Saturday, April 24, 2021

Weekend Open Thread

20 comments:

  1. Hello gang, hope you have another good weekend!

    Saint Maud was definitely the highlight of my movie-watching week, a British slow burn horror movie about a private nurse who becomes obsessed with saving her dying patient's soul. First-time director Rose Glass is definitely a name to look out for, and Morfydd Clark and Jennifer Ehle are both great.

    I don't entirely understand Ishtar's reputation as a total failure. It's certainly no masterpiece, but I was definitely entertained by it. I guess the reputation's more about conflicts between the director and the stars and it being a box office bomb than the quality of the final product. Bodies at Rest (2019) is the final film in the "My Boy Renny Harlin in China" trilogy. It's an uninspired thriller with a pretty silly plot and occasional directorial flair, nothing to write home about.

    And I also rewatched the first three Karate Kid movies, which I haven't seen since I was a teenager. The first one is formulaic but solid, the sequels are... weird. At least they're not just rehashes of the original's plot, so that's something. Still have the Hilary Swank starring fourth one left, which I don't think I've ever seen before.

    In other news, I'm highly excited about the news that movie theaters here in Finland should be reopening by early May, and Minari, Promising Young Woman and Another Round are all slated to come out when they do. (The theaters were open last summer and fall, but they were shut down again in October and my withdrawal symptoms are getting bad.)

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  2. The Virtuoso (2021) - Wow! What an amazing mess of a movie that was somewhat fun to watch but really dumb. I mean, Anthony Hopkins, David Morse, Abbie Cornish, Diora Baird. What the hell is going on here?! Cornish continues her streak of never being able to hide her natural accent. It's pretty bad but definitely worth a watch.

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  3. Over the past decade I have delved into almost every kind of genre film made in Europe in the 1960s and ‘70s. The Krimi films produced in Germany remains the major blind spot. Seeing a bunch of them available for rental on Amazon Prime, I took the krimi plunge this week. Though not anamorphic, the films are presented in a widescreen format and look great.

    THE SINISTER MONK (1966) – My first watch was this mystery about a whip-wielding killer dressed in a monk’s robes. Karin Dor, one of the genre’s biggest names, stars as a young woman confronting a greedy family and the threat of the murderous monk. With a film that is this much fun, the fact that the plot is hard to follow did not matter much. The Sinister Monk is pure entertainment, and the sometimes inappropriate score is very catchy.

    THE MYSTERIOUS MAGICIAN/DER HEXER (1964) – “Hello, this is Edgar Wallace speaking.” When a woman is murdered, the police and her brother, a notorious criminal, simultaneously seek justice against the perpetrators. I cannot say I disliked The Mysterious Magician, but I was a little perplexed by it. Perhaps something was lost in the dubbing. There are details that, even by going back, I did not fully comprehend. The general tone is silly, which I was not expecting. The contrast between the archaic stories (Edgar Wallace died in 1932) and the hip 1960s vibe seems to be a common part of the krimi experience. There are some familiar faces from the previous film here, and the star, Joachim Fuchsberger, was in many krimis.

    Thank you for the recommendations a couple of weeks ago, Derk. I will be watching more krimis in the weeks ahead.

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    1. Lucky you, crossing a new-to-you genre from your shame list. :-)

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    2. I am glad you had at least some fun with these movies. I agree, that they can be a bit confusing, but I like the style and the feeling I have, when I watch them. It is sad, that modern Krimis don't come close to the genre quality of this series. I hope that other readers and listeners of F This Movie! will take a look, too.

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  4. I just noticed that if I go by my star rankings on Letterboxd, then Tom and Jerry is best movie I've seen this year so far haha

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    1. Chaybee, I was thinking.. I think the sound mixing is really good in One Night in Miami. I'm a little biased about it, but I honestly thought it was notably well done.

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    2. I'm just now getting your message, Meredith and watching a Red Bull Academy video with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis for the 3rd time cause it's that interesting. Hmm.. The actual sound design for One Night in Miami didn't stand out to me though the music was fantastic. I'm going to give it another watch on my basement system this time based on your comment and pay closer attention to that aspect. Hope all is well!

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    3. Had to look up Red Bull (Music?) Academy. Very cool! Nah personally I'm not a sound person so I would defer to someone who knows about it - my only specific comment about that movie is that I thought it would sound "cagey" - kinda claustrophobic, where everyone sounds too close to their mics, which sounds common in movies now. But even though the whole thing takes place in enclosed spaces the sound still had a "natural" quality to me. 💁🏻‍♀️ ;)

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    4. I totally know what you mean. While the movie "Cadillac Records" wasn't very good (and really inaccurate) it did a really good job of creating that effect you described in the studio session sequences.

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  5. So I read that they're remaking Princess Bride and I was excited. Let there be more Princess Bride adaptations, why not? But..I'm still mad about that Little Women remake. I guess some movies matter more than others in that way. I didn't care at all that they made a different Anne of Green Gables, which probably meant more to me growing up than Little Women. But, well, maybe it was just the pretentiousness of that new LW that is so annoying. I want to like Greta Gerwig. But it hasn't happened yet.

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    1. I liked Greta Gerwig fine before, but "Lady Bird" made me love her. "Little Women" was okay, but not Earth-shattering and hasn't aged well (and it's only a couple of years old). Hope you warm-up to her, because she's already inside the Hollywood system and I'd rather have her voice writing/directing projects than none at all. We need every female filmmaker we can get, and can't afford to lose the few we have. :-(

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  6. You know THE UNHOLY (2021, theater) is an above-average 'PG-13' genre horror pic when I want to talk about it than the Oscar-nominated films I also watched (below). While it has its share of dumb jump scares and satanic possession cliches, this Sam Raimi/Robert Tapert production makes sure that characters and a well-written story take center stage. Jeffrey Dean Morgan has the tricky role of being both an a-hole opportunist and sympathetic scoundrel that can both repel and hold audience sympathy, especially alongside Cricket Brown (who seems angelic by comparison). Great supporting work by William Sadler and Cary Elwes (sporting a wicked Boston accent) as religious leaders dealing with Morgan's journalist. Maybe it's the lapsed Catholic in me, but I appreciate that everyone in "The Unholy" (in front and behind the camera) took the story seriously and did their best to squeeze an entertaining morality tale out of a limited budget. An enthusiastic recommendation, especially if you can watch it in a movie theater for maximum impact.

    Carey Mulligan is the odds-on favorite to win Best Actress Oscar tonight for PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN (2021, theater/Amazon Prime), but the real star is first-time director Emerald Fennell. An actor with TV writing credentials ("Killing Eve," "Drifters"), Fennell's handling of a very tricky tone and slow-burn screenplay are a thing of beauty to watch unfold. Essentially a feminist revenge fantasy, "PYW" also has fun casting a rogue's gallery of likable actors (Adam Brody, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Chris Lowell, Bo Burnham, Alfred Molina, etc.) to play the douchiest versions of men any woman will sympathize with. Even in a below-capacity theater because of attendance limits, you could feel the oxygen being sucked from the theater during the final act when Cassandra's quest for revenge "goes there." :-O

    Chloé Zhao's NOMADLAND (2021, theater/Hulu) is fine, but I wouldn't have thought too highly of it if the award season hadn't told me it was an odds-on favorite to win Best Picture. As Oscar-baity as prestige pictures get, "Nomadland" at least has a beating heart of an intriguing character at its core thanks to Frances McDormand's committed portrayal of a widow unwilling (unable?) to let go of a nomadic lifestyle. Except for a handful of actors (including David Strathairn=) everybody that interacts with Fern is a real person, which really adds to the authenticity of the locales she travels through. It won me over at the end and wouldn't upset me if it got Best Picture, but you have to be in a particular mood to appreciate the sadness permeating every frame of "Nomadland." YMMV.

    I'm back to my NYC apartment, but before leaving my parents' AZ home we watched Mike Nichols' new-to-me REGARDING HENRY (1991, Amazon Prime), because that's what my stepmother felt like watching. :-P The trailer back in '91 made me not want to see it. It's exactly the movie I thought it would be, but I was surprised the law firm Harrison Ford worked at before John Leguizamo (!) shot him the face wasn't as unsympathetic as I expected. They're patient waiting for Henry to recover, and then give him a light workload to keep him in the payroll. Yes, in the end they're still rich New York lawyers that turns out to be douchebags, but the movie doesn't earn the disdain for the profession that Henry and his wife (Annette Bening in a thankless role) arrive to by the end. "It's fine" and all, but "Regarding Henry" is now a time capsule of a style of weepy mainstream melodrama (featuring big stars and multi-million production values) Hollywood doesn't make anymore. Worth seeing for unknown character actor Stanley Swerdlow stealing the movie by playing a physical therapist that cares for the well-being of Henry while sexually harassing every attractive woman he comes across. Oh. early 90's. :-(

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    1. For once, :) I completely agree with you about Promising Young Woman. Was one of my favorite films of last year. Watched it on December 31st and it snuck it's way in to my top 10 just in time. So damn good, especially, as you mention, because of the director's beautifully shot and crafted debut.

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    2. If there's justice in Hollywood (HA!) Emerald Fennell will win an Oscar for Best Screenplay (it's that well-written and tightly structured) and McDormand will get Best Actress in an upset. Nothing against Carey Mulligan winning, and she's excellent as Cassandra. But any good actor worth her salt could have played the same role, including Margot Robbie (who co-produced the film along with Mulligan).

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    3. I'll be respectful on my thoughts on Robbie's acting ability. I loved her in OUATIH, though. Also, you know me, Oscars mean nothing whatsoever. I haven't seen Nomadland. It looks like maybe the most uninteresting movie ever, haha.

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    4. Actually "Nomadland" is a very interesting portrayal of a group of people/eco-system that are almost invisible in the American pop culture. It's just a depressing experience for the average people with a home, a 9-to-5 job, etc. It's also the rare Hollywood movie almost exclusively about (a) the real-life plight of being working poor in America that (b) has all leads that are of the third age without making a big deal out of their age. Don't misinterpret my ambivalence toward "Nomadland" as an indictment against its quality. It's just a particularly depressing movie for a likely-to-be depressing Oscar telecast following a devastatingly depressing year for the movie industry and the world at large. You know, misery loves company and all. :-P

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    5. Yep, sounds like the most uninteresting movie ever. :)

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  7. I went back to Christopher Nolan’s Bat-movies this week. BATMAN BEGINS (2005) I really liked this one upon revisiting. I felt it was the most pulp/action of the three. THE DARK KNIGHT (2008) still plays, and is rockin’ entertainment. The movie gets the Joker right in ways that more recent Joker stuff has taken too far. THE DARK KNIGHT RISES (2012) continues to be a mess, trying to do many stories in one movie. Overall, though, all three movies are solid Bat-action. (I still say they should’ve called it the Batmobile and not the Tumbler.)

    CLUE (1985) “Why would he kill her in public?”

    MISSION IMPOSSIBLE: GHOST PROTOCOL (2011) Are we still calling it “Ghost Protes” or is that not a thing anymore?

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