Last night I watched Nicolas Winding Refn’s Drive again. It is an interesting mix of hypnotic movement, stillness and sudden violence. The elevator scene even segues from slow motion into the fight sequence.
Gus Van Sant’s Gerry is 100 minutes of Matt Damon and Casey Affleck wandering around lost in the desert. The scene of them staggering across a dry lake bed at dawn is incredibly slow, but also kind of mezmerizing and beautiful.
Slow-paced.
If you find slow-paced films boring, we’ll leave it at that.
You obviously didn’t read anything I wrote.
I don’t find films slow-paced boring.
I find films that do the same things over and over and over and over and over…etc again boring.
Like every Michael Bay film.
I said that many people call films slow, using that word to stand in for boring. They can’t seem to fathom that you can’t enjoy a film unless they’re randomly throwing things and an making noise.
Just because a deliberate pace is used as a story telling device doesn’t mean something fascinating, exciting and interesting isn’t happening.
I took note of everything you said, including your free-standing sentence:
“And come to think of it, what does slow mean if not boring?”
Trying to rhetorically place it within context failed - it just came across contradictory to what you previously said.
Maybe the record-setter for slow, that flick. Saw it long ago and can’t remember if I finished it.
This thread reminds me of the remake TV series of The Fugitive from 2000.
I was never particularly a fan of the original TV series, never particularly a fan of the Harrison Ford film but I loved the remake series. Although it wasn’t a problem for me I was always aware how slowly it was paced. I could be wrong - working from memory here - but I vaguely recall that, at the time, it was the most expensive TV show ever? If so it did it on a show without any big name stars and without any overt special effects to ramp up the budget.
TCMF-2L
Need relevant definition of “slow.” Do you mean time of movie (longer is slower), or what certain scenes feel like because you are uninterested in them? Deer Hunter had a awkward, painfully slow, painfully long wedding scene, but I don’t think many people would denounce the movie because of it or consider it slow, and probably beg for more in the end.
[QUOTE=teela brown]
a movie set in 2019
[/QUOTE]
Set in 2019 but filmed in 1981 (released in 1982). She has the benefit of 35 years of developments. Not a very good analysis (it would have been if done 30 years ago).
I take it no one has heard of Meek’s Cutoff?
I don’t mind slow if there are great visuals to look at or slow with great acting going on. Slow when you’re laying down the plot and building toward something? No prob.
But man, this movie had none of that. I slogged through about 30 minutes and threw in the towel. Rotten Tomatoes gives it an 86% reviewers’ score but I’m content to take their word for it.
The only thing I remember about that series was that CBS was REALLY pimping that show! They ran promo after promo, especially during football games. They pushed that new series so much (opening their new Friday night lineup) they practically ignored the new series that debuted after it. A little show called C.S.I.
I found all of these movies extremely slow, to the point where I had trouble getting through them:
Young Frankenstein (saw this one in the theater during one of those revival things, and fell asleep!)
Singin’ in the Rain
The Music Man
In all three cases, I’m very fond of the lead actor (Gene Wilder, Gene Kelly, and Robert Preston). But they couldn’t save these films for me.
Melancholia
The Fountain
Solaris (original and remake)
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The king of the “genre” is Michelangelo Antonioni - or as some wags call him, Antoni-ennui. My favorite is the classic Blowup,, in which nothing happens, then something almost happens, then nothing happens some more.
It kills me that I and most people walk into the movie knowing the almost-something, with the implication that that’s the jumping-off point for an exciting bit of action. It’s playing in town later this summer, and I’m hoping to find one of my twenty-something friends to go with me completely in the dark.
Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers movies (too lazy to look up the studio) are about 14 minutes long, if you take out the songs and dancing. Which they are, if you take out the songs and dancing.
I need to see this movie. Concrete pours are always tricky. Maybe we need a remake of Gladiator that is about pouring the Coliseum.
Oh, like Real Life? I’ve been spoken to sternly because my stories show not much happening and end because that seemed like as good a time to end as any, and I got bored. There is no accounting for taste.
There is a YouTube video describing its Kubrick references. Silly me, I thought the whole damn thing was a Kubrick homage. That worked.
Lawrence of Arabia - I think the slow pace adds to the emotional impact, especially with the trip across the desert.
Once
Tender Mercies - Again, the pacing helps.
An Angel at My Table
The Story of Qiu Ju
2001 had a glacial pace, but ok by me.
Try showing it, these days, though, to someone who’s never seen in before - not that I’m hinting at any particular demographic.:rolleyes:
ok total hijack question - that smiley I just used - for irony.
Is that what it’s used for, or is it used specifically for looking at the post directly above mine (for whatever reason)? (not my intention)
Tora! Tora! Tora! builds slowly. I mean, we all know what is coming, the ending is inevitable, but it seems as if every little detail of what led up to the attack is gone over in minute detail…The end is of course the one fast pace, frenetic action scene in the whole movie.
I just watched Meek’s Cutoff yesterday. I slogged through the whole thing, but should have had your foresight and quit after 30 minutes. Slow-paced doesn’t even begin to describe this movie… glacial is more like it. And the ending… 
. After nearly two hours of boredom, there was no conclusion… it just ended.
To make matters worse, I also watched Mystery Road. It is an Austrailian movie, obviously very low budget. Also very slow paced, with a ridiculous shootout at the end. I’ll give credit for it being an unusual shootout, but just as farcical as most more typical shootouts.