TV/Movies Megathread

[celedhring]

Jack Reacher: silly (very), but decently entertaining. Some of the action scenes manage to be funny and well shot.

Werner Herzog playing an over the top sociopathic ruthless Eurovillain - so, himself - is a highlight.

[Sophie Scholl]

Reviews are in for Batman v Superman.

It doesn't look good for comic book fans.
Or movie fans.
Or comic book movie fans.

I enjoyed this guy's review, at least. Spoilers, of course: https://youtu.be/OTKDtoBR-2M 

I wish they'd make a Giffen/DeMattias era Justice League flick in the vein of Deadpool.  That could be amazing.

[Eddie Teach]

The Act of Killing. Wow.

[CountDeMoney]

Jack Reacher: silly (very), but decently entertaining. Some of the action scenes manage to be funny and well shot.

I was pleasantly surprised.  Fun movie.

[Savonarola]

I saw the third part of Shoah (1985).  Here the narrative moves from Chelmno to Auschwitz.  The interviews are a great deal more graphic since there are a lot more survivors of Auschwitz.  Some are difficult to watch, like the barber who cut women's hair before they were sent to the gas chambers.  Claude Lanzmann interviews him as he is cutting hair and the barber is still clearly disturbed by what he saw and what he did.

The part that was most interesting to me was the discussion about the transportation.  They had a historian with a dispatch with the train schedule of the "Special train" from Krakow to Auschwitz.  It's almost identical to what they used in Colombia before we built our system; and just like their system it had to go to every station manager.  Also interesting was that they considered 50 box cars filled with people to be a long train; we could get twice as many cars filled with coal with with three 50s era diesel trains (I believe they were using steam powered trains in Poland). 

It then occurred to me that maybe I was drawing the wrong lessons out of a Holocaust film.   

[Malthus]

I saw the third part of Shoah (1985).  Here the narrative moves from Chelmno to Auschwitz.  The interviews are a great deal more graphic since there are a lot more survivors of Auschwitz.  Some are difficult to watch, like the barber who cut women's hair before they were sent to the gas chambers.  Claude Lanzmann interviews him as he is cutting hair and the barber is still clearly disturbed by what he saw and what he did.

The part that was most interesting to me was the discussion about the transportation.  They had a historian with a dispatch with the train schedule of the "Special train" from Krakow to Auschwitz.  It's almost identical to what they used in Colombia before we built our system; and just like their system it had to go to every station manager.  Also interesting was that they considered 50 box cars filled with people to be a long train; we could get twice as many cars filled with coal with with three 50s era diesel trains (I believe they were using steam powered trains in Poland). 

It then occurred to me that maybe I was drawing the wrong lessons out of a Holocaust film.   

If only they had put your team in charge, amIrite? 

[Valmy]

So many more people could have been sent to Auschwitz if they had just had diesel trains. 

[Savonarola]

If only they had put your team in charge, amIrite? 

Heh, imagine what we could do with today's technology!

One of the strangest parts of the narrative is how bizarrely normal it is.  The rail office would arrange for special train for Jews in no different way than they would have done for migrant workers or a tour group.  The Gestapo would try to get at least 400 people on a train in order to get the special half rate for adults (and even if they were a few shy would claim 400 people.)

One (strange) difficulty the Gestapo encountered was that track time had to be paid for in local currency (just as is the case today); but the Holocaust (for lack of a better term) was an unfunded mandate.  The money confiscated from victims was used to fund their transport, but it was always in local currency and wartime conditions made it hard to exchange currency.  So Holocaust victims from Greece had to go through Croatia, Hungary and Poland to reach their destination; but all their money was in drachma.  The Gestapo ended up defaulting on a large part of their transport budget because they couldn't exchange currency.

Edit:  Should have said "Banal" rather than "Bizarrely normal."  I've failed Hannah Arendt. 

[Malthus]

Heh, imagine what we could do with today's technology!

Under President Trump, maybe your chance will come. 

One of the strangest parts of the narrative is how bizarrely normal it is.  The rail office would arrange for special train for Jews in no different way than they would have done for migrant workers or a tour group.  The Gestapo would try to get at least 400 people on a train in order to get the special half rate for adults (and even if they were a few shy would claim 400 people.)

One (strange) difficulty the Gestapo encountered was that track time had to be paid for in local currency (just as is the case today); but the Holocaust (for lack of a better term) was an unfunded mandate.  The money confiscated from victims was used to fund their transport, but it was always in local currency and wartime conditions made it hard to exchange currency.  So Holocaust victims from Greece had to go through Croatia, Hungary and Poland to reach their destination; but all their money was in drachma.  The Gestapo ended up defaulting on a large part of their transport budget because they couldn't exchange currency.

Edit:  Should have said "Banal" rather than "Bizarrely normal."  I've failed Hannah Arendt. 

I would never have imagined group discounts to figure largely in genocide. 

[Valmy]

I would never have imagined group discounts to figure largely in genocide. 

Really? These are the Germans we are talking about here.

[viper37]

I would never have imagined group discounts to figure largely in genocide. 

Me neither. 

[Savonarola]

I would never have imagined group discounts to figure largely in genocide. 

Me neither. 

That is what drove home the "Banality of evil" concept for me; (in fact Eichmann's group was responsible for the transport to the concentration camps.)

[Malthus]

I would never have imagined group discounts to figure largely in genocide. 

Really? These are the Germans we are talking about here.

Well, if it was scheisseporn, it would make sense ... 

[Valmy]

I would never have imagined group discounts to figure largely in genocide. 

Really? These are the Germans we are talking about here.

Well, if it was scheisseporn, it would make sense ... 

I mean OF COURSE they tried to ship people to death camps as efficiently as possible.

[celedhring]

I never got to that part of Shoah. The thing is so incredibly long.