Veltigar

I was in the same headspace as your wife concerning goodwill for the franchise and I also found the beginning quite difficult. I guess we're so conditioned to expect a certain thing from SW now that it is hard to adjust to a different take. I did restart it eventually however, after more than a month of break due to travel at the recommendation of @Corvinus85 and others, which was very fortunate for me as it picks up considerable speed from episode 4 onwards to become one of the best TV-show of last year. There is a famous actor from LOTR who is included in later episodes whose arc in particular floored me. In fact, his last scene in the first season was probably my favourite moment of television in 2022. So there is something to look forward to definitely

A friend talked me into watching another season of The Mandalorian. In preparation for watching the episode together tomorrow, I finally watched the three Mandalorian episodes embedded in The Book of Boba Fett. I have to say that I'm not entirely looking forward to season three of The Mandalorian based on these episodes. I'm not saying anything shocking when I state that this is clearly no Andor. What I find striking however, is that whenever I watch The Mandalorian, I come away with a feeling of wasted potential. The Mandalorian is a pretty cool character (visually) and the emotional connection at the core of the story works well. It's just so unfortunate that the emotional storyline of Grogu and Mando is played out on such an idiotic canvas. The world just feels fake. There is no depth to anything. There are also no stakes and most of what works is just reminiscent of better properties outside of Disney Star Wars So yeah, The Mandalorian season 3 is facing an uphill battle to convince me. It's just maddening to know that they can produce an Andor if they set their mind to it and then just choose not to do so. Plus est en vous Disney.

No. Nothing whatsoever 5c5ad7259e42b911d3055365.jpg (1000×669) (ghostwhalelondon.com)

I went to see Cocaine Bear over the weekend. It was way better than a movie with that title should be (A friend of mine described it as "it's like Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter except for the fact that it's also a good movie). It's definitely not a cinematic master piece, but it was a great time at the movies for me. The actors are all solid, which is not that surprising when you look at the cast. Keri Russel, Ray Liotta, Kristofer Hivju, Margo Martindale, Matthew Rhys, Isiah Whitlock Jr. and Ice Cube's kid. That's an impressive line up for a film with such a jokey concept. I'm assuming Elizabeth Banks pulled a lot of strings to get this many veteran actors together for this type of a crazy concept film. The action is pretty good, the bear CGI is well done and aside from the fact that it has some really funny moments, it also has some pretty good dramatic beats (in particular, the cop's storyline was quite touching imo). So yeah, definitely would recommend seeing it.

Oh, nice, that is sooner than I anticipated Although it will be difficult to decide whether to binge this or watch it on a weekly basis. So far I have done the binging strategy and I feel like the series is wonderful for that.

They cannot be stupid enough to remake the LOTR trilogy. Who in their right mind would even go near an idea that is bound to fail. Extended universe stuff sure, that might actually lead to a few interesting films between all the shite.

Does anyone have more info on this? There was an article on the Guardian about it, but I felt like it did a poor job explaining what exactly WB could attempt to do given all the rights issues.

When is it coming out?

I watched Scorsese's The Color of Money (1986) a few days ago. It stars Tom Cruise, Paul Newman and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio and is a follow-up to 1961's The Hustler in which Paul Newman played the younger version of his poolshark Fast Eddie Felson character in this film. I tried to watch The Hustler a few months ago, but the film somehow failed to grab me. I therefore decided against watching The Color of Money, but luckily I picked it up again. This is a fantastic film in my book. Scorsese himself isn't a fan of it as it is probably the least personal film he's ever made, but I think the performances really sell it. Paul Newman is tremendous as the aging Fast Eddie Felso, who slowly falls back into his addiction to pool and finds meaning in that. Mastrantonio is great in her role as well, although I do feel that the script did her no favours by reducing her to a more stereotypical girlfriend character at the end of the film. Tom Cruise basically plays himself in this film, which is rather funny to see. So definitely another of the early Cruise films that deserve to be watched again.

I finished my tussle with the LOTR Extended Editions with The Return of the King. Ultimately, my assessment remains broadly similar to the one I have had for the previous two extended editions. It's nice that they exist and if you are a big fan, you definitely have to have seen them at least once, but I would say that the theatrical cut is superior. As to the extended edition of tRoK specifically, I do think it is the best of the bunch. The fact that Saruman's fate is not resolved in the theatrical cut is quite odd and it's a good thing that the extended cut rectifies it. The scene with the Mouth of Sauron is rather cool, although I get why it was cut, as it makes Aragorn look like a bit of a war criminal. I also think that the added material makes the ending of tRoK's extended cut feel less bloated than the theatrical cut where the ending just keeps on going in comparison to what came before. All in all, I was very glad to be able to revisit this franchise. I would recommend people not to do it in 4K however. For some reason everything looked more childlike than I remembered. It doesn't surprise me now that PJ would end up creating The Hobbit. Like George Lucas, he was hemmed in by the state of technology which provided a check on his worst impulses as a film maker.

Not sure how I will be able to see this, but it looks interesting:

I watched the Extended Edition of The Two Towers yesterday. It's really been a very long time since I sat through the entire theatrical cut of this film (I used to usually fast-forward through all the hobbit stuff) and I forgot just how long of a film it is. An issue that is further exacerbated in the extended edition of course. All in all, I think the extended edition of The Two Towers is worth a watch from the moment you become a moderate fan of this franchise (which I'm going to define as having watched and loved the theatrical cut of the trilogy, not necessarily being into the books). On that front it's definitely more accessible than Fellowship's extended cut, which in my opinion is only worth it if you are a really committed fan of the franchise. That being said, if I watch this again some time in the future (and am at liberty to pick either the theatrical or extended cut), I'll probably stick to the theatrical cut. I guess it's even less faithful to the lore than the extended cut, but as a film experience I think the theatrical cut remains superior. Yeah, I'm definitely glad that I'm binging this XD I just think cliff hangers like that would detract from the experience. It's definitely way better than it should be and I am happy to see that it is rewarded for it. I can imagine positive reviews like my own kept it going, so good that the stars are aligned on a good film for once. I do always wonder about these numbers though. I'm not deep enough into them to understand how that 400 m haul translates to its relative performance. Is that a lot for a(n animated) film in general?

I have been tearing through the second season of Vox Machina over the past couple of days. It's rather addictive, so I am sad that I finished it already. On the other hand, I can't imagine watching this show on a weekly basis. There are just too many cliff hangers, so it is better for my heart to watch it all in one go. Thanks to @Corvinus85 for posting about it and I do agree with his assessment that this second season was even better than the first outing. I suppose mostly due to the increased focus, as the first season had two arcs, while this only had one main arc. It's not ground-breaking storytelling by any means, but I do feel like this whole show is a testament to the power of well-executed tropes. A lot of things you can predict from a mile off and of course no one of the principal heroes is actually ever in any meaningful danger (not to mention the fact that they all have a tragic backstory straight out of central casting), but this show's earnestness and its sense of humour are enough to power through the predictability. You genuinely wish these characters to succeed, which is something other Amazon fantasy shows could learn a great deal from. I'd recommend a cinema outing for this. Watching this together with a respectful audience is a real treat and it will help you find some mental rest. I know it helped me on that front! It's no Top Gun: Maverick (), but The Banshees of Inisherin would definitely rank high in my 2022 list. I wonder whether it has a chance to prevail against Everything Everywhere All At Once.

I went to see The Banshees of Inisherin yesterday. It's a marvellous film and I hope it does well at the awards. At first it was written and directed by the same director who did Calvary, but apparently it is that director's (more famous) brother. Between them, the brothers have made Calvary, The Banshees of Inisherin, In Bruges, The Guard and Seven Psychopaths. These are some talented people evidently. As to The Banshees of Inisherin itself, I find it hard to write anything about it without spoiling the film. I was engrossed throughout and was always kept on my toes as to what would happen next. The actors were amazing, the script was bleak yet funny and I thought the evocation of its time period was marvellously done. It really felt like a window into life on a small Irish island in the 1920's. Particular praise should be reserved for the costuming. I especially liked everything Kerry Condon's character was wearing. It felt authentic, yet oddly glamorous. A perfect fit for the character she was playing and I think there will be a lot of women curious whether they could lay their hands on one of her outfits.

I was aimlessly scrolling through a list of 250 must watch films on IMDB yesterday. It was a tad depressing because I had seen most of the films included, but then I noticed a film that I had heard off, but never actually watched before. It is 1997's Donnie Brasco, directed by the same guy who made Four Weddings and a Funeral. It sort of cracked me up that that guy directed a hardcore mob movie, so I decided to give it a chance. That was something I didn't regret. This film is amazing. Everyone in it is really acting their pants off and is giving a performance that must rank in their professional top three. For someone like Depp (probably his best role after Jack Sparrow) or Michael Madsen (probably his best role outside of the Tarantino universe) that might not be that surprising, but I'm willing to say that the same thing is true for Al Pacino as well. He completely nails it as Lefty, who as a pathetic (yet strangely endearing) working class gangster is the perfect antidote for Pacino's altogether more glamorous upper class Michael from The Godfather franchise. In fact, I feel like this film, even more than Goodfellas might have a good claim to be the anti-Godfather. The world of the mob is so realistically rendered (amongst other things due to the fact that all the wiretaps from the undercover agent were mined for mob slang to up the veracity of the dialogue) and it is so grubby, you cannot help but wonder why anyone would choose to get involved with these sad-eyed clowns. @Corvinus85's list is pretty complete. The only other thing I would add to it is that they spent a lot more time in The Shire prior to departure, which I was not a fan off. Since you are feeling so evangelical about this, why not force the people's eyes open with ducktape to ensure they keep looking :p

Elvis is a terrible atrocity of a film, but Butler was the one redeeming factor in it. He's definitely capable of more than what was shown in Shannara.

I had to make the (apparently) awkward confession to my friends that I had never seen the extended editions of Peter Jackson's LOTR trilogy before. So yesterday, we decided to rectify this and thus my friends made me watch the extended edition of The Fellowship of the Ring. I cannot remember the last time I saw the theatrical version of this film. I tend to skip it and go straight for The Two Towers and The Return of the King, but even for those two films it must have been quite some time since I last saw them in full. In my memory, Fellowship's CGI and other effects were far more convincing. Like, it is still amazing what this film was able to do 20 years ago, but for some reason my nostalgic brain thought the gap with the cutting edge of VFX today was far smaller than it actually is. There is a lot of material in there which reminds me off cut scenes in videogames, which was an unpleasant confrontation with reality. For the rest, I wasn't very impressed with the extra material. My friends swear that it is worth the extra time investment in the latter two films, but when I see Fellowship again, I'm pretty sure I'll end up reverting to the theatrical cut again (my apologies for the heresy). I am curious about the other two instalments however. Not sure when I'll get around to it, but eventually I'll see the extended editions for the other two films as well. That is far more energetic indeed, thanks for sharing. He probably is, although I do still prefer Branagh's version to his reading :p

I'm waiting for the MiB to wipe my memory. There is one scene you have to see (spoiler about a character appearance, so don't click on it if you don't want to know)

There was. Not as good as in Branagh's version, but in general I thought it was a good effort on the musical front

Not exactly a movie, but I went to see the National Theatre's Henry V starring Kit Harrington. I gave this format a chance a few months ago when I went to see Emilia Clarke in the Sea Gull. Back then I was very pleasantly surprised by the experience of watching that play in a movie theatre. Not as good as the real thing perhaps, but a good ersatz experience if you are unable to go to London physically. Since that one was so enjoyable, I decided to give Henry V a shot. I like certain parts of the the play a lot and I have a great fondness for some of the earlier adaptations (particularly the Kenneth Branagh film from 1989). This version just pales by comparison unfortunately. It transposes the play to a modern setting, a thing I tend not to like and it didn't manage to win me over. It was rather pedestrianly done, apart from some choice pieces of music and a nice décor evoking the English flag. The worst part however, was Kit Harrington. As an actor he is so utterly devoid of charisma that he just is not credible as Henry V. Compare his boring, dead-eyed delivery of the St. Crispin's day speech with the soaring, twinkle-in-the-eye-madness that is present in Branagh's rendition. Who could be inspired by such a king? When Branagh does it, you feel like you want to take up arms yourself and go wreak havoc on the flower of French chivalry. With Harrington's version on the other hand, I felt like I wanted to slink out of the theatre and desert into the night.

To paraphrase Vin Diesel in F&F: Good to hear, I hope Puss in Boots 2 stays around for a bit. It was unexpectedly great EEAAO deserves all the love that is thrown at it, so I was happy to read that Even if Top Gun 2 picks up no awards, it's still a roaring success. Something you fed, ever just so slightly, by watching it on the airplane. So in a way, the triumph of Top Gun 2 is also partly a story of your triumph. You and Tom Cruise did this together I think that if you looked deep enough in your heart, you would find there is room for more than one trench run set piece in there

Can I be the one to tell @Tywin et al. how sad Tom Cruise feels about the lesson the night after Top Gun 2 got 6 oscar nominations? So you all hate Star Wars (the original) as well?

The original Top Gun is a classic. An artefact of big hair, big jets and 'Murica. If we ever launch another Voyager mission, we should replace the Golden Record with a blu-ray of Top Gun The bolded would have been a crime. Best IMAX experience I have ever had. I can't imagine how much you lose by watching that at home.

I do wonder what happens when you correct for both costs and for the elevated ticket prizes. When I paid my tickets for Avatar I did have to look twice before I believed just how much more the tickets cost compared to TG:M in IMAX. Especially because Avatar probably has far more people choosing the most expensive option to view the film. That is probably offset by how much it cost to make these films though. Where does it stand profitwise v. its revenues. Hey, marines don't die, they just go to hell to regroup. Which is kind of what earth in the Avatar universe is nowadays