Movie Thread

zitothebrave said:
Side note, I have a thing for Katie McGrath
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Thanks a lot: I'd never heard of her, but now I do too.

Side note: I guess I should get around to actually seeing a film from 2015 at some point. The closest I've come to seeing anything from this year was watching Foxcatcher on the plane a couple days ago. I also read Inherent Vice, in anticipation of seeing PTA's realization of it—then heretofore have proceeded to fail to see the film.
 
Merlin got me all riled up about her. Merlin is a great show.

Seriously, how can this not rev your engine

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Anyone else really disappointed with the Apocalypse images so far? I've never read the comics, but was a big fan of the cartoon and he was always portrayed as much larger than the average person.
 
Bj1133 said:
Anyone else really disappointed with the Apocalypse images so far? I've never read the comics, but was a big fan of the cartoon and he was always portrayed as much larger than the average person.
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There's an issue with portraying him that large which is making him a semi-believable character. His comic height is 7 feet tall, they can still quite possibly pull this off with some good camera trickery. That being said the movies have elected usually to going with more believable character heights. Colossus in steel form is like 7'5 and he never seemed larger than anyone else in the films.
 
John Wick and The Equalizer were very very surprisingly good.

I haven't liked Keanu in anything since the first Matrix. He was awesome in Wick.
 
Movie thread was a month old and I couldn't find it.

Mrs. 50# was out of town for a few days last week and I'm past the Hookers and Blow (or Boats and 'Hos) phase of my life, so I hit a variety of theaters and provide you the report herein on what I saw.

#1--The Gift--A real surprise. Joel Edgerton wrote, directed, and starred in this little gem of a movie. Jason Bateman has to be serious and the always wonderful Rebecca Hall performs well. Just a nice, little story full of suspenseful revenge and revengeful suspense. On a scale of 4, I give it a solid 3.5.

#2--Vacation--Being a fan of the original series, I had to see it, out of morbid curiosity if nothing else. Lots and lots of tired, obvious jokes and limbo rock humor--the bar just keeps getting lower--but Ed Helms and Christina Applegate both do a pretty good job. Chris Helmsworth steals the show with an hilarious send-up of Helms' characters' egomaniacal weatherman brother-in-law. Can't go higher than 2 stars, but not as bad as many reviewers led me to believe.

#3--Straight Outta Compton--Pretty much the standards music biopic in which must has been glossed over, but informative nonetheless and pertinent given the times we live in. The old "the more things change, the more they stay the same" line applies here. As I was watching I thought, "Man, the casting director did a good job finding someone who looked like Ice Cube to play that part." Got home and found out that Ice Cube's son is playing the young Ice Cube. I know squat about rap and hip-hop, but I was surprised that I recognized as many songs as I did. 3 stars.

#4--Best of Enemies--The coup de grace of the weekend. Documentary on the William Buckley/Gore Vidal televised skirmishes on ABC's coverage of the 1968 Republican and Democratic conventions. If you have any interest in politics (or in Buckley or Vidal outside of politics), it's a must see. I think the contention of the creators is the film shows where the country's polarization or disintegration of the mainstream media began goes a bit too far, but it is a very insightful portrayal of a turbulent time in American history and how two pretty heady intellectuals showed that the consensus in America was disintegrating. If one loves Buckley and hates Vidal (or vice versa), there's nothing in the movie that will change your mind, but I couldn't help but think as I left the film how these two in addition to obviously disliking each other, envied each other as well. Say what you will about Vidal, but the guy was a superb writer and a master of the language. Buckley took a stab at fiction, but it was not his wheelhouse. On the other hand Buckley was instrumental in building the post-WWII conservative movement in the country that has simply grown in influence. Vidal made a couple of runs at public office, but much like Buckley's fiction, he came up short. Part of me wants to believe that the animosity between the two was fueled by Vidal's desire to be an effective opinion leader and Buckley's desire to be an artiste. Fortunately or unfortunately (depending on one's political stripe), things ended up where they ended up. The filmmakers did a pretty good job of bringing together experts across the political and cultural spectrum to chime in on the impact of the debates (Todd Gitlin, Eric Alterman, Sam Tanenhaus, the late Christopher Hitchens, Buckely's brother Reid, and the Heritage Institute's Robert Wald. Clearly a 4/4 stars from this reviewer, although I think the premise that these confrontations have somehow outlined today's debates goes a tad too far.
 
50PoundHead said:
#4--Best of Enemies--The coup de grace of the weekend. Documentary on the William Buckley/Gore Vidal televised skirmishes on ABC's coverage of the 1968 Republican and Democratic conventions. If you have any interest in politics (or in Buckley or Vidal outside of politics), it's a must see. I think the contention of the creators is the film shows where the country's polarization or disintegration of the mainstream media began goes a bit too far, but it is a very insightful portrayal of a turbulent time in American history and how two pretty heady intellectuals showed that the consensus in America was disintegrating. If one loves Buckley and hates Vidal (or vice versa), there's nothing in the movie that will change your mind, but I couldn't help but think as I left the film how these two in addition to obviously disliking each other, envied each other as well. Say what you will about Vidal, but the guy was a superb writer and a master of the language. Buckley took a stab at fiction, but it was not his wheelhouse. On the other hand Buckley was instrumental in building the post-WWII conservative movement in the country that has simply grown in influence. Vidal made a couple of runs at public office, but much like Buckley's fiction, he came up short. Part of me wants to believe that the animosity between the two was fueled by Vidal's desire to be an effective opinion leader and Buckley's desire to be an artiste. Fortunately or unfortunately (depending on one's political stripe), things ended up where they ended up. The filmmakers did a pretty good job of bringing together experts across the political and cultural spectrum to chime in on the impact of the debates (Todd Gitlin, Eric Alterman, Sam Tanenhaus, the late Christopher Hitchens, Buckely's brother Reid, and the Heritage Institute's Robert Wald. Clearly a 4/4 stars from this reviewer, although I think the premise that these confrontations have somehow outlined today's debates goes a tad too far.
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Every few years since junior-year of college, I binge-watch those vituperative debates on YouTube. I hadn't heard of this film; thanks for bringing it to attention.
 
50PoundHead said:
#2--Vacation--Being a fan of the original series, I had to see it, out of morbid curiosity if nothing else. Lots and lots of tired, obvious jokes and limbo rock humor--the bar just keeps getting lower--but Ed Helms and Christina Applegate both do a pretty good job. Chris Helmsworth steals the show with an hilarious send-up of Helms' characters' egomaniacal weatherman brother-in-law. Can't go higher than 2 stars, but not as bad as many reviewers led me to believe.
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I enjoyed the Vacation Movie. It's really dumb and yes it's pretty damned predictable. But then again so were the originals. What you're seeing is how the main character reacts to everything. I think Helms did a good job at that. One area I think they failed at was the brother dynamic. It was made into way more than it should have been. COuld have totally cut that out and used the kids as a foil for the dad, like they did in the originals. People forget that overall every character in the originals was built in one way or another to support Chevy Chase. I think the failure of the new one is that it was trying to develop the whole family.
 
zitothebrave said:
I enjoyed the Vacation Movie. It's really dumb and yes it's pretty damned predictable. But then again so were the originals. What you're seeing is how the main character reacts to everything. I think Helms did a good job at that. One area I think they failed at was the brother dynamic. It was made into way more than it should have been. COuld have totally cut that out and used the kids as a foil for the dad, like they did in the originals. People forget that overall every character in the originals was built in one way or another to support Chevy Chase. I think the failure of the new one is that it was trying to develop the whole family.
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Agree 100%. That little subplot went nowhere. I thought the younger brother's foul language was amusing at a level, but that's about it for those two in terms of adding to the story.
 
Legendary Horror Maestro Wes Craven, 76 , died after battling brain cancer today.

Everyone always talks about Nightmare on Elm Str but People Under the Stairs is probably my favorite.
 
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