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Return Of The Film Corner Thread


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2 hours ago, ejp626 said:

I managed to sneak in The Shape of Water after all (and hope to catch The Last Jedi this weekend -- it has been quite a challenge avoiding spoilers!). 

It was entertaining and mostly looked good (not the rain*), but it was completely predictable.  I was more interested in the Cold War fable trappings (the cars, the boxy houses in suburbia) than the fate of the main characters.  It's also probably impossible to avoid comparisons with ET in a movie like this, but there are several things lifted from ET (and arguably Dark City), as well as a scene taken almost verbatim from Delicatessen.  For some reason I thought it was PG, and it was much racier than I expected, but in fact it is rated R.  Overall, a qualified thumbs up...

* The rain looked completely fake.  Maybe it should have been added in digitally... 

BTW, I saw a trailer for the next Wes Anderson film -- Isle of Dogs.  Looks absolutely horrible in all senses of the word.

I liked The Shape Of Water - a lot!!

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10 hours ago, BillF said:

 I preferred the new one to the original. Is that heresy?

Not heresy. It surpasses the original as an immersive work of art, both visually and emotionally.

It's made with such skill, thoughtfulness  and empathy, with Roger Deakins camera lifting it to a Kubrick level.

The missus doesn't comment on films very much but she was also blown away and fondly compared it to our cinema viewing of Blade Runner on it's first version release.

I think it will eventually be seen  as one of the greatest SF films of all time.

 

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Mark Felt : The Man Who Brought Down The White House (2017)

https://sonyclassics.com/markfelt/img/share.jpg

Being a sucker for all things related to Watergate, I really liked this timely take on the Deep Throat story,

so much so that I watched it twice.

https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/09/mark-felt-the-man-who-brought-down-the-white-house-review/541053/

 

Edited by kinuta
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"The Darkest Hour"

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4555426/

Saw it last night -- very good and quite close to the facts as I know them. It's breathtaking to realize how close to total disaster things got in those few days in  May and June 1940, not only in purely military terms but also how close the Brit political establishment was to sheer surrender-monkey behavior, with Churchill the new PM being pushed on almost all sides to seek peace terms from Hitler, this while the entire British army was encircled at Dunkirk and there were as yet no plans to even attempt to bring any of them home. One point I'll have to find out more about -- the entire War Cabinet, including all the top military men, is just paralyzed at this point, and it is Churchill alone who insists that some attempt at a rescue operation must be mounted, making use of private civilian craft because British naval forces are inadequate to the task. That significantly civilian rescue, called Operation Dynamo,  is of course what happened, with some 300,000 members of the encircled 400,000-man British Army eventually being brought back to England. But can it be true that this operation was solely Churchill's idea? While that's not impossible, I'll try to find out more. BTW Gary Oldman is terrific as Churchill. I also liked the fact that the film is almost literally claustrophobic -- scenes of figures hurrying down tight dank underground corridors to meet in tight dank underground rooms from which almost all parties would like to escape but cannot perfectly mirror the actual emotional state of the times and the participants. BTW, another turning point that I suspect is quite true -- the King (the stutterer of "The King's Speech"), whose best friend is Lord Halifax, the weasel-like chief advocate of asking Hitler for surrender terms, suddenly tells Churchill one-on-one when everything seems about to go totally black, that he will stand behind Churchill's "fight them on the beaches" stance all the way.

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Joan Didion : The Center Will Not Hold - Griffin Dunne (2017)

http://static.metacritic.com/images/products/movies/0/168356ef06bbae80951425b265ded2bf.jpg

Very interesting.

It does what good documentaries are supposed to do, makes you want to know more about the subject.

I'm almost embarrassed to admit to barely knowing her, but have been busy reading several of her articles and short essays on line.

 

 

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2 hours ago, BillF said:

I saw 18 recently released films this year. Those I enjoyed most were:

Manchester by the Sea

Certain Women

Personal Shopper

Blade Runner 2049

Happy End

What have been your 2017 favorites?

Lady Bird

Three Billboards

Coco

The Shape Of Water

Wind River

Looking forward to The Hostiles, The Post & I, Tonya.

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2 hours ago, BillF said:

I saw 18 recently released films this year. Those I enjoyed most were:

Manchester by the Sea

Certain Women

Personal Shopper

Blade Runner 2049

Happy End

What have been your 2017 favorites?

I loved Blade Runner 2049--saw it twice in the theater.  Also enjoyed the David Lynch documentary The Art Life.  In general, I didn't get out to the cinema as much as I would have liked.  

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2 hours ago, jlhoots said:

Lady Bird

Three Billboards

Coco

The Shape Of Water

Wind River

Looking forward to The Hostiles, The Post & I, Tonya.

Yes, I saw Wind River too. It didn't quite make my list.

2 hours ago, ghost of miles said:

I loved Blade Runner 2049--saw it twice in the theater.  Also enjoyed the David Lynch documentary The Art Life.  In general, I didn't get out to the cinema as much as I would have liked.  

I forgot about documentaries. I saw The Case of the Three Sided Dream about Roland Kirk a few months ago and on 10th Jan I'm due to see Chasing Trane. Anyone know anything about this Coltrane documentary?

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Given the unavaoidable overlap in release dates, a few were actually released in 2016 but I was unable to see them until this year.

In no special order.

Dunkirk

Blade Runner 2049

My Cousin Rachel

Lady Bird

Lady Macbeth

Silence

Jawbone

Jackie

I Am Not Your Negro

Paterson

Personal Shopper

20th Century Women

To Walk Invisible

 

Edited by kinuta
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