Let’s Talk Movies! #31: Pandas, Zombies, Male Models, Superheroes, Greeks and…Caesar!

Which Of These Movies Grabs Your Interest?

  • Jan. 15th - The 5th Wave - Sci-fi with Chloë Grace Moretz, Liev Schreiber, Maria Bello

    Votes: 15 31.9%
  • Jan. 29th - Kung Fu Panda 3 - Animated with Jack Black, Angelina Jolie, Dustin Hoffman, Jackie Chan

    Votes: 4 8.5%
  • Feb. 5th - Hail, Caesar! - Comedy with George Clooney, Josh Brolin, Channing Tatum, Ralph Fiennes

    Votes: 19 40.4%
  • Feb. 5th - Pride and Prejudice and Zombies – Horror comedy with Lily James, Sam Riley

    Votes: 12 25.5%
  • Feb. 12th - Zoolander 2 - Comedy with Ben Stiller, Owen Wilson, Christine Taylor, Will Ferrell

    Votes: 14 29.8%
  • March 18th - The Divergent Series: Allegiant – Adventure with Shailene Woodley, Theo James, Ansel El

    Votes: 9 19.1%
  • March 25th - Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice – Adventure with Henry Cavill, Ben Affleck

    Votes: 17 36.2%
  • March 25th - My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 – Romantic comedy with Nia Vardalos, John Corbett

    Votes: 12 25.5%
  • Apr. 15th - The Jungle Book – Adventure with Idris Elba, Ben Kingsley, Scarlett Johansson, Lupita Ny

    Votes: 12 25.5%
  • Apr. 22nd - The Huntsman: Winter's War - Fantasy with Chris Hemsworth, Charlize Theron, Emily Blunt

    Votes: 12 25.5%

  • Total voters
    47
Weekend Domestic Chart for April 15th, 2016

No surprise that The Jungle Book came in at #1. It made just over 103 domestically and 136 million internationally. So just under 240 million in just three days (on a 175 million budget). Barbershop: The Next Cut debuted at #2 and made 20 million on a budget of the same amount. No international box office numbers for this one, I'm not sure it will get much of a release around the rest of the globe.

Kevin Costner's thriller Criminal debuted just outside the top five at #6, making just over 5.5 million on a 31.5 million budget. It only made an average of $2,150 per theatre, this one is perhaps currently in the lead for being one of the year's bombs. :( The horror flick Green Room debuted down at #31 where it made less than $100,000, but it was playing at only three theatres, where it averaged $29,328 per theatre. That's better than The Jungle Book (which averaged $25,636 per theatre). The Green Room goes wide April 29th.

Second week in a row for a James Franco bomb. The Adderall Diaries debuted down at #65 where it made $5,517 playing at 30 theatres, averaging $184 per screen. That's like 20 to 30 people at each screening? :fragile:
 
http://variety.com/2016/film/news/threes-company-movie-new-line-1201757451/

Three's Company movie's in the works.

Hmm, so the story line for the 70s sitcom was Jack pretending to by gay so that he could have two females roommates. Yeah, I'm sure that story line will go very well with today's PC environment, LOL. I wonder how the writers will update it, since it's no big deal now for opposite sexes to live together, and it's a lot easier to be openly gay for the most part.

I can see the following potential casting:
Jennifer Lawrence - Chrissy Snow.
Bradley Cooper - Jack Tripper.
Sally Fields - Mrs. Ropper.
 
Just saw the "new" Mad Max movie. Fantastic! Loved it. How did Charlize not get nominated?!?!?
 
Beeba Boys is a recent viewing, directed by Deepa Mehta, a female, Indo-Canadian director...and one of my favourite directors! She did Fire/Earth/Water trilogy as well as Midnight's Children (all of which I recommend). But I found Beeba Boys to be a bit of a mess. It's still good, but scattered in a way, with parts of the plot not making sense and clarity of characters being unclear. Maybe it's one of those movies where one needs to focus on specific plot points because they matter a great deal in what happens later in the story. And maybe the problem I had with the characters had to do with the fact that not everyone is who you think they are. But there's one female character who I swear appeared late in the movie and her presence didn't make sense to me in that scene...but maybe it was a totally different character? And towards the end of the movie, there's a scene between characters that I thought should have had the opposite reaction between the characters. This is probably one of those situations where I should re-watch the movie to understand all of this better. It's just that I didn't like the movie quite enough to want to do that... :( If you're on the fence with viewing this movie or not and are swayed by tall, dark and handsome men, here's a photo of one of the lead characters that might help you make up your mind! ;)

http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/M...xNTYwNzE@._V1_UY1200_CR585,0,630,1200_AL_.jpg

The second is "Passengers" with Jen Lawrence and Chris Pratt Plot: A spacecraft traveling to a distant colony planet and transporting thousands of people has a malfunction in its sleep chambers. As a result, two passengers are awakened 60 years early.

This one will be interesting to see how toned down the performances will be. Both Lawrence and Pratt have such big personalities, they will really have to scale it down to make a movie like this work.

We also watched Vacation last night. It had so many stupid and cheesy parts but it was still funny and Chris Hemsworth shirtless is good enough for me.

Agreed! :D :swoon:
 
Beeba Boys is a recent viewing, directed by Deepa Mehta, a female, Indo-Canadian director...and one of my favourite directors! She did Fire/Earth/Water trilogy as well as Midnight's Children (all of which I recommend). But I found Beeba Boys to be a bit of a mess. It's still good, but scattered in a way, with parts of the plot not making sense and clarity of characters being unclear. Maybe it's one of those movies where one needs to focus on specific plot points because they matter a great deal in what happens later in the story. And maybe the problem I had with the characters had to do with the fact that not everyone is who you think they are. But there's one female character who I swear appeared late in the movie and her presence didn't make sense to me in that scene...but maybe it was a totally different character? And towards the end of the movie, there's a scene between characters that I thought should have had the opposite reaction between the characters. This is probably one of those situations where I should re-watch the movie to understand all of this better. It's just that I didn't like the movie quite enough to want to do that... :( If you're on the fence with viewing this movie or not and are swayed by tall, dark and handsome men, here's a photo of one of the lead characters that might help you make up your mind! ;)

http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/M...xNTYwNzE@._V1_UY1200_CR585,0,630,1200_AL_.jpg



This one will be interesting to see how toned down the performances will be. Both Lawrence and Pratt have such big personalities, they will really have to scale it down to make a movie like this work.



Agreed! :D :swoon:


https://youtu.be/deSRpSn8Pyk Teaser from "The Magnificent Seven" (where Pratt can ham it up to his heart's desire):encore:
 
The Muppets :rofl:

I think it's crazy to make 4 all at the same time... That said, I'll watch Avatar 2 when it comes out.
 
Just saw the "new" Mad Max movie. Fantastic! Loved it. How did Charlize not get nominated?!?!?

Because The Academy has difficulty appreciating movies like Fury Road, generally. Fury Road did win a fair number of Oscars... just not in the main categories. It's my favorite movie of all-time.
 
I missed Trumbo in theatres and saw it on video only recently. I really liked it. Well worth seeing.

Because The Academy has difficulty appreciating movies like Fury Road, generally. Fury Road did win a fair number of Oscars... just not in the main categories. It's my favorite movie of all-time.

The movie was nominated for Best Picture, so I don't think this is why Charlize did not get nominated. I think perhaps people did not think that her acting was better than the acting of those who were nominated. I saw the movie. I wasn't thinking "there's an Oscar-worthy performance." My thoughts were "How many dollars per word is she being paid? She doesn't have many lines." That doesn't help.
 
Hmm. It's been a long time since there's been a week or releases where I didn't want to see even one of the movies coming out. Nina almost got a "yes", but most of it looks so dark and depressing. Blah. Don't need that these days. I'm going to watch Minions, that should cheer me up! :D P.S. What's the term for man who won't/can't grow up? Bruce Willis has been making stupid action movies for decades. You're 61 dude, grow the f*** up!!!


Apr. 22nd - The Huntsman: Winter's War - Fantasy with Chris Hemsworth, Charlize Theron, Emily Blunt, Jessica Chastain, Nick Frost and Rob Brydon
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2-_OQL9fBk

April 22nd - Nina – Biographical music drama with Zoe Saldana, David Oyelowo, Mike Epps and Bonnie Bartlett
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3EWygLE_No

April 22nd – Holidays – Comedy horror with Ruth Bradley, Seth Green, Michael Gross and Kevin Smith
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0YnwMFswMY

April 22nd- Elvis & Nixon (Limited) – Comedy with Michael Shannon, Kevin Spacey, Alex Pettyfer, Johnny Knoxville and Colin Hanks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9x3Z6b0Z1g

April 22nd- A Hologram for the King (Limited) – Drama with Tom Hanks, Tom Skerritt and Ben Whishaw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UW4OE1egbHs

April 22nd- The Meddler (Limited) – Comedy drama with Susan Sarandon, Rose Byrne, J.K. Simmons, Jason Ritter and Lucy Punch
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbN58_kYZrU

April 22nd- Precious Cargo (Limited) – Action with Bruce Willis, Claire Forlani and Mark-Paul Gosselaar
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5Gc2qoLvvM

April 22nd- Compadres (Limited) – Action comedy with Kevin Pollak and Eric Roberts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VgGJA8LeMQ

April 22nd- Tale of Tales (Limited) – Fantasy with Salma Hayek, John C. Reilly, Toby Jones and Shirley Henderson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3hVmpGzl7A

April 20th - How to Let Go of the World and Love All The Things Climate Can”t Change (Limited) – Documentary. From imdb.com: “Documentarian Josh Fox ("Gasland") travels the globe to meet with global climate change "warriors" who are committed to reversing the tide of global warming. Funny and tragic, inspiring and enlightening..”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEM6Fg99e7E
 
I watched Kevin Costner on Graham Norton last week. He was clearly uncomfortable but friendly. He told a story that probably went on too long and was clearly not in his element but by the end the audience and guests (especially Ricky Gervais) were applauding. Graham had asked him about some of his famous films and I won't go into the story but it is clear that the studios were not crazy about Costner's choices for films. So Costner had to finance the films himself. I love "Bull Durham" and liked "Dances With Wolves" and they were among the films listed. I think it was his passion for the films and for the people, on both sides of the camera, that made the films that won me over. New respect for Kevin.
 
I watched Kevin Costner on Graham Norton last week. He was clearly uncomfortable but friendly. He told a story that probably went on too long and was clearly not in his element but by the end the audience and guests (especially Ricky Gervais) were applauding. Graham had asked him about some of his famous films and I won't go into the story but it is clear that the studios were not crazy about Costner's choices for films. So Costner had to finance the films himself. I love "Bull Durham" and liked "Dances With Wolves" and they were among the films listed. I think it was his passion for the films and for the people, on both sides of the camera, that made the films that won me over. New respect for Kevin.

I watched that same interview, and I too had new respect for him. I still think his choice of vehicles has been terrible, almost without exception, for the past 20 years or so, but I still keep hoping that he'll find something that suits his talents and interests.
 
I watched that same interview, and I too had new respect for him. I still think his choice of vehicles has been terrible, almost without exception, for the past 20 years or so, but I still keep hoping that he'll find something that suits his talents and interests.

I think there was an earnestness there I didn't expect. In a way that moment reminded me of film stars of a bygone age when they played good, earnest guys... actors like Gary Cooper or Jimmy Stewart. But Costner wasn't acting in that moment and I think it made him all the more impressive. I agree that he is in dire need of some good parts. Keaton came back. Maybe Costner can too.

Of course it is on Youtube: The part regarding Kevin, films and "the writer" starts at four minutes in....https://youtu.be/dl0PhZlDCA8
 
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Speaking Graham Norton, I just watched an episode where Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant were plugging their upcoming movie, Florence Foster Jenkins. I saw a play about here years ago and thought that the time it would make a splendid movie, and the trailer looks very promising. It looks like they're playing it for heart over laughs, which is as it should be. (BTW it's one of those trailers that gives away much of the plot, so be aware of that.)

For those who aren't familiar, Florence Foster Jenkins was a New York socialite in the 20s, 30s, 40s who decided she wanted to be an opera singer. She was absolutely dreadful, but she didn't know it -- and what she lacked in ability she made up for in enthusiasm.

(Oh, and in a delightful twist on the 20-something female love interests for 50-something male actors, how great is it that Hugh Grant at 55 is playing 66-yr-old Streep's husband?)

Opens May 6.
 
I watched Kevin Costner on Graham Norton last week. He was clearly uncomfortable but friendly. He told a story that probably went on too long and was clearly not in his element but by the end the audience and guests (especially Ricky Gervais) were applauding. Graham had asked him about some of his famous films and I won't go into the story but it is clear that the studios were not crazy about Costner's choices for films. So Costner had to finance the films himself. I love "Bull Durham" and liked "Dances With Wolves" and they were among the films listed. I think it was his passion for the films and for the people, on both sides of the camera, that made the films that won me over. New respect for Kevin.

I have not watched Graham Norton much, but his show is just so different than the US shows. An actual conversation, give/take, and you learned something about all the people. Helen Mirren - just wonderful as always. I loved how Mirren and all 3 men, Gervais, Bana and Ewen McG were really listening and being very respectful.
Kevin - such a real thing to see, to me I always thought he had not the best rep in Hollywood.
I have enjoyed him in many movies - to me one of his be performances was 'Upside of Anger' - typecast as a boozy, retired ball player, but I really liked him and Joan Allen, and the movie had an interesting twist at the end.

Back to Graham Norton show - what a cast of guests - Bana - so dreamy, Ewen - always love him! And Helen is the Queen.
 
Speaking Graham Norton, I just watched an episode where Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant were plugging their upcoming movie, Florence Foster Jenkins. I saw a play about here years ago and thought that the time it would make a splendid movie, and the trailer looks very promising. It looks like they're playing it for heart over laughs, which is as it should be. (BTW it's one of those trailers that gives away much of the plot, so be aware of that.)

For those who aren't familiar, Florence Foster Jenkins was a New York socialite in the 20s, 30s, 40s who decided she wanted to be an opera singer. She was absolutely dreadful, but she didn't know it -- and what she lacked in ability she made up for in enthusiasm.

(Oh, and in a delightful twist on the 20-something female love interests for 50-something male actors, how great is it that Hugh Grant at 55 is playing 66-yr-old Streep's husband?)

Opens May 6.
I saw the trailer for this as well and look forward to seeing it as I have heard about Florence Foster Jenkins. I saw an interview with Hugh Grant (just by accident waiting at the hospital for an appointment) and Grant said that he was a good actor, not a great actor but it gave him an opportunity to act alongside people like Streep. I think Hugh as an older gentlemen looked really good. It also has Simon Helberg from Big Bang Theory in it.
 
I have enjoyed him in many movies - to me one of his be performances was 'Upside of Anger' - typecast as a boozy, retired ball player, but I really liked him and Joan Allen, and the movie had an interesting twist at the end.
I saw that years ago and thought it was an excellent movie. Agree that Costner was really good in it and Joan Allen was fantastic.
 
I watched James Cagney in Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) recently. Was a bit of a struggle to get through. Afterwards I thought that the purpose of the movie was to cheer America on in regards to WWII. So if that was it's purpose, then good, but watching it now wasn't really enjoyable for me. Cagney's character is rather unlikeable and I kept waiting for when he acknowledges his flaws and grows as a person. Didn't really happen, basically stuck with the jerk thing right 'til the end! :lol: The movie was also an opportunity for Cagney to show he could play more than a gangster, but considering this was the time of Astaire and Rogers, I didn't think his singing and dancing were worthy of much (if any) merit. Cagney won the best actor Oscar for this role, I'm assuming it was a "go U.S.A." type of thing and that many would debate whether that was the best acting of the year. Although the other nominees didn't look particularly strong that year, from a brief look at the nominees, I'd guess only Gary Cooper (for The Pride of the Yankees) is a performance once could truly argue was better (Ronald Colman, Walter Pidgeon and Monty Woolley were the other three). Luckily I've got some other musicals to watch that should make me happier! :)

Watched "The Virgin Suicides" yesterday after hearing a lot of good things about it and all I can say is... WTF

That film is terrible from start to finish. It has no point or purpose and is about as far removed from reality as Star Wars. A complete waste of time.

I saw The Virgin Suicides shortly after it came out as part of a double bill. It was the second movie playing and I found it really hard to get into. So I ended up leaving halfway through. I think many years later I watched it again, but I don't remember much about it, other than how I probably should have left it half-unseen. Director Sofia Coppola made up for this miss (in my opinion) with 2013's The Bling Ring, which I loved!! :cheer:
 
Finally saw Room tonight. Excellent movie. I can definitely see why Brie Larson got so many accolades...not that I was surprised before, because she's always been an excellent actress, but after seeing Saoirse Ronan in Brooklyn, I figured Brie would have to give quite the performance to top Saoirse. As it is, I'd have a hard time picking which one was stronger.

So now I have seen all of the Oscar nominated movies that I want to see from this year (I may eventually see Mad Max, but won't seek it out, and no desire to see The Revenant) and would rank them: Brooklyn, The Big Short, Room, Spotlight, Bridge of Spies, The Martian. But all six movies were really strong, I feel like it's unusual for me to like (or even see) that many of the nominees (or that high of a percentage if we're looking back at the days when there were only 5).
 
Has anyone seen A Grand Affair with Jonathan Rhys Meyers? I've started watching it, about one third of the way through it. Not enjoying it, thinking about giving up on it. I rarely do that with a movie, but it doesn't have a subtitles option and I find both the leads to speak in a rather mumbly way, so I can't watch the movie at double-time. Just wondering if anyone recommends that I stay with it and watch it rather than give up on it... :shuffle:
 

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