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Steve2911 posted:There are precisely zero watch-able Bay films. The only unwatchable Bay film is Pearl Harbor.
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Jul 24, 2015 21:07
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Steve2911 posted:There are precisely zero watch-able Bay films. Your DVD player is broken.
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Jul 24, 2015 21:14
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I enjoyed the Island, its a fun flick.
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Jul 25, 2015 12:20
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Pain and Gain is fantastic.
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Jul 26, 2015 20:20
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Pain and Gain is in many ways a spiritual sequel to Meet the Feebles.
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Jul 26, 2015 21:23
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It owns because it pulls the exact same trick on the audience that the criminals pulled on everyone else. By making Shalhoub so very unlikeable, you kind of find yourself sympathising with a bunch of torturers and thieves, which is exactly how they got away with it for so long.
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Jul 27, 2015 00:35
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Hbomberguy posted:You get a great succession of shots: And here they are! Importantly, not only did Bilbo never see this, but no-one did. No-one involved in this encounter survived. We are seeing the battle from the 'impossible' perspectives of the dead. Imagine you're watching a propaganda film about the heroic cause of the Americans and their genocidal sharp-teethed monster enemies the Nazis, but it gets taken over by the memories of a fallen German soldier, and you simply see a human who was lied to and misled by ideology, and dies just like anyone else, himself no more evil than those killing for whatever nation they happened to be born into. The fight's climax begins here: Thorin has just tried to drown Azog by throwing him a weight. It's a straight up joke about repressing your inner darkness - as in horror movies where the bad guy is locked up in 'the basement' (which happens in like three other Jackson movies).  The shot is both a repeat of a shot from earlier, where Thorin hallucinates falling into an ocean of gold, and features Azog passing across the ice as if he were a reflection of Thorin. So Azog is coded as an extension of the 'corruption' present in the story, and as an alternative way of looking at Thorin himself. He stabs through the 'floor', emerging through the divide. Something about him is too inherent to Thorin to be easily buried. After Thorin purposefully lets himself get stabbed in order to then revenge-stab Azog:  Thorin doesn't look heroic even during his climactic fight. He's angry, but calculating. This is because he isn't a hero, and has traded his own life away tactically, simply to settle a score and ensure they both die.  The two characters both lean in closer to each other, as if the center of the frame were a mirror. However, complicating that imagery, you have Thorin 'emerging' from Azog, connected to him. So you have two characters who function as reflections of one another, yet are the product of something that encompasses them both.  I can't recall any other time in the LOTR/Hobbit films when a 'bad guy' goes out so quietly, or at least a part that focuses so heavily on the enemy's experiences as they die. Azog looks scared, and sad. The shot hammers home that the enemy experiences all the terrors of living as we do, because we are ultimately the same.  Even when Thorin stands up, to hammer it home you get this shot. They don't 'separate' into different figures the way stories with similar themes normally play out - Thorin hasn't actually changed - and you again have the image of Thorin staring down at this 'shadow', with the sun over his shoulder for good measure. Which other character's death does this most remind us of? Boromir:   It's a shot that emphasizes the closeness (thematic or otherwise) of the relationship between the two characters in each scene. Boromir is, I'm sure you're aware, the guy who got misled by the ring and almost messed a lot of poo poo up. So there's a link: Both Azog and Boromir are 'corrupted' by 'evil influences'. Your worst enemy is just another person, trapped by the influences that made them this way. The major visual difference is that Azog dies alone. No-one 'watches him go out', emphasizing the other characters' inability to empathise with the Orcs. No-one sits around feeling sad that misled, deformed Elf Azog was killed. The scene becomes a story not about one side's victory or sacrifice but about their mutual failure to comprehend their own similarity to one another. Because Thorin and Azog fail to ally with one another against the forces that made them this way, Lord of the Rings happens: The same conflict on a larger scale. Music wise, with Boromir, you get this humanising 'sad music' as he passes, but with Azog, all music fades away as he goes. This neutral silence is jarring. You'd expect some kind of music to underscore Thorin's victory or sacrifice, but nope. He has simply taken a life, and everything is still. The whole film you've had Gandalf talking about the importance of propaganda and heroic music playing over everything good and 'bad guy music' playing over the bad guys' parts. For this brief moment, the veil is lifted and you simply have the cold silence of watching someone die.
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Aug 2, 2015 22:30
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Thanks for reminding me how terrible the lighting was in this trilogy.
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Aug 2, 2015 23:01
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What's wrong with it?
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Aug 2, 2015 23:33
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Hbomberguy posted:What's wrong with it? Why do you persist in defending these terrible films?
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Aug 2, 2015 23:57
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I'm simply asking what is wrong with the lighting. Granted, the aesthetic is different from the originals. You're welcome not to like things just because they're different, but personally I try to appreciate things for what they are.
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Aug 3, 2015 00:01
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I want to hear somebody who knows more about film lighting than I do tell me what they think is wrong with it.
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Aug 3, 2015 00:09
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It's definitely much more fanciful and otherworldly than the Boromir scene—ethereal blown-out lights coming in from off-stage, fuzzy shadows under heads that look like they're cast by lights fixed ten feet up. But I dunno, maybe that's an aesthetic choice or something.
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Aug 3, 2015 00:22
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People need to stop confusing 'different' with 'bad'. Also watch films without constantly trying to award it marks out of ten. You're not writing for some trash "review" magazine.
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Aug 3, 2015 09:30
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The real problem with those shots is the colour palette. Keep them thumbnailed, blur your eyes, and try to make out what you're looking at. Now do it with the two LotR ones.
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Aug 3, 2015 13:24
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Hbomberguy etc: These films are misunderstood masterpieces. Everyone else: No, they sucked. Hb etc: You're just LOTR fanboys who can't handle the fact that these films are different. Everyone else: We don't hate them because they're different, we hate them because they sucked. Hb etc: You need to Read the films as a metatextual postmodern masterpiece, due to Death of the Author and other CompLit/Film Studies Whoozamajizits Everyone else: No, they just sucked. [Repeat for 300+ pages]
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Aug 3, 2015 15:26
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Szmitten posted:The real problem with those shots is the colour palette. Keep them thumbnailed, blur your eyes, and try to make out what you're looking at. Now do it with the two LotR ones. Cinema as it's meant to be seen. It's perfectly acceptable to not like an aesthetic choice. But that doesn't make it bad. The hazy, dream-like quality of the sequence is entirely appropriate for the narrative.
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Aug 3, 2015 15:50
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sassassin posted:It's perfectly acceptable to not like an aesthetic choice. But that doesn't make it bad. The hazy, dream-like quality of the sequence is entirely appropriate for the narrative. I enjoy the lighting in that scene, and I remember specifically noticing it in the theatre. It reminds me of Legend, which is also shot specifically to look like a living fairy tale.
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Aug 3, 2015 16:14
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Basebf555 posted:I enjoy the lighting in that scene, and I remember specifically noticing it in the theatre. It reminds me of Legend, which is also shot specifically to look like a living fairy tale. I love this because in the 80s it became popular enough and such a thing because of Scott that he still used it a lot for the decidedly un-fairy tale-like Black Rain in 1989, though Michael Douglas and the Japanese liason guy clearly live happily ever after at the end.
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Aug 3, 2015 17:31
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Chicken Butt posted:Everyone else: No, they just sucked. The assertion that a given film 'just sucked', and the basic film reading which shows otherwise is some kind of overcomplicated wizardry, is not particularly convincing.
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Aug 3, 2015 20:16
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It's boring when people just call things bad.
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Aug 3, 2015 20:30
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Bongo Bill posted:It's boring when people just call things bad. Yea, I can kinda see how in a thread about an upcoming film like Star Wars, one might get annoyed at people who want to discuss the earlier, unpopular films. But in this situation there's no new films coming out, so if we're just going to throw up our hands and say "this trilogy is poo poo, discussion over", then what is there left to talk about? If you think there's nothing worth discussing in these films then why even post in this thread?
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Aug 3, 2015 20:53
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Basebf555 posted:Yea, I can kinda see how in a thread about an upcoming film like Star Wars, one might get annoyed at people who want to discuss the earlier, unpopular films. But in this situation there's no new films coming out, so if we're just going to throw up our hands and say "this trilogy is poo poo, discussion over", then what is there left to talk about? If you think there's nothing worth discussing in these films then why even post in this thread? The problem is, is that The Hobbit films really were poo poo and everyone really does wish the discussion was over.
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Aug 3, 2015 21:45
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Myrddin_Emrys posted:The problem is, is that The Hobbit films really were poo poo and everyone really does wish the discussion was over. I don't like 'em but I'll talk with most whoever about movies because I like hearing opinions and perspectives. It may lead to learning new things about a given movie or at least about the person giving their opinion! It's a magical process. sassassin posted:They fleshed out one dwarf and everyone complains about it. See, I don't really feel like they fleshed out Romance Dwarf that much though. He went from "has a brother; no, not that one" to "has a brother and likes a Lady Elf." Lady Elf, I feel, gets much stronger characterization than Romance Dwarf because she gets to interact with her father and Legolas whereas he mostly gets lost in the shuffle of the crowd of Other Dwarves. That, by itself, isn't a problem though. The problem is that the films themselves at least seem to want you to care about the dwarves but they also don't put much effort into giving a reason past their existence. Thorin gets a reason, Old Dwarf eventually gets a reason, Romance Dwarf does as well. The rest are like cannon fodder in a war movie where they don't merit many lines. But even then there's a tension in cannon fodder when you wonder where they're going to get written out. The dwarves just keep rolling along carefree, except Romance Dwarf, who is cut down as part of the bargain for having more lines. Again, though, that's not necessarily a problem. Not every character needs to be important or well-realized. I simply feel that all of these characters and more bouncing around detract from the aspects of the film that worked better. Thorin is solid, Bilbo's great, and the third movie made me wish they'd played up Old Dwarf more because I thought by that point his character was actually becoming something. But stretching to three movies affected many of the characters in a negative way. I don't care about how winding the plot gets on its own. There's a lot of effort put into building a web of information concerning the state of the movie's world but I don't think the ultimate payoff justifies spreading the story and most of the characters so thin. So for me it's not so much that I'm complaining about the characterization of Romance Dwarf. It's that looking at his arc reminds me of the problems I have with the trilogy overall given the amount of space there was to work with. I think Jackson achieved his goal of making very adventurous and action-packed movies. But within its own space it seems to ignore the parts that work in favor of characters and events that more weakly push the trilogy's goals. That makes it difficult for me to indulge the over-the-top nature of the action.
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Aug 3, 2015 22:45
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Myrddin_Emrys posted:The problem is, is that The Hobbit films really were poo poo and everyone really does wish the discussion was over. Fortunately, there's an easy way to stop seeing the discussion.
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Aug 3, 2015 23:43
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Myrddin_Emrys posted:The problem is, is that The Hobbit films really were poo poo and everyone really does wish the discussion was over. So why are you here then? If a tree falls in the woods and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound? Are you a loving moron?
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Aug 3, 2015 23:55
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The problem isn't just that the films are bad. It's that people are having a discussion I don't like. I can't just stop reading it. It has to be stopped. I have to stop them. I have to stop them. It's what Tolkien would have wanted.
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Aug 4, 2015 00:27
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Hbomberguy posted:The problem isn't just that the films are bad. It's that people are having a discussion I don't like. I can't just stop reading it. It has to be stopped. I have to stop them. I have to stop them. I'm pretty sure that I have become my own fantasy version of Tolkien and so I can say that this is exactly what we/he/I deserve, if not what we/he/I wanted.
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Aug 4, 2015 02:13
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Chicken Butt posted:Hbomberguy etc: These films are misunderstood masterpieces. Because it's still amusing how people actually defend this poo poo:  
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Aug 4, 2015 03:19
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Immortan posted:Because it's still amusing how people actually defend this poo poo: Yeah it is amusing how a stage actor has a breakdown over doing something that he's done for decades.
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Aug 4, 2015 03:35
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We're in that part of the cycle where folks aggressively over-interpret bts material as if it could possibly be a gauge of a film's quality again. If an actor didn't enjoy the working conditions on set, that's basically proof the film is objectively bad. Which is why Apocalypse Now, The Shining, and Blade Runner are terrible films.
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Aug 4, 2015 03:51
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Heavy green screen sets can certainly have a negative impact on an actor's performance but I don't think I'd say the Hobbit movies are examples of that.
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Aug 4, 2015 03:55
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computer parts posted:Yeah it is amusing how a stage actor has a breakdown over doing something that he's done for decades. I don't think McKellan's a big one man show guy. Edit: He may actually be a one man show guy.
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Aug 4, 2015 03:57
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porfiria posted:I don't think McKellan's a big one man show guy. Is that a gay joke? 
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Aug 4, 2015 04:01
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Hedrigall posted:Is that a gay joke? Yes, now. Although aren't we all one man show guys, at the end of the day?
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Aug 4, 2015 04:55
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computer parts posted:Yeah it is amusing how a stage actor has a breakdown over doing something that he's done for decades. This is a retarded defense of that clip.
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Aug 4, 2015 08:58
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Adlai Stevenson posted:The problem is that the films themselves at least seem to want you to care about the dwarves but they also don't put much effort into giving a reason past their existence. I don't think the films do assume anyone cares about the other dwarves. They get completely overshadowed in screen-time during the third movie by pretty much every character with a name. They're props for Thorin, and he doesn't always need them.
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Aug 4, 2015 09:52
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Immortan posted:Because it's still amusing how people actually defend this poo poo: I thought that scene in the film was very moving, and a great use of 3d effects. Everyone in the cinema stood up and applauded.
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Aug 4, 2015 09:53
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Anyway, Ian McKellen loves acting by himself. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ka6i2c03eSU
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Aug 4, 2015 10:28
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Chicken Butt posted:Hbomberguy etc: These films are misunderstood masterpieces. This outline can also be applied to the Star Wars thread with regards to the prequel trilogy.
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Aug 4, 2015 13:56
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