Somehow threads merged, so here's part 4 of our ongoing movie discussion.

^Whew...

I watched a feature length PBS film about Jean-michel Basquiat... I can't remember the name of the feature, but it was just awesome. Full of period interviews and period film, this is a complete full length story of Jean-michels life up to his post death period.

beautiful set up and 3/4 posters from the GOAT director ever.

and damn dark knight I was really looking forward to the el royal movie u def tapered my enthusiasm big time.

I hated Bad Times at the El Royal. Much like DTK I enjoyed the first third but once it really starts it fell apart for me, not unlike The Hateful 8 which was very similar.

I hated Bad Times at the El Royal. Much like DTK I enjoyed the first third but once it really starts it fell apart for me, not unlike The Hateful 8 which was very similar.

Ok so this guy in oot the other day mentions this movie Uncle Boonmee Who can Recall His Past Lives, the title intrigues me. I look it up and see it won Cannes and is from Thailand etc. and I'm sold. Get it from the library, put it in last night, and it was pretty weird and slow and I actually only watched about 20 minutes, will finish it off tonight.

But it already has the funniest movie line of the century imo:

Great film. See also Syndromes and a Century.

I watched that a few years ago. It was pretty damn strange.

I loved Bad Times at the El Royale and it kept me riveted and interested from start to finish. Loved the mood and style. Definitely had a Hateful 8 vibe but it was way better than Hateful 8. If they made more movies like this I would go to the movies more often.

Has anyone seen Sisters Brothers?

Enjoyed A Star Is Born, but overall came out of it pretty underwhelmed with respect to it being the alleged frontrunner for Best Picture. Loved the first two acts, but it didn't stick the landing for me, similar to La La Land.

Conversely there was some negative buzz for First Man, but I thought it was an excellent piece of filmmaking, better than Whiplash and La La Land for sure. Gosling nailed it.

Eager to see Roma. Was at a lecture by Guillermo del Toro earlier this week at UNLV (his first ever public event of that kind, and he chose UNLV of all places), and he really raved about Roma.

Uncle Boonme was interesting and weird but I think ultimately pretty bad. Considering Tim Burton was the jury president that year, the selection of that film makes a bit more sense.

I thought there were far worthier winners of that Palme D'Or that year (Another Year/Of Gods and Men), but you know, they weren't weird enough I guess.

I forgot to go to the del Toro lecture on campus.

Apostle 6/10

Bit of a messy story with some obvious writing flaws and the gore was overdone but the atmosphere and acting were solid.

Has anyone seen Pawel Pawlikowski's Cold War yet? Or Destroyer starring Nicole Kidman.

I'm really hoping these are great.

Finally watched Eighth Grade. Very good but not great IMO. I didn't laugh a ton and some of the emotional bits didn't land as well for me as they might for parents or daughters. I did really enjoy it though. God, being young sucks in a lot of ways.

I would love to see Elsie Fisher get an Oscar nomination.

Free Solo

Holy ****! WTF's he doing up there?

How do they take these pictures? Drones? We'll find out.

Risk vs. consequence: Fat tails, indeed.

In it for the money? Moderately successful dentist.

Cute & small: Doesn't take up too much room.

Bottomless pit: Self loathing.

Feels good: To be perfect.

Romance: Detrimental to armor.

Vegas: There's so much climbing.

A lot about performance and execution. Excruciatingly enjoyable to watch. Check it out.

Bad Times at the El Royale

Father Flynn: Right crossed by The Supremes.

Wurlitzer Fu; Shotgun Fu; Dan Draper Fu; Bates Motel Fu.

I would have found a way: To forgive myself.

You've got glass in your face: Recurring motif.

Wolf Love: It wasn't sexual, but it wasn't not sexual, either.

He talks so much: That he starts to believe himself.

Great flick from beginning to end. Cynthia Erivo is the best Super Hero in ages. Great dance music, theater permitting. Check it out.

A bit disjointed and covers a lot of years, but I really enjoyed it. Just have to try not to think of Borat when they keep saying "chenqui".

Went to A Star is Born expecting a kind of schlocky romance movie (obviously I knew almost nothing about the history of the film going in). Was ultimately blown away by how emotionally powerful it was. By the ending, my screening had multiple people audibly sobbing in the theatre.

-I was put off at first by the early pacing, but came around to seeing how quickly it moves as necessary to their relationship.

-Lady Gaga is great throughout, and really makes the movie work with her incredible musical stage presence. You can tell how talented she is by contrasting her music scenes with Bradley Cooper's. Cooper does well, and is actually a pretty good singer, but he rarely gets more than a few bars before a cut and the camera is constantly moving around or away from him to keep the pressure off his acting. With Gaga you get longer shots, the camera holding on her face to really take advantage of her ability to tell whole stories through her stage performances.

-My quibble, though, was that the movie was never quite clear on how it felt about Gaga's burgeoning pop career. Bradley Cooper's character clearly disapproves of her pop turn, and the movie sometimes hints that Gaga feels the same but that seems to cut against the overall point of the film. Maybe a second viewing would make it clearer to me.


As a sidenote, wikipedia tells me this version started in 2011 as a Clint Eastwood-Beyonce vehicle. That, uh, would not have worked.

I believe Clint Eastwood was going to direct not star.

My experience was very much the same as yours. I do not have much choice of english films so i just see whatever is out that week. I went into this having only seen the poster and was expecting a chick flick. I was blown away.

This was my biggest problem with the storytelling. I thought it was set up to culminate by way of the SNL scene -- with the song intentionally bad (personal opinion, I know), the dancers returning, and news of the Grammy nominations -- but then nothing really happened except maybe more drinking.

lol that SNL song was really bad. It was confusing.

That was on purpose, right?