Match Cut Madness 3: Best of the 00s

[Skitch]

...you risk having The Incredibles lose if you don't watch Yi Yi :)

I know!! When does voting end? I totally have time to watch it tomorrow (friday).

[Idioteque Stalker]

When does voting end?

Six days. Rounds start out nice and long, and then get shorter as the tournament progresses.

[Skitch]

I'll watch YiYi tomorrow!

[transmogrifier]

I would love to see The Incredibles lose first round. Such an overrated film. Yi Yi is leagues better. Brad Bird peaked with The Iron Giant, which is superb.

[DFA1979]

It's ludicrously entertaining, but I've always found the elitist themes discomforting. If Yi Yi takes it out in the first round then somewhere Watashi will feel a disturbance in the force.Yeah he might come back and post more creepy Mrs. Incredibles posts. I agree The Incredibles is overrated and I liked both movies.

[Ivan Drago]

I watched it last night while I was dead tired. It's an epic film that's never boring. Not as flashy overall as something like Magnolia (at times it is) but well worth the watch.

Holy fuck, you weren't kidding. I just finished it and was enthralled the whole time. I have to gather my thoughts for a Letterboxd review before I go any further, but that's one of the most beautiful films I've ever seen.

[StuSmallz]

That's not what I said in my original post, or at least not what I meant to say. I did say that films of the studio era were just ahead of the culture in their representation of gender roles, depicting women who were slightly more independent and modern than was socially acceptable for the period, but I didn't mean to imply that such films (and their latter day successors) were unambiguously progressive. Rather, part of their fascination lies in their ambivalence, which reflects broader ideological tensions within American society during this period. By the time Jackson made his trilogy, however, attitudes toward women had shifted considerably, so while his female characters are doubtlessly more active than their counterparts in Tolkien's novels, they are not transgressive women and the films' attitude toward them is unambiguously positive.That attitude is a good thing, though; for one thing, the increasing role of women in the military was an ongoing process worldwide when the trilogy was being filmed/released (and still is even to this day, (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_warfare_and_the_milit ary_(2000%E2%80%93present)#202 1) in fact), and for another, that process still remains somewhat controversial even today, so the trilogy's positive portrayal of its female characters in combat didn't just mindlessly reflect early 2000's society in their process of updating Tolkien's books, but were (and still are) ahead of the curve in that regard instead. Besides, Arwen was obviously the one most capable of saving Frodo in that stiuation, and they needed Eowyn to defeat the Witch King (plus, the movies were co-written by two female screenwriters), so why wouldn't the trilogy take a positive view of women in combat in those moments, and what sense does it make to essentially criticize them for being progressive in that regard?

[Paranoid Android]

Holy fuck, you weren't kidding. I just finished it and was enthralled the whole time. I have to gather my thoughts for a Letterboxd review before I go any further, but that's one of the most beautiful films I've ever seen.

Looks like I might have to watch this tomorrow. I watched Paprika this afternoon, can I now vote? Can I just add it by going:

The Dark Knight vs Paprika

I mean

The Dark Knight vs Paprika

fuck this is hard

The Dark Knight vs Paprika

or should I add it to my previous post?

[baby doll]

That attitude is a good thing, though; for one thing, the increasing role of women in the military was an ongoing process worldwide when the trilogy was being filmed/released (and still is even to this day, (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_warfare_and_the_milit ary_(2000%E2%80%93present)#202 1) in fact), and for another, that process still remains somewhat controversial even today, so the trilogy's positive portrayal of its female characters in combat didn't just mindlessly reflect early 2000's society in their process of updating Tolkien's books, but were (and still are) ahead of the curve in that regard instead. Besides, Arwen was obviously the one most capable of saving Frodo in that stiuation, and they needed Eowyn to defeat the Witch King (plus, the movies were co-written by two female screenwriters), so why wouldn't the trilogy take a positive view of women in combat in those moments, and what sense does it make to essentially criticize them for being progressive in that regard?Even if one finds the films' stance admirable politically (and I have little interest in getting into a feminist argument about whether admitting women to the military is genuinely feminist or whether it is an essentially cosmetic change that does not fundamentally dismantle existing power structures), from an artistic standpoint, rah rah female empowerment is pretty boring because it precludes any ideological tension. Hollywood melodramas from The Cheat to Basic Instinct are all about negotiating the absolute limit of what is socially acceptable, both sexually and racially, hence their emphasis on transgressive sexuality which is simultaneously a source of fascination and anxiety. The girl power feminism of Jackson's trilogy is both sexless and well within the bounds of what early 21st century audiences found acceptable.

[Dukefrukem]

I would love to see The Incredibles lose first round. Such an overrated film. Yi Yi is leagues better. Brad Bird peaked with The Iron Giant, which is superb.

YOu just think it's overrated because it hits too close to home with your Marvel hate.

[Idioteque Stalker]

I watched Paprika this afternoon, can I now vote? Can I just add it by going:

The Dark Knight vs Paprika

or should I add it to my previous post?

I count votes as they come in, so either making a new post like this or simply posting to notify you have edited your original votes is best.



I have to gather my thoughts for a Letterboxd review before I go any further, but that's one of the most beautiful films I've ever seen.

I see you have rated it a 7 out of 5, which is an outrage. It clearly deserves at least a 7.5 out of 5.

[Idioteque Stalker]

This Stu/BD discussion is good reading. Rep all around.

My two cents, apropos of nothing: Eowyn taking down the witch king is a big enough movie moment that I choose to surrender and not think about it too much, but lets be honest -- in LOTR "man" refers to a race, not a gender. If the writers were being 100% consistent with Tolkien's world-building, the scene would've played out like this:

Witch King: No man can kill me.
Eowyn, dramatically removing helmet: I am no man!
Witch King: Well, you know what I mean...

And then he turns her into a puddle of red goo.

[Skitch]

30 min into Yi Yi. 3 hours of this?? If this doesn't end with the boy going on crazy kill rampage...

[Ivan Drago]

I count votes as they come in, so either making a new post like this or simply posting to notify you have edited your original votes is best.




I see you have rated it a 7 out of 5, which is an outrage. It clearly deserves at least a 7.5 out of 5.

LOL.

BTW I edited my original votes to include the one for Yi Yi.

[transmogrifier]

YOu just think it's overrated because it hits too close to home with your Marvel hate.

You realize that this makes no sense as written, right?

[Dukefrukem]

You realize that this makes no sense as written, right?

Enlighten me.

[transmogrifier]

Enlighten me.

How can I? It doesn't make sense. And I didn't write it.

[Skitch]

quido I'm sorry, but I'm gonna have to pass on making Yi Yi banners. If you would like to, the size is 2000x750.

This movie sucks. Unless something amazing happens in the last 37 hours of this endless nothing. Film so far is about nothing. People...who do every day things...with every day relationships...bored. Just because your art is different doesn't make it good. Its fine that some people relate to this, but for me, this is nothing. Not shot particularly interesting, zero writing, acting fine...now I'm looking at a dead naked dude because?...and still an hour 15 left, sweet christmas...whining and crying...

[Dukefrukem]

How can I? It doesn't make sense. And I didn't write it.

Well it was a joke so... you know? How you hate Marvel movies, which are Super Hero movies? And the Incredibles is a super hero movie?

[Ivan Drago]

My thoughts on Yi Yi are here: https://boxd.it/242k3F

[Skitch]

Im at the swimming pool...you have to be fucking kidding me...this movie is emotional exploitation. No offense, Ivan, I love you dearly, but my god this film can rot

Oh shit the kid didn't drown, fuck me. I sincerely hope this boy kills every one else in this movie

[Skitch]

I have watched every frame of Yi Yi. Not only is my vote is for The Incredibles, Yi Yi doesn't even deserve to be in this competition imo. I fully expected to come back here voting for Yi Yi (I put Paprika in as a replacement and voted against it round one DAMMIT). What the hell do you see in this film? You have to admit its shot like ass.

[quido8_5]

Holy fuck, you weren't kidding. I just finished it and was enthralled the whole time. I have to gather my thoughts for a Letterboxd review before I go any further, but that's one of the most beautiful films I've ever seen.

Yesss! I was smitten from the first time I watched and the other four were even better. I've spent over 12 hours if my life watching this movie and I can't wait to give it another three.


What the hell do you see in this film? You have to admit its shot like ass.

I think, to a certain extent, it's what you noted above. This is a film where people do everyday things with everyday relationships. What makes it extraordinary, in my mind, is the sweep and intimacy. I feel like I know these characters, as much as characters can be known, as well as the time and place in which they live. That's only one, relatively small reason, but one that immediately comes to mind. FWIW, I don't think it looks bad and rather think it's distinctive and matches the tone of the film.

[Gizmo]

Round 1
Bold is the vote, no bold means I haven't seen one:

No Country for Old Men vs. Moon
Brick vs. Requiem for a Dream
Pan’s Labyrinth vs. Dogtooth
Kill Bill Vol. 1 vs. Irreversible
The Royal Tenenbaums vs. 25th Hour
Almost Famous vs. Tropic Thunder
Spirited Away vs. The Descent
Punch-Drunk Love vs. O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Primer
Brokeback Mountain vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. I’m Not There
Shaun of the Dead vs. The Life Aquatic
Mulholland Drive vs. Donnie Darko
Spider-Man 2 vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Adaptation
Fantastic Mr. Fox vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. A.I. Artificial Intelligence
The New World vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Still Walking
Memento vs. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Zodiac vs. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
The Prestige vs. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
Children of Men vs. Battle Royale
Ratatouille vs. In Bruges

The Dark Knight vs. Paprika
A Serious Man vs. Unbreakable
Wall-E vs. Kung Fu Hustle
The Departed vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. A History of Violence
Minority Report vs. Oldboy
LOTR: The Fellowship of the Ring vs. City of God
The Incredibles vs. Yi Yi

[baby doll]

This movie sucks. Unless something amazing happens in the last 37 hours of this endless nothing. Film so far is about nothing. People...who do every day things...with every day relationships...bored. Just because your art is different doesn't make it good. Its fine that some people relate to this, but for me, this is nothing. Not shot particularly interesting, zero writing, acting fine...now I'm looking at a dead naked dude because?...and still an hour 15 left, sweet christmas...whining and crying...Some of the greatest artists who ever lived dedicated themselves to representing everyday people doing everyday things and everyday relationships (John Updike described his style as an attempt "to give the mundane its beautiful due"). Criticizing Yi Yi for being about ordinary people is about as useful a criticism as trashing The Incredibles for being about characters with super-powers. That is, it is a criticism based on subject matter rather than treatment. Moreover, I would quarrel with your characterization of the characters in Yang's film as "bored," as if their all problems could be solved by picking up a book or spending a day at the beach. Ultimately the film's real subject is the search for meaning in life: The Asian economic miracle of the 1970s and '80s has provided the characters with a standard of living comparable to that of the West but it hasn't given their lives meaning. (I don't believe it's ever mentioned in the dialogue, but it's clearly pertinent that the film was made in the immediate aftermath of the Asian Economic Crisis.) As for having "zero writing," that seems to me a rather astonishing claim given how Yang manages to juggle a huge cast of sharply defined characters without overwhelming the spectator; like Yang's earlier multi-protagonist films The Terrorizers and A Brighter Summer Day, the film has a novelistic density rare in cinema. And what's impressive about Yang's direction is how subtly he guides the spectator's attention through subtle changes in the blocking of his shots more than the editing, so that the spectator becomes sensitized just noticeable differences in the image. In other words, as Jonathan Rosenbaum once wrote of Kiarostami, Yang's style redefines what we think of as a filmic event and does so to show us more rather than less.

[quido8_5]

Watched Still Walking. Lovely, tender film with several heartbreaking moments. Unfortunately it's going against In the Mood for Love. Doubt it needs my help but all in for In the Mood for Love. Think it may have a good chance of a deep run.

[Skitch]

Some of the greatest artists who ever lived dedicated themselves to representing everyday people doing everyday things and everyday relationships (John Updike described his style as an attempt "to give the mundane its beautiful due"). Criticizing Yi Yi for being about ordinary people is about as useful a criticism as trashing The Incredibles for being about characters with super-powers. That is, it is a criticism based on subject matter rather than treatment. Moreover, I would quarrel with your characterization of the characters in Yang's film as "bored," as if their all problems could be solved by picking up a book or spending a day at the beach. Ultimately the film's real subject is the search for meaning in life: The Asian economic miracle of the 1970s and '80s has provided the characters with a standard of living comparable to that of the West but it hasn't given their lives meaning. (I don't believe it's ever mentioned in the dialogue, but it's clearly pertinent that the film was made in the immediate aftermath of the Asian Economic Crisis.) As for having "zero writing," that seems to me a rather astonishing claim given how Yang manages to juggle a huge cast of sharply defined characters without overwhelming the spectator; like Yang's earlier multi-protagonist films The Terrorizers and A Brighter Summer Day, the film has a novelistic density rare in cinema. And what's impressive about Yang's direction is how subtly he guides the spectator's attention through subtle changes in the blocking of his shots more than the editing, so that the spectator becomes sensitized just noticeable differences in the image. In other words, as Jonathan Rosenbaum once wrote of Kiarostami, Yang's style redefines what we think of as a filmic event and does so to show us more rather than less.

I'll restate, just because you're different doesn't mean you're good.

[baby doll]

I'll restate, just because you're different doesn't mean you're good.It doesn't mean you're bad either. Incidentally, Yi Yi is probably the closest Yang ever came to making a "normal" movie: the plot, and Yang's mise en scène, are less dense than in A Brighter Summer Day, and there's more cutting within scenes.

[transmogrifier]

I have watched every frame of Yi Yi. Not only is my vote is for The Incredibles, Yi Yi doesn't even deserve to be in this competition imo. I fully expected to come back here voting for Yi Yi (I put Paprika in as a replacement and voted against it round one DAMMIT). What the hell do you see in this film? You have to admit its shot like ass.

Skitch is a brilliant man... with lots of well-thought-out, practical ideas....He's ensuring the artistic quality of the movie industry. Oh, yes, and his personal hygiene is above reproach.

[Skitch]

Skitch is a brilliant man... with lots of well-thought-out, practical ideas....He's ensuring the artistic quality of the movie industry. Oh, yes, and his personal hygiene is above reproach.

...what?

[Idioteque Stalker]

[...] And what's impressive about Yang's direction is how subtly he guides the spectator's attention through subtle changes in the blocking of his shots more than the editing, so that the spectator becomes sensitized just noticeable differences in the image. In other words, as Jonathan Rosenbaum once wrote of Kiarostami, Yang's style redefines what we think of as a filmic event and does so to show us more rather than less.

BD shredded this post. The Kiarostami comparison speaks to me, and brings to mind the beguiling final/credit shot in Haneke's Cache. (Now that the play-in round is over, I will admit it hurt to replace Cache with Jesse James, though neither had much of a chance against Memento in any case.)

And Skitch I couldn't disagree more about Yi Yi -- nevertheless I admire you as I do the man who stands on the beach at dusk and proclaims to the tide, "Not tonight."

[transmogrifier]

...what?


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHzypHJUMMo

[Skitch]

It doesn't mean you're bad either.

Agreed.

[Skitch]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHzypHJUMMo

My bad. I thought what you were referencing was about the current run of media about celebrities and bathing habits. Yeah it's a thing at the moment

Quoting Simpsons to completely disagree with me is way more acceptable than what I presumed might me inferred.

[Skitch]

And Skitch I couldn't disagree more about Yi Yi -- nevertheless I admire you as I do the man who stands on the beach at dusk and proclaims to the tide, "Not tonight."

For fucks sake is everyone gonna reference shit I don't know because of this fuckin Yi Yi movie? :D

I GAVE THREE HOURS TO THIS

[transmogrifier]

For fucks sake is everyone gonna reference shit I don't know because of this fuckin Yi Yi movie? :D

I GAVE THREE HOURS TO THIS

You gave 6 hr+ to the various iterations of Justice League. You'll live.

[transmogrifier]

My bad. I thought what you were referencing was about the current run of media about celebrities and bathing habits. Yeah it's a thing at the moment

Quoting Simpsons to completely disagree with me is way more acceptable than what I presumed might me inferred.

I'm thinking there is enough material now that I could hold various conversations on various topics using only Simpsons quotes. Pity I stopped watching with Season 10, so I'm limited to low-hanging fruit.

[Idioteque Stalker]

For fucks sake is everyone gonna reference shit I don't know because of this fuckin Yi Yi movie? :D

I GAVE THREE HOURS TO THIS

I think if Yi Yi makes it to the Sweet Sixteen, Skitch should be forced to make a Yi Yi banner. And it must be the most fantastic banner MC has ever seen... or else.

[Peng]

I think if Yi Yi makes it to the Sweet Sixteen, Skitch should be forced to make a Yi Yi banner. And it must be the most fantastic banner MC has ever seen... or else.

A compromise banner with an Akira bike crashing through a Yi Yi scene, like Last Action Hero poster?

[Idioteque Stalker]

A compromise banner with an Akira bike crashing through a Yi Yi scene, like Last Action Hero poster?

It could be the finest banner ever created. My fear is he enjoys the punishment.

[Idioteque Stalker]

As stated in the play-in round rules, I HAVE to vote for replacement movies in round 1. Yes, in some cases it really hurts. EDIT: This rule has been dropped, and some of my votes have changed. I left the names/replacements for anyone interested in seeing play-in round results.

No Country for Old Men vs. Moon
Brick vs. Requiem for a Dream
Pan’s Labyrinth vs. Dogtooth (Baby Doll replaced Grizzly Man)
Kill Bill Vol. 1 vs. Irreversible (Ezee E replaced Once)
The Royal Tenenbaums vs. 25th Hour
Almost Famous vs. Tropic Thunder (Yxklyx replaced Anchorman)
Spirited Away vs. The Descent (Peng replaced The Squid and the Whale)
Punch-Drunk Love vs. O Brother, Where Art Thou? (Yxklyx replaced Synecdoche, NY)

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Primer (Skitch replaced Elephant)
Brokeback Mountain vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. I’m Not There (Baby Doll replaced Beau Travail)
Shaun of the Dead vs. The Life Aquatic (Dukefrukem replaced The Hurt Locker)
Mulholland Drive vs. Donnie Darko
Spider-Man 2 vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Adaptation
Fantastic Mr. Fox vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring (Peng replaced 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days)

There Will Be Blood vs. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (Baby Doll replaced Atonement)
The New World vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Still Walking (Peng replaced L'Enfant)
Memento vs. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (Ezee E replaced Cache)
Zodiac vs. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Ezee E replaced Wendy and Lucy)
The Prestige vs. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (Yxklyx replaced Hot Fuzz)
Children of Men vs. Battle Royale (Skitch replaced Let the Right One In)
Ratatouille vs. In Bruges

The Dark Knight vs. Paprika (Skitch replaced Assassination of Jesse James)
A Serious Man vs. Unbreakable
Wall-E vs. Kung Fu Hustle (Dukefrukem replaced Talk to Her)
The Departed vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. A History of Violence
Minority Report vs. Oldboy
LOTR: The Fellowship of the Ring vs. City of God
The Incredibles vs. Yi Yi

[Skitch]

A compromise banner with an Akira bike crashing through a Yi Yi scene, like Last Action Hero poster?

Hey I'm not talented enough to actually create. I just reshape. I mean, unless yall want some mspaint talent, it will be hideous.

[Skitch]

You gave 6 hr+ to the various iterations of Justice League. You'll live.

That's your hell, not mine. Comic book movies are a breeze.

[Skitch]

As stated in the play-in round rules, I HAVE to vote for replacement movies

I protest this rule. Vote for the one you want, man

[transmogrifier]

I protest this rule. Vote for the one you want, man

Yeah, it doesn't make sense at all. Especially because there is a high chance match-ups will be decided by a single vote.

[Idioteque Stalker]

I too have been questioning the rule, and Skitch's motion has been seconded, so I'll get rid of it and revote. FWIW, aside from a gesture of good faith, the original intent was to encourage participation in the play-in round and give replacement movies a fighting chance, but none of those things have proven necessary.

[StuSmallz]

Even if one finds the films' stance admirable politically (and I have little interest in getting into a feminist argument about whether admitting women to the military is genuinely feminist or whether it is an essentially cosmetic change that does not fundamentally dismantle existing power structures), from an artistic standpoint, rah rah female empowerment is pretty boring because it precludes any ideological tension. Hollywood melodramas from The Cheat to Basic Instinct are all about negotiating the absolute limit of what is socially acceptable, both sexually and racially, hence their emphasis on transgressive sexuality which is simultaneously a source of fascination and anxiety. The girl power feminism of Jackson's trilogy is both sexless and well within the bounds of what early 21st century audiences found acceptable.I think that boiling the trilogy's portrayal of female characters down to nothing more than "rah rah women" is an over-simplification, and I also can't agree with the idea that there's no ideological tension or anxiety in the trilogy's depictions of women; it's just that it's not super up front about it (although even that is ignoring Aragorn's concern about the road to Rivendell being too dangerous for Arwen, or his potentially chauvinistic surprise at Eowyn for being a woman that has some "skill with a blade"). After all, the movies didn't come out in some sort of social vacuum, and similar to the way that Gone With The Wind reflected Great Depression-era anxieties about women in a Civil War-set narrative, the Lord Of The Rings movies reflected a number of conflicting historical and artistic contexts, as they were obviously produced as early 2000's adaptations of mid-20th century novels, and co-written by two New Zealand women, but adapted from the writing of a British/South African man born in 1892, a writer whose depiction of female characters has often been criticized as reflecting regressive personal views on his part.

So, there's a ton to study there as a result, whether it's the debate we're having on whether the films' portrayal of women was a mindless appeal to modern "gurl power!" sentiments, or an intriguing subversion of our expectations for how women would behave a presumably more patriarchal, medieval-style society (I obviously fall in the latter category), whether the deletion of certain supporting female characters from the books in favor of brevity was justified, in light of the overall reduction in female presence they resulted in, and whether they did more to reinforce regressive depictions of women as mere love interests by bringing the romance between Aragorn & Arwen more to the forefront, or did enough to offset that by portraying her as more of a warrior on the whole. So, as far as I'm concerned, there's just as much intellectual juice to be wrung out of the more implicit gender tensions of the trilogy as when that theme is more overt, and certainly more than actual examples of empty, contrived "gurl power!" in film:


https://youtu.be/zkP6abc1GEw

Anyway, as for the complaint about the portrayal of women being "sex-less", that strikes me as being an oddly narrow criticism, and ultimately an irrelevant one as well, because, just like I can't imagine something like The Handmaiden being as good as it was without its relatively graphic sex scenes (because they're essential to the overall effect of that film), I also can't imagine LOTR being better with more sexual female characters, because that all depends on the particular movie in question, and whether or not it needs sexual content in general. I mean, the sexual content of Game Of Thrones worked because that series was designed from the ground up to be a grittier, more realistic deconstruction of the High Fantasy style that Tolkien popularized (although even then the show went too far with it at times), but something like that would be a terrible change to include in an adaptation of Rings, and none of the female characters in the trilogy would be improved at all if they were more sexual, IMO (because the scene in Fellowship where Arwen tells Aragorn that "I would rather share one lifetime with you than face all the ages of this world alone" is already as romantic as it gets, and nothing about the depiction of their relationship would be improved if she were a sexier character, or if she and Aragorn were shown to be doing it at any one point).

[StuSmallz]

This Stu/BD discussion is good reading. Rep all around.My two cents, apropos of nothing: Eowyn taking down the witch king is a big enough movie moment that I choose to surrender and not think about it too much, but lets be honest -- in LOTR "man" refers to a race, not a gender. If the writers were being 100% consistent with Tolkien's world-building, the scene would've played out like this:Witch King: No man can kill me.Eowyn, dramatically removing helmet: I am no man!Witch King: Well, you know what I mean...And then he turns her into a puddle of red goo.Yeah, but it's also not as though they have no concept of gender in the movies' version of Middle Earth:


https://youtu.be/d-PmAQ9Opu4

:D

[Peng]

This Stu/BD discussion is good reading. Rep all around.

My two cents, apropos of nothing: Eowyn taking down the witch king is a big enough movie moment that I choose to surrender and not think about it too much, but lets be honest -- in LOTR "man" refers to a race, not a gender. If the writers were being 100% consistent with Tolkien's world-building, the scene would've played out like this:

Witch King: No man can kill me.
Eowyn, dramatically removing helmet: I am no man!
Witch King: Well, you know what I mean...

And then he turns her into a puddle of red goo.

I read the books a few months ago, and this sequence is just a very simplified version of the book's more formal, mythic-leaning language (I was surprised too that this scene is not wholly a film-made moment upon reading to that part), but in the book Tolkien essentially uses 'man' the same way:

"Hinder me? Thou fool. No living man may hinder me!"

[......] "But no living man am I! You look upon a woman. Eowyn I am, Eomund’s daughter. You stand between me and my lord and kin. Begone, if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him."

[StuSmallz]

I read the books a few months ago, and this sequence is just a very simplified version of the book's more formal, mythic-leaning language (I was surprised too that this scene is not wholly a film-made moment upon reading to that part), but in the book Tolkien essentially uses 'man' the same way:

"Hinder me? Thou fool. No living man may hinder me!"

[......] "But no living man am I! You look upon a woman. Eowyn I am, Eomund’s daughter. You stand between me and my lord and kin. Begone, if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him."The movie definitely did that moment better then, IMO; sorry, any Tolkien-ites here!

https://i.ibb.co/dMnZx84/theyareontome.gif (https://imgbb.com/)

[Peng]

Lol it's adaptation; the film's one is not going to land as written word well in the book too (especially when surrounded by Tolkien's language and plotting, since in the book that moment is the first time readers/Merry learned that it was actually Eowyn in disguise). They each work for their own medium.

[StuSmallz]

Lol it's adaptation; the film's one is not going to land as written word well in the book too (especially when surrounded by Tolkien's language and plotting, since in the book that moment is the first time readers/Merry learned that it was actually Eowyn in disguise). They each work for their own medium.That's true, and I suppose part of that preference is also just due to the fact that I prefer the movies' take on the material (which I felt were more engrossing than the books', since I found them to be a bit too reserved) in general.

[Yxklyx]

The movie definitely did that moment better then, IMO; sorry, any Tolkien-ites here!

https://i.ibb.co/dMnZx84/theyareontome.gif (https://imgbb.com/)

Actually no. I was disappointed in the change in dialogue here. I think the original would have worked much better. Also, some of Aragorn's final words to Boromir were better written in the book.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Yeah, but it's also not as though they have no concept of gender in the movies' version of Middle Earth

As it turns out, the pig-faced orc who said "The age of men is over" was ahead of the social justice curve and in fact predicted a #metoo reckoning spanning all of Middle-Earth.



I read the books a few months ago, and this sequence is just a very simplified version of the book's more formal, mythic-leaning language (I was surprised too that this scene is not wholly a film-made moment upon reading to that part), but in the book Tolkien essentially uses 'man' the same way:

"Hinder me? Thou fool. No living man may hinder me!"

[......] "But no living man am I! You look upon a woman. Eowyn I am, Eomund’s daughter. You stand between me and my lord and kin. Begone, if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him."

Well damn, there goes my theory. Despite it being in the original text, however, I still think it one of the spottier moments lore-wise. I hope the witch king's response was, "Alas, thou hast smitten me upon a technicality!"

[baby doll]

I think that boiling the trilogy's portrayal of female characters down to nothing more than "rah rah women" is an over-simplification, and I also can't agree with the idea that there's no ideological tension or anxiety in the trilogy's depictions of women; it's just that it's not super up front about it (although even that is ignoring Aragorn's concern about the road to Rivendell being too dangerous for Arwen, or his potentially chauvinistic surprise at Eowyn for being a woman that has some "skill with a blade"). After all, the movies didn't come out in some sort of social vacuum, and similar to the way that Gone With The Wind reflected Great Depression-era anxieties about women in a Civil War-set narrative, the Lord Of The Rings movies reflected a number of conflicting historical and artistic contexts, as they were obviously produced as early 2000's adaptations of mid-20th century novels, and co-written by two New Zealand women, but adapted from the writing of a British/South African man born in 1892, a writer whose depiction of female characters has often been criticized as reflecting regressive personal views on his part.

So, there's a ton to study there as a result, whether it's the debate we're having on whether the films' portrayal of women was a mindless appeal to modern "gurl power!" sentiments, or an intriguing subversion of our expectations for how women would behave a presumably more patriarchal, medieval-style society (I obviously fall in the latter category), whether the deletion of certain supporting female characters from the books in favor of brevity was justified, in light of the overall reduction in female presence they resulted in, and whether they did more to reinforce regressive depictions of women as mere love interests by bringing the romance between Aragorn & Arwen more to the forefront, or did enough to offset that by portraying her as more of a warrior on the whole. So, as far as I'm concerned, there's just as much intellectual juice to be wrung out of the more implicit gender tensions of the trilogy as when that theme is more overt, and certainly more than actual examples of empty, contrived "gurl power!" in film:

Anyway, as for the complaint about the portrayal of women being "sex-less", that strikes me as being an oddly narrow criticism, and ultimately an irrelevant one as well, because, just like I can't imagine something like The Handmaiden being as good as it was without its relatively graphic sex scenes (because they're essential to the overall effect of that film), I also can't imagine LOTR being better with more sexual female characters, because that all depends on the particular movie in question, and whether or not it needs sexual content in general. I mean, the sexual content of Game Of Thrones worked because that series was designed from the ground up to be a grittier, more realistic deconstruction of the High Fantasy style that Tolkien popularized (although even then the show went too far with it at times), but something like that would be a terrible change to include in an adaptation of Rings, and none of the female characters in the trilogy would be improved at all if they were more sexual, IMO (because the scene in Fellowship where Arwen tells Aragorn that "I would rather share one lifetime with you than face all the ages of this world alone" is already as romantic as it gets, and nothing about the depiction of their relationship would be improved if she were a sexier character, or if she and Aragorn were shown to be doing it at any one point).When I said The Lord of the Rings trilogy was sexless, I didn't mean to suggest that this was a flaw per se or that adding sex would have automatically improved the quality of the films (although it couldn't have hurt!). To reiterate, my argument is that the sort of ideological tensions one finds in a film like Gone with the Wind--sexual or otherwise--are not present, as far as I can perceive, in Jackson's trilogy. The films could've embodied other ideological contradictions besides the sexual, which I was using merely as an example, but the starkness of the film's moral universe seems to preclude it, and this lack of tension is, in large part, what makes the trilogy so bland.

The problem with trying to read ideological contradictions into the trilogy's depiction of women is twofold: first, women are peripheral to the plot rather than central (as they are in The Cheat, Gone with the Wind, Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, Basic Instinct, and Jackson's earlier Heavenly Creatures, which had matricidal teen lesbians), and second, while individual characters in the narrative may be uncomfortable with assertive women, the film portrays those women and their actions in unambiguously positive terms. In other words, even if the women transgress the gender norms of Middle Earth, they don't transgress the gender norms of western societies in the early twenty-first century. The films weren't made in a historical vacuum, but they don't strike me as being what Eric Cazdyn would call "films of history"--i.e., films that work through the most fundamental ideological contradictions of their time on the level of their form before a common language exists to speak about these issues. (Significantly, many of Cazdyn's examples centre on the figure of a transgressive woman: A Page of Madness, Sisters of the Gion, In the Realm of the Senses.) Fritz Lang's Die Nibelungen clearly has a lot to tell us about Germany in the 1920s, despite being based on a thirteenth-century epic poem, but I'm not convinced that Jackson's film has all that much to tell us about New Zealand in the early 2000s (putting the aside the fact that Lang was a great filmmaker and Jackson isn't).

[Idioteque Stalker]

With fewer than 48 hours left to go, we have:

Ties
Kill Bill Vol. 1 vs. Irreversible
A Serious Man vs. Unbreakable

Nailbiters
Pan's Labyrinth vs. Dogtooth
The Royal Tenenbaums vs. 25th Hour
There Will Be Blood vs. A.I. Artificial Intelligence

If you've been thinking about voting and have a preference in these match-ups (or any others), now would be a great time to vote by posting in this thread or sending me a PM.

And you Play-In Round participants with extra Round 1 votes -- it's getting to be that time.

[baby doll]

Idioteque Stalker informs me that, according to the rules, I have a "plus-one" vote for this round, which I will bestow upon A.I.

[Philip J. Fry]

No Country for Old Men vs. Moon
The Royal Tenenbaums vs. 25th Hour
Punch-Drunk Love vs. O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Brokeback Mountain vs. Finding Nemo

Surprisingly I don't like Nemo that much.

Lost In Translation vs. I’m Not There
Shaun of the Dead vs. The Life Aquatic
Spider-Man 2 vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Fantastic Mr. Fox vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. A.I. Artificial Intelligence
The New World vs. Amelie
Memento vs. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Zodiac vs. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Ratatouille vs. In Bruges

The Dark Knight vs. Paprika
Inglourious Basterds vs. A History of Violence
Minority Report vs. Oldboy
LOTR: The Fellowship of the Ring vs. City of God

[Spun Lepton]

No Country for Old Men vs. Moon
Brick vs. Requiem for a Dream
Spirited Away vs. The Descent
Punch-Drunk Love vs. O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Primer
Brokeback Mountain vs. Finding Nemo
Shaun of the Dead vs. The Life Aquatic

There Will Be Blood vs. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (no contest)
The Prestige vs. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
Children of Men vs. Battle Royale
Ratatouille vs. In Bruges

A Serious Man vs. Unbreakable
Wall-E vs. Kung Fu Hustle
Minority Report vs. Oldboy


These games always remind me of how many major movies I have not seen.

[Ezee E]

Do I have an extra round 1 vote?

[Skitch]

Hey Stalker your inbox is full.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Do I have an extra round 1 vote?

No. After replacing three movies you blocked Ghost World, advancing A History of Violence to Round 1. Extra votes went to those who replaced three movies but didn't block anything.



Hey Stalker your inbox is full.

Fixed. Resend those nudes.

[Mr. McGibblets]

Eowyn was from her mother's womb untimely ripped.

[Skitch]

Fixed. Resend those nudes.

I....I have never in my life wanted to send pictures of my balls and taint more than now

[Yxklyx]

I have an extra bonus round 1 vote for sale to highest bidder :)

[megladon8]

No Country for Old Men vs. Moon
Brick vs. Requiem for a Dream
Pan’s Labyrinth vs. Dogtooth
Kill Bill Vol. 1 vs. Irreversible
The Royal Tenenbaums vs. 25th Hour
Almost Famous vs. Tropic Thunder
Spirited Away vs. The Descent
Punch-Drunk Love vs. O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Primer
Brokeback Mountain vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. I’m Not There
Shaun of the Dead vs. The Life Aquatic
Mulholland Drive vs. Donnie Darko
Spider-Man 2 vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Adaptation
Fantastic Mr. Fox vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. A.I. Artificial Intelligence
The New World vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Still Walking
Memento vs. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Zodiac vs. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
The Prestige vs. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
Children of Men vs. Battle Royale
Ratatouille vs. In Bruges

The Dark Knight vs. Paprika
A Serious Man vs. Unbreakable
Wall-E vs. Kung Fu Hustle
The Departed vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. A History of Violence
Minority Report vs. Oldboy
LOTR: The Fellowship of the Ring vs. City of God
The Incredibles vs. Yi Yi

[DFA1979]

No Country for Old Men vs. Moon
The Royal Tenenbaums vs. 25th Hour-only seen TRT
Punch-Drunk Love vs. O Brother, Where Art Thou?-only seen O Brother
Brokeback Mountain vs. Finding Nemo

Lost In Translation vs. I’m Not There-Only seen LIT
Shaun of the Dead vs. The Life Aquatic
Spider-Man 2 vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Fantastic Mr. Fox vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring-only seen Mr. Fox

There Will Be Blood vs. A.I. Artificial Intelligence-N/A
The New World vs. Amelie
Memento vs. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Zodiac vs. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly-Only seen Zodiac
Ratatouille vs. In Bruges

The Dark Knight vs. Paprika
Inglourious Basterds vs. A History of Violence
Minority Report vs. Oldboy
LOTR: The Fellowship of the Ring vs. City of God-Only seen LOTR

[DFA1979]

If I have time I'll try and get to the ones available on streaming. Pluto TV has multiple ones and Peacock has Brokeback Mountain so I'm watching that right now. Tubi has Spring Summer Fall Winter etc. City of God is on Hulu but it's premium subscription boo.

[Yxklyx]

You definitely need to check out City of God. I'm sure it'll be in at least the Elite Eight (if it beats LOTR).

Since there were no takers I'll put my bonus vote for Kill Bill Vol. 1 - not that I'm so in love with it but Irreversible doesn't do much for me and all the others are rather even match-ups.

The New World not doing good and I even voted against it because it's against Amelie but it's one of my favorite films from this decade, might be my favorite film directed by Terrence Malick.

[DFA1979]

You definitely need to check out City of God. I'm sure it'll be in at least the Elite Eight (if it beats LOTR).

Since there were no takers I'll put my bonus vote for Kill Bill Vol. 1 - not that I'm so in love with it but Irreversible doesn't do much for me and all the others are rather even match-ups.

The New World not doing good and I even voted against it because it's against Amelie but it's one of my favorite films from this decade, might be my favorite film directed by Terrence Malick.
City of God is a big one I haven't seen yet.

I like The New World but Amelie is one of my favorite movies ever made and it's one of those unique and special films that I cherish a lot.

[Skitch]

I'll never forget seeing City of God in theater...very unusual to get such a film in my area, and me and my buddy were alone in the theater.

[Idioteque Stalker]

A massive surge from Oldboy at the finish! Round 1 results incoming.

[Philip J. Fry]

I'll never forget seeing City of God in theater...very unusual to get such a film in my area, and me and my buddy were alone in the theater.Kinda sad to see an empty theater for a film of that caliber.

[DFA1979]

Kinda sad to see an empty theater for a film of that caliber.

I've seen a lot of great movies in empty theaters by myself. People in this country often hate reading subtitles which is silly. One of the things I like about The Last Drive-In With Joe Bob Briggs is that every season he picks some foreign movies to showcase even though people still complain about having to read subtitles.

[dreamdead]

Last minute sneaking in...

No Country for Old Men vs. Moon
Brick vs. Requiem for a Dream
Pan’s Labyrinth vs. Dogtooth
Kill Bill Vol. 1 vs. Irreversible
The Royal Tenenbaums vs. 25th Hour
Almost Famous vs. Tropic Thunder
Spirited Away vs. The Descent
Punch-Drunk Love vs. O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Primer
Brokeback Mountain vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. I’m Not There
Shaun of the Dead vs. The Life Aquatic
Mulholland Drive vs. Donnie Darko
Spider-Man 2 vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Adaptation
Fantastic Mr. Fox vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. A.I. Artificial Intelligence
The New World vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Still Walking (harder than I thought)
Memento vs. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Zodiac vs. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
The Prestige vs. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
Children of Men vs. Battle Royale
Ratatouille vs. In Bruges

The Dark Knight vs. Paprika
A Serious Man vs. Unbreakable
Wall-E vs. Kung Fu Hustle
The Departed vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. A History of Violence
Minority Report vs. Oldboy
LOTR: The Fellowship of the Ring vs. City of God
The Incredibles vs. Yi Yi

[Idioteque Stalker]

Round 1 is now closed. Here are MC's results:


No Country for Old Men vs. Moon (BLOWOUT)
Brick vs. Requiem for a Dream (UPSET + BLOWOUT)
Pan’s Labyrinth vs. Dogtooth (UPSET + NAILBITER)
Kill Bill Vol. 1 vs. Irreversible
The Royal Tenenbaums vs. 25th Hour (UPSET + NAILBITER)
Almost Famous vs. Tropic Thunder
Spirited Away vs. The Descent (BLOWOUT)
Punch-Drunk Love vs. O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Primer
Brokeback Mountain vs. Finding Nemo (NAILBITER)
Lost In Translation vs. I’m Not There
Shaun of the Dead vs. The Life Aquatic (BLOWOUT)
Mulholland Drive vs. Donnie Darko (UNANIMOUS BLOWOUT + HUMILIATION)
Spider-Man 2 vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (BLOWOUT)
Before Sunset vs. Adaptation
Fantastic Mr. Fox vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring (UPSET)

There Will Be Blood vs. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (NAILBITER)
The New World vs. Amelie (BLOWOUT + HUMILIATION)
In the Mood for Love vs. Still Walking
Memento vs. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Zodiac vs. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
The Prestige vs. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (BLOWOUT)
Children of Men vs. Battle Royale
Ratatouille vs. In Bruges (UPSET)

The Dark Knight vs. Paprika (NAILBITER)
A Serious Man vs. Unbreakable (NAILBITER)
Wall-E vs. Kung Fu Hustle
The Departed vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien (UPSET)
Inglourious Basterds vs. A History of Violence
Minority Report vs. Oldboy (UPSET)
LOTR: The Fellowship of the Ring vs. City of God
The Incredibles vs. Yi Yi (UPSET)

[Philip J. Fry]

I've seen a lot of great movies in empty theaters by myself. People in this country often hate reading subtitles which is silly. One of the things I like about The Last Drive-In With Joe Bob Briggs is that every season he picks some foreign movies to showcase even though people still complain about having to read subtitles.

Yeah, unfortunately that's something that happens in general. Even in a place like here (Mexico) where you had to get used to subtitles, theaters have gone more out of the way to pander to people who don't like them, preferring to dub everything, often with awful results.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Dogtooth saved by dreamdead at the buzzer!

[Yxklyx]

I should have put my extra vote for AI.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Voting for Round Two is now open! Vote now by posting in this thread or sending me a PM.

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi



The Smoldering Aftermath of Round 1

With more upsets (8) than any other round in MC Madness history, the massive destruction of Round 1 has left Madness 3.0 a fetid and hopeless wasteland from which MC can only pray to recover. If you feel like blaming/thanking someone, the posters who went with the underdog most frequently (while voting in over half the match-ups) were Dukefrukem (65% of the time), Yxklyx (56%), and Skitch (50%). Leave some iconoclasm for the rest of us, you agents of chaos!

With its unanimous, humiliating victory over Donnie Darko, Mulholland Drive has now logged the most dominant single-round performance in MC Madness history (even more so than Goodfellas vs. There's Something About Mary if you can believe it). With 1 seeds There Will Be Blood, The Dark Knight, and to some extent Eternal Sunshine looking vulnerable in Round 1, it's David Lynch who now appears to be setting the pace. And don't sleep on Amelie, which likewise humiliated Terrence Malick's New World and now matches up with a demoralized There Will Be Blood.

Now let's check in with the ten directors who started with multiple movies:

-- Round 1 couldn't have gone any worse for Wes Anderson, who lost all three of his match-ups and is now out of the tournament.
-- Steven Spielberg lost two movies and is now out (though it should be noted A.I. put up a hell of a fight against 1 seed There Will Be Blood, and Minority Report was comfortably leading until Oldboy's heroic last-moment comeback).
-- Brad Bird, Ang Lee, and the Coens lost one movie a piece but are still alive and (varying degrees of) well.
-- Paul Thomas Anderson, Alfonso Cuaron, Andrew Stanton, and Quentin Tarantino all managed to escape the gauntlet unscathed. Each had an "uh-oh" moment along the way except for Cuaron, who was at every moment in control of his match-ups. Keep your eye on him.
-- Haters ready your ink and quill: With The Dark Knight, The Prestige, and Memento advancing, Christopher Nolan now has the most movies in the tournament. Some may argue he had easy match-ups in Round 1 -- rest assured Round 2 will be no cakewalk as he takes on A Serious Man, Zodiac, and In the Mood for Love.


Which movies will make it through Round 2 and advance to the Sweet Sixteen? Find out when voting closes in five days!

[Idioteque Stalker]

Congratulations to Baby Doll and Peng for having movies they suggested in the Play-In Round make it through the round one gauntlet.

Baby Doll: Dogtooth
Peng: Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring

These posters will receive one extra vote if their movie makes it to the Sweet Sixteen. The extra vote can then be redeemed for any match-up, in any remaining round of Madness 3.

[Idioteque Stalker]

It's time to check in with transmogrifier's Sweet Sixteen predictions!



He lost!


transmogrifier's official Sweet Sixteen predictions:


No Country for Old Men
There Will Be Blood
Inglorious Basterds
Mulholland Dr.
Dark Knight
Spirited Away
Memento
Fellowship of the Ring
Eternal Sunshine
Before Sunset
Children of Men
Royal Tenenbaums
Any ONE Pixar movie (if nothing else, this will be your downfall)
In the Mood for Love
City of God/Oldboy (I'll allow it since the odds are so incredibly against you)
Lost in Translation

Very good predictions overall, but you still get 40/1 odds.

It was that damned Tenenbaums movie.

[Lazlo]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi

[Mr. McGibblets]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring (Can't vote)

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi (can't vote)

[Yxklyx]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi

[Ezee E]

lol at HUMILATION

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi

[dreamdead]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi

[Idioteque Stalker]

HUMILIATION = When BLOWOUT doesn't tell the whole story. Like a 42-3 NFL game, it isn't fun to watch no matter who you're rooting for.

[Philip J. Fry]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy

[quido8_5]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi

[Spun Lepton]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man

[baby doll]

No Country for Old Men > Requiem for a Dream. For all its pretentious guff, the Coens' neo-western has style while Aronofsky's Reefer Madness update only has a battery of expressionistic effects.

Dogtooth > Kill Bill, Vol. 1 [and Vol. 2]. A satisfying whole vs. a grab bag of set pieces that never amount to very much.

25th Hour > Almost Famous. Characters vs. amusing clichés.

Spirited Away > Punch-Drunk Love. Story vs. sequences.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind > Finding Nemo. A great movie vs. a cute one.

Mulholland Dr. > Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Lynch at his best vs. Ang Lee at his best.

Before Sunset > Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring. A tour de force of acting and directing vs. self-orientalizing guff.

There Will Be Blood > Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain. I'm tempted to vote against Anderson's film to protest the reflexive assumption that "dark," male-centred movies are automatically more serious and artistic than light, female-centred movies (see every Christopher Nolan movie), but at the end of the day, if I had to pick of these movies to see again, I'd opt for Anderson's, as it has a bit more mystery to it.

In the Mood for Love > Memento. An enduring classic that needs to be seen more than once vs. a cleverly constructed neo-noir exercise that loses most of its appeal on second viewing.

Zodiac > The Prestige. A pretty good, if long and morbid, serial killer movie vs. visual monotony.

A Serious Man > The Dark Knight. The Coens at their most mysterious vs. Nolan at his most obvious.

Y tu mamá también > Wall-E. A great, sexy, beautifully acted and directed road movie for grownups vs. an above-average kids' movie whose first half is a lot more inventive and successful than its second.

Inglourious Basterds > Oldboy. Tarantino at his most disciplined vs. Park throwing shit at a wall and seeing what sticks.

Yi Yi > The Fellowship of the Ring. Jackson has a complicated mythology and an army of set decorators and special effects technicians; Yang has novelistic storytelling and mise en scène. Artistry vs. money.

[megladon8]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi

[DFA1979]

Brokeback Mountain was better than Finding Nemo imo. Oh well at least I got to find out why people love that movie so much.

[DFA1979]

Yeah, unfortunately that's something that happens in general. Even in a place like here (Mexico) where you had to get used to subtitles, theaters have gone more out of the way to pander to people who don't like them, preferring to dub everything, often with awful results.

I meant US but I'm sure it applies elsewhere, too.

[Skitch]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream - easy
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous - easy
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead - easy
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon - easy
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring - not even close

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy - rewatchability

[Idioteque Stalker]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love (OUCH)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo (yawn)
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring (YAWN)

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento (OUCH)
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille (yawn)
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien (ouch)
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy (YAWN)
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi (ouch)

[Skitch]

I was literally typing that as you posted. Sorry, working from the phone here. Yes, the Ring over the YiYi...but as you say....(yawn)

[Ivan Drago]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi

[StuSmallz]

When I said The Lord of the Rings trilogy was sexless, I didn't mean to suggest that this was a flaw per se or that adding sex would have automatically improved the quality of the films (although it couldn't have hurt!). To reiterate, my argument is that the sort of ideological tensions one finds in a film like Gone with the Wind--sexual or otherwise--are not present, as far as I can perceive, in Jackson's trilogy. The films could've embodied other ideological contradictions besides the sexual, which I was using merely as an example, but the starkness of the film's moral universe seems to preclude it, and this lack of tension is, in large part, what makes the trilogy so bland.


The problem with trying to read ideological contradictions into the trilogy's depiction of women is twofold: first, women are peripheral to the plot rather than central (as they are in The Cheat, Gone with the Wind, Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, Basic Instinct, and Jackson's earlier Heavenly Creatures, which had matricidal teen lesbians), and second, while individual characters in the narrative may be uncomfortable with assertive women, the film portrays those women and their actions in unambiguously positive terms. In other words, even if the women transgress the gender norms of Middle Earth, they don't transgress the gender norms of western societies in the early twenty-first century. The films weren't made in a historical vacuum, but they don't strike me as being what Eric Cazdyn would call "films of history"--i.e., films that work through the most fundamental ideological contradictions of their time on the level of their form before a common language exists to speak about these issues. (Significantly, many of Cazdyn's examples centre on the figure of a transgressive woman: A Page of Madness, Sisters of the Gion, In the Realm of the Senses.) Fritz Lang's Die Nibelungen clearly has a lot to tell us about Germany in the 1920s, despite being based on a thirteenth-century epic poem, but I'm not convinced that Jackson's film has all that much to tell us about New Zealand in the early 2000s (putting the aside the fact that Lang was a great filmmaker and Jackson isn't).The fact that none of the women in LOTR are lead characters doesn't cause problems for analyzing their roles in the films, because Arwen, Galadriel and Eowyn still hold a significant presence and impact within the trilogy regardless (and an expanded one when compared to the books to boot), at least as much as male characters like Boromir, Elrond, or Denethor do, and in some cases even moreso, since none of those men were the ones that rescued "the ringbearer" when he was on the verge of death, which would've caused the failure of the quest to destroy the ring before they had even formed the fellowship (and that's without even going into the fact that the movies are all ensemble pieces anyway, so there are no "lead" characters in the trilogy in the first place, male or female).


And as for that second point, the trilogy portraying women being relatively bold or aggressive as an unambiguous positive isn't a problem, because again, given the specific contexts of those examples, why on (Middle) Earth would they not portray that in such terms? Like, when Eowyn slays one of Sauron's top subordinates in Return Of The King in the defense of Middle Earth, what sense would it make for the movie to have trepidation about her doing so just because of her gender? Context is king, and it's not neccessary for every film with a "strong woman" in it to hold a conflicted attitude about them, because doing so would obviously be a regressive portrayal of the gender on the whole, and exactly the sort of thing that art should be criticized for encouraging, regardless of how "interesting" it is to study that in a critical fashion later on.

[StuSmallz]

Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy

[Peng]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring (My replacement keeps being brought up against (imo) stone-cold masterpieces lol)

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento (My Sophie's Choice this round)
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi

[baby doll]

The fact that none of the women in LOTR are lead characters doesn't cause problems for analyzing their roles in the films, because Arwen, Galadriel and Eowyn still hold a significant presence and impact within the trilogy regardless (and an expanded one when compared to the books to boot), at least as much as male characters like Boromir, Elrond, or Denethor do, and in some cases even moreso, since none of those men were the ones that rescued "the ringbearer" when he was on the verge of death, which would've caused the failure of the quest to destroy the ring before they had even formed the fellowship (and that's without even going into the fact that the movies are all ensemble pieces anyway, so there are no "lead" characters in the trilogy in the first place, male or female).

And as for that second point, the trilogy portraying women being relatively bold or aggressive as an unambiguous positive isn't a problem, because again, given the specific contexts of those examples, why on (Middle) Earth would they not portray that in such terms? Like, when Eowyn slays one of Sauron's top subordinates in Return Of The King in the defense of Middle Earth, what sense would it make for the movie to have trepidation about her doing so just because of her gender? It's not neccessary for every film with a "strong woman" in it to hold a conflicted attitude about them, and in fact, doing so would be very regressive, and exactly the sort of thing that art should be criticized for encouraging, regardless of how "interesting" it is to study that in a critical fashion later on.That the female characters are peripheral to the plot of Jackson's trilogy--at least in comparison with Frodo, his buddy (Sam?), Gandalf, and the skinny little junky dude (whose name I no longer recall)--doesn't pose a problem for analyzing their roles in the films (any role can be analyzed, no matter how small); it's just that, in this case, the analysis is unlikely to turn up anything very interesting. And of course there's no reason why a film begun in the late 1990s and released in the early 2000s should have a conflicted attitude about assertive women, especially when those women are largely asexual. (Cate Blanchett is so ethereal here she scarcely seems to have any corporeal existence whatsoever.) But that just goes to show my point that Jackson's trilogy was behind the culture rather than ahead of it, as Hollywood melodramas of the studio era were just ahead of what American society was willing to accept at the time--or, more precisely, by centring the figure of a transgressive woman, such films negotiated the outer-most limits of socially acceptable behaviour for a society that was rapidly being transformed by industrial capitalism. That's in part what made them exciting for spectators, and it's why they're still exciting today as contemporary attitudes towards women are not much more enlightened than they were in the 1930s. (It's one thing to recognize intellectually that pervasive misogynistic attitudes cost Hillary Clinton votes in the 2016 election and another thing altogether to actually find her likeable.) When Sharon Stone's character in Basic Instinct brazenly flouts social norms ("What are you gonna do, arrest me for smoking?"), the breaking of a taboo is both thrilling as a vicarious release for the spectator's repressed desires and anxiety-producing as it threatens the total breakdown of social order, causing the spectator to react with nervous laughter. When an ethereal elf-woman rescues a hobbit from the forces of darkness, the spectator can only feel relief. In short, The Lord of the Rings movies are fundamentally not sexy.

[transmogrifier]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream - seen both, but don't care
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1 - seen both, but don't care

(I'll pretty much vote against any of these four films in the next round)

25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille (grudgingly)
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi

[transmogrifier]

It's time to check in with transmogrifier's Sweet Sixteen predictions!



He lost!



It was that damned Tenenbaums movie.

I guessed 15 out of 16 (ish, not counting the two hedges)? Not bad, I would say

[quido8_5]

Hardest: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo

Easiest: In the Mood for Love vs. Memento. I'm surprised that Memento has taken such a dip in my estimation. Still a four-star movie, but I don't think it has aged well. Unfortunately it will forever be known for its gimmick structure, even though it serves the plot and the quality of film overcomes the "gimmick". Plus, In the Mood for Love is one of the few films from the last twenty years that I would consider a classic.

Who Give a Shit?: Zodiac vs. The Prestige

[StuSmallz]

Who Give a Shit?: Zodiac vs. The PrestigeI do; why do you ask?

:D

[baby doll]

Who Give a Shit?: Zodiac vs. The PrestigeBoth of these movies are, of course, wildly overrated in the way that only "dark," male-centred Hollywood prestige movies can be, but at least Fincher is a pretty good director, even if the script gets bogged down in uninteresting procedural minutia. (It was doubtlessly a mistake on my part to watch the director's cut instead of the theatrical release version.) On the other hand, watching The Prestige in a theatre was physically painful because there's so little variation in rhythm and shot scale. To paraphrase the opening paragraph of Ebert's review of the 2008 Death Race: Hitchcock said a movie should play the audience like a piano. The Prestige played me like a drum.

[Idioteque Stalker]

I'm surprised that Memento has taken such a dip in my estimation. Still a four-star movie, but I don't think it has aged well. Unfortunately it will forever be known for its gimmick structure, even though it serves the plot and the quality of film overcomes the "gimmick".

Gimmick implies more negativity than I think is warranted. The unique structure is central to the movie's narrative, themes, and overall appeal. It's been a while since I last saw it, so I can't get too deep into the weeds, but maybe my favorite Nolan moment is "Why am I running? Oh, I'm chasing this guy. Oh wait -- he's chasing me..." A rare, actually funny moment in his filmography -- though it should be noted I have a weakness for Guy Pearce.

[Skitch]

Gimmick implies more negativity than I think is warranted. The unique structure is central to the movie's narrative, themes, and overall appeal. It's been a while since I last saw it, so I can't get too deep into the weeds, but maybe my favorite Nolan moment is "Why am I running? Oh, I'm chasing this guy. Oh wait -- he's chasing me..." A rare, actually funny moment in his filmography -- though it should be noted I have a weakness for Guy Pearce.

I was reading your first sentence and thought: "I should comment that my favorite scene is the 'I'm chasing this guy' scene." :D :D

The film is still effective, imo. I would've easily voted for it but I have not seen its competitor. I think its also something to consider budgets at the time and the kind of budget Nolan could sway...at the time, probably not all that much? All he had before that was Following, right?

[Skitch]

Wiki says Momento had 9 million. In 2001 (before digital really took over? again just spewing probably wrong facts everywhere), that would've maybe been mid-upper indy budget?

My gut thoughts and memory are just swinging for the fences tonight, first day of school and I've barely slept in three days, forgive me.

[quido8_5]

I do; why do you ask?

:D

Just making sure... certainly not because Christopher Nolan wanted me to confirm that even his minor works are still relevant. This is not what Nolan does for karaoke every. single. time:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNLhxKpfCnA


Gimmick implies more negativity than I think is warranted. The unique structure is central to the movie's narrative, themes, and overall appeal. It's been a while since I last saw it, so I can't get too deep into the weeds, but maybe my favorite Nolan moment is "Why am I running? Oh, I'm chasing this guy. Oh wait -- he's chasing me..." A rare, actually funny moment in his filmography -- though it should be noted I have a weakness for Guy Pearce.

I agree the structure fits the film, but it is also what has made it distinctive to so many people who want to see Nolan's "indie" stuff (in my experience, it is known less by the title than by the description: "that one that goes backward.") I think it is great, but not exceptional without its structure. Memento is of the same ilk as LA Confidential. Both are excellent crime films with lots of twists. The latter, though, has an entire ensemble of great performances and direction that is superb but never ostentatious-- best-of-genre level good. Memento is a great, but has some serious limitations. Guy Pierce gives the only performance that isn't perfunctory (I'm also operating off of a viewing over a decade ago, so may not be entirely accurate) and the script is good, but the flashbacks are kind of pedantic and reminiscent of a Lifetime movie about a tragic break in. The structure is not "gimmicky" inherently, but it could be construed as Nolan putting himself up as an iconoclastic director and auteur right out of the gate. It feels wrong to type this, but that's the thing: the more I think about Memento, the less I like it...even though I don't think it'll ever fall below **** because it is a great movie. At the same time there are limitations inherent to its inception*, that are only exacerbated by the high concept films he's released since.

* 8-)

[Skitch]

]
Memento is of the same ilk as LA Confidential.

LA Confidential had budget of 35 million, again from wiki.


Memento is a great, but has some serious limitations....and the script is good, but the flashbacks are kind of pedantic and reminiscent of a Lifetime movie about a tragic break in.

I don't disagree about the Lifetime comparison with the break-in, but that was a false constructed memory, so imo the Lifetime feel fits.


At the same time there are limitations inherent to its inception*, that are only exacerbated by the high concept films he's released since.

I don't think its fair to judge Momento on his following* films...or are you saying its an issue as a theme with the director?

[Yxklyx]

I didn't care that much for Zodiac the first time but on rewatch it has this relentless momentum that elevates it above most modern films.

[StuSmallz]

I didn't care that much for Zodiac the first time but on rewatch it has this relentless momentum that elevates it above most modern films.While I loved it immediately back in '07 (which was reconfirmed upon a rewatch (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/film/zodiac/) last year), I do agree about the overall momentum of the movie; I mean, the scene where Toschi and his partner are reconstructing the Stine murder is almost nothing but watching them talk about it, but it's still fascinating to watch just because it's so sharply written, and it has that odd pleasure of watching people who are just really smart and good at their jobs going about it (so "uninteresting", my kiester):


https://youtu.be/beDjy5dNH0w

[DFA1979]

Wait we're already voting again? Whoa.

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream-Salty trans is hilarious
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1-Only seem Bill
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous-N/A
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love-Only seen SA
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo-Nemo shouldn't even be here I love it but better than Brokeback Mountain? LOL.
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring-Um maybe I'll get to these some day

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie-Only seen Amelie *whistles*
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige-Never saw The Prestige and I don't know if I ever will
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien-Only seen Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Y-Never seen Yi Yi or even heard of it until this year streaming really often sucks at enabling people in the US to view foreign cinema save for maybe Criterion channel and a few others.

[quido8_5]

LA Confidential had budget of 35 million, again from wiki.

Nolan's use of a scant budget to create something that could even be compared to LA Confidential is a feat. Wish he could exercise some of that restraint instead blowing up some of the biggest budgets in modern Hollywood history.


I don't disagree about the Lifetime comparison with the break-in, but that was a false constructed memory, so imo the Lifetime feel fits.

I had not thought about it this way. Very good take and I can see it maybe being intentional on Nolan's part.


I don't think its fair to judge Momento on his following* films...or are you saying its an issue as a theme with the director?

It's not fair. It's certainly more of a Nolan issue for me than a Memento issue. At the same time, the structure is also what makes Dunkirk exceptional. I guess I'm honestly trying to figure out how Memento lost its luster for me. Ten years ago, Memento going up against anything would have been an epic battle. Now, I didn't even hesitate.

* lol

[Dukefrukem]

I didn't care that much for Zodiac the first time but on rewatch it has this relentless momentum that elevates it above most modern films.

This was my experience. I didn't think it held a candle to Fincher's other stuff.

[Gizmo]

No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi

Only 4 left I haven't seen. Dogtooth, which I really want to, 25th Hour, A Serious Man, and Yi Yi, all of which I've never been too concerned with, but may have to look into now.

[Spun Lepton]

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie

Either one of these could win and I'd be fine with that.

The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man

I'll be pissed if Nolan's over-complicated superhero movie wins over the Coens' magnum opus. I swear, I'll take my toys and go home, MC.

[megladon8]

I hated A Serious Man. Did absolutely zilch for me.

But it has also been 10 years. I'd be open to giving it another shot.

Also, side note (not directed at any specific person, and I'm just being nitpicky) I feel like refusing to vote for 2 films just because you don't like either of them is kinda...why bother voting at all then?

[DFA1979]

Well I haven't seen all the films and I vote when I can so I think that cancels out someone who refuses to vote on a match.

[transmogrifier]

...why bother voting at all then?

Um.... exactly? That's why I didn't vote for them. Why bother if I don't care about them in equal amounts?

[DFA1979]

I for one support trans letting the hate flow. And I'm not gonna let Brokeback Mountain losing to Finding Nemo go either.

[quido8_5]

Um.... exactly? That's why I didn't vote for them. Why bother if I don't care about them in equal amounts?

What's the opposite of Sophie's Choice?

If we're all forced to vote for two films we care about deeply in equal amounts, we also have to vote for things we don't care about in equal amounts.

[Skitch]

I don't have a problem with not voting if you dislike both. I do have a problem with any voting if you haven't seen both.

[DFA1979]

I don't have a problem with not voting if you dislike both. I do have a problem with any voting if you haven't seen both.

I don't vote if I haven't seen both movies. That's silly.

[Yxklyx]

I was going to say it should be Mulholland Dr. but the final credits have Mulholland Drive.

[transmogrifier]

What's the opposite of Sophie's Choice?

If we're all forced to vote for two films we care about deeply in equal amounts, we also have to vote for things we don't care about in equal amounts.

Thats the thing though; we don’t :)

[DFA1979]

I was going to say it should be Mulholland Dr. but the final credits have Mulholland Drive.

I can't remember which one it is so I Googled and it said Mulholland Drive is the title. I'll go with that I guess. Also I'm finally viewing Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring and it is fantastic. What a movie.

[Idioteque Stalker]

I do have a problem with any voting if you haven't seen both.

This is the main thing, and one of the primary ways MC Madness is different than Filmspotting madness. In R1 of their tournament, for instance, The Incredibles won 75% to Yi Yi's 25% -- in ours, it was the opposite. My gut tells me this has a lot to do with people here self-enforcing this rule, rather than simply voting for the movie they've seen.

In the other tournament, enforcing voting rules is impossible; in ours, it is pointless. Do I want everyone to abstain any time a choice is difficult/boring? No. But is trans or anyone else affecting the supposed integrity of the game by trolling a match-up or two? Also no. Face it, y'all just want him to vote in the hopes he votes for the same movie you voted for.

[megladon8]

No, I want him to vote because the world political scene is in shambles right now. We need change.

This is important.

[Skitch]

If trans wants to protest the shitty candidates by obtaining or by voting for a third party that can't win, I completely back his decision.

[Idioteque Stalker]

What matters most is the MC populace trusts in the integrity of the voting process, lest Tenenbaums fanatics attempt an insurrection.

[megladon8]

MC Bernie bros. Great. Just what we need.

[Idioteque Stalker]

With fewer than 24 hours left to go, here are the closest match-ups:

Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man

If you've been thinking about voting and have a preference in these match-ups (or any others), now would be a great time to vote by posting in this thread or sending me a PM.

[Skitch]

To be clear, I wasn't accusing anyone of anything, just saying I felt it was an important rule. I believe in the MC community.

And I'm once again asking for your money.

[quido8_5]

Thats the thing though; we don’t :)

The royal we. Ya' know, the editorial.


Face it, y'all just want him to vote in the hopes he votes for the same movie you voted for.

Precisely!

[StuSmallz]

That the female characters are peripheral to the plot of Jackson's trilogy--at least in comparison with Frodo, his buddy (Sam?), Gandalf, and the skinny little junky dude (whose name I no longer recall)--doesn't pose a problem for analyzing their roles in the films (any role can be analyzed, no matter how small); it's just that, in this case, the analysis is unlikely to turn up anything very interesting. And of course there's no reason why a film begun in the late 1990s and released in the early 2000s should have a conflicted attitude about assertive women, especially when those women are largely asexual. (Cate Blanchett is so ethereal here she scarcely seems to have any corporeal existence whatsoever.) But that just goes to show my point that Jackson's trilogy was behind the culture rather than ahead of it, as Hollywood melodramas of the studio era were just ahead of what American society was willing to accept at the time--or, more precisely, by centring the figure of a transgressive woman, such films negotiated the outer-most limits of socially acceptable behaviour for a society that was rapidly being transformed by industrial capitalism. That's in part what made them exciting for spectators, and it's why they're still exciting today as contemporary attitudes towards women are not much more enlightened than they were in the 1930s. (It's one thing to recognize intellectually that pervasive misogynistic attitudes cost Hillary Clinton votes in the 2016 election and another thing altogether to actually find her likeable.) When Sharon Stone's character in Basic Instinct brazenly flouts social norms ("What are you gonna do, arrest me for smoking?"), the breaking of a taboo is both thrilling as a vicarious release for the spectator's repressed desires and anxiety-producing as it threatens the total breakdown of social order, causing the spectator to react with nervous laughter. When an ethereal elf-woman rescues a hobbit from the forces of darkness, the spectator can only feel relief. In short, The Lord of the Rings movies are fundamentally not sexy.While I agree with you that modern attitudes towards women still aren't as enlightened as they should be, you keep contradicting and undermining your own points; you cite the results of the 2016 election as an example of lingering sexism in today's society (an election that happened a decade and a half after the release of Fellowship, no less), but earlier in this same post, you said that there was "no reason" why a 2000's movie should feel conflicted about women, as part of an attempt to dismiss the trilogy's portrayal of the gender as merely reflecting the changes that society had undergone, and in a previous post, you literally wrote that "By the time Jackson made his trilogy, however, attitudes toward women HAD shifted considerably", (http://matchcut.artboiled.com/showthread.php?8164-Match-Cut-Madness-3-Best-of-the-00s/page10&p=643490&viewfull=1#post643490) so... which is it?

Anyway, as for you contrasting LOTR's overall positive portrayals of women with the more conflicted attitudes of previous movies, the problem with that is the "anxiety" a lot of those films displayed (including some of the examples you specifically mentioned) towards assertive female characters tended to not be part of an overall critical examination of sexism, or even just neutral reflections of where society was at at those points in time with gender relations, but undeniable affirmations of that anxiety. Take Catherine in Basic Instinct, for example; while the moments in that film where she challenges or psychologically cuts down the men are a somewhat intriguing aspect of her character, they get cancelled out by the overall highly regressive nature of her characterization, which makes an unavoidable connection between her assertive personality and her psychotic, murderous behavior, so instead of that example of female empowerment serving as a positive message to women, it instead ends up being yet another negative warning to men to beware of bold/sexy women, because they'll inevitably end up being dangerous psychos (and that's not even delving into certain behind-the-scenes tidbits from that production, like the fact that the infamous "upskirt" moment, which is the only thing that most people still remember from that piece of trash, was apparently filmed without Sharon Stone consenting to having that part of her anatomy showing up onscreen, (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9N3P20iv2uI&t=559s)which adds a whole other layer of problematic to a movie that already had way too much of that anyway).

[baby doll]

While I agree with you that modern attitudes towards women still aren't as enlightened as they should be, you keep contradicting and undermining your own points; you cite the results of the 2016 election as an example of lingering sexism in today's society (an election that happened a decade and a half after the release of Fellowship, no less), but earlier in this same post, you said that there was "no reason" why a 2000's movie should feel conflicted about women, as part of an attempt to dismiss the trilogy's portrayal of the gender as merely reflecting the changes that society had undergone, and in a previous post, you literally wrote that "By the time Jackson made his trilogy, however, attitudes toward women HAD shifted considerably", (http://matchcut.artboiled.com/showthread.php?8164-Match-Cut-Madness-3-Best-of-the-00s/page10&p=643490&viewfull=1#post643490) so... which is it?Some things change and some things stay the same. The female characters in Jackson's trilogy are assertive but not in a way that threatens the patriarchy; indeed, insofar as the women in the film are all aligned with the forces of good, their occasional acts of assertiveness serve merely to preserve the status quo. This marks a change from classical Hollywood films where desiring, assertive women are either femme fatales (Double Indemnity) or neurotics (Letter from an Unknown Woman), but there is still a certain ideological continuity: before female assertiveness was a threat to the established order; now it can be reigned in and directed towards socially acceptable ends, at least so long as the women remain resolutely asexual. (Alternatively, in recent comedies like Trainwreck, female sexuality is defined more or less explicitly as a problem that gets solved by shunting the heroine into a monogamous relationship.) Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.


Anyway, as for you contrasting LOTR's overall positive portrayals of women with the more conflicted attitudes of previous movies, the problem with that is the "anxiety" a lot of those films displayed (including some of the examples you specifically mentioned) towards assertive female characters tended to not be part of an overall critical examination of sexism, or even just neutral reflections of where society was at at those points in time with gender relations, but undeniable affirmations of that anxiety. Take Catherine in Basic Instinct, for example; while the moments in that film where she challenges or psychologically cuts down the men are a somewhat intriguing aspect of her character, they get cancelled out by the overall highly regressive nature of her characterization, which makes an unavoidable connection between her assertive personality and her psychotic, murderous behavior, so instead of that example of female empowerment serving as a positive message to women, it instead ends up being yet another negative warning to men to beware of bold/sexy women, because they'll inevitably end up being dangerous psychos (and that's not even delving into certain behind-the-scenes tidbits from that production, like the fact that the infamous "upskirt" moment, which is the only thing that most people still remember from that piece of trash, was apparently filmed without Sharon Stone consenting to having that part of her anatomy showing up onscreen, (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9N3P20iv2uI&t=559s)which adds a whole other layer of problematic to a movie that already had way too much of that anyway).I doubt Basic Instinct would be much fun if Stone's character were an "example of female empowerment serving as a positive message to women." Indeed, that sounds like the feminist equivalent of socialist realism: noble, uplifting, and unspeakably dull. Conversely, for all their "problematic" aspects, Double Indemnity, Letter from an Unknown Woman, and Basic Instinct are genuinely great movies, whereas The Lord of the Rings films aren't. Good politics don't necessarily make for good aesthetics.

Moreover, I don't see how the scenes where Stone challenges the authority of the male police officers (which is virtually every scene in which she appears) are "cancelled out" by her character being a psychotic murderer; on the contrary, the achievement of the film in general, and Stone's performance in particular (which is brilliant), is to keep the two sides of her character in constant tension. In other words, Stone quite literally embodies fascination and danger. She isn't any less fascinating for being dangerous, at least for spectators (like me) who are themselves products of the same sexist, homophobic society that produced Verhoeven's film. Inhabitants of a queer-feminist utopia where everyone always thinks correct thoughts may not get the appeal because their ultra-enlightened views on gender make it impossible for them to respond instinctively to Basic Instinct in the same way audiences did in 1992, but then such people don't yet exist.

[DFA1979]

What matters most is the MC populace trusts in the integrity of the voting process, lest Tenenbaums fanatics attempt an insurrection.

That movie rules but the Anderson I'm the most crazy about is The Life Aquatic. Also I'll keep trying to view the ones I haven't seen yet. Apparently Dogtooth is on Tubi. No way to view 25th Hour so I guess I'll have to see if my local library has it or maybe I'll just buy it this week.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Round 2 is now closed. Here are MC's results:


No Country for Old Men vs. Requiem for a Dream
Dogtooth vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1 (NAILBITER)
25th Hour vs. Almost Famous (UPSET)
Spirited Away vs. Punch-Drunk Love
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Finding Nemo (BLOWOUT)
Lost In Translation vs. Shaun of the Dead (UPSET + NAILBITER)
Mulholland Drive vs. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring (BLOWOUT)

There Will Be Blood vs. Amelie
In the Mood for Love vs. Memento (NAILBITER)
Zodiac vs. The Prestige
Children of Men vs. Ratatouille
The Dark Knight vs. A Serious Man (UPSET + NAILBITER)
Wall-E vs. Y Tu Mama Tambien
Inglourious Basterds vs. Oldboy
The Fellowship of the Ring vs. Yi Yi (UPSET)

[Skitch]

Round 2 is now closed. Here are MC's results:

Before Sunset vs. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring (BLOWOUT)


You fucking monsters

[megladon8]

In the Mood for Love not winning is the biggest pisser for me.

[baby doll]

In the Mood for Love not winning is the biggest pisser for me.Ditto. Dogtooth losing to Kill Bill, Vol. 1 and Y tu mamá también losing to Wall-E also suck. On the other hand, Yi Yi beating The Fellowship of the Rings and A Serious Man beating The Dark Knight were both pleasant surprises.

[megladon8]

In the Mood for Love may be the sexiest movie I have ever seen. And it doesn't even feature a kiss.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Voting for the Sweet Sixteen is now open! Vote now by posting in this thread or sending me a PM.

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi



Underdog Watch!

-- After notable upsets over The Royal Tenenbaums and Almost Famous, 25th Hour has now outperformed Spike Lee's 90s contestant, Malcolm X. The next Spike Lee joint to live up to? 80s champion Do the Right Thing. And it'll be hell straight away as 25th Hour matches up with Madness mainstay Hayao Miyazaki's beloved Spirited Away, which (alongside Wall-E) hopes to tie the record for the longest-lasting animated film in MC Madness history.

-- Yi Yi: The impossible-to-translate phrase on MC's lips that has the normies asking, "Wait, what beat Lord of the Rings?" After two titanic upsets over The Incredibles and The Fellowship of the Ring, one wonders just how far Edward Yang's swan song can go. No live-action non-English language film has advanced past the Sweet Sixteen (though Ran, Vagabond, and Three Colors: Red came close), and after seven such films fell in Round 2 it is 90s runner-up Quentin Tarantino who stands between Yi Yi and the record books.

-- After a touch-and-go victory over Unbreakable, A Serious Man sent a message with its upset of 1 seed The Dark Knight. With Christopher Nolan losing two movies in Round 2, the Coens and Quentin Tarantino are now the the only filmmakers left with multiple movies in the tournament -- and they match up in the Sweet Sixteen!

Which movies will advance to the Elite Eight? Find out when voting closes in four days!

[transmogrifier]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1 - are you kidding me? Pass
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead - most lop-sided contest ever
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento - In the Mood for Love should be here, you heathens
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi

[Ezee E]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi

[Gizmo]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi

[Yxklyx]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi

[Skitch]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento - (rewatchability)
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E - (haven't seen all of a Serious Man)
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi

[Yxklyx]

Skitch and I need to have a viewing party - we've nearly voted the same starting in round 1.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Skitch and I need to have a viewing party - we've nearly voted the same starting in round 1.

Burn all the Yi Yi deniers.

[Peng]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi

[baby doll]

No Country for Old Men > Kill Bill, Vol. 1. A good (if pretentious) movie vs. some good scenes.

25th Hour > Spirited Away. This is really comparing apples and oranges here. Both are great in completely different ways, but Lee's film seems to me the more inexhaustible of the two, which is to say that I suspect it still has new things to reveal to me that would justify watching it again.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead

Mulholland Drive > Before Sunset. Tough call, but of the two, Lynch's film is more the innovative, tightly structured, and inexhaustible. Actually maybe it's not such a tough call, although I still love Linklater's film.

There Will Be Blood > Memento. I'd watch Anderson's film again.

Children of Men > Zodiac. A toss-up between two movies I'm less than enthralled with. Of the two, Cuarón's seems to me the more disciplined.

A Serious Man > Wall-E. I've seen the Coens' film four times and would watch it again; I've seen Wall-E once and have no desire to see it again.

Yi Yi > Inglourious Basterds. In addition to its other virtues, Yang's film doesn't make me feel dirty for watching it.

[Ezee E]

Doing the Baby Doll thing....

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
-Anton Chigurh would kill Bill.

25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
-26 hours on drugs

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
-This mind remembers little to nothing of Shaun

Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
-Before Sunset, more like before drinking one of the finest espressos in the world.
HELP MEEEEEE

There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
-WOULD DRINK GUY PEARCE'S MILKSHAKE.

Zodiac vs. Children of Men
-Zodiac Killer would've just gotten high with Michael Caine.

A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
-Actually forgot what I voted on here.

Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi
-Nay nay... couldn't vote

[megladon8]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drivevs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi

[Mr. McGibblets]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi (can't vote)

[Dukefrukem]

I abstain from this round. MC stinks.

[DFA1979]

Hi Mr. McGibblets. It's been a while.

[transmogrifier]

I abstain from this round. MC stinks.

The three actual best movies of the 2000s are still alive, so that's a bonus (though one won't be there in the next round because of the match ups). But the next-best three are missing: Oldboy, Battle Royale, and In the Mood for Love..... MC anti-Asian cinema confirmed? (/s)

[Skitch]

MC anti-Asian cinema confirmed? (/s)

Don't lump me in there.

[StuSmallz]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men


Yi Yi > Inglourious Basterds. In addition to its other virtues, Yang's film doesn't make me feel dirty for watching it.Huh?

[quido8_5]

RIP In the Mood for Love. That's one swift kick in the balls for such an elegant movie.

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away (25th Hour still in the competition, aye?)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset (well, this just sucks, but I guess I really am a softy)
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglorious Bastards vs. Yi Yi


No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
-Anton Chigurh would kill Bill.


:-) This works on several levels and may just win the comments for this round.


There Will Be Blood vs. Memento - (rewatchability)


Rewatchability. I think this is it! The first time I watched Memento it was mind-blowing. The second time, utterly satisfying. The third time the structure was cool, but I was able to just appreciate the film aside from its structure-- the superb performance by Guy Pierce, the bang-on noir mise en scene, the moments of genuine heartbreak, while still having a thread of humor running throughout. The forth time, the structure became a distraction. Same with the fifth and sixth. After a few viewings, the structure becomes a parlor trick that obscures the qualities of the film.

[baby doll]

Huh?In terms of filmmaking craft, Inglourious Basterds may be the best film Tarantino has ever made, but both times I've seen it, I start to feel slightly nauseous in the last forty minutes because all that craft has been placed in the service of a rather simplistic agenda: namely, to get the spectator to root for the brutalization and murder of Nazis. Tarantino appears to regard his audience as a mob howling for blood, and the film uses the historical crimes of fascism simply as a pretext for giving it to them (much as he would subsequently use the horrors of slavery in Django Unchained and the crimes of the Manson family in Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood, both less accomplished films). In other words, notwithstanding the fact that Melanie Laurent is obviously no Romy Schneider, Tarantino has put all of his considerable craft and technique into making the best possible version of Le Vieux fusil.

[Skitch]

Rewatchability. I think this is it! The first time I watched Memento it was mind-blowing. The second time, utterly satisfying. The third time the structure was cool, but I was able to just appreciate the film aside from its structure-- the superb performance by Guy Pierce, the bang-on noir mise en scene, the moments of genuine heartbreak, while still having a thread of humor running throughout. The forth time, the structure became a distraction. Same with the fifth and sixth. After a few viewings, the structure becomes a parlor trick that obscures the qualities of the film.

Agreed. There is also the element of how sad the story is. Sure, TWBB isn't a happy go fun time either, but being presented in a linear story arc/journey makes it easier to revisit every few years whereas the parlor trick of Momento takes away from rewatchability. Not that rewatchability is the most important key to whether a film is good or not, but when you know whats coming it can detract from revisiting. Not always...I've seen The Sixth Sense maybe twice...and Fight Club dozens of times.

[Lazlo]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi

[Spun Lepton]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E

[Ivan Drago]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi

[Dukefrukem]

The three actual best movies of the 2000s are still alive, so that's a bonus

Yeh but they won't survive. So F this.

[transmogrifier]

So sad to see Zodiac fall to another one of Cuaron's flashy technical exercises in nothingness.

[Philip J. Fry]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E

[dreamdead]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset - y'all be evil... these two and ITMFL are probably my 3 favorites of this decade.
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi

[Idioteque Stalker]

25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E

Who even are you?!



Yeh but they won't survive. So F this.

Only one movie survives. Best not to get too emotionally attached.

[Philip J. Fry]

Who even are you?!




Only one movie survives. Best not to get too emotionally attached.I'm as surprised as you. I just really dig ASM and 25th Hour.

[DFA1979]

Gonna just ignore the end of that last page. I'm bummed that the Spike Lee movie pack I found back in July didn't have 25th Hour. To the Barnes & Noble!

[Idioteque Stalker]

No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1 (ouch)
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away (YAWN)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset (yawn)
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi (OUCH)

[Skitch]

Wow, so Before Sunset is even more overrated than even I had imagined.

[transmogrifier]

Before Sunset is almost perfect.

[megladon8]

I low key can't stand it.

[Skitch]

I low key can't stand it.

I high key couldn't even finish it.

[DFA1979]

Before Sunset is almost perfect.

I honestly have little interest in seeing any of the trilogy. Please tell me how it is any different from your average white people meet cute movie.

[DFA1979]

I really shouldn't post while drinking but fuck it I don't care today. Think I'll watch Dogtooth when I get home sounds like it's messed up enough for how I feel right now.

[Skitch]

I honestly have little interest in seeing any of the trilogy. Please tell me how it is any different from your average white people meet cute movie.

Lots more whining.

[transmogrifier]

I honestly have little interest in seeing any of the trilogy. Please tell me how it is any different from your average white people meet cute movie.

The thing is, I love this move completely, but I don't care if you don't want to watch it, or that Skitch can't even finish it. I don't write essays on demand :)

[DFA1979]

Lots more whining.

Not encouraging haha.

[DFA1979]

The thing is, I love this move completely, but I don't care if you don't want to watch it, or that Skitch can't even finish it. I don't write essays on demand :)

I just asked why I should watch it not asking for an essay or whatever. Also I find this hilarious considering how for years people on this site and the Corrie dogged me for not giving them a full review of a movie I liked. Why am i here again I donno I mean folks have asked me to stay and I'm like why? Why bother? Anyways fuck it.

[DFA1979]

Sorry Idiot I'm glad you did this contest and you set this up only for people to literally spit in your face. You're a good dude.

[Skitch]

The thing is, I love this move completely, but I don't care if you don't want to watch it, or that Skitch can't even finish it.

And you shouldn't care. You do you bro! :) Lord knows I've got plenty I love that everyone hates.

[Peng]

To the haters: Baby, you all miss that plane.

[transmogrifier]

And you shouldn't care. You do you bro! :) Lord knows I've got plenty I love that everyone hates.

Indeed. And I apologize in advance because I will be voting for Before Sunset in every match up except one :)

[Yxklyx]

I really shouldn't post while drinking but fuck it I don't care today. Think I'll watch Dogtooth when I get home sounds like it's messed up enough for how I feel right now.

Oh yeah, that one's messed up.

[StuSmallz]

Some things change and some things stay the same. The female characters in Jackson's trilogy are assertive but not in a way that threatens the patriarchy; indeed, insofar as the women in the film are all aligned with the forces of good, their occasional acts of assertiveness serve merely to preserve the status quo. This marks a change from classical Hollywood films where desiring, assertive women are either femme fatales (Double Indemnity) or neurotics (Letter from an Unknown Woman), but there is still a certain ideological continuity: before female assertiveness was a threat to the established order; now it can be reigned in and directed towards socially acceptable ends, at least so long as the women remain resolutely asexual. (Alternatively, in recent comedies like Trainwreck, female sexuality is defined more or less explicitly as a problem that gets solved by shunting the heroine into a monogamous relationship.) Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

I doubt Basic Instinct would be much fun if Stone's character were an "example of female empowerment serving as a positive message to women." Indeed, that sounds like the feminist equivalent of socialist realism: noble, uplifting, and unspeakably dull. Conversely, for all their "problematic" aspects, Double Indemnity, Letter from an Unknown Woman, and Basic Instinct are genuinely great movies, whereas The Lord of the Rings films aren't. Good politics don't necessarily make for good aesthetics.

Moreover, I don't see how the scenes where Stone challenges the authority of the male police officers (which is virtually every scene in which she appears) are "cancelled out" by her character being a psychotic murderer; on the contrary, the achievement of the film in general, and Stone's performance in particular (which is brilliant), is to keep the two sides of her character in constant tension. In other words, Stone quite literally embodies fascination and danger. She isn't any less fascinating for being dangerous, at least for spectators (like me) who are themselves products of the same sexist, homophobic society that produced Verhoeven's film. Inhabitants of a queer-feminist utopia where everyone always thinks correct thoughts may not get the appeal because their ultra-enlightened views on gender make it impossible for them to respond instinctively to Basic Instinct in the same way audiences did in 1992, but then such people don't yet exist.The women in LOTR don't "threaten the patriarchy" that much within the narrow context of Middle Earth society (whether they did so in the real world is another question, though), but that's an irrelevant point, since the trilogy is obviously portraying a fantasy world where sexism against women is not shown to be anywhere near as rampant as it is in the real one, either in the medieval times that inspired Tolkien in the first place, or even in 2021 (I mean, Theoden literally proclaims that Eowyn is to rule Rohan in his place if he dies in Return Of The King, which is exactly what happens). Furthermore, LOTR's positive portrayal of such women is a good thing, especially in the context of how previous movies (including Basic Instinct) had typically portrayed female empowerment, which is in the inherently negative manners you admitted, as it tended to be connected to emotional instability or immorality, either of the sexual kind, or the homicidal (with the first often leading to the latter), usually culminating with the woman in question ending up either in jail or dead. In other words, these characters were portrayed as a threat to the patriarchy in order to serve as an implicit warning against women from being assertive or sexually liberated, since it often lead to doom for both them and the men in their orbit, and such characterizations were themselves the product of a patriarchal system (Hollywood) that set up those limits and consequences for female characters in the first place, the same system that primarily valued women for their looks/bodies, where sexual abuse ran rampant (and still does to a certain extent, if the fallout of the Weinstein scandal is anything to go by), and multiple actresses were pressured into having abortions, including Davis & Crawford themselves.

Anyway, regarding the points about Basic Instinct, while it's always possible to go too far in either direction when it comes to portraying female empowerment, like the way that the relatively mindless "girl power!" sentiments of something Captain Marvel ignores the way that the title character is absorbed into the propaganda of the American military-industrial complex, Basic Instinct still goes too far in the opposite direction by being a genuinely offensive, regressive portrayal of female empowerment, and a stark contrast to the way that the female portrayals in LOTR, Fury Road (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/film/mad-max-fury-road/), and (to counterbalance this with a good Verhoeven movie) Total Recall (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/film/total-recall/) not only hold up as progressive even today, but are also still endlessly fascinating to analyze, because it's not some either/or choice between movies being either enlightened or interesting; they can (and should) be both, and to act otherwise is nonsense.

[DFA1979]

I'll just limit myself to voting and ignoring the dumb bullshit certain people post from now on.

[StuSmallz]

I'll just limit myself to voting and ignoring the dumb bullshit certain people post from now on.https://i.ibb.co/HCmYT36/theyareontome.gif (https://imgbb.com/)

Should we finally just try to move this back-and-forth over to the "28 Films Later" thread now, where it would be more on-topic?

[dreamdead]

I honestly have little interest in seeing any of the trilogy. Please tell me how it is any different from your average white people meet cute movie.

Waaaaaaaay back in 2008, I wrote the following (http://matchcut.artboiled.com/showthread.php?28-The-Non-Adminstrative-top-50-(continued)/page11&p=38773&viewfull=1#post38773) for the non-administrative top 50. I stand by pretty much all of it, though some of the NGO talk would probably warrant greater coverage in how the characters struggle to be good liberals...

[baby doll]

The women in LOTR don't "threaten the patriarchy" within the narrow context of Middle Earth society (whether they did so in the real world is another question, though), but that's an irrelevant point, since the trilogy is obviously portraying a fantasy world where sexism against women is not shown to be anywhere near as rampant as it is in the real one, either in the medieval times that inspired Tolkien in the first place, or even in 2021 (I mean, Theoden literally proclaims that Eowyn is to rule Rohan in his place if he dies in Return Of The King, which is exactly what happens). Furthermore, LOTR's positive portrayal of such women is a good thing, especially in the context of how previous movies (including Basic Instinct) had typically portrayed female empowerment, which is in the inherently negative manners you admitted, as it tended to be connected to emotional instability or immorality, either of the sexual kind, or the homicidal (with the first often leading to the latter), usually culminating with the woman in question ending up either in jail or dead. In other words, these characters were portrayed as a threat to the patriarchy in order to serve as an implicit warning against women from being assertive or sexually liberated, since it often lead to doom for both them and the men in their orbit, and such characterizations were themselves the product of a patriarchal system (Hollywood) that set up those limits and consequences for female characters in the first place, the same system that primarily valued women for their looks/bodies, where sexual abuse ran rampant (and still does to a certain extent, if the fallout of the Weinstein scandal is anything to go by), and multiple actresses were pressured into having abortions, including Davis & Crawford themselves.

Anyway, regarding the points about Basic Instinct, while it's always possible to go too far in either direction when it comes to portraying female empowerment, like the way that the relatively mindless "girl power!" sentiments of something Captain Marvel ignores the way that the title character is absorbed into the propaganda of the American military-industrial complex, Basic Instinct still goes too far in the opposite direction by being a genuinely offensive, regressive portrayal of female empowerment, and a stark contrast to the way that the female portrayals in LOTR, Fury Road (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/film/mad-max-fury-road/), and (to counterbalance this with a good Verhoeven movie) Total Recall (https://letterboxd.com/stusmallz/film/total-recall/) not only hold up as progressive even today, but are also still endlessly fascinating to analyze, because it's not some either/or choice between movies being either enlightened or interesting; they can (and should) be both, and to act otherwise is nonsense.With regard to The Lord of the Rings, it seems to me that the first question is: how genuinely progressive is its depiction of a world ostensibly less sexist than our own? I would argue not very, since the films' female characters gain assertiveness on the battlefield at the expense of sexual expression. In other words, the efforts of Jackson and his co-writers to imagine a non-sexist fantasy world are constrained by the sexist attitudes of the world in which the films were actually produced and consumed. It's evident that mainstream audiences in the early 2000s readily accepted the assertiveness of the films' female characters on the battlefield to the point that it aroused virtually no comment, but I doubt the same audiences would have as readily accepted them having Dionysian bisexual orgies. (Needless to say, there can be no female liberation without sexual liberation.)

The second question is: how interesting is the film's depiction of a non-sexist fantasy world, limited though it may be in its omission of female sexuality? Again, I would argue not very since the films' unambiguously affirmative stance towards female empowerment (as distinct from emancipation or liberation) leaves nothing for the spectator to do but nod in agreement: Yes, this is how things ought be but aren't yet. The films' attitude is essentially pious and nothing is more boring in art than piety, since it doesn't allow for contradiction, messiness, tension, ambivalence, or complexity.

This is, not incidentally, why so much liberal film criticism is not only insufferable but overly simplistic. In characterizing films in binary, either/or terms (progressive/regressive, enlightened/unenlightened, feminist/misogynist), such criticism fails to grapple with the complexity of pop culture as a site of ideological contradiction. To take the example of a classical film in which the heroine dies at the end, Josef von Sternberg's Dishonored has both progressive and conservative elements and much of the film's fascination results from the productive tension between them. Inevitably the prostitute heroine dies (by firing squad, no less), yet the film in no way endorses this, instead regarding her as a sort of martyr and contrasting her genuine (if sexually transgressive) patriotism with the hypocrisy of the male military officers. (Jonathan Rosenbaum has characterized the film as "an antiwar statement that a prostitute can do more for her countryman than a female spy.") Yet the film's attitude towards its heroine is far from straightforward, as evidenced by the famous close-up of her instinctively fixing her lipstick just before she's shot. On the one hand, the heroine/Marlene Dietrich is to be admired for her beauty, while on the other, her exaggerated, slightly campy makeup denotes the lack of an authentic essence. Basic Instinct evidences a similar split attitude towards its heroine, combining fascination and condemnation, although as I've pointed out elsewhere on this forum, she's never punished for her transgressions and the seeming phallic victory of the Michael Douglas character is highly provisional and could be reversed at any moment: if he's still alive at the end of the movie, it's only because Stone wants him alive for now. The contradictions of Sternberg and Verhoeven's films make them a lot more exciting to watch (and re-watch) than the bland liberal pieties of Portrait d'une jeune fille en feu or The Lord of the Rings, neither of which I have the slightest desire to see again.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Should we finally just try to move this back-and-forth over to the "28 Films Later" thread now, where it would be more on-topic?

Your convo remains on topic despite LOTR getting voted out. Anything even tangentially related to "best of the 00s" is welcome here. Pretty sure he wasn't referring to you anyway. Feel free to carry on.



Waaaaaaaay back in 2008, I wrote the following (http://matchcut.artboiled.com/showthread.php?28-The-Non-Adminstrative-top-50-(continued)/page11&p=38773&viewfull=1#post38773) for the non-administrative top 50. I stand by pretty much all of it, though some of the NGO talk would probably warrant greater coverage in how the characters struggle to be good liberals...

I was more of a lurker back then, but this was and still is a great thread. I suppose we can assume you'll vote BS all the way to the end, unless a seismic shift has occurred...

[Idioteque Stalker]

With ~24 hours left to go, we have three nailbiters:

Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E

If you've been thinking about voting and have a preference in these match-ups (or any others), now would be a great time to vote by posting in this thread or sending me a PM.

[quido8_5]

I honestly have little interest in seeing any of the trilogy. Please tell me how it is any different from your average white people meet cute movie.

That's a fair point for the first one, even if it is more impressionistic and believable than most meet cute movies. Before Sunset, though, is the inverse of a meet cute movie. With a surprising amount of dexterity it weaves through the numerous ways that people can drift through life, making decisions that are simultaneously profound and regrettable. It is an 80-minute* glimpse into the early adulthood of these characters who we met as idealistic 20s-somethings. The ending is beautiful and that's all I'm going to say about that. If Before Sunset is the inverse of Sunrise, because it still maintains some sense of idealized romanticism, Before Midnight is 100 the opposite... but that's for another time. For right now: it's 80 minutes of your life that you could either a) regret about as much as watching three episodes of some binge-y TV show, or b) absolutely adore. I mean, the choice is yours... :goes to watch three episodes of The Chair:

* The fact that it unravels in real time, if nothing else, makes it worth a viewing-- some of the best editing of the decade.


I really shouldn't post while drinking but fuck it I don't care today. Think I'll watch Dogtooth when I get home sounds like it's messed up enough for how I feel right now.

Wait, we're supposed to post on here when we're not drinking?

[DFA1979]

Waaaaaaaay back in 2008, I wrote the following (http://matchcut.artboiled.com/showthread.php?28-The-Non-Adminstrative-top-50-(continued)/page11&p=38773&viewfull=1#post38773) for the non-administrative top 50. I stand by pretty much all of it, though some of the NGO talk would probably warrant greater coverage in how the characters struggle to be good liberals...

Cool. I can't remember if I read it or not so I checked it out. Good review, I might watch the trilogy after all.

[DFA1979]

baby doll's Inglourious Basterds post is straight cringe but I'm the problem around here? I guess no one wanted to get paragraphed posted to death I guess.

[DFA1979]

That's a fair point for the first one, even if it is more impressionistic and believable than most meet cute movies. Before Sunset, though, is the inverse of a meet cute movie. With a surprising amount of dexterity it weaves through the numerous ways that people can drift through life, making decisions that are simultaneously profound and regrettable. It is an 80-minute* glimpse into the early adulthood of these characters who we met as idealistic 20s-somethings. The ending is beautiful and that's all I'm going to say about that. If Before Sunset is the inverse of Sunrise, because it still maintains some sense of idealized romanticism, Before Midnight is 100 the opposite... but that's for another time. For right now: it's 80 minutes of your life that you could either a) regret about as much as watching three episodes of some binge-y TV show, or b) absolutely adore. I mean, the choice is yours... :goes to watch three episodes of The Chair:

* The fact that it unravels in real time, if nothing else, makes it worth a viewing-- some of the best editing of the decade.



Wait, we're supposed to post on here when we're not drinking?

Nah post drunk if you want. Do whatever it used to be a free and open forum with members. Once.

[StuSmallz]

baby doll's Inglourious Basterds post is straight cringe but I'm the problem around here? I guess no one wanted to get paragraphed posted to death I guess.Cringe how? He was just expressing his personal opinion.

[Idioteque Stalker]

The Sweet Sixteen is now closed. Here are MC's results:


No Country for Old Men vs. Kill Bill Vol. 1 (BLOWOUT)
25th Hour vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Shaun of the Dead (BLOWOUT)
Mulholland Drive vs. Before Sunset (UPSET + NAILBITER)
There Will Be Blood vs. Memento (UPSET + NAILBITER)
Zodiac vs. Children of Men
A Serious Man vs. Wall-E (NAILBITER)
Inglourious Basterds vs. Yi Yi (UPSET)

[Peng]

Wow, all my preference except one (Lee vs Miyazaki, which I can't be mad about because anything non-American, including Miyazaki's own films, have always withered away last few threads, and I need to rewatch the latter anyway since it's been over a decade).

[Idioteque Stalker]

This will be our strongest Elite Eight yet if you ask me.

[megladon8]

I'm astounded that Memento won in its match.

[quido8_5]

Agree with both stalker and meg. I think this elite is quite a bit better (and less expected) than the previous decades. I can't believe Memento won either, but depending on the match-up, I could actually vote for it this round. Madness.

[Lazlo]

Bit of a bug in the system with Yi Yi, which I should have seen by now but haven't. If we're all honest, seems like the people who haven't seen it won't vote and the people who have really like it and will vote to the point where it could be the champion just based off the passion of a few who've seen it. It'll just keep rolling for a while.

I mean, nothing to be done about it, them's the rules, but it's interesting to see it take down some of my favorites and I couldn't defend them. Guess I oughta see it finally. I bet it's great!

[Skitch]

I feel like Wall-E has been skating on easy matchups.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Voting for the Elite Eight is now open! Vote now by posting in this thread or sending me a PM.

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi



Contenders or Pretenders?

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is one of two movies to enjoy multiple blowout victories (the other is No Country for Old Men). In the Elite Eight's premier match-up, the Gondry/Kaufman juggernaut -- one of only two remaining #1 seeds -- goes head-to-head with Richard Linklater's Before Sunset, red-hot after arguably the biggest upset of the tournament so far: a nailbiter victory over David Lynch's Mulholland Drive. Either of these 2004 romances could conceivably become MC Madness champion under different bracket circumstances, but MCers have a choice to make: hop on the plane and forget all about Jesse and Celine or systematically erase Joel and Clementine from memory?

The last hope for 00s superstar Christopher Nolan, Memento has fought tooth-and-nail to get this far. Coming off back-to-back nailbiter victories over WKW's In the Mood for Love and #1 seed There Will Be Blood, a battle-tested Memento now matches up with Alfonso Cuaron's Children of Men, which has quietly amassed three solid-if-unexceptional victories in a row over Battle Royale, Ratatouille, and Zodiac. If Cuaron's film has been winning in its sleep, upon waking will it be groggy or rejuvenated; conversely, has Memento's tough road to the Elite Eight left it weary or resolute?

Even if it doesn't advance any further, Edward Yang's Yi Yi is now the benchmark against which all other live-action, non-English language movies will be tested in Madness going forward -- and is furthermore tied (along with Ed Wood from Madness 2) for the greatest number of upsets. Can this Cinderella story possibly continue, or will Andrew Stanton's Wall-E trash-compact its way into our hearts and break into the Final Four?

Find out when voting closes in four days!

[Philip J. Fry]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Memento vs. Children of Men

[Idioteque Stalker]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away

Oh good -- you're back. Somebody hacked your account and voted a few days ago.

[Yxklyx]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away - easy choice
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset - incredibly easy choice
Memento vs. Children of Men - another incredibly easy choice
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi - tough call, the former's strength lies in the first half/third but the latter is solid throughout

[Skitch]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away - Yes, No Country has some beautiful tripod shots of scenery, but just think about how much hand drawn work went into Spirited Away. The detail is incredible. I feel like the story has many more layers than No Country. Spirited Away deserves your vote!

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi

[Idioteque Stalker]

I feel like Wall-E has been skating on easy matchups.

I would say Kung Fu Hustle was an easy match-up in R1, except that one was actually closer than you might think. I would call Y Tu Mama Tambien a neutral match-up (neither easy nor hard), but it definitely could've been a rougher go in R2 had Wall-E gone up against, say, Amelie. And, yeah, the match-up against Sweet Sixteen underdog A Serious Man wasn't the biggest test of strength of that round, but ASM did take out The Dark Knight, so... yeah, I dunno.

EDIT: I feel like No Country and Eternal Sunshine have had the easiest roads to this point. But maybe they just make it look easy.

[Skitch]

I would say Kung Fu Hustle was an easy match-up in R1, except that one was actually closer than you might think. I would call Y Tu Mama Tambien a neutral match-up (neither easy nor hard), but it definitely could've been a rougher go in R2 had Wall-E gone up against, say, Amelie. And, yeah, the match-up against Sweet Sixteen underdog A Serious Man wasn't the biggest test of strength of that round, but ASM did take out The Dark Knight, so... yeah, I dunno.

EDIT: I feel like No Country and Eternal Sunshine have had the easiest roads to this point. But maybe they just make it look easy.

I think this is the first time I voted for Wall E. I'm not wild about it, its a good movie, but not my favorite Pixar.

[baby doll]

Spirited Away > No Country for Old Men
Before Sunset > Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Children of Men > Memento
Yi Yi > Wall-E

[Idioteque Stalker]

Bit of a bug in the system with Yi Yi, which I should have seen by now but haven't. If we're all honest, seems like the people who haven't seen it won't vote and the people who have really like it and will vote to the point where it could be the champion just based off the passion of a few who've seen it. It'll just keep rolling for a while.

I mean, nothing to be done about it, them's the rules, but it's interesting to see it take down some of my favorites and I couldn't defend them. Guess I oughta see it finally. I bet it's great!

This got me thinking: Which movies from each Madness Elite Eight have the lowest viewership numbers on LB?

80s Madness: Stop Making Sense (58k, lost to tournament runner-up The Shining)
90s Madness: Ed Wood (102k, lost third place winner Fargo)
00s Madness: Yi Yi (53k)

I don't think the relatively lower popularity of Stop Making Sense gave it an advantage. I do, however, believe Vagabond (currently at 31k and in the 20s at the time) may have benefited from its obscurity relative to the movies it overcame on the way to the Sweet Sixteen: Raising Arizona and Die Hard. The Vagabond match-ups had the lowest recorded votes in any Madness tournament. The Yi Yi match-ups aren't nearly as low, but they still average about half of the total voting body in any given round.

I can't speak for others, but there are movies in this tournament I perfer over Yi Yi -- Yi Yi just hasn't matched up with them (yet).

[baby doll]

I can't speak for others, but there are movies in this tournament I perfer over Yi Yi -- Yi Yi just hasn't matched up with them (yet).If we were doing a ranked ballot:

Yi Yi
Before Sunset
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Spirited Away
No Country for Old Men
Wall-E
Children of Men
Memento

[quido8_5]

Bit of a bug in the system with Yi Yi, which I should have seen by now but haven't. If we're all honest, seems like the people who haven't seen it won't vote and the people who have really like it and will vote to the point where it could be the champion just based off the passion of a few who've seen it. It'll just keep rolling for a while.

I mean, nothing to be done about it, them's the rules, but it's interesting to see it take down some of my favorites and I couldn't defend them. Guess I oughta see it finally. I bet it's great!

I've thought about this and, to a certain extent, it is definitely a bug in the system. Conversely, a case could be made for the system working especially well in this situation. Over the course of previous movie madness competitions (especially the 80s) I watched movies that I otherwise wouldn't have-- sometimes to support a film I truly loved, sometimes out of spite. So, if this tournament makes me watch movies I otherwise wouldn't have (at least, at this time). Some were great, some weren't, but it was always interesting. You may or may not like Yi Yi, but it's worth watching even if you end up hating it. Plus, this is a film that people get passionate about because, if it resonates with you, then there's the possibility that it sneaks into your favorite films of all time.

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset - Damn it, this is why we have rank-order lists!
Memento vs. Children of Men - my 17 year old self would be so proud!
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi -

I'm honestly torn. When is this round wrapping up? Given what I said above, this may seem like an obvious choice; however, I've watched Wall-E maybe half a dozen times in the last year and it keeps getting better. I haven't watched Yi Yi in seven years. For Wall-E, as Yxklyx noted, the second third of the movie is pretty pedestrian. Still, it's potentially the funniest third of the movie and the last third relies on the second. Obviously, this takes a little bit of mental gymnastics, which makes me wonder if Yi Yi is the clear winner for me. Difficult to make the decision without a more recent viewing of Yi Yi (which I would love to have, if at all possible).

[Philip J. Fry]

Oh good -- you're back. Somebody hacked your account and voted a few days ago.I was tempted to vote No Country, though.

[Ezee E]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi

[transmogrifier]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi

[Skitch]

My man!

[transmogrifier]

The best three movies of the 2000s are Eternal Sunshine, Before Sunset, and Mulholland Dr… so of course they all get matched up with each other so only one can make the final 4. Where can I lodge my formal complaint with these shenanigans?

[dreamdead]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi

I'm pretty comfortable suggesting that--for me--Yang's film is better than every film still here except for Linklater's. There are no films I actively am neutral about still here, just layers of appreciation to love. Bitter about losing the Lynch film, but 'tis what it is.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Where can I lodge my formal complaint with these shenanigans?

Please direct all formal complaints to the MC Madness Board of Trustees, which guarantees each and every bit of feedback has a 50/50 chance of being looked at with a blank stare before an inevitable offhand rejection.

Brackets, along with pretty much everything else, are based on Filmspotting's tournament from 2019. (https://challonge.com/madness19/)

[Yxklyx]

How are the match-ups determined? Because it seems to me with the quality of the films presented here, that the matchups determine the winner.

[Lazlo]

I've thought about this and, to a certain extent, it is definitely a bug in the system. Conversely, a case could be made for the system working especially well in this situation. Over the course of previous movie madness competitions (especially the 80s) I watched movies that I otherwise wouldn't have-- sometimes to support a film I truly loved, sometimes out of spite. So, if this tournament makes me watch movies I otherwise wouldn't have (at least, at this time). Some were great, some weren't, but it was always interesting. You may or may not like Yi Yi, but it's worth watching even if you end up hating it. Plus, this is a film that people get passionate about because, if it resonates with you, then there's the possibility that it sneaks into your favorite films of all time.

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset - Damn it, this is why we have rank-order lists!
Memento vs. Children of Men - my 17 year old self would be so proud!
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi -

I'm honestly torn. When is this round wrapping up? Given what I said above, this may seem like an obvious choice; however, I've watched Wall-E maybe half a dozen times in the last year and it keeps getting better. I haven't watched Yi Yi in seven years. For Wall-E, as Yxklyx noted, the second third of the movie is pretty pedestrian. Still, it's potentially the funniest third of the movie and the last third relies on the second. Obviously, this takes a little bit of mental gymnastics, which makes me wonder if Yi Yi is the clear winner for me. Difficult to make the decision without a more recent viewing of Yi Yi (which I would love to have, if at all possible).

Yeah, no shade against Yi Yi, its run in this tournament has re-sparked my interest in it, so nothing wrong with that. Just didn't have time to watch it before it took out some of my all time favorites. Ultimately I just hope both teams have fun and I'm always glad to see people advocate for stuff they love.

Anyway.

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi

[Idioteque Stalker]

How are the match-ups determined?

Match-ups follow the brackets established by Filmspotting's tournament from 2019. (https://challonge.com/madness19/)

[StuSmallz]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Memento vs. Children of Men

[Peng]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi


Before Sunset is in my all-time top 10 so that will be my easiest vote from now on.

[Mr. McGibblets]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi

Is Yi Yi streaming anywhere? I'll try to watch it this weekend.

[Lazlo]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi

Is Yi Yi streaming anywhere? I'll try to watch it this weekend.

Criterion Channel.

[Idioteque Stalker]

Match-ups follow the brackets established by Filmspotting's tournament from 2019. (https://challonge.com/madness19/)

Filmspotting's Elite Eight:

No Country for Old Men (eventual third place winner)
The Royal Tenenbaums
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (eventual runner-up)
Mulholland Drive
There Will Be Blood (eventual champion)
Children of Men
The Dark Knight
The Fellowship of the Ring

These are all great movies, but I like ours better. To only share three of a possible eight is quite the departure.

[Gizmo]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi

[DFA1979]

Cringe how? He was just expressing his personal opinion.

I've been instructed to refer all personal issues elsewhere.

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset-Only seem Eternal
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi-Only seen Wall-E

[megladon8]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi

[Idioteque Stalker]

Is Yi Yi streaming anywhere? I'll try to watch it this weekend.

I hope you manage to get around to it because this match-up is going to be close. I'm undecided myself at the moment, and quido is holding out as well.

[Ivan Drago]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away
Memento vs. Children of Men
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi

[Philip J. Fry]

Surprised for the Memento love. I do think it's good, but that good?

[transmogrifier]

Surprised for the Memento love. I do think it's good, but that good?

I voted against it in an earlier round, but it is easily better than the overrated Children of Men.

[Philip J. Fry]

I voted against it in an earlier round, but it is easily better than the overrated Children of Men.I disagree.

[Idioteque Stalker]

I have voted for Memento every round. The only match-up that was tough was In the Mood for Love. But I too am surprised by how well it has done/is doing.

[Skitch]

Children of Men is way overrated. Its good, I own it, but mega overrated.

[Idioteque Stalker]

No Country for Old Men vs. Spirited Away (yawn)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vs. Before Sunset (ouch)
Memento vs. Children of Men (yawn)
Wall-E vs. Yi Yi (OUCH-IEST OF OUCHES)

Watched a good chunk of Yi Yi earlier. I love that movie and would never say an ill word about it. But this is madness, and I will continue to shout my love for Wall-E from the rooftops until the day I die.

[Ezee E]

Get YiYi the fuck outta here. Easiest path ever.