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vonFiedler

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#140: The General
The last silent movie on this list, The General actually isn't a mediocre, boring film. Rather, it's a pretty damn good movie, but one with some pretty glaring flaws as well. One long train chase, this was basically Fury Road 90 years before Fury Road. There are plenty of "oh shit, I can't believe that happened moments", which is unusual for an old as fuck movie. Unfortunately, the cut is very choppy. If you see it on Youtube, the common recommendation is to increase the speed to 1.25. Sounds odd, but it doesn't seem sped up as much as the regular cut seems too slow. Unlike Chaplin, Keaton didn't make his own soundtrack, so the score is stereotypical classical music, often let to run the full length before switching over to a new song. This means that at best you can't take the score seriously, and at worst it's often inappropriate for the action at hand.

It would be a really feasibly and interesting project to re-edit and re-score this movie. I think just about anyone could do so, insert music you don't own but edit it together to be more fitting. Could raise the film to an 8/10.

#141: The Elephant Man
The only David Lynch movie on the list, even Mulholland Drive just barely misses the cut. The Elephant Man is one part Oscar bait biopic exposing x about humanity, one part Oscar bait we used to film in black and white masturbation, one part David Lynch, one part David Lynch. I could stand to see more David Lynch, but I think I can assess the director the same way I can assess Twin Peaks: I love what he represents, I'm not confident in his execution. Don't get me wrong though, this, ostensibly his best film, is very good. And anything Lynchy is worth seeing at least. Very, very fucking strange at times but it stays grounded for the most part.



I've been assigning scores to each movie as I go, just part of checking each movie off the list. I did a little checking, and I've gone down from an average score of 8.5 at the top of the list to an average of 7.5 lately (not really related, but years-wise movie quality peaked in the 70s and first half of the 90s). Not counting films I had already seen, there were 24 movies between L.A. Confidential and Heat, my two most recent 10 ratings, and I'm not like ButteredToast who is shy about that. Likewise, for 9s, there were 26 movies between Scarface and The Seventh Seal. I've pretty consistently been giving movies 7s and 8s, without even many dips below that. I guess this has just started to feel like a bit of a chore. Like, I want nothing more than to see another awesome 10 movie, but then I look ahead a week and the next movie is Casino, another fucking three hour mob movie. Gag.
 

termi

bike is short for bichael
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does anyone know some good samurai movies I could watch :o
hey, just dropping by to tell you once you have familiarized yourself a bit with Kurosawa's movies, you should check out Harakiri, directed by Kobayashi. It's my favourite samurai movie and has received major acclaim in general. It offers a very interesting take on samurai culture (and perhaps even modern japanese culture) and is, above all, intensely suspenseful and a fantastic watch. You don't wanna miss out on it, believe me.
 
Finally seen all Best Picture nominees for this year, and I have to say that the list is nowhere near as strong as last year's: Last year we had four incredible films (and one masterpiece) in Birdman, Whiplash, The Grand Budapest Hotel and Boyhood, while Selma was very strong. Theory of Everything was a little bit too melodramatic and worthy, American Sniper was just plain horrible, and I haven't seen The Imitation Game, but overall 2014 was very strong.

This year's Best Picture nominees don't consist of any duds, but the competition isn't as strong. If I were to rank them:

8. Bridge of Spies - ★★★
It's a decent movie no doubt, but the film never creates any tension, and is heavily dramatic on a moment that is inherently anti-climatic. The script is the best thing about Bridge of Spies - very witty, and without much bias. The direction is competent but overly cheesy, the look of the film seems quite shiny and fake, and the performances are reasonable. I have no idea why Mark Rylance is receiving so much praise for his performance - I thought he was just fine. It's plot is a little confused at times, and gets occasionally muddled in focus, but its biggest condemnation is that you don't really resonate or care for any of the characters.

7. Room - ★★★
Room really frustrated me. It was incredibly emotional, and very well-acted, but I feel like that none of that emotion was earned. The film is inherently depressing due to the subject matter, but the actual way it conveyed the emotion was awfully insincere - a schlocky, over-sentimental score playing over each emotional beat took me out of the movie. The movie can only evoke genuine sadness during understated moments - 'I love you, Grandma' - but aside from that the film revels in bluntness. The direction is also often very lacking, and can come across as distracting to the story. Tremblay is great, but my God the narration is sickly-sweet. The film also loses a lot of focus in the second and third acts, and I'm not sure I agree with the way the characters react after certain situations occur. Also wasn't as explorative during the second third acts (as in, Tremblay's arc wasn't as developed as I would have liked it to have been.)

6. The Martian - ★★★
I enjoyed the Martian (though, heck, I prefer Ridley's last, Exodus). But why the hell was it nominated for Best Picture? It's a harmless popcorn flick that's great on the feel-good factor, terrible in creating tension. Characters feel exactly what they are - actors in a film. None of them feel like real people, due to a script bloated with quips. It's visually impressive, Damon is charming (Best Actor nomination though? You kidding me?), but I couldn't care less for what goes on in the story. It's pure sci-fi, but only because it's not funny enough to be a comedy and not dramatic enough to be a drama. The fact that this is nominated, and Interstellar wasn't last year, is a travesty.

5. Spotlight - ★★★★
Spotlight doesn't do too much wrong: its script is sharp, the direction is polished and not obtrusive, the performances are understated and its quite powerful at times. Sadly, Spotlight is limited by the story - the events are truly horrifying, but the only way to respect the victims and tell the story in a proper way is also in a way that seems quite distant, confusing, and altogether not as emotive as it has the potential to be. There's very little left to say about Spotlight really - I found it interesting, but wouldn't want to watch it again. If it wins Best Picture, which it will, it will be one of the most forgettable entries in recent memory.

4. The Revenant - ★★★★
The Revenant is one of the most beautiful-looking films I've seen in cinema, but it conveys tension and thrill at the expense of diminishing any other emotion. There's a distinct lack of engrossment with the story, and so despite DiCaprio's sufferings, we don't care for him as a character. Hardy is great, Poulter is even better, DiCaprio is good but not worthy of his imminent Oscar, and Gleeson remains one of the most overrated young actors we have today. But when the film excites, it really excites - the river scene is incredible, the fight between Hardy and DiCaprio tense, and the opening few 20 minutes are marvellous. And despite the film's runtime, it goes by so quickly. If this won Best Picture, I honestly wouldn't be too disappointed - it's a daring epic that needs to be seen in cinema.

3. The Big Short - ★★★★
This is what Wolf of Wall Street should have been - an intensely riveting insight into money and corporate greed, while maintaining the humanity and sorrow of it all instead of reveling in the destruction. Each performance is on point - Bale and Carell in particular - and the film does a good job of explaining the story in an informative and powerful manner. The outrage is illustrated exceptionally well by McKay, and he's very deserving of his director nomination. Yet despite all this, I'd be pretty disappointed if it won Best Picture - it's entertaining, but overall quite safe.

2. Brooklyn - ★★★★★
I was very skeptical watching Brooklyn - I'm not one for slight, hammy romances. Within the first 10 minutes I knew I had gotten it desperately wrong - a smile was sprawled on my face that was maintained for the majority of the film's runtime. The film deals with the theme of immigration in a reverent, understanding manner, but where the film really excels is in the chemistry between Saoirse Ronan and Emory Cohen. Every scene they had together made me giddy, and I found myself unexpectedly welling up with emotion. Brooklyn gets everything right in its emotional beats, and sure, it's saccharine, but it's the best kind - akin to Amelie. Gleeson is gormless and devoid of charm, of course, but I believe that's an intentional choice to highlight Ronan's choice: Ireland, or Cohen? Rather than Gleeson, or Cohen? It's a film that'll be endlessly watchable, and deeply feel-good.

1. Mad Max: Fury Road - ★★★★★
For me, there is only one film this year that I'd truly be happy winning Best Picture - Fury Road is far above its competition. A hallmark in the action genre, there is nothing about Mad Max: Fury Road to complain about. Its action is insane, and insanely good, the choreography out-of-this-world, the world-building exceptional, the production design inventive, the score powerful and denoting grandeur, the cinematography sweeping and beautiful, the editing impeccable, the acting intense, the cinematic value indescribable. I doubt it does, but if this film wins, I'll be jumping out of my seat - like I was doing when watching this film (for both the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th times watching).

My Best Picture list would personally be: Inside Out, Mad Max, The Revenant, Anomalisa, The Hateful Eight, Brooklyn, The Duke of Burgundy, The Big Short, Beasts of No Nation, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl
 

vonFiedler

I Like Chopin
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7. Room - ★★★
Room really frustrated me. It was incredibly emotional, and very well-acted, but I feel like that none of that emotion was earned. The film is inherently depressing due to the subject matter, but the actual way it conveyed the emotion was awfully insincere - a schlocky, over-sentimental score playing over each emotional beat took me out of the movie. The movie can only evoke genuine sadness during understated moments - 'I love you, Grandma' - but aside from that the film revels in bluntness. The direction is also often very lacking, and can come across as distracting to the story. Tremblay is great, but my God the narration is sickly-sweet. The film also loses a lot of focus in the second and third acts, and I'm not sure I agree with the way the characters react after certain situations occur. Also wasn't as explorative during the second third acts (as in, Tremblay's arc wasn't as developed as I would have liked it to have been.)
Oh, this fucking argument. God forbid that a movie's score carries its own weight, we need scores that we never notice until we buy them to brag about what connoisseurs we are. When someone tells me that a scene where a dog dies "wasn't sincerely sad" because the music also swelled they just look like a fucking idiot... of course it's sad, the dog just died. The music is just making it better. One would think that someone who'd nominated Inside Out (rightly so) would get that.

The narration is sickly-sweet? Cause the narrator is a fucking 5 year old! The actor himself literally wasn't told about the darker shit in the film. There's a layer of whimsy over the whole film. Of course it seems insincere, it's genuinely naive. In an interview with the cast, someone was talking about the scene where he's jumping off of chairs with more room, "you see that all the time with children and think nothing of it, but he goes from this cramped space to being able to do this, and you think, that's childhood". I don't know what you could have wanted from his arc that we didn't get. It just seems to have flown right over your head while you were pre-preparing the new york times review column that you aren't actually responsible for.

Your talk of inability to create tension in other gripping movies makes you seem like a rather cold person too. And you never did rebut me over Interstellar vs. The Martian. The Martian, as far as being likeliness goes, is my Oscar pick so far. Interstellar was shit. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.

And I can see why you wouldn't understand this, but those quips? Real people do that. I'm doing it right now. But not only is it not "unrealistic" but the reason this new trend in movies is so popular is actually because tiny bits of levity are like micro-injections of breathing room that help movies, silly action films and smart oscar movies alike, conform to Ray Bradbury's 1st rule of art (which they desperately need to).

But I'll give you that Matt Damon's character doesn't feel like a person. He feels like more than a man. He feels like what humans want to be. He goes beyond the limits of humanity using determination, levity, and most importantly, SCIENCE. The character in Interstellar does so with a magic hole in space that actual scientists previously thought was a space god for no reason. Fucking stupid shit ass stupid fucking movie. I miss Nolan as a good director so much.
 
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My tl;dr thoughts on Room with mild spoilers.
I think I'm going to take Eagle's side on the Room argument, even though I have different reasoning than him. Room did feel contrived, ungenuine, and unrealistic. I tried to appreciate this movie. I tried many times to try to look the other way at some of the events and weird reasoning. But at the end of the day it just turned out to be a just alright film.

This being said, I'm not sure anything but the story is to blame for me not liking the movie. I don't see at all how the score takes you out of this movie. I get how a score can influence a scene in good ways and bad ways, but if that is the sole reason for taking you out of a movie that's silly. The narration also seems to follow the purpose of the movie's goals. This is not supposed to be based on the horrors of the situation but rather a child's perspective of what happened. If anything, they went too far AWAY from the child's point of view and tried to bring the mom in way more than the should have. Which brings me to my next point.

The reason why I thought Room was just alright is because it did not seem to stick to what it was trying to accomplish. For those I found who read the book and watched the movie, the movie lost touch because of its presentation. In the book, the audience is able to experience the story solely through the eyes of the child with the actions of the other adult characters and the new world around him able to be understood through HIS eyes and HIS narration. In the movie though, we're left divorced from the child's mind and are pushed towards the mothers view of things. We try to see the story through HER eyes and HER rationality. How SHE acts. It's because of this that this movie seems off to me. The adult audience is presented the views of the child and the mother, and we cannot connect to the child. We see things from OUR eyes not the child's eyes. The first time the kid sees a dog, it means jack shit (pun) to us because we think "Oh, that's cute. The kid likes the dog." We cannot discover the dog with the child in film because we are ALWAYS going to look at the dog as a dog as soon as we see the dog. In no way can we re-teach ourselves what a dog is to connect to this kid. You can in the book when this thing is being described to us through the kids eyes when we DON'T know it's a dog until we figure it out through clues. But it's really really hard to mimic that with film.

That's why a lot of this movie didn't click to me. It tried telling the story through the kids eyes when there is no way possible for me to see the world through the kids eyes. As such, the audience kind of pushes themselves towards the mother and her understanding... and the mother is just a secondary character and her actions seem weird when we are pushed more and more toward the kid's point of view.

They needed to commit to the child's point of view and leave the moms actions as a mystery. They needed to leave the mom a secondary character and her story removed from the child. The room needed to be overblown at the beginning. Make it seem like it way way bigger than what it was. They tried to do that, but it could have been done more. When the man comes, we as the audience need to be left in the dark as to what the hell is going on and go in the closet with the kid. The mom needs to get more frantic and more broken as the power shuts off and we as the audience don't know why. And then out of nowhere we need her to pull that carpet scene and feel his confusion, and stay with the kid for the rest of the movie. Build the story with the hospital and the grandma and what happens to the mom when they come back from HIS EYES dammit.

Way more time needs to be spent on the kids perspective and the kids eyes and NOT in third person trying to get a big picture. The big picture does not work with the innocence of the movie, you need that refined view from the kid to make a lot of the rapid changes in character more viable. Through the kid, you can see both the strength and happiness of the mom WHILE NOT UNDERSTANDING HER INTERNAL PAIN and have that make sense. It makes sense for her to be protecting her child and putting on an act for him. And then when the real world hits, her snap makes more sense. It does NOT make sense when the audience is shown the big picture. It makes the mom seem like a bratty teen and not a broken victim.

I dunno. I think that's why I couldn't like the movie. I wanted to, it just saw written and directed in a way that did not hold true to the end goal they were trying to get out of it.

The non tl;dr version is that Room was just an average movie but it has nothing to do with what Eagle said.
 

DHR-107

Robot from the Future
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Orange Islands
4. The Revenant - ★★★★
The Revenant is one of the most beautiful-looking films I've seen in cinema, but it conveys tension and thrill at the expense of diminishing any other emotion. There's a distinct lack of engrossment with the story, and so despite DiCaprio's sufferings, we don't care for him as a character. Hardy is great, Poulter is even better, DiCaprio is good but not worthy of his imminent Oscar, and Gleeson remains one of the most overrated young actors we have today. But when the film excites, it really excites - the river scene is incredible, the fight between Hardy and DiCaprio tense, and the opening few 20 minutes are marvellous. And despite the film's runtime, it goes by so quickly. If this won Best Picture, I honestly wouldn't be too disappointed - it's a daring epic that needs to be seen in cinema.
I thought this was one of the most horribly strung out movies I have ever seen. Yes, it was beautiful and incredibly well shot. But my god, there was no tension because we had to wait for 130 million years between each bit of action. I was on the verge of falling asleep because the middle 45 minutes were almost dead weight. Make a 2h30 film but fill it with content like Interstellar. There were several segments that left me entirely confused. What happened with the girl he rescued from the french? Why did they all go after Leo's character and none of them seemed to care about the girl who had just chopped their commanding officers dick off?

I will agree however that Poulter stood out immensely for me. Played it perfectly. But it's a shame that the lull in the middle of the film never really crescendo'd to anything. I'd probably only give it a 5 or 6 to be honest... Looks great, but it lacks in a lot of places. I'll be sad if Leo got an Oscar for that performance, when he has had other, better roles.
 

vonFiedler

I Like Chopin
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Skipped Casino cause I watched both of these with friends and Casino was too long for the nights in question.

#144: Warrior
This came highly recommended by all of my friends, so I was looking forward to it. Unfortunately, it did very little for me. The first half was a drama with only a thin veneer of being a sports movie. And by drama I mean every character is an asshole all the time, sometimes for good reasons, often not so much. Starring Tom "I play cartoon characters" Hardy. When the fighting gets into full-swing it's definitely a better movie, but at the same time the set-up is more ridiculous than anything in Rocky 3-5. Would never fucking happen. And the movie in no way was able to convince me of the final outcome. I get that the underdog winning in the end is pretty normal, but the final fight is a literal shit lord vs. one of the most mary-sue characters I've seen in movies in a long while. It'd be like Krillin beating One-Punch Man. The total lack of resolution didn't do the movie any favors either.

#156: Fargo
Ya this one was pretty good, you betcha. Way more vulgar and violent than I had expected it to be. And yet at the same time, just as innocent and wholesome as I expected it to be. It's really astounding that even in the 90s someone was able to make a convincing movie about how the humble, kinda average joe will triumph over greedy criminals, especially when the people who did so would later make No Country For Old Men. It handles portraying idealism in a fucked up world very well, and I think would be a good early movie for my kids to see someday.
 

RODAN

Banned deucer.
honestly, it was just like a bunch of great parts that came together to be disappointing. it wasn't very funny, it wasn't very charming (outside of a couple scenes) and it wasn't very well written. like it just was muddled and confusing IMO. Also it was just like, passively bad instead of actively bad. Like it doesnt do anything egregious but its just sooo mediocre and bland and boring. despite having a lot of great parts to it on paper.
 
Has anyone seen "Macbeth" (2015)? How was it? Macbeth is tied as my favorite of Shakespeare's tragedies and I'm patiently waiting for this particular rendition's release on Blu-Ray (it wasn't shown anywhere near me)... I'm not fond of modern portrayals of Shakespeare's works by any means, so that's another reason I'm looking forward to it.

edit: Thanks to the wonders of the internet, I managed to see it tonight. I thought it was very well done, a proper sort of film adaptation. Genuinely enjoyed the visual aspects of the movie, and the performances were wonderful. I'm no film critic, but I'd say it was a great film.
 
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vonFiedler

I Like Chopin
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First, two good superhero movies that still didn't make me a fan of their mc.

#42: Deadpool
Obv a lot of people really liked this movie and won't shut up about it. That's fine. It was a really good movie. It was funny from start to finish and I don't think I've ever been in a theater where an audience laughed so much. The action was certainly decent as well. Stylistically it works. In regard to substance, it's as generic as Green Lantern before it. The plot is dull. The villains are lame. The X-Men are underutilized. The love interest is a good character but mysteriously lacking in her superpowers and in need of rescue. A sophomoric shuffling of the sequence of events on screen does not stop this from being a bland origin story. Deathstroke for life.

#147: V for Vendetta
I skipped this movie when it first came to theaters. This was just after the bad Matrix sequels, and I hadn't heard great things about it in theaters. But if you've been reading the thread, you may know that the Wachowskis are my favorite directors (sidenote... didn't direct this film? Well, the director is a long-time patsy of theirs, so I'm not sure if this is meaningful at all), so how did that happen? Speed Racer became one of my favorite movies ever, so I decided to give V a chance. But I did so at a party where I wasn't paying much attention. It's astonishing how many plot details I got wrong as a result.

It's certainly a good, well-told story. I guess my biggest complaint is with V. Seemed like a very disingenuous, power fantasy character. Actually too theatrical, and with abilities that made no sense. I plan to read the comic because I hear that isn't an issue in it. My thing is, why is this movie on the IMDB list? Why not better Wachowski movies like Speed Racer and Cloud Atlas? Why not the better Alan Moore adaptation, Watchmen? V also pales in comparison to the books it draws so heavily from, specifically 1984 and Count of Monte Cristo. I'm guessing it's just the internet obsession with the persona. There's probably a lot of internet dipshits who get the wrong sort of fantasy out of this movie.

#141: Casino
The last mob movie on the list for me, and thank god. Well, I don't know if Casino was better than The Godfather or Goodfellas, but I liked it just a bit more. All of the tropes are the same, but have slight variations to them, and the main character is interesting enough. Joe Pesci can't narrate for shit though.

#146: The Wolf of Wall Street
Holy fuck, this movie was entertaining as shit and I do not understand it at all. It's a three-hour Scorcese film, nominated for a bunch of Oscars, about the stock market... why does it play out like any National Lampoons or American Pie movie? And why does that work? It's the most outrageously debaucherous thing I've ever seen and has performances that make Nicolas Cage seem restrained. What was the point? Was it a farce? A condemnation of the stock market and fraud? What kind of tone is this movie trying to sell? It's so wonderful and confusing at the same time.

#148: Judgement at Nuremburg
Can we cool it with the three hour movies already? Okay, this black and white film was pretty good. It's a historical piece about how much blame was to be shared with allowing the nazis to come to and exercise power. It's held up for three hours by the Oscar winning-performance of the actor playing the German defense attorney, and by the sheer breadth of topics it examines on both sides of the arguments presented. It's lightly undercut by a bit of red-scare running through it, which is probably historical enough, but in 1961 is treated with a sort of hindsight finality that looks silly now.
 
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So yeah Zulawski died today and I am really fucking sad about that.
Go watch Possession pls
 
I thought this was one of the most horribly strung out movies I have ever seen. Yes, it was beautiful and incredibly well shot. But my god, there was no tension because we had to wait for 130 million years between each bit of action. I was on the verge of falling asleep because the middle 45 minutes were almost dead weight. Make a 2h30 film but fill it with content like Interstellar. There were several segments that left me entirely confused. What happened with the girl he rescued from the french? Why did they all go after Leo's character and none of them seemed to care about the girl who had just chopped their commanding officers dick off?

I will agree however that Poulter stood out immensely for me. Played it perfectly. But it's a shame that the lull in the middle of the film never really crescendo'd to anything. I'd probably only give it a 5 or 6 to be honest... Looks great, but it lacks in a lot of places. I'll be sad if Leo got an Oscar for that performance, when he has had other, better roles.
Gotta disagree w/ you - the film was tremendously tense, the river scene and end fight exemplifying that. A few parts of the film could have been cut out, sure - I didn't care for the dream sequences - but the film is all about the journey and so the 'dead weight' is needed to convey the relentless suffering and torment that DiCaprio's character goes through. I thought it was made clear that the girl he rescued from the French was picked up by the natives, leading to them not killing DiCaprio at the end as a way of thanking him. Second part is a really small nitpick - I could be making cases like that for every film. True, it's disappointing that Leo has his Best Actor win all but locked down, but the competition this year is really weak - every nominated male performance has been quite average (though I haven't seen Trumbo or The Danish Girl). Perhaps Fassbender is more deserving, but even then...

Oh, this fucking argument. God forbid that a movie's score carries its own weight, we need scores that we never notice until we buy them to brag about what connoisseurs we are. When someone tells me that a scene where a dog dies "wasn't sincerely sad" because the music also swelled they just look like a fucking idiot... of course it's sad, the dog just died. The music is just making it better. One would think that someone who'd nominated Inside Out (rightly so) would get that.
I didn't say that the score made the film insincere, just that it's a contributing factor in the overall fakeness of the film's emotional core. But I hate pandering to audiences via treating them like children - the overuse of a generically sad theme blatantly tells the audience how they should feel, rather than letting them work it out for themselves. Good films are able to create sadness not due to their score, but alongside their score. That's what Room fails to do - the concept is inherently upsetting but isn't really capitalised on by its director (Buttered Toast explains this in a more eloquent way than I could write) - something that Inside Out achieves. Of course, a score isn't even needed to convey sadness - Patricia Arquette's monologue in Boyhood was the most heartbreaking scene of 2014 imo.

The narration is sickly-sweet? Cause the narrator is a fucking 5 year old! The actor himself literally wasn't told about the darker shit in the film. There's a layer of whimsy over the whole film. Of course it seems insincere, it's genuinely naive. In an interview with the cast, someone was talking about the scene where he's jumping off of chairs with more room, "you see that all the time with children and think nothing of it, but he goes from this cramped space to being able to do this, and you think, that's childhood". I don't know what you could have wanted from his arc that we didn't get. It just seems to have flown right over your head while you were pre-preparing the new york times review column that you aren't actually responsible for.
You know those ads or radio ads where an adult puts on a kids voice and pretends to be one, or a kid reads from a script written by an adult? That's what the narration felt like - that's what I mean by insincere. Read Buttered Toast's post which explains how underdeveloped Tremblay's 'arc' is also.

Your talk of inability to create tension in other gripping movies makes you seem like a rather cold person too. And you never did rebut me over Interstellar vs. The Martian. The Martian, as far as being likeliness goes, is my Oscar pick so far. Interstellar was shit. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.

And I can see why you wouldn't understand this, but those quips? Real people do that. I'm doing it right now. But not only is it not "unrealistic" but the reason this new trend in movies is so popular is actually because tiny bits of levity are like micro-injections of breathing room that help movies, silly action films and smart oscar movies alike, conform to Ray Bradbury's 1st rule of art (which they desperately need to).

But I'll give you that Matt Damon's character doesn't feel like a person. He feels like more than a man. He feels like what humans want to be. He goes beyond the limits of humanity using determination, levity, and most importantly, SCIENCE. The character in Interstellar does so with a magic hole in space that actual scientists previously thought was a space god for no reason. Fucking stupid shit ass stupid fucking movie. I miss Nolan as a good director so much.
Dude, I thought there were a bunch of tense films in 2015 - Sicario, The Revenant, Hateful Eight, Beasts of No Nation, Whiplash, Crimson Peak, Lost River, Foxcatcher, Chappie, The Lobster, Partisan, Wild Tales, etc - just because it doesn't line up with what you view as tense doesn't mean that I'm a cold person.

The Martian is a severely average film. It's told in a very procedural, standard fashion, where plot points are met one by one in an almost mechanical way. The film flipflops between cheesiness and realism to the point where it only comes across as confused. The hollywoody quips undercut any potential the film has to go more than skin-deep into the struggles of being stranded on Mars - surely the emotion can be more intense, akin to Tom Hanks' end scene in Captain Phillips? In a way, the film should have afforded more time to Damon back on Earth - which, by the way, is another reason as to the lack of tension as you know he's going to survive - as I feel that would be more interesting than what we were given. Real people quip, sure, but not as excessively as what was on screen. After a rewatch though, I realise that it's only Damon's crew, Damon himself and Donald Glover that are culpable of this.

And why do you hate Interstellar so much?? It has one thing that The Martian sorely lacks - ambition. While The Martian is intent on keeping safe and by the books in order to appeal to the masses, and, in turn, rack up the Oscar nominations (Damon for Best Actor? Ridiculous), Interstellar is a brave and unique exploration into space and wild concepts of planets and fourth dimensions. Was there any scene in The Martian that overwhelmed you as much as the warphole scene? Gripped you as much as the 'Mountains' scene? Impacted you as much as the intensely emotional video scene? Interstellar is a flawed masterpiece, but hey, at least it tries to do something different. The Martian is entertaining, but wholly by the books, and heck, I enjoyed Exodus more.

Okay onto films I've watched since last update:

The Revenant - ★★★★
Synecdoche, New York - ★★★★★ (REWATCH, STILL MY FAVE FILM OF ALL TIME)
A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence ★★★★ (REWATCH)
Room - ★★★
London Road - ★★★★ (REWATCH)
Anomalisa - ★★★★★
Spotlight - ★★★★
Brooklyn - ★★★★★
Hot Fuzz - ★★★★ (REWATCH)
Sicario - ★★★
Mad Max: Fury Road - ★★★★★ (REWATCH x7)
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer - ★★★
The Prestige - ★★★★★ (REWATCH, STILL MY 2nd FAVE OF ALL TIME)
3 Idiots - ★★★★★ (REWATCH)
Zoolander - ★★★★ (REWATCH)
Deadpool - ★★★★
The Martian - ★★★ (REWATCH)
Zoolander 2 - ★★★★
Crimson Peak - ★★★★ (REWATCH)
Melancholia -
 

vonFiedler

I Like Chopin
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I didn't say that the score made the film insincere, just that it's a contributing factor in the overall fakeness of the film's emotional core. But I hate pandering to audiences via treating them like children - the overuse of a generically sad theme blatantly tells the audience how they should feel, rather than letting them work it out for themselves. Good films are able to create sadness not due to their score, but alongside their score.
In red is what you said. In blue is the same thing, but said in a pretentious way. The paragraph you quoted was all about how fucking stupid this whole paragraph as an argument is, and since you are essentially repeating yourself, there is nothing more to say. The melodrama argument is a shite argument by people who don't know shit about music parroting what other shite critics have said. I disagree fundamentally, and never want my movies to be like the ones you want to watch.

That's what Room fails to do - the concept is inherently upsetting but isn't really capitalised on by its director (Buttered Toast explains this in a more eloquent way than I could write)
I'm going to call you on your general reading comprehension here. Because BT's entire argument was that the movie was too upsetting because it didn't follow the book enough, and because apparently you hate movies that follow books so I don't know how that wasn't a red flag. Which leads me to

You know those ads or radio ads where an adult puts on a kids voice and pretends to be one, or a kid reads from a script written by an adult? That's what the narration felt like - that's what I mean by insincere.
I disagree so much that, like many others, I'd have given Tremblay the main actor oscar if possible. As is he's probably getting the secondary anyway.

Dude, I thought there were a bunch of tense films in 2015 - Sicario, The Revenant, Hateful Eight, Beasts of No Nation, Whiplash, Crimson Peak, Lost River, Foxcatcher, Chappie, The Lobster, Partisan, Wild Tales, etc - just because it doesn't line up with what you view as tense doesn't mean that I'm a cold person.
That was a more general observation than something limited to one movie. But hey, Chappie is exactly the kind of wonderful movie I'd expect you to hate, so that's something.

And why do you hate Interstellar so much?? It has one thing that The Martian sorely lacks - ambition. While The Martian is intent on keeping safe and by the books in order to appeal to the masses, and, in turn, rack up the Oscar nominations (Damon for Best Actor? Ridiculous), Interstellar is a brave and unique exploration into space and wild concepts of planets and fourth dimensions. Was there any scene in The Martian that overwhelmed you as much as the warphole scene? Gripped you as much as the 'Mountains' scene? Impacted you as much as the intensely emotional video scene? Interstellar is a flawed masterpiece, but hey, at least it tries to do something different. The Martian is entertaining, but wholly by the books, and heck, I enjoyed Exodus more.
Stop repeating yourself. We've argued about these two movies three times now and you don't address what I say at all, so why put anything in the form of a question? Why did you even bother to reply?

The Martian was safe because it followed a book closely? Should it not have? It was a major motion picture, how many people do you think saw it who read the book? I hadn't. I don't give a shit about the book. So that argument's fucked. The Martian is one of the first space movies that instills a confidence in space exploration, science, and the power of man in general, as opposed to the general fear-mongering we usually see. That would easily make its message the most ambitious and important of the year, had The Big Short not come out (and The Martian is the better movie overall).

Interstellar wanted to be about the power of man... but it's filled with voodoo nonsense (I won't repeat myself, read the post you quoted) because Nolan has steadily gone from being a very smart above-your-head director into one that dumb things down for the lowest common-denominator. Nolan prints money. He's not brave, he doesn't have to be. I don't pull the fanboy card often, but I don't know how else someone could fail to see something so obvious AND highly rate his two recent shitfests.

The warphole scene did not overwhelm me.
The mountains scene? Was that the WHOM WHOM WHOM WHOM I'm Hans Zimmer and people pay me to bang a hammer against a wall and call it music scene?
Which video scene? I don't even remember this powerful amazing scene. I have a vague guess, but maybe you should remind me?
I liked it when Matt Damon was trapped on a planet that he had no hope of getting off of. No, wait, I'm still thinking of The Martian.


And I'm glad you liked Exodus, cause you're gonna love Gods of Egypt.
 
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TheValkyries

proudly reppin' 2 superbowl wins since DEFLATEGATE
New Rule: No conversations about tension that are simply value judgments. If you want to talk about a lack of tension figure out where it lacked, why there was no conflict in that area, or if there was conflict figure out why the conflict was underwhelming AND THEN POST ABOUT THAT. Don't just say "yeah man x scene had no/a lot of tension", yeah where though? How? Show some actual thought out and analyzed dissection for chrissakes instead of surface level platitudes that you could glean from the review from entertainmentdailydeath.com...
 

Stratos

Banned deucer.
I dont want to write my thesis on this but im going to make a couple quick points RE: the martian

To the point that you wish you'd seen more of Watney back on earth: I assume you haven't read the book, then. The book literally ends as soon as he gets back on the Hermes, and though Weir was a creative consultant for the movies so I'm not worried that the stuff with Watney on Earth goes against the book or anything, that wasn't the point. The Martian wasn't the story of Watney dealing with the psychological horrors of isolation; The Martian was a story about human strength and will in the face of massive adversity. It was a very positive book and a very positive movie, and that was an intentional decision because like Von said, it's supposed to paint a confident and brave picture of space exploration.

The Martian is just a near-future version of Apollo 13, honestly: An incredibly scientifically accurate and uplifting tale of resourcefulness and overcoming challenges in space. And I'm ok with that, because I absolutely fucking loved both of them. I've also read both books (Lost Moon—written by Jim Lovell!—for apollo 13 and well, the martian for the martian) and both books are extremely good too, though I'd honestly say if you've watched Apollo 13 you've read Lost Moon, while that's not the case for The Martian (I did read Lost Moon almost a decade ago so maybe i just don't remember it as well).

last comment i guess
The mountains scene? Was that the WHOM WHOM WHOM WHOM I'm Hans Zimmer and people pay me to bang a hammer against a wall and call it music scene?
jesus christ im glad im not the only one. Interstellar had literally the worst soundtrack I've ever heard on a movie and it completely fucking ruined many parts of it for me (not that the movie would have been fantastic otherwise, but it would have been all right). Some parts of the soundtrack seriously just sounded like Hans Zimmer scraping various bits of scrap metal against each other and calling it "dissonance building tension" as opposed to actual, you know, music.
 

vonFiedler

I Like Chopin
is a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnus
jesus christ im glad im not the only one. Interstellar had literally the worst soundtrack I've ever heard on a movie and it completely fucking ruined many parts of it for me (not that the movie would have been fantastic otherwise, but it would have been all right). Some parts of the soundtrack seriously just sounded like Hans Zimmer scraping various bits of scrap metal against each other and calling it "dissonance building tension" as opposed to actual, you know, music.
Do you remember when that one track was comprised mostly of a ticking clock? Because time was of the essence? FUCKING GENIUS /sarcasm
 
In red is what you said. In blue is the same thing, but said in a pretentious way. The paragraph you quoted was all about how fucking stupid this whole paragraph as an argument is, and since you are essentially repeating yourself, there is nothing more to say. The melodrama argument is a shite argument by people who don't know shit about music parroting what other shite critics have said. I disagree fundamentally, and never want my movies to be like the ones you want to watch.
Yeah, this argument isn't going to go anywhere. We clearly disagree on the matter, it's all subjective, let's move on.

I'm going to call you on your general reading comprehension here. Because BT's entire argument was that the movie was too upsetting because it didn't follow the book enough, and because apparently you hate movies that follow books so I don't know how that wasn't a red flag.
Also gonna call you out on your general reading comprehension. I don't think that BT calling the film 'ungenuine' and that 'a lot of this movie didn't click to me' results in a film that's too upsetting. It may contain upsetting themes/themes that are more upsetting than what the book conveys, but that's not what I'm arguing. The themes themselves are inherently upsetting, not the way the film portrays them. Also, don't generalise. I don't automatically hate a movie that follows the book, but I hate the stigma against movies diverting from the book.

I disagree so much that, like many others, I'd have given Tremblay the main actor oscar if possible. As is he's probably getting the secondary anyway.
Again, subjectivity, so not gonna argue. Tremblay's performance was hella good sans narration (which is more a fault of the writer's), but if we're talking about actors who deserve to win Best Actor then I'd go for Abraham Attah in Beasts of No Nation or Antoine Pilon in Mommy (Though I don't know if he's eligible). Also, Tremblay can't get Supporting Actor, he's not nominated - would've liked him ahead of Rylance tho.

The Martian was safe because it followed a book closely? Should it not have? It was a major motion picture, how many people do you think saw it who read the book? I hadn't. I don't give a shit about the book. So that argument's fucked. The Martian is one of the first space movies that instills a confidence in space exploration, science, and the power of man in general, as opposed to the general fear-mongering we usually see. That would easily make its message the most ambitious and important of the year, had The Big Short not come out (and The Martian is the better movie overall).
I don't mind if a film follows the book closely, but by doing that it automatically limits itself in what the film can accomplish. I'm sure the book is great, but as a film it's formulaic and standard - a perfectly acceptable, enjoyable film (I gave it 3 stars) but not a film that excels in any department. Why are you praising The Martian for instilling 'a confidence in space exploration, science, and the power of man in general' while simultaneously bashing Interstellar? It achieves the same effects - heck, the reason as to why they all survive is revealed as being mankind. If that doesn't instill a confidence in the power of man in general, then I don't know what does. Sure, The Martian achieves all that, but I'd argue against (this is subjective, of course) The Martian being heralded as ambitious as a result of that. When I talk of ambition, I talk of scope, of grand themes (In Interstellar's case, love, time, mankind), and The Martian's grand themes (mankind, hope) aren't fully realised due to a lethargic way of telling the story. Also, you argue that there's no fear-mongering occuring in the film, but the fact that Damon finds himself in the position he does is a huge example of the trepidations of space exploration - not that the film is hindered by it, just that your point is a little wonky. And in terms of the most important movie message of the year, it's ridiculous that you think The Martian's is one of them. Look towards Inside Out its message that to overcome depression you need sadness, you need to accept your current state. Look towards Tomorrowland (yes I am aware that this film is almost universally loathed) and its message to break away from constant pessimism and create a world worth living for. The Martian's message of looking toward space exploration is not nearly as powerful or important, and its message of man being able to survive in the face of adversity is hardly new for movies this year (The Revenant) or space movies in general (Gravity).

Interstellar wanted to be about the power of man... but it's filled with voodoo nonsense (I won't repeat myself, read the post you quoted) because Nolan has steadily gone from being a very smart above-your-head director into one that dumb things down for the lowest common-denominator. Nolan prints money. He's not brave, he doesn't have to be. I don't pull the fanboy card often, but I don't know how else someone could fail to see something so obvious AND highly rate his two recent shitfests.
Ok so I read your post that hates on Interstellar's 'voodoo nonsense' and

'The character in Interstellar does so with a magic hole in space that actual scientists previously thought was a space god for no reason.'

it's kinda hilarious how unjustified your response is. Scientists didn't think it was a space god, but rather a separate entity or life form evolved way beyond humans - which is reasonable as there could be very little else to create this wormhole. Then its shown that its an evolved form of humans that created this wormhole to save themselves. It's a paradox, but a plausible one and the film shouldn't be condemned for being unrealistic for that. I'm supposing you hated the final act of Interstellar and the black hole shizz? A select minority hate it too, and I don't see why: we have very little idea as to what could occur in a black hole, and so there's freedom for creativity - and what we got in Interstellar was such a grand plot point and intensely unique (Thank God I got to see that in the cinema rather than something more tepid or lacking in imagination) that made for a richly rewarding cinematic experience. What would you have rather happened? Because it sounds to me like you'd rather have a more by-the-books, film limited by strict laws (rather than using the idea that not all of science is known, and so giving license to the wild ingenuities of Interstellar). Which is exactly what you got in The Martian, so hey, you got what you wanted.

Which video scene? I don't even remember this powerful amazing scene. I have a vague guess, but maybe you should remind me?
The scene as soon as McConaughey and Hathaway arrive on ship after the water planet, and sit down to view video messages from their children (or in Hathaway's case, father). The shock of the reveal that they've been on the planet for years, and watching McConaughey's son slowly begin to resent him message after message was intensely heartbreaking.

And I'm glad you liked Exodus, cause you're gonna love Gods of Egypt.
Sick banter m8

Also,

Stratos said:
jesus christ im glad im not the only one. Interstellar had literally the worst soundtrack I've ever heard on a movie and it completely fucking ruined many parts of it for me (not that the movie would have been fantastic otherwise, but it would have been all right). Some parts of the soundtrack seriously just sounded like Hans Zimmer scraping various bits of scrap metal against each other and calling it "dissonance building tension" as opposed to actual, you know, music.
Are we seriously bashing Interstellar's Oscar-nominated, Golden Globes-nominated, BAFTA-nominated score here? Interstellar's score was fuckin terrific - orchestral, somehow denoting the same elements of grandeur and epicosity as the film, and incredibly unique. The score is instantly recognisable and iconic in that regard - I know that there's a lot of hate against Zimmer now because seemingly it's now 'cool' to hate him due to his popularity, but he's a master at creating iconic scores. Just look at Pirates of the Caribbean, Sherlock Holmes, Inception, Dark Knight. They're beloved, and for good reason - without them, the films wouldn't have the same atmosphere/tone, and would be directly hindered. I'd rather have Interstellar's score than generic Marvel score #472 or The Martian's score - did it have a score? I can't remember. It's really forgettable.
 
Just watched the Revenant. It is pretty good and Leonardo DiCaprio is good as the lead role with his facial expressions. There isn't much dialogue and the story itself isn't actually that good. There are some really wonderful shots of the woods and snowy mountains. They just didn't set up everything that well in the start. There is a lot of ogre and blood in the film, I had to look away for those parts!
 

vonFiedler

I Like Chopin
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Why are you praising The Martian for instilling 'a confidence in space exploration, science, and the power of man in general' while simultaneously bashing Interstellar?
Because it's bad at it.

Ok so I read your post that hates on Interstellar's 'voodoo nonsense' and

'The character in Interstellar does so with a magic hole in space that actual scientists previously thought was a space god for no reason.'

it's kinda hilarious how unjustified your response is. Scientists didn't think it was a space god, but rather a separate entity or life form evolved way beyond humans - which is reasonable as there could be very little else to create this wormhole.
For no reason. Why does a wormhole require a creator? Isn't that the exact same argument that us religious folk make about everything else? They don't understand it, so they think it's created. Which would be FINE, if it weren't a movie about humanism. It's a humanistic movie utterly failing to live up to the core beliefs of the concept.

What would you have rather happened? Because it sounds to me like you'd rather have a more by-the-books, film limited by strict laws (rather than using the idea that not all of science is known, and so giving license to the wild ingenuities of Interstellar). Which is exactly what you got in The Martian, so hey, you got what you wanted.
YES. I want my movie about how awesome science is to SHOW how awesome SCIENCE is. Not make shit up wholesale. Interstellar is a fantasy movie masquerading as a logical movie. It's stupid drivel. The Prestige and Inception were fantasy movies too, but they grounded in lies and bullshit, so it was great when they were a bunch of bullshit. That's the kind of movie Nolan always excelled at, and he's biting off way more than he can chew by making a movie like Interstellar WHILE ALSO dumbing down his films in order to make the maximum amount of money. When he goes back to making movies like Memento, and alienates a portion of his audience, well, then we can maybe put bravery on the table, but I'd still argue someone as powerful and with (clearly) as dogmatic fans as he has that it wouldn't require bravery to do so.

Are we seriously bashing Interstellar's Oscar-nominated, Golden Globes-nominated, BAFTA-nominated score here? Interstellar's score was fuckin terrific - orchestral, somehow denoting the same elements of grandeur and epicosity as the film, and incredibly unique. The score is instantly recognisable and iconic in that regard - I know that there's a lot of hate against Zimmer now because seemingly it's now 'cool' to hate him due to his popularity,
Is it popular? Is it really? Thank fucking god. Best news I've heard all day.

I've always hated Hans Zimmer. The only reason he gets nominated is because the western movie and video game industries are oversaturated with his iconic sound anyway, and yes it is iconic, it's just not good... chucka chucka chucka chucka chucka chucka chucka WHOM WHOM WHOM WHOM WHOM WHOM WHOM... there, I've saved everyone the need to listen to half of the AAA video game title themes this year.

Pirates is generic shanty music that any high schooler could make.
Inception was someone else's better music slowed down... clever, but it would have been better if he could create a somewhat original score of his own to do that with
Dark Knight popularized the chucka chucka WHOM WHOM, so fuck it right up its dark hole
I don't remember Sherlock Holmes score at all, but I can guess how it goes... and then youtube it... oh, yep, he added some plucka plucka to his chucka chucka, REALLY going outside his boundaries

The Martian's score - did it have a score? I can't remember. It's really forgettable.
Which is surprising, given that it was done by Hans Zimmer's award winning student Harry Gregson-Williams. And also somewhat better and more accomplished, though hardly perfect. At least The Martian had this retro adventure 4X game soundtrack, which might not be exactly appropriate but it was still really cool. But I'm guessing non-diagetic music isn't something you're exactly passionate about, given that all you can do is name the most well known composers, dryly list their awards, and describe music only in ludicrously vague terms like "epicosity", seriously, what the fuck kind of word is that?

I realize I'm being mean and I'm sorry, but I actually AM passionate about non-diagetic music, and I am going to shoot down factory-produced opinions about it when I need to.
 

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