Movies 2025 Movie Discussion Thread

[Curt McGirt]

When I was a kid we went to Universal Studios and the highlight was the Hitchcock exhibit that year, which had the Bates Motel standup from Psycho, an optical illusion staircase descending for Vertigo, and a 3D segment in a theater where I saw the Mother Bates reveal for the first time ever. It concluded with a section that just had birds flying at the screen until one entirely blacked it out. Terrifying and awesome. Sadly, Jaws was out of order that year. 

I think I also got to be in the cast of Arcade that year? Nick filmed there, right? That had to be the place we went to with it. We also went to Disneyland once I think and it sucked, no memories of that shit. Parents didn't like it either. 

Anywho. Check THIS out. Quentin Tarantino's list of desired actors for Pulp Fiction, by role: 

Can you imagine Frank fuckin' Reynolds as Winston the Wolf? "You got a head minus a body in a car, take me to it" and then he starts playing with the head  Can you also imagine Michael Madsen and Larry Fishburne leading the movie? Lili Taylor would have been a great Honey Bunny. A lot of the actors for Mia and Marcellus would have been interesting. But there are a lot of... humorous... candidates in there. He also has an elevated opinion of William Petersen that I do NOT share.

[Mister TV]

3 hours ago, Curt McGirt said:

When I was a kid we went to Universal Studios and the highlight was the Hitchcock exhibit that year, which had the Bates Motel standup from Psycho, an optical illusion staircase descending for Vertigo, and a 3D segment in a theater where I saw the Mother Bates reveal for the first time ever. It concluded with a section that just had birds flying at the screen until one entirely blacked it out. Terrifying and awesome. Sadly, Jaws was out of order that year. 

I think I also got to be in the cast of Arcade that year? Nick filmed there, right? That had to be the place we went to with it. We also went to Disneyland once I think and it sucked, no memories of that shit. Parents didn't like it either. 

Anywho. Check THIS out. Quentin Tarantino's list of desired actors for Pulp Fiction, by role: 

Can you imagine Frank fuckin' Reynolds as Winston the Wolf? "You got a head minus a body in a car, take me to it" and then he starts playing with the head  Can you also imagine Michael Madsen and Larry Fishburne leading the movie? Lili Taylor would have been a great Honey Bunny. A lot of the actors for Mia and Marcellus would have been interesting. But there are a lot of... humorous... candidates in there. He also has an elevated opinion of William Petersen that I do NOT share.

Did a quick re-cast during lunch without using anyone in the actual flick.

Pumpkin - Christian Slater
Honey Bunny - Marisa Tomei
Vincent - Gary Oldman
Lance - Nick Cage
Jody - Lili Taylor
Mia - Jennifer Beals
Jules - Charles Dutton
Butch - Matt Dillon
Fabian - Julie Delpy
The Wolf - Michael Keaton
Koons - Tommy Lee Jones
Marcellus - Bill Duke

 

[Bustronaut]

Most interesting to me is that Uma thurman doesn't appear ANYWHERE on all of those lists.

[Zimbra]

There's a fascinating alternate universe where Pulp Fiction is Phoebe Cates' last role before she retires instead of Princess Caraboo.

All of his choices for Butch feel insanely wrong.

[J.H.]

Bill Duke as Marcellus is totally different vibe and I'm here for it@

James

[odessasteps]

Charles S Dutton as Jules is interesting. 

[Curt McGirt]

4 hours ago, Mister TV said:

Did a quick re-cast during lunch without using anyone in the actual flick.

Pumpkin - Christian Slater
Honey Bunny - Marisa Tomei
Vincent - Gary Oldman
Lance - Nick Cage
Jody - Lili Taylor
Mia - Jennifer Beals
Jules - Charles Dutton
Butch - Matt Dillon
Fabian - Julie Delpy
The Wolf - Michael Keaton
Koons - Tommy Lee Jones
Marcellus - Bill Duke

This is a real good one. Funny enough, there was a guy on a Facebook page I posted this on who gave Slater to Pumpkin too, only his was what he tried to make in his words "the dumbest version". 

Quote

Pumpkin: Christian Slater

Honey Bunny: Marisa Tomei (she's doing the My Cousin Vinny voice)

Vincent: Dennis Quaid

Lance: Johny Depp

Jody: Kathy Griffin

Mia: Robin Wright

Jules: Eddie Murphy

Butch: Nick Cage

The Wolfe: Danny Devito

Koons: Al Pacino

Marcellus Wallace: Sid Haig

Vincent as Dennis Quaid is really the nadir. I think only old-ass Robert Carradine would be more ridiculous. 

[Technico Support]

Johnny Depp as a world weary veteran boxer is ridiculous.  
 

The best critique of Christian Slater I ever read was, “when we first saw him, we thought we’d found this generation’s Jack Nicholson.  Then we realized he was just impersonating Jack Nicholson 24/7.”

[zendragon]

On 6/9/2025 at 7:52 AM, Dolfan in NYC said:

This was Michael Cera's first Wes Anderson movie wasn't it?  

Because it feels like he was as at home in a movie as I've ever seen anyone, ever.  

I saw TPS in a theater in the Catskills that's been around since the 1940s because, it's legitimately the perfect venue for this:

If you're ever up here, this is one of those places you should really check out. 

A Hundred year old theatre in Hollywood is going to be doing a 70mm run of The Phoenician Scheme

 

19 hours ago, Andrew POE! said:

Movies today. I think there's a bird theme.

Gran Turismo (Netflix, leaving on 6/10) - 3/5 stars

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Gran Turismo as a movie will not reinvent sports movies. It will reinvent movies based on video games at times and seems to have progressed a bit beyond "the worst of the worst" in video game based movies. Can you imagine Paul W.S. Anderson or Uwe Boll directing something like this? Neill Blomkamp keeps very much in the driving line of Michael Mann or Ridley Scott for biopics: stylish, sleek, great cinematography, and more about the presentation than any historical accuracy.

What is irritating while watching Gran Turismo is how much of this is as much about Jann Mardenborough (Archie Madekwe) as it is about the 'plucky underdogs' of Nissan and de-legitimatizing video games too. Jann as a character is out to accomplish his own dream as a race car driver; yet, we're told throughout the movie and from Jack Salter (David Harbour), that "this is the real world" when it comes to competing in motorsports. It seems to not recognize that video games do help with problem solving, patience and time management. For myself personally, I’ve mentioned in job interviews having Platinum’ed some really difficult video games like Dark Souls and Demon’s Souls; those games taught me to be calm in situations and to be relaxed under stress. So it’s not really fair for the movie to downplay video games initially.

There's a few times through the movie where Jann as a character demonstrates a real arc; the scenes where Salter and Mardenborough visit the site of Jann's almost catastrophic wreck and an incredibly great scene where Jann's dad Steve (the completely underrated Djimon Hounsou) patch things up.

The rest of the time though is corporate pandering to Nissan, PlayStation, and motorsports sponsors. It's Happy Gilmore or Cool Runnings but with greater emphasis on pleasing sponsorships. The movie wouldn't have worked if a multi-million dollar company like Nissan didn't have an egotistical marketing executive like Danny Moore (Orlando Bloom) kissing up to his company's leadership to get another multi-million dollar company like PlayStation to do an academy for game consumers to actually race on actual tracks. I somewhat wished there had more about this aspect of Jann not being completely onboard with the corporate love fest, although a few of the scenes at the Academy where he tries to answer questions terribly and awkwardly was a bit towards that direction.

Mardenborough as a character is out to prove everyone wrong and succeed where Salter and his dad failed in their professions or show how being 'camera ready' isn't important to Danny; yet this isn't to say that Jann Mardenborough isn't better than Steve or his dad or Danny, he's just luckier and applying what he did in the game to real life. The other characters involved - like Jann's mom Lesley (Geri Halliwell-Horner) and his love interest Audrey (Maeve Courtier-Lilley) don't really have as much of a character arc other than to look concerned or to cry on screen for Jann. Jann's rivalries with other drivers like Nicholas Capa (Josha Stradowski) and Matty Davis (Darren Barnet) from the Academy was a bit short lived. The central conflict of the story is Jann's conflict with himself. I did like the usage of Enya's "Ocarina Flow" (it wasn't as transcendental as the usage was in Eighth Grade, but hey what can you do).

Despite the pandering nature of the story, I did like the cinematography on the race tracks and in Tokyo; the movie did make me want to have a desire to visit those places and to see the 24 hours of Le Mans (yay, spending thousands of your money for tourism). The cars look incredible.

Gran Turismo is a beautifully shot sports drama with a bit lower expectations on the story.

The Birds (Netflix, not leaving any time soon, just started on it last night) - 5/5 stars

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Next to Hitchcock's Rope, The Birds is also a movie about queer identity and relationships albeit for female identity. Two of the female characters involved seem to have an unspoken love for each other; you could even say it's a romance. What unites them and draws them together is one man that both seem to agree was wrong for them.

In a lot of ways, The Birds 'invented' the disaster movie, which came to flourish in the 1970s with Airport, The Towering Inferno and The Poseidon Adventure. What seems to be the gist of The Birds is the story of a wide-ranging disaster with personal aspects for the characters having implications and insights to the cause.

What the movie focuses on initially is Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren). The character goes to a bird shop in San Francisco and meets Mitch Brenner (Rod Taylor), who seems to have an antagonistic relationship from the start and knows more about Daniels than is let on. Brenner wants to get an order of two love birds for his sister and spends most of his initial time on screen challenging Daniels over her knowledge.

Daniels deciding to go to Bodega Bay herself with the birds and trying to sneak in shows the character's disregard for a straightforward method and approach. It can be interpreted that Hitchcock is setting up the movie to be a romantic film between Daniels and Hunter, although at one point, they seem to squash that notion as Daniels has to talk about her time in Rome "swimming in a fountain naked," when the truth is a bit different. Yet for whatever reason, Daniels cannot leave Bodega Bay. The birds like a magnet are pulled to the town due to Daniels.

In a lot of ways, Bodega Bay as a town resembles a lot of the sea side towns in Stephen King's stories. The residents seem to have more horror adjacent behaviors than is believed - the school kids singing a song reminiscent of The Naked Kiss while Daniels silently looks at the birds gathering, looks away and sees more appearing. There's also the scene in the diner with various characters we only see in those scenes - the man quoting the Bible and declaring what is happening is the end of the world, the fisherman who saw one of his crew get flesh pulled off his arm, and the woman with the two kids who tries to escape due to the others 'scaring the children.' The actual cause of what happened, like other disaster movies and like in Spielberg's Jaws, is never properly explained. One character thinks it's due to the activities of man (climate change before that was even a word!), another think it's part of nature and the birds are confused, and another (in the diner) blame Daniels directly (with a POV shot as Daniels is being blamed). The Birds as a movie doesn't seek to present an answer.

Something I really liked and found different compared to other Hitchcock movies is the usage of sound and the lack of music. Earlier Hitchcock movies (like Rear Window and Vertigo famously) have distinct musical motifs throughout the movie to signify and maximize the thrilling aspects. Yet with this, like Hitchcock's The Wrong Man, music isn't used at all. Almost all of the horror and thriller aspects are conveyed through the usage of closeups and quick cuts between the actors' facial expressions and the birds attacking on screen. The birds themselves carry the horror aspects and the characters pay attention when the birds are heard.

It can also be said that The Birds may had an unspoken influence on George Romero's Night of the Living Dead and other 'zombie' movies. Zombies on those movies are an unexplainable, oppressive force that continuously comes for the characters. Towards the end of the movie, Brenner puts wood over the windows and barricades the doors from the bird attack, so the birds cannot get in. There's an absolutely horrific scene where the birds fly through the chimney and one scene where Brenner's mother Lydia (Jessica Tandy) finds the body of a townsperson with their eyes plucked down.

The ending shot is absolutely beautiful yet apocalyptic as the characters drive off. We do not see other people in the town and the radio report indicates that almost everyone has escaped except for a few and there is a roadblock. The characters' fates are unknown. But the main thing is now, Bodega Bay is no longer their town. It's for....The Birds.

The Birds is a great precursor to disaster, horror and zombie movies.

Migration (Netflix, leaving on 6/19) - 3/5 stars

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Migration is a cute, charming kids' movie that has humorous bits for adults with a great script from Mike White and a great soundtrack from John Powell. At times, the movie calls to mind Little Miss Sunshine and National Lampoon's Vacation with its humor; Kumail Nanjiani is literally "Chevy Chase as Clark Griswold but a duck" and Elizabeth Banks as Pam Mallard could work as "Beverly D'Angelo as Ellen Griswold but a duck." (Watching this movie, I don't understand why Elizabeth Banks hasn't been in more family comedies or obtained the same career path as D'Angelo, Kathleen Turner, or Rebecca DeMornay, she deserves to be in the same breath as those actors).

Anyway, there's some great sequences (the first scenes in New York is incredible even in animated form) and there's a nice message about stepping out of your comfort zone no matter what.

Lady Bird (HBO Max, leaving on 6/30) - 5/5 stars

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I felt Lady Bird in my bones.

Growing up, I was face to face with class differences as a child all the way through college (and after college and even now to be fair). I was regaled tales of how my parents had it so difficult with my dad having a plant administrator's salary while most of my friends had parents that were doctors and lawyers in town. My mom would take me to a mall and, rather cruelly, have me look at books in the bookstore but refused to buy a 5 cent sticker because "we're poor." Being poor became a punishment. She wasn't interested in actually talking about or focusing on the good things in her life because if I listened to her, life was difficult.

Lady Bird (or Christine) played by Sairose Ronan encounters this class difference upon first frame with her mother Marion (Laurie Metcalf). Marion has Christine endure a slightly abusive, slightly manipulative, slightly loving relationship as the two are driving back from somewhere, likely a local college visit. Lady Bird wants to go to an East Coast school because of the idea that somehow going there will expand her horizons. Her life will be better because she went there and because she got out of Sacramento. As Lady Bird calls it with one of her friends later in the movie, "Sacramento is the Midwest of California." There's something so basic, so simple, and so normal about Sacramento that staying in the state and being around it never entered the equation for Lady Bird. She cites concern about not ending up like her brother Miguel (Jordan Rodrigues) who lives with his girlfriend and works at a local grocery store.

Throughout the movie, Lady Bird encounters just not fitting in with other students at the Catholic high school she attends. She has two boyfriends in the movie - one named Danny (Lucas Hedges) that she names a star "Bruce" with him in a really sweet scene. Danny seems like a great and true thing for Lady Bird - until his true feelings come out and he's actually gay. Lady Bird then meets Kyle (Timothe Chalamet) at a coffee shop who is the 'bad boy.' Kyle drives Lady Bird to see her friend Julie (Beanie Feldstein). This is on account that Kyle puts down "Crash Into Me" and says the song sucks; yet Lady Bird hearing it thinks about her friend Julie on the night of prom. Friendship is stronger than love.

While watching this movie as I mentioned, it made me reflect on a lot of aspects of my life and the relationships with my parents. I would say probably my sister is more like Lady Bird; she's strong, independent, and didn't want my parents to find out about where she wanted to go to college (or post-graduate or for her Ph.D. program). For me, my parents had to mortgage their house to help pay for my schooling at undergraduate; my life would have been a lot different if my mother got her way and decided to have me go to the college she wanted for me. Marion did the same exact thing to Lady Bird; having to pay for college for her daughter is too much as it is, so why should Lady Bird go to an expensive college like Columbia, Yale, or Princeton because "it's on the East Coast"?

Throughout the movie, Lady Bird and her mother are at an impasse for the entirety. One scene that stuck with me was Marion driving around the airport drop off zone, reaching the departure gate, getting out of the car, and just bursting into tears in her husband Larry (Tracey Letts)'s arms. The ending scene where Lady Bird describes Sacramento in a voice mail made me cry; "when was the first time you drove through Sacremento?"

Greta Gerwig draws on elements of her own life and makes a movie that goes behind standard 'coming of age' stories. The best 'coming of age' stories in movies always makes those that are adults reflect on their own childhood and teenage years. For an earlier generation, it's Ferris Bueller's Day Off. For some, it's American Graffiti. For others, it's Superbad and American Pie. But there's something with this movie that met me. Greta Gerwig must have recorded my life somehow.

I loved how Gerwig filmed this movie - she uses a few horizontal panning shots with cuts denoting a change in location. The first few times it happens is near the start of the movie where Julie and Lady Bird are walking down the street and looking at various houses. The second time is towards the end when Christine is walking down the street of New York City and stops at a church.

One character aspect I liked was how Lady Bird changes her name back to Christine but lies about where she's from. Sacramento becomes San Francisco. It shows that no matter how far away from home, people can still decide to lie about things in their lives when it suits. A small hometown becomes Atlanta when a Ph.D. student is meeting people at a conference.

Lady Bird is an absolute treasure of a movie.

 

Definably relate to the growing up poor stuff. My mom seemed to enjoy using the "we're poor" excuse to not do things

[odessasteps]

Cera has been in a bunch of Anderson-adjacent feeeling pictures (Juno, Nick and Nora, Scott Pilgrim).

[Brian Fowler]

Bruce Willis was such a perfect choice for Butch it makes all those names that aren't Bruce Willis feel completely wrong.

I know Paul Calderón almost stole Jules from Jackson until Sam re-worked the way he auditioned the last scene with Pumpkin. Which ended up being, imo, still the best single scene performance of Jackson's entire career.

[Andrew POE!]

Pulp Fiction talk serves as a reminder that I still need to watch it.

Movies today...

In Country (Criterion Channel, leaving on 6/30) - 3.5/5 stars

Spoiler

After doing Moonstruck, Norman Jewison did In Country. In Country in some ways tries to do what was done in Moonstruck with the presentation of a set of characters in a region of the United States. With Moonstruck, it's a group of Italian in New York City. With In Country, it's families of Vietnam veterans in rural Kentucky.

It also tries to use music in a similar fashion to speak to the characters that Moonstruck did. Moonstruck had opera be the centerpoint for Nicholas Cage and Cher's characters. With In Country, it uses the music of Bruce Springsteen.

So much of what's involved with the movie is with the accents for the actors and not so much with the characters. The movie occasionally finds aspects that are deeply moving, but that's few and far between. The movie is focused on the relationship between Samantha Hughes (Emily Lloyd) and her contentious uncle Emmett Smith (Bruce Willis). Emmett came back from Vietnam with PTSD and with an inability to want to have a normal civilian life.

We start the movie with Samantha having graduated from high school and Emmett being completely distant to the whole affair. He stands for a photo for Samantha in a group family picture.

The thing with the movie is Emily Lloyd's accent was really distracting and almost tried too hard; it was hard to have a connection with her as her character. The other characters involved had an easier way to connect to them and felt more like actual people - Bruce Willis' Emmett and Joan Allen's Irene especially. Bruce Willis had a great scene towards the end where he finds her sleeping in a swamp after reading her father's journal. "Back there, they're still alive." Joan Allen also had a stupendous scene where she talked about someone coming back from Vietnam and leading a productive life. "You don't owe anybody anything just because they love you."

Somewhat dodgy with the movie is Samantha deciding to sleep with one of Emmett's friends that is working on a VW for her (yuck!).

I did like the last scenes in the movie as Emmett, Samantha and Samantha's grandmother (Peggy Rea) visit the Vietnam Memorial in Washington DC. The soundtrack during the scenes are really incredible and touching.

For the most part, In Country does something that's not normally done with mainstream Hollywood movies and depicts life in a rural community respectfully and depicts soldiers in Vietnam respectfully. It makes an effort to show those in rural communities as being people. There are some character issues, but the story has it's heart in the right place.

A Guide To Breathing Underwater (Criterion Channel, leaving on 6/30) - 3/5 stars

Spoiler

Doesn't actually teach you how to breathe underwater.

It's more of a metaphor and uses dance with the conflict of light and darkness in its shot as the figure dances. There's no sound but the French Debussy-esque piano score until the end. Then it's the sound of the ocean on Fire Island with a naked dancer.

Tetsuo: The Iron Man (Criterion Channel, leaving on 6/30) - 4/5 stars

Spoiler

The first time I watched this, I couldn't even make past the first 15 minutes.

I wondered if the person in the introductory scene was really jamming a piece of metal into his leg. It looked too real to be special effects. It looked like he really did cut his leg open, cut away the flesh to expose the muscle and then proceed to jam the metal in. The maggots looked real.

The person, credited as "metal fetshist" is the director Shinya Tsukamoto. I wonder if he still has the scar on his leg to prove that this happened or it were indeed special effects.

Once I watched it and decided to stick it out, the movie is indeed strange. It's like a melding of David Lynch's Eraserhead, pornography, David Cronenberg's body horror, and Nine Inch Nails' "Happiness in Slavery" music video. It has a dreamlike rhythm and imagery as the character speeds up in a faster framerate through the area due to his being attacked and then eventually becoming a metal man. The person he's fighting with also melds with him.

Tetsuo: The Iron Man is something to be experienced once.

Nine (Criterion Channel, leaving on 6/30) - 2.5/5 stars

Spoiler

"You kill your film several times, mostly by talking about it. A film is a dream. You kill it writing it down, you kill it with a camera; the film might come to life for a moment or two when your actors breathe life back into it - but then it dies again, buried in film cans."

What a self-fulfilling prophecy those lines became - it could have been describing this movie.

As anyone knows, I am a fan of the movie 8 1/2. There's something magical in the sense that the movie speaks to a midlife crisis for Guido Contini as well as it speaks for every man in some sense (or at least ones with a similar worldview). So the challenge with Nine is to do a story that's informed by the original movie 8 1/2 but to make it a musical.

Nine as a movie mostly succeeds but mostly fails to accomplish this.

With a cast this stacked, it would be thought that this movie would be interesting, but is a bit boring to watch. There's none of the imaginative spark that came from 8 1/2. Although there is beautiful black and white cinematography sprinkled throughout the movie, almost every scene appears to be the same. Hotel rooms, movie sets, screening room, giant sets, offices. Daniel Day Lewis as Guido Contini does have a bit of Marcello Mastroianni in his portrayal of the character and sings really well.

The rest of it is simply beautiful women shot beautifully with some lackluster musical numbers. Mario Cotillard does a great job as Guido's wife and has a great number with "Take It All" and "My Husband Makes Movies." But "Cinema Italiano" from Kate Hudson is just really bad and seems like a parody. Nicole Kidman is barely in it as Claudia Jenssen, the movie star that Guido picked for his next movie.

Of course, at a certain point, the third act for this movie falters a bit and the conclusion has Guido getting back on the horse to make movies again. With all the women shown throughout the movie singing on a multi-platform stage to face Guido and his camera.

Despite how lifeless and lackluster everything feels, Rob Marshall shoots the movie extremely well. This is really his talent as a director - the script and the story aren't as strong, but he knows how to photograph things well and present theatrical productions as a cinematic showcase. Day Lewis is the highlight and honestly he's one of the best character actors ever.

Nine made me want to revisit 8 1/2 and watch the rest of Fellini's work on Essential Fellini box set.

 

[Curt McGirt]

3 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

Paul Calderón

Christ, that just made me imagine Giancarlo Esposito as Jules. 

Used to have a really rad VHS copy of Tetsuo with reflective metallic box art. I lent it out one time and don't know whether I ever got it back... Anyway, I only watched it the once and it felt really long for only being what, an hour?

[HarryArchieGus]

9 hours ago, Andrew POE! said:

Pulp Fiction talk serves as a reminder that I still need to watch it.

How does the guy who will randomly watch anything miss Pulp Fiction? Maybe before that you could show just how willing you are to watch anything and dive in on the Kirk Cameron 'Left Behind' series. 

I caught Jungle Fever on Laserdisc this week, and was completely blown away. Such great style! Easily one of Spike's best with X and DTRT. So many incredible performances. I didn't really forget how great John Turturro is, but this was certainly a reminder. There's a scene in particular where he combats his father played by Anthony Quinn that was completely outstanding. His brother Nicholas Turturro is also impressive in his toxic performance. Everybody - Snipes, Tyra Ferrell, and of course Samuel L Jackson as a junkie. Underrated Annabella Sciora's 'Angie' was, yet again, completely wonderful. Her scary battle with her father, played by the great Frank Vincent, was unbelievably brutal and hard to watch. I'm gonna follow this with Clockers, also from my Laserdisc catalog. Also curious to see Crooklyn. 

[Andrew POE!]

27 minutes ago, HarryArchieGus said:

How does the guy who will randomly watch anything miss Pulp Fiction? Maybe before that you could show just how willing you are to watch anything and dive in on the Kirk Cameron 'Left Behind' series. 

I end up being busy on the weekends - which is usually the best time for me to watch movies longer than 2 hours. I'll watch it this weekend, I promise! 

[HarryArchieGus]

1 hour ago, Andrew POE! said:

I end up being busy on the weekends - which is usually the best time for me to watch movies longer than 2 hours. I'll watch it this weekend, I promise! 

You mean Left Behind 1?

[Andrew POE!]

Just now, HarryArchieGus said:

You mean Left Behind 1?

Nope, Pulp Fiction. I won't touch Left Behind 1. (At least not yet). 

[Execproducer]

22 hours ago, Andrew POE! said:

Pulp Fiction talk serves as a reminder that I still need to watch it.

Movies today...

In Country (Criterion Channel, leaving on 6/30) - 3.5/5 stars

  Reveal hidden contents

After doing Moonstruck, Norman Jewison did In Country. In Country in some ways tries to do what was done in Moonstruck with the presentation of a set of characters in a region of the United States. With Moonstruck, it's a group of Italian in New York City. With In Country, it's families of Vietnam veterans in rural Kentucky.

It also tries to use music in a similar fashion to speak to the characters that Moonstruck did. Moonstruck had opera be the centerpoint for Nicholas Cage and Cher's characters. With In Country, it uses the music of Bruce Springsteen.

So much of what's involved with the movie is with the accents for the actors and not so much with the characters. The movie occasionally finds aspects that are deeply moving, but that's few and far between. The movie is focused on the relationship between Samantha Hughes (Emily Lloyd) and her contentious uncle Emmett Smith (Bruce Willis). Emmett came back from Vietnam with PTSD and with an inability to want to have a normal civilian life.

We start the movie with Samantha having graduated from high school and Emmett being completely distant to the whole affair. He stands for a photo for Samantha in a group family picture.

The thing with the movie is Emily Lloyd's accent was really distracting and almost tried too hard; it was hard to have a connection with her as her character. The other characters involved had an easier way to connect to them and felt more like actual people - Bruce Willis' Emmett and Joan Allen's Irene especially. Bruce Willis had a great scene towards the end where he finds her sleeping in a swamp after reading her father's journal. "Back there, they're still alive." Joan Allen also had a stupendous scene where she talked about someone coming back from Vietnam and leading a productive life. "You don't owe anybody anything just because they love you."

Somewhat dodgy with the movie is Samantha deciding to sleep with one of Emmett's friends that is working on a VW for her (yuck!).

I did like the last scenes in the movie as Emmett, Samantha and Samantha's grandmother (Peggy Rea) visit the Vietnam Memorial in Washington DC. The soundtrack during the scenes are really incredible and touching.

For the most part, In Country does something that's not normally done with mainstream Hollywood movies and depicts life in a rural community respectfully and depicts soldiers in Vietnam respectfully. It makes an effort to show those in rural communities as being people. There are some character issues, but the story has it's heart in the right place.

A Guide To Breathing Underwater (Criterion Channel, leaving on 6/30) - 3/5 stars

  Reveal hidden contents

Doesn't actually teach you how to breathe underwater.

It's more of a metaphor and uses dance with the conflict of light and darkness in its shot as the figure dances. There's no sound but the French Debussy-esque piano score until the end. Then it's the sound of the ocean on Fire Island with a naked dancer.

Tetsuo: The Iron Man (Criterion Channel, leaving on 6/30) - 4/5 stars

  Reveal hidden contents

The first time I watched this, I couldn't even make past the first 15 minutes.

I wondered if the person in the introductory scene was really jamming a piece of metal into his leg. It looked too real to be special effects. It looked like he really did cut his leg open, cut away the flesh to expose the muscle and then proceed to jam the metal in. The maggots looked real.

The person, credited as "metal fetshist" is the director Shinya Tsukamoto. I wonder if he still has the scar on his leg to prove that this happened or it were indeed special effects.

Once I watched it and decided to stick it out, the movie is indeed strange. It's like a melding of David Lynch's Eraserhead, pornography, David Cronenberg's body horror, and Nine Inch Nails' "Happiness in Slavery" music video. It has a dreamlike rhythm and imagery as the character speeds up in a faster framerate through the area due to his being attacked and then eventually becoming a metal man. The person he's fighting with also melds with him.

Tetsuo: The Iron Man is something to be experienced once.

Nine (Criterion Channel, leaving on 6/30) - 2.5/5 stars

  Reveal hidden contents

"You kill your film several times, mostly by talking about it. A film is a dream. You kill it writing it down, you kill it with a camera; the film might come to life for a moment or two when your actors breathe life back into it - but then it dies again, buried in film cans."

What a self-fulfilling prophecy those lines became - it could have been describing this movie.

As anyone knows, I am a fan of the movie 8 1/2. There's something magical in the sense that the movie speaks to a midlife crisis for Guido Contini as well as it speaks for every man in some sense (or at least ones with a similar worldview). So the challenge with Nine is to do a story that's informed by the original movie 8 1/2 but to make it a musical.

Nine as a movie mostly succeeds but mostly fails to accomplish this.

With a cast this stacked, it would be thought that this movie would be interesting, but is a bit boring to watch. There's none of the imaginative spark that came from 8 1/2. Although there is beautiful black and white cinematography sprinkled throughout the movie, almost every scene appears to be the same. Hotel rooms, movie sets, screening room, giant sets, offices. Daniel Day Lewis as Guido Contini does have a bit of Marcello Mastroianni in his portrayal of the character and sings really well.

The rest of it is simply beautiful women shot beautifully with some lackluster musical numbers. Mario Cotillard does a great job as Guido's wife and has a great number with "Take It All" and "My Husband Makes Movies." But "Cinema Italiano" from Kate Hudson is just really bad and seems like a parody. Nicole Kidman is barely in it as Claudia Jenssen, the movie star that Guido picked for his next movie.

Of course, at a certain point, the third act for this movie falters a bit and the conclusion has Guido getting back on the horse to make movies again. With all the women shown throughout the movie singing on a multi-platform stage to face Guido and his camera.

Despite how lifeless and lackluster everything feels, Rob Marshall shoots the movie extremely well. This is really his talent as a director - the script and the story aren't as strong, but he knows how to photograph things well and present theatrical productions as a cinematic showcase. Day Lewis is the highlight and honestly he's one of the best character actors ever.

Nine made me want to revisit 8 1/2 and watch the rest of Fellini's work on Essential Fellini box set.

 

Damn, I remember when Emily Lloyd looked to be the Next Big Thing but I guess bad luck and mental health issues derailed that train. Under the circumstances, the title of her autobiography is both heart-breaking and funny as hell. 

Gotta love such a high score for Tetsuo: The Iron Man. Have you by any chance seen Tokyo Fist?

Edited June 12, 2025 by Execproducer

[Andrew POE!]

7 minutes ago, Execproducer said:

Damn, I remember when Emily Lloyd looked to be the Next Big Thing but I guess bad luck and mental health issues derailed that train. Under the circumstances, the title of her autobiography is both heart-breaking and funny as hell. 

Gotta love such a high score for Tetsuo: The Iron Man. Have you buy any chance seen Tokyo Fist?

Yeah, it's a shame about Emily Lloyd. It's obvious from watching In Country that she and Bruce Willis didn't get along. 

I haven't seen Tokyo Fist, but I may track it down. 

[odessasteps]

I remember people passing around the Tetsuo vhs in college, but not telling people what it was about. 

[clintthecrippler]

I had a similar experience with my first time viewing of Tetsuo The Iron Man. First time I think I was prepared for something that might be "fucked up" but still a traditional movie, if that makes sense.

Second time, I approached it with the mindset that I am basically watching a 70-minute long music video, and it absolutely clicked and washed over me from there. 

And agreed with whoever recommended Tokyo Fist earlier, that might be my second favorite Tsukamoto work next to the first Tetsuo flick. 

[Andrew POE!]

Movies today....

Heathers (Criterion Channel, leaving on 6/30) - 4/5 stars

Spoiler

"She said yoo hoo"

Heathers has had an untold influence on later "satires about high school that's really a satire about class structures" movies like Jawbreaker, Mean Girls, Clueless, Election and Lisa Frankenstein. Veronica (Winona Ryder) is a girl at Westerburg High School who is part of a social group with the Heathers. (Since the high school is called Westerburg High School, why oh why was there not a needledrop for The Replacements?).

The movie opens with the Heathers (including Shannen Doherty as Heather) playing croquet. What I noticed is the balls they are using match a color on their outfits and Veronica's buried up to her head in the dirt. She addresses the camera and starts with "Dear Diary...." The movie gives the impression that this would be Veronica addressing the audience and narrating the events that occur through the movie. The fact is though, the movie on occasion uses this style.

The fact is Heathers has some pacing issues with the story and some aspects just aren't as interesting as it should be. It makes up for it with the dialogue ("Well fuck me with a chainsaw! Do I look like Mother Teresa?") and Winona Ryder's performance and Christian Slater's Jack Nicholson like performance as J.D. Both are just magnetic to watch throughout the movie.

The movie does commit to its satire by presenting the parents and authority figures as a bit clueless - it's almost like the earlier Massacre at Central High although not nearly as insane as that movie was. J.D. and Veronica make the various murders look like suicides.

The drawback is the ending. The movie cops out of having J.D. blowing up the high school along with Veronica; it would have been in the vein of Stanley Kubrick's dark satires like A Clockwork Orange and Dr. Strangelove to have Heathers end with everyone dead.

I did like the shot compositions throughout the movie - the scenes toward the end had usage of cut away as it switches between what is going on in the basement and the hallways emptying for the school assembly. It also used documentary style cuts between students to denote them being asked the same question a few times in the movie.

Even then, Heathers is a movie that makes up for its shortcomings with an overall well directed movie.

Showing Up (HBO Max, leaving on 6/30) - 5/5 stars

Spoiler

This is my first exposure to Kelly Reichardt. I think I'm a fan.

Showing Up just feels like an idealized version of art college. I never felt like I was watching a story, or actors performing as characters. I felt like I was watching actual people who happen to look like famous and attractive actors going about their day to day lives. They sculpt, they paint, they embroidery, they set up exhibits, and do things that are creatively fulfilling. It made me wonder "Hey, why didn't I major in art or photography or theater or film or painting or scultpture in college? Why did I chose a degree in business administration?" Of course, the counter to the argument in choosing degrees in art, painting, sculpture, film, theater, etc. is if you're not careful, you'll never leave the college and go into the real world. You'll be happy living in a bubble (although to be fair with this being shot in Oregon, what a bubble it is).

Which is what happened to Lizzy (Michelle Williams).

Lizzy has very simple motivations as a character and the slightest thing bugs her - much of the humor is in how Lizzy reacts to things and the overly dramatic behavior she exhibits. The lack of hot water in her apartment bugs her. Having to leave to get food for her cat bugs her. Other people bug her. She is very much a misanthrope; having to go somewhere or take care of a pigeon on her day off bugs her. Being at work and working with her mom Jean (Maryann Plunkett) at the Oregon College of Art and Craft bugs her. The problem is she doesn't want to step out of her comfort zone.

The pigeon has a lot of symbolism with this movie. Lizzy and Jo (Hong Chau) have a shared experience with the pigeon where they are both caring for it. Lizzy is a bit more perturbed that Jo isn't caring for the pigeon as much as Lizzy thinks she should. After all, Lizzy spent $150 to take a pigeon to a vet to find out that the bird needs a hot water bag next to it. So the pigeon flying around and then leaving shows a bit of growth for Lizzy. Lizzy and Jo walk down the street and chat; Lizzy seems to have almost a weight lifted from her. That weight would be her exhibit and having to no longer care for the bird.

The other aspect that's interesting is Lizzy's relationship with her family. Her brother Sean (John Magaro) likely has undignosed schizophrenia and seems to believe that he can hear something while digging a hole in his backyard. He complains to Lizzy about losing access to a channel through his antenna and it's something caused by his neighbors. Yet he has the lights turned off and doesn't pay for cable. I get it. Everything is too expensive. Having to pay more than $10 for electricity is a crime. Those fat cats that work for the power company can afford to have cheaper electricity for all. It's not my problem they won't be able to buy a yacht this year.

Additionally, her father Bill (Judd Hirsch) may be experiencing Alzeheimer's but he's happy with himself anyway. "I do a little of this, a little of that, then it's time to watch TV." "That sounds depressing," says Lizzy. The other characters (like Jean) cares for him and tells him that things he is saying aren't true.

The climatic scenes at the art exhibit for Lizzy is the height of anxiety. Lizzy stands there nearly stonefaced as Sean had gone missing, Bill may be saying the wrong things, Jean is worried about Sean but happy he's arrived, Sean eats a lot of cheese and says "that's my supper" and two kids are screwing around with a pigeon in a box. The whole thing comes to ahead as the pigeon flies around the room - I was a bit worried that the pigeon would land on one of Lizzy's exhibits, but it would have been poetic if the bird had. It lands on the floor and Sean picks it up and carries it outside to fly away.

With this movie, Kelly Reichardt simply shows the simplicity of moments and of character interactions. If you're looking for grand, sweeping scenes or dramatics, you'll be disappointed. If you're expecting the story beats to fit some rules of storytelling, you'll also be disappointing. Showing Up has its grandeur in the moments and in the existence for the characters.

20th Century Women (HBO Max, leaving on 6/30) - 5/5 stars

Spoiler

This is my first exposure to Mike Mills. I think I'm a fan.

20th Century Women doesn't feel like an American movie. It feels very Truffaut, very Ozu. The domestic drama that Ozu does with families in Japan seems to have a place in sun kissed 1979 California. The sentimentality and romanticism of Truffaut does has a reverse Jules Et Jim relationship for three of the characters.

It's everything that cinephiles, budding filmmakers, and intelligent people want out of a movie.

The characters are crafted to feel like actual people and to have actual intelligence. It's the realization of the image that people have when they first watch Wes Anderson's movies, except these characters aren't jaded about life or trying to be ironic. They are trying to make sense of the life they lead.

What's interesting is the almost anthropological overview of history Dorothea (Annette Benning) and her son Jamie (Lucas Jade Zumann) provide when describing what has happened to the other characters that are met in this movie and the wider range scope of the characters' background. We're told several times that Dorothea is a product of the Depression; so naturally her musical taste is more old-fashioned and she likes Casablanca and Humphrey Bogart. Even with the exterior of trying to be 'hip' and going to dive bars and listening to Black Flag and The Talking Heads, Dorothea doesn't truly understand and connect with her son Jamie. It of course makes sense for her to ask the other people in her house to help.

Jamie and Julie (Elle Fanning) indeed have a "Jules Et Jim" relationship with Abbie (Greta Gerwig). It's more in the sense that Jamie wants Julie sexually but Julie doesn't see herself with that. Two scenes exemplify this "Jules Et Jim" dynamic; one is where Abbie is coming home after getting beaten up at a bar and tells Jamie "you should go as far away as possible." Abbie wants Jamie to seek adventure and to find his heart's desire. Jamie and Julie do this but it leads to disatrous results. "I don't wanna just have sex with you. I want you. But it's your version of me. It's not me. It would be a lot better if you just wanted sex. You are exactly like the other guys. You just seem like you're all modern," Julie says. Jamie walks off, obviously hurt by this.

Jamie as a character wants to be masculine, but being part of a 'generation of men raised by women,' it feels different. Dorothea suggests that Jamie talk with William (Billy Crudup) but Abbie points out that neither of them have anything in common. Abbie gives Jamie feminist literature to help Jamie understand what women think or feel (or at least what the author of those books think and feel). This leads to two different outcomes - the first one, Jamie tells a guy at a skate park that the woman he had sex with was faking her orgasm. He proceeds to beat her up and spray paint nasty slogans on his car (which goes into the dichtomy of Black Flag vs. The Talking Heads and how punk music has fragmentation). The other outcome involves Jamie reading a passage to his mother and Dorothea obviously is a bit taken aback; she doesn't understand why Jamie read to her this. "I don't need a book to tell me how I should understand being a woman," she says to Jamie, leaving his a bit confused. Eventually, Jamie gets it and is able to compartmentalize his thoughts (to borrow a phrase from Julie).

What makes 20th Century Women work is the usage of mixed media like still photography, other films, and newsreel footage within the movie. Also, Mike Mills just has smart shot selection and cinematography. Two scenes I really liked were almost mirror images of each other - Jamie and Julie are in a hotel room and the camera is facing towards the left hand side of the room as Julie is sitting on a bed. The mirror image of the shot is when Dorothea is picked up after being booked at the police station. The camera is facing towards the right hand side of the room and Dorothea is sitting on a bed. Another great shot is when Abbie arrives at the police station to pick up Dorothea; the camera is aimed towards the end of the hallway. As they are leaving, the camera goes to the other side and captures the characters in the shot.

20th Century Women is an achievement in any century.

 

[clintthecrippler]

I rewatched Dr. Strangelove over the weekend for the first time in about 15 years and boy oh boy, does a movie where the global population is destroyed in a nuclear catastrophe all because of one mentally ill person that is drunk with power, suffering from sexual inadequacy, and babbling about flouride poisioning hit a lot harder in 2025 than any other time in my life since I first saw it during my teenage years thirty years ago.

It was also a bit of a mindfuck watching Mission Impossible: Final Reckoning the next day and seeing parallels in the way the topic of "acceptable death" came up during discussions of preemptive nuclear strike in both movies. Between that and Ethan's journey inside the Entity Mask/Coffin having some "eye closeup" shots that reminded me of Dave dealing with HAL's meltdowns in 2001: A Space Odyssey, I wonder if Cruise and McQuarrie went on a Kubrick kick while in pre-production of the final M:I flick.

I also did a second watch of Friendship over the weekend. A woman sitting in the row behind us kept going "Oh God" or "Oh No" every ten minutes like she was watching a horror movie, and that was absolutely the best cinematic viewing experience for a second watch of that movie. Also, A24 announced the Blu-Ray release this week, and one of the special features is:

Spoiler

a 12-minute cut of the Conner O’Malley garage scene

 

[Gonzo]

Mel Brooks just dropped a teaser trailer for the Spaceballs sequel.

https://x.com/MelBrooks/status/1933196954273755322

I can haz 2027 now, please?

EDIT: This probably should have gone in the "Upcoming Movies" thread rather than here. My apologies.

Edited June 12, 2025 by Gonzo

[Technico Support]

On 6/11/2025 at 10:47 AM, Andrew POE! said:

Nope, Pulp Fiction. I won't touch Left Behind 1. (At least not yet). 

You waited so long to see Pulp Fiction that $5 is now a decent price for a milkshake.

(It’ll make sense later)