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Post by President Hound on Aug 4, 2020 19:31:58 GMT -5
been watching those made for DVD DC animated movies on HBO Max.
besides the rock solid Return of the Joker, they are either lifeless adaptations of classic comics or overly edgy garbage.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 4, 2020 22:58:35 GMT -5
been watching those made for DVD DC animated movies on HBO Max. besides the rock solid Return of the Joker, they are either lifeless adaptations of classic comics or overly edgy garbage. Return of Joker is actually part of the DCAU canon, the rest are not and don't have many of the people behind the genius of the DCAU left. Bruce Timm is still involved, but let's not talk about that.
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Post by President Hound on Aug 4, 2020 23:50:56 GMT -5
been watching those made for DVD DC animated movies on HBO Max. besides the rock solid Return of the Joker, they are either lifeless adaptations of classic comics or overly edgy garbage. Return of Joker is actually part of the DCAU canon, the rest are not and don't have many of the people behind the genius of the DCAU left. Bruce Timm is still involved, but let's not talk about that. yeah, without Dwayne McDuffie who seemed to be the guy behind the whimsy, it feels? bleh.
and the whole animation in RoJ actually being good. characters actually moves.
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Post by Ben Grimm on Aug 5, 2020 7:35:35 GMT -5
Return of Joker is actually part of the DCAU canon, the rest are not and don't have many of the people behind the genius of the DCAU left. Bruce Timm is still involved, but let's not talk about that. yeah, without Dwayne McDuffie who seemed to be the guy behind the whimsy, it feels? bleh.
and the whole animation in RoJ actually being good. characters actually moves.
In an alternate, better world, Dwayne McDuffie is DC's Kevin Feige and the DCEU is at least arguably as good as the MCU.
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Post by Powerthirteen on Aug 5, 2020 20:57:58 GMT -5
Robin Hood (1973)
I haven’t seen this since I was a kid. As an adult my major takeaway is that I really want a hit of whatever Peter Ustinov was smoking to produce this vocal performance. The rest of it is also nice, and the archery tournament reduced my five year old to giggling hysterics.
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Post by Powerthirteen on Aug 5, 2020 21:01:53 GMT -5
Filled in a major gap this weekend with The Blues Brothers. Hot take time: hey, you know what, The Blues Brothers is a really entertaining movie. And as it involves nazis and disproportionately violent overreaction by law enforcement officials, it's surprisingly relevant forty years later. Even taking the dark glasses and black hat into account, Dan Aykroyd is unrecognisable. On the evidence of this and Sneakers, he should have done more dancing in movies. ”The use of unnecessary violence in the apprehension of the Blues Brothers.... has been approved.” Possibly the funniest thing in this movie is the hordes of cops at the end all mindlessly going “HUT HUT HUT HUT!” as they rappel into downtown Chicago and whatever.
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Post by Nudeviking on Aug 5, 2020 21:35:32 GMT -5
Andre the Giant (2018) - Like most thing related to professional wrestling this was equal parts funny and sad. One moment you’d have Ric Flair grinning like a jackass while implying that Andre’s cock was the size of an elephant’s trunk and then the next second you’d have people talking about how much pain he was in during WrestleMania III but how he still went out there because of his love of wrestling. I absolutely love the old territorial wrestling stuff so getting to see a bunch of footage of Andre from that period was cool. There might have been a bit too much Hogan in the back half though it kind of makes sense due to how interconnected their careers were for awhile.
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Post by sarapen on Aug 6, 2020 7:15:51 GMT -5
been watching those made for DVD DC animated movies on HBO Max. besides the rock solid Return of the Joker, they are either lifeless adaptations of classic comics or overly edgy garbage. Did you watch the cyberpunk Batman show or did you go into this one blind? I think you can watch this movie without having watched the series.
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Post by President Hound on Aug 6, 2020 11:40:06 GMT -5
been watching those made for DVD DC animated movies on HBO Max. besides the rock solid Return of the Joker, they are either lifeless adaptations of classic comics or overly edgy garbage. Did you watch the cyberpunk Batman show or did you go into this one blind? I think you can watch this movie without having watched the series. I watched a handful of episodes when I was in middle school.
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repulsionist
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Post by repulsionist on Aug 6, 2020 19:19:39 GMT -5
Spiral (1978)
Finally, I found the meagre European film offerings in Netflix Australasia. This happened to show up under the search string '19'. I chose 'Movies from the 1970s'. The last entry, after US nostalgia films, after Hong Kong action and martial art films, after Bollywood films, was this straggler. It's a Polish film. It concerns a belligerent asswipe who's intent on assuring everyone in a Tatran (section of the Carpathian range) lodge that they know nothing and are dim bulbs. Said twerp irritates the varieties of Poles in the lodge of all archetypes, moodily smokes some cigarettes, then proceeds to go on a climb with borrowed equipment. The outdoor shots of Morskie Oko and surrounding High Tatras in winter are stunning. I haven't finished the film yet, and the basic plot is laid bare by initial action in the first 5 minutes. But, I'm actually excited to finish it sometime in the near term when I have access and time. I feel so proud that I found something engaging and new, even if it's chronologically old.
Prior to finding Spiral I started Alibaba Aur 40 Chor (1980). This is an Indian-Russian collaboration. The Uzbek horse riding skills on display in the intro are awesome, though poorly filmed. I couldn't sustain interest so I moved to investigate further until I landed on Spiral.
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repulsionist
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Post by repulsionist on Aug 9, 2020 18:31:15 GMT -5
She's Gotta Have It (1986)
First time viewing. I knew of it. I watched the At the Movies review of this as a soon-to-be high school sophomore. I saw Do The Right Thing in cinema on its release weekend because to of the culture buzz around Spike Lee and a nascent adoration of Public Enemy. Shoestring budget in 1980s Fort Greene. Gawd did NYC and its boroughs look nice at the edge of Giuliani-fication. That upward shot of Brooklyn Bridge. Squee! All the rest of the shots look amazing. The static blur photos on the subway were well used. And, his dad's soundtrack smokes! What a vibrant film. The switch to colour at the birthday surprise for Nola was so brilliant, despite my having seen the effect before. The Thanksgiving dinner scene was also shrewd cinema; like part Scorsese and part Neil Simon. I like that Nola remains empowered throughout the film. Even with the glibly-staged rape, she remains the owner of her power to choose. Johns did some great acting work. At no point during the run time did I feel she lost her sense of who the character was and where they were in the drama of the film. I felt a lot of Classics' influence in the dramatic shifts, as well as theatre, one-room play movements. The phones killed me. I remember those handsets with the dial pad in the microphone end.
I watched this with my wife. We had some laughs at the 'Dog Section' of the film. Some of the more silly and vain male behaviour from Greer Childs got a chuckle out of us both. Mars Blackmon's dialog and speech rhythms were a treat. Jamie's character arc is there to build some of the drama. The fourth wall interviews appear to forecast reality television's 'aside as interview' style (e.g. The Real World). Overall, we both appreciated this as the breakthrough it was heralded as some 35 years ago.
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Post by ganews on Aug 9, 2020 23:11:43 GMT -5
covid week 21 movies
The Lady from Shanghai What a mixed-up movie. Orson Welles puts on a decent Irish brogue and gets mixed up with some insane and unhappy rich people. The lady of the title is Rita Hayworth, but her history in Shanghai serves no purpose other than to help along the climax in San Francisco's Chinatown. It's hard to understand the plot from first principles, and the twists are unveiled mainly through exposition. The Chinese funhouse and hall of mirrors make no sense, honestly, but they really are quite the setpiece, and Welles has a way with broken glass shots. Then the whole thing just ends with philosophizing. The star performance is Glenn Anders as George Grisby, the conniving and perhaps playfully insane law partner. His is one of the most uncomfortable performances ever - not like he's going to murder you like Robert Mitchum, just that he's someone who makes your skin crawl. I wonder if the character is coded as gay? It's a plot point that he doesn't have a wife but also that is explicitly a twist, and he seems to be into Rita Hayworth.. Everette Sloane from Citizen Kane also delivers as the handicapped, paranoid(?), brilliant defense lawyer except the whole courtroom scene is an absolute joke. The way the jury and judge behave as comic relief in the middle of an 87-minute slow-burn, it must be some kind of commentary.
Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome By far the Mad Max movie I have seen the least. And while I've seen the back half of it several times, I can't clearly recall any of it from before the kids shave Mel Gibson so he stops looking like Braveheart. The thunderdome itself is pretty silly; obviously it would be a lot easier to maneuver if you were strapped ,into the rubber trapeze, though at least it inspired that one game in American Gladiators. Pretty cool that the guy who plays the little Master was in Freaks, Wizard of Oz and a bunch of other stuff. The rescue premise makes a lot of sense actually, that there's only one guy who kinda knows how to make technological society function, and without that guy everyone who spent all their time making fetish gear is screwed. The kid tribe really screws up the whole timeline of the premise. Also it's uncomfortable that the oldest girl and oldest guy are obviously old enough to screw around with each other, explain that to the eight-year-olds. The mandatory chase-escape is really tacked-on.
Metalocalypse: The Doomstar Requiem - A Klok Opera I watched Metalocalypse from the beginning through the third season. Then I finished grad school, and my consumption of all things animated fell off dramatically. I picked it back up by rewatching the third season, then the fourth, and now this grand finale (which shouldn't have been the finale). It's bloated and over-the-top, in other words fitting both as a rock opera and for this show. The conspiracy throughline also amounts to pretty much nothing, as that was always the least interesting part, lasted about 60 seconds per episode, and was generally finished with "let's see what happens". Solid capper with a little tease for the future. I don't know why Adult Swim decided against a fifth season; maybe it's because they sucked in many ways, even during the salad days of the 2000s when there was a lot of great output.
Full Metal Jacket I don't even know why I put this on. I've seen it before and I don't really like it. I suppose because it's a brutal message but one that I already know and don't want to hear again. Yet I don't feel this way about other Vietnam or military experience movies, of which I think Jarhead (a movie I like) might be the best comparison.
War Dogs Todd Philips directs another very bro-y movie, a crime drama in his ongoing attempt to be Scorsese. Miles Teller, already high on the list of insufferable screen presences, gets to make out with Ana de Armas years before Knives Out. Jonah Hill fuses his characters from Superbad and The Wolf of Wall Street. The plot is about small-time arms dealers making a play and may otherwise be summed up with a line from All the President's Men: "The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand."
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Post by chalkdevil 😈 on Aug 10, 2020 14:38:10 GMT -5
Knives Out Baby fell asleep early enough and my wife wasn't too tired to watch a movie together. Pretty rare event these days. And, hey, this was a pretty good movie. It was enjoyable and, for a modern murder mystery movie, it was easy enough to follow without being too obvious. I was a little worried since I remember not really keeping up with Brick the one time I watched it 15 years ago, so was happy this went more the Clue route than the neo-noir route*.
*I've decided I don't really like neo-noir detective stories. Maybe too many double crosses or confusing mysteries that I don't feel are actually solvable in the context of the movie. Maybe it's because I am bad at registering character names and can't keep up with who is being talked about. Anyway, I've decided it's not my thing.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 11, 2020 11:02:14 GMT -5
Life (2017)
Nothing you haven't seen before (it follows the Alien formula beat-for-beat) but a decently good time if you're looking for space-monster mayhem.
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Post by The Sensational She-Hulk on Aug 11, 2020 14:43:55 GMT -5
Andre the Giant (2018) - Like most thing related to professional wrestling this was equal parts funny and sad. One moment you’d have Ric Flair grinning like a jackass while implying that Andre’s cock was the size of an elephant’s trunk and then the next second you’d have people talking about how much pain he was in during WrestleMania III but how he still went out there because of his love of wrestling. I absolutely love the old territorial wrestling stuff so getting to see a bunch of footage of Andre from that period was cool. There might have been a bit too much Hogan in the back half though it kind of makes sense due to how interconnected their careers were for awhile. I saw this when it first came out and I cried the rest of the afternoon because what really got me, in addition to learning how much pain the poor guy was in on a constant basis, was how goddamn mean people were to him. I was so overwhelmed by the revelation of how random strangers thought nothing of making him a spectacle or mocking him for their own amusement...although unfortunately, I was not surprised.
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Post by Powerthirteen on Aug 11, 2020 15:15:27 GMT -5
covid week 21 movies
The Lady from Shanghai What a mixed-up movie. Orson Welles puts on a decent Irish brogue and gets mixed up with some insane and unhappy rich people. The lady of the title is Rita Hayworth, but her history in Shanghai serves no purpose other than to help along the climax in San Francisco's Chinatown. It's hard to understand the plot from first principles, and the twists are unveiled mainly through exposition. The Chinese funhouse and hall of mirrors make no sense, honestly, but they really are quite the setpiece, and Welles has a way with broken glass shots. Then the whole thing just ends with philosophizing. The star performance is Glenn Anders as George Grisby, the conniving and perhaps playfully insane law partner. His is one of the most uncomfortable performances ever - not like he's going to murder you like Robert Mitchum, just that he's someone who makes your skin crawl. I wonder if the character is coded as gay? It's a plot point that he doesn't have a wife but also that is explicitly a twist, and he seems to be into Rita Hayworth.. Everette Sloane from Citizen Kane also delivers as the handicapped, paranoid(?), brilliant defense lawyer except the whole courtroom scene is an absolute joke. The way the jury and judge behave as comic relief in the middle of an 87-minute slow-burn, it must be some kind of commentary. I don’t think this movie has as much Lost Potential as The Magnificent Ambersons - the long weird courtroom scene, which iirc is one of the few sections that more or less matches up w Welles’ original, suggests to me that he might have been in serious need of a story edit to focus the tone - but damned if I still wouldn’t love to see a non-butchered version of this.
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Post by Nudeviking on Aug 11, 2020 18:58:09 GMT -5
Andre the Giant (2018) - Like most thing related to professional wrestling this was equal parts funny and sad. One moment you’d have Ric Flair grinning like a jackass while implying that Andre’s cock was the size of an elephant’s trunk and then the next second you’d have people talking about how much pain he was in during WrestleMania III but how he still went out there because of his love of wrestling. I absolutely love the old territorial wrestling stuff so getting to see a bunch of footage of Andre from that period was cool. There might have been a bit too much Hogan in the back half though it kind of makes sense due to how interconnected their careers were for awhile. I saw this when it first came out and I cried the rest of the afternoon because what really got me, in addition to learning how much pain the poor guy was in on a constant basis, was how goddamn mean people were to him. I was so overwhelmed by the revelation of how random strangers thought nothing of making him a spectacle or mocking him for their own amusement...although unfortunately, I was not surprised. Yes, that was another bit that I'd put over on the "wrestling is remarkably sad" side of the equation. I can't remember which talking head said it or exactly how it was worded since my daughter was painting my fingernails and was telling me not to move during the segment but the part about how unlike other wrestlers or actors or celebrities who can put on sunglasses and a hat and just kind of disappear into anonymity Andre was always going to get gawked at even if he was just a guy on account of being as huge as he was. It was something I'd never even thought about with regards to him but once I did was bummed out.
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Post by Nudeviking on Aug 11, 2020 19:03:02 GMT -5
AVP: Alien vs. Predator (2004) - I'm pretty sure that the Predator and Ice Climber lady would have fucked at the end of the movie if not for that lousy Alien.
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Post by Nudeviking on Aug 12, 2020 19:11:25 GMT -5
Power of Grayskull: The Definitive History of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (2017) - This was a decent enough documentary about the He-Man and She-Ra franchise. I'd heard some of the stories in the He-Man episode of that Netflix series, The Toys That Made Us, but this one was less centrally focused on the toy line specifically so we got more detailed accounts from people who worked on the show and the movie and the comics than we did in the Netflix one. I don't know if anyone who didn't grow up with these toys would give a shit about any of this stuff though.
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LazBro
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Post by LazBro on Aug 13, 2020 10:57:47 GMT -5
Uncut Gems - AKA "Two plus hours of bad people yelling the f-word at each other very loudly."
I dunno. It's certainly a spectacle, and Adam Sandler delivers a great performance - I never once even thought about it being Adam Sandler. You buy into Howard as Howard right away. - but it's so frustrating to watch this man destroy himself, and the ending, while appropriate, is just kind of a bummer and leaves you wondering what it was all for. (For nothing, which was maybe the whole point, but as an arc it left me unsatisfied.)
It's a hell of a thing though. Love its use of real people playing themselves, or nearly so.
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Post by songstarliner on Aug 13, 2020 15:00:56 GMT -5
Uncut Gems - AKA "Two plus hours of bad people yelling the f-word at each other very loudly."
I dunno. It's certainly a spectacle, and Adam Sandler delivers a great performance - I never once even thought about it being Adam Sandler. You buy into Howard as Howard right away. - but it's so frustrating to watch this man destroy himself, and the ending, while appropriate, is just kind of a bummer and leaves you wondering what it was all for. (For nothing, which was maybe the whole point, but as an arc it left me unsatisfied.)
It's a hell of a thing though. Love its use of real people playing themselves, or nearly so.
I liked it the first time round, and I still think it's a hell of a thing, but I didn't last twenty minutes of a re-watch - way, waaaaaay too much yelling.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 16, 2020 0:44:39 GMT -5
Power of Grayskull: The Definitive History of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (2017) - This was a decent enough documentary about the He-Man and She-Ra franchise. I'd heard some of the stories in the He-Man episode of that Netflix series, The Toys That Made Us, but this one was less centrally focused on the toy line specifically so we got more detailed accounts from people who worked on the show and the movie and the comics than we did in the Netflix one. I don't know if anyone who didn't grow up with these toys would give a shit about any of this stuff though. The production of the live action movie is fascinating imo, also just that movie in general. Did it get into the remake series from the early 2000s at all, or did it more stick to the early stuff?
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Post by Nudeviking on Aug 16, 2020 3:18:08 GMT -5
Power of Grayskull: The Definitive History of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (2017) - This was a decent enough documentary about the He-Man and She-Ra franchise. I'd heard some of the stories in the He-Man episode of that Netflix series, The Toys That Made Us, but this one was less centrally focused on the toy line specifically so we got more detailed accounts from people who worked on the show and the movie and the comics than we did in the Netflix one. I don't know if anyone who didn't grow up with these toys would give a shit about any of this stuff though. The production of the live action movie is fascinating imo, also just that movie in general. Did it get into the remake series from the early 2000s at all, or did it more stick to the early stuff? They touched on the remake toys and the fact that there were tie-in comics and a cartoon but not in any sort of great detail beyond the fact that the people working on them were all fans of the original cartoon and toys when they were kids.
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Post by Nudeviking on Aug 16, 2020 7:37:15 GMT -5
Jason and the Argonauts (1963) - I don’t know if this was recently added to Netflix or was something that’s been there the entire time that they only decided to tell me about because I watched the right combination of bullshit. Either way this is the sort of movie I wish Netflix had way more of: pre-2000s “genre films.”
As for the movie itself I’ve seen it dozens of times before since it used to be on TV all the time in the 1980s and early 90s. I’ve probably not seen it in close to 20 years but it still rules ass! I mean how could any movie where hirsute barrel chested dudes battle giant bronze sentinels, screaming bird monsters, hydras, and skeleton warriors not? Speaking of all those awesome monsters I still absolutely Ray Harryhausen’s effects. Sure they might not look as “realistic” as modern CGI shit but they’re more charming and in a way feel more organic and natural.
Anyway this was great and I hope that it’s a sign that Netflix is going to start adding more stuff that populated the Saturday Matinees and Midnight Movies of my childhood television.
Errementari: The Blacksmith and the Devil (2017) - Things I learned from this movie:
1. Demons, much like draculas, suffer from arithmomania and will obsessively count small items that you scatter about the ground. 2. When you die and go to Hell you get to carry random trinkets with you that you can use to harass the agents of Hell. 3. There’s a Basque language that sounds absolutely unlike any of the other languages of Europe that I’m familiar with.
As for the film it’s set in the Basque Country after the first Carlist War and centers on an old blacksmith who lives off in the woods outside of a particular town. All the townfolk are afraid of him and it turns out that fear’s a bit justified. It turns out he sold his soul to a demon in order to survive the war but now keeps that demon imprisoned in his smithy and heaps abuse upon it for all the personal misfortunes that the smith blames the demon for.
There’s a small girl that the townfolk are dicks to and a plot about missing gold that results in both the blacksmith and the demon being redeemed for their misdeeds and the townfolk coming to respecting the small girlchild they were previously dicks to.
Good movie that’s well worth checking out if you want a horror movie that’s more fantastical than gory or terrifying. Also maybe start carrying around a satchel of chickpeas in case you come across a demon in your travels and need to beat a hasty retreat.
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repulsionist
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Post by repulsionist on Aug 16, 2020 16:39:44 GMT -5
Oceans (2009)
Did you know Disney owns the oceans now? Well, they do. And, this is how much of them you get to see with the Standard Pass - as delivered by the producer of Costas-Gavras' films and later Microcosmos and still later the magnificence of the flying dinosaurs that leave green bombs everywhere: Winged Migration. English narration by Bond #6, wherein some lines are lovingly faltered over in general awe of the hubristic folly at play.
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Post by ganews on Aug 16, 2020 19:40:13 GMT -5
covid week 22 movies
Moby Dick (1956) Not bad but of course an imperfect adaptation that can't help but leave out most of the best parts of the book (the regular and dangerous operations of a whaling vessel, not really great cinematic material). Other major changes are the absence of the Zoroastrians and using Fedalla's death for Ahab's. On the former I guess the producers figured they couldn't have a non-Christian foretelling doom (that's the white Elijah's job, and Queequeg's bones notably are inaccurate), and on the latter Ahab's book death would have looked too gruesome on-screen. Hey wait this screenplay is by Ray Bradbury! I guess he wanted to keep only the God & Man themes from the book. Gregory Peck as Ahab makes the big speeches and chews the big oceanic scenery. They found a tall Austrian to play Queequeg, the coolest character in the book by far, and he does a good enough job that I wish the movie were longer so he could do more.
The Talented Mr. Ripley I wonder how many critics at the time cranked out the phrase "the talented Mr. Damon". Now I know where the casting decision for Behind the Candelabra came from. The movie really slow-plays the title character's sexuality; it's obvious early on that he wants to *be* playboy Jude Law (who wouldn't?) but warms up to the idea that he wants to be *with* Jude Law (who wouldn't?). And while that's the headline-grabber, Damon is convincing as a dork too. Gwyneth Paltrow has some kind of accent in the beginning that goes away 30 minutes in, Cate Blanchett does a light-Katherine Hepburn, Philip Seymour Hoffman does a jaded act. Gosh the rich dad played by James Rebhorn is dumb. Cool to see Philip Baker Hall as the American detective.
3:10 to Yuma (2007) Another Elmore Leonard adaptation where the protagonist and antagonist have comity and even alliance. The cast is filled with a bunch of actors playing familiar types from their past (and future) movies: Russell Crowe as the supremely capable and tough renegade; Christian Bale as the beaten-down but honorable man who is capable in the end; Gretchen Mol as the concerned wife; Alan Tudyk as the nerd who dies. It's pretty good action. It's not really clear why Russell Crowe carries his respect for the busted rancher so far, other than being a Leonard work. Plus I guess Luke Wilson just wanted to be in a western for some reason, because he has about four disposable lines despite being the third- or fourth-biggest star here.
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Floyd D Barber
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Post by Floyd D Barber on Aug 16, 2020 23:55:03 GMT -5
Metropolis 1927 (2011 restoration, I think)
SPOILERS FOR A 93 YEAR OLD MOVIE
I had seen the older, viciously edited 90 odd minute version before, and this restoration restores much to the story.
I like to watch silent movies sometimes. If you ever watch silent movies, you will immediately notice (with very few exceptions) that there is no nuance or subtlety in the characters movements or expressions. The performances are in no way naturalistic. You just have to accept that. I think that is one reason a lot of people are put off by silent films, all that vamping and camping makes them seem sort of amateurish at first. But this doesn't indicate any lack of professionalism, or lack of skill or training by the performers. My understanding is that in that era, when film itself was still very new, virtually all the actors, and most of the crew came from a stage background, where playing to the cheap seats was a necessity. Mannerisms and expressions had to be exaggerated because the majority of the audience was physically far away from the stage. As actors' and directors' experiences with this new medium grew, along with technical advancements, a far more realistic performance style became possible. But not yet.
So, Metropolis is considered a classic, and one of the finest and most famous silent films. It is a visual and technical masterpiece. The plot, not so much. Fritz Lang himself stated that it sort of went off the rails, and the announced "message" of the film, "The Mediator Between Head and Hands Must Be the Heart" was dumb and didn't really make much sense. He also hated the way that the Nazis later heaped praise on their interpretation of it's meanings (and that his wife and screenplay co-writer, Thea Von Harbou, divorced him and joined the Nazi party.)
I watched this under the influence of painkillers and melatonin, which I believe is the best way to view it. This might have influenced my perceptions of it.
The plot, while having several gaping holes, is more or less coherent. It sums up like this: Dad runs city. Son is a pampered frat-bro. Son meets an Angelic Social Reformer for about three minutes, falls in love. Son goes looking for ASR in worker slums, sees workers getting screwed over and injured. Son goes full commie. Dad gets pissed. MEANWHILE, IN ANOTHER PART OF TOWN, a Mad Scientist is inventing robot sex doll to replace his dead crush, who dumped him and married Dad, and died giving birth to Son. Dad is pissed at both Son, and workers. He approaches Mad Scientist with a proposition: make robot sex doll look like Angelic Social Reformer, let her loose to discredit ASR, sow discontent among the workers, and party hardy. That genius plan works out about as well as one might expect. Chaos ensues.
Most of the characters have deep flaws. Some overcome them, some don't. Almost all of them makes stupid decisions at some point.
Joh Fredersen (Dad) is an asshole. Absolute corporate prick. He fires his long time assistant (Josaphat) for something out of his control. He sends his goon (The Thin Man) to spy on his Son (Freder)*, he has no regard for the safety or welfare of his workers, yet doesn't seem to care when they riot and threaten destroy the city. He does have a couple of moments of humanity, however. When he talks to Rotwang (the Mad Scientist) and Rotwang is screaming at him about Hel (Rotwang's dead crush, JF's dead wife, F's dead mother) JF quietly says to him basically "let her go, she's as dead to me as she is to you", and he does care about his son.
Freder (Son) starts out as a pampered rich kid**. When he sees Maria (the Angelic Social Reformer) he is instantly smitten. At first, he just goes into the worker city deep underground to find her, but when he sees the conditions the workers labor under, and witnesses a horrific explosion which kills and maims several workers. he immediately realizes that something is rotten in old Metropolis, and to his credit, he tries to do something about it.
Maria (Angelic Social Reformer) is a good soul. She is first seen bringing a group of the workers' children up to the rich peoples playground so they can see how "their brothers" live, and to make the rich assholes see those kids. She is meeting with the workers, trying to help organize them, while stressing the need for non-violence. Later on, when shit gets real, she risks her life trying to save a group of the worker's kids.
Rotwang is an ancestor of the incels. He fumes and rages because Hel married JF, and died giving birth to F. His lost crush consumes him. He's building this robot, but his motives are never clearly stated. Was he going to set it lose to attack his perceived enemies? Was he just going to bionk it? We never learn. He's pretty much minding his own business when JF comes to him asking him to decipher a drawing (McGuffin) found in the pocket of an injured worker. Rotwang goes apeshit when he sees JF, yells at him about Hel, and then shows JF his robot he's building, like "What you been doing, bitch? I been building a robot." That is when JF has his brilliant plan to have his sworn mortal enemy work for him and turn loose this robot to wreak havoc. No way that could possibly go wrong.
Rotwang captures Maria and forms the robot to look just like her. He throws a bash to introduce the robot (Not-Maria) to society.***
Josaphat has been JF's loyal number two man for many years. When JF hears of the explosion in the factory from Freder instead of Josaphat, he fires him. When JF kicks you to the curb, you are on the shit list forever. Josaphat goes out into the hall to blow his brains out, but Freder stops him. Josaphat agrees to work with Freder to find Maria and improve the workers conditions. Josaphat consistently does the right thing, while getting very little credit or recognition. When the violence breaks out, he puts himself in harm's way to help save people. If he says he's going to do something, he does it.
The Thin Man is JF's black bag man. He is sent to spy on Freder. He tries to intimidate Josaphat (unsuccessfully) into giving up information about the worker's meetings. He does the dirty work, up to a point. But The Thin Man is also the only one to call JF on his bullshit when people start to get hurt. He is the one who points out, to his face, that JF, the lord high boss of Metropolis, is the one responsible for the death and destruction that has resulted from his actions. The Thin Man has big brass balls.
Grot is the foreman of the heart machine. He informs JF of the workers plans to meet, and gives JF the McGuffin. He is the one who defends the heart machine during the revolt, yelling that if it is destroyed, the worker's city will flood. He is the one yelling at the workers to think of their children, still deep underground in their homes. He is the one who attempts to convince JF to negotiate with the workers. But is also the one screaming to burn Maria (but really it's robot Not-Maria) alive because he thinks she incited the riot that caused so much destruction.
11811 is one of the worker drones, who Freder replaces at his station for a shift, so he can experience what the workers go through. He is supposed to go to Josaphat's and wait for Freder, but instead he hits the clubs. But he is also the one who protects Freder, at the cost of his own life.
Not-Maria, the robot, is instantly irresistible to anyone who sees her. She is out causing fights, even killings, breaking up homes, and telling the workers to forget nonviolence, and burn the fucker down. She is programmed to do that, so who is to blame for that?
The Workers get screwed at every turn. Not-Maria has convinced them to revolt and destroy the factories. They have a legit beef. But they are stupid enough that they leave their children alone in the worker's city and destroy the heart machine, which will drown all their children. They are literally dancing while their homes flood. When Grot finally gets them to understand the consequences of their actions, instead of rushing to save their children, they build a huge bonfire, and burn a young woman alive. It turns out, in the confusion, they grabbed the robot instead of Maria, but they didn't know that.
Freder, Maria (the real one) and Josaphat manage to save the children at the last moment. Rotwang gets his comuppance, and JF finally agrees to talk to the workers.
Who are the heroes here? Who are the Good Guys? Maria is consistently acting in the best interests of the workers and their children. Freder goes from being a Frat-Bro to a brave man, and the Mediator, but he still started out as a creepy Aryan poster boy. Jon Fredersen finally shows some remorse and willingness to negotiate, but is an evil turd for most of the movie. Grot is actually pretty heroic, except for that whole "Let's burn Maria at the stake" bit, that's a demerit. 11811 dies saving Freder. but he's only in about half an hour of the movie. Rotwang is a grief-stricken, tortured soul, who ends up trying to kill everybody, I think that disqualifies him. The Thin Man starts out as a heavy, but becomes, for a few minutes, the "the Hound" of the movie. For a few minutes.
Josaphat, the solid, unassuming, background guy, is the one person besides Maria who doesn't do anything wrong. He doesn't start out creepy, he doesn't skip out on his duties, he try to kill anybody, he doesn't sell anybody out. And he doesn't get much credit for anything.
Now, here is the thing that baffles me about the movie: what is Jon Fredersen's motivation? I get that he wants to keep the workers under his thumb, but what good does it to have then destroy his own factory? Insurance fraud? I don't think so.
If he had half a brain, he would have set up a factory for Rotwang to mass produce his robots, replace and fire all the workers, and go into the sex robot business as a sideline to whatever the hell he was already doing. Acording to the movie, robot Not-Maria was completely irresistible, and indistinguishable from a real person.
Somebody wasn't thinking ahead.
*Every time they mentioned Freder Fredersen, I kept thinking of Froderick Fronkenstein ** The scenes of Freder at the stadium and the Sons Club are really creepy for all the Aryan Youth Aryan-ing around
*** The invitations end with "C.A.Rotwang". No thanks, buddy, I don't want to go to a party to see your diseased genitals.
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Post by Nudeviking on Aug 17, 2020 4:38:09 GMT -5
War of the Worlds: Goliath (2012) - This movie was shit. For starters it had my two least favorite kinds of animation: late 90s/early 00s XTREEEEEEEEEME!!!! cartoon for boys character design and random overly rendered 3D robots in an otherwise 2D cartoon. The voice acting was also shit. The concept was decent (a sequel to H.G. Wells set at the onset of World War I) but a lot of the time the plot ended up feeling like this movie was a pilot to a TV series that never(?) got made. That being said, if you every wanted a movie where US President Theodore Roosevelt machine gunned a UFO out of the sky or piloted a mecha this is the flick for you!
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Post by chalkdevil 😈 on Aug 17, 2020 9:13:21 GMT -5
The NeverEnding Story (1984)For any parents out there looking to traumatize their children with the ghosts of their own nostalgia, this is the movie for you. It has everything: - Large, unsettling puppets that move in that mechanical, Disney ride way that is just slightly unnerving.
- Child actors weeping and pleading for their lives, at one point directly down the lens.
- A haunted school attic with SO much taxidermy.
- A man making and then drinking an orange juice and raw egg smoothie.
- Travelling montages with helicopter shots!
- The haunting and effective death of a beloved animal that was introduced a full 2 minutes earlier.
- A protagonist who falls out of frame and disappears during the movie's climax and is only seen again during a travelling montage via helicopter shot.
- An unconnected narrator that just chimes in at the end to I guess wrap things up with a couple of sentences.
- So many slow pushes in on actors faces.
- That thing where hopelessness and the death of literature is manifested as a world rending apocalypse.
I summary, it's only 94 minutes long, has a very solid synth-y soundtrack, and will make your children cry. Highly recommend.
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Post by nowimnothing on Aug 17, 2020 9:40:01 GMT -5
The NeverEnding Story (1984)For any parents out there looking to traumatize their children with the ghosts of their own nostalgia, this is the movie for you. It has everything: - Large, unsettling puppets that move in that mechanical, Disney ride way that is just slightly unnerving.
- Child actors weeping and pleading for their lives, at one point directly down the lens.
- A haunted school attic with SO much taxidermy.
- A man making and then drinking an orange juice and raw egg smoothie.
- Travelling montages with helicopter shots!
- The haunting and effective death of a beloved animal that was introduced a full 2 minutes earlier.
- A protagonist who falls out of frame and disappears during the movie's climax and is only seen again during a travelling montage via helicopter shot.
- An unconnected narrator that just chimes in at the end to I guess wrap things up with a couple of sentences.
- So many slow pushes in on actors faces.
- That thing where hopelessness and the death of literature is manifested as a world rending apocalypse.
I summary, it's only 94 minutes long, has a very solid synth-y soundtrack, and will make your children cry. Highly recommend.
Classic case of "let's get a German director best know for a depressing war movie to make a children's fantasy film." I think the juxtaposition works though. At least it does not talk down to kids like so many movies of the time did. And it inspired of the best parts of a kind of sloppy third season of Stranger Things:
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