Movie opinions thread (what have you seen, what did you think?)

basic

back to basics
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Dune: Part Two- I dunno, on one hand I'm glad dense sci-fi like this is even getting such well done adaptions and seems to do fairly well with general audiences and fans alike. On the other I couldn't really care less. I find both movies to be very disconnected feeling and unengaging. There are engaging scenes but as a whole they just leave me feeling kind of indifferent.

They are visually exceptional though, incredible art direction, shot composition etc, but that's about all I really enjoy.

I also thought the music in this one was especially terrible. Just felt like it was trying to be epic instead of assisting with the already epic visuals. And for the love of god can they stop with the wailing female vocals in everything. It's played out and it was never pleasant to listen to in the first place.
based
 

terry.330

Classic. Haven't Played It Yet.
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I watched the Baz Luhrman Elvis and thought Butler was magnificent in the role of Presley.
I think the only things I'd seen him in were some shitty WB level show and Once Upon A Time In Hollywood. I heard he was good in Elvis but Baz Luhrman is just too much for me. That drag queen show on a coke bender fever dream pacing, editing and visual tornado style he has does not work for me. The Great Gatsby was the straw that broke the camel's back for me.

He's a really interesting guy though. I've seen interviews with him and he's extremely intelligent, knowledgable and has real vision, it's just not a vision I enjoy.
 

HornheaDD

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The Fall Guy - Low stakes, meta-heavy action comedy loosely based on the early 80s TV show. Ryan Gosling is an affable if improbably handsome stuntman who's dating an up-and-coming production assistant (Emily Blunt) when he gets severely injured during a stunt. He spends 18 months recovering and feeling sorry for himself and drives away his lady friend. He finally gets back in the saddle when a producer calls because his now director ex is in trouble: the leading man on her first big break has disappeared and they need a replacement stuntman. Will they/won't they romantic subplots ensue and Gosling gets beat to shit while trying to solve the mystery.

The movie has token nods to the show (character names, the original theme song plays in the credits, Lee Majors and a rough looking Heather Thomas show up in an after-credits scene, a hint of the premise) but it's mostly just a love letter to the hard-working stuntman. Several real stuntmen have minor roles in the movie, a lot of screen time is dedicated to talking about the art of filmmaking and stuntwork and it's incredibly clear that the director (himself a stuntman before becoming an action movie director) has a genuine love for the craft. It has a very Indiana Jones quality to it (likable hero who is CONSTANTLY in way over his head and gets the crap kicked out of him a lot) and Ryan Gosling is suitably charming and has chemistry with Emily Blunt. Both of them are entirely too attractive for their roles (no stuntman on earth looks like Ryan Gosling) but it's not as distracting as I thought it could be.

There's a few fun extended action sequences, they go out of their way to use every trick in the stuntman/filmmaking 101 playbook and it has a solid 80s soundtrack. Chekov's guns out the ass too. Pretty good as popcorn movies go but I will say the tone is kind of all over the place and the movie can be a little overly goofy and meta. It's not a dealbreaker (more of a nitpick) and probably not that surprising from a guy who made a Deadpool movie but it definitely made the movie feel like it was being pulled in too many directions.

Been meaning to watch this one. For the longest time I just didn't like Ryan Gosling. He has a severely punchable douchey face (hear me out) and I just didnt like him. He admittedly made me chuckle lightly on some of his SNL appearances but I mean.. its SNL. Not exactly heady comedy.

Then I watched The Good Guys. He was a complete idiot in that movie and he cracked me up. So I'm a fan now. Plus he did that whole bit on SNL recently where he showed up as Beavis. It was incredibly stupid, but had a bit of charm if you were a teen in the 90s and enjoyed B&B.
 

Average Joe

Calmer than you are.
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Love Lies Bleeding

I wasn't sure where this was going a half hour in since it was... and I can't believe I'm about to say this... a bit too heavy on the hot lesbian sex scenes. Thankfully, this got progressively more intense and bonkers as it went along.

I really dug Saint Maude so I thought I knew what to expect, but there was a lot in this that threw me for a loop. I was genuinely shocked by the few bits of body-horror in here; it isn't a body-horror film, but they treat those scenes as visual metaphors and internalizations to great effect. A lot of really great shots and visual effects that emphasize moments of heightened emotions: pulsating objects; thumping sounds; ethereal/trippy hallucinations are all used very effectively to make you feel tense/anxious.

Also quite notable for some great performances. I know lots of people hate on Kristen Stewart, but I dig her and she was great here. Katy O'Brian, who (whom?) I've never actually seen in anything was also great as the initially misunderstood outcast quickly turned roid-raging lunatic. I wish we got to see more of the girl who played Daisy as she was also great and played the naive/ditzy girl with a cunning/manipulative side really well.

Oh, and Ed Harris ate a bug.
 
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Taiso

Outside of Causality
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The Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes

Saw it on opening weekend with my roommate.

I don't really have a lot to say about it. It was engaging enough but a bit long at 2.5 hours. I was intrigued by the idea that there are still intelligent humans living in the world and protecting themselves from the virus that wiped out their (mostly) species wide capacity for reason.

A lot of the themes are revisitations of things we've already seen before in this franchise: the division in ideologies between different apes, oppression of others based on ignorance or falsely drawn conclusions and the ever looming threat of global devastation if the apes ever get their hands on the weapons the human race left behind.

It was fine but other than adding a few minor wrinkles to the lore of the series, it just felt like an adventure film with some Star Trek: TOS era social and political messaging.

I felt like there were a ton of easter eggs in this movie that escaped my notice. And vistas of real world places that I was supposed to recognize but didn't.

3.5 out of 5
 

terry.330

Classic. Haven't Played It Yet.
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Alligator- The old urban legend about the baby alligator getting flushed down the toilet and growing into a giant monster in the sewers. Perfect fodder for a cheesy Jaws rip off. In fact you know those scenes in Jaws with all the yokels going after the shark like morons or any of the scenes on the beach with all ugly ass people everywhere? Well this is a whole movie of that. Thankfully there's a fair amount of self awareness to it all and while it never goes into complete comedy territory like Lake Placid, it's just kind of stupidly enjoyable. About on the same level as Piranha. There's some fun gore, animatronics and miniatures and most of the cast seem to be aware of what kind of movie they're in. Dumb fun.
 
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100proof

Insert Something Clever Here
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That’s funny I watched True Grit just this past Saturday. Really enjoyed it. Hadn’t seen it since I saw it in the theater. Did that girl ever do anything else?

The short answer is yes. Quite a bit.
 

Lagduf

2>X
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The short answer is yes. Quite a bit.

Looked her up, and yeah lol she’s been pretty successful and im embarassed to say I’ve seen her in a number of things she’s been in or done voice work in and didn’t realize it.
 

lithy

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The wideset eyes about to fall off the side of her face is a thing that one young 'it' actress always seems to have, then they get a bit older and some new young alien eyed girl comes along.

Emma Stone
Amanda Seyfried
Anya Taylor-Joy

Those are the ones that come to mind.
 

fake

Ned's Ninja Academy Dropout
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Late Night with the Devil
Pretty great horror comedy set in the '70s on a late night talk show set. It plays out pretty much how you'd expect, but it's still really enjoyable. David Dastmalchian does a great job; this is the first lead I've seen him play. It borrows a lot from other cult classics like Ghostwatch as well as the obvious stuff like The Exorcist, and has plenty of overt references to stuff like Bohemian Grove, Gnosticism, Anton Lavey, etc.

Ghostwatch
Felt like making it a double feature after watching Late Night... If you haven't seen it, it's a BBC special from '92. It was a paranormal spinoff of their Crimewatch show, using the same format, hosts, etc. It was a proto-Blair Witch undisclosed found footage show, and people lost their minds. The ways they fuck with the audience are pretty genius.
 

HornheaDD

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Godzilla X Kong

What. Was that. It felt like a shitty ABC saturday night tv movie. It wasn't even worth the download.

Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. And I liked the first and second Godzilla movies. They were at least kinda serious, for what they were. This one was just like... "lets make a really shitty attempt at the spectacle of The Avengers, but just two monsters who don't talk. Oh and lets give the monkey a power glove."
 

Average Joe

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Godzilla X Kong

What. Was that. It felt like a shitty ABC saturday night tv movie. It wasn't even worth the download.

Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. And I liked the first and second Godzilla movies. They were at least kinda serious, for what they were. This one was just like... "lets make a really shitty attempt at the spectacle of The Avengers, but just two monsters who don't talk. Oh and lets give the monkey a power glove."

IMG_5729.gif
 

famicommander

Tak enabled this rank change
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Furiosa is apparently bombing hard. Worst Memorial Day opening since the early to mid 1980s, and that's not accounting for inflation.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes looks like it's going to do just well enough. Mostly held up compared to the last trilogy in the US, Europe, and the rest of the world but completely collapsed in China. Might have to cut the budget but we'll probably see a sequel.
 
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