The All-Things Cinema thread

[Bartimaeus]

6 minutes ago, majestic said:

Looks like I lied with my assessment there. I have seen WALL-E too. It was fine. 

For whatever reason, I felt more emotional connection to those two stupid robots than all of the rest of Pixar's characters combined, I think. Don't ask me, it's overwhelmingly the reason the film works for me where so many don't.

Anyways, it's thanks to Frozen that I started getting more interested in animation again, which eventually lead to me trying out a few Cartoon Network shows like Gravity Falls (STINKS), Adventure Time (SORT OF STINKS BUT HAS SOME GOOD PARTS), and Steven Universe (DOESN'T STINK OUTSIDE OF A RELATIVELY SMALL PERCENTAGE OF EPISODES), which then eventually lead to me checking out various other animated movies and shows, which eventually lead to me incidentally coming across that one Nausicaa poster that inspired me to me actually give it and the other Ghibli movies a chance, which eventually lead to me trying out more random stuff like Perfect Blue and Sailor Moon, which finally leads us to having resurrected the anime thread and where we are today. All's well that ends well, aye?

Edited October 15, 2021 by Bartimaeus

[Guest]

10 minutes ago, Amentep said:

I liked the first Toy Story, disliked the second, loved The Incredibles, liked A Bug's Life and Ratatouille, thought Monsters, Inc, Cars and Finding Nemo was okay, outright hated WALL-E and UP, after which they stopped being must see films for me.

6 minutes ago, Amentep said:

Brave didn't have a sequel; I guess Joy (in Inside Out) and Dory (in Finding Dory) were their next Female main leads.

I think the first TS, as a film, was good, but was catapulted to great status by novelty and remains there due to nostalgia. The 2nd one was better. The 3rd was a questionable decision by the studio. The 4th was a sign that Pixar of old is probably gone forever.

Pete Docter is a 50/50 director (Monster's Inc and Inside Out were great. I didn't like Up or Soul)

Brad Bird is a golden child who cannot make a bad animated film (Incredibles 1 & 2, Ratatouille...and Iron Giant even though that's not Pixar)

Andrew Stanton (Bug's Life, Finding Nemo, Wall E) would also have a pretty impressive record in my book if he had stuck to animation and hadn't made Finding Dory.

I appreciate that the studio makes an effort to foster new directors. Sometimes it works (Coco, Brave) and sometimes it doesn't (Luca, Cars 2 & 3)

[majestic]

18 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

For whatever reason, I felt more emotional connection to those two stupid robots than all of the rest of Pixar's characters combined, I think. Don't ask me, it's overwhelmingly the reason the film works for me where so many don't.

Anyways, it's thanks to Frozen that I started getting more interested in animation again, which eventually lead to me trying out a few Cartoon Network shows like Gravity Falls (STINKS), Adventure Time (SORT OF STINKS BUT HAS SOME GOOD PARTS), and Steven Universe (DOESN'T STINK OUTSIDE OF A RELATIVELY SMALL PERCENTAGE OF EPISODES), which then eventually lead to me checking out various other animated movies and shows, which eventually lead to me incidentally coming across that one Nausicaa poster that inspired me to me actually give it and the other Ghibli movies a chance, which eventually lead to me trying out more random stuff like Perfect Blue and Sailor Moon, which finally leads us to having resurrected the anime thread and where we are today. All's well that ends well, aye?

Everything that ends with Sailor Moon and Steven Universe is well indeed, even if you happen across a Rebuild or two on the road. Or a Madoka in your case.

edit: Or Cardcaptor Sakura. Heh.

Edited October 15, 2021 by majestic

[Bartimaeus]

Speaking of Toy Story 4, I actually watched it recently, and here's a more differenter opinion: I think Toy Story 4 is my favorite of the Toy Story series, even though it has some serious problems that bring it down so completely unnecessarily (like the entire plot revolving around the literal, LITERAL trash that is Forky...or Buzz Lightyear being a completely useless and utterly flanderized moron the entire movie when it seems like they should've just found a way to remove him entirely). There's some quite stupid stuff in that movie...but I fell in love with the villain instantly, I didn't mind where they took Bo Peep's character, I even liked her little toy friend, and I identified more with the themes in it more than in any of the others. I do recognize, however, that it is probably the worst quality out of all of them in terms of consistency and storytelling, but now that I've confessed this sin, I can...uh, live peacefully, I guess.

Edited October 15, 2021 by Bartimaeus

[Zoraptor]

The Black Hole was the first movie I can actually remember watching (on a flight from New Zealand to the UK, I must have been 5 or something and from what I remembered it was not really aimed at 5 year olds and seemed an odd pick for an in flight movie given they were shown on the old central projectors). I had no idea what it was called up until a few years ago though.

No top ten from me, as I hate making movie top tens. Games, sure, why not. TV shows, yeah, ok. Movies... do I pick the ones that are technically best, that I liked the most or which were most memorable? Maybe the ones I'd take with me to watch if marooned for a year? Whatever I do and whichever order I pick I'm instantly unhappy with it for some reason.

 

[Sarex]

@Keyrock @KP the meanie zucchini @Amentep If you are really interested, it's

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Queen of the Damned

 

 

[LadyCrimson]

I used to have favorite movies/TV shows. I suppose on some level I still might, but I don't really think of it that way anymore. I mean I do still have favorite or disliked genres overall but ... there is just "I was entertained and left it on" or "I was not entertained and turned it off" or "I loved that movie when I saw it 10+ years ago."

Some movies get relegated to "classic" status in that I think everyone should try to watch it/them at least once - original 12 Angry Men would be one of those, for example, or for genre specific ones, like Alien/Aliens for sci-fi/horror folks.

--Alternatively, there is also the category of "the lead (or supporting) male lead character was really handsome/beautiful and this old fart could stare at their face all day like an art painting."

...I guess I watch films/tv these days more with my visual-triggered emotions than with my brain, if that makes sense.

[Amentep]

24 minutes ago, Sarex said:

@Keyrock @KP the meanie zucchini @Amentep If you are really interested, it's

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Queen of the Damned

 

 

 

I seem to recall it had a good visual look and a strong cast (Stuart Townsend, Lena Olin, Bruce Spence, Aaliyah, Vincent Perez, Claudia Black, Paul McGann). Haven't seen it since it was in theaters, so my memory is a bit vague now.

22 minutes ago, LadyCrimson said:

--Alternatively, there is also the category of "the lead (or supporting) male lead character was really handsome/beautiful and this old fart could stare at their face all day like an art painting."

I think we've all probably watched films because something about one of the lead catches our attention.

[Gromnir]

7 hours ago, Amentep said:

I like some Pixar, but a number of their films seem just to be maudlin.

am s'posing am wondering where to draw the line on identifying the mawkish fare, particular when animated. films such as iron giant and grave of the fireflies has already been mentioned and is more than a little justification for declaring 'em maudlin. two o' our favorite animated movies both came out in 2012: paranorman and frankenweenie. were those films indulging in excessive sentimentality? arguably, but we liked 'em even so. even steinbeck got into the act with the red pony. not movie per se but a great american author when creating children's fare had a goal o' reducing his pint-sized audience to tears, which isn't that hard btw. kinda makes you wonder wtf is wrong with these people. if is animated and/or made for a younger audience and not meant sole for laughs, then there is a better than fair chance the dolphin, deer, robot, racoon, dog, best friend, imaginary friend, etc. is gonna die.

arguable the greatest animated movie o' all time, albeit not in the way most reflect on the term, king kong (1933) were maudlin, which is why when dino de laurentiis (sp?) remade in 76, he observed in a pre-release interview that, "no one cries when jaws die, but when the monkey die, people gonna cry." (am apologizing if we didn't get the quote exact correct, but we didn't bother to check.) red-blooded american men can't cry when watching romantic movies, but is ok with kong, brian's song, and a small list o' similar maudlin fare. 

am not disagreeing with your point 'bout pixar movies btw, but am reflecting a bit and concluding that if the flick is indulging tear-jerker sentimentality and we like, then is good, but if we do not like so much, then is maudlin. 

as an aside, we mentioned some time past how the thirteenth warrior is a locked-in addition to our guilty pleasures list. am not gonna try and convince anybody 13th warrior is fantastic cinema, and liberties were taken in the adaptation, but we watch every year or so and never regret doing so. is still our favorite "beowulf" inspired movie, which is admitted not setting high the bar.

HA! Good Fun!

 

 

[Sarex]

1 hour ago, Amentep said:

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I seem to recall it had a good visual look and a strong cast (Stuart Townsend, Lena Olin, Bruce Spence, Aaliyah, Vincent Perez, Claudia Black, Paul McGann). Haven't seen it since it was in theaters, so my memory is a bit vague now.

The music was awesome too. I watched it a ton when I was younger. As I said I'm kind of curious how it would stand up today.

[Pidesco]

Here's my list from 2006:

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Mononoke Hime

Big Sleep

Reservoir Dogs

Blade Runner

Annie Hall

Sunset Boulevard

Dr Strangelove

Young Frankenstein

Psycho

City of God

Porco Rosso

Sen To Chihiro

Casablanca

Adaptation

Being John Malkovich

Three Kings

Citizen Kane

The Great Dictator

The Shop Around the Corner

Airplane

Hot Shots

Godfather

Godfather II

Seven

Fight Club

12 Monkeys

Alien

Elephant Man

Blue Velvet

Taxi Driver

The Man Who Wasn't There

Underground

Ran

Good Night and Good Luck

Ghost World

Solaris

Jackie Brown

On The Waterfront

Adam's Rib

Traffic

Kind Hearts And Coronets

Sleeper

Unforgiven

Memento

Insomnia

Chasing Amy

Maltese Falcon

Cinema Paradiso

[majestic]

Heh, when I think about it, the three animated films on my list could easily be called maudlin as well. Both Violet Evergaden and the Cardcaptor Sakura movies live off of being sentimental, just in very different ways. One is very heartwarming, the other is soul-crushing until the mood is ruined by the happy ending (and technically it retroactively ruins the series, but that's something else entirely...).

 

[Amentep]

I don't mind sad stories, it just feels like that's all Pixar decided to produce after a certain point in time with a couple of exceptions, and that often times they were (IMO) sad (like the opening to UP or the abandonment sequence in Toy Story 2) in ways that didn't serve the story but a desire to empress the emotion on the audience.

As an aside, I liked the 13th Warrior.  I've probably mentioned it before, but I had a weird experience seeing in the the theater (which I didn't recognize until we saw it at home), but the version I saw in the theater wasn't the version on the home version (VHS?).  I would blame myself mixing up the movie and the book, except my brother saw the movie with me and he hadn't read the book (I think maybe he still hasn't).  I'm not sure if the studio tinkered with the film post release or if we saw an accidently released interstitial edit as the movie was rife with reedits and reshoots before it got released (we kind of leaned toward maybe an accidental release of a variant audience test edit of the film as at least one sequence with the Mother of the Wendol including different actors rather than just trimmed scenes).

[Sarex]

9 minutes ago, Amentep said:

I don't mind sad stories, it just feels like that's all Pixar decided to produce after a certain point in time with a couple of exceptions, and that often times they were (IMO) sad (like the opening to UP or the abandonment sequence in Toy Story 2) in ways that didn't serve the story but a desire to empress the emotion on the audience.

As an aside, I liked the 13th Warrior.  I've probably mentioned it before, but I had a weird experience seeing in the the theater (which I didn't recognize until we saw it at home), but the version I saw in the theater wasn't the version on the home version (VHS?).  I would blame myself mixing up the movie and the book, except my brother saw the movie with me and he hadn't read the book (I think maybe he still hasn't).  I'm not sure if the studio tinkered with the film post release or if we saw an accidently released interstitial edit as the movie was rife with reedits and reshoots before it got released (we kind of leaned toward maybe an accidental release of a variant audience test edit of the film as at least one sequence with the Mother of the Wendol including different actors rather than just trimmed scenes).

I liked it too, but I watched it as a kid.

[Sarex]

Thunder Road is something else... a hard watch and heartbreaking.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

14 minutes ago, Sarex said:

Thunder Road is something else... a hard watch and heartbreaking.

But it does have moments that are absolutely hilarious.

[LadyCrimson]

I like tragic movies. Which doesn't mean they have to have a downer ending per se, just that there's a lot of tragedy going on, no matter how it turns out in the end. I just find them cathartic, since I tend to be someone who keeps a lot "in". That said, I don't watch such a lot, because that would be overly depressing.

Pixar - I loved Wall-E's opening but once he goes off planet chasing after Eve it was ... still entertaining, but nothing too special. I would say the same about Up.  That boyscout kid character annoyed me quite often.  It was cute overalland I love Ed Asner, but yeah.

Toy Story - saw that in theaters and yeah, at the time it was wowzer.  After that ... I did see most of the sequels I think, none of which had a lot of impact for me - they were decent time-passers, and then I forget I saw them. I didn't care much for Inside Out, Cars - Incredibles was mild fun, don't care to see the sequel. Basically Pixar is hit or miss - they seem to do well with certain bits and pieces but often the overall film is only "ok" for me, especially after any initial impression may wear off. But early on their animation was a draw.

[Sarex]

4 minutes ago, KP the meanie zucchini said:

But it does have moments that are absolutely hilarious.

It was more awkward for me and hard to watch. I get that some scenes were absurd, but I felt sorry for him and couldn't laugh.

Edited October 15, 2021 by Sarex

[Amentep]

Hmmm, it wasn't until this moment that I realized you're probably talking about the 2018 Jim Cummings THUNDER ROAD and not the 1958 Robert Mitchum THUNDER ROAD... 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

8 minutes ago, Sarex said:

It was more awkward for me and hard to watch. I get that some scenes were absurd, but I felt sorry for him and couldn't laugh.

I can get that, but the parking lot freak out was just too much for me not to laugh at. 

3 minutes ago, Amentep said:

Hmmm, it wasn't until this moment that I realized you're probably talking about the 2018 Jim Cumming's THUNDER ROAD and not the 1958 Robert Mitchum THUNDER ROAD... 

I probably should have put (2018) in there.

[InsaneCommander]

My favorite movies are these, unless I really forgot something:

 

2001: A Space Odyssey

Arrival

Back to the Future

Blade Runner

City of God

Interstellar

Pulp Fiction

Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back

The Lord of the Rings (all three)

The Matrix

The Shawshank Redemption

The Silence of the Lambs

Edited October 15, 2021 by InsaneCommander

[Malcador]

I should take Office Space off mine.  I didn't heed the warnings so it's too depressing now.

[Hurlshort]

20 minutes ago, Malcador said:

I should take Office Space off mine.  I didn't heed the warnings so it's too depressing now.

Sometimes the humor strikes a bit too close to home. Watching AP Bio does that for me.

[LadyCrimson]

^ Shawshank is definitely one of those that I think "everyone" should at least try to watch.  Green Mile too, although maybe very slightly less so than Shawshank.

[Hurlshort]

Shawshank is probably one of the few serious movies I could put on my list.

Thinking of that also made me regret not putting Bull Durham on my list. Bunch of lollygaggers!