TV/Movies Megathread

[Savonarola]

Strange Cargo (1940)

This is the eighth and final pairing of Clark Gable and Joan Crawford.  Crawford had just had a successful comeback co-starring in "The Women," while Gable was on top of the world having just been Rhett Butler.  Consequently, while Joan got top billing on the print, Gable (for the first time in Crawford-Gable pictures) got top billing on all the publicity material and Mommy Dearest was none too pleased.  (Even worse Gable had just gotten married and was being faithful to his wife (Carole Lombard) allegedly much to Joan's chagrin.)

The story is... different.  Eight men on Devil's Island bust out and are trying to make it to the mainland.  One of the men, Ian Hunter (no, not the lead singer of Mott the Hoople) is a mysterious stranger/Christ figure with some sort of supernatural power.  They're joined by a chanteuse/putain (Crawford) who has been Shanghaied by one of the convicts (Gable.)  One by one the convicts die, but not before experiencing a conversion experience with the help of Hunter.  At the same time Crawford-Gable have a standard Hollywood romance where the macho hombre (or maybe macho homme in this case) becomes civilized after falling for a dame.  The two stories don't always mesh together.  It sort of reminded me of Cool Hand Luke, (if we saw the film through Dragline's eyes rather than Luke's and if the evil is inside of us, rather than society or "The Man,") but with a love story.

[HVC]

Saw the blue beetle trailer. Might be good, as far as super hero movies go.  Has more of a marvel rather then DC vibe, which is a plus already.

[Josquius]

Murder Mystery - it was decentish. Given it is getting a sequel and trends are changing in cinema right now hopefully we can see comedy films as a thing come back?
Though Adam Sandler wouldn't be high on the list of what I want there - curious he still has his production company going.

[Sheilbh]

November release for Ridley Scott's Napoleon starring Joaquin Phoenix

I am beyond hype that history's greatest European finally gets the Hollywood treatment

[Syt]

Full size: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Fs375bcaEAIIMSQ?format=jpg&name=4096x4096

[Barrister]

Still enjoying the new season of Ted Lasso. Every time I watch it makes me want to start a new career in Football Manager.

Also, I'm not the biggest Leonard Cohen connaisseur (besides Hallelujah and First We Take Manhattan, but it speaks to his memorable voice that the song in the end credits comes on, and I immediately thought, "That's Leonard Cohen, right?"

Sorry, finally watched Ted Lasso S 3 Ep 3 and wanted to talk about it, but this was about the most discussion we had on the topic from last week.  But anyways with Ep 4 coming out tomorrow it's as good as time as any to re-hash.

First of all just to respond to Syt - "Everybody Knows" is one of Cohen's more famous songs.  Not as well known as Hallelujah granted, but probably more so that First We Take Manhattan.  It features prominently in the late 80s/early 90s Christian Slater flick Pump Up the Volume, for example (speaking of which I remember the movie fondly but suspect it has aged horribly if I went back to rewatch it).

But back to Ted Lasso.  I thought it was a really good episode.

So let's start with Zava.  Clearly he's a colossal prick (does he really have a tattoo of himself on his back?), but he makes a show of at least trying to be a teammate.  The show itself does a good job of zagging where you think it will zig, and avoiding obvious plot points (think how Ted just immediately forgave Rebecca for hiring him under false pretenses) so curious to see where they go with Zava.  I think it's pretty obvious though Richmond isn't going to just keep winning all season.

Jamie Tart - lower key in the episode.  Obviously upset with Zava.  What I liked as character growth was hints how Tart is not a stupid man - he corrects Coach Beard on irony vs hypocrisy, and corrects Roy Kent about a prima donna vs. a "pre-Madonna".

Rebecca and the psychic.  I don't think you can have Rebecca make a big deal about seeing a psychic and then not believing her for those predictions to not turn out to be true in some fashion.  The green matchbook shows up by the end of the episode.  But also in any literary fashion predictions of the future do not usually come true in the fashion you'd expect.  So there was the "shite in nining armour", Rebecca being drenched upside down, and finally that she will have a family and be a mother.  GIven how we see Rebecca drinking champagne I think we can assume she's not unknowingly pregnant with Sam's baby (plus in terms of the show timeline months passed in that single episode).  So is "being a mother" literal?  Or is it a corny "Richmond is her family" kind of thing?

Finally the gay sub-plot.  Hoo boy - issue of homophobia in sports is a big one.  Googling suggests there are no openly gay EPL players right now.  I hope they treat that story fairly and with the time needed.  It's Trent Crimm who sees Colin and his lover making out.  I can't see Crimm just muckraking it in a blog post or something, but it's not clearly what storyline purpose Crimm is going to have in this season.  So far he's just kind of "there".

[Syt]

I mean, with the psychic - my gut instinct "shite in nining armor" (which is a cute mix up from knight in shining armor of course) is to think "a dick, wearing #9". Who's wearing the #9 in Richmond? Jamie Tartt.

I feel they're setting up for some serious growth this season - him trying to comfort Roy after his break-up, him not being stupid, as you pointed out, but also seemingly being the only one not dazzled by Zava (partially, because he's now the former hotshot asshole who's being outshone by someone else) - I feel he might step up as new leader when Zava's luster fades or he loses interest in his new adventure (maybe he encounters failure and can't handle it).

[Barrister]

I mean, with the psychic - my gut instinct "shite in nining armor" (which is a cute mix up from knight in shining armor of course) is to think "a dick, wearing #9". Who's wearing the #9 in Richmond? Jamie Tartt.

That makes sense...

[Savonarola]

On the disc with Strange Cargo there was a biography of Joan Crawford and Clark Gable.  They both came from rough backgrounds, Gable's mother died when he was an infant and he left high school at age 14 to become a drifter eventually working as a lumberjack in the Pacific Northwest.  Crawford was abandoned by her father and her step-father and grew up in abject poverty.  The various pretentious film historians speculated that appealed to Depression era America.  (Crawford had actually started in the silent era, but didn't become a big star until the 30s.)

There was also an MGM cartoon called "The Lone Stranger" that definitely wouldn't fly today; and there was a short on Nostradamus which demonstrated Nostradamus predicted America would win the Second World War.  (This was in 1940, before US or even USSR entrance into the Second World War. (Well, I mean on the side of the Allies in the case of the USSR.))

[celedhring]

Strange Cargo (1940)

This is the eighth and final pairing of Clark Gable and Joan Crawford.  Crawford had just had a successful comeback co-starring in "The Women," while Gable was on top of the world having just been Rhett Butler.  Consequently, while Joan got top billing on the print, Gable (for the first time in Crawford-Gable pictures) got top billing on all the publicity material and Mommy Dearest was none too pleased.  (Even worse Gable had just gotten married and was being faithful to his wife (Carole Lombard) allegedly much to Joan's chagrin.)

The story is... different.  Eight men on Devil's Island bust out and are trying to make it to the mainland.  One of the men, Ian Hunter (no, not the lead singer of Mott the Hoople) is a mysterious stranger/Christ figure with some sort of supernatural power.  They're joined by a chanteuse/putain (Crawford) who has been Shanghaied by one of the convicts (Gable.)  One by one the convicts die, but not before experiencing a conversion experience with the help of Hunter.  At the same time Crawford-Gable have a standard Hollywood romance where the macho hombre (or maybe macho homme in this case) becomes civilized after falling for a dame.  The two stories don't always mesh together.  It sort of reminded me of Cool Hand Luke, (if we saw the film through Dragline's eyes rather than Luke's and if the evil is inside of us, rather than society or "The Man,") but with a love story.

I saw this movie during college, and I remember I was intrigued by it. It's essentially a salvation story (quite literally, given the character of the probably-Jesus dude), but with enough ambiguity to make it engaging. Don't remember enough of it to make an ellaborate review, but it felt like an oddball movie given it's a big golden age melodrama, and I always love finding those.

[The Larch]

I went last night to watch the Dungeons & Dragons movie and I must say I was much more entertained than I hoped for. I can see them starting yet another cinematic universe based on it, as they can easily churn out movies given that they have an endless IP generator of content right there.

[celedhring]

I went last night to watch the Dungeons & Dragons movie and I must say I was much more entertained than I hoped for. I can see them starting yet another cinematic universe based on it, as they can easily churn out movies given that they have an endless IP generator of content right there.

Yeah, it's a great oldschool popcorn flick. Sadly, it doesn't seem to have been too successful.

[The Larch]

I went last night to watch the Dungeons & Dragons movie and I must say I was much more entertained than I hoped for. I can see them starting yet another cinematic universe based on it, as they can easily churn out movies given that they have an endless IP generator of content right there.

Yeah, it's a great oldschool popcorn flick. Sadly, it doesn't seem to have been too successful.

Even if this one must have been pricey, I could see movies like these done more on the cheap, and I guess they could be great material for any streaming platform, they don't need to be feature films. For what I'm seeing they've already started to produce a spin off tv show, for instance, and future projects will be for tv, apparently..

[Josephus]

.

But back to Ted Lasso.  I thought it was a really good episode.

So let's start with Zava.  Clearly he's a colossal prick (does he really have a tattoo of himself on his back?), but he makes a show of at least trying to be a teammate.  The show itself does a good job of zagging where you think it will zig, and avoiding obvious plot points (think how Ted just immediately forgave Rebecca for hiring him under false pretenses) so curious to see where they go with Zava.  I think it's pretty obvious though Richmond isn't going to just keep winning all season.

He is modelled after Ibra....Zlatan Ibrahimovic... in everyway--his abilities, his vanity and his poses.

[Savonarola]

The Blue Bird (1940)

The beginning of the end for Shirley Temple.  She would be in movies until 1950, but none of them would be the hits of her 30s era work.  At the ripe old age of 11 her career was in decline.

This is an attempt by MGM to make their own "Wizard of Oz."  It does the black and white to color thing of Wizard of Oz, it has similarly grand sets, and if you sync it to Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon," there's all these weird coincidences, but the color isn't not Wizard of Oz's glorious extra color, it's much more muted; there's a much more limited cast; there's only one song and no dance numbers; and the story (taken from a play) just isn't as good.  The biggest problem in the movie, for audiences of the time, was that Temple plays an unlikable character.  They just couldn't accept Shirley Temple playing anyone other than Shirley Temple.

Gale Sondegaard was originally slated to play the Wicked Witch of the West in Wizard of Oz, but turned it down to play the villain in this movie (which is for the best, no one could have filled that role as well as Margaret Hamilton.)  Temple, until the end of her life, would complain about not being cast as Dorothy.  She was much closer to Dorothy's age then Judy Garland, but she couldn't have sung the songs anywhere near as well well as Judy (and considering how Garland ended up, maybe it's for the best that Shirley didn't get the part.)