Posts by Rebecca Peterson3

jadedrifter17, I’m fairly certain you haven't actually watched this one (I can't even recall the title)...

It revolves around this terminally ill young girl who refuses to pass away until she gets a visit from an American President—I think it was either Carter or Clinton... and then, predictably, various humanitarian organizations step in to orchestrate a meeting between the President and the patient at the hospital. But the moment the kid finally sees Carter or Clinton, she just closes her eyes and drifts off into the great beyond...

Personally, I suppose I would have stepped in if the President were too busy playing peacekeeper on the global stage to show up, just so the child could cling to life for a little while longer...

Jack Murphy5 said:I honestly can't say how I would have handled it... 😛

I know that the ending didn't sit right with me at all.

It wasn't for me either, mostly because the director decides to pivot from an intensely realistic structure into something entirely different—that bus scene—in the literal final minutes of the film.

If I were in his shoes, I probably would have focused on their journey back home: the winter vacation concludes, we carry away certain experiences, and perhaps things in our marriage won't ever be quite the same... but that would require an extra ten or twelve minutes, and the film is already far too long.

Is it possible that the entire bus sequence was staged just to set up one of those final shots, where the mother tiredly hands her child over to a friend instead of her husband? A sign that some things simply aren't forgotten, and that nothing will ever return to the way it was...
If that's the intention (and it very well could be), then I find that ending perfectly acceptable.

Ethan Palmer61 said:That’s just how it works with Haneke; he simply refuses to grant you the luxury of a happy ending...

How can you say that isn't the case? Take that one movie where some guy brings a girl home under the pretense of studying together, only to brutally murder her... and then the old folks just swoop in, grab everything he’s built for themselves, and everyone lives happily ever after...?

Jack Murphy5 said:Force Majeure (2014)

It’s an incredibly solid film for the most part, though I have to say, those final few minutes are just utterly nonsensical...

I find myself wondering... how exactly would you go about reaching a climax in such a scenario...
He opted for that surrealist, Buñuel-esque path, which isn't exactly the most joyful way to live, though I suppose it’s certainly not the most foolish either...

bluenomad2 said:Most of the films by Ridley Scott and Quentin Tarantino.

signature.

It feels as though two separate stories were forced together into one single mess—the first part, which I suppose I could have anticipated, even if my expectations were low, and the second part involving a serial killer, which ends up being the sole reason the entire movie exists. It’s such a waste of a talented cast... (I'm intentionally ignoring the Russian accent, because despite the thin and lackluster plot, that's easily the most grating thing about the whole production).

briskhound2 said:I totally blanked on the fact that Ted Bundy used to hunt right by those railroad tracks—those endless lines... Anyway, look, there are plenty of nods to him, but the movie itself isn't actually about Ted Bundy. And honestly, Smith isn't the only one playing with that archetype; you see similar vibes from Donald James in *Monster* and *The Shoemaker* (though *The Shoemaker* definitely leans harder into it), and even Hannibal Lecter was partially inspired by his MO. So yeah, the references to Ted Bundy are legit, but the guy in this film is just some random, no-name killer... By stripping away all the specific details from the book, they turned him into such a bland, forgettable character that he’s almost irrelevant to the actual plot...

I should probably add a disclaimer here—I haven't actually read the book myself, but what I saw on screen was just pathetic (and honestly, I was looking forward to it so much because of such a talented cast...)

Casey Cox2, you've got a point there—'Citizen X' really is a perfect fit.

briskhound2 said:Look,
*Child 44* isn't actually a biography of Ted Bundy—it’s more like he was just used as a template, mostly to give the novel some weight. His connection to the book and the movie is really just that he was the most infamous serial killer from the old USSR, maybe one of the only ones who actually grabbed enough headlines to be recognizable. The movie itself doesn't really focus on him... it just sprinkles in a few nods to the whole "serial killer" vibe and the setting of America...

A serial killer, Russia, naked boys, train stations, locomotives... those references are certainly just "passing mentions," aren't they? 🍿

brightheron64 said:But honestly, I feel like that choice was more of a loss than a gain, especially for the audience that watched Citizen X.

If the plot required a serial killer, there were plenty of others right here in America to choose from... using Ted Bundy felt completely unnecessary when they could have easily just crafted a compelling fictional character instead...

It’s a bit like having a protagonist who is an Iranian mobster and deciding to name him Khomeini... quite pathetic and rather low-brow, really.

Jamie Turner80 said:The uncompromisingly anti-Russian, anti-Soviet, and anti-communist stance maintained by Child 44 stands as one of its few redeeming qualities, and arguably its most significant. The decision to set the narrative strictly in 1953—the year of Stalin's death—is both deliberate and wise. Naturally, the film uses the past to comment on the present, though it does so with zero subtlety; there is an excess of heavy-handedness here, including certain early references to the Ukrainian famine that feel somewhat forced by the time they pay off later in the story. However, no one forced Putin's censors to rise up and defend Stalin's legacy. The issue, much like with any direct and blunt demonstration of ideology, might be that Ridley and his creative team leaned into this approach specifically to stir the pot. They focused so heavily on making a statement that the film itself begins to unravel at the seams. Beyond its rigid political stance and a barrage of loaded references—the famine, World War II, Stalinist paranoia, aggressive communist propaganda, a repressive society, and, for good measure, the killer Chikatilo—the movie offers very little else of substance. Noise and fury, as a rule, serve only to mask poor material and structural flaws.

more at:
http://film-na-dan.blogspot.com/2015/06/child-44.html

It is nothing more than foaming, hysterical garbage attempting to stitch together things that simply do not belong together—Ted Bundy and an investigation of that nature just couldn't have happened in the 1950s; it was far too early... you can't just pluck a serial killer out of his own historical context and plug him into whatever scenario suits your whim (though I suppose having Ridley in the credits helps somewhat...🤣
after witnessing this, Citizen X (which is actually a decent film) looks like a goddamn masterpiece.

Nicolaus Copernicus—well, he’s certainly not a complete stranger to us, though I suppose we could say he doesn't exactly command the same immediate recognition as some others...

Noah Roberts46 said:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1846526/?ref_=tt_rec_tt

I found this one to be an absolute waste of my time... honestly, just complete garbage.

I'm with you on that.
Rutger Hauer was the only thing making this remotely watchable, so I think I'll definitely be skipping the remake...

The cell phone is being blamed while the writer takes center stage, though I have to wonder... haven't they exhausted this particular narrative trope by now? 🤦

swiftsurfer27 said:The concept is brilliant, but I have to admit, I’m feeling skeptical. My King has let me down before.

All I see when I look at that image above is a textbook example of fake political correctness—as if they need to check off every single box for diversity just to make it look like some United Colors of Benetton ad 😁 featuring those two kids... it just feels sort of meh to me.

I still haven't forgiven Stephen King for begging Rowling to keep Potter alive; honestly, he can go jump in a lake.

Regardless, I'll give it a look. I do like the idea itself.

Exactly. ☕

I find myself quite captivated by those films where characters are initially presented as perfectly normal, even beautiful, human beings, only to have some external catalyst—be it a smartphone, a stray meteorite, an annoying neighbor, or even just a random group of civilians from the Middle East—suddenly strip away every ounce of their humanity and transform them into mindless, bloodthirsty monsters🍿

What can I even say? I am genuinely looking forward to 🙂
I’ve already sat through every single movie based on books by King, so this one is definitely on my list...

A toxic individual can leave someone’s very soul fractured and cause irreparable harm to a child, only to then navigate those consequences with their signature brand of malice... and that is precisely where the strength and sheer scale of Jennifer's performance lies.

If I had realized this list was curated by Tarantino, I wouldn't have bothered casting my vote...
What was actually so difficult about typing out the titles of the movies you've watched (you, not Tarantino)?

It’s nothing that hasn't already surfaced deep within the rabbit hole...

Grace Sanchez50 said:By that logic, even 2001: An Odyssey wouldn't even qualify as Sci-Fi🤷 according to your reasoning

Well, actually, the difference is night and day. You should probably just read what wiredraven82 wrote; they’ve already laid it all out for you quite clearly... several times over, in fact.

Grace Sanchez50 said:Gravity is Sci-Fi☕

I mean, what exactly makes it Sci-Fi?

It’s certainly worth a look...