Movie 2023 MOVIE DISCUSSION THREAD

[JLowe]

23 hours ago, John E. Dynamite said:

The best punk venue in Baltimore is right next door to an insanely wonderful video rental store where they've got a giant Criterion display and a whole room where the shelves are organized by director. I was really good about renting from them, but I fell off cause I spend a ton of time with wrestling and games and music but I've been trying my best to get through three movies every two weeks. Redoubled my efforts over the last couple months. So I watched a bunch of movies from them recently and I love a lot them, like

The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant (!)
Auntie Mame
Heroes of the East
We Jam Econo
Chunking Express
Beat Street
The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent
Kwaidan

movies are good, watch good movies, that's all

One of the two best (former) video stores in Austin moved to a place walking distance from my house a few years back and we went regularly, especially in the Halloween season to get the rare/fringe stuff. They were barely hanging on when the pandemic hit and that was the final nail. I was really hoping Tim League (Alamo Drafthouse owner) would take them over but I guess they were hurting too. We had another store (I Luv Video) that apparently is coming back.

[Curt McGirt]

We had the amazing Rentertainment in Champaign but it went under years ago.

[elizium]

First time watch of The Bourne Identity and wow was that a good one. I had avoided it for the longest time because Damon doesn’t do anything for me and I tend to prefer slower, grounded le Carre-style spy stuff.

Watching Supremecy right now and also digging it quite a bit. One thing, Bourne, I don’t know what you thought might happen when you try to resuscitate someone underwater. Even if it works, the first thing they’re gonna do is gasp and inhale a lungful of water. Otherwise, no notes 

[Dolfan in NYC]

 

[Curt McGirt]

Those kids drove Donner through the roof. That was not just funny but also the cruelest joke they could have pulled on him, aside from announcing a sequel. 

Bringing Out the Dead was on last night and, as misery loves company (what's next? Am I gonna end up watching Banshees of Inishirin again?), I had to catch what was left of it. God what a movie. It might be seriously the best Nic Cage performance of all aside from Pig. TOM FUCKING SIZEMORE showed up (completely forgot he was in it) and man he had to be on the highest test coke he could find. At the end he is literally destroying an ambulance with a baseball bat while screaming "DIE! DIE! DIE!" over and over and it put a tear to my eye that he's gone. 

[Curt McGirt]

Bringing Out the Dead: A Pandemic Dialogue | Features | Roger Ebert

This is an excellent back-and-forth about the film and its relation to pandemic times and NYC. There's a paragraph from one of the writers in the middle that just decimated me. 

Spoiler

Of course the New York of Martin Scorsese is not everyone’s New York. In "Mean Streets" and "Taxi Driver" it’s like an open wound, a sweltering, festering nightmare. A place only the criminally deranged seem fit to occupy. By the '90s it was clear how those people had just become an underclass screaming for someone to recognize that they existed, same as the rich and powerful who’d “cleaned it up.” Now everyone just sort of pretends all that’s over and that everyone is just a gleeful participant in a new economy. That’s a lie, but it’s too late to change things. We just have to wait for the inevitable crash when the city is nothing but the extremely poor freelancer class firm in their belief that they’ll become rich tomorrow, and the scamming, scheming pornographically wealthy giving them the false belief all the work everyone does for them is worth it. Everyone’s a winner and nobody sleeps. 

 

[John from Cincinnati]

On 5/9/2023 at 7:42 PM, elizium said:

First time watch of The Bourne Identity and wow was that a good one. I had avoided it for the longest time because Damon doesn’t do anything for me and I tend to prefer slower, grounded le Carre-style spy stuff.

Watching Supremecy right now and also digging it quite a bit. One thing, Bourne, I don’t know what you thought might happen when you try to resuscitate someone underwater. Even if it works, the first thing they’re gonna do is gasp and inhale a lungful of water. Otherwise, no notes 

Recommend watching Ultimatum and pretending everything after that doesn’t exist. 

[Craig H]

Chunk being in full Chunk mode constantly calling him "Dick" was really hilarious. I don't think that kid had to stretch too far to act in his role.

[elizium]

2 hours ago, John from Cincinnati said:

Recommend watching Ultimatum and pretending everything after that doesn’t exist. 

Tubi has all of them, so I plan on going through them all. Bring on RenDog

[Curt McGirt]

From the TV thread: 

Quote

It's been awhile since I saw it but The Krays smokes Legend. Legend still has a great performance by Hardy (there's a couple specific bits and a fight scene between the two brothers that is seamless) but it has its problems. The Krays, IIRC, was simply awesome. I'm gonna dig it up and watch it again tonight. 

So, dug it up. It's a phenomenal picture that deserves the 4* that Ebert gave it (and he's got a good review/interview on his website). The two films, however, are apples and oranges. The Krays focuses on the power and influence the twins' mother had over them their entire lives and she is in many ways the lead character. Mom stokes their narcissism and encourages their behavior. She seems to know what they do and discreetly accepts and even encourages it with her lack of distain. Accordingly, they dote on her endlessly and even live upstairs at the family home. Reggie gets a surprisingly quiet, downplayed role while Ron gets the focus -- and man is he scary. These guys come at dudes with SWORDS. It all builds to a fittingly bloody climax. Extremely well-acted and beautifully set-dressed film. The place just looks like the claustrophobic East End, the clubs are gorgeous, the ladies are all dressed in prints like your grandmother's couch. Good, good stuff. 

Legend is totally different. Its focus is on Reg trying to keep Ron under control when it is clearly impossible. This allows Hardy to just let it all hang out. There's a brief confession he gives to Philly mob boss Angelo Bruno (infamously shotgun-assassinated in his car) where he admits to being a homosexual with all races and finishes with something to the extent of he had a foreign lover that he "twisted into a pretzel -- I hurt him good". Whereupon jaw-dropped Chazz Palmintieri just accepts it and tells him "you got some balls, kid". They really excel at shooting the two brothers including the fight scene mentioned above. Sadly, this one also focuses on Reggie's wife including an all-too typical voiceover from her. She's just not that interesting of a character and it turns soapy at points. The wife knocks around for about a half hour of The Krays before committing a very realistic suicide whereas this gal does so without a tear. Even though it is more involved with the business side and the twin vs. twin side, and the melodrama lends to Hardy going over the top, it reduces the mother's influence to but one scene and is frankly just too American of a movie. 

Funny, the review for the latter on rogerebert.com complains about the film having a Goodfellas bar scene ripoff but I swear to god The Krays has a "Karen at the girls' makeup party" scene down almost verbatim, only the film was a year earlier!

[Curt McGirt]

It's also of note that I went to Wiki and the Krays apparently had sex with each other for years among other lurid things. Neither of these films even bother to mention that the twins were mini-stars of their time who were friends with people like Sinatra, Liza Minelli, etc. and had George Raft fronting for them at one point.

[odessasteps]

I know I saw it in college when it was at the art theater in Bloomington, but I don’t remember if I’ve seen it since.  I was thinking of watching it for the pod and doing something on classic British gangster pics, since I watched along Good Friday not that long ago. 

[Curt McGirt]

Oooo, that would be cool. Gives you a chance to watch Get Carter and EDIT: you just watched The Long Good Friday I are dumbs haha

Edited May 13, 2023 by Curt McGirt

[odessasteps]

For the Plot, I usually do 2 movies or shows so as to make it not more than 30 minutes, depending on how many clips I use. 

[Curt McGirt]

Definitely let Good Friday be one of them for sure. 

Anyway... NSFW 

Legend (2015) Tom Hardy The Krays The Richardsons Pub Fight Scene - YouTube

[odessasteps]

I was actually going to do originally a Bob Hoskins double feature of Friday and Roger Rabbit.

[elizium]

Bourne Legacy is probably not going to be as good as the original trilogy, but they certainly went ham on the casting 

[Curt McGirt]

4 hours ago, odessasteps said:

I was actually going to do originally a Bob Hoskins double feature of Friday and Roger Rabbit.

Oh SHIT. If you did Good Friday and Mona Lisa you'd be cooking with gas.

[Curt McGirt]

Mona Lisa Trailer 1986 - YouTube

I mean, c'mon. It's even a British crime film too... with Michael Caine!

[odessasteps]

I may not have watched that since it first came out,although it was great. 

[Octopus]

Derp. Time for some shameful plugging.

My film, Ode to the Whale of Christ, is officially available on YouTube! 

CLICK HERE for the link to the film, so I don’t bog down this site with a big 30 min embedded video

This was the abstract silent film that was completed right before I created my film fest, Octopus Marquee Independent Film Festival (sheesh, I’m plug whoring hard). For a little over 2 years it had a fun run on the festival circuit. Now with the Octopus putting more focus on family (lil Octopus is now running around the house and climbing on the couch, future filmmaking endeavors (shooting the next film soon), and spending time highlighting independent Auteurs and unique filmmakers through the OctoMarqIFF, it is time to end the films run on the exclusivity festival circuit. If you’d like to watch this 30 minute experimental b&w silent film , please click the link provided above or CLICK RIGHT HERE.

Quote

Ode to the Whale of Christ 

A Modern Silent Film, by David Matthew Johnson. A black and white film with a rhythmic abundance of text that scatters across the screen and a meditative pace that creates a visually compelling sensory experience.
She carries He, a man eternally asleep. We witness She’s struggle carrying, feeding, bathing, and caring for He, until She can lift He no longer.

Reviews:

Spoiler

“A stylish short movie that dares to be black & white and silent. Yet, it is never silent.” – Luminous Void

“[David Matthew] Johnson succeeds in one of the most difficult creative operations: making aesthetics and content coincide. This homogeneous creative act is a film of rare fluidity of writing, original but discreet, intimate and lyrical, up to the disturbing finale. The breaking of modern conventions allows Johnson to free himself from the burden of structures and the film, in its frequent written parts, seems to urge the spectator himself to compose his vision. A rare and precious work.” - Prisma Rome Independent

“ ‘Ode to the Whale of Christ’ is an extraordinary film that has a deep influence on the viewer. David Matthew Johnson makes an inventive use of silence.
By silence he totally captures the attention of the viewer, pointing out that very important, sacred acts take place here. Furthermore, he introduces a tension, which at times takes your breath away. The silence severely intensifies the viewer's emotional involvement in the drama.” - Dr. Konstantinos Akrivos PhD - Short Encounters

"“Ode to the Whale of Christ, minus its explicit religious symbolism, is also an account of everyday human toil, the kind fated to simultaneous perseverance and utter absence of reward. The mercilessness which She subjects herself to is easily a representation of self-harm masked as service. Her care in the absence of his response is easily an account of historical emotional and physical labor in empty marriages.” - Indie Shorts Mag

 

This was the film I posted here about the theater screening late last year. It can be really tough putting myself out there and for so long I’d never finish anything for that fear of failure and timidness to be front and center. But to hopefully make a living making the weird movies I imagine I have to be brave and active at working on my dreams. 

Here was pics of the screening from last year’s thread:

[Brian Fowler]

On 5/12/2023 at 1:56 PM, John from Cincinnati said:

Recommend watching Ultimatum and pretending everything after that doesn’t exist. 

Recommend not watching Ultimatum and trying to forget that Supremacy existed.

(Yes, I know that's a contrarian opinion. But Jesus fuck Ultimatum was a terrible movie and it's editing Oscar was a crime against cinema.)

[The Natural]

On 5/10/2023 at 2:42 AM, elizium said:

First time watch of The Bourne Identity and wow was that a good one. I had avoided it for the longest time because Damon doesn’t do anything for me and I tend to prefer slower, grounded le Carre-style spy stuff.

Watching Supremecy right now and also digging it quite a bit. One thing, Bourne, I don’t know what you thought might happen when you try to resuscitate someone underwater. Even if it works, the first thing they’re gonna do is gasp and inhale a lungful of water. Otherwise, no notes 

 

On 5/12/2023 at 6:56 PM, John from Cincinnati said:

Recommend watching Ultimatum and pretending everything after that doesn’t exist. 

 

On 5/12/2023 at 9:35 PM, elizium said:

Tubi has all of them, so I plan on going through them all. Bring on RenDog

 

3 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

Recommend not watching Ultimatum and trying to forget that Supremacy existed.

(Yes, I know that's a contrarian opinion. But Jesus fuck Ultimatum was a terrible movie and it's editing Oscar was a crime against cinema.)

The Bourne Identity (2002) is great, The Bourne Supremacy (2004) is very good though my least favourite of the three and The Bourne Ultimatum (2007) is fantastic. I love that film especially. In my head canon, it ended as a trilogy with no weak entries and a rare trilogy where the third film is the best. Unfortunately The Bourne Legacy (2012) and Jason Bourne (2016) exist. The former is the worst of the five films followed by the latter which legit put me to sleep at the cinema.

Edited May 14, 2023 by The Natural

[The Natural]

10 hours ago, Octopus said:

Derp. Time for some shameful plugging.

My film, Ode to the Whale of Christ, is officially available on YouTube! 

CLICK HERE for the link to the film, so I don’t bog down this site with a big 30 min embedded video

This was the abstract silent film that was completed right before I created my film fest, Octopus Marquee Independent Film Festival (sheesh, I’m plug whoring hard). For a little over 2 years it had a fun run on the festival circuit. Now with the Octopus putting more focus on family (lil Octopus is now running around the house and climbing on the couch, future filmmaking endeavors (shooting the next film soon), and spending time highlighting independent Auteurs and unique filmmakers through the OctoMarqIFF, it is time to end the films run on the exclusivity festival circuit. If you’d like to watch this 30 minute experimental b&w silent film , please click the link provided above or CLICK RIGHT HERE.

This was the film I posted here about the theater screening late last year. It can be really tough putting myself out there and for so long I’d never finish anything for that fear of failure and timidness to be front and center. But to hopefully make a living making the weird movies I imagine I have to be brave and active at working on my dreams. 

Here was pics of the screening from last year’s thread:

Cheers, friend. Couldn't happen to a nicer fella. Love you xxx.

[elizium]

Bourne Legacy was much better than I was expecting. I loved that it picks up immediately (or technically during) Ultimatum and we see the fallout of the original trilogy. Supporting cast, especially Stacy Keach, are great. And Ed Norton probably got a decent payday to hang out in rooms full of monitors for a few days.

Didn’t like the added sci-fi element of having their mental and physical capabilities enhanced and needing daily pills to keep them. Was much less silly when they were just brainwashed elite soldiers.

Even being an Avenger, I don’t buy Renner as some sort of super soldier. The movie really should have been about Oscar Isaac’s character who, in 5-10 minutes of screen time, had hints of a much more interesting backstory than Renner got in 2+ hours of film.

Oh lol I just remembered the whole thing about Renner’s character being hunted by wolves because they didn’t recognize him as human.

Starting Jason Bourne and my hopes are not exactly high. Bourne becoming some sort of Russian underground prize fighter seems wholly out of character. The Hackers-esque hacking the Gibson sequence killed me. Good thing for Julia Stiles the CIA keeps a folder labelled “Black Operations”

E: Apparently he's an underground fighter in Greece which, sure why not....

Edited May 14, 2023 by elizium