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| gromit |
 Posted: Tue Nov 12, 2013 1:13 am |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9010
Location: Shanghai
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Frances Ha is Noah Baumbach's b&w NYC film about late 20-somethings having to grow up. It reminded me a lot of late 70's Woody Allen, in its mood and pace/editing and use of music. In many ways it plays as a reinvention of Annie Hall, with Frances drifting and unsure of herself, but the main relationship being with her girlfriend from college, as they drift apart and become estranged.
The guys in the film are curiously flaccid and trying hard to be hip and confident, in a wimpy way. It even has that over-privileged white NY world Woody was comfortable in. At a few points it comes off as over-written. But it's mostly an enjoyable interesting film. Nothing really happens but we see a confused life trajectory, as Frances is adrift and stumbling through towards adulthood. Greta Gerwig is much better here in the lead than that Lola Versus film I barely made it through.
Hmm, just IMDbing GG and now i see that she was in Woody's Rome film in 2011. And since she co-wrote F Ha with Baumback, maybe I'm on to something reading the film as a Woody homage. Possibly just coincidence, I suppose... |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Tue Nov 12, 2013 6:05 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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| All is Lost is a one-man film starring Robert Redford as a man aione at sea and in dire straits. Redford is still interesting and he certainly commands the screen, but the film is a little dry, sort of (to quote my wife) like a training film for "how to survive at sea." The ending is beautiful and borderline profound, but getting there is a bit of a snooze. |
Last edited by billyweeds on Tue Nov 12, 2013 9:47 am; edited 1 time in total |
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| bartist |
| Posted: Tue Nov 12, 2013 9:35 am |
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Joined: 27 Apr 2010
Posts: 6958
Location: Black Hills
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jeremy wrote: "The Counselor" has to be the most polarising film, ever. On Metacritic, even the repuable critics vary wildly, giving the film scores ranging from 100 to 20, and its also been given a zero...by The Portland Oregon.
I thought it was fantastic, one of my favourite films of the year.
Must be polarizing - have heard everything from fantastic to turkey. Now I'm curious. Thanks.
Weeds - thanks for the thumbnail. Film night is Thursday this week, and we were trying to decide between slavery and dire straits. So I'm thinking WFV on the dire straits. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Tue Nov 12, 2013 9:46 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: New York City
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[quote="bartist"]jeremy wrote: ...we were trying to decide between slavery and dire straits...
It's a choice between horror and semi-boredom and I too would choose horror. OTOH, if Dallas Buyers Club is in the vicinity, that would be my personal suggestion. |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Tue Nov 12, 2013 9:58 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 14498
Location: Houston
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billyweeds wrote: All is Lost is a one-man film starring Robert Redford as a man aione at sea and in dire straits. Redford is still interesting and he certainly commands the screen, but the film is a little dry, sort of like a training film for "how to survive at sea." The ending is beautiful and borderline profound, but getting there is a bit of a snooze.
I probably won't see this for the same reason I didn't see Cast Away.
I did see About Time. I enjoyed it okay. I cried in the emotional parts. But that doesn't make it a good movie. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Tue Nov 12, 2013 10:06 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: New York City
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Joe Vitus wrote: billyweeds wrote: All is Lost is a one-man film starring Robert Redford as a man aione at sea and in dire straits. Redford is still interesting and he certainly commands the screen, but the film is a little dry, sort of like a training film for "how to survive at sea." The ending is beautiful and borderline profound, but getting there is a bit of a snooze.
I probably won't see this for the same reason I didn't see Cast Away
Compared with Cast Away, All Is Lost is Citizen Kane. |
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| Marc |
| Posted: Tue Nov 12, 2013 12:50 pm |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
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Quote: I probably won't see this for the same reason I didn't see Cast Away
Did you also avoid The Old Man And The Sea, Beach Party Bingo, Moby Dick and South Pacific? |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Tue Nov 12, 2013 12:57 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: New York City
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Marc wrote: Quote: I probably won't see this for the same reason I didn't see Cast Away
Did you also avoid The Old Man And The Sea, Beach Party Bingo, Moby Dick and South Pacific?
In point of fact, all four of these movies were turkeys to some extent or other. The Old Man and the Sea was boring beyond description, Moby Dick featured Gregory Peck as a lethally miscast Ahab, and South Pacific was one of the all-time worst movie musical adaptations. AS for Beach Blanket Bingo (the real title) I assume you're kidding. Well, I assume you're kidding about all this shit, but keeping it real here. |
Last edited by billyweeds on Tue Nov 12, 2013 3:10 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Tue Nov 12, 2013 2:38 pm |
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| I saw BBB a long time ago and from what I remember, it was so bad, it was good. |
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| jeremy |
| Posted: Tue Nov 12, 2013 6:58 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 6794
Location: Derby, England and Hamilton, New Zealand (yes they are about 12,000 miles apart)
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I think the problem some critics have with The Counselor is that it has all the trappings of a noir crime thriller, but these are mainly just a veneer or a vehicle. The film subverts or just ignores the viewers expectations of the genre, particularly the use of ostensibly real dialogue. Cormac McCarthy's charactures talk in a deliberately unreal and literary way - it's Tarantino off the back of a degree in English.
The Counselor is a much more fundamnetal beast than a normal thriller. In some rspects it reminded me of "Blood Simple". It's almost pre-theatrical - a morality play or a Greek tragedy. Although set in the same milieu, Oliver Stone's Savages was a b-movie with a veneer of serious film making. The Counselor is the opposite.
I must admit that I was unsettled by it (and Javier Bardem's haircut) at first, but once I understood the nature of what I was watching, I warmed to its difference.
I was struck by the similarities in setting and theme between The Counsellor and the Coen's adaptation of his novel, No Country For Old Men. It was as though, Cormac McCarthy wanted a second go at making the same film. On his terms, I think The Counselor succeeds better than its much lauded predecessor.
The film is not without its flaws, of course (all interesting work has them) but I find its poor reception somewhat depressing. It's as though Hollywood and its followers don't seem to be able or refuse to see past their own conventions and tropes.
The car fucking scene will go down in cinema history. |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Wed Nov 13, 2013 9:41 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: Houston
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billyweeds wrote: Marc wrote: Quote: I probably won't see this for the same reason I didn't see Cast Away
Did you also avoid The Old Man And The Sea, Beach Party Bingo, Moby Dick and South Pacific?
In point of fact, all four of these movies were turkeys to some extent or other. The Old Man and the Sea was boring beyond description, Moby Dick featured Gregory Peck as a lethally miscast Ahab, and South Pacific was one of the all-time worst movie musical adaptations. AS for Beach Blanket Bingo (the real title) I assume you're kidding. Well, I assume you're kidding about all this shit, but keeping it real here.
Well, I like South Pacific. It isn't a great movie, but it preserves a lot of the original staging from the stage version, and Mitzi Gaynor is perfectly cast (yes, Billy. YES.  ). I'm suprised Jaws didn't get thrown into the list, which is the best Spielberg movie ever. But in general I do avoid sea-set movies. Maybe that has something to do with Waterworld? |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Wed Nov 13, 2013 12:16 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: New York City
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Joshua Logan's direction of the film version of South Pacific is execrable. The color filters are disgusting and the literalness of the whole thing turns me off completely. As for Mitzi Gaynor, it's not that she's awful or horrible casting, but the obviously perfect Nellie Forbush, Doris Day, was there for the asking and staring them in the face, and the fact that they didn't cast her--ostensibly because (I'm not kidding here) that she was too obvious a casting choice--was ridiculous and self-destructive.
Joe--the main problem with the film of SP for me is that the staging was too much like the stage version. |
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| knox |
| Posted: Wed Nov 13, 2013 12:16 pm |
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Joined: 18 Mar 2010
Posts: 1246
Location: St. Louis
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billyweeds wrote: All is Lost ....but the film is a little dry, sort of (to quote my wife) like a training film for "how to survive at sea." The ending is beautiful and borderline profound, but getting there is a bit of a snooze.
My manual for "how to survive at sea" begins with: Stay ashore. Living in Missouri is a particularly effective strategy. The film: dull, in places, but better than a lot of the other maritime survival films out there. It would be amusing to list the films of 2013, each with the prefix: "how to survive...."
How to survive a sociopathic patient who tries to destroy your career
How to survive in space
How to survive capture by Somali pirates
How to survive a zombie war
How to survive over a decade of slavery
How to survive attack by alien insectoids
How to survive the apocalypse |
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| Syd |
| Posted: Wed Nov 13, 2013 1:37 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 12921
Location: Norman, Oklahoma
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How to survive the revenge of the dark elves.
How to survive the splitting of your entire continent, volcanoes and weird animals.
How to survive the Tournament of Champions. |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Wed Nov 13, 2013 2:17 pm |
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| How to survive Winnie Mandela |
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