Film and Episodic Content Discussion Thread

With the recent announcement of the Scream reboot, it feels like a good time to revisit the original and its seismic impact on the horror genre, which is still felt to this day. Scream is the granddaddy of the meta take on scary movies, so let's investigate why it became such a phenomenon.

New video every Wednesday at 12 noon Central.

 

It's Wednesday my dudes! I will watch this tonight - thank you.

 

To live and die in la is such a great movie. Everything aesthetically is perfect. The entire thing deconstructs the phony world of Hollywood and American popular culture. super cops, buddy cops, police thuggery, Innocent victims, sexually ambiguous villains, adrenaline junkies, extreme sports bros, and popular music are all shot down or merely varnish on a world of shit. The Miami Vice and cop movie aesthetics are established and then totally ignored. They’re merely a canvas at most. The costumes are normcore, what these characters can afford, with random 80s gaud thrown in. The plot is perfect and no one acts out of character. It’s RoboCop level but more even subversive. Pay attention to the urban hellscape of gang graffiti and urban blight. That’s all real. I doubt they made that for the film. It’s too smart and too brutal for it’s own box office popularity. It’s more otherworldly than the French Connection, which is grounded in euro cinema and has less of a varnish. The LA chase is better and so is Willem Dafoe.

 

This was the first film in which I totally noticed Willem Dafoe. As in I had trouble looking away when he was onscreen. Also the first time I really saw William Petersen act (he's amazing). I'm not sure than any other film role he got was as good as this one.

Both actors are among our greatest living actors IMO.

 

Sorry to say I've fallen behind, haven't yet seen this or a couple others.

I love these videos (learn things from every one) so will make it my business to see them all...

 

Received thrilling email from Netflix today: my favorite Korean drama, STRANGER (one of the best TV series I've seen on Netflix) has a 2nd season upcoming. Cue happy dance!

https://www.netflix.com/title/80187...739D41558D63A516B9F64526E1C&lkid=PRIMARY_HERO

The first season was very well written, tense, dramatic, surprising, with fascinating characters, especially the 2 leads. I strongly recommend this one.

 

Now on Netflix:
Sinatra,All or Nothing At All.
4 hour documentary that draws you in from the get go, as one reviewer said "it makes you nostalgic for a time you never lived"
Frank had one helluva life!

 

This was shown on successive nights on PBS several years ago. I watched it twice. I already loved this man's voice & body of work...this documentary enriched my understanding of his life & back-story.

I was a child during the time of his greatest work with Capitol Records. My parents had just one record of his (they preferred Tony Bennett), so I really didn't get fully exposed to his singing until my late 20s. It was like stumbling over buried treasure...

Not a week goes by where I don't listen at least a few of his songs.

 

(seeing this again)

This is another superior explication of cinema experiences many of us shared.

I think you & Cameron are correct in saying our unconscious destructive urges yield the emotional resonance & subtext of this film. I felt that acutely while watching THE TERMINATOR for the first time...the guilty thrill of imagining myself raining destruction upon those that who stand in my way.

2 related meta-points:

• This is not the first time a dark destroyer captured our imagination. Over a century ago the vampire myth first appeared in cinema; it has been repeatedly invoked to express similar destructive urges--plus eroticism, sadism, and the primordial urge to hunt prey.
• Other events framed THE TERMINATOR: high levels of murderous crime in American cities, fueled in part by the crack epidemic

There is another character who springs from the unrestrained id: the Incredible Hulk. I was always struck that the Hulk stopped short of mass murder (of which he was manifestly capable). His creators intended him as a "Beauty & the Beast" conflicted parable, balancing murderous rage with love & compassion. No thanks--I'll take the Terminator any day...

 

Ever wonder why you were on the edge of your seat when you first saw Back To The Future's clock tower scene? In my latest video I explain why.

New video every Wednesday at 12 noon Central.

 

The 4k box set for these movies is on the way, and I sure hope they do it justice. You can tell, even from this youtube clip, that it has the potential to look amazing.

Thanks for sharing!

 

I always knew there was something weird with The Neverending Story when I saw it as a young lad. In my latest video I tackle the crazy-complex themes this movie isn't afraid to present to kids. FALCOR!
New video every Wednesday at 12 noon Central.

 

ATREYUUUUUUUU - I need to get caught back up on your videos. I've been slipping on keeping up.

 

just saw TENET in the theatre. it was a decent movie going experience. I think the buzz it will generate (and has generated) will pull people back to the cinema from hibernation.

the post-COVID movie theatre experience was interesting. no waiting in line for concessions, no one to check your ticket, 20 people in an auditorium on opening night for a blockbuster release.

Spoiler: review with minor spoilers

this movie is basically a redux of Inception, and Inception is the better movie by far. it not only follows the Nolan formula of action/CGI setpiece - plot exposition - action/CGI setpiece but the plot is basically 95% the same, only this time the protagonists have a much more one-dimensional motive and there is no real character development. dream invasion as an excuse for crazy action setpieces has been replaced with 2deep4u reverse entropy theory.

im sure people will make hour-long video essays trying to dissect this movie, but I don't see the point. I think after two viewings, most people could understand the plot of Inception enough to not be bothered by it. I think you could see TENET five times and still not grasp the 2deep4u elements. it's just focused on running at break-neck pace and flash despite its 150 minute runtime, and the exposition isn't as well done as Inception. its better to shut off your brain and enjoy the action.

6.5/10, my score will increase to 7.5/10 when I get to watch it again with subtitles to make up for the god awful audio mix muffling all the dialogue

 

The first of my two-part ALIEN/ALIENS analysis. The visceral terror the xenomorph inflicted on unsuspecting audiences really can't be understated. And it works because of very specific design choices made by Ridley Scott. Fun fact: I was a baby in my mother's stomach when she and my dad saw ALIEN in '79.

New video every Wednesday at 12 noon Central.

 

Alien was the first movie I ever saw in a theater. I was only 5 years old!!

My dad took me and my brother who is 7 years older than me. I don’t think he knew what it was going to be like. The goddam thing gave me nightmares for years I think, hahaha. I couldn’t watch it again till I was a teenager, but after that, I loved it. And Aliens is amazing too. Looking forward to your analysis.

 

Thanks, yeah, wasn't old enough to see it other than experience it through osmosis in my mother's womb. But it really scared the living shit out of me when I saw it later as a kid and I'd have the occasional nightmare. It's the kind of horror movie that really can't be done anymore... audiences are too jaded, and most horror concepts have been run into the ground. There was something extremely unique about HR Giger's design and Ridley Scott's handling of the material. Even if you could come up with a monster as abstract and disturbing as the xenomorph, you'd likely get a filmmaker who can't do the material justice, or the constraints of studio/committee filmmaking would ruin the project. It almost happened on the first ALIEN, as 20th Century Fox execs were hounding Ridley Scott, who at one point got so angry he punched a hole in the low ceiling of one of the sets.

 

Really glad to see you post PtI of II on these 2 films. Years earlier I had seen the predecessor film, IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE, which was moderately scary only because I was 6 of 7 when it first came on TV. But ALIEN/ALIENS was a entirely different universe of Sci-Fi horror. Those 2 films set a standard that still hasn't been equaled IMO.

I'm going to enjoy your videos on this topic...

BTW, the film I saw while in my mother's womb was obviously D.O.A. (that would explain so much about my family dynamics).

 

Tenet was an... okay to good movie. It's the most Nolan-ish Nolan film, and not really in a good way.

The exposition was terrible, the pacing was just non-existent, the sound mixing was awful and I felt bad for the speakers in my IMAX theatre more than my own ears.

The concept of his previous work - Dunkirk itself helped mask all his aforementioned weaknesses as a filmmaker, but there was no hiding for Tenet.

And I can't help but feel that the main issue here is over ambition. Given the complexity of just about everything, there is just no way that you could get a great film out of 2.5 hours. Heck, even a 10 part miniseries would have been a stretch. The audience needs time to breathe. As what @k4rstar said earlier, Inception looks like child's play in comparison.

But ok for the good parts: Shit, some of set pieces were just incredible. When you think about some of the action sequences and how they must have been filmed from a technical standpoint, it's honestly mind-boggling to even comprehend. Not unexpected from Nolan though.

And yeah we can criticize the overly complex plot structure, but damn you still have to admire the sheer audacity and originality of it. I mean, there is maybe no other than Nolan who could conceive a plot like this, likely no one else who would even fathom trying to make a movie out of this, and sure as hell no one else who could make it into one that even semi-works on a functional level. So in a way, I think this movie is utterly brilliant just for not failing and self-imploding.

As yeah, aa whole though I think it's his second worst film after TDKR. Still well worth the experience but falling short of his brilliant best. Just... too much.

 

Picked up mother! on 4k this weekend. I know it's not everyone's cup of tea, but I adore it. The Atmos soundtrack is extremely effective.