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The D&D [Instant Watch] Film Society

124

Posts

  • Xenogears of BoreXenogears of Bore Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    THE LOVE GURU

    If there is one universal truth about people and movies it is that everyone, no matter how cultured, likes at least one bad movie. One movie with cringe worthy special effects, tastleless or unfunny jokes, terribly bad acting, horrendous special effects or just a absymal premise. Low budget, no budget, over budget, poorly edited, not edited, over edited, killed by a focus group, you don't care about the excuses, you see something good in the movie. Some love was put into it, someone acted their heart out, a serious script with some great moments of levity. A great premise marred by one or more of these ideas, or a once in a lifetime acting job in a movie that didn't deserve it.

    The Love Guru isn't one of those movies.

    the-love-guru.jpg

    Some people even enjoy watching terrible movies under the so bad it is good premise. Manos Hands of Fate, Q, Driven, Gigli, anything done by Rifftrax or MS3TK.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkRb5DF_ox0

    So trailers for comedies usually include all the funny parts of the movies these days... Looks like they forgot something here. They thought Mike Myers giant noggin on a kids body would be funny. It's really creepy.

    Sadly, The Love Guru isn't even one of those movies. It is instead the singularly least funny comedy ever made. It is a mixture of the basest dick and fart jokes mixed with offensively bad Indian accent based humor, grade school word play jokes, a tragically unfunny script. Why would you make a reoccuring joke based on the real name of the cop from Law and Order:SVU? Yes, Indian words can sound silly in English, we get it.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BVsrcbDBYI&feature=related

    Mike Myers is no stranger to bad accents and language jokes. They are a part of just about every movie he did from Wayne's World to So I Married an Axe Murderer to Austin Powers to Shrek, and some one convinced him to branch out to a movie centered on him doing an Indian accent for eighty minutes. It does not work. At all.

    The premise of the movie does it no favors. Guru Maurice Pitka (Mike Myers) is a goofy Indian jesus who is the second most famous self help man from India, hired by the Toronto Maple Leaf's beautiful owner Jane Bullard (Jessica Alba) to help out "The Tiger Woods of Hockey" Darren Roanoke (The usually funny Romany Malco playing a straight man) get over his wife leaving him for the giant wanged goalie from Qubec Jacques "Le Coq" Grandé (Justin Timberlake) and get his game back in gear. Yes, his name is a penis joke. Everything he owns has a giant red cock on it.

    Speaking about names let's look at some of the other ones here.

    Coach Punch Cherkov
    Guru Tugginmypudha (Ben Kingsley will do ANYTHING for money)
    Dick Pants
    Guru Satchabigknoba

    The entire movie is a endless waltz of bad word play or Indian accents are funny jokes, dick and fart jokes, and naughty grade school jokes. Over and over again.

    Back to the plot of the movie Jessica Alba hired the guru because she has been a fan since childhood and secretly had a crush on him, oh, and of course Jessica Alba is a lonely and hated millionaire owner of a beloved hockey franchise and doesn't have a boyfriend or husband. But Pitka has a love problem of his own, to become a real Guru he needs to wear a chastity belt. You can see where this is going only it does so in the worst way possible.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYtDKysEnjA&feature=related

    (Youtube lies, there are no funny scenes in this movie.)

    I guess this all could have worked if not for the purile level the humor stays at. Every possible bad gradeschool joke you can think of is in this movie, seperated by ridiculous Hollywood cameos and sometimes interrupted by the aforementioned innane comedic plot of this movie. The movie was written and produced by Mike Myers, and years and years of doing children's movies must have schewed his timing towards younger audiences. Every single joke falls flat. It's a gigantic chain of failure. Oh and I guess he wasn't sick of all the midget jokes from Austin Powers, as Verne Troyer plays the Leaf's diminutive coach and even then it's still not as funny as those movies. Yes, he is small. Yes, he is vicious and creepy.

    Not even the impressive comedic supporting cast of Stephen Colbert, John Oliver, Jim Gaffigan can drag a laugh out of this movie, no matter how hard they try. Colbert does have some pretty decent bits that were cut though, as seen here.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDnhnAwj5MI&feature=related

    Why oh why do I want you to watch this terrible movie, besides watching Daniel Tosh get punched in the face? It's simple my friends, you need to know what a truely terrible movie is. The acting is fine. The budget was big. I doubt the editing really hurt it as no scene really drags nor does the plot have any gaping holes. It's just a movie that should have never, ever been made. I don't think the greatest comedic writers or directors could have salvaged this complete mess. That this movie made it past the script approval process, past the elevator pitch even, and then was made and promoted as a potential summer blockbuster.

    You need to watch this movie though. It is gracefully short. I watched it twice in the last week trying my hardest to find any redeeming qualities to this film. There are none, besides maybe how fine Jessica Alba is. Speaking of that fine lady she seems to be the only one in the movie who has an inkling that she is watching the potential career suicide of Mike Myers in process, just something in her performance seems to me that she is doing what a professional does when they want to phone it in but not actually perform like they were in a Star Wars prequel.

    Xenogears of Bore on
    3DS CODE: 3093-7068-3576
  • VariableVariable Mouth Congress Stroke Me Lady FameRegistered User regular
    edited November 2010
    this movie scares me. I loved Wayne's World so much my whole life, and austin powers trilogy started out so goddamn good (to me)... seeing anything of his now makes me sad.

    I'd need to watch with a friend. someone to keep sharp things away.

    Variable on
    BNet-Vari#1998 | Switch-SW 6960 6688 8388 | Steam | Twitch
  • GimGim a tall glass of water Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Intriguing.

    You have brought us a fine challenge.

    Gim on
  • RyadicRyadic Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    I wouldn't mind watching 85 minutes of Colbert and Gaffigan. Probably would have been a better movie in the end. Not gonna lie, but I laughed a whole lot at that Youtube video. Just something about Colbert's demeanor and overall comedic timing that makes me laugh so hard.

    I knew this movie would be horrible from the first time I saw the trailer on TV.

    Ryadic on
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  • nexuscrawlernexuscrawler Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Variable wrote: »
    this movie scares me. I loved Wayne's World so much my whole life, and austin powers trilogy started out so goddamn good (to me)... seeing anything of his now makes me sad.

    I'd need to watch with a friend. someone to keep sharp things away.

    He's one of those stars who's ego combined with laziness ruined a great career.

    like Eddie Murphy

    nexuscrawler on
  • BogartBogart Streetwise Hercules Registered User, Moderator mod
    edited November 2010
    Is it worse that the Cat in the Hat movie he made?

    Bogart on
  • RhalloTonnyRhalloTonny Of the BrownlandsRegistered User regular
    edited November 2010
    There are few movies that I'm unable to sit through.
    This is one of them.

    RhalloTonny on
    !
  • pots+panspots+pans Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Just watched Dear Zachary. Holy shit. That's the most powerful piece of cinema I've ever seen. I cried, I've never cried at a movie.

    pots+pans on
  • RyadicRyadic Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    pots+pans wrote: »
    Just watched Dear Zachary. Holy shit. That's the most powerful piece of cinema I've ever seen. I cried, I've never cried at a movie.

    Exactly. People cry at stupid movies like The Notebook and shit. But this movie actually hits a spot in everyone's heart.

    Ryadic on
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  • TomantaTomanta Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Just an FYI for everyone, Netflix added the new cut of Metropolis to streaming. Metropolis is awesome. I'd consider doing a writeup but I'd never finish it.

    Tomanta on
  • RyadicRyadic Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Doesn't look like we have someone for next week, or at least the OP doesn't show anyone.

    We just going to cycle back to Bogart and go through again? I'm up for this. I don't want this thread to die out.

    Ryadic on
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  • ElkiElki get busy Moderator, ClubPA mod
    edited November 2010
    Is it my turn yet?

    Elki on
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  • ThomamelasThomamelas Only one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me! Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Elki, if you want to go, send me a PM with the Film. This goes for anyone else as well.

    Thomamelas on
  • ThomamelasThomamelas Only one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me! Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    That movie was bad. The acting was bad, the camera work was subpar, the editing was utter shit and the screenplay was proof that post delivery abortions should not only be legal but encouraged in some cases. I guess the sound guys did a passable job but the rest of this crew should be deeply ashamed. And thus we have a new rule. Only films that people will enjoy. I will accept films that are awesomely bad, but I will not accept just bad films any more.

    Thomamelas on
  • pots+panspots+pans Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Which film are you talking about?

    pots+pans on
  • ThomamelasThomamelas Only one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me! Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    pots+pans wrote: »
    Which film are you talking about?

    The Love Guru.

    Thomamelas on
  • ElkiElki get busy Moderator, ClubPA mod
    edited November 2010
    Video games are the first stage in a plan for machines to help the human race, the only plan that offers a future for intelligence. For the moment, the inseparable philosophy of our time is contained in the Pac-Man. I didn't know when I was sacrificing all my hundred yen coins to him that he was going to conquer the world. Perhaps because he is the most perfect graphic metaphor of man's fate. He puts into true perspective the balance of power between the individual and the environment. And he tells us soberly that though there may be honor in carrying out the greatest number of victorious attacks, it always comes a cropper - Sans Soleil (1983)


    It would be rude, indeed, to leave adjectives next to such images. And how to remember a film of memory? It's already a fog. The mind has condensed it to flashes. Girl. Cats. Giraffe. Death. Color. What else was there... Film?


    PDVD_001.jpg


    PDVD_000_orig.jpg


    Seeing it is a function of time and mood. How will you experience Japan and Guinea? As I did? I've wished it before for other things, but there is the ever present impossibility of subjecting others to the oppression of the prejudices of my memories.

    The first image he told me about was of three children on a road in Iceland, in 1965. He said that for him it was the image of happiness and also that he had tried several times to link it to other images, but it never worked.


    PDVD_017_orig.jpg

    He wrote me: one day I'll have to put it all alone at the beginning of a film with a long piece of black leader; if they don't see happiness in the picture, at least they'll see the black.


    Anonymously immortalized in celluloid; it is immaterial if was our own happiness or a given one. A biography seconds long.

    He wrote me that in the suburbs of Tokyo there is a temple consecrated to cats. I wish I could convey to you the simplicity—the lack of affectation—of this couple who had come to place an inscribed wooden slat in the cat cemetery so their cat Tora would be protected.


    PDVD_002_orig.jpg

    No she wasn't dead, only run away. But on the day of her death no one would know how to pray for her, how to intercede with death so that he would call her by her right name. So they had to come there, both of them, under the rain, to perform the rite that would repair the web of time where it had been broke.


    Marker is forever in on what Adrian Martin called the Minimal Threshold of Fiction. Finding inspiration in travel. In the other, and with little parasitism.

    A people of nothing, a people of emptiness, a vertical people. Frankly, have you ever heard of anything stupider than to say to people as they teach in film schools, not to look at the camera?


    PDVD_004_orig.jpg


    And I realize the cruelty of my key strokes. I erase him, and make it mine. Words deprived of their neighbors take new meaning and the associations of images are changed.

    He used to write to me: the Sahel is not only what is shown of it when it is too late; it's a land that drought seeps into like water into a leaking boat. The animals resurrected for the time of a carnival in Bissau will be petrified again, as soon as a new attack has changed the savannah into a desert. This is a state of survival that the rich countries have forgotten, with one exception—you win—Japan.


    PDVD_006_orig.jpg

    My constant comings and goings are not a search for contrasts; they are a journey to the two extreme poles of survival.

    Shonagon had a passion for lists: the list of 'elegant things,' 'distressing things,' or even of 'things not worth doing.' One day she got the idea of drawing up a list of 'things that quicken the heart.' Not a bad criterion I realize when I'm filming; I bow to the economic miracle, but what I want to show you are the neighborhood celebrations.


    PDVD_007_orig.jpg

    I've spent the day in front of my TV set—that memory box. I was in Nara with the sacred deers. I was taking a picture without knowing that in the 15th century Basho had written: “The willow sees the heron's image... upside down.”


    chris-marker-sunless.png


    He is a collector of images. His and others. Allowing them by power of mass to find their own links and relationships.


    sans-soleil-filmstill.png

    The commercial becomes a kind of haiku to the eye, used to Western atrocities in this field; not understanding obviously adds to the pleasure. For one slightly hallucinatory moment I had the impression that I spoke Japanese, but it was a cultural program on NHK about Gérard de Nerval.

    In Apocalypse Now, Brando said a few definitive and incommunicable sentences: “Horror has a face and a name... you must make a friend of horror.” To cast out the horror that has a name and a face you must give it another name and another face. Japanese horror movies have the cunning beauty of certain corpses. Sometimes one is stunned by so much cruelty. One seeks its sources in the Asian peoples long familiarity with suffering, that requires that even pain be ornate.


    PDVD_008_orig.jpg

    And then comes the reward: the monsters are laid out, Natsume Masako arises; absolute beauty also has a name and a face.

    I see her, she saw me, she knows that I see her, she drops me her glance, but just at an angle where it is still possible to act as though it was not addressed to me


    02_06_08a.jpg

    and at the end the real glance, straightforward, that lasted a twenty-fourth of a second, the length of a film frame.

    And now, the scene moves to Cassaque: the seventeenth of February, 1980. But to understand it properly one must move forward in time. In a year Luis Cabral the president will be in prison, and the weeping man he has just decorated, major Nino, will have taken power. The party will have split, Guineans and Cape Verdeans separated one from the other will be fighting over Amilcar's legacy. We will learn that behind this ceremony of promotions which in the eyes of visitors perpetuated the brotherhood of the struggle, there lay a pit of post-victory bitterness, and that Nino's tears did not express an ex-warrior's emotion, but the wounded pride of a hero who felt he had not been raised high enough above the others.


    asanssolielPDVD_025.jpg

    And beneath each of these faces a memory. And in place of what we were told had been forged into a collective memory, a thousand memories of men who parade their personal laceration in the great wound of history.




    I'm writing you all this from another world, a world of appearances. In a way the two worlds communicate with each other. Memory is to one what history is to the other: an impossibility.

    He wrote me that only one film had been capable of portraying impossible memory—insane memory: Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo. In the spiral of the titles he saw time covering a field ever wider as it moved away, a cyclone whose present moment contains motionless the eye.

    In San Francisco he had made his pilgrimage to all the film's locations: the florist Podesta Baldocchi, where James Stewart spies on Kim Novak—he the hunter, she the prey. Or was it the other way around?


    asanssolielPDVD_028.jpg
    It seems to be a question of trailing, of enigma, of murder, but in truth it's a question of power and freedom, of melancholy and dazzlement, so carefully coded within the spiral that you could miss it, and not discover immediately that this vertigo of space in reality stands for the vertigo of time.

    He is a Third Worlder of time. The idea that unhappiness had existed in his planet's past is as unbearable to him as to them the existence of poverty in their present.

    The unhappiness he discovers is as inaccessible to him as the poverty of a poor country is unimaginable to the children of a rich one. He has chosen to give up his privileges, but he can do nothing about the privilege that has allowed him to choose. His only recourse is precisely that which threw him into this absurd quest: a song cycle by Mussorgsky. They are still sung in the fortieth century. Their meaning has been lost. But it was then that for the first time he perceived the presence of that thing he didn't understand which had something to do with unhappiness and memory, and towards which slowly, heavily, he began to walk.


    PDVD_016_orig.jpg

    Of course I'll never make that film. Nonetheless I'm collecting the sets, inventing the twists, putting in my favorite creatures. I've even given it a title, indeed the title of those Mussorgsky songs: Sunless.


    And yet is almost fully-formed in my memory. And almost a neat 30 years later, the politics of the man from 2000 years to come have not gone out of date.

    And then in its turn the journey entered the 'zone,' and Hayao showed me my images already affected by the moss of time, freed of the lie that had prolonged the existence of those moments swallowed by the spiral.


    sunless5.jpg

    By the way, did you know that there are emus in the Île de France?


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    Elki on
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  • ThomamelasThomamelas Only one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me! Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Elki, I finished watching Sans Soleil. In the last 30 minutes or so, the idea that it's a meditation on memory becomes clearer. But the first hour or so feels like it's self-indulgent, and shallow. It felt like that first hour could be cut without harming the film at all, because it was so lacking in substance other then "Look at Japan, see how different they are! And here are the odd shots of Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde to re-enforce it". It may simply be that the substance of the beginning was so fine, so gossamer that I simply didn't find it, but I suspect it's more a case that it simply doesn't exist.

    Thomamelas on
  • JamesKeenanJamesKeenan Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Do you remember Oldboy?

    oldboy-face.jpg



    Of course you do.Oldboy was one of "those" movies that everyone was supposed to see. Like Bladerunner or Resevoir Dogs or Fight Club or, now, Inception. It's 104 on the IMDB top 250 currently. What struck me as odd And maybe this was my own experience only was how few people I knew who didn't know Oldboy was part two of a trilogy. And if you didn't know that? Well, don't feel bad. Now you do.


    Enter Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance.

    MV5BMjMxMTY1MjM1MV5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMTIwNjQzMQ@@._V1._SX450_SY619_.jpg

    Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance was actually part 1 of "The Vengeance Trilogy." Oldboy was part 2, but Oldboy was the popular one. Also, for any concerned or confused, the movies are completely independent and separate. No continuity except the emotional themes. Part 3, also, is Sympathy for Lady Vengeance.

    But we're not concerned with those other two movies, we just want ours. So onto the movie.





    Sympathy for Mr Vengeance is... certainly something. One of the most significant parts of it is the cinematography. While watching the film, try to keep in mind constantly that this is a movie which exists in part simply to demonstrate the marvel of cinema itself. The very fact of putting images to screen, of moving pictures, and the possibilities when you take images from the world itself. Like those wide angle Western shots of open plains which existed because now they could exist. Cinematography is the art of using angles, lights, shadows and motion to show the world. Just to show it as it is, or isn't. And this is a movie which acknowledges and appreciates that fact.

    To put it simpler, this is one of those fantastic movies that is not just a story on screen, it's a goddamn movie. You're not just seeing what Park Chan-wook (the director) wants you to see, he exploits his medium fantastically to specifically show it to you how he wants you to see it.



    Secondly, this movie is brutal. Do not watch this movie with younger audiences if violence is not something you want them to see. It has 'bad' language, but it's in Korean, so maybe that's not a big deal. The violence might be. And in fact, if your squeamish, it might not be pleasant for adults, either

    But I think that'd be a shame. Because in my opinion, one of the main reasons I like this movie so much, is because of the point of the violence. I'm sure you've heard this line a lot, but it is officially JamesKeenan's opinion that this movie is the real deal, a legitimate movie where the violence serves a purpose. This isn't some silly snuff film where we're pushing limits because it's fun to make people a little sick. And the film isn't that bad. It's not hardcore exhibitionist with it's violence. The violence is there because the themes of this movie art "revenge, violence and salvation." I do not think the scenes would have the same emotional impact without showing that yes, this guy just got stabbed in the neck, and he's bleeding, and now he's dead. And this once nice man did the stabbing.









    I would rather avoid a plot synopsis, I think the movie will be a lot more meaningful if you don't have a conception of where the story is going before you watch it.






    Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance. - I enjoy lighter, more fun movies often, like The Big Lebowski. But cinema has a darker side, and this movie will remind you of it.

    JamesKeenan on
  • JamesKeenanJamesKeenan Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    I picked this movie because it represented elements that I thought were a bit lacking. Elements: Korean, Dark, Gritty, Foreign, Bloody blood.

    JamesKeenan on
  • GoumindongGoumindong Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    I believe the best way to describe Sympathy for Mr Vengeance is this.

    "At first nothing good happens. Then it gets worse. Then it doesn't get better. Then it gets worse"

    The movie, like Oldboy(Sympathy for Ms Vengeance is not as good imo) is simply horrifying. Not horrifying like horror films are, but horrifying in only the way that something that is true can be. What "The Chaser" did to hope (Oh, you had some? Let me beat that out of you with a clawhammer), Sympathy for Mr Vengeance does for the belief that everything will just turn out OK.

    Goumindong on
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  • azith28azith28 Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    In reference, In memorandum, and In honor.

    Spaceship needs to be added to this list.

    The name of the movie may have changed but i think few people have seen it because of this and it deserves to be watched today, if for nothing else then 'Cooking with John.

    The name of the movie was Spaceship when it first came out but i think they had to change it due to some earlier copyright on the name. It starred leslie Nielson.

    And i forgot it was cooking with john not bob. It was a little scene inside the movie. its a campy old show kinda like 'naked gun in space'.

    azith28 on
    Stercus, Stercus, Stercus, Morituri Sum
  • JustinSane07JustinSane07 Really, stupid? Brockton__BANNED USERS regular
    edited November 2010
    I have no idea what you just said.

    Is "Spaceship" the name of the movie? Or is it "Cooking with Bob"? Is "Cooking with Bob" a segment within the movie?

    JustinSane07 on
  • JacobkoshJacobkosh Gamble a stamp. I can show you how to be a real man!Moderator mod
    edited November 2010
    azith28 wrote: »
    In reference, In memorandum, and In honor.

    Spaceship needs to be added to this list.

    The name of the movie may have changed but i think few people have seen it because of this and it deserves to be watched today, if for nothing else then 'Cooking with bob'.

    Are you posting in the correct thread?

    Jacobkosh on
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  • JamesKeenanJamesKeenan Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Goumindong wrote: »
    I believe the best way to describe Sympathy for Mr Vengeance is this.

    "At first nothing good happens. Then it gets worse. Then it doesn't get better. Then it gets worse"

    The movie, like Oldboy(Sympathy for Ms Vengeance is not as good imo) is simply horrifying. Not horrifying like horror films are, but horrifying in only the way that something that is true can be. What "The Chaser" did to hope (Oh, you had some? Let me beat that out of you with a clawhammer), Sympathy for Mr Vengeance does for the belief that everything will just turn out OK.


    I think I will agree that Oldboy was more entertaining. More kung fu. Better story. And a clearer enemy throughout. Etc. Certainly better production values.

    But I'm positive far more people have seen Oldboy. And I think the visuals of Mr Vengeance are just cool at times.

    So...

    JamesKeenan on
  • JamesKeenanJamesKeenan Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Also, I think Sympathy for Mr Vengeance should have ended just 30 seconds sooner. When
    the guys get out of the jeep, check the photo, and move forward, off-screen.

    It's obvious who they are, why they're there and what they're going to do. It's at that point I think the director showed someone being stabbed just to show them being stabbed. It wasn't necessary, because nothing worthwhile happened after it or because of it.


    But that's just me.

    JamesKeenan on
  • WashWash Sweet Christmas Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance was my favourite of the Vengeance Trilogy, really glad someone put this on the list. The one thing it has above the other two movies, which are both excellent in their own right, is that there is nothing distracting you from the horror of everything falling apart.

    Oldboy is a movie about revenge - Lady Vengeance, even more so - but the first is almost equal measure a mystery, the second more about redemption in the end. Mr. Vengeance is just pure, horrifying pain, the worse for the fact that, unlike the other two films, Mr. Vengeance has a lot more love. Love is what motivates each character, whereas rage and injustice power the other 2/3's of the trilogy.

    Scenes like
    The one where the crackhead won't let him bury his sister, where a father watches his daughter's autopsy, where a man holds the hand of his dead lover in an elevator

    In a lot of ways, yes, Mr. Vengeance is the weakest of the trilogy, it's certainly not as visually memorable as Lady Vengeance and it's not as thrilling or action-packed as Oldboy, but of the three it can hardly be argued it has the most heart. Which is exactly why it's the hardest to watch.

    Wash on
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  • GoumindongGoumindong Registered User regular
    edited November 2010

    I think I will agree that Oldboy was more entertaining.

    That was a typo. I wrote "Sympathy for Ms Vengeance" and I meant "Sympathy for Lady Vengeance". This is probably confusing because the U.S./UK Screening was just called "Lady Vengeance".

    My mistake. I think Oldboy is the easiest to get into for most people. But Mr Vengeance is imo, easily the best film of the three. Lady Vengeance just didn't do it for me. It felt weak and showy and pointless.

    Goumindong on
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  • RyadicRyadic Registered User regular
    edited December 2010
    I'm really skeptical to watch this movie. Oldboy spoilers to follow.

    I am back and forth on Oldboy. There are things I love and things I hate. Oldboy does some things in film that few movies care to even consider and that's the way it displays images on the screen, such as JamesKeenan mentioned about Mr. Vengeance. The part where they're fighting and it is like a sidescrolling video game? That was intentional and one of my favorite parts of the movie. It's just so... I can't describe it in words.
    But for me movies are all about the storyline and plot. Character development is very important to me. Pulp Fiction is my favorite movie and it does everything I enjoy in a movie right. Great characters that are heavily developed. Wonderful dialog that draws you in and makes you forget that this is a movie. Looks more like a slice of life, if you will. The casual dialog seems so natural and never out of place. The witty banter back and forth between characters and their, sometimes, corny jokes just seem so right.

    Oldboy does a lot of this, but when it comes down to it, the ending ruined the whole experience for me. I hated the big reveal. So, the main character fell in love and slept with his daughter and it was all just a big revenge plot of a guy who got caught doing his sister? His sister committed suicide and he blames the main character for it all? It really left a bad taste in my mouth. I did not care for it at all. Then the part where the main character cuts his tongue out? It really didn't seem to fit. Did not seem natural at all. That may be a cultural thing, though. Maybe there's some significance there for Koreans that a Western audience just wouldn't get, but I didn't like it.

    I did know that it was a 3-part trilogy. I think I will end up watching this, though. I'll just have to find the time.

    But someone tell me that this movie doesn't contain the same thing I hate about Oldboy, that way I will be more willing to watch it.

    Ryadic on
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  • WashWash Sweet Christmas Registered User regular
    edited December 2010
    The deal with Oldboy's ending is
    the main character doesn't get his revenge, or even a satisfying answer for why he was imprisoned. Ultimately his entire quest is for naught, and is shown as folly. It's supposed to leave a bad taste in your mouth in that his awesome journey ends with him being utterly defeated by the antagonist. Then the antagonist in turn is defeated by his own need for revenge, it having consumed his life to the point that it's his only purpose and once accomplished his life is meaningless.

    The first two films in the Vengeance trilogy aren't out to make revenge a heroic or just course of action, they make an exhibition out of how self-destructive and twisted revenge is. That the antagonist was delusional, and his reason for punishing the protagonist wasn't exactly the main character's fault, shows just how stupid revenge is. Because at the end of the day no answer will satisfy you, no amount of punishment your oppressor undergoes will be suitable enough.

    As far as the tongue thing goes, it's cultural, mutilation as a means of making up for dishonour.

    Wash on
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  • GimGim a tall glass of water Registered User regular
    edited December 2010
    I always get this and "Vengeance Is Mine" confused.

    I need to see both again. It's been too long.

    Gim on
  • ThomamelasThomamelas Only one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me! Registered User regular
    edited December 2010
    I tried to watch it but the streaming version on Netflix lacks subtitles or dubbing. So I couldn't. I've added it to my disk queue to watch it later.

    Thomamelas on
  • DrezDrez Registered User regular
    edited December 2010
    show_me_love.jpg

    I know what you're thinking. You're thinking "Drez chose to review a movie about underage lesbians? I'm shocked." Well, folks, put your melodramatically-italicized, sarcastic, internal monologues away, because this movie is unlike any other movie about lesbians you've ever seen.

    But let me be honest. If I had a choice, this is not the movie I would have reviewed. That is not to say this isn't an excellent film worthy of praise; it is. This is the feature-length directorial debut of Swedish director Lukas Moodysson. His third film - Lilja 4-Ever - is a better film. In fact, it is perhaps my favorite film. However, it is not available via Netflix Instant Watch, and is altogether difficult to find in North America.

    As such, I have a dual purpose here. My primary goal is to present what I consider a wonderful film in its own right. My secondary purpose is to introduce a wonderful director and hopefully inspire people to track down his aforementioned third film.

    So, with no more disclaimers, I present to you Show Me Love (originally titled Fucking Åmål, but changed when it started percolating as a possible Academy Award pick). I will refer to it henceforth as Show Me Love, as that is the most popular name for the film, and was chosen by Moodysson himself when pressed for the alternate, euphemized title.

    Show Me Love movie centers primarily around two teenage girls - Agnes and Elin - living and going to school in the small Swedish town of Åmål. The original title is lifted directly from dialogue in the film, when one of the girls expresses her angst at how small Åmål is and little there is to do there.

    Oh, and Agnes - a girl and an outcast - has a crush on Elin, who is a very popular girl in their school. Also, Agnes is not the only one that has a crush on Elin. And she has a sister she only vaguely gets along with. And so on and so forth.

    We've all been through high school in some form. I'm sure many of us have had crushes, and I'm sure many of us were lonely and unpopular, or at least felt that way at the time. I'm sure some of us may have even lived in a small town that we wanted to break free from. That is nothing new to any of us. That's nothing new to film either.

    But the performances offered in this film make the texture of the film so much more vivid than any other teen or relationship drama. This is not a Molly Ringwald film. I cannot overstate how excellent the acting is, in this and every Moodysson film I've seen (including the second film, though I found it ultimately boring despite appreciating it for its artistic quality). Nothing feels forced. Everything feels natural. At some point, you nearly forget you are watching a film. This is Lukas Moodysson's gift. He can turn film into life. Or life into film. I'm not sure which direction he works in.

    I could sit here and wax eloquent for hours citing specifics as to why I love this film. The film is equally heartwrenching and uplifting at different times simply because that's how teenage life can be. I've never seen the concept of unrequited teen "love" handled so realistically by not only the director but the actors as well. Agnes in particular is excellent. It's hard to put it into words. You may ask: "Well why should I even give a shit about a realistic depiction of the emotional pitfalls of teen romance?" and I don't really know how to answer that question. All I can say is: watch this film. If you don't like it, c'est la vie. But I think you will.

    If you don't like this, you probably won't like his other films, which are darker and somewhat more adult (for instance Lilja 4-ever is a very realistic and upsetting exploration of the sex trafficking trade that goes on in Europe and Russia). But I highly recommend it if you can get your hands on it, especially if you liked Show Me Love. Totally different film, but the same texture with the same excellent acting.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhWEI6-_w9E

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  • ThomamelasThomamelas Only one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me! Registered User regular
    edited December 2010
    For now, the Film Society will be going on hiatus till after the holidays. If there is interest, we'll pick up then.

    Thomamelas on
  • ThomamelasThomamelas Only one man can kill this many Russians. Bring his guitar to me! Registered User regular
    edited January 2011
    Our hiatus is over. Fluffy has taken up the task of Week 11.

    Thomamelas on
  • WashWash Sweet Christmas Registered User regular
    edited January 2011
    Brick
    JGL-Brick.gif

    Brick is Rian Johnson's first film. He filmed a good chunk of it at his old highschool. That information's not important when you're watching the movie, but it says something about the man who made it.

    The movie opens with Brendan (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) crouched over the dead body of a girl with a blue bracelet. Soon we find out her name is Emily, and she is his ex-girlfriend and the person he loves. We don't know who killed her. Brendan needs to find out.

    The plot isn't original, it's your classic whodunit murder mystery, glued together with all the best noir tropes. You've got your stoic, morally questionable "detective" Brendan, his man behind the scenes and nerdy sidekick, affectionately called Brain (Matt O'Leary), the femme fatale Laura (Nora Zehetner), the dame who set the whole thing into motion, Emily, (Emilie de Ravin), and a mysterious crime boss, the Pin (Lukas Haas). Brendan needs to know who killed Emily, and he's willing to dive deep into the shady criminal element at his highschool to find out.

    You'd be surprised at what a detective story can become in a different setting.

    It's a little amazing how well old noir tropes lend themselves to a highschool setting. Highschool has always been a test-run for the real world, a tiny cloistered society within a society. You've still got your social elite, your intellectuals, and your criminals. They're all still there, just a lot younger, and a lot out of their depth.

    So yeah, it's an old formula. Still, you can't claim this film ain't fresh.

    The score, composed by Rian Johnson's brother, is gentle, sad and sweet. The characters, too, are fragile. One thing that sets this aside from other detective stories and neo-noir flicks is that most protagonists are, well, older. Jaded middle-aged detectives who drink too much and have already seen it all are common-place; it's different when you're dealing with people who are, comparatively, innocent. This is a detective story but it's also a story about a kid looking for whoever's responsible for the death of his love. When your jaded old detective takes a beating, or provokes murderers and scoundrels, you expect he has some experience with this, he's been around.

    Brendan, our protagonist, is in highschool, and when you watch him slowly, over the course of the film, breakdown physically and emotionally on his quest for justice while dealing with things way above his maturity level, it's heartbreaking. Levitt does a great job.

    It's meaningful in a way that Rian Johnson filmed his first movie at his old highschool. He chose a place symbolic of his childhood for his ascension from aspiring filmmaker to filmmaker proper. Brick was his graduation. I think that's pretty cool.
    brick_movie.jpg

    Wash on
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  • VariableVariable Mouth Congress Stroke Me Lady FameRegistered User regular
    edited January 2011
    nice write up fluffy

    great excuse to watch this one again. so good.

    Variable on
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  • TomantaTomanta Registered User regular
    edited January 2011
    Brick is awesome, and the prime reason I think of Joseph Gordon-Levitt as an amazing actor instead of that kid from 3rd Rock from the Sun. I mean, sure, he's been in great stuff since then, but I saw Brick was first.

    Tomanta on
  • theconductor221theconductor221 Registered User regular
    edited January 2011
    Just found this thread, but Brick is quite honestly a film that despite its problems, I constantly cite just as something overall that was fantastic.

    theconductor221 on
  • InkSplatInkSplat 100%ed Bad Rats. Registered User regular
    edited January 2011
    I just need to rage real quick that One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest is expiring from Netflix Instant. Why would they do such a thing!?

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