TV/Movies Megathread

[Phillip V]

I have enjoyed new television show Nashville. Some good songs and good casting. Critically well-reviewed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zez288nd054

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjMsCr77n7s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAI_1FsJ8rE

[Ed Anger]

I like her penis chair.

[FunkMonk]

Father Loves Beaver. Yule love it.

[Phillip V]

Colonel Graff and Ender



http://insidemovies.ew.com/2012/12/05/enders-game-exclusive-first-look/

[Viking]

Colonel Graff and Ender



http://insidemovies.ew.com/2012/12/05/enders-game-exclusive-first-look/

I will support this movie if

1- they get the big reveal right
2- they don't make the sequels

[Eddie Teach]

If that's the actor playing Ender, he's too old. (And no I'm not talking about Harrison Ford, smartasses).

[Ideologue]

Also, Kleves; thanks for the Pacific Rim trailer.  Looks like Evangelion, but made for an American audience, so that it won't be creepy and gross.  I'm looking forward to it.  Should be a nice taste of what they can do with giant monsters till Godzilla arrives in 2014.

Did you like Cloverfield, Ide? I think that's supposed to be getting a sequel at some point too.

I never saw Cloverfield.  I skipped it in the theaters because movies like that, on the big screen, literally make me ill.  It's funny, because I can ride roller coasters all day, and it's pretty rare that I get carsick, but a big enough screen and point-of-view cinematography trigger a toxicity response to inconsistent input from my senses of vision and balance, i.e. I chuck the fuck up.  Happened with Blair Witch, and when I got dragged to Paranormal Activity I spent twenty minutes in the cinema bathroom (I like that movie, but let's be honest, I didn't miss that much).  So I only watch movies like that at home, and I sort of forgot to catch up with Cloverfield.

Happens with FPS games too, if I haven't played them in a while, and moreso if I'm watching someone else play (when I play myself, I think I can project enough into the game that the mismatch between senses is muted).

I'm gonna get around to Cloverfield one of these days, though.  I like monsters, I like J.J. Abrams.

[Josquius]

Pacific Rim looks cool giant robots and monsters effects wise but even from the trailer the plot seems horrid, and that sort of flaw is usually well hidden in trailers...

[Ideologue]

The General (1926).  Buster Keaton: bad ass.  Thrilling physical stunts that we recognize today as shockingly, insurance-voidingly dangerous and some really amazing camera work bring to life the story of Johnnie Gray, a young Southern railroad engineer who proves his worth to his bitchy stupid girlfriend, to the Confederacy, to himself, and to his train by defeating the plans of Union spies and destroying a lot of stuff in hilarious ways. An action comedy of the highest order, this may also be the only film in which there is a train chase... and apparently it really happened (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Locomotive_Chase WTF).  In any event, I'm pretty sure it's the only movie where they really smash a locomotive into a ravine, at least the only one that did it for a pretty dumb joke.

Most of the jokes, however, are pretty funny--my favorites are just Keaton's reaction shots to the increasingly ridiculous, but increasingly lethal, scrapes he gets into, especially in the first train chase.  It just goes to show how stupid people in the 1920s were, that The General was a terrible flop in the year of its release, receiving both a poor critical response as well as disastrous, in comparison to its $750,000 cost, box office receipts of barely over a million worldwide.  One article I read called it a "1920s Waterworld," and it's pretty apt.  Like with Costner, it's the film that broke Buster Keaton's career.  Actually, I guess that would be a 1920s Postman, but it can be both.

Though excellent in all ways, I can say a few things in criticism.  The first train chase is so great, that the movie does have a downward trajectory after the thirty-minute mark.  It by no means becomes bad or even anything less than spectacular, but that first fifteen-minute-or-so-sequence could be watched standalone a hundred times over a hundred days, and I doubt I'd get bored with it.  Also, his bitchy stupid girlfriend could stand to be a lot less bitchy, and somewhat less stupid, as the jokes about her native ineptitude, on account of having a vagina, don't land as well as Keaton's weird blundering competence (though in fairness there's one part where she sticks it pretty good to the Union soldiers on the chase home).

Also, and this is more of a political problem with the film, it's sort of hard at first to root for historical villains, even if they're really funny and cool.  One gets over it.  Watch, enjoy, don't think about the horrible system of oppression and horror that Johnnie Gray is unwittingly fighting for!  A+

Minor aesthetic note: I wish this were in proper black in white rather than the sepia tone.  Who gives a shit?  You're right.



Not pictured: the Confederate war crimes that issued from the Great Locomotive Chase.  Nine hanged.

College (1927).  Buster Keaton is a Tri-Lam-grade nerd and physical weakling who proves his worth to his bitchy, stupid not-girlfriend (see, it's totally different from The General) by going out for sports while he's at college.  You may already have identified the core deficiency in the premise.  If not, let's try this again: Buster Keaton plays a pussy.  I mean, emotional pussy, yes, he can do that, but just look at those arms, he's cut like a statue.  Anyway, he's still convincing enough as a total dork.

Unfortunately, the first two thirds drag kinda badly.  The gags where he continually fails at all things athletic are all individually pretty good, but after about twenty minutes, I got it: HE"S BAD AT SPORTS HA HA HA?  Also, apparently bullying at college was pretty hardcore back in the 1920s, because they treat this dude like shit, endangering his life over his performance at America's pastime.  It's not like he ruined a real baseball game, assholes, that was a try out.

However, A Son (that's his character's name, it's in the credits) gets on the Dean's good side by telling him that he's doing it all for a girl, which pulls on the Dean's dick-strings because he too once had the chance to impress a lady through physical feats but he eschewed them, and now he's old and doesn't even masturbate anymore because it's too sad (as this is a silent film, this is conveyed through subtext).  So the Dean makes him coxswain of the rowing team, which is the little guy on the boat who yells at everybody to row.  They try to poison Keaton so that he can be replaced, but he is accidentally too crafty and does an unwitting Princess Bride on his would-be poisoner.  Then there's a really great scene where the rudder breaks, and he steers a boat with his ass.  Spoiler: they win!  Then his bitchy, stupid not-girlfriend is getting imprisoned by her really rapey actual boyfriend, because he wants her to be expelled, because he got expelled for reasons (I guess), and she calls him, and he valiantly comes to her defense, and there's this wicked sequence where all the athletic stuff he was shitty at before, he's good at now, because of practice, and he sprints streets, hurdles hedges, pole vaults up to her window, and beats the crypto-rapist to death with a baseball bat!  (May have made that last part up.  But it's pretty cool nonetheless.)

It's no General, but it's alright!  B

Conan the Barbarian (1982).  Lots of tits, and also a little bush if you look close at the Blu Ray, and lots of blood.  The first hour or so drags a little, but then it gets great real fast and stays that way. I'll point out that while Arnold's vocal performance is hilarious, and more hilarious in this early role than it would be later, but his physical performance has some subtlety.  No shit. B+

Conan the Destroyer (1984).  No tits--this would have been a major criticism thirty years ago, when pornography was not as readily available to me as air or water.  Today, it is of no consequence, and honestly the female leads are still way hot and way scantily clad, and range a nice gamut of types (from prissy 100 pound blonde to pneumatic brunette dominatrix to Grace fucking Jones).  There's still plenty of violence.  Overall, though, it's not as uniformly good as the first.  I hadn't watched either in over a decade, but I had remembered liking Destroyer much more than Barbarian as a kid.  That's not true anymore.

But here's why I did: there are two individual set-pieces which are so memorable they seared into my young brain and their marks stayed with me.  Though the film unfortunately often devolves into crumminess, especially when the princess and the comedy-thief* are talking about fucking, these two parts make the movie an experience you can't easily dismiss.  First, Conan's fight with the wizard is my favorite scene in the two films (when he wins, the wizard sinks into his red cape, and when the cape's uncovered, he's just bits of broken mirror, which is so cool).  Second, the battle at the end with Dagoth the Hermaphrodite Faced God is really neat too.

Finally, a fantastic score. Some will tell you it's a little repetitive.  But you know how you follow up great music?  You play it again.  Basil Pouledoris gets that. B+

*Okay, this guy mostly sucks, but his last comedy bit, with the music sting--yeah, maybe it undermines the drama of the moment, but, you know, it's actually really funny.

[Ed Anger]

Next up, the Fatty Arbuckle collection.

[Ideologue]

BTW, is it a dick move that I opened my dad's present, the Buster Keaton box set, and started watching the movies while I still have them?  My girlfriend says yes.  I think that's ridiculous.  I saved him the trouble of opening it, and I made sure the discs work.  Add to that the fact that it cost a shitload of money, and I'm a bona fide God damned hero.  But where's my parade?

[Ed Anger]

Yes, it was a dick move. Suck it up, Grima Wormtounge of gift giving.


Can you tell I'm watching Lord of the Rings on TNT?

[Ideologue]

Oh, and I forgot, about Keaton's College?

I don't know why I'm always surprised by it, because at this point I've had a lot of exposure to media from the 1920s, 30s, and 40s.  It's gonna happen.  It's unavoidable.

Shit is gonna get racist.  It's probably not gonna be mean.  It's gonna be like your grandmother, who refers to people as "colored" or "negroes."  She's got no real animus, she's no Nazi, but there it is.  This is what she grew up with, this is what made her laugh.  If it's Fibber McGee and Molly, you're gonna hear a line like "[Mayor LaTrivia's] drank so much tea his eyes started to slant!"  And if it's a movie, sooner or later you're gonna have blackface.

The scene in question here involves Keaton's character needing a job, but they only want "colored waiters" at this restaurant (that serves white people--I think they made this up, because otherwise early 20th century racism is really confusing to me--so it's beyond monstrous to sit near a black family eating dinner, but it's okay for black people to handle your food directly?).  To College's credit (maybe?), I like to think Keaton is acting retarded is because Keaton acts retarded generally, but this is a dodge, because he acts retarded in a different way when he's "in character."  I did like it when his (apparently successful... ugh) disguise is pierced, the black people who work at this weird alternate dimension restaurant with their own melanin come after him with a cleaver.

I mean, it's fine, but they should put warnings on this shit, just in case, you know, you happen to be watching it while someone else is in the room.  CAUTION: CONTAINS DISCREDITED COMEDY TROPE; MAY EMBARRASS VIEWER.  Being a miscegenationist who has an interest in early pop culture is tough.

[Ideologue]

Yes, it was a dick move. Suck it up, Grima Wormtounge of gift giving.


Can you tell I'm watching Lord of the Rings on TNT?

It's fine.  I'm gonna wrap it up in Christmas paper.

[Ed Anger]

I get sexually aroused by ripping off shrink wrap.