Good lord yes. That movie was the dumbest piece of masturbatory pretentious bullshit that I've seen in quite some time. If you want a movie to summarize the fedora-wearing Reddit crowd, that's pretty much the gold standard.

Just watched Saving Mr. Banks. It was a pretty good movie. Pretty depressing, heartwrenching stuff. Fortunately the movie focused more on P.L. Travers than it did on Walt Disney. Tom Hanks was great as Disney, but I was afraid this was going to be more along the lines of a Walt Disney biopic where they conveniently gloss over the less respectable sides to his character. Instead he really just plays a supporting role. Really did put a whole new spin on Mary Poppins though, now that I know more of the backstory. It was also cool to see reenactments of the writing team come up with iconic scenes and, especially, songs.

The one thing that's kind of keeping me from seeing Saving Mr. Banks is that I'm almost certain from the trailers and promotional material that they're gonna change the part of the Mary Poppins creation story where Pamela Travers hated the final product, to the point that after demanding to Walt Disney that the animated segment get chopped out (and this was at the premiere of the movie, mind you), Disney walked away from her for good, remarking that "The ship has sailed!". I have this feeling in my gut that they changed it to Travers loving the movie and falling under Walt Disney's charm, and that will be the deal breaker for me because of how that's blatantly not what actually happened.

Well:

I mean, don't get me wrong, it looks really good. Emma Thompson and Tom Hanks seem like they've just slipped so snug into their characters that they became them, particularly Emma Thompson since Tom Hanks will always be at least slightly recognizable as Tom Hanks. It's just that as a Disney history buff, as well as a guy who regards Mary Poppins as the best live action Disney movie ever (2nd only in their entire filmography to Fantasia), stuff like that would bug me to the point of adversely affecting my overall view of the movie. I do know for a fact that I'd love without reproach the scenes recreating the story meetings, especially considering I have a CD with the story sessions on them that I like to listen to on long drives.

More spoilers then:

I have now seen the new Hobbit 3 times. The UN should pass a resolution recommending Benedict Cumberbatch be allowed to inseminate every adult woman on Earth even if it means only 1/10th of the resulting babies sound like Smaug. Seriously, I hope every single deleted scene in the inevitable Extended Bonus Extended Long Extended Edition of Desolation of Smaug takes place inside the lonely mountain. They could not have possibly put too much Smaug into this movie.

The movie overall falls short of any of the LOTR movies, but Smaug is the best thing Jackson has done in any of his five Tolkien films.



You have nice manners for a thief and a liar.....

I finished watching this Hong Kong action/drama called Saving General Yang. What a sad tale this one was...but, I could not help but feel like some of the sacrifices made were totally unnecessary and fruitless. I guess that was the point. Eh, just a sad movie all around.

Regarding Session 9:



Best shot ever.

I'll concede on TCM 3 and... whatever came after that but TCM 2 is awesome. The TCM remake wasn't terrible but... not really necessary either. TCM 2 has already been remade but it's called House of 1000 Corpses.

Saw Wolf of Wall Street over the weekend and holy fuck was that movie good! I knew absolutely nothing about it going in, aside from hearing that it was really good, and I'm glad because all the over the top ridiculousness (which for the most part is entirely based on actual shit and NOT embeleshed) was a wonderful surprise. I wouldn't call the movie a comedy by any means but that is easily the funniest movie I've seen in years. Can't recommend it enough.

Some of the popular movies in 2014 to look forward to (or not):

http://entertainment.time.com/2014/01/0 ... e-in-2014/

Interstellar looks intriguing.

I'm interested in The Monuments Men, Gone Girl and Interstellar, and will likely see 'em at the cinema.

Each have good directors and interesting subject matter, I also like the Hellfish vibe with Monuments, it's been a dream of sorts to see that in a long 2 hour version.

Edit: I'm sure The Simpsons based The Flying Hellfish on a old movie although I'm unaware of what.

The Place Beyond the Pines was a deeply flawed, deeply frustrating masterpiece. There's no denying it carries some of the most nail-bitingly intense scenes in recent memory (including a front seat car chase that may have finally toppled We Own The Night's insanely high watermark), but unfortunately the movie is heavily weighed down by a bloated script that seems a lot more convinced of its sustained importance than I am (Cianfrance seems to fancy himself as the next Altman but he's really just an ersatz Iñárritu), glacially slow tracking shots where the audience can do nothing else but gawp at Ryan Gosling's or Bradley Cooper's imposing neck muscles, and an ending that tries to come off as quietly profound but instead is just irritatingly trite and meaningless.

I fucking hate when this happens, because I certainly can't recommend a movie this flawed, but I also don't think anyone should miss it. The good is amazing and the bad is amazingly bad. 5/10

(anyone who liked this film should immediately watch Revanche, because it does literally everything Place Beyond attempts to do, only without the gimmicky Altman-esque latticework and inconsistent pacing)

No Godzilla on the list.....

Correct me if I'm wrong but I think the majority of the American audience/media isn't too fond of kaiju-type movies, which is probably why Pacific Rim didn't do well in the boxoffice.

Yet at the same time they threw themselves all over the Transformers movies, which were really just the destruction and carnage parts of a kaiju movie but with the monsters replaced by giant robots.

I think Godzilla has enough name value to make money at the box office. Helps that Bryan Cranston's the lead guy less than a year after coming off Breaking Bad ending.

I doubt it's about the destructive/carnage nature of the movies. Transformers, over a period of time, has pretty much become 'murica-centric, no? It's probably taken about two decades for Transformers to cement itself in the american/western market. Right from the 80s/90s cartoons to the toys. Naturally, the cultural setting of the first Transformers movie followed suit and so did the rest of the sequels.

But yeah, Godzilla is a bigger name and should most certainly do better than PR. With regards to PR, I suppose the people who are either really open-minded or anime/manga fans would've enjoyed it. The latter being a small demographic, hence it failed to rake up good money.

Transformers is huge in Japan too. Maybe not the Michael Bay movies, but they had a fair number of their own anime series based on it.

I liked Pacific Rim. It's tone reminded me of Starship Troopers, and the battles weren't all over the place like Transformers.
Personally I'm not interested in Godzilla because of that Roland Emmerich effort, that's the only Godzilla movie that made it to the big screen here and I think a lot of people feel it'll be the same lacklustre thing. When/if good reviews churn out you can expect interest to soar.

Spring Breakers - Almost unwatchable. I was ready to quit very early on, when they started singing that Britney Spears song from the late 90s. Then things improved slightly once James Franco entered the picture. He seemed to be having fun with his role, at least, but the movie in general wasn't really going for "fun" despite what its poster suggests. I guess people who liked this say it's intended as a satire, but all I got out of it was a loud, obnoxious showcase of forgettable characters (except Franco's) behaving in ridiculous ways.


That movie has my Netflix record for "most consecutive weeks chilling near the bottom of my queue without being bumped to the top, or removed." After reading that review, I guess it's staying at the bottom. Although I would have seen the damn thing months ago if the nearly 2.5 hour running time hadn't discouraged me.

Yeah, just watch Revanche instead. That's a true masterpiece.

Weird. The way you describe it makes me think it's a pretentious Nicolas Winding Refn effort.

The Wolf of Wall Street was hilarious at times with its ridiculous excess and Jonah Hill's character was probably funnier to me than it should have been because he reminded me of a close friend, but I found pretty much all of the other characters really difficult to like or care about partially because of what they did and partially because of their personalities. If you look at it as a 3 hour dramatic comedy film it's pretty good, but if you expect too much on the character drama side of things I think you run a risk of being disappointed in it.

The Desolation of Smaug was three more hours of what you'd expect from Peter Jackson. I'm no Tolkien buff, but I'm pretty sure this film took some rather significant liberties with the story. They basically invent a character who was never in the Hobbit, find a reason to shove Legolas into the story and spend a rather excessive amount of screentime on him killing orcs in fancy elvish ways, and invent scenes for Gandalf (although it's kind of a cool set of scenes). I enjoyed it well enough apart from the plot issues, but nothing I'd get too excited about. I always enjoyed LOTR more than the Hobbit, and I think the same is going to be true of the film versions. The Hobbit is just too silly (you also have this weird dichotomy between dwarves singing together/joking around and then Legolas jumping around indiscriminately decapitating orcs), and the emotional tone is completely different from LOTR.

Midnight in Paris was an interesting film to me because I have an interest in 20's literature and scene in Paris as it was at the time. That being said I don't think I got too much out of the movie's depiction of that setting. I also fail at understanding the appeal of romantic comedies, even ones like this that have a little more creativity than the typical pile of cliches that rom-com fans seem to never tire of. Owen Wilson's wife and in-laws were completely, utterly unlikable and so there was very little conflict for his character about leaving his wife that was transparent for the viewer. The whole time I just sat there wanting him to bash his wife's skull in - but that's probably typical of the kind of character complexity you find in rom-coms. Every supporting character in the film is completely one dimensional to the point of the movie being almost boring. Every piece of the script is just so brazen about the emotional response it wants to elicit from the viewer that I kind of found it insulting. They also could have done so many interesting things with the setting and characters but they never do. Disappointing.

I've probably spent more time in the cinema this year than I have anywhere else, so far. So many damned good movies are getting dumped on us. I'm going to see Her in a few hours, and I may take in Inside Llewyn Davis afterwards. Spike Jonze and the Coen Brothers are some of the best auteurs working in the movies these days, so it should be a good matinee double feature.

American Hustle is one of the best movies I have seen in a good while. Hilarious yet it maintains a somber atmosphere. Very poignant. Made me take another look at myself. One of those kinds of movies. 9/10

Wolf of Wall Street was hilarious but a little unrelatable. Leo as a coked out millionaire going batshit on a yacht is nothing new, really, and I really don't understand those who say he deserves an Oscar for it. Not even over what Bale did in American Hustle. 7/10

Anchorman 2 was funny, but I was so skeptical watching it that I didn't let myself give in to the completely goofy, over-the-topness of every single line in that movie. 7/10

I enjoyed American Hustle, but probably would've enjoyed it more if it didn't drop right out of the seventies. I just have no affinity or interest in that time period. Regarding The Place Beyond The Pines: that movie is goddamn awesome, and a bit troubling, mostly because some of it reminds myself of me when I was younger. Spring Breakers is a hedonistic, excess clusterfuck. I can't remember the last time I walked away from a film feeling so shitty about afterwards. It's like Hotline MIami in movie form. You want to keep watching it even as you're getting more depressed by the minute.

Also, speaking of Refn.... Only God Forgives is interesting in concept, but it may be perfect as a titular anti-movie.

Also, I got a chance to see Special I.D. where once again Donnie Yen returns to the modern, gritty cop area where he beats the crap out of everybody.

Saw Wolf of Wall Street. Good movie, but not amazing. I guess I'm an idealist and didn't relate/connect to many characters because of that. Basically I just viewed the main character as a guy who abused the opportunities that were given to him.

Oblivion - If it came out 10 years earlier it might have been thoroughly captivating but the reveal concept was disappointing by today's standards. Not a bad film by any stretch of the imagination but also not all it could be, it reminded me of The Island in that respect and also in other overly polished ways. A few scenes were like a perfume commercial, visually stunning but an utter lack of anything else, and the blaring electronic score in some scenes felt obnoxiously overdone. It kept my interest for the better half, the initial vague premise kept me glued to my seat while action scenes were mostly thrilling. I wouldn't sway people away as it genuinely wasn't a bad film but it never reaches it's full potential.

It's the Golden Globes tonight, here's some things I'll follow:

-Brooklyn Nine-Nine (best tv series, comedy and best actor in comedy for Andy Samberg)
-James Spader (best actor, tv series drama for The Blacklist)
-Tatiana Maslany (best actress, tv series drama for Orphan Black)
-Joaquin Phoenix (for Her)

Projection:
Best picture, drama: Gravity
Best picture, comedy or musical: Her

I also watched Drinking Buddies yesterday, cool little movie with Olivia Wilde, Jake Johnson and Anna Kendrick. Very down to life and with a good script. I like Johnson a lot in New Girl and he had a nice chemistry with Wilde in this charming movie.

Wolf of Wall Street - 5/5

I will probably never say this again, but it doesn't matter that none of the characters are relatable in this. It doesn't matter that there isn't any real depth or nuance to the storyline, or that there isn't much to be learned from it beyond 'wealth makes you a jackass.' Because this is an absolute triumph of movie making. Leo Dicaprio is brilliant, perhaps turning in the performance of his career. Also one of the best Scorsese pictures in ages, I think. It's just a flat out enjoyable film - with three hours worth of material and a ton of funny, memorable scenes, there is so much to dig into here. The directing is a big part of that, as there is always something going on, and the film is really quite fast paced. You'd expect a film this huge to slow down and bask in how grandiose it all is, but no - this is just pedal to the metal, full speed all the way, jam-packed with all kinds of hilarious, degradent things going on. The story is simple and clear - Jordan Belfort, a self-made Wall Street stockbroker, loves to indulge in drugs, outlandish sex and all manner of partying. And the film just takes that and runs with it to make one of the most crude, rude and pitch-black comedies out there. There isn't a second of this I wasn't having fun with. It's weird to be so enamored with a film with so little depth story-wise, but the acting is flawless and the impeccable directing of Scorsese makes depth where the story has none. This is just a brilliant, balls to the wall comedy. Go see it.

Watched "Her" last night. My favorite movie of the year, and I have seen most of the popular contenders. No film has actually had that kind of emotional effect on me for a very long time - we're talking at least a few years. Maybe a little too gushy for some of the frequenters of this forum though! Great acting, great script, great cinematography, and just a great concept. The movie had a couple of very funny moments in the first half but became a lot more serious in the second half (although it's a serious film overall). One part of me would have liked more comedy (because it actually made me burst out loud laughing), another part appreciates that the film was probably more effective because of the change in mood achieved by one half of the film being distinctly more playful than the other half. One of those movies that will be in my all time favorites.

Watched "American Hustle" recently. I think I liked this more than "The Wolf of Wall Street", although both films have some different strengths despite both being period pieces. The important characters here are a lot more complex and easier to empathize with. I was confused by Louis CK's role, just because he never got a single joke in. Maybe this was just to troll the audience, who sat around waiting for a punchline that never came. I find Christian Bale's physical commitment pretty astonishing. He was like what, 130 pounds in "The Machinist", between 180 and 200 of muscle in the Batman movies, and here he is firmly over 200 pounds of pure flab. I've had complaints from friends that they found this movie too slow, and the lengthy exposition segment near the beginning of the film doesn't really help this matter, but personally I am not bothered by films with slower pacing. The deliberate pacing built up enough anticipation to make the climax satisfying in a way it wouldn't have been if this film was 90 minutes long. Good but perhaps not amazing period drama with characters that are fun to watch.

Just watched "Prince Avalanche", very fucking damn good movie with Paul Rudd and Emile Hirsch. It's just 2 guys painting the road lines of a devastated area. It's very contemplative, it has these nice shots of Texas served with the excellent soundtrack composed by Explosions in the Sky. Rudd is very damn solid and proves he's a fine actor. Highly recommended, perhaps in my top 5 of 2013.

I'll watch "Her", "Rush", "Don Jon", "The World's End" and "Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters" (it probably blows but it will be somewhat entertaining, I guess) soon.

I really liked Don Jon. I doubt a lot of people here would though.

Yeah, like I said it was good on some level but nearly every character in the movie being a totally unlikeable guido made it hard to really love.

Anyone saying American Hustle was better than Wolf of Wall Street is on drugs. That movie was the most average thing ever.

Yeah, I haven't seen either but the day an O. Russell film outdoes a Scorsese one is the day I eat Diamhea's fedora. I Heart Huckabees, Three Kings, Flirting with Disaster and Spanking the Monkey are all horrible, horrible movies imo.

http://www.nomachetejuggling.com/2011/1 ... ing-order/

I'm absolutely doing this at some point. Since the link doesn't show all the way, this blog post explains the "Machete Order" of the Star Wars movies, and how this is really the best way to watch the movies.

Empyreal: seems like you were really into it. For me, the storyline pulled the quality of the movie down enough to say it's only a somewhat above average film for me... Then on top of that, with the grand collapse of the character, I felt no sympathy whatsoever for the character... Because for me, the character has to start off as someone I could care about in order for that to happen, but I didn't care at all about him from the start. Actually, I cared the most about the FBI guy that was talking to him, and that says a lot, considering he didn't appear a lot in the film. The downfall of a fairly privileged white boy who probably grew up middle class or upper middle class (they said he had 2 parents that were accountants) and abused the opportunities given to him is a story that draws the overall quality of a movie down for me.

Wolf of Wall Street was just not my thing. I've never had much of a spot for films that put comedy first, and the longer and grander the scope of the film is, the worse this gets. I do think it's interesting that this is the concept that Scorcese chose to go with, not just as a storyline, but structurally speaking, as a three hour comedy film. I give the film credit for having balls and trying something relatively new with the biopic formula, but at a finer grain, pretty much all of the non-technical aspects of the film made me cringe. It just wasn't quite funny or visceral enough to make me ignore how repetitive and alienating it was.

^ here it was listed as a "crime drama," not a comedy

Oh look, Rattus thinks you have to like or sympathize with a character or else a movie loses points. I wonder what other great opinions she has.