driver Posted February 28 Share Posted February 28 The Killing of a Chinese Bookie(Director's Cut). Enjoying the ever loving hell out of this. It's on MAX. 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt McGirt Posted March 1 Share Posted March 1 I was just sitting on the toilet doing my best thinking (as always) and for some reason (probably because I posted that Crow/Godfather mashup in the other thread) I came up with the reason "Blue Lou" Boyle was named that in True Romance. Spoiler Mob Goon #2: "Why you frownin', Lou? You always look so down after you kill 'em." Lou: "I don't know, I just always feel blue. I think it's cause I can't kill 'em again. I want to, but they gotta go to wherever we gotta take 'em. Can't help it." Mob Goon #1: *laughter* "Shit, Lou! You feel bad cause you need somebody else now? You're sick!" Lou: "Yeah, just can't help it... Okay, hand me the cleaver, let's get rid of this trash and get some lunch. I'll feel better then." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLSigman Posted March 1 Share Posted March 1 Spoilery question about Dune part 2. Spoiler Is Alia there? Because I've not seen any mention of her in reviews or the soundtrack listing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contentious C Posted March 1 Share Posted March 1 5 hours ago, JLSigman said: Spoilery question about Dune part 2. Hide contents Is Alia there? Because I've not seen any mention of her in reviews or the soundtrack listing. Spoiler Yes, there's a credit wayyyyyyyyyyyy down the IMDb list, but how they're handling that is...weird? Will probably warrant actually seeing the movie to understand the direction they're going with it. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
driver Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 Watched Opening Night yesterday. An interesting movie. Liked it a lot, but it required me to pay attention. Saw it on Max. Seems like a lot of Criterion Collection releases are on Max now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contentious C Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 (edited) Criterion has had that going for a while. Same with TCM. Anyway, yeah. The Time Machine (2002) - I'd always heard this was catastrophically bad, and that part of the reason Guy Pearce did an enormous shitload of DTV crap afterwards is because this tanked his career. It's just...averagely bad? There are worse movies than this by a mile. It certainly isn't good, though, since the entire back half of the film is portrayed by generally bad actors, lots of details are never explained in any meaningful way, and then it gets wrapped up too neatly (who knew every tweedy scientist was capable of a muscle-up, right?). The nicest thing I can say about it is now I've seen it, and it showed me how weaksauce and derivative one particular time-travel idea I had for a story would have been. When Will I Be Loved - Now HEEEERE is the bad stuff. Ugh. If this is any indication, it's probably for the best that James Toback's career has been summarily shot into space post-#MeToo. I first heard about this in the local paper when it came out; let's face it, it's not famous because it's any good (it isn't). It's famous because this slice of chaos was, inexplicably, Neve Campbell's first nude scene in a film, and back in '04, that was still reason enough to get eyeballs on a movie that otherwise didn't deserve them. Sure, Toback had an Academy Award nomination to his name and a few other credits where people took notice for one reason or another, but there's essentially nothing about this to save it from its current placement in Bad Movie Hell. It's so shoddily assembled that the edits and sounds border on painful. It feels like something trying to both bask in and also skewer its influences; if it's trying to be a bit like a Woody Allen movie, down to name-dropping him, this is more, "Woody Allen Ain't Got Nothing on What a Creep I Am." If the meandering park scenes and random encounters were meant to evoke, I don't know, Cleo from 5 to 7, this spin on the idea would be more akin to Horny Dingbats from 5 to 7. Calling the ancillary characters thin gruel is an insult to gruel; Mike Tyson as a gossamer-veiled version of himself might be the only member of the supporting cast to sound half as amusing as he's meant to be. And the almost improvisational style of dialogue is laughable at best. In fact, for a wide swath in the beginning, the dialogue is so pathetic and garbled that it seems 100% pulled out of one orifice or another. It reads like Toback told the cast he wanted to do a Mike Leigh sort of film and then only shot a single take, failing to understand the iteration towards competence and emotional authenticity that goes into Leigh's films. If there's anything that keeps this off the cinder pile of the Truly Worst of All-Time, it's that Campbell and Dominic Chianese are professional enough to make their scenes together work. Their longish section could have had something compelling to say about money, power, aging, sex work, honesty: all sorts of topics, if only it hadn't been trying so hard to fit them all into ten minutes of mostly cruel banter. Their dialogue still feels stilted, self-indulgent, and basted far too long in its own juicy pretension, but they take that chicken shit and turn it into...well...certainly not into chicken salad, but also not-chicken shit. In the end, it's hard not to think of the contemporaneous and Internet-famous argument that transpired between Vincent Gallo and Roger Ebert due to a screening of Gallo's movie, The Brown Bunny. Ebert's GOAT zinger to Gallo would ring true here, as well. No matter who you are, no matter what you did in life, be thankful: you're not James Toback and you didn't direct When Will I Be Loved. Moreover, it's this writer's fervent hope that, if you did direct any films, you weren't such a sad sack that you thought you could hide your creepy, disgusting insecurities in plain sight, as Toback clearly attempts in this sad little punch bowl stowaway. Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning - Since they claim they're changing the title on the next one, I feel no need to call it "part one" like a lame-o. I really would like Pom Klementieff to just play World's Sexiest Chaos Gremlin in everything; this tops her turn as Mantis largely due to the sexiness factor. But man oh man, it's so weird that they keep casting women opposite Tom Cruise who might be Too Hot for Tom Cruise...and yet the one time they cast someone *as his wife*, it's arguably the least attractive leading lady in the entire series. Anyway. How's the movie? Welp? Have you seen the last 3? Then you've seen this. Plug in Esai Morales doing...uh, the FUCKING WEIRDEST VOICE EVER (seriously, when did he come up with the oddly deep hypno-drone? He didn't used to sound like that, did he have some kind of freak accident?), Venice and Rome instead of Other Famous Cities, and some different batshit stunts. You've seen this already, it's preposterous, it's mildly enjoyable, it's Mission: Impossible. The whole AI plot is kind of fucking annoying, though, since, at the end of the day, it's completely unclear how its objectives are being met, especially when those objectives are so clearly affecting real-world things (like blowing up bridges with time bombs, apparently it's totally normal to have dudes hanging off this bridge that's part of a famous rail line, embedding shit into the mortar, no one in Austria looks twice at that...). X - Why, exactly, did people make a big deal about Mia Goth? You aren't bedazzled by her talent. You aren't bedazzled by her looks. It's her GODDAMN LACK OF EYEBROWS, OK? That's what's tweaking your brain, not this pornified-Texas-Chainsaw-Massacre, subverting-tropes-but-not-really, bunch of ageist bollocks masquerading as mid-concept horror. I was thinking I was going to watch this and Pearl, but this was too friggin' boring to make Pearl worth the time. Urban Cowboy - Speaking of people who didn't need a big deal made about them, John Travolta dancing again, everyone! At least this isn't as blatantly fucking offensive as practically every second of Saturday Night Fever, although this skips over the frequent calls of "See You Next Tuesday" and goes straight into domestic violence as a no-chaser shot. On the plus side, Travolta's portrayal is pretty solid, as it's clear he's a lot more in on the joke with Bud than he was with Tony, making him into a right proper lunkhead in almost every scene before it inevitably draws itself to its absurdly saccharine close. This movie feels like the film version of License to Ill: there's probably a lot of tongue-in-cheek fun being had at the expense of the culture it presents, but it probably did more to typify and celebrate it than anything else. Oh, and this is far and away the Least Craggy I've ever seen Scott Glenn look, but, then again, I still haven't watched Nashville. Edited March 2 by Contentious C Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
odessasteps Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 Would you say he’s craggy in The Right Stuff? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt McGirt Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 39 minutes ago, Contentious C said: X - Why, exactly, did people make a big deal about Mia Goth? You aren't bedazzled by her talent. You aren't bedazzled by her looks. It's her GODDAMN LACK OF EYEBROWS, OK? That's what's tweaking your brain, not this pornified-Texas-Chainsaw-Massacre, subverting-tropes-but-not-really, bunch of ageist bollocks masquerading as mid-concept horror. I was thinking I was going to watch this and Pearl, but this was too friggin' boring to make Pearl worth the time. HA! Thank you. Her monologue at the end of Pearl is great, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLSigman Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 14 hours ago, Contentious C said: Hide contents Yes, there's a credit wayyyyyyyyyyyy down the IMDb list, but how they're handling that is...weird? Will probably warrant actually seeing the movie to understand the direction they're going with it. I'd forgotten they weren't doing the time skip, so.... yeah, I've got opinions, but I'll wait until it's out on streaming and I can watch it. Thank you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RazorbladeKiss87 Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 8 hours ago, Contentious C said: X - Why, exactly, did people make a big deal about Mia Goth? You aren't bedazzled by her talent. You aren't bedazzled by her looks. It's her GODDAMN LACK OF EYEBROWS, OK? That's what's tweaking your brain, not this pornified-Texas-Chainsaw-Massacre, subverting-tropes-but-not-really, bunch of ageist bollocks masquerading as mid-concept horror. I was thinking I was going to watch this and Pearl, but this was too friggin' boring to make Pearl worth the time. Yeah, I was excited to see this as I was not able to when it was released. One late night a few weeks ago Showtime had it so I stayed up, despite working early the next morning. My morning self hated my previous night self. I'm a big Ti West fan (House of the Devil was my favorite horror film of the 2000s. Still might be. I haven't revisited or given it much thought lately.) but this wasn't it. I haven't watched Pearl and I'm not sure I intend to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RazorbladeKiss87 Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 Oh, but I will say that I liked Mia Goth in Nymphomaniac. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elizium Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 I am also a low voter on X, Pearl, and Mia Goth. X I found boring and derivative. Pearl was better but I mostly like the faux technicolor look that it has. I can't imagine I'm ever going to feel the need to watch it again. I'll watch Maxxine for completest sake. I find Mia Goth can be grating, at least Infinity Pool understood that and used it to its advantage. I liked her in Suspiria. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
driver Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 Just watched my third John Cassavettes movie since the middle of the week. Mikey and Nicky(being the third of them) is really good. The Killing of a Chinese Bookie was the first. They all have a mid-late 70's vibe and an air of grittiness to them, 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaedmc Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 1 hour ago, driver said: Just watched my third John Cassavettes movie since the middle of the week. Mikey and Nicky(being the third of them) is really good. The Killing of a Chinese Bookie was the first. They all have a mid-late 70's vibe and an air of grittiness to them, Though it can't help but have a similar vibe because it features John Cassavettes and Peter Falk, Mikey and Nicky is an Elaine May film. 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
driver Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 Oops. It was still pretty damned good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaedmc Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 12 minutes ago, driver said: Oops. It was still pretty damned good. Honestly it's a common mistake. I've got the Cassavettes box set from Criterion, and I just enjoy seeing his characters think, you know what I mean? Sometimes his characters feel they're backed into a corner trying to suss out an escape route. Love Chinese Bookie. Love Woman Under the Influence. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contentious C Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 (edited) 10 hours ago, RazorbladeKiss87 said: Oh, but I will say that I liked Mia Goth in Nymphomaniac. It's a good thing I'm not in charge of member titles, or you'd be, "The Guy Who Liked Something, Anything about Nymphomaniac". I looked up her part but I couldn't for the life of me tell you who she was in that. Edited March 3 by Contentious C 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
(BP) Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 At some point I watched and enjoyed Minnie and Moskowitz. I was going to go on a Cassavettes kick after that, but I started with Husbands, and it was so interminably dull and self indulgent that I gave up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt McGirt Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 14 hours ago, Contentious C said: who she was in that Prostitute #3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Log Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 I think my biggest issue with Dune 2 is that it retroactively makes all previous action blockbusters look like shit. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt McGirt Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 Are they giving away the sandworm tops to all that size popcorns or is it just something special for certain places? Or do you have to pay an extra $20? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contentious C Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 2 hours ago, Curt McGirt said: Are they giving away the sandworm tops to all that size popcorns or is it just something special for certain places? Or do you have to pay an extra $20? Free for any single males in the audience. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt McGirt Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 Well, I'm a lock Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Technico Support Posted March 5 Share Posted March 5 That thing looks like a Fleshlight from The Upside Down. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt McGirt Posted March 5 Share Posted March 5 (edited) Everybody is making these "stick your dick in it" jokes but that thing looks frightening to stick your hand in much less your erect penis. And you're supposed to stick your hand in it. People really do have prurient minds; I just want it because it looks scary! Edited March 5 by Curt McGirt 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now