Movie/TV recommendations

[ThunderPeel2001]

I'm exaggerating, of course. There were some very strong scenes, however, and the grim weirdness of the world it pictured certainly had an effect on me back then – the naval mine scene, for instance, will stay with me for the rest of my life. Perhaps part of the reason why the movie was so effective was that an innocent child™ was tossed into that world. For the same reason Tideland was the most nauseating movie experience I have ever had. City of Lost Children is a very pleasing movie by comparison. Without a comparison as well as a matter of fact.

Yep, I get you. I have to see that movie again. It was so good.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Gnomeo & Juliet

Cuz I worked on it. It's not as bad as it sounds.

Ooh. What did you do on it?

[Jayel]

Ooh. What did you do on it?

I was one of the software devs. Tools and plugins and stuff.

[Nachimir]

Film classic time: A Bout de Souffle (Breathless), the French nouvelle vague starter by Godard.

+1, that's a great film.

Currently really enjoying Being Human. Wasn't so bothered about it after the first series, but I just caught up on Series 2 and 3, and they're pretty good.

[Orv]

I'm sure it's been said in here before, but;

MOON

I loved every minute of it, and I loved the realization moments.

"Oh shit, he's a clone!"

"Oh shit, they replay the original messages!"

"Oh shit, clone half-life of three years!"

Good damn movie.

[Kolzig]

Eternal Sunshine of Spotless Mind

Now I get why one of my friends totally loves Charlie Kaufman scripts. From him I've only seen Being John Malkovich multiple times and now this and I can just say: "wow".

If Adaptation can keep up this level of high quality then I'm happy, I've had that movie on dvd for years and I've not yet watched it. I've tried like three times, but it just needs your mind to be in a certain mode to be ready.

[Nappi]

Go for it. Adaptation is great and the plot isn't at all hard to follow even though it might seem like that at first (if that was what you meant).

[syntheticgerbil]

Definitely. I don't like Being John Malkovich very much at all and I sometimes feel like the only point to seeing it is just to be the precursor to Adaptation.

Also, out of that whole mess of the Michel Gondry/Spike Jonze/Charlie Kaufman triad, sometimes I feel like I don't know who I want to follow or who was really responsible for making Eternal Sunshine or Adaptation so amazing to me. I stopped following Kaufman after watching Synecdoche, one of the most abysmal times I've ever had in a theatre, then Gondry seems to be getting worse or at least has never amazed me with the way Eternal Sunshine did, which I feel works on more levels because of his input as a director more than the writing. Spike Jonze is sadly the only one I always feel confident about but I wish he would do more movies instead of music videos, commercials, and skate videos all of the time. None of that delivers in the same manner.

This probably makes me seem really idiotic, but what I enjoy the most about Eternal Sunshine, beyond the visuals, is just the way it unfolds and how it is paced. I hate movies I can't understand or follow. I hate it when I'm confused about character motivations or actions. I also can't stand scenes that add nonsense or more confusion to the story simply for the sake of doing so without explanation. This makes me a terrible audience for most fringe, vague, or experimental movies.

So my apparently narrow minded (so I've been told) way of wanting an understandable story made me think when starting Eternal Sunshine without much knowledge of the director or writer upon first viewing made me think I was in store for a bunch of abstract confusion and that I'd get really annoyed by the hour mark. I was annoyed for the first 30 minutes but then pieces started coming together, the point of the story was revealed at an accelerating rate, all the strangeness was explained, and you ended up caring for these characters that were initially confusing you in the bizarre way they were acting. I guess it's always nice to be intensely surprised when you think you're going to hate something. I know I probably enjoy a few other movies that may utilize similar tricks, but I can't think of any that does it better than Eternal Sunshine.

Also on the topic of Moon again, the other day I was wishing I had a little computer buddy that followed me around and cared about my wellbeing. That would be so awesome.

Edited February 14, 2011 by syntheticgerbil

[Nachimir]

I agree on Gondry Gerbil; I loved Eternal Sunshine and a lot of his music videos, but anything I've seen from Be Kind Rewind on has been a lot less coherent.

[brkl]

Agreed. Breaks my heart.

[ThunderPeel2001]

I heard Gondry was upset that Kaufman got all the recognition for Eternal Sunshine (I don't know if that's true or not), but to be fair to him, it looks like it was a great collaboration with Kaufman, judging from both their later works.

I was definitely in the "Kaufman is a genius camp" after Adaptation, though.

I remember he was in the same aisle as me in Ralph's once... just after Adaptation was released. I really wish I'd said hello, as that film blew my mind. *Regret*

[syntheticgerbil]

I heard Gondry was upset that Kaufman got all the recognition for Eternal Sunshine (I don't know if that's true or not), but to be fair to him, it looks like it was a great collaboration with Kaufman, judging from both their later works.

Yeah I guess I misspoke. It was still a great collaboration but I suppose I'm replying to the press more than what actually happened where people dismiss Gondry's input on the film.

To me, if you've seen a lot of his music video making ofs or the documentary that came with his Director's Label DVD, you'll see a lot of the silly old school techniques Gondry loves using repurposed for the movie, so I get confused why most critics seem to think Eternal Sunshine was such a hit on script alone. I like the visual flair that he has going, but I suppose we all sort of agree the guy doesn't have much going for him at all in terms of storytelling and writing by himself.

Also, can I get thoughts from you guys on the Science of Sleep story? I feel like it sort of made sense coming from the main character suffering from an onset of a mental disorder, possibly schizophrenia, where he has acute anxiety not allowing him to function and he's constantly having to fight conflicting ideas of reality in his head, but it seems some viewers don't see that at all. Without that explanation the movie doesn't hold together for me at all even if dream logic were supposed to be applied all over the film.

I do think with Science of Sleep it feels like Gondry was trying to make something clear about what was going on with the main character and the story but by not wanting to obvious about it possibly, he left things kind of half explained or not coherently linked.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Yeah I guess I misspoke. It was still a great collaboration but I suppose I'm replying to the press more than what actually happened where people dismiss Gondry's input on the film.

To me, if you've seen a lot of his music video making ofs or the documentary that came with his Director's Label DVD, you'll see a lot of the silly old school techniques Gondry loves using repurposed for the movie, so I get confused why most critics seem to think Eternal Sunshine was such a hit on script alone. I like the visual flair that he has going, but I suppose we all sort of agree the guy doesn't have much going for him at all in terms of storytelling and writing by himself.

Yeah, but at the time, people were giving Gondry ZERO credit for the VISUAL look of the film. They were pretty much buying into the idea that all of the visual flair was already in Kaufman's script. That may seem stupid now, but that's why he got so upset (allegedly). I seem to recall Gondry later saying that none of that flair was in the script and it was all him (which I can believe).

As for Science of Sleep, the idea that the lead character suffers of some illusionary mental illness doesn't really add anything of value to the film for me. Of course, that may have been Gondry's intention, and you're absolutely right, but it doesn't add anything of any value for me.

[JonCole]

The King's Speech left me breathless. I now see why there's so much hype surrounding it.

[Ben X]

Just saw Labyrinth on the big screen on an old celluloid print. It was pretty scratched up, but it was still gorgeous. Great to fully appreciate all the production design and little background details. Really really love that film.

Brian Froud does commentary, which is somewhat strange.

Synth, I forgot to ask way back when: is the Froud commentary worth listening to? I get the feeling it'd be very design-specific (as he's doing the only commentary I'd hope for him to cover other aspects and throw in some anecdotes) with loooong silences...

[syntheticgerbil]

I think it was almost completely anecdotes about being on the set with his wife and son or going back and forth with Terry Jones. I think there was a lot of talk about set designs too. Sorry I don't remember a lot of specifics. I do know he actually did not go very deep in design beyond the set or maybe the original inspiration for some of the goblins, so there wasn't any talk about drawing, painting, or character design.

Funny enough, you'd think this would equal long silences, but he talks sort of slow and calm with a slight nervousness, kind of having the ability to put you in a trance.

I don't think anyone has ever asked me about commentary before. Most of the time it equals getting made of fun of...

[Thyroid]

A couple of days ago I saw JFK: The Director's Cut, which is a good movie. Some puzzling work in the make-up department, but if you want to see Tommy Lee Jones covered in golden paint and in a gay bondage game with Kevin ***** and Joe Pesci, watch this.

This brings the total of Kromsy Movie Year up to 4 movies now.

[ThunderPeel2001]

A couple of days ago I saw JFK: The Director's Cut, which is a good movie. Some puzzling work in the make-up department, but if you want to see Tommy Lee Jones covered in golden paint and in a gay bondage game with Kevin ***** and Joe Pesci, watch this.

This brings the total of Kromsy Movie Year up to 4 movies now.

Such an amazing movie. Stone at the top of his powers. Not sure if I've seen the Director's Cut or not, though. Hmmm. Also: As amazing as this movie was, it was essentially utter bullshit. I find it hard to believe that Stone bought into what he was selling, but (I think I'm right in saying) apparently he did. *shrugs*

[Thyroid]

You know, though? I find the Lee Harvey Oswald being sole killer theory very hard to believe. On the other hand, the real story is probably not as stupidly convoluted as the movie makes it out to be.

[ThunderPeel2001]

You know, though? I find the Lee Harvey Oswald being sole killer theory very hard to believe. On the other hand, the real story is probably not as stupidly convoluted as the movie makes it out to be.

No, he was. Seriously. Just a lone gunman who wanted to be famous. Nothing more than that. (I love the diagram in the court room showing the "official bullet path" -- it was almost deliberately distorted to make it impossible.)

Some amateur animator took all the available footage and modelled the most accurate 3D representation of the Daley Plaza ever created. He won an Emmy for his troubles and his work was independently confirmed by a forensic modelling company (they said his work displayed "absolute geometric integrity").

He was initially a conspiracy theorist, but ended up proving himself wrong: The bullets all came back to the "sniper's nest".

Clippy:

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More detail:

[Roderick]

I just came back from The Eagle, with Tatum Channing (or the other way around, I forget).

It's funny how a strong, promising opening to a movie you know little about can really hurt the experience in the long run. The Eagle starts with a very introspective, personal, gritty, realistic depiction of life in a Roman garrison. You think; this could be the start of a 'The Fountain'-esque movie filled with crushing doubts, personal growth, set against the muddy and beautiful backdrop of year naught Britain.

It's quite unfortunate then that the second act moves away from this and becomes what basically amounts to a remake of King Arthur from 2004. The insult is complete when at the end

there's a goddamn bromance oneliner from the main character. Any credibility the movie hadn't already wasted was at that moment shot onto the audience's face with a loud groan of TMEH.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Watched Inside Job last night. Nice to see that someone has come up with a simple way to explain the specifics of what caused the financial crisis. I've had the CDO/subprime thing explained to me many times since it happened (and it was nice to see it confirmed that I understood it well). It's never been a secret, everyone in the financial sector understood precisely what caused it, and there was no argument about it. Hopefully this will put an end to the mass ignorance about what caused this crisis.

The problem with the film is that, one you know what caused it all (about 25 mins into the movie -- maybe less), the film sort of wanders into its own conspiracy theories. It reminded me a bit of Michael Moore, only more boring. Maybe I'm wrong (and someone can explain it to me) but I'm not sure I understand supposed to be so bad about a financial consultant not revealing that he was being paid to write a report... Are we supposed to think he did it for fun?

The bits of text that come up, revealing people's salaries, seemed a bit unnecessary, too. Do we really expect these people to give back money they've already earned?

The stuff about the rating agencies was genuinely frustrating, though, with it being revealed that nobody wanted to accept responsibility.

What did everyone else think?

[Orv]

Has anyone here not seen the new Star Trek movie? Do so now.

[Roderick]

You mean, do let's continue not seeing the movie, or...?

I saw it by the way, just confused about your meaning. You seem to mean a thing.

[Orv]

I mean that you should see it, immediately, post-haste, forthwith, without pause or constraint.