Watch, Watched, Watching: Anybody but Superman

[Ramsay B.]

24 minutes ago, A True Kaniggit said:

But I would still watch it again for the battle scenes. Especially for the audio during the battles. BANG!

The theater I go to just redid their dolby BTX, or whatever, and a few of those gunshots scared the shit out of me. They were crazy loud.

And I wonder whose idea it was for Jesse Plemons to wear those glasses. Man, he really knows how to play those type of roles.

Spoiler

Also, as soon as Jessie took that picture of Lee in the beginning you knew that Lee was gonna die. I just figured they were gonna make a big deal about that particular pic, but they obviously didn’t.

 

[DMC]

10 minutes ago, Ramsay B. said:

And I wonder whose idea it was for Jesse Plemons to wear those glasses.

Drew Sharp.

[Ran]

8 hours ago, Ramsay B. said:

And I wonder whose idea it was for Jesse Plemons to wear those glasses.

Plemons brought them to the costume fitting himself and asked what they thought if his character wore them, per the costume designer. 

He came in last minute because another actor backed out of the role, and since he was hanging around set anyways Kirsten suggested that they ask him to fill in. 

By all accounts, a very successful piece of nepotism.

Edited April 19 by Ran

[Ramsay B.]

12 minutes ago, DMC said:

Drew Sharp.

That poor tarantula. (I definitely had to look that name up, didn’t recognize it at all)

[Isis]

9 hours ago, Ramsay B. said:

He’s 5-5 with me. Ex-Machina and Annihilation were great. I just saw Civil War and really liked it. Men and Devs were both solid at the very least. I hope he’s not done with making movies like he supposedly said recently. Although now seeing conflicting reports of that. Who knows?

I'm a fan of his. I read The Beach the year it came out and I've consumed all his stuff since. I thought Ex Machina was great. I also really enjoyed Devs. Men, I thought had a great concept but it felt like it was lacking something and I feel the same way about Civil War. Maybe directing isn't his strongest suit?

9 hours ago, A True Kaniggit said:

I watched Civil War last Sunday. And my thoughts are that the battle scenes during the movie show exactly what they are supposed to. How terrifying and bloody a civil war in the U.S. would be.

But story wise, the movie is a let down.

 

But I would still watch it again for the battle scenes. Especially for the audio during the battles. BANG!

While the trailers for other films were playing (before watching Civil War) my seat was vibrating but I noted that during the film the sound wasn't as loud.  NB this was not an IMAX showing.

I might watch it again if it was on TV when I was channel surfing. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Holy fuck, The Beach is a book?!?!?!?!? I've always argued that's one of Leo's five best films. 

[Ran]

Half way through Apple+'s Sugar, the "genre-bending" neo-noir detective show created by Mark Protosevich (writer of Tarsem Singh's The Cell, wrote the Will Smith I Am Legend, and the Spike Lee-directed adaptation of Oldboy) and starring Colin Farrell as the titular John Sugar, a private detective who is very good at finding lost people, a polyglot with a fanatical level of interest in Hollywood films who detests carrying guns, and a genuinely nice dude who keeps going out of his way to help people he runs into in passing. The first two episode are directed by Brazilian director Fernando Meirelles, best known for the magnificent City of God, and his aesthetic is rife through the show -- lots of interesting editing choices and camera angles, and (uniquely) a heavy use of vintage films as B-roll or commentary on events no doubt inspired by Sugar's deep love of Hollywood cinema. It reminds me of nothing less than the old HBO sitcom, Dream On, but it's not played for laughs, it's just a sign of how Sugar's mind free associates.

But... there's a twist, as "genre-bending" might suggest, and so far it's not clear. It seems to tie into Sugar, into the fact that he occasionally gets weird cramps or numbness, weird flashes of visions, and there's something about a society of polyglots that he's part of... Theories abound. Simon Kinberg is an executive producer on this, which may suggest the direction of the twist.

It's fun. Not too deep, a little stiff at times (but this may be on purpose), but Farrell is such a charismatic, interesting actor. Also appearing on the show are James Cromwell, Amy Ryan, and -- after a couple of episodes -- Anna Gunn, among others.

 

[Zorral]

‘Rebel Moon — Part Two: The Scargiver’ Review: Of Stars and Wars
A delirious, pulpy mishmash of knockoffs, Zack Snyder’s film isn’t good, but it sure is something.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/19/movies/rebel-moon-part-two-the-scargiver-review.html

For whatever reasons it delighted me that the caption giver pulled "isn't good, but it sure is something" straight from the author's own text.  Ha!

Though, s/he could have pulled from the text, "The film has plenty of death, yet little life," for equal delight.

This too is excellent --

"I found myself thinking of that moral debate in Kevin Smith’s “Clerks” about the never-seen workers who died building the Death Star for Darth Vader. At least Snyder shows their faces. Then he mows them down."

Quote

"Snyder’s ostentatiousness is unmatched. His refusal to dial down any of his impulses — dramatic smooches backlit by a pink-ringed planet, priestly hats that resemble glowing pepperonis, a four-legged tank which totters like a hung-over armadillo — has an admirable resolve, even if it comes from an inability to say no to himself. As the body count ticks into the triple digits and the bone-rattling battle expands from the land to the air, I found myself thinking of that moral debate in Kevin Smith’s “Clerks” about the never-seen workers who died building the Death Star for Darth Vader. At least Snyder shows their faces. Then he mows them down."

 

Edited April 19 by Zorral

[Veltigar]

Don't have much time for content lately, but I did manage to get caught up with Shōgun this week. I missed out on three episodes, but being able to do a mini-binge is not doing this series any favours. There are some outstanding scenes, where the costumes and sets really blew me away

Spoiler

Alas, I cannot find my favourite scene in which Mariko confronts the Osaka court and announces her plan to withdraw with her ladies towards Toronaga, but everything there was breath taking.

I also really like Ishido's outfits. Say what you want about the guy, but he was a stylish dresser!

The attention to detail throughout remains by far my favourite aspect of the show. They really do seem to offer a window in the Japan of that era.

On the whole however, there is a lot that doesn't make any sense. There are quite a few adaptation choices that are understandable (e.g. reducing the number of characters involved in certain scenes for instance, as that's just necessary to make it affordable) and a few that I think are real contributions (foregrounding Lady Ochiba a bit more, more focus on the Japanese characters although the latter is also necessary since so much of Blackthorne's reflections are thoughts and ill-suited for the screen), but in the whole I think the adaptation also makes a lot of nonsensical choices to get characters from here to there and crafts versions of the characters that are psychologically less compelling than their version in the  books.

Spoiler

Mariko in particular suffers from this. I don't think it's the performance but really the writing here. I feel that they have undermined her agency and have ascribed far too much power to Toranaga to influence her.

I also felt that Toranaga was done a dirty turn in the last couple of episodes. They imply getting caught by his brother was his ploy all along, but then you have the nonsensical developments that lead to the convenient death of his son for which he can then get 49 days of mourning? Which everyone seems to be surprised by, even though they issued an order for said son to commit Seppuku? It's truly jibberish.

 

 

 

On 4/15/2024 at 8:15 AM, TheLastWolf said:

The Last Farmer, I mean this is up there for me with Tarkovsky, don't know how I missed it earlier. An article (supposed to be a review, but... read and you'll know) that embodies the very essence of this film to help ya along the way.

I have actually seen some of the films on your list already. When I have more time to explore, I'll certainly browse through it for some inspiration for future forays into Indian cinema  

Edited April 19 by Veltigar

[Corvinus85]

1 hour ago, Veltigar said:

 

Spoiler

I also felt that Toranaga was done a dirty turn in the last couple of episodes. They imply getting caught by his brother was his ploy all along, but then you have the nonsensical developments that lead to the convenient death of his son for which he can then get 49 days of mourning? Which everyone seems to be surprised by, even though they issued an order for said son to commit Seppuku? It's truly jibberish.

 

Why are those events nonsensical?

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Watched the fifth of ten episode of In Her Car Ukrainian-European coproduction.

I can highly recommend this one.

Plot is built around a Ukrainian Psycho-therapist, who finds her a new calling by driving Ukrainians through their war torn country. Each episode tells the story of her passengers. It has some pretty dark humour in it.

Spoiler

First we have the story of two feuding sisters

Second Ep has her drive her estranged husbands mistress

Third Ep. Was about a French married couple who paid a visit to their son, who works as journalist in Ukraine with some interesting family dynamics.

Fourth ep was about a guy trying to evade military service

Fifth was about a Grandmother wanting to say goodbye to her grandson in the army, before his unit is transfered to the frontline (again with some family drama and dark humour moments)

 

Edited April 19 by A Horse Named Stranger

[polishgenius]

Watched Rebel Moon Part 2, and it's very annoying, because there's actually a few good ideas and thoughts in there, but it's so amateurishly written and structured that they mostly get lost. 

 

Spoiler

The fight on the falling ship, for one, is way better executed than the somewhat similar scene in Black Widow. And honestly the whole battle plan for the village actually made some kind of sense- I was wondering how Snyder was possibly going to make one village and six warriors taking on a whole battleship plausible, but it was actually well thought out. 

Unfortunately much of it is visually barely coherent- which is actually unusual for Snyder. 

 

I also appreciated that he didn't do the thing where defeating the main baddie is all you need to do and the army falls over or vanishes- they needed the rebels to come in and clean up. Unfortunately that was undercut by them coming completely out of nowhere and not being set up at all within this movie.

 

 

Past that it was mostly just an unmemorable, clunky mess.

[Werthead]

Finished up with The Bear. Decent, a little bit overrated but when it was on fire it was really good. Other times it was a bunch of adults screaming about cheese.

Another couple of episodes of Manhunt down and damn this is good. Feels like it should be getting as much talk as Shogun. Tobias Menzies is outstanding.

Checked out Ford vs. Ferrari and very solid, great performances from Christian Bale and Matt Damon. Unlike some other recent-ish racing movies (like the otherwise solid Rush), the blending of real racing and CGI is faultless.

Kicked off a rewatch of The Wire and I'm pretty certain this show is only getting better and better with age.

[Zorral]

1 hour ago, Werthead said:

Kicked off a rewatch of The Wire and I'm pretty certain this show is only getting better and better with age.

Dominic West -- from Jimmy McNulty to King Charles III!

[Relic]

16 hours ago, Werthead said:

 

Kicked off a rewatch of The Wire and I'm pretty certain this show is only getting better and better with age.

Gonna push back a bit to say that The Wire was the greatest show ever made by the end of season 4, and remains so. No other television show comes close to portraying meaningful important issues with such wit, humor, and empathy. I'll go as far as to say that the Wire is the greatest work of American fiction ever put on screen.

I'm glad you're enjoying more than ever, but it was always special.

Edited April 20 by Relic

[Werthead]

33 minutes ago, Relic said:

Gonna push back a bit to say that The Wire was the greatest show ever made by the end of season 4, and remains so. No other television show comes close to portraying meaningful important issues with such wit, humor, and empathy. I'll go as far as to say that the Wire is the greatest work of American fiction ever out in screen.

I'm glad you're enjoying more than ever, but it was always special.

The two statements are not incompatible

I thought The Wire was the best TV show ever made (traditional, very minor Season 5 caveats aside) after first watching it, but you could say other shows were close behind it. I think now that's not so much the case. Other shows in that bracket I found were weaker on a rewatch (Breaking Bad's flaws are a lot more apparent on a rewatch, and pushed it out of my Top 5, maybe outside the Top 10).

[polishgenius]

Deadwood! Deadwood! Deadwood!

 

[TheLastWolf]

1 hour ago, Relic said:

Gonna push back a bit to say that The Wire was the greatest show ever made by the end of season 4, and remains so. No other television show comes close to portraying meaningful important issues with such wit, humor, and empathy. I'll go as far as to say that the Wire is the greatest work of American fiction ever out in screen.

I'm glad you're enjoying more than ever, but it was always special.

 

32 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

Deadwood! Deadwood! Deadwood!

 

...and Twin Peaks is my definitive Holy Trinity of the small screen 

[Werthead]

For me it goes something like (nowhere near exhaustive):

S-TIER

• The Wire
• a gap, then the rest are not far off par with one another
• Deadwood
• The Sopranos (from what I've seen, this is finally high on my list for a full watch)
• Band of Brothers
• Rome
• Halt & Catch Fire
• Edge of Darkness
• State of Play
• Andor (provisional, depends on Season 2)
• Better Call Saul
• Chernobyl

A-TIER

• Shogun (provisional)
• Manhunt (provisional)
• Game of Thrones (Seasons 1-4)
• True Detective (Season 1)
• Battlestar Galactica (Seasons 1-2, first few eps of Season 3)
• Breaking Bad
• Ultraviolet

There's a lot of shows that are personal favourites but are also highly variable in quality so I'd be dubious about putting them that high up in any kind of an attempt at an objective list despite their best episodes approaching A-tier or S-tier quality (i.e. Babylon 5, Doctor Who, most sitcoms, most Star Trek shows, though Deep Space Nine does flirt with the A-tier).

I haven't seen Twin Peaks since it first aired, so I'd need to rewatch to determine where to put it.

Edited April 20 by Werthead

[polishgenius]

I actually don't watch enough TV to have a full-on tier list or anything. 

But I can say my favourite 3 individual seasons (not counting limited series, because Band of Brothers is obviously thereabouts too) are Deadwood season 2, The Wire season 3, and Hannibal season 2. Hannibal of course is the one where that season is much better than the other two (though they're still quality).