RodeoSchro said:

damosuzuki said:

the disaster artist - it may not play as well to people who don't know the source material, but this film had more genuine laughs for me than any movie i've seen in years that wasn't toni erdmann. & everyone else in the theatre seemed to enjoy it as much as i did. i also think it was a fun & mostly affectionate ode to misguided ambition. 4/5

[Edited 12/11/17 19:38pm]

I'm hoping I can find a movie house that plays "The Room" and then "The Disaster Artist". I've never seen either movie. Do you think that would be a good way to see them?

just watch some of teh numerous "highlights" clips of The Room on youtube and you will get a pretty good view about the movie and especially about Tommy Wiseau who James Franco is playing.
The movie itself is a true horror to sit through.

214 said:

stpaisios said:

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008) 10/10

August: Osage County (2013) 8.5/10

Julie & Julia (2009) 6.5/10

Times Square (1980) 3.5/10

Deadpool (2016) 4.5/10

10 to that ridiculous movie from Brad Pitt? sorry but i find the story hillarious, the dialogues and acting come across as quite pretentious.

Calling it ridiculous is a little stretch, don't ya think? Concept is tricky, but main theme is universal. you can be indifferent after watching... & David Fincher is my favorite director, cinematic aspect itself is A for my taste.

damosuzuki said:

RodeoSchro said:

I'm hoping I can find a movie house that plays "The Room" and then "The Disaster Artist". I've never seen either movie. Do you think that would be a good way to see them?

at minimum, i'd recommend viewing one of the 'room' clip summaries floating around youtube. there are a few that give you the main scenes in 8 minutes or so, and i think that's really all you need to prepare you for the disaster artist.

i haven't witnessed this, but i've heard that most 'room' screenings involve a lot of audience participation - people yelling lines, throwing plastic cutlery at moments, etc - & are generally so raucous that you probably won't catch most of what's actually happening in the film. if you think that's something you'd enjoy, then i'd say go for it - but i don't think you need back to back screenings to enjoy the disaster artist itself. the yt clip summaries would adequately arm you, i think.

[Edited 12/12/17 20:27pm]

Good advice, thanks! I'd heard that about "The Room" screenings, too.

JorisE73 said:

RodeoSchro said:

I'm hoping I can find a movie house that plays "The Room" and then "The Disaster Artist". I've never seen either movie. Do you think that would be a good way to see them?

just watch some of teh numerous "highlights" clips of The Room on youtube and you will get a pretty good view about the movie and especially about Tommy Wiseau who James Franco is playing.
The movie itself is a true horror to sit through.

LOL, thanks!

mudbound (2017) 4/5 it's a bit of a shame that the vast majority of this film's audience will only get to see this on netflix. it's sweeping & grand in story & visuals & really ought to be seen on a big screen. while it has almost nothing in common with it in most ways, it reminds me of lost city of z in that both movies are really throwbacks to an earlier, old-fashioned era of storytelling. i did think there was maybe just a bit too much story, though not to the extent that the movie was draggy or too long. rather, there were maybe just a few too many threads in this sprawling epic, though that took nothing away from its gut-punch ending.

The Last Jedi

C+

Tell Adolph Hitler, Charles Manson and boy band creator Lou Pearlman to get their scarves out. I just watched a Ryan Gosling movie and that means Hell is probably about to freeze over!

After a great early-morning breakfast at Denny's, I came back to a house with everyone else still in bed. What do you do at 9 AM on a Sunday morning? Watch whatever movie is coming on the movie channel that I'm too lazy to change off ofl, that's what!

Now as we all know, I have sworn off Ryan Gosling movies forever. And ever. They call that guy a MOVIE STAR?!? He's the highest-paid actor on the planet? He's a thumb with a nose! And a stupid grin that belies a complete lack of understanding of his immediate surroundings! What on Earth could possibly make me break my vow?

Well, the movie is called "Lars and the Real Girl". First off, pretty much anyone named "Lars" is cool. Name one nerd named "Lars". I bet you can't. It's like naming a girl "Olivia". She is guaranteed to be beautiful. There are no ugly, plain, or non-descript "Olivia"s. Hey, can you imagine what a child conceived by a guy named Lars and a woman named Olivia would be like? The beauty/coolness would be incomprehensible, probably.

Secondly - talking about the movie now, not the spawn of a Lars Ulrich/Olivia Newton-John coupling - the description of the movie said...well, you'll find out in about two or three paragraphs. But when you do, you'll understand why I broke my vow and watched this.

"Lars and the Real Girl" is the typical boy-meets-girl/they-fall-in-love/hilarity-ensues kind of movie that we've all seen before. Except in this movie:

THE GIRL IS A RUBBER SEX DOLL.

That's right - Gosling plays a dimwit who's afraid of human contact, so he orders a sex doll off the Internet and pretends it's a real woman. In fact, he isn't even pretending. He is absolutely convinced his sex doll is a real woman.

Now, I know what you're thinking - RodeoSchro, this has already been done. The '80's romp "Mannequin" is one of the all-time 80's-est movies ever. Couple a B-list cast of Andrew McCarthy, Kim Cattrall, James Spader and Mesach Taylor with a ridiculous plot and viola! Instant mediocrity! Not even naming the mannequin's department store after Prince could save this turkey.

MEANDERING SIDENOTE - You know how your brain remembers certain irrelevant facts that no one is ever going to want to hear about? Mine does and one of those irrelevant facts concerns Andrew McCarthy and Prince. In the video for "Raspberry Beret", Prince has a coughing fit in the beginning. You surely remember that. Well, Andrew McCarthy was quoted about that for some unfathomable reason and he said, "Yeah, when I saw Prince cough, I thought 'He gets it. This job is a grind!'" And I thought, "No, you jackass! PRINCE coughs because he works so hard he gets run down. YOU cough because you recently said you took up smoking, which we all know is for idiots!"

Back to this movie. It's not very good. There are some laughs, a few tears, and blah blah blah. But I suspect "Lars and the Real Girl" will go down in history as perhaps THE MOST CANADIAN MOVIE EVER.

I know this film is "allegedly" set in Wisconsin but c'mon. No disrespect to any Cheeseheads out there, but you guys are NOT this nice. Only Canadians are. To wit:

Gosling is a life-long resident of the town. As was I assume his family - including his brother, who left town for a while, found a non-town girl to marry, and then returned. Gosling is painfully shy, and cannot stand to be touched. Also, he's really just plain weird. So he sees a co-worker looking at sex dolls on the Internet, and orders one for himself. It comes delivered in a large crate. If only it had "Fra-GEEEE-leee" on the side!

Gosling introduces his new sex doll to his brother and sister as his Internet girlfriend, "Bianca". She is wheelchair-confined, so obviously she can't walk. She knows little or no English, so obviously she can't talk. She's very religious, so obviously Gosling can't use the various holes she has for their intended use. But because he's known to be addled. his sister-in-law sees him having even a lifeless sex doll as a girlfriend as a step forward. Gosling's brother, on the other hand, knows his brother is nuts.

As Gosling goes about his business, everyone in this clearly Canadian town accepts his sex doll girlfriend as real, and humors him to points unbelievable. Gosling's brother gets the town doctor/psychiatrist to "see" Bianca on a weekly basis, but it's really a ruse to get Gosling into psychoanalysis.

All the while there is a nice co-worker who for reasons unexplainable has a crush on Gosling. But she is content to play second fiddle to a sex doll. So ask yourself -

Is there any town in America where this could happen? Is there any town in America where a guy could parade his sex doll around as his girlfriend, and no one would make fun of him?

Of course not! Only Canadians are this nice.

Long story short - Gosling gets jealous when the nice co-worker gets a boyfriend of her own. What to do? Only one solution - kill off your fake sex doll girlfriend! Which he does by going into her room (the sex doll sleeps in his brother and sister-in-law's home, while Gosling has an apartment in the garage). Then he starts screaming "WAKE UP!! WAKE UP!!!" It turns out Bianca is unconscious.

So they call 911.

Who actually sends an ambulance to pick up a sex doll.

And take her to the hospital, which is full of actual sick humans.

But they admit her, even giving her a room of her own complete with an IV.

However, Bianca is just too sick and she dies. This, of course, was Gosling's decision. None of the doctors rendered an actual diagnosis on his sex doll until he told them, "She's dying! Boo hoo hoo hoo!"

But then it gets WEIRDER.

They have a real funeral for Bianca. Complete with church service, casket and actual burial. In a real cemetary. Despite there being actual state laws against this kind of thing.

And guess what? The death and burial of his sex doll cures Ryan Gosling of all mental illness!

Only in Canada could all this niceness happen.

All of this is, or course, unbelievable. But the MOST unbelievable thing of all is that this script was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Screenplay.

I am now more convinced than ever that I could write scripts for a living, and I am going to write two of them over the Christmas break. Both of them will make sense, too.

There really is no one to blame but myself for what I just went through. I knew better than to watch a Ryan Gosling movie. And I never ever will again, not even if the title is "Lost Footage Of A Prince Concert No One Knew About Where Prince Played Every Outtake Ever And For Some Reason There Is Three Seconds Of Ryan Gosling In It".

"Lars and the Real Girl" gets one Canadian Curling Broom out of a possible eight Canadian Curling Brooms. Why eight? Why not?

.

[Edited 12/17/17 11:34am]

The Last Jedi - 9.2/10 (after three viewings). If you think it's too long or too prequely you are incorrect. Heaven forbid there actualy be a city that actually looks futuristic in a Star Wars movie.

The Empire Strikes Back 9.5/10

The Last Jedi 9.2/10

Star Wars 8.9/10

Rogue One 8.6/10

The Force Awakens 8.3/10

Revenge of the Sith 8.1/10

Return of the Jedi 7.8/10

Attack of the Clones 7.4/10

The Phantom Menace 7.2/10

Hudson said:

RodeoSchro said:

EmmaMcG said:

Hudson said:

The Last Jedi - 9.2/10 (after three viewings). If you think it's too long or too prequely you are incorrect. Heaven forbid there actualy be a city that actually looks futuristic in a Star Wars movie.

The Empire Strikes Back 9.5/10

The Last Jedi 9.2/10

Star Wars 8.9/10

Rogue One 8.6/10

The Force Awakens 8.3/10

Revenge of the Sith 8.1/10

Return of the Jedi 7.8/10

Attack of the Clones 7.4/10

The Phantom Menace 7.2/10

I really enjoyed the 'prequely' city in this movie. Why should everywhere look so poor in a universe with interstellar space crafts? And I agree almost 100% with your scoring system although personally, I'd swap the bottom two and give them both lower scores.

The bottom two probably deserve lower scores but they're too exciting for me to give a mediocre score to. I always put Clones higher just to compensate for the majority of people that rank it last.

Star Wars -- Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (2017)

Rian got it just right, and as I had hoped, reset the board. The flaws in this movie will manifest themselves after I come down from the first viewing, but this one enters the top tier. CLEARLY influenced by Rogue One.

The Shape Of Water (2017) - Exceptional. .25

Star Wars: The Last Jedi - very disappointing.

EmmaMcG said:

it makes Plan 9 look like 2001 A Space Odyssey.

The Killing Of A Sacred Deer 3.5 / 10

EmmaMcG said:

RodeoSchro said:

I'm hoping I can find a movie house that plays "The Room" and then "The Disaster Artist". I've never seen either movie. Do you think that would be a good way to see them?

I'm eagerly awaiting your review of The Room. Seriously, it makes Plan 9 look like 2001 A Space Odyssey. It's absolutely awful but it's hard to look away. Before I knew it was a big cult movie I had seen it 3 times just for a laugh. It's definitely a movie to watch with other people. As Jerry Seinfeld said, You can't watch a bad movie on your own. Who are you going to make sarcastic comments to?

Now I have to watch the entire movie! I thought I was going to get away with the suggestion that I watch a compilation of the worst clips. Oh well, I have a feeling a movie like this needs to be watched from beginning to end - and hopefully drunk!

I think I'll try to go to one of those movie houses this weekend, and get the full experience.

Twelve O'Clock High 8/10

Can't imagine this classic being made today. I love the slow pacing of these older movies. Today with everyone having ADHD.

RodeoSchro said:

EmmaMcG said:

RodeoSchro said: I'm eagerly awaiting your review of The Room. Seriously, it makes Plan 9 look like 2001 A Space Odyssey. It's absolutely awful but it's hard to look away. Before I knew it was a big cult movie I had seen it 3 times just for a laugh. It's definitely a movie to watch with other people. As Jerry Seinfeld said, You can't watch a bad movie on your own. Who are you going to make sarcastic comments to?

Now I have to watch the entire movie! I thought I was going to get away with the suggestion that I watch a compilation of the worst clips. Oh well, I have a feeling a movie like this needs to be watched from beginning to end - and hopefully drunk!

I think I'll try to go to one of those movie houses this weekend, and get the full experience.

Never tried it drunk, maybe that'll make it a likable movie!

Saboteur 5/10
It's worth it just for social and filmaking anthropology. But it's woefully dated in the worst ways.

damosuzuki said:

mudbound (2017) 4/5 it's a bit of a shame that the vast majority of this film's audience will only get to see this on netflix. it's sweeping & grand in story & visuals & really ought to be seen on a big screen. while it has almost nothing in common with it in most ways, it reminds me of lost city of z in that both movies are really throwbacks to an earlier, old-fashioned era of storytelling. i did think there was maybe just a bit too much story, though not to the extent that the movie was draggy or too long. rather, there were maybe just a few too many threads in this sprawling epic, though that took nothing away from its gut-punch ending.

Read the book instead. It was a good one!

RodeoSchro said:

EmmaMcG said:

RodeoSchro said: I'm eagerly awaiting your review of The Room. Seriously, it makes Plan 9 look like 2001 A Space Odyssey. It's absolutely awful but it's hard to look away. Before I knew it was a big cult movie I had seen it 3 times just for a laugh. It's definitely a movie to watch with other people. As Jerry Seinfeld said, You can't watch a bad movie on your own. Who are you going to make sarcastic comments to?

Now I have to watch the entire movie! I thought I was going to get away with the suggestion that I watch a compilation of the worst clips. Oh well, I have a feeling a movie like this needs to be watched from beginning to end - and hopefully drunk!

I think I'll try to go to one of those movie houses this weekend, and get the full experience.

i'm actually listening to the audio version of greg sestero's book (the source material for franco's movie). i almost never listen to audio books, but i was told to give this one a listen because sestero does a great 'tommy' impression - and it is pretty great. i'm 5 hours in, and i'm really enjoying it.

Empress said:

damosuzuki said:

mudbound (2017) 4/5 it's a bit of a shame that the vast majority of this film's audience will only get to see this on netflix. it's sweeping & grand in story & visuals & really ought to be seen on a big screen. while it has almost nothing in common with it in most ways, it reminds me of lost city of z in that both movies are really throwbacks to an earlier, old-fashioned era of storytelling. i did think there was maybe just a bit too much story, though not to the extent that the movie was draggy or too long. rather, there were maybe just a few too many threads in this sprawling epic, though that took nothing away from its gut-punch ending.

Read the book instead. It was a good one!

thanks! i might try to get it from the library once things settler down in the new year.

free fire (2017) 3/5 ben wheatley's kill list was one of my favourite movies of the century so far, but i've liked each successive movie he's made a little less each time. free fire halts the fall, though i wouldn't call it great or a return to form necessarily. it's simple, and i suspect a lot of people would find it a bit numbing & repetitive, but i thought it was a perfect, fun 90 minute sprint.

the meyerowitz stories (2017) 4/5

my happy family (2017) 4.5/5

damosuzuki said:

RodeoSchro said:

Now I have to watch the entire movie! I thought I was going to get away with the suggestion that I watch a compilation of the worst clips. Oh well, I have a feeling a movie like this needs to be watched from beginning to end - and hopefully drunk!

I think I'll try to go to one of those movie houses this weekend, and get the full experience.

i'm actually listening to the audio version of greg sestero's book (the source material for franco's movie). i almost never listen to audio books, but i was told to give this one a listen because sestero does a great 'tommy' impression - and it is pretty great. i'm 5 hours in, and i'm really enjoying it.

i just started reading it last night...i can't remember the last time i laughed so long and hard while reading.

after my brief exchange with trivialpursuit about jake gyllenhaal, i was inspired to watch 'brothers' after perusing his imdb page...

not a bad premise, but this movie just beats you over the head with itself...everything is on the nose and how it should be, with no room for the story to breathe. overall, a waste of a good plot and decent(ish) performances.

Shadow of a Doubt. 5/10

I've finally got around to watch some older films. And some have held up really well. Some of these older Hitchcock films haven't. A lot "oh golly shucks" type of writing and delivery. Great as time capsules of sorts, but not really great cinema.

creep 2 (2017) 3/5 - like its predecessor, creep 2 uses mark duplass's pleasant, goofy normalcy very effectively - nervy, edgy, if not particularly believable (who would stay in an isolated house with this guy?), & a perfectly good watch for no-budget genre fans.

the squid & the whale (2005) 3.5/5 i generally enjoy noah baumbah & all his woody allen-isms, and this one was no exception, though jesse eisenberg's performance occasionally crept into slightly annoying territory for me.

the prowler (1981) 1.5/5 a smattering of decent gore effects here & there, but nothing else enlivens this very inert 80s slasher.