Recommend a movie

10 posts

O'Zebedee

Historical caper/horror/hallucinatory thriller. Flawed but unique, as is every other Ben Wheatley film I've ever seen.

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/embed/cRRvzjkzu2U

*I've only ever seen this and Kill List , mind you - Kill List was equally strange and at times unfathomable.

Bronze Age Pervert
Stubby image fixed ...
It is a Greek story of revenge...
Fitz
watched The Iceman last night, it was pretty good.

decided to look into michael shannon's filmography because i like him, something about his look, and he's a good actor.

found this:

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It's a film about a working man who lives in some tornado-alley cornfield kind of state. His life becomes increasingly difficult as he suffers from auditory and visual hallucinations, along with sleep-disturbing nightmares.

four jingle bells out of five.
popfop
Out of the Furnace , :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

Good, straight forward tale of revenge and proletarian life in the Rust Belt. Christian Bale plays an honest dude who works in a steel mill and plans on making a life with his girlfriend. Casey Affleck (the good Affleck) plays his younger brother who is also a decent guy despite trying to take the easy way in life and make money through gambling and bare knuckle boxing matches rather than working. Following a chance car accident after being at a bar, Bale is sentenced to a year in jail while Affleck is deployed to serve his final tour of Iraq. A series of misfortunes continue plague the brothers as their father dies of cancer while Bale is still locked up and Affleck comes home from Iraq with the expected amount of rage and frustration. Bale also finds out that his girlfriend, who he had planned on starting a family with, has left him once he gets out of prison. Meanwhile, Affleck, in debt to a small time gangster played appropriately by Willem Dafoe, decides to repay some of his debt by partaking in a bare knuckle match up in the Ramapough Mountains. The match is organized by Woody Harrelson, who naturally plays the part of a brutal redneck degenerate superbly. While Harrelson often seems typecast for these roles, it should be mentioned that his father was a hitman who killed a Texas judge. Predictably, some bad shit goes down and when Bale finds out he decides to take matters into his own hands.

One could criticize this film for being too simplistic and indeed it does present a Manichean view of good blue collar guys vs. scumbag rednecks (working class vs. underclass), but that's not really the point, especially as other themes shine through. For one, working class life is depicted without being maudlin or pitying. Bale's character deals with a variety of hardships but he is never portrayed as a victim, instead he pushes on and keeps his head up. Secondly, the law is portrayed as an inefficient and bureaucratic hindrance to justice. If anything, this movie promotes the legitimacy of the blood feud and the notion that violence is often the best solution to certain problems.

...

I want to briefly discuss the ridiculous lawsuit brought against the makers of the film by the Ramapough Mountain "Indians" (mulattos riding ATVs and making dream catchers in the woods of New Jersey). While the Ramapough Mountain folk in the film are portrayed as inbred, meth making white trash, it is pretty clear they are meant to represent the "Indians." The surname of Harrelson's character, DeGroat, is apparently a very common name amongst this community. The most amusing part of this farce is that the filmmakers made the Ramapough characters white because it's safe, while the actual Ramapough folk are trying to claim Indian status because it means gibsmedats.
popfop
I saw this back when it was in theaters and enjoyed it but I can understand why others don't. While I can't say the movie has a definite point, one thing that struck me was how Phoenix's character remains impervious to the metaphysical hokum promoted by the L. Ron Hubbard character. Those who fall for the charms of the pseudo-Hubbard are inevitably upper middle class people looking to find something in themselves. In essence, the pseudo-Hubbard is successful because he caters his bullshit to the narcissism and cultured aspirations of the upper classes (see also: Theosophy). Phoenix, on the other hand, is a lower class drifter who has no need for such introspections and is content to live life as an experience, going from place to place and moving on when he gets bored or feels too tied down, either by a job or a woman. If this film is about anything, it is the journey and the different ways that people choose to travel it.
Stubby
Cornelio , you saw The Great Beauty, right? Can you tell us how it was please? I'd like to know.
Cornelio
I couldnt finish it. Bad imitation of Fellini. I recommend you not to watch it.
popfop
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Wise Blood , :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

Strange film from 1979 based on a Flannery O'Connor novel of the same name. Brad Dourif is Hazel Motes, an angry young man who returns from service in WWII and decides to become a street preacher, forming his own ministry called the Church of Truth without Christ Crucified. While he preaches a deadening atheist materialism, stating that salvation is possible without repentance, his actions are outwardly religious. At one point he is asked by a woman what sect he's from, when he responds with confusion she asks if his church is Protestant and he affirms that it is. I assume this is a joke by O'Connor who was a devout Catholic and is essentially saying that either Protestantism leads to atheism or atheism is just another Protestant sect, albeit one without a belief in God, which is what I've always seen it as. Along the way Motes runs into other street preachers who are naturally con artists, including Asa Hawks, played by Harry Dean Stanton, who pretends to have blinded himself with lye as an act of asceticism. Hawks is accompanied by his minx of a daughter Sabbath, played by Amy Wright, who becomes quite smitten with Motes. They end up shacking up until Motes blinds himself with lye, going through with the deed which Sabbath's father was too cowardly and disingenuous to carry out. Motes continues to carry out more acts of extreme asceticism, even going so far as to wrap barbed wire around his torso and walking around with rocks in his boots. While the townspeople continue to find his atheist preaching odd, these acts of self-flagellation genuinely disturb others including his landlady who has become his caretaker since Sabbath left. The film ends rather sadly with Motes succumbing to the elements after going out in a rainstorm.

While I found the film enjoyable, it lacks a central mood. There is a subplot involving a local simpleton who tries to befriend Motes which just comes off as a cornball attempt at comic relief. And while I find Dourif to be a good actor, he's better in smaller roles than as a protagonist (think of his role as Frank Booth's henchman in Blue Velvet , specifically the "pussy heaven" scene). Amy Wright as the nymphette Sabbath Lilly was easily my favorite part, though perhaps I'm biased since weird, gawky and kinky girls from small towns really get my motor running. As a tribute here are some stills of Amy Wright in Wise Blood:
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Bronze Age Pervert

Saw Wolf of Wall Street and Lone Survivor last night (movie hopping...)

Wolf of Wall Street is pedantic formulaic coloringbook trash, so predictable...I walked out in the middle.

Lone Survivor is a good movie. It has harrowing fight scene, shows supreme power of USA soldiers' training without demeaning the bravery of the Taliban; also has esoteric message about the superiority of Aryan Pashtunwali and a friendly Pashtun chieftain (note his blue-eyed elder advisor).

Stubby

Russian Ark

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A single 90 take, wandering through the Hermitage museum in Petersburg. The POV is that of a phantom wandering the museum with his new companion, 'the European', who gives commentary on the art, the culture, and Russia's place in Europe. As they wander they witness numerous scenes from Russia's history, from Pyotr the Great onward.

Great looking, interesting view of both history and the museum itself, which is massive. Recommend.