TV/Movies Megathread

[Malthus]

Snuck out this weekend to see Godzilla. Was hoping for some mindless giant monster action. Was unhappy that said action came with an hour of silly backstory in which monsters were not very visible. Did not care about the non-monster characters.

Gee, if only you'd been warned.

I haven't seen your review yet. I musta missed it upthread.

Sorry.  That came off really bitchy now that I reread it.

Meh, no prob. I'm interested in your review. Link? 

[viper37]

Last of the Mohicans has issues with a very contrived plot line in the third act, but it more than compensates by being a story about a total badass kicking all kinds of ass.

Red Coats getting slaughtered by tomahawks. Troupes de la Marine defeating regiment of foot.  Nothing more is needed

[Eddie Teach]

The Dirty Dozen. Fun as always.

Just wait until the next remake.

Until just now I was unaware there had been a sequel made nearly 2 decades after the original. I think I'll skip it.

[viper37]

Oh interesting. I mean the one with the orchestration.

If you don't well up in the last ten minutes you're inhuman.

The scene where Alice looks at Magua, looks at the cliff, then comes back, as if she's empty, as if her soul has already departed from this world... I haven't seen anything quite like this in any movie so far.

There are multiple version of the movies:
- Theater release
- Director's expanded Cut
- Blu Ray Director's definitive cut

The Director's cut is fun because you see another aspect of siege warfare, where there are troops engaging the enemy outside of the fort, in a conventional ranged battle.  Also, an extended speech from Montcalm and the old indian chief.

The Blu Ray definitive cut removes those but puts back the original soundtrack when Nathaniel&co are chasing after the Mohawk war party.  It also changes some camera angles.

[Ideologue]

Snuck out this weekend to see Godzilla. Was hoping for some mindless giant monster action. Was unhappy that said action came with an hour of silly backstory in which monsters were not very visible. Did not care about the non-monster characters.

Gee, if only you'd been warned.

I haven't seen your review yet. I musta missed it upthread.

Sorry.  That came off really bitchy now that I reread it.

Meh, no prob. I'm interested in your review. Link? 

http://kinemalogue.blogspot.com/2014/05/destroy-all-actors.html

[Ideologue]

Oh interesting. I mean the one with the orchestration.

If you don't well up in the last ten minutes you're inhuman.

The scene where Alice looks at Magua, looks at the cliff, then comes back, as if she's empty, as if her soul has already departed from this world... I haven't seen anything quite like this in any movie so far.

Yeah, I think I said this about a year ago when I picked up LotM, but I've just about never seen such a really powerful turn for such a minor character and minor actor.  I mean, I am not at all certain Jodhi May has a line in this movie--or any movie.*

*She's actually a very successful TV/crap movie actress.  Constantly working, but I've never seen her again.

[Eddie Teach]

She had a few lines when she greeted her sister at the beginning.


That scene was evocative, but it was also mystifying.

[Malthus]

http://kinemalogue.blogspot.com/2014/05/destroy-all-actors.html

There are a couple of other points that could be added:

[spoiler]

(1) much of the backstory makes, literally, no sense. I know that is a trifling observation about a movie that features gigantic monsters smashing stuff, but they spend so damned long on it, it is annoying.

For example, a giant monster arrives, trashes a nuke plant, and lays a huge, glowing egg on it. For no particular reason, people decide not to fuck with the egg much, just keep it under observation - and are totally astonished when it hatches into a terrible monster. I wonder, could anyone have seen that comming?

They do this not once, but twice. Turns out humans have another giant egg. Thinking it dead, they stuff it in a nuclear waste storage facility, even though they must suspect these monsters eat nukes. They just sort of throw it out with the trash as it were, and do not bother, you know, cutting it up to find out about giant monsters. It wakes up, eats the waste, and leaves.

Then there is the strange invisibility of giant monsters. They regularly move around all over the place without anyone noticing. For example, the army dudes come up with a brilliant plan to lure the monsters with a nuke, then blow them the fuck up. So they transport the nuke to the "convergance" point, where all the monsters are headed, by train. Oopsie, a monster intercepts the train! Somehow, the army dudes have totally lost track of a gigantic monster wandering about in America, and apparently have no idea it is anywhere near the train. They send our forgettible hero to walk down the train track, to see if he can spot it.

Then, the monsters are converging on SF. So pack up the kiddies and get the fuck out. Maybe don't take the Golden Gate bridge right in the monster's path, though - ya think?

Now, it is maybe par for the course for giant monsters to be absurd, and for people in giant monster movies to all act like idiots, but it hardly seems necessary in this case.
[/spoiler]

[Ideologue]

I don't think we need to put that second one in spoilers, and I do agree it's very silly.  Even 50s-60s kaiju pictures court disbelief when it comes to that, but now it's practically ludicrous.  In fairness, iirc they do travel underground, although this would tend to make them easier to track, not less.

At the same time, it's a genre where really large explosives can't seem to destroy puny biological organisms and 40,000 ton monsters don't liquefy the earth beneath their feet.  You gotta roll with it.

As for the first, I kinda [spoiler]liked the idea that the MUTOs, who eat radiation, could potentially clean up massive nuclear accidents, which made them worth researching despite the obvious dangers.  My impression was that Serizawa thought it'd be relatively easy to destroy it if it showed signs of waking up--and they did execute their contingency plan--but he was wrong.  Again, this kind of thing would be a lot easier to buy in a period piece, when the government was routinely doing retarded things like high-altitude nuclear detonations without really understanding the science behind it, and causing hundreds of millions of dollars worth of damage for their ignorance.  (Can you imagine the billions worth of damage Starfish Prime would've wrought in 2014? )  Still, to the extent the movie is about humans at all, it's about human hubris, I thought it dovetailed nicely enough with its themes and I was willing to spot it its premise based on the promise of monster action, which was more-or-less performed.[/spoiler]

[celedhring]

Halfway through Arrow Season 2.[spoiler] The Suicide Squad is in this too? I'm loving this show now.[/spoiler]

[Ideologue]

You shouldn't put tags around that, man.  That's a selling point.  Is Dr. Rape Light in it?  What about Capt. Boomerang?

[Malthus]

I don't think we need to put that second one in spoilers, and I do agree it's very silly.  Even 50s-60s kaiju pictures court disbelief when it comes to that, but now it's practically ludicrous.  In fairness, iirc they do travel underground, although this would tend to make them easier to track, not less.

At the same time, it's a genre where really large explosives can't seem to destroy puny biological organisms and 40,000 ton monsters don't liquefy the earth beneath their feet.  You gotta roll with it.

As for the first, I kinda [spoiler]liked the idea that the MUTOs, who eat radiation, could potentially clean up massive nuclear accidents, which made them worth researching despite the obvious dangers.  My impression was that Serizawa thought it'd be relatively easy to destroy it if it showed signs of waking up--and they did execute their contingency plan--but he was wrong.  Again, this kind of thing would be a lot easier to buy in a period piece, when the government was routinely doing retarded things like high-altitude nuclear detonations without really understanding the science behind it, and causing hundreds of millions of dollars worth of damage for their ignorance.  (Can you imagine the billions worth of damage Starfish Prime would've wrought in 2014? )  Still, to the extent the movie is about humans at all, it's about human hubris, I thought it dovetailed nicely enough with its themes and I was willing to spot it its premise based on the promise of monster action, which was more-or-less performed.[/spoiler]

Well, sure, as I said the whole premise of monster movies is absurd, and yes I was willing to give the movie lots of absurdity-rope in the hopes of some heavy monster-stomping porn.

My complaint is that, if you are going to waste my time with an hour of backstory that doesn't include monster-stomping porn, it had better not be inherently dumb, or feature characters I don't give a shit about.

In my memory, they never really explain why they are studying the damn things, or if they actually learned anything by doing so.

[celedhring]

You shouldn't put tags around that, man.  That's a selling point.  Is Dr. Rape Light in it?  What about Capt. Boomerang?

I don't know, just finished the episode where Bronze Tiger is recruited into the squad - dunno whom the other members will be. Deadshot is in the show, so I'm guessing he'll be a part of it too.

[Ideologue]

Well, sure, as I said the whole premise of monster movies is absurd, and yes I was willing to give the movie lots of absurdity-rope in the hopes of some heavy monster-stomping porn.

My complaint is that, if you are going to waste my time with an hour of backstory that doesn't include monster-stomping porn, it had better not be inherently dumb, or feature characters I don't give a shit about.

Agreed on that.  On the plus side, this is the kind of thing you can only do once; I think the sequel will be more of an action jam.

In my memory, they never really explain why they are studying the damn things, or if they actually learned anything by doing so.

I don't think I'm making it up... I'm pretty sure it's explicit, but I could be wrong.

[crazy canuck]

Watched the latest incarnation of The Great Gatsby.  Once I got over the cartoonish style I really enjoyed it.  Leo put in one hell of a performance.