Today I picked Cinderella Man instead of Willy Wonka, and now that I'm reading all your comments, I'm starting to think I might have made a mistake.
It’s not that I don't like Tim Burton or especially Johnny Depp, but the movie just didn't feel right to me...
hm 🤔
I mean, I am pretty much obsessed with chocolate 🙂 so I figured watching a movie about chocolate (especially one starring Depp 🙂) would be total torture if I couldn't eat some while watching.
Anyway, whatever happens... you guys convinced me, I'm going to go watch it (armed with three pounds of Hershey's and Mozart truffles 😁)
Michelle Sanchez5 said:The movie is, just like you guys noticed, brutally bloody and kind of naive. The whole story plays out in a simulacrum—a place that looks like the US in the 21st century, but isn't quite it. It’s this martial arts world where normal rules of economics, politics, police work, physiology, or even gravity don't really apply. It's a world built out of allusions ranging from spaghetti westerns to Asian movies, with the director's presence layered over everything like some kind of superstructure.
I’m not really a fan of Tarantino's movies. Honestly, those Tarantino-style curses and the bluntness in every single sentence kind of bother me. I feel like you can make a high-quality film (or a novel, or a drama) without needing all that. Plus, this whole "alchemy" thing bugs me too. I mean, can anyone actually make something original nowadays? (Maybe total originality is impossible, I guess.) But does everything have to be mashed together? Does there have to be an allusion to something already existing in every single scene?
One thing is pretty clear, though—to fully love this movie, you basically have to be just as obsessed with the films that influenced Bill as Tarantino is. Personally, I didn't leave the theater feeling particularly hungry or impatient to see a sequel.
By some miracle, there’s even a Brechtian (well, maybe...) allusion here—the way each chapter title is displayed, Richardson's photography full of heavy, bright colors, and that skillfully stylized scene that owes a lot to Yohei Taneda.
I've had enough of these reviews where critics just try to sound smarter than they actually are. So, I figured I should just take matters into my own hands and write a review the way it should be done. Maybe I'll get lucky, or maybe not.
He talks a big game, but that doesn't really suit you 70% of the time. At least not for me.
I don't adore any of Tarantino's influences, nor do I even know who they are, and frankly, I don't care. I don't even adore Tarantino. So what now?
I really vibe with movies like this. I mean, it's just visually stunning. But honestly, it’s actually good too.
There were a couple of scenes that were just... intense. Like, the final dance with the drums... I stepped out to grab a burger and when I came back, she was still dancing 😁,
And that thing where they go a bit overboard with her being blind—since she can basically see everything (I mean, she isn't actually blind, she's just pretending, so who would ever believe her???)
Overall, it was really well done. Still, I don't think it beats Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and definitely not House of Flying Daggers, though that one is a bit more grounded, I guess.
I finally sat down and watched Hero last night. 👍 Now THAT is what I call a beautiful film. The cinematography alone deserves 5 Oscars. The plot felt a little weak to me at first, but they pulled it together masterfully toward the end. And those different versions of how everyone dies? Just great.
But it did feel a bit long. Some people say you shouldn't watch these kinds of films at home. I suppose I agree. 🙂
lepa.pametna@neudata said:The true value of this movie—the part that goes way beyond just being visually stunning—is how the lead, Mia, faces her choice. She’s stuck between two men. Even though traditional morality tells us it's impossible to be irresistibly drawn to one person while still having deep feelings for someone else, she loves them both. And she knows that no matter who she picks, she'll end up living with regret. So, she chooses...
[cue the dramatic music]
... her own death.
As the ONLY acceptable and, therefore, r-i-g-h-t-e-o-u-s option.
Is that really how you see things?
If you're attracted to two guys at once, is it honestly more honorable to die than to live with that "messy" reality?
🙄
Why do you think this one uniquely special, "different" woman from the East ultimately had to die when faced with such an ambiguous choice?
northernfalcon30, you've got it wrong. A total mistake.
We don't look at things through our lens here. In our world, everything is fair game—it's more like, "why not both?" But in that Eastern culture, which feels totally foreign to our American way of thinking, honor comes before everything else.
Carol Ortiz4 said:...... Before you start throwing shade at BAR, just keep in mind that Charlie Whiting actually gave their system the green light back at the start of the season...
It really doesn't matter whether they use that tank or not. If the rules say you can't use it, then you just can't. I think we're talking about the full tank here.
I don't have anything against BAR, personally. I guess.
The FIA is just known for constantly messing around with things, though I don't really think they're targeting BAR specifically.
The only thing I forgot to bring up was that whole socio-political and other... angle regarding the film:
Watching it, you might think, "Wow, those boys were so sweet and peaceful..." but we all know how things actually went down in Cuba and eventually with Che Guevara.
As far as just being a movie, it’s great because it avoids all that heavy-handedness about later political angles and stands on its own. Honestly, they could have made this about Nikola Tesla and it would have worked just as well.
But if we can't ignore the fact that this is about Guevara, then maybe the film is a bit unrealistic in how it portrays a revolutionary who was actually quite different from what we see.
Ugh!! I'm getting tired of all this constant complaining.....🙂
This movie was honestly one of the best things I saw last year. 👍
What really gripped me was how it managed to be socially conscious and political, yet still felt fun, grounded, and adventurous all at once. It didn't overdo any single part; it just balanced everything perfectly into one cohesive story.
By the way, the story is actually true—like someone else mentioned before, both he and his closest friend kept diaries, so the film is basically a blend of those two accounts.
Speaking of the Amazon River, I used to work for a guy who was Peruvian, and from what I remember of his stories, crossing parts of the Amazon River can be doable, especially during certain dry seasons, but it's incredibly risky.
Just a wonderful film. And when the song won an Academy Award, I was practically jumping for joy!
Oh, one more thing. The singer gave probably the best speech at the Academy Awards in the last ten years!
Since everyone was raving about it, I figured I’d give it a shot and try to get through the beginning (well, as much as you can watch anything while your computer is acting up and you're stuck formatting a hard drive 😁)
..but after watching just a few scenes, I was honestly like, "WTF?" and just gave up. Plus, it felt kind of pointless to struggle through—I mean, I could pretty much understand the dialogue anyway, so there wasn't really a reason to deal with the hassle of trying to follow along...
I guess I'm just definitely not one for American indie films 🙂
If anyone actually went to see this sequel hoping for a decent movie, it was definitely me.
I watched the first one maybe three or four times, and honestly, I’ll still watch it whenever it pops up on TV. It's always good. And we don't even need to get into the cast...🙂
But this? I walked into the theater and could barely make it to the credits because it was just unnecessarily long—like, they could have cut thirty minutes easily. It was monotonous, and frankly, it felt pointless. As for the plot or the script, well, I'm basically typing this with my left big toe.😬 ...
I mean, jeez.
I won't go as far as saying it's a total catastrophe or complete garbage, but... there's hardly any decent scenery to look at, and if we're being totally objective, the acting is just completely uninspired. The guys and Zeta Jones and Douglas were the same way. She's pretty, so I guess everyone just forgives her.😁
All in all, I wouldn't suggest going to the theater unless you're forced to or you really can't think of a better way to blow thirty bucks.
Steven Soderbergh, shame on you. You should've let someone else sign off on this one instead of yourself.
p.s. In some older posts here, someone mentioned that a guy named Vincent dances in the movie. Really? I have no clue. I think I might have fallen asleep during that part.🙂
The movie really saves Billy Bob, but honestly, I was cracking up the whole time regardless. (It felt a bit like Johnny English to me—you know, those movies people call trash, but I thought they were genius because I spent ninety minutes laughing my head off) ...
There are some brilliant lines in there, but obviously, Bad Santa is bad, so if you were expecting anything else—well, you shouldn't have.
So, for me, the movie was great. That’s why we were playing with balloons in the back row, and that’s why this really cute guy ended up sitting right next to me in my favorite seat.
I don't want to get carried away here, but if you aren't counting everything Spielberg did before Mosquito Coast—and sure, we can all agree he made a masterpiece with Dead Poets Society...
Things after the 80s are a bit more debatable, I guess. A great director stays great, but that doesn't mean every single thing they touch turns out to be a hit. For me, Master and Commander was actually pretty good, mostly because I just have a soft spot for those kinds of seafaring movies, but it isn't exactly a cinematic landmark.
Gallipoli and The Year of Living Dangerously, along with Witness, are easily in my top 50 films of all time. They’re just incredibly smart, complex movies that handle the clash of different cultures in such a phenomenal way.