|
Professor Clumsy posted:So what is the difference between art and entertainment? Art is boring and pretentious. Entertainment is entertaining.
|
#
?
May 4, 2012 20:24
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 6, 2024 06:43 |
|
|
Angela Christine posted:Art is boring and pretentious. Entertainment is entertaining. Entertainment is art, therefore...
|
|
#
?
May 4, 2012 20:32
|
|
|
Humbug Scoolbus posted:Messages are for IMs and phone calls. Movies are for entertainment. Perhaps you don't speak a lick of Italian, but love to listen to Italian opera because you find the way it sounds enthralling. Or maybe you like the look of an arrhythmic fiber optic pulse, but don't notice the Morse Code message. You are always free to ignore the message and engage art on your own terms, but that doesn't mean that there is no message contained therein.
|
|
#
?
May 4, 2012 21:17
|
|
|
Gyges posted:Perhaps you don't speak a lick of Italian, but love to listen to Italian opera because you find the way it sounds enthralling. Or maybe you like the look of an arrhythmic fiber optic pulse, but don't notice the Morse Code message. You are always free to ignore the message and engage art on your own terms, but that doesn't mean that there is no message contained therein. Substitute Russian for Italian and that's it exactly.
|
|
#
?
May 4, 2012 21:34
|
|
|
Juggling is art. So are fart jokes.
|
|
#
?
May 4, 2012 22:59
|
|
|
Professor Clumsy posted:Juggling is art. So are fart jokes. And fart juggling is an indescribable gray zone. We know. Please stop with the cliches.
|
|
#
?
May 4, 2012 23:05
|
|
|
Professor Clumsy posted:So what is the difference between art and entertainment? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcReu_d9h4o When most movie goers think of 'art' in films, they think of things like that. They think of Oscar winning movies for best actor and best script, or thinks that might bore them to tears. Art, as stereotyped, is typically something unique and difficult to grasp. They think of, like your example, Nosferatu, a vampire movie more focused . But Nosferatu is from a different day and age, and it is difficult to fathom that similar techniques used in a film from the 1920's can be transcribed to an era of CG special effects, short attention spans, and the want for instant gratification, particularly in a genre generally aimed towards that sort of audience, and especially when the source material is taken into consideration. I will not and, frankly, can not deny that a shot may mean something to someone. To me, that shot of Nosferatu more of shows to me that he is imprisoned by who and what he is. Particularly when it is taken out of context (he dies moments later, which gives leverage to your interpretation.) Farts are art. Le Petomane proves this. He did something unique, he did something remarkable, and he did something that is beyond comprehension.  Art, ultimately, is also subjective. If it were objective, it would not be art. So while I or anyone else may disagree with your view of the Avengers, it is how it is to you. Though frankly, given the context it's a superhero movie, the shot in question is pretty well a trope at this point, and has occurred since the 70's at least. Someone like Spiderman gets the poo poo knocked out of him, he hears people in trouble, looks straight at the fourth wall, and heroically performs beyond his previous limits to reach the people in trouble and save them, just in the nick of time. Does that mean it isn't about 9/11? No. But it shades the meaning to those who aren't looking for some deeper meaning, whatever they may ultimately take from it.
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2012 00:19
|
|
|
What is not art?
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2012 03:45
|
|
|
Angela Christine posted:What is not art? Sport and food.
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2012 09:13
|
|
|
Angela Christine posted:What is not art? What isn't not art? http://www.somethingawful.com/d/current-movie-reviews/bully.php I actually enjoyed this review, and it's made me want to go see the film. I didn't even know it was coming out, and it actually seems like it'd be an interesting documentary.
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2012 15:57
|
|
|
Feels like the kind of movie you definitely should see but puts off because you know you're going to feel like poo poo watching it/after.
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2012 16:22
|
|
|
Professor Clumsy posted:You can learn everything you need to know for a rudimentary understanding of film language from this one single shot from Nosferatu... So, the rule of thirds then? Set for life.
|
|
#
?
May 8, 2012 03:42
|
|
|
Hey Prof I have a question about your Battleship review:ProfessorClumsy posted:What Battleship the film does is apply this philosophical principle to everything in life. Approaching a girl in a pub is a game of Battleship, allowing yourself to be tasered is a game of Battleship, even other games like football (soccer) and baseball are essentially Battleship at their core. Hell, toward the end of the first act this film even dares to suggest that 9/11 and the recent London riots were games of Battleship. Every time this happens, however, we are reminded that Battleship is a two-player game and that the other side is experiencing the exact same thing as we are: blindly firing at potential targets in the hopes of achieving a hit or miss and learning from that for the next move. I think this is an interesting idea but it remains a little vague and I don't really understand how these events are presented like the game. Is it the entire context of the film? Are there references to the game smattered in the dialogue? I'm not sure if I'm going to hit it up in theaters but I definitely want to know how deep this rabbit hole goes.
|
|
#
?
May 9, 2012 18:02
|
|
|
Kull the Conqueror posted:Hey Prof I have a question about your Battleship review: Hooray, a film I'd rather talk about! The dialogue doesn't directly reference the game, but it is made clear every step of the way during the prologue that this is going to be the central thesis of the film. In one scene, Taylor Kitsch breaks into a convenience store via the air conditioning ducts and falls blindly through the ceiling tiles, landing on a shelf full of condiments. The big joke comes when his brother Alexander Skarsgård says "It's time for a game change" and the title BATTLESHIP appears, implying that it's just the same game. They clearly knew the idea was silly, but it's just so sincere and well explored.
|
|
#
?
May 10, 2012 11:06
|
|
|
For the Dark Shadows review, I just wanted to say that Seth Grahame-Smith didn't write Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. He did, however, write Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (both the book and the screenplay). Also, Dark Shadows sounds absolutely dreadful. I wasn't expecting much from Depp based on the previews, but I was hoping the great supporting cast might at least shine. I suppose I should have known better from a Burton-Depp collaboration.
|
|
#
?
May 13, 2012 21:21
|
|
|
Clicked on the link at the end of the Damsels In Distress review, very disappointed that Hey Julie was not the song choice.
|
|
#
?
May 13, 2012 22:02
|
|
|
Chairman Capone posted:For the Dark Shadows review, I just wanted to say that Seth Grahame-Smith didn't write Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. He did, however, write Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (both the book and the screenplay). Well, that's embarrassing. We'll edit that out. Requested_Username posted:Clicked on the link at the end of the Damsels In Distress review, very disappointed that Hey Julie was not the song choice. There were originally two, the other one was "Someone to Love." "Hey Julie" or "Leave The Biker" were also contenders.
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2012 03:06
|
|
|
Why is there a Minority Report for my review of The Raid, which none of us wrote, and which confuses me with Sean?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2012 20:04
|
|
|
Vargo posted:Why is there a Minority Report for my review of The Raid, which none of us wrote, and which confuses me with Sean? Following the link to the review in which the quoted phrases appear, which was written by Sean, is the key.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2012 22:13
|
|
|
Vargo posted:Why is there a Minority Report for my review of The Raid, which none of us wrote, and which confuses me with Sean? Perhaps Current Releases is haunted?
|
|
#
?
May 20, 2012 11:32
|
|
|
Is 9/50 the lowest-rated Movie of the Week?
|
|
#
?
May 20, 2012 11:48
|
|
|
quote:...no PG-13 Hollywood film would seriously touch abortive solutions with Cameron Diaz's dick if Matthew Morrison were pushing. The miscarriage for plot convenience reminds me of CAD. Pretty sad that Hollywood writers are just as bad as a writer for a terrible webcomic.
|
|
#
?
May 20, 2012 19:55
|
|
|
Y-Hat posted:Don't kid yourself, Sean- no Hollywood movie at all, in this day and age at least, would touch abortion as a solution. The R-rated Knocked Up didn't do this, although admittedly that would have defeated the entire purpose of the movie. On the other hand, when someone photoshops Anna Kendrick into loss.jpg, I'll probably laugh.
|
|
#
?
May 21, 2012 02:20
|
|
|
" It's like one of those fake movie posters that Adam Sandler puts in the background of his films to show that he recognizes what a hack he is, then he goes ahead and makes them anyway." Is this a real thing? Like Disney or Pixar putting hints in their movies about what the next, or previous, movie was/is going to be? I didn't pay close attention when someone explained it, maybe Disney goes backwards and Pixar goes forwards.
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2012 09:27
|
|
|
Krinkle posted:" It's like one of those fake movie posters that Adam Sandler puts in the background of his films to show that he recognizes what a hack he is, then he goes ahead and makes them anyway." That's definitely a thing that Pixar does, but he's mostly referring to the scene in Funny People where we see posters for all the crappy family comedies Sandler's character had made over the years. Like "Redo", where Sandler becomes a baby with a man's head, or "Merman", where Sandler becomes a merman. They're not real and they never should be; that's the joke. It's just that Sandler seems to have forgotten that he's the punchline. Or he doesn't care.
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2012 13:18
|
|
|
Jay Dub posted:That's definitely a thing that Pixar does, but he's mostly referring to the scene in Funny People where we see posters for all the crappy family comedies Sandler's character had made over the years. Like "Redo", where Sandler becomes a baby with a man's head, or "Merman", where Sandler becomes a merman. That is most definitely what I'm referring to. I guess I should have said "Funny People," but my brain was telling me it's happened more than once. This was after my brain told me,"One more Gin & Tonic and you can write the review," so take that for what it's worth.
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2012 14:43
|
|
|
Vargo posted:That is most definitely what I'm referring to. I guess I should have said "Funny People," but my brain was telling me it's happened more than once. This was after my brain told me,"One more Gin & Tonic and you can write the review," so take that for what it's worth. I'm sure there's probably another (worse) joke like that in Jack & Jill, but who among us would ever know that?
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2012 14:53
|
|
|
Jay Dub posted:That's definitely a thing that Pixar does, but he's mostly referring to the scene in Funny People where we see posters for all the crappy family comedies Sandler's character had made over the years. Like "Redo", where Sandler becomes a baby with a man's head, or "Merman", where Sandler becomes a merman. He doesn't care, because of the money. He's just a dude who likes to employ his friends and make money doing it. He couldn't give a gently caress about the final product.
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2012 16:25
|
|
|
Jay Dub posted:I'm sure there's probably another (worse) joke like that in Jack & Jill, but who among us would ever know that? Jack and Jill pretty much out and out calls movie snobs assholes, so it at least had that going for it.
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2012 16:59
|
|
|
Sheldrake posted:Jack and Jill pretty much out and out calls movie snobs assholes, so it at least had that going for it. Pfft. What else is new?
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2012 18:08
|
|
|
Just saw Dark Shadows with my mother, who watched the soap opera it was based on as a teenager, rushing home from high school in the 60s to watch it in black and white. Did you know Dark Shadows was based on a literal soap opera? Knowing that, I was able to enjoy the movie for what it was, though it did drag on a lot, and it made sense in context, but if I didn't know that I think I would have been absolutely pissed off about the false bill of goods that commercial had sold me. The movie is a soap opera and there are like three jokes and they were all in the trailer. A few jokes were in the trailer that weren't even in the movie.
|
|
#
?
May 22, 2012 22:15
|
|
|
"The problem is, there are much better ways to point out that what western culture believes about its supposed enemies is completely ridiculous" While I am sure this is true, I think it misses the point of Dictator a bit, its less like Borat/Bruno where the gags come from reactions and more about making fun of the source material (middle eastern/African dictators, not really terrorists) more directly (although there is a bit of both). And in this case, I think it works pretty well. Many dictators are pretty comical characters, particularly Gaddafi, who provides an awful lot of the gags like the all female bodyguards. I mean: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRbV8HO4AnQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weY5Lht2UAI I think that this is going to be a problem that The Dictator suffers from in america. People will see it through the lens of terrorism etc as that is the defining feature of the US's rhetoric towards that part of the world, as opposed to a film more about the absurdity of the rulers themselves. distortion park fucked around with this message at 09:49 on May 27, 2012 |
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 09:41
|
|
|
pointsofdata posted:"The problem is, there are much better ways to point out that what western culture believes about its supposed enemies is completely ridiculous" I don't really see anything funny in either of those two videos. Except maybe that Gaddafi claimed his dissenters were on hallucinogenics. That's kinda funny, but really more terrifying.
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 18:22
|
|
|
Vargo posted:I don't really see anything funny in either of those two videos. Except maybe that Gaddafi claimed his dissenters were on hallucinogenics. That's kinda funny, but really more terrifying. I can understand why some (most?) people might not find it amusing, and its not really in a laugh out loud sort of way which is something Baron Cohen attempts to add. Perhaps Kim Jong Il is a better example with his claims to have hit all hole in ones on his first round of golf, or Idi Amin adding "Conquerer of the British Empire" to his title. The unifying theme of modern dictators appears to be their total divorce from reality. Of course, a comedy still has to be funny, and I personally think that The Dictator is. Out of curiosity, did you find Ali G funny? I preferred Ali G and The Dictator to Borat, and didn't think much at all of Bruno.
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2012 22:46
|
|
|
pointsofdata posted:I can understand why some (most?) people might not find it amusing, and its not really in a laugh out loud sort of way which is something Baron Cohen attempts to add. Perhaps Kim Jong Il is a better example with his claims to have hit all hole in ones on his first round of golf, or Idi Amin adding "Conquerer of the British Empire" to his title. The unifying theme of modern dictators appears to be their total divorce from reality. Of course, a comedy still has to be funny, and I personally think that The Dictator is. Out of curiosity, did you find Ali G funny? I preferred Ali G and The Dictator to Borat, and didn't think much at all of Bruno. I never actually saw The Ali G movie, though I did enjoy Borat/Bruno. I do agree that the idea is that there are incredibly ridiculous comedic rulers out in the world today, like tiger-killing Putin, who is the closest we'll ever get to an actual James Bond villain. However, I think that Baron Cohen takes that and he hides it behind this "haha perceptions of terrorists" idea that I just didn't find funny. Like the helitour/Porshe 911 scene I mentioned, it all seemed obvious anf just fell flat to me.
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2012 02:07
|
|
|
Professor Clumsy's MIB3 review posted:This film's failure is not all on the shoulders of an overly grim tone, though; there's also the question of the absolutely bizarre subtext. You see, in this film the Men in Black themselves are no longer working for the good of the universe and its denizens, they are xenophobic aggressors shaking down immigrants for leads. They are directly compared to a pair of racist cops who pull Will Smith over because he is black, but even then they expect us to agree with them. In one scene, J and K bust into a Chinese restaurant and K slaps the owner with a spiky fish before tearing his clothes off to reveal a giant slug body. The other Chinese staff members are also revealed to be giant slugs (one of whom is violently beaten to death with a frying pan by Tommy Lee Jones). So I guess the Chinese are all giant slugs in disguise, right? Good to know. Later, a Muslim has his turban removed to reveal a giant, bulbous head. Oh, I see... this is valuable information. With that in mind, I can conclude that J and K are not merely racist- they've also updated their approach to conform to a post-9/11 world. Traditional methods of interrogation have given away to the ticking time bomb scenario where torture and other extreme methods are necessary if lives are to be saved. The world of the first Men In Black, where cooperation among the alien population is paramount, is a bygone era.
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2012 04:44
|
|
|
But it's set in the past before 9/11, that doesn't really apply to any cast member except 1.
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2012 05:02
|
|
|
Yeah that might have been kind of a reach on my part. Still, the movie was made in 2012 and the filmmakers probably imported that perspective to the characters. Either that, or they wanted to show K as being less compromising when he was younger. Regardless, the lack of subtlety in their interrogation techniques stands in stark contrast to the original MiB, which was more nuanced. It's also one reason among many why the movie was better than the movie that Clumsy saw.
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2012 05:44
|
|
|
Was it that nuanced? I seem to recall Tommy Lee Jones shooting that one dude in the face as the opening move of his questioning. Sure the dude's head grows back right away, but justifying that way seems like a slippery slope...
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2012 06:25
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 6, 2024 06:43 |
|
|
TheBigC posted:Was it that nuanced? I seem to recall Tommy Lee Jones shooting that one dude in the face as the opening move of his questioning. Sure the dude's head grows back right away, but justifying that way seems like a slippery slope... In the first film it is K who is the heartless one, roughing up the aliens and being cold to humans, J updates his approach ("make it a happy memory"). They also have that scene where the guy is trying to escape the planet with his pregnant wife, this film doesn't have anything like that. Just take a look at the MiB office in this one compared to the first: the twins are gone, the crazy technology is nowhere to be seen and the immigrating creatures just aren't there, they sucked all the fun out of agency and made J a harder character to warm to, a less likeable actor would have really suffered for it. Professor Clumsy fucked around with this message at 23:09 on May 29, 2012 |
|
#
?
May 29, 2012 10:36
|
|