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2014 MOVIE OMNIBUS THREAD


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So in order to balance that we need more movies about young immigrants coming to America, getting screwed over by senior guys, and forgiving them?

 

Without the forgiveness part, that's a bit like the plot of GTA 4.

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So in order to balance that we need more movies about young immigrants coming to America, getting screwed over by senior guys, and forgiving them?

 

Without the forgiveness part, that's a bit like the plot of GTA 4.

With less bowling.

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Since we need to lay the October Horrordays thread to rest I'll put this here. 

 

Puppet Master III is pretty good after all these years. It was acclaimed as the best of the PM films and I agree. It's a period film set in 1941 Nazi Germany where Andre Toulon (Guy Rolfe), the original puppet master, is caught doing subversive marionette skits (and bringing his puppets to life with his secret serum) by an undercover Nazi. This brings him to the attention of a doctor trying to bring the dead back to life to use as human shields on the Russian front and the local Gestapo head played by a typically vicious Richard Lynch, who promptly murders Toulon's wife. Toulon escapes and plots his revenge. I don't know how Charlie Band swung the money but they actually shot this at Universal Studios in Hollywood and it looks pretty good. Some good gore, decent puppet effects, and more than anything Guy Rolfe's performance really carries it as he goes from gentle old man to bitter and vengeful but still with a good heart. Cool to know the puppets are inhabited by the souls of people killed by the Nazis, too. 

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http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/my-miserable-night-at-jordan-737331

 

Interesting and somewhat depressing take on Jordan Belfort and his current seminar tour. It's amazing how the movie portrayed him as this huge, charismatic big shot (and maybe he was back then) but it's rather clear at this point he's just a two-bit con artist...and not even a very good one. Most there were asking for a refund.

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http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/my-miserable-night-at-jordan-737331

 

Interesting and somewhat depressing take on Jordan Belfort and his current seminar tour. It's amazing how the movie portrayed him as this huge, charismatic big shot (and maybe he was back then) but it's rather clear at this point he's just a two-bit con artist...and not even a very good one. Most there were asking for a refund.

 

Funny that people pay to go to a known scam artist and then complain about being scammed.  Entertaining movie, but if you thought to yourself at any point of the film that "I'd like to  meet / know this guy in real life" you probably need help. 

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Have to remember that it was a different time then.

These days just about everyone is aware of the hard sell tactics guys like Belfort used because every sales/marketing company used them and everyone over the age of 18 has seen at least one of Boiler Room or Wolf of Wall St OR they have worked for a 2-bit "Jordan Belfort inspired" knock off company.

Anyone trying to sell like that in this day and age is faced with a market that is wise to the act.

It's like that scene in Boiler Room where Ribisi chews out the news subscription guy over and over again.

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So, I was watching 'Her' for the...jeez...fifth time earlier tonight and noticed a part that I never spotted before that made me laugh.  When Samantha has Theodore walking around with his eyes closed and telling him to spin around and sneeze and stuff, just before she says "Everybody thinks you're really drunk" and he orders the pizza, you can see a girl in the background catch her heel and stumble as the guy beside her tries to kind of keep her going.  I just like to imagine her going "I'm gonna be in a movie! I'm gonna be a movie! All I have to is walk and..shit!  Nobody saw it, you're still good, you're still good."

 

Also, I think the best line in the movie is when Theodore and Samantha are out on the double date with Chris Pratt's girlfriend and his character and Samantha goes on this spiel about how she was sad she didn't have a body but she realized it doesn't matter and how everyone else's body will rot and decay and they all go silent and Chris Pratt just goes "Yikes" and it's so perfect.

 

So, to sum it up, I really love that movie.

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Just got back from NIGHTCRAWLER. It's not for anyone without patience since it takes it's sweet time building to the big event seen in the trailers.

The ending will definitely turn some people off, but Jake G. carries the movie on his back and is so awesome at playing the skeeviest, sleaziest sociopath possible that I still give it a solid two thumbs up.

More thoughts may be forthcoming tomorrow.

 

Just saw it last night and thought it was pretty awesome as well. However, I don't see why the ending would turn some people off. Honestly, once I got into the story that's how I expected it to end.

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I guess I'm going to have to see Birdman since everyone in the world is talking about how great it is.

 

 

I saw John Wick this week... still gotta see Birdman, Nightcrawler, Whiplash, Interstellar and Big Hero 6.  Also wouldn't mind seeing The Skeleton Twins, St. Vincent and Force Majeure.  And that's just what's in theaters right now, never mind the stuff from earlier in the year I have to catch up on.

 

Might do a multiplex weekend.

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Finally got around to seeing "The Raid: Redemption"

Holy shit was this amazing!

The fight choreography was intense but still beautiful to watch. Some of the 'takedowns' (we werent sure who actually died) resulted in huge screams from the group I was with.

And that final boss fight... geez!

Awesome, awesome stuff. Anyone who is putting off watching this needs to see it ASAP! I recommend watching with a small group just for the reactions haha

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I saw John Wick this week... still gotta see Birdman, Nightcrawler, Whiplash, Interstellar and Big Hero 6.  Also wouldn't mind seeing The Skeleton Twins, St. Vincent and Force Majeure.  And that's just what's in theaters right now, never mind the stuff from earlier in the year I have to catch up on.

 

Might do a multiplex weekend.

 

 

So I only managed to cross two of those off my list, probably the two lowest profile ones.

 

Force Majeure: This is a front-runner for Best Foreign Film Oscar, about a family on a ski trip.  They're eating lunch on a mountainside patio when an avalanche begins; it looks like it's going to hit the patio, everyone panics, and the dad takes off running, abandoning his family.  The avalanche doesn't make it to the patio and the dad comes back, but now the mom is pissed at him and we get 90 minutes of tension.  As far as foreign film contenders, I thought Haemoo was much better than this, but it's not bad.  Good examination of relationship dynamics and the male psyche. There is some symbolism (the grimy hotel worker guy pretty clearly represents relationship problems), and it's the final scene, on a bus, that I'm thinking about the most.  It seems to send an anti-relationship message, but not sure if I'm interpreting it correctly.  They did a really good job shooting that part, though, making a normal bus ride seem as frightening as possible.  Glad I saw it in a theatre just for that.

 
The Skeleton Twins: Again, not bad, not great.  After Adult Beginners and this, I may have to stop completely trusting that I'll love anything the Duplass brothers produce.  Not an SNL guy (only seen Hader in The To-Do List, I think) so I have no strong feelings about the stars... I'd say it was forgettable, except that I've had Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now stuck in my head for about 24 hours now.  The way they frame shots to get across the siblings' relationship really stuck out to me.  Like the two of them will be having a conversation, the camera flips back and forth between them as they're speaking, and one will be alllll the way on the left of the screen and the other will be allll the way on the right, because they're emotionally far apart.  And that changes as the movie progresses.
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Just ordered Dolph Lundgren Punisher Blu Ray from amazon UK.  This is a test run and if shit is good I'll be on a slippery slope.  Didn't want to splurge on Thunderbolt & Lightfoot 'til I confirm the kill.  Other imports that sound good are Flight of the Navigator and Buckaroo Banzai.

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Just watched Like Father, Like Son and knew it would be good, but wasn't really prepared, for some reason, for how straight-up emotional it is.  It's a Hirokazu Koreeda film (And, man, I'm not sure there's a more consistent director working on the planet right now: Maborosi, After Life, Nobody Knows, Still Walking, I Wish all excellent films) and it's just devastating.  A well-to-do architect and his wife discover that their son was switched at birth with another boy who has been raised by a lower-class family who runs a repair shop and have to decide whether or not to switch back to their biological sons.  The architect, who always found his son to be a little soft and unambitious, thrills at the thought of raising a child more like him, even though he never spares any time with his son anyways.  In his arrogance, he also has a pipe dream about raising both boys.  The families do a sort of 'son exchange' with each son going to live, unknowingly, with their biological parents for weekends over a series of months.  Now I'm not a parent, myself, but when the parents start to realize that they might have made a mistake (I won't tell you which option they chose), it's just an absolute gut-punch of a scene with a wonderful performance by Masaharu Fukuyama that conveys so much without words.  I think I'm starting to ramble here, but it's really good and by our DVDVR rules it's eligible for the 'Best of 2014' list so you should watch it!

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Just got back from seeing...

 

Interstellar - LOL.  Seriously, that's my reaction.  There's some nice ideas and themes in this movie but...man.  There are so many plot holes, mistakes, and leaps in logic it's like somebody took a machine gun to the script.  Good grief.  Even technically it disappoints.  It was apparently shot on film- film left out in one of the dirt storms from the movie, that is.  It's grainy, dull, and flat.  The special effects are unimpressive, with some looking like they were ripped straight out of a medium-budget sci-film.  From 1984.  Anne Hathaway's dialogue and deliver range from pretty good to laughably terrible.  And, well, it's an Anne Hathaway movie so, of course she cries.  Maybe she's crying over the way her skin changes shades for no apparent reason, from pale to almost ghostly white and back again. Matthew Mconahayhayhayhayhay spends the entire movie acting like he simply doesn't have the energy to enunciate or even fully speak his lines.  The little girl who play's the daughter is very good in her limited screen time.  Jessica Chastain looks good but is pretty unremarkable in a part that doesn't ask much of her.  Having said all that, like I mentioned, there's some nice themes here.  The overarching "survival instinct" theme.is well-done.  The pull of love and family are well-done.  The last 5-10 minutes of the movie is really good.  And, despite being 3 hours long, the movie doesn't feel particularly long.  In the end, though, this movie is simply not good.  4/10.  Maybe.

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I feel like Tabe saw a completely different movie than the rest of us.

 

Not that I don't think it had issues, but he's praising the weakest elements and having problems with the strongest.

I am apparently the only person who liked the last couple minutes.  Oh well.  Maybe I'm just looking for a silver lining to an otherwise bad movie.

 

There are just soooooo many plot holes - hair that somehow doesn't grow, lakes that don't fill in despite the world being completely dried up, face shields that magically repair themselves, ships that are indestructible (but we can't have working MRI machines), ships with seemingly unlimited food & water resources, inhospitably cold planets that somehow don't have an effect on bare skin when gloves and helmets are removed, and on and on and on and on.

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I feel like Tabe saw a completely different movie than the rest of us.

FWIW, the two guys I saw the movie with, and several people on my Facebook page, all had the same opinion as me.  I've got one friend who thinks it was really, really great but opinion is running like 9:1 against in my circle.

 

I was sooooo disappointed with the movie.  And the first 30 minutes or so, I was thinking "man, this is gonna be great!"  And then it...wasn't.

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