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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.
MacArthur - 5/10
Regarding General Macarthur's life from WWII to the Korean War. It's a big ask for a movie to cover a decade of someone's life and so it wasn't really a surprise that it didn't quite work. He was a very interesting person and big personality in real life, but the performance of the actor left a lot to be desired. He more or less had just a single expression throughout most of the movie which is one of those things that you can't unsee. Pretty disjointed movie too, jumping from one thing to the next too way too quickly, like it wants to skip to the good parts. At one stage it even had a weird news reel montage to skip ahead 3-4 years. I'm glad to have watched it though, seemed like a good way to learn more about such an important historical figure. Maybe it would work better as a miniseries or something because this was a clunky film.
Lords of Chaos - 6/10
About Mayhem, pioneer Norwegian black metal band. I felt very immersed since they don't hold back in showing what happens - all the darkest sides of humans to the point that it basically becomes a horror movie in many scenes. They are some very powerful scenes, and as someone that likes a lot of black metal and so have read and seen a ton of things about what the movie portrays, I know that those things are indeed exactly what happened or at least very close to what happened (there are artistic liberties but it's smaller things, not really important in my opinion as it doesn't take away from these true events).
As for the quality of it as a movie, they did a lot with what they had. It was pretty obvious how limited budget their budget was, and they did make it go a long way, but there were odd choices. Colour grading was weird, soundtrack was great, locations were good, main character played by Rory Culkin was great, supporting character's actor was awful. So a very mixed movie but ultimately well worth the watch - will not ever watch it again though because of the horrific scenes mentioned above. I won't mention specifics/spoil it, but two scenes in particular were way too disturbing for me.
Elvis - 6/10
Hoped for an A Complete Unknown level movie but was left kind of unsatisfied. It also had a style to it that I didn't quite vibe with. I get what they were going for, but overall, that editing and hyped up thing didn't work for me.. like, I really don't understand why you'd want a hiphop soundtrack for a period piece. The overall look of the film was also disappointing. They had an airport/airfield scene for example which looked like everything was a giant bluescreen - like, why don't you just find an actual airfield to make that scene? This is also the worst I have ever thought of Tom Hanks, truly awful, which really surprised me as I usually think he's good (although I can never see him in the roles he play, no matter what, I only ever see Tom Hanks). I realize I'm sounding pretty negative about it and so but Austin Butler almost made up for most of these things, I really loved him in this. The story was also great. Unlike MacArthur above, they successfully crammed decades of story into 2½ hours and it definitely worked. Writing was great, just too bad there are so many things to drag it down.
I saw Elvis in theaters and liked it a lot. Baz Luhrmann definitely has a distinct style and it works for some and not others. I’m not the biggest fan of his films (Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rogue being his most popular) but I did enjoy The Great Gatsby.
I think Baz’s reasoning with the updated soundtrack is to put the popularity of the music at the time into today’s context. He did a reverse of it in Gatsby where he had popular songs covered in an old timey way. I actually dig his production design in Elvis (even moreso in Gatsby) I think there’s a lavishness to it even if there is also an artificiality to it. The Great Gatsby is probably still his best looking film though.
I also love the way the film is edited, with its frantic and kinetic pacing, but also done well enough that you’re not left with whiplash.
I have only seen The Great Gatsby, been a while, and apparently only rated that one 6/10 as well. I do remember the same problems with some strange CGI as they drive through an oil field (?). Otherwise the CGI was great - there's a reel of it somewhere and you have no idea about a lot of it. And you're right, it is mostly really good looking. They really hit home with the lavishness. I did feel a bit of whiplash in Elvis though so disagree there.
It makes me a bit worried for the upcoming Jean d'Arc film. I have been wanting an epic movie about her for a long time (as well as Lady Godiva but that's entirely different of course, I digress), and yeah, I really fear I won't like it very much if he's doing it in his usual full on nothing-held-back stylized way. All I want from true stories like hers is realism, historical accuracy, and for it to be as down to earth as possible.
Watched Lars and the Real Girl last night. All I really knew about it was that it was a quirky comedy where Ryan Gosling falls in love with a sex doll. I was absolutely not ready for the very heartfelt and sincere film that it actually was. Liked it a lot. Ryan Gosling is a great actor.
Disney's Snow White
This is has the highest budget of any of the live action Disney movies, and somehow looks the worst out of all of them.
A couple of days ago I got this video in my recommended feed that covered 2012's Snow White and the Huntsman. I watched the film back during release, but I had not a single memory of it. The clips used in the video helped me realize "wow movies used to look incredible."
This rendition of Snow White does not hold a candle to the 13 year old adaptation. Art Direction, Costume Designs, VFX, and especially performances are horrifically worse in Disney's version. Watching that video reminded me of something else that I read, about the production of the Harry Potter films since those films look better than a lot of the blockbusters we get now. The technical crew was relatively embarrassed to be working on a fantasy children's film so they decided to make it look as best as it possibly could. Alfonso Cuaron attempted to elevate the material into a more arty direction. This was the principle Christopher Nolan had when making Batman Begins, elevating the material which included having Oscar winning and nominated actors in supporting roles to give it more credibility. Remnants of this philosophy can still be found in Snow White and the Huntsman with it's gorgeous cinematography and production design, as well as the casting of Oscar winner Charlize Theron.
Now-a-days we get this drab. Not a single frame is shot in a real location. The few set designs we have that aren't CG look cheap and tacky (compare it to Wicked's PD and this pales in comparison). The cinematography is flat and boring. The editing is worse. And instead of prestige actors in supporting roles we get... Gal Gadot.
Everything feels amaeturish. Most of the performances are bad, Zegler is fine in the role although she's not given much to work with. It is so poorly written, everything added and changed is cliche and badly paced. The only song left from the original film is Whistle While We Work (A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes has been replaced for whatever reason) and none of the original songs are really memorable. Nor is there any show stopper musical number, I would say there isn't even much of a climax.
It's really a baffling film from Disney. I've enjoyed plenty of their live-action adaptations (Cinderella and Cruella are genuinely good movies while stuff like Aladdin and Maleficent are suitable entertainment). But this is really so far below most of the theatrical films Disney has made under this "franchise." I suppose they were in a bit of a corner considering we've gotten several live action Snow White adaptations so they can't really do what any of them have, but also there's not enough to the original film to justify a nearly two hour runtime. Still, they probably could have done better.