Movie News, Reviews, and Discussion Super-Thread

[Bebpo]

Those aren't just two random episodes of some random TV show. They're pretty widely regarded as high-water marks for TV action and it's one of the highest profile TV shows around. As far as opportunities available he was probably at his career best before this Hellboy thing happened.

Wiki says the last ep he did of GoT was in 2014 though? I mean that was 5 years ago and he's done like 1 ep of Westworld and a few other tv show eps and that's it? There's no way he was working on Hellboy more than a couple years ago there's an odd gap if he was at his high point in 2014.

[Himu]

Probably concentrated on family

[Momo]

Hellboy's at 9% on RT, lmao. What a fuck up.

https://www.thewrap.com/hellboy-david-harbour-neil-marshall/

[HyperZoneWasAwesome]

International film festival just hit town, so prepare yourselves for obscurities up the wazoo.

Such as The Longest Night (La Mala Noche, Ecuador), a very earnest and slightly noir-ish look at a portion of Latin America's sex trade. Its a week in the life of a prostitute that's getting to the point in her life where her options begin to winnow. It sort of skirts the borders of the same territory that the Dardenne have staked out, but the filmmaking isn't quite as assured, but not being as good as the Dardenne's is a high friggin bar to clear after all. Its a valuable work in that its an empathetic and appropriately de-glammed (but crucially not oppressively glum) look at a marginal yet common figure in society. The only knock I've really got against it is that its more admirable than excellent, that's not really so bad.



But while the previous film might never rise past another one of legions of festival obscurities, that won't be a problem with Master Z: Ip Man Legacy which will be something your Netflix account will recommend to you in several months or so provided you've ever watched a martial arts film before. Yuen Woo-Ping has a towering reputation as a director of fight scenes, but his record as a director of movies isn't quite as sterling. This film demonstrates so damn well how he's great at the former and competent at the latter. The antagonist of Ip Man 3 (Jin 'Max' Zhang) fights many dudes and amongst perfunctionary gangster drama. Performances are stilted, the dramatic staging is flat, the parts where the people are hitting each other are fantastic though. The great cast fills in the expected and underwritten parts with as much brio as possible. I had a pretty good time watching this, but then again its difficult for me to not enjoy any film that has a bunch of great fight scenes in it, and hell, any film that has Dave Bautista beating a man to death while wearing an apron ins't entirely short on inspiration.

[Bebpo]

Hellboy's at 9% on RT, lmao. What a fuck up.

https://www.thewrap.com/hellboy-david-harbour-neil-marshall/

Reading this the one comment that strikes out is that Marshall handed in the film at the end and the studio cut it together and they never promised the director final cut of his movie. Some of the studio control stuff in these superhero movies is pretty stupid. I feel like any director that's been directing and cutting their own movies for their career getting told "you shoot the scenes, we'll make a movie out of it" has got to be pretty insulting.

Getting F4 deja vu a bit with that article.

[Joe Molotov]

Hellboy's at 9% on RT, lmao. What a fuck up.

https://www.thewrap.com/hellboy-david-harbour-neil-marshall/

They should have had Ron Perlman, I don't care if he is 70 years old.

[Great Rumbler]

Hellboy's at 9% on RT, lmao. What a fuck up.

Release the Del Toro cut! Do it, cowards!

[Himu]

I’m still amazed the longevity of the Ip Man franchise. I remember when Yen was like “this will be our last one” with the original sequel. Nope.

On the other end I will see ANYTHING with Michelle Yeoh in it.

[HyperZoneWasAwesome]

Part 4 with Donnie is out later this year, with Scott Adkins as this years iteration of the evil foreigner. Can't wait.

Yeoh actually gets to give the best performance in the film despite having maybe the fifth most screentime. Its an honest to gosh throwback in terms of style and content to any Hong Kong cheapie from the mid 70's to 80's, but with a very modern sheen on its production. Guess that'll happen when you give the keys to a dude well into his seventies. I found the clunky dramatic parts charming as hell, but that might just be me.

[Joe Molotov]

I heard it's just a lot of kung fu fighting, sounds good to me. 

[TVC15]

All this talk of Kurosawa got me to finally watch RAN. What are these hats they're all wearing at the beginning?

spoiler (click to show/hide)

[close]

Like nearly every other time I've watched a Kurosawa movie afterward I'm thinking, why did I put this off so long? Been on my watchlist for years. So incredibly enjoyable, amazing riff on King Lear. Saburo, what a goddamn gem

spoiler (click to show/hide)

:'(

[close]

Those are called eboshi. They were worn pre Sengoku period I think by samurai class men.

this is the only site i could find a clear depiction of something really similar http://www.kariginu.jp/kikata/2-2.htm ("old fashioned rattan hat" is the transalation im getting). get some old depictions when i looked up ori or "samurai" eboshi. cool style anyway, had never seen it before.

There's different kinds and it's dependent on the era.

I'm used to it because it's featured in a lot of Nobunaga game art.

(Image removed from quote.)

It's essentially a part of non-battle wear for samurai. When they're out of battle they'd cover their hair and it was considered dishonorable for a samurai to not cover their hair with a hat. If I recall, ebishu went out of fashion post-Sengoku era of which Ran takes place as a setting.

Watched some early silent films yesterday. I occasionally do it to see how far we've come. It's amazing how film goes from The Great Train Robbery to Metropolis and The Passion of Joan of Arc in less than 30 years.

The silent films I watched were all crap but it's interesting to see the techniques and technology evolve over time.

The movies were:

The Great Train Robbery
The Lonedale Operator
Buster Keaton's The Playhouse

That was all I could stand. Watch the minstrel show in that Buster Keaton stuff is always so damn awful. Never mind Griffith's later embracing KKK with Birth of a Nation.

Then I watched Yojimbo to wash my palate.

I recently re-watched A Fistful of Dollars and was taken aback by how much it cribs - even entire shots - from Yojimbo. But after watching Yojimbo for the first time in a long while, I have to say that ultimately I prefer Fistful for its tone, more grounded story elements, and cinematography. I just prefer it, although Yojimbo is still the original classic.

Thinking of watching Pacific Rim 2 or Up In The Air after The General tonight. I have never seen Pacific Rim 2. The first one kicked ass so I'm looking forward to it.

The General with Buster Keaton (not to be confused with The General with Shaq) is my favorite silent movie. I think it's on Amazon Prime.

I'm watching it on Youtube. It's a culmination of the entire silent era in many ways. Good farewell to an old era.

Buster Keaton is one of my faves. I have everything he did on blu ray. Some of the few BDs I own. Those and Valley of the Dolls, Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, and a few Corman movies that aren’t streaming.

[Himu]

Part 4 with Donnie is out later this year, with Scott Adkins as this years iteration of the evil foreigner. Can't wait.

Yeoh actually gets to give the best performance in the film despite having maybe the fifth most screentime. Its an honest to gosh throwback in terms of style and content to any Hong Kong cheapie from the mid 70's to 80's, but with a very modern sheen on its production. Guess that'll happen when you give the keys to a dude well into his seventies. I found the clunky dramatic parts charming as hell, but that might just be me.

That’s because Michelle is always a badass professional!

[Tasty]

I heard it's just a lot of kung fu fighting, sounds good to me. 

Were those guys fast as lightning?

[Joe Molotov]

I heard it's just a lot of kung fu fighting, sounds good to me. 

Were those guys fast as lightning?

UMMMMMM, some of them are ladies, but yes.

[Himu]

I miss Roger Ebert so, so much. The end of his life was soul shattering.

[Transhuman]

He was such a great guy, but goddamn. Watching that documentary Life Itself was tough. The way his lower face just sort of hung there without a jaw/throat was grotesque. It's hard to imagine a worse state to be in physically.

Don't smoke or drink

[benjipwns]

I also admired the interiors of the Borg probe, and the peculiar makeup work creating the Borg Queen, who looks like no notion of sexy I have ever heard of, but inspires me to keep an open mind.

never forget

[Transhuman]

"Wild Things" is lurid trash, with a plot so twisted they're still explaining it during the closing titles. It's like a three-way collision between a softcore sex film, a soap opera and a B-grade noir. I liked it.

☆☆☆

-Roger Ebert

[Tasty]

When my taste in movies started diverging from the mainstream as an early teen, my thoughts 100% aligned with Ebert's (on the movies in question), but I only discovered that retroactively. He's still probably my favorite film critic (my still-living favorite is Mark Kermode), though my tastes have diverged a bit since I first became a fan.

The great thing about Ebert though is that when you disagree with him, at least you get where he's coming from.

[Tasty]

https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/hellbound-hellraiser-ii-1988

"Kirsty!" we hear. And "Tiffany!" And "Kirsty!!!" and "Tiffany!!!" And "Kirstiyyyyyyy!!!!!" And "Tiffanyyyyyyy!!!!!" I'm afraid this is another one of those movies that violates the First Rule of Repetition of Names, which states that when the same names are repeated in a movie more than four times a minute for more than three minutes in a row, the audience breaks out into sarcastic laughter, and some of the ruder members are likely to start shouting "Kirsty!" and "Tiffany!" at the screen.

Man imagine if Ebert had reviewed Inuyasha

[Himu]

Ebert even when I disagreed was still my favorite critic. He still is. I don’t have a favorite critic anymore. None of them have garnered the brand loyalty I developed towards Ebert.

[Himu]

To this day, if I watch any film made before his death I look up whether or not the guy reviewed it. These days I just scroll through RT and see a blob of faces that I don’t know and don’t care to know.

The closest is red letter media but they’re mostly entertainment value and not regarding a movies quality because they watch a lot of trash deliberately for laughs.

[benjipwns]

i think Ebert would rest easy knowing there was real film criticism still going on thanks to On Cinema At The Cinema

[Bebpo]

I saw Hellboy 2019 and it was ok? I dunno, after that RT and reviews I expected something a lot worse. It's entertaining and pretty decently paced, the main guy does a good Ron Perlman as Hellboy impression, there's some nice art direction at times and some cool monster bits, and Milla Jova~~ can speak fluent english now? (ok I haven't seen her in anything in like 10 years; she's aged very well!).

Some scenes are BAD (there's a scene with giants that feels like it was test footage and really should've been cut), the story beats are kinda generic and the sidekicks are much less cool than the Del Toro edition sidekicks (but they're tolerable, I expected much worse from their introductions).

It's not a good movie, it's probably a lot worse compared to the Del Toro ones (which only exist in my memories since I haven't seen them in forever), but it's fairly entertaining and watchable? If they made a sequel (which they won't) and it was better I'd watch it.

Even as a horror fan there's a lot of unnecessary violence & gore. This movie is a total splatterfest for better or worse. Like Rodriguez's Planet Terror bit kinda genre but without the campyness. Been a while since I've seen so many brains and guts and viscera flying everywhere all the time. Huge body count in this. Some of it was neat, but almost all of it was CG and not that great CG so some if it looks just bad (there's a part where a baddy tears out a guy's vocal chords and puts it in his mouth to replicate his voice and the CG is so terrible it's just goofy. I've seen that in a different movie where it was practical effects and it was way creepier).

Using the AMC moviepass thing I'm on and seeing it with friends it was worth watching. I'd say it was better than Pet Semetary 2019. Wouldn't pay much for it though. Saw IP Man Z: The Legacy is opening down here this weekend so probably gonna moviepass that next week with my movie friends. Haven't seen a martial arts flick in a while.

[Himu]

I have been considering for a while to check Sinema (or whatever), Movie Pass, or AMC a-list. What’s the best one? Isn’t Movie Pass RIP by now?

[HyperZoneWasAwesome]

Ebert's workload when he was dying of cancer was hugely impressive. I don't friggin know how he was the wherewithal to keep working as hard as he did, not only that but his blogging and autobiographical musings that he ramped up prior to his death I think is some of his strongest writing ever. It was and is inspiring stuff to me.

I wrote him a pretty long email not too long before he passed. I thanked him for his contributions to my own personal taste and what movies meant to me. The dude wrote back to me a short but thoughtful reply. He'll always be a personal hero to me, no matter how wrong he was about Spawn (I blame the sauce, seems likely).

[Skullfuckers Anonymous]

I have been considering for a while to check Sinema (or whatever), Movie Pass, or AMC a-list. What’s the best one? Isn’t Movie Pass RIP by now?

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/454129649/preshow-attend-first-run-movies-in-theaters-free

[Himu]

Ebert's workload when he was dying of cancer was hugely impressive. I don't friggin know how he was the wherewithal to keep working as hard as he did, not only that but his blogging and autobiographical musings that he ramped up prior to his death I think is some of his strongest writing ever. It was and is inspiring stuff to me.

I wrote him a pretty long email not too long before he passed. I thanked him for his contributions to my own personal taste and what movies meant to me. The dude wrote back to me a short but thoughtful reply. He'll always be a personal hero to me, no matter how wrong he was about Spawn (I blame the sauce, seems likely).

When I was first getting into movies in a more serious manner around 2005-2006 or so he was an invaluable resource. I would look up some of my favorite flicks, like say Red Violin to see what he said about them and the guy would name drop similar films like Tales of Manhattan and La Ronde. Then I would watch those, further instilling my movie knowledge.

Ebert da gawd.

His website is still an invaluable resource I still learn from. I wish he were still with us. His Top Movies list helped solidify my tastes in movies. I miss and love him and I’ll always respect him.

[Transhuman]

Ebert even when I disagreed was still my favorite critic. He still is. I don’t have a favorite critic anymore. None of them have garnered the brand loyalty I developed towards Ebert.

Kermode is pretty good

[Himu]

Still haven’t gone through everything on Ebert’s list.

It’s fucking massive.

https://www.rogerebert.com/great-movies

[HardcoreRetro]

All of em are classics, so you should be able to cross out a bunch of them and come to a pretty concise list. If you're an avid movie watcher that is.

[Transhuman]

The only one I saw was the anime

 

Time 2 die

[Himu]

All of em are classics, so you should be able to cross out a bunch of them and come to a pretty concise list. If you're an avid movie watcher that is.

I used to use it as a rough guide of what to watch and eventually stopped following it because I noticed I’d catch more and more stuff without consulting itjust by following the directors other stuff or directors similar to them. So I’ve surprisingly seen a sizable portion and still haven’t seen everything. This is why Ebert was the best. Guy was a treasure trove.

[Joe Molotov]

[kingv]

https://m.

Star Wars episode ix teaser.

Subtitle is “rise of Skywalker” which is a weird ass name actually. Isn’t ray a not-Skywalker?

Daisy Ridley is looking hotter here than usual.

Pretty sure the voice over is actually Mark Hamill. Also pretty sure that’s Palestine at the end.

[Svejk]

I think JJ could actually end this on a satisfactory note...  He's pretty damn good at what he does...

[headwalk]

a minute of reminding everyone what a shite actor daisy ridley is before a minute of absolutely nothing shots spliced with OT callbacks to get the fanboys sweating.

love that they've given lando the exact same costume he wore 40 years ago just incase that particular nostalgia bait didn't land right due to his melted face.

[Great Rumbler]

Day 1 for me, brehs.

[Joe Molotov]

a minute of reminding everyone what a shite actor daisy ridley is before a minute of absolutely nothing shots spliced with OT callbacks to get the fanboys sweating.

Well, it's working tbh. 

[headwalk]

Well, it's working tbh. 

what are you most excited about?

i stuck with this shit through the prequels, which were always colossally awful but never quite this desperate and pandering.

just genuinely seems like fanfic, but coming from a executive whiteboard filled with piecharts rather than some special fellow's geocities page.

[Joe Molotov]

Well, it's working tbh. 

what are you most excited about?

i stuck with this shit through the prequels, which were always colossally awful but never quite this desperate and pandering.

When something happens that I recognize, and then some John Williams music starts playing.

[Don Rumata]

I think JJ could actually end this on a satisfactory note...  He's pretty damn good at what he does...

He's good at making trailers and marketing.
Less so at making movies.

Still, can't be worse than fucking Ep. VIII.

They really botched this trilogy in the dumbest possible way, but i'm still curious to see where the fuck they're going with this, because so far, the story made no sense at all.

Also, i forgot they still had to kill Lando.

[kingv]

Yeah, I don’t really get Where any of it was going with episode 8.

[Don Rumata]

If we get new Palpatine memes it will all be worth it

Abrams creates Snooky, Johnson kills off Snooky, Abrams has to bring back Snooky.
Was this trilogy written through a game of telephone?

[Nintex]

Star Wars Episode IX
- Rey confronts Kylo. He discovers that he was wrong. He wants to reach out and hugs her.
SURPRISE. The remnants of Darth Maul fused with his ship and is now Darth Tieaul who stalks the planet of Tatooine. He kills Kylo. Rey now has to fight Darth Tieaul.

- Oh no the Empire First Order is winning. Luckily Lando shows up just in time to sacrifice the Millenium Falcon and blow up the DEATH RAY

- The heroes discover that Snoke what just a puppet controlled by Palpatine who is sitting somewhere tweeting orders to the First Order until he regains his true strength.

- Palpatine is protected by Force Walkers, undead CGI Jedi and Sith (remember Qui Gon Jin and Grievous?) fighting on his behalf. Leia keeps them at bay.

- Rey's parents were 'nothing' but her biological father was. Her mother was secretly inseminated with the seed of Darth Vader by the First Order on Palpatine's orders. Making her Luke's 'little Sister' and his new 'vessel'.
"Snoke was just a PUPPET, you will be my new flesh and blood hehehehehehe"
 
- Palpatine loses the final battle against Rey and the others. Who says that she will never turn evil. But at that moment Palpatine tries to control her mind. Kylo returns, Badly injured. "THIS IS FOR MY FATHER" and he destroys Palpatine by crashing his ship into him.

- Poe and the others escape

- Poe marries Finn, all the heroes are there to celebrate

- Rey takes her leave. Says that the time of both the Jedi and Sith has ended. She returns to her home planet scavenging ships.

The galaxy is at peace

After the credits we see a small village and a narrator talks about the 'Balance of the Force'. An Ewok has given birth to Human/Ewok twins that resemble Kylo.
Stormtroopers show up to take away the newborn. "Bring him to Master Kenobi"
-END-

[I'm a Puppy!]

Guys Remember when we were like "We need to tell more stories in this universe than just one family's stories." ? LOLZ Nevermind!!

[nachobro]

star wars

[Nintex]

To be fair JJ Abrams is a good film maker and this will probably be enjoyable.

Although no doubt the corporate Disney borg has focus tested this thing to hell and back on audiences range 3 - 99 in all 256 genders and the Chinese so that there is something for EVERYONE.

[Himu]

https://m.

Star Wars episode ix teaser.

Subtitle is “rise of Skywalker” which is a weird ass name actually. Isn’t ray a not-Skywalker?

Daisy Ridley is looking hotter here than usual.

Pretty sure the voice over is actually Mark Hamill. Also pretty sure that’s Palestine at the end.

Who cares.

Remember the time when Luke went back to Tatooine and this time he was a badass? Let’s do that again with Rey!

Remember Lando? I do!

Skip.

[HardcoreRetro]

Daisy Ridley is looking hotter here than usual.

This is a joke on her being in a desert setting right?

[Himu]

Kill Star Wars. It has the emotional and story depth of a fly on the wall. There is only one Star Wars trilogy, the original. The other two are merely trying to grasp at that original trilogy’s feats. Let it die. Star Wars, beyond the original trilogy, has nothing to offer but nostalgia, subjecting expectations, and dance fight scenes. Let it die and let us all have the good memories of it before it’s too late.

[HyperZoneWasAwesome]

Peter Strickland (Berberian Sound Studio) makes another unclassifiable yet delightful and genuine oddity with In Fabric. Its droll as hell and very often funny but not quite a comedy, its got lots of spooky parts and a few walloping scares but it sure ain't a horror film, its more of a retro-fetishistic and horror-adjacent dry comedy with lots of low-key social and consumer commentary. So far its a genre of one but its a damned solid genre. As for plot and character, its a diptych about an evil, magical red dress and the people who come into its possession. But what its really about is being as British as possible while introducing supernatural buggedity-boos and purple prose into mundane and quite arch lives. Its really something, with uniformly strong performances and vivid cinematography and sound design. I got no friggin idea how Strickland gets funding for these things, let alone multiple films now (gotta be a hell of a pitch meeting) but I'm quite glad he is.

[Himu]

Whew those colors.

[Raist]

Subtitle is “rise of Skywalker” which is a weird ass name actually. Isn’t ray a not-Skywalker?

Turns out she was just there to bait the woke folks in. She dies, crushed by the ship, within the first 10 minutes.

Rest of the movie is about Kylo, a Skywalker only in name, he's actually Palpatine's son.

Movie ends with everyone being together again, it was all just a dream in the Force-purgatory.

[Uncle]

Who cares.

Remember the time when Luke went back to Tatooine and this time he was a badass? Let’s do that again with Rey!

Remember Lando? I do!

Skip.

[Himu]

AT-ST! AT-ST!

[nachobro]

Rich should play Palpatine. He's got the better cackle, no question.

[Himu]

As for plot and character, its a diptych about an evil, magical red dress and the people who come into its possession

Sounds similar to Red Violin except that movie has no ghosts. Then again the violins cost finish was its creators dead  wife’s blood. So it’s close.

[CatsCatsCats]

Oh that’s supposed to be Palpatine? Sounded like Hamill joker laughter to me

[Uncle]

Rich should play Palpatine. He's got the better cackle, no question.

Mike has the Palpatine voice, Rich has the George Lucas voice