Films

[jump]

Watched The Cat Returns for the first time last night, it's one of the strangest things I've seen in my entire life. But also joyful and brilliant.

Yeah The Cat Returns and Studio Ghibli are great in general, Porco Rosso remains my favourite from them.

[Amy Lawn]

Yeah The Cat Returns and Studio Ghibli are great in general, Porco Rosso remains my favourite from them.

Porco Rosso is excellent, I think Hayou Miyazaki is my favourite filmmaker of all time, Nausicaa Of The Valley Of The Wind, Princess Mononoke, Laputa Castle In The Sky and Spirited Away are all firm favourites, and his entire body of work is completely flawless. I'm currently reading the Nausicaa manga, which is staggeringly good, definitely the best manga I've ever read, and some of the best comics as a whole (which is saying something with the sheer volume of comics I read). I really love Isao Takahata's stuff as well, but I'd never seen any Ghibli stuff beyond those two, so I've got From Up On Poppy Hill, The Cat Returns and Whisper Of The Heart to watch over the bank holiday, picked up the three as a bundle at £10 which is a relative bargain. I don't know whether to spend any more money on the rest of them, because I imagine there'll be some sort of Studio Ghibli complete box set after When Marnie Was There is released. Such a box set is very appealing to me, but the Miyazaki Complete box set was a bit of a joke, the price for the box set, which contained all the films on bare-bones Blu-ray discs with no features, was more than it was to buy all the films individually, as deluxe Blu-ray editions with special features and a bonus DVD copy of the film, surely that defeats the purpose of buying a box-set.

[Mouseboy11]

Mad Max:Fury Road is looking incredible, can't wait.

[Spindles]

I look forward to seeing how that comes out, one of a number of non-comic book franchises that have films in the work that I'm looking forward to.

Am I the only person who finds the endless procession of Marvel and DC comic book movies to be samey and not that interesting?

[The Nal]

Am I the only person who finds the endless procession of Marvel and DC comic book movies to be samey and not that interesting?

Nope. Me too.

Enjoyed the first half of Nolans Batman trilogy and some of The Avengers but couldnt get through any of the others - Thor, Superman, X Men etc. Spiderman was particularly god awful. Just shit.

[metallimuse]

I look forward to seeing how that comes out, one of a number of non-comic book franchises that have films in the work that I'm looking forward to.

Am I the only person who finds the endless procession of Marvel and DC comic book movies to be samey and not that interesting?

I'm not a fan of any of the comic book movies other than the Batman one's.

[WS_Jack_III]

Firefly/Serenity

long time since you made this comment but i agree. Serenity is the best sci fi film ever. Never been much of a fan of Star Wars.

I've just ordered Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy on blu ray. Love the MCU and i need to catch up on it. Just about finished Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and I'm noticing references to the second Captain film which i haven't seen.

[The Nal]

You should give watchmen a go. You'd love it.

So Ive been told yeah. Been meaning to for ages. Ive a great version of it too. Maybe over the weekend, snooker depending.

[kaosmark2]

long time since you made this comment but i agree. Serenity is the best sci fi film ever. Never been much of a fan of Star Wars.

I've just ordered Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy on blu ray. Love the MCU and i need to catch up on it. Just about finished Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and I'm noticing references to the second Captain film which i haven't seen.

I think Serenity falls off a bit on rewatching. It's still very good, but while Firefly gets better every watch-through (considering I'm into double figures for rewatching the show I feel I can say that), my 3rd viewing of Serenity emphasised the problems in the film, and the struggle to develop some of the characters.

Star Wars has its moments. The Empire Strikes Back in particular. I understand its iconic status, but I think ultimately, there's probably just over 1 and a half great films worth of scenes between the 6.

Winter Soldier is really good, I think it's one of the best MCU films to date, although the scenes of Black Widow trying to push Cap into dating anyone feel forced and cheesy. Lots of good things about it though.

I'm at least a month behind on Agents of SHIELD. Thought it was very mixed this season, with some great episodes and lots of poor plot designs. Last season started atrociously but grew into a really strong show after the winter break, whereas this one hasn't had anything that's really gripped me yet, despite not reaching the same lows.

[kaosmark2]

You should give watchmen a go. You'd love it.

I still think the Watchmen film is a pale fragment of the comic. Same with V for Vendetta. At least MCU/Nolan's Batman do their own stories, rather than just desensitised and less subtle copies of an exact story.

[viberunner]

You should give watchmen a go. You'd love it.

The graphic novel was pretty great, the adaptation failed... what terrible ending. He had the source material with one of the most imaginative, weird, in-your-face endings to any graphic novel and instead Zack decides, no, what it really needs is him thinking up something utterly mundane.

His ending is up there with Dallas' "it was all a dream". Or the Fonz jumping a shark.

[WS_Jack_III]

Watchmen film is great. Been meaning to read the graphic novel for ages.

I like V movie and graphic novel but the film was just an American version of the source material.

[DomDom1984]

The Nal, on 29 Apr 2015 - 8:18 PM, said:

Nope. Me too.

Enjoyed the first half of Nolans Batman trilogy and some of The Avengers but couldnt get through any of the others - Thor, Superman, X Men etc. Spiderman was particularly god awful. Just shit.

What Spiderman? I thought the first Andrew Garfield one was absolutely brilliant. The rest I can take or leave. The second Garfield was particularly disappointing given how good the villains were.

[jump]

The graphic novel was pretty great, the adaptation failed... what terrible ending. He had the source material with one of the most imaginative, weird, in-your-face endings to any graphic novel and instead Zack decides, no, what it really needs is him thinking up something utterly mundane.

His ending is up there with Dallas' "it was all a dream". Or the Fonz jumping a shark.

I don't think the ending was that bad and in some ways actually improves on it, for a superhero movie that was meant to be grounded introducing a giant squid monster at the end kinda detaches itself. I liked Watchmen but it plays itself too close to the source material by taking things straight out of the page and doesn't let it's characters come to life leaving it feeling hollow to me.

[The Nal]

What Spiderman? I thought the first Andrew Garfield one was absolutely brilliant. The rest I can take or leave. The second Garfield was particularly disappointing given how good the villains were.

Anything involving Toby McGuire. There was a scene in a hammock I think which was an embarrassment for all concerned. The director, actors, right down to catering and the little brown hands who made the dvd boxes. A low point in all their lives.

Edited April 30, 2015 by The Nal

[LondonTom]

long time since you made this comment but i agree. Serenity is the best sci fi film ever. Never been much of a fan of Star Wars.

I've just ordered Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy on blu ray. Love the MCU and i need to catch up on it. Just about finished Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and I'm noticing references to the second Captain film which i haven't seen.

Ah Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D is damn awesome around the TWS stuff! After a fairly dull start, keeps on until the end of S01 along those themes! (Then S2 has been really mixed so far, but the last couple of weeks has picked up alot more, apparently a few tie ins with Age of Ultron this week!)

Also V for Vendetta is great, I should really get around to the comic but that could be why I like it so much. One of my favourite films actually.

[jump]

The way people keep saying you need to stick with Agents of Shield you'd think it's a slow burning masterpiece like The Wire rather than a generic spy show that relies on the Marvel movie events to make it interesting every now and then.

[philipsteak]

http://www.avclub.com/article/surely-you-cant-be-serious-oral-history-airplane-218043

An oral history of Airplane. It's long, but worth a read if you like the film. 35 years old this year

[LondonTom]

The way people keep saying you need to stick with Agents of Shield you'd think it's a slow burning masterpiece like The Wire rather than a generic spy show that relies on the Marvel movie events to make it interesting every now and then.

Nah, its just that if you enjoy the MCU films, its a great addtion to it and worth sticking around for the movie tie ins.

[Winslow Leach]

The graphic novel was pretty great, the adaptation failed... what terrible ending. He had the source material with one of the most imaginative, weird, in-your-face endings to any graphic novel and instead Zack decides, no, what it really needs is him thinking up something utterly mundane.

His ending is up there with Dallas' "it was all a dream". Or the Fonz jumping a shark.

There's one aspect of the ending to the film that I prefer to the original, but on the whole Watchmen is a seriously shoddy adaptation. It looks a lot like the graphic novel, but it completely misses its tone, the feeling, and the entire point of it. They could have done more with it if they hadn't stayed so visually slavish to the source, and if they'd got a director who wasn't a steaming great pile of self-important. hackery.

Same with V for Vendetta, it's a completely sanitised, 'I Can't Believe It's Not Anarchism' version of the graphic novel.

I've never even dared to watch From Hell.

Edited May 1, 2015 by Winslow Leach

[The Nal]

Really looking forward to this.

[viberunner]

They could have done more with it if they hadn't stayed so visually slavish to the source, and if they'd got a director who wasn't a steaming great pile of self-important. hackery. Same with V for Vendetta, it's a completely sanitised, 'I Can't Believe It's Not Anarchism' version of the graphic novel. I've never even dared to watch From Hell.

V, Watchmen, and From Hell are each about as good as League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

As for Snider, I really like his Dawn of the Dead and 300. He should have stuck with their tone - ostensibly serious but fully self-aware of their deep silliness. Man of Steel and Watchmen was him thinking he was a Serious Director... a concept that would be laughable if it weren't so depressing.

[justanothername]

Has anyone on here seen Unfriended yet as I'm probably going to have to watch it today as I want to know if it is just a horror movie that just tries to be scary through jump scares or is it actually smart and tense (which I'm betting it is not)

[WS_Jack_III]

Enjoyed Winter Soldier and Guardians. Like how they are trying to not just do Super hero movies with each release. The whole spy on the run feel to Winter Soldier was a good angle and Guardians was a big space opera.

[FloorFiller]

Enjoyed Winter Soldier and Guardians. Like how they are trying to not just do Super hero movies with each release. The whole spy on the run feel to Winter Soldier was a good angle and Guardians was a big space opera.

i think that's where Age Of Ultron fails - whilst the films that have preceded it have all tried to do something new to stop the whole superhero thing getting stale, because it's one of the biggies and has the large ensemble cast, it can't do anything but be a straight up superhero film really. hoping the switch in directors for the last one (two) will change this up a bit