Film/Video Discussion Thread - The Bear and Badger

poprock

Yeah, I’ve only had the pokey bum check once and I thought that was normal.

poprock

Flawless page turn victory.

g.man

Was it your birthday?

acemuzzy

poprock wrote:

Flawless page turn victory.

Lol, that's made my whole week

Spoiler:

Moot_Geeza

I've only had it once. E.coli.

EvilRedEye

I’m convinced some people are gonna walk out from this screening of Anatomy of a Fall once their popcorn runs out.

DrewMerson

EvilRedEye

Ruh-roh, they’ve had to stop the film because the subtitles aren’t on for the French bits.

EvilRedEye

Anatomy of a Fall (2023) - Sandra Hüller stars as a woman whose husband has either been murdered or committed suicide in this riveting legal drama. The whole thing is super ambiguous from start to finish, particularly Hüller‘s deservedly Oscar-nominated performance. A really good, cerebral film. I was on the fence about giving it four or five stars but there’s an absolutely beautiful doggo in it which swings it for me. ★★★★★

EvilRedEye

Just Killers of the Flower Moon left now, which I’ve decided I will NOT be watching in the cinema as the Cineworld was less comfortable than my local cinema (it was cold and ended up sat there in my coat and gloves, plus they fucked up the subtitles and had to rewind part of the movie). Can’t be arsed.

EvilRedEye

A random YouTube comment made me realise I really understated how good the dog is - there’s a scene where the dog actually, properly acts, it’s amazing!

Also I’ve just realised Sandra Hüller also played Hedwig Höss in The Zone of Interest, what a year she’s had!

SpaceGazelle

Winnie the Poo seems to have lost some of his charm.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-68510904

davyK

New version of Caligula on its way. The original negatives have been found. Not a single frame of the released versions remains in this...

regmcfly

That's genuinely fascinating

nick_md

MK someone's doing that thing you do but with Titanic

https://amp.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/mar/08/experience-i-own-nearly-3000-vhs-tapes-of-titanic

acemuzzy

Moot_Geeza

Saw that earlier. Didn't read it all tbh, just sent him a death threat.

EvilRedEye

Seems like there’s a credible accusation the screenplay of The Holdovers was pretty radically plagiarised from a fairly well-known unproduced screenplay. Big drama!

Brooks

davyK wrote:

New version of Caligula on its way. The original negatives have been found. Not a single frame of the released versions remains in this...

Yeah I'm watching this gorgeous nonsense.

EvilRedEye

Killers of the Flower Moon (2023) - This narrative has all the runaway momentum of Sisyphus slowly and interminably pushing his immense boulder up a hill for all eternity. There’s clearly some very important history here and a decent performance by Lily Gladstone but in general it feels like Scorsese has failed, or perhaps not even attempted, to find the movie in these events. I’m not even sure the long run-time is actually the problem with this film - it would feel long at any length because it has no real narrative drive to it or any sense of momentum as a story. Leonardo DeCaprio’s character is ostensibly the protagonist of the movie but it doesn’t really feel like the movie has a protagonist at all. What is the point of adapting history into a movie if you don’t include the trappings - the brevity, the pacing, the characterisation - that make a movie, a movie?

The soundtrack is really bad and sounds like bed music for the background of YouTube videos someone found on a royalty-free music site and only serves to heighten the sense of interminability. There is a weird error in the script where a character uses the word ‘genocide’ despite it being fairly common knowledge that it was not coined at the time the events took place.

I found this movie boring and didn’t care about what was going on, which is an astonishing thing to have to say about a movie about genocidal serial killings. ★★☆☆☆

EvilRedEye

Here’s my final ranking of the Best Picture nominees:

1. The Zone of Interest (★★★★★)
2. The Holdovers (★★★★★)
3. Barbie (★★★★★)
4. Anatomy of a Fall (★★★★★)
5. Oppenheimer (★★★★☆)
6. American Fiction (★★★★☆)
7. Past Lives (★★★★☆)
8. Maestro (★★★☆☆)
9. Poor Things (★★★☆☆)
10. Killers of the Flower Moon (★★☆☆☆)

I’d strongly recommend all the films down to American Fiction. Past Lives, Poor Things and Killers of the Flower Moon were all many people’s genuinely absolute best film of the year though so YMMV. I’ve not seen a great consensus around Maestro and it seems like the odd one out, although Davy liked it.

Moot_Geeza

Great review of Flower Moon. Not that I've seen it yet, but it successfully puts me off.

JonB

I'd like to see quite a few of those still, which is uncommon for Oscar films these days. It's been a good year. All I've seen so far is:
Oppenheimer - very good
Flower Moon - quite good
Barbie - quite bad

tin_robot

EvilRedEye wrote:

Seems like there’s a credible accusation the screenplay of The Holdovers was pretty radically plagiarised from a fairly well-known unproduced screenplay. Big drama!

I read the article in Variety and thought “wow, that’s shocking”. Then I read Stephenson’s own deposition about the similarities and thought “oh, they’re both following the same fairly generic formula”.

I can’t see it resulting in anything terribly substantial, but who knows. It mainly left me thinking The Holdovers sounds like a lot of other movies.

hylian_elf

Are those the Best Movie nominations? Meh.

hylian_elf

Past Lives would take my pick.

davyK

I've developed a taste for plodding pictures that have great performances in them. Probably why I liked Flower Moon. Having said that - I've no real desire to see it again.

Scorsese has become very self indulgent with these longer films. But he's earned the right in my book. Loved The Irishman - must have watched it 3 times now.

I loved the performance in Maestro - and I might rewatch at some point. I found the concerts mesmerising and there's an argument the two leads have that I thought was stupendous.

hylian_elf

Still need to see The Holdovers out of those nominations.

EvilRedEye

I’ve had enough of full-length films for now but am checking out some Oscar nominated shorts.

The After (2023) - Archetypally short filmish to the point of cliche. I honestly think this was put together as a portfolio piece for the director rather than with the intention of engaging an audience. A guy is a big businessman who doesn’t make enough time for his family, then his wife and kid are murdered in broad daylight by some psycho guy in this weird, super-cliche-feeling scene. Then he’s suddenly a taxi driver who finds the similarities between his passengers and his dead family difficult to deal with. Didn’t do much for me and the world of short film can’t be in rude health if stuff like this is getting Oscar nominations. ★★★☆☆

EvilRedEye

Invincible (2022) - I’m confused how a 2022 short film is eligible for the 2024 Oscars but hey ho. I had to watch this on my fucking phone because Vimeo doesn’t have a TV app. A troubled French Canadian teen thinks he’s invincible, but is he really? This is a really well made little film. It’s only half an hour long but thanks to its roots as a real-life story actually manages to fit some emotions in. This shits on The After and if the former wins over this I will put my fist through a screen. ★★★★★

You can watch it for free here.

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