Random Movie Thoughts Thread

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

We're in the obligatory attempt to revive monster movies while super heroes fall out of fashion. Buckle up for a lot of Classic Monsters re-envisioned.

If we have another mummy, can we do without that stupid double-pupil thing? I feel like you shouldn't just be allowed to add random attributes to your monsters and then display it all over the advertising.

I think the classic monsters are also all cheaper since they are all public domain.

 

[The Cat]

If we have another mummy, can we do without that stupid double-pupil thing? I feel like you shouldn't just be allowed to add random attributes to your monsters and then display it all over the advertising.

I think the classic monsters are also all cheaper since they are all public domain.

I want a good Creature from the black lagoon movie

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

I want a good Creature from the black lagoon movie

Shape of Water

 

[Totenkindly]

Shape of Water

[in a hick voice] Those iguana people be stealing our women!

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

On a whim, I played For Your Eyes Only with the Roger Moore commentary track. What a hoot. He’s candid and hilarious. The old British uncle I never had

 

[Totenkindly]

I started my Peacock streaming binge.

First film down: Knock at the Cabin (2022)

I have decided that M. Night Shyamalan is the Benjamin Button of film directors. He started his career at the peak of his abilities and then slowly has rolled backwards in skill and vision and appears to be heading straight back to infancy. The allusion doesn't quite hold up (though close enough to mention), as his career is kind of leveled out as B films that really don't show any promise or future in his skills ever increasing.

This film is based on a book that I think won a Bram Stoker award -- and now I'd really like to read the book, because it must be a much better treatise on the topic. I spent the first thirty minutes of this film laughing at just about everything. I just found it all very silly. The girl is no Haley Joel Osmont, she has no subtlety, and seemed more cast because of her cuteness. I think the peak quality of the film occurs when it becomes evident that the invaders are actually very sincere and believe what they are saying -- and the threat they pose isn't actually what you might expect. (They are more dangerous to each other than to our protagonists.) But this is a very problem -- because the tension actually dissipates. Shyamalan just isn't able to pull off the shifting of the source of threat convincingly for much of the film, so then it just feels like a silly exercise in manufactured fear.

Shyamalan also doesn't really pull off why one of the characters changes their mind or what is so convincing to him. We're told, not really shown. In fact, that's a big flaw in the film; it just never quite feels personal or resonant, it never really affects the audience. Even with the big traumatic moments at the end, I felt almost numb watching it. The story was not really being told or evoked, it was just unfolding randomly.

The end feels like a cheap sentimental ploy. i can tell what he was going for, but... there was no inherent emotion or power in it. No real chemistry either, honestly. The most emotive moments ironically came from the invaders -- they each at moments pull off some real emotion (fear, sorrow, anxiety) and it's the only real emotion in the film.

This isn't a fault of the actors. It's a bit of a casting issue, and it's also the semi-bad script (apparently it was a Black List script developed by the book's author, but Shyamalan rewrote it when he took over the picture -- asshat) along with just not REALLY making the characters come to life that is the problem. Stupid plot points meant to increase tension but just seeming unrealistic. Sometimes it's really hard to believe this is the same guy that wrote and directed The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, and Signs.

The attempts to convey world disaster also did not work or do much, aside from maybe the planes. It all felt underwhelming and non-global.

Specific parts of the film are spoilered here:

Great conceit to have the invaders actually believe they truly are here to save the world -- and they prove it by, instead of threatening the Chosen Family, they kill each other one by one, bringing a new plague each time, to encourage the Chosen to make a decision on who to sacrifice. The main problem with this is that all you have to do is wait it out and all the invaders will soon be dead. Why feel threatened? The issue is more about whether they are correct or not -- THAT is the threat.

Which Shyamalan does a bad job at proving. The first plague is the tsunami -- but his primary scene here is a flood at ... Haystack Rock in Oregon. Like WTF? If you've been there, there is nothing there. It's pretty rural. I was surprised to see that many people at that beach, and the weather there can get cold based on location. Why not show Seattle getting wiped out? Or an actual city? Sorry, I'm not feeling like "Armageddon" watching a wave roll over Haystack Rock!

The plagues are just news reports about "the flu". You want to scare me, show me shots of people actually rotting away on camera in live time. Again, uncompelling.

The planes are actually more compelling, when you watch some fall out of the sky during news reports. Yeah, that was good. Except a dumbass comment bout how many "up to 700 planes have inexplicably crashed" -- but worldwide there are probably 8200 planes or more in the sky daily. 10% is a hell of a lot of accidents without cause, but 90% of the planes in the world were untouched. Again, not very compelling... and all that was needed was actually looking up the total of planes around.

Finally the lightning strikes seemed more convincing. So then one of them decides to die to save the world, but there's not really any emotion in the scene. It feels stale, predictable, and uncompelling. We barely know anything about these people. The only stuff we've seen are recycled shallow bits about "life as a gay couple." It all felt so stereotypical and dumb. One of them is dead now? Who cares? This should have been moving but it just wasn't.

The emotions shown by the invaders were actually far more real (Grint was great) than the main characters. [/sopiler]

After this watch, I'm glad I didn't pay good money for a theater watch.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

I started my Peacock streaming binge.

First film down: Knock at the Cabin (2022)

I have decided that M. Night Shyamalan is the Benjamin Button of film directors. He started his career at the peak of his abilities and then slowly has rolled backwards in skill and vision and appears to be heading straight back to infancy. The allusion doesn't quite hold up (though close enough to mention), as his career is kind of leveled out as B films that really don't show any promise or future in his skills ever increasing.

I used to really root for M. Night and at times defend his films from critics, in large part because of the fact that he would always include the greater Philadelphia area as a setting. But I think I first started seeing some cracks with the Village. I remember I predicted the twist from the opening scene, and I would have been more intrigued by the movie if there actually were monsters in some 19th century Pennsylvania village, then by what we got.

I remember defending Lady In the Water to someone at some point ( I haven't seen it since so it's entirely possible I'll change my mind). But The Happening was just... bad. And I could tell from the trailers that it was bad because it just looked dumb. I guess I was supposed to find people leaping out of buildings and falling from the sky en masse chilling, but I just found comical.

I also really don't think the environmental movement needs Hollywood directors to make bad "allegories" or "cautionary tales" like this. Maybe they should push for a law against it.

 

[Totenkindly]

I really would love for him to succeed again. I'm just feeling a bit frustrated with him. I watched a bit of The Sixth Sense again today and it was just constructed so carefully and without the pretensions of his later career.

In his favor, he IS in a brief cameo -- but only as a character on a TV in the background of a scene, so not really that invasive as normal.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

I really would love for him to succeed again. I'm just feeling a bit frustrated with him. I watched a bit of The Sixth Sense again today and it was just constructed so carefully and without the pretensions of his later career.

In his favor, he IS in a brief cameo -- but only as a character on a TV in the background of a scene, so not really that invasive as normal.

I think even at the time I would have conceded it was a bit invasive in Lady in the Water.

 

[Totenkindly]

I'm supposed to see Beau is Afraid tomorrow afternoon. Then I guess I have to decide whether M3GAN, Cocaine Bear, or Puss in Boots comes next.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

I'm supposed to see Beau is Afraid tomorrow afternoon. Then I guess I have to decide whether M3GAN, Cocaine Bear, or Puss in Boots comes next.

I'd go with M3GAN just to see what the fuss is about. I've been bombarded with ads for that on social media.

Cocaine Bear sounds too much like a movie made around an internet meme that doesn't end up being that good. Ironically, I really liked Safety Not Guaranteed a lot, despite my skepticism. So maybe you should do Cocaine Bear.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

On a whim, I played For Your Eyes Only with the Roger Moore commentary track. What a hoot. He’s candid and hilarious. The old British uncle I never had

I watched a few more with his commentary. This guy apparently had a hard-on for Cubby Broccoli. Interesting because I know Connery and Lazenby did not have the best experience with Cubby. Interesting hearing his thoughts on Walken and Christopher Lee. Lee was a gigachad badass with a sense of humor. He described working with Walken like playing tennis with a pro, and said it made him feel pushed to be a better actor. Moore is (was) very self deprecating about his abilities. He mostly has nice things to say about others while downplaying his own performances. Not my favorite Bond but I always have a soft spot for his movies because I was introduced to his and Dalton’s movies first. I enjoy conversational, loose commentaries like that. Makes me feel like I’m hanging out with the people commenting on the film.

 

[The Cat]

It bloooows for me because I’m a horror person. I didn’t mind a million superhero movies. That said, Dracula has been done so much and in so many ways, that it’s obligatory at this point. I love original horror and don’t mind companies like Blumhouse flooding the market. It’s still a cheap genre to produce, I just kinda get irritated how a lot of horror now is produced with a Big Budget PG-13 sheen and I don’t want to see it become a sterile genre like it did for a while starting in the late 80s. We don’t need a lot of overly formulaic remakes. But that’s exactly what we’re going to get. These people just milk everything to death now

Expect more forgettable remakes. I’m betting we’ll see a Thing reboot, Monster Squad, lots of 80s and 90s favorites “reimagined”

I said "Monster movies" not horror. Monster Movies have REALLY Leaned into what you suggest since the 90's have been more about blockbuster pg13 summer movies. (Jurrassic Park and ID4 really cemented this.) Vampires and ghosts tend to be the ones that get the r ratings. Mimic is really one of the only r rated monster movies i can recall from the time period. There was Carnasaur when JP came out, but JP stomped into the ground. Don't get me wrong, I think more r rated monster movies would be good, but they tend to be billed for specatacle and making money which means we take our almost f word and scantily clad but never topless obligatory bare backed actress scene and watch the single geeky character either die hard or discover they were just a traditionally masculine action star this whole time behind their glasses they miraculously don't seem to need 45 minutes after loosing them. Really depends on how they pull of their hawaiian shirt. I was thinking for a while horror was going to see a resurgence in the mid early aights, but it was just jump scares and torture porn. Which doesnt really do it for me. No give me cosmic horror, taboo, psychological tension and madness, give me the unexplained then don't explain it. tbh I've found a lot of good horror on youtube, and analogue horror. Tbh Im really enjoying the Backrooms and SCPs as a horror concept. There's also some decent horror in the indie game market. And european horror is just beautiful. Everytime sad people go for a hike into a dark forest trying to take a shortcut. I feel more and more alive as I sing to the screen... Do not go in there...don't do it man, you're not ready for the dark woods, you're still haunted by your past. The Joten will mark you. Also if there is a Lodge of any color or a shining tetrahedron or a cursed book and really horny vines. I'm in. Except for gore. I don't like gore. I know too much about real gore so it makes me sad or mad over scared.

 

[Totenkindly]

I ended up watching Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, since I wanted something lighter. Definitely had sequences that were inspired by Spiderman: Into the Spider-verse.

It's got the same feel as the original, but a bit deeper and more thoughtful -- with Puss being older and losing the illusion of youthful invulnerability. It's still really funny but manages to have depth, and it helps that Banderas himself is aging (and Hayek). Some really decent voice performances.

Some of the best casting was having Ray Winstone and Olivia Colman as Papa and Mama Bear, and they all have this crazy Cockney thug accent. it's pretty hilarious, I'm glad I could still understand what they were typically saying. Florence Pugh I think is also using some version of her regular accent here, so it's a nice wake-up call to American audiences who might not realize her national origins (as her learned American accent is quite decent).

Really a nice little film, with some depth about how fear of death inhibits life and also about how what we value changes as we get older.

I can't say I'm a big John Mulaney fan, but he was kind of amusing in this film as one of the Big Bads.

Harvey Guillen is also really great as the emotional support anchor of the film.

I can't say I haven't seen all of these conceits before elsewhere, but the film wields them to high effect.

 

[Totenkindly]

EDIT: Beau is Afraid (2023)

This was quite an experience. For accessibility for a modern wide-scale release, I would put it on a level with Aronofsky's "mother!" -- with the major difference being that I felt like the craziest shit in Aronofsky's film was reserved for the third act, which totally just spirals off the rails and hits unforeseen levels of bombast, whereas Aster's "Beau is Afraid" has steady blips of craziness throughout and while it ends in a totally unexpected way, didn't really build like "mother!" does to a shattering conclusion but just kind of peters out so that you're not even sure it's the end of the film right away.

ANother film it reminds me of is Charlie Kauffman's "Synecdoche, New York" -- but that film ended in a way that tore me apart emotionally in a generally good way, while BiA just kind of left me in cerebral mode trying to determine what I had actually just seen and not really liking any of the characters.

--

Let me also describe the audience: There were about 12 people in the Regal theater I attended, which is about twice as many as I expected to see. The audience also laughed throughout the film -- a little weak at first (who wants to be the first one to laugh at something that is serious but just nutty?) and then confidently as we all realized we were finding all these funny moments together in the film. Like, there's just a lot of crazy shit that you are either horrified by or need to laugh at -- it's all either "weird" funny or "dark" funny, and "holy shit!" funny.

The funniest moment (it got the biggest laugh) is a shocker that occurs after Beau finally gets to his mom's house and meets up with someone (not his mom) there. It's the funniest bit because it's so horrific and unexpected, I don't think anyone saw it coming -- so it caught everyone off-guard but pretty much encapsulates the spirit of the whole damn film in a nutshell.

The problem is that there is no real catharsis in this story to leave it feeling rewarding, and everyone ended up leaving the film in silence (about 2/3 left when the credits started rolling, a few of us stuck it out until the end). I think the general feeling was dissatisfaction overall.

--

The acting in this film is fine (actually really good much of the time).

The absurd elements are just wild. Like, so much crazy shit going on -- and I think if one is to watch a second time, they'd have more time to read the signage and graffiti for more laughs, as well as watch the background of scenes to reveal details and behavior that was overlooked on first pass.

Aster is a great filmmaker regardless, the way he puts things together and directs his cast. However, in this case, it's more down to "what was the point?" it feels mostly like he's airing out his own baggage, and is easily the most self-indulgent of his pictures, I didn't feel like it was in service to a story because there wasn't really much story here per se, just more like a character unraveling without any real answers.

----

This is a decent explanation of the film (spoilers!!):

Let’s Talk About the Ending of Beau Is Afraid

It would be tempting to say that Beau Is Afraid is the story of Beau’s journey back home, but really, there isn’t much of a journey.

www.vulture.com

this is likely true:

Why the New Studio Math — and the New Indie Cred — Won’t Let ‘Beau Is Afraid’ Be a Bomb

Even if Ari Aster's three-hour head trip starring Joaquin Phoenix tanks at the box office, that will be a signifier of its status.

www.google.com

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

I'll add more later about Beau is Afraid.


This is a decent explanation of the film (spoilers!!):

Let’s Talk About the Ending of Beau Is Afraid

It would be tempting to say that Beau Is Afraid is the story of Beau’s journey back home, but really, there isn’t much of a journey.

www.vulture.com

this is likely true:

Why the New Studio Math — and the New Indie Cred — Won’t Let ‘Beau Is Afraid’ Be a Bomb

Even if Ari Aster's three-hour head trip starring Joaquin Phoenix tanks at the box office, that will be a signifier of its status.

www.google.com

Did you enjoy it?

 

[Totenkindly]

Did you enjoy it?

Not as much as I hoped.

I don't begrudge Aster making it (some people seem to be personally outraged, as if he is required to provide audiences with films they love -- buncha pissy consumer types), as he's a director who goes off the beaten path and looks at the world in unconventional ways, so this is rather required occasionally.

However, if his following films are more like this and less like his first two, I will be disappointed and won't emotionally connect as much with them. In this film, I kinda actually "get" Beau -- but I find I like him less and less as the film progresses, rather than empathizing as much.

My specific thoughts (spoilers):

Beau is basically the ultimate in passive and his mom is the ultimate in passive-aggressive when she's not just being aggressive. She's domineering and controlling; Beau is weak and ineffectual, and when the chips are down, he typically tries to hide/ignore the situation or lets others control his destiny. It's kind of sad.

My parents were not the same as Beau's -- he had a missing father and a controlling terrifying mother that he both loved and was frightened of, wanting things from her while despising himself for taking them, yet not having the strength to just grow up independent especially as an adult. He never really stood up to his mom. I had an overbearing but disconnected father, and a doting mother who I ended up just avoiding.... so I get the avoidance thing, because I felt too weak to stand up against my father's insensitive running me over if we engaged and my mom's hypersensitivity if I did anything that hurt her feelings.

But as an adult, you eventually have to get to a point where you figure out who you are, then you live according to who you are and what you believe, and if other people have responses of displeasure with that, you have to be firm, compassionate, but strong enough to keep doing your thing. This is the differentiation of autonomy and becoming an independent strong human being whatever your gender. It's hard to stand up against parents who you are feeling you are displeasing by not doing/being what they want, but it is essential.

Beau never does that. He has trouble standing up against anyone. He has a fantasy in the middle of being the lone hero journey guy who through many travails earns the respect of his own children, but it's just a fantasy. And when things between he and his mom finally come to a head in the final act, he finally flips out and chokes her violently... then immediately lets go and grovels to try to earn her love back. [I'll be honest, I was actually whispering, "Just shove her down the steps, you idiot" -- I wanted to see him rise up against her, because she was so awful.] he just can't really ever tell her to shove off and stand on his own two feet without apology. So he thinks he might be free, but his apology belies that; and the last ten miserable minutes is just him accepting he can't live under his own guilt of not being what his mom wanted and yet not being strong enough to be independent, and he gives up.

Anyway, on first watch, it feels like a well-made film by a good director that is emotionally unsatisfying.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Not as much as I hoped.

I don't begrudge Aster making it (some people seem to be personally outraged, as if he is required to provide audiences with films they love -- buncha pissy consumer types), as he's a director who goes off the beaten path and looks at the world in unconventional ways, so this is rather required occasionally.

However, if his following films are more like this and less like his first two, I will be disappointed and won't emotionally connect as much with them. In this film, I kinda actually "get" Beau -- but I find I like him less and less as the film progresses, rather than empathizing as much.

My specific thoughts (spoilers):

Beau is basically the ultimate in passive and his mom is the ultimate in passive-aggressive when she's not just being aggressive. She's domineering and controlling; Beau is weak and ineffectual, and when the chips are down, he typically tries to hide/ignore the situation or lets others control his destiny. It's kind of sad.

My parents were not the same as Beau's -- he had a missing father and a controlling terrifying mother that he both loved and was frightened of, wanting things from her while despising himself for taking them, yet not having the strength to just grow up independent especially as an adult. He never really stood up to his mom. I had an overbearing but disconnected father, and a doting mother who I ended up just avoiding.... so I get the avoidance thing, because I felt too weak to stand up against my father's insensitive running me over if we engaged and my mom's hypersensitivity if I did anything that hurt her feelings.

But as an adult, you eventually have to get to a point where you figure out who you are, then you live according to who you are and what you believe, and if other people have responses of displeasure with that, you have to be firm, compassionate, but strong enough to keep doing your thing. This is the differentiation of autonomy and becoming an independent strong human being whatever your gender. It's hard to stand up against parents who you are feeling you are displeasing by not doing/being what they want, but it is essential.

Beau never does that. He has trouble standing up against anyone. He has a fantasy in the middle of being the lone hero journey guy who through many travails earns the respect of his own children, but it's just a fantasy. And when things between he and his mom finally come to a head in the final act, he finally flips out and chokes her violently... then immediately lets go and grovels to try to earn her love back. [I'll be honest, I was actually whispering, "Just shove her down the steps, you idiot" -- I wanted to see him rise up against her, because she was so awful.] he just can't really ever tell her to shove off and stand on his own two feet without apology. So he thinks he might be free, but his apology belies that; and the last ten miserable minutes is just him accepting he can't live under his own guilt of not being what his mom wanted and yet not being strong enough to be independent, and he gives up.

Anyway, on first watch, it feels like a well-made film by a good director that is emotionally unsatisfying.

I am definitely interested in seeing this so I'm trying to avoid spoilers. It sounds weird enough that I should like it, but that doesn't guarantee anything. I've come across a few movies that I feel like I should like them, but I just don't and that fact will puzzle me. I think Pan's Labyrinth falls into this category, which is made even weirder by the fact that I love Crimson Peak and Shape of Water.

 

[The Cat]

I am definitely interested in seeing this so I'm trying to avoid spoilers. It sounds weird enough that I should like it, but that doesn't guarantee anything. I've come across a few movies that I feel like I should like them, but I just don't and that fact will puzzle me. I think Pan's Labyrinth falls into this category, which is made even weirder by the fact that I love Crimson Peak and Shape of Water.

Pan's Labyrinth is real in a different way than Crimson Peak and the Shape of Water though. Surely you've been to a similar labyrinth yourself in real life? At lest metaphorically?

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Pan's Labyrinth is real in a different way than Crimson Peak and the Shape of Water though. Surely you've been to a similar labyrinth yourself in real life? At lest metaphorically?

Sure, but the labyrinth was nothing like the one in the movie. Somebody else helped me out of it and I never got to thank them. Kind of an anticlimax in some ways though not in others. I don't think I've ever encountered advice that good before or since. I should remember it moving forward.