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Movie of the day

Started by Max Rockatansky, August 21, 2016, 10:59:42 PM

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Max Rockatansky

I'm not much one for watching TV shows anymore, in fact I didn't have cable at all for about 3 years.  That said I've always been a bigger fan of movies.  I don't really have a genre that I like, I just watch what's interesting to me at any given particular time.  This week I've seen the following movies:

Wolf of Wallstreet:  A Scorsese movie...can't go wrong there.  Usually I'll watch a little bit of this one or Goodfellas if nothing else is on.  The way Jordan Belfort is presented in this reminds me of my brother....not in a good way.  :-D
Skyfall:  Probably one of the best five Bond movies in my opinion.  Really they did about everything they could to screw this one up along with Casino Royale when SPECTRE came out.  Blofeld being Bond's step brother was about the most stupid "twists" they've ever done in a Bond movie....that includes the Brosnan era.
Shooter:  What the hell was this supposed to be?  Why does everyone thing Mark Walburg can lead a movie?....this is what I always think of when I see him in any movie now:



Also...I couldn't understand a damn word coming out of Danny Glover's mouth.  I liked the guy in the Leathal Weapon movies but it was very apparent how old he was in this.
Gone Girl:  Great movie but will make you feel crappy about being married if you are...at least for a friggin week. 
Sherlock Holmes:  My wife wanted to watch this...it was okay.  Should be called Sherlock Stark since basically it's just Tony Stark with a fake British accent.  The bullet time segments were pretty interesting at the very least.


Max Rockatansky

Now I got Conan the Barbarian on.  Despite the crappy reviews this happens to be one of the most quotable movies of the 80s.  People forget James Earl Jones was in this...everyone picks the Arnold quotes...my favorite happens to be the "riddle of steel" and the "tree of woe."


sparker

Right now, in the little spare time I have, I'm binge-watching comedies from the 80's -- the classic old standbys Caddyshack, Airplane (NOT the sequel!!!!), Trading Places......and some that never quite got the accolades that, IMO, they deserve:  Ruthless People (love the cop referring to Bill Pullman's idiot character: "This has got to be the stupidest person in the world"), and (drum roll), my all time fave......Used Cars!  Radically profane and preternaturally snarky; it's got the late Jack Warden at his blustery best: "Used to be when you bought a politician, the fucker stayed bought!" as well as a young Kurt Russell as Rudy, our resident anti-hero whose ambition is to rise above being a dishonest used car salesman to being a graft-grabbing local politico.  Actually the plot is loosely derived from the relocation of I-10 west of Phoenix in the '70's and the land-grabbing that occurred once the final alignment was made public -- and the movie was filmed in the Avondale area west of central Phoenix.  It was also Robert Zemeckis' (Back to the Future, Forrest Gump) first feature film.  Any film that casts Al Lewis (Grandpa Munster) as a local "hanging judge" deserves a pat on the back!  It's ludicrous, profane, outrageous, and one of the funniest films since Blazing Saddles and Holy Grail! 

Re the Bond saga:  Apparently the original SPECTRE screenwriter, John Logan, freely borrowed the "adopted stepbrother" concept from the Fleming short story "Octopussy", in which Bond recounts his childhood after his parents were killed, and being temporarily taken in by Hannes Oberhauser, an Austrian ski instructor who was himself later killed by a British officer (Bond's target).  He invented the son Franz and turned him into the latter-day Blofeld.  Unfortunately, that turned the master criminal Blofeld into little more than a petulant overaged adolescent who acted out when he didn't get the attention he wanted, and turned it into a career as a single-minded asshole with a God complex.  Subsequent screenwriters tried to make the concept work, and Christopher Waltz' low-key characterization almost made him believable -- almost!  Since they ended the film with Bond walking away from MI6 with his new psychiatrist girlfriend in tow (I can't see that ending well!), it'll be interesting to see how they continue the series 2-3 years from now.  Hopefully they'll flesh out Blofeld into someone with more broadly unhealthy interests than simply making his former foster brother miserable!   

Max Rockatansky

#3
I didn't honestly expect Used Cars to get mentioned.  :-D  That's one of my favorites simply because of how familiar I am with the Phoenix area and how it was before everyone wanted to move there. Zemeckis had some good stuff going back in those days.  I was telling someone I know about all the subtle time changes in the background of Back to the Future Movies like; Twin Pine Mall to Lone Pine Mall or something like Clayton Ravine becoming Eastwood Ravine.

I thought it was part of something Flemming wrote but I couldn't remember.  Regardless it's one of the most stupid plot points in any Bond movie....or really the whole series.  That and they basically gave the entire character away in the trailer...but almost every movie does that nowadays.  They tried to wedge the antagonists from the three previous movies into members of SPECTRE....which was stupid also.  I'm to understand the reason why QUANTUM was used in Quantum of Solace was due to come sort of rights issue that didn't let them use SPECTRE.

They could bust out SMERSH and make it part of the Chinese Intelligence, boy would that get the movies banned over there.  :-D

sparker

Yeah, the whole Quantum/Spectre thing was a bit of a mash-up!  In the last film, it sounds like they tried to frame Quantum as a division of Spectre run by the late Mr. White, as the internal entity responsible for collecting OPM (Other People's Money) to run the whole outfit.  SPECTRE wasn't the worst film in the series (that dishonor falls to Moonraker and Man with the Golden Gun, IMO) but it did have plot holes you could drive a Peterbilt through!  But I wouldn't kick Lea Seydoux out of my bed for eating crackers! 

Unlikely the Chinese would use SMERSH (Smiert Shpionam/Death to Spies) as a model -- although North Korea:  Un and his cronies would eat that shit for breakfast!

Max Rockatansky

Yeah....she could have one of those 8 roll-pack Ritz boxes if it was up to me....but it ain't.  :-D

Funny, there really hasn't been any "terrible" Bond movies but there have been some "not good" ones.  The worst one I thought was ironically the North Korean laden Die Another Day.  I wasn't the biggest fan of Never Say Never Again or View to a Kill...and that's despite Christopher Walken.  Moonraker was weird as all hell but at least they had the decency to flesh out Jaws...for reasons.  :rolleyes:

Yeah though...after Die Another Day and all the other North Korean crap that has come out lately (Red Dawn remake and the Interview) they really need to stay off that crap.  Maybe something it's time to hit up the Middle East and some kind or something like that....seems like uncharted territory for the series oddly.

Tonight RoboCop 2014 is on.  This isn't anywhere near as good as the original with all the 80s brand snark but this is still a decent enough flick.  The part where Alex Murphy becomes a cyborg actually is done pretty well in those one...

sparker

Yeah, Die Another Day was the most ridiculous of the Brosnan four.  Goldeneye was excellent (there wasn't one bad piece of casting in that film -- Sean Bean always makes a good [and competent] baddie).  And if not for the fact that Denise Richards couldn't act her way out of a paper bag, The World is Not Enough wasn't all that bad (more good acting on the part of Robert Carlyle).  But whoever came up with the gene-replacement plot for D.A.D. should have their Writers' Guild membership revoked!  Also, the special effects sucked. 

Speaking of the writers' guild, I've gleaned from several sources (and a couple of friends who are in the Guild) that because of the writers' strike in late 2007 and early 2008, Quantum of Solace had no working screenplay at the time of shooting, just some preliminary notes from Paul Haggis (the original story/screenplay guy) and Purvis & Wade (the team that was to "polish" Haggis' concepts).  The actual shooting script was assembled on pretty much a daily basis by Barbara Broccoli (her producing partner, Michael G. Wilson, was a member of the guild due to his having co-written the last three Moore films and the two Dalton ones and couldn't officially contribute anything), Marc Forster (the director), Daniel Craig, Jeffrey Wright, and even Olga Kurylenko (who apparently was surprisingly good with dialogue!).  They'd all get together every morning and hash out what was to be shot that day, write it down in script form, and go from there.  It's no wonder the film seemed like it was put together by a committee -- it was! 

Max Rockatansky

Yeah Golden Eye was a huge surprise when it came out, I don't think anyone expected it to be as good as it was.  They actually played out a decent Post-Cold War plot probably as best expected and for what it's worth really kicked off people noticing Sean Bean dies in almost everything.  :-D  I always got a kick out of Tomorrow Never Dies and Elliot Carver being the over the top media villain trying to start a war.  Denise Richards trying to be a nuclear scientist was completely laughable but at least I think it got her out of the spotlight for being a terrible actress. 

Well that would probably explain why Quantum of Solace was all over the place like that.  I had the hardest time actually trying to figure out what the hell was going on at times between the action scenes.  At least the scenery was pretty unique out in the desert.

sparker

I got to know several longstanding members of the Eon Productions (the 24 "official" Bond films) production crew when they were filming "View To A Kill" in S.F. back in the summer of '84 (I introduced many of them to the Hunan Restaurant on Sansome street, and they were exceptionally grateful in return!).  There were some behind-the-scenes stories, including how Donald Pleasence ended up being the original (fully seen) Blofeld in You Only Live Twice.  It seems that originally they had cast a Czech stand-up comic named Jan Werich as Blofeld (he was a chubby guy with a white beard) after his agent told them he spoke English.  Well, he really didn't -- which pissed off Saltzman & Broccoli to no end, since they had gone through much the same thing with Gert Frobe in Goldfinger (they had to dub over 90% of his lines with a voice-over specialist).  Besides, in the intial scenes he had filmed (the control-room stuff with Connery) he came off more like a cackling Santa Claus than an evil mastermind.  Werich fell ill, so the producers decided to replace him before any more scenes were filmed; they paid him off, and he returned to Prague.  But that left them without a Blofeld.  It just so happened that another film, the Night of the Generals, was in the process of "looping" (voice overdubs), and the three actors who played the titular Nazi "generals" were at Pinewood Studios for that process -- Peter O'Toole, Charles Gray, and Donald Pleasance.  Broccoli wanted to approach O'Toole on a whim, but Saltzman talked him down from that for $$$ reasons!  Saltzman had worked with Gray before, and preferred him as Blofeld because of his physical presence.  They also needed to cast the doomed British agent Henderson; Saltzman suggested Pleasence as a "cameo" for this.  They approached both actors for those roles -- but Gray was opening in a London play in a couple of weeks, and could only work a day or so before going into rehearsals -- and the Blofeld scenes would require a few weeks' worth of shooting.  And Pleasance was free for several weeks before his next film booking.  After consulting with the make-up crew about ways to make the 5'6" & 125 lb. Pleasance more menacing (they decided on the famous "monocle scar" design), they reversed the roles, and Gray portrayed Henderson (the scene was shot in 1 day!), and Pleasance made history as the first -- and best-remembered (partially due to the Dr. Evil character in Austin Powers) Blofeld.  Ironically, in Diamonds Are Forever, 4 years later, Gray finally played Blofeld (the interim Blofeld in On Her Majesty's Secret Service was Telly Savalas).

Of the three original (pre-Waltz) Blofeld portrayals, I'd rate Pleasance as the most purely evil character, Savalas as the toughest and most directly menacing (he came off as more an uber-gangster), and Gray as an arrogant, snide, and sarcastic CEO!  Christoph Waltz's later portrayal seemed to use elements of the Pleasence and Gray portrayals, but with Waltz's usual low-key subtlety. 

Oh, and one more thing:  The original producers' choice to play Goldfinger was the American actor Victor Buono (who was only 26 at the time but played much older due to his premature baldness and corpulence), but he had a chronic cardiac condition (which eventually killed him!) and was uninsurable in the U.K., so they were forced to look elsewhere.  At least he would have spoken English! 

Max Rockatansky

Personally I preferred Donald Pleasance in the roll, he pretty much nailed the "super villain" stereotype.  For whatever reason it always seemed like he was the only one ever standing up to Michael Myers in his Dr. Loomis roll in the Halloween films....Blofeld versus Michael Myers.

That's one hell of a story though how things changed on the fly and largely for the better.  It's funny how sometimes things derailing can actually end up making a character or movie better.

Max Rockatansky

#10
Dune is on....oh boy.  I even know what the Butlerian Jihad is because I read the Frank Herbert novels and sometimes still this movie is confusing as all hell.  I always liked this movie but probably because it's weird rather than good....  I'm at the part where the Spacing Guild is folding space to transport the House Atreides to Arrakis.  Incidentally when they throw out 350 degrees Kelvin that roughly translates into 170.3F.

sparker

Quote from: Max Rockatansky on August 26, 2016, 10:36:06 PM
For whatever reason it always seemed like he was the only one ever standing up to Michael Myers in his Dr. Loomis roll in the Halloween films....Blofeld versus Michael Myers.

Ironic, isn't it:  a more heroic Pleasance character confronting a character called Michael Myers, when the creator/star of the Austin Powers films -- and the Blofeld/Pleasance "spoofer" of record -- was Mike Myers.     :-D

Max Rockatansky

Actually that didn't occur to me until you mentioned it.  :-D  I remember thinking back when Mike Myers started popping up in movies and Halloween remakes were coming out that it would be funny he played Michael Myers.  :rolleyes:

Turned on the TV and the end of War Games was on.  Basically it was at the classic scene where the AI Joshua is deciphering the nuclear launch codes and basically concludes there isn't a winning movie.  Good movie and brings me back to a time where we were all worried about the "Reds" as opposed to "terrorists" and we had to practice "duck and cover" in school...like that was going to help at all.  :rolleyes:  You can definitely tell that Matthew Broderick wasn't the same actor after that 1987 where he killed a couple people in Ireland.

ET21

I just watched Scarface, Jurassic World, Jason Bourne, and the Dark Knight Trilogy this week.
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MN: I-90

Max Rockatansky

Yeah I never got around to Jason Bourne after I saw it was getting average movie reviews.  I'll probably just wait until it comes out on download or DVD.  I had a look for it the other day but it was only playing at night and I hate going to the movies after school kids get out.

I like Jurassic World in regards to the dinosaurs and big fight at the end, basically it turned into a monster movie.  The human characters and overall story were pretty forgettable or awful...at least they were written that way.  Godzilla 2014 was kind of the same way, basically you spent the whole movie just waiting for the scenes with the creatures in them.

The Dark Knight trilogy is probably the best series of super hero movies that were ever made.  The only problem is that they led to that whole offshoot of "dark" superhero movies that DC is chugging out today.  At least the Dark Knight Trilogy had some pretty decent humorous moments played in with the rest of the serious elements.  It's funny how well the Dark Knight movies nailed the villains but the Marvel movies can't for some reason.

Max Rockatansky

#15
Star Trek IV tonight...the most 80s of all the Star Trek Movies:








7/8

Quote from: Max Rockatansky on September 09, 2016, 12:30:33 AM
Star Trek IV tonight...the most 80s of all the Star Trek Movies:

I've only seen a small bit of this movie, and the 80's look with this strange plot about whales really threw me off guard. To be honest, it looked too weird, but I'm reading about it now and the reviews are pretty good. Maybe I should give it a proper chance next time and watch the whole thing.

Max Rockatansky

Quote from: 7/8 on September 09, 2016, 08:10:05 AM
Quote from: Max Rockatansky on September 09, 2016, 12:30:33 AM
Star Trek IV tonight...the most 80s of all the Star Trek Movies:

I've only seen a small bit of this movie, and the 80's look with this strange plot about whales really threw me off guard. To be honest, it looked too weird, but I'm reading about it now and the reviews are pretty good. Maybe I should give it a proper chance next time and watch the whole thing.

Out of the movies with the original series cast I'd probably put it second behind Wrath of Kahn.  Without giving too much away, the plot is strange but entertaining, and there is not a main villain but you really don't notice.  For me this is kind of the point where the series got it's somewhat sarcastic self deprecating sense of humor from that has carried into the new series.  For a time there was this theory about the even numbered Star Trek Movies being good and the odd numbers being bad.  Anyways....


US 81

Quote from: Max Rockatansky on September 09, 2016, 09:15:46 AM
Quote from: 7/8 on September 09, 2016, 08:10:05 AM
Quote from: Max Rockatansky on September 09, 2016, 12:30:33 AM
Star Trek IV tonight...the most 80s of all the Star Trek Movies:

I've only seen a small bit of this movie, and the 80's look with this strange plot about whales really threw me off guard. To be honest, it looked too weird, but I'm reading about it now and the reviews are pretty good. Maybe I should give it a proper chance next time and watch the whole thing.

Out of the movies with the original series cast I'd probably put it second behind Wrath of Kahn.  Without giving too much away, the plot is strange but entertaining, and there is not a main villain but you really don't notice.  For me this is kind of the point where the series got it's somewhat sarcastic self deprecating sense of humor from that has carried into the new series.  For a time there was this theory about the even numbered Star Trek Movies being good and the odd numbers being bad.  Anyways....



While none of the Star Trek films are really "deep", this one is probably the most easily understood / most "accessible" to viewers who are not familiar with the Star Trek universe.

roadman

QuoteIt's funny how well the Dark Knight movies nailed the villains but the Marvel movies can't for some reason

Because Marvel is more interested in keeping the franchise going than by producing movies that have actual plot lines.
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Max Rockatansky

Quote from: roadman on September 09, 2016, 06:02:54 PM
QuoteIt's funny how well the Dark Knight movies nailed the villains but the Marvel movies can't for some reason

Because Marvel is more interested in keeping the franchise going than by producing movies that have actual plot lines.

Yeah I've always been surprised that they have for the most part been at least "okay" movies if not decent the way they are trying to operate.  The Nolan Dark Knight movies really knew what villains to use and who to omit...same thing with some of the stranger Batman plot elements. 

Today's movie....Die Hard with a Vengeance which ironically seemed to be predicting the future.  :-D



I can't find the scene but there is one where John McClain asks Zeus "have I oppressed you today?"  The banter between Bruce Willis and Samuel L Jackson is priceless.  Hard to think Jeremy Irons was a serious actor before this:




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