Movie 2023 MOVIE DISCUSSION THREAD

[FourPostMassacre]

On 8/2/2023 at 1:30 PM, Mister TV said:

Requiem for a Heavyweight is like Night in the City, where it uses wrestling as a plot point. 

All the Marbles is great but there's so much padding, more than a third of it is them driving around with Falk's character badly ADR'ed in saying "you girls need to work on the sunset flip".

Body Slam is a personal favorite. 

[Curt McGirt]

Caught the last quarter or so of The Last Boy Scout on TV earlier. What a ridiculous '90s Action OD of a film. It just goes shootout-car chase-shootout-car chase-shootout/foot chase. The final villain getting shot up and falling onto a fucking whirling helicopter blade is so over the top, it's absolutely perfect. Then I read the review from Ebert and he complained about the super misogyny through the whole film, which I only got a mere whiff of from how much I watched. It kinda felt like the '90s version of Cobra or Commando, the one that took the current popular action pattern and ran with it all the way to the moon.

[driver]

Watched Ladybug Ladybug yesterday. A young Olivia Soprano plays a school teacher. It's on Pluto. It would make a good double feature with The Day After.

[Contentious C]

Hey, I watched some stuff. 

No, I'm not back to the longer-form things.  Just...felt like getting down some thoughts before they vanish from my very distracted brain.

Raw Deal was one of those 80s movies that I'd seen the cover of a million times and never watched, since it never seemed to be on TV and it never popped up anywhere when I was in the mood for some shitty action movie from the period.  And, now I know why: because it isn't any good!  It's just your average Dino De Laurentiis-quality production that just so happens to have Arnold in it.  But, let's face it, I've watched some of the worst schlock imaginable, so this is no worse than, say, a 4 or 5 out of 10 compared to that.  Robert Davi is in it, how bad can it truly be when we spend so much time with him playing the same typecast role? 

But!  It does have one of the just plain stupidest plot holes I have EVER SEEN in my life.  So, yeah, Arnold's character has to fake his own death, see?  So he goes to a big-ass abandoned chemical plant, which, somehow, is still FULL TO THE BRIM with chemicals (never mind that they're valuable, and dangerous, and regulated, and a million other things that would have them be ANYWHERE ELSE), but that isn't the best/worst part.  He cuts the chain of the fence with some bolt cutters to break in, calls in a fake 'disturbance' because he's the local sheriff, parks his sheriff's car under the chemical vat, turns it on...and then...

CALMLY WALKS AROUND THE BACK OF THE VAT AND RETRIEVES A !!MOTORCYCLE!! SO HE CAN MAKE HIS GETAWAY WITH NO ONE THE WISER, FIRING A FLARE TO IGNITE THE CHEMICALS AS HE DRIVES OFF.  ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!?!?!?!?!?!?

?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

Oh my God, whatever Inception did for making audiences try to be smarter in movies, this did the exact opposite.

Similarly, The Amityville Horror was a barely-remembered childhood movie that I had caught dribs and drabs of but never watched in its entirety.  Now I have and...good God, why was this movie popular?  It's *terrible*.  The plot meanders in about six different directions without connecting them in any meaningful way, stuff pops up and then is forgotten about just as fast as it arrived, the kids are basically just Plot Devices With Legs so bad shit can happen...ugh.  And it's not scary.  At all.  It's just insulting, and awful, and stupid, and it should have been relegated to the dustbin of history, instead of being how everyone refers to those attic windows.

Next to watch (eventually) in the 'movies from my childhood I never got around to seeing': Cobra !

I'm also going to say something a little controversial.  The Fast & the Furious: Tokyo Drift is the best F/F movie out of the first 3, and it's not that close.  The first one is just Point Brake and badly done at that, and the second one is...oh my God, Tyrese Gibson & Paul Walker trying to carry a movie is like dropping the Pentagon on an anthill in the Amazon and saying, "Hey, can you lug that back to Arlington, please?"  Cole Hauser is the least menacing villain ever: what's he gonna do, summon his character from Good Will Hunting and say the "R" word one too many times to you and make you feel bad about yourself (and yes, in this case, the "R" word is "rat in a bucket", just ask Mark Boone, Jr.)?  So it's beyond shit, and I'd imagine still the worst movie in the series.  But the third one...actually isn't terrible.  You can see Jeremy Lin very clearly setting the standard for the look and feel and tone of the subsequent installments with how his movie plays out.  It isn't, you know, actually good, but it was trying to *do* something and it's hard to fault it for that.  It's memorable enough that I watched something else (which I can't recall at the moment) that very, VERY clearly ripped off the opening stunt sequence from this.  Some other movie where the main character is trying to use a fast car to cut off a much bigger vehicle and has to drive through what amounts to a construction zone to do it.  I'm blanking on it, but Tokyo Drift did it better anyway.

Shazam: Fury of the Gods wasn't as good as the first one by any means, but it didn't deserve to bomb as hard as it did, either, so it's kind of too bad it's likely the end of the road there.  It's got its moments, but it's sort of ridiculous that Billy-as-Billy is more mature than Billy-as-Shazam.  Djimon Hounsou has one of the absolutely hokiest, hammiest, godawfulest first scenes but then is somehow pretty good the rest of the film.  I don't get it.

Immortals feels like a movie where Zack Snyder influenced someone, and that someone made something even broodier and darker and sleazier than 300, and then that movie influenced Snyder to desaturate the fuck out of any film he did starring Henry Cavill for the foreseeable future, which, let's face it, was 3 movies too many.  This is a little more visually appealing than how I've described it: there are some neat transitions here and there, but mostly it just feels like trying to capitalize on the success of a movie that didn't, you know, involve gods coming to Earth to fight the actual battle that mattered.  But I think we can safely say that any film that requires Stephen Dorff to have abs probably has its priorities in the wrong place.

The Menu should have been better but...I don't know.  I think the last third of it falls apart almost entirely, and I really doubt that so many people would acquiesce like that.  In my head, I was already breaking the tops off the wine glasses and holding the stems between my fingers and ready to fuck up a dude or six.  But man, that first half and the setup, and the whole bit with Nicholas Hoult, not to mention its point-counterpoint play that it has if you've watched The Bear?  Damn.  Good good stuff.

But the real winner here was easily, easily Promising Young Woman.  Boys should have to watch that shit at 9, and 12, and 15, and before graduating high school, and probably after as well.  It's as much a goddamned public service as it is a withering social commentary.  It has no easy answers, it gives no easy outs, it leaves every ugly door open just enough so you can see inside, and yet it's still somehow an emotionally satisfying conclusion despite the utter depravity and total, total *wrongness* of the whole fucking story.  This probably should have won Best Picture instead of Nomadland.  I don't know if it's as good as Drive My Car or EEAAO, probably not, but it's in the ballpark at the least.

...

OK, that was pretty fucking long after all.  Shit.

Edited August 20, 2023 by Contentious C

[Curt McGirt]

9 hours ago, Contentious C said:

good God, why was this movie popular?  It's *terrible*. 

THANK YOU. Such a boring fucking movie. 2 and 3 are also terrible but awesome in comparison, because 2 has a basement full of zombies and 3 has the most brutal car crash/death by burning in any film ever. 

If you had a problem with the delirious randomness of Raw Deal then prepare for the ultimate in said absurdity with Cobra. There's a dissection of it on Youtube ("Why Cobra is the greatest movie ever" or somesuch) that checks off every little thing. It's insane. Me, I prefer Red Dawn to Raw Deal, because it has a scene where Arnold pulls off a guy's fake leg, dumps a bunch of coke out of it and says "cocainum" which I guess is Russian for cocaine. Then he kicks a bunch of drug smuggler ass. Raw Deal has Koji Kitao too which means it's automatically worse because he just does that to things. 

Edited August 20, 2023 by Curt McGirt

[odessasteps]

As a child of the 70s, the Amityville style houses (that look like faces) still give pause when I see them. 

[Curt McGirt]

Actually, I don't know which one Koji was in. I'm pretty sure it's Red Heat, which also has a nice list of character actors. 

It just hit me that The Shining is a better ripoff of The Amityville Horror. Holy wow Batman! 

[driver]

Watched Enys Men and it's a very interesting movie. Even giving it every ounce of my attention I'm still trying to figure out what I watched beyond the fact that it's creepy and it's setting adds to that atmosphere.

Watched All About Evil. The entire cast appears to be having a ball chewing as much scenery as they could, but special recognition goes to Natasha Lyonne for really enjoying herself.

 

[Contentious C]

6 hours ago, Curt McGirt said:

Actually, I don't know which one Koji was in. I'm pretty sure it's Red Heat, which also has a nice list of character actors. 

It just hit me that The Shining is a better ripoff of The Amityville Horror. Holy wow Batman! 

According to IMDb, he was in neither! Maybe you're thinking of someone else. I had forgotten all about Red Heat, aka the Let's Copy Lethal Weapon era. Weird the only rewatchable movie from that bunch is Turner & Hooch.

[Curt McGirt]

What about Tango and Cash? I remember my mom was in some kind of "MY SON CANNOT WATCH THAT" spook over it from a review she read or something. Like it was something I'd go out of my way to watch, if she hadn't been scared that I'd watch it! 

I think Kitao was uncredited? There was a fight towards the end of one of the movies involving a trailer truck or something with him I think. I dunno. 

[J.T.]

Koji Kitao is in Raw Deal.  I know he was the sumo guy in JCVD's The Quest, but I don't remember him being in Raw Deal.

[Mister TV]

47 minutes ago, Curt McGirt said:

What about Tango and Cash? I remember my mom was in some kind of "MY SON CANNOT WATCH THAT" spook over it from a review she read or something. Like it was something I'd go out of my way to watch, if she hadn't been scared that I'd watch it! 

I think Kitao was uncredited? There was a fight towards the end of one of the movies involving a trailer truck or something with him I think. I dunno. 

I re-watched Tango & Cash during the pandemic, it’s a silly but fun action flick, Jack Palance chewing every bit of scenery is amazing and worth a watch. 

[odessasteps]

I could see not letting a little kid watch 48 Hours, but not Tango & Cash. 

[Eivion]

2 hours ago, odessasteps said:

I could see not letting a little kid watch 48 Hours, but not Tango & Cash. 

I watched both as a kid. 

[Travis Sheldon]

The Amityville Horror is one of my favorite haunted house movies where the house wins. 

[J.T.]

12 hours ago, Mister TV said:

I re-watched Tango & Cash during the pandemic, it’s a silly but fun action flick, Jack Palance chewing every bit of scenery is amazing and worth a watch. 

The best part is finding out that LAPD secretly has a Q branch that issues out cowboy boots with hidden shotguns and heavily armed RVs to the detectives.

I'd have no problem with a kid watching Tango & Cash because it doesn't take itself seriously.  There are plenty of reasons not to let a kid watch either of the 48 Hrs movies especially the sequel, unless you want to explain who Russ Meyer is to your small child.

Edited August 21, 2023 by J.T.

[Curt McGirt]

Mom was told it was too violent. Meanwhile I was scooping up any and all horror I could...

The real LAPD didn't need a secret Q division, they were perfectly happy showing off their new toys to the local suburbanites in Compton etc.

[Mister TV]

1 hour ago, J.T. said:

The best part is finding out that LAPD secretly has a Q branch that issues out cowboy boots with hidden shotguns and heavily armed RVs to the detectives.

I'd have no problem with a kid watching Tango & Cash because it doesn't take itself seriously.  There are plenty of reasons not to let a kid watch either of the 48 Hrs movies especially the sequel, unless you want to explain who Russ Meyer is to your small child.

Watched some Tango & Cash clips during breakfast, forgot about the massive amount of character actors in it, including Brion James going all out with crazy eyes and a cockney accent.

[Curt McGirt]

EDIT: Ah hell, I'll just let him tell it. (RIP buddy)

Quote

In a 1999 interview with Louis Paul at the Chiller Theatre Convention, actor Brion James elaborated on his experiences working on Tango & Cash and the film’s production problems:

BJ: TANGO AND CASH, I had two scenes when I started the film. Konchalovsky wanted to work with me for years, he worked for Cannon, they couldn't pay me, so I couldn't work for them. He wanted me to work with him on RUNAWAY TRAIN. Finally, I get to work with him and he calls me in and I meet Stallone and Russell and they say 'Yeah, he's great.' I just had two scenes with these guys, they chase me around, and I get beat up and that's it. So, I get there and I'm acting with Stallone and made my character have a cockney accent just to add something. I said I'm in a movie with all of these guys, how am I going to chew the scenery with all of these fuckers? So, I created the cockney, I'm not just another hit man from Cleveland. They loved it. They played off of it, they got into it. So Stallone started re-writing the script, the script wasn't really ready, but they were there to go, so when you got to go, you go. The script was ready, and when it was not, he would fix it. The film was twenty million dollars over budget and I wound up being on the film for fourteen weeks. My part went from a few days, to much bigger. So, I became the main bad guy, and not Jack Palance.

LP: Konchalovsky lost that picture, didn't he?

BJ: He did a great job, but Sly got him fired. Sly is very protective about his films. He got his own DP in, and the film went twenty million dollars over budget. So the studio had to justify it, and fired him, saying it was the director's fault. It wasn't his fault. They didn't have a script. I was even re-writing at the end of the day, over and over. They only had three weeks left and they brought in Albert Magnoli. He did rock videos and a Prince movie (PURPLE RAIN). They gave this guy three quarters of a million dollars to do three weeks. By the time he got there, I was like don't talk to me, stay back. I knew this character for weeks, I know what I'm doing. It wound up being a great film, that eventually made a lot of money. It's one of the biggest pirated videos in the history of Russia. There were 80,000 pirated copies. Warner Bros. was crazy not to market it properly, but that film was huge. I went to the Ukraine when I was shooting another film, and I was mobbed. I was in the Black Sea and I had no idea that people even knew who I was.[11]

 

Edited August 21, 2023 by Curt McGirt

[Dolfan in NYC]

Here is the best commercial for Oppenheimer ever:

 

[Log]

15 hours ago, odessasteps said:

I could see not letting a little kid watch 48 Hours, but not Tango & Cash. 

Had my son at soccer practice this weekend. Kid on his team comments on a dad's Star Wars t-shirt. Kid's mom says he knows the characters, but hasn't seen the movies because they're not sure he's "ready for them".

Meanwhile, I'm thinking of how my son and I watched Bloodsport and Predator last weekend.

[Dolfan in NYC]

2 minutes ago, Log said:

Had my son at soccer practice this weekend. Kid on his team comments on a dad's Star Wars t-shirt. Kid's mom says he knows the characters, but hasn't seen the movies because they're not sure he's "ready for them".

Meanwhile, I'm thinking of how my son and I watched Bloodsport and Predator last weekend.

tbf, Predator is mostly invisible throughout that movie. 

[J.T.]

4 minutes ago, Dolfan in NYC said:

tbf, Predator is mostly invisible throughout that movie. 

I don't think the visual of the Predator would be as problematic as the visuals of the flayed naked soldiers and of course Jesse Ventura being killed by laser arrows that blew his chest open.

That being said, I watched Predator with my daughter when she was eleven.  She absolutely loved it.

I am probably the worst father that has ever lived.

Edited August 21, 2023 by J.T.

[Zimbra]

Remember when they made a line of action figures for fucking Robocop?

I wonder how many other kids parlayed liking the toys into getting traumatized by Clarence Boddicker and ED-209.

[Log]

46 minutes ago, J.T. said:

I don't think the visual of the Predator would be as problematic as the visuals of the flayed naked soldiers and of course Jesse Ventura being killed by laser arrows that blew his chest open.

That being said, I watched Predator with my daughter when she was eleven.  She absolutely loved it.

I am probably the worst father that has ever lived.

I did re-direct his attention during the flayed bodies scene, at least.

When my daughter was younger, my mother-in-law thought that it was awful that I watched the Marvel movies with her. I mean, they're super-tame and nothing even bothered her in those, but my nephew (who's about the same age as my daughter) got scared in one, so they must be scary to every kid since my in-laws use him for the baseline of all things. Sorry, that's a rant for another time.

Anyway, one day my daughter is chilling on her iPad watching some videos. All of a sudden, she comes in the room just bawling, so upset with something she'd watched. It was Taylor Swift's Bad Blood video. I guess in that video, a bunch of Taylor's famous friends get "killed" in pretty violent ways. I felt a little vindicated since none of the stuff I'd showed her upset her.