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Watch Watched Watching: Indie Art Cinema Wave #__?


TheLastWolf

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23 hours ago, IFR said:

"Christopher Nolan Bombshell: Director Talking To Multiple Studios On Film He’ll Direct About J. Robert Oppenheimer & Development Of The A-Bomb In WWII"

I'm interested to see what he does with this, but there's already a pretty decent version of that film in Fat Man and Little Boy. Apparently they were convinced they had a best picture nominee on their hands. Not so much, but I liked it a lot.

There was also a PBS series called Oppenhiemer from the early '80's that's excellent. Partly because it also covers Oppenheimers subsequent fall from grace after the war. 

On 9/9/2021 at 8:14 PM, Tywin et al. said:

I also watched Once Upon a Time in America over the weekend. It's a fringe top five gangster film, but I like it more than just about anything other than The Godfather and Goodfellas. It's a much more brutal film though, and its gritty realness probably is an accurate reflection of organized crime in the early 20th century. Highly recommend it, but it has to come with a massive trigger warning.

Talk about directors cuts. Leone's original cut was 6 hours and he wanted to release it as two films. He then edited that down to 4.5 hours. The European cut was 3h 49m, which I think is the one on Netflix right now. The original American release was 139 minutes and the cuts were done without Leone's involvement. 

Scorsese was trying to do a restoration of the 4.5 hour version, but supposedly there are rights issues with the deleted scenes(?). I don't know what the status of that is.

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I rewatched The Matrix Trilogy. I haven't seen any of those films in years. The first films wasn't as clever as I remember. The other two films were better than I remember. Some subtle bits of dialogue that had more meaning than I realized at the time. All in all, a pretty strong trilogy. I'm excited for the new film.

Also: The bullet time stuff has gotten a bit gimmicky, but overall great cinematography and surprisingly timeless VFX. Plus actual physical sets and miniatures.

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Caught British 60's movie If on tv last night. Its something I've always been told is good, but get it mixed up with Ray Winstone movie Scum.

Blew me away quite quickly though. Apparently this is the movie that got Malcom McDowell the role in Clockwork Orange, and you can completely see why. His energy is incredible and there is something so theatric about the movie that I couldn't stop watching. 

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7 hours ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Talk about directors cuts. Leone's original cut was 6 hours and he wanted to release it as two films. He then edited that down to 4.5 hours. The European cut was 3h 49m, which I think is the one on Netflix right now. The original American release was 139 minutes and the cuts were done without Leone's involvement. 

Scorsese was trying to do a restoration of the 4.5 hour version, but supposedly there are rights issues with the deleted scenes(?). I don't know what the status of that is.

 

I can't even imagine what was to be included in a six hour cut. More Joe Pesci I hope! But yes, if you're going to watch this, you have to see the near 4 hour cut. The American version literally broke Sergio Leone's heart and he never made another film after seeing it.

And I appear to have overlooked something. I was going to tell @Ran that he next needs to watch Once Upon a Time in the West, an absolutely amazing film, but I didn't realize there was a film wedged between the two that was meant to represent a trilogy. I'm going to have to check out Duck, You Sucker! 

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27 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

that he next needs to watch Once Upon a Time in the West, an absolutely amazing film,

It is, indeed, terrific. Henry Fonda playing a villain was revelatory. 

Duck, You Sucker! aka Once Upon a Time ... the Revolution, is a hard one to get ahold of out here. Not being streamed anywhere. I'll have to poke around.

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8 hours ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

I'm interested to see what he does with this, but there's already a pretty decent version of that film in Fat Man and Little Boy. Apparently they were convinced they had a best picture nominee on their hands. Not so much, but I liked it a lot.

There was also a PBS series called Oppenhiemer from the early '80's that's excellent. Partly because it also covers Oppenheimers subsequent fall from grace after the war. 

I definitely will watch those. I did read the Wikipedia summary of Fatman and Little Boy. Interesting that it is taking the perspective of Groves. The artistic liberties taken has me nervous, but I'll consume any material regarding the Manhattan Project.

And even with existing material, that was such a fascinating period and Oppenheimer such a fascinating character that there's plenty of room for other takes, particularly from talented storytellers like Nolan.

I seriously encourage even people who don't like nonfiction to read The Making of the Atomic Bomb, Dark Sun, and The American Prometheous. All very accessible, absolutely gripping books. There's also a great book on Enrico Fermi called The Pope of Physics, which is highly entertaining. Such an extraordinary period.

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32 minutes ago, DMC said:

On Nolan and the Oppenheimer rumors, be interested to hear more details.  There could be a big difference between an Oppenheimer biopic and a Manhattan Project-centered..project.

Absolutely. There are so many ways Nolan could go with this. I wish that he was willing to do a miniseries due to the breadth of the subject. I wish someone would just make a series that adapted the Rhodes' book, covering the early physics and personalities that developed the physics, going through the paranoia of Germany's potential nuclear program and America's response in the creation of the Manhattan Project, and then culminating with the bombing of Japan. There's a lot of high drama there, and HBO's Chernobyl demonstrated that you can build a lot of tension around the fear of radiation (although Chernobyl was somewhat misleading in how it handled aspects of radiation, but it was still mostly accurate and an awesome miniseries).

Regardless, I am curious how the movie will turn out.

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3 hours ago, Heartofice said:

Caught British 60's movie If on tv last night. Its something I've always been told is good, but get it mixed up with Ray Winstone movie Scum.

Blew me away quite quickly though. Apparently this is the movie that got Malcom McDowell the role in Clockwork Orange, and you can completely see why. His energy is incredible and there is something so theatric about the movie that I couldn't stop watching. 

If... was definitely the movie role that made Kubrick want Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange. BTW, there is no hidden meaning in the film switching from colour to b+w. It drove me crazy trying to figure this out but it turns out that Lindsay Anderson simply ran out of money and had to go to cheaper b+w film stock. There is a sequel, of sorts, with Malcolm McDowell  again playing MickTravis. It also has a very young Helen Mirren and a soundtrack by Alan Price.

With these 3 movies I have been a lifelong member of the Malcolm McDowell fan club. I think I have watched each of these movies at least 5 or 6 times.  Which was why I had to see Caligula.

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2 minutes ago, maarsen said:

If... was definitely the movie role that made Kubrick want Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange. BTW, there is no hidden meaning in the film switching from colour to b+w. It drove me crazy trying to figure this out but it turns out that Lindsay Anderson simply ran out of money and had to go to cheaper b+w film stock. There is a sequel, of sorts, with Malcolm McDowell  again playing MickTravis. It also has a very young Helen Mirren and a soundtrack by Alan Price.

With these 3 movies I have been a lifelong member of the Malcolm McDowell fan club. I think I have watched each of these movies at least 5 or 6 times.  Which was why I had to see Caligula.

I did a bit of reading up after watching, and yeah think you are right about the  black and white thing. I was trying to work out if there was any commonality between those scenes but there isn’t. 
 

It’s a very strange movie, hard to tell what is real and what is pure fantasy, and actually I don’t think the film cares. It’s all very avant garde. 
 

Did occur to me that it is absolutely not a movie that could be made now, even if many of the themes seem current, whilst still clearly a product of it’s time. 
 

Also apparently part of a loose trilogy of movies btw.

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1 minute ago, Heartofice said:

I did a bit of reading up after watching, and yeah think you are right about the  black and white thing. I was trying to work out if there was any commonality between those scenes but there isn’t. 
 

It’s a very strange movie, hard to tell what is real and what is pure fantasy, and actually I don’t think the film cares. It’s all very avant garde. 
 

Did occur to me that it is absolutely not a movie that could be made now, even if many of the themes seem current, whilst still clearly a product of it’s time. 
 

Also apparently part of a loose trilogy of movies btw.

If.. was the quintessential 60s movie. I grew up in the 60s and it hit every chord for those of us caught up in youthful rebellion during that time.

"Run! Run through the halls!"

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2 hours ago, Ran said:

It is, indeed, terrific. Henry Fonda playing a villain was revelatory. 

It's the only time he did that, right?

Quote

Duck, You Sucker! aka Once Upon a Time ... the Revolution, is a hard one to get ahold of out here. Not being streamed anywhere. I'll have to poke around.

It's streaming on Prime here. I'll check it out sometime after the tennis match later toda and report back. 

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41 minutes ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

She was coming on to you.

All my life people have been telling me I look like famous actors who look nothing alike.

JTT when I was younger was probably the most common one. 

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Watched Wong Kar-wai's 2046. Some years back, after praising In the Mood for Love on FB, I was advised not to bother with this one, and I heeded it at the time. But after my most recent rewatch, I finally dove in. I'm glad I did.

2046 is a very interesting, loose sequel to In the Mood for Love, showing what one might call a possible future that Chow might have experienced after the events of that film. We discover that he has shifted into writing fiction -- cheap erotica, science fiction, and the occasional kung fu adventure as he did with Su -- and has become a bitter, cynical womanizer, constantly shadowed by the relationship that never came to be with Mrs. Su. The narrative is pretty fascinating, opening with his in-progress story titled "2047" (a very important date for Hong Kong cinema, and Hong Kong in general, as seen from that time -- it's when the independence of Hong Kong is officially supposed to end; and obviously, 2046 is the last year of freedom...), which is inspired by his own life and by events we'll find he's been witness or party to in the years since he left Singapore to return to Hong Kong.

 

The rest plays out as we skip between different vignettes of dramas -- his run in with an old fling from Singapore, his witnessing a thwarted love affair between the apartment owner's eldest daughter and a Japanese man, his rendevous with a beautiful cabaret girl (played by the stunning Zhang Ziyi), his involvement with a woman gambler who helps get him to Hong Kong -- and all of it reflects on Chow's dissolution into chasing after that shadow of the past while turning away and refusing the offers of the present. It's a mature and deep way to push the character who had been so kind and mild in In the Mood for Love. I know that this approach to the narrative, and especially Chow's coldness and inscrutability in some of the arcs, displeased early critics, but I felt quite differently about it.

All that said, don't come into it expecting something as sensual or beautiful as In the Mood for Love. Christopher Doyle does return for the cinematography, but Mark Lee Ping Bin doesn't, and Wong Kar-wai seems uninterested in capturing exactly the same vibe or style. So the long, lingering slow motion shots, the characters artfully framed and isolated, mostly doesn't happen. It has an eclectic and interesting score, with new pieces from Shigeru Umebayashi (of "Yumeiji's Theme" fame) and another of adapted pieces of music.

Now to see if the first film in the "trilogy" following men chasing after a woman named Su Lizhen, Days of Being Wild, is available somewhere.... otherwise, there's a few other Wong Kar-wai films that I can get access to easily that I may watch first.

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On 9/7/2021 at 1:48 AM, Tywin et al. said:

For whatever reason sometimes I think The Edge (1996) is titled The Game. Both movies are really enjoyable with some similarities despite totally different settings. 

Ok I had to search this one out for a re-watch. I saw this, the one time, back in the old millennium, though I can't recall of any similarities with The Game - however, my recollection of watching it back then was positive. It holds up really well after all these years, great re-watch, really enjoyed it. Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin are exceedingly good, helped by David Mamet's dialogue. I'm reminded of what Mamet gave Baldwin to work with in Glengarry Glen Ross and he laps it up again here. I'm pleased that Bart the Bear was prominently acknowledged in the credits, his performance was absolutely menacing. This is by far director Lee Tamahori's best Hollywood work.
    

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13 hours ago, Ran said:

Duck, You Sucker! aka Once Upon a Time ... the Revolution, is a hard one to get ahold of out here. Not being streamed anywhere. I'll have to poke around.

It's also known as A Fistful of Dynamite. 

Have you seen this before? Because damn this is a brutal film. 

 

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4 hours ago, ithanos said:

Ok I had to search this one out for a re-watch. I saw this, the one time, back in the old millennium, though I can't recall of any similarities with The Game - however, my recollection of watching it back then was positive. It holds up really well after all these years, great re-watch, really enjoyed it. Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin are exceedingly good, helped by David Mamet's dialogue. I'm reminded of what Mamet gave Baldwin to work with in Glengarry Glen Ross and he laps it up again here. I'm pleased that Bart the Bear was prominently acknowledged in the credits, his performance was absolutely menacing. This is by far director Lee Tamahori's best Hollywood work.
    

Follow it up with The Ghost and the Darkness. 

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