Topic: Movie thread.

@Rambler You say not a masterpiece!

@Rambler what's that...

I watched 1917 (FreeVee) this morning & thought it was pretty great.

Absolutely killer set & costume design that really brought you into the trenches, with plenty of environments that managed to managed awe, whether it be the brutality of no man's land, a striking journey through a wartorn city at night, and even a few moments that were hauntingly beautiful in a way. The illusion of the "single take" camera work also played a crucial role in really immersing you in it.

I definitely teared up a few times as well. It definitely does a good job making you feel the fear & horror the soldiers had to deal with.

I'm not sure what the general consensus is on this one, but I recently finally watched Evolution for the first time in full (I came in around about halfway through the first time I watched it) and man....I ABSOLUTELY LOVED IT. It's got just the right amount of late 90's/early 2000's comedy cheese to it (actors hamming up their lines, dodgy CG and costumes that were mind blowing at the time and a little bit of crassness thrown in for good measure) alongside genuinely good performances from basically the entire cast (I don't think there was a single actor/ress I downright disliked throughout the film). It's dated, easily critiqued and definitely filled with that infamous 2000's edge at points but this is absolutely a movie I'd gladly watch again (and recommend you to watch as well if you see it on).

I've seen The Banana Splits movie. It's alright, no better or worse than any other low budget horror film.

I can't say I was a big fan of them, as I only vaguely remember watching The Banana Splits whilst waiting for 40 year old Adam West Batman reruns to come on before school started but my main impression I got was thinking there's really not much else you can do with them apart from retooling them to sell a so-so horror film. That is the standard with most things nowadays as people want for pop culture references without the actual pop culture.

Everything Everywhere All at Once

our family recently watched this, and Oh boy, this is a very very fun movie to watch...

the timeline paradox is easily digestable and explainable for those who are not familiar with it, and it's a great family movie. 5/5 would recommend. 😉

@markmarkmark
Loved that movie as well.
Still in my Top 5 of the year.

Couple of movies for me tonight.

Swamp Thing (Tubi) - I'm not at all familiar with the comics it's based on & I wouldn't say it's a particularly good film, but I did enjoy my time with it. Seems mostly held back by the budget & VFX of the time, but the overall setup was decent & there was at least one entertainingly disturbing transformation sequence (be aware there is some nudity despite being rated PG). There looks to be a sequel, which I'll give a go.

Lupin the 3rd: Goemon's Bloodspray (Blu-Ray) - Goemon centric Lupin film that plays out like an ultra violent modern day samurai film where he finds himself up against a nigh indestructible American assassin with killer axe skills. Very bloody, with lots of excitingly fun action.

the Return of Swamp Thing (Tubi) - Takes a bit more of a comedic tone than the original, & paired with noticeably improved VFX & costuming it's a much more fun watch at that. I assumed it was more of a reboot than a sequel (and in some ways that's still true), but along the way it infers the original is still canon, but handwaves the idea that the villain died at the end.

Ghost in the Shell ARISE 3 & 4 (Blu-Ray) - Last two OVAs in this GitS series. Maybe I just wasn't in the right headspace for it but I thought they were narratively more dense than the first two & I left with some questions. If you liked the first two these are worth a look though.

National Lampoon's Movie Madness (Tubi) - Anthology of parody films (the first a spoof of a family drama, the second a revenge flick, & finally a buddy cop film) that is absolutely terribly dull. While the final one seemed maybe a bit funnier than the first two, I had largely tuned out by then, and all of them feel like they go on much longer than they do (while it certainly has it's duds as well, I think the Kentucky Fried Movie is a much more enjoyable film of this type overall). That, & it seems like a direct to VHS film that got a lazy digital transfer (it's not in widescreen, & there's a very noticeable "screen tearing" effect that happens nearly everytime the camera pans, and sometimes even when a character is just moving).

Deadpool 2 (Disney+) - Still working my way through Fox's X-Men catalogue. Kinda more of the same after the first one, but that's not a bad thing. Being just a bit more versed in comic lore/culture than I was the first time I watched it, more of the jokes/references landed for me even, & just like the first film, in spite of how crass & crude it is, it even managed to make me tear up a time or two.

I saw Three Thousand Years Of Longing the other day and it's bloody lovely! If you ignore the dressing of it's about genies and wishes it's really George Miller's (who flicks range from the Mad Max films to the Babe and Happy Feet movies oddly lol) love letter to storytelling (actual storytelling and not franchises, nostalgia and blockbusters which are really just sell moments) and centres on a conversation between a romantic and someone who is unimpassioned debating love. As much as it is an ambitious story which is spanning hundreds of centuries it is just really intimate and I love how it is so committed to the story. The ending is exactly I what I've said M Night movies SHOULD be doing, a plot twist of no plot twist to subvert the smart mark audiences.

@markmarkmark Yeah it's a decent flick but I don't find the concept of a multiverse or alternative realities that complicated to be honest that it requires excessive explanation. It's been in pop culture for yonks since Star Trek (where it created the evil version has a beard meme/trope) with major shows/movies/books like The One, Sliders, His Dark Materials etc since then also featuring the idea plus Marvel and Rick & Morty have been pushing it hard for the last few years too.

yeah, well for me, I have a love/hate relationship with the concept of time paradox theories. 🤣🤩
although I do really like them.

I also agree though that although the time altering plots and stories have existed for a few decades now, we have to admit, there are still some of the older generation in our families that has trouble wrapping their heads around time paradoxes. 😅

@Mioaionios yeah, everything everywhere all at once is easily in my top 5 movies of the year too, also watched the making of the movie on youtube, and it's really such an interesting experience to hear how they made lots of the creative stuff and the concepts.

Also 🌭Hotdog fingers prosthetics. 😉🤣

@jump @markmarkmark
I honestly don't care about tropes. As long as the story and characters are good, it really doesn't matter if some concepts have been done before.

Nobody complains when Scorsese makes another movie in which a regular guy becomes a crime boss and ultimately falls flat on his face. I'd call that a trope. And one that has been done a bajillion more times than multiverses for instances.

If it's done well, nothing else matters.

@Mioaionios I wouldn't call a multiverse a trope myself, aside from mentioning Star Trek created the evil twin has a goatee meme/trope with it's Mirror Universe episode (which was more about showcasing the concept of a multiverse have been in mainstream pop culture since at least the 60s) I didn't really bring up tropes or call them good/bad. Just that parallel dimensions have been showcased enough times that it's not a foreign concept that requires a lot of explaining to the audience anymore in regard to a comment about how the movies explains itself.

@jump
Ah, gotcha!

Big Bad Mama (Tubi) - An impoverished mother & her two teen daughters get deeper & deeper into crime trying to make ends meet during the depression. Decent enough criminals on the run type film, that features William Shatner & lots of boobs because it's a 70's film.

@Rambler In one multiverse we could be Trees Elves.

How in the world did Chip 'n Dale win the Emmy for best TV movie?

This has to be a joke, right? Right?!

@Mioaionios Sorry but I quite liked that film, full of silly little things and Ugly Sonic just was brilliant.

@Bunkerneath
I get why people liked it, but saying it's the best TV movie of the year is stretching it, surely.