list/discuss/rate - your recently watched movies

*frinspar* wrote: Replace "Star Wars" with "prog" and everything you wrote still works.

Edited by rogerthat - December 27 2015 at 01:21

Star Wars - The Force Awakens...
...but the audience snoozes.

So my son (23) and I went to see this highly hyped piece of cinema yesterday. I have to admit to being a little disappointed. Mostly with the thin writing and dull plot progression. I've been a SW fan, more or less, since the first one came out in '77, but J.J. kinda missed the mark IMHO. Sure, there were lots of action(ish) sequences and the cinematography was impressive, but it seemed completely lacking any suspense or engaging plot development. I could easily sum up the entire move in probably two or three sentences.

No spoilers here...if you want to go see it, have at 'er. But be forewarned, this is an unsatisfying story that takes a back seat to the visual dressings of the franchise. Characters and plot should be the core of a movie, not an inconvenience.

I'm not even sure where to place this movie in the SW hierarchy, but it's not in the top 5 as far as I'm concerned. They better step up the game for Episode Vlll.

Live long and prosper!

^^  I'm not sure when, or if, I will watch the new Star Wars but I saw today that it reached one billion dollars at the box office in twelve days.

^^^ The movie sounded great in 9.1, when I saw it on the theater, but we use subtitles here, so it was easier to follow 

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

As I feared, Star Wars, for all intent and purposes, is over.  

At least the eccentric, brilliant, quirky, and creatively wondrous world given us by a quiet filmmaker named George Lucas has come to an end.   As any real fan will tell you, it isn't enough to look and sound like Star Wars.   It must, without question, feel like it, and this bland imitation does not seem to feel like anything other than a new sci-fi product meant to cash-in.   I kept asking myself why The Force Awakens felt like a Star Trek flick, and then it hit me: J.J. Abrams has done it again, except this time he's nearly wrecked a long-beloved saga and turned it into a mini-series with casting rejects from Game of Thrones.

I suppose it was inevitable.   Everything changes or comes to an end.   But before leaving the meeting with execs from Disney, George Lucas should have turned and said, "Oh one other thing; you have to hire Star Wars fans; people who deeply know and understand the Star Wars galaxy. Otherwise I'm taking me and my rights with me to the grave."   But he didn't, and now we'll probably have another decade of mediocre pabulum to choke down before someone comes along and says "Uh, yeah, let's do this series justice and lose the sentimental emptiness; the audience isn't stupid-- They're Listening.  Remember?"  

I hesitate to describe the story as there is none, and any highlights would spoil the plot.   Suffice to say if you love the SW Universe, be prepared to be left feeling empty and befuddled as you depart the theater in a confused haze muttering to yourself about how a once great legacy has become Battlestar Galactica.   Yeah, no thanks.

 

The Martian

In what could've amounted to Castaway on Mars, this movie refreshes that motif as stranded astronaut Matt Damon uses all his scientific skills and resources to survive on the Red Planet.   The Martian doesn't have the soul of Moon, human aloneness of Gravity or historic truth of Apollo 13 and is largely a populist flick, but the pace is clean and the script doesn't dillydally with typical sci-fi plot points.   Solid entertainment.

I watched two Vietnam war movies in the past week:

^ At least the second part has Adam Baldwin in it. He always does the same kind of role but it's always funny 

Irrational Man

Woody Allen's clever 2015 drama has a womanizing college professor who decides to turn to murder in order to bring meaning back to his life.   Twisted, sardonic, grimly amusing, Woody lends his sharp eye for human psychology and the line between morality & reality to a strong script.   Reminiscent of his Crimes and Misdemeanors from '89, Irrational Man, though far from his best, is superior to anything he's done in at least five years.

Bridge of Spies

A script about simple human dignity is not what one normally expects from the Coens but with the help of Matt Charman and Steven Spielberg, unsung hero James B. Donovan's amazing story is condensed into dramatic form.   It's 1960 and the Cold War is about to blow up into a hot one as Donovan struggles to exchange one Soviet spy for a CIA pilot and a college student while being thwarted at every turn by both the KGB and U.S., all posturing to win release of the men on their own terms.   The standout here is master thespian Mark Rylance (Wolf Hall) in a fascinating and nuanced portrayal of Soviet spy and British national Rudolf Abel.   Recommended.