What movies have you seen recently?

[JayBee74]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

Suburbicon (Oct 27th) looks like a wild ride.


<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/IYga2m0V2O0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

[daflyboys]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

^^ So did Hail,Caesar. This looks a bit Fargo-ish. Guess we'll see.

[LowerWolf]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

Rogue One. Even better the second time around.

[RockinDaMike]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

I'm in the minority on Rogue one, it was just okay for me and not great. There are some great scenes in it and loved everything with Donnie Yen (huge fan) but it didn't feel special to me like 4-6 and Force Awakens did.

[LowerWolf]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

I'm in the minority on Rogue one, it was just okay for me and not great. There are some great scenes in it and loved everything with Donnie Yen (huge fan) but it didn't feel special to me like 4-6 and Force Awakens did.

That's how I felt seeing it in the theater. It was good, but not great.

It's still not on par with FA for me, but I enjoyed it a lot more watching it last night.

[Quint75]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

Dunkirk in glorious 70 mm. Excellent movie, great performances, especially Mark Raylance.


Sent from my iPhone using Operation Sports

[Chip Douglass]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

Saw Dunkirk a few days ago and was pretty disappointed.

I don't think it does justice to the enormity of the task of the evacuation. Nearly 700 ships were deployed in the operation, yet you only see a few destroyers and Mark Rylance on his small boat. The mighty Luftwaffe, which Hitler tasked with destroying the Dunkirk pocket, doesn't seem to consist of more than a handful of Stukas and Messerschmidts. There's no presentation of the broader military/political context either (the collapse of France, the truly heroic rearguard actions that made the evacuation possible, etc.), which the film could have benefited from.

I loved the musical score and the minimal dialogue, but the film could have been a lot more than what it was.

3/5.

[Blzer]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

I've now seen Dunkirk four times in theaters, twice in 70mm IMAX. It literally gets better every time that I see it.

Thinking about The Emoji Movie upsets me. If I ever see it, it would only be to confirm a suspicion I have for its ending (and I will pay for another movie to see it if so). Either way, this image made me laugh:




Also, remind me to do reviews for the following films later:

Deepwater Horizon
A Cure for Wellness
There Will Be Blood
War for the Planet of the Apes
Wonder Woman

[JayBee74]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

I've now seen Dunkirk four times in theaters, twice in 70mm IMAX. It literally gets better every time that I see it.

I saw the standard version just after it came out, and while I appreciate the ambitious undertaking I was quite frankly bored. Is there an argument out there that this type of movie needed no character development or is there an argument that it actually had some? I didn't see the emotion or feel the peril of any of the men. I would say the three level storytelling (land, air, and sea) confused me a bit but I got to the point where I didn't care.

My younger brother is a huge Nolan fan (I am not) and described the Imax version as "brilliant". There is no amount of visual enhancement that could make me enjoy this film. I realize I am in the minority.

EDIT: It took me some time to figure out that the shell-shocked soldier on the civilian boat (right?) was the Peaky Blinders guy.

[Blzer]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

I saw the standard version just after it came out, and while I appreciate the ambitious undertaking I was quite frankly bored. Is there an argument out there that this type of movie needed no character development or is there an argument that it actually had some? I didn't see the emotion or feel the peril of any of the men. I would say the three level storytelling (land, air, and sea) confused me a bit but I got to the point where I didn't care.

My younger brother is a huge Nolan fan (I am not) and described the Imax version as "brilliant". There is no amount of visual enhancement that could make me enjoy this film. I realize I am in the minority.

EDIT: It took me some time to figure out that the shell-shocked soldier on the civilian boat (right?) was the Peaky Blinders guy.

I'm sorry that I don't have a shorter way to provide some answers for you, but I guess you can start with this post of mine:

http://forums.operationsports.com/fo...5&postcount=80

Spoiler

I'm curious if when you refer to character development that you mean backstory. He didn't do that very much, but some characters had some less-than on-the-nose development, or at least something that we can use to describe them. Just because Nolan didn't explain characters doesn't mean they didn't maintain a consistent personality. Tommy (the lead) didn't have much to go with so that he is an everybody man, where we can inject our own personality into him.

However, let's focus on Harry Styles' character for a second. How would you describe him? I think we can both agree that he was somewhat cowardly. Think about it: he sells out Gibson, then from the trainyard onward he couldn't handle the thought that his country would provide him a hero's welcome. He didn't even realize the blind man couldn't see; he just thought he couldn't bear to look at him. Then when the Churchill speech was in front of him, he deferred to Tommy to read it because he didn't want to eat up any hurt words (such as when Tommy started off by reading "Wars are not won by evacuations."). Then the elderly man outside of the train was knocking on the window, and of course Alex shied away from him as well.

So I know something about his personality. Do I know why he's like that? Did he have daddy issues at home? Maybe. I don't have to know why to sympathize with his situation. I felt happy for him when he did return home with pretty much a standing ovation, because he did everything he had to do to survive and it paid off for him.

This next character, though the most short-lived, has the most development of any other character in the film. His name is George, the young boy who suffers damage to his occipital lobe and dies on the Moonstone. Granted, he uses a couple of lines to explain away his past, starting with: "I'll be useful, sir." Does he end up being useful? I guess in a physical way, not really. Did he have ambition to make something of himself compared to the life he had led thus far? Absolutely.

George wasn't even meant to cast off and take the call; in fact, I don't even know if he was aware he was going into a battle zone. He had no training or understanding of his environment, in war or at sea. But he had a want and a will to prove to himself and others that he was not just a wasted body. Peter (blond-haired fellow on the boat) empathized with this when George was telling him he was hoping someday to make a local paper, just to make amends for his uselessness on the homefront. He was the only character whose past and future we grabbed hold of truly.

The accident also balanced the shivering soldier to a state of guilt and acceptance of them not changing course. That soldier would eventually even pulled a soldier up from the sea, something you couldn't fathom seeing him do the night before when he shunned Tommy and such. You don't think he wouldn't otherwise have grabbed his .303 and held Dawson at gunpoint to force him to turn that ship around?

War changes people, and often dehumanizes them. He became human again, checking up on George through Peter, who even lied to him about his death just to not make him feel too much shame for his actions. Of course, at the trainyard he found out about his death anyway. George served a purpose that even he did not intend to, and he was very much useful to make the things that happened, happen.

Anyway, you'll see that my previous posts really mention Jeremy Jahns often. I'm not saying that Jeremy's opinion is wrong, I'm just saying it's not fully realized. I think he was so fast to want to receive hits and subscriptions on YouTube that he made a video without considering all aspects of the film first. Half of his video was him defending himself of his opinion on the film based on lack of character development. He needs to reconsider posting a knee-jerk reaction like this. He even admitted that he liked Interstellar more on a second viewing, and his initial grade for the film would have raised as a result. I bet if he and others read these posts and re-watched the film (my second viewing left me much more impressed than my first viewing, and my fourth more than my third, etc.), everyone might have a different stance than the first time around.

Spoiler

After seeing the film the third time, I really tried to play this in my head if it was played in chronological order, and I'm now just laughing at critics that think it would have worked that way. The pacing would have been wretched. Nolan couldn't have taken the film that he made and put it chronologically. If somebody creates an edited version that is chronological (hey, maybe I will someday just for the hell of it), it won't play well. It just won't.

The only way it would play well is if you cut out 80% of the AIR narrative, 50% of the SEA narrative, and add many more MOLE scenes that build character development. You can even keep the 107 minutes time length doing that. If you don't cut those things out, this would be The Matrix Revolutions all over again. As it is though, Nolan nailed it. I really hope I can send a personal e-mail with a chronological version to every critic that complained about it, and see if they like that version of the film more. If they are true film critics, they'll realize why Nolan did it the way that he did.

My fourth viewing of this film made me appreciate the way this film was edited so much, especially the way scenes with similar tension were used. Nolan really planned this very carefully. I already mentioned that its editing is less "necessary" in a natural way of talking about it (like Following), but I now realize that it needs to explanation as to why it's built another way.

[JayBee74]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

I'm sorry that I don't have a shorter way to provide some answers for you, but I guess you can start with this post of mine:

http://forums.operationsports.com/fo...5&postcount=80

Spoiler

I'm curious if when you refer to character development that you mean backstory. He didn't do that very much, but some characters had some less-than on-the-nose development, or at least something that we can use to describe them. Just because Nolan didn't explain characters doesn't mean they didn't maintain a consistent personality. Tommy (the lead) didn't have much to go with so that he is an everybody man, where we can inject our own personality into him.

However, let's focus on Harry Styles' character for a second. How would you describe him? I think we can both agree that he was somewhat cowardly. Think about it: he sells out Gibson, then from the trainyard onward he couldn't handle the thought that his country would provide him a hero's welcome. He didn't even realize the blind man couldn't see; he just thought he couldn't bear to look at him. Then when the Churchill speech was in front of him, he deferred to Tommy to read it because he didn't want to eat up any hurt words (such as when Tommy started off by reading "Wars are not won by evacuations."). Then the elderly man outside of the train was knocking on the window, and of course Alex shied away from him as well.

So I know something about his personality. Do I know why he's like that? Did he have daddy issues at home? Maybe. I don't have to know why to sympathize with his situation. I felt happy for him when he did return home with pretty much a standing ovation, because he did everything he had to do to survive and it paid off for him.

This next character, though the most short-lived, has the most development of any other character in the film. His name is George, the young boy who suffers damage to his occipital lobe and dies on the Moonstone. Granted, he uses a couple of lines to explain away his past, starting with: "I'll be useful, sir." Does he end up being useful? I guess in a physical way, not really. Did he have ambition to make something of himself compared to the life he had led thus far? Absolutely.

George wasn't even meant to cast off and take the call; in fact, I don't even know if he was aware he was going into a battle zone. He had no training or understanding of his environment, in war or at sea. But he had a want and a will to prove to himself and others that he was not just a wasted body. Peter (blond-haired fellow on the boat) empathized with this when George was telling him he was hoping someday to make a local paper, just to make amends for his uselessness on the homefront. He was the only character whose past and future we grabbed hold of truly.

The accident also balanced the shivering soldier to a state of guilt and acceptance of them not changing course. That soldier would eventually even pulled a soldier up from the sea, something you couldn't fathom seeing him do the night before when he shunned Tommy and such. You don't think he wouldn't otherwise have grabbed his .303 and held Dawson at gunpoint to force him to turn that ship around?

War changes people, and often dehumanizes them. He became human again, checking up on George through Peter, who even lied to him about his death just to not make him feel too much shame for his actions. Of course, at the trainyard he found out about his death anyway. George served a purpose that even he did not intend to, and he was very much useful to make the things that happened, happen.

Anyway, you'll see that my previous posts really mention Jeremy Jahns often. I'm not saying that Jeremy's opinion is wrong, I'm just saying it's not fully realized. I think he was so fast to want to receive hits and subscriptions on YouTube that he made a video without considering all aspects of the film first. Half of his video was him defending himself of his opinion on the film based on lack of character development. He needs to reconsider posting a knee-jerk reaction like this. He even admitted that he liked Interstellar more on a second viewing, and his initial grade for the film would have raised as a result. I bet if he and others read these posts and re-watched the film (my second viewing left me much more impressed than my first viewing, and my fourth more than my third, etc.), everyone might have a different stance than the first time around.

Spoiler

After seeing the film the third time, I really tried to play this in my head if it was played in chronological order, and I'm now just laughing at critics that think it would have worked that way. The pacing would have been wretched. Nolan couldn't have taken the film that he made and put it chronologically. If somebody creates an edited version that is chronological (hey, maybe I will someday just for the hell of it), it won't play well. It just won't.

The only way it would play well is if you cut out 80% of the AIR narrative, 50% of the SEA narrative, and add many more MOLE scenes that build character development. You can even keep the 107 minutes time length doing that. If you don't cut those things out, this would be The Matrix Revolutions all over again. As it is though, Nolan nailed it. I really hope I can send a personal e-mail with a chronological version to every critic that complained about it, and see if they like that version of the film more. If they are true film critics, they'll realize why Nolan did it the way that he did.

My fourth viewing of this film made me appreciate the way this film was edited so much, especially the way scenes with similar tension were used. Nolan really planned this very carefully. I already mentioned that its editing is less "necessary" in a natural way of talking about it (like Following), but I now realize that it needs to explanation as to why it's built another way.

No, I wasn't referring to back story.In Nolan's defense, there are so many moving parts combined with limited dialogue that there wasn't much time for character development. You maintain that Nolan gave his characters a consistent personality. I guess he did, but I didn't care about any of them including Harry Styles' character (I have to admit I had to look the singer/actor up-sorry kids).

To me, the movie was a thin spread of characters on a huge Production Value sandwich. Agree to disagree Blaze. I respect your opinion and your detailed thoughts.

One question for you. Did you like Cillian Murphy's (shell-shocked guy) scenes and performance in this movie?

[Blzer]

^ Sorry, typing on the flip phone, keeping it short. I understand. I loved Murphy's performance, probably because of the acting range I see him have in his films, even if you just think of the Nolan films (Batman Begins, Inception, Dunkirk). He is mesmerizing even in a way that he is understanding to not overstep in his roles. What do you think?

EDIT: Now that I'm at a computer, I also wanted to mention that the more I watch this film, the more I care about these characters. Not that I haven't been invested before, but I feel like I'm getting to know them more, like they're actual people. Even characters like Peter and Gibson. They just mean so much more to me now than they initially did.

[JayBee74]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

^ Sorry, typing on the flip phone, keeping it short. I understand. I loved Murphy's performance, probably because of the acting range I see him have in his films, even if you just think of the Nolan films (Batman Begins, Inception, Dunkirk). He is mesmerizing even in a way that he is understanding to not overstep in his roles. What do you think?

EDIT: Now that I'm at a computer, I also wanted to mention that the more I watch this film, the more I care about these characters. Not that I haven't been invested before, but I feel like I'm getting to know them more, like they're actual people. Even characters like Peter and Gibson. They just mean so much more to me now than they initially did.

Yeah, he did a great job. Can't believe I didn't recognize him right away.

[areobee401]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

Arrival

One of the more thought-provoking sci-fi movies I can remember seeing in some time. The type you instantly want to discuss after watching. Amy Adams was fantastic through.

Z for Zachariah

Another good sci-if movie that relates to and touches on things we face in our world today. I think what I enjoy most was how its left to the viewer on how to interpret everything. Could see the story menaing a number of things with all feeling plausible. All three leads did a good job in their respective roles.

[daflyboys]

Re: What movies have you seen recently?

Hey Blzer, do reviews for the following films later:

Deepwater Horizon
A Cure for Wellness
There Will Be Blood
War for the Planet of the Apes
Wonder Woman

My work here is done.