Serious Movie Discussion XXXVIX

[theskza]

Lol you could've just not said anything. We know your thoughts on animation. But seriously, Inside Out might be my favorite animated film.

 

[Bullitt68]

Lol you could've just not said anything.

Where's the fun in that?

But seriously, Inside Out might be my favorite animated film.

With two Phil Collins references in this one sentence, I have to point out that, had this aptly titled song been featured, I would've absolutely made it a point to see it.

 

[Francis Rossi]

When it comes to animation, Bullitt's mouth becomes full of wrong. He can't help it.

Unless it's anime. Slag that off all you want and I'll generally agree (with a few exceptions).

 

[Rimbaud82]

So I watched Andrei Rublev, which I understand Bullitt described as boring, overrated and pretentious piece of crap :icon_chee

Well I can definitely understand why people would come away thinking that, I was almoststarting to think that myself at times haha. It was a bit of haul to watch it because it was so damn long and because of that it did feel somewhat overwrought but on the whole I still loved it, there was just too much that lingered with me after I watched it. It almost goes without saying that the imagery was incredible, but I just liked the style of the film. It's meant to be a biography of Andrei Rublev, yet at no point do we actually see him paint or even do anything of great note on screen. I liked the way in which it was done though.

I was reading an article in The Guardian I think it was, which made a good point, and it's something that I always think makes typical "cause and effect" biographies of artists quite dull, that most of them offer up a simple, linear narrative as if that will allow us to understand the artist and therefore make sense of his art. Obviously that's not the case though. So I liked the approach of Tarkovsky, to contrast the role of the artist and his own beliefs against the 'real' world and the social and political turmoil of that time. It presented the images on which the audience can reflect, without imposing any kind of answer. I like this quote from Tarkovsky:

"In cinema it is necessary not to explain, but to act upon the viewer's feelings, and the emotion which is awoken is what provokes thought"

Also have to say that I absolutely loved the ending, the very touching scene with the boy and the bell and the sudden burst of colour when we actually see Rublev's work. After everything that you witness throughout the film it was a very powerful ending I thought.

Not to say it was perfect and I definitely get where Bullitt's criticism comes from. As I say there were certain sections where I was starting to question it myself, but then other scenes would come along and blow me away, and when taken as a whole it left a very lasting impression.

 

[europe1]

First cartoons and now Tarkovsky!

This just isn't Bullitt's week, is it?:icon_chee

 

[Rimbaud82]

First cartoons and now Tarkovsky!

This just isn't Bullitt's week, is it?:icon_chee

:icon_chee

 

[chickenluver]

But for the claim that an animated film is at the front of the pack to be even remotely justified, you'd have to *invent a new word to convey just how horrendous and miserable the year has been for film.

I'll never understand you

 

[chickenluver]

So I watched Andrei Rublev, which I understand Bullitt described as boring, overrated and pretentious piece of crap :icon_chee

 

[Ricky13]

But seriously, Inside Out might be my favorite animated film.

Yeah Inside Out was amazeballs. Personal example of how compelling it was: when the Pixar short (Lava, in this case) that's usually played before the main feature started, a large part of the audience started snickering. I suppose it was funny to them that there was a short at all, and animation for some reason makes adults feel uncomfortable about watching it as a group. Plus it was a musical. That attitude waded into the start of Inside Out. But by the time the film got to the halfway mark, there wasn't a sound in the house. Shit just got better and better.

Who the fuck knows whether best film of year etc. Fury Road will likely remain my favorite but I loved Pixar's latest. It's a deeply complex exploration of emotional development as it relates to memory and executes it with class, gravitas and humour all at once.

Also saw Song of the Sea, an Irish animated film with a similar message, and as good. It uses Irish folklore as its conceit. Highly recommended. The animation is stunning.

I think the year has been great so far. So far at cinemas I've enjoyed:

Mad Max: Fury Road
Blackhat
Inside Out
Ex Machina
Kingsman: The Secret Service
Song of the Sea
Magic Mike XXL
Spy
Amy

Jurassic World can go fuck itself. A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night was style over substance. Black Coal, Thin Ice was boring. Ant-Man was disappointing, though not bad. Age of Ultron was more of the same. I'm either too dumb or too smart to "get" It Follows. I know I didn't like it. While We're Young was the most disappointing Baumbach I've seen. Love & Mercy was OK.

 

[KOQ24]

Yeah Inside Out was amazeballs. Personal example of how compelling it was: when the Pixar short (Lava, in this case) that's usually played before the main feature started, a large part of the audience started snickering. I suppose it was funny to them that there was a short at all, and animation for some reason makes adults feel uncomfortable about watching it as a group. Plus it was a musical. That attitude waded into the start of Inside Out. But by the time the film got to the halfway mark, there wasn't a sound in the house. Shit just got better and better.

Who the fuck knows whether best film of year etc. Fury Road will likely remain my favorite but I loved Pixar's latest. It's a deeply complex exploration of emotional development as it relates to memory and executes it with class, gravitas and humour all at once.

Also saw Song of the Sea, an Irish animated film with a similar message, and as good. It uses Irish folklore as its conceit. Highly recommended. The animation is stunning.

I think the year has been great so far. So far at cinemas I've enjoyed:

Mad Max: Fury Road
Blackhat
Inside Out
Ex Machina
Kingsman: The Secret Service
Song of the Sea
Magic Mike XXL
Spy
Amy

Jurassic World can go fuck itself. A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night was style over substance. Black Coal, Thin Ice was boring. Ant-Man was disappointing, though not bad. Age of Ultron was more of the same. I'm either too dumb or too smart to "get" It Follows. I know I didn't like it. While We're Young was the most disappointing Baumbach I've seen. Love & Mercy was OK.

Blackhat was bad.
-hemsworth sucked
-no chemistry between any of the actors
-even the action scenes were subpar,considering it's a Michael Mann movie


just realized i now watched all big picture nominees from this year (thought Foxcatcher was nominated too).

I'd rank em

Whiplash-9.5
Nightcrawler-9.5*
Boyhood-9.5
Gone Girl-9.0*
Inherent Vice-9.0*
Birdman-9.0
Grand Budapest Hotel-9.0
Selma-9.0
2 Days 1 Night-8.5*
Mr Turner-8.5*
Wild-8.0*
How to train your dragon 2-8.0*
Theory of Everything-7.5
Imitation Game-7.0
American Sniper-7.0


*The ones which weren't nominated

 

[Ricky13]

Couple things:

Blackhat was bad.
-hemsworth sucked
-no chemistry between any of the actors
-even the action scenes were subpar,considering it's a Michael Mann movie

Your FACE is sub-par.

I actually agree with you. It's an okay movie. But I feel like I'm watching his brain tick when I watch his films. He sees the way things are going well ahead of others. I might be wrong, but I think he's building to something great.

I'd rank em.....

Rankings (and ratings) are for vaginas.

 

[A Bird]

Had some crappy weather this weekend so I ended up binging on a bunch of fantasy and sci-fi movies. No real theme just a bunch of stuff I had been wanting to watch (or re-watch) and hadn't had the chance to.

Snowpiercer

 

[Rimbaud82]

Just watched The Mirror. Probably enjoyed it least out of the Tarkovsky films I have seen so far but I still thought it was brilliant in it's own way, though very challenging at points. Perhaps Tarkovsky's head was starting to veer slightly too far up his own ass...but it was still a great work of art imo (Am I a full blown fan-boy now? haha).

At times I was wondering what in the hell I was watching, but towards the end I had a kind of epiphany, where even if I didn't just suddenly crack the code or anything I felt like I began to understand what I was watching and had watched. When I was first watching it I was trying to piece together in a logical sense what I was seeing. I had read a little bit briefly what the film was about and that it was filled with symbolic imagery, so at first that's what I was trying to make sense of. Scenes play out with very little context and it was a little frustrating at first that I couldn't make a whole lot of sense of it. It was definitely something like stream of consciousness.

As it went on I stopped trying to attempt to analyse and make complete sense of all that was happening and just let it play out. By the end of the film it just hit me what this film was showing, or at least what I personally took from it. It was encapsulating everything that makes us who we are, the moments that define and shape us as a person. The history which provides the groundwork for our upbringing and the experiences of our parents that will in turn affect how we are raised. So when I was watching it I wasn't actively noticing things then saying internally "I see what you're doing there", but at a certain point I just got it and retroactively everything fit this theme. Maybe I am way off the mark, I haven't read any articles about it yet so I am not sure what the consensus is but I'm gonna try and find some stuff shortly.

Anyway, as has been the case with all of his films, it certainly made me think about it long after I finished watching it.

 

[Bullitt68]

Time for a proper catch-up:

Comparing Tarkovsky to Ed Wood are you? Oh, that's low! I'm surprised you didn't compare their dialogue!

I didn't think there was much of a point considering there's no comparison. Wood>Tarkovsky.

Spoiler

I think it's a great film

I was originally going to post my review of it, but I wanted to wait and see if anybody'd actually take it up. Since you did, here's what I thought of it:

I watched The Duellists. Definitely a great pick, Sigh. A C-level Barry Lyndon, which, I know, sounds like an insult, but it's truly high praise considering the mind-boggling level of cinematic brilliance at which Kubrick is operating on Barry Lyndon.

The imagery is similarly breathtaking, though it's more due to what's in front of the camera as opposed to how Ridley is using it. I did like the Kubrickian zooms, and I'm not just talking he used zooms and Kubrick used zooms: I'm talking straight lifted slow zooms to accentuate the portrait-like beauty of the compositions.

As for the film itself: Had Keitel been allowed to go to the De Niro/DDL extremes of emotion, that performance could've been an unforgettable classic. Instead, it was merely great in bursts. I do have to say, though, seeing him in those costumes, it made me think of what an awesome combination he and Kubrick would've been on Kubrick's abandoned Napoleon project. It also would've been better had Ridley used someone stronger than Keith (which one is that?) Carradine.

My favorite scene BY FAR is their first meeting and subsequent duel. Other than that scene, though, the other scenes that rank among the best right behind it are the three with Edward Fox (the original Jackal from the criminally underrated The Day of the Jackal). Both he and Keitel were superb in the scene where Fox confronts Keitel with what Carradine had set when his name came up.

The campaign was far too dragged out and the ending was disappointing, but none of the above criticism soured my overall admiration for the film. Rather, I'm just noting the various ways the film could've approached classic status. As it stands, with the weak lead, the misdirected performance from Keitel, and the generally poor decision-making on Ridley's part, what we're left with is a hidden gem that definitely deserves more attention than it's gotten thus far. . .but not too much. After all, Barry Lyndon is still out there.

Disappointing ending? Whaaaa?

Disappointing only because, for a film with such high stakes, it just fizzles out instead of ending with a real punch. Barry Lyndon ends on a similar note, but only after completely ripping out your insides :icon_lol:

The final duel was great, and just filled with tension.

No it wasn't. It was actually incredibly stupid. It felt like a goofy game of paintball, them being turned loose and they have to find each other. True story or not, Ridley should've done something else.

And if you want tension, watch the duel at the end of Barry Lyndon. The deliberate pacing squeezes out every last drop of tension, and with the relentless, deep percussive music, it's almost unbearably suspenseful.

The final shot of a humbled Keitel staring out from the cliff was beautiful.

I know it was supposed to be, but it wasn't. The imagery was gorgeous, but the final image a la Kuleshov didn't have any real power, mainly because Keitel wasn't allowed to flesh that character out to the degree I felt it needed to be nor did the film have the aid of majestic music like Barry Lyndon.

The campaign being dragged out for so long, is because it was loosely based on a true story where two men continued their duels over several years.

I know, but it felt like The Wrong Man syndrome where Ridley, like Hitchcock, was too faithful, the fact that the story was based in fact becoming handcuffs restricting artistic expression rather than a springboard from which to create a fictional universe.

Everything you were saying about it, europe, I could see Ridley trying to do it, but I didn't feel that he pulled it off very smoothly. It was a rough and bumpy ride, but he did manage to bring things home and there was a lot of it that was good, and the fact that it was his debut makes it even more impressive than it would've been otherwise.

Year of the Dragon was absolutely awful

I'm too biased to ever say any Mickey Rourke film was awful :icon_chee

So Wild Strawberries is outstanding, watched it last night.

Stop talking about Tarkovsky and tell me more about this. How amazing is Victor Sj

 

[Bullitt68]

Finally finished a movie. It's been a while. It was Holiday, and while the ending is a bit lame, I really enjoyed. I definitely took to heart what Grant's character was feeling, since I feel that now in my late twenties myself. It's kind of hard to just "follow the path" when you don't even know what it is you're looking for. Like with most older movies, i love how short and to the point it is. Hour and a half, and we're out.

Very special movie for me. One of the few times in my life I watched a movie for the first time and then, when it was over, immediately started it over from the top. Hepburn was fucking stunning in it and she plays that character with such pathos, her and Grant's relationship was so perfectly written and acted, and like you said, everything with Grant's character is really resonant and I love the way he played the ups-and-downs while trying to fit into that world.

What was it about the ending that you didn't like? How rushed it is once Grant leaves?

Still havent watched Lyndon.

[YT]BUdFmYTNfd0[/YT]

Well I re-watched Night of the Living Dead last night. Still an amazing movie.

I had a friend in high school who was fucking OBSESSED with the Dead movies. I've never really cared about zombies, but Night of the Living Dead is legit and I rewatched that one a bunch of times after I first saw it.

is it common knowledge that Morricone is going to score The Hateful Eight?

As much as I've bitched about Tarantino staying in Westernland, this is cool as hell.

Has Bullitt watched Mad Max: Fury Road yet?

No, he has not.

Looking forward to that write-up.

He cannot guarantee it'll happen anytime soon, but he'll be sure to post his thoughts once he gets around to it :wink:

I'm struggling through French Connection right now. I like Friedkin's movies and this one has a great reputation but I can't get into it.

I don't like Friedkin's movies and I've never managed to sit through that one beginning to end and don't ever care to.

Besides: Bullitt FTMFW

I saw The Third Man for the first time

The #2 film noir behind The Maltese Falcon IMO and just one of the GOAT. Joseph Cotten is so fucking underrated and he KILLS IT in this one, and Welles brings the heat, too. And the cinematography is phenomenal. And that score!

Amazing film.

I also watched 1956's Invasion of the Body Snatchers for the first time!

Far and away the best of the '50s sci-fi films. Great premise and very smart filmmaking.

I could tell I was watching something special with the Third Man, but I just couldn't connect with the film in any emotional way.

Oh, man. Cotten sells that emotionality like a boss.

Inside the apartment, meanwhile, Cotten and Valli talk about the Welles they remember and the Welles they've now learned about. This is one of my favorite scenes of the film because it's very dramatic and Cotten's a damn underrated actor. We've known all along that he's been smitten with Valli, but we've also known all along that Welles was the love of her life, and she even says, after Cotten assures her that she'll fall in love again, that she doesn't want to.

While talking about the depressing truths they'd learned about Welles, Cotten cracks a joke and makes Valli laugh. He remarks how it's the first time he'd ever seen her laugh and he asks her to do it again. Her happiness disappears as quickly as it had appeared, and she tells him "there isn't enough for two laughs."

Cotten goes over to her and says, "I'd make comic faces and stand on my head and grin at you between my legs and learn all sorts of jokes. . .I wouldn't stand a chance, would I?"

It's a beautiful scene and possibly the best piece of acting I've seen from Cotten.

I don't know what that "possibly" is doing there. That's easily Cotten at his best in one of the most beautiful scenes in all of cinema.

I think Touch of Evil kind of outdoes all of those, in a way.

No way. Touch of Evil isn't even on the pedastal, IMO. The Maltese Falcon, The Third Man, and The Big Sleep are at the top of the list. Then you've got stuff like Laura, The Killers, Out of the Past, The Woman in the Window, etc. Even staying within Welles' filmography, I think The Trial beats Touch of Evil while both The Lady from Shanghai and Mr. Arkadin are right there with it.

Not saying it's not an awesome movie, but it's a few steps behind the best of film noir IMO.

I'll say this for The Third Man, I've spent a long time looking for another movie like it and have never really succeeded in finding one.

I haven't found another one like it, either, and I don't expect to.

Automatic fail.

I'll never understand you

I watched Andrei Rublev

Just watched The Mirror.

Well, you made it through his worst two. Now go for Ivan's Childhood.

 

[chickenluver]

 

[Bullitt68]

Perfect response. And funny enough, I'm actually rooting for Aldo :icon_chee

 

[Rimbaud82]

Well, you made it through his worst two

 

[SoulBrotherNo1]

damn, thanks for the gifs guys, im laughing my ass off now

 

[KOQ24]

Bullet to the Head[/B] with him directing Stallone?

No.i was put off by the reviews.It wasn't exactly on top of my to-watch list