TV/Movies Megathread

[celedhring]

I personally loathed Death Proof, but it's the only film of his that I would qualify as "bad". I think the guy has a great filmography. Even his least successful films are always very worthy of a watch or two.

[CountDeMoney]

Oh, c'mon....Death Proof was fucking fantastic. 

It had all the necessary Aristotelian elements for a successful plot line, straight out of The Poetics:
1) Kurt Russell in a 1970's Grand Prix satin jacket.
2) Muscle cars.
3) Women getting murdered in muscle cars by Kurt Russell in a 1970's Grand Prix satin jacket.
4) Mary Elizabeth Winstead in a cheerleader outfit.

Per Fect.

[The Larch]

Agree wholeheartedly re: Mary Elizabeth Winstead in a cheerleader outfit.

I'm not big on cars or satin jackets so that's not really a plus for me.

[celedhring]

The whole muscle cars and girls in short outfits exploitation element was fine, including the way he subverts it when the girls get her revenge. But 90% of that film was just people sitting and talking about random crap. I'm all for Tarantino dialogue, but that was way too much.

[frunk]

The whole muscle cars and girls in short outfits exploitation element was fine, including the way he subverts it when the girls get her revenge. But 90% of that film was just people sitting and talking about random crap. I'm all for Tarantino dialogue, but that was way too much.

It's particularly egregious in the first act, where there is no tension established.  I think on a re-watch it might play better, but on the first one it just feels listless and lazy until the action starts.

[Duque de Bragança]

Should I go watch Escape to Victory and miss the last part of England-Iceland? Pelé is waiting for my decision. 

[Zanza]

Tetris gets trilogy as story 'too big' to fit into single film

Tetris, the 1980s video game about stacking blocks, is being made into not one, but three films, according to Empire.

Producer Larry Kasanoff is lining up a trilogy about the GameBoy favourite, which featured the simple but addictive formula of shuffling falling shapes into corresponding gaps.

"The story we conceived is so big," said Kasanoff. "This isn't us splitting the last one of our eight movies in two to wring blood out of the stone. It's just a big story."

Rumours about the narrative direction of a film about matching shapes have been tumbling through the internet since the project was first announced in 2014. Kasanoff says that speculation about the potential franchise's content, including a prediction that anthropomorphised blocks will be going into battle, are way off target.

[Valmy]

A huge epic Tetris story? I think they are missing the point of why people enjoyed Tetris.

[Barrister]

A Tetris movie.

[Ideologue]

The whole muscle cars and girls in short outfits exploitation element was fine, including the way he subverts it when the girls get her revenge. But 90% of that film was just people sitting and talking about random crap. I'm all for Tarantino dialogue, but that was way too much.

"20 minutes of perhaps the greatest vehicle stunt ever" is enough to make it amazing, but, truly, I love the first act too--the sustained tension of Tarantino's direction, and the looming menace of Mike, as well the grindhouse style keeps it interesting, even when it is mainly just 20-somethings yammering about whatever.  (I don't understand Frunk's objection at all.  Mike is hovering in the background the whole time even before he makes the ladies' acquaintance.)  The Bell/Thoms/Dawson/Winstead act is awesome, too, and while they pretty much immediately slide into "how Quentin Tarantino wishes women talked, and not how any woman has ever talked in the history of time," it's in service of some progressive goals, it's not uninteresting (the circling long take conversation at the diner is just wonderful as a pure cinematic exercise), the formal shift in the filmstock works well, and, as noted, it offers 20 minutes of perhaps the greatest vehicle stunt ever.

N.B.: I also don't take any points off for how the discussion of Vanishing Point makes it appear as if QT has never actually seen Vanishing Point, which is practically the opposite of a fun car action movie and vastly more in line with all the sad alienated white man movies they were making at that point in time, e.g. The Graduate, Cool Hand Luke, Seconds, The Swimmer, etc.

[The Brain]

Tetris gets trilogy as story 'too big' to fit into single film

Tetris, the 1980s video game about stacking blocks, is being made into not one, but three films, according to Empire.

Producer Larry Kasanoff is lining up a trilogy about the GameBoy favourite, which featured the simple but addictive formula of shuffling falling shapes into corresponding gaps.

"The story we conceived is so big," said Kasanoff. "This isn't us splitting the last one of our eight movies in two to wring blood out of the stone. It's just a big story."

Rumours about the narrative direction of a film about matching shapes have been tumbling through the internet since the project was first announced in 2014. Kasanoff says that speculation about the potential franchise's content, including a prediction that anthropomorphised blocks will be going into battle, are way off target.

"GameBoy favourite"

[frunk]

I don't understand Frunk's objection at all.  Mike is hovering in the background the whole time even before he makes the ladies' acquaintance.

Kurt Russell is far too affable a personality to be menacing.  Before the end of act 1 reveal I didn't find him menacing at all.  Even after he's revealed as a crazed killer I was like "what a nice guy".

[Admiral Yi]

Deathproof needed hotter chicks.

[viper37]

Tetris gets trilogy as story 'too big' to fit into single film

Tetris, the 1980s video game about stacking blocks, is being made into not one, but three films, according to Empire.

Producer Larry Kasanoff is lining up a trilogy about the GameBoy favourite, which featured the simple but addictive formula of shuffling falling shapes into corresponding gaps.

"The story we conceived is so big," said Kasanoff. "This isn't us splitting the last one of our eight movies in two to wring blood out of the stone. It's just a big story."

Rumours about the narrative direction of a film about matching shapes have been tumbling through the internet since the project was first announced in 2014. Kasanoff says that speculation about the potential franchise's content, including a prediction that anthropomorphised blocks will be going into battle, are way off target.

I thought it came from a parody site like The Onion, but it's real... 

[Josquius]

It is a pretty long story

https://youtu.be/hWTFG3J1CP8