Cinema and Movie Thread: flickering images

[InsaneCommander]

New ‘Lord of the Rings’ movies are in the works. Here’s what we know

[Amentep]

 

[Keyrock]

29 minutes ago, Amentep said:

 

That looks dreadful.

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, Keyrock said:

 

That looks dreadful.

reasons?

personally, we dislike the peter pan story and the cinematic graveyard is littered with bad peter pan films. also, live-action disney remakes o' their animated catalog has been near universal miss. we didn't know anything about this film 'til we saw the trailer, which is another example o' our zero interest. was every reason to expect seeing the trailer would confirm our disinterest.

...

peter and many o' the lost boys look like little kids. in the novel we got no specific mention 'o peter's age, but he proud announces he retains all his baby teeth at one point. many o' the themes is inextricable linked to peter and the kids being... kids. in so many movies, peter and the boys appear old enough to break a few themes from the book. if you think a peter pan movie should follow the source material regarding theme, then this trailer provides a glimmer o' hope. again, am not a fan o' the novel, but am admitted more curious 'cause the movie looks as if is trying to handle core themes in a way all those crap adaptions did not. am at least curious. 

am not having complaints 'bout visuals and sound. did not go cheap. is scenes which reminded us o' scorsese's hugo, and not just the clock. is only a trailer, but we saw a few genuine beautiful shots with fantastic use o' light. 

jude law, alan tudyk and molly parker is in the trailer and mr. law sounded appropriate menacing. am optimistic 'bout the cast, though kid actors is always a crap shoot.

after viewing the trailer, we checked and saw the director is the person who did the recent green knight.

am far more interested today than we were yesterday, and yesterday we had not seen the trailer.

'course the thing is, we still don't particular like peter pan, so...

HA! Good Fun!

 

 

Edited March 1, 2023 by Gromnir

[Hurlshort]

15 hours ago, Keyrock said:

That looks dreadful.

I'm not sure what looks dreadful about it. Granted it lacks the campiness of Hook, but it looks like a pretty standard Peter Pan flick.

[Keyrock]

It's the EPIC MUSIC playing over decidedly not epic stuff happening. It's the actor playing Wendy, who is shown more than anyone else, having the same exact facial expression in every shot. Also, while Peter Pan was kinda schlongsure in previous adaptations, he comes off as straight up smug to me in that trailer.

[Hurlshort]

9 minutes ago, Keyrock said:

It's the EPIC MUSIC playing over decidedly not epic stuff happening. It's the actor playing Wendy, who is shown more than anyone else, having the same exact facial expression in every shot. Also, while Peter Pan was kinda schlongsure in previous adaptations, he comes off as straight up smug to me in that trailer.

He's no Mary Martin, of course.

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, Keyrock said:

It's the EPIC MUSIC playing over decidedly not epic stuff happening. It's the actor playing Wendy, who is shown more than anyone else, having the same exact facial expression in every shot. Also, while Peter Pan was kinda schlongsure in previous adaptations, he comes off as straight up smug to me in that trailer.

epic music is the fail? you ain't never seen a trailer before yesterday? is a trailer, so is not gonna be more than one music track anyways.

*shrug*

peter pan, the character from the book, is s'posed to be an unlikable and smug little d-bag, though in a trailer which peter gets two spoken lines and less than ten seconds in which you could see his face clear enough to read facial expressions, am thinking you are perhaps trying too hard to find fault.  and again, peter pan is a kid. in the novel (and play) he is written as selfish and immature because, he is a kid. peter pan says inappropriate when is most inappropriate and habitual takes credit for the achievements o' others. did we mention selfish? needs repeating 'cause other than foolish bravery, selfishness is his most defining quality. IF peter is "straight up smug" in this new iteration, and from the extreme limited trailer exposure am not sure how one arrives at such a conclusion, then it means this version o' peter is far closer to the author's intended character than most previous adaptions. example: in a follow up peter pan story by the original author, it is revealed that tinker bell died a short time after the events o' the peter and wendy tale, and within a few years peter has literal complete forgotten tinker bell. peter doesn't genuine care 'bout anybody. peter does have a somewhat obsessive fixation with wendy and her descendants, but is extreme shallow and childish. 

we wouldn't say wendy has only one expression in the trailer, but she does suffer from the open-mouth wonder, fear, confusion bit. 

if is some other reason...

HA! Good Fun!

Edited March 1, 2023 by Gromnir

[Bartimaeus]

It's not a musical, which we can all be thankful for. This reminds me that as a kid, I watched the direct-to-DVD sequel to Disney's Peter Pan, Return to Neverland, and I remember liking it. IIRC, it takes place during...probably World War II, with a new main character, Jane, and her city/home is getting bombed at the beginning of the film? I have recently learned that it was apparently(?) terrible, so I should probably re-watch it to appropriately destroy more of my childhood memories.

I should also probably get a copy of Hook for my nieces to watch at some point.

Edited March 1, 2023 by Bartimaeus

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, Bartimaeus said:

I have recently learned that it was apparently(?) terrible, so I should probably re-watch it to appropriately destroy more of my childhood memories.

we said we didn't like the peter pan stories, but am nevertheless recognizing something clever j.m. barrie did with the play and novel. children is gonna enjoy the tale in a much different way than will adults. is not simple a matter o' how with more education and experience adults will recognize aspects o' story which may be less obvious to children. is not a phantom tollbooth or even rocky and bullwinkle situation. the core themes o' pan stories is dealing with childhood and kids ain't equipped to understand. the inability o' children to grok peter and wendy is a cognitive development obstacle as 'posed to lack of knowledge. events and scenes from barrie stories in which child audiences is meant to laugh and cheer, an adult audience is likely to feel pity or even weep. 

have never seen return to neverland, so we cannot speak to its quality, and as already noted, am not a fan o' peter pan in general. even so, peter pan stories should be viewed different as adults compared to when one is a child. if you saw or read a peter pan tale as a kid, then is appropriate your childhood memories should be fundamental altered when experiencing as an adult.

 HA! Good Fun!

[the_dog_days]

 

[Bartimaeus]

Women Talking (2022). A period drama about women and girls in a traditional Mennonite colony who find themselves frequently being assaulted and raped by the men of their colony with no reparation or resolution available to them. The men say they are lying, that what they are experiencing is merely flight of female fantasy; one of the young women decides to take a sickle to her would-be assaulter. In response, the women and girls are finally recognized and given an ultimatum by their church: forgive the men responsible for the attacks...or abandon the colony and their only chance to gain entry to Heaven. Fantastic options from the point of view of religious and uneducated women and girls, I have to say.

Spoiler

the premise and first 5-10 minutes made me think it was gonna be really great, but it kiiinda turned into a babby's first power dynamics + girl power + general religion and philosophy discussion pretty quickly thereafter for most of the rest of the film

that's a terrible oversimplification, and it's not bad (actually there are a number of great scenes), but this should've been my jam and on the whole it sadly wasn't

in a way, it's almost kind of fitting because of the conditions that these women live in, being mostly simple due to lack of education, but even with that in mind, it still doesn't quite totally gel; still, a worthwhile watch even accounting my issues with it

 

5 hours ago, Gromnir said:

we said we didn't like the peter pan stories, but am nevertheless recognizing something clever j.m. barrie did with the play and novel. children is gonna enjoy the tale in a much different way than will adults. is not simple a matter o' how with more education and experience adults will recognize aspects o' story which may be less obvious to children. is not a phantom tollbooth or even rocky and bullwinkle situation. the core themes o' pan stories is dealing with childhood and kids ain't equipped to understand. the inability o' children to grok peter and wendy is a cognitive development obstacle as 'posed to lack of knowledge. events and scenes from barrie stories in which child audiences is meant to laugh and cheer, an adult audience is likely to feel pity or even weep. 

have never seen return to neverland, so we cannot speak to its quality, and as already noted, am not a fan o' peter pan in general. even so, peter pan stories should be viewed different as adults compared to when one is a child. if you saw or read a peter pan tale as a kid, then is appropriate your childhood memories should be fundamental altered when experiencing as an adult.

 HA! Good Fun!

I am not at all familiar with Peter Pan outside of the Disney stuff, and it's been quite a while since I saw even any of that. Weirdly, I have stronger memories of Return to Neverland than I do of the original Disney animated film...but not strong enough in either's case to really have a good grasp to see exactly what you mean.

Edited March 2, 2023 by Bartimaeus

[LadyCrimson]

That Peter Pan film trailer just looks like another average, cgi, youth/young adult adventure movie. Doesn't look terrible or special in any way. That said I'll do my usual qualifier that I'm also not a big fan of that story in general, nor a big fan of modern day young adult films. Also, maybe it's good. Can't tell anything from most action-y trailers anymore except whether it maybe has some good cgi visuals. >.>

Edited March 2, 2023 by LadyCrimson

[Gromnir]

2 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

I am not at all familiar with Peter Pan outside of the Disney stuff, and it's been quite a while since I saw even any of that.

am suspecting your recollection is the norm as 'posed to the exception. perhaps too few parents nowadays is reading to their kids, but even if they are, am doubtful peter and wendy makes top twenty lists. we frequent lament how underappreciated is authors o' children's fiction, mentioning lloyd alexander, phillip pullman, simon juster, madeleine l'engle, rudyard kipling and neil gaiman just to name a few. am old, so am no doubt ignoring a whole catalog o' recent authors making great youth fiction, authors o' whom we ain't even aware. furthermore, is vast repositories o' fairytales and mythology from 'round the world we would be reading to kids before we would ever get 'round to considering barrie. heck, we would even read shakespeare before trying barrie.

have seen criticism o' the recent trailer other than epic music in a movie trailer.

New live-action 'Peter Pan' trailer shocks with major character changes: 'Diversity nonsense'

predictable. 

the book peter and wendy is pre adolescents, but the author did not otherwise describe their appearance in any detail save for attire. tinker bell? author left her visual characteristics up to the imagination o' readers, and her personality is as broken as is peter's. 'ccording to barrie, tinker bell is so diminutive she may hold onto no more than one emotion at a time. disney influenced the multitudinous versions o' peter pan which followed far more than did the original novel and play. as such, the expectations 'bout character appearance and personalities is more linked to disney than barrie.

gonna repeat, am not a fan o' the barrie works but we also weren't a fan o' disney, so we had no good will built up in advance o' the trailer. the trailer changed our mind for the better, 'cause while we ain't a fan o' barrie, we ain't ever seen an effort to do peter pan based on peter and wendy v. peter pan. peter pan is functional suffering a curse which keeps him perpetual shallow, selfish and smug, incapable o' making and maintaining meaningful relations. the curse ain't some kinda faustian bargain in which he sacrifices his soul, nor is it akin to greek tragedy in which he were cursed by the gods for impiety. peter pan is a kid in perpetuity. that's it. you would think such cynical thematic material would be a hard sell particular for family movies, but every few years there is a new effort to do peter pan. fascinating, no?

while am not a fan o' barrie, am curious to see what a director produces when trying to be faithful to barrie themes especial 'cause am believing most people is like bartimaeus and they do not know the source material.  curious, the expectations created by disney allows a director who is faithful to source material to nevertheless surprise audiences with something unexpected. 

HA! Good Fun!

[LadyCrimson]

^ I have never seen the entire animated Disney Peter Pan. A lot of clips of it. On the flip side, I do not recall if I've ever read the original book work either. If I did, it was when I was very little in my early voracious reading tot phase, so to speak. I think more likely I read some illustrated children's book based on Disney's movie, or something similar. It's strange that I can't recall but I'm aware of the basic story and history (and that Disney's version, like a lot of Disney versions, are quite different).

Mostly I just find the whole premise a little dull, even with cynical underpinings. I think my abandonment/mixed race adoption/dysfunctional family stuff makes me often unable to relate or empathize to a lot of fiction re: young children, family loyalty or family "because family" bonding, etc. I'm warped that way.

Edited March 2, 2023 by LadyCrimson

[Chairchucker]

I'll probs watch live action Pan, and I'll probs enjoy it more than cartoon Pan, although that is more of a reflection on my feelings on cartoon Pan than my expectations of live action Pan.

[Gfted1]

 

[Bartimaeus]

8 hours ago, LadyCrimson said:

That Peter Pan film trailer just looks like another average, cgi, youth/young adult adventure movie. Doesn't look terrible or special in any way. That said I'll do my usual qualifier that I'm also not a big fan of that story in general, nor a big fan of modern day young adult films. Also, maybe it's good. Can't tell anything from most action-y trailers anymore except whether it maybe has some good cgi visuals. >.>

Yes, and it looks perfectly in line with the rest of Disney's live-action remakes. If you didn't like the others, there's no reason to expect to like this one, but if you did...well, there you go. I personally saw the Cinderella remake and Emma Watson's Beauty and the Beast, and I haven't had any appetite for more since. Live-action magic and fantasy never really captures my interest or imagination like animation can, especially modern computer visual effect-driven stuff. All the movie magic which was ingeniously crafted by many other means in the 70s-90s will forever remain there no matter how much one wishes elsewise.

@Gromnir

I don't think Keyrock was necessarily suggesting something untoward with the casting, though it doesn't help that a lot of people really struggle with putting their actual problems with media into meaningfully intelligible words, myself a queenly example, and instead focus on utterly minute details that don't really matter in the grand scheme of whether something is "good"/enjoyable or not. Sometimes, you watch a trailer (or even an entire film) and immediately go "whoa, that really spoke/appealed to me"; other times, the exact opposite happens, and it's just better to leave it at that rather than say something like "the epic music didn't seem fitting". No, I do suppose the epic music was in fact not particularly fitting, but if that truly poisons your initial impression of a film, then you should probably be like me and largely stop watching trailers because that happens with most of them. I try to make good on that when I can, though I did make an exception here because of the ongoing discussion of the film.

You know, I have audiobooks of the Peter Pan trilogy(?) for my nieces to listen to*, and I don't really have a ton of time or attention span to read novels these days. Never been much one for audiobooks, but maybe I'll give them a try to get a better picture of the series.

*Hey, if anyone has any good idea for audiobooks both old and new that might appeal to fairly young children, you let me know. I already have the following, but I could use more:

Spoiler

Narnia, Boxcar Children, Winnie the Pooh, The House in the Big Woods, The Wind in the Willows, The Mysterious Benedict Society, My Father's Dragon, Anne of Green Gables, Alice in Wonderland, The Little Prince, Peter Pan, The Secret Garden, The Borrowers, Cinnamon Bear, The Magic Tree House, and Little House on the Prairie...and maybe a few more I can't remember off the top of my head.

 

Edited March 2, 2023 by Bartimaeus

[Hurlshort]

My first Peter Pan experience was in the theatre, which sounds fancy. It was fantastic watching the actors fly around the stage. I was pretty young, but I still remember it fondly.  

Edited March 2, 2023 by Hurlshort

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

I think we can all agree that the perfect Peter Pan adaptation would be Alan Moore's lost girls.

11 minutes ago, Hurlshort said:

My first Peter Pan experience was in the theatre, which sounds fancy. It was fantastic watching the actors fly around the stage. I was pretty young, but I still remember it fondly.  

That would be pretty cool.

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, Bartimaeus said:

No, I do suppose the epic music was in fact not particularly fitting, but if that truly poisons your initial impression of a film, then you should probably be like me and largely stop watching trailers because that happens with most of them.

exactly. is unlikely this were the first movie trailer keyrock had ever seen, so is doubtful he were genuine caught off guard by the disconnect 'tween epic music and a few seconds o' scenes taken outta context.

1 hour ago, Bartimaeus said:

I don't think Keyrock was necessarily suggesting something untoward with the casting

indeed. am suggesting he struggled to find other problems. 

HA! Good Fun!

[uuuhhii]

On 3/1/2023 at 7:42 AM, Amentep said:

 

never like the older version so this hardly seems any worse

[the_dog_days]

1 hour ago, Fire Walk with KP said:

I think we can all agree that the perfect Peter Pan adaptation would be Alan Moore's lost girls.

That would be pretty cool.

Doesn't Lost Girls Wendy engage in incest?

[Amentep]

3 hours ago, Fire Walk with KP said:

I think we can all agree that the perfect Peter Pan adaptation would be Alan Moore's lost girls.

[Keyrock]

Lot of Peter Pan schlong riders in this thread, I see.