Author Topic: 1990s US Bracket: Verdicts  (Read 712318 times)

facedad

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Re: 1990s US Bracket commentary
« Reply #290 on: April 20, 2008, 11:02:33 PM »
You've made the correct choice.
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winrit

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Re: 1990s US Bracket commentary
« Reply #291 on: April 20, 2008, 11:12:06 PM »
*I'll try to make these shorter next time if I'm awarded another chance.

Please don't. I like reading everyone's reviews. That's the best part of this process!
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Re: 1990s US Bracket commentary
« Reply #292 on: April 20, 2008, 11:28:24 PM »
Congrats on making the choice that skjerva and faceboy and sdedalus will not kill you for.
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edgar00

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Re: 1990s US Bracket commentary
« Reply #293 on: April 20, 2008, 11:46:00 PM »
Congrats on making the choice that skjerva and faceboy and sdedalus will not kill you for.

Oh thank god! I was trembling as I clicked the 'post' button earlier this evening.
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facedad

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Re: 1990s US Bracket commentary
« Reply #294 on: April 21, 2008, 12:29:24 AM »
Out of Sight vs. Snow Falling on Cedars

Out of Sight
Major Flaws: Jennifer Lopez. Otherwise, it's predicated on the kind of suspension of disbelief in relationships and attraction that never fully works (though the joke about Three Days of the Condor addresses this problem). Finally, depending on your point-of-view, the film is very superficial. While that's not necessarily a bad thing, it's rare that pure entertainment is also transcendent.

Major Attributes: As a film that knows it's intentions and desires, it really has everything in hand. The damage caused by Lopez is minimized as best it can be. Everything anyone loves about Soderbergh's Ocean's Eleven is present here and in a more complexly entertaining way. It's really wonderfully put together. The look and visual rhythm reinforce the tone in a way that a certain actor often fails to. Most importantly, it was supremely entertaining and almost entirely convincing with almost all the actors doing supreme jobs. I was really surprised just how much I admire the look of the film.

Snow Falling on Cedars
Major Flaws: The single biggest flaw of the film is the Ishmael storyline. It's a B-story at best and at worst it's an unnecessary framing device. For this film to succeed, it should have been a remake of Anatomy of a Murder using this crime/trial storyline. The listlessness of the love story and Ishmael's motivations only serves to reinforce stereotypes about white heroism in service of needy minorities. This isn't even Hawke's fault, as he was fine, though not good. There is nothing additive about the love story and the main story is developed weakly as it is. From the opening shot, it is absolutely clear who was good, who was evil, who had done wrong, who was wrongly treated and how all this racism was going to shake out. There's even palpable misogyny thrown in for no good reason in the guise of greater xenophobic venom coming from women than from the mostly understanding and fair-minding men. But at it's core it's a really basic replaying of the reductive storyline of the bad white people battling the good white people for the souls of disenfranchised minority characters. That's not to say the Japanese characters weren't disenfranchised, just that it could've been handled much better. On top of all this, it dragged through multiple sequences.

Major Attributes: Not surprisingly, it lived up to it's cinematographic legend. It is really shot and lit beautifully with framing that is better than average. Also, Max von Sydow has to work very hard to be so bad as to be mediocre, and he didn't try hard enough here, relegating him to the level of spectacular. He's really unstoppable. It's heart was in the right place and between the editing and the dialogue involved in the court drama, it had a bit of something interesting going on with the development of that storyline. However, as stated earlier, it fell flat and detrimentally predicable. On a separate note, don't construe the relative paucity of praise in comparison to the flaws as a complete condemnation. There really are some good aspects the the film, just not enough. I would be really interested to see a remake, it's too bad Preminger is too dead to do so. If you want to see it, you will see some good things.


Verdict: This was never really close. That's not to say that Snow Falling on Cedars was unworthy, but it just can't stand up against a slate of really good and great films. Out of Sight was one of those really good films and for that it moves on.

Out of Sight > Snow Falling on Cedars
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edgar00

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Re: 1990s US Bracket commentary
« Reply #295 on: April 21, 2008, 12:41:38 AM »
I've never seen Snow but it sounds like it was a painful experience. I always wondered whether it was worth checking out. Now I know...
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facedad

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Re: 1990s US Bracket commentary
« Reply #296 on: April 21, 2008, 12:42:48 AM »
I've never seen Snow but it sounds like it was a painful experience. I always wondered whether it was worth checking out. Now I know...
Sorry again pixote.
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secondcitywolverine

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Re: 1990s US Bracket commentary
« Reply #297 on: April 21, 2008, 01:02:50 AM »
Smoke vs Malcolm X

When I first received this match up, I was excited and nervous. I had never heard of Smoke and I had only seen small parts of Malcolm X. I was glad to see two films as close to a first watch as possible.

Smoke
This is one of those films that is hard to describe a plot. Mostly it revolves around a group of characters that either frequent a cigar shop in New York or are connected to one of these regulars through some story. The stories themselves don't truly tie into one another, but are like the stories of many in the big city in that many people are involved. I think many would consider this an "actor's movie" as there are some great performances. William Hurt plays the hermit author that has gone into seclusion since the murder of his wife at a bank robbery and Forest Whitaker does an amazing job as a man trying to restart his life after running away from his past. I would call this a "writer's movie" though. There is very little action in this film as the whole movie is moved through dialog. Most scenes are with two or three people and reminiscent of Six Degrees of Separation. Stockard Channing has a small role in this film as well that is very outside her norm as a one-eyed blonde. Overall I was impressed with the writing, but didn't become to attached to the characters.

Malcolm X
For me, a great film will cause some form of emotion while watching. Whether it be happiness, sadness, anger, or fear. Well this film had them all. From the beginning of the film I was laughing when young Malcom Little was attempting to be cool with his fly suits, became sad when he became a hustler and literally stole jewelry off the fingers of people, angered with him at the outrage blacks have endured, and then angry at him with his statements about JFK's assasination, and finally sad when he was gunned down by the same people that he had been loyal to for so long. Denzel Washington does such an amazing job portraying Malcolm X that when they display photos and videos of the real Malcolm X at the end of the film, it is hard to distinguish the two. Al Pacino won the oscar that year for best actor in Scent of a Woman, which I'll have to rewatch because Denzel was quite convincing here. And for a film that is over three hours long, it moves at a perfect pace.

This wasn't a close fight. Malcolm X is the winner by quite a margin, but Smoke is definetly worth checking out.

edgar00

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Re: 1990s US Bracket commentary
« Reply #298 on: April 21, 2008, 01:10:07 AM »
I've always been a huge fan of Spike Lee and especially Malcolm X. Denzel Washington does indeed give a great performance (his best?). I have the two-disc special edition and it's a real treat for history buffs.

I like that movie so much I wonder who (message board member) and what film might take it down, if at all.
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facedad

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Re: 1990s US Bracket commentary
« Reply #299 on: April 21, 2008, 01:26:17 AM »
I'm up for that challenge.
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