Continuing the discussion from Movies you've seen recently (Part 1) - #10019 by ekedolphin.
Previous discussions:
Drive-Away Dolls on Amazon Prime. A great opening scene and all downhill from there. The two leads deserve a better script without throwaway cameos by bigger stars. Best thing I can say is that it was less than 90 minutes and I didn’t pay to see it.
Kinds of Kindness
Somewhat recommended.
An anthology movie by Yorgos Lanthimos and it is only OK, to be honest. Watching a movie like this, I have to wonder if he had three ideas for movies, none of which could reach the 90 minute length or justify a full movie on their own. Instead, he filmed three mini-movies and shared actors between the three. None of the segments are bad, but none are exactly very good.
This summer, I read Stephen King’s new collection of short stories and novellas. For the novellas, I felt the same. They looked like novels he began and realized they weren’t good enough or wouldn’t be long enough to be full novels.
Not bad, not great.
Another fan of Terrence Stamp’s performance in The Limey. But the movie overall has too many blah spots.
Interesting casting choices. Lesley Ann Warren, Luis Guzmán, and Joe Dallesandro. Melissa George is one of those actors I wish was given better stuff and could act a little better. I think the best lead acting she’s done was in The Butterfly Tree but that’s not overall that good of a movie. Some small roles in good movies, such as The Limey, Mullholland Dr. and Dark City but not so much as a lead.
An issue I had with The Limey was the Guzman and Warren characters becoming wingmen for Terrence Stamp as he cuts a wide path of murder and anarchy. Neither character was given a believable reason for doing so. I checked Wikipedia to see if maybe the Prime version had been shortened.
I caught Barry Lyndon last week, and, yes, it was beautiful, but, man, was it dull. And waaaaaaaay stretched out. Every scene was at least 50% longer than it needed to be. Yes, the 18th C was a slower paced time, but not that dang slow. Ryan O’Neal was just o.k. Marisa Berenson had nothing to do besides look pretty. I did like Hardy Kruger, and Leonard Rossiter was definitely a hoot in the opening section. His dancing was spectacular. I still laugh thinking about it.
I expected more. Thackeray’s been made into movies before (Vanity Fair a bunch of times), and this was very limp Thackeray. The social commentary and satire didn’t play at all or was embarassingly obvious. I’m finding Kubrick is usually disappointing for me.
Robert Altman is almost never disappointing for me, even with something like Brewster McCloud (watched it a day or two after Barry Lyndon) It was kind of a wild mess, but funny, energetic, satirical, and a lot of fun. I laughed a lot, and it was a magicial trick back to the 1970s.
Nailed it in one. Kubrick got long-winded after a bit. This partly lead to the falling out between him and Anthony Burgess over the Napoleon movie. Burgess wanted a regular movie and Kubrick wanted an extended epic.
His one mis-step for me. Shining and Full Metal Jacket are both great. I haven’t seen Eyes Wide Shut since it came out in theaters, though.
True, but Full Metal Jacket would have been just as great if it ended with the scene in the latrine.
I haven’t seen it since it was first released but that was our reaction at the time. I’ve always referred to this movie as “Bore-y Lyndon.” I recall friends raving about it, but when asked what they liked, they mentioned the beauty of the cinematography and nothing else. That pretty much sums it up. Ryan O’Neal was not a good choice for the part. Too much of a lightweight. I’ve always been curious to watch it again, just to see if my opinion might change 50 years later.
I found I was spending a lot of time checking out the decor of the buildings they were in. I was particularly interested in an interesting brownish stone (marble?) in the room where Lyndon was making reports to Captain Potzdorf. Because I noticed it and it struck my memory, I noticed that that same room was supposedly part of the mansion Lyndon lived in with his Duchess.
I liked the book better. Cruise is such a try-hard. He had no chance of embodying the nuance of the role.
Strange Darling
Hugely recommended. Awesome.
Wow, one of the best movies of the year and it came out of nowhere for me. I was blown away, went in blind and the movie drew me in completely.
Longlegs got a lot of buzz and is a good movie, but Strange Darling is somehow totally different and at the same time a an even better movie of the same genre. What a movie.
Go in blind. The movie is told out of order in 6 chapters. Shuffling up the chapters was a great idea and it really makes the movie even better.
Yeah, great movie. Thrilling, gripping, scary, totally satisfying.
I love surprises and this was a big one. See it as soon as you can.
That was, in fact, the title of the MAD Magazine parody.
I have not seen this; most people don’t seem to know it even exists. It might make for an interesting comparison with EWS (which I did not care for). Then again, it might not.
Wow, I’ve read the book and I had zero idea a previous adaptation existed.
Edit: Wow, it’s up on Youtube.
The first half of Full Metal Jacket is right up there with my favourite films ever. But then Private Pyle does his thing and the second half is just a bit ‘meh’. It is interesting watching it now though, knowing the Vietnam stuff was shot in London’s Docklands, before all the regeneration that lead to Canary Wharf etc. They must’ve planted a lot of palm trees!
I have never before seen or heard of the MAD parody. It would seem that many people other than me had the same reaction to the film. Well, as they say, great minds think alike. (And there were no greater minds than “the usual gang of idots” at MAD!)
Interesting… considering that Kubrick filmed a shortened version of Burgess’ A Clockwork Orange.
I’m a defender of the second half. At least once they get to the battle sequence and the guys are trapped with the sniper shooting at them.
But even before that, I like the whole second 2/3 or half of the movie.
But, yeah, that opening with the boot camp was incredible.