Azz said:

estelle81 said:

Yeah, they didn't really do the character justice in this Batman series IMO. I've always loved the complexity that is Two-Face. The idea that a man can be a do-gooder and a evil-doer all in one person has always intrigued me because it's true of all people in the world. Everybody has a good side and a bad side and for Two-Face/Harvey Dent it wasn't just shown as an internal battle but an external one also by the two dramatically different sides of his appearnce. One side handsome and the other grotesque and the split personalities feuding with each other inside one body. Through all that internal struggle, there was always one common agreeance...justice must be served at all costs; and, how that justice came to pass was determined by the mere flip of a coin. The idea that a two-headed coin (one side perfect and the other hideously scratched) was the ultimate judgment call for Two-Face and showed a sadistic fairness to him. Sad his screen time was cheapened to a few short scenes but I think Christopher Nolan did a fantastic take on the Batman Series as a whole. I really wanted him to have Harley Quinn in the previous film too but she's a pretty new character to the Batman series...she's my fave Batman villianess by far. Either way, the series was done wonderfully but I still loved Tommy Lee Jones' performance as Two-Face in 'Batman Forever'. All just my

Insightful analysis. I liked your conclusion that it was more an external rather than internal battle. Very nice

I also thought that they were treating the audience a tad stupid, with the repeated remarks from Dent 'I don't trust your office'. It just didn't feel ironic when he was betrayed by the office at the end, the foreshadowement did not work. But even so, the dinner talk regading julius ceaser, was great. 'You either die a hero, or live long enough to see yourself become the villian'.

I'd love your take on Avengers, BB and TDKR in comparison to the unmatched Dark Knight. I really think Nolan did the impossible with regards to Comic adaptations. It was a well-acted film, with a thorough plot, good vilains, directing, & tone which I have yet to see in other adapations. Really a one off.

[Edited 8/2/12 19:13pm]

Thanks for liking my little Two-Face obsession. I agree that they did seem to believe the viewing audience was going to be clueless when it came to Two-Face. He's one of the better Batman villians IMO...such a waste to get rid of him soo quickly but the acting for him was very well done. Nolan did a great job in picking the actors that he did for his series and I think that's one huge reason why this trilogy was so good.

I think the reason I'm such a huge Batman fan is because of the great villians he battles. I have to admit that when I first saw BB, I was upset because I believed that Tim Burton did the best job in bringing the Batman series to the big screen...he wasn't responsible for those last two tragedies in that series or one failure and a tragedy because 'Batman Forever' wasn't overly terrible thanks to the good casting. Val Kilmer did okay as Batman and made a very believable Bruce Wayne. Chris O'Donnell was...well, there. Tommy Lee Jones and Jim Carrey were great together I thought and both did a great job bringing Two-Face and The Riddler to life.

After watching BB, I really couldn't compare the old series with the new one. Tim Burton had darkness to his take but it didn't have the 'realness' that Christopher Nolan was able to bring to the table. Seeing The Scarecrow and Ra's Al Ghul in BB was a bit unexpected for me because they aren't the more popular Batman villians but I liked how they showed the importance of Ra's Al Ghul in turning Bruce Wayne into Batman with the training. This was overlooked in the previous Batman films...seriously, how does some rich kid learn how to be such an amazing fighter in the first place? Nolan explained it perfectly. I like the Scarecrow...he's just that evil genius that you can't wait to see get his in the end. The visual effects for him were awesome and they picked a great actor to play the character...he was the Scarecrow hands down.

BB was a well done beginning to the series but if I had to pick which one between the three to save in the event of a fire, it wouldn't be this one. Dark Knight was fantastic. When I heard the Joker was in this one, I think I thought the same thing as many Batman fans...who's gonna be the Joker and how is that guy gonna portray the Joker when Jack Nickalson did such an amazing portrayal of a truly evil individual. I always like to tell people that, in movies, there are the 'real villians' and the 'misunderstood bad guys'. To this day, I believe the only truly evil horror movie villian is Freddy Krueger. Before he was burned alive and became the nightmare man, Freddy had been a child molester who murdered his victims. Jason was some poor bullied kid who sought revenge and Michael Myers just had some serious family problems; but Freddy was evil from the start. That's the Joker in Batman. Nothing about him makes you really feel sorry for him because he was believed to have been a bad guy before he started donning the face paint and green hair.

Unlike Tim Burton, Nolan didn't really go into the full backstory of how the Joker became the Joker. Burton showed him as a street thug who was the guy who killed Bruce Wayne's parents and then fell into a vat of acid when Batman couldn't hold onto him. Nolan had the Joker as some lunatic with a mysterious past. Either way, the Joker is one of the ultimate villians. I thought Heath Ledger did an outstanding job interpreting the Joker as he saw him to be. Nickelson's Joker was sadistic but cartoony which was pretty sick because he made me think of some deranged clown and clowns are already scary even if they aren't trying to kill everybody. Ledger's Joker was more dark and realistically sinister. Many people wanted to compare the two Jokers but for me how do you compare two characters that really only have the name in common. They weren't the same at all IMO. Both performances were very different and equally stellar in their own way. I think this is probably why Two Face got written off so easily.

You can't put another Batman villian with the Joker, period. Burton didn't try to do it so I don't know why Nolan tried at all. The Joker is such a powerful antagonist that he doesn't need help in his pursuit to destroy all things rational, so putting Two Face in the mix really just set the character up for failure. If Nolan was going to put another Batman Villian with the Joker, it should have been Harley Quinn because she has the ability to find the humanity in the Joker which I take to mean she has the power to persuade him also, but that's just my feelings on Ms. Quinn, the Joker's Hench Wench.

All in all, I liked the characters that Nolan picked for this trilogy. He chose one character from each of the other four Batman films. ' The Joker' from 'Batman'; 'Catwoman' from 'Batman Begins' (Michelle Pfeiffer is still the better Catwoman IMHO but Hathaway did a good job - 100 times better than Halle Berry in that monstrosity of a film); 'Two-Face' from 'Batman Forever'; and 'Bane from 'Batman and Robin' (the movie that tortured and brutally murdered the last Batman series. All Bane did in that film was grunt and be Poison Ivy's big, dumb bodyguard). Nolan really did a great job with Bane...I didn't like how he was soo easily and quickly killed in the end of the movie but he was quite the villian throughout the film. If he had done another film in the series, I would have loved to have seen either Clayface (always thought he was quite an interesting concept in the animated series), the Riddler, or Poison Ivy.

I loved the introduction of Robin and I think Levitt is such a great actor to be the Boy Wonder...I liked how Nolan set Robin up to be more than a sidekick if they do a spinoff. In the event of a fire, I'd be saving The Dark Knight out of the three. TDKR was great but Dark Knight hit it out the park for me...TDKR would be my second pick though.

As for the Avengers...that movie was absolutely fantastic. I can't really compare it to Batman because I'm a Batman fan til I die but it was definitely loved by me. I loved the diversity of the Avenger team. There was a god, an undefeatable Hulk, an American hero, a 'human robot' (I love Robert Downey Jr. btw...he is Iron Man no doubt about it), and two human super assassins...oh, and Samuel L. Jackson who should have had more fight scenes but he's Sam Jackson so . My only let down to the movie was that they couldn't get Edward Norton to come back as the Hulk because I thought he was great in the remake...that first one was...uh yeah . I can't wait for the sequel to drop because it's gonna be too hot. After watching the latest Spiderman (not by choice I might add - not a big Spidey fan), I would love to see him become a part of the Avengers team..and Wolverine *crossing fingers*.

Well that was quite a novel I just wrote so I'm gonna back away slowly now.

Is Illuminati the worst movie ever? It was awful!

Brave

unbelievable how far cartoon movies have come .. funny .. good kid movie pure disney with tearjerking moments as disney usually does.

The Good, the Bad, the Weird (2008) - The story of two outlaws and a bounty hunter in 1940s Manchuria and their rivalry to possess a treasure map while being pursued by the Japanese army and Chinese bandits.

What a fun, crazy movie. Byung-hun Lee as bad guy Park Chang-yi was way hot.

2 and a half of 5 stars

interesting , but pure tediusness

and

watched this for the first time before that the other night

4 out of 5 stars

a bit slow to start, but it got better. crazy shit freaked me out for a little bit, i can't stunt . kinda funny though after a while, the fucked up shit she was saying and doing

Eloise's Lover - Sweet coming-of-age drama/tragedy about a young girl who unexpectedly falls in love with an artistic, free-spirited lesbian... Kind of a thin, run of the mill storyline, but I liked this anyway (C+)

Kiss Me Deadly (1955) - A doomed female hitchhiker pulls Mike Hammer into a deadly whirlpool of intrigue, revolving around a mysterious "great whatsit."

Surreal and classic film noir drama.

2.5/5 spoof characterization of the james bond franchise.

ZombieKitten said:

Exit through the gift shop 4/5 What the!!!

Great movie! I like the illustration Mr. Brainwash made for Madonna's Celebration album.

Metropolis (1927) - In a futuristic city sharply divided between the working class and the city planners, the son of the city's mastermind falls in love with a working class prophet who predicts the coming of a savior to mediate their differences.

The restored scenes look fantastic on blu-ray. Minus 1/2 because sadly the original version is still incomplete. 1/2

sexton said:

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (2011) - British retirees travel to India to take up residence in what they believe is a newly restored hotel. Less luxurious than its advertisements, the Marigold Hotel nevertheless slowly begins to charm in unexpected ways.

Pleasant, but predictable.

ZombieKitten said:

Yes it's really good - I just don't know what to think though

Do you mean if it's a documentary or mockumentary?

sexton said:

ZombieKitten said:

The best movie you'll ever see is "Bridge To Terabithia".

It means everything!

BTW I rate it

10/10

sexton said:

Some feel the reason "Exit Through The Gift Shop" didn't win the Oscar was because of the rumor that was going around that it was a hoax.

ZombieKitten said:

sexton said:

Mr. Brainwash clearly had a love for the genre. And fortunately for him it was a medium that he could actually work in and have occasionally satisfactory results. I don't think it's wrong to call him an artist. He's just not a very good one in my opinion. To me it was very clear comparing his work to Banksy and the others that came before him.

He did nothing NEW it was 100% derivative - the thing he did right was hype.

My fave was invader's little mosaics

I wouldn't consider Mr. Brainwash an artist.

His Madonna is a straight up Andy Warhol rip, and that's his best piece.

Disgrace 3.5/5 Very very sad, but engaging and different.

I Will Follow 4/5 A lot of folks loved it and a lot of folks couldn't stand this movie, but I really got into it after the slow confusing beginning and felt something about it I could relate to, and gave it an extra 1/2 star because of it. Very slow paced, not a whole lot happens but I thought the people connections were wonderful.

Phoebe in Wonderland 3/5 Very confusing, weird and dark but I had to stay with it til the end and I thought the end paid off in a way that made a lot of sense which made me like it. I did feel distant from it maybe because I was getting angry with the mother even though I could understand her point of view, the little sister had me cracking up though. Even though it's about a kid it's not a kids movie.

Celeste and Jesse Forever (2012) - A divorcing couple tries to maintain their friendship while they both pursue other people.

Rashida Jones puts on her best Kristen Wiig for this romcom as a bridesmaid looking for a new man. Surprisingly not terrible. 1/2

The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

It was like an Occupy Wall Street fantasy. Anne Hathaway was good. But there was no defining performance like Heath Ledger's Joker from the last Batman film. And I still don't like Christian Bale as Batman.

The Bourne Legacy 3.5/5 Intense. I need to see it again since I don't fully understand why folks were doing what they were doing, but that lab scene I'm not crazy about seeing again. I tried not to wuss out and start crying but my eyes got damp, I looked around and I could see a few other folks were uncomfortable too. I'd be interested in seeing Jeremy in the sequels.

The Dark Knight Rises 3/5 should have seen it before Bourne and without seeing other peoples comments about it. I wasn't as drawn in, but it was entertaining. I liked Anne but I didn't feel the chemistry and knowing some things made other thing less spectacular.

Total Recall 2.5/5 What the hell happened to Mars?! Droid invasion?! Was this I, Robot or Total Recall?! On it's own it was an okay action/adventure movie, I think Colin is adorable, and I had some fun watching it, but it being a remake of a classic it was disappointing, and no real spectacular life altering ending. I got into the flying cars they made a lot more sense to me than a lot of the flying cars in other sci-fi movies, I always have question on how they don't just run into things,

Wrong Will Smith movie edit.

[Edited 8/14/12 19:40pm]

Real Steel (2011) - Set in the near future, where robot boxing is a top sport, a struggling promoter feels he's found a champion in a discarded robot. During his hopeful rise to the top, he discovers he has an 11-year-old son who wants to know his father.

Typical Hollywood feel-good movie. With robots. 1/2

Until two weekends back, I’d never watched a James Bond film, and knew very little about them. I’ve just never really had any interest in that style of movie. One of the podcasts I follow is reviewing the entire Bond franchise, so I took it as an opportunity to try something different and watched the first few films in the series. I can’t really say I enjoyed any of them very much. I found it very hard to stay focused on Thunderball, during the underwater scenes in particular. From Russia With Love was the one I enjoyed the most, partly because I found the actress in it almost painfully sexy, but also because it seemed like the tightest film plot-wise.

I was a little surprised at the overall level of silliness here. I knew the Moore-era films were meant to be fairly light-hearted, but I was under the impression that the Connery films were at least somewhat serious, hard-boiled spy films.

Dr. No: 1.5/5

From Russia With Love: 3.5

Goldfinger: 3

Thunderball: 1

You Only Live Twice: 2