You fellas are a little fastidious and like to peck away at each other.
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You fellas are a little fastidious and like to peck away at each other.
I think we can all agree that Tyler Perry's "Madea Goes to Jail" grossed nearly 100 million dollars and is therefore a great movie.Quote:
Originally Posted by Prospero
I have a tenant who wrote a film that had a budget of $10 Million but grossed an embarrassing $317,382. It received a 7.3 on IMDb. How can you tell if that's a good film? Ask the few people leaving the theater if they liked it. As far as success there isn't any. I hope he's allowed to write another film worthy of a 7.3. His rent will be due eventually again.
On account of it being Veteran's Day I just finished watching Kelly's Heroes
so....i finally caught Skyfall this weekend.
as a movie devoid of any affiliation to the Bond franchise, it drags and is not very good.
as a bond movie, it is terrible.
don't believe the hype. the story has no arc, it is not realistic and of course the villain has an overcomplicated plan that has to work perfectly well at every turn after being unnoticed and dormant for years for vengeance, and bond becomes nothing more than a testament to what the movie preaches against (old ways vs. new ways).
i was so damn disappointed. the only positive is that javier channeled a gay anton chiguar and was funny but otherwise one dimensional.
this is by far the worst of the modern Bond flicks (pierce and craig).
Watched the latest version of “The Three Musketeers” with my gf yesterday. By director Paul W.S. Anderson, (2011) with a good, largely British cast. Yet another delirium based on the beautifully written novel from Dumas. I remember watching a series in 7 or 8 episodes, maybe 40 years ago, that faithfully followed the novel, and included parts of Dumas’ follow up, “40 Years After” and “The Vicomte de Bragelone”; it still is unfortunately the best adaptation I’ve seen to this day. This movie is beautifully made, great special effects, quite entertaining with a lot of action, but it’s a teenager movie, if not a child movie. Seem like a Walt Disney production. The thin plot line mimics from afar the original one but is otherwise filled with ridiculous developments. Utterly disappointing once again. (My gf fell asleep half way through...)
The Three Musketeers 3D (2011) - Official Trailer [HD] - YouTube
Three Musketeers - Official Trailer 2 [HD] - YouTube
An interesting list indeed Stavros - thank you. And I note with a degree of enthusiasm that Bill Murray will be appearing as FDR in a new movie - promising combination of a favourite actor and a personal hero in the person of Roosevelt. I'll also wait with a degree of trepidation till I see Spielberg's Lincoln - his take on War Horse was a horrible and over-sentimentalised mess after the brilliance and sheer emotion of the stage version, which also has a vastly superior soundtrack to John Williams' overblown efforts in the film.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stavros
BUT.... it has Daniel Day-Lewis in the title role, and that for me is enough to justify parting with the necessary folding. I'm firmly with Prospero on that.
So, Stavros, I ask with a degree of some trepidation - who do you consider to be the best actors currently working in film?
Hey, there were Komodo Dragons in the film . They also had that Wiry Goofy Guy as the villian & you can't forget the DiverShitty involved with the new Money-Penny .
Quote:
Originally Posted by RallyCola
Yes of course, because I just don't relate to the work that Day-Lewis has done, though I really can't accept that winning an oscar is the confirmation of his skills, it has to be based on more than that, and that is also true of everyone else. My tone is irritating and I am aware of that, it has got me into trouble in the past, nothing serious but definitely embarrassing, but I do sometimes think people are too timid when being asked to express themselves. These days nobody I think, would be allowed to publish this kind of journalism, which nevertheless was typical of Hanslick -it is his review of Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto from 1881:Quote:
Originally Posted by Prospero
The Russian composer Tchaikovsky is surely no ordinary talent, but rather, an inflated one, obsessed with posturing as a genius, lacking discrimination and taste….The same can be said for his new, long, and ambitious Violin Concerto. For a while it proceeds soberly, musically, and not mindlessly, but soon vulgarity gains the upper hand and dominates until the end of the first movement. The violin is no longer played; it is tugged about, torn, beaten black and blue….The Adagio is well on the way to reconciling us and winning us over, but it soon breaks off to make way for a finale that transports us to the brutal and wretched jollity of a Russian church festival. We see a host of savage, vulgar faces, we hear crude curses, and smell the booze. In the course of a discussion of obscene illustrations, Friedrich Vischer once maintained that there were pictures which one could see stink. Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto for the first time confronts us with the hideous idea that there may be compositions whose stink one can hear.
Dino I watched Dario Argento's The Bird with Crystal Plumage, his directorial debut in 1970, but it was disappointing, do you rate it? As usual the dubbing was cackhanded and awful.
Sorry you didn't like that one. The Bird is one of my favorite. I like the usual look and colors of his films and enjoyed the way the action was shot. Soundtrack too. Sometimes you gotta be pretty forgiving when watching a whacky Giallo film. The dubbing is always bad. Even in Italian it's dubbed and not well either.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stavros
Have you seen Deep Red? If you ever get into more Giallo, check out some Sergio Martino.
Always like this one too.
http://vamkino.net/_ld/6/51330930.jpg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pNqHK80Q-8
the entire sequence from the conversation in the casino in maccau through the line "what makes you think this is my first time" was crap including using the damn lizard as a step ladder.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cecil Rhodes
i like naomi harris...i'd fuck her sideways...and i really don't care if moneypenny is black...but that they purposefully leave her name out till the end, "oh we have never formally been introduced..." is utter garbage. its their attempt at a plot twist and to avoid the fact that this is ultimately a prequel to establish a Bond devoid of personal feelings for anyone (he has no vested interests anymore after what happens in the chapel), just vengeance and country first, that M has to be a dude and moneypenny has to be a secretary.
moreover, the utter lack of originality and nods to other movies was annoying. ralphy boy was miscast...he can't play such a lightweight character well...its forced and plastic. ben whishaw as an emo quartermaster computer genius was horrid. i'm not saying Q has to be a bumbling idiot, but why did it have to be so cliche...pick a young kid but making him regular...why does he have to be an emo douche? the old gameskeeper that taught bond to shoot, the ubersmart villain that is a kick-assed hacker, because we all know that hacking with super cool undetectable algorithms is sexy and smart...the list of cliches goes on and on. the movie was a clusterfuck of too many ideas, a poorly conceived plot, a divide between a story of a mother and son scorned vs. redemption and finally, what really killed it for me is that judi dench all of a sudden is a fucking action star killing people and making light-bulb IEDs. M isn't supposed to handle a gun and do wet work.
my point is this....this was a bad movie, but even worse as a bond movie. don't believe the marketing lies because the critics that love this movie probably think the flintstones are historically accurate.
Bogus question I think, as I have no idea who the best film actors are. As far as this parlour game goes, contemporary actors whose work I have enjoyed include Michael Fassbender, Jeffrey Wright, Peter Sarsgard, Mathieu Kassowitz (who also directs), Vincent Cassel and even Brad Pitt whose more recent films have been a major improvement over the earlier works; Jamie Foxx and Edward Norton have also made enjoyable films, and so on. There are a lot of very good actors out there, they don't always make great films, but I think this generation is as good as any previous one. There are actors like David Strathairn who often play in secondary roles but whose ability can be fundamental to the success of the film, so how does one make a list without including such actors? And I assume we are not talking about 'movie stars' whose box office attraction can make or break a film. I enjoy a lot of films which don't require really great acting, so that is another level of appreciation.Quote:
Originally Posted by robertlouis
It was on BBC4 and I think its the first of a short season of Giallo films so there will be another one next week, don't know which. Tenebre is my favourite, for obvious reasons. Although there is a transvestite in Bird, so I wonder if Argento is 'one of us'...?Quote:
Originally Posted by Dino Velvet
I'd heartily endorse each of your choices and could easily add more Frenchmen after Cassel. And you're right, this is not about stars and their ability to "sell" a film: that is entirely to do with pushing a commodity and not about creating art. Strathairn was mesmerising as Ed Murrow in Goodbye and Good Luck. I enjoyed Javier Bardem immensely in The Sea Inside and Philip Seymour Hoffman in The Talented Mr Ripley, but too many actors' choices become a compromise with Hollywood. And Tom Cruise, despite Magnolia, is only good at grinning and running.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stavros
Daughter Asia might be interested in the TS Community.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stavros
Tenebre is my #1 Argento too. You much for Suspiria or Inferno? Nightmarish films you just go with the flow. The last of that series, Mother Of Tears, is beyond terrible.
Trauma is one I like that always gets panned. That head removal machine with the fishwire was impressive. Dumb Oliver looking kid with the glasses...
I've got it in the can for viewing later. I suspect that BBC4 showed it as a coda to Mark Gatiss's documentary film Horror Europa which I mentioned earlier in the thread.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stavros
I have a 3 part documentary of A History of Horror with Mark Gatiss. I'm a junkie for stuff like that.Quote:
Originally Posted by robertlouis
Strathairn is also excellent in Lincoln
i wouldn't know much about the Macao scene because i started 40 winking from the time the assassin shot the guy in Shanghai until the helicopters showed up on the deserted island .
Quote:
Originally Posted by RallyCola
Just watched wanderlust. The part where the guy gives himself a pep talk in the mirror had me rolling.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-Cjn...eature=related
Better quality.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8dR2...eature=related
Training Day was on tv last night, so I watched it. Disaster. Good cop/bad cop, old cop/young cop, renegade cop/rule-book cop and so on I don't know how many such films there are, some, like the Dirty Harry set are even watchable. In this one, in spite of boasting about how many druggies he has banged up or has waiting for trial, the DZ character never writes a report, never sets foot inside a police station, has one conference with superior officers who seem little interested in his work and then draws on a team to first dig up $4m that has been sealed in a trunk underneath a concrete floor, before murdering the peddlar who it belongs to. How the peddlar was supposed to get at his own money is not explained; why the rookie who has a wife and a new-born baby never once calls home in the entire training day, not even to say he is going to be late, is not explained. But because we are asked to take seriously this depiction of the 'other side' of LA, is it escapist fantasy? Rookie cop has head thrown through a window, after which DZ smashes a deckchair on the same head, and throws his victim, a fellow policeman, from a fifth floor balcony onto a mezzanine below; moments later, rookie cop leaps from roughly the 4th floor onto the bonnet of DZ's car, with no apparent injury and so on and so on. Seeing Maori Cliff Curtis pretending to be a latino homeboy wasn't much of an improvement either. Apparently the crime writer James Elroy Flecker descibed this film as a waste of time, which is an understatement. Needless to say, Denzel Washington dominates this film with his wooden delivery and histrionics. A waste of time indeed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dino Velvet
127 hours...would you be able to?
Stavros - the crime writer James Elroy Flecker? Reviewing films in between writing stanzas of the Golden Road to Samarkand?
Oops! Looks like I been fleckered on that one! James Ellroy.Quote:
Originally Posted by Prospero
Training Day was based on the LAPD Rampart Scandal. FX's The Shield was too.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stavros
LAPD Rampart Division - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Rampart scandal - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sorry buddy. I'll flip you a few Spaghetti Westerns. You seem good with those.
Can't go wrong with Lee Van Cleef. Tomas Milian does a nice job too.
The Big Gundown | Trailer | 1966 - YouTube
La Resa dei Conti The Big Gundown - YouTube
You might like this...saw it a couple of weeks ago....doesn't really have an ending though (in my opinion).Quote:
Originally Posted by Dino Velvet
Rampart (2011) - IMDb@@AMEPARAM@@http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMTk4MjAxNzU2MV5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMDA5NTAwNw@@._ V1._SX95_SY140_.jpg@@AMEPARAM@@BMTk4MjAxNzU2MV5BMl 5BanBnXkFtZTcwMDA5NTAwNw@@@@AMEPARAM@@SX95@@AMEPAR AM@@SY140
I remember seeing the poster recently. Probably check it out on DirecTV when it comes on. Thanks.Quote:
Originally Posted by fred41
I saw Wreck-It Ralph .
Thanks -I did read that a lot of this stuff is based on reality, although I really do find it hard to believe that a man who has been beaten to a pulp and had his head thrown through a window can still leap four storeys onto a car, etc etc. And since Ellroy was on this one if I can find it I will watch it.Quote:
Originally Posted by fred41
Dino -will look out for the van Cleef film; he was a natural for westerns.
The Big Gundown is out of print here. Let me know if you need help finding a good copy in your format. You want the uncut version. I got mine on eBay from a guy who does restoration on Spaghetti Westerns. It was a bootleg but a good one and all that is/was available.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stavros
The Road.
The Road... what a depressing film that was, though nowhere near as bleak as the book on which is was based
Quote:
Originally Posted by bimale69
Haven't read the book, Prospero, but the movie was one of the darkest I have ever seen...Quote:
Originally Posted by Prospero
Skyfall
The Road is by Cormac McCarthy. Trish uses a line from one of his others - "Blood Meridian -The Evening Redness in The West" - on her signature. That book was, in its own way, even bleaker about humanity. A cheery writer.
The difference between the film and the book of The Road - as i recall - is that the film leaves the tiniest glimmer of hope at the end. The book does not.
It's a crime this isn't out on Blu-ray. Hello Blue Underground, Anchor Bay, or Severin...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnYZ8Skftug
http://www.grouchoyyo.com/2folio/giallovenezia2fb.jpg
"Lockdown" with Guy Pearce...don't waste your time...better off just staring at a blank wall.