MOVIE COMMENT CATCH-ALL THREAD

[Victator]

I found the later Freddy movies creepy in a John Waters designed hell way. 

[Craig H]

Zero Dark Thirty was fucking awesome. Goddamn, what a good movie.

[mco543]

I watched Josie and the Pussycats today in my Advertising In Society class and I have to say it was quite enjoyable. It wasn't anywhere near as bad as I had assumed it would be and I thought it was very well done as a satirical social commentary on advertising. It didn't hurt that I've had a crush on Rachael Leigh Cook since I first saw her "this is your brain on drugs" commercial when I was like 10 but still.

 

High marks for, of all things, Josie and the Pussycats.

[Ace]

No lie, Josie's one of my favorite movies.

[caley]

Watched two 50s films this weekend.

 

Big Jim McLain was a John Wayne flick with the Duke leading the House of Un-American Activities Committee and going after communists in Hawaii.  It's a weird one in that it starts off extremely heavy-handed with Wayne and partner James Arness complaining about how the communists they bust always plead the 5th and get away with it.  Then they get sent to Hawaii to bust up a Communist Cell, and there's a whole scene dealing with the USS Arizona that feels like it's straight out of a Memorial Day ceremony and is Wayne at his most patriotic/jingoistic/heavy-handed but then instead it turns into almost a romantic comedy with John Wayne attempting to woo secretary Nancy Olson, it stays with this rather light-hearted approach with Wayne interviewing various ex-communists (the scenes aren't particularly good or important, but it gives an excuse for them to just pile on the Communism hate with sentences like "Once I came to my senses...") and run-ins with a rather forward boarding house lady, then, all of a sudden, a rather important character is murdered by communists, and it turns into a brisk sprint with Wayne et al. taking down the commies.  Not one of the better John Wayne films I've seen, that's for sure.

 

Riding Shotgun: Man, I've been DVRing almost every movie playing today on TCM for Randolph Scott day.  This one features Scott as a stagecoach guard who has been riding shotgun for years trying to track down an evil outlaw and get his revenge.  The outlaw pulls a trap on him, leading him away from the stagecoach he's supposed to protect so he can rob it, then use it as a distraction to get the law away from the casino in town he's actually targetting.  Scott gets away, of course, but then, when he reaches the town, all the people are acting cold towards him and it's then that he finds out the townsfolk believe he was in on it.  It's an interesting set-up, but the townsfolk are so aggressively stupid that I ended up shouting at the screen how I wanted Scott to yell "Fuck all, y'all!" and ride away leading the people to the bloody deaths they all so deeply deserve.  It's basically like taking 'High Noon' and making the people even dumber, less courageous and more awful.  Still, it has an early Charles Bronson in it!

[Elsalvajeloco]

Zero Dark Thirty was fucking awesome. Goddamn, what a good movie.

I thought it was good, but The Hurt Locker is still the better Bigelow movie IMO. The movie has so much more tension and patience compared to Zero Dark Thirty. The scene in The Hurt Locker with Ralph Fiennes where they're ambushed and Renner and Mackie's faces become covered with sand is some brilliant, breathtaking stuff. Zero Dark Thirty turned into explosion porn pretty quickly, and I don't think Jessica Chastain was all that great as people hyped up. She only had one truly great moment and that was when she unzipped the bodybag. I thought Jason Clarke was the MVP of the movie.

 

I saw Elysium this weekend, and I have to admit I was a little disappointed like JT (see the Summer Blockbuster thread). Exterior shots of Elysium are basically only 5% of this movie with the rest being spent on exteriors of Earth (I guess Southern California) and interiors when on Elysium. Kruger was fucking money though. Without Kruger, I would have walked out 30 minutes in. The story just isn't that good and it's pretty implausible that you could simply reboot some shit to make everyone citizens of Elysium. 

[piranesi]

Ladies and Gentlemen....there is a movie right now on my t.v. called STRIPPED TO KILL.

 

It stars Greg Evigan from MY TWO DADS and Norman Fell.

 

Norman.

Fell.

 

stars in STRIPPED TO KILL.

 

Jesus.

 

There's also a woman in the movie who played a fat lady in Al Bundy's shoe store to no fewer than four times, with four different character names.  I feel another series coming on:

 

Large Actresses Who Played Mean Ladies That Al Budy Sold Shoes To.

 

Standby.  I'll need to get into the Library of Congress archives.

 

 

Update 1:35 a.m.: The whole Vince-McMahon-is-becoming-Norman-Fell thing is freaking me out.  It doesn't help that Norman Fell is playing a corrupt strip club owner who abuses his workers, encourages their drug dependency, and then fires them when it affects their performance.

 

Update 1:41 a.m.: This movie is like an experiment.  "Can we unfold an entire serial-killer/detective plot in the 30 second increments between a series of blurry, clumsily choreographed 80s-era strip routines?" 

 

Update 1:43 a.m.: The experiment is a success.

 

Update 1:45 a.m.: The lead detective lady/undercover stripper looks a lot like Susan Dey.  That must have seemed like a winning hand in 1987. 

 

Update 1:48 a.m.: Greg Evigan, meanwhile, is trying reaaaaaaaally hard to be Mickey Rourke (9 1/2 WEEKS Mickey Rourke), like, you can see him practicing the slouchy posture while Susan Dey is reading her lines.  Again, I can't fault the logic at the time. I did the same thing, only with BARFLY Mickey Rourke.  Hindsight though, man.  Greg Evigan and I are both revisiting our demons tonight.

 

 

Update 1:51 a.m.:  This just happened:

 

Update 1:55 a.m.: Norman Fell just gave a stripper some advice.  Again, read this as Vince McMahon talking to Fandango:

 

"You do a very creative act.  Some of them will get it.  Most of them will think you're trash.  You gotta protect yourself.  Use them.  Don't let them use you.  Now get out there and shake your ass."

 

Update 1:59 a.m.: 80s underwear must look as weird today as 1930s underwear looked to us back then.

 

Update 2:06 a.m.: The undercover detective lady pretending to be a stripper is getting lost in the game.  She is now doing more and more intricate routines.  She just said "When this started, it was just an investigation.  But it's more than just turning them on.  I'm getting in touch with something I can't control."

 

 This is amazing.

 

Update 2:08: This is a line that was just spoken:

"Yeah, well they found Cinnamon.  Dragged about a hundred miles underneath a semi."

 

Update 2:11 a.m.:  If you ever wanted to see Susan Dey have sex with Mickey Rourke, something like that is happening right now.

 

update 2:20 a.m.: Okay.  I can't even keep up with the awesome dialog here:
I'm going to post some, though, because wherever you are in your current relationship, some of this may come in pretty handy:

 

"You're afraid of being a woman.  All those strippers are.  You'd rather dance up there in front of 100 men rather than be in bed with one.  When it gets real you can't handle it."

"When a stripper makes a mistake, she just twists her ankle.  Cops get killed."

"I can't deal with this emotional stuff."
"Well then make me stop."
"How?"
"You're a cop, figure it out."
[sex happens]
 

update 2:29 a.m.: Holyshitthekillerisoneofthestrippersbutshe'snotreallyshe'saguywearingprosteticboobseventhoughwe'veseenherstrippingforweekssomehownobodynoticed.

 

update 2:32 a.m.: As the killer is chasing Susan Dey, we cut periodically to an interpretive dance about death being done by a stripper dressed as an executioner.  Eventually this abstract manifestation of the film's themes is down to nothing but the executioner's hood + boobs.

 

WE ARE ALL NAKED IN THE FACE OF DEATH!!!!!!!!!!

 

Update 2:35: Final fight of course takes place on the stage of the abandoned strip club.  Yes, the pole has been used to deliver a spinning kick.  This whole scene was ripped off for the final fight in TAKEN 2.

 

Update FINAL:  Greg Evigan ends the movie wearing a sleeveless denim vest with no shirt and blue jeans.  Shameful.

 

Final line of the film:  "My thigh is not fat."

 

I am sated.

[Curt McGirt]

Jeeeeeeezus piranesi. I saw that as a kid on cable and couldn't sit through it.

 

And what's wrong with denim on denim? It looks great. Sleazy, but great. As long as you have a tasteful black t-shirt to wear, and are of an accommidating waist-length (in other words, if you're straight pimpin)

 

God I need some sleep.

[Johnny Sorrow]

 

"You do a very creative act.  Some of them will get it.  Most of them will think you're trash.  You gotta protect yourself.  Use them.  Don't let them use you.  Now get out there and shake your ass."

I'm gonna use this line at the club. Lol.

[J.T.]

Josie & The Pussycats is aces.  I don't think that anyone understood that it was actually satirizing the very thing critics accused it of taking part in.

[Ace]

"Josie and the Pussycats is the best movie ever! _{join the army}"

[Tabe]

A couple more Netflix movies for me:

 

Inside Deep Throat - Very good documentary about the groundbreaking porno.  Lots of good interviews and stories.  They don't delve very far into whether Linda Lovelace was lying when she came out years later and trashed the film, claiming she was raped and so on, and that's a big minus, IMHO.  Other than that, worth checking out.  Be forewarned, there's a few seconds of x-rated footage in it.

 

Arbitrage - Richard Gere is a bigwig at an investment bank who's trying to sell his company before his fraud is discovered.  He's a good guy though - he only committed the fraud to cover up losses on investments being wrongly held up in Russia.  This isn't anything particularly groundbreaking but it's good.

[Zero]

Watched Running Scared with Billy Crystal & Greg Hines. It's on Netflix. It was a pretty funny buddy cop flick. Dug it. 

[piranesi]

Watched Running Scared with Billy Crystal & Greg Hines. It's on Netflix. It was a pretty funny buddy cop flick. Dug it. 

 

 

Even more than LETHAL WEAPON, this was a kind of perfect formula movie.  Not just interracial mismatched wisecracking buddy cops, but making one of them a comedian...or trying to convert a comedian into a tough guy role.  After 48 Hours, they kept doing this.  Billy Crystal, Jim Belushi, Jay Leno (opposite Pat Morita!!!!), all the way up to Adam Sandler and Chris Tucker...amazingly one of the least tough group of people you could imagine.

 

But RUNNING SCARED was like the purist distillation of this formula.

 

If only Jimmy Smits character was named Mendoza instead of Gonzales...it would be perfect.

[SovietShooter]

The chase scene in Running Scared where they take the car on the train tracks is milk like two tits. 

[J.T.]

Running Scared is fucking great.  So infintely quotable and what an ensemble cast.

 

Dan Hedaya stole every scene he was in and Whoa Nelly, Tracy mother fucking Reed as Mary Ann!  BONUS~!

[Curt McGirt]

Dredd gave me a Robocop hard-on like no other. Except for the fact that dude was what I coined an "ultra-fascist", but it stuck to the comics, so great. Such a self-contained world there. If they don't make that sequel I'm gonna be pissed.

[piranesi]

Running Scared is fucking great.  So infintely quotable and what an ensemble cast.

 

Dan Hedaya stole every scene he was in and Whoa Nelly, Tracy mother fucking Reed as Mary Ann!  BONUS~!

 

Also early Joe Pantoliano at his early-Joe-Pantolianoist.

[jaedmc]

Wrote some thoughts about shot compostition in Kurahara's 1957 film I Am Waiting here: http://jaekrenfrow.blogspot.com/2013/08/lost-in-transition.html It's a good movie worth watching if you dig noir and if you're going to take part in the BEST OF 1950's POLL coming later.

 

Also I've been hitting up some Louis Malle films and watched Au Revoir Les Enfants and Black Moon. Au revoir les enfants is really good and the last section is quite devastating. Black Moon is also really good, but is an acquired taste. There's no real plot, but the collection of sounds and images are all quite fascinating, and connected with me. I think no one will watch this movie the same way, which makes discussion afterwards really interesting.

 

And lastly, for now, my wife and I went on a real date for the first time in ages and did a double feature of Frances Ha and The Bling Ring at the Siskel Center. Both movies are great representations of the Post 9/11 youth and its lack of direction, but discussing two very different groups. Frances Ha focus on the late 20's, educated, disenfranchised artists, who knows how the world works and would rather remain a child. Obviously I connected to this quite a bit, as I, like Frances, am stuck between real world responsibilities and keeping true to my self as an artist who wishes the world wasn't so fucking serious. It's a great movie and Greta Gerwig is killer as usual. she gives the most realistic drunk performances of anybody.

 

Bling Ring on the other hand shows the highschool set, focused on celebrity and materialism as social status. The celebrities they rob from are people they idolize, and since our society goes to great lengths to learning everything about these people's lives, it seems all too natural that children would think it would be okay to just invade their homes. My wife said this was her favorite Sofia Coppola film, and it is a really good movie. I might be in the minority, but I thought Coppola actually showed these kids as sympathetic, and viewed them without irony. At times they seemed beautiful in their happiness, and the tragedy was what they were doing to be happy. I've seen people complain about the characters being unlikable, but maybe it's because I'm a parent, I just felt bad for them that their families and society failed them so much in showing them any kind of moral direction. So anyway, check those movies out.

[Death From Above]

The next good Wes Craven movie I see will be the first one.

[Craig H]

 

Zero Dark Thirty was fucking awesome. Goddamn, what a good movie.

I thought it was good, but The Hurt Locker is still the better Bigelow movie IMO. The movie has so much more tension and patience compared to Zero Dark Thirty. The scene in The Hurt Locker with Ralph Fiennes where they're ambushed and Renner and Mackie's faces become covered with sand is some brilliant, breathtaking stuff. Zero Dark Thirty turned into explosion porn pretty quickly, and I don't think Jessica Chastain was all that great as people hyped up. She only had one truly great moment and that was when she unzipped the bodybag. I thought Jason Clarke was the MVP of the movie.

 

I saw Elysium this weekend, and I have to admit I was a little disappointed like JT (see the Summer Blockbuster thread). Exterior shots of Elysium are basically only 5% of this movie with the rest being spent on exteriors of Earth (I guess Southern California) and interiors when on Elysium. Kruger was fucking money though. Without Kruger, I would have walked out 30 minutes in. The story just isn't that good and it's pretty implausible that you could simply reboot some shit to make everyone citizens of Elysium. 

 

 

Oh yeah, Jason Clarke was great. I'd even say that Coach was better than Jessica Chastain and I wish he were in the movie even more. When Jason Clarke's character tells Maya that he's leaving, you can see just how much has been stripped away from him when he mentions that they killed his monkeys because those monkeys were the one innocent thing left in his life at that point, and they were killed as well.

 

I didn't think ZDT was explosion porn though, as there is a lot of time in between "action" sequences. The action sequences themselves aren't terribly long too. The first of which is the brief scene of the attack by the gunmen after Amar is stuffed into the box. After that is some more tail chasing until they show the aftermath of a bombing on TV. Then there's the Marriott bombing, and finally the 12/30/2010 bombing. If anything, I thought the movie was heavy on interviews, but the subject matter fascinates me so much that I didn't mind. I agree with you though, regarding The Hurt Locker. Of the two, I think that one is the better movie if only because the pacing is better and there aren't very many lulls. Plus, the way that movie ends is one of the most badass and haunting endings to a movie that I've seen. 

[jaedmc]

Catherine Grant, who if you love studying film is an absolute must follow on twitter, posted this very rad video dissecting the opening scene of Requiem For a Dream. She specifically analyzes how Arronofsky uses the split screen technique.

 

[PuroresuFan]

A couple more Netflix movies for me:

 

Inside Deep Throat - Very good documentary about the groundbreaking porno.  Lots of good interviews and stories.  They don't delve very far into whether Linda Lovelace was lying when she came out years later and trashed the film, claiming she was raped and so on, and that's a big minus, IMHO.  Other than that, worth checking out.  Be forewarned, there's a few seconds of x-rated footage in it.

 

 

 

So I took your advice and watched about an hour of this so far. I was pretty surprised to see part of the actual scene used like you had said. I would recommend this just on everyone saying nice things about one another and then cutting to Lenny Camp answering every question with "He/she/they were an a**hole!".

[Randy]

For those Korean movie fans, I saw a pretty good movie called NEW WORLD.  It's about an under-cover cop inside a big gang.  The leader of the gang dies, leaving a power vacuum.  The cop's handler positions the two most likely candidates (to take over) to take each other out so that the under-cover gangster to rise to power and be elected the leader.  I liked how It's pretty ambiguous in certain parts so that every detail of what happens isn't spelled out.

[Elsalvajeloco]

I started New World a few weeks back. I made it like almost halfway through. It's just a lot of meetings and stuff. Hopefully, when I do decide to finish it, it picks up in the second half.