Man of Steel

Meh.

Things I liked:

The cinematography - it looks spectacular.

The narrative structure - I liked how we went back and forth from Clark's adult hood and childhood.

Henry Cavil looks like Superman should look.

Kevin Costner and Diane Lane

Michael Shannon's performance and Zod's motivation

The Krypton production design was spectacular.

Things I didn't like:

****ing Snyder has no ****ing clue how to frame a shot. Jesus, this guy pisses me off so much. No compositional skills at all. And what's with the shaky-cam during dialog scenes? At times, it looked like the camera was on a flatbead going over a gravel road. It was ridiculous.

The dialog is stilted, cliche-ridden and completely flat. The folksy stuff works with Costner and Lane, but all the military and Daily Planet dialog is just awful.

The last third of the movie is all action and disaster stuff that really isn't all that interesting.

Another Zak Snyder piece of **** that had promise.

How can it look fantastic whilst being a complete mess compositionally?

The color pallet has a desaturated look that's fantastic. The film is gorgeous-looking while still being a complete ****ing mess with regards to frame and composition.

I agree with all of this. Goyer is WOAT for dialogue.

But I still enjoyed it. Twice

George Lucas says hi.

Arguable. Lucas is terrible through and through. You expect nothing better. Goyer reminds you how good it could have been. Disappointment much higher.

This is extremely annoyingly noticeable... and to be honest, not typical ZS. I blame this not on ZS, even though he was charged with the responsibility, but I blame it on what I call "the Nolan effect".

Snyder couldn't hold Nolan's jock strap. Nolan knows how to frame a shot.

Neither of them are composition masters... unfortunately Nolan doesn't know how to use a tri pod though.

I can almost guarantee you this "hand held" idea was his...

I've never complained about shaky cam before. I usually love it. When it's done right, ala the Bourne movies. And I've never had a problem with Nolan's framing or composition. He's damn good.

My problem with Snyder is not only does he use shaky cam in scenes where it makes no sense (and I'm NOT talking about hand-held - that's a completely different look), his camera is literally jumping up and down like it's vibrating. I really thought there was something wrong with the projector at first.

Hand-held is fine. That's just a more intimate, less stable way of shooting a scene.

Picked up Snitch from Redbox last night, low expectations probably helped, but really enjoyed it. Solid action-drama, and suprisingly the Rock played a non-bada$$ roll pretty well.

Linklater, Hawke, and Delpy AMA on Reddit

Omnomnomnomnomnom

There goes my afternoon

Seriously, if this doesn't open here soon I'm renouncing my Canadian citizenship!

LOL Canada

Has anyone seen the East? Isn't showing in my area but the trailer looks intriguing.

THX 1138

Wow, I really wasn't expecting much, given this is often mentioned in passing as George Lucas's first scifi movie before Star Wars, but it was pretty terrific. It showed both confidence and a deft hand with location, scene-setting, sound/audio design, visual flair, framing, composition, imagination and surrealism. I watched the director's cut so it inevitably has Lucas's "now" hand rubbing poop over his 1971 handiwork with stupid zero-G physics CGI, which is a shame (it felt like someone told Michael Bay he could use CGI to improve 2001), but I was surprised at the very high level of artistry and talent on display here.

Pretty nice surprise, as I was expecting a bit of a cack-handed borefest, and was very, very wrong.

78/100

Agree with all of this, squares completely with my experience.

The movie feels like it has 6 endings, the audience literally groaned just before the final fight where I was watching it. I think most people were wanting it to just end. I felt slightly nauseated by it as well. The soundtrack, shaky cam and action was such that it just ****ed with my head. Very unpleasant.

First half was pretty good though. Disappointing overall.

Kevin Costners character:

Lol...I know, right?

Lets see, I've got a grown son with super human strength...there's a monstrous twister bearing down on us and the dog is still in the car.

Hide under the underpass, Son. I got this.

Diane Lane is so yummy. Can't believe she's whatever age she is.

Amazing in Unfaithful

Jubal or "Marty vs Marty" (1956) D: Delmer Daves
Glenn Ford, Ernest Borgnine and Rod Steiger star in this Western. Borgnine is a nice rancher who takes on Ford as a ranch hand. Borgnine's wanton Canadian wife seems to hit on anything that doesn't move - and Glenn Ford will not be moved. Tragedy ensues.
I think Steiger was being paid by the length of each syllabus. Throw in Charles Bronson and you have diction that would give Henry Higgins a conniption. Overall enjoyable.

Primer
??/10

Unqualified to judge what the **** just happened. Had to read the Wiki explanation. I got the basic idea, but the layers upon layers were beyond me. Also definitely needed closed captioning.
Do recommend.

I've now seen Primer at least four times, and every time I notice something new.

I watched it with someone else for his first time last night. I told him it would be a mind****. The first half he shrugged and said, "I dunno, I think I'm following what's going on." I told him to wait for it.

Dom, you've just described Hikeeba pretty much to a T.