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Movies You've Seen Recently |OT| April 2017

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Chumley

Banned
The whole "bird erupting out of a gunshot wound" shot is cribbed wholesale from The Holy Mountain. Like, I get that Jodorowsky isn't exactly Mr. Mainstream Filmmaker, but anyone with an interest in world cinema, it was rather shocking to see such a direct lift like that.

Eh, I don't consider references like that to be "cribbing", almost every director does that from time to time. Spielberg, Nolan, Scorcese, they all put visual references in their films from directors who inspired them as little nods.
 
This doesn't make sense. First, cinematographers are responsible for everything that composes a shot, not just lighting. I would get fucking fired if a director ever asked me how I want to compose a shot, and I just shrugged my shoulders and said "I dunno, it's up to you". Inarritu's films before Birdman looked nothing like they do now, so the argument that Lubezki plays some kind of minor role is just wrong.

And as far as him "cribbing" from other directors, that's always such a lazy argument. Of course he's influenced by Tarkovsky. Herzog is too. It's a good influence to have. What exactly is your point there? What specifically in The Revenant is stolen or unoriginal? Because I seem to remember a dozen or more shots that were executed with technical precision and consideration I've only seen in a handful of other films.

Herzog's movies bare very little resemblance to those of Tarkovsky, save in the general qualitative sense. Inarritu is basically the non-self-conscious version of what Paul Thomas Anderson was up until There Will Be Blood or so, someone who mimics greats of the past without rexontextualizing those successes into art that offers its own, artistically and aesthetically singular worldview. The Revenant is the epitome of cinematography that is showy without actually doing what good cinematography is supposed to do, which is to expand upon and deepen the events on-screen. It has some of the most beautiful shots of icicles melting or water flowing you'll ever see, but it doesn't speak to the experiences depicted in the way that, say, the framing in The Tree of Life perfectly encapsulates the nature of memory and the perspective of childhood. If anything, it arguably works against it in that it undermines the audience's sense of the roughness of the events of the plot by overly focusing on natural beauty, in comparison to the more eye-level realism used by Herzog in "Aguirre", which is every bit as beautiful but makes those depicted look as ugly and desperate as they really would have been, without the showiness.
 

Chumley

Banned
Herzog's movies bare very little resemblance to those of Tarkovsky, save in the general qualitative sense. Inarritu is basically the non-self-conscious version of what Paul Thomas Anderson was up until There Will Be Blood or so, someone who mimics greats of the past without rexontextualizing those successes into art that offers its own, artistically and aesthetically singular worldview. The Revenant is the epitome of cinematography that is showy without actually doing what good cinematography is supposed to do, which is to expand upon and deepen the events on-screen. It has some of the most beautiful shots of icicles melting or water flowing you'll ever see, but it doesn't speak to the experiences depicted in the way that, say, the framing in The Tree of Life perfectly encapsulates the nature of memory and the perspective of childhood. If anything, it arguably works against it in that it undermines the audience's sense of the roughness of the events of the plot by overly focusing on natural beauty, in comparison to the more eye-level realism used by Herzog in "Aguirre", which is every bit as beautiful but makes those depicted look as ugly and desperate as they really would have been, without the showiness.

The intent of the movie wasn't to go for the kind of realism you're talking about. It was about evoking spirituality and emotion within the landscapes and the journey of Glass, and every dream sequence was surreal and sort of artificial as a way of distancing the audience from his own personal memories. The intimacy is on him and his journey, but not his dreams. The camera is always tight and wide on Leo and no one else. It's about immersion as well. If you misunderstood the intended tone or think it was artificial, whatever, but the intention is nowhere even near Tree of Life or Aguirre.
 
The intent of the movie wasn't to go for the kind of realism you're talking about. It was about evoking spirituality and emotion within the landscapes and the journey of Glass, and every dream sequence was surreal and sort of artificial as a way of distancing the audience from his own personal memories. The intimacy is on him and his journey, but not his dreams. The camera is always tight and wide on Leo and no one else. It's about immersion as well. If you misunderstood the intended tone or think it was artificial, whatever, but the intention is nowhere even near Tree of Life or Aguirre.

I don't really care of intent, but result. The conception of spirituality in The Revenant was as off-the-rack as it comes, the underlying narrative had very little to it both because the writing was so-so and DiCaprio can't project 19th-Century machismo if he tried (he can't project 21st Century masculinity, tbh), so the contrast between the two does not work because neither component works on its own, nor is there much elegance in their integration, see: the clumsiness surrounding Hugh Glass' wife enumerated earlier in the thread. I offered up Aguirre as something that is both successful at what it does as well as more successful at what The Revenant is ostensibly "trying" to do, according to those who claim its merits.
 
so the argument that Lubezki plays some kind of minor role is just wrong.

Not minor, but more specifically collaborative. The comment about attributing credit was more of a general point I made, because I notice it often, and not a response to anything specific in the thread so far. It was a way of saying I can still appreciate a lot of the visuals in the film in one sense (i.e. technical execution) while still having problems with them in another sense (i.e. problems with how they function in a larger sense, or are designed conceptually).

It's a good influence to have. What exactly is your point there?

Snowman just covered this perfectly, but quickly, that he doesn't make those influences his own. There are specific cribs like the one Ridley mentions, quite a few shots looked to me like they came straight from Malick - The New World specifically and usurprisingly (a single shot looking up at a tree canopy means nothing on its own, I'd grant, but patterns emerge through repetition and it started looking blatant) - and more grammatical stuff like the single take action scenes, especially the opening ambush scene, which as I already suggested, looked to me specifically like Cuarón's playbook for Children of Men (also stuff like breathing on the lens, which gave me flashbacks to an intense argument my friends once had about the function of the blood on the lens in Children of Men).

And this might make my argument sound crazy, but yes, Lubezki shooting many of these examples is a coincidence. Children of Men and The New World do not look anything at all like each other. That's my point. But my experience of watching The Revenant is that it clearly imitates both of them, and other films beyond that (from Tarkovsky to Jodorowsky) and I found it distracting, and in no way cohesive, and that's how I tend to feel about Iñárritu's films in general. He does the same with Godard on Birdman, for example (but I'll also grant Birdman is more purposeful and a better film).

I dunno. All I see when I watch Iñárritu's films are pale imitations of better films. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
 

TheFlow

Banned
Not minor, but more specifically collaborative. The comment about attributing credit was more of a general point I made, because I notice it often, and not a response to anything specific in the thread so far. It was a way of saying I can still appreciate a lot of the visuals in the film in one sense (i.e. technical execution) while still having problems with them in another sense (i.e. problems with how they function in a larger sense, or are designed conceptually).



Snowman just covered this perfectly, but quickly, that he doesn't make those influences his own. There are specific cribs like the one Ridley mentions, quite a few shots looked to me like they came straight from Malick - The New World specifically and usurprisingly (a single shot looking up at a tree canopy means nothing on its own, I'd grant, but patterns emerge through repetition and it started looking blatant) - and more grammatical stuff like the single take action scenes, especially the opening ambush scene, which as I already suggested, looked to me specifically like Cuarón's playbook for Children of Men (also stuff like breathing on the lens, which gave me flashbacks to an intense argument my friends once had about the function of the blood on the lens in Children of Men).

And this might make my argument sound crazy, but yes, Lubezki shooting many of these examples is a coincidence. Children of Men and The New World do not look anything at all like each other. That's my point. But my experience of watching The Revenant is that it clearly imitates both of them, and other films beyond that (from Tarkovsky to Jodorowsky) and I found it distracting, and in no way cohesive, and that's how I tend to feel about Iñárritu's films in general. He does the same with Godard on Birdman, for example (but I'll also grant Birdman is more purposeful and a better film).

I dunno. All I see when I watch Iñárritu's films are pale imitations of better films. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

white-guy-blinking-meme-gif.gif





regardless of whether The revenant was inspired by other works or not the visuals are top tier and easily one of the best shot movies this decade 2010-2017. And this is coming from a guy who doesn't like him as a director. I give credit where credit is due.


edit: this is like after watching Hidden Fortress and then going on letterboxd and seeing everyone Flame Star Wars/George Lucas for burrowing from Hidden Fortress. like lord have mercy
 
Well at least I know I'm crazy.

While I'm fired up, I'll make one more point about The Revenant, which has less to do with borrowing or cribbing or inspiration (or cinematographic merit) and more with my overriding beef with the film, which gets me to the heart of the matter: I find the film's aesthetic goals to be dubious at best. Strap in because I'm pretty sure I'm driving this discussion over a cliff here.

Why is the film shot in natural light, anyways? Why does Leo actually eat raw meat like for real?
Why does any of this matter when there's a CGI deer in one of the first shots?

I don't understand why the film insists on natural light, if not to make the production more difficult. I don't understand why many choices were seemingly made to increase the (widely reported) difficulty and hardships of the production, if not out of a misguided sense that good art is only produced through hardship. (And if that's true, what does it mean when that hardship is arbitrary and self-imposed?) I don't know how any of this is consistent or significant when one of the film's major sequences involves Leo fighting a not-actually-there-bear.

I remember reading a fluff piece about the ways Leo suffered for his role (he got the Oscar, so good for him), and all I could think is... why does it matter that a vegetarian ate raw meat on film, if a movie is make believe? Does anybody remember what happens during the sequence that involves Leo eating raw meat? Does anybody remember what happens directly prior to Leo eating raw meat? Because it involves CGI wolves hunting and killing their CGI prey.

And whatever this film's aesthetic ambitions, I have to call foul on that.

So, yes, Leo eats raw meat (a pointless acting stunt in and of itself, I'd wager)... after having it basically hand delivered by CGI wolves.

I call foul on that so fucking hard.

The Revenant is stupid. Thanks for reading.
 

TheFlow

Banned
Well at least I know I'm crazy.

While I'm fired up, I'll make one more point about The Revenant, which has less to do with borrowing or cribbing or inspiration (or cinematographic merit) and more with my overriding beef with the film, which gets me to the heart of the matter: I find the film's aesthetic goals to be dubious at best. Strap in because I'm pretty sure I'm driving this discussion over a cliff here.

Why is the film shot in natural light, anyways? Why does Leo actually eat raw meat like for real?
Why does any of this matter when there's a CGI deer in one of the first shots?

I don't understand why the film insists on natural light, if not to make the production more difficult. I don't understand why many choices were seemingly made to increase the (widely reported) difficulty and hardships of the production, if not out of a misguided sense that good art is only produced through hardship. (And if that's true, what does it mean when that hardship is arbitrary and self-imposed?) I don't know how any of this is consistent or significant when one of the film's major sequences involves Leo fighting a not-actually-there-bear.

I remember reading a fluff piece about the ways Leo suffered for his role (he got the Oscar, so good for him), and all I could think is... why does it matter that a vegetarian ate raw meat on film, if a movie is make believe? Does anybody remember what happens during the sequence that involves Leo eating raw meat? Does anybody remember what happens directly prior to Leo eating raw meat? Because it involves CGI wolves hunting and killing their CGI prey.

And whatever this film's aesthetic ambitions, I have to call foul on that.

So, yes, Leo eats raw meat (a pointless acting stunt in and of itself, I'd wager)... after having it basically hand delivered by CGI wolves.

I call foul on that so fucking hard.

The Revenant is stupid. Thanks for reading.
yea the revenant is just an amazingly shot movie. other than that it is meh.
 

lordxar

Member
Evolution First off, this sucked. It looked really good and had some interesting moments but it just blew as far as movies go. There's ambiguous then there's this boring snoozefest.
 

kevin1025

Banned
Evolution First off, this sucked. It looked really good and had some interesting moments but it just blew as far as movies go. There's ambiguous then there's this boring snoozefest.

When I see someone mention Evolution my mind always goes to the David Duchovny 2001 alien comedy.
 
We taking shots at shooting in natural light now? Lol

You do it because it looks more natural and immersive. Chill out breh. Not every aesthetic decision in a movie has to be some ultra layered masterstroke. Digital cameras make it easy. The only real obstacle is having just a couple of hours per day to get magic hour shots.

Eating real raw meat though. Lulz

The Revenant could've been a great little beast of an adventure movie if not for all the pretension. Too bad.
 
Shadow of a Doubt: Though it takes a while to layer on the suspense (and in the mean time doubles down on Hitch's love of bumbling and oblivious older folk), when it does heat up it proves a remarkable showcase of Hitchcock's suspense chops on a smaller and subtler scale. Rather than grand sized setpieces, Shadow of a Doubt is a cat and mouse game of two competing ideologies battling it out just out of plain sight in small town America. Jospeh Cotton plays the amazingly sinister and nihilistic Charles to Teresa Wright's idealistic Charlie. The restraint the two leads must show to remain undetected leads to some pretty cracking scenes. Apparently this was Hitch's favorite of his own films, and while I don't think I'd rank it quite as highly I can see why he may have.
 
We taking shots at shooting in natural light now? Lol

You do it because it looks more natural and immersive. Chill out breh. Not every aesthetic decision in a movie has to be some ultra layered masterstroke. Digital cameras make it easy. The only real obstacle is having just a couple of hours per day to get magic hour shots.

Eating real raw meat though. Lulz

The Revenant could've been a great little beast of an adventure movie if not for all the pretension. Too bad.

I like shooting in natural light, I just don't think Inarritu did much with it other than making a revenge movie filled with awesome screen savers.
 

Ridley327

Member
North by Northwest: Even after seeing it on a big screen, I'm still in disbelief that a woman as beautiful as Eva Marie Saint ever existed. I mean, it's a fantastic thriller otherwise, but seeing her projected on screen dozens of feet tall and wide is like seeing proof of deities.
 

Chumley

Banned
Not minor, but more specifically collaborative. The comment about attributing credit was more of a general point I made, because I notice it often, and not a response to anything specific in the thread so far. It was a way of saying I can still appreciate a lot of the visuals in the film in one sense (i.e. technical execution) while still having problems with them in another sense (i.e. problems with how they function in a larger sense, or are designed conceptually).



Snowman just covered this perfectly, but quickly, that he doesn't make those influences his own. There are specific cribs like the one Ridley mentions, quite a few shots looked to me like they came straight from Malick - The New World specifically and usurprisingly (a single shot looking up at a tree canopy means nothing on its own, I'd grant, but patterns emerge through repetition and it started looking blatant) - and more grammatical stuff like the single take action scenes, especially the opening ambush scene, which as I already suggested, looked to me specifically like Cuarón's playbook for Children of Men (also stuff like breathing on the lens, which gave me flashbacks to an intense argument my friends once had about the function of the blood on the lens in Children of Men).

And this might make my argument sound crazy, but yes, Lubezki shooting many of these examples is a coincidence. Children of Men and The New World do not look anything at all like each other. That's my point. But my experience of watching The Revenant is that it clearly imitates both of them, and other films beyond that (from Tarkovsky to Jodorowsky) and I found it distracting, and in no way cohesive, and that's how I tend to feel about Iñárritu's films in general. He does the same with Godard on Birdman, for example (but I'll also grant Birdman is more purposeful and a better film).

I dunno. All I see when I watch Iñárritu's films are pale imitations of better films. ¯_(ツ)_/¯

I think you're critiscizing the script and direction, not the cinematography. Which is fine, but I still haven't heard a real argument explaining how Lubezki wasn't anything other than perfect at realizing Inariitu's vision and setting revolutionary benchmarks for the craft in the process. From a purely technical level, the film deserves the respect it's received. As someone who actually works as a DP, I can't say enough how fucking insane it is that they nailed the shots they did in those conditions. Not just a demonstration of creative will, but a synergy of modern technology in tons of different ways.
 

Toothless

Member
End of March stuff first:

Kong: Skull Island is a film full of empty style. Scenes are included simply for the cool factor, with no regard for when it makes sense for character. The first two-thirds of the movie are super rough thanks to this. Vogt-Roberts directs with a really odd playfulness that doesn't mesh well with the ultra-serious characters and war setting. The script is similar to the 2014 Godzilla film in that the setpieces are few and far between while the characters are just dull archetypes elevated by the cast for the most part.

Speaking of the cast, they're serviceable for the most part. Hiddleston and Larson scoot by mostly on their charisma, and Reilly steals the movie in a really special way. The military crew outside of Jackson is awful though, and honestly, Jackson is only good half the time. Goodman is wasted although his counterpart in Hawkins is an interesting presence throughout. Kong himself is neat, but manages to both be in the movie too much and also far too little.

Yet, Kong: Skull Island does almost redeem itself. The third act is remarkably entertaining, allowing pay-offs for even the smallest bits with either awesome moments or legitimately sweet interactions between characters. Even the military crew is good in these forty minutes, which combines the human drama with the monster action in a breathtaking way. Vogt-Roberts's direction shines with this, the wackiness of the story finally converting his empty style to bubblegum style; ultimately flavorless, but joyful within the moment. However, despite its excellent third act, Kong: Skull Island ultimately disappoints thanks to poor character work and a complete tonal confusion.

Also, happy endings are dead; post-credit scenes killed them.

Childhood films are often hard to analyze. For years, I've thought of Beauty and the Beast as a perfectly decent animated Disney movie, but certainly not one of my favorites. After returning to it for the first time in five years though after both performing in a stage version and seeing a live-action remake, I finally understand why this is great. A timeless love story constantly made anew thanks to gorgeous animation and legendary music. The music is staged just as marvelously as it is written, dynamically moving the characters and the "camera" around in a way that always engages. The Beast is clearly one of the greatest animated characters of all time, being ridiculously expressive and shockingly sympathetic throughout despite the admittedly awful way he acts for a lot of the film. However, Belle is truly the heart of the film, one of Disney's best leads.

The film moves at a perfect pace. The only thing the Broadway show and live-action remake added that actually is missed is a song just for the Beast (As a side note, "If I Can't Love Her" would certainly fit better with the pacing than "Evermore," although either would've been nice to been added in over "Human Again" for the Special Edition.) However, it is not fair to complain about an addition in later productions to be missing in the originator of it all.

Beauty and the Beast is often considered one of the greatest Disney films of all time, and I've always had trouble agreeing with that. Now, I completely understand why. Beauty and the Beast is one of the greatest movie musicals ever made, brilliantly utilizing fantastic songs to move forward its narrative full of memorable characters realized by superb animation. An absolute classic.

The Boss Baby is possibly the oddest mainstream animated film in years. This works both for and against it in multiple ways, but almost always pays off in humor. It's a ridiculously silly film, but one that is never boring and frequently shocking in a fun way. The animation uniquely changes to fit the situations, and its consistently stupid and overcomplicated plot is rarely annoying, and rather amusing. Baldwin never sounds like anything other than Baldwin, but that adds to the truly bizarre tone of the film. The most disappointing parts of the film are when it falls into cliche story structure for American CGI films and when it overexplains its own jokes, but thankfully, the weirdness never really goes away even in these moments. The Boss Baby should not have been made; it is a truly bizarre animated film that never really gels within its own reality. However, this is its greatest strength, being an amusing adventure that flirts with the surreal and mind-numbing silly jokes. A very surprising film.

Power Rangers
is perfectly watchable. That's probably the best compliment one can give it. The brief minute of actual Ranger action is great; too bad the rest of the movie is cliche teen drama and mind-numbing robot fights. It's all shot with the most useless shaky cam in recent memory and with a gross color palette to match it. Pleasantly, the girl rangers steal the show, probably thanks to their characters being the only compelling ones. Cyler is also good as an autistic Ranger, bringing humor and a surprising heart to the film. Banks and Cranston both know exactly what kind of movie they're in, and ham it accordingly. Unfortunately though, Power Rangers is forgettable thanks to a lack of inspired direction, a boring script, and a fear of totally embracing the cheesiness of its source material.

Top 5 first watches of March:

1. Logan
2. The Sixth Sense
3. This is Spinal Tap
4. Beauty and the Beast (2017)
5. The Boss Baby

And then today I saw Life. After many contemporary auteurs have given their shot at a space film, Sony has recently decided to start allowing directors without an established style try it out. First they gave us the mediocre Passengers, but now Life comes, the biggest argument against the modern space movie craze yet.

Featuring a mind-numbingly dumb script, Life pilfers much of its aesthetic from other recent sci-fi. You've got the one-takes of Gravity, the jokey vibe of The Martian, and the booming score of Interstellar all in one film. However, this all means nothing without a cohesive vision behind it, and Life jumps from being a cliche horror film to attempting to be a serious sci-fi film without once trying to marry these two tones.

The biggest problem the film has though is that all of its characters are morons. Maybe two make decently thought decisions the whole film, but these are scientists of the International Space Station. They're Earth's finest, most intelligent people, but yet, they frequently make decisions that are silly and hard to buy into, just for the sake of keeping the monster alive a bit longer, and thus, extending the film's runtime. It's rare that a film makes me root against the future of the human race, but when the only line of defense is full of complete idiots, perhaps it's time for humans to die out.

The last two minutes of Life are a foregone conclusion by the first twenty minutes. These are the best moments of the film because, although they are predictable, they are edited and shot in an extremely funny, campy way. Unfortunately, the previous excruciating hour and a half is not worth this pay-off. Life wastes its ensemble of fantastic actors and a huge budget on an all-too-calm horror film that basks in the cliches of the genre far too much. Ultimately, thanks to dull direction and a horrendous script, Life ultimately proves to be a lifeless film.
 

smisk

Member
Thanks to whoever recommended Chungking Express (1994) last week, I watched it tonight and it was great! Normally I'm not a big fan of the handheld cam style, but this was really well done and not distracting. The movie felt really intimate, I think because he used close-ups so much, and I thought the acting was great.

Just signed up for FilmStruck, so hit me with any recommendations! Already added a ton of Kurosawa stuff to my watchlist.
 

TheFlow

Banned
Thanks to whoever recommended Chungking Express (1994) last week, I watched it tonight and it was great! Normally I'm not a big fan of the handheld cam style, but this was really well done and not distracting. The movie felt really intimate, I think because he used close-ups so much, and I thought the acting was great.

Just signed up for FilmStruck, so hit me with any recommendations! Already added a ton of Kurosawa stuff to my watchlist.
Haha I probably started that convo.


But filmstruck has something from just about every director.

Their Japanese and French film collection is mind numbing. They have all of Demy
 

Blader

Member
Can someone explain to me why shooting The Master in 70mm made sense when the camera is nearly always so close on the actors? Seemed like a big waste of the format. PTA had sort of an explanation for why he wanted to go that route in an interview with Marc Maron, but I don't remember what it was other than it not being a satisfying one.
 
Can someone explain to me why shooting The Master in 70mm made sense when the camera is nearly always so close on the actors? Seemed like a big waste of the format. PTA had sort of an explanation for why he wanted to go that route in an interview with Marc Maron, but I don't remember what it was other than it not being a satisfying one.

I want to say it involved some technical detail I'm too dumb to know, or just fetishizing film. I do know he wanted The Master to look old school.

Hateful 8 being in 70mm also didn't make much sense to me.
 
We taking shots at shooting in natural light now? Lol

Nope, just the reasons for doing so in The Revenant.

(But you're right, I needed to chill. I get heated when it's time to discuss Iñárritu, haha. So I logged off and actually watched a movie. I'll post about it later.)

Early 2000s was a weird time. Like remember "eight legged freaks"

Of course I do. I had a huge crush on Kari Wuhrer when I was younger.

The Turin Horse

This is a total non-sequitur, but this is still one of my favorite youtube videos after all these years:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZ3-7C6RYOE

Also, equally useless contribution: I passed Béla Tarr on an escalator once. I didn't say hi. True story.
 

Creepy

Member
My girlfriend made me watch Rogue One and whatever the other one is called.

They were star wars movies, they had droids and lasers and stuff like that.

Whatever, they were both pretty boring.

She's been trying to drag me to the batman lego movie but I'm not having it...
 

Icolin

Banned
My girlfriend made me watch Rogue One and whatever the other one is called.

They were star wars movies, they had droids and lasers and stuff like that.

Whatever, they were both pretty boring.

She's been trying to drag me to the batman lego movie but I'm not having it...
The Lego Batman movie is pretty good, but you're better off getting the Lego Batman games if anything.
 
Can someone explain to me why shooting The Master in 70mm made sense when the camera is nearly always so close on the actors? Seemed like a big waste of the format. PTA had sort of an explanation for why he wanted to go that route in an interview with Marc Maron, but I don't remember what it was other than it not being a satisfying one.
I don't know but the movie looks amazing either way, so I don't fault him.
 
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