Films

[FloorFiller]

For me The Last Jedi had some of the best Star Wars moments:

 

Kylo and Rey vs. Elite Praetorian Guard. Kylo in general. Hyperspacing in to Snoke's ship. Luke vs. Kylo. Luke in general.

and some of the worst Star Wars moments:

 

Some of the comedy, especially the opening Poe and Hux scene, didn't land/felt a little forced. Leia becoming Superman. The entire Finn and Rose subplot (and the forced romance than came with it) which was all deemed pointless in the end. Various subplots from The Force Awakens seemingly abandoned/ignored, e.g. The Knights of Ren. Daisy Ridley not being a very good actress. 

Luckily I was too busy smiling from ear to ear to really let the negatives take away from the film.

Edited December 16, 2017 by FloorFiller

[Wooderson]

The reviews of this on IMDB/Rotten Tomatoes are barbaric. Peeps nae happy.

[Amy Lawn]

4 hours ago, Wooderson said:

The reviews of this on IMDB/Rotten Tomatoes are barbaric. Peeps nae happy.

Happiness comes from being serious with yourself about what you want from life, setting goals, working towards, and achieving them. Not Star Wars.

[philipsteak]

14 hours ago, Wooderson said:

The reviews of this on IMDB/Rotten Tomatoes are barbaric. Peeps nae happy.

Reading some of those, I reckon some of them are almost happier that they get to hate it. And more importantly, get to tell the world that they hate it

[FloorFiller]

[Spoiler-ish without actually giving anything away]: It's a weird one. On the one hand, a lot of people are getting butthurt to a ridiculous degree because all of their expectations/theories that they've been mulling over for the past couple of years have largely proven to be false and fan service, for the most part, wasn't met. But to me it also seemed like Rian Johnson went absolutely out of his way to not meet fan service with a lot of stuff, sometimes at the expense of the story, so interesting to see how JJ Abrams will handle the third film now that a lot of his previously built up plot threads have been ignored/dismantled/destroyed.

Edited December 17, 2017 by FloorFiller

[Amy Lawn]

2 hours ago, FloorFiller said:

But to me it also seemed like Rian Johnson went absolutely out of his way to not meet fan service with a lot of stuff, sometimes at the expense of the story,

explain what you mean here fam

[Amy Lawn]

Most of yesterday's rant had completely ceased to bother me during this morning's second viewing.

[Wooderson]

Amongst the critics I've seen positively respond to this movie, I've sensed a degree of butthurt at the (this forum aside, natch) contrary fan reaction.

[Hugh Jass]

Saw The Last Jedi yesterday and came away feeling unsatisfied. It's biggest problem is that it's too fucking long. There's a good, maybe even great, Star Wars film buried in there but it's just so bloated that it's almost impossible to enjoy, there's almost Lucas-eque levels of padding and self-indulgence (you just needed a couple of Gungans to turn up to talk about trade embargoes and we'd be there).

There's a lot of good stuff in there and with better and more ruthless editing it would have been better - they could easily have cut Finn, Rose, del Torro and the whole casino planet from the film and it would have made negligible difference to the plot.

[Amy Lawn]

We doing top 10 of the year then? I shall start.

1. Logan
2. Moonlight
3. Call Me By Your Name 
4. A Silent Voice
5. The Death Of Stalin
6. Get Out 
7. Thor: Ragnarok
8. Star Wars: The Last Jedi
9. Prevenge
10. The Red Turtle

Still quite a few I've yet to see, like Paddington 2, In This Corner Of The World, The Florida Project, Detriot, and Okja. I reckon it's been a very good year for films (ignoring the fact that the biggest box-office success was Beauty & The Beast and that's about the very worst film I've ever seen), been to see loads of stuff and about 20 films made it into "would definitely watch again" territory. At the beginning of the year I'd decided to fuck off all the superhero releases except for Lego Batman because I'm fed up of them now, and before this year they were pretty much all the same insipid thing. Then I was really surprised by Logan, which is easily the best of any superhero film and an outstanding film in its own right. I ended up accidentally seeing Spider-Man Homecoming and thought that was Marvel's crown jewel and yet another buddy for the previously lonely Dark Knight trilogy in the realm of superhero films which are actually brilliant films, and hot on the heels of that we got Thor: Ragnarok outclassing it. I also saw Wonder Woman and thought that was 90% a great film let down by 10% studio mandated CGI shit and world-building bollocks. At the risk of eating these words again this time next year, I think I can happily skip all of 2018's offerings because Infinity War and Black Panther look like the usual smashy smashy nonsense (I could be swayed by Ant Man & The Wasp tho), and then Deadpool, the last X-Men film and Justice League were all utter crap so there's no way I'm going to see their sequels/spin-offs. Will definitely be there for The Incredibles 2, because the first one is in my all-time top 5, I love it. Also I got mad love for Mary Poppins, but I'll be going to that one with a raised eyebrow and a "please don't fuck this up" attitude (I expect they will fuck it up tho). Despite the behind the scenes horror of the Han Solo spin-off, I'm quite looking forward to it, because the casting has been perfect and the only Ron Howard-directed films I've watched have all been really good.

[The Nal]

Loved Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri. 

Martin McDonagh becoming one of my favourite directors and anything with Frances McDormand and Sam Rockwell in it is going to be good. 

[Hugh Jass]

Films of 2017:

5. Spiderman: Homecoming

4. Logan

3. Get Out

2. Manchester By The Sea

1. Dunkirk

Yet to see Blade Runner 2049 or The Death of Stalin and both could easily crash the list.

[The Nal]

All available

Blade Runner 2049

Call Me By Your Name

Dunkirk

I, Tonya

Kingsman The Golden Circle

Lady Bird

Last Flag Flying

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri

[ThomThomDrum]

Anyone else watch Mother! ?

I actually very much enjoyed it. I can see why some had issues with it however. I personally do like Aronofskys style of writing and direction but. He doesnt spoon feed it to the audience all the time, but then that can run the risk of being perceived as disappearing up ones navel by some. 

[rock the clock]

i saw phantom thread tonight at the royal festival hall with a live score. I'm trying to work lots of it out but it's absolutely stunning. This is one I'll be returning to again and again 

[Amy Lawn]

I went and watched The Post the other day. I'd say it was very solid, but nothing which elevates it to worthy of a best picture nom. The performances are all good without being great, and to be honest I felt like there wasn't really much hard work for anybody to do, including Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep, there were no complicated characters here at all. It was well scripted, plotted and paced without ever doing anything unorthodox or unexpected. Good direction, Spielberg was doing this whole schtick where how much the camera was moving and how much movement there was in the frame would change to fit the story beats and help telegraphy the passage of time and a sense urgency, but I was a bit tired of it by the end. The themes were put across very coherently and everything worked in service of them at all times, but ultimately they were pretty simplistic. If you like footage of newspaper printing machines rolling though, this is the film for you, lovely stuff.

[FloorFiller]

Well this certainly looks visually amazing judging by these 40 seconds and I'm a little more hopeful in it than I was before. Just hope the swapping of directors so late on and apparent troubles on set don't turn it in to a mess.

[FloorFiller]

 

And as a huge fan of the previous three Mission Impossible films, this looks great. Say what you want about Tom Cruise but when it comes to this particular franchise and it's ever increasing action spectacles he's got his shit together. Looking forward to this a lot.

[Amy Lawn]

13 hours ago, FloorFiller said:

And as a huge fan of the previous three Mission Impossible films, this looks great. Say what you want about Tom Cruise but when it comes to this particular franchise and it's ever increasing action spectacles he's got his shit together. Looking forward to this a lot.

Say what you like about Tom Cruise, but I challenge anybody to show me 10 seconds of movie footage where he's not giving it 500% Cruise and the camera is fucking loving him. He might be in some right shit films, but I don't think he knows that at all.

[vintagelaureate]

I saw The Shape Of Water' yesterday, very odd. Beautifully shot, as expected by Del Toro, but really odd. Much more so than Pan's Labyrinth. 

[The Nal]

Looking forward to this. Fascinating story. 

 

[MrZigster]

On 05/02/2018 at 10:36 PM, GETOFFAMYLAWN said:

Say what you like about Tom Cruise, but I challenge anybody to show me 10 seconds of movie footage where he's not giving it 500% Cruise and the camera is fucking loving him. He might be in some right shit films, but I don't think he knows that at all.

Along the same lines:

I challenge anyone to name a Tom Cruise film without a "Tom Cruise doing some running" scene somewhere in it.

He must have it written into his contracts.

Molly's Game is worth a watch. Best poker film since Rounders.

[Amy Lawn]

3 hours ago, MrZigster said:

Along the same lines:

I challenge anyone to name a Tom Cruise film without a "Tom Cruise doing some running" scene somewhere in it.

He must have it written into his contracts.

Directors are trying to tire him out so he's not got the energy to get up in their business as much.

[vintagelaureate]

I'm putting myself through the Baywatch film as I'm a glutton for punishment. Within the opening minute I can tell it's not for me, but as my daughter has settled on me and I dropped the remote, I've essentially made a commitment... 

Black Panther tickets booked for Tuesday though.

[lharris92]

Black Panther thoughts:

 

Very good film, finding it hard to find a fault but there are probably a few minor ones that I didn't pick up on.

 

edit: Will be interesting to see on whether there is a sequel planned (depending on Infinity War of course).

Edited February 13, 2018 by lharris92