A few films recently watched.

  On 3/20/2012 at 5:54 PM, kinski said:

  On 3/20/2012 at 3:08 PM, Xenblake said:

  On 3/20/2012 at 2:52 AM, Boxus said:

speaking of Herzog, I just watched

 

The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser

 

9/10. great film. the actor playing kaspar was brilliant, and some of the dialogue was really profound. i loved his story about the desert caravan. gonna check out aguirre soon, still got a lot of catching up to do on his filmography.

 

Now watch Stroszek, better film imo, same lead actor Bruno S.

 

he's not really an actor, he's just mentally ill. but yes, herzog/bruno movies are great.

lol

i'll definitely check out stroszek

the five obstructions - 9/10 - wow..........such an intense film and original, can't believe I am just now seeing it. Lars is the man. As is Jorgen. Such a demented yet amazing friendship they have.

lol

Von Trier is such a prick in that film. You can tell he enjoys making the other filmmaker uncomfortable.

  On 3/21/2012 at 9:44 PM, Atop said:

the five obstructions - 9/10 - wow..........such an intense film and original, can't believe I am just now seeing it. Lars is the man. As is Jorgen. Such a demented yet amazing friendship they have.

  On 3/21/2012 at 10:21 PM, takeshi said:

lol

Von Trier is such a prick in that film. You can tell he enjoys making the other filmmaker uncomfortable.

Agreed. With both.

lady terminator -

whoever mentioned this movie earlier in this thread and brought it to my attention - i love you. this is like 'what's up tiger lily' all over again. or mst3k. simply amazing and hilarious. live will never be the same again.

^you're welcome!

7/10

  On 3/21/2012 at 11:44 PM, Hasselbalch said:

  On 3/21/2012 at 9:44 PM, Atop said:

the five obstructions - 9/10 - wow..........such an intense film and original, can't believe I am just now seeing it. Lars is the man. As is Jorgen. Such a demented yet amazing friendship they have.

 

  On 3/21/2012 at 10:21 PM, takeshi said:

lol

Von Trier is such a prick in that film. You can tell he enjoys making the other filmmaker uncomfortable.

 

Agreed. With both.

agreed with both but, at the end I just felt sorry for Von Trier. It's clear he's a prick and yet you start to wonder why he's a prick, and realize it comes from weakness not from strength, from his desire to see his narrow interpretation of things confirmed at whatever cost. I ended up feeling he was a bit of a pathetic dork. But the other guy was a bit stuffy, so it all evened out. I do agree it's a great and original and thought-provoking film.

Lars is just your typical pretentious artist. A dime a dozen. Though most could never make great films. I agree that he was an asshole in the film but that was the point. He was pushing his friend to do what they both love, make films. He was also trying to help Jorgen psychologically in some way. Lars seemed genuinely pleased that Jorgen was becoming happier with each assignment. I wish they would have talked more about what was possibly bothering Jorgen and the reason for the exercises, beyond just seeing if Leth could create the films the way Lars was envisioning them. Seems like there was a much deeper underlying reason for the whole film.

  On 3/21/2012 at 6:07 PM, THIS IS MICHAEL JACKSON said:

  On 3/20/2012 at 10:23 PM, MortstoX said:

Filmfestival in town. Gonna se loads and started with these films today:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1754078/ Las acasias from Argentina

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1821593/ Rundskop (Bullhead) from Belgium, and

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1729226/ from Denmark.

All solid films! Bullhead can be found on The Pirate Bay.

great lead acting, loved it, reminded me of tom hardy on bronson...

 

i think they should have discharged all the comedy they created with the mechanics, imo, it was uncalled for and made the movie lighter...

Yep, I was thinking the same thing. The rest of the movie is so dark and depressing, and the parts with the goofy mechanics didn't fit in at all. Solid film anyway.

I really like Alexander Payne at times, but The Descendants managed to be worse than Sideways. He was aiming for something beautiful, poetic, and chin-strokingly touching, but instead it was half soap opera and half Weekend At Bernie's. The body of a key character being on life support for all but 20 seconds of her 30 minutes of screen time should have been the first indication to the producers that this was going to be a bad movie. I thought the script was terrible and the acting at times shockingly bad. The teenage daughter of Clooney was very talented though and I suspect she'll have quite a career.

I've always maintained Payne was a 1-hit wonder. Election was great fun, but his later stuff is turgid and uninspired imo (yes, even About Schmidt). I will always be more of a David O Russell fan (even though he'll probably never make another great comedy and seems like a verbally abusive weirdo). Not sure why I always associate the two directors, but they sort of "came out at about the same time." I know some wattm-ites think Payne is deeper, but I'm not so sure, his "depth" seems facile. And Russell had at least 2 very strong flicks, Flirting with Disaster and Three Kings, and a few interesting ones - I Heart Huckabees and Spanking the Monkey. 'Course then he went Hollywood and did the Fighter, probably to pay the bills....

21 jump street 8/10

bullhead 8/10

Hey, I liked The Fighter, so going by your math, I'd have to agree with the overall assessment. I do maintain that About Schmidt was, for me, effective if not brilliant. So, three good films for DOR and two good ones for Payne. It's worth noting, of course, that About Schmidt is 10 years old now. I gave Payne a puncher's chance to return to top form following his excellent short in Paris Je T'aime. Maybe he should stick with short films in all seriousness. I thought even The Descendants might have been a good 20 minute film, but at feature length, it veered off into CringeLand.

Facile and turgid are excellent terms to describe all of DOR and Payne's failures though...I <3 Huckabees very much included.

X-Men First Class: Fucking godawful.

Tower Heist: Speaking of fucking godawful and anything to do with X-Men, how does Bret Ratner still have a career?

why would you even watch tower heist? you could review it without even bothering to sit through it

  On 3/22/2012 at 6:07 PM, Benedict Cumberbatch said:

why would you even watch tower heist? you could review it without even bothering to sit through it

I'm married.

Why would you marry someone who wanted to watch tower heist?

Grounds for divorce: tower heist

  On 3/22/2012 at 6:20 PM, Benedict Cumberbatch said:

Why would you marry someone who wanted to watch tower heist?

 

Grounds for divorce: tower heist

Oh stop it. You watch crap with your wife sometimes, too!

I do but I feel the line is drawn before tower heist plus you're way harsher on filims than i

my wife recently watched the bieber film

The Way Back

Did you think that this is the "movie titles that describe your last shit" thread?

The Innkeepers - Decent build-up and believable characters let down by an ending where not a great deal happens beside standard horror stuff.

permanent midnight - THE serious ben stiller movie! and it's not even bad. it's kinda awkward but once it sets into the groove it's enjoyable. wouldn't recommend it but it was really ok.

  On 3/22/2012 at 4:55 PM, The Overlook said:

Facile and turgid are excellent terms to describe all of DOR and Payne's failures though...I <3 Huckabees very much included.

Hmm, I thought I Heart Huckabees had some big flaws but I can't really attack any film that has that marky mark fucking-in-the-mud scene with Isabelle Huppert. Plus them bashing themselves in the face with rubber balls...loved it

  On 3/22/2012 at 7:05 PM, The Overlook said:

  On 3/22/2012 at 6:20 PM, Benedict Cumberbatch said:

Why would you marry someone who wanted to watch tower heist?

 

Grounds for divorce: tower heist

 

Oh stop it. You watch crap with your wife sometimes, too!

Ooh, a better topic than DOR and Payne. I actually liked Tower Heist!

WTF

I had to watch that shit with my girlfriend. To answer your question Mirezzi I think Ratner got in good with older producers and they throw him a bone every now and then. I remember reading something once where Ratner said he lived in Bob Evans' house for a while. That seems about right to me, they both seem like the same type of blowhard.

Certified Copy - 8/10 - Juliet Binouce (sp?) could still get it. In all seriousness this was good. Most of the dialogue felt like real conversations and I don't feel that way about most films nowadays.