TV/Movies Megathread

[Queequeg]

Nixon.

So is Oliver Stone just completely fucking talentless?  I have no idea how the fuck you make a boring movie out of the life of Richard Nixon.  The paranoia alone should make it fucking easy. 

[Admiral Yi]

Nixon.

So is Oliver Stone just completely fucking talentless?  I have no idea how the fuck you make a boring movie out of the life of Richard Nixon.  The paranoia alone should make it fucking easy.

Totally shot his wad on Platoon and Wall Street.  Had been hustling movie money people ever since.

[Ideologue]

Wait, french lesbian porno?

Nixon.

Now we're talking.

[Ideologue]

Actually, isn't that basically the plot of Dick?  Remember that?  It was big.*

*Lol.

[Savonarola]

The Dragon Painter (1919)

In the silent era Sessue Hayakawa put together his own company of actors to make Oriental pictures that were different of the cliche's of the day.  (In most of the pictures Asian men were sneaky, sadistic and lusted after white women.  A marvelous example of this is "The Cheat" where Hayakawa brands a white woman to show his ownership of her.)

In The Dragon Painter Hayakawa is a primitive (and half savage) painter who believes that his princess has been stolen.  This belief propels him to create.  He comes to the attention of a famed artist who doesn't have an heir or disciple.  The artist has a daughter (played by Hayakawa's wife, Tsuru Aoki) who Hayakawa believes is his princess.  Once they are married he can't paint; so she kills herself so he can recover his genius (or does she?)  Anyway we all learn a valuable lesson in the end.

[Eddie Teach]

Actually, isn't that basically the plot of Dick?  Remember that?  It was big.*

*Lol.

[The Brain]

SatC movies are on TV. Back to back!

[Malthus]

I hope you're happy with what you started, Malthus. 

My contribution: for a kiddie show, Avatar has some surprisingly adult themes, many of which sail right over the heads of the actual kids watching it.

The episode I just watched with the kid had examples of this. It involves the female lead character, Katara, searching for the man who murdered her mother when she was a child. The actual killing of her mother isn't shown, but the effect on her and her brother isn't hidden at all. She finds him as a pathetic old man, totally at her mercy - and, as much as she wants to, simply can't bring herself to kill him. I thought it was a pretty nuanced take on revenge, memory, and morality, far beyond the scope of most children's shows, and it ends with a real zinger - the Avatar, who had pressed Katara to "forgive" her mother's killer (something she doesn't by any means do - she doesn't kill him, but she states outright she hasn't forgiven him) praises her decision, stating that "violence is never the answer" - whereupon prince Zuko points out that, if that is the case, exactly what is he planning to do when he faces the Fire Lord (the big bad)?   

[Viking]

I hope you're happy with what you started, Malthus. 

My contribution: for a kiddie show, Avatar has some surprisingly adult themes, many of which sail right over the heads of the actual kids watching it.

The episode I just watched with the kid had examples of this. It involves the female lead character, Katara, searching for the man who murdered her mother when she was a child. The actual killing of her mother isn't shown, but the effect on her and her brother isn't hidden at all. She finds him as a pathetic old man, totally at her mercy - and, as much as she wants to, simply can't bring herself to kill him. I thought it was a pretty nuanced take on revenge, memory, and morality, far beyond the scope of most children's shows, and it ends with a real zinger - the Avatar, who had pressed Katara to "forgive" her mother's killer (something she doesn't by any means do - she doesn't kill him, but she states outright she hasn't forgiven him) praises her decision, stating that "violence is never the answer" - whereupon prince Zuko points out that, if that is the case, exactly what is he planning to do when he faces the Fire Lord (the big bad)?

As much as people like other episodes like The Blue Spirit or Zuko Alone. The Southern Raiders and The Puppetmaster are my two favorites. They confront the issues that Aang avoids Deus Ex Machina each season finale. In reality shit like this happens and you can't be pure of intent, pure of action and simultaneously successful. In those two episodes everybody loses and growth happens because they know they lost. Another personal highlight for me is Lake Laogai. Ju Lee freaks me out. Then again, I had a Ju Lee style minder when I was in china in 1989 and it felt a bit like reading 1984 and feeling de-ja-vou. 

[Ideologue]

The Counselor (2013).  Not to everyone's taste, no doubt, but if you liked Waking Life, or better yet Mindwalk, and thought to yourself, "I wish Sam Waterston's life was destroyed, John Heard got decapitated, and Liv Ullman was fucking evil," you may like this.

A

The J.D.: the degree so versatile you can fail to deal drugs with it too

Am working on the others.  Writing is hard.  Just ask CdM.  LOL.

[Sheilbh]

Nixon.

So is Oliver Stone just completely fucking talentless?  I have no idea how the fuck you make a boring movie out of the life of Richard Nixon.  The paranoia alone should make it fucking easy.

I thought it was a fine film. Odd casting, though at least he got Hopkins when he was still trying.

[CountDeMoney]

Am working on the others.  Writing is hard.  Just ask CdM.  LOL.

  Ass.  I've been busy on an expansive research work concerning Castro's early consolidation of power, tentatively entitled Fidel a la Florentine: Machiavellian Fortuna, Virtu and the Cuban Revolution, 1959-1963, thank you very much.



I have some movie recommendations for you from the '80s, Ide.  Can't remember if I sent them your way before.
Brainstorm with Christopher Walken, Natalie Wood (in her last film), Louise Fletcher, and Cliff Robertson.  I may have recommended it to you once before, but it's a bit ahead of its time. 
Gloria, 1980--the original one.  Gena Rowland rocks in it.  A John Cassavettes production.
In light of your recent John Frankenheimer kick, two with Roy Scheider: 52 Pick Up with a fucked up Clarence Williams III, and The Fourth War, where Roy Scheider and Jurgen Proctnow fuck with each other on the Czech border at the end of the Cold War.

[Ideologue]

52 Pick Up is, iirc, in my queue right now.  I can't even remember what the synopsis was now but I remember at the time it sounded fucking cool.

[CountDeMoney]

It's a nifty, nifty movie.  How could an Elmore Leonard story not be?

[Ideologue]

I still can't believe Black Sunday isn't available on Netflix.  It's not just famous--I know the basic plot outline even though I've never seen it--but, FFS, it's a story about a crazy guy who crashes a blimp into the Superbowl.  It's a real American fable.