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gromit
Posted: Sun Feb 01, 2015 4:10 am Reply with quote
Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 9005 Location: Shanghai
Watched the 1st hour of Citizen4 last night, until some powerful unseen force switched my brain to unconscious mode. It's quite interesting to see/hear Snowden, and he's really a well-spoken intelligent fellow. I think they made a smart decision to set the groundwork and provide context before we meet Snowden in Hong Kong, roughly half an hour in.

One moment I loved was the courtroom scene about 14 minutes in, where the plaintiffs' lawyers make District Court ruling and the gov't case appear totally ludicrous. Essentially if everyone is surveilled and harmed then it equates to no one being harmed or having the right to sue. Just cast your net wide enough and rights disappear, I guess. Anywho, next up is the gov't lawyer, and it's my old classmate Thomas Byron, who is so obviously bullshitting and mealy-mouthed, trying to put across this weak shadowy gov't case. Essentially he says the political process should deal with surveillance, not courts -- one senior judge on video link calls him out on this junk -- and and and furthermore there's the danger of huge gov't secrets being exposed to the detriment of all mankind. And Thomas Byron with his bowtie and short haircut looks like such a stereotypical U of C law alum (it's a rather conservative place). And he sounded exactly like he was in moot court back at law school. I need to write a thank you note to the 9th Circuit Appeals Court for allowing cameras in their courtroom.

Anyway, I'll report back when I finish the film, but it's pretty interesting so far.

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Befade
Posted: Sun Feb 01, 2015 4:27 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 3784 Location: AZ
The completely, horribly, incomprehensible neglect suffered by the film: A Man Most Wanted. No nod to the brilliant P.S. Hoffman.

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gromit
Posted: Sun Feb 01, 2015 6:09 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 9005 Location: Shanghai
Well, I found the second half of C4 rather uninteresting.
I wasn't much interested in the drama of getting Snowden out of the hotel. We never find out if they go to the UNHCR, or if it is helpful. Not sure why we watch Snowden shave or gel his hair, while Tv news plays about him. The ominous soundtrack grew quite tiresome, and almost parodic as it recurred when nothing was happening. And for some reason we watch Glen Grunwald speak Portuguese. And then Snowden is Russia, but we learn nothing about what Russia/Putin is up to. And little about how/why he got there. Even the wiretapping of Merkel issue ends up fizzling out. And a bunch of email text being typed on screen is rather uncinematic and dull.

And the film becomes more about the heroic Snowden and Grunwald rather than the security issues at stake. It was like two different films, and the last 50 minutes were fairly pointless and dull.


Last edited by gromit on Wed Feb 04, 2015 9:31 am; edited 3 times in total

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gromit
Posted: Sun Feb 01, 2015 6:22 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 9005 Location: Shanghai
The other night watched A Touch of Sin (Jia Zhang-Ke).
Have to remember to avoid his films. Never like them, but I try to at least see some modern Chinese films. In a lazy approach, it's really three short films lumped together to provide a portrait of corruption and violence and boring/annoying people in modern China. I didn't like any of the three stories or the annoying vapid characters. And most of the violence is almost cartoonish.

The only thing I liked were the landscapes and the scattered compositions with animals. But unfortunately the scenes with people also unfold in the same lethargic impersonal manner. I was also left wondering why/if they were really building an airport seemingly on top of a small mountain. Quite a yawn, with little to say.


Last edited by gromit on Mon Feb 02, 2015 12:46 pm; edited 1 time in total

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bartist
Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 9:43 am Reply with quote
Joined: 27 Apr 2010 Posts: 6941 Location: Black Hills
Befade wrote:
The completely, horribly, incomprehensible neglect suffered by the film: A Man Most Wanted. No nod to the brilliant P.S. Hoffman.


you don't think the oscars are really about artistic merit, do you? I want to see this - LeCarre thrillers don't always translate to the screen well.

saw Am Sniper, some well-done scenes, but seems to duck many issues (as one expects from Kyle's pov) - WTF happened to his brother - there's that 90 second scene at the airfield....and we hear no more. Sienna Miller was excellent - lost all her Englishness and 15 pounds and transformed into all American girl. may write more when not on this stinking tablet.

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billyweeds
Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 11:27 am Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City
gromit wrote:
Well, I found the second half of C4 rather uninteresting.


As I've said before, I found almost the entire film uninteresting, and cannot for the life of me understand what all the raving is about. Substantively it's old news, and cinematically it's primitive. Snowden has a great personality, but I'd rather see him interviewed on 60 Minutes than stuck in that Hong Kong hotel room with the uncharismatic Glenn Greenwald.
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chillywilly
Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 12:20 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 8250 Location: Salt Lake City
marantzo wrote:
Quote:
... but I felt even the whole story and theme behind time and space travel was overdone.


Overdone? How about "Wildly Overdone!" As I wrote about it, I mentioned that it became a mishmash.

Yes, "wildly overdone" is a much better description.

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billyweeds
Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 12:23 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City
chillywilly wrote:
marantzo wrote:
Quote:
... but I felt even the whole story and theme behind time and space travel was overdone.


Overdone? How about "Wildly Overdone!" As I wrote about it, I mentioned that it became a mishmash.

Yes, "wildly overdone" is a much better description.


One of the most excruciating movie experiences of 2014.
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chillywilly
Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 12:52 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 8250 Location: Salt Lake City
billyweeds wrote:

Million Dollar Baby was good, but the fact that it beat out the infinitely superior Sideways for the Oscar will forever gall me.

Going to agree 100% with this here. I was sad Sideways lost to MDB.

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Chilly
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chillywilly
Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 1:04 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 8250 Location: Salt Lake City
billyweeds wrote:
gromit wrote:
Just picked up a handful of 2014 films.
So I can start a-catchin' up:

Whiplash
Birdman
Citizen Four
Lucy
Leviathan


I wanted to nab Foxcatcher, but they was all sold out.
I decided to wait on Interstellar, Selma and Imitation Game. For Interstellar, I want to wait and make sure I get a perfect digital copy.


I would say that if you feel you just have to see Interstellar, the home screen is not the way to go.

I was very happy I saw it in the theater. Sound wise and picture wise.

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Chilly
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gromit
Posted: Tue Feb 03, 2015 12:54 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 9005 Location: Shanghai
I'll have to go back and see what folks thought about Whiplash.

I was a bit conflicted.
There's a lot of good stuff -- notably the use of music and the way it's edited to make the music dramatic.
But the film tries to be overly dramatic about things (notably the car accident and its aftermath, but also the final concert). Not being content to be a character study and minor test of wills, the film amps things up more than I felt fit the material. This is also seen in small details throughout the film, such as the bloody hand going into an ice bath, etc.

The two central performances are very good, and it's a rather accomplished film. I just felt it didn't need all the theatrics. One rankled. The Charlie Parker story twice-related (maybe thrice as I think the drummer mentions it to his pseudo-girlfriend) was inaccurate. Jo Jones tossed a cymbal on to the floor -- essentially gonging Bird off-stage. An act of humiliation, not violence. This can be seen in Clint Eastwood's film Bird, where somehow Jo Jones tosses the cymbal in slow motion. Now, does the teacher alter the story to suit his more confrontational bullying techniques? He does change the story of how a former pupil died. Or does he just get the story wrong. In any case, it's pretty hard-core (and assholish) to decide: I'm gonna fuck with every student I have in case I have one who can be pushed/tormented to greatness. As though careers and minor success and confidence isn't important, only greatness is.

Anyway, there is no way gromit would take abuse like that. Throw a chair at my head and ask me why you did that, and I'd say it's because you're an asshole with anger management issues. Or maybe I'd start enlisting witnesses and/or see if anyone recorded that outburst of violence. That is if I didn't pick up my chair and do an el ka-bong on him. (Uh, I can be a hothead when I think/know someone is f*cking with me). I'm always surprised how many people get easily cowed.

Anyway, it's quite a good film, I just wish they didn't decide it needed to be so dramatic.

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billyweeds
Posted: Tue Feb 03, 2015 1:34 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City
gromit wrote:
I just wish they didn't decide it needed to be so dramatic.


Apparently it's a fairly accurate version of life at Juilliard (the prototype for the music school and the place where the writer matriculated).
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gromit
Posted: Wed Feb 04, 2015 1:30 am Reply with quote
Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 9005 Location: Shanghai
Two more thoughts on Whiplash:

The ending is problematic, as it vindicates Simmons bullying approach. He gives the kid an impossible task to humiliate him -- playing a new song he's never heard before in front of an important audience at Carnegie Hall -- and this extreme fucking-with causes the kid to rise to the occasion and realize greatness. Simmons becomes ecstatic, likely as much at the playing as that his method worked. Hmmm ...

And getting back to the Charlie Parker/Jo Jones story: only part of the story is that Bird needed to practice more. But the core is that Bird was trying some innovative, revolutionary ish and the old guard wasn't ready for these ideas, this new flashy style. In other words, Yardbird already had his style picked out and was trying to develop it. So it's quite fraudulent to say that, if after the set, Jo Jones had said, "Nice try kid, keep at it" -- that Parker would have given up or settled or not become Bird. The humiliation technique could have been detrimental and caused him to give up or tone things down. And if Simmons says, Bird wouldn't have given up no matter what because he was destined for greatness, than encouragement seems better than humiliation/abuse.

So my conclusion is that Simmons just uses that story as justification for his bullying -- even though he (purposely?) gets the story wrong in many particulars.

Maybe a further point is that there is obviously a lot of middle ground between You cringing sack of shit, you're sabotaging my orchestra and Good job, you're great. It doesn't have to be all super-negative or empowering positive reinforcement. It's fairly easy to point out both the good and bad and discuss what needs improvement. You know, constructive criticism, rather than abusive humiliation.

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billyweeds
Posted: Wed Feb 04, 2015 5:46 am Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City
Gromit--No reasonable person could disagree with your comments on constructive criticism, but it seems you're looking for a different movie.
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gromit
Posted: Wed Feb 04, 2015 6:10 am Reply with quote
Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 9005 Location: Shanghai
Well, I guess I meant that the film's ending shows a positive result for the brutal method, seemingly endorsing Simmons Manichean approach. Problematic. And the drum protege essentially embraces that approach as well.

I interpreted it that the Simmons character is a sadistic asshole and one of those folks who thinks he's never wrong, so he justifies his behavior by making it an extreme either/or choice. So he doesn't look for a middle-ground because it's all just self-justification to bolster the asshole he is.

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