Films

[DomDom1984]

I'd say the movie is exactly what you expect of one with a load of money thrown at it. That's essentially what a blockbuster is.

[mjsell]

I'd say the movie is exactly what you expect of one with a load of money thrown at it. That's essentially what a blockbuster is.

 

Very true. I never understand it though, pay someone who can write a story that is more than just blatantly obvious connectives between action scenes. The character building in Jurassic world is shocking: and its not as if they don't spend a lot of time in the film trying to do it as well.

Edited June 15, 2015 by mjsell

[Spindles]

I found it as enjoyable as something like Avengers or such.  I liked that there were lots of nods to other films in the genre as well.

 

I watched the TS version that is doing the rounds, sound is perfect, picture not too bad.  

 

I wasn't expecting any depth at all in the usual formula of "kids are in peril, adults race to protect them, bigger and better dinosaurs than last time", so it satisfied me.  The characters were 2 dimensional stereotypes one and all, but the emergence of the scientist from the first film as some modern frankenstein was a good turn for the inevitable sequel they spent about 10% of the film setting up.

 

Be glad they didn't go for the horrible Human dinosaur hybrid that was in an earlier draft script for the film.  The day they jump the shark that much I think you might as well let the franchise die.

[mjsell]

I found it as enjoyable as something like Avengers or such. 

 

 

I'm so sick of superhero movies these days... Of every trailer we got before JW yesterday only one wasn't a movie that was to do with someone saving the world.

 

Has anyone seen the trailers for Ant-man?? I was sitting there gobsmacked. I thought it was a piss take movie for ages and slowly realised that they were being serious.

 

You can clearly tell that I am not a comic book movie fan. I didn't mind it a few years back when you got maybe 2 a year but now it is literally every other movie

[LondonTom]

 

Has anyone seen the trailers for Ant-man?? I was sitting there gobsmacked. I thought it was a piss take movie for ages and slowly realised that they were being serious.

 

Antman looks amazing! But I am going for the cheap thrills like the Thomas the tank Engine scene at the end of the trailer

 

Glad I didn't jump the gun and go see Jurassic World with all the hype now, seen a few more people after the initial excitement say its a bit meh.

[Spindles]

I'm so sick of superhero movies these days... Of every trailer we got before JW yesterday only one wasn't a movie that was to do with someone saving the world.

 

Same, which was why I compared it with avengers really.  Just a series of set pieces chained together with a fairly basic plot.

 

I enjoyed it, the effects were on point, the action sequences enjoyable and Chris Pratt got precisely 3 seconds to be amusing which made his inclusion worthwhile.

 

What I liked about it was the lack of any pretence that it was more than it was.  It set the scene up quickly, things went wrong fast and escalated consistently until the inevitable spectacular final 20 minutes, the billionaire owner was possibly the best character in it, although I would have liked to have seen Jeff Goldblum return to um and ahh his way through a script where the only part he read was the price tag.

[mjsell]

Same, which was why I compared it with avengers really.  Just a series of set pieces chained together with a fairly basic plot.

 

I enjoyed it, the effects were on point, the action sequences enjoyable and Chris Pratt got precisely 3 seconds to be amusing which made his inclusion worthwhile.

 

What I liked about it was the lack of any pretence that it was more than it was.  It set the scene up quickly, things went wrong fast and escalated consistently until the inevitable spectacular final 20 minutes, the billionaire owner was possibly the best character in it, although I would have liked to have seen Jeff Goldblum return to um and ahh his way through a script where the only part he read was the price tag.

 

I agree with everything you said there except the last final 20 minutes being spectacular. I just did not care enough for that last fight scene to mean anything to me. I have to say the tiny bits of humour in the movie was probably my favourite thing, I especially liked the guy in the control room (Nick from New Girl).

[Amy Lawn]

Ant-Man looks exactly like the first Iron Man, but with him not being rich himself, just employed by somebody who is, and littler.

[viberunner]

I'm so sick of superhero movies these days... Of every trailer we got before JW yesterday only one wasn't a movie that was to do with someone saving the world.

 

 

Of the recent Marvelverse films enjoyed exactly and precisely Captain America Winter Soldier (because he's saving the world from the superhero/USA outfit who they're basically calling a bunch of neo-Nazis, and it was done well), and Guardians of the Galaxy.

 

The rest of them can fuckoff and die. Shit plots, poseurs, and high-cost but boring-to-watch action sequences.

[DomDom1984]

I've enjoyed most of them. Iron Man 2, Captain America: The First Avenger and Avengers 2 all didn't impress me at all, but the rest have been great fun for me, and Guardians of the Galaxy might well be one of my favourite movies ever.

 

Jurassic World is fun enough. The main arc with the super dino is a bit ludicrous, but when the carnage kicks off, I ended up just going along for the ride, and it was good fun.

[mjsell]

Okay I'll agree that Guardians of the Galaxy is a good superhero movie - mainly because it doesn't take itself too seriously.

 

And I found JW funny; but I was more laughing at the ridiculousness of it all and the bad acting/silly set pieces. Is it bad that I was genuinely hoping one of the kids got killed? They were doing my head in.

 

It's bad when the most memorable moment of the whole movie for me was an extra running off holding two margaritas whilst getting dive-bombed by pterodactyls

[t8yman]

Kermodes "kermodian rant" on Entourage - The Movie has become quite the viral sensation, and rightly so, its a classic.

 

[viberunner]

LOL, that was funny. Has one made me want to see it more. His comparison to The Player demonstrates his entire lack of understanding to Entourage.

 

Griffin Mill in The Player is a successful but ultimately middle-ranking executive, intelligent, seemingly well educated and probably from a reasonable-to-affluent background (if his easy confidence is anything to go by) grinding away in a job that both overworks him and is under threat, so yes that's a great vehicle for showing Hollywood vacuousness and and hollowness.

 

The Entourage are schemies. They're neds. They're chavs. They're from a prone-to-crime, prone-to-get-shot, hard-as-nails, dirt-poor background where the is no reasonable prospect of anything other than lifelong poverty. So when they hit paydirt - not a couple hundred grand a year middling executive wage but proper tens of millions per film paydirt - the shine is never going come off a new Lamborghini, or the new yacht, or the private jet, or the gorgeous Californian girls eager to hang out with you. They came from broke, they even went broke again during the series, so they're enjoying while they can get it. It really is no deeper than that. 

 

I can see a best friend asking Griffin Mill if he wants to go out shopping for a ten thousand dollar watch and Mill would pull a mask of a smile on and think of killing himself, killing his friend, or some kind of murder/suicide combo. Ask Johnny Drama if he wants to go out shopping for a $10K watch and he'll be like "does a bear fuck in the wood, bro?"

 

It's a funny video Kermode has made but he missed that. A show or film about trustifarians who inherited daddy's money and who zoom around in the bling would be utterly depressing. And I think that's the film he's rejecting. But the point of Entourage is they never expected to end up how they ended up.

[t8yman]

I get your point, but its the reason I never watched the series, it took me 5 minutes to despise the characters and the whole world they populated, this comes from someone who lists Hollywood boulevard as one of my favourite places on the planet. I think he was also railing against the marketing tosh that he quoted, about how it is everyone's dream to live that life.

 

I simply couldn't bear to watch the show either, so even without MK's mauling of it, I would have never watched the film.

 

I feel equally repelled by "Empire", a series a mate of mine raves about, even the trailer made me baulk.

[DomDom1984]

I think the characters are great, but it's all so uninvolving. You can't get invested because everything is just so low risk. But it remains good to me thanks to the wit of the scripts and the characters.

[Spindles]

I know nothing about the film or the show, but to hear an eloquent man rail against the horrific consumerist dystopia like this is great entertainment.  It reminds me alot of his transformers: dark of the moon rant, which I enjoyed very much

[LondonTom]

 

The Entourage are schemies. They're neds. They're chavs. They're from a prone-to-crime, prone-to-get-shot, hard-as-nails, dirt-poor background where the is no reasonable prospect of anything other than lifelong poverty.

So if you start off poor , its fine to be morally ambiguous if you hit the big time? :S What a depressing thought!

[Spindles]

That Mark Kermode clip made me think of American Psycho, so I just watched that....which was nice.

 

Now excuse me, I have to return some video tapes.

[viberunner]

I get your point, but its the reason I never watched the series, it took me 5 minutes to despise the characters and the whole world they populated....

 

 

I despised it first time round too and didn't watch it. It has been released on NOW TV as a boxed set (in the run-up to the film, obviously) and the ex (who I see frequently) has been going through them so I've seen a good percentage of them. The show has grown on me. The lead character (the film star) is a warm person without an ounce of malice in him, and he's totally relaxed about life. If his nippy wee mate comes in "we have a problem Vince" he'll be "no we don't, life is good". He spends his money on his friends and family not out of a feeling of obligation but because "I just want you to be happy". It gets balanced by his friends, the poor gofer, his brother who is bad D-list actor, and his mate who is prone to getting stressed.

 

They're not educated, they're not particularly bright, and they don't have their sights set for much self-improvement, but they have no malice in them either. The show is playing for a gentle "feel good" vibe, which is what the characters aim for.

 

 

So if you start off poor , its fine to be morally ambiguous if you hit the big time? :S What a depressing thought!

 

 

For starters, I doubt you're a High Horsed White Knight and they'll be some moral ambiguity within you if we look hard enough. These guys aren't racists or murdering or stealing or selling heroin, so not like The Sopranos or Ray Donovan or The Wire. Their "moral crime" is to enjoy shiny expensive stuff, going to parties, having sex, etc., because they came from a deprived background. It's a moral crime that their background explains and, given the list of nastier crimes there are, it's a crime I can live with.

 

But they don't feel entitled to it, and it took them a while to even come to terms with it. For example the first expensive car they bought they fretted about it and lots of lines like "this cost more than the house I grew up in", and that's a theme that keeps getting replayed. When they get access to something shiny or expensive their faces light up, partly in disbelief that they're really there and getting access to [whatever].

 

They never end up swaggering onto the yacht [or whatever] as if they deserve it, like the Bullingdon son of a banker might. They put on a show of front - pretending they're not intimidated - and walk on whispering to each other how crazy it is people like them are in the place.

 

That's the heart of the show. And it's absolutely fine to be left cold by it, or even to be utterly refused by it, but Kermode clearly didn't "get" it.

 

And yet I bet Kermode is absolutely fine with posh spunkstains Coldplay. Fuck, I bet he listens to Coldplay on repeat.

[Amy Lawn]

Actually, I feel like I have to interject, Kermode looks to have some pretty decent taste in music, he mentioned 65daysofstatic on BBC news a few weeks ago, he's got a lifetime pass now.

[philipsteak]

Yeah, he hates Coldplay. He REALLY hates U2, but I don't think he can be bothered to summon up the same level of hatred for Coldplay 

[DomDom1984]

I think the gentle feel good vibe is the real faltering point for Entourage for me, and the only place where I completely get the backlash it gets. Because it's fairly hard to get invested in characters when ultimately, you know that it's always going to turn out well.

Certainly the best thing in the series for me was when Vinny slowly but surely went off the rails.

[viberunner]

I thought his Reefer Madness breakdown was the weakest point of the series, too forced & his responses were too out of character. They have other low moments. They spent all their money making an independent film, it ended up winning loads of Raspberry awards & went straight to DVD.

 

But yeah, you don't get too invested in the characters. But outside of Spartacus and Game of Thrones I'm not sure how many TV characters I have actually "invested" much in. Some Sons of Anarchy to a lesser degree perhaps.

[lost]

Kermodes "kermodian rant" on Entourage - The Movie has become quite the viral sensation, and rightly so, its a classic.

 

 

That is brilliant! Can someone now sit him down infront of a few series of Geordie shore and role out a review of that please. 

[t8yman]

A perfect webrip (HD or SD) of Mad Max came out yesterday, I downloaded it, I watched it. 

 

I still have a headache.

 

In parts - cool as fuck- costumes, sets, creative direction, it was brilliant.

 

In others it was painful to watch. Editing was like an MTV video - but with quicker cuts, pacing - either 190mph or stopped dead, and far, far too long. I was ready for it finishing, thinking "there can't be long left now?", so I knocked the mouse to one side to bring up the media player controls - over 45 minutes left. Jesus it was hard work. 85-90 minutes might have been perfect, especially seeing as it was basically a string of car chase sequences with some rather large explosions punctuating it.

 

The entire bog sequence could have been left out.