Whatcha Watching?

[dbunting]

19 hours ago, Zorral said:

As for the FreeVee Bosch: I loved the series, until AP use of it to get people to move to their commercial based FreeVee.  I never even finished the first episode of the second season because 1) the commercials were far too many and long, just like tv, which is why I never had one; 2) cannot emotionally deal with yet another young women in dreadful sexual violation and torture peril, in whose character we are invested. People's mileage varies for both issues.

The thing you're talking about in episode 1 gets resolved pretty quickly and turns more into her dealing with the emotional parts of it for the rest of the season.

[Zorral]

9 hours ago, dbunting said:

nto her dealing with the emotional parts of it for the rest of the season.

Yet this doesn't change the fact that the writers evidently can't figure out anything else for young female cop storyline than trauma, does it?

It also doesn't affect that the commercials make watching for me impossible.

Edited November 15, 2023 by Zorral

[Zorral]

Watched the first episode of Murder At the End of the World.  It's a little cognitively dissonant to be watching this now, as it's Iceland, and currently the place is on high alert volcano/earthquake watch.  I'll give the second episode a watch tonight.

[WarGalley]

Has anyone seen Three Body on Amazon? Is it any good? The IMDB episode summaries are terribly translated (which I vaguely recall to be a criticism of the book so maybe it's just being faithful to the source material ). 

[Isis]

13 hours ago, WarGalley said:

Has anyone seen Three Body on Amazon? Is it any good? The IMDB episode summaries are terribly translated (which I vaguely recall to be a criticism of the book so maybe it's just being faithful to the source material ). 

Is that from The Three Body Problem?

[Rippounet]

4 hours ago, Isis said:

Is that from The Three Body Problem?

Yes, but it's the Chinese adaptation, not the coming Netflix mega-production.

[SpaceChampion]

For some reason the eponymous Blackberry movie has been recut into a 3 part mini-series, about 45 minutes each.  So about 15 minutes was added back from the cutting room.   I guess I liked the movie enough to eager for a rewatch for the additional material.  It's streaming on Gem, the CBC streaming platform for those in Canada.  https://gem.cbc.ca/  

 

[Liffguard]

Just watched How to Blow Up a pipeline

Not gonna comment on the politics right now. As a movie, it was very tight, very lean and spare. It was successful at keeping the tension on a slowly but steadily rising simmer throughout. The characterisation was pretty minimalistic, and the characters somewhat one-note, but then it isn't really supposed to be a character study. It was more looking at what sort of situations could lead to certain motivations, rather than granular personality details. If you want a smart, restrained thriller, definitely recommended.

[Slurktan]

The first two episodes of the Monarch (Godzilla) show on apple were pretty good,  Kind of a conspiracy/spy show in a world where there are also giant monsters.

[Veltigar]

Finally got to see Killers of the Flower Moon. Despite the fact that the circumstances (i.e. the audience at the theatre) were less than ideal, I was floored by the film. It's definitely arduously long and I won't say that I never felt the runtime of the film, but all in all I thought it was quite devastating.

It also felt strangely unlike any other Scorsese film I can remember. This despite the fact that it's basically about a mob, has both DiCaprio and De Niro in it, and sports a butt-numbingly long runtime. I read that he was inspired by the work of Ari Aster to slow this film down and I think that really shows here. It's also a consequence of the fact that this film lacks the larger-than-life characters that characterise most of Scorsese's most memorable work. The actors all do a great job of course, but there is no Bill the Butcher, Travis Bickle or Jordan Belfort in this film to anchor the story around.

I think it was a good decision not to create such a character for this film, as this story shouldn't be sensationalized any more than it already has been done (which is my major point of criticism for the film)

Spoiler

I read some opinion pieces berating Scorsese for actually showing the murders and normalizing the violence against Native American women in particular. It's an argument I have sympathy for, since statistics show that violence against Native American women is still all too common and Scorsese sanitizes the murders too much for my liking (clean headshots, little blood, etc.).

I guess it probably would have been more appropriate to not show the murders themselves but show the aftermath more clearly. That would have made the film even more grizzly than it already was though, so I feel conflicted about it.

I also thought the ending was very courageous

Spoiler

Wrapping the story up with an old-fashioned cigarette branded radio show with Scorsese himself owning up to making entertainment out of this tragic story was great.

There are two things I am conflicted about and for which I really should read the book:

Spoiler

1. From what I gather in articles, the real-life case was even more horrendous with a conspiracy that was far greater than what Scorsese could show even with a film with such an extended run time. If that was the case, then I think that aspect should have been highlighted even more I think. It's strongly implied, especially when the town basically comes together to force Ernest to revoke his testimony, but perhaps this should have been explicitly acknowledged.

2. The decision to tell the story from Ernest's POV and depicting the love affair with Molly as being genuine. As to the latter, people have made worse decisions in real life, and it appears that their grand daughter convinced Scorsese that there was a genuine connection somewhere in the marriage. So, I can live with that.

To tell the story from Ernest's POV on the other hand, that might not have been the most interesting way to do this story. I guess I do sympathise with the criticism on that front.

 

On 11/14/2023 at 2:58 AM, WarGalley said:

Watched Killers of the Flower Moon. I didn’t feel the runtime at all and enjoyed it quite a bit, digging into the backstory for the last couple of days to see what was fact vs. fiction. I may put the book on my To-read list though that list is growing faster than I can read them.

the one thing that stuck out most to me was:

  Hide contents

Mollie should have been more devastated than Lily Gladstone showed given the truth about her husband. I felt like that could have been done more dramatically but I’m guessing that was Scorcese’s direction . I can’t imagine a human being responding so stoically to the level of betrayal that she endured.

Good film overall.

As to your criticism in the spoiler section:

Spoiler

I think the film very clearly establishes the Osage as a rather stoic people. De Niro literally has a monologue where he tells DiCaprio that they might not talk much, but that they will have understood everything and think too much communication is a foolish endeavour (blackbird talk IIRC).

Coupled that with Molly's earlier speech where she dreamt of Ernest coming clean to her, revealing all his dirty secrets and putting these away in a box to be thrown in the river, I reckoned that she knew the truth and was willing to let everything go if he was truthful to her.

The fact that he lied right there at the end showed her that he couldn't be trusted and that there marriage was over, as the secrets would always remain between them. So, she took the cold, logical decision and got herself and their children to safety. Not much emotion required in my opinion, as by know she had known about his involvement for a long time and suspected it even longer.

 

On 11/14/2023 at 9:20 PM, Ran said:

The story is very mediocre and, yes, derivative in places, as I see @Veltigar mentioned in his review, but it's ... not offensive, I guess? So long as you accept that "rule of cool" is the explanation for a lot of the details of the setting, and don't nitpick things like why someone is using walking, talking robot AI suicide bombers rather than just using missiles or aerial bombardment, weapons they've already shown to have, and things of that sort.

Offensive is perhaps a strong word, but I do feel like the quantity of derivative story beats adds up. Like, one or two blatant rip-offs would be manageable, but he does so much of them. He really should find himself a great screenwriter as you suggest, that could lead to a terrific film.

[Zorral]

So you're saying the story of Osage murders -- particularly of women -- by white men to get rich(er) is derivative of the violence of white men visited upon Native Peoples since the beginning of colonization of the Western Hemisphere, which made for a less than satisfying film/entertainment/work of art.

Edited November 18, 2023 by Zorral

[SpaceChampion]

Scott Pilgrim Takes Off  isn't a straight adaptation like it seems in the first episode, at least until the point where it becomes clear this is some kind of alternate reality.  Right at the moment I was thinking "so far the movie is way better, and they're just retreading the same story but worse" it takes a left turn.  On to episode 2...

[Luzifer's right hand]

Lilith finally showed up in the Fraiser reboot and I enjoyed that a lot.

I'm a big fan of the character having watched most of Cheers by now on top of Fraiser.

13 hours ago, Veltigar said:

Finally got to see Killers of the Flower Moon. Despite the fact that the circumstances (i.e. the audience at the theatre) were less than ideal, I was floored by the film. It's definitely arduously long and I won't say that I never felt the runtime of the film, but all in all I thought it was quite devastating.

It also felt strangely unlike any other Scorsese film I can remember. This despite the fact that it's basically about a mob, has both DiCaprio and De Niro in it, and sports a butt-numbingly long runtime. I read that he was inspired by the work of Ari Aster to slow this film down and I think that really shows here. It's also a consequence of the fact that this film lacks the larger-than-life characters that characterise most of Scorsese's most memorable work. The actors all do a great job of course, but there is no Bill the Butcher, Travis Bickle or Jordan Belfort in this film to anchor the story around.

I think it was a good decision not to create such a character for this film, as this story shouldn't be sensationalized any more than it already has been done (which is my major point of criticism for the film)

  Reveal hidden contents

I read some opinion pieces berating Scorsese for actually showing the murders and normalizing the violence against Native American women in particular. It's an argument I have sympathy for, since statistics show that violence against Native American women is still all too common and Scorsese sanitizes the murders too much for my liking (clean headshots, little blood, etc.).

I guess it probably would have been more appropriate to not show the murders themselves but show the aftermath more clearly. That would have made the film even more grizzly than it already was though, so I feel conflicted about it.

I also thought the ending was very courageous

  Hide contents

Wrapping the story up with an old-fashioned cigarette branded radio show with Scorsese himself owning up to making entertainment out of this tragic story was great.

There are two things I am conflicted about and for which I really should read the book:

  Hide contents

1. From what I gather in articles, the real-life case was even more horrendous with a conspiracy that was far greater than what Scorsese could show even with a film with such an extended run time. If that was the case, then I think that aspect should have been highlighted even more I think. It's strongly implied, especially when the town basically comes together to force Ernest to revoke his testimony, but perhaps this should have been explicitly acknowledged.

2. The decision to tell the story from Ernest's POV and depicting the love affair with Molly as being genuine. As to the latter, people have made worse decisions in real life, and it appears that their grand daughter convinced Scorsese that there was a genuine connection somewhere in the marriage. So, I can live with that.

To tell the story from Ernest's POV on the other hand, that might not have been the most interesting way to do this story. I guess I do sympathise with the criticism on that front.

 

As to your criticism in the spoiler section:

  Hide contents

I think the film very clearly establishes the Osage as a rather stoic people. De Niro literally has a monologue where he tells DiCaprio that they might not talk much, but that they will have understood everything and think too much communication is a foolish endeavour (blackbird talk IIRC).

Coupled that with Molly's earlier speech where she dreamt of Ernest coming clean to her, revealing all his dirty secrets and putting these away in a box to be thrown in the river, I reckoned that she knew the truth and was willing to let everything go if he was truthful to her.

The fact that he lied right there at the end showed her that he couldn't be trusted and that there marriage was over, as the secrets would always remain between them. So, she took the cold, logical decision and got herself and their children to safety. Not much emotion required in my opinion, as by know she had known about his involvement for a long time and suspected it even longer.

 

Offensive is perhaps a strong word, but I do feel like the quantity of derivative story beats adds up. Like, one or two blatant rip-offs would be manageable, but he does so much of them. He really should find himself a great screenwriter as you suggest, that could lead to a terrific film.

Spoiler

I had the feeling that Molly knew and would have forgiven him if he stopped lying. I watched it with my mother and she felt the same way.

 

[Ran]

On 11/18/2023 at 8:12 AM, Veltigar said:

Offensive is perhaps a strong word, but I do feel like the quantity of derivative story beats adds up.

I did say not offensive. But yeah, it was too much -- not so much the derivative bits, but just how it was packaged together.

It was really interesting to contrast the film to Oppenheimer, which I saw recently, which was completely and utterly gripping from the start, helped by Nolan and Jennifer Lame editing this thing to keep it moving and propulsive ... despite the biggest bit of tension being an argumentative cross-examination around a conference table late in the film. Amazing film, and also helped by some great scoring that really helped set a mood. I wonder how it was that Zimmer's The Creator score could be so... I don't know, flat and unmemorable, and can only come up with the fact that, well, everyone knows Zimmer doesn't necessarily do all the composition work any longer, but more importantly I think it had to do with the collaboration with Edwards who made a lot of choices that sucked tension out of the film. Still think Edwards has amazing potential and he's done some terrific stuff, but The Creator feels like a wasted effort, which is hard to say when I love the visual aesthetic of it all.

But yeah, Oppenheimer was fantastic. I expect RDJ to get a best supporting nom at least, and Murphy of course is getting a Best Actor nod. (Those famous blue eyes of his are crazy.) Best Picture nod (maybe win, too) goes without saying. It's going to get a lot of awards.

Also watched The Game by David Fincher, thanks to the podcast Blank Check. I realized that it's a film I've seen parts of, but never the whole thing. Great mind-fuck thriller that sort of presaged the rise of alternate reality games, while dialing it up to 11. I also had a funny moment where I went, "Hey, that assassination team has a guy wheeling a big trash bin around to put bodies in, just like Fassbender in The Killer..." And a split second after went, "Well, yeah, Fincher." Hah. 

Started watching Pluto, an anime adaptation of a manga series that is basically a non-canonical take on a famous Astro Boy storyline from the 60s. Kind of cool to have Switzerland as a setting for an anime, but only really just started.

For All Mankind's new season (two epsiodes out now) has been pretty solid, an improvement, I think, on the previous season. We'll see how long that lasts, though...

Edited November 19, 2023 by Ran

[Werthead]

Finished watching Brawn: The Impossible Formula 1 Story on Disney+. Mostly a good documentary with some good insider knowledge from the 2009 season that I don't think had been revealed until now. It did feel oddly compressed at 4 episodes (Drive to Survive sometimes has the same problem with 10 episodes to cover a full season) and there's a few stories that didn't feel well-represented (the absence of Vettel and Hamilton from the interviews is odd), but Keanu Reeves was a very effective host: I'm sure most interviewers without his stature would have not asked some of those questions of Ross Brawn in particular, but also Barrichello, who spent most of the doc looking pissed off.

Wrapped up Mythic Quest Season 3. Excellent, and a mild improvement on Season 2. The out-of-continuity stand-alone episode remained the highlight, even if it was much more mundane this year (Ian and Poppy's deep backstories, and we find out why Ian pronounces his name so weird) compared to last year's one with Isaac Asimov, Ray Bradbury and Ursula K. Le Guin.

Started watching Ted Lasso Season 3 and yikes, when they said the show had descended into a caricature of itself, they weren't kidding. Will see it out for completionists' sake, but this would have been better as a one-and-done. Going to have to power through this to get to Foundation Season 2 and For All Mankind Season 4.

The second season of Welcome to Wrexham was also very good, with some clever side-episodes exploring things like fans with disabilities and the women's team (who I think had a collection of bigger and more interesting personalities then the men's team). Fortunately we didn't have a repeat of the Rob/Ryan two-hander where they try badly to explain Wales to American viewers. One of the best things about the season was seeing Ryan Reynolds go all-in on the team. In Season 1 he'd clearly been more stand-offish and seeing it as another business deal like Mint and Aviation Gin, but by the end of the season he'd been invested, and in Season 2 he's clearly become way more obsessed about it. Interesting that they are considering releasing Season 3 in batches, before the football season actually ends, so the TV show doesn't get spoiled by reality again.

[Ramsay B.]

I’m towards the end of s2 of Boardwalk Empire. Some of the middle episodes are a slog to get through. A few boring storylines. I totally forgot…

Spoiler

That Jimmy and his mom fuck. Jesus. That’s really high up there for the world’s worst hangover. Can’t blame him for joining the war after that shit.

 

[polishgenius]

8 hours ago, Zorral said:

So you're saying the story of Osage murders -- particularly of women -- by white men to get rich(er) is derivative of the violence of white men visited upon Native Peoples since the beginning of colonization of the Western Hemisphere, which made for a less than satisfying film/entertainment/work of art.

 

He wasn't talking about Killers of the Flower Moon with the derivatives comments- that's a convo about The Creator.

 

 

 

 

Anyway I agree that Edwards needs a good script partner. In this particular instance I think he also needed to work with someone from Asia. Because while Veltigar talked about how it's refreshing to see a non-white cast against American villains, the sheer laziness of New Asia was jarring even to me- and I'm not from there or know anything about those places and cultures. Its an unthought-out stew- an impression not helped by later reading a quote from Edwards about how he was inspired to set it there because he visited there once and thought the culture was as close as you can get to an alien planet. It just didn't feel like he was actually interested beyond using it as set-dressing.

The other issue I had was that it uses imagery evocative of Vietnam, also heightened by the setting- but the actual plot is far more reminiscent of the war on terror and the drone strike campaign. Not a problem in itself, but because

Spoiler

it does turn out to not have been the AI that dropped the nuke, it runs dangerously close to veering into a 9/11 truther allegory. I think it just about skates with it, but it's another part of the script that felt undercooked.

 

The thing for Edwards is that Monsters was almost entirely improv - the actors given vague cues, filmed for ages working from them, and then the film found in the edit. Can't work that way on a film like this where the VFX have to be planned in tandem with the filming, and I think the stiltedness shows in all his big-budget films, even Rogue One which I like. So yes he needs help on that front.

Edited November 19, 2023 by polishgenius

[Veltigar]

5 hours ago, polishgenius said:

 

He wasn't talking about Killers of the Flower Moon with the derivatives comments- that's a convo about The Creator.

Thanks for clearing that up  

5 hours ago, polishgenius said:

Anyway I agree that Edwards needs a good script partner. In this particular instance I think he also needed to work with someone from Asia. Because while Veltigar talked about how it's refreshing to see a non-white cast against American villains, the sheer laziness of New Asia was jarring even to me- and I'm not from there or know anything about those places and cultures. Its an unthought-out stew- an impression not helped by later reading a quote from Edwards about how he was inspired to set it there because he visited there once and thought the culture was as close as you can get to an alien planet. It just didn't feel like he was actually interested beyond using it as set-dressing.

 

I give him somewhat of a pass on the culture front, because I think he never really goes into "New Asian" culture that deeply. Perhaps its wrong for him not to care, but I think he mostly wanted to pilfer his travel memories for visuals. Everything for him is subservient to that, which makes sense, since the cinematography and visuals is what he does best.

There is some iconography borrowed from existing places in Asia (particular in the latter scenes in the monastery), but it's more Blade Runner than trying to emulate an existing place in Asia imo and it never grinds to a halt to explain why the cultures of "New Asia" were more gently predisposed to AI (which would probably be an orientalist mine field).

It's definitely an undercooked setting, but I think he would have been just as uninterested in exploring the underlying cultures if this was set in South Dakota or Edenborough.

5 hours ago, polishgenius said:

The other issue I had was that it uses imagery evocative of Vietnam, also heightened by the setting- but the actual plot is far more reminiscent of the war on terror and the drone strike campaign. Not a problem in itself, but because

  Hide contents

it does turn out to not have been the AI that dropped the nuke, it runs dangerously close to veering into a 9/11 truther allegory. I think it just about skates with it, but it's another part of the script that felt undercooked.

 

 

100% agreed with the spoiler comment. Like I said in my review, the political implications in this film are so wild, I wouldn't be surprised if Edwards was studying Xi Jingping Thought as a hobby 

 

[Veltigar]

9 hours ago, Ran said:

I did say not offensive. But yeah, it was too much -- not so much the derivative bits, but just how it was packaged together.

Oh yeah, I more meant that even in my negative appraisal of the film on that front, I wouldn't use the word offensive.

9 hours ago, Ran said:

It was really interesting to contrast the film to Oppenheimer, which I saw recently, which was completely and utterly gripping from the start, helped by Nolan and Jennifer Lame editing this thing to keep it moving and propulsive ... despite the biggest bit of tension being an argumentative cross-examination around a conference table late in the film. Amazing film, and also helped by some great scoring that really helped set a mood. I wonder how it was that Zimmer's The Creator score could be so... I don't know, flat and unmemorable, and can only come up with the fact that, well, everyone knows Zimmer doesn't necessarily do all the composition work any longer, but more importantly I think it had to do with the collaboration with Edwards who made a lot of choices that sucked tension out of the film. Still think Edwards has amazing potential and he's done some terrific stuff, but The Creator feels like a wasted effort, which is hard to say when I love the visual aesthetic of it all.

But yeah, Oppenheimer was fantastic. I expect RDJ to get a best supporting nom at least, and Hinds of course is getting a Best Actor nod. (Those famous blue eyes of his are crazy.) Best Picture nod (maybe win, too) goes without saying. It's going to get a lot of awards.

 

Yeah, Oppenheimer was great. It definitely deserves awards for its actors. I think Cillian Murphy is probably the most likely winner amongst them. For supporting actor, I do hope they go for someone else than RDJ. I think Ryan Gosling's Ken totally stole the Barbie movie, so I'd like to have that performance rewarded.

Best movie is trickier though. Oppenheimer certainly was an achievement, but I wouldn't rule out Killers of the Flower Moon.

Ah well, lots of speculation at this point, especially since I hope Napoleon will blow us all away and amend the scores a bit. It feels like it hasn't been the best year for cinema really.

[Ran]

7 hours ago, polishgenius said:

 

He wasn't talking about Killers of the Flower Moon with the derivatives comments- that's a convo about The Creator.

Thanks for clearing that up. I had no idea that that was aimed at the conversation about The Creator so hadn't clarified.

7 hours ago, polishgenius said:

Anyway I agree that Edwards needs a good script partner. In this particular instance I think he also needed to work with someone from Asia. Because while Veltigar talked about how it's refreshing to see a non-white cast against American villains, the sheer laziness of New Asia was jarring even to me- and I'm not from there or know anything about those places and cultures. Its an unthought-out stew- an impression not helped by later reading a quote from Edwards about how he was inspired to set it there because he visited there once and thought the culture was as close as you can get to an alien planet. It just didn't feel like he was actually interested beyond using it as set-dressing.

The other issue I had was that it uses imagery evocative of Vietnam, also heightened by the setting- but the actual plot is far more reminiscent of the war on terror and the drone strike campaign. Not a problem in itself, but because

  Reveal hidden contents

it does turn out to not have been the AI that dropped the nuke, it runs dangerously close to veering into a 9/11 truther allegory. I think it just about skates with it, but it's another part of the script that felt undercooked.

 

The thing for Edwards is that Monsters was almost entirely improv - the actors given vague cues, filmed for ages working from them, and then the film found in the edit. C

Good point about that, that I hadn't thought of. I didn't realize it was so loosely scripted.

It's a really good, and underseen, film. Also where I first noticed Scoot McNairy, who's great in it.

1 hour ago, Veltigar said:

 

I give him somewhat of a pass on the culture front, because I think he never really goes into "New Asian" culture that deeply.

Ditto.

1 hour ago, Veltigar said:

it never grinds to a halt to explain why the cultures of "New Asia" were more gently predisposed to AI (which would probably be an orientalist mine field).

I think that all the signs suggest that the US was just as well-disposed to AI as New Asia was prior to the nuking of LA, and then there was a complete sea-change of opinion. We have that scene of their doing cleanup in LA, with the robot waking up and being terrified that the little girl under his care needed him, that shows they were just as integrated into society as they appear to be in New Asia. So that seems to be the only real difference.

 

1 hour ago, Veltigar said:

It's definitely an undercooked setting, but I think he would have been just as uninterested in exploring the underlying cultures if this was set in South Dakota or Edenborough.

Agreed. 

1 hour ago, Veltigar said:

100% agreed with the spoiler comment. Like I said in my review, the political implications in this film are so wild, I wouldn't be surprised if Edwards was studying Xi Jingping Thought as a hobby 

We're given only one real possibility in the film, that the AI dropped it, but then two sub-options --

Spoiler

it did so deliberately, or it did it due to a "human coding error". I can see, if you squint, the notion that in fact humans deliberately made the AI drop it to then justify wiping out AI -- the very start of the film gives some Starship Trooper vibes where Verhoven's film very much gives the impression that the military has pushed a war against the Bugs for its own purposes -- but I think we're supposed to take one of the two choices (deliberate AI choice vs. accident due to human error) as the only intended ones simply because the film doesn't really explore alternatives.

I would have liked a hint of there being AI factions and that one inimical to humanity was behind the nuke, as well as hints about the US military actually being behind it, just to complicate the story... but for the most part, the script takes the path of least resistance. 

I've an itch to rewatch the film just to soak in the visuals, because it looks incredible, but... it feels like something you should maybe put on as background noise to occasionally glance at rather than something to spend time actually looking at.