11
votes
Midweek Movie Free Talk
Have you watched any movies recently you want to discuss? Any films you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.
Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.
I'm gonna make a few posts here ngl.
The Iron Claw
I'm really impressed with Zac Efron's career evolution, and how he started choosing interesting projects starting with Neighbors. I think he's really talented, even if the projects he chooses don't end up good like The Beach Bum. I think this is the first time in a long time for him that he's actually picked up critical acclaim. I believe he deserved acclaim for The Greatest Beer Run Ever last year and I believe critics were only harsh on it due to Farrelly having won Picture with Green Book.
This is really good. It's from the guy who made Martha Marcy May Marlene with Elizabeth Olsen back in 2011. So it's a wrestling movie in the vein of The Wrestler. It's artsier and insanely depressing. It's really good. The performances are all fantastic with Efron and Jeremy Allen White standing out. I like the soundtrack and I like the visual flair of the film.
One of my internet pals really liked this movie and has it as his top 5 of the year. I don't think I liked it that much but I will like it more in rewatches. It's a little bit of a tearjerker too.
Ferrari
I thought this was awesome. It's a classic melodrama with big theatrical performances from Adam Driver and Penelope Cruz. It's big in emotions, the racing scenes are fucking sick. The sound design is awesome. I think it has more in common with Ford v Ferrari than I expected, and I really love that movie so I'm happy with this.
It has really beautiful cinematography as well. It's just a really technically fantastic film.
I agree! I think Effrons turnaround started with Neighbors and so far I have been a big fan of his progression. I hope we continue to see him grow and take on more interesting and challenging roles.
All in all, I really liked Iron Claw. I went in blind (like I do with most movies) and had no idea what to expect. The Von Erichs were one of those names I heard about growing up and passively being interested in wrestling - but this story is really insane. I'm a bit surprised someone hasn't tried to make a movie about it before.
All of the performances were great and all of the brothers had great on-screen chemistry. Efferon and JAW getting shredded for this movie really showed crazy commitment. Harris Dickson was also a great choice. I hadn't heard about him and I wasn't sure about him until this movie. I think the man has talent and hopefully we will see more of him. I think Holt McCallany was the right choice for the dad. He played the role really well.
If you haven't seen it, I say give it a shot. It's been one of my favorite movies this year.
Yeah I had no idea about the real life people so when everything started unraveling I was shocked. And it just kept going.
If you haven’t already you should watch Beer Run. I think that’s a great Efron performance.
Sorry to be a bit pedantic, but their names are spelled Zac Efron and Harris Dickinson.
If you liked Harris Dickinson, check out Triangle of Sadness.
Lol not pedantic, I was typing on mobile and not thinking much about spelling.
Triangle of Sadness actually looks really good. Thanks for the suggestion!
So I watched 51 movies in theaters this year. I kept a list and I don't plan on watching any more movies in theaters these next few days. Here it is:
Comparing this to last year when I saw 24. The last one also having been watched the day after Christmas (that one being Babylon). More movies came out this year and also I had more cash to spend on this.
I don't think I've seen 51 movies in the theaters in my entire life (of 45+ years). You're single handedly keeping Hollywood alive 😅
I actually retroactively did a list like this for most years that I could remember. It's actually rare in most years that I hit 30 movies in theaters. The only other year I even hit 50 was in 2017 when MoviePass came out and I watched 67 movies. Before I had MoviePass I would rely on advance screenings, which were free raffles to watch a movie anywhere from a month to a few days early. Those were still not for every movie and I still wouldn't hit 30. And before that I would go maybe ten times a year, that's when I was a teenager and didn't have any money.
The only reason it was so high this year was because my sister's job recently got a perk that she gets free tickets at both Regal and AMC. So a lot of the latter part of the list I ended up seeing for free. If it wasn't for that I probably wouldn't have seen stuff like Priscilla, Anatomy of a Fall, Boy and the Heron, or Iron Claw in theaters. But I'm glad I was able to because I am insanely impatient.
Recently took at trip to South Korea and watched Phantom (유령) on the flight and really enjoyed it! I'm terrible as summarizing movies so I'll pull the synopsis from Wikipedia. It's a period spy action thriller set in the 1930s during the Japanese colonization of Korea. The story starts with a failed attempt to assassinate the new Japanese resident-general by an anti-Japanese organization. The colonial government then gathers 5 suspects in a remote hotel to hunt down the so-called "Phantom" or spy planted by the anti-Japanese organization. The film follows the five suspects as they each try to clear their suspicions and return to their normal lives. I didn't know about this movie until I caught a glimpse of it on another passenger's screen on my flight. I saw glimpses of Park So-dam and Park Hae-soo, best known internationally from Parasite (2019) and Squid Game (2021), which caught my attention. Once I found the movie on the in-flight entertainment system, it had my attention for its entire 133 minute run time. Definitely recommend giving it a watch!
The same cannot be said for another movie I tried watching, Gran Turismo. I'm a big racing fan and love playing the Gran Turismo games but I really did not like this film. I made it about an hour into the film before stopping. In the movie's defense, the racing shown in that hour is pretty nice and relatively engaging. The story was extremely weak imo. I know the movie is just supposed to be an ad for the games but it was way more of an advertisement than I was expecting. In that first hour, characters were constantly mentioning how great GT is and how it's so accurate that it's not a game but a full on racing simulator. From what I read online, the story improves a bit after that first act but I just couldn't do it.
I finished Béla Tarr's Sátántangó from 1994 yesterday. More than seven hours of black and white long takes about poor farmers in rural Hungary. Really taking the pretentious arthouse level to 11. I am not a purist so I didn't watch it in one setting, but split over three evenings at the included intermissions. Though if a local cinema did an event of this, I would totally be interested in watching it again.
The average shot length is close to 3 minutes, which compared to the average modern movie with an average shot length of about 4-5 seconds, makes this for a non-traditional movie experience to say the least. I am sort of a sucker for long takes in movies and this ordeal almost became a personal study in what that can hold my attention. I am the sort of person who grabs for their phone while waiting 30 seconds for the water to boil, and I sometimes become restless and bored with many modern movies that despite well developed plots and efficient shot editing, still makes me reach for my phone. I can't fully explain it, but taking the long shots of mundane things on screen - like people walking through mud or packing their suitcase - mesmerized me to the screen. Something about long slow takes that demands attention and focus.
I believe there is a little tendency when watching these kinds of long arthouse highly acclaimed so called masterpieces, that one must come to the same conclusion. Maybe even sort of a Stockholm-syndrome effect - like you have just spent more than 7 hours with this thing, it has to be a worthwhile or life changing experience. I am not really settled on that yet, because I was more fascinated by the whole concept of what film can also be - rather than being emotionally invested. The film clearly conveys a great deal of misery, hopelessness and nihilism, but it didn't really grab me in a personal way. The film feels a lot more philosophical and intellectual. Its literary source is very apparent and I might pick up the novel at some point.
It is still one of the very few films that I immediately felt like I want to revisit at some point. The structure is not strictly linear and there is some cyclical nature that inspires one to go back to the beginning and see everything again with the complete picture in mind.
From my recollection many of those shots were long because they had to use up all the film on the camera reel. Something about there being no budget to frivolously throw away unexposed film or something like that.
I own it and have tried to watch it but it’s just so bleak. And long. It sounds like you had a revelatory experience with it and I’m kinda jealous. ☺️
Not really sure how that makes sense. They dont save on the budget by putting it in the final film at least. I just think it is Bela Tarr’s style. Long shots are prevalent in all his films.
I did preface my comment with “my recollection”. I didn’t say how good my recollection is 😆
I just remember something about 35mm cartridges being 11 minutes long and not wanting to waste film left on the cartridge by doing shorter takes. That some of the scenes end when the film runs out. That it cost the same to develop regardless of actual film used. Money may have been a separate topic of the film that my brain mixed in.
Again, my (poor) recollection and I could be mixing it up with someone/thing else. That I can’t find any mention of it in a few internet searches makes me think I fever-dreamed it to realization as to why his shots were always so long.
Alright what’s everyone’s most anticipated for next year. Theres not a lot of movies coming out, seems kind of empty.
I wish I could answer, but I’m so out of the loop, I have no idea what’s coming out this year, bar Dune: Part 2, which I am definitely watching!
Watching Ang Lees Sense and Sensibility. It's a beautiful moving film and Broke back Mountain was groundbreaking. I don't know his recent work.
Re sense and Sensibility, it is interesting to see a younger Alan Rickman. That voice is now indelibly Severus Snape
Sense and Sensibility is my favorite Jane Austen adaptation. I love Hugh Grant and Emma Thompson’s chemistry.
Hammarskjöld
Director: Per Fly | Year: 2023
Actors: Mikael Persbrandt, Francis Chouler, Cian Barry
Rating: ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
Links: IMDb