Recent posts

#1

Off the Record / Re: TV/Movies Megathread

Last post by viper37 - Today at 01:45:38 PM

After Period of Chastity, Hollywood Movies Embrace Sex Again


Good.  Less China, better movies. 

Studios obsessively focused on PG-13 franchises and animation in recent years, but movies like "Challengers" and "Saltburn" show eroticism has returned.

Zendaya, clad in a skintight dress, gyrates on a dance floor in "Challengers," a $56 million sports drama that arrived in multiplexes on Friday. "It's getting hot in here," the hip-hop soundtrack intones, as she closes her eyes and runs her hands through her hair, lost in fantasy. "So take off all your clothes."
The story continues at a motel, where Zendaya, playing a tennis prodigy, begins a ménage à trois with two guys; it fizzles after they become more interested in each other. The plot moves on — to sultry interplay on the hood of a car, in a dorm room, in the back seat of a car, on the wooden slats of a sauna. There is erotic churro eating.


[...]

In the 2000s, however, film companies started to obsessively focus on PG-13 franchises and animation — genres that could play to a global audience and sell merchandise. Studios also wanted to expand into China, where censors do not allow sex scenes. As a result, steamy storytelling began to dwindle on the big screen (except at art house theaters). Premium television picked up the slack.
Sex in mainstream movies was "pretty much gone" by 2019, as Ann Hornaday, chief film critic for The Washington Post, wrote in a column that year. A few months later, Kate Hagen, writing in Playboy magazine, found that only about 1.2 percent of films released between 2010 and 2020 contained an overt sex scene, the lowest decade total since the 1960s. (It peaked in the 1990s. Coincidentally or not, that was the decade when pornography started to become available online.)


Now, some filmmakers are pushing back.
Awards season brought "Saltburn," with its arousing-disturbing bathtub scene and Barry Keoghan's twirling, full-frontal finale. "Poor Things" found an insatiable Emma Stone romping through a Paris brothel. Christopher Nolan filmed the first sex scenes of his 35-year career for "Oppenheimer." ("More interested in the joys of sex than any recent season I can remember," as Kyle Buchanan, awards columnist for The New York Times, described the crop of contenders in February.)

#2

Off the Record / Re: [Canada] Canadian Politics...

Last post by viper37 - Today at 01:39:13 PM

I don't think Carney has what it takes to pull a Harper and become PM without any previous ties to Quebec.

As it is now, with Pablo Rodriguez as his Lieutenant, no.

He could probably win without Quebec though.  There's still a solid base of Anglo-ridings he's going to get no matter what.

#3

Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023

Last post by grumbler - Today at 01:38:28 PM

Palestinians might not have been a nation in the 40's, but almost a century of conflict have no doubt made them one now.

Israel might not have been a nation in the 40's, but almost a century of conflict have no doubt made it one now (not saying this to disagree, because I agree, but it's useful to point out that northing about Palestine is as artificial as Israel).

Palestine is no more a nation than Israel, and no less.  Both are artificial constructs of the way the European colonizers drew lines on a map. 

#4

Off the Record / Re: [Canada] Canadian Politics...

Last post by viper37 - Today at 01:38:02 PM

with the exception of maybe Taylor Swift

It would sure make an interesting Languish poll.

#5

Off the Record / Re: [Canada] Canadian Politics...

Last post by Grey Fox - Today at 01:35:19 PM

I don't think Carney has what it takes to pull a Harper and become PM without any previous ties to Quebec.

#6

Off the Record / Re: Archaeologists do it in ho...

Last post by Legbiter - Today at 12:44:50 PM

Those Yamnaya show up everywhere!

Horse, wheel and...milk. 

#7

Off the Record / Re: [Canada] Canadian Politics...

Last post by Sheilbh - Today at 12:44:14 PM

So I watched the clip Carney posted, which is presumably the core of his message/where he thinks he's landing his argument:
https://x.com/MarkJCarney/status/1783959221396230605

Having watched that and understanding it's at a friendly think-tank, my instinct is he needs practice at politics. I actually checked the venue because my first thought was that he was delivering a message that was too political for the audience he was addressing, but that's not the case. Not that it's impossible and I could well believe he'd grow into the role, but I think especially jumping in now ahead of a national election with bad polls would be (from his perspective, at least) I think a big risk.

I can easily see the contrast he'd be able to draw stylistically with Trudeau - a sort of no time for dilettantes, I'm serious, "not flash, just Gordon" style message. In terms of the what is he in it for - what's the vision - I'm not sure "mission-oriented capitalism grounded in values" is there yet. Also if you're going to try to triangulate and do a third way style politics, you need two points to run against - in more recent years Obama was brilliant at setting up a false choice and then presenting himself as the middle, Macron does similar in his "en meme temps" politics. But in this I only see him talking about Poilievre so that point of "another way" doesn't quite land.

#8

Off the Record / Re: Israel-Hamas War 2023

Last post by OttoVonBismarck - Today at 12:34:22 PM

And Germany shouldn't have lost most of eastern territories post WW2. That was a fucked up action forced on the world out of the grim reality of needing to keep the Soviets happy.

Wars have consequences. When you start a war and kill millions of people, the consequences are intrinsically just. Germany could never have been permitted to do what it did and simply return to the status quo, it needed, and justly received, serious punishment.

Also using the term "genocide" to refer to what was done to the Germans after WWII shows why you and people like you need to not use that word.

The Palestinians have not killed as many, but they are likewise worthy of punishment--in this case losing validity of their land claims. (Note, Israel could still always negotiate concessions to them, the Palestinians just no longer have any moral validity to their land claims.)

#9

Gaming HQ / Re: The Miscellaneous PC & vid...

Last post by Jacob - Today at 12:22:04 PM

That's cool. Thanks for the heads up - I might get it once it's done.

#10

Off the Record / Re: NHL Hockey thread

Last post by Jacob - Today at 12:18:41 PM

It's a bit like showing up at a wedding and loudly and incessantly talking about how much better some other wedding you went to last week was.