Let's Talk Movies #36 - 2020 - Yep it is a new decade

VGThuy said:
You inspired me to Google search her and his movie and it seems when the news first came out, there was a lot of divisiveness about the casting and some accused her of “Jewface”. It’s making the festival circuits now and I wonder what the overall reactions will be from the Jewish community (and I recognize there is diversity in the community with different people of Jewish faith having their own unique backgrounds and histories).

I remember back in 2003/2004, Tovah Feldshuh did a hit one-woman Broadway show where she played Golda Meir in Golda’s Balcony. Valerie Harper did a movie adaptation in 2006. Both women wore prosthetic noses. I wonder what the discourse was for both women, especially Harper who is not Jewish. I guess the Harper film adaptation wasn’t a big budget film nor did it make big m oney (I don’t remember if it even receive a full theatrical release) so whatever discourse there was wouldn’t have hit “mainstream” news.
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Ingrid Bergman IIRC also played a older Golda Meir for television just before her death and won a posthumous Emmy for that performance. I believe that she also wore a prosthetic nose.
 
I was looking for something free and found "I Think We're Alone Now" on Tubi starring Peter Dinklage and Elle Fanning about possibly the last two people left on earth. He is fine alone...she is not fine alone and somehow they need to make a relationship work. It is a good film with a bit of a strange third act.

And here is a trailer of a new film starring Peter Dinklage, Anne Hathaway and Marisa Tomei
youtu.be

SHE CAME TO ME Trailer (2023) Anne Hathaway, Peter Dinklage

SHE CAME TO ME Trailer (2023) Anne Hathaway, Peter Dinklage, Marisa Tomei, Drama Movie© 2023 - Vertical
youtu.be youtu.be
 
watchthis!! said:
Lethal Weapon is an action comedy from 1987. You might have heard of it. :lol: I decided to re-watch it because I didn’t remember anything about it other than it starred Mel Gibson and Danny Glover. I am wondering if production values have improved SO much over the years that even a big hit movie from the 80’s now looks a little cheap (as well as dated). Gibson exudes a lot of spark as a police officer still reeling from the death of his wife. And Glover gives the right amount of comedic edge considering his new partner is suicidal and the new pair are investigating the suicide (or possible killing) of the daughter of a friend of Glover’s. I have to admit that ogling Gibson in his pre-crazy days was a highlight of re-watching this for me. And Richard Donner does a good job of directing this movie, keeping the excitement and comedy and action all at a high level throughout. Gary Busey has a small role as the bad guy and singer Darlene Love has an even tinier role as Glover’s wife.



Some wacko saying Bullock should give back her Oscar is NOT a devastating loss. She will keep her Oscar.
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As someone already pointed out, I was not referring to losing her Oscar as a "devastating loss." She lost her longtime partner to ALS recently. Horrible disease.

As to your other reference.. I adored the original "Lethal Weapon." Went to see it a ridiculous number of times at my local theater while I was in college. And yes, I had a gigantic crush on Mel Gibson. One of his best roles, IMO. The rest of the movies in the franchise really didn't measure up to the first one. And Mel Gibson ... let's just say, I no longer have that crush.
 
I wouldn’t say I’m much of a Woody Allen fan, but Midnight In Paris is a movie I have wanted to see for a while. Owen Wilson plays a disillusioned writer who, while on vacation in Paris, finds himself wandering the streets late at night. By some strange flight of fancy, he finds himself meeting Jean Cocteau, Cole Porter, Zelda & Scott Fitzgerald, Josephine Baker, Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein and Pablo Picasso. Hemmingway and Stein help him with the novel he is trying to write. He considers whether his life would be better if he stays in this world of the past he is somehow visiting. The cast for this one is brilliant, including Rachel McAdams, Kathy Bates, Adrien Brody, Tom Hiddleston, Marion Cotillard, Michael Sheen and one very handsome Corey Stoll (House Of Cards).

vgerdes said:
As someone already pointed out, I was not referring to losing her Oscar as a "devastating loss." She lost her longtime partner to ALS recently. Horrible disease.
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Wow, I had no idea. I did do a google news search on Bullock after reading your post. The only news stories were about The Blind Side and how she should give back to her Oscar (there's an article now that includes the word "ridiculous" about this discussion). Awful how she's dealing with bad news on top of a devastating moment. :(

vgerdes said:
As to your other reference.. I adored the original "Lethal Weapon." Went to see it a ridiculous number of times at my local theater while I was in college. And yes, I had a gigantic crush on Mel Gibson. One of his best roles, IMO. The rest of the movies in the franchise really didn't measure up to the first one. And Mel Gibson ... let's just say, I no longer have that crush.
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The world had a crush on him. Then the world broke up with him. Now he's doing D-list action movies that skip the theatre and end up on some random streaming service... :eek:
 
I had no idea this movie even existed until very recently. A bunch of cute doggies getting revenge on eville hoomans?! I’m in! :D

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I saw 2023 live action version of The Little Mermaid and loved it. It made me cry multiple times. It's a beautiful looking film and I enjoyed all the performances (well, maybe with one exception - more on that later). I checked on the article I posted recently about the possible Oscar nominations for best supporting actress. Melissa McCarthy is one of the names mentioned for this movie. I did think she was really good in this. There was even a murmur from the (small) audience during one of her character's most ghastly moments. But I'm not sure if her performance will make it to the top five nominees come Oscar time. I followed that article I just referred to and got to this page:

Oscars Predictions 2024: Gearing Up for Fall Festivals After the Big ‘Barbenheimer’ Summer
variety.com

Oscars Predictions 2024: Gearing Up for Fall Festivals After the Big ‘Barbenheimer’ Summer

Variety Awards Circuit section is the home for all awards news and related content throughout the year, featuring the following: the official predictions for the upcoming Oscars, Emmys, G…
variety.com variety.com

For Visual Effects, The Little Mermaid is predicted as the Oscar winner. Of course, we've got over half a year to go until the Oscars happen, but I think this is a deserved nomination, if not the win. Halle Bailey and Jonah Hauer-King make for a great new screen couple. This is her first major role and I see that Hauer-King has done a lot of stuff, but I had never heard of him before this. He has a great singing voice and he certainly is handsome! My only negative thought is around Javier Bardem. I liked him in the role and the scenes between him and Ariel at the end were wonderful. But there was something about his voice in this that rubbed me the wrong way. He kind of mumbled, his voice just irritated me. I don't remember feeling this way about him in other movies, so not sure why I felt this now. But other than that, this is pretty much a perfect movie.
 
ilovepaydays said:
It’s official - Dune: Part 2 will now be released on March 15, 2024.

I wonder how many other major movies will be shifted to the right.
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As much as I sympathize with the writers and actors and support them in their strike, this one made me cry a little. I've been waiting so long to see it. Dune was one of my favorite books, and I loved part 1 of Villeneuve's version.

I'm also a bit worried about what this strike will do to movie theaters -- especially the small, independently owned ones. They still haven't completely recovered from pandemic hell, and now this. I do think it's going to have some impact on movie releases for the next year or so. As to how much? That's still TBD.
 
vgerdes said:
As much as I sympathize with the writers and actors and support them in their strike, this one made me cry a little. I've been waiting so long to see it. Dune was one of my favorite books, and I loved part 1 of Villeneuve's version.

I'm also a bit worried about what this strike will do to movie theaters -- especially the small, independently owned ones. They still haven't completely recovered from pandemic hell, and now this. I do think it's going to have some impact on movie releases for the next year or so. As to how much? That's still TBD.
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I remember the writers strike years ago and it destroyed a lot of shows too.hopefully this gets resolved but I’m not holding my breath either 😔. This time it’s both.
 
I watched Dramarama, about five Christian School Theatre Kids having one final party before they all set off for college during the summer of 1994, so their party is a costumed Murder Mystery. No alcohol or sex or drugs, but secrets and resentments are revealed. As a person who also graduated from high school that exact same time, it hit hard in the feels. I have a great attachment to this small movie. Also, there is a truly great Robert Altman joke that I never thought would ever happen in my life.
 
It’s more a gag than a verbal joke, so hard to describe. But it’s on free streaming apps like Tubi. :)
 
vgerdes said:
What really annoys me about this mess is that there are people who are questioning whether Sandra Bullock should surrender her Oscar. Why the hell should she? All that she did was act her socks off and get rewarded for it. She didn't write the story, she didn't defraud anyone of anything. Plus, she is grieving a devastating loss right now. Just leave her alone.
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Didn't she get a Razzie in the same year? And actually accepted it which was hilarious.

ETA - Yep she did - https://www.bustle.com/entertainment/sandra-bullock-razzie-speech-academy-awards-oscar

As for Lethal Weapon, it is a great action flick. And Gibson and Glover were great together.
 
I recently saw The Haunted Mansion with some friends. At lunch we agreed that our expectations were low for this movie. Which we agreed after seeing it was a good idea because we ended up enjoying it. If we had expected too much, we maybe would have been disappointed. Overall, it was a fun enough experience. More for the exuberant (and large) cast: Tiffany Haddish, Owen Wilson, Danny DeVito, Rosario Dawson, Dan Levy, Jamie Lee Curtis, LaKeith Stanfield and Jared Leto. Hasan Minhaj is also in the movie, but his role is tiny and thankless, so he is sadly under-used. The best part of the movie is a cameo with someone who steals the whole movie in my opinion. The audience was small, but the loudest laughter happened during this part of the movie. The effects were good enough and the story was fine. But if you're going to see it, do so because you love the cast. One strange thing we thought about the movie was that
Jared Leto's character was CGI and his voice was distorted. Only in an old newspaper clipping do you realize the character is Jared Leto. We wondered how much he got paid for a role which could have been played by anybody.
 
It looked like it might be fun from the trailers but not "go to the theater" fun. (Not these days anyway. Back when I was dating, Mr. Mac and would go to them movies every weekend and sometimes more than one.)

So I'm waiting for it to get to Disney+. (I love Disney+ so much. Half of the TV I watch is on that streaming service.)
 
Watched My Salinger Year, starring Margaret Qualley and Sigourney Weaver. Qualley is a young woman who moves to NYC in the 90s to write, and gets a job at a historic literary agency, headed by Weaver, where JD Salinger is its most prized client. Think Devil Wears Prada in the literary world. But the movie is more whimsical. Weaver is just wonderful, and Qualley is charming.

But this movie is all about the ex-boyfriend, who plays the clarinet. I’m only a few scenes, Hot Clarinet Man creates an intense romance with Qualley. They share a dance that is really great. This must be skated by someone for their short program!!!!
 
manhn said:
Watched My Salinger Year, starring Margaret Qualley and Sigourney Weaver. Qualley is a young woman who moves to NYC in the 90s to write, and gets a job at a historic literary agency, headed by Weaver, where JD Salinger is its most prized client. Think Devil Wears Prada in the literary world. But the movie is more whimsical. Weaver is just wonderful, and Qualley is charming.

But this movie is all about the ex-boyfriend, who plays the clarinet. I’m only a few scenes, Hot Clarinet Man creates an intense romance with Qualley. They share a dance that is really great. This must be skated by someone for their short program!!!!
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But does it pass the Bechdel test?
 
I remember loving the movie Fame and am happy to say that it stands up really well. It seems very strange to me that the movie is over 40 years old. If I were to find any fault in it, I think that would be a tough task. Maybe that the tough love that Anne Meara directs at Gene Anthony Ray that would result in her being fired today in about three seconds? But that’s what it was like back then. I actually watched the movie twice, the second time with director Alan Parker’s commentary with certain moments having additional commentary by the star of that scene. Gene Anthony Ray said his audition in the movie (danced to Red Light by Linda Clifford) was actually danced to an Earth, Wind and Fire song. They couldn’t get clearance for that song in the movie though. A similar thing happened when Bruno’s dad pulls up in his taxi and blasts out the title song of the movie from his cab. Donna Summer’s Hot Stuff was used for that scene. And the guitar part at the beginning of the song Fame has a similar feel to the guitar riff in Hot Stuff. That scene to the title song has a fantastic (yet simple) line from Irene Cara. She hears the music from the school and runs to the entrance (like everybody else) and she stops and says, “that’s my song…!” It’s her first time hearing her music played in public…and everybody’s loving it. 😊 Parker said that one scene took four days to film.


One of Paul McCrane’s songs in the movie was one he wrote and auditioned with. Parker like it so much, he put it in the movie. Another standout part of the movie is the cafeteria scene when the song Hot Lunch Jam begins with just someone using some drumsticks on a piano and then the song (and scene) builds gloriously from there. Parker said that the dancing in that scene (like with the Fame theme song scene) was all choreographed, but done so as to NOT look choreographed. Dancers had to be coached to perform as their dancing came out of nowhere even though they had worked on the choreography for quite a while at that point.

The funniest line in the movie is when Montgomery tells Doris that he is seeing an analyst. She pauses for a moment and then blurts out, “what’s wrong with you?? :lol: Lastly, the finale to I Sing The Body Electric is just as phenomenal as I remember it. Buoyantly joyous! :cheer:
 
What can I say about The Quiet Girl other than wonder if it’s the best movie of all time? I’m still in awe of this getting to have seen this. It’s just so brilliant on every level. I guess the story is where I have to start. It’s not all that complex, but boy does it get you right there. The director has added each ingredient with the exact perfect amount. Directing his cast to give top-notch performances.

The story is quite straight-forward. Cáit is a nine year old girl, one of a handful of kids in a poor family in rural Ireland. Her parents decide to send Cáit to the home of the older cousin of the Mom for the summer. Cáit leaves behind two overwhelmed parents who are so burdened, they have little to give her. Cáit now finds herself with this older couple who had not seen her since she was a baby. And everything is different. She is loved in a way that she has never been loved. The summer ends and Cáit is driven back home.

I’m putting my last thoughts in spoilers to say how the ending impacted me. But if you plan to see this movie (AND YOU SHOULD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) please don’t read the spoiler and watch the movie yourself.
Cáit’s return to her family is quiet...eventful...yet these moments are also the most impactful moment I quite possibly have ever seen in a movie. I was practically sobbing, like I was feeling something in my gut that I had never felt before while watching a movie. How amazing for the people in this movie to create something so phenomenal. I can’t praise them enough!
 
"Camp X-Ray" had me glued to the screen from the get-go. Kristen Stewart really dives into her role as a young soldier assigned to Guantanamo Bay, revealing a different side to military life than we're used to seeing. It's not about high-octane thrills; rather, it's the quieter moments that get under your skin.

The relationship between Stewart's character and a detainee is a standout element in the film. Despite being worlds apart, they manage to connect on a human level. It's a different take on war films that focus solely on combat and conflict.

So, if you're in the mood for a movie that digs a little deeper into the complexities of human emotion and the murky ethical grounds of war, give "Camp X-Ray" a shot.
 
Two movies with casts which are better than the movie: The Messengers and 3 Generations.

The Messengers is a spooky tale from 2007 which stars Kristen Stewart, Dylan McDermott, Penelope Ann Miller and John Corbett. Is this new family’s home haunted or is problem child Stewart just causing more havoc for the family? The cast is great as are the special effects. The story is okay, but should have been beefed up some. This could have been a much greater movie if a good re-write (or re-writer) had happened.

3 Generations stars Elle Fanning who is beginning his transition from female to male. Naomi Watts, Susan Sarandon, Tate Donovan and Sam Trammell co-star. Talented cast, but the script dumbs down the story and has cliched characters (especially poor Sarandon). She (and they) deserved something better to work with. But at the very least, we have a movie dealing with a topic not seen in a movie very often (and this movie came out in 2015).
 
I saw The Meg 2 last week with a friend. We had both seen the first one and it was silly fun. This one was advertised in a humourous way, so we were expecting some laughs along with the action. The first 90 minutes was all in a small undersea vessel, so lots of darkness and very little movement. Then finally (FINALLY) the cast comes out of the ocean and the last 30 minutes are a rollercoaster of action. But not all that well done. Lots of over-the-top stuff happens, but it makes you roll your eyes in your head rather than look at your friends and say, "that's so stupid" as you laugh your butt off. :lol: My friend and I wished we could have seen Statham in a movie as good (and as funny as) Spy. The Meg 2 has made a decent profit, so I guess in a couple of years, The Meg 3 will hit the big screen. I expect I will be skipping it.
 
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