Quoting Milky Joe (view post)
Wow, really? For the life of me, I can't get a handle on either of yours taste---and all this time I thought I was the only one who was lukewarm on it.
(That bit in the prison with the dude's prosthetic leg makes me laugh every time, though. That shit was inspired.)
The first Guardians felt more concerned with how much fun it was having than how much I was. But it did have some good moments.
I am looking forward to Kurt Russell, though.
"How is education supposed to make me feel smarter? Besides, every time I learn something new, it pushes some old stuff out of my brain. Remember when I took that home wine-making course and forgot how to drive?"
--Homer
I dont have any insight into dual directing, but I love it when dual directors flip the bird at the guild rules. Nonsense. If people have found a way to co-direct, let em. Mildly weird that Marvel whos been terrified of frmale anything "finds" their female director in half a male team, but whatever. Wouldn't be questioning it if they hadnt been so adverse to female everything in the past, but here we be.
I'm pretty quiet around these parts, but I really don't like Guardians. (Also, I don't like Marvel in general, so.) Its action was bloated and weightless, the soundtrack was fun and so what.
I don't think I like James Gunn very much.
I'm sure the DGA rules also exist to protect directors from studio fuckery. It's not always about two directors working together to realize the film of their common dreams. It's about keeping studio heads from undermining the process and hedging their bets by destabilizing the director's leadership.
Yes, the main historical reason for the implementation of the rule was diva actors. The guild doesn't want a star (especially if they have directorial aspirations) who demand this and that on set, suddenly claiming that they're a co-director and wanting to be credited as such. Clint Eastwood was notorious for this kind of thing in the 70s.
Movie Theater Diary
What does that mean.... exactly. "Bloated and Weightless"?
Bloated:
The action pieces were overstuffed and overlong and overloud. Hyperactive and borderline incoherent. Fat as hell.
Weightless:
The action setpieces were hollow and empty, tedious and unimpactful.
I recognized the seeming surface contradiction of the terms when I wrote what I wrote but decided I liked it.
Ahh, I see. Thanks for info Syco and 8. I assumed it was some silly thing lording over creators, like the credits all have to be up front that Lucas got fined for.
See, Guardians is the Marvel movie I probably most wish was longer (for, I dunno, more team stuff before the final act? More funny interplay to just hang out in some of the cooler locales a little longer? Either way, just reaching.. No complaints), and it's definitely the one that has the most weight and impact on me.
Its last 15-20 minutes are just the perfect assault on my tearducts and the muscles it takes to make me grin ear to ear. The sort of warm, emotional nutrition I rarely get from big movies.
Totally prepared for Vol. 2 to not have that same effect on me, but I'm still looking forward to it immensely.
Last 11 things I really enjoyed:
Speed Racer (Wachowski/Wachowski, 2008)
Safe (Haynes, 1995)
South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (Parker, 1999)
Beastie Boys Story (Jonze, 2020)
Bad Trip (Sakurai, 2020)
What's Up Doc? (Bogdanovich, 1972)
Diva (Beineix, 1981)
Delicatessen (Caro/Jeunet, 1991)
The Hunger (Scott, 1983)
Pineapple Express (Green, 2008)
Chungking Express (Wong, 1994)
I dont even remember long tedious action bits.... are we watching the same movie? The finale is barely 20 minutes. Everything else is small and contained and definitely not empty. The intro scene alone qualifies as being the opposite of everything you listed. Are you over generalizing here?
There's tons of little rumor headlines and tidbits that makes my first three movies here, solid choices if you were in Vegas.
I would guess no.
I just thought it was overly clever and self-referential in a way that wasn't as formally interesting as, say, Deadpool was. The absurd amount of hype around it might have prepared me for something it wasn't, though.
There were a lot of really good moments, but when Dave Bautista is the most memorable part of your movie, you're probably doing something wrong.
All respect to Bautista though, because that guy could kill me.
The severed arm perfectly acquitted itself, because of the simplicity of its wishes and its total lack of doubt.
Nobody watches "Guardians" for the action. I mean, if we compare it to any other blockbuster of its size and scope (from "Raiders" to "The Matrix" and beyond) it doesn't have a single memorable set piece. Nor does it have a single memorable visual (it could have had em, but Gunn's pacing is so frantic and desperate that he misses the obvious opportunities).
Personally, I'm at the point that if unless you're Jackie Chan, Donnie Yen, Woo-ping Yuen, Tsui Hark, or Johnny To --- well, I'm already bored by your faux action American bullshit, which more often that not involves a small army outfitted with machine guns and enough cross cutting to invoke seizures in epileptics.
The problem with the ending of "Guardians" is that it fits the Marvel template to a tee -- it's exactly the same ending as we already saw in stuff like "Winter Soldier" or "Ultron." Lots of shit thrown at the screen, a ton of CGI, and that feeling of weightlessness that Sync mentioned.
I think it's a fun movie, in parts, and most of the comedy works and that the soundtrack pumps a ton of energy into a story and characters that aren't, on their own, really all that interesting.
I really like the long take where Raccoon's discussing the prison escape in the foreground while you watch Groot recede into the background, stretch out of frame, grab the battery thing, return into frame, and yank it free right after Raccoon explains that that particular step has to be done last. That moment had a great sense of wit and relied on us paying attention to the composition.
The prison escape might be one of the better sequences in all of Marvel's movies.
I really like both the first chase scene where the team all meets and the prison escape. The last combat scene is not my thing at all, long and generic and loses most of playful feel of the film.
Agreed.
So the guy who wrote & produced The Last Stand will be writing & possibly directing the next X-Men film which will be a Dark Phoenix story.
Not a good sign.
The severed arm perfectly acquitted itself, because of the simplicity of its wishes and its total lack of doubt.
With so many cool villains left untapped, I find it extremely annoying that they are so obsessed with the Phoenix saga, a story that cannot be told in one film. Even a trilogy would be tough, because its such a weird story.
Yeh and Kevin Feige produced that movie too. That movie was shitty because Ratner didn't understand the source material.
...or directing, acting, writing, etc.
Yes, shame on Ratner, but the studio was also pushing the film when they didn't have a script ready, and I'd argue that the best writer involved with X2 (Michael Dougherty) ducked out to help Singer with Superman Returns, leaving scripting duties to Zak Penn and Simon Kinberg, who both have more uneven filmographies.
I thought you were talking about Jee-Woon Kim.
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