Movies

[metroid composite]

Birth of a Nation

I...genuinely don't know how to react to this movie.  On the one hand, basically invented modern cinematography, and largely holds up today.  On the other hand, ridiculously over-the-top racist.

In some sense, it's interesting to watch just to see what kind of tricks movies use to get people emotionally involved, because it's easier to realize you're being tricked by cinematography when you're watching a movie with outrageous political goals (lots and lots of damsel in distress tropes!  "The southern white women are in danger, rally the KKK!"  Lots of ominous music for northerners, with lighting that casts shadows over their eyes.  The black militia is constantly firing rifles into the air at all hours of the day.  The KKK is depicted riding on majestic horses, never firing guns into the air.  The southerners are shown gaining allies in unexpected places, the enemies are just a mob which already existed or came from elsewhere.  "[strike]Han[/strike] Northerners shot first").

[The Duck]

What exactly made you watch that, met?

[NotMiki]

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kinolorber/pioneers-of-african-american-cinema?ref=HappeningNewsletterFeb1115

just leavin' this here

[Captain K.]

Kingsman:  Absolutely fucking great.  It's Men in Black 1 crossed with 1970s James Bond.  Just the right measure of campiness to where it can still take itself seriously.  There's a scene in there that I can't spoil, but pretty much every DLer will greatly appreciate it.

[Captain K.]

Seventh Son:  Extremely meh.  Disappointing since the trailer was so good.  The "witches" are hyped up so much and amount to so little.  They have no personalities and so little screentime that they might as well just be minions.  The whole thing comes off as an episode of Power Rangers.  Curious if the books are any better since the concept of the Spook itself is interesting.

[Shale]

Thor 2: Basically what I expected from reviews - a fun but mostly episodic adventure of Thor fighting generic bad guys, comparable to a pretty good arc of the comics. Tom Hiddleston as Loki is of course the best reason to watch, followed by Thor hitting things with a hammer in entertaining ways, and then the Warriors Three being great. The biggest problem is that it takes forever to get to a point where I care what happens, largely because Jane is such a waste of space in this one. That's more the script's fault than Natalie Portman's (Why turn her into a McGuffin girl? Why?) but she doesn't exactly make the most of the opportunities she's given, and the setup for the actual plot gets compressed way down in order to give her time to do....er....stuff. Meanwhile Darcy is ten times more interesting and actually gets to do science stuff despite Jane being the certified Comics Scientist. Weird decisionmaking all around.

[Cmdr_King]

She did have a few moments I quite liked ("Is that an image tech tech" "No it's a healing image" "Does it technobabble"  "... ... yes"  *smugface*) but they were few and far between, definitely.  But really Thor is come for Tom Hiddleston, stay for hammerin' shit, so hey.

[The Duck]

Now I can be snobby about hating Academy Award winning Birdman. Has anyone else seen it? Am I just on crazy pills for disliking it?

[Shale]

The Academy Award winner for best actor in a leading role.

[The Duck]

I'm surprised that wasn't his Norbit.

[Luther Lansfeld]

I approve of the cape sans shirt personally

[Luther Lansfeld]

Now I can be snobby about hating Academy Award winning Birdman. Has anyone else seen it? Am I just on crazy pills for disliking it?

The movie sounds like Hollywood auto-fellatio to me, so I'm not surprised it won an Oscar. Not touching it myself.

[Fenrir]

It's only getting released tomorrow here, i'm going to see it. I got my fair share of meta this week with Sils Maria (pretty sweet) . So I'm not too excited (and i'm pretty sure Boyhood should have won) but hey at least there's Emma Stone ? She's cool.

I saw the grand budapest hotel and it was lovely. Peak Wes Anderson.  It was also full of excess with its art direction and use of like 20 super famous actors for super small roles

[Sierra]

Grand Budapest Hotel is the best thing he's done since Royal Tenenbaums. Was happy to see it grabbed all the art Oscars, however little I tend to normally care about that sort of thing (the awards in general).

Isn't Best Picture usually something everyone regrets almost immediately anyway?

[The Duck]

Grand Budapest is super Wes Anderson-y, but there are dark and deeply sad undertones that make it among my favorites of his. It's definitely his most visually beautiful, and Fiennes was practically made for it in retrospect. I wouldn't have necessarily expected Ralph Fiennes to work because he hadn't appeared in very many comedies beforehand, but his timing is great.

One stray thought of mine is who exactly would work in a Wes Anderson film and why, since there are ones that fit and ones that don't. Bruce Willis very much does not fit in, for example, but someone like Bill Murray really does. Then there are those who work in some but not others. Edward Norton as the scoutmaster in Moonrise Kingdom is great, but he's also weirdly out of place in Grand Budapest (he's unaccented, which is jarring). I also found Adrien Brody to be terrible in Grand Budapest and sort of blah in Darjeeling, but I can't dissociate his performance from my general dislike of him. George Clooney has a way of talking that really fits Anderson's style but I don't know if his Clooney-ness would be too obtrusive in live action.

[Fenrir]

Royal Tenenbaums.

Only Anderson movie with a lesbian scene

Grand Budapest is super Wes Anderson-y, but there are dark and deeply sad undertones that make it among my favorites of his. It's definitely his most visually beautiful, and Fiennes was practically made for it in retrospect. I wouldn't have necessarily expected Ralph Fiennes to work because he hadn't appeared in very many comedies beforehand, but his timing is great.

One stray thought of mine is who exactly would work in a Wes Anderson film and why, since there are ones that fit and ones that don't. Bruce Willis very much does not fit in, for example, but someone like Bill Murray really does. Then there are those who work in some but not others. Edward Norton as the scoutmaster in Moonrise Kingdom is great, but he's also weirdly out of place in Grand Budapest (he's unaccented, which is jarring). I also found Adrien Brody to be terrible in Grand Budapest and sort of blah in Darjeeling, but I can't dissociate his performance from my general dislike of him. George Clooney has a way of talking that really fits Anderson's style but I don't know if his Clooney-ness would be too obtrusive in live action.

Why Adrien Brody?

As far as I'm concerned, to fit in an Anderson movie I think you just need to be credible as someone at least a little melancholic, and who doesn't want to be in the middle of the room attracting all the attention. Not Willis, Cruise, Downey Jr, Elba.

The only character I found jarring in Grand Budapest Hotel was Dafoe, but that's only because of his character, and that made for a pretty shocking plot twist. (Goldblum in the museum)


I should probably rewatch Darjeeling now, it's his only movie I watched getting nothing out of it. Rushmore and Zissou were my favourite.

[The Duck]

I can't really explain why I dislike Brody. I think a lot of the Pianist's success is because of Polanski and not necessarily Brody (though he's good there) and he hasn't really added to anything else he's been in. In Grand Budapest, he really can't do crass vulgarity the way Fiennes can without sounding horrible, although the contrast there may be the point? I don't know. For all that, I dislike Jason Schwartzman even more, mostly because of his extremely punchable face, so I don't love Rushmore as much as everybody else.

The only thing that sticks to me about Darjeeling other than the very abrupt tonal shift in the middle is when one of the brothers says "if we weren't brothers, would we be friends in real life," which I struggle with in terms of whether I think it's middle school philosophy vs something that I actually thought about my own siblings last week. A lot goes on in the movie but it doesn't have the strong focus of his later films, so not very much else stood out to me.

[Hunter Sopko]

I can't really explain why I dislike Brody. I think a lot of the Pianist's success is because of Polanski and not necessarily Brody (though he's good there) and he hasn't really added to anything else he's been in. In Grand Budapest, he really can't do crass vulgarity the way Fiennes can without sounding horrible, although the contrast there may be the point? I don't know. For all that, I dislike Jason Schwartzman even more, mostly because of his extremely punchable face, so I don't love Rushmore as much as everybody else.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure the contrast is the point. You're supposed to hate Brody's character in the movie, and he fills it well. He's a prick, who despite the blood and trappings of high society still can't hide the fact he has not one cultured and civilized bone in his body. Design or accident, Brody just works here.

[NotMiki]

It's only getting released tomorrow here, i'm going to see it.

Growing Wings Therapy?

[Sierra]

Royal Tenenbaums.

Only Anderson movie with a lesbian scene

I can only assure you that for once, that is pure coincidence. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go save my family from the wreckage of a destroyed sinking battleship.

I should probably give Steve Zissou a second watch. I wasn't much struck by it at the time.

[The Duck]

Royal Tenenbaums.

Only Anderson movie with a lesbian scene

I can only assure you that for once, that is pure coincidence. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go save my family from the wreckage of a destroyed sinking battleship.

I should probably give Steve Zissou a second watch. I wasn't much struck by it at the time.

I quite liked it. Life Aquatic at least has one standout scene but it's hard to separate how much of that is the Sigur Ros song. The scene has a sad wistfulness that is also present in The Grand Budapest Hotel.

[Cotigo]

So, on the topic of translations of movie titles, I walked past a poster for Boyhood yesterday. The Japanese title is, 6歳から大人までの僕, or "Me from age 6 to adulthood" which just does not have the same ring to it at all.

Incidentally, Fifty Shades of Grey just kept the English title.

[Grefter]

Here I was hoping for "49 Daddy Lashes"

[Luther Lansfeld]

The Spy Who Loved Me - Pretty decent movie that hardcore drags from about 70% to 90% in. It is campy and 70's and has ridiculous music. One weird thing about the movie is that Roger Moore looks kind of old (because he was like 50) and I'm definitely not sure how well that works for the Bond feel.

Next Bond film is Moonraker. I am ready to up my camp value to max.

This poster is amazing: http://writandseal.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/moonraker01.jpg

[Captain K.]

70s Bond is best Bond.  Also go see Kingsman already.