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Zorral

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Finished Only murders in the building tonight.
It was good. A little light-hearted whodunnit like the trailer implied. Nothing fancy or pretentious, just a little comedy/mystery. A limited cast, good acting (Steve Martin and John R. Hoffman are excellent - Selena Gomez feels more generic).

It was refreshing to step away from huge franchises and/or big budgets for a bit, because the expectations are so much lower.

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I had accidentally posted this in the Upcoming thread:

The final episode of OMITB was a bit of a mixed bag for me, but mostly positive.

Spoiler

I was hoping we'd get one final twist wrt the murderer, but alas. bassoon lady actress sold it well.

A very nice showcase for Steve Martin's comedic shtick.

Fun fact, that scene from the trailer that had everyone guessing was just setup for the next case... And nice job of lampshading that there are some "loose ends" left hanging. (Not to mention some leaps of logic, like: Wasn't it Jan herself who suggested to the podcast crew to look elsewhere for the second murder, instead of putting it on the Dimas duo?

And why was Bunny wearing podcast merch, was she a closeted fan?! Speaking of which, those superfans sure looked ecstatic when their heroes were handcuffed, lol.

I assume that now-grown-up Lucy will be the replacement for Gomez, which can only help in the acting department.

All in all I'm looking forward to season 2.

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Amazingly found enough free time to watch two films in the past week, Five Fingers for Marseilles and The Forgotten Battle. The former was an interesting South African take on the Western genre with the usual tropes. Absolutely breathtaking landscapes. The latter is a Dutch film on the Battle of the Scheldt with particular emphasis on the Battle of the Walcheren Causeway.

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Vigil was a decent show, I felt entertained. Thought the script was weaker in the more personal scenes. Suranne Jones and most other actors were very good. Rose Leslie... sorry, but I wasn't buying her as a detective. I really like RL, I just don't think she's a very good actress.

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I saw The Last Duel night before last.  I went in expecting it to be mediocre and it surpassed those expectations.  I actually liked it fairly well.  The performances were good with Comer leading the pack pretty easily but Driver was also good as expected.  Everyone was good enough.  Damon was as expected and a bit more...brutish than usual while still being himself.  Affleck was pretty good as the bored-odd-corrupt lord of the land and his blond hair looked fine and added to the noble-born-are-eccentric style.  So I thought the cast did a good job.  I was looking forward to stark, dismal cinematography and it delivered on that account.  Most scenes look dark or cold or both.  The music was great I thought, really great.  Overall I really enjoyed it more than I thought I would.  We'll ignore that this was the first movie I have seen in a real theater since Joker in the Cinerama before Covid attacked.

 

    

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In For A Murder - W Jak Morderstwo in Polish (2021); Netfix Poland Original.

Quote

It revolves around a murder that takes place in a small town in Poland and Magda, a resident in the neighbourhood takes it upon her to investigate the case and solve the murder. However, when the case draws back to some past incidents, the events that follow seem to get complicated.

An updated, Polish Agatha Christie given the village murder screen treatment we know so well by now from Brit tv, like Midsomer Murders etc. and by now later updates such as the Daniel Craig Knives Out.   We even begin with long tracking shots of a lovely youngish blonde woman, riding a bicycle on lovely wooded tracks, getting lovely veg and fruit and honey from the street market, returning home to cute kids in a lovely house. But the husband, nope, not so much, but one's friends since childhood, now that's another matter.. 

I enjoyed this very much, not least because of its location, which isn't either England or the US,

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Just watched Passengers (2016). Liked the core concept, hated the Hollywood cheese ladled on top of it in revolting amounts. If the second half hadn't been a romance, it would have been a much better film. I want to see the version where everything was orchestrated by robot barman Michael Sheen for kicks. 

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I was not kidding. Dear me, it’s finally over. Why did I watch this? What did I even watch? (Midnight Mass, for the record) It was so confusing and unsettling and it felt so wrong. I really wanted to give it a chance and look at it as abstract art and find the meaning, because there was obviously intention and meaning behind every last detail and element, they just never really formed into one theme or conclusion or message. I read reviews and critiques but nothing truly helped me understand, it was just more guesses. And I hate to settle for such conclusions but it really seems like the kind of overwritten story which nobody, including the author, really knows what it’s trying to say because it’s trying to say so many paradoxical things in so many paradoxical ways.
 

The acting was great, the dialogue was great, the concept was… truly creative in a way that’s almost frightening to me, but still impressively, admirably creative. I don’t know how you come up with stuff like that. I also don’t know if you should, but the fact that you do is definitely mindwork to applaud. The whole thing is cinematographically stunning, every shot is beautiful. If you take a pair of scissors and cut out certain lines of thought and certain sequences, they are prime drama. And somehow, on the whole, it still falls apart. 

So here is my major issue with this production (there are minor ones as well): 

The story doesn’t set up it’s own world, rules and boundaries. (Yes I understand that this can be explained away as a creative choice that reinforces the blind belief that’s attributed to the dark side of religion, and the show expects you to follow wherever it leads on the same principle as religious doctrine does. But let’s be real that’s not how a narrative works and it’s lazy and self-serving convenience for the script and I don’t care that that’s a reference to religion too. This is a story, it needs to be constructed as a story and it isn’t)

Spoiler

General rules: HOW does one become a vampire? Do you need to be consciously revived? Some did, some didn’t. If so HOW? Does the person need to drink a vampire’s blood or it’s enough if one drinks from the victim’s blood (this is what we see happen to Annie yet she still wakes up) or does it just happen automatically when the main vampire is around? Does it make a difference how one’s killed? Why does the sunlight work on vampires but not fire? What of the usual holy water or stake trope? They don’t have to work but you have explain why they don’t, because the sunlight is a trope too, so you need to set which trope works in your story and why and which doesn’t and why. I could go on. 

And this story claims to be set in the real world in real time, but very conveniently ignores that the real world in real time has a concept of blood sucking horror creatures and spits out at least one entertainment production about them every damn year. It’s a pop culture element. It doesn’t even have to be real time, even 50 years ago, people will have heard of Nosferatu and Count Dracula. Your story needs to deal with this if it claims to be set in the real world. Internet. Please don’t ignore the existence of the internet, or you know, just human memory that would remember what a priest looked like 30 years ago. Please at least hint at how the world hasn’t picked up the story of the miracle island? 

And if you are going to stretch as far as to mix religious drama and horror WITH sci-fi, you need to show more than “it’d aggressively attack a fetus” - would it? How? Would it erase its existence like the mainland doctor claimed? Why? I read a review that claimed that the thing was supposed to have overt (whatever you say at this point) references to the covid pandemic. This may point to why the Semmelweis example was cherry picked, but it’s another damn reason why you need scientific explanations for the shit you pull in your story. 

Furthermore:
Riley’s personal story gets rolled up into the religious horror fiction without a real resolution. 

Unresolved plotlines and plot holes  

Spoiler

The cats, the missing drug dealer, the poison cans, the medical work, the power, means of communication, religion representation, all wood constructions etc

I understand that Christianity and death with both their dark and light sides make a vast enough topic especially if packed with individual stories and horror fiction. So why would you kinda mix Islam into it but not really and why would you kinda mix science and infections into it but not really. 

And you know what, the linking of horror and religious drama was way too literal and it didn’t lift either genre, they pulled each other down. The fantastic horror elements couldn’t entertain because they were weighed down by the heavy social commentary and religious topics. And the heavy stuff couldn’t sink in because it was belittled by the horror fiction. 

It was just way too much. Way way too much. 

 

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I watched the first 3 episodes of Cowboy Bebop since it's free on Tubi, I had questions after the live action trailer and it piqued my interest back in my college days but had never gotten around to it. About what I expected: not really a comedy but a slow burn cartoon fit for a late night of Adult Swim TV. I will continue. The trailer in comparison seems too....  disco-ey (beboppy?) to me and I don't quite get the cut frame thing the live action version has going on. Also, John Cho as Spike doesn't seem quite right for me but that's probably too premature since its only one trailer for the movie and 3 episodes for the show.

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9 hours ago, RhaenysBee said:

snip

 

Now I've had a bit of time with it, I think Midnight Mass might be my favourite show of the year. Big statement but it seems to have really stuck with me and ticked a lot of the boxes that I tend to enjoy.

I don't think I agree with your arguments that there was too much, I don't agree at all. In fact the show was pretty clear what it was talking about, it has two main themes, religious faith and death and those two are pretty interconnected. A good horror or genre movie or show will tap into something we all relate to and add a horrific element to spice it up, and Midnight Mass did that really well.

 

Spoiler

It sounds a bit like you want everything put on a plate for you when it comes to vampires. Honestly there was no need to over explain the rules here, the show works perfectly well without everything being laid out neatly. One of my biggest bugbears is when movies feel the need to just tell me exactly how everything works, rather than leave an element of mystery and letting me work it out.

So for instance, nobody says the word vampire in the show. Its your interpretation that these are vampires. So you are using your own back knowledge to fill in the blanks. But it seems pretty clear from the show that religious symbols have no effect on the 'angel' or on 'vampires'. The priest spends his days in a church, touching crosses etc. Work it out. 

It also adds to the idea that god isn't there, that this is something outside of religion but being given a religious meaning by people looking to believe. That is maybe one of the most powerful and interesting ideas in the show.


Honestly, I think you are just over thinking it, trying to add scientific reason to something that doesn't need it. Would the vampire blood attack a fetus and revert the body back to its original state? Yeah maybe it would. I think that part of the show worked perfectly.


Where I do agree with you, is that it was a little unclear about who would come back from the dead and who wouldn't, and what would need to happen, because right at the end it seems like if you just get bitten that is enough but it might be thats not true if enough of you is eaten
 

As for the other bits you said were unresolved:
 

Spoiler

What about the cats? the angel ate them. They washed up on the shore. It was obvious.
What about the missing drug dealer? Like why didn't he come back? Maybe because the angel ate him.
What about the poison cans? 
I'm not sure what you are referring to with all the other points. 

So really, each to their own, if you aren't in the right frame of mind to take a show on its merits or it isn't something for you then fair enough, but I have to say it feels like you are coming at the show from absolutely the wrong direction. 

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1 hour ago, Heartofice said:

Now I've had a bit of time with it, I think Midnight Mass might be my favourite show of the year. Big statement but it seems to have really stuck with me and ticked a lot of the boxes that I tend to enjoy.

I don't think I agree with your arguments that there was too much, I don't agree at all. In fact the show was pretty clear what it was talking about, it has two main themes, religious faith and death and those two are pretty interconnected. A good horror or genre movie or show will tap into something we all relate to and add a horrific element to spice it up, and Midnight Mass did that really well.

It is indeed a key element for me that I don’t tend to enjoy/understand/appreciate horror as a genre. I can enjoy and appreciate horror elements in fantasy or sci-fi, but horror in itself is probably the farthest from my interests. And mixing it with religion to this level of literal doesn’t sit well with me, which was my starting statement. My mind does recognize and appreciate a lot of great things about the show, but I took no positive emotional impact from the themes or entertainment value from the plot. The message (a part of which I think I understand) didn’t really touch or elevate me because it was dragged down by the horror-like execution. I’m sure the two can strengthen each other when someone enjoys the genre. And I couldn’t enjoy the plot because it didn’t make enough sense for my brain. 

1 hour ago, Heartofice said:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

It sounds a bit like you want everything put on a plate for you when it comes to vampires. Honestly there was no need to over explain the rules here, the show works perfectly well without everything being laid out neatly. One of my biggest bugbears is when movies feel the need to just tell me exactly how everything works, rather than leave an element of mystery and letting me work it out.

So for instance, nobody says the word vampire in the show. Its your interpretation that these are vampires. So you are using your own back knowledge to fill in the blanks. But it seems pretty clear from the show that religious symbols have no effect on the 'angel' or on 'vampires'. The priest spends his days in a church, touching crosses etc. Work it out. 

It also adds to the idea that god isn't there, that this is something outside of religion but being given a religious meaning by people looking to believe. That is maybe one of the most powerful and interesting ideas in the show.


Honestly, I think you are just over thinking it, trying to add scientific reason to something that doesn't need it. Would the vampire blood attack a fetus and revert the body back to its original state? Yeah maybe it would. I think that part of the show worked perfectly.


Where I do agree with you, is that it was a little unclear about who would come back from the dead and who wouldn't, and what would need to happen, because right at the end it seems like if you just get bitten that is enough but it might be thats not true if enough of you is eaten
 

As for the other bits you said were unresolved:
 

Spoiler

That’s kinda because it’s an upright elegant looking nocturnal winged predator that sucks blood and dies from sunlight. If it were a four legged/hairy canine-like nocturnal predator that howls at the moon, my brain would jump to werewolf. If it had floppy ears and a button nose, my brain would jump to rabbit even it ate people’s livers. That’s just how the brain works and the show knew this perfectly well and counted on it, and selected this specific horror element to weave into the religious passages because they played on what the audience knows about both.

As for the scientific explanation, this is a door the show kinda opened for itself when it couldn’t stay away from the blood testing and the virus-infection-epidemic trinity. Which it should have. This is another thing I’m morally not okay with, and I know that’s my personal problem and I know that others may be perfectly okay with it. But my point is, if you are going to talk about iron levels and photophobia and hormone levels and microbes and viruses, instead of well all doctors are on the mainland and we are cut off, then you kinda need to either do it or not. It’s okay both ways, just commit. 

Spoiler

Right, the creature sucked them dry that’s fine, but somehow they all landed in the ocean to be washed up? 
Yes, the creature ate him and on an island with the population of 120, people weren’t looking SEVERAL missing persons. Or I’m sure they were, but off camera? Or it was a message about how the sheriff was not that perfect because he still half-assed his job? Anyway, these are the kind of little issues every film and show has, because no plot is ever airtight, that’s okay, it’s hardly a problem, it’s just nitpicking, it’s not why I didn’t like the show. 

 

 

1 hour ago, Heartofice said:

So really, each to their own, if you aren't in the right frame of mind to take a show on its merits or it isn't something for you then fair enough, but I have to say it feels like you are coming at the show from absolutely the wrong direction. 

I’m certain I don’t have the right frame of mind to enjoy it and it’s my responsibility that I didn’t call quits after three episodes. But I didn’t because I was curious to see where the show was headed. That and the fact that I did spend an hour or two reading up on the show is my defense that I did go out of my way to try to understand and appreciate it and come at it from multiple directions. And that was useful and most interesting. But it didn’t ultimately change my mind about the major issues I had with the show. :dunno: whoever enjoy it, good for them, and I see and respect all the great stuff I listed about the show myself. 

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Season 3 of What We Do In The Shadows is shaping up really well. Episode 2 was one of the funniest ever. Kayvan Novak doing a Matt Berry impersonation whilst wearing the The Cloak of Duplication was simply hilarious. 

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14 minutes ago, Spockydog said:

Season 3 of What We Do In The Shadows is shaping up really well. Episode 2 was one of the funniest ever. Kayvan Novak doing a Matt Berry impersonation whilst wearing the The Cloak of Duplication was simply hilarious. 

How you watching? Can't be arsed to wait for UK release. 

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Just now, BigFatCoward said:

How you watching? Can't be arsed to wait for UK release. 

Get yourself a VPN and follow these instructions:

How to watch HBO Max in the UK

It's not exactly legal, only because HBO Max isn't available in the UK yet. But we have a subscription, we're not stealing anything, and the back catalogue is amazing. I have Veep on all the time.

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7 hours ago, Spockydog said:

Get yourself a VPN and follow these instructions:

How to watch HBO Max in the UK

It's not exactly legal, only because HBO Max isn't available in the UK yet. But we have a subscription, we're not stealing anything, and the back catalogue is amazing. I have Veep on all the time.

What We Do In The Shadows is on HBO Max?  I thought it was only on Hulu (for the FX channel).  I’m waiting until our next swing by Hulu.  We have HBO Max right now (Dune!!) but I haven’t seen the goofy vampires there. 

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