351

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Regan wrote:

Speak for yourself. You fertile  bastard. *Pushes up glasses on nose*.

No kids here, intend to keep it that way.

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Alex wrote:
Regan wrote:

Speak for yourself. You fertile  bastard. *Pushes up glasses on nose*.

No kids here, intend to keep it that way.

You know, medical science has discovered where kids come from and how to prevent it wink

Also, we have a new Star War film to bash. Let's focus on that big_smile

God loves you!

Thumbs up Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Engaging with Prequel defenders is the film equivalent  to having a scientific debate with creationists...

Extended Edition - 146 - The Rise Of Skywalker
VFX Reel | Twitter | IMDB | Blog

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Faldor wrote:

Engaging with Prequel defenders is the film equivalent  to having a scientific debate with creationists...

As a creationist I resent that wink

ETA: speaking of controversial opinions, and to avoid derailing this thread, please feel free to PM how much I'm wrong.

Last edited by fireproof78 (2016-05-08 18:21:17)

God loves you!

Thumbs up +3 Thumbs down

355

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

The bugs from Starship Troopers did nothing wrong. Buenos Aires was inside job set up by the Federation to justify going to war with the bugs, there's no way they could've launched an asteroid from the other side of the galaxy to hit such a precise target - they didn't have the technology and it would've been picked up by Federation satellites and defense outposts long before it actually collided with Earth. The bugs didn't initiate any sort of attack and were only defending their home turf when the humans showed up.

356

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

I don't think that that is all that controversial.  I think that's baked into the satirical cake.  When NPH says, "It's afraid," and everyone cheers to swelling music....it's kinda giving you a gigantic wink.

Eddie Doty

Thumbs up Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Ewing wrote:

The bugs from Starship Troopers did nothing wrong. Buenos Aires was inside job set up by the Federation to justify going to war with the bugs, there's no way they could've launched an asteroid from the other side of the galaxy to hit such a precise target - they didn't have the technology and it would've been picked up by Federation satellites and defense outposts long before it actually collided with Earth. The bugs didn't initiate any sort of attack and were only defending their home turf when the humans showed up.

Lies!

Remember the Rodger Young!

God loves you!

Thumbs up Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Focused way too much on the trees (i.e. different separate talking points), I kind of ended up missing the forest:
these reviews can be disqualified with only a few quotes, and (almost?) no commentary.



<RLM, EpII, Number 2: The audience is expected to accept too many things that we are and are not told> wrote:

So this movie – like the last one – still doesn’t have a main character. Instead now it’s got two:
Anakin and Obi-Wan. And I’m still not sure which one we’re supposed to relate to - I would think people could relate more to Obi-Wan cause he’s basically a good guy who doesn’t murder people? But at the same time he’s also very distant cause he’s like a weird monk without any personality. So take your pick, idiots

<RLM, EpII, Number 4: Love and Marriage> wrote:

Now all joking aside, why aren’t the Jedis allowed to love?
Cause we’re told they’re not allowed to, but it’s never really explained. Does anyone get like a creepy vibe from these movies? I guess it’s got something to do with, like, purging emotions to avoid being tempted by the Dark Side right?

But Obi-Wan you know, he smiles, he laughs, he gets annoyed, he enjoys a good sarcastic quip, sometimes he gets really, really pissed off:
“You will be expelled from the Jedi Order!”
So, so love leads to the Dark Side, but getting fucking pissed doesn’t?
“Come to your senses!"

I mean the Jedis aren’t supposed to be Vulcans right? Even Vulcans took wives and had sex.
So really the only thing that made Obi-Wan different from like a normal person, was that he didn’t express any interest in chicks.
“I was beginning to wonder if you’d got my message.”

[...]

So then Amidalan finally sees Anakin again, and for no reason she’s not allowed to love either.
“We can't. It’s… just not possible.”
What the fuck? She’s just a senator, why can’t she fucking date a guy? For Christ’s sake.

[...], men don’t love women, Mace is unmarried, Palpatine don’t got a wife - in fact the only person in the Galaxy who’s married is Jimmy Smits. Why is he in this movie? They should’ve just put Paul Blart Mall Cop in the movie - I mean, why not?

Look, I’ve been through a divorce too (), and I had some pretty bad relationships (), but really this is getting kinda creepy don’t you think?
“They do… decide to… give in to their emotions, and… ultimately they will suffer all the consequences of that.”
And you don’t gotta be a sex therapist to realize what this represents [Sarlacc Pit]...

Now you can see why people hate these fucking movies - cause the people in them act like weird space aliens and not people. Now technically they are weird space aliens, but we can’t relate to their fucking weird, sterile, sexless universe. They seem as cold and lifeless and boring as the computer generated world they’re projected against. Simple, real, genuine moments like this: [Han, Luke and Leia embracing], have been replaced by this: [Neimoidians get shot at]

Main characters, their personalities and their emotions are one of RLM's most central talking points - yet they can't describe Obiwan in EpII without contradicting themselves at every step of the way:
-Is he a distant monk without any personality, or does he snark, laugh and fume his way through the movie?
-Is he a normal person who's celibate, or a weird space alien and not people?
-Are his anger and sarcastic quips the closest this movie gets to having "genuine human moments", or is it Nute Gunray making comical noises while dodging blasters?


Interestingly enough, there is a pattern to this:

He remembers Obiwan's expressions, emotions, personality traits etc. whenever it's in the service of criticizing the supposed "plot hole contradiction" between his emotionality and the Jedi's supposed anti-emotion clause (which actually has never been established or hinted at*).

But as soon as it comes to making more general statements about "relatable protagonists" and how this is "essential to storytelling", all of this suddenly stops existing - for obvious reasons.





And this makes RLM inherently unreliable when making any statements about "characters" - case in point, let's revisit this famous section:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxKtZmQgxrI#t=480

Upon rewatching it recently, I realized that I had essentially wasted my time "refuting" what those guys are saying - the accompanying visuals on the right side of the screen already do that job:
They're struggling to describe Quigon as anything other than "beard, stern and stoic", yet every single image completely flies in the face of that.

Without context, this could be interpreted as "it wasn't memorable enough, hence why these people don't remember it even though it evidently exists" - however, given how disorganized and reality-divorced Mike's own thought process can be (as seen in the ^^Clones excerpts^^), it's entirely plausible that he thought the images actually supported and corroborated the crew's descriptions.







Different example, same pattern:

<RLM, EpIII, Number 14: I’m Done> wrote:

So I don’t know if there’s anything more to say about “Revenge of the Sith”, or the other Star Wars prequels. Sure, you can pick them all apart on the technical failings, the plot inconsistencies, and the lousy dialogue, but generally speaking they failed to connect with people, and that was the main problem.

It felt like someone came along [George entering the studio] and sucked all the excitement and emotion out of Star Wars, and then they left it in this vacuum of dull, sterile, boringness.

<RLM, EpIII, Number 2: Number 2: Here we go again… / 5. No stupid ass retarded love story.> wrote:

This film is filled with hate, revenge, choking, murder, betrayal, sadness, more murder, more choking, worrying, more murder, death, and so on. Hey anyone still wanna use the excuse that these movies are made for little children? I offer it now as the time for you to bring that up.
Lucas goes full on adult audience here giving us the very first Star Wars film that’s rated PG-13.

So why does this have to be so dark? I mean did we really need this in a Star Wars movie? [Anakin draws his saber on the kids]
Okay so Darth Vader was a bad guy, sure, but did he have to be a violent murderer?

<RLM, EpIII, Number 7: Is Everyone Blind AND Stupid? / Just how stupid is Yoda?> wrote:

Anyway when Anakin is raging with frustration and worry about Padme’s inexplicable impending murder by pregnancy, Yoda can’t tell that Anakin is:
1. Hiding something really big.
2. Is madly in love with hot pants Padme.
3. Is just teeming with irritation and frustration at the Jedi and at every aspect of his life.

I guess the Dark Side clouds everything, but by just looking at the guy I could tell all sorts of things are wrong, and I'm no psychologist - in fact I threw my last psychologist out a window for asking [...]
So how stupid is Yoda? The guy is like sweating, and he looks evil, and-

Insightful.




__________________________________________________
__________________________________________________




So with that basis established:

ShadowDuelist wrote:

The only emotions displayed by Obi-Wan in this movie are confusion and annoyance.

<RLM, EpII, Number 4: Love and Marriage> wrote:

But Obi-Wan you know, he smiles, he laughs, he gets annoyed, he enjoys a good sarcastic quip, sometimes he gets really, really pissed off:

"Confusion" seems to come up quite a lot:

<RLM, EpIII, Number 7: Is Everyone Blind AND Stupid? / Just how stupid is Yoda?> wrote:

So Yoda might be a powerful Jedi, but wise he is not. [...] Besides always having a look of utter confusion on his face about everything all the time,

Once again, this is accompanied by a series of images, of which not a single one supports the claim in the audio:

First shot: He's preparing to fight Sidious, looking angry and determined.
Second shot: They've just discovered the dead kids and he's realized they've been stabbed by a Jedi - so, fittingly one would think, his face channels grief, sadness, mournfulness, and possibly a hint of shock or disbelief upon said realization.

The next 2 shots are rather representative of his general demeanor throughout this movie (and the second one as well): worry, concern, suspicion, contemplation, grimness.
Entirely consistent with a "wise master" character - "confusion", especially "utter" confusion, would, on the other hand, make him look stupid, and hence inconsistent with a wise master character. Now why would Plinkett say that?


The final shot is him in that Anakin scene, looking I guess "wise and zen".

One amusing aspect of this is that, while the examples in the middle don't require utter insanity to mistake for "confusion", just extreme tone-deafness (both confusion and wariness/suspicion involve "uncertainty", and furrowed eyebrows), the first two and the last example kind of do - what we're talking about here, is a complete lack of discernment.


He does the same thing in the KotSC review: claims Ford looks like a "confused grandpa" in his reveal shot, even though he actually looks pissed off and grumpy; mainly pissed off.



ShadowDuelist wrote:

The only emotions displayed by Obi-Wan in this movie are confusion and annoyance.

He shows "confusion" in one or two moments: for example when he says "Master who?" or "the- the army?" - but even the second example is already a lot more (layered) than simply confusion: he's lost and confused, but is also trying, and barely managing to save appearances.

This is a pattern throughout his 1st 2 scenes with the grey aliens - however, comedic fish-out-of-water confusion stops being a thing once he starts probing Jango Fett with his gaze.
Earlier in the bar when looking for the assassin, there wasn't a hint of confusion either - some "annoyance", sure, but mostly he was on alert.



So those few bits aside, the emotions/expressions he shows throughout this mystery plot, are things like curiosity, worry, concern, doubt and uncertainty - which all seem quite fitting considering he's in the process of uncovering a worrisome shadowy conspiracy plot while receiving questionable pieces of information which he doubts and is uncertain about.

He goes about his quest like it's just another job and his reaction to even the clone army is basically "well that's fucking weird, moving on."

Well, what he "moved on to" was to report this clone army to Mace and Yoda - which part of that scene (i.e. the one where he's yelling in the rain) sounds like professional indifference to you?

His whole story has no emotion to it

And just like Plinkett, you go from "he shows this and this emotion" to "no emotion to it".

and just happens to show up at places that move the plot along while doing something mostly unrelated.

Wait.... where is he doing things that are "unrelated" to anything?

And how is following clues that lead to places = "just happening to show up at places"?
And when the plot is him going on a quest of discovery and chasing clues, is "moving the plot along" really a sensible way to describe him... doing exactly that?


ShadowDuelist wrote:
El Nameaux-Standardon wrote:

That's the least important part, though - what matters is the meat of the conversation, namely Dooku revealing that the Sith is controlling the Senate and claiming to fight against that, and the TF having joined him after having been betrayed by him after EpI.

This is part of that "red herring" that I described - at the end, it turns out that this "new development", the emergence of 3rd parties etc., was all just a ruse and it's always been that same conspiracy from EpI all along.

It also reintroduces Sidious back into the plot, after already having reintroduced the TF.

Except that Obi-Wan just ignores and dismisses all this information so it's actually just an excuse to talk to the audience 'cause George doesn't know how to show is these things instead.

He relates it to Mace and Yoda at the end, which sets up their search for the "Sith lord in the government" in the next movie.













ShadowDuelist wrote:
El Nameaux-Standardon wrote:

What a bizarre thing to say in response, considering that:
-ESB is acknowledged for standing on its own legs and in fact coming off stronger WITHOUT the sequel that undermines it
-my quoted statement emphasized how II was precisely not about "setting up the next movie", but about the plot of II


RLM's made two claims in part II/9:
A) Clones is "just a bunch of stuff happening between 1 and 3".
B) It cargo cults ESB by borrowing plot lines and imagery but forgetting all the substance.
B1) Oh and also  that it tries to be the darkest of the three LOL!

Complete horse:
A) It's got its own point and direction: tensions with the separatists and suspected shadowy warmongers leads to discovery of secret "arms race" leads to war breaking out.
What at first seems to be a new crisis unrelated to I, gradually turns out to be that same crisis coming back with a vengeance - culminating in the Sidious reveal at the end.


B) All the borrowed imagery and plot structures are heavily modified to serve this new narrative with its own substance, and flair.

B1) When was the third where Vader would emerge and the Empire win ever NOT gonna be the darkest LOL - no refutation required, too silly.

--
Which is why these more than superficial similarities only make up 5% of the substance and it's therefore silly to focus on them while describing the movie, or the drama in it.

--
Actually Obiwan's the one possibly lured into a trap, if you go with the "Jango was in on it" hypothesis - Anakin certainly wasn't lured by anyone big_smile

And the parallels pretty much end there, 10 times flimsier than the one's named by Squiggly between 1 and 4.

I was going to write a whole thing here to better articulate my point but then I didn't. The core is that both these films are about journeys. ESB tells a strong compelling emotional story that causes our characters we care about to grow and change, AotC goes through the some the same motions but the only character that has any arc is Anakin and his is shallow. The actually journey that's taking place is the decent of the Republic into war. Maybe that works for you but I don't enjoy The West Wing either.

I don't watch the West Wing - but if it's a show about people chasing conspiratorial clues through exotic locations and danger, I certainly wasn't aware of it; I thought it was about politics inside the White House.


So you're talking about "character growth":

ShadowDuelist wrote:
El Nameaux-Standardon wrote:

Which of the plotlines are you talking about here?
If it's the mystery plot, i.e. the main plot mostly carried by Obiwan, then it's mostly carried by the discovery and tension and Obiwan/the Jedi coming off as appropriately concerned and worried about it all - those emotions are shown in a natural fashion, not "told".

Or are you talking about Anakin's subplot? LOL, well first of all this is sometimes true and sometimes not, but that storyline is a mess way beyond just emotions being told not shown big_smile

The only emotions displayed by Obi-Wan in this movie are confusion and annoyance. He goes about his quest like it's just another job and his reaction to even the clone army is basically "well that's fucking weird, moving on." His whole story has no emotion to it and just happens to show up at places that move the plot along while doing something mostly unrelated.

ShadowDuelist wrote:
El Nameaux-Standardon wrote:

He goes dark on Tattoine and is then mildly angrier/gloomier than before - how is that a reasonable "arc"??
More like THIS is a set-up for the next movie.

And while there's technically an "arc", or an overall sort of structure to the lovestory, once you zoom in even just one bit it's the most disorganized mess ever, so have fun lauding that big_smile

It's not a reasonable arc, but at least it is one. No one else in this movie has any kind of growth. Hell, Padme manages to fall in love without it having any kind of impact on her character.

But I already dismissed the HC/Padme storyline as an incoherent mess, didn't I?

The movie is held together by the mystery/discovery arc - led by Obiwan, though Anakin joins him in the first and final acts.

He doesn't change or grow in the process, as such - but what changes drastically, is the circumstances;
the viewer experiences this discovery and change in galactic landscape through his eyes, and actions - and, for what it's worth, he does appear more serious and contemplative at the end than he did at the beginning of the movie wink

Though that last bit is arguable.
















ShadowDuelist wrote:
El Nameaux-Standardon wrote:

Jango dragging him around and shooting missiles at him and them suspensefully hanging over the abyss is all "fighting", baby.

More like awkward stumbling around because suddenly everyone for got how to fight, but sure.

There is no "stumbling" or "awkward" anywhere in that scene - no one forgot how to fight, Obiwan gets caught in the rope in the process of pulling his weapon, and Jango takes off on his jetpack and does a pretty good job of dragging him around.

So I've no idea what you're referring to here.

That's cause the point was never "omg is he gonna die", and the tone doesn't convey that either - compare the actual (considerably) pointless mess of an action scene in this movie, the droid factory, where the tone is implying that Padme is heading for her death but actually it's just a fun, tense action obstacle run.

Saying this scene is better than the factory scene isn't a very high bar for it to clear. Just because this is better than watching Jabba take a shit doesn't mean it's good.

I didn't say it was "better than", I said the factory one was gratuitous and inserted, while this was wasn't.

No, the point was trying and failing to capture Jango and get some answers out of him.
It was also a snappy pay-off to the tensions and hints between the two in their previous scene - the exhilirating effect is emphasized in the way the action suddenly starts after a few seconds of the camera hovering above Slave I.

Sure that's Obi-Wan's reason to fight Jango, but my point was what's the scriptwriters reason to have them fight here? Sure it pays off some tension between them, but the dogfight scene above Geonosis does that better. It exists purely to be an action beat and the fact that you could cut it and nothing would feel missing says a lot.

Eh, if we go with this premise that two scenes in a row of him trying to capture Jango are one too many, then the dogfight would be the one who ought to get cut - the first one's a legitimate, classic "trying to catch the bad guy before he takes off", it begins with both of them on the ground and ends with the escape; the dogfight begins and ends with Jango flying away and thinking he's gotten rid of his pursuer, so it's way more unnecessary and gratuitous.


With that said, "the hero fails to capture the villain twice instead of once" is certainly not a very damning criticism - the bigger (though still not that major of a) problem with the dogfight is Obiwan's motivation: as it's unclear whether he wanted to capture him mid-space, or just failed to stay undetected after leaving hyperspace.
After it's over, he manages to follow Jango undetected; but one would've thought if he was already observing Jango flying towards a mysterious planet, following him there undetected rather than trying to arrest him again would've been his goal in the first place.

So that bit's a bit murky - if Obiwan's objectives had been better explained or conveyed, this (relatively minor) structural problem would probably have been solved.







Anyway, should this topic be continued, it'd probably have to be a separate thread - as I doubt this one was meant to get "hijacked" by one single controversial subject for several pages.

But that's something for the forum residents to decide, so we'll see I suppose...

Last edited by El Nameaux-Standardon (2016-10-22 10:44:25)

Thumbs up Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

We are NOT living in a Golden Age of TV

Most new TV series are far too slowly paced and vaguely written.

Yes, the production values are fine and there are some A-list actors in several series, but... nothing ever happens!

I'm talking about West World, Taboo, Emerald City, Bellevue, The OA, Mr Robot, Frontier, Walking Dead, and a dozen other high-profile series.

To anyone who says that you have to keep watching 'coz they typically don't get going until Season 2, fuck you. I can hear my beating heart counting down the seconds 'til I die when I watch these pilots. So I typically bail  somewhere between episodes 2 and 3. I think I'm being generous to TV if I give them two episodes (in movies, I normally give them between 20-30 minutes to get me hooked).

The problem with today's TV is always the same: too little plot for too much screen time. They produce these shows by the yard. In movie editing, it's about "kill your darlings" to drive down the 3-hour assembly edit to under 2 hours. In TV, it's about padding out the one-hour of plot to fill 10 episodes. They do this with lots of consequence-free false drama.

Why movies are (generally) better than TV:
* One writer makes for consistent characters and cohesive plot.
* 2-ish hours is good time to tell a story. If you have more story to tell, make it 2.5 hours or even 3 hours or a mini-series.
* Superior production values: cinematography, score, VFX, action set pieces
* Ability to go to global locations rather than just the interiors of rooms.
* Story arcs that ratchets up tension and stakes, rather than just repetition or false drama.
* Vagueness is not rewarded as "intriguing" as movies tend to resolve by the end

TV could and should be a place to explore ideas in depth, but having English-literature graduates work on, say, provocative sci-fi concepts doesn't work.

In principle, if you could have the same density of plot as a good movie, sustained throughout an entire TV season with consistency of writing, that would be great. There are some exceptions (Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones) but generally speaking, the view that TV is currently superior to movies is false. Perhaps if we lived 1000 year lifespans...

Last edited by avatar (2017-03-04 20:57:20)

not long to go now...

Thumbs up +1 Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/whtt.gif

Teague Chrystie

I have a tendency to fix your typos.

Thumbs up Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

You'll have to excuse Faldor, he's getting up there in years, the eyes don't work so well you see.

He said West WORLD Faldor, West WORLD.

ZangrethorDigital.ca

362

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

As a literature major myself, I resent the implication that we somehow aren't capable of understanding and writing SF. tongue

That said, agreed re: most television. FilmCritHulk wrote a great piece about the issue that contrasts Breaking Bad with Luke Cage to demonstrate how we've lost the art of episodic storytelling.

I'm obviously a huge fan of Breaking Bad, and I love Hannibal to death, but outside of those I don't invest much in modern TV because of this problem. The only current show I'm watching is Orphan Black, and it's a *huge* example of the problem described above--seasons 1 and 2 are pretty great television, but then season 3 is basically one episode's worth of content stretched over ten and season 4 can't really recover from that. I love the idea of extended storytelling as opposed to solely episodic work in principle, but it's really rare for it to be done well.

Last edited by Abbie (2017-03-05 19:03:57)

Thumbs up Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

DarthPraxus wrote:

(he's stopped using all caps, don't worry)

https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTWw4jOlJJVIGUYSRLI4In8H0eYCMkDox9pQjK3b7cPq1u5cUzRaQ

ZangrethorDigital.ca

364

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Oh shit, was that one before the transition? Apologies.

Thumbs up Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

avatar wrote:

There are some exceptions...

avatar wrote:

...Game of Thrones...

http://www.gifbin.com/bin/092009/1253886001_office-no.gif

Game of Thrones was a groundbreaker but it's very quickly become a typical example of what you're describing: great production value, infinite dullness. Plot and character consistency may not be amongst its problems, but it's consistently not a very good adaptation.

I see Game of Thrones as a catalyst for bigger TV productions, but as you've pointed out, budget isn't quality. Hell, if there's one that could be considered an actual groundbreaker, it's Twin Peaks, and I'm pretty sure it didn't have much to work with. Turns out author-driven shows tend to be more faithful and expressive than studio-driven shows. Ring a bell?

Last edited by Saniss (2017-03-06 09:07:00)

Sébastien Fraud
Instagram |Facebook

Thumbs up Thumbs down

366

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

I was going to say the same thing. I totally agree with avatar's post, except for the Game of Thrones part. Good lord I hate that shit. I tried for, like, 5 seasons, and eventually had to admit that it's just The Walking Dead with ice walkers that don't do anything instead of walkers that don't do anything, and the occasional boob/penis.

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Alex wrote:

I was going to say the same thing. I totally agree with avatar's post, except for the Game of Thrones part. Good lord I hate that shit. I tried for, like, 5 seasons, and eventually had to admit that it's just The Walking Dead with ice walkers that don't do anything instead of walkers that don't do anything, and the occasional boob/penis.

Fair enough. I didn't just wanna say "All TV is shit" - there are exceptions but, sure, strike GOT from that list. Doesn't leave much though. I like Silicon Valley and some of Better Call Saul, but that's infested with the same thin plot problems (false drama and loads of repetition).

All the sins that writers are told to avoid in movies, are doubled-down upon in today's TV.

not long to go now...

Thumbs up Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

My contribution (it's a doozy):

Ok, I think Christopher Reeve is an awesome Superman (that's not the controversial opinion). But here's the thing: I don't care for the Donner Superman movies. Like, any of them. Old guys, don't tell me I just don't understand because I wasn't alive yet (well, for the first one). Overall, they're fairly goofy movies. Margo Kidder is insane. Gene Hackman plays a goofy, dopey, comic-relief Lex Luthor. Lex is a character who, in the comics, is one of the smartest and most calculating people on the planet. He's also all kinds of evil, and he's more than just a mustache twirling Snidely Whiplash wannabe. Do I think Superman is fine? Sure. Do I respect it as a benchmark of its time? Of course. Same with Superman II. I think the groundwork is there. That's not what bothers me about these movies. What bothers me is that, whenever a new Superman movie comes out, everyone loses their damn minds if it's not like the Christopher Reeve films.

Let's get one thing straight. Superman (as a character) is much, much older than the Richard Donner films, and the majority of his adventures have been on a comic book page, not on screen. The Donner movies are not the be-all end-all baseline of how a Superman movie absolutely HAS to be.

Does that mean I think Man of Steel was good? No. Man of Steel was pretty much shit. At best it was mediocre. But that was for its own reasons. Not because it wasn't like Reeve's Superman. In fact, if anything, the fact that it tried to borrow Superman II's plotline worked against it.

Bryan Singer's Superman Returns suffers from an even worse problem, which is that it couldn't decide if it was a reboot, remake, or a sequel. Chronologically it took place after the events of the last Reeve film. But the crisis point and several dialogue lines were stolen from the first Donner film.

It's like filmmakers keep forgetting that Superman was (and is) a comic book character first and a movie character second.

To quote Forest Gump, "That's all I got to say about that right now."

Please.... be gentle.

"I solemnly swear I am up to no good." - Han Solo, Terminator 2: With a Vengeance

369

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Hmm. Where do I fair in a superman outfit with an inflatable horse costume? Asking for a friend. A friend who thought it was good. Good to dress up circe 2010.

The difficult second album Regan

Thumbs up Thumbs down

370

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Yes I'm afull

The difficult second album Regan

Thumbs up Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

The more today's DC superheroes become dark, brooding, EMOs in the rain, the fresher the Donner Superman becomes. Aw Shucks.
For me, only the dickhead sidekicks of Lex don't hold up. I'm fine with the rest.

If Lex was another badass Joker-type of villain who instantly disembowels everyone who disrespects him... you know, we've seen enough of those.

not long to go now...

Thumbs up Thumbs down

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Alex wrote:

I was going to say the same thing. I totally agree with avatar's post, except for the Game of Thrones part. Good lord I hate that shit. I tried for, like, 5 seasons, and eventually had to admit that it's just The Walking Dead with ice walkers that don't do anything instead of walkers that don't do anything, and the occasional boob/penis.

I've not seen Walking Dead as of now, but as I understand it it's primarily about the zombies and is an ongoing series - so if the zombies there "don't do anything" it's clear why that would appear as if the show was treading water.


GoT isn't just about the ice zombies, however - its first several seasons were primarily about the wars and political conflicts between humans, and various travel adventures on the side (some which encountered supernatural things that had nothing to do with the Walkers); the "ice walkers" were set up as a looming threat that gradually and slowly built over 6 seasons.

It's a story that's designed with a beginning, middle and end, and now that the "3rd act" is about to begin, they're probably gonna start doing a lot of things in S7 if the leaks are to be believed.
They pretty much destroyed the Wildlings in S5, destroyed the Children sanctuary in S6 so you know where they're heading next

Thumbs up Thumbs down

373

Re: Defend your most controversial film opinion.

Having finally completed his filmography in preparation for mother! (just watched Requiem tonight), I think The Wrestler is Aronofsky's best movie.

My heart wants to say it's The Fountain, because I love it dearly and it's beautiful and everything it's doing with theme is such my shit, but it nags at me that Rachel Weiss' character exists solely to teach a lesson to Jackman rather than really being a person in her own right. Wrestler, on the other hand, is . . . basically perfect? I think it's funny that it was made before Black Swan, because it seems like the mature filmmaker's exploration of themes that are handled in a more juvenile/silly fashion in that movie. It's like Aronofsky's Zodiac/The Social Network, a film that's zero directorial artifice. He has the confidence to just watch this incredibly painful and moving story unfold, and because of that lack of artifice I think it's unquestionably the most human film he's ever made. Everyone involved is operating at the top of their game.

Overall, my ranking goes Wrestler > Fountain > Pi > Requiem > Black Swan > Noah. He hasn't made a bad film and has made at least three great ones. I'm stoked as all hell for mother! next week.

Thumbs up Thumbs down