Wa Wa Watching Nothing

[RhaenysBee]

4 hours ago, Zorral said:

other words you came to this production with certain expectations that it wasn't fulfilling because it wasn't the intent of the creators to do so.  It wasn't made as a Poe biopic; he was intended to be a supporting character.

Not even close, sorry  nope, I didn’t come with this expectation, because I had no idea Poe would be in this movie in the first place. I came for the supernatural period crime drama the thumbnail and the title and the algorithm insinuated and it took me 30 minutes to even realize Poe was in it. Then he became the center character who moved the plot, had a romantic sub story, was a hub center, nearly became a victim and eventually solved the crime. This baffles me because the movie isn’t about him. It’s like a Poe fan fiction. To which I would have found it preferable for my taste if it were either a Poe biopic, or a different character rose up as protagonist and Poe remained a 5 minute cameo. Well, the balance of the universe needed me to stumble on a few movies I didn’t like, because I had a lucky  streak with great movies on the previous days. 

[RhaenysBee]

I finished Blonde. It’s the most ponderous, narcissistic, overdone mess I’ve seen in ten years. Andrew Dominik must have never heard the phrase less is more. It’s over-written, over-directed, over-edited, over-acted and overall overwhelming - it’s this sentence, but on the screen and for 3 hours. This is an objectively bad movie and I could fill page after page why. It suffers from a chronic and severe lack of self-awareness, it is neither respectful, nor graceful to Marilyn Monroe’s memory or its own underlying themes. It’s offensively long for no good reason, it can’t keep a plot, it can’t tell a coherent story, it expects you to know Marilyn’s biography at the same time as changing/omitting vital events of it. It’s a visual hodgepodge that does nothing for the atmosphere or the storytelling, half of it is pseudo-artistic garbage that should have landed on the cutting room floor and the other half is still a splintered clutter. The characterization of Marilyn Monroe is a stagnant renter’s beige graph, there are no ups, no downs, the movie and the life it depicts don’t pulsate, it’s a flat line of neurotic misery which kills any chance of tension, investment or you know, just basic interest. Now I don’t claim to know anything about the truth of Marilyn Monroe’s real life, but I can tell you this doesn’t work in a 3 hour long movie and that it’s hella demeaning and disrespectful toward Marilyn. As for the acting, I genuinely believe that Ana de Armas would have the acting range to do justice to playing Monroe if she were given a decent script and direction. What we got instead brings to mind an interview with Emma Thompson in which she recounts the best piece of direction from her career to be “don’t sigh, don’t cry”, or if you must, do it once and with meaning - not for 3 hours straight. And yes I do think that Pam and Tommy was far more intelligent, nuanced, respectful and graceful to the real people and the essence of that story than Blonde and the mainstream criticism of that show was being the opposite, so there’s that for scale. 

Edited October 23, 2023 by RhaenysBee

[dog-days]

11 minutes ago, RhaenysBee said:

I finished Blonde. It’s the most ponderous, narcissistic, overdone mess I’ve seen in ten years. Andrew Dominik must have never heard the phrase less is more. It’s over-written, over-directed, over-edited, over-acted and overall overwhelming - it’s this sentence, but on the screen and for 3 hours. This is an objectively bad movie and I could fill page after page why. It suffers from a chronic and severe lack of self-awareness, it is neither respectful, nor graceful to Marilyn Monroe’s memory or its own underlying themes. It’s offensively long for no good reason, it can’t keep a plot, it can’t tell a coherent story, it expects you to know Marilyn’s biography at the same time as changing/omitting vital events of it. It’s a visual hodgepodge that does nothing for the atmosphere or the storytelling, half of it is pseudo-artistic garbage that should have landed on the cutting room floor and the other half is still a splintered mess. The characterization of Marilyn Monroe is a stagnant renter’s beige graph, there are no ups, no downs, the movie and the life it depicts don’t pulsate, it’s a flat line of neurotic misery which kills any chance of tension, investment or you know, just basic interest. Now I don’t claim to know anything about the truth of Marilyn Monroe’s real life, but I can tell you this doesn’t work in a 3 hour long movie and that it’s hella demeaning and disrespectful toward Marilyn. As for the acting, I genuinely believe that Ana de Armas would have the acting range to do justice to playing Monroe if she were given a decent script and direction. What we got instead brings to mind an interview with Emma Thompson in which she recounts the best piece of direction from her career to be “don’t sigh, don’t cry”, or if you must, do it once and with meaning - not for 3 hours straight. And yes I do think that Pam and Tommy was far more intelligent, nuanced, respectful and graceful to the real people and the essence of that story than Blonde and the mainstream criticism of that show was being the opposite, so there’s that for scale. 

So you wouldn't recommend it, then?

[RhaenysBee]

7 minutes ago, dog-days said:

So you wouldn't recommend it, then?

Nope, whatever else you do with your three hours will be a better choice than this movie. 

[Zorral]

2 hours ago, RhaenysBee said:

Blonde.

I knew better than to watch it.   The things that have been done to that woman which she never ever earned or deserved.

[RhaenysBee]

5 hours ago, Zorral said:

I knew better than to watch it.   The things that have been done to that woman which she never ever earned or deserved.

I want to say I should have read the reviews but there’s a chance they might have prompted me to watch it anyway to see for myself if they were right. Well, if there ever was an ungracious adaptation…

[Ramsay B.]

Some peeps upthread mentioned a Boardwalk Empire rewatch. I had been thinking about it and decided to start again. Figure it’d be my new exercise bike show taking over Succession.

My buddy asked me my thoughts on Succession and if I thought it was top tier. I wouldn’t put it in my personal top tier, but won’t argue against people that would. The acting, writing, production value and all that was amazing. Especially when you compare it to most of the stuff that’s out nowadays. I think it just got a little too repetitive at times. Glad they ended it when they did. 

Edited October 25, 2023 by Ramsay B.

[kissdbyfire]

Started rewatching The Killing and I’m enjoying it. Funny how much I didn’t remember. 
I find it especially curious how I didn’t remember at all how most every character is very unsympathetic.

[Heartofice]

Started Fall of the House of Usher. I saw in reviews that the first episode is stronger than the second and I definitely think that is true. I was pretty hyped for the show by the end of the first ep, but something about that second episode drained me of all enthusiasm. 

I suspect it is because of the modern day setting and just the irritation I get watching the Usher children, who are all utter shits and completely unlikable. I will plough through and hope it improves. 

Other than that, I watched Rebecca, the most recent version of this tale, with Armie 'the Cannibal' Hammer. I didn't realise till afterwards that it was directed by Ben Wheatley. That was pretty surprising because it's absolutely not his type of movie, but I could tell as I watched it that someone with genuine skill was at the helm.. obviously he next went on to direct The Meg 2... so I do think someone needs to have a word with him about his career.

[Maithanet]

Watched No Hard Feelings since it just came out of Netflix.  Overall I thought it was an enjoyable sex comedy, and not a movie I've already seen before, which is nice.  Jennifer Lawrence (Maddie) really brought it, and the male lead (Percy) held his own, which was nice.  It was interesting seeing the differences they brought up between millennials and Gen Z, although it would sometimes get a bit muddled with the class issues (Percy being much younger and much wealthier than Maddie). 

One issue i had was

Spoiler

That the parents got basically no telling off or comeuppance for being such awful people.  Percy is shy and cautious and suddenly this gorgeous older woman is super into him and super horny for no clear reason.  He flees in terror, hates himself for being a coward, tries again, eventually becomes attached, and then gets heartbroken when he finds out the truth.  All of this was totally foreseeable!  He is understandably angry at Maddie, but she's just doing a job.  This was all his stupid parents idea, but in the end he just tries to establish slightly better boundaries and that's it.  Did the movie not realize how terrible they were?

 

[WarGalley]

Back from a trip to France so was able to catch up on a few movies and TV shows during the long flights.

Guardians of the Galaxy v3 - this was not the movie I was expecting. I thought we were going to get some kind of closing arc to the Guardians but I didn't get that feeling at the ending. The soundtrack carries the movie (again) and I was surprised that I didn't feel burned out by it.

John Wick 4 - Ok, you know what you're getting when you go into this but I'm not sure I consider this movie to really be the best of the whole series. The thing that bothered me most was JW and any henchman character being practically Superman-level bulletproof (or in many cases, car-hitting proof). I almost got bored of some of the shooting scenes since they were treating bullets almost like blanks. Not bad but didn't live up to my expectations of entertainment.

Avatar 2 - Nothing new here again but I enjoyed the movie quite a bit and didn't feel the runtime at all. I really regret watching this on an airplane headset TV instead of in an IMAX theater. I'm making a note to watch the next one in IMAX no matter what.

The Last of Us - I was amazingly able to get through episodes 4-9 on a single flight. While I enjoyed this show, there wasn't much new here either. I also don't think it's worthy of a best drama nod for awards season and I wasn't really blown away by Pedro Pascal's peformance. Bella Ramsey was better in her role. It's a good show but not great. As I haven't really been keeping up with TV shows in real-time (and always seem to be catching up with older shows), I wonder if the field is weak.

Bosch: Legacy Season 2 - this dropped recently on Freevee (Amazon's free streaming service). I'm 2 episodes in and it's your typical Bosch formula. Depending on where they go in episode 3 and beyond, I may be a little disappointed with the current storyline but I'll save commentary for later when I finish the season.  

 

[dbunting]

2 hours ago, WarGalley said:

Back from a trip to France so was able to catch up on a few movies and TV shows during the long flights.

John Wick 4 - Ok, you know what you're getting when you go into 

The Last of Us - I was amazingly able to get through episodes 4-9 on a single flight. 

Bosch: Legacy Season 2 - 

 

Pretty much agree on Wick and Last of Us.  John Wick 4 was a little much for me

Spoiler

Especially the stairs at the end.  I did however like the shot gun fight scene, felt like a video game

Last of Us I thought was good, one really good episode but that's it, good not great.

Bosch, I plan to watch this soon, I'm sure Ill like it as long as the most famous detective in LA doesn't somehow go undercover again.

[Zorral]

17 hours ago, WarGalley said:

Bosch: Legacy Season 2 - this dropped recently on Freevee (Amazon's free streaming service)

I never finished the first episode.  I literally cannot take the commercial interruptions, which are more numerous and lengthy than the first season. But I do so like the Bosch series and the actors, so I did give it another try.  I never watch freevee, and this is why. 

Edited October 27, 2023 by Zorral

[Darryk]

The new South Park episode taking aim at Disney is brutal. Takes no prisoners.

[Heartofice]

17 minutes ago, Darryk said:

The new South Park episode taking aim at Disney is brutal. Takes no prisoners.

Lol, it really hits the mark! 

[Veltigar]

There are new South Park episodes? That's good news

[SpaceChampion]

11 hours ago, Veltigar said:

There are new South Park episodes? That's good news

It's a TV special, not part of a season. 

[Sw33t Summ3r Ch1ld]

My Mom and I bought some movies at the local trade-in movie and TV show shop some time ago. We bought Underworld and Resident Evil. Those were soooo cool. The Last Unicorn made me reminisce of growing up. I also got The Truman Show and The Lion King. My Mom bought me more movies on Amazon. I received movies that were in a series like Harry Potter, Twilight, and The Hunger Games. I also bought some movies at Walmart like The Matrix and Divergent. I was watching quite a few of them. They were all stunningly good and I'm glad I have them.  

[Ran]

Watched Wes Anderson's latest on Netflix, basically four short films adapting stories written by Roald Dahl: The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar (the longest of them at 45 minutes or so), The Swan, The Rat Catcher, and Poison (these three are like 17 minutes each). They have a shared cast, with Ralph Fiennes in particular appearing in all of them -- either in the role of Roald Dahl himself, and/or as a character in the story. Benedict Cumberbatch, Rupert Friend, Richard Ayoade, Dev Patel, and Sir Ben Kingsley round out the main cast of these, I believe, and it's just all wonderfully charming in that Andersonian way.

This series is particularly fun because he plays a lot with meta-narrative, having "stage hands" appear to produce items, adjust scenery, even move an actor from one spot to another to get that classic Anderson framing, all while the story is being narrated by the characters. Anderson basically uses the challenge of adapting these stories to basically give a master class in how to tell a story. Really fun, and all quite short, very much worth watching, IMO.

The Rat Catcher is probably my favorite of the three shorter ones, but mostly because Fiennes just completely embodies the character as described. Amazing actor.

Edited October 29, 2023 by Ran

[TheLastWolf]

I've never read a nonfiction work so quickly and when I caught KOTFM on IMAX, that's cinema. Phenomenal work from everybody, and the Scorsese picture card got the most cheers even out here.