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| carrobin |
 Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 9:24 am |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 7795
Location: NYC
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| Ah, the good old days--when you could go into a movie halfway through. Can't do that anymore. At least they'll let you leave halfway through, if you've had enough. |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 9:28 am |
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Joined: 30 Oct 2014
Posts: 278
Location: Winnipeg: It's a dry cold.
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carrobin wrote: Ah, the good old days--when you could go into a movie halfway through. Can't do that anymore. At least they'll let you leave halfway through, if you've had enough.
Oh yeah, I've left more than a few films.  |
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Big bang, shmig bang; still doesn't explain how anything starts. |
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| yambu |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 12:07 pm |
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Joined: 23 May 2004
Posts: 6441
Location: SF Bay Area
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gromit wrote: Watched the first 2 hours of Bondarchuk's 1966 War & Peace....There seems to be too many characters, and so everyone gets a brief time, and the result is we don't really care about any of them... |
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That was great for you. How was it for me? |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 2:13 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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carrobin wrote: Ah, the good old days--when you could go into a movie halfway through.
I totally disagree with this sentiment. I despise the memory of going into movies with my parents when the movie had started and then sticking around for the beginning. Gone are the days when "this is where I came in" was a catchphrase, though it's still around in a more metaphorical sense.
Still, even though we came in late the first time I saw Rear Window, it remains my favorite movie of all time. As for Some Like It Hot, hearing "Nobody's perfect" out of context was crazy-making in retrospect. SLIH is, however, one of my favorites, too, so maybe the practice wasn't all bad.
It was Psycho that changed everything, btw. Hitchcock made coming in at the beginning a prerequisite, and from then on it became permanent. |
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| carrobin |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 2:36 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 7795
Location: NYC
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| Actually, these days I've found that one can leave a multiplex movie minitheater and sneak into another minitheater pretty much anytime. I've done it only once, though, under the influence of a less ethical friend. ("That's right, blame me," I can hear him saying…) |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 3:34 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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| I have no compunctions whatsoever about multiplex-hopping. But I seldom do it, because for some reason theater managers stagger the films in such a way as to make it difficult to go from one to the other (unless, of course, one comes in in the middle of the movie--and I've already expressed my feelings about that). |
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| carrobin |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 3:44 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 7795
Location: NYC
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| Oddly enough, the friend who led me into temptation (and "The Madness of King George") was also fanatical about seeing movies from the beginning. We just happened to hit a moment when we came out of one and the other was starting a few yards away. And after all, it's not like we were stealing anyone's seat. The place was practically empty. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 4:42 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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carrobin wrote: Oddly enough, the friend who led me into temptation (and "The Madness of King George") was also fanatical about seeing movies from the beginning. We just happened to hit a moment when we came out of one and the other was starting a few yards away. And after all, it's not like we were stealing anyone's seat. The place was practically empty.
I even hate missing the logos at the beginning of the movie. That's how OCD I am. |
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| bartist |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 4:54 pm |
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Joined: 27 Apr 2010
Posts: 6967
Location: Black Hills
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| My spouse cannot miss the trailers. We are both weary, however, of the coke ad with the guy vacillating about arm placement on his date. Just --- already and be done with it. Kidding aside, I sometimes wonder about misplaced trailers, e.g. you are seeing some cerebral period drama, and they show 14 trailers with exploding cars and sexy vampires and potty-mouthed bears. Who is in charge of ad targeting? |
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He was wise beyond his years, but only by a few days. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 6:39 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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bartist wrote: My spouse cannot miss the trailers. We are both weary, however, of the coke ad with the guy vacillating about arm placement on his date. Just --- already and be done with it. Kidding aside, I sometimes wonder about misplaced trailers, e.g. you are seeing some cerebral period drama, and they show 14 trailers with exploding cars and sexy vampires and potty-mouthed bears. Who is in charge of ad targeting?
Not the case in my neck of the woods. If you're seeing an exploding-car movie, you see ten exploding-car trailers and you are fed up with the genre by the time the movie proper begins. Likewise, if you're there to see a sensitive indie dramedy, you are Sundanced to sleep just in time for the logo. In any case, there are approximately ten too many trailers every time. Two or three is plenty for me. |
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| carrobin |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 7:02 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 7795
Location: NYC
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| And when you go to an animated flick, you get about two dozen kiddie trailers. Some are cute, sure, but there's only so much cute one can take. |
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| Syd |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 7:18 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 12944
Location: Norman, Oklahoma
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billyweeds wrote: I have no compunctions whatsoever about multiplex-hopping. But I seldom do it, because for some reason theater managers stagger the films in such a way as to make it difficult to go from one to the other (unless, of course, one comes in in the middle of the movie--and I've already expressed my feelings about that).
About the only time I'll do it is if I can't stand the movie I'm watching and either a promising movie is just starting or it's one I've seen and don't mind watching the movie again from the middle. |
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Rocky Laocoon foretold of Troy's doom, only to find snaky water. They pulled him in and Rocky can't swim. Now Rocky wishes he were an otter! |
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| Syd |
| Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2015 7:20 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 12944
Location: Norman, Oklahoma
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billyweeds wrote: bartist wrote: My spouse cannot miss the trailers. We are both weary, however, of the coke ad with the guy vacillating about arm placement on his date. Just --- already and be done with it. Kidding aside, I sometimes wonder about misplaced trailers, e.g. you are seeing some cerebral period drama, and they show 14 trailers with exploding cars and sexy vampires and potty-mouthed bears. Who is in charge of ad targeting?
Not the case in my neck of the woods. If you're seeing an exploding-car movie, you see ten exploding-car trailers and you are fed up with the genre by the time the movie proper begins. Likewise, if you're there to see a sensitive indie dramedy, you are Sundanced to sleep just in time for the logo. In any case, there are approximately ten too many trailers every time. Two or three is plenty for me.
What gets interesting is when the movie is out of left field and they have no idea what trailers will appeal to the audience. You get some weird combinations that way. |
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Rocky Laocoon foretold of Troy's doom, only to find snaky water. They pulled him in and Rocky can't swim. Now Rocky wishes he were an otter! |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 5:06 am |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9016
Location: Shanghai
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Bondarchuk's War & Peace didn't really come together for me. A bunch of scenes that didn't fit well. I think the Ruscico release I have is around 6.5 hours and the full film is apparently 7' 15mins, so maybe some of the disjointed nature was due to edits. But I think largely they tried to fit a lot in and jump from one thing to another, possibly with the expectation that the audience is already familiar with much of the storyline. I also found some of the scenes a bit puzzling as I wasn't sure how to read them or what they were trying to say.
I did find Part 4's Moscow fire scenes to be pretty impressive. Though I probably spent the first few minutes of that trying to puzzle out why Nap and the Frenchies were leaving Moscow so suddenly, without enforcing a treaty or fully defeating the Russkies.
One oddity was that a few scenes seemed rather familiar, though I hadn't seen the film before nor read the novel. The failed elopement for instance. Then it occurred to me that I must have seen the earlier Hollywood film. Not sure why my big Russian reading binge in late high school didn't include Tolstoy. I should see if I can pick up a copy here -- 19th C classics are quite popular, at least with the official gov't book stores.
The early voiceovers seemed to be Tolstoy's thoughts, sort of overarching philosophy. But later vo's were mainly character thoughts, and didn't add much to the film. Kind of distracting. As was some of the later techniques such as still frames of characters.
On a final note, Ludmila Savelyeva is pretty terrific in the role of Natasha Rostov. Turns out she is/was a ballerina, and it shows in the way she dances and gracefully zooms around, especially in the early scenes as an adolescent. |
Last edited by gromit on Sat Aug 08, 2015 3:44 am; edited 1 time in total
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| Syd |
| Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 10:31 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 12944
Location: Norman, Oklahoma
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| Dragon Hunters, I watched this again and loved it again, although it took me a while to get into the animation style. It's a ferociously imaginative story about two con men/dragon hunters in a world of flying islands who find themselves in the company of a young girl who strives to be a knight herself, and they all find themselves on a quest to kill the skeleton dragon, the World-Gobbler. It's often funny, and sometimes scary. There's a tv series that inspired this, but you don't need to know anything about it. The movie stands by itself as a cracking good story full of amazing images, and, in the case of the gentle giant Lian-Chu, a steadfast and worthy knight. |
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Rocky Laocoon foretold of Troy's doom, only to find snaky water. They pulled him in and Rocky can't swim. Now Rocky wishes he were an otter! |
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