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Dude, Where's My Car (2000): D God help me, but I sat through this entire stupid, brainless loving movie, and it amazes me that anyone could have ever found any of this funny. Part of the problem might be that I'm watching as a 40 year old; not a dumbass teen who thinks "clever" puns about smoking weed are hilarious. On the other hand, none of this is anything we haven't seen many times before, and usually done a lot more entertainingly (e.g: Cheech and Chong; Spicoli, etc). The Conker's Bad Fur Day-esque plot was slightly interesting just to see where it would go (oh look, there's Brent Spiner!), but Conker is funnier and better written. There was a single fairly good joke in the whole thing: an "it's like being in a country music video" quip when Kelso and Stiffler were walking in the "space nerds'" barn. The rest was Not Good. Delta Force 2: The Colombian Connection (1990): D Over the course of this film, the US a) puts boots on the ground in a sovereign Central or South American country to save the life of a handful of narcs, b) commits 'regime change' against the leader of said country, and c) lays waste to a Native village that is used as a playground for a firefight. Shouldn't be surprising given Norris' regressive politics, but this moment in history was an awkward time to watch a movie that took such obvious delight in bellicose American imperialism. Besides that, the movie is a cheesy cliche fest whose plot reminds me most strongly of License To Kill. You have a charismatic villain that the movie reminds us at every turn is eeeevil. You have the "hero" entering a sovereign country to get him, you have a woman victimized by the villain, and you have plenty of eye rolling one liners from the hero. I didn't think it was all that terrible until the sequences in "San Carlos", when the politics of the movie and cheesiness of the fights became a bit too much to tolerate.
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Apr 16, 2024 00:11
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Steve Yun posted:One of the things my screenwriting professor said that stuck with me is that you can’t help but reveal your worldview in your writing. Oh for sure, and also, I think a lot of people don't actually identify their perception of normalcy as having ideological content.
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Apr 16, 2024 00:23
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The movie (and director) do have a clear "this side is fascist and thats bad" position, but also walks enough of a tight rope to not piss off either side that it makes it entirely irrelevant to the film. https://x.com/kermodeandmayo/status/1778772594038108226 I find his "the president is clearly depicted as a fascist" line to be more than a little eye raising. The movie also opens with a suicide bomber blowing up a water truck where protestors are clashing with police, murdering the cops and fellow citizens for ??? reasons Also, there are lines that are deliberately vague like "your iconic photo of the Antifa massacre" that could be read in two ways. Garland is trying to have his cake and eat it to and that's honestly more annoying than if it were truly apolitical and just trying to tell a story about conflict journalists.
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Apr 16, 2024 00:54
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There are two literal Nazis in the special thanks for the movie
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Apr 16, 2024 00:56
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Yeah, that too. Garland is a toothless coward even if he tries to claim his movie is sending a clear message (which it utterly fails to do)
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Apr 16, 2024 01:03
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Now I'm questioning whether any of his movies had a clear message. Or if he just enjoys flirting with controversial topics and powerful imagery.
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Apr 16, 2024 02:19
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Oh hey, I'm watching movies again. The Craft (1996, Andrew Fleming) [digital] 3/5 Late Night with the Devil (2023, Cameron Cairnes/Colin Cairnes) [theatrical] 3.5/5 Ingagi (1930, don't care) [Blu-ray] 1/5 Girl Gang (1954, also don't care) [Blu-ray] 2/5 Wonka (2023, Paul King) [Max] 4/5 The House Bunny (2008, don't care) [digital] 2/5 Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (2024, Adam Wingard) [theatrical] 3.5/5 Bring It On (2000, Peyton Reed) [digital] 3/5 The Blonde Pick-up/Racket Girls (1951) [Blu-ray] 1.5/5 Clifford (1994, Paul Flaherty) [theatrical] 1.5/5 Dante's Inferno (1911) [Blu-ray] 2.5/5 Dance, Girl, Dance (1940, Dorothy Arzner) [Blu-ray] 3.5/5 High Sierra (1940, Raoul Walsh) [Blu-ray] 4/5 90 Degrees in the Shade (1965, Jiri Weiss) [Blu-ray] 3.5/5 I'm honestly shocked by how good and fun Wonka is. It's like a love letter to golden age Disney live-action musicals. I can't believe I saw Clifford in a theater before a single Hitchcock film.
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Apr 16, 2024 02:58
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Bottom Liner posted:The entire time, all I could think about was how Children of Men did everything this movie wants to do 100x better 20 years ago. Man I loving hated that movie, so now I'm curious if I'll hate Civil War more,.or appreciate the differences.
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Apr 16, 2024 04:47
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After watching Civil War my hot take is that it was pretty good and will probably stick with me for a bit. People will also probably argue about it all year.
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Apr 17, 2024 04:47
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Revenge of the Ninja (1983): B Someone on imdb said it pretty succinctly: "Hokum, but enjoyable hokum". This movie is ridiculous as hell, with a convoluted plot (something about smuggling heroin into or out of the country using traditional Japanese dolls?), ethnic stereotypes (stock Italian "goombas" and even a Native American wielding a bowie knife and axes), lots of gratuitous fights, and a B-movie production. But it was a far more entertaining time than either Dude, Where's My Car? or Delta Force 2 (though the latter wasn't too bad). I would watch this again in a heartbeat.
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Apr 18, 2024 00:52
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the Zone of Interest 2023 So I saw this on HBO/Max the other day and was a little, I don't know, confused by the blurb because I wasn't clear on the premise. I thought it was going to be some weird take on "good Nazis" or something so I wasn't actually going to watch it, however, last night I started it (figuring I'd watch some and get an idea of what it was like, go to bed and see the rest today if it held my interest). Instead I stayed up until 3 am to finish it because I was enthralled. Unexpectedly great, really fine performances. This movie is incredibly powerful and moving. 10/10 ...as an aside, I'm in a FB group of globe collectors and someone recently picked one up from Germany around this same time that actually has a "zone of interest" on it and that was the first time I'd ever heard the term, other than this movie. It's actually part of the reason I watched it, when I saw this before I assumed it was just the title they went with.
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Apr 18, 2024 22:43
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Some of the best sound design of all time. Incredibly effective concept executed perfectly.
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Apr 18, 2024 23:42
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Civil War. 3/5. Some parts were pretty great. Others fell flat hard. Overall I enjoyed it though and it was often very pretty. Valoa valoa valoa. 3.5/5 Very gay and quite sad. I like that. Wish there was a little more meat to that story though.
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Apr 20, 2024 21:55
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They really did Challengers a disservice with the name because practically everyone I've heard talk about it or talked to it about has made the "is it about the space shuttle? is there more than one?" joke. Also, I was extremely turned off by the marketing campaign of, "HEY DO YOU WANT TO SEE ZENDAYA gently caress TWO GUYS????????????????????" But man times are tough right now, and I really need a distraction, I have a ton of free movie credits and hate the Ape movies and some people I trust said Challenger was good so I figured, what the heck, might as well. It was pretty darn good. I kind of understand the marketing because "a modern French New Wave film/tennis sports movie" is probably tough sell. It's not a total bait and switch, it's definitely about the relationship of the three protagonists, but at its heart it's an experimental film: it doesn't really reveal itself as such as first, but by the end it's doing some really interesting things with editing, camera shots, angles, sound and music,. You can probably figure out how it's gonna end 10 minutes into the movie (and indeed I wonder if the writer [Justin Kuritzkes] wrote that first and went backwards from there) but that's not the point. It's really about everything building up to that moment. Definitely worth seeing.
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May 13, 2024 10:32
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Star Wars: A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi – My local theater was showing these last week and I figured it would be nice to see them on the big screen. I was a little apprehensive, since I wasn’t sure if I’d still like these films now that I’m older. I’d seen them before on home video and the 1997 re-release “special edition”, but I hadn’t watched them recently. Also, when I saw The Force Awakens I almost walked out of the theater and I didn’t bother seeing Last Jedi or Rise of Skywalker. I did enjoy myself, but I must admit I’m starting to age out of these kinds of movies (or it might just be that I’ve seen them so many times before). I understand that Star Wars is a simplistic good vs evil story, but there were points in the films where I “overthink” some of the plot. Also, these were the "second-special" edition versions of the films, which in addition to the changes that Lucas added for the first special edition in the 1990s, had some subsequent changes that were added later. I felt that the added/modified scenes, which were most notable in the Mos Eisley scenes in New Hope and Jabba's palace in Jedi were extraneous, but I probably thought they were cool when I saw them as a teen in the 1990's. Wikipeda has a good article on the various changes. Again, I did enjoy these films. At no point did it feel like the plot was dragging and there is a good balance between character development, world building, and narrative to keep the films going. From what comments I've heard the prequel movies leaned too heavily into the world building, while the sequels went too far in the opposite direction. My rankings: New Hope - 4.5/5 Empire - 5/5 Jedi - 4.5/5 Also, one thing that always bothered me (as an adult, I probably didn't think about when I was a kid) at the end of Jedi was how the empire just falls apart after the Emperor is killed and the second Death Star destroyed. The special edition even had scenes of celebrations on various worlds. However, historian Bret Devereaux, whose blog teaches history via analyzing works from pop culture, gives a good explanation while analyzing the development of the Star Destroyers. He basically compares the Old Republic and the Galactic Empire to the Holy Roman Empire, a confederation of powers that each had their own governing system. When Palpatine tried to centralize them with a single system that would make the Galactic Empire unpopular even if the world wasn't particularly oppressed. EDIT: Dammit, "good vs evil", not "good vs email" The_Other fucked around with this message at 19:48 on May 14, 2024 |
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May 14, 2024 19:29
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The_Other posted:I understand that Star Wars is a simplistic good vs email story, gently caress. This is the missing piece we've all gotten wrong for so long.
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May 14, 2024 19:38
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The_Other posted:He basically compares the Old Republic and the Galactic Empire to the Holy Roman Empire, a confederation of powers that each had their own governing system. When Palpatine tried to centralize them with a single system that would make the Galactic Empire unpopular even if the world wasn't particularly oppressed. Or just America.
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May 14, 2024 20:38
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Yeah it was more directly Vietcong and United States if I remember.
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May 14, 2024 20:44
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Yes, from the get go it was always a new-left pulp allegory of NLF vs genocidal colonizers. Historical antiquity need not apply.
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May 14, 2024 20:54
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The Incredibles (2004): B+ A 20 year old movie that I not only have not seen (aside from the Mr. Incredible meme) but managed not to get spoiled. Although I saw all of the twists coming, because they were pretty obvious if you've seen a movie before, I'm not too worried about it; this is a comic book film! That's part of the fun. I enjoyed the ridiculously over-the-top lair (it reminded me of You Only Live Twice, which was probably intentional), but the best part of the movie was the humor. I especially liked the part where Frozone was calling for his super suit at the end of the movie. Also liked the Nixon CGI character at the end. Regarding something in the ending, and boy do I hope this isn't  : wouldn't it be unfair for Dash to compete with "normies" since incredibly (pun intended) fast running is his superpower?
F_Shit_Fitzgerald fucked around with this message at 20:49 on May 17, 2024 |
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May 17, 2024 20:28
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F_Shit_Fitzgerald posted:boy do I hope this isn't lol I have bad news
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May 17, 2024 20:45
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That era was an incredible (lol) run from Pixar. Def watch the rest of their 2000s lineup if you missed any more.
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May 17, 2024 20:48
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I missed a lot of them actually. Case in point - Wall-e (2008): A I liked The Incredibles a lot but I really liked Wall-e. It took me a bit to warm up to the movie, but once I did, I was amazed. One of the reason the Chapo boys love (the original) Avatar so much is because it depicts the US Army as the villain. This movie depicts a future earth ravaged by rapacious capitalism, where future humans are lulled into complacency by robots that cater to their every whim. I know I'm not the first one to make this point, but there is a rich irony in the fact that this movie was released by Disney. Beyond all the political, though, Wall-e is anchored by a love story that probably doesn't break any new ground but is sweet. Just a surprisingly great movie that I wouldn't mind having on DVD.
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May 18, 2024 00:13
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Topaze (1933, Harry d’Abbadie d’Arrast) [Blu-ray] - 3.5/5 I really enjoyed the 30s Marcel Pagnol films I've seen so far - the Marseilles Trilogy and The Baker's Wife are all wonderful. This is an American production (produced by David O. Selznick for Radio Pictures) and it's surprisingly well-made, even with the comparisons to the French films. John Barrymore is excellent in the lead role and there's some impressive camera work for its time. I don't think it has the same spark the Pagnol films have, but still worthwhile. Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965, Norman Taurog) [Blu-ray] - 2.5/5 Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs (1966, Mario Bava) [Blu-ray] - 2.5/5 Two more "paycheck" movies for Vincent Price. This might be the most gay coded of any character he's played, but he's having fun. I do think the sequel is a little better made and has some interesting choices (must have been a paycheck movie for Bava too). Bikini Machine has a neat opening credits sequence animated by Art Clokey. The 36th Chamber of Shaolin (1978, Lau Kar-leung) [Blu-ray, English dub] - 4/5 Got a lot of Shaw Brothers films to watch and this seemed like a good start. So much fun. Frogman (2023, Anthony Cousins) [digital] - 2/5 Another found footage horror. It has some interesting moments and even some surprise body horror, but it wears a little thin. Major Dundee (1965, Sam Peckinpah) [Blu-ray, theatrical cut] - 3.5/5 I've been wanting to see more Peckinpah and this is a pretty good film. I debated whether to see the original cut or the extended cut first, but even with some obvious plot weirdness, it's a good time. Tammy and the T-Rex (1994, Stewart Raffill) [4K UHD, rewatch] - 2/5 Incredibly dumb, but I can't help but admire how Denise Richards is so drat likable and is putting 110% into her performance. Hunted (1972, Peter Crane) [Blu-ray] - 3.5/5 Assassin (1973, Peter Crane) [Blu-ray] - 4/5 Moments (1974, Peter Crane) [Blu-ray] - 4/5 Indicator put out a Blu-ray set of the three films produced by The Pemini Organisation - low-budget, but impressive films. Hunted is only 41 minutes long, but works like a one-act play with Edward Woodward and June Ritchie. Assassin stars Ian Hendry and is a pretty fun, compact thriller that's under 90 minutes. Moments is a deeply melancholy film that sort of reminds me of Bergman's later work. Well worth checking out, especially as these were almost completely lost (so obscure they exist only as one surviving print each and missing footage had to be dropped in from VHS). Hundreds of Beavers (2022, Mike Cheslik) [theatrical] - 5/5 Masterpiece. The movie industry should switch to letting artists make the most insane poo poo possible with a low budget. The Daydreamer (1966, Jules Bass) [Blu-ray] - 2/5 I'm not a huge fan of Rankin-Bass specials, but this was incredibly tedious. Nice animation and design, but meh. Let's Kill Uncle (1966, William Castle) [Blu-ray] - 3/5 This felt like a John Waters kids movie. The ending is a little bit of a letdown, but it's fun to see kids and an adult plot to murder each other.
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May 18, 2024 15:08
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I had no idea Bava directed a Doctor Goldfoot movie. Those were a go-to back in 90’s stoner days, along with Vampire Planet strangely enough. And to bring it back to your post, Castle’s The Tingler, his best-known work: https://youtu.be/_4c72CWAd-Q?si=EyGQEvQr2-ydu3L_
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May 18, 2024 21:38
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At the theater? AGGRO DR1FT. Absolutely incredible. Monstrously psychedelic and bizarre and hypnotic. I love all of Korine’s work - it’s a drat shame that The Trap will probably never get made, because the script is one of the best I’ve ever read. But this was pretty close. I loved the midgets ambling around carrying the villain’s head at the end; very much reminded me of Even Dwarfs Started Small by Werner Herzog. 9/10 At home? Tetro. Currently revisiting Coppola’s minor/recent works. Terrific performances (Gallo steals the show but Alden Ehrenreich actually surprised me, and I’ve always liked him), great friction and lovely digital cinematography by Mihai Mălaimare Jr. (who might be my current favorite DP after Benoit Debie). 8/10 Speaking of DPs, it’s crazy how Emmanuel Lubezski dropped off after doing a bunch of Malick films that were filmed like four years before they even came out. Dude’s been out of the game for like a decade (besides Amsterdam by David O Russell, which I had no clue existed). I still think he has one of the most distinct styles of any living DP.
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May 19, 2024 00:04
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Remulak posted:I had no idea Bava directed a Doctor Goldfoot movie. Those were a go-to back in 90’s stoner days, along with Vampire Planet strangely enough. And to bring it back to your post, Castle’s The Tingler, his best-known work: It's visually more interesting and has some weird stuff like Goldfoot doing all this directly to camera narration, but it's pretty obvious it was primarily made for an Italian audience because even Price is badly dubbed. Castle is a lot of fun and I've seen most of his main works. I've got his last film Shanks in my queue.
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May 19, 2024 00:19
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sadfly posted:Speaking of DPs, it’s crazy how Emmanuel Lubezski dropped off after doing a bunch of Malick films that were filmed like four years before they even came out. Dude’s been out of the game for like a decade (besides Amsterdam by David O Russell, which I had no clue existed). I still think he has one of the most distinct styles of any living DP. I think a lot of the latter Malick stuff after they worked on The New World was all shot contemporaneously in one short period around Tree of Life, then edited into loose narratives over the course of years. As far as 'chivo' is concerned, after years of intense shoots he's kind of reached the very top as one of the most celebrated and awarded DPs in history. Dude's probably just taking it easy after shooting The Revenant lol
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May 19, 2024 00:23
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He’s been doing a lot more photography work and non-Hollywood stuff in general. His photos are great though. Same wide angle + natural light style https://www.instagram.com/chivexp/?hl=en
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May 19, 2024 01:33
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sadfly posted:At the theater? AGGRO DR1FT. Absolutely incredible. Monstrously psychedelic and bizarre and hypnotic. I love all of Korine’s work - it’s a drat shame that The Trap will probably never get made, because the script is one of the best I’ve ever read. But this was pretty close. I loved the midgets ambling around carrying the villain’s head at the end; very much reminded me of Even Dwarfs Started Small by Werner Herzog. 9/10 I gotta watch more Korine. I finally got around to Spring Breakers and man, did people give me the wrong view of the movie. It was really funny and stupid but that was just the surface level. Like you describe Aggro Dr1ft it felt really psychedelic, but specifically the itchy kind of hallucinations you get after drinking too much NyQuil or Benadryl. It just had this low frequency hum of danger the whole time that was just incredibly disturbing.
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May 19, 2024 07:43
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Famethrowa posted:I gotta watch more Korine. I finally got around to Spring Breakers and man, did people give me the wrong view of the movie. It was really funny and stupid but that was just the surface level. Like you describe Aggro Dr1ft it felt really psychedelic, but specifically the itchy kind of hallucinations you get after drinking too much NyQuil or Benadryl. It just had this low frequency hum of danger the whole time that was just incredibly disturbing. Korine is great. Spring Breakers kicks so much rear end, it's such a sharp genreblend of Malick meets trash, and yeah, just so loving seedy. I feel like it's also one of the only films that properly captured the vibe of the Girls Gone Wild decade at the height of the Iraq War and how hosed up everything was. The one I simply couldn't watch again was Beach Bum, I left the theater so hosed up by that film. Probably one of the darkest satires of American culture I've ever seen.
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May 19, 2024 10:03
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BeanpolePeckerwood posted:I think a lot of the latter Malick stuff after they worked on The New World was all shot contemporaneously in one short period around Tree of Life, then edited into loose narratives over the course of years. As far as 'chivo' is concerned, after years of intense shoots he's kind of reached the very top as one of the most celebrated and awarded DPs in history. Dude's probably just taking it easy after shooting The Revenant lol Yeah, it seemed like he shot everything post-ToL around 2012-2014. I love all of them - Song to Song is gorgeous. And I really liked the DP work on A Hidden Life.
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May 19, 2024 10:23
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BeanpolePeckerwood posted:I think a lot of the latter Malick stuff after they worked on The New World was all shot contemporaneously in one short period around Tree of Life, then edited into loose narratives over the course of years. As far as 'chivo' is concerned, after years of intense shoots he's kind of reached the very top as one of the most celebrated and awarded DPs in history. Dude's probably just taking it easy after shooting The Revenant lol This is his latest stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3e9D8WDdIo Plus he is the DP on Alfonso Cuaron’s tv show for apple tv…coming this year i think?
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May 19, 2024 11:37
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Saw Fury Raod for the second time last week. 9.5/10 It's just fantastic from top to bottom, and is a huge spectacle in the best way. I think I saw it originally on a flight much closer to the original release date, and even on that tiny screen was wowed. Very much looking forward to seeing Furisoa this weekend. This Saturday I saw Bullet Train. 5.5/10. It's not terrible, but there's no need for me to go back. A lot of the jokes didn't work for me. The Hornet ending every single sentence with "bitch" got old really, really fast. Having The Twins underscored at every turn by "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" was another miss to me. The Thomas The Tank bit didn't do anything for me. I get why they did it, but I didn't like it. They telegraphed the end bit for so long. As soon as they described what was up with the gun, I just couldn't focus on anything else. loving get on with it already. That was the other thing, way too many threads going on at once. Sure, it all came together eventually, but Ladybug and The Wolf and The Hornet and The Twins and The Father and The Daughter and The Son and The Elder and The White Death and whoever else showed up just took so long to get there. And the last 5-10 minutes just felt so unnecessary.
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May 20, 2024 15:16
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I saw Back to Black last week. I though Marisa Abela did a really good job with the role. I didn't realize how much I missed Amy Winehouse until after watching an imitation of her for a bit there. And while it was nice that she used her own voice for the songs, and she isn't bad at all, that's when we are reminded that she really isn't Amy Winehouse. The movie was also completely toothless as far as deconstructing her life goes, and if there was an intended message beyond "hey look it's Amy Winehouse" it didn't really make it out. The whole thing was surprisingly milquetoast for a life that was so wild. There's probably a great movie to be made about her, but this wasn't it. 1.5/5
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May 20, 2024 15:42
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