No I'm a fan. But I remember MC panning it, as being eye rolling, despite Leo's performance.
I need to rewatch it.
No I'm a fan. But I remember MC panning it, as being eye rolling, despite Leo's performance.
I need to rewatch it.
I enjoy the film enough but called its premise from the poorly designed intro. No judgements, it's still a fine film, just doesnt (imo) ring as something trans would dig.
1. Greenberg
2. Let Me In
3. The Social Network
4. Inception
5. Black Swan
6. Meek's Cutoff
7. True Grit
8. Exit Through the Gift Shop
9. The Ghost Writer
10. MacGruber
Ratings on a 1-10 scale for your pleasure:
Top Gun: Maverick - 8
Top Gun - 7
McCabe & Mrs. Miller - 8
Crimes of the Future - 8
Videodrome - 9
Valley Girl - 8
Summer of '42 - 7
In the Line of Fire - 8
Passenger 57 - 7
Everything Everywhere All at Once - 6
I need to rewatch it too. I remember thinking the script was kind of ridiculous and implausible even for the '40s / '50s when it took place. It also has an exposition dump of an ending with Ben Kingsley's character literally drawing the plot on a chalkboard. It's the kind of thing if Shyamalan did it, critics would have tore it to shreds, but Scorsese does it and it's like "oh it's his Val Lewton homage! 5 stars!" I also remember being annoyed that people acted like it was his first horror film but Cape Fear did it first and better. I guess you could split hairs and say Cape Fear is a "thriller" rather than "horror" but it feels like a horror movie through and through.Quoting Dukefrukem (view post)
BUT it's been a decade and I generally love Scorsese, so I should give it another whirl.
Ratings on a 1-10 scale for your pleasure:
Top Gun: Maverick - 8
Top Gun - 7
McCabe & Mrs. Miller - 8
Crimes of the Future - 8
Videodrome - 9
Valley Girl - 8
Summer of '42 - 7
In the Line of Fire - 8
Passenger 57 - 7
Everything Everywhere All at Once - 6
1. Certified Copy (Abbas Kiarostami)
2. Poetry (Lee Chang-dong)
3. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
4. Meek's Cutoff (Kelly Reichardt)
5. The Four Times (Michelangelo Frammartino)
6. Nostalgia for the Light (Patricio Guzmán)
7. Norwegian Wood (Tran Anh Hung)
8. Exit Through the Gift Shop (Banksy)
9. The Arbor (Clio Barnard)
10. Winter's Bone (Debra Granik)
Giving up in 2020. Who cares.
maɬni – towards the ocean, towards the shore (Sky Hopinka) ***½
Without Remorse (Stefano Sollima) *½
The Marksman (Robert Lorenz) **
Beckett (Ferdinando Cito Filomarino) *½
Night Hunter (David Raymond) *
Shutter Island is one of the three Scorsese adaptations where I already knew the original film/book when I watched his films, so either I feel he adapts/expands well (The Departed, Hugo) or I don't have plot hangup that comes from experiencing the story the first time (Shutter Island, and to a lesser extent also Hugo).
And as much as I like him, Shyamalan wouldn't have done it with the same cinematic fever dream intensity of so many striking, nightmarish sequences (Scorsese's most exhilaratingly, purely capital-D Directing achievement alongside Raging Bull and Kundun). Which in retrospect is the only way to pierce through the book's plot -- which I enjoy reading but had BIG misgiving upon hearing it's being adapted, wondering how what I accept through proses on pages is not going to look derivative/unsatisfying when on screen (and of course it still seems that way to many) -- by going straight to its core (the protagonist's mindset) and build from there.
Midnight Run (1988) - 9
The Smiling Lieutenant (1931) - 8.5
The Adventures of Robinhood (1938) - 8
Sisters (1973) - 6.5
Shin Godzilla (2016) - 7.5
Huh I like this year, I just hate that The King's Speech won Best Picture. Lame. My list could always be better but it is what it is.
1. The Social Network
2. Inception
3. Black Swan
4. Monsters
5. Valhalla Rising
6. The Fighter
7. Tucker & Dale vs Evil
8. Winter's Bone
9. The Illusionist
10. Hesher
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I liked Shutter Island a lot. Scott Pilgrim barely misses my list.
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Not to continue opening our can of worm into this thread, but just wondering that if you still go by US release date, since Valhalla Rising is 2009 by imdb, then should both Tucker and Dale and Hesher count as 2011? Especially when they are the same situation as The Hurt Locker's 2008-2009 split, in that they toured the festival in 2010, but were released in US on 2011?Quoting MadMan (view post)
Midnight Run (1988) - 9
The Smiling Lieutenant (1931) - 8.5
The Adventures of Robinhood (1938) - 8
Sisters (1973) - 6.5
Shin Godzilla (2016) - 7.5
I can't win haha. Give me a minute.Quoting Peng (view post)
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They call your name out loud and clear
Here comes a regular
Call out your name
Here comes a regular
Am I the only one here today?
Alright let me try again heh. Disregard the previous list.
1. The Social Network
2. Inception
3. Black Swan
4. Monsters
5. The Fighter
6. Winter's Bone
7. The Illusionist
8. Insidious
9. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (hey it's on there now wahoo)
10. The Ghost Writer
I should probably rewatch Toy Story 3 at some point. I last saw it years ago.
Last edited by MadMan; 05-14-2020 at 10:13 AM.
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I am kind of surprised that more people liked The Ghost Writer. I was not a big fan of Meek's Cutoff.
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Along with Paul Verhoeven, Polanski is probably the greatest living practitioner of classical Hollywood filmmaking. It's instructive to compare the stylishness of a film like The American, where the fancy visual style feel imposed on the plot from without, with the style of Polanski's film where every stylistic choice is motivated by the narrative.Quoting MadMan (view post)
Just because...
The Fabelmans (Steven Spielberg, 2022) mild
Petite maman (Céline Sciamma, 2021) mild
The Banshees of Inisherin (Martin McDonagh, 2022) mild
The last book I read was...
The Complete Short Stories by Mark Twain
The (New) World
1. Certified Copy
2. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
3. Poetry
4. Another Year
5. Exit Through the Gift Shop
6. The Social Network
7. Carlos
8. The Illusionist
9. Blue Valentine
10. Scott Pilgrim
Those top five are impeccable. Fincher's is edited to a tee, Assayas's uses New Order with such style, and the bottom three deliver emotionality with visual aplomb as well.
The Boat People - 9
The Power of the Dog - 7.5
The King of Pigs - 7
I put both in my top ten and I cannot argue against this point.Quoting baby doll (view post)
Last edited by Skitch; 05-14-2020 at 08:53 PM.
I never saw The American. I heard mixed things. I do like Paul Verhoeven and need to see more from him. Polanski has made some great and good flicks over the years, that's for sure.Quoting baby doll (view post)
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They call your name out loud and clear
Here comes a regular
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I’m a huge fan of feverish filmmaking that complements the narrative/themes and generates genuine emotional connection. To me, that’s the alchemy of cinema. It’s easy to be all Michael Bay or Guy Ritchie about things, but it’s much more difficult to balance kinetics with emotional or narrative-driven throughlines that pay off at the end. My top 3 for this year all do that.Quoting Skitch (view post)
Last 10 Movies Seen
(90+ = canonical, 80-89 = brilliant, 70-79 = strongly recommended, 60-69 = good, 50-59 = mixed, 40-49 = below average with some good points, 30-39 = poor, 20-29 = bad, 10-19 = terrible, 0-9 = soul-crushingly inept in every way)
Run (2020) 64
The Whistlers (2019) 55
Pawn (2020) 62
Matilda (1996) 37
The Town that Dreaded Sundown (1976) 61
Moby Dick (2011) 50
Soul (2020) 64
Heroic Duo (2003) 55
A Moment of Romance (1990) 61
As Tears Go By (1988) 65
Stuff at Letterboxd
Listening Habits at LastFM
I'm watching Wolf of Wall Street for 2nd time, a movie I didn't love, and man...Leo is a magnet.Quoting transmogrifier (view post)
This is how I remember it perfectly summed up.Quoting Pop Trash (view post)
I'll forever remember The American as the first movie I watched at the theater (remember them?) after finally getting glasses after being in denial about my vision for a few months. Beautiful cinematography only made stronger by my then new crisp focus.Quoting MadMan (view post)
Ratings on a 1-10 scale for your pleasure:
Top Gun: Maverick - 8
Top Gun - 7
McCabe & Mrs. Miller - 8
Crimes of the Future - 8
Videodrome - 9
Valley Girl - 8
Summer of '42 - 7
In the Line of Fire - 8
Passenger 57 - 7
Everything Everywhere All at Once - 6
I'm sorry, but this is a serious question because the part in bold confused me. Is the list meant to be backwards, with Scott Pilgrim as #1?Quoting dreamdead (view post)
I do believe he is just taking the top five's quality for granted and moving onto describing 6-10, meaning the list is correct as is.Quoting Grouchy (view post)
Last 10 Movies Seen
(90+ = canonical, 80-89 = brilliant, 70-79 = strongly recommended, 60-69 = good, 50-59 = mixed, 40-49 = below average with some good points, 30-39 = poor, 20-29 = bad, 10-19 = terrible, 0-9 = soul-crushingly inept in every way)
Run (2020) 64
The Whistlers (2019) 55
Pawn (2020) 62
Matilda (1996) 37
The Town that Dreaded Sundown (1976) 61
Moby Dick (2011) 50
Soul (2020) 64
Heroic Duo (2003) 55
A Moment of Romance (1990) 61
As Tears Go By (1988) 65
Stuff at Letterboxd
Listening Habits at LastFM
I will get around to it at some point I'm sure.Quoting Pop Trash (view post)
BLOG
And everybody wants to be special here
They call your name out loud and clear
Here comes a regular
Call out your name
Here comes a regular
Am I the only one here today?
What transmogrifier writes is true. For me, the Kiarostami is the only stone-cold "classic" of my top ten, but that's more of a matter of the other top four (Uncle Boonmee, Poetry, Another Year, Exit...) not getting a rewatch since 2012 or so. I'm hoping to do a mini-marathon of Mother, Poetry, and Burning this summer to offset the k-dramas, so that will hopefully help me better situate them in the memory.Quoting transmogrifier (view post)
The Boat People - 9
The Power of the Dog - 7.5
The King of Pigs - 7
I never got back to you about your Korea trip because I assumed that was off now? Korea still has the mandatory two weeks quarantine for all international visitors....Quoting dreamdead (view post)
Last 10 Movies Seen
(90+ = canonical, 80-89 = brilliant, 70-79 = strongly recommended, 60-69 = good, 50-59 = mixed, 40-49 = below average with some good points, 30-39 = poor, 20-29 = bad, 10-19 = terrible, 0-9 = soul-crushingly inept in every way)
Run (2020) 64
The Whistlers (2019) 55
Pawn (2020) 62
Matilda (1996) 37
The Town that Dreaded Sundown (1976) 61
Moby Dick (2011) 50
Soul (2020) 64
Heroic Duo (2003) 55
A Moment of Romance (1990) 61
As Tears Go By (1988) 65
Stuff at Letterboxd
Listening Habits at LastFM