Author Topic: Respond to the last movie you watched (2013-2016)  (Read 973699 times)

DarkeningHumour

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #6240 on: September 01, 2015, 01:51:34 AM »

Trainwreck (Judd Apatow, 2015)

Such a great film!

Yes, it is.

I didn’t even realise Tilda Swinton was in this film until I saw the credits

I know !

This film suggests that Amy has changed, but does she really change? Really? It is kind of swept under the rug with one grand gesture that suggests that she is at least trying. Judging by her track record she will never cope in a monogamous relationship, and I think it is folly for her to try. They will both end up miserable if it ends the way the film suggests. I think a more realistic ending for Amy to be truly happy would be for her to convince Aaron to try a non-monogamous relationship model, otherwise they will be back arguing again in a couple of weeks, probably breaking up before the year is out. Better to be invested in ethical non-monogamy than cheating monogamy. Mainstream film viewers are perhaps not ready for that yet. Maybe that film will come out in the next decade. Until then, this film is fine :)

Oh wow. You start off praising the film and then it becomes a serious analysis of whether it provides a long-term psychologically viable ending - or some other combination of words that work. I think you are thinking too much about this, the movie is not that interested in the psychological underpinnings of polyamorous people.
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Tim

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #6241 on: September 01, 2015, 03:34:04 AM »
Oh wow. You start off praising the film and then it becomes a serious analysis of whether it provides a long-term psychologically viable ending - or some other combination of words that work. I think you are thinking too much about this, the movie is not that interested in the psychological underpinnings of polyamorous people.

Yes, I know I am way overthinking it, however, the film itself spends a LOT of time introducing and then reinforcing this issue, so it just seems odd or just clichéd that it is forgotten about in the last 1/3 of the film. I did love the ending, but I just wonder if there is an Amy Schumer cut that goes for another half hour that suits her character more..... :)
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DarkeningHumour

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #6242 on: September 01, 2015, 05:48:19 AM »
There should be Amy Schumer cuts for all romcoms.
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MattDrufke

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #6243 on: September 01, 2015, 07:14:43 AM »
Draft Day (2014)
Dir: Ivan Reitman


A Kevin Costner sports movie? Directed by Ivan Reitman? Damn the mediocre Rotten Tomatoes score and absolutely no box office, I'm in! Thanks, HBOGo!

Here, Kevin Costner plays... Kevin Costner. You know these movies enough to know the score. Costner has been playing the washed-up down on his luck sports figure fighting for one more chance for 25 years now, which is crazy considering he still looks crazy good. He could be in Bull Durham today and I'd buy it. Here, he's the down on his luck GM for the Cleveland Browns, stuck with the #7 draft pick.

This movie was fun for a couple of reasons, mostly because it's a relatively engaging football movie which shows you very little football being played, and none of it live. All of the action and stakes come from Costner and the draft room, which is refreshing. I also give a light kudos to the film getting approval to use NFL team names and logos, because I hate when a film wants you to cheer for the New York Grasshoppers or some stupid nonsense like that.

In the end, the actors (Denis Leary, Jennifer Garner, Sean Combs, Frank Langella, and others) are fine, but no one here is raising a pretty predictable script to anything special. Costner is all in as himself, as playing grizzled and desperate as good as he can. He carries this movie into not bad status, but there's nothing here really to bring you in and fully engage you.

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Bondo

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #6244 on: September 01, 2015, 07:37:22 AM »
ethical non-monogamy

Now you're speaking my language, and what for me I couldn't get over for the film. The film doesn't seem to understand that ethical or healthy non-monogamy exists. Even at the start, her promiscuity is tied up with her mistreatment or indifference of her sexual partners. Her dad, who the film opens teaching that monogamy isn't realistic, is a racist/sexist/generally obnoxious person. So in this sense, unless the film specifically had her learning the lesson that the problem was her lack of respect and not her lack of monogamy, it would be hard for it not to end basically like it did.

Corndog

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #6245 on: September 01, 2015, 08:20:29 AM »
Draft Day (2014)
Dir: Ivan Reitman


C+- The "C" is for "Costner"

I had an urge to watch this again last night, but alas, it wasn't on Netflix or at RedBox. It must be the upcoming season that got me wanting. It is an enjoyable little movie and much better than I was expecting. I believe I voted for it for Best Surprise in last year's Filmspots.
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pixote

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #6246 on: September 01, 2015, 11:12:52 AM »
A Man for All Seasons (Fred Zinnemann, 1966)

Great review, Teproc! I love this film. I think you're right about the direction; still, the dialogue and actors are so wonderful, aren't they? For me - and perhaps for you, too - they overwhelm any blandness.

Ah, poor Zinnemann. Always overshadowed by the performances he himself elicited (which somehow falls outside the umbrella of 'direction').

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jascook

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #6247 on: September 01, 2015, 11:55:18 AM »
Vacation (Jonathan Goldstein/John Francis Daley, 2015)

Disappointing.  Rusty Griswold was never much like his father, but somehow Ed Helms wound up playing him as an even more bumbling version of Clark (with a noticeable dash of Andy Bernard, Helms's character in The Office).  The two boys are the subject of a very unfunny series of gags showing the younger brother bullying the older.  Christina Applegate does a decent job as Rusty's wife Debbie, and Leslie Mann is a worthy successor to the more rebellious versions of Audrey in past films.  But this film follows the Cousin Eddie Rule more than I would have hoped. 

The Cousin Eddie Rule of the Vacation movies states that the entries featuring Randy Quaid are all pretty good to great, whereas the ones without Quaid stink to high heaven.  This is not necessarily because of Quaid, but nonetheless I find it valid.  The 2015 Vacation is at least not as egregious as European Vacation, but it sure as Hamburger Helper isn't a patch on the 1983 original.

It was good to see a cameo from Chevy Chase as Clark (or is that Pierce Hawthorne?) but Beverly D'Angelo got ripped off here; she only gets about two lines and absolutely nothing to do.  And, whereas the original Vacation gave us comedy greats such as John Candy and Imogene Coca, here we have to settle for the far less funny Charlie Day and the guy who plays Daryl in The Walking Dead. 

4/10
« Last Edit: September 01, 2015, 11:59:15 AM by jascook »
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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #6248 on: September 01, 2015, 03:11:47 PM »
A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014)
* *
Director Ana Liliy Amirpour is clearly a fan of Tarantino and Leone. Her music choices often sounds like Morricone or Portishead. This should be a favorite for me. However, this film shows the difference between being a fan and understanding what makes a moment. With Drive (which has a similar dreamy tone, look and pace) Nicolas Winding Refn shows an understanding of effect. Amipour's images are stylish but they don’t evoke anything beyond they’re own self-aware coolness. A vampire dressed in a chador on a skateboard is original, but these scenes are gift wrap: shiny, borrowed, disposable and there's way too much of it for so small a package.

Teproc

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #6249 on: September 02, 2015, 09:08:33 AM »
The Graduate (Mike Nichols, 1967)

This started off so well. Right before Benjamin decides to take Mrs. Robinson up on her offer, there's this great shot of him at the bottom of a swimming pool in a diving suit. We have an interesting character here with Benjamin : he's a young, well, graduate, with a promising future ahead of him, only that's his problem : he's not sure what that future should be, and the idea of a world full of possibilities is making him sick. Great, I'd watch a movie about that. Everything in the first 20 minutes seemed to be about that, with the camera constantly focused on him as he's barely listening to people congratulate him and talking about his future. I was even on-board with the Mrs.Robinson thing, despite Hoffman being so clearly much older than his character was supposed to be for it to really work. Mrs. Robinson is after all a pretty intriguing character at first, a sort of mirror of Benjamin's malaise : she's full of confidence where he's perpetually nervous, but she seems just as miserable as he is.

And then... the rest of the movie happens. For me, its downfall starts with Benjamin and Elaine's first date. Well, maybe even before that, come to think of it, as it wasn't clear at all to me why everyone suddenly seemed so intent on forcing him to go on his date with a character we hadn't even heard about, much less seen, before. That could have been fine, but Elaine, as it turns out, is a non-character. She has no motivations, no personality, nothing. All you need to do to make her fall in love with you is apparently to drag her to some sort of strip club and publicly humiliate her, she loves that. Seriously, that scene was insane, and it is crazy that the movie wants us to believe in a relationship that starts in those terms. I guess Benjamin apologizes for it, but since his behaviour after that is that of a creepy obsessive stalker, I don't think that's really enough.

Oh, there's the iconic soundtrack too, which is incredibly on-the-nose, but at least it's fun and it distracts from the horrible melodrama the film devolves into, with characters doing things for no other reason than : drama ! Maybe I should give Nichols a little credit for the final shot, where we see that maybe, maybe this isn't actually going to work out between those crazy kids, but it's too little, too late. Rarely have I seen a movie waste interesting characters so fast.

3/10

I do realize this is pretty acclaimed though, so I am eager to hear why this film seems to work for so many.
« Last Edit: September 02, 2015, 09:11:45 AM by Teproc »
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