The Movie Review and Discussion Thread

[Romulus]

Originally Posted by Steve46

I don't like historical dramas filled with battles. Can't stand Braveheart either.

What about Lord of the Rings????

[Show spoiler]

[Steve46]

Originally Posted by Romulus

What about Lord of the Rings????

[Show spoiler]

I could do with fewer battle scenes.

[Foggy]

Originally Posted by Romulus

What about Lord of the Rings????

[Show spoiler]

What, Middle Earth actually existed?!?!

[lDlisturb3d]

Originally Posted by Steve46

I could do with fewer battle scenes.

Steve imma kill you

[Show spoiler]

[iam1bearcat]

thinking about some of my favorite films and i realized that the majority of them are:

1. very long dramas
2. films many would consider very slow and / or very boring
3. minimal dialogue
4. quirky music / scores
5. confusing / complex / difficult to follow
6. quirky / unique and films people say, "you have to have acquired taste" to enjoy
7. films that Diesel would avoid like the plague and / or absolutely hate

hopefully over the next few weeks i can put my list together as i feel stepping away from films for a long while has really made it clearer what i enjoy and what films really do deserve to be at the top of my list

[jvince]

Originally Posted by Steve46

I don't like historical dramas filled with battles. Can't stand Braveheart either.

Originally Posted by Foggy

I'm pretty much the same, I'm open to any film, but anything like Gladiator or Braveheart and I'm

I'm with Steve and Foggy on this one. Kingdom of Heaven bored the heck out of me the two times I attempted to watch it. I'm willing to try again someday though.

[Diesel]

Originally Posted by iam1bearcat

thinking about some of my favorite films and i realized that the majority of them are:

1. very long dramas
2. films many would consider very slow and / or very boring
3. minimal dialogue
4. quirky music / scores
5. confusing / complex / difficult to follow
6. quirky / unique and films people say, "you have to have acquired taste" to enjoy
7. films that Diesel would avoid like the plague and / or absolutely hate

hopefully over the next few weeks i can put my list together as i feel stepping away from films for a long while has really made it clearer what i enjoy and what films really do deserve to be at the top of my list

Needs to be higher on the list

[Al_The_Strange]

Originally Posted by iam1bearcat

thinking about some of my favorite films and i realized that the majority of them are:

1. very long dramas
2. films many would consider very slow and / or very boring
3. minimal dialogue
4. quirky music / scores
5. confusing / complex / difficult to follow
6. quirky / unique and films people say, "you have to have acquired taste" to enjoy
7. films that Diesel would avoid like the plague and / or absolutely hate

hopefully over the next few weeks i can put my list together as i feel stepping away from films for a long while has really made it clearer what i enjoy and what films really do deserve to be at the top of my list

That totally sounds like you.

The majority of my favorite films are:

1.) A pleasing (and usually crowd-pleasing) combination of style and substance.
2.) Action! Lots and lots of action! Battles, fights, brawls, car chases, 'splosions, bring 'em on!!!
...alright, even if it doesn't have all that, I at least ask for good pacing.
3.) Gratuitous slow-motion (as opposed to gratuitous fast-motion, or shakey-cam).
4.) Awe-inspiring visuals that bring to life stuff that can't otherwise be seen on planet Earth.
5.) Slapstick comedy. High-brow stuff ain't funny. *spits*
6.) Dialogue with personality.
7.) Good, wholesome blood n' guts. The most inventive kills may illicit a positive reaction (doesn't have to be "brutal" per se though; I prefer stylized, over-the-top gore like "Kill Bill" over something like "Saw").
8.) Naked chicks every five minutes or less.
9.) Overall, films that you and jiggy might not dig, whereas Steve and jvince seem to like about half of.

Originally Posted by iam1bearcat

4. quirky music / scores

I love film music and have a pretty big collection of soundtracks. Can't say that I collect "quirky" music, but most of my favorites aren't traditional. I find myself loving soundtracks that have lots of techno or rock mixed in with the compositions.

Big examples would be, like, the works of Hans Zimmer ("Black Hawk Down," "Inception," "TDK"), Graeme Revell ("Red Planet," "Aeon Flux"), Brian Tyler ("F&F: Tokyo Drift," "Children of Dune"), Tyler Bates ("300," "Doomsday," "Watchmen"), and any soundtrack where they got an actual band to do the music (like Vangelis doing "Blade Runner," Massive Attack doing "Unleashed," or Toto composing "Dune").

[Foggy]

Blue Velvet

I never ever want to meet Dennis Hopper!

This film reminded me of History of Violence (A film I hate). They both feature a very stereotypical American safe environment, with a dark and violent underworld beneath the sunshine blanket. But I like Blue Velvet a hell of a lot more.

Main reason being Blue Velvet is a lot more cryptic to watch. It's essentially a horror film about human curiosity. A man with nothing going on in his life comes across an ear in the middle of a field, reports it to the police, but instead of letting them do their job, he decides to investigate himself, leading him to violent noir world. Instead of getting out of the spiral of darkness like he should do throughout the film, he keeps going deeper, maybe because he believes it's the right thing to do, but it's mainly due to his curiosity. I guess any film could boil down to this, but Blue Velvet plays it up so well that it feels unique in it's situations, you never really know what's going to happen next, in fact, true to Lynch, you often don't really know what happened prior to what's next.

Blue Velvet is also a very tense atmospheric film, while History of Violence is just cold and dull for the most part, pushing you to a distance to look at a really boring world. Blue Velvet makes you a spectator of a gritty unpleasant world filled full strange surreal stuff. It's funny, it's repulsive, it's uncomfortable, it's gripping. It's pretty much anything you wouldn't and would want out out of a film.

But, I liked Mulholland Drive more, there were parts of this where I felt a drag, although I was watching this late last night during a distracting thunderstorm, I expect to like the film more on repeat viewings

8/10

[lDlisturb3d]

Originally Posted by jvince

I'm with Steve and Foggy on this one. Kingdom of Heaven bored the heck out of me the two times I attempted to watch it. I'm willing to try again someday though.

Well Kingdom of Heaven is fitted if you LOVE this genre. Braveheart and Gladiator would be for someone is so so about it.

[jvince]

Blow Out (1981)
A soundman for sleazy exploitation flms accidentally records evidence of the assassination of a presidential candidate. Brian de Palma's direction. John Travolta's performance. The emphasis on sounds. The style. The way the scenes were shot and framed. The use of colors and light and darkness. All f*cking perfect. A must-see for anybody who loves films (or anything about filmmaking) and, of course, a little conspiracy.

[Al_The_Strange]

Originally Posted by jvince

Blow Out (1981)
A soundman for sleazy exploitation flms accidentally records evidence of the assassination of a presidential candidate. Brian de Palma's direction. John Travolta's performance. The emphasis on sounds. The style. The way the scenes were shot and framed. The use of colors and light and darkness. All f*cking perfect. A must-see for anybody who loves films (or anything about filmmaking) and, of course, a little conspiracy.

Agreed.

[SquidPuppet]

Originally Posted by Diesel

Very surprising then because Kingdom of Heaven is very much about the characters and not the action.

Characters facilitate the brief action that the film has, not the other way around as usual for big movies.

I have to agree. The Directors cut is a completely different film than the theatrical version. COMPLETELY night and day. It was SO much about the story and the personal issues and motivations. The action was just there to depict the consequences of disagreement.

[Diesel]

Where is Surf at by the way? All this talk about Kingdom of Heaven...his spider-senses should be tingling

[SquidPuppet]

Brave

I finally went to the theater to catch this. Finally.

Something was off here. The Pixar magic was missing.

The first act was a story we have seen a million times. The second act went WAY too far into an unexpected, odd, and (for me) uncomfortable direction. And the end was a big "Been there - done that" moment.

The action scenes employed the same super (overly) close photography combined with quick cut fast editing from Quantam of Solace that left me yearning to be able to see what was actually happening.

It was NOT a bad film, it just didnt have the Oomph, the pizazz, the chemistry, that certain special something found in most Pixar films.

On the plus side, the animation was another step forward. Detail and motion were simply amazing.

3/5

[Steve46]

Originally Posted by SquidPuppet

Brave

I finally went to the theater to catch this. Finally.

Something was off here. The Pixar magic was missing.

The first act was a story we have seen a million times. The second act went WAY too far into an unexpected, odd, and (for me) uncomfortable direction. And the end was a big "Been there - done that" moment.

The action scenes employed the same super (overly) close photography combined with quick cut fast editing from Quantam of Solace that left me yearning to be able to see what was actually happening.

It was NOT a bad film, it just didnt have the Oomph, the pizazz, the chemistry, that certain special something found in most Pixar films.

On the plus side, the animation was another step forward. Detail and motion were simply amazing.

3/5

I gave it a 4, but it's not in Pixar's Top 5 and was not up to the usual level. Too much action, not enough heart.

[Foggy]

Originally Posted by SquidPuppet

Brave

I finally went to the theater to catch this. Finally.

Something was off here. The Pixar magic was missing.

The first act was a story we have seen a million times. The second act went WAY too far into an unexpected, odd, and (for me) uncomfortable direction. And the end was a big "Been there - done that" moment.

The action scenes employed the same super (overly) close photography combined with quick cut fast editing from Quantam of Solace that left me yearning to be able to see what was actually happening.

It was NOT a bad film, it just didnt have the Oomph, the pizazz, the chemistry, that certain special something found in most Pixar films.

On the plus side, the animation was another step forward. Detail and motion were simply amazing.

3/5

It sounds like it was pretty much what I saw in the trailer. I read that they changed director during the middle of production for this, it's probably the big reason the films problems

[SquidPuppet]

Originally Posted by Steve46

I gave it a 4, but it's not in Pixar's Top 5 and was not up to the usual level. Too much action, not enough heart.

The heart was there between Mom and Daughter, but that is just so "standard" in films.

The only new ground that the movie broke was having Mom

[Show spoiler]turn into the Bear,

which was weird and didnt work for me. I aslo found it offputting that Dad was trying to

[Show spoiler]kill Mom/his wife.

That would be GREAT in a psycho-thriller, but a Pixar film? Eh....didnt work. They missed the balancing point between humor and danger.

[SquidPuppet]

Originally Posted by Foggy

It sounds like it was pretty much what I saw in the trailer. I read that they changed director during the middle of production for this, it's probably the big reason the films problems

Yep, too many Chefs. Three in total.

Sounds like you felt the same way about Blue Velvet as I did. You feel a bit "sneaky and dirty" while watching it.

[Diesel]

Sounds like I didn't miss much when I decided to pass on it before it left our theater.