Originally posted by @TedMaul
Mark Kermode is an idiot
I note that there is no denial of Camembert and Gitannes.
what is the fourth wall?
The one you knocked down to build that bathroom
Or ā¦ https://fttreading.wordpress.com/2012/05/31/breaking-the-fourth-wall-direct-address-in-the-cinema-4/
Rather ashamed to say Iāve only just gotten around to watching American Beauty. Really rather impressed overall. Some great performances and a non hollywood ending. No idea how is slipped past my radar.
My kid and I have been into Deadpool for years reading the comics, heās way too young to take to the Cinema for it though. Loved all the shorts that Reynolds put together when pitching it trying to get it made. Deadpool broke 4th wall even as a comic strip character , thought his part in th wolverine movie was awful and nothing like the deadpool we all wanted
Watched Bone Tomahawk tonight. Just out I believe and Kurt Russell stars as a sheriff in a small town, who sets out with a rag-tag bunch on a rescue mission following a kidnapping by violent persons unknown. In many ways, an old fashioned western, with plenty of time spent building the characters, the scenario and the resulting tension.
BUT - its not like any other western film for sure. Described in one review as 80% western, 20% horror, the violence, when it comes, is brutal and you need to seriously brace yourself for the final 20 minutes or so. It will not be for everyone but it is brilliantly acted, has great scenery, is darkly witty in places and wow, does it pack a punch. Loved it.
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Cheers, Bucks. Wasnāt aware of that coming out. Looks right up my street.
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But is it as good & as scary/horrific as Cowboys v Aliens Bucks?
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There was Oscar beef between that movie and Fight Club, which imo, is 100x better than that movie. When I saw your post, I googled American Beauty vs Fight Club, and found even more. This is an article which compares four films from the same year, the two Iāve already mentioned, Office Space and The Matrix, and finds common ground.
There was the Best Picture winner at the Oscars, American Beauty. There was the groundbreaking action/science-fiction franchise-maker, The Matrix. There was the dorm-room cult classic Fight Club and the endlessly quotable Mike Judge magnum opus Office Space. And all these films had as their protagonist a white male middle-class guy whose primary motivation is disliking the fact that he is gainfully employed at a stable, well-paying, boring office job.
Certainly in real life most of us would probably rate āboring office jobā as a better life choice than āfast-food worker,ā āpedophile,ā āanarchist domestic terrorist,ā or āguerrilla freedom fighter in a post-apocalyptic hellscape.ā And yet Lester Burnham and Fight Clubās Narrator seem to get a spring in their step and a lightness in their heart from being liberated from making a decent paycheck and being able to afford groceries and mortgage payments. Hell, Neo throwing away material comfort in return for, essentially, living on a decrepit submarine comes with the reward of being able to stop bullets with his mind and fly.
What we have, in other words, in all of these films is a Hollywoodized Buddhist message that material comfort isnāt everything and that freeing ourselves from attachments to material things like jobs and mortgages is the key to true enlightenment and happiness.
ā¦ I know, right? If I have any millennial-aged friends around who care at all about movies, ripping into the 1999 Iām Employed, Boo-Hoo Tetralogy is a ritual. Going around in a circle talking about why we want to punch Lester Burnham in the face is classic generational bonding for us millennial film buffs at our social gatherings in our parentsā basements, as is waxing poetic about how much weād like to escape into the Matrix, the simulated reality where the Machines keep us enslaved by giving us steady paychecks and nice apartments.
Brilliant.
Saw the new Michael Moore earlier this week. Moore normally annoys me - his films strike me as pretty much propaganda pieces which play to the anti-American sentiment. But watching it the States with some very left wing friends put a different context on it - they are genuinely horrified by some of the things their country does, and the āany tactic to wake a country up to how things could be differentā approach made more sense. Momentarily.
You sound like a borderline communist Lou, with your lefty friends
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Michael Moore is a brilliant man, never afraid to show the truth, watching the Martian tonight.
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I saw that the other day and really enjoyed it. I didnāt notice Michael Moore in it though.
Ha Ha Iām yet to see him as well.
Totally. First Tory I ever met in my life was Chertsey.
Communism is great until you get to the hierarchy bitā¦
Iām crap at watching movies in any sort of time, but Iāve finally seen all of Django Unchained. Itās a dizzying experience, and probably the best movie Iāve seen from Tarantino, Hateful Eight included, probably because itās so satisfying and managed to tickle my brain while I was watching it.
Donāt get me wrong; in most senses, itās your typical Tarantino film, but the time period allows him to play with some pretty big themes, such as the value of education and the evil that emerges when humans are the property of others. Maybe Iām looking too much into it, the education thing is particularly relevant. Django is probably a gun-savant, but his education allows him to speak the same language that would use his lack of it to classify, or subjugate him.
Loved Foxx in this movie; Christoph Waltz was also excellent, as were De Caprio and Samuel L. One of my pals refers to this as Mr Jacksonās best performance, perhaps because it was so small. Itās a lot better than turning up in an eyepatch at the end of a Marvel film, thatās for sure. Most of all though, I donāt think a Tarantino film has ever had worthier characters than this one.
Most of his movies, the latest included, are usually filled with complete bastards. Even though the Inglorious Bastards were fighting the Germans, they were still bastards. The clue is in the name - just happened to be fighting on the right side. Django is on a worthy mission, and itās almost impossible not to feel thrilled as he tears up a world that says he has no rightful place in it.
We have very different tastes in film, you & I, pap.
Risk of sounding a bit poncy but enjoyed Force Majeure. Swedish subtitled but interesting about what happens when husband and father acts cowardly. On Netflix - well US library definitely.
also really enjoyed Big Short but may have been discussed already.
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