Movie Thread

[Hegemony]

I saw Barbie the other night. A number of good jokes, though I thought it was a little longer than it needed to be, and I suspect that if you inspect the plot closely, it doesn't all hold up logically. But it was a pleasant evening out.

[Sun_Worshiper]

Da 5 Bloods (2020)

This film follows four black Vietnam War veterans as they return to Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City in their old age in search of lost treasure. Thematically it is a commentary on black Americans fighting a pointless and horrible war for a country that oppresses them, while the plot is sort of in the vein of a heist movie. The commentary worked better than the plot for me, partly because the film is all over the place tonally: sometimes it is a comedy, at other points a tragedy, then an ultra-violent B-movie. It should also be said that the actors are absolutely fantastic and the commentary is incredibly heavy handed.

In the end, I enjoyed this and would recommend it, but I was also frustrated by it because all the pieces are here for a truly terrific movie, but this is just pretty good.

Grade: B+

[ab_grp]

Regarding Her, I didn't like the OS personality but realized after the fact that I do give the movie some marks for not making her some perfect thing of wonder.  She's manipulative and deceitful, and I guess some of that could be attributed to immaturity as she's learning.  I am trying to avoid saying too much about how things turn out, but there are definitely aspects of how things go that I think are both clever and realistic.

Also, Sun_Worshiper, it's so disappointing when a movie seems to have the bones to be really great but doesn't make it happen!

Weekend watchings:
High School Musical 3: This wraps up our live-action movies of that genre.  I don't have Jump In or the other related movies and am not sure we'll be picking them up anytime soon (though I have seen that one).  Eldest was at the right age for all of these movies, which is why I am familiar with them.  Why I enjoy them myself is another question, I guess.  Anyway, I put this one after the first one (HSM1>3>2).  Eldest says 1>2>3.  We saw this one in the theater together.  The kids are graduating and possibly going their separate ways.  Where will they go? What will they major in? Will the couples stay together? Most important of all, will Troy choose basketball, let alone the vaunted U of Albuquerque, which we all know is a basketball powerhouse AND his father's alma mater AND his best friend Chad's choice of school?! Lots of drama to sort out in this brief two hours.  The choreography is better than the music in this one, but there are some pretty funny scenes from newcomers.  Not sure what we will do for Friday night movies now.

Friday (Ice Cube): I exclaimed that "we watched Friday on Friday!" and then realized that it was actually Saturday.  Dang.  Neither of us had seen this one, but it was part of a very fancy 25-movie collection we picked up during Amazon's Prime Days sale.  I am not sure how to sum this one up.  It has a particular vibe that I find enjoyable to watch.  It's Friday, and Craig has been fired from his job, so there's not much to do other than hang out with his perennially-high friend Smokey and attend to a few things for his parents.  And try to hook up with the lovely Debbie, whose sister Felisha (of "bye, Felisha" fame) is something else.  Of course there's trouble lurking in the neighborhood, and when Smokey ends up owing money to a big bad guy you know it's going down.  This movie has some wacky characters and is pretty funny but takes a very quick turn to the not-so-funny.  We enjoyed it.  I wouldn't put it on my list of top movies, but I'd definitely watch it again.

[ab_grp]

Our weekend watchings are both from the aforementioned 25 pack.

Dumb and Dumber (Carrey, Daniels)- I had never seen this and felt like it would be a good Friday night post-vaccination stupor movie.  It did its job.  I can't see how it could be on any reasonably short list of funniest movies of all time, but it was pretty amusing and did have some very funny scenes.  The movie follows buddies Lloyd and Harry, who have stumbled into a bad situation due to good intentions, across the country in various crazy modes of transportation and with various interesting passengers.

Invictus (Freeman, Damon)- This one focuses on Nelson Mandela's early efforts as president to unite South Africa after apartheid.  He thinks that uniting behind the national rugby team (whose colors and emblem are divisive) will help in that regard.  Seems like he's right.  It's a feel-good movie without anything too shocking or unpredictable, but it's nice to have something to cheer for.  I just wish I understood the inscrutable game of rugby at all.  These movies can feel pretty heavy handed, but it seemed as if there were a couple potentially touching aspects that they really didn't play up at all.

[cathwen]

My husband and I saw Oppenheimer last weekend. It was...okay, but way too long. Parts of it were gripping, others not so much.

I wanted to see the film because both my parents had worked on the Manhattan Project, not knowing what it was, such was the secrecy and compartmentalization. My father was an electrical engineer, my mother an executive secretary. When I asked my parents about their work, Dad never said much about it (I imagine it involved designing electrical systems), and Mother (who of course had to take dictation and type up secret documents for her boss) never revealed anything, even years later, except that "it involved uranium," which was no secret by that time. When the announcement of the bombing came over the radio, Mother said she felt physically ill. The film did show similar reactions among some people.

So I wish that it had devoted some time to the many, many "little people," such as my parents, who were part of the endeavor. (And I just complained that it was too long!)

[ab_grp]

Thanks for the Oppenheimer review, cathwen! I have been a bit daunted by the length, though there are certainly plenty of long movies that I have ended up enjoying quite a lot.  Just hard to commit! We will definitely see it at some point (not on the big screen).  And that is so interesting about your parents.  I think there were many either involved with the project in some capacity or affected by the bomb testing (or bombing, of course) whose stories have not really been told, but maybe that will change given the outcry surrounding the film's release.  We visited the Trinity site on an open day, and I imagine that the downwinders might get their stories out in the near future.  Maybe the project support stories will also come to light. 

[secundem_artem]

Heart of Stone on Netflix.  I only got about half way through and turned it off.  Just one more reason to dislike Gal Gadot.  She seems to play every role with some kind of smirk on her face.

She is in the pantheon of actors I truly dislike - her, Will Farrell, Gwyneth Paltrow and her steam cleaned vajayjay, Rob Scheider, Shia LaBeouf, Jimmy Fallon, Seth Rogen and the cloud of weed that surrounds him, James Franco, Russell Brand, a few others I can't be arsed to remember at this time.

[Sun_Worshiper]

I saw Barbie the other night. A number of good jokes, though I thought it was a little longer than it needed to be, and I suspect that if you inspect the plot closely, it doesn't all hold up logically. But it was a pleasant evening out.

I watched this today. It is fun and funny, with great performances and set designs. It also has some solid social commentary, even if it lacks nuance, is quite heavy handed, and is somewhat undermined by the fact that the film is ultimately a two hour toy commercial.

B+

[RatGuy]

I think I'm the only one in my friend group who is excited about Haunting in Venice. I'll visit the theater for that one.

And I'm sad that Force of Nature got delayed, because I thought The Dry was one of the best mysteries I'd seen in a while.

Finally, I saw Talk to Me and while I'm not sure I "liked it," I did think it was good and it's stuck with me.

[Hegemony]

It also has some solid social commentary, even if it lacks nuance, is quite heavy handed, and is somewhat undermined by the fact that the film is ultimately a two hour toy commercial.

As someone on the internet noted, the studio is so buoyed by the success of Barbie that it's planning many more movies tied in to toys, where what the movie's success actually signals is that there is a market for more movies about women.

On that theme, I watched Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret with friends. It was liked more by the people who did not live through that era (it's set in 1970). It was unnaturally cheerful and wholesome for the adolescent experience of the era, in my view. All the pre-teen girls shiny and eager to grow up and get their periods, whereas the girls I knew were dreading the whole palaver. But essentially it's a movie intended to be heartwarming, however unrealistic that may be. Some well-done moments, however, especially the drama of buying Tampax at the store. The young actress playing the 11-year-old main character, Abby Ryder Fortson, was great.

[ab_grp]

Recently we have watched Crazy Rich Asians (good, and I had no idea that was Awkwafina, but she was pretty funny), The Hangover (better the first time I saw it but probably due to the surprise aspect... still funny), The Darkest Hour (good biopic about Churchill around the time of Dunkirk), True Lies (still hilarious and a fun action movie), and A Private War (good biopic about war journalist Marie Colvin).  We also watched Matrix, Matrix Reloaded, but I am refraining from rating them until we watch the third and fourth entries in that series.  I was eager after the first one, but the second was not very good.

[Sun_Worshiper]

We also watched Matrix, Matrix Reloaded, but I am refraining from rating them until we watch the third and fourth entries in that series.  I was eager after the first one, but the second was not very good.

First one is great, others not so much

[ab_grp]

We also watched Matrix, Matrix Reloaded, but I am refraining from rating them until we watch the third and fourth entries in that series.  I was eager after the first one, but the second was not very good.

First one is great, others not so much

Thanks for the heads up! We had planned to watch one per week to try to keep the thread, but that went out the window after the second one.  We won't rush to use a precious weekend night slot on the others any time soon.

[ab_grp]

We watched Ocean's Eleven (Clooney, Pitt, Damon, Cheadle, Gould, Scott Caan, Casey Affleck, Julia Roberts, Andy Garcia, Bernie Mac, et al.) and Definitely, Maybe (Ryan Reynolds, Elizabeth Banks, Rachel Weisz, Isla Fisher) this past weekend.  We'd each seen both before.  The first is a Vegas heist movie and remake of Ocean's 11 (starring the Rat Pack).  It didn't have quite the same feel that I thought it had the first time, like the kind of energy of Bullet Train, but it was fun anyway.  I think I saw the second one on the series a while back, but I don't really remember it.  I just ordered a cheap pack that has the original (1960s movie) and the second and third (twelve and thirteen) in it.

The latter involves a soon-to-be single dad telling his daughter the story of how he met her mother, and because several women star in this story it is left to the end to disclose which is actually the girl's mother.  There are plenty of things not to like about the characters, but I guess it's probably more realistic that they're not completely likeable.  I think it's a cute story overall and left me a bit teary-eyed at times (again).

[ab_grp]

Recent movies were Office Space (still pretty funny), Men of Honor (seen it before and again was invested by the end; very interesting, mostly true story of the first African-American US Navy master diver), Little Shop of Horrors (didn't remember if I had seen it, but it was pretty cute and had a fun soundtrack), and Guy Ritchie's The Covenant.  The last one is the only one new to us and the only recent movie.  It's not a true story but probably has some truthful elements, about the native interpreters in Afghanistan who helped the US military locate the Taliban and who really got the short end of the stick in return.  Here's the Rotten Tomato description (tomatometer 83%, audience score 98%):

Guy Ritchie's The Covenant follows US Army Sergeant John Kinley (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Afghan interpreter Ahmed (Dar Salim). After an ambush, Ahmed goes to Herculean lengths to save Kinley's life. When Kinley learns that Ahmed and his family were not given safe passage to America as promised, he must repay his debt by returning to the war zone to retrieve them before the Taliban hunts them down first.

We both thought it was very good.  I appreciate that Ritchie states that he tried not to make it saccharine, and I think that effort paid off.  Once the main action begins, it's pretty edge of the seat stuff.  I am also not a big military weapon fan, but I was pretty awed by one of the aircraft.  Regardless, I would recommend the movie for the story and acting.