Curb Your Enthusiasm. It all just seemed so push-button, with Larry reacting the same way in every situation and everybody else reacting the same way week after week to him.
The only laugh I ever got out of that show was when the woman called her husband “that fat fuck.”
Same here.
That too.
Though I think *Gattaca * has its moments.
Metacritic lists three Wolf Eyes albums with overall favorable reviews. I tried them, not realizing they were a noise outfit. That was a surprise. How can you critically evaluate a bunch of noise? “I give that thunder four stars!” “That airplane that just flew overhead was totally lame…3.7.”
I was checking them out because they were opening for Girl Talk. I don’t think any two artists could be more dissimilar.
ETA: While I’m on Girl Talk, that show was fun as all get out. However, I can’t stand listening to his album for more than a couple minutes before getting annoyed. He can really work a crowd, but I don’t wanna hear a mash-up of a bunch of obnoxious songs when I’m putzing around on my computer at home.
A while back that would have been one of my nominations, thought they had a few decent songs but nothing that special. I’ve now done a complete 180 on them, after hearing more of their back catalog and live recordings.
Have to disagree with all the votes for Radiohead, they’ve released a stong collection of diverse albums and are particularly good live. Can understand their whiny-ness putting people off though (I liked the review which described a track on their last album as a “whinge too far”). They are always going to divide opinion.
My nominations:
Pulp Fiction. Had it’s moments, but a triumph of style over substance. To be fair, it’s title describes it perfectly.
Bob Dylan. Always thought he was a much better lyricist than musician or singer (although he does have a distinctive voice).
The Rolling Stones. Some good songs, but nothing special.
The Lord of the Rings (film). Ridiculously cartoonish action scenes.
According to the story, everyone was afraid to tell the emperor the truth, which they all recognized, that he was naked. It’s a parable about how no one will speak truth to power, a form of groupthink that happens all the time on small and large scales. IOW, exactly the opposite of what you thought it meant, and what lissener said.
Several people here have praised The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada. I think lissener said it was one of the top 10 movies of the decade. I despised it. But I tend not to like that director’s work at all. I hated Babel and *21 Grams * also-- convoluted character torture doesn’t do it for me. The critics love Arriaga, though, and he’s gotten lots of nominations.
So, once again: Are you ever going to respond to the criticism of this stuff?
The stories of Kieslowski films are all about political allegory and social commentary; they’re not light entertainments, certainly not plot heavy, and if you don’t understand or don’t care about what he’s referring to, then they aren’t going to mean a lot to you, although the lush cinematography and the long, quiet takes where he allows his actors to just exist make his films worth watching even if the stories are nonsensical or go nowhere (as in La Double vie de Véronique). Besides, I could sit and watch Juliette Binoche or Irène Jacob do nothing at all, and Jean-Louis Trintignant is one of the forgotten great actors of European cinema.
With possible exception of Reservoir Dogs, which was also pastiche but at least it was fresh, raw pastiche, I totally agree. Tarantino is a film nerd granted a ludicrous budget and a professional film crew, and is even more full of himself than Kevin Smith. Pulp Fiction started an abhominable trend of imitators that we could do without.
Stranger
FWIW, *Melquiades *was directed by Tommy Lee Jones.
You’re right, of course. Arriaga wrote it. Doesn’t change my opinion of it at all.
Eminem - his lyrics deserve all the praise they get, at least the Eminem that I listened to (Slim Shady LP and earlier.) I mean,
*“I don’t have that bad of a mouth, do I?/Fuck, shit, ass, bitch, cunt, shoo-ba-dee-doo-wop!/ Skippity be-bop, a-Christopher Reeve, Sonny Bono, skis, horses and hittin’ some trees!”
*
The guy, while puerile, is an absolute wizard for creative wordplay.
Donny Darko - I didn’t understand the plot, and didn’t try to. But there’s so much more to a movie than the plot - I mean, I’m a David Lynch fan (has anyone mentioned him yet in this thread?) I don’t think the plot always has to make sense for a movie to be good. Donny Darko has a lot of scenes that are just compelling and unique. The scene of the kids at school in slow motion with Head Over Heels. Patrick Swayze’s hilarious character and his satirical self-help program. The movie’s characters and setting and atmosphere are what makes that movie, not really the plot.
Modest Mouse - they are “bipolar”, I suppose. But they bring a very raw, gritty, earthy energy to their music that few other contemporary bands do. I thought their newer stuff (Dashboard) was mediocre and overproduced, but I dig everything else for its alternation of subtle, folky instrumentals and melodies with primal, wild vocals. Float On got too much radio play, though!
I never liked Radiohead much, on the other hand, because Thom Yorke’s voice turns me off big-time and they seem to overuse crashing, suspended/minor chords and operatic, moaning vocals. I appreciate their musicianship, but I do think they’re overrated.
I agree with the Killers. No, rock and roll isn’t dead and decomposing, but the Killers are mediocre and should not be seen as a good representative of current rock.
I haven’t heard a whole lot of Rufus Wainwright, and what I’ve heard, I’ve not minded, but this:
is hilarious!
Pardon me while I slip into this raincoat and curl up in a fetal position.
The Wire.
I just. Don’t. F*&$ing. Get it.
I’ve give it three chances now, because enough people whose opinions I (relatively) respect praise it. I do not see what they see. Anecdote blah blah blah data…I have never met in real life a person who likes this show, and there’s a group of fellow teachers who like nothing more than to discuss Sunday night’s HBO and Showtime in the workroom on Monday morning, creating a cult of creative ways to call each other “cocksuckers” without students knowing (my favorite was to paste a picture of a rooster and a lollipop on one teacher’s lecturn before he got to class one day) after a new episode of Deadwood, or to wish that **Entourage ** was an hour long, or to collectively say after the first episode of John From Cincinatti, “screw that,” or to giggle with giddy anticipation of Peter O’Toole in The Tudors…not one of us can stand The Wire.
I fully understand that many people think it the greatest show on television. I respectfully disagree (respectfully, 'cause if I say what I’m really thinking lissener will smack my nose!)
Commence throwing of rotten vegetables.
That’s it, I’m writing you out of my will. Some things are just not acceptable.
I didn’t like The Wire either. (But in the interest of bud nippage, it would be helpful if you noted that nowhere have I “smacked” anyone for disagreeing with anyone else’s taste; I only pointed out that one metaphor is implicitly insulting. Again, not about disagreeing, but about insulting. . . I now return you to your regular thread.)
Well, to be fair, a director has a great deal of influence over how a script comes out. That, and it doesn’t treat the same themes that Iñárritu has been stuck on for his last three movies. *Melquiades *is worlds better than *Babel *and 21G. In many ways–many many *many *ways–it’s has more in common with John Ford’s greatest Westerns than with Iñárritu’s movies.
From someone who hates *Babel *and could care less about 21G, I recommend you give it a whirl,.
Nobody could see the clothes, but they all claimed to see them, “not wanting to appear a fool” It wasn’t because they were kidding themselves. It wasn’t because they were afraid of insulting the king. It was only because they were afraid of looking like a fool to other people.
Yeah, I said it was groupthink. No one wanted to be the one person who pointed out to the emperor that he was naked. Everyone else is cheering for his new outfit, I will too! Is how I interpreted it.
lissener, you didn’t like *The Wire * (second best show on TV ever, after Deadwood), but you loved The Three Burials… nope, I don’t think we like the same stuff (though I did agree with you about Six Feet Under).
I watched about half of the first season of The Wire, and it just didn’t hold together. And the lead dude’s Irish accent kept creaking through, which annoyed me.
And accusations of “groupthink” is an accusation of dishonesty. Especially in this instance because the Emperor’s subjects *lied *about what they saw. Call what made them do so groupthink or whatever, the point is still that they lied. So I, personally, stay away from the whole Emperor thing unless I specifically mean to call someone a liar.
I know; just funnin’ you. Besides, your correct assessment of **The Wire ** shows your superior taste!
About Schmidt comes to mind. Boring and pointless… I just didn’t get why the movie was made at all.
These threads.
Does the person who posts, “I don’t get the love for Radiohead” think he’s going to get a prize for being the one-millionth unoriginal fuck who writes that?
All the complaints in these threads are so shallowly thought out and general that they can’t be construed as anything other than veiled insults at the people who like those things. Wait for a thread to come around on the object of your scorn sometime and enter into a real discourse on it.