TV/Movies Megathread

[Ideologue]

Seriously, though--in less than 50 words and using only 7 commas, what's its damage?

It's unintentionally funny in how deeply and constantly it wallows in misery.  The first hour is a monotonous parade of background grotesqueries as well as at least one war crime perpetrated by the protagonists.  The second expects you to still care about the characters.  I guess if you only saw the second hour, it would have been cool.

For 11B4V: also not enough tank on tank action.

Saw it today, thought it was excellent.

The critique here is grotesque. The first hour is nothing but misery? It's a fucking war movie - of course it is miserable. War is kind of miserable.

Yeah, that's great.  It was comical how miserable it was.  "Oh, let's show a corpse getting run over by this tank!  Because they haven't gotten it yet!"  This is not a documentary or even based a true story; it is a designed piece of art, with every element intentionally placed.  Taken in aggregate, the happenstance of Fury is borderline ridiculous.  Perhaps that was the point, and if you like that kind of orchestrated misery, perhaps it is worthwhile.

However, I didn't see anyone in this film whose misery I cared about, because the characters were poorly drawn and boring and almost entirely nasty.  Collier ("Wardaddy" ) came the closest, as sort of Kurtz devoid of much poetry, but that's almost entirely due to Pitt's charisma as a star.  Norman is a void and he winds up as gross as everybody else and weirdly attached to the jerk that's been leading him astray.  He does so in a hurried arc that takes place over, like, a week.

And yes, the "protaganist" isn't a very nice guy. That is the entire point. A bunch of people doing pretty horrible things in a pretty horrible world. How could you so thoroughly miss the entirety of the point of the movie?

Yeah, a bunch of "not nice guys" whose [spoiler]sacrifice is accompanied with great big music swells and an expectation that you care about them as human beings, though they have (with the possible exception of Norman) abandoned their humanity with their actions, which ranged from war crimes to rape threats to kind of actual rape.[/spoiler]

Like I said, this is not a documentary.  It was a film about purposely-designed monsters (some worse than others), that the film still expects you to care about when they're in danger. 

Worse, they are clearly intended to represent soldiers' experience in WWII--including, I guess, their experience committing war crimes.  If I were a WWII vet I'd be fucking offended.  Actually, as a Southerner, I can already be a bit offended by its stereotyping myself.

Also went and saw Gone Girl with the wife earlier today. It was also extremely good, great little story, and a very unconventional and unsettling conclusion.

Well, that movie was great.

[Martinus]

Constantine MUST be awesome.

They straight-washed him in the tv series. 

[Berkut]

Seriously, though--in less than 50 words and using only 7 commas, what's its damage?

It's unintentionally funny in how deeply and constantly it wallows in misery.  The first hour is a monotonous parade of background grotesqueries as well as at least one war crime perpetrated by the protagonists.  The second expects you to still care about the characters.  I guess if you only saw the second hour, it would have been cool.

For 11B4V: also not enough tank on tank action.

Saw it today, thought it was excellent.

The critique here is grotesque. The first hour is nothing but misery? It's a fucking war movie - of course it is miserable. War is kind of miserable.

Yeah, that's great.  It was comical how miserable it was.  "Oh, let's show a corpse getting run over by this tank!  Because they haven't gotten it yet!"

I didn't think it was very comical, but I guess my ability to be amused by the horrific might be different from your own.

This is not a documentary or even based a true story; it is a designed piece of art, with every element intentionally placed.  Taken in aggregate, the happenstance of Fury is borderline ridiculous.  Perhaps that was the point, and if you like that kind of orchestrated misery, perhaps it is worthwhile.

The happenstance is ridiculous? WTF does that even mean? Is this just you stringing together words that you think will make you sound too cool for school?

The point is that war is NOT some grand adventure where the good guys win after some noble sacrifice - it is just a bunch of people who have been dehumanized attempting to butcher one another, and your best hope is that the "good" guys are slightly less dehumanized than the bad guys.

I guess you need your heroes a little more pure so you can feel for them. I thought it was a refreshingly unconventional look into exceptionally horrible circumstances, where even the heroes are deeply damaged goods.

However, I didn't see anyone in this film whose misery I cared about, because the characters were poorly drawn and boring and almost entirely nasty.

Ahhh, they were too nasty for you? So sorry.

Swan was too nasty for you? Gordo?

Of the five crew members, one was downright fucked up and cruel (Grady, although it was clear, if you were paying attention, that he was a product of what happened to him), one was clearly well over the line into "the ends justify any means" (Wardaddy), but I was still quite able to emphasize with him and what he was trying to do. The other two non-new members were neither particularly horrible people (Swan and Gordo).

I think you were not able to emphasize with them because you were too busy being offended and all torn up over a war story where the protagonists are not Captain Miller from SPR.

I found myself perfectly capable of emphasizing with them.

  Collier ("Wardaddy" ) came the closest, as sort of Kurtz devoid of much poetry, but that's almost entirely due to Pitt's charisma as a star.  Norman is a void and he winds up as gross as everybody else and weirdly attached to the jerk that's been leading him astray.  He does so in a hurried arc that takes place over, like, a week.

Again, that is the fucking point. He is the injection of humanity into the sordid mess that is these mens world. Of course it is hurried, the entire movie takes place in a very narrow slice of time, the very end of the war. That is what makes the entire thing so jarring - it is all nearly completely pointless and a waste.

And yes, the "protaganist" isn't a very nice guy. That is the entire point. A bunch of people doing pretty horrible things in a pretty horrible world. How could you so thoroughly miss the entirety of the point of the movie?

Yeah, a bunch of "not nice guys" whose [spoiler]sacrifice is accompanied with great big music swells and an expectation that you care about them as human beings, though they have (with the possible exception of Norman) abandoned their humanity with their actions, which ranged from war crimes to rape threats to kind of actual rape.[/spoiler]

That is why the movie works - because if you make the effort to think enough about them rather than be oh so hipster offended at their loss of humanity, you realize that they are not some horrible people, they are normal people placed in a horrible situation. That they are still capable of sacrifice is the entire point!

Yes, you ARE expected to care about them as human beings, DESPITE their obvious failings and their inability to both survive in a horrible situation as long as they have without it damaging them profoundly.

Like you said, this is fiction, everything is there for a reason. If the people who made the movie had wanted you to be easily attachced to the characters, they could have made them all heroes with trivial flaws, it could have been Saving Private Ryan. The reason the movie is excellent is that they are demanding more from the viewer than anything that simple, that uni-dimensional.

War is horrific, and it turns humans into horrors - those that it doesn't just kill outright. Despite that, they are still humans, and still capable of human sacrifice.

I guess maybe that isn't satisfying to those who demand a simpler story where the good guys are all really damn good so we know who to like and who not to like.
Like I said, this is not a documentary.  It was a film about purposely-designed monsters (some worse than others), that the film still expects you to care about when they're in danger. 

Worse, they are clearly intended to represent soldiers' experience in WWII--including, I guess, their experience committing war crimes.  If I were a WWII vet I'd be fucking offended.  Actually, as a Southerner, I can already be a bit offended by its stereotyping myself.

Also went and saw Gone Girl with the wife earlier today. It was also extremely good, great little story, and a very unconventional and unsettling conclusion.

Well, that movie was great.
[/quote]

[Martinus]

watched ep 1 of new American Horror Story. So far I liked this season's plotline more than last year's. We'll see where it goes.

I liked Jessica Lange singing a song that wasn't written for two more decades.

[Martinus]

Seriously, though--in less than 50 words and using only 7 commas, what's its damage?

It's unintentionally funny in how deeply and constantly it wallows in misery.  The first hour is a monotonous parade of background grotesqueries as well as at least one war crime perpetrated by the protagonists.  The second expects you to still care about the characters.  I guess if you only saw the second hour, it would have been cool.

For 11B4V: also not enough tank on tank action.

Saw it today, thought it was excellent.

The critique here is grotesque. The first hour is nothing but misery? It's a fucking war movie - of course it is miserable. War is kind of miserable.

And yes, the "protaganist" isn't a very nice guy. That is the entire point. A bunch of people doing pretty horrible things in a pretty horrible world. How could you so thoroughly miss the entirety of the point of the movie?

This clip is awesome. Amazing reaction time on the black dude.

[Berkut]

Well, I don't really want to argue with Ide about this, except that I would hate for other Languishites to pass on the movie because of his bizarre review.

It is very good - probably not quite great, but there are parts of it that are simply incredible.

The battle with the Tiger is worth the price of admission alone, if you are at all interested in WW2 armored combat. Probably the best movie armored engagement I've ever seen. Hell, it isn't even really close, to be honest.

[Ideologue]

I did like the Tiger battle.

Anyway, just to defend myself a little:

The happenstance is ridiculous? WTF does that even mean? Is this just you stringing together words that you think will make you sound too cool for school?

Nope, it's just one damned thing after another, clearly ordered in such a way for maximum (theoretical) dramatic effect.  Enough terrible things happen, and in such a precise way, that they seem false and contrived.  [spoiler]The three big examples are--the shelling of the apartmen house right after the tankers leave (and Norman is even able to find his deflowerer's body in the rubble!), and the friendly fire incident at the end, and then Norman is spied by a young SS soldier who is just too innocent to kill him, just like he was!  I mean, FFS.[/spoiler]  Oh, and of course there are more: Norman was a typist but of course he was sent to go help drive a tank; Norman is the one to fail to shoot the Volksgrenadier kid on sight; that little piece of face with an intact eye; [spoiler]hell, Norman being the sole survivor is straight-up SPR, man.[/spoiler]  It all adds up to a big fakey-seeming chain of events, and dour realism is the worst way to play that.

[Eddie Teach]

This clip is awesome. Amazing reaction time on the black dude.

As many times as I watch this, I can't tell if he's actually connecting or not.

[Berkut]

wow, a sequence of events structured in a way for maximum theatrical effect.

Who would ever imagine such a thing in a movie?

[Ideologue]

Whatever, man.  I'm going to bed.  I'm glad you were edified by your movie.  I wasn't.  The end.

[Ideologue]

Except one more thing: I don't know why everyone on Languish has to be a dick, like, all of the time.  I think I'm going to take a break for a little while.

[Razgovory]

Well, I don't really want to argue with Ide about this, except that I would hate for other Languishites to pass on the movie because of his bizarre review.

It is very good - probably not quite great, but there are parts of it that are simply incredible.

The battle with the Tiger is worth the price of admission alone, if you are at all interested in WW2 armored combat. Probably the best movie armored engagement I've ever seen. Hell, it isn't even really close, to be honest.

You take his pseudo-intellectual ramblings on film way to seriously.

[Berkut]

Except one more thing: I don't know why everyone on Languish has to be a dick, like, all of the time.  I think I'm going to take a break for a little while.

...you dumb cunt.

It is a good question.

[Admiral Yi]

Watched the second half of Rush, the Formula 1 movie.  There's a whole lot of footage of cars going fast and announcers of sundry nationalities screaming into their mikes.  Not terribly dense on plot.  I'll take a look at the first half some time to see if I'm missing anything.

One thing that struck me is how slow the pit crews were compared to Nascar pit crews.  I understand it's not the real thing; maybe someone who has seen both Nascar and Formula 1 can tell me whether that's accurate or not.

[Liep]

Watched the second half of Rush, the Formula 1 movie.  There's a whole lot of footage of cars going fast and announcers of sundry nationalities screaming into their mikes.  Not terribly dense on plot.  I'll take a look at the first half some time to see if I'm missing anything.

One thing that struck me is how slow the pit crews were compared to Nascar pit crews.  I understand it's not the real thing; maybe someone who has seen both Nascar and Formula 1 can tell me whether that's accurate or not.

F1 has improved on pit stops a lot. When I followed F1 in the Schumacher days a pit stop was about 7-10 seconds for a full tank up and change of wheels, now it's 2.6-3.0 seconds.

So I can imagine it was even slower back in the 70's, but so was Nascar I guess.

EDIT: Yes, Nascar pit crews were also slow in the 70's, http://www.nascar.com/en_us/news-media/articles/2014/7/16/evolution-of-the-nascar-pit-stop-nascar-hall-of-fame.html