Watched, Watched, Watching: Saltier Things Part One

[polishgenius]

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

Maybe saying it's insanely overrated is a bit of a take, but I don't think it holds up today for general audiences. I watched it recently and liked it a lot while recognizing it's gross. Every film student should see it. I wouldn't say the same about causal movie fans. 

Is it any more gross than any other film about horrible people doing uncomfortable things? Like is there a significant difference in that respect between it and say Taxi Driver or Scarface or Nightcrawler?

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

4 hours ago, polishgenius said:

Is it any more gross than any other film about horrible people doing uncomfortable things? Like is there a significant difference in that respect between it and say Taxi Driver or Scarface or Nightcrawler?

I guess I'd argue Scarface is a lot of fun. I wouldn't say the same about Taxi Driver though it's the better film. 

[dbunting]

9 hours ago, DMC said:

Well, that was what I was expecting to get attacked for!

Gotta hand it to ya you caught me off guard.

You have to expect to get grief when you call FNL a sitcom. I mean, the latter seasons were laughably bad, but that doesn't make it a sitcom!

[Zorral]

Spoiler

After Ruby’s death

that walk of Tommy’s through Birmingham – accompanied by a black dog.  Churchill’s “black dog” of depression, is the immediate observation.  Brilliant. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

To infinity – actually, let’s go back: why can film franchises no longer look to the future?
Everywhere you look, Hollywood’s biggest science-fiction, fantasy and action franchises have stopped exploring uncharted territory, and put themselves into reverse gear

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2022/jun/15/hollywood-film-franchises-fictional-histories-lightyear

Quote

 

.... The Toy Story series is stranded in a similar sort of way. One of the most touching aspects of the other films is that they show time slipping past. Andy grows up, leaves home, and puts away childish things, whereupon any viewer who’s ever had a child or been a child bursts into tears. Lightyear scraps all of that poignancy and profundity. By retreating to when Andy was six years old, it lets us forget that, by now, he’d probably have kids of his own. But it isn’t just the Toy Story team that’s pressing the rewind button. Everywhere you look, Hollywood’s biggest science-fiction, fantasy and action franchises have stopped exploring uncharted territory, and put themselves into reverse gear.

Instead of another Toy Story film, we have a nostalgic trip back to Andy’s childhood viewing. Instead of another Despicable Me, we have a flashback to Gru’s childhood, too, in next month’s Minions: The Rise of Gru. Instead of a Star Wars episode recounting Rey, Finn, and Poe’s further adventures in a galaxy far, far away, we have several TV series (The Mandalorian, The Book of Boba Fett, Obi-Wan Kenobi) set before The Force Awakens. And instead of a film about a middle-aged Harry Potter, we have the Fantastic Beasts spin-offs, which revisit those halcyon days when Dumbledore wore a tweed suit and not a dress. The pop-culture river is full of boats beating on against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past. ....

 

[Nictarion]

7 hours ago, dbunting said:

You have to expect to get grief when you call FNL a sitcom. I mean, the latter seasons were laughably bad, but that doesn't make it a sitcom!

I liked the Michael B. Jordan seasons. 

[dbunting]

26 minutes ago, Nictarion said:

I liked the Michael B. Jordan seasons. 

So did my then teenage daughter. She loves the show and has watched it a few times though. My wife and I used to watch it, but it lost me in S2 or S3.

For her its FNL, The Office and Greys Anatomy.

[polishgenius]

Everything, Everywhere, All at Once. What a great fucking movie. I guess 2022 is just the time for films that are completely unapologetically about being fun and awesome. I can't believe I've seen this, Top Gun Maverick, and RRR within like a month of each other. 

[briantw]

9 hours ago, dbunting said:

You have to expect to get grief when you call FNL a sitcom. I mean, the latter seasons were laughably bad, but that doesn't make it a sitcom!

I mean, aside from the subplot where Landry and Tyra kill that dude, which is terrible and dumb, I thought the show stayed pretty good throughout.  The first season was the best, though.

Also, kind of crazy that, of all the "kids" on that show, the guy who played Landry went on to be probably the second most successful actor after Michael B Jordan.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

Finished Gaslit.

Great series. Reminded me why Julia Roberts is Julia Roberts. Shea Whigham as G. Gordon Liddy is a goddamn revelation.

Recommend.

[Mexal]

13 hours ago, polishgenius said:

Everything, Everywhere, All at Once. What a great fucking movie. I guess 2022 is just the time for films that are completely unapologetically about being fun and awesome. I can't believe I've seen this, Top Gun Maverick, and RRR within like a month of each other. 

We also watched this the other night and it was fucking fantastic. 

RRR was that good? I'll have to check it out.

[RumHam]

12 hours ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Shea Whigham as G. Gordon Liddy is a goddamn revelation.

Recommend.

I haven't seen this yet, but I love him. Even when the role is small he always does a great job.

[Luzifer's right hand]

I just finished the first season of Severance.

Good stuff.

I'm really looking forward to season 2.

 

 

[Veltigar]

Watched a couple of movies on the plane, most of which were terrible. I watched the original Tron and I don't get why this is a cult classic, it was painfully dull, even at 02.00 a.m. on a Transatlantic flight. I didn't think the visuals were all that great, nor the performances. I can't really say anything positive about it, but it has been a couple of weeks since I last saw it.

Next up is Days of Thunder, the race extravaganza that proved that Tom Cruise, Tony Scott and Bruckheimer/Simpsons do not have a magic touch. I'm not sure what went wrong here since these people were involved and there was a great supporting cast to work with.

I guess cars and rednecks are just inherently less exciting than jets and naval aviators or perhaps the universe needed to balance itself by creating this pile of dogshit to offset Top Gun's awesomeness (a little bit like we had to suffer a global pandemic in order to deserve Top Gun 2). Safe to say, if you have never seen it, I envy you as the film fails on pretty much every level. The characters are all obnoxious, the plot makes no sense and the action is just not memorable in the slightest.

The final film I watched on the way back was The Eagle. I had seen it before, but I just wanted to have a fun swords & sandal movie to relax with. It's not a film you have to go out of your way to watch, but all in all I was very happy to revisit it. I'm a bit biased towards films like this and there are strong Last of the Mohicans and 13th Warrior vibes in this one for me, but I think they do a pretty good job all in all. The action scenes are exciting, Jamie Bell and Channing Tatum work well together and they sort of succeed in allowing you to sympathize with individual characters while emphasizing just how horrible the cultures they are coming from really are.

When I got back I also watched some series. The first four episodes of The Boys were a lot of fun. The story is insane but they keep things moving forward at a brisk pace, which makes for some good brainless TV. Especially fronted by these excellent actors. The guy playing Homelander really is the Starr of this show for me.

Also slowly caught up with Kenobi. I'm looking forward to the finale for that one. I'm a little bit hazy/worried on how this fits in the timeline and there are a lot glaring plot holes in it where the writers have to resort to dumbing down the Empire considerably for the characters to have a fighting chance, but I can't help but like it. Ewan McGregor is a likeable presence and the show has some good visuals so far. I'm curious to see whether they can stick the landing, but so far I'd say it is my favorite SW property in years.

On 6/16/2022 at 3:43 AM, briantw said:

I mean, aside from the subplot where Landry and Tyra kill that dude, which is terrible and dumb, I thought the show stayed pretty good throughout.  The first season was the best, though.

Also, kind of crazy that, of all the "kids" on that show, the guy who played Landry went on to be probably the second most successful actor after Michael B Jordan.

Totally agree. I went through it during the first months of the pandemic for the first time and seeing it discussed here kind of makes me want to revisit season one. The latter seasons are a step down, but with the exception of that particular plot point it never gets itself lost in the weeds I would say.

[dbunting]

1 hour ago, Veltigar said:

Next up is Days of Thunder, the race extravaganza that proved that

 

When I got back I also watched some series. The first four episodes of The Boys were a lot of fun. The story is insane but they keep .

Also slowly caught up with Kenobi. I'm looking forward to the finale for that one. I'm a little bit hazy/worried on how this fits in the 

Totally agree. I went through it during the first months of the pandemic for the first time and seeing it discussed here kind of makes me want to revisit season one. The latter seasons are a step down, but with the exception of that particular plot point it never gets itself lost in the weeds I would say.

Assume you cant sleep on planes either? When I made the trips across I was the same way, watched movies there and back both times! The trip there was brutal the first time. We laid over in Amsterdam for like 6 hours before flying to Stockholm Sweden. Then we stayed up all day touring the city since it was our only free day there, went to the Vasa museum. 

Days of Thunder, I remember liking this when it came out, but have never seen it since then so it may suck

The Boys, totally agree with all points

Kenobi..I like it enough but the last episode did some really dumb things, they really need to wrap it up well. I still like The Mandalorian more.

Friday night lights, I stopped watching after the whole killing happened, just set me off the show entirely. Wife and daughter both watched it all the way through and loved it.

[Ran]

2 hours ago, Veltigar said:

even at 02.00 a.m. on a Transatlantic flight

I feel like the time and setting you chose was not optimally conducive! I think you're literally 40 years from when the visual effects were completely unprecedented and jaw-dropping (the reason they weren't nominated for an Oscar for VFX? The Academy reacted viscerally against the computer-generated effects and refused to acknowledge it as real visual effects), and IMO the design of the electronic world and vehicles are still very strong.

There's also the incredible electronic score by pioneer Wendy Carlos.

It's absolutely true that its pace and story are kind of middling. It's not a fantastic film script, and the performances feel kind of empty most of the time (no doubt in part due to the utter weirdness, for them, of the sets they were working on and the way they looked, and having to try and imagine seeing effects that weren't right there in front of them).

 

 

[Iskaral Pust]

Finished Moon Knight, which we enjoyed, even if the second half of the season became a lot like Legion.  Oscar Isaac was very good.  My wife only remembers him from Star Wars and was impressed by how good he was this time.  (Considering she’s a big fan of the SW sequels, I think that just shows how poor the writing and characterization was).

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

Spiderhead:

 

 

[DireWolfSpirit]

On 6/14/2022 at 1:22 PM, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

61* is really good. 

As well as 42, We are Marshall, Brian's Song, Rocky, Invictus, Chariots of Fire, Rush, Ali, Cobb, Field of Dreams, A League of Their Own, Hoosiers, Love and a Basketball, Any Given Sunday, and like a hundred other "sports" movies.

[Kalbear]

Finally got to see everything everywhere all at once. It lives up to and surpasses all expectations. It should win best picture and all the awards. Probably for like 5 years running. 

[Ran]

Been awhile since I've updated. Not too many movies seen, though I've started Zhang Yimou's To Live (aka Huo zhe) after having enjoyed Raise the Red Lantern and then later his two gorgeous wuxia films Hero and House of Flying Daggers. It's the story of a wealthy compulsive gambler, Fugui, and his family, told across decades beginning in the 1940s, the tremendous changes brought by the communist revolution very much a focus on the film but foregrounding at all times the actual human experience and the toll it had. 

I also did start the remake of Father of the Bride, transposed to a Cuban-American family based in Miami and starring Andy García (no relation!) and Gloria Estefan (also no relation, but my mother knew her in high school!) but ... twenty minutes or so of very gentle, low-hanging-fruit humor about Cuban families was enough. It lacks all the energy of the 1991 version with Steve Martin, and feels so falsely glossy that it fails to match the Spencer Tracy - Joan Bennett - Elizabeth Taylor original from 1950.

Mostly been watching TV series, namely the new seasons of The Boys and For All Mankind. Hacks recently finished in a way that felt like a series finale, but a day or two ago it was announced it was getting a third season. This season was very enjoyable in a low-key way, though there were a couple of plot threads that hung around in stasis for a loong time until they resolved which felt odd. I'm guessing they were hoping for a promise of a third season until quite late and decided to just wrap things up when it wasn't forthcoming. And Barry ended this past weekend and it was a strong entry into a show that's growing increasingly dark. The way it ends, will be curious to see where the next season goes...

Also started going through the Attenborough Prehistoric Planet. Amazing where TV CGI has gotten, and quite neat to see some of the most recent understandings of dinosaur appearance and behavior. (At the same time, re-watched a clip from Jurassic Park, and the VFX still holds up very well in places).