[Aptorian]

I liked the beard. He was rocking a similar beard in Blood Father and he looked good with it.

Like I've said elsewhere, if they made a Last of Us movie Gibson could play a great Joel.

[amphibian]

Apt, on 30 December 2016 - 12:08 PM, said:

Depends upon your moral values and your willingness to give people second chances. Do you believe that a person should be professionally blacklisted for personal issues? Should such a ban be indefinite?

Personally I think Gibson makes amazing films so I will definitely watch Hacksaw Ridge eventually.

I think Gibson is definitely an alcoholic, comes from an abusive family, and is someone who has religious based views that do not treat women well. But he's done more in Hollywood/movies to employ minority/native actors than 99% of Hollywood movie making people.

Him being better than Woody Allen or Polanski isn't the right frame of mind, even if he is. The right question is "Are you OK with watching Mel Gibson movies after knowing who he is and what he's done in his past?"

I actually am. He's heavily apologized for his breakdowns involving alcohol and a horrible relationship with an ex-wife, fixed most of his problems, and has been a better person. Apocalypto and Passion of the Christ put so much money and good things into the communities where they were made that these were really wonderful things done well (even if I object slightly to the torturing of Christ symbology). Icon Pictures also does a decent job funding artistic projects as well as okay-ish mass appeal stuff.

It's a complex question and the answer probably isn't the same for everyone.

[Morgoth]

Well, I can understand why someone with Cause's background would be uncomfortable giving Mel Gibson any money.

[worry]

Yah, the poor guy has literal sugartits. Can't even leave the house when it's raining.

[worry]

Watched Don't Think Twice. This is Mike Birbiglia's second feature, and like Sleepwalk With Me, another very low key pleasant surprise. And it pulls off the near-miracle of making you feel sympathy even for improv comics.

[Malankazooie]

Watched the The Revenant over the Christmas break. Not sure why DiCaprio won the Oscar for this, unless crawling around in the snow and making grunting sounds makes one worthy of an Oscar, sure, then I guess he is deserving. Probably more like a sympathy win for the times popular opinion felt he should have one.

Where the movie shines though, is in the breathtaking locations backdrop and cinematography. Beautiful and stunning.

[Mezla PigDog]

I watched Saving Mr Banks last night. When it was originally released I assumed it was more about Walt Disney than PJ Travers and wondered what could be interesting about it other than the Hollywood era it was set in. I faintly acknowledged that it got good reviews and that must be why I TiVo'ed it. I wanted something fluffy to watch while we polished off the Christmas booze and chocolates before todays detox started. It's a really really good film. It's not fluffy either. I cried like a mother fucker for the last 30 minutes or so.

[worry]

Watched Suicide Squad. I'm sure there's a ded-thread for it but I don't wanna dig for it this late in the game. Anyway, this movie wasn't nearly as bad as BvS, but it was still pretty weak. More of a dull mostly-charmless thud than a deep dark crater of awful. Will Smith and Jared Leto should both be put up for Razzies, though, that's for sure. Truly dire performances. Maybe Jay Hernandez as well, though it was mostly the writing there that was the problem. Who knew you could create a whole character out of Cypress Hill lyrics? Everyone else did fine -- maybe Viola Davis was better than fine, and Ike Barinholtz was typically a scene-stealer. The plot was pretty goofy too -- "they worship machines!" Perhaps someone finally slipped David Ayer a copy of OK Computer and blew his mind? Luckily this evil moon goddess's idea of an extinction machine is your typical magical cyclone of lightning and city debris, and we know superheroes find this routine work. At least the baddies weren't robots! Ultimately, while there wasn't much to like about this movie, there also wasn't a lot to hate, other than the aforementioned Leto, Deadshot, and Dildoblo. People who feel they were cheated out of more Joker scenes here, I will never understand.

All that aside, special mention should go to the music in this movie. Any script that includes 5 or 6 different musical cues in the first 10 minutes should be burned, along with its writer.

Also, not to keep complaining, but more honesty, to keep complaining, after finishing SS I cooled off with an episode of Batman TAS to get the taste out of my mouth, but it ended up being a Red Claw episode. Just my luck!

[Traveller]

I watched some of Transformers Dark of the Moon. Which helpfully names the location to which all copies should be sent.

I kind of didn't mind the first two, but the 20-30 minutes I saw of this were atrocious in so many ways.

[Macros]

Briar King, on 04 January 2017 - 12:00 AM, said:

1&2 are good movies imo. 3 is bad. 4 is horrible. 5 actually looks quite good from last trailer so hope remains.

 1h2ilh.jpg (35.16K)
Number of downloads: 0

[QuickTidal]

Watched ID4: RESURGENCE...and had not expected it to be as bad as it was.

It's pretty roundly awful. And the funny thing is that this is mostly because they were so intent on recreating the original, that they didn't realize that the stuff they think is interesting (the stuff that shone for audiences in '96...big explosions, destructo-porn ect.) is all old hat now...and then they try to shoehorn in every old character into random plot lines. It's a misha mash of like 10 plots...none of which are ever allowed to gel. You don't care about any of the characters in the slightest.

The thing is, there are elements of the move that are GREAT....but they are such a small part of the overall mess that they don't make up for it. If they'd have ignored the periphery characters from the first one (David's dad for example) and focused down on two or three of the great plot points, AND came up with a better idea that just "The aliens come again, bigger and more angry"...it could hav been good. As it stands, it's EVERYTHING that is wrong with putting no effort into a long sequel like this.

[Aptorian]

Macros, on 04 January 2017 - 03:52 PM, said:

Briar King, on 04 January 2017 - 12:00 AM, said:

1&2 are good movies imo. 3 is bad. 4 is horrible. 5 actually looks quite good from last trailer so hope remains.

 1h2ilh.jpg (35.16K)
Number of downloads: 0

[Malankazooie]

Watched The Brothers Grimsby. As a gag movie goes (one gag leading to the next gag sort of thing) it had some laughs. I suspect some will find them (the gags) too offensive, determining them to be too "sexist"/"misogynist"/"racist"/<plug in ist - ism word here>. The elephant scene was rather over the top, but it appeals to the puerile 14 year old in most of us, I think.

[Morgoth]

I couldn't watch more than 30 minutes of that movie. I strongly doubt my 14 year old self would have thought it was worth the watch either.

[worry]

Watched Disney's live-action The Jungle Book (I've been doing good with movie-watching so far this year, gotta chalk it up to finishing WoT and having that monkey off my back). I gotta say, this movie was pretty awesome start to finish. I've never read Kipling and I don't really intend to -- I dunno how much of his white-man's-burden baggage seeps into his fiction but I imagine it can't help but -- so I'm gonna attribute a lot of the good stuff to Disney, mistakenly or not. The original cartoon is SO full of personality -- THREE villains, all completely different and all completely wonderful, not to mention the Odd Couple nature of Bagheera and Baloo -- and all of that gets transferred to the live-action movie in ways that pay homage to but are anything but retreads of the originals. The only performance that's a bit jarring at first is Bill Murray as Baloo -- it's hard to live up to Phil Harris's singularly charming voice -- but Murray fits the character as written quite well. And he doesn't phone it in (which you never know with him), it's a fully committed performance. Also this Neel Sethi kid is hilarious as Mowgli, and I have no idea why he isn't getting the same Welcome To Hollywood treatment as Jacob Tremblay (just kidding, I know exactly why). And this movie even manages a few great triumphs over the original: 1) Favreau included the wolves, 2) the final fight w/ Shere Khan is an improvement, 3) the "red flower" through-line is perfected. If I have a complaint, it's that in the very end Mowgli gets to stay in the jungle. They abandon that melancholy inevitability -- so key to the original -- for a pure happy ending.

[Andorion]

death rattle, on 04 January 2017 - 09:06 PM, said:

Watched Disney's live-action The Jungle Book (I've been doing good with movie-watching so far this year, gotta chalk it up to finishing WoT and having that monkey off my back). I gotta say, this movie was pretty awesome start to finish. I've never read Kipling and I don't really intend to -- I dunno how much of his white-man's-burden baggage seeps into his fiction but I imagine it can't help but -- so I'm gonna attribute a lot of the good stuff to Disney, mistakenly or not. The original cartoon is SO full of personality -- THREE villains, all completely different and all completely wonderful, not to mention the Odd Couple nature of Bagheera and Baloo -- and all of that gets transferred to the live-action movie in ways that pay homage to but are anything but retreads of the originals. The only performance that's a bit jarring at first is Bill Murray as Baloo -- it's hard to live up to Phil Harris's singularly charming voice -- but Murray fits the character as written quite well. And he doesn't phone it in (which you never know with him), it's a fully committed performance. Also this Neel Sethi kid is hilarious as Mowgli, and I have no idea why he isn't getting the same Welcome To Hollywood treatment as Jacob Tremblay (just kidding, I know exactly why). And this movie even manages a few great triumphs over the original: 1) Favreau included the wolves, 2) the final fight w/ Shere Khan is an improvement, 3) the "red flower" through-line is perfected. If I have a complaint, it's that in the very end Mowgli gets to stay in the jungle. They abandon that melancholy inevitability -- so key to the original -- for a pure happy ending.

I have actually read the original Kipling book.

I haven't seen this film, but I did see the first cartoon.

The Kipling story and the Disney story are essentially different.

Baloo is not a lovable goofy pal, he is the wise, venerable, but very cranky teacher. Bagheera is not the strict parent figure but rather a guiding older brother, Kaa is not an almost-villain but a source of wisdom. Haati is not a goofy pompous bore, but a serious force to contend with.

Mowgli's going to the village is not inevitable. He goes, but eventually he returns, and then there is a chapter called "Letting in the Jungle" which is one of the more epic things Kipling has written.

Mowgli's battle with Shere Khan is not the unrealistic face off of the movies but rather a cunningly plotted battle.

Nor is it the climax of the story.

There are also a number of other stories in the book, almost all of them being about animals. Some of them are lovely, my favourite being The White Seal which is a manifesto against seal hunting.

Kipling's imperial agenda is not that explicit in the book. It leaks through in exactly two stories - Servants of the Queen - a dialogue between different animals serving in the British Indian army and The Undertakers - a very morbid story.

Overall Kipling's book is very rich. He created an entire structure of law and culture for the animals. Every story was preceded by a poem and ended with a long song. I still have a few of those lines memorised.

[polishgenius]

The original Jungle Book is awesome and I'm still sore at Disney for releasing their stupid pointless live-action adaptation of their own cartoon, delaying the release of the Andy Serkis version that is more based on the books by two years.

Eta: I gather it was changed in this remake but the original Disney version of Jungle Book was probably more racist than the books are, what with King Louie and all.

This post has been edited by polishgenius: 05 January 2017 - 07:00 PM

[worry]

Watched Captain America: Civil War finally. I think I'm all caught up on MCU. This was definitely Top 3. Waaaaaaaaay better than Age of Ultron, and continues the top tier run of the Cap movies above all the other solos. Black Panther and Spider-Man were both fantastic. I think with Tom Holland they finally hit the bulls-eye. I won't get as wordy as I did above w/ SS and TJB though. Just really happy with it.

[worry]

Watched Star Trek Beyond. That's a movie a day so far! I would rate this one "pretty good". It's a very straightforward, fairly minor story w/ good (but not particularly deep) character moments and solid action. A decent baddie w/ interesting motivations, but only a so-so payoff. Or -- if you're the baddie's second in command -- no resolution whatsoever. I guess now he gets to live alone on the forest planet hunting sky jellyfish for nourishment. The framing ambivalence stuff w/ both Spock and Kirk is totally unnecessary, but oh well. Of all the three movies, I think this one felt the most like an episode of the show -- for better and worse.

[Tiste Simeon]

Watched the Assassin's Creed movie. I liked it a lot, and my wife, who knows nothing of the continuing story (IE Templars vs Assassins, the Apple of Eden, the Animus etc) liked it too. Quite a slow messy start and the script is not great but overall an enjoyable addition to the franchise. Doubt it will be on any film of the year lists but it is a solid action/adventure film with some stunning cinematography.