Movie News, Reviews, and Discussion Super-Thread

[Great Rumbler]

Yeah, looking at it again it seems like there's a lot of practical effects. I think what's giving me that vibe is the post-processing color pallete? I don't know. Regardless it does look like a bunch of dumb fun and I'm looking forward to it.

The first shot of the trailer was literally the most blue-and-orange movie thing I've ever seen and I couldn't help but roll my eyes.

[Steve Contra]

Andrex couldn't help but roll his eyes that Australia, known for blue sky and orange, iron rich outback sand, is orange and blue when filmed.

https://www.google.com/search?q=australian+outback&rlz=1C1ASUT_enUS454US454&espv=2&biw=1517&bih=752&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=3-uIVN--DozEgwS7cg&ved=0CCoQsAQ&dpr=0.9

Google is in on it too

[benjipwns]

Uh dude, Australia was built by Hollywood as a place to shoot movies.

[Madrun Badrun]

Sounds like another Jewish conspiracy

[Joe Molotov]

Sounds like another Jewish conspiracy

The Jewish Conspiracy is a just a conspiracy created by Jews to make themselves feel more important.

[fistfulofmetal]

THIS MOTHERFUCKER RIGHT HERE

[chronovore]

Insidious Chapter 2: Loads of creepy fun. No genuine horror, but plenty of neat imagery, good use of the first movie’s mythology, and good use of misdirection without spelling /everything/ out for the audience.

[StealthFan]

Predestination, brehs. Pirate that shit ASAP.

[chronovore]

[Tasty]

I really liked it. A good 7-8/10 for me. I didn't like the obvious "switch" midway through the film, but I kinda really loved how it ended (last scene in particular.) And on reflecting a lot about the movie I see how its theme comes through in even the smaller things. Great acting and cinematography, too. Film just looked dank and creepy while still being "proper" and whatever. I never guessed it was filmed in Australia (accents should have given it away but I'm thick.)

[Verdigris Murder]

Whatever else about the Babadook, the bit with the mother hearing the Baba dook dook calling; and the gradual changing of the houses interior colours were most excellent.

[fistfulofmetal]

Watched some stuff

Dark Mountain -
Awful amateur bullshit movie that unabashedly COMPLETELY rips off Blair Witch in the most literal way. Every story beat is identical. The only difference is that it takes place in the desert and not the woods. The entire last sequence could be considered a shot for shot rip. THEN right at the end it rips off the end of [REC]. Not saying that the last shot of [REC] is like, super original or anything? But it's very clearly a rip. It's awful. Fuck whoever made it.

Life After Beth -
I liked it overall but lost a lot of interest as I watched it. The direction they take the story felt kinda boring to me and too predictable. I was interested in exploring the concept of your dead girlfriend coming back to life and having to exist with a zombie Aubrey Plaza girlfriend. But it minimizes that and doesn't go as deep as they could. But it's not bad.

Enemy -
One of Jake Gyllenhaal's recent big acting showcases, and it def delivers on that front. It's an interesting doppelganger story that doesn't try to go into the "WHY" so much as just let things linger on the "WHAAA?" aspect. It also kinda makes no sense. The story doesn't try to wrap things up in a neat bow or anything and you REALLY have to try and interpret the story in your own way. Good movie. Worth a watch for Gyllenhaal at least.

[Eric P]

It's such an adaptation of the book. i think the book works better as it gives you very detailed internal monologues.  I'd say read the book if you enjoyed the movie.

[TakingBackSunday]

Gone Girl was fucking fantastic.  The douche chills felt while in the theater, my god

[HyperZoneWasAwesome]

Blade Runner: Final Cut, in a theater.

 

[TakingBackSunday]

Just saw The Babadook

fuck me what a film

I highly encourage you all to read this discussion about it:

http://www.reddit.com/r/TrueFilm/comments/2l495c/the_babadook_discussion/

paints the ending in several lights.  I thought the ending was done phenomenally.  The kid was fucking great, too.

[chronovore]

Jodorowsky’s Dune: The man is insane in the best possible way. The documentary is immaculate. I can’t imagine what the landscape would have been like if it had come out, but it seems likely that it would not have caught fire in the USA, just as El Topo and Holy Mountain were not accepted by mainstream audiences. The man is a visionary, and the story of the run up to making the film is compelling.

[Quaker]

Jodorowsky’s Dune: The man is insane in the best possible way. The documentary is immaculate. I can’t imagine what the landscape would have been like if it had come out, but it seems likely that it would not have caught fire in the USA, just as El Topo and Holy Mountain were not accepted by mainstream audiences. The man is a visionary, and the story of the run up to making the film is compelling.

I don't know about immaculate, it gets to be a little circle jerk-y and some if its claims are pretty iffy(no question that the production design of Alien was born out of its failure but some of the other ones it makes seem like stretches.) It's a really fun, interesting story though, and I love that they went through the effort to animate the storyboards and illustrations. It's pretty much worth it just to be introduced to Chris Foss' work.

Birdman

Best movie I've seen all year, and probably the best movie I've seen all decade. 11/10

I was surprised by how hilarious it is. Lubezki's work behind the camera is fantastic and I love the meta nature of it(and the real-life press junket proving the movie right when Keaton got asked all those asinine questions about Nolan's Batman movies and movie blogs then running those as news.) It might have worked a little better if they had left out the Taxi Driver coda at the end but that's just me armchair directing.

@ critics getting butthurt over the goofy depiction of the NYT theater critic and the entertainment press in the movie.

http://thedissolve.com/reviews/1152-birdman/

I actually like The Dissolve and think it'd be fair to shit on him after 21 Grams, Babel or Biutiful(even though I like those to some extent) but I thought this was Inarritu back on his game.

[Tasty]

It was a fun documentary but Jodorowsky himself rubbed me the wrong way.

[team filler]

just watched Predestination. I feel like watching that crap killed more of my brain cells than downing a bottle of everclear would in the same amount of time. stupid stupid movie, the title should have been Stupid Time Paradox: The Movie!

[TakingBackSunday]

It was a fun documentary but Jodorowsky himself rubbed me the wrong way.

Pretty much.  His misogyny was especially abhorrent, and the way he treated his son throughout production is depressing.

[Tasty]

It was a fun documentary but Jodorowsky himself rubbed me the wrong way.

Pretty much.  His misogyny was especially abhorrent, and the way he treated his son throughout production is depressing.

Yeah. He seemed really petulant at points too, which I guess is the mark of a savant but whatever. The joy on his face when he talked about "raping Dune" with glee made me go

Dune deserved better (and still does.)

[TakingBackSunday]

Weeeeeeell I don't know about that, I find Dune to be pretty fucking bad and has been outclassed by many books since its release, but I will say that his vision would've made for a truly monumental experience.

[Great Rumbler]

I find Dune to be pretty fucking bad and has been outclassed by many books since its release,

[Stoney Mason]

Watched Gone Girl tonight.

That was really fun. It was like watching high class porn and I mean that in a good way. The movie starts off feeling like an oscar wanna be picture and I found myself not liking it. But then you realize its all a mirage and its like a murder version of The Game.

Really fun trashy movie.

[Tasty]

Gone Girl really was a ton of fun. Another Fincher/Reznor/Ross/Cronenweth great.

[Mupepe]

Gone Girl was pure fun.  I heard that the book shift in tones is much more erratic.  I need to get around to reading it.

[team filler]

mazerunner is crap. the whole movie is just a setup to get you to watch the sequel, but does nothing to actually make you care about a sequel.

[toku]

mazerunner is crap. the whole movie is just a setup to get you to watch the sequel, but does nothing to actually make you care about a sequel.

welcome to the world of young adult novels turned films filler

[team filler]

shut the fuck up

[toku]

shut the fuck up

choke on my black dick

[Junpei the Tracer!]

I enjoyed The Maze Runner a lot but I agree with filler about the sequel setup ending. Didn't care for that.

[Bebpo]

^^yeah my friend mentioned that was a good one.  Definitely on my radar now.


Ain't Them Bodies Saints - Nice little 1970s small town Texas western-ish.  Not so much a story movie as a scenery movie where you enjoy the gorgeous cinematography, Casey Affleck & Rooney Mara chewing up scenery along with the supporting cast all to slow panning cameras and nice banjo music.  It's a slow ride that drops you right in the middle and isn't out to say much but just watch how things unravel.  Liked it.

[chronovore]

mazerunner is crap. the whole movie is just a setup to get you to watch the sequel, but does nothing to actually make you care about a sequel.

welcome to the world of young adult novels turned films filler

I thought you were referring to films being intentionally made as filler, not addressing him. Like The Hobbit, it's almost all filler. Man, I hate that. It's insulting to be given NOTHING. I blame Matrix Reloaded.

[Tasty]

Matrix Reloaded was packed to the gills. It's Revolutions they had to pad out with a pointless mech battle that was like 3/4 of the movie.

[Barry Egan]

How about 8 minutes of Zion dance party footage.  You call that lean editing?

[Tasty]

That part was pretty dumb. But from Seraph-on the movie's pretty tight.

I really like Reloaded, if it wasn't obvious. It's not as good as the original but it's still underrated/unnecessarily-hated.

[Great Rumbler]

The original Matrix was pretty much a stand-alone film, it told a complete story even if it did leave open the possibility for sequels. But Reloaded, on the other hand, was the setup for a really awful payoff, which is partly why people knock it so much. Reloaded wasn't a great movie, and it introduced way too much stuff that was never once mentioned or suggested in the original movie, but it did have that crazy-awesome highway chase...

[chronovore]

Can anyone tell me what actually happened in Matrix Reloaded? Other than a couple unanswered questions, and just introducing villains which hand-wave away the threat Neo posed at the end of the first movie, what is the story arc, as a body unto itself?

Hint: I'm pretty sure there isn't one.

I like Reloaded just fine for fights and el explodo, but it mainly manages to trivialize the first movie's accomplishments.

[Stoney Mason]

I was/am about as big a fan as you can be of the original Matrix. It saddens me those two unnecessary sequels tarnished the whole thing to a lot of mainstream people. If I'm in a charitable mood, I'll say they had some decent action scenes that still stand up as terrific. But in my normal mood, I hate them. I hate everything about them. They took aspects that never needed expounding and spent two movies expounding on them in a completely boring way.

Avatar is going to do the same thing with its sequels. I know people on the bore hate Avatar but I quite liked it. And in neither case no normal person watched Avatar or the Matrix and really needed to know more about those expanded universes. The charm is in discovering the world initially in both of those films. Not being spoon-fed universe expander material.

I didn't mind the Animaxtrix approach because at least that felt a little artsy and less dragging you around by the nose. 

[chronovore]

The Animatrix wasn't perfect, but it was a much better sequel to the original than Reloaded or Revolutions.

[Stoney Mason]

I was such a big Matrix mark around that time, that for a good while I convinced myself that reloaded wasn't so bad. But by the time revolutions came out the brainwashing had left.

And I was just sad.

I've never been so hyped for a movie before or since the matrix sequels. At the time I didn't really care whether the sequels were needed. I just thought they were going to be awesome because the Matrix was awesome and they had to be!

[chronovore]

Same here.
 :'(

I would have loved a sequel which featured Evil Neo, since he had gained absolute power in the Matrix. There's a story in there.

[Mr. Gundam]

I loved the first Matrix movie. Saw the sequel, thought it was such absolute shit that I've never bothered seeing the third one.

In other news, my wife, a professional middle class white woman, wants to see Wild, the movie based on the book for professional middle class white women.

I don't think I can get out of this. Ugh.

[Joe Molotov]

I loved the first Matrix movie. Saw the sequel, thought it was such absolute shit that I've never bothered seeing the third one.

In other news, my wife, a professional middle class white woman, wants to see Wild, the movie based on the book for professional middle class white women.

I don't think I can get out of this. Ugh.

Tell her you're waiting for Wild XXX. It's about professional middle class white women too. 

[Mr. Gundam]

I loved the first Matrix movie. Saw the sequel, thought it was such absolute shit that I've never bothered seeing the third one.

In other news, my wife, a professional middle class white woman, wants to see Wild, the movie based on the book for professional middle class white women.

I don't think I can get out of this. Ugh.

Tell her you're waiting for Wild XXX. It's about professional middle class white women too. 

My wife agrees with me on it being a total professional middle class white woman movie, but she read the book and wants to see it.

Eh, I drug her to Days of Future Past. I'll live I guess.

[Steve Contra]

Thank god my wife isn't into any of that shit

[Mr. Gundam]

It's showing at the Sundance by our house. They've got local beer on tap.

This will work out just fine.

[cool breeze]

I was such a big Matrix mark around that time, that for a good while I convinced myself that reloaded wasn't so bad. But by the time revolutions came out the brainwashing had left.

And I was just sad.

I've never been so hyped for a movie before or since the matrix sequels. At the time I didn't really care whether the sequels were needed. I just thought they were going to be awesome because the Matrix was awesome and they had to be!

with Reloaded I remember leaving the theater, neither me nor any of my friends were really saying anything about it.  it was just sad and draining.  what's worse is I already bought enter the matrix to get into the whole transmedia bullshit.  I returned it, and eventually saw Revolutions on TV many months later.  I haven't rewatched either of sequels in the past 11 years but I still really like the first one.

[toku]

Matrix Trilogy is the only movie trilogy I care about.

[Joe Molotov]

I was still marked out after seeing Matrix Reloaded, because I was convinced that all that crap about the Merovingian and the Architect and the Oracle and Zion, that Revolution would come out and it would all make sense and it would be the best movie ever. Then I saw Revolution (on IMAX!) and I realized it was all just bullshit. There was no Wizard, there wasn't even a man behind the curtain, there was just the Wachowski's, pants around their ankles, showing their ass right there on that jumbo screen and no one could stop them. The dream was dead. 

[chronovore]

Yeah, I think the Wachowski Bros were overwhelmed with the degree of success, and were definitely influenced by how much bigger a production was “required” for the sequels. I know it’s unlikely for a crew to maintain their vision/integrity once Hollywood smells money, but imagine what could have been if they’d somehow made the sequels with the same budget. I can’t help but feel it would have been more coherent, sane, and good.

I own all three Matrix movies; I’ve probably seen the first one 7 or 8 times, the second one 3 or 4 times, and the last one 2 times, once of which was in theaters.

I keep my eyes open for the Animatrix blu-ray when I look for used stuff, and I can imagine watching that several more times.
On the plane back from the USA, there were many movies. United’s 787 updated personal entertainment centers are the best I’ve seen on a plane to-date. I watched several which I know I’ll see again with my kids with Japanese dubs, but wanted to enjoy the dialog in English:

Captain America: Winter Soldier -  This was just great. There was a lot of good stuff in it. I enjoy Hydra’s motivation as a world power, where they’re honestly able to talk about a “higher good” while talking about slaughtering millions of people. It’s eerie. Plenty of good messages in it, and I STILL cannot believe how Marvel has turned the cinematic Captain Marvel into one of my favorite super-heroes. I get legitimate chills. Oh, also the end-credits being a giveaway to how much of a ‘70s action/spy throwback this was, were great.

Guardians of the Galaxy - I know I shouldn’t have watched this on the 10” setback screen as my initial experience with the movie, but I also knew the comedy would die stillborn if I had to hear it in Japanese and/or read subs for it. It was still great, even on a tiny screen. I see what people meant by it feeling like a Star Wars movie, but it felt more like a Marvel one. The team chemistry with its support and rivalry was my favorite bit. Thanos was neatly realized, and Ronan was pretty disposable, all things considered.

22 Jump Street - I giggled a lot. It was great how self-aware the movie was. The credits collection of upcoming sequels were perfect.

Trading Places - Still funny. Jamie Lee Curtis = hrrrrrnnnng.

[HyperZoneWasAwesome]

The Babadook makes virtues of its limited resources.  Yeah, the budget is clearly pretty low, but great acting and practical effects don't cost much.  Limited scope and locations, good, there's more focus on the house that the troubled mother/son live in that mirrors their psychological decay.  Its also one of the few films, horror or not, that grapples successfully with some pretty weighty subject matter, specifically about how shitty parenthood can be sometimes (or always, if you're the protagonist of The Babadook).  The movie is fraught already by the casual cruelty of children, the unintended but substantial harm caused by depression and grief, and the crappy job of the heroine, that there's a gol-dern monster in it only raises the stakes for the characters slightly.

finding a unique spin in a fright flick is awfully damn rare, even rarer still is a debut film from a director being this frigging solid.  I can't wait to see what Jennifer Kent has up next, for as good as the scares are here, the drama underpinning it is way more frightful.  She might be the good horror film director that becomes a great dramatic filmmaker.  Most people who see this would probably agree.

[Steve Contra]

Babadook was the best horror movie I've seen since maybe the descent?  The last act wasn't quite up to the set up, but hey it's a first effort.

spoiler (click to show/hide)

They shouldn't have abandoned the book so early.

[close]

[Tasty]

Can we just stop and admire how much buzz the Babadook has gotten? It's literally all over this thread and my Twitter feed. This is a movie from an unknown director, shot outside America, made on a shoestring budget, and not released in theaters or on home media. And for the past two weeks it feels like everyone is talking about it. I'm so surprised and happy that such a situation like this can occur.

[Steve Contra]

The other horror movies that have had this kind of buzz have tended to be manufactured buzz by the studio (remember Willco reciting marketing material for Paranormal Activity?). 

[Tasty]

Yeah no Wrath, this is pretty different. The buzz is by actual people who have seen the movie and are sharing their honest thoughts. I've never seen this much of it for a single indie film before.

[Tasty]

Not sure I've seen a similar situation on the Bore. Granted, I might not know of another example.

[Mr. Gundam]

This happens all the time with small movies, probably just stuff you're not interested in.

Seeing how I don't like horror, I haven't seen much buzz about Babadook. Totally depends on the circles you run in.

[TakingBackSunday]

I think Babadook is a very approachable horror movie, even for those not into horror flicks.  I would check it out Gundam.