Raxivace's 2018 List of Movies or (Neo-General Chat: The Second Raid)

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Sat Aug 18, 2018 7:38 pm

I fell a bit behind with updates (Been watching too many old Survivor seasons on the side). Some of these are from a while ago, but oh well.

151. The Man From Planet X (1951, Dir. Edgar G. Ulmer) - This film is like if someone handed off an Ed Wood sci-fi project to Ulmer but he tried to make a genuinely good film anyways.

I think it…kind of works? It definitely feels atmospheric at times, with Ulmer's background in German Expressionism coming through at times.

The stuff with the competing scientists is sort of neat, sort of whatever, but as a vehicle to getting to Ulmer's set design its fine. The initial ambiguity of the alien character and what he wants is kind of neat too, and his ultimate goal of trying to crash his home planet onto Earth is something I can appreciate. Not sure I've seen that kind of plot point in a Hollywood film from this era before.

The actual goofy-ass design of the alien man though is what makes this weird.

Seeing this bro wander in through an expressionistic movie is odd and the thing I'm most unsure about here. The budget for this film was clearly not in creating elaborate costume design. I'm not sure this works, though I have to give the movie credit for certainly making this weird clashing combination of costume design and film style memorable at the very least.

152. Inside Man (2006, Dir. Spike Lee) - I missed this movie when it came out, but I recently learned Spike was the one to direct this which surprised me since a kind of straightforward police story about a hostage negotiator doesn't exactly scream subject matter you would expect from Spike, if only because of how often he tackles police brutality in his work.

Still, he not only makes some solid genre fair here, he still manages to infuse it with a lot of his thematic concerns not only about race in America, but specifically in a post 9/11 context. The bit where a Sikh man is confused for a Muslim man and attacked for it is even eerily reminiscent of recent events (Not that attacking a Muslim would be justified either, of course).

Spike's newest movie, BlacKkKlansman also apparently has similar genre elements as this and I'm excited to see that at some point.

153. Zero For Conduct (1933, Dir. Jean Vigo) - I wasn't super into this one, though I'm sure that's partly influenced by the fact that I watched a public domain version.

It seems…fine, as far as a story about schoolchildren rebelling go. I know it influenced Truffaut's The 400 Blows but I really do think that Truffaut did the same basic idea better and with more humanity.

154. L'Atalante (1934, Dir. Jean Vigo) - This is a perfectly fine film that I don't quite understand the masterpiece status it has. The story of a newlywed couple going through marital troubles was already well trodden ground at this point (Perhaps most famously in this era with Murnau's Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans), but Vigo does bring his solid mise-en-scene to this. The underwater bit is particularly neat, reminding me of Taris. Still...I'm not really sure there's anything here that makes this a cut above other films, especially since at times it does seem a bit sloppy with some of its editing (Even Truffaut mentions this in the clip below).

Some Letterboxd reviews I read suggested that perhaps the film was being more rewarded for “what could have been" with Vigo's career since he died shortly after his dead. I have no idea how true this explanation is, though film culture itself is by no means immune to the allure of mythology about artists- especially when that mythology paints the artist as a tragic figure.

Having now finished Vigo's now small filmography (A mere three short films and a lone feature), I have to agree with Jimbo's conclusion that he was just a B+ artist. Perhaps with more time on this Earth he would have become greater...but he didn't.

Truffaut seemed to like the movie a lot, I guess I'll just defer to him for more positive comments about L'Atalante and Vigo in general.

155. Glumov's Diary (1923, Dir. Sergei Eisenstein) - A bizarrely surreal and comedic short that from what I can tell was the first bit of film Eisenstein ever directed. I'm not even sure how to describe it, I can only link to it.

Apparently, it was meant to accompany a stage production. I don't know too much about, but it reminds me of how Orson Welles tried to do something similar with the hilariously titled Too Much Johnson in the 30's.

Post by **Gendo** » Sat Aug 18, 2018 8:18 pm

I never knew Inside Man was Spike Lee. Been wanting to see it. And, Google tells me that it features the song Chaiyya Chaiyya, which I just posted about in the music forum! Weird timing!

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Sun Aug 19, 2018 12:14 am

I don't click the music forum very often so I didn't even realize that was the same song. That is pretty odd timing.

I dunno if you have Netflix but Inside Man is on there if you want to watch it.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Sun Aug 19, 2018 6:15 am

Alright I just have to get this one off my chest.

156. Gigi (1958, Dir. Vincent Minelli) - The 1958 Best Picture.

Honestly its legit one of the worst Best Picture winners. Worse than Around the World in 80 Days, worse than Greatest Show on Earth, worse than Crash, worse than Gentleman's Agreement, worse than Driving Miss Daisy, worse than most movies. The only ones it might not be worse than (That I've seen at least) are Cimarron and Cavalcade.

You see, Gigi is a musical and a love story. That's fine, I like both of those things. As a love story, not a single character is interesting, I don't buy or understand the romance. Gigi herself, a "courtesan in training" is supposed to be some fascinating girl that everyone is enchanted by and she just…doesn't work as a character. Neither does the rich pompous male lead.

As a musical this fails because not a single song here is memorable…except for one, which is played at the beginning and ending.

I'm sorry but even in context that song is just fuckin' creepy.

The only kind of neat thing here is that there's a bit where in walking into a dance hall, everyone except the two leads freezes in place. That's sort of neat and even kind of predicts Godard's Band of Outsiders a few years later.

That's it. That's really it. Sweet jesus. How does Minelli go from making something like An American in Paris that mostly works to this drivel? And why the fuck did it sweep so many awards. Forget the fact that Hollywood made unrecognized masterpieces this same year like Vertigo and Touch of Evil, even something a BP nominee that was actually, uh, nominated like The Defiant Ones (A fuckin' Stanley Kramer film. STANLEY KRAMER) is better than this.

Ugh.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Sun Sep 02, 2018 6:42 am

For about a week I had a pretty nasty cold, which has really impacted my movie watching. I wish I could have come up with a little more to write about these but alas. :(

157. Strike (1925, Dir. Sergei Eisenstein) - The first of Eisenstein's propaganda films, this one about a strike that ended in tragedy in 1903. Like a lot of the better propaganda, while the story hardly has any of the nuance of good drama, though it is saved by Eisenstein's incredible visual style that would only be further developed in Battleship Potemkin.

I think something like a battleship works better as a singular encompassing visual for the collectivist kind of story and aesthetic that Eisenstein is going for- its easy to see it standing in for a group. In comparison workers on strike is slightly more abstract, not quite leading itself as naturally to striking cinematography. That Eisenstein still manages to find as much as good as he does is astounding- the massacre at the film's end in particular really stands out.

158. Rampage (2018, Dir. Brad Peyton) - Almost as mindless as the video games its based on, though this film version is partially saved by The Rock's charisma and some of the giant monster bits being fun to watch. You could do worse if you're seeking relatively mindless popcorn entertainment.

159. The Seven Year Itch (1955, Dir. Billy Wilder) - Pretty decent as a comedy, though I can really feel its roots as a stage-play at times.
I don't have much to really say about it, though I did think the bit where Marilyn Monroe talks about how people should have loved the titular Creature From the Black Lagoon kind of funny considering how The Shape of Water now exists. I wonder if Guillermo del Toro had this scene in mind when writing that film.

160. Never Say Never Again (1983, Dir. Irvin Kershner) - As a solo Bond film it's pretty decent, though arguably the production itself is the most interesting aspect. It's the last of the major “unofficial" Bond films (Joining the 1954 and 1967 versions of Casino Royale), and even stars Sean Connery himself for the final time as Bond, who had major involvement in the production (I'd have to imagine it was Connery who lead to someone like Max von Sydow ending up cast in here. I guess he was willing to do goofy franchise stuff long before his stints in Game of Thrones and Star Wars).

Speaking of Star Wars, Kershner (Of Empire Strikes Back fame)…doesn't really bring a whole lot to the table here? I'm really skeptical now how much of ESB was really him, since like none of the visual pizazz from that film is on display here. For the most part Never Say Never Again really does seem like its meant to simulate the look of most of the films from Eon Productions- perhaps as a measure to not alienate audiences who don't know this isn't an “official" film in the series.

The story is loosely a retooling of Thunderball's (For legal reasons it had to be), though I like the idea of Connery being an aged Bond in a world that doesn't necessarily want him around anymore. I kind of wish this angle had been pushed further- it could have elevated beyond just a typical Bond film and done something a little more daring than Eon Productions normally does.

It's neat that the film exists, but it just seems like given the opportunity more could have been done with it even within the restrictions of "Thunderball's plot, but again".

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Tue Sep 04, 2018 12:17 pm

161. Hereditary (2018, Dir. Ari Aster) - The VVitch meets The Babadook. Unfortunately, I only like half of the films in that equation.
I generally don't care for lol satanic cult as a plot device (The Seventh Victim probably being the only movie in this “genre" I even like.), especially when this film was just more interesting as a fucked up family drama. Like I was saying in Derived's thread, that turn just kills a lot of the movie for me and sleeping on it hasn't really made it any better.

162. Black Panther (2018, Dir. Ryan Coogler) - I don't know if this is necessarily a much better film than any of other the recent fare from Marvel (Well it's better than Age of Ultron and Civil War at least. Most films are better than Age of Ultron and Civil War.), but I feel like this is the first one maybe ever to like, actually try and tackle any kind of meaningful theme at all and regardless of how we may critique that I do think it deserves credit for feeling like the first one to even really try. It may still be a mixed bag but at least there's things to actually talk about.

How this movie tries and tackles colonialism is interesting, particularly through the Killgore character. On the one hand, he's ostensibly our villain, the moral challenge to our hero T'Challa. Yet it really does seem like Coogler's interest in this story are more with him than any other character. The prologue of the film isn't even T'Challa's backstory but his. He's even played by Michael B. Jordan, the lead actor of Coogler's previous two films (Fruitvale Station and Creed), both of which also heavily dealt with America's murdered black fathers and the sons they leave behind. Creed in particular was about optimistic futures that might still await these children, but Black Panther instead focuses on negative one- Killmonger of course tragically ends up in the CIA, embracing the kind of imperialistic attitudes that he also (Rightfully) seeks to end in others. His most telling line is probably his proclamation that “The Sun will never set on the Wakandan empire"- his good intentions have been corrupted by the American military-industrial complex.

Still, I can't help but wonder what this movie would have been like without the restrictions of Disney/Marvel behind it. The ending should probably a little more...provactive (Outreach centers are great, but is that really stopping imperialism? Even if Killgore's methods are wrong his stated concerns are very much legitimate), and the usage of Martin Freeman's heroic CIA agent characters feels a little weak when the villain of the film is essentially a product of his the evils of his organization. I think there's very much been a running problem of these Marvel movies wanting to say the status quo needs to be changed but backing off at the last minute, and while Black Panther does it a little better than some of the others it still kind of falls into half-measures. Maybe its being in the MCU itself that is holding it back, I dunno.

Cinematically I don't know that I find this to be as interesting as Coogler's other films either- like there's nothing that quite matches something like the one-take boxing match in Creed. Still, I do really like the match-cut from Killgore watching the fire to his newly claimed throne, followed by the neat camera rotation as he takes it. It's cool.

(0:02-0:31).

Derived Absurdity · Post by **Derived Absurdity** » Tue Sep 04, 2018 1:55 pm

What didn't you like about Civil War?

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Tue Sep 04, 2018 3:35 pm

I didn't like how the debate about the Accords or whatever they were called was fairly muddled and underwritten (Which perhaps makes it not very surprising when the movie just becomes about Stark and Rogers fighting over more personal reasons), but more than that I found some of the action to just be awful, visually incoherent messes.

Like the big Bucky breakout sequence is just awful. Characters disappearing between shots, appearing out of nowhere, no real sense of flow etc. Compare that to like, any scene in Mad Max: Fury Road for example where despite rapid editing there's still a clear flow of action at practically all times and the difference is staggering.

Derived Absurdity · Post by **Derived Absurdity** » Wed Sep 05, 2018 1:53 am

Yeah. Civil War was just aesthetically ugly and dull and I barely remembered anything in it a week after seeing it. Like, why did they choose to make their big fight scene take place in an ugly-ass abandoned airport, of all places. I also remember thinking the story was stupid and bad, but I don't remember why.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Mon Sep 10, 2018 5:13 pm

163. The Ox-Bow Incident (1943, Dir. William A. Wellman) - An interesting and lean little western that's sort of a courtroom drama. Henry Fonda and his friend ride into town, hear about a murder, and ride out with a posse of like 30 people (It's a large group at any rate, I can't remember the number for sure) to catch and interrogate the accused.

Most of the movie is spent on sort of a mock trial of three men accused of the murdering. Fonda, his friend, and five others think judgement is being rushed and that the three accused should be given a proper trial instead of what more or less is just frontier justice. The rest of the posse disagrees, and ultimately hangs the three accused…only later to find out that the dude that was thought to be murdered had never even been killed, and three innocent men were basically just murdered over nothing.

The whole thing of course is basically a story about the dangers of confirmation bias. It's not stylistically showy at all as a film, (Though I like a bit toward the end of the film where Fonda and the six others not convinced of the guilt are contained within a single shot while a panning a shot is needed to show everyone opposed to them), but its solidly constructed.

164. Lancelot du Lac (1974, Dir. Robert Bresson) - Bresson brings his minimalist, unglamorous style to the tragedy of Lancelot and Guinevere and it…almost works? Kind of, sort of? I think he has the right idea in focusing more on focusing on the effects of violence in the film (Even the big tourney big noticeably shows you very little of actual violence and instead people just reacting to it), and I generally like him trying to bring such mythic characters and stories down to Earth. Still…even with that in mind he's still trying to tell a story of how a love affair ultimately brings a kingdom to its end, and with that in mind I feel like all of the performances of the actors involved should be a little more passionate than even the naturalistic performance style allows.

It's also a little short at like 80 minutes. The whole thing could have used a little more meat on its bones- but not too much to defeat the point of what Bresson was going for.

165. Avengers: Infinity War (2018, Dir. Anthony Russo & Joe Russo) - So if Spider-Man: Homecoming and Black Panther are closer to what I think the Marvel movies are decent at doing, Infinity War is the kind of thing I think they struggle more with. The bloated, Robert Altman-esque cast really doesn't give anyone here room to breathe. Its like two and a half hours of action scenes, with Thanos being the tissue that connects everything as he (Or his minions and children) jump from battle to battle.

Thanos' motivations are kind of goofy. Dude's big plan is to kill 50% of life in the universe because he's worried about resources being depleted. I've seen that kind of motivation before, but it feels like that kind of theme kind of comes out nowhere for something Marvel has spent building up to for a decade. Also, can't he just use the Infinity Stones to create more resources? It's weird that no one even suggests that, even if he could shoot it down with some dumb rationalization like “Well the universe would still just blow through all of that, my plan guarantees we never even have to get to that stage" or whatever.

Also its kind of funny that the best shot in this movie (Where Thanos looks at the eclipsed sun after sacrificing Gomorrah) is taken straight out of Berserk, where its used in a very similar context.

Lastly, holy crap, Carrie Coon is absolutely wasted as Thanos' nameless daughter who uses the spear. She's a good actress, she deserves a better role than this!

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Mon Sep 10, 2018 5:14 pm

Anyways Hurricane Florence is approaching my home, so in the extremely off-chance I somehow don't make it, it's been fun, guys.

Post by **Gendo** » Mon Sep 10, 2018 6:14 pm

What state are you in? It's supposed to be headed right for me also, in NC.

Derived Absurdity · Post by **Derived Absurdity** » Mon Sep 10, 2018 6:18 pm

Hey, that's exactly what I said! About Infinity War, not the hurricane. Good luck with all that.

Another very good criticism of Infinity War that I didn't come across until well after my post was that it kind of destroys a lot of the Marvel movies that came before it. The whole point of Thor: Ragnarok was that the place didn't matter, the people did, which is why it was okay that Aasgard was physically destroyed as long as the people of it were together and well. The very first scene of Infinity War has all those people destroyed. The arc of Homecoming ended with Peter Parker refusing to join the Avengers and just being your humble neighborhood Spiderman, but here he joins them immediately. Black Panther was supposed to be about black people unbeholden to white people and how white people are not particularly important in the story of Wakanda, but here T'Challa sacrifices Wakanda immediately for battle with no hesitation. Guardians of the Galaxy 2 was about staying together as a family even if you're not biologically related, but in this movie they break up pretty much immediately. This movie just destroyed all those stories just for the sake of Thanos. I only saw all these movies once and I didn't particularly care about any of them, so I might be off on my recollections, but that's something I was kind of vaguely aware of watching this one, that all the stories and character arcs from the last four or five movies just kind of seemed to get tossed aside.

If this reading is correct then that is yet another example of how this movie fundamentally fails in long-form storytelling, which is supposed to be what the MCU is good at.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Mon Sep 10, 2018 7:56 pm

Another one with Thor: Ragnarok that bothered me was the whole thing about how magical weapons are kind of bullshit, real strength comes from within, from friendships, from love for others etc. Cool. And then in Infinity War, Thor...has to go on a quest to get a special magical axe to kill Thanos that almost works that only doesn't work because Thor didn't aim for his head.

It's like, why even have that whole quest element in the movie? It makes it seem like Thor didn't learn anything at all, and I don't think we're intentionally supposed to believe Thor is relapsing.

Gendo wrote:What state are you in? It's supposed to be headed right for me also, in NC.

I am also in NC, near Raleigh.

Post by **Gendo** » Mon Sep 10, 2018 8:07 pm

Woah, all this time! I'm in Raleigh, North Raleigh specifically. We should try to get together for a coffee or something sometime!

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Sun Sep 16, 2018 11:57 pm

166. The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973, Dir. Peter Yates) - A perfectly decent crime drama with a strong (And unexpectantly foul-mouthed IMO) central performance from Robert Mitchum. It's a very 70's crime drama in every way, from on location shooting in Boston, to restrained acting, to a cheesy 70's soundtrack, to themes of fatalism etc. That's all well and good, it just never quite seems to rise to outright exceptional. It's a good movie though. I liked it better than The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1978) at any rate.

Also there's a character in here named Jackie Brown, which is where I'm assuming Tarantino got the name from for his movie.

167. Sympathy for the Devil (AKA One Plus One, 1968, Dir. Jean-Luc Godard) - This is something of a cinema-verite documentary that shows the Rolling Stones creating their famous song “Sympathy for the Devil"…sort of. While Godard's long takes of the band in their studio doing work naturally draws comparisons to something like Let It Be (The documentary about the creation of the Beatles album that also shows that band beginning to fall apart), it wouldn't be a Godard film without complicating elements. We often also cut to various political radicals in staged segments, from members of the Black Panther party, to some kind of Nazi running a book store, to a woman known only as “Eve Democracy" who answers questions of politics with a “Yes" or “No". All of this is also accompanied by strange voice over that sounds like some kind of erotic thriller novel is being read.

Even more weirdly, the entire film (The cut I found at least) appears to be in the English language. I know Godard is fluent in English, but its just strange to see his style without hearing any French at all.

Godard's juxtapositions are as unusual as usual, though I still find it vastly preferable to A Film Like Any Other. The political talks are more understandable, and the bits with the Rolling Stone developing Sympathy for the Devil are fun. Not my favorite Godard by any means but I wouldn't call it his worst either- an interesting curiosity in his filmography.

168. Dark Passage (1947, Dir. Delmer Daves) - The third of four productions between Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall (Coming after To Have and Have Not and The Big Sleep and before Key Largo). It was also the last of these films that I had yet to see.

It's a weird one at first. The basic story is one you might expect from noir- Bogie is an escaped convict, on the run from the law etc. In a rather bizarre turn though, the first third or so of this film is largely shot from Bogart's first-person perspective. This whole section (Alongside Lady of the Lake (1947), which used a similar gimmick.) ends up feeling like a distant ancestor of found footage stuff like The Blair Witch Project or Marble Hornets.

The whole thing comes to an end when Bogart gets plastic surgery and can start investigating why somebody seems to have started tailing him and murdering people in his wake. From there it really does just become a more kind of standard noir, but one I had a lot of fun with.

169. Slick Hare (1947, Dir. Friz Frelend) - A fun little Warner Bros. short that was included on my Dark Passage DVD. Here Elmer Fudd is a waiter and cook in a Hollywood restaurant who has to prepare some “fried rabbit" for his guest Humphrey Bogart...or else. Unfortunately the rabbit he has to prepare is one Bugs Bunny.

The impersonation of Bogart is excellent and the whole short is quite fun.

170. Escape Room (2017, Dir. Will Wernick) - A group of friends gather for the birthday of their friend Tyler. Tyler's girlfriend Christen decides for Tyler's birthday everyone should go to an escape room. Everyone starts solving puzzles to escape but then people start dying. Who trapped them in the escape room and why?

Yeah this is clearly in the vein of stuff like Cube, Saw (I think. Haven't actually seen any of these myself.), that movie Fermat's Room I watched a few months back etc. As just kind of a hollow horror mystery thriller I enjoyed it, though the acting got a little too campy at times and it's ending is a little nihilistic for my tastes.

171. Rushmore (1998, Dir. Wes Anderson) - Watching this movie's main character Max is sort of like watching Scarlett O'Hara trying and failing to become Ferris Bueller for like 90 minutes. Seriously, I'm not sure the Max has even a single redeeming quality. He's such a little shit and not even a particularly interesting one.

Bill Murray was good in his supporting role at least. Other than that, I dunno, this was the first Wes Anderson I just didn't even enjoy much at all.

Post by **Gendo** » Mon Sep 17, 2018 2:09 am

You're alive!

I just can't get into Wes Anderson; but I should probably give him another shot.

Faustus5 · Post by **Faustus5** » Mon Sep 17, 2018 5:05 pm

Raxivace wrote:Bill Murray was good in his supporting role at least.

The look on Murray's face when it dawned on him how much the kid was making up to mask his insecurity was priceless.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Wed Sep 19, 2018 3:36 am

172. Revenge (1989, Dir. Ermek Shinarbaev) - The story of a family whose daughter* is murdered and then raises a son to get revenge.

Despite a very action movie sounding premise, this is anything but. It's a quiet, meditative film- in a sense its merging of these arthouse tendencies with that kind of plot reminds me of The Revenant, though that film still has more of a plot focus.

I think this is at least partly due to Shinarbaev's collaboration on this film with novelist Anatoli Kim. According the blu-ray special features, this is because Kim would put intentionally ambiguous or unknown elements into the script (Such as the bit in the very beginning with the tortoise, or the hedgehog that appears multiple times). Shinarbaev would ask what they mean and Kim would only reply "I don't know". In a way it really reminds me of that negative capability thing that Jimbo sometimes talks about.

This isn't to say that Shinarbaev didn't contribute at all though.He and his cinematographer came up with some aboslutely beautiful imagery. The landscapes here in particular are as beautiful as any in Ford or Kurosawa.

Anyways its a cool movie and easily one of my favorites so far in these World Cinema Project boxsets.

*There seems to be some confusion about this. The IMDb plot description says it's a son that is murdered, but in the film its very clearly a daughter. The murderer character meets the son later on the film and seems confused as to how he can even exist, which may be the source of where this discrepancy originates.

173. American Boy: Profile of Steven Prince (1978, Dir. Martin Scorsese) - Scorsese interviews his friend Steven Prince, once a road manager for Neil Diamon, though Prince is probably more well known to cinephiles as the guy who sells guns to Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver.

Anyways the doc is mostly just Prince telling various stories about his life growing up, doing drugs, a time he shot and killed a guy etc. He's fairly charismatic in his own weird way, so it's a fun (And quick) 50-ish minute watch if you're into this sort of thing.

Interestingly enough, one of Prince's stories here was heavily homaged by Tarantino in Pulp Fiction.

Unfortunately, I couldn't find a video on YouTube that played each segment in their entirety next to each other. Every video I found online kept cutting between them like this.

----------------------------------

Oh yeah, not that I expect this to be a crowd that cares about this sort of thing but I finished watching the first ten seasons of Survivor. They've been really interesting to take a look at, especially comparing the social attitude of Americans nearly 20 years ago to now. Here are some brief words about each of these seasons.

1. Borneo - The original and still fun to watch today with all of the different personalities involved. Its hard to compare to modern seasons because the game was still being developed here, but its kind of funny to people take great moral offense to what is now basic gameplay like "alliances".

2. The Australian Outback - Another very early season, not a whole lot to say about it. Seeing a dude burn the skin off of his hands was neat.

3. Africa - Another early season where's there's not a whole lot of interesting strategy in the voting, though the location is fun. I think its improved in retrospect too, knowing that like half of the foundation for the betrayal controversy in the All-Stars seasons is set here with the Lex/Ethan/Big Tom trio (And more specifically, that they don't remain a trio in All Stars).

4. Marquesas - Probably most notable for being the first time "Boston Rob" Mariano would ever play, though while he goes out early the rest of the season is pretty solid and there's some decent strategizing for an early season of Survivor here. Sean Rector in particular probably needs more credit for the idea of bringing two smaller alliances together to take on a bigger one.

5. Thailand - The guy who won this season would go on in life to (Allegedly) shoot a puppy. He might actually be some kind of sociopath, though we know he's the best skater. He's got the biggest ice skates on.

6. The Amazon - Rob Cesternino absolutely makes this season since he's like, one of like five people up until this point in the show to have any idea what he's even doing out here and he does so with wit. Even without him though there are a lot of other memorable moments, like the camp burning down, the first deaf contestant, Jenna and Heidi stripping for peanut butter (An act that would eventually lead to them posing in Playboy) etc.

7. Pearl Islands - An incredibly fun season, from the pirate theme, to Rupert's adventures, to Johnny Fairplay's infamous dead grandma lie, to the first goober to ever outright just quit the game, to Sandra and her general attitude, to a surprisingly large amount of talk about the Boy Scouts of America of all things. Seriously as good as this season is I never want to hear about the god damned honor of the fucking Boy Scouts ever again.

8. All-Stars - Might as well be called "Boston Rob Ruins Literally All of His Friendships: The Television Series Event". Seriously this is a very bitter season (Even without the unfortunate sexual assault allegation that occurs here early on), though in some ways its the most interesting one since it goes out of its way to show all of your favorite players from the previous 7 seasons in either a negative light or as incredibly vulnerable people that you can't even enjoy hating.

It's not very fun to watch because of that, but probably more than any other it really gets to the heart of what it means for Survivor to be a “social game", even if it's dark at times.

9. Vanuatu: Islands of Fire - ALL HAIL THE SPIRIT STONE

10. Palau - This one is interesting to watch if only because its the first season where a tribe loses literally every single Immunity Challenge until there's literally nobody left. Its like the longest car crash ever, just great to watch.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Wed Sep 19, 2018 3:37 am

Gendo wrote:You're alive!

I just can't get into Wes Anderson; but I should probably give him another shot.

Yeah luckily we ended up not getting hit very hard by Florence.

I like the other Wes Andersons I've seen well enough but Grand Budapest Hotel and Hotel Chevalier are the only ones I've loved. I guess hotels are the subject he knows best.

Faustus5 wrote:
Raxivace wrote:Bill Murray was good in his supporting role at least.
The look on Murray's face when it dawned on him how much the kid was making up to mask his insecurity was priceless.

In general I should have mentioned how much more...restrained Murray is here compared to like Ghostbusters or Groundhog Day and so on. I wonder if this is what lead him to doing stuff like Lost in Translation too (Not to mention the other Wes Anderson movies he would make).

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:49 pm

So a while back Danny Boyle left James Bond 25, but now Cary Fukunaga is set to direct the next Bond movie.

I really liked what he did with True Detective Season 1 and Beasts of No Nation. This could be good.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Mon Sep 24, 2018 8:13 pm

174. Ready Player One (2018, Dir. Steven Spielberg) - I had heard for the last several years that the original novel was kind of shit. I never read it, but I did find Spielberg's version to actually be a pretty fun little treasure hunt film.

Damn, the references to different nerd stuff here is pretty varied though, from Citizen Kane and Seven Samurai (Toshiro Mifune and Mifune Productions are even mentioned in the credits), to stuff like Back to the Future and The Shining (These two in particular get some major love), to Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street, to some of Spielberg's own movies like Jurassic Park and War of the Worlds, to Street Fighter and Sonic, to Akira and Mobile Suit Gundam*. That's not even a fraction- there's YouTube videos that go through the literally hundreds of different touchstones here. It's arguably cynically done and cheap nostalgia baiting, but dammit it also lead to me seeing Spielberg directing a scene where the RX-78-2 Gundam fights Mechagodzilla- this movie practically became a Super Robot Wars game for a scene.

*The Gundam in particular being in this movie is some fucking hilarious irony because Yoshiyuki Tomino once talked about in an interview how he considered Spielberg to be his biggest competition. Now Spielberg goes and uses his most iconic creation like this.

I'm not entirely sure this kind of overloading on popculture references really works with a movie that tries to end on the note of "Maybe take a break from pop-culture once in a while?" though.

175. Drive, He Said (1971, Dir. Jack Nicholson) - Yes that's right, Jack Nicholson is also a film director

He tries, but just isn't a great director either. Drive, He Said was his debut feature film (He previously was one of like five directors on a b-horror film in the 60's called The Terror, where also starred alongside Boris Karloff of all people.), and here he tries to look at college life in America, with a focus on a star basketball player and his brother who, in trying avoid the draft, does a bunch of drugs until he goes crazy.

Most of it just doesn't work. The basketball scenes are impressive, Bruce Dern as the basketball coach is phenomenal, but Nicholson just doesn't get deeply into any of the issues he tries to touch here whether its about Vietnam, or sex, or celebrity, or youth protest etc. It did make me think of La Chinoise and A Film Like Any Other again (Fuckin' Godard man), and perhaps its most interesting in that kind of comparative sense.

Two of the uncredited screenwriters on here are Robert Town (He also plays a character in Drive, He Said. He of course would become most famous for later writing Chinatown) and, strangely enough, Terrence Malick. That's two very clashing sensibilities right there, and with Nicholson himself and the author of the novel that this is based on thrown in there perhaps this film was just doomed to never quite work.

176. Jurassic World: Lost Kingdom (2018, Dir. Juan Antonio Bayona) - May not come close the height of Spielberg's original Jurassic Park but it was a little better than I expected. The structure reminded me more of The Lost World though- first half focused on the island, second half focused on mainland America.

Here the second half is mainly in a mansion though, which I guess makes it just Resident Evil with dinosaurs? Wait that's just Dino Crisis.

177. A Safe Place (1971, Dir. Henry Jaglom) - Yeah I don't even know what the deal with this one. You would think a film inspired by the French New Wave starring Tuesday Weld with Orson Welles and Jack Nicholson in supporting roles could be great, but the whole thing is ephemeral to the point of not feeling like much of anything. At least in a previous film from BBS Productions like Head the anarchic nature of the story was part of the point- here the chaos may be calculated by doesn't seem to add up to much.

Welles kind of works as his magician character at least- fitting since he was a stage magician in real life.

178. The Last Picture Show (1971, Dir. Peter Bogdanovich) - Really reminded me of George Lucas' American Graffiti, with the use of pop music, kids going to war, the small town setting (Though here the town is explicitly a dying one) etc. Really makes me wonder what the hell ever happened to Bogdanovich, since as a young guy he had some very movies under his belt and now he's just “That talking head with the ascot you see in DVD special features for 40's movies".

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Thu Oct 04, 2018 1:56 am

179. Limite (1931, Dir. Mario Peixoto) - The story of one man and two women lost at sea, and their memories.
I really struggled with this silent film because like for the first 80 or so minutes of its runtime, as I kept constantly getting interrupted by something, so I could invest as much into its story or mood that as I would have liked. Still, there are some very striking images here (And few title cards, perhaps even fewer than The Last Laugh) that it would be worth revisiting in the future. I wish I had more to say.

180. The Adventurer (1917, Dir. Charles Chaplin) - A cute little short where Chaplin plays an escaped prisoner who tries posing as a butler…for a judge.

It's a pretty typical Chaplin short for this time period, though the reason I checked it out was because clips from it were played in Limite. Pretty fitting, since both films feature escaped prisoners as characters (Though they're used in incredibly different ways).

181. Law of the Border (1966, Dir. Lütfi Ã–. Akad) - Scorsese describes this as something of a “Turkish western", and despite the presence of jeeps and such I think that's fairly accurate since we ultimately have a story of bandits, cattle, lawmen, farming, the construction of a school as a “civilizing" factor etc. Unfortunately, like 20 minutes of this film is still in fairly bad condition despite restoration efforts, and some footage is even still missing. Its still an enjoyable watch, but a hard one to love nowadays due to how history has mangled it.

182. Taipei Story (1985, Dir. Edward Yang) - This was a real pleasant surprise.

The interview with Hou Hsiao-hsien (The lead in the film here and credited as a writer. I'm sure Jimbo could tell us about his more famous work as a director in great detail) and film critic Edmond Wong mention an influence on Yang by people like Godard and Werner Herzog which I wonder if isn't being overstated a bit. Taipei Story at least didn't have nearly as radical a formalism as Godard's films do (Though it still excellently done), and is waaaaaaay too urban to ever seem like Herzog to me.

The urban-ness of this movie is interesting though, as Yang uses the story of a couple and the people that revolve around them (Both older and younger) to really explore the development of Taipei. One character looks across the city and can't remember which buildings they have designed and which they haven't hasn't, Hou's older baseball coach friend remembers a time when none of the buildings were even there, whereas the youngest generations take abandoned buildings for granted as hangout spots. All three groups are disillusioned to varying degrees.

This isn't to say that staying in the past is the answer either- Hou's character fantasizes about his “glory days" as a baseball player, and such an overindulgence on nostalgia gets him nowhere.

Despite Yang's seeming cynicism about what urbanization would be, that Hou's character would then get killed in one of the least urban spots in the story- on a road traveling around a mountain- is curious.

I don't really feel like I've even scratched the surface of this one (The interplay in how China, the United States, Japan, etc. affect the culture of Taipei is a huge element of this movie too but not one I'm really educated enough to say anything about). Definitely one I want to watch again soon, as well as finally watching A Brighter Summer Day and Yi-Yi at least.

183. The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004, Dir. Wes Anderson) - Another Wes Anderson I just wasn't super into, though I liked some of the seafarer stylings in the movie, and the more bittersweet tone that pops up toward the end (Like when the jaguar shark is finally encountered, aided in no doubt by the track “Staralfur" by Sigur Ros that plays) worked better for me.

184. Macross Delta: Passionate Walküre (2018, Dir. Shoji Kawamori) - A pretty straightforward condensation of the Macross Delta TV anime, focusing most of the story down into roughly two hours. The basic story follows "Walküre", a band who doubles as a "Tactical Sound Unit" using their cheery pop music to cure a mysterious rage virus called the "Var Syndrome" that has appeared in the galaxy, a cadre of mecha pilots that protect the band called Delta Squadron, and the mysterious "Aerial Knights", another group of pilots that seem intent on not only killing Walküre but allowing the Var syndrome to continue to spread.

I think the movie plays up to Delta's strengths- namely its fun music, the spectacle of Walküre's performances, and the battle scenes are genuinely better. The kind of bathetic ending is done better here too, both with how the final battle itself is played out and reorganizing Messer's funeral so it comes as a kind of epilogue to the film.

I think Passionate Walküre has the same weird flaw as all of the other Macross movies in that it still kind of assumes you've seen the TV anime. I'm not even sure the origins of the Var Syndrome, a key element of the plot, are even explained properly in the film. Here they're just purely a MacGuffin, which is fine. The goofy conspiracy revolving around apples and bottled water is completely gone too- and that's super unfortunate because the sheer idea of that owned.

The largest and most bizarre change to me though is that the central love triangle (One of the key ingredients of the Macross franchise) is entirely removed. Mirage goes from being the third spoke of the triangle to just another pilot, and her relationship with Hayate seems purely platonic.

Hayate himself is used pretty differently in the movie. Similar to how Hikaru was used in Do You Remember Love?, now he starts off already as a pilot instead of becoming one in a story parallel to Freyja joining Walküre. I wouldn't even say he's the main character in this telling of the story- just Freya's love interest- that would certainly explain why his negative qualities are downplayed here. None of the stuff about his relationship with his father here too- him being the one who who fucking nuked Windemere doesn't even come up.

I'd argue in this telling of the story, Freyja is the main character. Her story really is shaped into almost a Disney-esque Princess story (Though raunchier). Its an interesting change in direction. Supposedly this is getting a sequel movie, which has me curious if they'll with having Freyja as the de facto lead.

I had a lot of fun with it overall.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Thu Oct 04, 2018 1:59 am

Anyways since its October I'll be moving on to watching a bunch of horror movies. Any recommendations?

I know I plan on watching some more of the old Universal stuff that I have on blu-ray now, maybe some Hammer Horror Dracula, and a few standalone things at least. I didn't really make any big plans for this year though.

maz89 · Post by **maz89** » Thu Oct 04, 2018 6:59 am

What do you mean "didn't make big plans for this year"?? It's October, there are 3 months left! Since January, you've been watching movies left, right and center!

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Thu Oct 04, 2018 11:26 am

Nah, I won't even be able to manage an average rate of one film per day this year. :(

Recently I've liked to do some kind of big horror movie project for October ever since Jimbo got me to watch all of the Val Lewtons a few years ago, but I just didn't get any cool idea put together for this year.

maz89 · Post by **maz89** » Tue Oct 09, 2018 7:10 am

I've been watching the early Bond films lately and I have to ask: why is James Bond such a slut? Also, have to ask, does it make anyone uncomfortable when he lecherously imposes himself on any woman who comes his way, despite her protests? "No means no" never worked for him.

Post by **Gendo** » Tue Oct 09, 2018 2:12 pm

All of Bond is something I need to get to sometime soon; in order to make good progress through my "own but haven't seen" list. But I think that's mostly a product of the time; women in those films are trophies, not people. Kingsman actually attempts to satirize it by taking it to an extreme near the end; though their attempt fell really flat IMO.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Tue Oct 09, 2018 2:39 pm

185. It Comes at Night (2017, Dir. Trey Edward Shults) - Another sleek, “prestige horror" film (“Art horror" is another term I've heard been used recently to describe these kinds of movies) from A24, similar in tone to The Witch, Hereditary, to a lesser extent Green Room etc.
After most of humanity seems to be wiped out by a disease or something (I'm not sure the specifics really matter), a family in hiding meets and takes in another family. They agree to work together to survive, but can this second family be trusted?

The whole thing plays out kind of like a chamber drama like 10 Cloverfield Lane, but with two families of three instead of three individuals. Similar usage of ambiguity too (What exactly is the disease thing? Who killed the dog? Who opened the door? Why wasn't the small child in his room with his parents? Was the man lying about having a brother, or does he in fact have a brother in law that he had only misspoken about? Who were the two dudes in the forest?), though unlike 10CL this ambiguity isn't ever quite resolved, instead fueling the paranoia of the characters even further. It somewhat bizarrely reminded me of Steinbeck's The Pearl of all things too, in that paranoid fighting over resources spiral out of control only leading to a child getting murdered.

Of all of A24's “prestige horror" films this is probably the one I liked the most, as it doesn't quite feel regressive like The Witch or Hereditary did to me, and doesn't seem mindless in the way that Green Room did to me. I don't think the general atmosphere is as impressive as, say, the reconstructed 17th century of The Witch though either- as slick as its look is I'm not sure that it's an especially cinematic film.

I really do think the film is missing something in general that could really elevate it though. Maybe its cinematic flair, maybe it just needed to be longer (It's barely even like 90 minutes, perhaps it could have been a little slower of a burn). It's hard for me to really say what it is.

186. A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (1988, Dir. Renny Harlin) - A pretty standard Elm Street movie, except the characters that survived from Part 3 you kind of liked are here for some reason and are killed off pretty quick, and also the theater scene from Sherlock Jr. is ripped off. Not a whole lot else for mem to say about it, other than it sets up the disaster that is Part 5.

187. A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child (1989, Dir. Stephen Hopkins) - If Elm Street 2 was arguably a progressive film in regards to gay men, Elm Street 5 goes in the opposite direction into being a regressive film about abortion.

Seriously, this is some conservative propaganda. The entire film is predicated on Freddy coming back to life through the unborn baby of Alice from Part 4, because ~babies can dream too~, even if the fetus in Alice can't be any older than like 72 hours. Luckily Alice decides not to abort, even though she's now a 18 year old single mother (Her bland ass boyfriend is killed in the movie btw, big RIP to that guy), as the unborn soul of her baby (Who has previously spent the movie crying about how her mommy doesn't love her but at “his friend with the funny hand" does) has absorbed Freddy's power as his own and defeats Freddy with it.

It is the most hackneyed metaphorical argument against abortion I have ever seen. Don't believe me that this is in the movie? Go watch it yourself with what I've said here in mind, you won't be able to miss it. The entire thing plays like it was written by one of those priests that troll around college campuses with Bibles and tasteless hand-made signs.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Tue Oct 09, 2018 2:42 pm

maz89 wrote:I've been watching the early Bond films lately and I have to ask: why is James Bond such a slut? Also, have to ask, does it make anyone uncomfortable when he lecherously imposes himself on any woman who comes his way, despite her protests? "No means no" never worked for him.

It's because Bond is actually Connery's character from Marnie operating under a code name.

Derived Absurdity · Post by **Derived Absurdity** » Wed Oct 10, 2018 2:55 am

Are you telling me a horror movie from the 80s is conservative when it comes to sexuality because I will not believe it.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Wed Oct 10, 2018 4:32 am

Derived Absurdity wrote:Are you telling me a horror movie from the 80s is conservative when it comes to sexuality because I will not believe it.

That's the stereotype for these movies, and the one I thought applied before I started really watching these, but it doesn't hold up quite as easily as you might expect. Most of them, to me at least, seem intentionally designed to be read both liberally or conservatively. I.e. in a lot of these movies you'll have a villain killing teenagers for some teenaged transgression (Usually having sex), but you're not always meant to identify with the villain himself, and even when you are that identification will often switch by the end to the "final girl" that he's failed to kill, who will then punish the villain for his murders by defeating them.

So it's often a mixed message (Is the patriarchal violence that the villain represents something we're meant to be afraid of or indulge in? It can sometimes change on a scene by scene basis within any individual movie), but that can at least be something to talk about.

In contrast, I've never seen any of these other movies go as hard in one direction as "The soul of my unborn fetus will defeat the villain". It's hard to spin any kind of real pro-choice theme out of that lol.

Derived Absurdity · Post by **Derived Absurdity** » Wed Oct 10, 2018 4:15 pm

Yeah, but there's a reason the final girl is almost always chaste and virginal. The Cabin in the Woods made fun of that.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Fri Oct 12, 2018 12:23 pm

Derived Absurdity wrote:Yeah, but there's a reason the final girl is almost always chaste and virginal. The Cabin in the Woods made fun of that.

Eh I think enough of these movies have final girls that aren't so virginal for it to not be such a hard and fast rule. Elm Street 1, several Friday the 13th movies, Terminator 1 (Sarah Connor having sex is even a key part of the plot), Texas Chainsaw Massacre 1, arguably Alien 1 etc.

I think its a problem with Cabin in the Woods that some of what its criticizing in horror doesn't actually seem to actually hold up super well. Like Evil Dead 1 is a huge reference point in that movie, and there the virginal girl is raped and killed by a tree partway through the film (In an admittedly shittier scene of a film I otherwise quite like).

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Fri Oct 12, 2018 12:42 pm

188. Cronos (1993, Dir. Guillermo del Toro) - An antique shop owning grandfather finds a strange looking amulet in one of his statues that grants him immortality by turning him into some kind of a vampire. He drinks blood, is burned by the sunlight, sleeps in a coffin (The granddaughter's toybox) etc.. Meanwhile, a corporate asshole and his lackey son seek to steal the amulet.

I'm not very familiar with del Toro's early movies but its cool to see his neat sensibilities for genre blending are already in place here. The whole thing plays out like a mix of a Spielbergian family movie and like, body horror. A weird combination that actually mostly works.
The last act is a bit messy to me though. Ron Perlman is glad his dad is dead, so why is he even trying to fight grandpa at this point?

189. House of Frankenstein (1944, Dir. Erle C. Kenton) - A weirdly bifurcated story. The first third of the film focuses on Boris Karloff and his “hunchback" assistant buying the remains of Dracula and touring them as a show, and the rest of the film focuses on following up on Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man, as Karloff and co. find both of their remains and plans to use them for some brain swapping shenanigans. Also there's a love triangle between a gypsy woman, the hunchback, and Lawrence Talbot that ends fairly tragically.

It's a short watch at like 70 minutes but it's fun. Watch out for quick sand.

190. House of Dracula (1945, Dir. Erle C. Kenton) - The last of the Dracula/Frankenstein/Wolf Man part of the Universal monster movies that I had yet to see. Unfortunately, I wasn't super into this one, though I appreciated that it tried to return the series to the more atmospheric mood of some of the earlier entries.

I was a little confused by how this connects to the previous movie though. Didn't Talbot die in House of Frankenstein?

Eva Yojimbo · Post by **Eva Yojimbo** » Tue Oct 16, 2018 4:26 am

Catching up:

Raxivace wrote:
Eva Yojimbo wrote:I'm surprised it doesn't sound familiar. Last film I heard it a lot in was the Eastwood one. There's also a really funny and memorable scene in The Seven Year Itch that uses the first movement (instead of the second one I posted above):

That's ridiculous, I used to play piano and nothing like that ever happened to me. ... Maybe I should have stayed with the piano...

That's actually one of the major Billy Wilder films I haven't seen...I do plan on finishing his filmography some day, since he doesn't have that many films compared to someone like Hitchcock and I like most of the ones I watched already (Also an old podcast I used to listen to did an episode on every single one of his movies, which makes the deep dive more fun when you can sort of simulate having someone going through the movies with you).

I played guitar for years and nothing like that ever happened... and guitarists are supposed to get the chicks!

Like most Wilder it's definitely worth seeing, though I think it's more mid-tier for him. Not as good as his best, but not among his worst either.

Raxivace wrote:Looking at the Wikipedia page for MI3, apparently David Fincher was going to direct this originally. Now that would have been interesting.

Fincher would be a great fit for the MI series. Would love to see him do one, but I don't know if it'll ever happen.

Raxivace wrote:
I often think that thematic depth depends as much on how much we like films rather than anything that's objectively in the films. So often I've found when analyzing a film and trying to put into words what I think it "means," it usually comes down to some pretty common, universal stuff that exists in tons of media, and the only difference between them is that THIS work made me care because of its particular take on the subject matter, and THAT work made me not care because of its take. So I'm sure that people could analyze De Palma and find "thematic depth," but I think we agree that his style or take on the subject matter just doesn't really provoke/inspire us to care.
Yeah generally I agree with this.

That argument about De Palma I mentioned is a more specific one based in intertextuality though- I wouldn't have raised a fuss if it just said that De Palma is interested in general themes of voyeurism or whatever. I might challenge his exploration (Or dramatization or cinematic representation or whatever terms we want to use describe the films) of those themes compared to Hitchcock's but that's different grounds for discussion.

Yeah, I'm also skeptical as to whether De Palma is intentionally saying anything about Hitchcock, but there is a general theory that most art is a commentary of sorts on past art. I think this can be be more compelling in some cases than in others, especially in cases where you can tell that, one, an artist was explicitly influenced by something and, two, they made some interesting alterations to the thing they borrowed from. So perhaps there might be something to De Palma's intertextuality on that level, but doubtfully intentionally.

Raxivace wrote:
I think we'd both agree that neither Hitchcock nor Kurosawa cared about themes; they cared about entertaining an audience and mastering their craft to do that in highly creative ways. The fact that they did what they did so well is probably what makes their themes matter more than the vast majority of arthouse directors out there who are very consciously and overtly theme-heavy.
Well if you mean they didn't care about themes to mean that they didn't care about themes above all else (Like entertaining an audience) then yeah I'd agree.

Yeah, that's what I meant. Though Kurososawa was infamously indifferent to those who tried to discuss what his films meant; he would only ever be interested in talking technique.

Raxivace wrote:
Of those I played, the original was still my favorite. It's hard to beat the atmosphere and design of that mansion, and I actually loved the puzzles. I also really liked RE2 once I got over how ridiculous it was that any police station would be designed like that! I didn't remember a whole lot about 3 and CV until I watched the walkthroughs and a lot of it came back to me. I do agree CV was better, but I do remember being a bit freaked every time Nemesis showed up back in the day.
Yeah the mansion is amazing.

The design of the police station is curious. In the beta for RE2 it resembled a real police station more closely, but that version of the game was scrapped nearly entirely (Though various builds of it now float around the internet and the hands of collectors), and we got the art museum-turned-police station of the final version of the game. I forget what entirely motivated this change in design, but I like that RE2 itself treats it as a part of its backstory lol. Even the collector's edition of the RE2 remake references it.

On a related note, I love that the files of the game treat the absurd puzzles as an entirely diegetic thing.

Ha! I'd almost forgotten how they treated the design/puzzles diegetically.

On a semi-related note, I happened on a YouTube playthrough of the new Spider-Man game, and being a lifelong (semi-closeted) Spider-Fan who was rather astounded by what I saw, I broke down and bought a PS4 just to play the damn game. I've spent the last few weeks playing it through several times and it's addicting as hell, and I'm secure enough in my masculinity to admit that the ending makes me cry every damn time. This game gets Spider-Man right better than any media since the first two Raimi films.

So, now that I have a PS4 (for now, anyway), any must-play games? I know you'd recommend the RE remakes, but given that I just recently watched the walkthroughs on YouTube (twice, no less!) I'd rather hold off for a while so it'd be fresher. I was hoping that I could catch up on the Metal Gear Solid games (I've played 1 and 2, and the first was, along with Ocarina of Time, my all-time favorite game back in the day), but I found out the PS4 isn't backwards compatible and there's no version of MGS 3 and 4 for the PS4, so that's frustrating. I thought about maybe the latest Grand Theft Auto (I loved 3 and Vice City), but given Spider-Man is also an open-world game I'm not sure I want to play a similar game right after. Maybe an RPG might fit the bill... if I don't get bored with it (that used to be my problem with RPGs; I loved them, but they were always so long that I'd usually get bored before I finished them).

Raxivace wrote:
Eva_Yojimbo wrote:I haven't seen this one myself. Much like you I've saved the last few Kurosawa films because I hate for my "journey" to end. I've done the same with several directors: I also only have a few films to see from Ozu, Mizoguchi, Bergman, and a few others.
Speaking of Bergman, are you getting that bigass boxset Criterion is putting out of his films? I'm really tempted, though if I do it will take me forever to work through it.

Definitely getting that Bergman box set, even though I've seen almost all of the films in it. Many of them are new to blu-ray and some of the lesser ones I doubt will ever get their own releases. I'll also probably end up buying all the individual releases for the others as well since I already own most all of the individual blu-ray releases and I'm an OCD completist when it comes to shit like this.

Raxivace wrote:
Eva_Yojimbo wrote:I don't disagree with you about Spielberg's virtuosity, but I think I liked it slightly less than you. I guess I just never really got the whole shark terror thing, in part because sharks mostly seem like dumb dogs in water to me... like, they're almost never aggressive towards humans and there's probably a thousand animals you should be more scared of than sharks. Of course, film and the suspension of disbelief and all that... it's certainly excellent for what it is, but not quite top-tier Spielberg for me. Part of me actually prefers Duel.
I mean Duel is great, but this is also clearly the words of a man who has never had to fight a rabid dog or the terror of nearly drowning.

Here's the thing- sharks are both of those threats combined, like Voltron. A berserk animal with mastery over an environment that humans can never truly conquer... Holy shit, I'm scared just thinking about it.

I've never fought a rabid dog, but I did almost drown when I was about 3. Fell into my neighbors pool and I remember even thinking at the time that I was going to die. Luckily the neighbor saw me in time and managed to pull me out.

Humans can't conquer the water? Hell, Submarine > Shark any day of the week. :)

Raxivace wrote:145. Oh, Woe is Me (1992, Dir. Jean-Luc Godard)

Completely agree about how beautiful the film is, but it's also pretty typically beautiful for these late Godard films. Passion and Nouvelle Vague are just as beautiful (and, from what I can remember, Eloge D'Amour and Notre Musique). I also sympathize with not understanding much of it, and I don't think more subtitles would help any. These later Godard films are so elliptical and dense (including aurally; the entire soundtrack to Nouvelle Vague, including dialogue and sound effects, was released) and there's zero exposition to familiarize the viewer with anyone or anything. Part of me thinks that the narrative "mystery" of these films is part of what makes them so alluring and special. Like, if they were more comprehensible they'd be completely different films altogether. I don't recall the Rashomon shot you pointed out, but it definitely looks like it. Also, I'm guessing that Godard's problems with Kurosawa were probably more philosophical than technique wise. Godard not might've minded lifting some shots like that from Kurosawa as long as he wasn't borrowing any of Kurosawa's "bourgeois" narrative strategies. I actually don't even remember the "Quit talking" bit, but your guess is as good as any. In these late Godard films, it very much seems like Godard is most interested in how people miscommunicate with each other and are completely losing a connection with the world (nature, god, etc.) around them. Almost, dare I say, Malick-esque?

Raxivace wrote:146. Mysterious Object at Noon (2000, Dir. Apichatpong Weerasethakul) -

Yeah, I pretty much agree with your assessment: interesting in concept, but not really compelling or successful in execution. That said, all of Weera's films after this one are superb. I dare even say that Tropical Malady, Syndromes, and Uncle Boonmee are flat-out masterpieces. Perhaps my favorite director of the 21st century. You should at least make Tropical Malady a priority.

Raxivace wrote:148. Octopussy (1983, Dir. John Glen) -

This is the point where the Moore Bond completely lost me. I just thought this one and the last one sucked balls.

Raxivace wrote: 150. A Film Like Any Other (1968, Dir. Jean-Luc Godard) - I can't believe I bought this shit on blu-ray.

Can't say I didn't warn you!

Edit: Oops, completely missed this last page of posts. I guess I'll try to finish catching up tomorrow. :)

Eva Yojimbo · Post by **Eva Yojimbo** » Tue Oct 16, 2018 4:27 am

Kuribo4 wrote:(Looking at the first post here)
160~ films in one year. Damn. That's about one every other day or so.

Pfft, back in my late teens I saw around 1100 films in one year. Some days I did almost nothing but watch films all day.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Tue Oct 16, 2018 6:29 am

Eva Yojimbo wrote:Yeah, I'm also skeptical as to whether De Palma is intentionally saying anything about Hitchcock, but there is a general theory that most art is a commentary of sorts on past art. I think this can be be more compelling in some cases than in others, especially in cases where you can tell that, one, an artist was explicitly influenced by something and, two, they made some interesting alterations to the thing they borrowed from. So perhaps there might be something to De Palma's intertextuality on that level, but doubtfully intentionally.

Yeah I can agree on this kind of broad level.

On a semi-related note, I happened on a YouTube playthrough of the new Spider-Man game, and being a lifelong (semi-closeted) Spider-Fan who was rather astounded by what I saw, I broke down and bought a PS4 just to play the damn game. I've spent the last few weeks playing it through several times and it's addicting as hell, and I'm secure enough in my masculinity to admit that the ending makes me cry every damn time. This game gets Spider-Man right better than any media since the first two Raimi films.

You know I haven't actually followed the new Spider-Man game much.

I'm kind of surprised to hear you're back into gaming though!

One of us, one of us...

So, now that I have a PS4 (for now, anyway), any must-play games? I know you'd recommend the RE remakes, but given that I just recently watched the walkthroughs on YouTube (twice, no less!) I'd rather hold off for a while so it'd be fresher. I was hoping that I could catch up on the Metal Gear Solid games (I've played 1 and 2, and the first was, along with Ocarina of Time, my all-time favorite game back in the day), but I found out the PS4 isn't backwards compatible and there's no version of MGS 3 and 4 for the PS4, so that's frustrating. I thought about maybe the latest Grand Theft Auto (I loved 3 and Vice City), but given Spider-Man is also an open-world game I'm not sure I want to play a similar game right after. Maybe an RPG might fit the bill... if I don't get bored with it (that used to be my problem with RPGs; I loved them, but they were always so long that I'd usually get bored before I finished them).

It's a real shame you missed out on the PS3 generation. There's a lot of cool stuff from then that hasn't come to modern systems yet. MGS2 and MGS3 (As well as Peace Walker and Revengeance) will probably get modern ports eventually (Konami has already created a PS4 port of Zone of the Enders 2 of all things, and that was way less popular of a franchise than Metal Gear ever was), but MGS4 still hasn't left the PS3 for anything else even a decade later. MGS5 is on the PS4, but will be literally incomprehensible if you haven't played at least MGS3 and Peace Walker (And there's thematic context from the two original MSX games, MGS4, and Revengance as well that you'd be missing out on).

I don't play a lot of the bigger mainstream games, so its hard for me to throw out blanket recommendations. I can just throw out a list of stuff I liked though, and if you have questions about them I can try posting some more thoughts.

-Bloodborne
-Final Fantasy 15 (It's a big open world game though, might not be your cup of tea ATM)
-Evil Within 1 and 2
-P.T. (The Silent Hill demo thing Kojima and Del Toro did. If you want to play this though I'd have to lend you my account/password and instruct you on some uh questionably illegal methods to acquire this. It's very cool though)
-Super Robot Wars V (I don't think you would like this one as much as I did, but its the closest we'll ever get to having an Evangelion game in English)
-Tales of Berseria
-Persona 5
-Friday the 13th: The Game
-NieR: Automata (I liked the original NieR better though, but alas that's on the PS3)
-Firewatch
-Telltale's The Walking Dead (You don't need any familiarity with the show or comics to jump into this)
-BioShock HD Collection (Well the first two games in it anyways. BioShock Infinite disappointed me)
-Haunted Castle (Just kidding, don't fucking played Haunted Castle, it's a piece of shit)
-Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon (If you liked old NES platformers like Castlevania. This is a huge throwback to those, particularly Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse)
-Dark Souls: Remastered
-Shadow of the Colossus (I think you mentioned playing the PS2 version back in the day, but the remake on the PS4 is utterly gorgeous)
-Journey
-Fez (If you like bullshit puzzles wrapped around a cute platformer)
-The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (This is another big open world RPG though. Maz liked it more than I did but I thought it started strongly enough)

Maz and I talked about some of these games in the Games forum btw.

http://forum.pittersplace.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=1805

http://forum.pittersplace.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=2047

I'm sure he could recommend you some stuff too. IIRC he said he liked the new God of War a lot.

Hell, Submarine > Shark any day of the week. :)

I tried to fight a shark with a submarine once. It didn't work out.

Part of me thinks that the narrative "mystery" of these films is part of what makes them so alluring and special.

Yeah its cool, it just is a little humbling when I thought I was getting the film only to realize that I didn't realize I was missing important stuff while watching the film until after I was done with it, if that mess of a thought makes any sense.

Almost, dare I say, Malick-esque?

Yeah I can see it. Malick's more poetic though, has more of a sense of wonder, while Godard in this era is usually taking either a more essayistic approach or just kind of bombarding and overloading you with information in sometimes unpleasant ways. Interesting ways, but not always pleasant.

Raxivace wrote:Yeah, I pretty much agree with your assessment: interesting in concept, but nt really compelling or successful in execution. That said, all of Weera's films after this one are superb. I dare even say that Tropical Malady, Syndromes, and Uncle Boonmee are flat-out masterpieces. Perhaps my favorite director of the 21st century. You should at least make Tropical Malady a priority.

Yeah I still plan on getting to these other films at some point, but MOAN was the film between both World Cinema Project boxsets that didn't really land at all for me and that was kind of disappointing.

Can't say I didn't warn you!

That you did!

Like foolish Harker ignoring the denizens in the pub who all stared at him upon the announcement of his intentions to travel, I approached Dracula's castle anyways and suffered for it.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Tue Oct 16, 2018 6:30 am

Eva Yojimbo wrote:
Kuribo4 wrote:(Looking at the first post here)
160~ films in one year. Damn. That's about one every other day or so.
Pfft, back in my late teens I saw around 1100 films in one year. Some days I did almost nothing but watch films all day.

Man I wish I had that kind of energy. Some days I struggle just to get out of bed.

maz89 · Post by **maz89** » Tue Oct 16, 2018 8:13 am

Eva Yojimbo wrote:On a semi-related note, I happened on a YouTube playthrough of the new Spider-Man game, and being a lifelong (semi-closeted) Spider-Fan who was rather astounded by what I saw, I broke down and bought a PS4 just to play the damn game. I've spent the last few weeks playing it through several times and it's addicting as hell, and I'm secure enough in my masculinity to admit that the ending makes me cry every damn time. This game gets Spider-Man right better than any media since the first two Raimi films.

So, now that I have a PS4 (for now, anyway), any must-play games? I know you'd recommend the RE remakes, but given that I just recently watched the walkthroughs on YouTube (twice, no less!) I'd rather hold off for a while so it'd be fresher. I was hoping that I could catch up on the Metal Gear Solid games (I've played 1 and 2, and the first was, along with Ocarina of Time, my all-time favorite game back in the day), but I found out the PS4 isn't backwards compatible and there's no version of MGS 3 and 4 for the PS4, so that's frustrating. I thought about maybe the latest Grand Theft Auto (I loved 3 and Vice City), but given Spider-Man is also an open-world game I'm not sure I want to play a similar game right after. Maybe an RPG might fit the bill... if I don't get bored with it (that used to be my problem with RPGs; I loved them, but they were always so long that I'd usually get bored before I finished them).

OMG. Yes!!!!

Witcher 3 is one of THE best games I've ever played, period. You MUST check it out. It's a huge game (150+ hours if you want to do all of the extras but significantly shorter if you turn down the difficulty and stick to the main storyline - but what's the fun in that?). You may need to consult wikipedia for what happened in the first two games (the latter of which I played after completing Witcher 3 because I fell so deeply in love with the characters and world). Raxi wasn't as crazy about it as much as I was unfortunately (you can read our spoiler-filled discussion on the game thread AFTER you've finished the game), but I'm hoping you'll see the light. ;p If you don't get 'bored', that is... I couldn't get bored. The characters, the acting, the dense mythology, the ambiguous decision making, the uncertain atmosphere alternating between hope and dread... made sure I remained glued to my seat. Gameplay is a shit load of fun - I'm making what is arguably the most important element seem like an afterthought but there's a reason I happily poured in time I could have spent watching 50 movies into this game.

I recently finished the latest God of War and thought it was a terrifically constructed, beautifully designed RPG. 50+ hours with all the extras.

Another must-play recommendation I didn't see in Rax's list is Last of Us. It's a shorter game (about 15 hours) and it's set during another zombiepocalypse but people have been raving about this one for good reason. It's the only non-open world RPG I'm recommending unlike the previous two.

Among Rax's other picks, I've played Journey, Firewatch, Telltale's Walking Dead, Dark Souls and MGSV. Good games too, but none I'm crazy about (well, except for MGSV). I think you could consider Journey and Firewatch because they're shorter games (a couple of hours each IIRC) and the latter, btw, is quite different from the typical RPG model. Firewatch and, on that note, Gone Home are more about traversing through different environments to unravel an intriguing mystery rather than shooting up bad guys.

Also, Rax, I hadn't played a single MGS before MGSV so I decided to read up on the storylines from the previous games while I was playing it. Mostly ended up confused, but still I thought the game's story was really compelling on a visceral level, lol.

I can't wait to play Red Dead Redemption 2, which is going to get released at the end of this month. That's the Rockstar Games you should get instead of GTA V, which I wasn't too crazy about because of its bland storyline and characters (although gameplay and graphics might have still made it worthwhile... for a while).

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Tue Oct 16, 2018 2:27 pm

It's worth noting that Gone Home was insanely controversial when it came out several years ago, though IIRC neither me nor maz had particularly strong feelings about it.

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Tue Oct 16, 2018 5:58 pm

Oh yeah, if you liked Castlevania: Symphony of the Night back in the day its getting a rerelease on the PS4 in a few days alongside the game its a sequel to, Rondo of Blood (Which is one of my personal favorites).

Eva Yojimbo · Post by **Eva Yojimbo** » Wed Oct 17, 2018 4:15 am

OK, full catch-up this time.

Raxivace wrote:
Eva Yojimbo wrote:
Kuribo4 wrote:(Looking at the first post here)
160~ films in one year. Damn. That's about one every other day or so.
Pfft, back in my late teens I saw around 1100 films in one year. Some days I did almost nothing but watch films all day.
Man I wish I had that kind of energy. Some days I struggle just to get out of bed.

If film watching requires energy, you're doing it wrong. ;)

Raxivace wrote:
On a semi-related note, I happened on a YouTube playthrough of the new Spider-Man game, and being a lifelong (semi-closeted) Spider-Fan who was rather astounded by what I saw, I broke down and bought a PS4 just to play the damn game. I've spent the last few weeks playing it through several times and it's addicting as hell, and I'm secure enough in my masculinity to admit that the ending makes me cry every damn time. This game gets Spider-Man right better than any media since the first two Raimi films.
You know I haven't actually followed the new Spider-Man game much. I'm kind of surprised to hear you're back into gaming though!

If there's anything you want to know about the game just ask. I'm about through with my 4th playthrough so I pretty much know it inside and out now. FWIW, I'm back into gaming for now. If I get back into film and literature I may end up selling everything again... in fact, I kinda planned on selling it around Christmas anyway, which would give me enough time to play all the DLC and then be done with it. But I enjoyed it so much I thought I might catch up on some other titles. We'll see what happens over the next few months.

Raxivace wrote:
So, now that I have a PS4 (for now, anyway), any must-play games? I know you'd recommend the RE remakes, but given that I just recently watched the walkthroughs on YouTube (twice, no less!) I'd rather hold off for a while so it'd be fresher. I was hoping that I could catch up on the Metal Gear Solid games (I've played 1 and 2, and the first was, along with Ocarina of Time, my all-time favorite game back in the day), but I found out the PS4 isn't backwards compatible and there's no version of MGS 3 and 4 for the PS4, so that's frustrating. I thought about maybe the latest Grand Theft Auto (I loved 3 and Vice City), but given Spider-Man is also an open-world game I'm not sure I want to play a similar game right after. Maybe an RPG might fit the bill... if I don't get bored with it (that used to be my problem with RPGs; I loved them, but they were always so long that I'd usually get bored before I finished them).
It's a real shame you missed out on the PS3 generation. There's a lot of cool stuff from then that hasn't come to modern systems yet. MGS2 and MGS3 (As well as Peace Walker and Revengeance) will probably get modern ports eventually (Konami has already created a PS4 port of Zone of the Enders 2 of all things, and that was way less popular of a franchise than Metal Gear ever was), but MGS4 still hasn't left the PS3 for anything else even a decade later. MGS5 is on the PS4, but will be literally incomprehensible if you haven't played at least MGS3 and Peace Walker (And there's thematic context from the two original MSX games, MGS4, and Revengance as well that you'd be missing out on).

I don't play a lot of the bigger mainstream games, so its hard for me to throw out blanket recommendations. I can just throw out a list of stuff I liked though, and if you have questions about them I can try posting some more thoughts.

-Bloodborne
-Final Fantasy 15 (It's a big open world game though, might not be your cup of tea ATM)
-Evil Within 1 and 2
-P.T. (The Silent Hill demo thing Kojima and Del Toro did. If you want to play this though I'd have to lend you my account/password and instruct you on some uh questionably illegal methods to acquire this. It's very cool though)
-Super Robot Wars V (I don't think you would like this one as much as I did, but its the closest we'll ever get to having an Evangelion game in English)
-Tales of Berseria
-Persona 5
-Friday the 13th: The Game
-NieR: Automata (I liked the original NieR better though, but alas that's on the PS3)
-Firewatch
-Telltale's The Walking Dead (You don't need any familiarity with the show or comics to jump into this)
-BioShock HD Collection (Well the first two games in it anyways. BioShock Infinite disappointed me)
-Haunted Castle (Just kidding, don't fucking played Haunted Castle, it's a piece of shit)
-Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon (If you liked old NES platformers like Castlevania. This is a huge throwback to those, particularly Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse)
-Dark Souls: Remastered
-Shadow of the Colossus (I think you mentioned playing the PS2 version back in the day, but the remake on the PS4 is utterly gorgeous)
-Journey
-Fez (If you like bullshit puzzles wrapped around a cute platformer)
-The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (This is another big open world RPG though. Maz liked it more than I did but I thought it started strongly enough)

Maz and I talked about some of these games in the Games forum btw.

http://forum.pittersplace.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=1805

http://forum.pittersplace.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=2047

I'm sure he could recommend you some stuff too. IIRC he said he liked the new God of War a lot.

If I really get the itch I may look for a cheap-ish used PS3 just so I can catch up on MGS. As much I loved the first game (and really liked the second), if 3 and 4 are on that level it'd probably be worth it.

From your list, the bolded ones are the ones I've heard of. Believe it or not, in all my gaming years I never played a Final Fantasy game. I bought VII because of all the hype but never got around to it. I also noticed they have an HD remaster of X and X-2, and XII on PS4; any of them worth it? I rented Shadow of the Colossus back in the day but didn't finish it. I just don't think I was in the right mood for it back then, but I might love it now. FWIW, my anti-open world thing was only in relation to a GTA-like games (which Spider-Man definitely borrows from), not full-blown RPGs. The Witcher definitely sounds interesting, especially with maz's high rec too. If you had to narrow it down to one, what do you think I should definitely play next?

Raxivace wrote:
Part of me thinks that the narrative "mystery" of these films is part of what makes them so alluring and special.
Yeah its cool, it just is a little humbling when I thought I was getting the film only to realize that I didn't realize I was missing important stuff while watching the film until after I was done with it, if that mess of a thought makes any sense.

Messy thoughts kinda fit with these late, messy Godard films. I'm tellin' ya though, if you liked Woe, you should really make Passion and Nouvelle Vague a priority; they're both just as beautiful. The former is basically one of Godard's films about filmmaking, but it incorporates a lot of painting references in the form of tableaux vivants that are just gorgeous.

Raxivace wrote:
Almost, dare I say, Malick-esque?
Yeah I can see it. Malick's more poetic though, has more of a sense of wonder, while Godard in this era is usually taking either a more essayistic approach or just kind of bombarding and overloading you with information in sometimes unpleasant ways. Interesting ways, but not always pleasant.

I'm tempted to say that they're both equally poetic but in very different ways. Malick is more sensuous/visceral, while Godard is more a marriage of the literary and the visual. Malick does have more of a sense of wonder, but I often feel a kind of melancholic longing in late Godard.

Raxivace wrote:188. Cronos (1993, Dir. Guillermo del Toro)

I remember really liking this one... more in memory than at the time perhaps. I saw it before I even knew who del Toro was. Now I have it in the Criterion blu-ray box set. Should really give it a rewatch...

Raxivace wrote:186. A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (1988, Dir. Renny Harlin)

187. A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child (1989, Dir. Stephen Hopkins)

I remember nothing about these given I saw them as a kid, back when the entire appeal was just blood and guts and scares. It's funny reading these mature, critical takes on films I enjoyed on such a simple, base level decades ago! :D

Raxivace wrote:182. Taipei Story (1985, Dir. Edward Yang) -

Your write-up made me want to see this even more. I think you know my feelings on Yi Yi and ABSD--two of the best films EVER--and I quite liked Yang's The Terrorizers too. This one sounds closer to ABSD and The Terrorizers. Gotta say, though, I never would've thought of Godard or Herzog in terms of Yang... not sure what directors I would think of, really. Perhaps Renoir sprang first to mind: a combination of a complex visual style, complex narratives, and complex thematic substance, with a slightly detached but humanistic perspective. Though their subject matter was extremely different, with Renoir often focused more on the past, class differences, and outsiders. Yang has a broader social conscience, perhaps. If you think Taipei Story is so rich that you haven't scratched the surface, I can't wait to hear what you think of ABSD; it's perhaps the richest, most novel-esque film I've ever seen.

You know how well I can ramble about Hou. I really do wish you'd get around to one of his... any one, really. They're all worth seeing/discussing and other than his first few none are less than great.

Raxivace wrote:183. The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004, Dir. Wes Anderson) - Another Wes Anderson I just wasn't super into, though I liked some of the seafarer stylings in the movie, and the more bittersweet tone that pops up toward the end (Like when the jaguar shark is finally encountered, aided in no doubt by the track “Staralfur" by Sigur Ros that plays) worked better for me.

My thoughts exactly. I did dig the visuals on this one more than Anderson's other films (save Budapest), but nothing in the writing or characters interested me in the least.

Raxivace wrote:178. The Last Picture Show (1971, Dir. Peter Bogdanovich) -

I loooooooved this when I saw it back in my teens. I thought it one of the most emotionally profound films I'd ever seen, even if (back then) I couldn't quite put my finger on why. I'm surprised how much has stuck with me over the years; I still vividly remember the pool scene for some reason. But more than anything it's the melancholic, wistful tone that I remember most. It's like a heavier, less subtle version of what I like so much about Ozu, that palpable feeling of time passing and things/people inevitably changing. I also wonder what happened to Bogdanovich in terms of his filmmaking...

Raxivace wrote:167. Sympathy for the Devil (AKA One Plus One, 1968, Dir. Jean-Luc Godard)

171. Rushmore (1998, Dir. Wes Anderson) -

Haven't seen that Godard because, believe it or not, I'm still waiting to go through the Stones' discography. I've heard most of their major albums, but haven't sat down and gone through them chronologically like I've done with most all of my favorite bands.

I pretty much hated Rushmore. I've never understand what was supposed to be even remotely appealing about it. It's the film that got me off on a bad foot with Anderson.

Raxivace wrote:164. Lancelot du Lac (1974, Dir. Robert Bresson)

Lancelot is one of the few Bresson's that just didn't do anything for me (another being his Joan of Arc film). Perhaps in both cases it's because I knew other versions of the material and I didn't think Bresson's take fit well with either. For Bresson's "lesser" films, I preferred A Gentle Woman, Four Nights of a Dreamer (almost impossible to find in a decent version, sadly), and The Devil Probably; the last of which is perhaps his most underrated. Angels of Sin is also pretty underrated; it's early Bresson and not as minimal as his later stuff, but still quite solid.

Raxivace wrote:157. Strike (1925, Dir. Sergei Eisenstein)

I saw this shortly after I saw Potemkin for the first time and, TBH, I liked them about equally back then. Now, I've seen Potemkin more times since while I've just seen Strike the once, but there are still scenes in that have stuck with me, including the massacre that you mentioned. I vividly remember them using that huge fire hose (I think it was) on the people in the streets. I actually felt almost the opposite as you in that Potemkin seemed more abstract while I felt the story/characters in Strike felt more natural... perhaps because my dad used to work at a factory and there were times when some of its workers would go on strike so it hit home a bit more.

Raxivace wrote:159. The Seven Year Itch (1955, Dir. Billy Wilder) -

Seems we pretty much agree on this one. As I said, a rather middling Wilder comedy.

Raxivace wrote:160. Never Say Never Again (1983, Dir. Irvin Kershner) -

I didn't care for this one back when I watched it. It just seemed a pretty bloodless Bond with a way-too-old-Connery not doing much of consequence. Back then I didn't even know it was directed by the ESB guy.

Raxivace wrote:Alright I just have to get this one off my chest.

156. Gigi (1958, Dir. Vincent Minelli)

Never saw this one, but your review is hilarious. It's rather disappointing to hear that Minelli made something so awful. His Meet Me in St. Louis is one of my favorite films, and An American in Paris is dope too. Worse than Gentleman's Agreement, though? I find that hard to swallow...

Raxivace wrote:I didn't like how the debate about the Accords or whatever they were called was fairly muddled and underwritten (Which perhaps makes it not very surprising when the movie just becomes about Stark and Rogers fighting over more personal reasons), but more than that I found some of the action to just be awful, visually incoherent messes.

Like the big Bucky breakout sequence is just awful. Characters disappearing between shots, appearing out of nowhere, no real sense of flow etc. Compare that to like, any scene in Mad Max: Fury Road for example where despite rapid editing there's still a clear flow of action at practically all times and the difference is staggering.

I will say in Civil War's defense that it was a condensing of an arch in Marvel Comics that ran for over 100 issues across various titles. It would be nearly impossible to turn that into a feature film and have it be fully coherent. I will say that I was a pretty unabashed fan of the film and I thought that whatever flaws it probably had were dwarfed by its sheer sense of scale and momentum. It just caught me up in its riptide and didn't let go. I might notice more of the flaws you point out if I revisited it, but, TBH, stuff like incoherent editing is something I pretty much expect in action blockbusters these days, even though I know there are rare exceptions like Fury Road.

Raxivace wrote:153. Zero For Conduct (1933, Dir. Jean Vigo)

154. L'Atalante (1934, Dir. Jean Vigo) -

I enjoyed both of these films more when I finally saw them on the Criterion blu-ray. ZFC is still kinda meh, though. I agree that Truffaut did this much better with 400 Blows. L'Atalante is a film I've now seen three times. First time I thought it was probably the most overrated thing I'd ever seen. Second time I enjoyed it, but still wasn't in love with it. Third time on Criterion blu-ray I enjoyed a bit more, and I think I finally got its appeal even if I still didn't think it "one of the greatest films ever made." It was basically the first "poetic realism" film, and it had a huge influence on French films of the 30s and 40s. As I saw more films from that period--those of Marcel Carne and some of Renoir's spring to mind--the more I got why L'Atalante was so important to French filmmaking. I also think it has a wit and charm about it, especially with Michel Simone's role, that's really appealing, and I can understand especially why Truffaut loved it, because that tricky combination of realism and poetry, of easy-going lightness with touches of darkness, is something Truffaut built a career out of trying to achieve. I think he was only sporadically successful, and in retrospect perhaps I appreciate even more how well Jean Vigo did it.

All that said, the film just feels a bit too... inconsequential for its "one of the greatest films of all time" status. There's not much there beyond the surface pleasures. I do, however, love that scene of the bride in white running along the ship, and underwater love-making montage. It does have its rather magical moments. I think I can justify a 9.0, but no higher.

Eva Yojimbo · Post by **Eva Yojimbo** » Wed Oct 17, 2018 4:22 am

Derived Absurdity wrote:Hey, that's exactly what I said! About Infinity War, not the hurricane. Good luck with all that.

Another very good criticism of Infinity War that I didn't come across until well after my post was that it kind of destroys a lot of the Marvel movies that came before it. The whole point of Thor: Ragnarok was that the place didn't matter, the people did, which is why it was okay that Aasgard was physically destroyed as long as the people of it were together and well. The very first scene of Infinity War has all those people destroyed. The arc of Homecoming ended with Peter Parker refusing to join the Avengers and just being your humble neighborhood Spiderman, but here he joins them immediately. Black Panther was supposed to be about black people unbeholden to white people and how white people are not particularly important in the story of Wakanda, but here T'Challa sacrifices Wakanda immediately for battle with no hesitation. Guardians of the Galaxy 2 was about staying together as a family even if you're not biologically related, but in this movie they break up pretty much immediately. This movie just destroyed all those stories just for the sake of Thanos. I only saw all these movies once and I didn't particularly care about any of them, so I might be off on my recollections, but that's something I was kind of vaguely aware of watching this one, that all the stories and character arcs from the last four or five movies just kind of seemed to get tossed aside.

If this reading is correct then that is yet another example of how this movie fundamentally fails in long-form storytelling, which is supposed to be what the MCU is good at.

FWIW, this was always a problem in the comics as well, but this kind of stuff is practically inevitable when you get that many people working on that many projects over that many years. Back when I read Spider-Man they often couldn't even keep character continuity for a few issues. I remember how in one issue that started with Peter Parker playing some trivia game with a baseball question. His guess was way off and he basically said he knew nothing about baseball. Then literally a few issues later (perhaps in a different title with a different writer) they did an entire issue with his memory of going to Mets games with his Uncle Ben every year and how the Mets always lost and how he kept up the tradition even after Ben's death.

Eva Yojimbo · Post by **Eva Yojimbo** » Wed Oct 17, 2018 4:34 am

maz89 wrote:
Eva Yojimbo wrote:On a semi-related note, I happened on a YouTube playthrough of the new Spider-Man game, and being a lifelong (semi-closeted) Spider-Fan who was rather astounded by what I saw, I broke down and bought a PS4 just to play the damn game. I've spent the last few weeks playing it through several times and it's addicting as hell, and I'm secure enough in my masculinity to admit that the ending makes me cry every damn time. This game gets Spider-Man right better than any media since the first two Raimi films.

So, now that I have a PS4 (for now, anyway), any must-play games? I know you'd recommend the RE remakes, but given that I just recently watched the walkthroughs on YouTube (twice, no less!) I'd rather hold off for a while so it'd be fresher. I was hoping that I could catch up on the Metal Gear Solid games (I've played 1 and 2, and the first was, along with Ocarina of Time, my all-time favorite game back in the day), but I found out the PS4 isn't backwards compatible and there's no version of MGS 3 and 4 for the PS4, so that's frustrating. I thought about maybe the latest Grand Theft Auto (I loved 3 and Vice City), but given Spider-Man is also an open-world game I'm not sure I want to play a similar game right after. Maybe an RPG might fit the bill... if I don't get bored with it (that used to be my problem with RPGs; I loved them, but they were always so long that I'd usually get bored before I finished them).
OMG. Yes!!!!

Witcher 3 is one of THE best games I've ever played, period. You MUST check it out. It's a huge game (150+ hours if you want to do all of the extras but significantly shorter if you turn down the difficulty and stick to the main storyline - but what's the fun in that?). You may need to consult wikipedia for what happened in the first two games (the latter of which I played after completing Witcher 3 because I fell so deeply in love with the characters and world). Raxi wasn't as crazy about it as much as I was unfortunately (you can read our spoiler-filled discussion on the game thread AFTER you've finished the game), but I'm hoping you'll see the light. ;p If you don't get 'bored', that is... I couldn't get bored. The characters, the acting, the dense mythology, the ambiguous decision making, the uncertain atmosphere alternating between hope and dread... made sure I remained glued to my seat. Gameplay is a shit load of fun - I'm making what is arguably the most important element seem like an afterthought but there's a reason I happily poured in time I could have spent watching 50 movies into this game.

I recently finished the latest God of War and thought it was a terrifically constructed, beautifully designed RPG. 50+ hours with all the extras.

Another must-play recommendation I didn't see in Rax's list is Last of Us. It's a shorter game (about 15 hours) and it's set during another zombiepocalypse but people have been raving about this one for good reason. It's the only non-open world RPG I'm recommending unlike the previous two.

Among Rax's other picks, I've played Journey, Firewatch, Telltale's Walking Dead, Dark Souls and MGSV. Good games too, but none I'm crazy about (well, except for MGSV). I think you could consider Journey and Firewatch because they're shorter games (a couple of hours each IIRC) and the latter, btw, is quite different from the typical RPG model. Firewatch and, on that note, Gone Home are more about traversing through different environments to unravel an intriguing mystery rather than shooting up bad guys.

Also, Rax, I hadn't played a single MGS before MGSV so I decided to read up on the storylines from the previous games while I was playing it. Mostly ended up confused, but still I thought the game's story was really compelling on a visceral level, lol.

I can't wait to play Red Dead Redemption 2, which is going to get released at the end of this month. That's the Rockstar Games you should get instead of GTA V, which I wasn't too crazy about because of its bland storyline and characters (although gameplay and graphics might have still made it worthwhile... for a while).

Thanks for all the recs. I'm definitely considering making Witcher 3 my next game. As much as I've enjoyed Spider-Man, I'm finally getting bored with my 4th play-through. God of War and Last of Us are also two I had my eye on. I know the former is insanely popular and the latter won like a bazillion awards and sounded up my alley.

Either of you played a game called Hard Rain? I don't remember how I heard about it, but it's another game I know was immensely praised for its story/characters. It's one I considered watching a YouTube playthrough but I never got around to it. Skyrim is another I've heard a lot of great stuff about...

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Wed Oct 17, 2018 5:04 am

You mean Heavy Rain? I haven't played it myself but I've heard mixed things.

Eva Yojimbo · Post by **Eva Yojimbo** » Wed Oct 17, 2018 5:38 am

^ That's the one. Must've got it mixed up with the Dylan song, lol.

BTW rax, RE your Black Panther review:

Raxivace wrote:Still, I can't help but wonder what this movie would have been like without the restrictions of Disney/Marvel behind it. The ending should probably a little more...provactive

What was that word supposed to be? Provocative or proactive or something else?

Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Wed Oct 17, 2018 5:43 am

Bah, it should be provocative. I don't know how to spell words, Jimbo. :(

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Raxivace · Post by **Raxivace** » Wed Oct 17, 2018 6:04 am

Eva Yojimbo wrote:If film watching requires energy, you're doing it wrong. ;)

Too many distractions at home for so many years now. I feel like a middle aged parent most of the time these days...

If there's anything you want to know about the game just ask. I'm about through with my 4th playthrough so I pretty much know it inside and out now. FWIW, I'm back into gaming for now. If I get back into film and literature I may end up selling everything again... in fact, I kinda planned on selling it around Christmas anyway, which would give me enough time to play all the DLC and then be done with it. But I enjoyed it so much I thought I might catch up on some other titles. We'll see what happens over the next few months.

Where do you land on "puddlegate"? That's the only thing I know about the game.

From your list, the bolded ones are the ones I've heard of. Believe it or not, in all my gaming years I never played a Final Fantasy game.

Huh, I could have sworn you said you played FF6 at some point.

I bought VII because of all the hype but never got around to it. I also noticed they have an HD remaster of X and X-2, and XII on PS4; any of them worth it?

I liked X a lot, but it suffers a bit from early 2000's English video game voice acting (And no option for the Japanese dub even on the PS4 release). I don't think X-2 had quite as good of a story, but its probably my favorite version of the traditional ATB battle system.

XII I used to like okay but I really soured on it from playing the PS4 version. Here's what I wrote about it last year.

Raxivace wrote:Oh yeah so I recently played the rerelease of Final Fantasy XII.

20. Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age -

The story still goes nowhere and isn't really worth discussing (Save for its localization using a suspiciously high amount of terms that would later be used in Game of Thrones as well (Who else says "mummer's farce"?)), but I was curious about the changes to the battle system.

This is actually the third release of FF12- the first being the original game and the second being the "International Zodiac Job System". In vanilla FF12, the character development system naturally lead to each party member being identical to each other in combat. IZJS changed this by adding a job system- each character would be forced into a specific role when they joined your party and be stuck with it the whole game. Black Mages specialized in offensive black magic, Knights would value strength and defense and so on.

Zodiac Age has the same job system, except now each character can get a second job partway into the game. Instead of making the game harder it actually makes the game way easier (It wasn't difficult to begin with), since the changes to the License Board because of the Job system make it way easier to get very powerful very quickly, and you get even more absurd once you get the second jobs and the second License Boards to go with it. Honestly even the strategies in combat didn't change that much for me- vanilla FF12 endgame was my party members spamming physical attacks and occasionally healing each other and Zodiac Age endgame was...two of party members spamming physical attacks, the third party member spamming black magic, and then all three of them occasionally healing each other (And I still don't feel any need to use the the backup three party members except bringing them out to spam Phoenix Downs if my main party is wiped (Which doesn't happen very often all things considered)). This plus the Gambit system means you basically program the game to play itself still using a system of what are basically if-then statements, and you only occasionally change what Gambits you've programmed.

Anyways what makes magic viable now over just completely spamming physical attacks isn't even the Job System forcing a character to specialize in it but instead that the spell queue from the original game being gone. In vanilla FF12, the PS2 could only handle one spell being thrown out at a time onscreen. That limitation is gone now with Zodiac Age since its on PS4 (And will probably get a PC release down the line). Everyone can spam magic willynilly, though it's more of a gamechanger for your own party then the enemies you face.

Oh yeah, didn't I mention you can literally fast forward this game? You can now play it at 2x speed and 4x speed, which is makes me question how good this was to begin with but that's a debate too large for this post and audience.

FF12 is still only an okay game. I think people have way overhyped how much the job system changes it up- it's sort of different, but other than the spell queue being gone I wouldn't call a whole lot of it unanimously better and I wouldn't call it a whole new game either, the way that Kingdom Hearts II really was changed with the additions of Critical Mode and Critical Mode Level 1 runs in its Final Mix rerelease. Zodiac Age, unfortunately, is still fundamentally Final Fantasy XII.

Also, the story of FF12 is just The Hidden Fortress and Star Wars but not nearly as good.

I rented Shadow of the Colossus back in the day but didn't finish it. I just don't think I was in the right mood for it back then, but I might love it now.

I have my own quibbles with the game (Thematically I find it very contradictory. I also read a book length analysis of it once that sucked so bad it legitimately made me think I hated the game more than I really did for a time), but its somber tone is still good and something I think you might like.

FWIW, my anti-open world thing was only in relation to a GTA-like games (which Spider-Man definitely borrows from), not full-blown RPGs. The Witcher definitely sounds interesting, especially with maz's high rec too. If you had to narrow it down to one, what do you think I should definitely play next?

Since I played Witcher 3 earlier this year you would get more discussion out of here if you played it next. The thing that gets me about the game though is that I think it peaks 20 hours in, and the next 100 or so hours after that vary wildly in quality while never reaching the heights of the beginning again (Maz disagrees with me here I think).

FF15 I did like a lot though. It has a very "chillaxing road trip with your bros" tone that was very unusual for Final Fantasy, and its basic aesthetic being "American midwest meets FF-style medieval retrofuturism" just feels insanely specific to my tastes. Like if that movie Nebraska was also crossed with, well, Final Fantasy games lol.

Messy thoughts kinda fit with these late, messy Godard films. I'm tellin' ya though, if you liked Woe, you should really make Passion and Nouvelle Vague a priority; they're both just as beautiful. The former is basically one of Godard's films about filmmaking, but it incorporates a lot of painting references in the form of tableaux vivants that are just gorgeous.

I will watch those films...after I finish the Godard + Gorin boxset!!!!!!!!

I remember nothing about these given I saw them as a kid, back when the entire appeal was just blood and guts and scares. It's funny reading these mature, critical takes on films I enjoyed on such a simple, base level decades ago! :D

Somehow I feel you're trying to trick me when you describe some throwaway posts I made at like 2 AM as "mature", as if you're buttering me up before trying to sell me a timeshare lmao.

If you think Taipei Story is so rich that you haven't scratched the surface, I can't wait to hear what you think of ABSD; it's perhaps the richest, most novel-esque film I've ever seen.

Part of me wonders if my own lack of experience with this kind of Asian arthouse cinema isn't causing me to overpraise it a bit, but I did definitely enjoy the movie a lot and greatly looking forward to whenever I can hop into some alternate dimension where time has ceased to flow and I could watch all of A Brighter Summer Day in peace.

You know how well I can ramble about Hou. I really do wish you'd get around to one of his... any one, really. They're all worth seeing/discussing and other than his first few none are less than great.

Hey, Hou has a screenwriting credit on Taipei Story too so uh something something Schrieber Theory something something that means I've seen a Hou film.

I also wonder what happened to Bogdanovich in terms of his filmmaking...

I read the book Orson Welles' Last Movie: The Making of The Other Side of the Wind recently and that implies the fall of Bogdanovich was the result of 1. Welles being jealous of his success and trolling him by giving him bad advice for his own films to stay on board with TOSOTW, 2. His affair with Cybil Shepherd and divorce from Polly Platt, the latter of who had helped creatively on his earlier films.

I'm always skeptical of these claims of "The good work of this famous person was actually the result of [Person X], who has been ~forgotten by history~" because of how easy that kind of narrative is to sell to people (To the point it almost feels like a meme to me), but meh.

I pretty much hated Rushmore. I've never understand what was supposed to be even remotely appealing about it. It's the film that got me off on a bad foot with Anderson.

Yeah I dunno. Maybe our middle American backgrounds prevent us from really getting it.

Lancelot is one of the few Bresson's that just didn't do anything for me (another being his Joan of Arc film). Perhaps in both cases it's because I knew other versions of the material and I didn't think Bresson's take fit well with either. For Bresson's "lesser" films, I preferred A Gentle Woman, Four Nights of a Dreamer (almost impossible to find in a decent version, sadly), and The Devil Probably; the last of which is perhaps his most underrated. Angels of Sin is also pretty underrated; it's early Bresson and not as minimal as his later stuff, but still quite solid.

I'll have to dig into those at some point.

Never saw this one, but your review is hilarious. It's rather disappointing to hear that Minelli made something so awful. His Meet Me in St. Louis is one of my favorite films, and An American in Paris is dope too. Worse than Gentleman's Agreement, though? I find that hard to swallow...

As bad as Gentleman's Agreement is, I at least find its heart in the right place and can more or less intuitively understand how and why it ended up as didactic as it did.

Gigi just baffles me with the way it is considering the talent involved, and stuff like that song I posted make me wonder where the hell exactly it was coming from to begin with.

I will say in Civil War's defense that it was a condensing of an arch in Marvel Comics that ran for over 100 issues across various titles. It would be nearly impossible to turn that into a feature film and have it be fully coherent.

I mean, as a movie all that Civil War really needed to do was make a satisfying narrative out of "Former allies fight over irreconcilable political differences". They almost even set the stakes up with the setup about the Avengers causing collateral damage in their battles and the need to curtail that, but the potential solution the Accords themselves provide aren't really clear to me which muddies, you know, the actual Civil War of the title.

I realize I'm saying "All they had to do to make the movie good was make a good movie lol" to some extent, but I don't think you really need any high degree of fidelity to hundreds of comics of source material to make the core idea work.

I will say that I was a pretty unabashed fan of the film and I thought that whatever flaws it probably had were dwarfed by its sheer sense of scale and momentum. It just caught me up in its riptide and didn't let go. I might notice more of the flaws you point out if I revisited it, but, TBH, stuff like incoherent editing is something I pretty much expect in action blockbusters these days, even though I know there are rare exceptions like Fury Road.

I expect those flaws too, I'm just disappointed the expectation exists.

Look, we need to revive the studio system of the Golden Age of Hollywood. That's the only solution here.

It was basically the first "poetic realism" film, and it had a huge influence on French films of the 30s and 40s.

Yeah even though I've read this before, I haven't seen very many pre-New Wave French films at all myself and that admittedly hurts my ability to appreciate or even properly contextualize something like L'Atalante. The version I watched wasn't on Criterion blu-ray, which would certainly only help the film too.

I can understand especially why Truffaut loved it, because that tricky combination of realism and poetry, of easy-going lightness with touches of darkness, is something Truffaut built a career out of trying to achieve.

Yeah now that you mention this I can totally see it.

maz89 · Post by **maz89** » Wed Oct 17, 2018 7:55 am

Eva Yojimbo wrote:Either of you played a game called Hard Rain? I don't remember how I heard about it, but it's another game I know was immensely praised for its story/characters. It's one I considered watching a YouTube playthrough but I never got around to it. Skyrim is another I've heard a lot of great stuff about...

Skyrim is fantastic - it's an even bigger game than Witcher 3. I put in about 100 hours into Skyrim late last year and then went on a break, my guess there's still at least another 150 hours of game left, including the DLCs... Been trying to get back to it since. I wouldn't say I got bored, just that other more pressing things came in the way and then I decided to check out other games because of their shorter length. The gameplay is really rewarding and smartly constructed offering a variety of skills/techniques (the way RPGs typically do), and the story was gripping too, although I can only remember it faintly atm (it's been a year).

As Rax noted, while Heavy Rain was lauded for being innovative on release, it has since received somewhat polarizing reviews, with many criticizing its script or performances. I, on the other hand, still think it holds up quite nicely today. It's innovative because of how cinematic it is and how creatively it uses player input to control the intriguing story. I don't think I'd played a game like it before. OK, so the script and performances may not be on par with what some of the best films of its kind have to offer, but they were hardly bland or dull. If you compare every film noir you see with The Third Man, you're bound to walk away disappointed, right? Especially considering Third Man wasn't designed to be an interactive, player-controlled movie.

Btw, Detroit Become Human is created by the same guy/studio (David Cage/Quantum Dream) that made HR and it's also pretty solid for its take on the 'machines gain consciousness' trope. I'd say one of the three characters/arcs is indeed a bit bland and lacking much in the way of nuance, but the game still packs a punch overall. It's just a really well-made sci-fi thriller, and if you're impressed with the graphical quality of Heavy Rain, your jaw will drop when you play Detroit (assuming you have a 4K TV and HDR - I know you have the screen size already). It's also a shorter game (12 hours) so it won't put a dent in your schedule.

HR is an 8/10 for me, even from a pure story/psychological thriller perspective. Detroit I'd say hovers around a 7.

I think the biggest critique of David Cage's games that I can agree with is that many of the decisions you make don't always have a huge impact on how the story progresses. This makes replays, in particular, a tiresome process. This is why I could never get around to re-playing Detroit or Heavy Rain - although, to be fair, I've seen a friend of mine play Detroit to death so I think I know most of the possible endings and they are all well-developed.