Let's all go to the movies~

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Thad
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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Thad » Wed Mar 14, 2018 12:53 pm

A Wrinkle in Time is a mixed bag.

It gets the most important thing right: fuck the haters; Meg is perfectly cast. Calvin is too.

Charles Wallace...is a child actor reciting lines. It's not his fault; I think the role is impossible in live action. (Would work fine in animation with an adult doing the voice.) I think they would have done better to do what Game of Thrones did for Arya and Bran: make him a couple years older than he is in the book, and cast an actor who's older than he looks. But they decided to keep Charles young; I understand the creative decision but I don't think it works.

Under "creative decisions I do NOT understand": I do not understand how anyone could possibly read A Wrinkle in Time and think, "Hm, Mrs. Whatsit...I'm seeing...Reese Witherspoon in the role. And also, instead of being kindly and supportive, I think she should spend the entire movie criticizing everything Meg says and does and telling everyone she doesn't think Meg is cut out for this."

Seriously. She's fucking awful. Not Witherspoon's fault (except insofar as she could have declined the role); she plays the role exactly as written. I just don't understand why she was written that way, at all.

Zach Galifinakis as the Happy Medium isn't quite as bad, but he's even more inexplicable. The role is female in the book; I guess somebody decided the book is too much of a whatever-the-opposite-of-a-sausagefest is (melon ball? taco truck?) and needed more dudes. It's a little odd that they went that way, but not a big deal. What IS weird is...he's not happy. At all. I mean, "happy" is right there in the name. Why is the Happy Medium so unhappy?

All in all, it was okay. I'm more excited about what it represents and what it's going to mean to kids watching it than what it actually is.

Wonder if they'll get into any of the sequels. I think Many Waters is definitely out (Sandy and Dennys are written out of the movie entirely, as if there were ever any question of whether Disney would consider doing a movie adaptation of a feminist critique of Noah's Ark), but maybe A Wind in the Door and then come back in a decade or so for A Swiftly Tilting Planet?

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Friday
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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Friday » Wed Mar 14, 2018 8:03 pm

Wrinkle/Wind/Tilting were some of my favorite books as a young kid and teen, I probably read them all seven or eight times, though I haven't read any of them in more than a decade.

When I saw the previews I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, that feeling you get when someone grabs you right in your childhood and fucks it up.

I haven't seen it (I don't know if I can bear to) but I'm glad to hear it has some strong points.
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Thad
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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Thad » Wed Mar 14, 2018 8:24 pm

I think it really nailed Meg's character, her journey, and the theme of the book, and I think that casting an African-American actor in the role added one more dimension to the message that you don't have to fall into the roles society has written for you. (Meg's fixation on how her hair isn't like the other girls' has a pretty clear racial subtext now; I think it's a nice touch.)

It's also got some pretty spectacular visuals.

I don't understand why they didn't just cast Oprah as Mrs. Whatsit, instead of casting her as Mrs. Which, making Mrs. Which into Mrs. Whatsit, and making Mrs. Whatsit into a character who is terrible.

It's no Black Panther, but not every movie can be Black Panther. It's decent, and I hope that it inspires kids the same way its source material has for generations -- kids of all races and genders, but girls and POC in particular.

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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby beatbandito » Thu Mar 15, 2018 11:25 am

Based on my limited knowledge of having read the book in grade school and seeing the release trailer, I was sure that Oprah was Mrs. Whatsit.

Also learned that Galifianakis is the second in the line of video productions of AWIT that make the questionable choice of making The Happy Medium a grumpy guy instead of the obvious choice of Lily Tomlin.
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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Thad » Fri Mar 16, 2018 12:37 am

Ava DuVernay Reportedly Directing The New Gods for DC and Warner Bros.

Sounds good to me. I've got my gripes with A Wrinkle in Time, but it did a pretty good job with the whole "trippy cosmic visuals" thing.

And I'm sure I'm not the first nerd to point out the similarities between IT and Darkseid.

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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby zaratustra » Fri Mar 16, 2018 6:08 am

Mothra wrote:Annihilation wasssssss half great, half shitty. Overall I'm feeling pretty ambivalent about it.

Lots of great moments. Lots of dumb garbage. The theme of this movie was really strained, to the point that I wish they hadn't tried to do one - this should have just been silent exploration.

This should have been the main character alone, exploring the Shimmer, almost never speaking. Flashback as needed.

I dunno, not worth seeing in theaters, but worth seeing on Netflix eventually.


aand it's on netflix and personally I liked it

it's like avatar if it was written by lars von trier

i mean you could see the final twist from ten miles away but eh

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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Mothra » Fri Mar 16, 2018 9:13 am

I think right up until the mid-point, I adored that movie.

It was a combination of the tonally-jarring horror, the monsters, and the sputtering out of the wife/husband plotline that made it go a bit south for me.

That said, lots of great stuff: The moss skeleton in the swimming pool, the repeating voices within the hyperbear, the fractal thing at the end... loved all that.

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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby nosimpleway » Fri Mar 16, 2018 10:30 am

Thad wrote:(melon ball? taco truck?)

Clam jam.

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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Mongrel » Wed Mar 21, 2018 2:17 pm



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Also, there's a Mr. Rogers marathon on twitch today to honour his 90th birthday: https://www.twitch.tv/misterrogers
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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Mongrel » Thu Mar 22, 2018 3:01 pm



Cable being the villain is perfect.
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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Mothra » Mon Mar 26, 2018 10:41 am

Pacific Rim: Uprising wassssssssss okay. It’s not worth seeing in the theaters, but it’s worth seeing eventually.

It doesn’t have the emotional beats of the first, nor do you really care about the characters or the resolution of the story, nor is there any memorable soundtrack to speak of, so, that macho fist-pumping bravado of the first one just isn’t there. That sucks. A lot of the movie thematically and practically revolves around people that are related to characters you liked in the first movie, talking about how great those characters were. The general theme of the flick is more or less: “It’s okay that you’re not as impressive as your heroes,” which is a fine message on its face, but for Pacific Rim, just feels like they didn’t even fucking try.

Nevertheless, there is a series of genuinely well-done and creative mech battles, linked by the occasional exposition-heavy cutscene. I was impressed by how good this movie looked, how clear the action was, and how well the design of all the new elements came out. The various sets and cockpits and mech internal systems look wonderful. So that’s nice to see.

Unfortunately, that design inspiration doesn’t carry to the Jaegers themselves, which look sorta bland and Transformersey. If they were all colored the same, it would be really hard to tell them apart.

Yeah, I don’t know. It didn’t get me riled up, didn’t pull me in emotionally, and didn’t charm me over. But, I was entertained.

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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Mongrel » Sun Apr 01, 2018 3:35 pm

This was pretty much the only April Fool's joke today that actually got a laugh out of me:

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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Mongrel » Sat Apr 07, 2018 2:58 am

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This image is fucking perfect and I wish DC would let me hope the movie would actually be like this.
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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Niku » Sat Apr 07, 2018 11:07 am

Do you like movies that are incredibly good at ratcheting up tension while being so incredibly dumb that the minute you walk out of the theater you literally have to stop thinking about the logistics before you make yourself hate the thing you just really enjoyed? Then you too might find solace in M. Night Shyamalan Presents: Signs 2: A Quiet Place.
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Thad
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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Thad » Fri May 18, 2018 11:49 am

I, Tonya is great, part white-trash Greek tragedy and part character-based absurdist comedy. The material is great (and sometimes postmodern; it tells us upfront that this story is being told by unreliable narrators, and occasionally reminds us by having the characters directly address the camera and argue about what really happened) and the cast is phenomenal. Margot Robbie, in particular, threads the needle as Tonya, presenting a character who's not very likable but is often sympathetic anyway.

My one gripe was the soundtrack, which I'm sure I would have liked better if this movie had come out before Guardians of the Galaxy. But it didn't, so it was hard not to think, every time a '70s rock song came on, boy, every soundtrack has to be like Guardians of the Galaxy now. The movie is set in the '80s and '90s; why is the music from the '70s? Because Guardians of the Galaxy, that's why, and also because classic rock is lazy Hollywood shorthand for "poor white people (but not the kind who listen to country music)".

There's a scene where Tonya's coach tells her that part of why she's not getting the scores she should is that the judges don't like the metal she's setting her routines to, and why can't she go with classical like all the other girls? So, given that the film clearly establishes that Tonya Harding is a metal fan, you might expect there to be more than 30 seconds of metal in the film's soundtrack. There is not.

But that's a minor complaint, in the scheme of things. It's a great movie with a great cast that expertly handles the absurdity of the episode it centers on, while also granting it context and shading and remembering that the reason we're still talking about this decades later isn't just that a crazy thing happened, but also that Tonya Harding is goddamn fascinating.

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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Friday » Fri May 18, 2018 2:37 pm

Yeah, I'm really, really sick of OVERPOWERING MOVIE SOUNDTRACK DROWNING OUT ALL OTHER SOUND EFFECTS, SONG CHANGES WITH EVERY SCENE EVEN IF SCENE IS ONLY 45 SECONDS LONG.
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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Thad » Sat May 19, 2018 1:01 am

So I wonder if Deadpool 2 means that my signed copy of the first appearance of Zeitgeist is worth a lot of money now.

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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Thad » Sat May 19, 2018 2:35 pm

A new Alamo Drafthouse just opened in Tempe. (Or, officially, the grand opening is next Thursday. But they're running a training week right now, with discounts on food while the staff learns the ropes.)

I got to drink two beers and eat a chicken sandwich with motherfucking brie on it while I watched Deadpool 2. And before the discount, it cost about the same as I would have paid to go see a movie somewhere else and then go out for dinner at a decent brewpub.

I will be going back there.

(In fact I will be going back there tomorrow.)

Motherfucking brie.

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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Mongrel » Sat May 19, 2018 2:59 pm

Thad wrote:A new Alamo Drafthouse just opened in Tempe. (Or, officially, the grand opening is next Thursday. But they're running a training week right now, with discounts on food while the staff learns the ropes.)

I got to drink two beers and eat a chicken sandwich with motherfucking brie on it while I watched Deadpool 2. And before the discount, it cost about the same as I would have paid to go see a movie somewhere else and then go out for dinner at a decent brewpub.

I will be going back there.

(In fact I will be going back there tomorrow.)

Motherfucking brie.

Is motherfucking brie somehow different from regular brie?

('cause brie on some sandwiches is not unusual for a decent sandwich place here and brie isn't especially expensive in the grocery store, unless you're buying good stuff)
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Re: Let's all go to the movies~

Postby Niku » Sat May 19, 2018 3:24 pm

Yeah, we go to the movies pretty much exclusively at a local dinner-theater alamo-knockoff type place for exactly the reasons you mentioned. The price is basically the same as any other dinner+movie but you get the convenience of it being a one-stop kinda evening. Basically my only two complaints about our joint is that when they repriced and updated the menu, they turned the "pick three appetizers" thing into a pick four when I just wanted the dang three ones that I liked, and also their burgers kinda suck. But it's made up for by basically the best pretzels I've ever had anywhere and all of the rest of the food being good-to-great. Also if you order candy they bring it to you in a martini glass.

My wife always vaguely lamented that the TERRIBLE Amc on the other side of the highway (the one that basically gets all the loud talkers, obnoxious teens, etc) had amazing plush recliner seats because it was the only thing they had going for them over our usual place, but our usual just remodeled all of their theaters over the last two months to have the much nicer recliner seats. So .. checkmate.

(It does mean needing to get hot-ticket tickets even earlier now though, since it has lowered their seats-per-theater).
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