Movies: Last Movie You Watched and Rate It | Part#: Some High Number +1

ORRFForever

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Oct 29, 2018
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As for long movies...

I don't mind quality long films. I have watched and loved The Deer Hunter, Goodfellas, The Godfather films, Shawshank, etc. Unfortunately, Once Upon A Time In Anatolia was not in that category.

When one character talked about his prostate issues, I thought, "I watch movies to avoid this kind of inane discussion" . For those who enjoy that kind of dialogue, let me ENTERTAIN you with talk about MY prostate issues...

I spend a ton of time in the pool. Between the cold water and my oversized prostate, I have to run to the bathroom 5 or 6 times during a 2 hour visit.

Now, I know what you're thinking : "Thank God he goes to the washroom and NOT in the pool", but I digress...


Anyway, last time I went to my doctor, he sent me for a PSA test. It cost me $35. I happily paid it because, well...

No fun, huh? So why would I pay to watch movie characters have the same discussion? ;)
 
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ORRFForever

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The part where they all gave up their share of the money despite almost dying 10 times. They knew the risk. Giving the dead guy a share is already nice enough. Taking no share is pure madness.
Good point. I thought that was a stretch as well.

Still, I really liked the movie.
 

ORRFForever

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Oct 29, 2018
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Triple Frontier. A silly movie that I wish would have had the balls to steer full bore into its silliness. It flirts with some levity, but just can’t quite fully let go of its whole we’re warriors/we’re brothers/the system failed us GRAVITAS, so it ultimately takes itself way too seriously. The music cues are the most comically on point since Watchmen. The character decision making is a little eyebrow raising at times. Yes, yes I get how greed, you know, CORRUPTS, man. Doesn’t preclude me from calling stupid decisions stupid. The ending is awful (though the juxtaposition of the final two scenes accurately sum up a movie that can’t decide whether it wants to be a serious movie about damaged men or an ass-kicking romp).
Shocked how much you disliked T.F.
 

Shareefruck

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Apr 2, 2005
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As much as I agree with you, I still don't think there's a right or better way to approach cinema. And I think you can get as much intellectual pleasure from Friday the 13th par VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan than from Solaris. I just think that it would come a lot easier to someone who knows how to appreciate Solaris.

That being said....

Dunkirk - It's nicely crafted, but it's not the masterpiece I was told it was... 6/10
I mean I won't be pompous enough to suggest that I can say this with total certainty, but I think there probably are better and worse (or at least more or less rewarding) approaches that we can guess at. I've never really bought the idea that both approaches are just equally promising and that it just comes down to person-to-person preference, personally. To me it's kind of like comparing the thrill of riding a fun roller-coaster vs. the satisfaction of having full and sprawling introspective moments/experiences in your life-- I think the former (even the best and most interesting possible version of it) is ultimately kind of doomed to have a very limited and less personally powerful ceiling of reward, while the latter can potentially reach a point that can actually really matter and feel genuinely important to a person. I can't really fathom how that can be matched.

The only fathomable exception to that that I can think of, where light/quick-paced movies might come close to matching the more slow-burning/introspective/deep-hitting stuff is when something is completely liberating/inspired in just how creatively unhinged, uninhibited, and borderline psychotic it can get, as if it's bursting with passion/energy and somehow perfectly juggling explosive madness in a spontaneous way (I get that a lot more with music than movies). But that still ends up being a different kind of challenging rather than being approachable or easy.
 
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Pranzo Oltranzista

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Oct 18, 2017
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I mean I won't be pompous enough to suggest that I can say this with total certainty, but I think there probably are better and worse (or at least more or less rewarding) approaches that we can guess at. I've never really bought the idea that both approaches are just equally promising and that it just comes down to person-to-person preference, personally. To me it's kind of like comparing the thrill of riding a fun roller-coaster vs. the satisfaction of having full and sprawling introspective moments/experiences in your life-- I think the former (even the best and most interesting possible version of it) is ultimately kind of doomed to have a very limited and less personally powerful ceiling of reward, while the latter can potentially reach a point that can actually really matter and feel genuinely important to a person. I can't really fathom how that can be matched.

The only fathomable exception to that that I can think of, where light/quick-paced movies might come close to matching the more slow-burning/introspective/deep-hitting stuff is when something is completely liberating/inspired in just how creatively unhinged, uninhibited, and borderline psychotic it can get, as if it's bursting with passion/energy and somehow perfectly juggling explosive madness in a spontaneous way (I get that a lot more with music than movies). But that still ends up being a different kind of challenging rather than being approachable or easy.

I used Jason Takes Manhattan for a reason: a friend of mine, one of the most brilliant minds I know, used it extensively in his doctoral thesis on metalepsis. I think any art object can be the spark plug to a complex and rich intellectual experience - and that experience emanates (for most part) from the spectator and not the object itself. That's what I meant when I said it would probably be easier for someone who is actually able to enjoy a more challenging film to gain intellectual pleasures from a blockbuster or lesser movie, but that pleasure remains IMO attainable in most cases.
 

ORRFForever

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Oct 29, 2018
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Never Grow Old [2019] :

A morality tale about a man who sells his soul to the Devil - really well played by John Cusack.

Best Western I've seen in years.
7.5/10

Movie Trailer :
 
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ProstheticConscience

Check dein Limit
Apr 30, 2010
18,459
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Canuck Nation
Wind River

with Jeremy Renner, one of the Olsen girls (who can't possibly need the money...) and a brief appearance by Jon Bernthal as Jon Bernthal.

Jeremy Renner is Cory something, an outdoorsy Fish and Wildlife Bureau guy in the wilds of southern Ontario wait, no, Wyoming. One day, he stumbles across the body of girl from the local native reserve frozen in the snow. She was badly assaulted and walked without shoes for hundreds of yards from...somewhere. The local reserve cops (all five of them) call the FBI, who send the weedy Olsen chick. And nobody else. She's in over her head, and she knows it. So is Cory; he just shoots problematic wildlife most of the time, but on Wind River reserve, there's not much help coming because there's just nobody bloody else around to do things like investigate murders.

On one hand, it's well-acted, tense, and has lots of outdoor shots of snowy mountains. As a murder mystery, it's undone by the fact that the killer(s) can come from one of two places, and they scope out one in the first half hour. So it drags quite a bit after that. Then you're noticing things like: snowmobiles look like a lot of fun, bodies hit by bullets don't actually fly through the air like video game corpses modelling the latest ragdoll physics, and how weird it is that you can never see anyone's breath in a place that's supposedly deadly cold all the time.
 

KallioWeHardlyKnewYe

Hey! We won!
May 30, 2003
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Nocturnal Animals - I barely ever see anything worth my time. If I wasn't so damn lazy, I'd write an essay on that one. 8/10

I don't think this was very well liked when it came out a few years ago. It's mean and ugly and a little sloppy, but it really resonated with me. Hit me at a very relevant time, for better and worse. Been curious to go back to it with the distance of a few years, life changes, etc. to see if I feel the same way.
 
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kihei

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Jun 14, 2006
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I used Jason Takes Manhattan for a reason: a friend of mine, one of the most brilliant minds I know, used it extensively in his doctoral thesis on metalepsis. I think any art object can be the spark plug to a complex and rich intellectual experience - and that experience emanates (for most part) from the spectator and not the object itself. That's what I meant when I said it would probably be easier for someone who is actually able to enjoy a more challenging film to gain intellectual pleasures from a blockbuster or lesser movie, but that pleasure remains IMO attainable in most cases.
A Ph,D on metalepsis? I'd like to meet that guy. He must enjoy twisting his mind into gnarly little knots.

Just playing around with ideas here. Does it have to be an "art object" of any kind that provides the catalyst to "a complex and rich intellectual experience"? Could, say, watching a flawless performance by an aesthetically pleasing athlete, say Roger Federer or Wayne Gretzky or Lionel Messi as examples, not also trigger "a complex and rich intellectual experience" as well?
 
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ORRFForever

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Oct 29, 2018
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I don't think this was very well liked when it came out a few years ago. It's mean and ugly and a little sloppy, but it really resonated with me. Hit me at a very relevant time, for better and worse. Been curious to go back to it with the distance of a few years, life changes, etc. to see if I feel the same way.
Isn't that the movie with the large naked women dancing in the opening?
 

Pranzo Oltranzista

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Oct 18, 2017
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Isn't that the movie with the large naked women dancing in the opening?

Yes it is.

A Ph,D on metalepsis? I'd like to meet that guy. He must enjoy twisting his mind into gnarly little knots.

Just playing around with ideas here. Does it have to be an "art object" of any kind that provides the catalyst to "a complex and rich intellectual experience"? Could, say, watching a flawless performance by an aesthetically pleasing athlete, say Roger Federer or Wayne Gretzky or Lionel Messi as examples, not also trigger "a complex and rich intellectual experience" as well?

Certainly could, you'd have to start from elsewhere than Genette though! :)
 

Mr Jiggyfly

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Jan 29, 2004
34,243
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Finding Neverland. A powerful and damning portrait of a predator who happens to be the most famous (and maybe most beloved) man in the world.

Triple Frontier. A silly movie that I wish would have had the balls to steer full bore into its silliness. It flirts with some levity, but just can’t quite fully let go of its whole we’re warriors/we’re brothers/the system failed us GRAVITAS, so it ultimately takes itself way too seriously. The music cues are the most comically on point since Watchmen. The character decision making is a little eyebrow raising at times. Yes, yes I get how greed, you know, CORRUPTS, man. Doesn’t preclude me from calling stupid decisions stupid. The ending is awful (though the juxtaposition of the final two scenes accurately sum up a movie that can’t decide whether it wants to be a serious movie about damaged men or an ass-kicking romp). All of that said ... I still managed to enjoy it. Growing up in the 80s, cable was rife with the likes of Uncommon Valor and Let’s Get Harry and similar ragtag mission type flicks, so I have a soft spot for this stuff. I just wish everyone involved would have realized this is a B movie, not an A.

Triple Frontier would have been pretty good if they didn’t make smart warrior types suddenly get stupid. I get the whole greed angle to, but these are men who understand you calculate your risks, you don’t just say ah f*** it let’s see what happens...
 

KallioWeHardlyKnewYe

Hey! We won!
May 30, 2003
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Triple Frontier would have been pretty good if they didn’t make smart warrior types suddenly get stupid. I get the whole greed angle to, but these are men who understand you calculate your risks, you don’t just say ah **** it let’s see what happens...

Exactly they go in expecting about $75 million (if I remember right) and uncover $250 million. Isn't there a figure somewhere in between that would have both satisfied their greed while also not risking the execution of their mission? Yeah, I know then we'd have a really short movie. ... But it's a pretty dumb decision for characters who've otherwise been smart and disciplined.
 

Hippasus

1,9,45,165,495,1287,
Feb 17, 2008
5,598
339
Bridgeview
Legos 2 450

This is a pretty good animated movie. It dealt with issues like authenticity, groupthink, social conformity, and individual identity. The plot was not predictable and straightforward and the film was quite funny too. Recommended for children and adults. I didn't even see the first one, but maybe I can still catch it somehow.

200: distasteful and pathetic
300: mediocre or subpar
400: average, but decent
500: very good
600: superb
700: transcendental
 

Mr Jiggyfly

Registered User
Jan 29, 2004
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Exactly they go in expecting about $75 million (if I remember right) and uncover $250 million. Isn't there a figure somewhere in between that would have both satisfied their greed while also not risking the execution of their mission? Yeah, I know then we'd have a really short movie. ... But it's a pretty dumb decision for characters who've otherwise been smart and disciplined.

Many times intelligent warriors just have bad luck, just don’t make them create it themselves with way out of character decisions.

Something more believable like...a mechanical failure on a helicopter that maybe wasn’t maintained to military standards under the care of Rent a Shady Copter.
 

Pranzo Oltranzista

Registered User
Oct 18, 2017
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I still don't understand the point of it.

Of the dancing fat ladies? Well, you can find Ford's uninteresting mumblings about it here: Tom Ford Explains the Controversial Opening Credits of Nocturnal Animals

As for me, I thought they were a very interesting introduction to the film. These ladies are all in pairs: one dancing in a fairy-ish world of red, hung to the wall as an artwork, and her double lying down on a bed in a more "banal" reality. Amy Adams' character sits beside them and the film positions her as one of them: lying down in bed, or on the couch, most of the time reading (another very interesting element). Her double, played by Isla Fisher, exists like the dancing ladies in an artwork, the novel. But just like the fat ladies, they both only exist on different diegetic levels of the same work (here, the movie).

I think I'll push that film to a 9/10
 
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Puck

Ninja
Jun 10, 2003
10,770
415
Ottawa
I watched Triple Frontier (Netflix) and I agree it was simple (I figured out ahead of time everything that would happen) but it was still a good suspenseful flick. I don't think there will be a sequel though (they insinuate it at the end when one guy gives the other the GPS coordinates (being vague here not to give out a spoiler)). It's on Netflix and I would recommend it if you have 2 hours to spend on Hollywood fare. Decent suspense heist flick. (for some strange reason it reminded me of Bogart's The Treasure of Sierra Madre (1948))
Triple Frontier (2019) - IMDb

If you wish to waste 2 hours of your life, watch SuperTroopers 2. It's stupid but fun. I'd recommend a joint while viewing. (legal in Canada). It played out like a series of Second City skits. If you are Canadian it helps on understanding the derogatory jokes re. maple leaf culture. This movie is a 3/10 but under the right conditions (frame of mind) it could be a 7/10 (under the influence of some intoxicating substances, even if it's just a bottle of wine (a glass might not be enough)). It made me laugh, nuff said.
Super Troopers 2 (2018) - IMDb

If you have online streaming capabilities I'd also recommend (my first real recommendation, if you watch the first two and weren't impressed) Roy Orbison Mystery Girl - Unraveled. It's a music documentary on the man and quite good.
Roy Orbison: Mystery Girl -Unraveled (2014) - IMDb
 
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Pranzo Oltranzista

Registered User
Oct 18, 2017
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2,673
I watched Triple Frontier (Netflix) and I agree it was simple (I figured out ahead of time everything that would happen) but it was still a good suspenseful flick.

Maybe it's just me, but these two affirmations seem contradictory! ;-)
 

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