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2022 Movies Discussion Thread (v.2.0)


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On 8/28/2022 at 8:15 AM, Curt McGirt said:

Jackie Brown, Kill Bill 2, Reservoir Dogs

But yeah if he just wrote them, True Romance, From Dusk Till Dawn... and Jackie Brown (all due respect to Elmore Leonard)

Rum Punch wasn't his best work, anticlimactic the way he structured it. Never seen Jackie Brown so I'm not sure how it differs. Then again I didn't love Get Shorty either(as a book).

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On 8/28/2022 at 6:49 AM, The Natural said:

Which big name films have you never seen from beginning to end, just clips of?

Mine:

  1. The Godfather.
  2. The Godfather: Part II.
  3. The Godfather: Part III.
  4. Alien.
  5. Aliens.
  6. Alien3.
  7. Alien Resurrection.
  8. Raiders of the Lost Ark.
  9. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.
  10. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.
  11. Schindler's List.
  12. The Matrix and all the sequels.
  13. Seven Samurai.
  14. It's a Wonderful Life.
  15. Casablanca.
  16. Apocalypse Now.
  17. 2001: A Space Odyssey.
  18. Taxi Driver.
  19. The Wolf of Wall Street.
  20. Casino.

I've never seen any of the Alien movies.  I really need to correct that.

Other than Godfather III, the Matrix sequels and Wolf of Wall St (only because I haven't seen it yet), I'd really highly recommend all of the movies on this list. Of course, that's not a controversial statement. It's a who's who of all-time great films, but still. Sometimes there's this barrier to watching something proclaimed as "great" for so long. I don't know what it is. Maybe a fear of being disappointed by it and thus feeling sort of left out? But I think these are a bunch of movies that aren't over-hyped. They hold up.

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On 8/30/2022 at 9:27 AM, Log said:

I've never seen any of the Alien movies.  I really need to correct that.

1 & 2 are really good.  1 is a horror movie in space, 2 is a war movie in space.  They are very different but both are great.  Bill Paxton is awesome in 2 (after Paxton died, PWG named their next show "Game Over, Man!" after one of his famous lines in the film).

3 I have only seen parts of and have never seen it straight through.  Reading an article in, I want to say Cinescape magazine, in the mid 90s about Alien 3's troubled production and zillion rewrites was my first exposure to "development hell."

Resurrection is weird, directed by Jean Pierre Juenet between City of Lost Children and Amelie, which is crazy.  I won't say it's good but it's not actively bad. 

Prometheus was a massive disappointment.  I don't remember Covenant at all.

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3 was a weird case of being a really good movie that both fit into the world built by the first two movies and needing you to ignore a massive fucking plothole for it to work in the first place.  

I can see where Resurrection wanted to go, but it didn't stick the landing.   However the sheer talent of the cast willed that movie to work way more than it deserved.

Prometheus might've suffered from Ridley being stuck up his own ass and getting too cute with the origins.  Covenant was actually a good flick that tried to clean up Prometheus' mess.  Both are worth a watch just to see Fassbender being fucking kingsized through out both, and Covenant for Danny McBride working outside his usual type. 

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21 hours ago, Raziel said:

Prometheus might've suffered from Ridley being stuck up his own ass and getting too cute with the origins. 

I need to double check but I seem to recall the issue with Prometheus was studio meddling, like someone got cold feet about making it an "Alien" movie and wanted it to work as a standalone film, so it ended up as this weird middle ground thing that satisfied nobody.

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On 8/28/2022 at 5:49 AM, The Natural said:

Which big name films have you never seen from beginning to end, just clips of?

Mine:

  1. The Godfather.
  2. The Godfather: Part II.
  3. The Godfather: Part III.
  4. Alien.
  5. Aliens.
  6. Alien3.
  7. Alien Resurrection.
  8. Raiders of the Lost Ark.
  9. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.
  10. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.
  11. Schindler's List.
  12. The Matrix and all the sequels.
  13. Seven Samurai.
  14. It's a Wonderful Life.
  15. Casablanca.
  16. Apocalypse Now.
  17. 2001: A Space Odyssey.
  18. Taxi Driver.
  19. The Wolf of Wall Street.
  20. Casino.

i grew up with the Indiana Jones movies and consider them all-time classics. i am curious how someone with no previous exposure to them would feel about them.

the Alien franchise is actually full of great movies. i would say all of them are at minimum "good" with most of them "great" or better. don't remember Covenant at all but just picked up the bluray, so a rewatch is imminent. 

i tried to watch 2001: a Space Odyssey 21 years ago and was bored to tears.

just rewatched the 3 Matrix movies a year or so back. 1 is excellent. 2&3 are decent but don't dive into the mythos the way i would have preferred.

Godfather movies are definitely worth a watch, but they are long so you really have to be in the mood for them. get you some good Italian food and dive in some weekend. (ditto Casino) 

not interested in the old b&w flicks.

 

have you seen any of these series? Rambo, Back to the Future (in the same vein as Indiana Jones for me), Predator (at least the first), Rocky (i assume you've seen these), Lord of the Rings?

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I've never seen E.T. and likely never will. One of the first films I remember where the trailer clearly hit every major story beat. Alien comes to earth, meets cute with kid, kid hides him but other kids find out, government baddies show up, kids lam it with alien, alien nearly dies but recovers, says goodbye to kid, E.T. go home, the end. Every bit of it was in the trailer. No thanks.

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On 8/30/2022 at 2:27 PM, Log said:

I've never seen any of the Alien movies.  I really need to correct that.

Other than Godfather III, the Matrix sequels and Wolf of Wall St (only because I haven't seen it yet), I'd really highly recommend all of the movies on this list. Of course, that's not a controversial statement. It's a who's who of all-time great films, but still. Sometimes there's this barrier to watching something proclaimed as "great" for so long. I don't know what it is. Maybe a fear of being disappointed by it and thus feeling sort of left out? But I think these are a bunch of movies that aren't over-hyped. They hold up.

Thank you for the recommendations!

8 hours ago, twiztor said:

i grew up with the Indiana Jones movies and consider them all-time classics. i am curious how someone with no previous exposure to them would feel about them.

the Alien franchise is actually full of great movies. i would say all of them are at minimum "good" with most of them "great" or better. don't remember Covenant at all but just picked up the bluray, so a rewatch is imminent. 

i tried to watch 2001: a Space Odyssey 21 years ago and was bored to tears.

just rewatched the 3 Matrix movies a year or so back. 1 is excellent. 2&3 are decent but don't dive into the mythos the way i would have preferred.

Godfather movies are definitely worth a watch, but they are long so you really have to be in the mood for them. get you some good Italian food and dive in some weekend. (ditto Casino) 

not interested in the old b&w flicks.

 

have you seen any of these series? Rambo, Back to the Future (in the same vein as Indiana Jones for me), Predator (at least the first), Rocky (i assume you've seen these), Lord of the Rings?

I've seen bits of all four Indians Jones films last week as one of the Sky Movies channels briefly became it. Need to see them fully.

Yeah, long films either work with the running time or don't. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly is the best example.

Thanks for the recommendations.  Seen the first Rambo, the first Back to the Future as a very young boy but not the others - I'm hit and miss with time travel stories, the first Predator, all the Rocky movies and the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. Re: TLOTR. That's something I wouldn't normally watch but did for Aje who's a big fan, he's like a brother to me and for the Best Films of the 2000s project here/on Smarkschoice.

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I still haven't seen Kane or Casablanca, top of my head. A lot of '50s and before classics. Basically the laundry list of TCM stuff. 

Carpenter was being totally facetious about never making a Western: ALL his films, besides Elvis and Halloween, are Westerns. His favorite director is John Ford. I don't think he liked the interviewer much...

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On 8/31/2022 at 10:19 AM, Raziel said:

Covenant for Danny McBride working outside his usual type. 

I couldn't buy it at all. Also, the Xenomorph in daylight is a total joke. Truly it's digital that killed the beast though. If Cameron had made Aliens a couple years later it would have been a total joke. Even Alien 3 had the unfortunate CGI of its demise which was just under the line of credibility to me. 

Speaking of which I was creeped out by the Xenomorph jaws on Johah's singlet from NJPW last night haha

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21 hours ago, Execproducer said:

I've never seen E.T. and likely never will. One of the first films I remember where the trailer clearly hit every major story beat. Alien comes to earth, meets cute with kid, kid hides him but other kids find out, government baddies show up, kids lam it with alien, alien nearly dies but recovers, says goodbye to kid, E.T. go home, the end. Every bit of it was in the trailer. No thanks.

I saw it when I was a kid,don't remember much, other than hating it, but that was probably 35years ago now. .   

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Godfather III is on and I had a thought

Spoiler

Why the hell would Michael Corleone, of all people, not have a personal medical standby at the ready, like say IN HIS HOME, instead of being taken to a hospital since he knows what can happen in hospitals? He could have them on retainer, rich and ready. He already had diabetes so why not? 

 

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Got a bit behind because I had 80% of stuff written up on Thursday and then fat-fingered the whole thing out of existence with a keystroke.  So, between that and being burnt out, I'm doing something a little different: Day 417 (and counting), 3 Sentences or Less Edition.

AXE Body Spray Instead of Shower

In the Line of Fire - The only thing that's aged worse than the copaganda, the sexism, the bad green-screening, and the script is Clint Eastwood himself.  Though I suppose we should be thankful John Malkovich is here, since this in many ways was the beginning of the "Being John Malkovich" idea.  Otherwise, no.

1922 - Molly Parker is in far too little of this to be able to ignore Thomas Jane's ridiculous, clenched-jaw accent or the way Dylan Schmid looks like Cut-Rate Chalamet.  Hasn't Stephen King done about eight other stories, too, where the moral is You Can Escape the Law but You Can't Escape Yourself, so why add to that number?  No.

Crooked House - This is an Agatha Christie adaptation that feels more like a TV movie than anything else, in spite of all the big names, but then again, that's sort of what streaming has done to the film industry in general, isn't it?  The ending goes hard, and there's a dinner scene that's pretty vindictive, but the rest of this is a snooze you'll find quite predictable.  Skip.

RRR - Gotta go against some of the good press on this one, because the scale of this feels off and ridiculous in a way that even the most absurd MCU entries don't, and that's on the writers and director for making something that's as subtle as a fart in church.  Plus, it's smuggling in a whole crapload of nationalistic propaganda and colorism on the backs of real historical figures who probably would despise how quickly India has let fascism ruin its democracy; read the recent Salon article about the film if you want to learn more.  No.

Cleaner - Sam Jackson can do this in his sleep, and so can Ed Harris, but Renny Harlin (or his editor) seem like a 12-year-old who just figured out editing software on the computer and have to spend their time doing dumb, goofy shit they're convinced 'looks cool' rather than making the story work better.  And while this is not that bad as far as noirs go - I've definitely watched worse during this streak - it's one of the more corrupted ones as far as its ethical center goes, and for a film that feels like it's trying to say something once in a while, that's kind of a swing-and-a-miss.  Meh.

That'll Do, Pig

Catfight - In another world, or another format like perhaps the stage, this could have worked, because the world it presents is so cynical and satirical and openly critical of capitalism and its effects on women that you can't help but appreciate how all-in they went with the demented nature of the film, down to little details like the incredibly fucked-up artwork that is frequently on display.  The problem is that it's full of jokes, but not full of jokes that land; in fact, plenty of them show just as much air as the many, many, many punches that Sandra Oh and Anne Heche "trade" in their bad playfighting.  Not for everyone.

The Gift (2013) - I can appreciate a movie that is swerve all the way through; the trailers definitely gave next to nothing about this away, and by the time you get to the end, you feel like Jason Bateman is the biggest piece of shit walking the earth.  But, it suffers from Manchester-by-the-Sea Disease, where one character is just there to advance the plot for someone else, and you have to wonder how fucked-up it is for Rebecca Hall's character - who we spend nearly the whole film with - to have so little agency of her own when nearly *everything* happens to her.  Decent if you can ignore the grossness of its implications.

The Battered Bastards of Baseball - I wonder if the people who made Major League or Bull Durham ever thanked Bing Russell for making those movies considerably more believable; this story is basically the Anvil to their This Is Spinal Tap.  This isn't as well-made as any of those other four films, which are all classics in their own right as far as I'm concerned, but it's a pleasant, effective jaunt through a point and place in time where something off-the-wall could happen and did happen.  Recommend.

Mindhorn - Imagine BoJack Horseman, only live-action and more "Magnum, P.I." than "Full House", and you pretty much have the premise for this; it's not nearly as funny as BoJack, but it has some moments that will make you want to fall out.  But it definitely feels more than a little bit like yet another jumped-up kind of film that, in another day, would have been straight-to-video, as it isn't as crisp or as good-looking as a lot of its contemporaries; it actually looked a little like an episode of "Sherlock", but I realize that isn't really much of a knock on it.  You might enjoy this.

Kodachrome - Both Jason Sudeikis and Ed Harris are problematic here, because Sudeikis has the emotional range of a potted plant and comes off as out of his depth as often as not, while Harris has more upper body definition than people 30 years younger than him, let alone terminal liver cancer patients.  But Harris is obviously the right casting for everything else about it, and it's believable in the sense of "piece of shit dad relating to son who's afraid he's also a piece of shit" that is the centerpiece of the film; it's just too bad they didn't get someone better for the lead.  Worth a look.

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I watched National Champions yesterday! It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, I thought it was going to be so bad it was funny but it was just regular bad. First all of the arguments they try to make(movie was released in December 2021) are no longer relevant since NIL has pretty much wiped out any talk of players getting paid by the schools or forming a union and collective bargaining. The first half seems like the final episode of a series or limited series about a big time college football team, the second half gets really over dramatic with grand speeches and melodrama that'll make your eyes roll. Now I would totally be down with a series about a big time college football team with J.K. Simmons as the head coach, Kristin Chenoweth as his wife, Timothy Olyphant as a sorta sleazy professor, Tim Blake Nelson as the big money booster and David Koechner as the SEC commissioner. 

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Went to our last remaining cinema of misfit movies this morning to attend a presentation on a new housing development for employees and their families. The theater workers were putting up posters of this weekend's films and, with the lack of tent-pole films coming out at the moment, we're starting to get a few stinkers and "only in our theater" productions returning to the screens.

 

First up ...

PARADISE HIGHWAY

Juliette Binoche (?!?!?) plays a redneck trucker (?!?!?) as she attempts to take the title of "female Liam Neeson." 

Frank Grillo appears to be starring in about 20 films that will be released in the next year or so. Saw on Wiki that he divorced his wife in 2020, so this must be the "pay the alimony" phase of his career.

 

MEDIEVAL

A Czech historical epic that actually looks cool and possibly worth a matinee, though I didn't know that 14th century Czechs spoke in perfect British accents.

 

"Paradise Highway" is sharing its screen with another Lionsgate film, "Wire Room," which features Bruce Willis and Kevin Dillon. Given Willis' health and the controversy about his doing so many films these last few years and why, I won't share the trailer. 

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2 hours ago, colonial said:

Went to our last remaining cinema of misfit movies this morning to attend a presentation on a new housing development for employees and their families. The theater workers were putting up posters of this weekend's films and, with the lack of tent-pole films coming out at the moment, we're starting to get a few stinkers and "only in our theater" productions returning to the screens.

 

First up ...

PARADISE HIGHWAY

Juliette Binoche (?!?!?) plays a redneck trucker (?!?!?) as she attempts to take the title of "female Liam Neeson." 

Frank Grillo appears to be starring in about 20 films that will be released in the next year or so. Saw on Wiki that he divorced his wife in 2020, so this must be the "pay the alimony" phase of his career.

 

MEDIEVAL

A Czech historical epic that actually looks cool and possibly worth a matinee, though I didn't know that 14th century Czechs spoke in perfect British accents.

 

"Paradise Highway" is sharing its screen with another Lionsgate film, "Wire Room," which features Bruce Willis and Kevin Dillon. Given Willis' health and the controversy about his doing so many films these last few years and why, I won't share the trailer. 

Trailer 1:

Binoche is just a lady driver who's seen some shit, put up with shit, taken shit and is tired of all the shit and has decided not to put up with anymore shit.

Trailer 2:

This reminds me of The Lover where the French family all had the whiniest ass English accents ever.

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