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Author Topic: Respond to the last movie you watched  (Read 684329 times)

Bondo

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #3250 on: February 26, 2019, 08:31:33 PM »
The problem with the "blind hate can be cyclical" message is that in this case the hate only flows one way. It is entirely the problem that it creates an equivalency between the white supremacists and the black gang. The gang might be bad people (though we certainly have no reason to suspect the initial victim is a gang member, and that he turns out to be might be even more problematic because it plays into stereotypes), but they don't seem likely to just randomly attack white people. They only specifically attack one guy who did a horrible thing.

That the director is Israeli makes me wonder if he's using race in America as metaphor for Israeli-Palestinian conflict and cycles of violence, but I'm not sure it would work in that capacity either.

1SO

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #3251 on: February 26, 2019, 10:08:41 PM »

Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb (2014)
★ ★ ½
I saw the first two Museum films in the theater. Didn't like them, but I get what they were doing. Easy entertainment built on a great high concept idea. This one benefitted from being a home viewing where anything better than bad was appreciated. There's quite a bit that isn't bad, I even laughed a few times. Plus, the special effects are really well-done. Not groundbreaking, but compared to The Great Wall, it shows what a difference it makes to have belief in what my eyes are seeing.

The best thing about watching Tomb at this particular time is the cast. That 2nd person from the left above is Rami Malek, who was also in the first film, and has a really big part here. I had forgotten Dan Stevens plays Lancelot and he's exceptional as usual. (Except for Beauty and the Beast he's always acting several levels above the material.) I'm at a point where I have nothing but warm feelings when I see Robin Williams in a movie, and some of his scenes are more emotional because of his tragic life. Dick Van Dyke shows up to dance to "Shake Your Groove Thing." Then there's the appearance by this well-known celebrity.


Alice Eve (with Hugh Jackman.)

There's still a lot of low-hanging fruit for laughs, including Ben Stiller as a caveman and a monkey that likes to pee on things, but the glass was half full for me this time, and I really liked how the film reaches a fitting conclusion for the entire trilogy. Got me thinking that I enjoy these films more than history says I do.

MartinTeller

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #3252 on: February 26, 2019, 10:52:53 PM »
We watched the first eight minutes of A Goofy Movie. Given the title, I expected a movie about Goofy, not his shitty kid. This seemed like it was gonna be some lame teen angsty stuff, and the one song we heard was terrible, and then Pauly Shore showed up. We bailed, may circle back to it later.

I'm sure I'm the millionth person to make this quip, but here goes anyway: Sleeping Beauty is a snooze. Maleficent is magnificent, and the artwork is often quite lovely, but the rest of it averages out to meh. The songs are dullsville. The narrator is the whitest white guy that ever spoke into a microphone, so stiff. Aurora is a cookie-cutter princess, no discernible personality... her animal friends are much more enjoyable. Ditto Phillip... he's nothing special, I'd much rather hang out with his horse Samson. The three fairies are okay, I guess. Mildly fun but also kind of annoying. The magic is sometimes clever but also so utterly arbitrary that it's hard to care (someone tell me because I didn't get it... why did they put everyone to sleep?). On top of all that, it's just gross that Aurora gets promised to some kid from the moment she's born, just because they're both royalty... and then, wouldn't you know, they just happen to accidentally fall in love with each other. What a messed up world. Really the problem is that the movie is just not very engaging. Thankfully, it's short. Rating: Fair (60)
« Last Edit: March 05, 2019, 04:19:43 PM by MartinTeller »

Corndog

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #3253 on: February 27, 2019, 07:41:18 AM »
We watched the first eight minutes of A Goofy Movie. Given the title, I expected a movie about Goofy, not his shitty kid. This seemed like it was gonna be some lame teen angsty stuff, and the one song we heard was terrible, and then Pauly Shore showed up. We bailed, may circle back to it later.

I remember A Goofy Movie fondly, though I also haven't seen it since I was probably about 8 or 9, so there's that.
"Time is the speed at which the past decays."

1SO

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #3254 on: February 27, 2019, 09:45:57 AM »
I watched A Goofy Movie for the first time in December. Pauly Shore brought back unpleasant memories, even in his few minutes of time. Luckily, it's a movie about Father and Son, but I still wouldn't recommend it. I watched it because the Disney community has a cult of fans for Powerline and I wanted to see what that was about.

I like that you also saw the Noirish shades in Zootopia.

Sleeping Beauty is one for me where the narrative flaws are crippling, but the fairy tale aspects are strong. Hard to explain, but I guess it works for me emotionally way more than mentally.

Corndog

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #3255 on: February 27, 2019, 11:48:50 AM »
Greta (Neil Jordan, 2018)

When I initially heard about this film, I certainly didn’t have any expectations. Sure, I love Isabelle Huppert, but I haven’t seen Chloe Grace Moretz in anything in a while, and while I’ve heard of his films, I’ve not seen anything by Neil Jordan. Regardless, Huppert is such a strong draw that there is a natural set of expectations just built on the fact that I get to see one of her performances. But then I read the plot synopsis and I wondered whether there was anything original could be done with the ill-fated, not what it seems relationship built between two strangers. Well, I will say this, Huppert is a must-see. The rest of the film is better than expected too.

Frances (Chloe Grace Moretz) has just moved from Boston to live with her friend Erica (Maika Monroe) in New York City. Erica sees Frances as too cordial, fearing she might get eaten alive in NYC, so she hopes to help guide her, but after Frances, a restaurant server, finds a lost purse on the subway, Erica tries to persuade her against returning it. Frances, being who she is, feels obligated to seek out the owner, Greta (Isabelle Huppert). Upon meeting, the two strike up a friendship, built somewhat on Frances having recently lost her mother, and Greta feeling lonely herself. But soon, the relationship takes a turn as it morphs into something Frances didn’t ever expect, resulting in a thrilling game of cat and mouse as we try to figure out just who Greta is and what she’s up to.

Isabelle Huppert is off the rails crazy in this, in the best possible way. Jordan constructs a rather tight and serious, yet silly thriller, which really affords Huppert the room to really let loose with her performance, and it works wondrously. The result is a film which is surprisingly effective in its creepiness and thrills. As previously mentioned, there is much here that is not new. The type of film here has been done before many times, and I’m not sure that Jordan really brings much new to the table per se, but the execution is quite strong, resulting in a fairly taut, if imperfect narrative. Come for the thrills, stay for Isabelle Huppert. Always.

There is some clunky dialogue, some more than questionable character decisions and motivations, but much of that is swept under the rug to give stage to the performances, which are universally good. Huppert, of course, but I was always pleasantly surprised by Moretz’s more serious turn here. Maika Monroe was strong as well, delivering a more playful vibe somewhere between the two. The balance was certainly effective, and the trio elevated the material from the rather mediocre and standard screenplay.

Huppert’s performance deserves a better movie around her, but the rest of it all is good enough to warrant a recommendation regardless. She is clearly having a whole lot of fun in this film, and it is refreshing to see a film not take itself so seriously that it can take a moment to also laugh at itself. It’s easy to see where things might be going, what might be happening, what character x is going to do. And there are plenty of eye-rolling moments where you can scream at the screen “don’t do that”, and “why doesn’t she just do x!?”. But all in all this is an easy film to have fun with an enjoy if you just release yourself to its wiles.

★★★ - Liked It
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Bondo

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #3256 on: February 27, 2019, 08:38:23 PM »
The Wife (2018)

I tend to be wary of films that get attention exclusively for one performance at the awards. I believe a performance can be the best thing about a film, but extremely rarely could I imagine a lead performance being great in a bad film. The good news is The Wife is actually a very good film which puts the great performance by Glenn Close to good use in it. It does suffer some weaknesses with the acting in the flashback scenes that makes the foundation of the relationship between Joan (Close) and Joe (Jonathan Pryce) that we see in its winter.

Getting past my discomfort with the blossoming romance of college-student Joan and her married literature professor viewed from an era of #metoo, the film is strongest in how it hits at sexism that pervaded the publishing industry (and arts writ large) at the time. It is a reasonable pair for Colette from last year. That Joan finds her ambitions thwarted explains a lot about how she finds herself in this relationship through trying times. And the bow on top is how convincingly the film calls out the difficult genius conception. And hey, it gave me a reason to bump Bohemian Rhapsody out of my top-10 for 2018.

FLYmeatwad

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #3257 on: February 27, 2019, 09:37:19 PM »
We watched the first eight minutes of A Goofy Movie. Given the title, I expected a movie about Goofy, not his shitty kid. This seemed like it was gonna be some lame teen angsty stuff, and the one song we heard was terrible, and then Pauly Shore showed up. We bailed, may circle back to it later.

I remember A Goofy Movie fondly, though I also haven't seen it since I was probably about 8 or 9, so there's that.

It's fire. Love how that one character is about cheese wiz.

MartinTeller

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #3258 on: February 27, 2019, 11:03:13 PM »
It's fire. Love how that one character is about cheese wiz.

No offense, but I think you and I like movies for very different reasons.

Brave - I had low expectations for this given how much everyone seems to hate it, so maybe that's why I liked it as much as I did. It's certainly a breath of fresh air after other Disney movies about princesses tripping all over themselves to fall in love and get married to some guy (as much as I adored The Little Mermaid, it does unfortunately follow that pattern). I really liked Merida and I thought the jokes were not bad and I found the story compelling enough. I also appreciated Pixar putting their anthropomorphism talents to such novel and effective use, rather than just dreaming up another dumb "what if [insert thing here] were just like people?" scenario. The bear is just fantastic. I also felt the movie didn't try too hard to be all Scottish-y... definitely not as egregious as The Princess and the Frog in its cultural scene-setting. I thought the film got a little too loud and hectic at times (and I think far too scary/violent for small children) and a bit frustrating near the end. But overall I enjoyed this.

My wife, on the other hand, really turned on Merida in a big way when she tricked her mother into eating something that would have an unknown effect, and did it for purely selfish purposes, and furthermore showed little concern that it was clearly making her ill, still only caring about her own wants. She hated the movie after that, and felt that the incident was far too casually swept under the rug and forgotten, and that the lesson was mothers are just supposed to take whatever their children do to them and immediately forgive them. I understand her point of view, but I'm a little surprised at how much of a nerve it touched for her. I was more willing to write it off as teenage self-absorption and naivete, and noted Merida's remorse at the end. Carrie felt it was too little too late. Rating: Good (78)
« Last Edit: February 28, 2019, 12:17:01 AM by MartinTeller »

Dave the Necrobumper

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Re: Respond to the last movie you watched
« Reply #3259 on: February 28, 2019, 04:39:19 AM »
My 2 little ones (5 and 7) enjoy the film and they are not the bravest of kids. So while they were a bit distressed at the later attacking the mother as a bear scene they did cope, still most likely a few years before your little one would watch it.