8186 replies to this topic

[theremin]

About The Fall: 1) I was hooked from the opening credits. I'm not sure how you could hit up 30 minutes and not be moved. Although, watching it at home with distractions (at least mental, possibly physical) is a slight excuse. Still, I suppose it's not actually supposed to be moving yet. There's definitely plenty of chuckles to be had at the introduction of characters (both real and imaginary). 2) There are several "deeper meanings". The one that struck me the most is what it says about storytelling. That's honestly what got me crying. It's one thing to have the Iron Giant fly into the sky, thinking he is Superman. It's another completely to have someone telling a story about something, that you know is fake, but realize that what happens in the story relates so much to the person telling it. I don't know if I'm explaining that well, I just woke up. 3) I don't do drugs.

[Pavement Ist Rad]

In any case, making up your mind on a movie after seeing only 30 minutes of it is completely ridiculous.

On the first watches of many of my favorite movies, I wasn't convinced that they were going anywhere during the early segments. Not that I thought, "Man, this is booooring," but it wasn't until stuff started to unfold that it would all become truly affective.

[bleach]

Abandoned Baby Mama. Tried to watch this



instead.

Ed Harris is at that "makes reading the phone book interesting" stage, and Jackson was decent. Eva Mendes had more to do that just be cheesecake, here, although as cheesecake goes, she's rarely a problem. Still, I figured out the "big surprise" about a third of the way through, got bored, and turned it off. Did I miss anything?

no. this movie was bland and easy to figure out pretty much from the start.

[vamos]

I'm going to watch the Fall again in a different state of mind

[caley]

I'm going to watch the Fall again in a different state of mind

I'm going to watch The Fall sometime next week, I'm holding off renting it until 'Snow Angels' comes out on Tuesday and take advantage of that 2 for $9 deal.

[brobee]

In any case, making up your mind on a movie after seeing only 30 minutes of it is completely ridiculous.

On the first watches of many of my favorite movies, I wasn't convinced that they were going anywhere during the early segments. Not that I thought, "Man, this is booooring," but it wasn't until stuff started to unfold that it would all become truly affective.

which is why i came to the somb. this thread specifically. you people are good people, even in disagreement. and i know that i read a lot of love for this way back when. i don't give up on movies often, and i never feel good doing it. i'll give it another shot down the line when i'm a little less pre-occupied.

and theremin, your description helps a lot actually. i almost gave up on the new paul auster book for similar reasons (overly simplistic story within story structure, but i pushed through, and the end of the book totally redeemed any qualms i had about it). my rule of thumb about stories within stories: if the story within isn't compelling as a standalone, the story as a whole suffers. for a world to be convincing, the stories within it need to sound like something people would like to read or hear. i love layered narratives, they just need to feel plausible relative to the people telling and listening.

[caley]

I am not your sugar.

The Party: It's funny, there was never one part in the movie where it bothered me that Peter Sellers was not Indian. I think it was because, for the bulk of the film, it's not funny because he's Indian, it's funny because he's a goof. Anyways, this reminded me a lot of the M.Hulot films, and I have to think they were quite influential in the script-writing, what there is of it. IMDB says it was largely improvised whichs makes sense because a lot of it is really funny and imaginative, but also because some segments go on too long, and the end of the party, itself, is kind of clumsy. Either way, though, I enjoyed it a lot.



It tastes like the back of a fucking L.A. school bus.

Sideways: This is still really good. Very funny. I still can't believe that Thomas Hayden Church and Virginia Madsen got Academy Award nominations but Paul Giamatti didn't, seeing as he's the rock of the entire movie.

[AFTERSHOCK]

I am not your sugar.

The Party: It's funny, there was never one part in the movie where it bothered me that Peter Sellers was not Indian. I think it was because, for the bulk of the film, it's not funny because he's Indian, it's funny because he's a goof. Anyways, this reminded me a lot of the M.Hulot films, and I have to think they were quite influential in the script-writing, what there is of it. IMDB says it was largely improvised whichs makes sense because a lot of it is really funny and imaginative, but also because some segments go on too long, and the end of the party, itself, is kind of clumsy. Either way, though, I enjoyed it a lot.

100% OTM.
I love the Party. On the whole, it's a really sharp piece of work.
It's the perfect film to watch with some close friends the day after you throw a party. Trust me.

[Bobzilla]

Dancer In The Dark was the first movie I thought of. Heartwrenching from beginning to end.

seconded. thats my go to answer for most depressing film ever.

Lars von Trier is one of the more crazy interesting director out there.

First movie I thought of too, with The Elephant Man a close second. Dancer In The Dark is also one of the most manipulatively depressing movies I've ever seen. Lars Von Trier is completely over-the-top with the angst, but damn if I wasn't bawling like a baby.

Saw this the other night...

Elegy

Is it wrong to not like a movie because the lead character comes across as a complete asshole? I'm unfamiliar with the Philip Roth novel The Dying Animal that this was based on, but after watching this I don't want to get familiar. Elegy is well-acted, but all that does is make Ben Kingsley's David character a completely convincing womanizing, self-absorbed asshole. Dennis Hopper is a good and surprisingly low-key presence in this. And I must be getting old if I think Patricia Clarkson is a hotter and cooler presence than Penelope Cruz. The movie takes an unwelcome turn toward the maudlin to rescue David's assholiness

Spoiler

with Dennis Hopper's George character kicking off (but not before some "I love you man" soliloquies) and Penelope Cruz getting breast cancer.

"Poor Penelope Cruz's breast!" said my companion at the end of this. That was about the depth of my feelings too. Disappointing.

[Tony]

Does Dave Kehr clarify things?

We may still be waiting for the Great American Novel, but John Ford gave us the Great American Film in 1956. The Searchers gathers the deepest concerns of American literature, distilling 200 years of tradition in a way available only to popular art, and with a beauty available only to a supreme visual poet like Ford. Through the central image of the frontier, the meeting point of wilderness and civilization, Ford explores the divisions of our national character, with its search for order and its need for violence, its spirit of community and its quest for independence.

He's certainly explaining the themes that may or may not exist in the film, but I still don't understand what makes the film great. The drama isn't terribly compelling, the characters aren't very well-drawn (no explanation for John Wayne's change of heart at the end). The comic relief (the bit with the squaw, the bathtub stuff, the wedding fight scene which feels like a Mel Brooks film) feels out of place.

Certainly the landscapes are beautiful, but it doesn't take a "supreme visual poet" to make those landscapes look that way. And there's nothing in the way its shot or constructed that implies anything deeper. The themes Kehr is describing are themes that can be found in pretty much any Western, if one interprets hard enough.

'The Searchers' also questions assumptions Ford had been making in his own films. The frontiersman character (Wayne) is shown to be a loathsome racist. Very few Hollywood westerns of the time were so conflicted about the kind of men who are needed to establish 'nationhood' establish 'nationhood'. It should be seen in the context of the Civil Rights movement.

The fact that I haven't seen many Ford films or even many Western films from that era might account for my lack of appreciation for The Searchers. I'll have to watch it again in a decade or so.

I watched it again yesterday and am still blown away by it. It makes more routine films like 'Unforgiven' shrivel to insiginificance.

Is there any other protoganist of the classic American Western as borderline psychotic as Wayne's character? Or scenes as disturbing as the preparation for the Comanche Raid at the beginning and the Refuge House for crazed white girls after being 'soiled' by Indians.

Arthur Eckstine puts it well..."The Searchers is one of those rare films that reveals something new with every viewing...so dense with meaning the only way to understand it is to slow the projection time to equal the five year diegetic time."

[Slackmo]

Man, Jules was a wet blanket and a half. Mox totally should've opted for indulging in the Whipped Cream Bikini.

[Ogawa]

Just watched The Fall. What an incredible film. I did not expect to be so engaged. Going in, I was thinking I'd be annoyed that the main fantasy material was a story within a story, but I was surprised to find I was just as enthralled with the real story (of the little girl and the man in the hospital) as I was with the fictional story. Perhaps more so. The relationship between the man and the little girl is so touching, and the acting so natural. This film played with my emotions. Yeah, I cried a few times.

And the images are so gorgeous. This film demonstrates exactly what's wrong with so many CG epics. The real world, with all the wonderful architecture and landscapes, is far more beautiful than anything a man at a computer could ever make.

I loved this film. The ending stuntman montage is one of my favorite things I've seen in film this year.

[caley]

I'll go to your room, but you'll have to seduce me.

Vicky Christina Barcelona: I enjoyed this much more than I expected to. It actually didn't seem like a Woody Allen flick at all, more like a less raunchy Almodovar. Fun performances, good dialogue. I thought the "square" characters were a little too dorky ("Oh great, a Rorshach blot!", in particular, and that guy standing around in his boxers with slippers on), but I was greatly surprised/satisfied by the ending. Also, this movie is pretty much a love letter to Scarlett Johanssen from Woody Allen much like My Life to Live is Godard's tribute to Anna Karina.



Prepare to suck the cock of karma!

Pineapple Express: Man, there were three people in the theater, counting myself, and it was still loud (A pox on people who yell "Ohhh!" every time somebody gets shot, congratulate actors for good punches ("That was a good one, man!"), make racist jokes, and chat on their cellphones. A dirty pox!). It was a lot of fun, though, and so vintage David Gordon Green with the random nature shots. I can't wait for the sequel.

[Tony]

I'll go to your room, but you'll have to seduce me.

Vicky Christina Barcelona: I enjoyed this much more than I expected to. It actually didn't seem like a Woody Allen flick at all, more like a less raunchy Almodovar. Fun performances, good dialogue. I thought the "square" characters were a little too dorky ("Oh great, a Rorshach blot!", in particular, and that guy standing around in his boxers with slippers on), but I was greatly surprised/satisfied by the ending. Also, this movie is pretty much a love letter to Scarlett Johanssen from Woody Allen much like My Life to Live is Godard's tribute to Anna Karina.

VCB struck me as flimsy tripe. There's nothing more annoying than a voice over narrator telling you how smart and cultured a character is and you never actually see that character in the act of being smart and cultured. There was nothing to any of those characters. It feels like Allen just filmed a first draft.

[Pavement Ist Rad]

Just watched The Fall. What an incredible film. I did not expect to be so engaged. Going in, I was thinking I'd be annoyed that the main fantasy material was a story within a story, but I was surprised to find I was just as enthralled with the real story (of the little girl and the man in the hospital) as I was with the fictional story. Perhaps more so. The relationship between the man and the little girl is so touching, and the acting so natural. This film played with my emotions. Yeah, I cried a few times.

Yes, this is the camp that I fall into (no pun intended... well, I didn't bother to delete it, so I guess it is actually intended.) Not the "ALL FLASH, NO SUBSTANCE, WOW, I AM A SOULLESS FUCK" camp.

Vicky Christina Barcelona was good. Spot on about it not totally feeling like a Woody Allen film for obvious reasons, although the awkwardness of Rebecca Hall (well, during the early scenes) and Scarlett Johansson trying to play Woody's characters and recite his dialogue definitely brought to mind Allen's other recent attempts at utilizing young actors in this day and age.

[Ogawa]

VCB struck me as flimsy tripe. There's nothing more annoying than a voice over narrator telling you how smart and cultured a character is and you never actually see that character in the act of being smart and cultured. There was nothing to any of those characters. It feels like Allen just filmed a first draft.

I thought some of that was more or less the point. That these are characters who think they are smart and cultured, but are really just young and confused. It wouldn't be the first time Woody Allen has made a film along those lines. I thought the narrator was less-than-serious, maybe a little sarcastic, like the one from Little Children.

[caley]

I'll go to your room, but you'll have to seduce me.

Vicky Christina Barcelona: I enjoyed this much more than I expected to. It actually didn't seem like a Woody Allen flick at all, more like a less raunchy Almodovar. Fun performances, good dialogue. I thought the "square" characters were a little too dorky ("Oh great, a Rorshach blot!", in particular, and that guy standing around in his boxers with slippers on), but I was greatly surprised/satisfied by the ending. Also, this movie is pretty much a love letter to Scarlett Johanssen from Woody Allen much like My Life to Live is Godard's tribute to Anna Karina.

VCB struck me as flimsy tripe. There's nothing more annoying than a voice over narrator telling you how smart and cultured a character is and you never actually see that character in the act of being smart and cultured. There was nothing to any of those characters. It feels like Allen just filmed a first draft.

Yeah, but would you really want to watch any of the characters reading a book, discussing philosophy? It's not exactly entertaining.

[Tony]

I'll go to your room, but you'll have to seduce me.

Vicky Christina Barcelona: I enjoyed this much more than I expected to. It actually didn't seem like a Woody Allen flick at all, more like a less raunchy Almodovar. Fun performances, good dialogue. I thought the "square" characters were a little too dorky ("Oh great, a Rorshach blot!", in particular, and that guy standing around in his boxers with slippers on), but I was greatly surprised/satisfied by the ending. Also, this movie is pretty much a love letter to Scarlett Johanssen from Woody Allen much like My Life to Live is Godard's tribute to Anna Karina.

VCB struck me as flimsy tripe. There's nothing more annoying than a voice over narrator telling you how smart and cultured a character is and you never actually see that character in the act of being smart and cultured. There was nothing to any of those characters. It feels like Allen just filmed a first draft.

VCB struck me as flimsy tripe. There's nothing more annoying than a voice over narrator telling you how smart and cultured a character is and you never actually see that character in the act of being smart and cultured. There was nothing to any of those characters. It feels like Allen just filmed a first draft.

I thought some of that was more or less the point. That these are characters who think they are smart and cultured, but are really just young and confused. It wouldn't be the first time Woody Allen has made a film along those lines. I thought the narrator was less-than-serious, maybe a little sarcastic, like the one from Little Children.

If that was the case then there wasn't enough expressive hay made from the it. Just about every character in the film is some sort of artist or poet and we never hear them discuss exactly what it is they think about their Art and/or the world much less even get more than a passing glimpse of their work.

I'll go to your room, but you'll have to seduce me.

Vicky Christina Barcelona: I enjoyed this much more than I expected to. It actually didn't seem like a Woody Allen flick at all, more like a less raunchy Almodovar. Fun performances, good dialogue. I thought the "square" characters were a little too dorky ("Oh great, a Rorshach blot!", in particular, and that guy standing around in his boxers with slippers on), but I was greatly surprised/satisfied by the ending. Also, this movie is pretty much a love letter to Scarlett Johanssen from Woody Allen much like My Life to Live is Godard's tribute to Anna Karina.

VCB struck me as flimsy tripe. There's nothing more annoying than a voice over narrator telling you how smart and cultured a character is and you never actually see that character in the act of being smart and cultured. There was nothing to any of those characters. It feels like Allen just filmed a first draft.

Yeah, but would you really want to watch any of the characters reading a book, discussing philosophy? It's not exactly entertaining.

Well I thought Waking Life was entertaining. There is a way to make a character's intelligence and erudition function dramatically and not just have someone tell the audience about it and proceed to take it for granted.

[caley]

Mama, I'll see you again tonight in my head movies. But this head movies makes my eyes rain!

Tropic Thunder: This was pretty awesome. Hilarious send-up of Hollywood cliches, including war movies, movies about the mentally-challenged, overtly alpha male hip hop artists, big studios, and the movie business, in general. Great cast, too, was surprised at the amount of screen-time for Jay Baruchel and Danny McBride, who are two of my favourite "Hey! It's that guy!" actors going right now.

[Freddie Freelance]

Man, Jules was a wet blanket and a half. Mox totally should've opted for indulging in the Whipped Cream Bikini.

Absolutely! I have no idea which movie you mean, but indulging in the Whipped Cream Bikini would improve nearly every movie in theaters today.