't to say that there aren't great timeless comedies - there are just less of them. Not topical so much as cultural. What's funny and what's not is mostly tied up in the social norms of the time, which is why comedy tends to date itself quickly whether it's riffing on current events or not. Dr Monkeysee fucked around with this message at 20:23 on Apr 6, 2011 |
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Apr 6, 2011 20:20
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The Cameo posted:It's like basing your entire view of Dustin Hoffman off of Mister Magorium's Wonder Emporium. In which he was goddamn delightful
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Apr 6, 2011 23:16
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What is it with this subforum? I just rewatched Zoolander this morning and then see people are talking about it.  This kind of thing happens way too much around here. Was that Zohan movie a lame rip off of Zoolander using hairstyling for modeling (as I assumed from the dvd cover and name) or was it actually something completely different? Also, is Little Big Man Dustin Hoffman's greatest role, or what? It has been so long since I saw it, I really want to track down a copy and introduce my GF to "human beans" and why I say that.
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Apr 7, 2011 00:55
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Barometer posted:Was that Zohan movie a lame rip off of Zoolander using hairstyling for modeling (as I assumed from the dvd cover and name) or was it actually something completely different? Not really. Did you ever see an old SNL sketch called Sabra Price is Right? Tom Hanks was the host and it was during the Mike Meyers/Adam Sandler era. Zohan is like they took that sketch and added some stuff about secret agents and isreal/Palestine to it. Robert Smigel wrote it too. He works better with puppets and cartoons I guess.
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Apr 7, 2011 02:08
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therattle posted:I think that comedies are often underrated as high-quality pieces of filmmaking. ... I seem to recall from the UHF commentary (of all places) that the best judge of any comedy, for any film critic, would be to watch it backwards. Go to a theater and sit in the front row, and observe the people watching it, facing away from the screen. That way you judge the movie on how funny it is to everyone else. Sure, the movie may lack earmarks of classic cinema, but if it makes people laugh, that should be how we judge comedies.
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Apr 7, 2011 02:09
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