Cinema and Movie Thread: I like to remember things my own way.

[Keyrock]

Glass Onion - I'm not sure if I fell asleep or zoned out or what, but there's a significant chunk of the middle of the movie I either didn't see, or don't remember, or something. I didn't care enough to go back and watch the part I missed. I did get a bit of entertainment out of Daniel Craig's hilariously bad southern accent, though.

[bugarup]

Happened upon John Wick 3. They started hiring video game writers for films.

[Gromnir]

aside, and admitted spam material from Gromnir, am thinking children's authors is too often overlooked and more than a few writers o' literature and movie fiction would do well to read more kid fiction. is a whole lotta symbolism in stories such as the phantom tollbooth, the chronicles of prydain, coraline, northern lights (the golden compass) and a swiftly tilting planet, but chances are kids miss the symbolism on a conscious level. the capacity to baffle grad students o' literature doesn't confer a level o' inherent worth on a novel. first goal is to make the audience wanna read and finish the work, yes? such an observation should be axiomatic but is nevertheless overlooked too frequent.  

just one example, but phillip pullman's books is not skimping on symbolism or allegory and is influenced heavily by milton's paradise lost. the character o' lord asriel may paradoxical represent both satan and "son of god" from milton's work. religious themes dominate pullman's novels.  is a helluva a lot more going on in pullman's books than is in the typical dickens novel... which if you paid attention to the first part o' this post is so not a criticism o' dickens. complex ≠ better.  that said, pullman's books is meant to be enjoyed by kids, who is not sophisticated enough to understand all the author craft... or sleight o' hand if you is annoyed by such pretension. pullman simultaneous challenges the PhD folks while telling a story many young audiences embrace. 

HA! Good Fun!

[Bartimaeus]

I wasn't allowed to read The Golden Compass as a small child, as my mom apparently thought/heard it was too anti-Christian. Of all places to draw the line, she chose the weirdest ones. Ten years later, she somehow ended up reading it and told me it was actually really good. Thanks, mom. Well, to be fair, she had pretty much given up the entire idea of organized religion and didn't want much to do with other American Christians by that point, so I guess it's understandable her stance had changed during the same time.

[Gromnir]

18 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

I wasn't allowed to read The Golden Compass as a small child, as my mom apparently thought/heard it was too anti-Christian. Of all places to draw the line, she chose the weirdest ones. 

y'know, am thinking the dark materials books is far more likely to result in a middle school kid asking themselves and their parents tough questions than would be a reading o' atlas shrugged. in that sense, phillip pullman is far more dangerous to Christian dogma than is ayn rand. 'course am not thinking faith has value unless it is resilient in the face o' tough questions, but am also simultaneous not without empathy for the parent afeared for their crumb snatcher's immortal soul and recognizing they just don't have the capacity to answer the questions young bartimaeus is plagued by after reading the subtle knife.

am not making excuses for clergy or parents who instead o' discussing challenging topics with kids decide that ignorance is bliss, but am understanding their not unjustified fears. a child who learns to question fundamental "truths" may very well come to conclusions parents and clergy do not recognize as legitimate or right, and then what does momma bartimaeus do? 

HA! Good Fun!

 

[Bartimaeus]

1 hour ago, Gromnir said:

 

Non-edit: The forums are trying to force me to use AP style quotations by not letting me post unless I convert, but I'm not falling for it - y'all will just have to deal with crappy image posts instead.

[LadyCrimson]

5 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

The forums are trying to force me to use AP style quotations by not letting me post unless I convert, but I'm not falling for it - y'all will just have to deal with crappy image posts instead.

The forum is not letting me post a long "what I watched" either (keeps giving me an error page) and I have no quotes in mine. I can't figure it out.

 

EDIT: for some reason it won't let me bold the movie titles. It would post without using any bold text.
I then tried to edit the posted-post to add the bold afterwards, and it gave me a "you can't edit this anymore/time ran out" error. Weird. Whatever.

Edited January 4, 2023 by LadyCrimson

[LadyCrimson]

---Black Adam - Dwayne still has that mega charisma and screen likability, whether it's scowling brows or mega-watt grin. Every second where his face is the focus of the shot I can't help but smile, and those seconds were the best thing of the movie. Pierce Brosnan did ok in his role but not a lot of screen time, and it felt a bit like he was slummin' a bit. There's not much else to say about the movie. For the first third, beyond a few dialogue lines here and there, I'm not sure it even had a plot. It had some good explosions I guess.

---Glass Onion - stellar overall cast, Craig is great, ok whodunnit, I was expecting it to hit my funny bone a little more. It was ok but my attention wandered a bit.
It should be noted that I'm not typically all that into Agatha Christie or very similar styled mysteries, in print or film. I'm not sure why ... I love the Sherlock short stories but there's something different style wise (re: the mystery/crime solving) even if they share many similarities.

---Knives Out - I knew about it but never got around to watching it, so since we just saw the sequel, we watched this one next. It was a little more amusing/entertaining and imo a better whodunnit than the second one.

---The Last Duel - I was expecting more of a war/battle story, less relationship/s and vengeance drama. I didn't think the choice of splitting the film into three very different chr. perspectives (who's version do you believe?) was the best choice. That said, as more of a drama, I did overall enjoy the film, although I wouldn't have minded a little more from Adam Driver's chr. perspective.

Speaking of Adam Driver, I am very much looking forward to when I can see White Noise (Danny Elfman does the score, too). I don't know if I will like it or not, but I'm looking forward to finding out.

Next on my to watch list: The Banshees of Inisherin. Brendan Gleeson, Colin Farrell, great combo, I'm expecting greatness. Or at least close to it.

[Bartimaeus]

6 minutes ago, LadyCrimson said:

The forum is not letting me post a long "what I watched" either (keeps giving me an error page) and I have no quotes in mine. I can't figure it out.

In my case, I can definitively see that I included a non-AP style quotation, which breaks posts one hundred percent of the time unless it's the very last part of a paragraph. I can't do AP style quotations, I just can't - it was torture back in high school and college, it's torture now, I ain't doing it. It's just a good idea to avoid quotation marks, apostrophes, and parentheses altogether since they seem to be the most inclined to break posts right now. Though apostrophes inside of words should be fine.

Edited January 4, 2023 by Bartimaeus

[LadyCrimson]

6 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

In my case, I can definitively see that I included a non-AP style quotation, which breaks posts one hundred percent of the time unless it's the very last part of a paragraph. I can't do AP style quotations, I just can't - it was torture back in high school and college, it's torture now, I ain't doing it. It's just a good idea to avoid quotation marks, apostrophes, and parentheses altogether since they seem to be the most inclined to break posts right now. Though apostrophes inside of words should be fine.

So I guess the forum is having issues then?  Noted.
For me (and for at least that one post) it was definitely from doing the highlight and press the B button to bold specific words. I did not try manually typing the bb code inside the post instead to see if that circumvented it somehow.

 

Edit: ok, tried to edit this post with quotation marks and got that same you-shall-not-edit message. Got it. Bold, quote marks, etc. Do not use.

Edited January 4, 2023 by LadyCrimson

[Bartimaeus]

2 minutes ago, LadyCrimson said:

So I guess the forum is having issues then?
For me (and for at least that one post) it was definitely from doing the highlight and press the B button to bold specific words. I did not try manually typing the bb code inside the post instead to see if that circumvented it somehow.

Yeah, some people in particular circumstances are really struggling to post at all right now - check out the last few pages of the "forum issues" thread if you're so inclined:

Edited January 4, 2023 by Bartimaeus

[Gromnir]

9 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

 

post

as a matter o' clarification, am thinking it is misleading to describe dark materials as anti-christian though is arguable some justification in such a position. am understanding how young readers might have difficulty making such a subtle distinction between christianity as a personal belief and a fantasy Church which is most assured pastiche o' real world catholicism and christian sects. organized religion, specific organized Christianity, is a clear target o' pullman criticism.

regardless, a fear o' children asking difficult questions is a position we see as untenable, but is admitted a bit arrogant making such judgements w/o having to deal with the real life difficulties o' raising a child.

HA! Good Fun!

[majestic]

This place is turning more and more into work every day. *death stare*

Edit: Hey, there should be more to this post, but I accidentially posted it. So it'll sit there, any edits would take too long.

Edited January 4, 2023 by majestic

[Gfted1]

Switch to a VPN located in the US?

[majestic]

What? No, I really just hit the submit button without typing the post first. For me, the forum is working perfectly fine, outside of the REQUEST BLOCKED issues that creep up whenever you accidentially annoy whatever checks the forums for scripting attacks.

[Keyrock]

I guess I'll only post single sentence posts with no formatting whatsoever from now on, like God intended.

[majestic]

To post something on topic: I don't mind symbolism in films or series (or even books), but if it is the or even just a major focus, it is far too easy for me to become annoyed by what I perceive to be the creative team or the writer doing it simply to feel smug and superior. Like a group of people telling each other in-jokes in the presence of someone deliberately left out, although as the good Bruno could attest to, I am being a hypocrite here, as I do enjoy that too, but I don't like it being done to me.

It's a fine line to walk and it is hard to explain where the breaking point is. To give an example, Mulholland Drive annoyed me to the point of disliking the film during the scene where the blue box is opened. In contrast, a while back I watched Adolescence of Utena, a film that has the two protagonists reach a car wash, with one of them entering as human and leaving it as a car. The other then gets in and drives off, being chased by a medieval style castle, leading to the final action/chase scene of the film and the ending.

The difference is, I guess, insofar as that scene with the car makes perfect sense within the film and all of its established symbolism, while opening the blue box came, appropriately I suppose, more or less out of the blue. That is not to say that Mulholland Drive defies understanding in any way. The film is, prior and after the change, a criticism of Hollywood and the way it tends to (ab)use people's hopes and dreams. There is just no point in the switch besides being intentionally confusing. It only gets worse if you're taking the scene at face value and ascribe everything that happened in the film to this point as Diane's fevered masturbatory (for those who have not seen the film, this is meant literally) fantasy that still pertains to reality as it is her way to cope with the other scene that happened in real life, which is the very beginning, albeit probably in a different manner than shown.

The scene breaks the narrative and adds nothing thematically. It serves no purpose, at least not in my opinion. Utena becoming a car did, and when you look back after the film is over, it was the only way it could have ended. Thematically, that is, they could have done any number of things. Car war perhaps a little on the nose, all in all.

5 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

Non-edit: The forums are trying to force me to use AP style quotations by not letting me post unless I convert, but I'm not falling for it - y'all will just have to deal with crappy image posts instead.

Regarding the last paragraph: this is something I thought about not that long ago. I would not call myself an atheist, but agnostic does not truly fit either. I do reject the idea of the Abrahamic god, for instance, but I do not know whether or not there are beings or entities that could be considered, if not gods, then at least godlike. This rejection is not borne out of a counter-reaction to any upbringing either, it is one based on conclusions that I arrived at early on in elementary school, but it is my own, and I do not try to convince others, but I do talk about it if and when the topic comes up. It also happened far earlier than my rejection of the Christian church/organized religion. That did come later. Seems logical: it did take longer to understand the church and its role in history than it is to poke holes into what the Bible describes, especially if it is presented as the literal truth by one's teacher.

Edited January 5, 2023 by majestic

[Amentep]

 

[Lexx]

Feels like I just watched half the movie.

[Keyrock]

Nosferatu Nic Cage?

[Bartimaeus]

Very simply put, heavily relying on types of symbolism or themes that do not personally impact me to carry a work is a surefire way to make sure that piece is ineffective for me. So it is no surprise that though I read literally hundreds of classic literature short stories in high school English, I only did not dislike exactly one: short stories, by their very nature, are barebones and incredibly pointed while being seeped in cheap...no, let's say simple yet usually painfully abstract symbolic tricks and shortcuts to quickly convey ideas as a result of the limitations of the medium...and it's at the cost of virtually everything I normally find enjoyable about reading literature. I hate the short story medium, and themes and symbology are never what I wish to approach or analyze a work of fiction with first - only, perhaps, once I already love and can immerse myself with it. With all of that said... The Green Knight (2021). The recent discussion of it reminded me of how I was into Arthurian stuff when I was a kid, which also reminded me that I had intended to see this even though the trailer looked...well, never you mind that.

Pretty sick hair, kid - you'd give some anime girls a run for their money. More pertinently...

Essel (the prostitute?): I like your head better where it is.
Gawain: I gave my word, I made a covenant.
Essel: This is how silly men perish.
Gawain: Or how brave men become great.
Essel: Why greatness? Why is goodness not enough?
[no answer, end scene]

Thank you for being the voice of reason, Essel. Anyways, I had some mixed feelings about the film overall as I predictably had trouble identifying with Gawain's character and the journey he goes through, but I did at least eventually get a lot closer than say...The Northman where I wanted to behead the main character almost the entire film, and I did think the film ended on a high note. The first third of the film was a bit difficult to get through, but it at least did ultimately serve some purpose in concretely establishing Gawain's measure of character.

On 12/26/2022 at 3:40 AM, Sarex said:

That one was such a letdown. As you say it's stunning, but lack the meat underneath.

Hey, at least I'm pretty up front when I just say "I can't watch this simply because I don't like the style/characters/framing" about something, .

Spoiler

What a grossly misleading poster, though - no surprise that this attracted tons of viewers who were expecting something else entirely different and hated it.

Edited January 6, 2023 by Bartimaeus

[Hurlshort]

Avatar 2 has a chance to passing the $2 billion mark. That will give James Cameron 3 out of the top 6 highest grossing movies of all time. Like Titanic and the first Avatar, it is driven by repeated viewings, making the opening weekend numbers much less important than the length of its run.

Not a big surprise, but I know there was some doubt here as to whether it would succeed.

Edited January 6, 2023 by Hurlshort

[Totally not Gorgon]

It's really quite good. 

[Amentep]

31 minutes ago, Totally not Gorgon said:

It's really quite good. 

I thought the first one was average at best, and haven't really had much interest in seeing the second.  If I did see it, do you think I'd like it better/worse/same than the first?

[Totally not Gorgon]

c