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Watched: Year One The Master - 4/5 House - 4.5/5 The Wrong Guy - 3.5/5 Mandy - 2.75/5 Gamera: Guardian of the Universe - 3.5/5 Hana-bi - 4/5 Speed Racer - 3.5/5 Tommy - 3/5 Forbidden Zone - 1/5 Synecdoche New York - 4/5 Secrets of NIMH - 3.5/5 Rocky - 4.5/5 Collateral - 4.5/5 Year Two Come and See - 5/5 Merry Christmas, Mister Lawrence - 3.5/5
Punished Chuck fucked around with this message at 07:57 on Jan 15, 2024 |
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Jul 9, 2023 23:38
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I need an excuse to watch more anyway, gaming’s been so good lately it’s obliterated all my other hobbies, don’t think I’ve watched anything since John Wick 4.
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Jul 9, 2023 23:40
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herculon posted:So do we get trophies on how long we watched the movie? Made it through Enter the Dragon and the following hour after it ends without making Kung fu poses and sound effects at your pets or furniture, etc.
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Jul 10, 2023 19:38
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I had a movie in mind instantly and for like 24 hours after signing up but then I thought of 2 others kind of in the same genre/style that might be better for a movie club so I’ll pick one of the three in a panic when I run out of time after getting rolled.
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Jul 12, 2023 19:42
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just finished. I'll try to remember to come back and do a proper review once some of my more abstract feelings solidify into something I can put into words, but here's a few scattered thoughts on things that particularly stood out to me, I don't know if any of these are really spoilers but I'll tag the whole thing in case anyone hasn't seen it yet and wants to go in blind: 1. I like that Freddie clearly does not believe or even remotely care about the actual philosophy/spiritualism of The Cause, but is still so completely under The Master's spell that he'll assault anyone criticizing the beliefs that he does not subscribe to or have any interest in. 2. Lots of really beautiful or striking shots, and I particularly liked the scene where the two jail cells are symmetrically splitting the screen in half, one with Freddie mindlessly raging and smashing things and one with The Master standing still and silent and dignified. Going to be thinking about that one a lot. There's a few shots like that where the scene is split in half, like when the exterior of the yacht is on the left side and the ocean on the right, or Freddie sprawled out on the ship's tower taking up the bottom half of the screen while all the other sailors far below on the deck throwing stuff at him take up the top half, and it was very visually arresting every time. 3. The Master's own codependency on Freddie is really interesting to me and I can't quite place it--obviously he's fascinated by someone who's like his complete antithesis and acts entirely on id instead of being stuck in this performance of a leading role, but is there more to it, does he want to fix Freddie to prove his ideas that man is more than an animal, or is he just fascinated with Freddie as he is and bringing him into the organization is just a reason to have him around? 4. I love how effective the first scene is at establishing Freddie's character and just how off and isolated he is, going from making the other sailors laugh at his antics with the sand woman to weirding them all and shuffling away awkwardly to jerk off after getting too into it. Good pick, a lot to think about before writing a proper review. Will be chewing on this one for a while, I think.
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Jul 16, 2023 06:32
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Hell yes
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Jul 24, 2023 05:53
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I watched House last night but it was late when I finished it and I went straight to bed after and kept forgetting to post my thoughts today. I liked it a lot, it's a very visually fascinating film. I'll go ahead and stick everything behind a spoiler tag so people who haven't seen it yet can go in totally blind even though only part of it will be about the actual plot: There's not a boring shot in the film, there's always a cool special effect, a brilliant use of color, an inventive camera angle, just always something going on. The scene early in the movie when Gorgeous is talking to her father and they're standing in front of a matte painting sunset with an odd lighting effect and behind a large window with a bunch of erratically sized and placed panes breaking up their forms in several places was just fascinating to look at and that was an early scene of just two people talking. I liked all the girls, they're one-note characters to the point that they're named after their personality trait but they're still fun to watch, the actresses are clearly having a good time and they have a lot of funny lines and moments. I don't mind one-note as long as that note is fun. As others have noted Kung-Fu is especially great, the way she'd strike a pose and get ready to kick some rear end at the slightest sign of things going wrong made me laugh every time. Their deaths were also bizarre and surreal enough that you don't really feel all that bad for them the way you might if a character you like gets eviscerated in a more traditional horror movie. The quality of the special effects helped with this, even when you see a character's severed limbs or something they're very clearly just a mannequin's limb with no attempts to make it look lifelike, which I'm sure is reflective of the budget and manpower but also helps with the surreal tone and keeps things a little lighter and funnier. The contrast between the villain's tragic origin, seething against happy young women because she can't accept the death of her fiance in the war and lived her whole life in denial and waiting for him to return, and how dreamy and funny and bizarre the rest of the movie is, is really fascinating. It's kind of a stock ghost backstory but it feels heavier here, maybe because of the rest of the movie around it. Apparently the director is from Nagasaki and lost all his childhood friends to the atom bomb so I'm sure he put some extra gravity on it being a wartime loss too. This movie was apparently designed as a response to Jaws lol. But the director asked his young daughter for ideas for a horror movie and the movie is a result of a child's off-the-wall imagination with serious directorial vision behind it. Cool little fact, explains the how unique and zany it ended up being. I enjoyed this movie a lot and don't think I've ever seen anything like it before, and probably never will again.
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Jul 26, 2023 02:53
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elf help book posted:weird is better than scary
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Jul 31, 2023 22:13
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lol
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Aug 7, 2023 15:55
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Aug 7, 2023 15:59
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The Wrong Guy was funny, I'd never heard of it before so that's another win for Movie Club. I don't think any of the jokes flopped, which is remarkable considering how frequently they're coming at you. I laughed the hardest at the bit at the end where the killer shoots Daly and then like 10 seconds later Nelson realizes he should have protected Lynne and awkwardly shuffles in front of her. I'd heard the Kennedy joke before too and didn't realize it was from something. I don't watch comedies very often so it was nice to step out of my comfort zone a bit and watch something I wouldn't have picked on my own.
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Aug 10, 2023 00:22
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Fungah! posted:ok watchin chucks BULLSHIT picks after i read dandadan https://youtu.be/0ylWpKEiqtA
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Aug 14, 2023 17:57
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Sweet, I’ve seen the original Gamera but not any of the others
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Aug 21, 2023 23:57
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Hell yeah
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Aug 24, 2023 12:54
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I think elfbot said it best when he said Mandy was a lot of good scenes that don't add up to much, I left it with the distinct feeling that I should have liked it a lot more than I actually did. I don't mean that as a slam because I did like it and I'm glad I watched it. I just felt like it was missing something that I can't quite put my finger on. The pacing was odd, a very slow start where it feels like half the film is setup, which isn't really a problem in and of itself, but then the actual revenge against the cult feels like it takes 5 minutes. On the plus side, I really enjoyed the hellish use of lighting and the really menacing ambient soundtrack. Lots of cool shots like the biker gang seeming to appear out of thin air while the blue light in Red's cabin is flickering, or the cult member offered as sacrifice being dragged away into the darkness afterward. Plenty of funny little sight gags like when Red is wielding a chainsaw and running up on a cultist, who sees him coming and starts to pull his own chainsaw out from behind some machinery and the blade just keeps going and going, or lighting his cigarette on the biker's severed burning head, or Cage alternating between crying and screaming in grief and furiously chugging the liquor. As noted Cage gives a fantastic physical performance throughout. I was also glad to see Bill Duke again, been a long time since I've seen him in something. I want to reiterate that I did like this movie, because I know I led with my misgivings about it and that probably makes it sound like I was more negative on it than I really am. I just can't shake the feeling that it doesn't quite add up to the sum of its parts. It does leave me wanting to check out the director's other movie Beyond the Black Rainbow and seeing what I think of that. When I bought this movie it was in a two-pack with The Color Out Of Space, which I'd recommend if you're craving more of Nicolas Cage losing his mind while a bunch of otherworldly neon lights and foreboding score flash at him.
Punished Chuck fucked around with this message at 05:12 on Aug 28, 2023 |
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Aug 28, 2023 04:55
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Sweet, this one’s been on my watchlist forever but I haven’t gotten around to it. Looking forward to it.
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Aug 28, 2023 18:14
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lmao
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Aug 28, 2023 18:41
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Gamera: Guardian of the Universe was pretty cool. Not my favorite kaiju movie but certainly in the upper tiers of them, I think. Nothing I love more than a guy in a rubber costume kicking over a bunch of scale-model buildings. The modernized designs for Gamera and Gyaos were cool, the human characters were likable and I never really felt like they slowed down the movie too much, which is a trap plenty of lesser kaiju films fall into. I loved the shots of Gyaos nesting on top of the knocked-over Tokyo Tower. I wonder if it was intended as an homage to Mothra making her cocoon in the similarly-knocked over Tower in her debut movie? Making Gamera a manmade genetically-engineered monster designed to take out Gyaos so they could explain the rocket legs flying saucer thing was so funny to me since in the original 1965 Gamera he just did that without explanation. It's just something he can do. My only real complaint is that the end of the fight felt kind of abrupt, you have the sick space dive but that doesn't finish either of them off and then Gamera just kind of blows up the Gyaos with a fireball like it did the other two. But like a slightly bigger fireball than usual since the girl's dad lent her his power. Fun film, 3.5/5 but tempted to give it a 4.
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Aug 29, 2023 03:07
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I also just watched Hana-bi. I enjoyed it a lot, it's only my second Beat Takeshi-directed film after watching Outrage: Way of the Yakuza a few years back. I loved how suddenly and easily it flowed between pleasant serenity and sudden brutality. I got excited when I saw the music was by Joe Hisaishi and he didn't disappoint, though I also liked the long silent stretches without any music. Takeshi's really good at editing, I love stuff like the sudden cut to the detective getting shot at the beginning with absolutely no lead-up, just very sudden and jarring like a scene like that should be. I really need to watch more of his stuff, I liked Outrage a lot and have been meaning to finish the trilogy but just somehow never got around to it over the last three years, will have to carve out some time shortly. Watching this also prompted me to look up his movie about the assassination of Oda Nobunaga which made me discover that it's already been shown at Cannes and is releasing in Japan in November, hopefully it doesn't take too long to make it west because I've been looking forward to that one.
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Sep 17, 2023 03:57
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Also I spent the whole movie trying to figure out where I knew the actor who played that one detective from and only right at the end did I realize that it's Yakuza Kiwami 2 lol 
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Sep 17, 2023 03:58
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Sonatine’s been on my watchlist since I first started watching yakuza films a few years ago and it was only while looking at his filmography after watching Hana-bi that I realized it was one of Takeshi’s lol It’s funny to watch the kinds of movies he makes and think about the fact that he’s best known in Japan as a comedian
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Sep 18, 2023 15:34
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Yeah I probably won't watch because I just saw it relatively recently but it's a good pick and I'm looking forward to seeing the discussion.
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Sep 19, 2023 02:27
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lol sick
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Sep 20, 2023 16:53
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I've always meant to watch Speed Racer because I've heard so much praise for it but every time I've tried I see how much it looks like a noisy CGI nightmare and it puts me off, so I'm glad Game Club gave me the final push to actually watch it. And... it basically was a noisy CGI nightmare lol, but they really leaned into it so it worked. It looks like a cartoon even when it's fully live-action because of the costuming, set design, constant use of bright primary colors, and the actors hamming it up which must have been really difficult to pull off but they did it. The actors were all clearly having a good time which is fun to see in a movie like this. I especially liked Matthew Fox as Racer X, who was cool. The sequence where Royalton threatens Speed with a fixed race if he doesn’t sign with him, and it does like a visualization of him losing the race, and then back to Royalton threatening to bury his dad’s business in lawsuits, and then it does a visualization of the summons, Speed refuses the offer anyway, then it skips forward to after all that actually happens, is actually a really smart bit of filmmaking that impressed me. The only thing I didn't like was Spritle and the monkey who annoyed me but I get they're from the source material. Very fun movie all around, I don't think I liked it as much as its biggest evangelists but I had fun through the whole thing and it had a ton of heart, I'm glad I watched it.
Punished Chuck fucked around with this message at 13:18 on Sep 23, 2023 |
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Sep 23, 2023 11:43
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I kind of want to try the original show now, I've never seen it. I do remember enjoying the 90s reboot as a kid and was wondering why I never hear anyone talk about it but apparently it was canceled in Japan before the full planned 52 episodes were created, then after just 13 episodes aired in English it was taken down forever by a lawsuit, which I guess explains it lol. Looking all that up also got me to realize that what I've always thought of as the Speed Racer theme was actually the theme for that show specifically, which is the same song but more 90s: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbXVIKgBEiQ
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Sep 23, 2023 11:47
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I love westerns but I don’t think I’ve seen one since I rewatched Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid with my grandpa several months back, looking forward to this
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Sep 25, 2023 23:29
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Maybe the horror thing can be a separate event, a new thread were everyone can post their favorite horror movie and people try to watch as many picks as they can or they’re interested in, unrelated to this thread and the list etc?
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Sep 30, 2023 22:28
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Finished Tommy a little while ago. Good music, cool visuals especially in the costuming and set design. My favorite song was the last one but the pinball song with Elton John was good too. Don't really know what else to say about it but it was a fun time. Shoutout to whichever pervert had the time of their life filming the mother smearing herself with beans.elf help book posted:tommy Also this lol
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Oct 15, 2023 04:39
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Made it through Forbidden Zone.
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Oct 20, 2023 22:01
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elf help book posted:Yes please
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Oct 24, 2023 15:53
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Turns out the last pick is Hideo Kojima’s favorite movie, apparently. https://x.com/hideo_kojima_en/status/1721745914245820563?s=46&t=nr2iKDgYRA_5eYbBsGdNXQ
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Nov 7, 2023 19:18
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Posting real quick to say that I watched The Secret of NIMH, before time runs out and the new film is announced. Will post my detailed thoughts on it and Synecdoche New York when I have more time to sit down and write out my thoughts but suffice to say for now that I'm grateful to BBV movie club because I enjoyed both and likely would never have watched either without them being picks for the club.
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Nov 14, 2023 01:10
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Don't know anything about it but Jenny's earned my trust after picking Under the Shadow for the exscreamvaganza which was one of my favorites of the event, so I'll definitely give it a watch.
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Nov 14, 2023 02:34
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The hardest laugh I got was Olive forcing him to explicitly apologize for abandoning her to have anal sex with his boyfriend, even though he didn’t and never stopped trying to reconnect with her, just so he could make peace before her passing, then when he asks if she could ever forgive him she just sobs, says no, and dies immediately
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Nov 20, 2023 22:28
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Streets of Fire felt like a fake movie that would be shown on a TV during a real movie. I'll be the odd man out and say that I liked this one a good bit, it definitely falls short of its potential--if they had done like The Warriors and threw in a bunch of short action setpieces to break up the dialogue-heavy parts then this could have been a stone-cold classic but the pacing drags it way down. But when it's on I think it's really on, the action scenes are fun even if there aren't enough of them, the music's great, I liked Rick Moranis as a cocky little Napoleon complex jerk, everything was self-consciously trying so hard to be cool that it was kind of endearing in a weird way. McCoy was a fun character, I liked the tough guy ex-soldier drifter John Rambo role just being given to a five foot five lady and having her sell it completely straight, and the actress gave it her all and was probably my favorite performance in the film (still kind of flat but just in the normal 80s-movie tough-guy sort of way). Young Willem Defoe was interesting to see, his line delivery was as bad as pretty much everyone else but his physical acting--faces, body language, just presence in general--is just off the charts. I laughed a lot throughout the movie but a lot of the time when I did I was unsure if the movie wanted me to be laughing or not. There's a really fantastic movie in here that they didn't quite manage to bring out; I keep thinking about the sequence in the original Star Wars where they rescue Princess Leia from the Death Star, a ragtag crew of people that don't like each other all that much pulling off a daring rescue under the enemy's nose, and there's lots of action but the characters are all bickering and playing off each other while they fight and flee. If they had gone for that sort of energy instead of just having long stretches of just the bickering this movie would have been right up there with The Warriors. As it stands, the two movies have enough shared DNA that you can tell they're by the same director, but it feels like Streets of Fire should be the amateurish early attempt by a director with some good ideas and some natural talent, who later in life with some more experience under his belt returns to the idea and refines it to perfection with the Warriors. The fact that it's actually made five years after The Warriors is bizarre. I guess I'll sum up by saying that it falls into a weird gray zone where it's not really good enough to be good, but it's too good to be a "so bad it's good." As a result I can't quite say if I liked it genuinely or ironically, but I did like it.
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Dec 4, 2023 05:46
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I’m listening to Streets of Fire’s soundtrack in the office today lol. Whatever else you can say about the movie you can’t say a bad word about the music https://youtu.be/3VopScslvPo?si=cpI8uRjnMqLO2KcA https://youtu.be/nDof_WWj_BY?si=3fLW6QAGXbCnNTbs
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Dec 4, 2023 18:22
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Rocky: A stone-cold classic. Actually my first time seeing it, it's one of those movies that permeates the pop culture atmosphere so much I kind of felt like I had seen it without actually ever watching it, but I was wrong as it's a much different film than I expected. It had a ton of heart, Stallone is super likable in the role and you're just always rooting for him and his romance with Adrian is very sweet and maybe my favorite film romance. Carl Weathers made a fun foil to him and, as others have noted, seeing him go from being cocky and showboating and unsportsmanlike, just toying with Rocky, to actually taking him seriously after getting knocked on his rear end is such a good moment for both characters. I love the ending too, having him win would have just been typical Hollywood schmaltz but having him technically lose the fight but just getting in there and giving it his all and being the first person to make it to the end of the match with Creed which is its own victory is just so much more profound. And despite that, and already knowing going into it that he was going to lose, the moments where he manages to fight back and go on the offensive are still so exciting that I was rooting for him to win anyway. Great movie, I'll have to check out some of the others and the Creeds. Maybe finally watch Raging Bull, the 4K of which has been sitting on my entertainment center for months now and I've just never gotten to.
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Dec 11, 2023 03:21
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I meant to mention it in my first post but (spoilers for the very ending, like the last 10 seconds of the movie) I love that whether he won or lost the fight is so secondary and unimportant that the announcement of Creed’s victory is almost drowned out entirely by Rocky and Adrian professing their love for each other, completely not listening, to the point that even the viewer can barely hear it.
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Dec 11, 2023 03:48
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elf help book posted:weird thing to call out but the gun shots are so loud compared to the rest of the movie, it makes them really shocking in a way thats appropriate I love when movies do this. My favorite theater experience was watching 1917 in an imax where the gunshots were so loud that I was flinching and jumping in my seat at every one
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Dec 18, 2023 04:28
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| # ¿ May 21, 2024 10:44 |
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Collateral is great, kind of the first rewatch I’ve done with the club but I think it’s the first time I’ve sat down and watched the whole thing, as opposed to catching it in parts on cable back when people did that. Just an electric movie, one scene flowing into the next, the dialogue tense and snappy enough that they feel like action scenes so the movie’s just always moving. Max is immediately likable from the first moment. This might be my favorite Tom Cruise role, I wish he did more villains because he knocks this out of the park. The scenes where Max and Vincent almost have a weird little camaraderie like when Vincent gets on the radio with Max’s dispatch and takes them to task for trying to get Max to pay out of pocket for cab repairs are so great and watching Max slowly learn from Vincent to grow more of a backbone was amazing, especially the turning point where Max takes command during the meeting with Felix where he’s impersonating Vincent, and then carries that confidence through the rest of the movie, like Vincent wore off on him or Max just never stopped the performance. The action scenes are fantastic and remind me of a lower-intensity John Wick, the scene where Vincent takes out the two robbers in the alley is probably the best 5-second action scene put to film. I love how matter-of-fact Mark Ruffalo’s death is, he’s dispatched with basically the same suddenness and lack of sentimentality as any of the no-name goons that went down in that scene. Great movie, will probably rewatch in the future.
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Dec 19, 2023 00:57
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