ysbreker

Movie/TV recommendations

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Boy got old.

That can happen?!

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That can happen?!

I said "Godsdamned kids" unironically the other day, so yes.

But then I am a grumpus so that isn't definitive proof.

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Finished Dollhouse. It was <positive tone of voice> alright.

While I often wish things would drop the

apocaphilia and future war stuff

(because it's often caricature rather than extrapolation of what we are), there was a lot to like about it. A thing I liked:

Paul Ballard's death was all the sadder for being so undramatic and brief. No telegraphing it well in advance, no buildup, no herculean effort then colossal sacrifice for the greater good. In a world of clichés, I think to kill one character like that, especially such a virtuous character, is pretty powerful storytelling.

1928882_o.gif

Hah. Defining image from my childhood, and I think my first ever wide-eyed, "WTF?" moment at the cinema :)

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I'm not sure if it's been mentioned at all in this thread, but Igby Goes Down is fantastic. I saw it when it came out in 2002 and it was my favorite movie through middleschool/highschool and I still love it. It has some great Goldblum and Kieran Culkin deserves to get more recognition as he's an actually good Culkin. He made me more excited to see Scott Pilgrim than the fact that it was Scott Pilgrim.

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Saw the Avengers in IMAX 3D. Didn't realize it was 3D until after I bought the tickets, but it was the only IMAX option anyway.

It was, as previously mentioned, very entertaining and well-written. Go Whedon.

I do have one problem with the film, which is silly because this always happens in these kind of films but it seems particularly glaring here:

So, SHIELD is obviously this ridiculously secretive and powerful organization that pays absolutely no attention to the law and can do whatever the fuck they want. Annoying, but the film tries to call attention to this with the scene where the Avengers figure out that SHIELD is using the Tesseract to develop WMDs and tell Fury that's not okay. That's cool.

Except for the earlier scenes where in order to find Loki SHIELD taps into EVERY CELL PHONE ON THE PLANET and "every camera connected to wireless" and NOBODY BATS AN EYE. In fact, Banner and Stark both seem quite happy to augment that surveillance technology to look for the Tesseract. (At least in TDK we had Morgan Freeman explicitly say "This is wrong" even if he went along with it.)

It seems very telling that the film's nod to the idea that yes, the military doesn't exist to make the world a better place but to figure out how to kill more people faster involves Cold War-era (and of course Iraq & Iran echoing) fears of massive explodey weapons and that the far more relevant and insidious threat of mass surveillance is completely normalized and not commented on.

Plus, of course, everybody thinks it's cool and not totally unnecessary and ridiculous that the US military has a giant flying invisible aircraft carrier (though I mostly just thought, "Oh, they stole the Valiant from UNIT.")

Of course, all of this is rather pointless because the most pernicious thing about these films with regards to US culture is not the normalization of ridiculous military overreach but the normalization of the idea that there will ever be some super-powerful world-(by which I mean US-)destroying threat to justify it. In these films, the absurd measures are always justified because the threat is REAL and all the people saying "Hey maybe this isn't such a big deal, or maybe we can negotiate, or maybe there's a way that doesn't involve tons of guns and destruction" are always WRONG (and usually stupid politicians who just need to shut up and listen to the SOLDIERS). Which is pernicious because that's precisely how the people in the US government behind its imperialism justify themselves. They really, truly believe that the enemy is at the gates and could and would blow up Manhattan

(and of course the images in The Avengers of destruction in NYC and the firefighters, police, etc. very consciously echo 9/11 images)

if the US government isn't a warmongering police state; and Americans, constantly bombarded with images like this, are mostly willing to accept it. I mean, obviously it's more complicated, and this goes back to Horkheimer and Adorno and before that, but it's still sad that I can't just enjoy a film without being fed an uncritical endorsement of the police state.

Mostly, just once, I'd like to see a super-hero or action film where the threat is totally overblown and just an excuse for the government to expand its power. (The Siege comes close.) (Maybe what I'm really saying is, please Whedon hurry up and make more Dr. Horrible.)

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Mostly, just once, I'd like to see a super-hero or action film where the threat is totally overblown and just an excuse for the government to expand its power.

The Phantom Menace

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Except for the earlier scenes where in order to find Loki SHIELD taps into EVERY CELL PHONE ON THE PLANET and "every camera connected to wireless" and NOBODY BATS AN EYE.

At that point in the film, I thought: "Huh. No one in SHIELD abuses that, ever", then imagined all the people in that control room short-selling and stalking their exes.

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hahahahahaha, touché.

"So this is how liberty dies... with thunderous applause."

That was the third movie!

(And Portmans only worthwhile bit of acting in the entire trilogy.)

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So I finally got round to seeing Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and while it's a better technically crafted viewing experience, I think I preferred the Alec Guinness mini series thing from way back for what it had the luxury of including due to the longer running length and to Alec Guinness' performance which IMO, while taking nothing away from Oldman's performance, felt closer to what I imagined from the book (Oldman gives the impression of a deeply buried rage/vindictivess under the surface where Guinness I felt gives off this more depressed/jaded/resigned vibe). Also there were times I felt the music was unnecessarily heavyhanded/overmelodramatic. Still it's much more beautifully shot/better production values than the miniseries so it has that going for it.

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Just saw Mallick's Days of Heaven and I thoroughly loved it. It's one of those films where everything that I could say about it has already been said, but it's pretty beautiful. The only Mallick films I haven't seen at this point are the New World and Badlands. I should get around to that.

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Oh crap, I've caught up with The Killing and now I'll have to wait :(:(:( I haven't noticed it being mentioned here, has anybody seen it? It's based on a Danish series, apparently, and it's terrific. One of those rare cases of procedurals that focus on one case only, not a new one every episode.

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I've heard good things about it and bad things about it, but I don't have access to it and feel iffy about downloading things I haven't paid for. I wonder if the original Danish series is worth seeing?

--

I saw The Other Guys the other day. It's OK. The idea is funnier than the actual execution, but it has its moments.

--

The new HBO show Girls looks pretty damn good. My curiosity is peaked; I want to watch it.

Edited by Kroms

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Mostly, just once, I'd like to see a super-hero or action film where the threat is totally overblown and just an excuse for the government to expand its power. (The Siege comes close.) (Maybe what I'm really saying is, please Whedon hurry up and make more Dr. Horrible.)

I think you missed an important word: SHIELD makes use of every AVAILABLE webcam, camera, eagle cam, whatever, on the planet. It doesn't hack into anything. It just uses what's already free and accessible. In The Dark Knight, it was everyone's cell phone, whether they like it or not.

A subtle, but important, difference. Especially if that's your central complaint!

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Ehhhh, I dunno. It could easily be construed either way. "Available" for an organization like SHIELD could very well mean everything, even if it's not publicly available.

At any rate, it was a fun movie. And the trailer for the new Spider-Man movie had a Glitch Mob song which is awesome.

I wonder, if DC were to do a Justice League movie, would they use a totally different Batman? I'd assume so. The Batman movies are pretty self-contained for superhero movies.

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Ehhhh, I dunno. It could easily be construed either way. "Available" for an organization like SHIELD could very well mean everything, even if it's not publicly available.

Lol. I knew someone would come back with that, but you can't complain about SHIELD using people's devices if you're the one who's construing that they're hacking them(!). Given Whedon's politics, I sincerely doubt we're supposed to think that nobody cared about the government hacking into people's private lives.

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Oh crap, I've caught up with The Killing and now I'll have to wait :(:(:( I haven't noticed it being mentioned here, has anybody seen it? It's based on a Danish series, apparently, and it's terrific. One of those rare cases of procedurals that focus on one case only, not a new one every episode.

The Killing is pretty amazing. I haven't seen the original it was based off of, but I really want to see how they differ.

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Lol. I knew someone would come back with that, but you can't complain about SHIELD using people's devices if you're the one who's construing that they're hacking them(!). Given Whedon's politics, I sincerely doubt we're supposed to think that nobody cared about the government hacking into people's private lives.

Well, I don't really care either way. I have an amazing ability to suspend my disbelief to levels most can't achieve. I can accept the most outrageous bullshit.

I'M JUS' SAYIN'

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Well, I don't really care either way. I have an amazing ability to suspend my disbelief to levels most can't achieve. I can accept the most outrageous bullshit.

I'M JUS' SAYIN'

Me too. I tend to be able to give things a pass if I've enjoyed it enough.

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The Killing is pretty amazing. I haven't seen the original it was based off of, but I really want to see how they differ.

Maybe I'll start watching it because I can't wait for the next episode :P

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Oh crap, I've caught up with The Killing and now I'll have to wait :(:(:( I haven't noticed it being mentioned here, has anybody seen it? It's based on a Danish series, apparently, and it's terrific. One of those rare cases of procedurals that focus on one case only, not a new one every episode.

I watched the first season of the Danish version. It was pretty good, although by the end I was getting a bit fatigued by all the plot twists and the ever-present musical drone. I only got a few episodes into season two; I should watch the rest sometime. I watched a bit of the American series, and it seemed good enough, but it didn't really seem necessary after having watched the original.

On the subject of Scandinavian crime series, I'm really enjoying The Bridge, although I must confess that part of the fun for me is just observing the languages and accents. And Kim Bodnia is fun to watch, with his toothy grin and eruptions of disbelieving laughter.

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I think you missed an important word: SHIELD makes use of every AVAILABLE webcam, camera, eagle cam, whatever, on the planet. It doesn't hack into anything. It just uses what's already free and accessible. In The Dark Knight, it was everyone's cell phone, whether they like it or not.

A subtle, but important, difference. Especially if that's your central complaint!

I didn't say they hacked them, I said they tapped them--as in, using the government-mandated backdoors that exist or are in legislation to exist in every land line, cell phone, security camera system, and ISP (among other things).

You really think they were using cameras people had just hooked up to a wireless network for anyone to use? Who does that? Who has their cell phone camera (as specifically mentioned in the film) connected to a network for anyone to use? Really?

I know Whedon's politics; I don't think they're particularly relevant.

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