The Official Movie Discussion Thread

[Jaysin]

Wasn't sure if I should post this in the TV thread or this, but since it's referencing DC movies, figured it was better here. When Disney+ launched I started watching The Simpsons from the beginning and my goal was to see how far I'd make it before it stopped being funny to me. Back in the day, I stopped watching around Season 10 or 11. I just started Season 30 and this joke left me almost in tears. I'm even a fan of quite a few DC movies, but this joke was great.

 

Homer: Wait wait wait. I know you were great in Fast & Furious, but what else where you in?

 

Gal Gadot: Uh... Did you see Wonder Woman?

 

Homer: Whenever I see the DC logo I immediately fall asleep.

[Jaysin]

I watched The Tomorrow War this evening and it was very fun, but to be honest I'm a sucker for Chris Pratt and alien invasion movies so I'm a little bias

[Blackman]

After probably over 2 years (last one was Sonic and before that the Maradonna movie ), I'll be making a return to the theater to see Black Widow. Despite getting access to Disney+ I've never managed to gather the will to see the Marvel movies, but I did read almost all Black Widow comics and liked them a lot. The movie is apparently just "fine" but that's good enough for me. From what I collected it's not needed at all to see the previous Marvel movies, in fact people actually like it less because of them... for some reason...

[Jaysin]

<p>Watched Werewolves Within and No Sudden Move last night. </p><p> </p><p>

Werewolves Within was a delight. Sam Richardson is so damn likable and naturally funny. It has edged past Dog Soldiers as my second favorite werewolf movie. Only movie ahead of it is the masterpiece Ginger Snaps.</p><p> </p><p>

No Sudden Move was mega convoluted and a bit of a mess. Everyone was backstabbing everyone and I loved the performances of the actors, but the story itself was just a mess. Also, for some reason, a fish eye lens effect was used randomly throughout the movie. I read the decision was to try and disorient the audience, but all it did was annoy me and detract from the movie. The performances themselves make the movie worth watching, especially Don Cheadle and Brendan Fraser, but like I said, the story is a mess.</p>

[CQI13]

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="Blackman" data-cite="Blackman" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25823" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>After probably over 2 years (last one was Sonic and before that the Maradonna movie <img alt=":p" data-src="//content.invisioncic.com/g322608/emoticons/tongue.png.ceb643b2956793497cef30b0e944be28.png" src="<___base_url___>/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png" />), I'll be making a return to the theater to see Black Widow. Despite getting access to Disney+ I've never managed to gather the will to see the Marvel movies, but I did read almost all Black Widow comics and liked them a lot. The movie is apparently just "fine" but that's good enough for me. From what I collected it's not needed at all to see the previous Marvel movies, in fact people actually like it less because of them... for some reason...</div></blockquote><p> </p><p> It fits between Civil War and Infinity War.</p><p> </p><p> I really would love for each movie to stand alone while still being part of the larger universe. They have chosen to make each movie a vehicle for the next one.</p>

[Jaysin]

Just finished Isle of Dogs. What a movie! So, so, so good!

[The Swanton825]

Does it have that same "hipster fairytale" feel of other Wes Anderson movies? Because I've wanted to watch Isle of Dogs for a while but I really can't stand his storytelling style or dialogue.

[Jaysin]

I've never seen any of his other movies so I have no clue what you're referring to.

[Rampaaage]

Does it have that same "hipster fairytale" feel of other Wes Anderson movies? Because I've wanted to watch Isle of Dogs for a while but I really can't stand his storytelling style or dialogue.

 

Kinda? Sort of? Yes and no? Not sure how best to explain it, but it definitely still feels like a Wes Anderson film. I'd say stylistically it's a little bit easier to digest than the live action films. It's a bit more Fantastic Mr. Fox than Grand Budapest if that helps.

[Jaysin]

I noticed Fantastic Mr Fox was also on Disney+ so I plan on watching that after Dynamite tonight.

[Jaysin]

Fantastic Mr Fox was fun on a bun.

 

Picked up Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima and gonna try and watch them for the first time at some point soon.

[The Swanton825]

Kinda? Sort of? Yes and no? Not sure how best to explain it, but it definitely still feels like a Wes Anderson film. I'd say stylistically it's a little bit easier to digest than the live action films. It's a bit more Fantastic Mr. Fox than Grand Budapest if that helps.

 

Grand Budapest is exactly what I was worried it'd be like, so that helps a lot.

 

And after thinking about it, I realized there's probably some hypocrisy to me calling Wes Anderson a hipster when some of my favorite movies are obscure foreign films lol

 

Picked up Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima and gonna try and watch them for the first time at some point soon.

Those two are such fantastic companion films. Eastwood pulls no punches on the brutality of the Pacific theater and utter lack of empathy politicians and the public at large in both countries had for the trauma all the soldiers experienced.

[Jaysin]

Those two are such fantastic companion films. Eastwood pulls no punches on the brutality of the Pacific theater and utter lack of empathy politicians and the public at large in both countries had for the trauma all the soldiers experienced.

 

I've been on the hunt for anything Eastwood related and realized I had never seen them. Very excited to check them out.

 

As far as the obscure foreign films, I am really into Korean movies so I definitely can relate. They're not super obscure, but movies like I Saw The Devil and The Good, The Bad, and The Weird are some of the greatest movies I've ever seen regardless of genre.

[The Swanton825]

I loved The Good, the Bad and the Weird! It's tied with Oldboy as my favorite Korean film. I love seeing Westerns filtered through another country's lens. The Proposition is another great example of that.

[RKOwnage]

I watched The Tomorrow War this evening and it was very fun, but to be honest I'm a sucker for Chris Pratt and alien invasion movies so I'm a little bias

 

I'm not a huge Pratt guy outside of Parks and Rec. I think I'd have liked him more if he just leaned into the Jack Black niche he was making for himself as opposed to being a generic action star. He's not bad, I just think he doesn't play to his strengths for the most part. That being said I'm sure his pockets are very happy with his decision, so whatever. But I LOVE Sam Richardson.

 

I loved The Good, the Bad and the Weird! It's tied with Oldboy as my favorite Korean film. I love seeing Westerns filtered through another country's lens. The Proposition is another great example of that.

 

This isn't exactly a hot take, but South Korea has some great movies. Parasite (obviously), Train to Busan, and Burning come to mind. All fantastic.

[Jaysin]

I loved The Good, the Bad and the Weird! It's tied with Oldboy as my favorite Korean film. I love seeing Westerns filtered through another country's lens. The Proposition is another great example of that.

 

I've never heard of that movie! I googled it and it has Guy Pearce, who is one of my favorite actors! Gonna try and track that down. I'm a sucker for westerns in general, but Pearce as the star? Sign me the heck up!

[RKOwnage]

I've been starting an in-depth exploration of movies from the 2000s, here are the first few I watched (or rewatched) on vacation last week:

 

Almost Famous (2000): A lot more sanitized than I thought for a movie about a famous rock band, but it was fun. Kate Hudson was great.

 

Adaptation (2002): Absolutely bonkers. Love Nicolas Cage so much, and it had great performances from Chris Cooper and Meryl. Charlie Kaufman is a nutcase.

 

Minority Report (2002): As much as I don't want to be, I am a big Tom Cruise fan. And despite not loving Spielberg, I really enjoyed this one. Great sci-fi movie.

 

The Squid and the Whale (2005): Noah Baumbach's precursor to Marriage Story. The story of a divorce from the children's perspective. Jeff Daniels is unbelievable in this. I liked this a lot more than I liked Marriage Story.

 

Tropic Thunder (2008): The RDJ blackface stuff I think actually holds up because it's so over the top and satirical, but the Simple Jack plot would probably have to be tinkered with in order to work today. The movie is hilarious though.

 

Burn After Reading (2008): I was enthralled by this for the first two thirds. So many actors playing inverted versions of their type casting. Couldn't stop laughing every time Brad Pitt was onscreen. But then it just kind of fell off a cliff and ended really abruptly. Pretty good, but I wish the ending was better.

 

Also, not the 2000s, but I watched The Mitchells vs. the Machines too. It was such a fun animated movie - basically a mix of the producers' other movies, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. Loved it.

[Jaysin]

I realized all three Hobbit movies and the extended cuts of LOTR are all on HBO Max. I've only seen the first Hobbit and the theatrical cuts of LOTR, so gonna watch one a night for the next six nights.

 

I've never read the books, so I'm far from a Tolkien fanboy, but I love Martin Freeman in like everything and he's reason enough for me to check out the Hobbit trilogy even if they inflated the story to make a trilogy.

[Jaysin]

Other than the complete waste of Taskmaster, Black Widow was a very fun, high octane action flick.

 

Florence Pugh completely upstaged every other actor in the movie though. I enjoyed her more in this one movie than I've ever enjoyed ScarJo's Widow. I genuinely look forward to Flo as the new Black Widow going forward.

 

Also, David Harbour as Red Guardian was fantastic. Hopefully he gets to do what he wants and gets to return as the character. You can tell he was having an absolute ball with the character.

 

Also, for the people who complain about MCU movies "building" to other movies, this one is pretty standalone. The post credit scene sets up something though.

[SanX]

<p>One thing I hated was how much they rag dolled the leading widows and how both of them would just stand up and shrug it as if it was nothing.</p><p> </p><p>

I don't have this problem in other actions films, say Mission Impossible, it's just that you are portraying a human spy character in a universe built around power levels and being a super soldier means something compared to a normal human.</p><p> </p><p>

I thought the movie had nice ideas, but it was really underdeveloped. Prison break sequence was stupid, Spoilers in white - <span style="color:#FFFFFF;">Flying castle is also a stupid place to hide red room</span>. When half of your heroes can fly and SHIELD had helicarriers, it's just not well-thought-out. As Jaysin said, Taskmaster is wasted and could have been used in a future show.</p><p> </p><p>

Florence Pugh is a great replacement for ScarJo though. I am excited about the post credit scene and what it means overall.</p>

[Jaysin]

<p>Yeah, Natasha and Yelena basically no selling falls from insane heights and overall acting like they're super powered was annoying. There were a few times where Natasha was falling from a real high spot and caught her self on a ledge. That would have ripped her arms out of her sockets.</p><p> </p><p>

Once I accepted they were being ridiculous, I just my brain off and was able to enjoy it despite the absurdity.</p><p> </p><p>

I did like the surprise appearance of one of Red Guardian's associates in the prison scene even if he wasn't in his transformed state. Also the reference to another Russian hero that Yelena mistakenly calls Red Guardian made me pop.</p>

[RKOwnage]

Haven't seen it yet but Florence rules. She's on her way to being the #1 actress of her generation.

[Self]

I enjoyed it, but it was definitely another flawed Marvel movie. The first act really took a while to get going for me. A lot of montages, clumsily meandering their way to get to the real plot. Once Yelena and Natasha got together, then I started liking the characters and caring. Yelena is awesome and a post-Infinity-Saga character I'm excited to follow going forward. The whole family section in the middle was the best part, and I wish it lasted longer.

 

I really like Taskmaster in the comics, so was disappointed here. If I could go back in time to re-write this movie (spoilers) I'd have completely cut the character and replaced them with other Widows (first half) and Yelena (final fight). Yelena didn't have much to do at the end, and seeing her get re-brainwashed into a slave after being so fun could have been an emotional gut punch that the Taskmaster reveal just wasn't.(end spoilers).

 

I agree with ragdoll physics complaints. Suicide Squad-levels of big crashes just being a normal way to get around town.

[Crychon]

This isn't exactly a hot take, but South Korea has some great movies. Parasite (obviously), Train to Busan, and Burning come to mind. All fantastic.

 

I've been doing a month of the service OnDemandKorea and have been watching some great Korean films all month. The one problem I've found with it is that some of the films don't have English subs, and just a Korean audio track, so I wasn't able to follow along. It also has 3 levels (Normal, Plus, Premium), so some titles are only available at certain levels.

 

Some definite recommendations from that service (that all have subtitles) for me:

Castaway on the Moon (2009), Sunny (2011), Silenced (2011), Han Gong-ju (2013), Masquerade (2012), A Bittersweet Life (2005), Miss Granny (2014), and The Beauty Inside (2015)

 

It also has Train To Busan (which I had already seen, so I didn't watch). I probably would've subbed for another month and taken it a bit slower if everything had subtitles, though. It was a great value to see all of those (and more) during my month of Premium, though.

[RKOwnage]

Watched No Sudden Move last night, the new Soderbergh movie with Don Cheadle, Benicio del Toro, and David Harbour. It was alright - way too much going on in the middle third without enough attention given to each group, but the beginning and the end were fun.

 

Also rewatched Roma. Its loss to Green Book at the Oscars is one of the biggest travesties in recent memory (and I thought Green Book was entertaining!).

 

EDIT: Just saw Jaysin's post from earlier in the thread:

 

No Sudden Move was mega convoluted and a bit of a mess. Everyone was backstabbing everyone and I loved the performances of the actors, but the story itself was just a mess. Also, for some reason, a fish eye lens effect was used randomly throughout the movie. I read the decision was to try and disorient the audience, but all it did was annoy me and detract from the movie. The performances themselves make the movie worth watching, especially Don Cheadle and Brendan Fraser, but like I said, the story is a mess.

 

Completely agree! I'm also a huge Julia Fox fan and wish she was in it more. The fish eye lens thing annoyed me a lot.