What Movie Have You Seen Today?

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In my desperate attempt to wring joy from contemporary blockbuster cinema I went in with great reviews-fueled hope. Really.

DUNE (Part 2)
It was supposed to be better than part 1 which I already was disappointed by. It was lauded even by Spielberg (oh, well, he knows how to hype things strategically). And the big success seemed to indicate that audiences loved this second part.

I didn´t. I was bored beyond even the boredom of the first part. And, um, the supposedly breathtaking cinematography was either orange sunsets or such a bleak grey/brown monochrome (until a big sequence was even just black and white) that I had to struggle to keep my eyes open. And also the constant expositional dialogue which went on and on and on and on, in such a glacial pace. Really, Villeneuve should never be let near a Bond film unless you want a 90-minute story be told in two three hour chapters with no sense of humor.

Everything David Lynch did with “Dune” was miles ahead of this, and in its weirdness just wonderfully bizarre and fun. What he absolutely managed to do - and Villeneuve failed horribly in - was to condense the narrative. These two parts are a bigger slog than the three Hobbits, and they were tough to stay awake in, too. Apparently, young people just wanted to see Zendaya kiss Chalamet.

And then…

The Fall Guy

I like Ryan Gosling. I like the idea of a movie about a stunt man. I like the concept of a mix between romantic comedy and an action satire. And the reviews were mostly fantastic. I really thought that the lack of box office was due to audiences not going for a Non-IP film.

Instead, this film is just a rudderless mess. The story is barely there, with the uninvolving love story pushing its way in again and again, and I just did not care, even with these performers, it was just not funny, not romantic, not in any way thrilling. And Aaron Taylor-Johnson… oh, boy, no, please, never Bond.

Also, why do they call this THE FALL GUY and the main character Colt Seavers? It has nothing in common with the show. It´s like adapting MAGNUM with a main character called Thomas Magnum but we only see him driving his Ferrari for two hours.

I have to say I am shocked that the film did even that disappointing sum of money. It shows how much marketing can actually wring out of a bad movie.

So… after that I can only suspect that I will hate FURIOSA, too.

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Thank you Stb. They are terrific.

Explains AVTAK being #21 on your list LOL. Only the Brosnan Quartet are below it.

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Exactly! The think with AVTAK is it’s parts are great but as a whole it’s lazy. Perhaps with a hungry Dalton as Bond it would have been a great Bond. Moore and MacNee bog it down. I think so anyway.
That’s it I think… It should be better than it is.
Lazy - same director sure it’ll do, terrible actor cast as Stacey, could have been a real ballsy character. Lazy comedy tropes and even lazier stunt doubling.

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I always think of Howard Hawks and RIO LOBO, and how he shoots around Wayne’s now prominent physical limitations, until he reaches a point where he blatantly shows Wayne’s double mounting a horse.

Of course, Hawks has prepared us for this moment by making a film whose subject is the aging of the Wayne body, and the necessity of relying on the help of others. So what in other hands would be lazy filmmaking becomes a profound meditation on growing old and accepting aid.

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Exactly that

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We just watched Dune on Blu-ray, mainly because we’d placed a hold on it at the library in the hope of seeing it before Dune Part 2 played at our local arts center. However, it didn’t arrive in time, so we recorded Dune Part 2 on our DVR.

I was pretty underwhelmed by Part 1. I remember reading the book eons ago and being impressed with the density of the story. As good as the cast seemed to be, this still felt like a surface cover of the written story, with little of its complexity or tension. Maybe that’s because I read the book long ago, and so I know how the story goes. But I have watched other films adapted for film and been drawn into them. I wasn’t drawn into this.

I have only watched parts of David Lynch’s Dune. I know it was almost universally panned, but I remember thinking that it wasn’t that bad, and in some ways was very good. But there was no way a 2.5-hour film was going to capture the depth of the novel, especially with all the exposition to explain things. So I think Denis Villeneuve had the right idea … yet still somehow managed to end up with the same result.

On to a very different movie:

Last night we watched Stevie Van Zandt – Disciple, which I had recorded on DVR via Crave, the service carrying HBO in Canada. It’s a wonderful overview of a brilliant and amazing musician and person. I had forgotten about him leading Sun City, and the influence that song and his other efforts had on the eventual end of apartheid in South Africa:

Now, I have to figure out when they’re going to air the documentary again, because I didn’t set my DVR to record beyond the recording window set by Crave. Watching it last night, it’s clear that the running time exceeded that window and we missed a chunk of the ending. HBO is continuing to air it, but I don’t see it listed again in my Crave schedule. Argh!

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Happens not very often but that´s exactly my opinion :grin: :grin: :grin: a perfect analyis of all three movies…and I´m pretty sure you won´t like Furiosa (I didn´t)

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I’m not a Mad Max fan, hardly remember anything about the original films and didn’t bother with the Hardy vehicle - but even on the promo shots and trailers FURIOSA just looks a bit off, doesn’t it? Not exactly cheap but artificial and like something you’d see in a game rather than a film.

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What is great about FURY ROAD is that it looks real and incredibly dangerous. The scenes I saw from FURIOSA, however, look a lot like green screen and CGI.

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Action only works for me when it’s real (EON I’m looking at you).

Here is a clip of a stunt from The Sugarland Express. I find stuff like this more thrilling than anything CGI. How did somebody not get killed!?

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If you think that´s a great stunt you should rewatch Mad Max 1 and 2. THEY should all be dead after that…

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Yes, but that stunt in SUGARLAND EXPRESS is one of those done for real which immediately lend the proceedings reality.

Sure, MAD MAX 1 & 2 and FURY ROAD have stuff in them which is unbelievably over the top dangerous. But that fits within the parameters of that kind of movie.

SUGARLAND EXPRESS is based on a real story, and this just as death defying stunt is done accordingly, not over the top.

By the way, I would love to see those realistic stunts be part of Bond films again, not the hyped up F&F fantasy blockbusters always try to top.

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Kevin Costner-Festival:

For love of the game
“Oh, no, another baseball movie with Costner!”
“Raimi goes soft with this, why the heck is he not doing a horror film?”
“The love story is so clichéd and boring.”
And so on and so on.
The reviews at that time killed this movie, and nobody wanted to revisit this one either. It´s just a silly soap opera, right?

At least that’s what I thought, too, which is why I waited so long to watch this.

And you know what? It is a really good movie.
Yes, it´s a romance, told in flashbacks during the last game of a baseball pitcher who gets told before the game that the team is sold and he will get traded if he does not retire anyway.
And everything which led to this point makes him think about the one relationship which could have given his life a better direction. Kelly Preston is wonderful as the woman we think we have seen before in other movies - until her backstory gets layer upon layer, with terrific dialogue. And Costner is again great as the guy who alienates everyone who seems to impact his life, when at the most important game of his life he finally realizes that he has made one disastrous choice which winning will not undo.

Yes, “For love of the game” is not revolutionizing the genre. But it revitalizes it with little details, witty dialogue and an involving emotional through line. And after the obligatory (but also needed) victory scene the film does not end with the typical re-appearance of the love interest. Instead, Raimi films Costner´s character alone in his hotelroom after the game, sitting down on his bed and breaking into tears. His decision to follow the love of his life and then meeting her again is pure Hollywood, of course, but earned and heartfelt.

Definitely one of the most underrated films of the late 90´s.

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Field of dreams

I haven’t seen this one since its release in 1989. Back then I thought not much of it.

It seems I had to grow into this one. Because now I was reduced to a sobbing mess at the end.

This is one of those adult dramas the studios won’t greenlight anymore. It is an unusual, naive clash of reality and fantasy, a son connecting with his dead father via a magical baseball field which will bankrupt his family, yet, as the beautiful last shot shows it will make everything turn out allright.

No scene wasted, Costner delivering drama and humour seemingly effortlessly, the magnificent James Earl Jones being perfect once again, and the cinematography gives it all such an inviting look, bolstered by James Horner‘s brilliant score, this really has become one of my favorite films ever.

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It was nice, and interesting to me, to read your thoughts on Field of Dreams.

I have always lived in the area of the U.S. this is set and grew up playing baseball with my dad as the coach, so you know it was going to work for me. So to see that the movie works as well as it does for you without (I’m assuming) having those things as a part of your life is nice…

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Indeed - I did play baseball for a short while in a course that was offered during my university years, but during the late 80‘s and early 90‘s baseball was not a popular thing here in Germany.

But the movie can be enjoyed for so much more, so it has universal appeal.

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SAF turning a double play. There is something I would gladly pay to see.

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I was a sobbing mess watching Field of Dreams on HBO way back when. Didn’t matter how many times I watched it, I bawled my eyes out every time. I’m not sure I would now, but then I haven’t watched it in ages. As I recall, it was embued with a powerful mix of sentimentality with nostalgia. My sense of those qualities has changed over time. Still, another film that impressed me this way, 84 Charing Cross Road, carries the same emotional resonance with me now.

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You wouldn’t. But I‘m flattered.

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