The Movie (and TV show) Watching Thread

[John Dule]

My thoughts on The Worst Person in the World, a Norwegian movie that got rave reviews back in 2021:

We live in a permissive age. Although open relationships, adultery, divorce, drug use, and opinion pieces about oral sex are still frowned upon in most circles, they are nonetheless considered far more acceptable than they were even in the very recent past. When I say this, I don't necessarily mean it in the negative way that conservatives do when they make this observation. Conservatives are correct that this shift in norms brings with it some downsides, but there are costs and benefits in all social change. What matters is not so much whether we label these changes as good or bad, but whether we identify and explore their implications. The Worst Person in the World is the latest in a long history of art that has attempted to perform this indispensable function. It is fascinated by one particular aspect of this new social reality: the proliferation of choice.

At a glance, it would be easy to mistake The Worst Person in the World for a girlboss battle hymn (or conversely, a damning portrayal of modern degeneracy). But despite its moralistic title, the film is less concerned with passing judgement on its main character than it is with exploring the complexities of her social dilemma. Julie is a young woman overwhelmed by the choices available to her and the concomitant responsibilities those choices bring. The opening montage of the film will be all too familiar to upper-middle class millennial audience members: despite good grades and natural charm, Julie nevertheless habitually abandons careers and relationships, ever-unsure of her choices. Because she is virtually unconstrained, she feels scriptless-- a "spectator in her own life" with limitless potential and yet no direction.

This scriptlessness is reflected in the film's meandering structure (even Julie's physical appearance seems to change from scene to scene). TWPITW covers a distinct chapter in Julie's life, but while its cathartic ending marks a clear conclusion to that chapter, the underlying issues she faces remain unresolved. Throughout the film she harms others with her own selfish tendencies (verbally abusing her boyfriend after he tries to simply compliment her writing) while simultaneously suffering as a result of the selfishness of others (her distant, estranged father who utterly ignores her in favor of his new wife and child). She is both a participant in and a victim of hedonism. Ironically, Julie's unexpected pregnancy at the end of the film feels almost like a glimmer of hope in this directionless world. It represents a massive constraint on her freedom, but it also means structure and responsibility-- two things she has never before experienced.

For those of us who welcome the permissiveness of the modern world (and I include myself in that category given my libertarian sensibilities), the psychological toll of freedom is an uncomfortable truth we must address. Depression, anxiety, and suicide are notoriously common in many free societies-- perhaps because when a person cannot blame external factors for their failures, they are instead forced to look inwards for the cause of their problems. In such an environment, it's not hard to see why a few personal missteps can cause some of us to see ourselves as "The Worst Person in the World." Freedom of choice means having to also live with the consequences of those choices, and it means becoming trapped in situations where we will likely regret whatever choice we make. It is this feeling of simultaneously overwhelming and nonexistent responsibility that TWPITW so expertly captures.

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

Great title for a film. This is how I feel sometimes.

I don't think there is permissiveness in the modern world. The most freedom-loving liberals will devour a person with guts if the person shows sexual deviations such as stalking, raping, pedophilia, bestiality, and so on, political deviations such as extremist ideologies and global terrorism are also not welcome. You need to watch your words and actions so as not to come across as racist, anti-LGBTQ+, anti-vegan, and so on. After all, it is still illegal to kill, rob, fraud and sell hard drugs, despite the fact that hip-hop encourages these things. And to this was added the growth of conservative sentiment, which would be the envy of the Victorian era.

Thus, in the modern world there is no permissiveness, and blaming something that does not exist for problems is rather strange.

I think this is a normal feeling, this is the usual voice of conscience. Those who immediately repel from themselves any thoughts about their mistakes, who are not reprobate of themselves for the harm caused to others, these are just arrogant cynical a***oles, and this is not normal. Therefore, it is better not to say that conscience is the cause of suicide, so that people do not repel the voice of conscience from themselves. As a result, after all, the character did not commit suicide at all, but, on the contrary, conceived a child and, therefore, got her life destination.

[President Johnson]

Just finished the first season of the brandnew series The Night Agent.

Loved the plot and characters. Although the former may have been a little unrealistic, with the vice president, a shady businessguy and some White House senior officials attempting to assasinate some Middle East terrorist-turned-politican as he disagrees with the (female) president to get him back in power over a military dictator. The main cast is about an FBI Agent (the night agent) that picks up the phone of a secret and rarely used line in the White House basement in case a secret agent is in trouble. One night the phone rings and a young woman that just witnessed her aunt and uncle - who secretly worked for the government - being killed. The two then meet as he's assigned to protect her. They quickly become the target of killers and are constantly on the run while trying to figure out who in the White House is a traitor. Meanwhile, after they discover too much, the corrupt chief of staff falsely accuses him of kidnapping the vice president's daughter. However, he's able to convince two Secret Service Agents who already wanted to arrest him, that he didn't kidnap said daughter (who actually hates her dad) to find her and help with the investigation.

The story actually began a year earlier when the agent accidently prevented a metro bombing in DC that was designed to kill the Middle Eastern leader currently staying in a coffeeshop above the metro line. Later on, the plan changes to kill both him and the president at a Camp David summit which the main characters are able to prevent.

Looking forward to Season two.

[T'Chenka]

I can't remember if I mentioned it before, but I'll state it now (again? maybe?) :

Irréversible (2002, director Gaspar Noé) is a very good film.
 

It's considered VERY controversial due to one scene (described in spoiler tags below), which makes a lot of people hate the movie, and also somebody called it "the most homophobic film of all time" and that label seems to have stuck. I personally don't find the film homophobic, but hey, that's just me.

Also, the movie moves backwards, in the same way that Memento by Christopher Nolan does. Highly recommended and IMO underrated. Doesn't deserve so much hate. The logic they use to claim that the film is homophobic is flawed IMO, but I don't want to deep dive / spoiler talk on certain scenes and characters in this post.

SPOILER

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It has an 8 minute long one-take shot scene of a woman being violently raped in a tunnel. It's key to the plot, and the director made artistic choices (camerawork) to make sure that the audience didn't feel like they were taking part in the rape. He also let the actress direct all of the takes of that scene (minus the camerawork) instead of him, so that she would be as comfortable as reasonably possible.

I don't think this is one of the better parts of the movie or anything like that, but it is key to the plot moving fowards (or, in the case of this film, backwards).

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

The other day I watched the first season of YOLO and then The Princess Bride (1987). The movie was very sweet and as a kid I would have loved it for sure, but in terms of absurdity it surpassed YOLO. The scene in which a dude from the 17th century fights with dudes from the 12th century with one dress sword, without a parrying dagger and a firearm, just slaps them with a flexible blade on chain mail and they fall like skittles, this scene cannot be justified by that this is just an event from a fairy tale that a grandfather reads to his grandson. Australia was also mentioned in one of the dialogues. In general, it's the most American fantasy, which I would gladly prefer Booshworld. By the way, it's funny coincidence that both the animated series and the movie both tell about True Love.

YOLO is drawn worse than Smiling Friends, but more energetic. It also maximizes the Nickelodeon vibe, which is unusual for Adult Swim. Very bright and psychedelic. Maybe I should try Koala Man now. Cusack's creations are crazier than American adult cartoons, and I really like this. Except perhaps Happy Tree Friends, but I hate that animated series for that there is nothing but animal abuse.

[Progressive Pessimist]

'Barbie?' 'Oppenheimer?' 'Talk to Me?' F*** all that s***! Neil Breen's new movie 'Cade: the Tortured Crossing' is out! I said that 'Dune 2' was my most anticipated movie of the year, but I completely forgot that Breen had a movie coming out. I can't wait to see it!

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

I watched Prey yesterday. I really liked the Numunuu setting and that the authors managed to recreate the vibe of the first film (although there is not a single bodybuilder here, two opposing groups are rapidly killed by the Predator in the primeval forest and only one person survives, winning with dexterity, cunning and knowledge acquired on the go, just like in the first film).

But two things greatly spoiled the impression:

1. If the authors wanted to show white people as monsters, as they probably were from the point of view of the then Numunuu, why didn't they choose the British or Americans or at least Spaniards? So it was not own repentance, just a foul insult to a foreign nation, in this case to the French one.

2. Why doesn't the Predator know how his own helmet works?

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It would have made more sense if he had just drowned in the floating mat rather than drag himself out like Baron Munchausen. After all, the Predator is ****ing heavy, and besides, with his blood loss and the loss of his arm, which could have a grappling hook, he could lose the opportunity to get out. Let him epic flounder with roars and thundering music, that's all. Because the vanilla climax scene was really dumb.

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

I started watching Asteroid City and now it seems to me that it was better to give Oppenheimer to Wes Anderson, instead of squeezing the epic blockbuster effects out of a boring biography of a boring scientist, as Nolan did.

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

By the way, it's a pity that I didn't manage to catch Asteroid City in the cinema. It needs to be seen on the big screen. Perhaps the movie was a problem for Kazakhstani cinemas because of one gay episode.

[T'Chenka]

Past Lives (2023, Celine Song) is now available online, for VOD rental or for people who sail the pirate seas with VPNs.

This is a HIGHLY. highly recommended film. Easily the best film of the year so far, IMO. Better than Oppenheimer, better than Spider-Verse 2. It's more of an indie drama romance type thing. Very well made, directing, screenplay, acting are all great. This will probably go down as a classic 2020s film with cinephiles, much like Nomadland, Drive My Car, The Worst Person In The World, etc.

Do yourself a favour and check it out. Especially if you like Before Sunrise, Wong Kar-Wai, Minari, etc.

[Benjamin Frank]

Operation Avalanche. A 2015 Canadian mockumentary of the faking of the moon landing. Although these are spoilers, they were given away in the trailer for the film.

Film makers Matt Johnson, Josh Broles and Owen Williams play versions of themselves. Matt Johnson especially is a young ambitious CIA agent who works with Owen Williams using being documentary filmmakers as their cover. They have just completed a project for the CIA in which they investigated Stanley Kubrick to determine if he knew any American government secrets.

Upon discovering that there is a Soviet mole in the NASA Apollo program, they lobby the CIA director to let them find the mole by going to Houston under the guise of doing a documentary film on the Apollo moon landing mission. Then, during this operation they bug the phone of the head of NASA and learn that the Apollo program can't land on the moon until at least 1971 due to not having landing gear that can land safely on the moon.

Matt Johnson then invents a mission he names Operation Avalanche to fake the moon landing before the end of 1969 in order to defeat the Soviet Union in the space race.

I don't know if the way this was done is actually possible in that the operation relied on previous data collected on astronauts that was then used to fool NASA's Mission Control into believing the astronauts were on the moon. However, the point here is that rather than the 'it would take thousands of people to pull off faking a moon landing' based on the film, due to the CIA agents cover as documentary filmmakers and the access to NASA that gave them, only eleven people knew of the conspiracy: the three CIA agents and their two cameramen, the three astronauts, the Director of the CIA, and the Director and former Director of NASA (in the film one Director of NASA retires rather than go along with the conspiracy.)

The film is highly energetic and wildly inventive as especially Matt Johnson is seen figuring out how to pull off the conspiracy in real time that sees him, for instance, film a mock up of his partner Owen Williams in a space suit in a Texas desert looking like he's on the moon, use his guise as a documentary filmmaker making a film about the Apollo mission to get on the London set of Stanley Kubrick filming 2001: A Space Odyssey, and, along with Josh Broles and Owen Williams come up with the line "one small step for this man (or 'a man'), one giant leap for mankind."

This seems to be something of a 'love it or hate it film' with the criticisms centering on the film being confusing, and the characters using language and not behaving in ways that were consistent with the late 1960s. (I agree with that part but I didn't really care.)  I thought it was a highly energetic and wildly inventive and entertaining film.

Two last points:
1.One critic said that if Buzz Aldrin ever met Matt Johnson, Aldrin would not just punch Johnson (Aldrin famously punched a person who asked him if he had really been on the moon) but would beat the Hell out of him. There is, of course, no evidence the three Apollo 11 astronauts were part of any faking of the moon landing.

2.As life imitating art, the three filmmakers got access to NASA's Houston space center by telling NASA they were making a historical documentary about the Apollo Mission.

[Progressive Pessimist]

So, I did end up re-watching 'Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2,' and I do think I slightly prefer it to the third one.

But I also saw 'The Whale,' finally. I know that it's been polarizing, as Aronofsky often is, but I liked it overall. Brendan Fraser obviously stands out with his performance and at the very least it's good to see him finally get some well-deserved accolades after decades languishing in bad films while always being charming and competent in them. All of the other actors are great too, especially Hong Chau who also stands out. In fact, I think that's this film's biggest asset-Aronofsky seems to have pulled back a little bit in his style and just let the actors do what they do in a simple, subdued fashion. It does feel a lot like a play, as it was adapted from, but Aronofsky elevates it by making it feel more dynamic than a film based on a play that takes place in one apartment should be. I was never bored even the entire movie is essentially just characters talking, and I even got a little verklempt as the film went on. I guess you could say I was close to blubbering!..._{I am so sorry.}

BUT as much as I would say I am positive on the movie as a whole, Arnofsky just couldn't resist the over-the-top melodrama his movies are often criticized for. The very end of the movie starting with Fraser's character going on an eating binge, gets very in-your-face and kind of disrupts what the movie was making me feel throughout most of it. Subtlety goes out the window. Not only that but I personally didn't care for one of the characters: a Christian missionary who felt like he existed more to have exposition delivered to him. He had an arc too, but it didn't feel all that necessary. The film was also very familiar to me as a huge fan of another Aronofsky film, 'The Wrestler.' This film is almost like a select few scenes from that movie were expanded. But maybe that's what drew Aronofsky to this project. It is a microcosm of all the concepts and themes he likes to explore: familial conflict, religion, self-destructive obsessions, sexuality, etc. None of that ruined the movie though, it just slightly undermined how relatable and human I found it for most of its run-time.

I would still recommend it if you think you can take it, it is a bit of a rough, draining watch, and I may not ever find myself watching it again unlike 'The Wrestler,' which I've seen dozens of times even though it can be just as emotionally exhausting.

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

I watched Asteroid City. Visually, the film is stunning, the acting is Room-level (which is an amazing achievement for Wes Anderson, given the cast of the best actors), the plot is so nonsensical that it's clearly written by a neural network (although I liked the general idea that a Wes came up with). Maybe if Wes hadn't been too lazy and written the script completely on his own, while choosing the biography of Oppenheimer instead of the biography of a non-existent playwriter, it would have turned out to be a masterpiece. Overall, the movie disappointed me.

[Punxsutawney Phil]

Saw Patlabor 2.

Interesting work, all things considered. I understood what it was drawing from rather well (very much keyed in to the Japanese environment), but was flying blind in regards to the characters. I don't know the franchise very well.

I would rate it 7.5 out of 10 I suppose.

[Meclazine for Israel]

'Barbie?' 'Oppenheimer?' 'Talk to Me?' F*** all that s***! Neil Breen's new movie 'Cade: the Tortured Crossing' is out! I said that 'Dune 2' was my most anticipated movie of the year, but I completely forgot that Breen had a movie coming out. I can't wait to see it!

Will check it out. Oppenheimer pulled in USD$900M.

1 hour of Los Alamos which was cool. 2 hours of drivel about his security clearance.

[Progressive Pessimist]

I watched Asteroid City. Visually, the film is stunning, the acting is Room-level (which is an amazing achievement for Wes Anderson, given the cast of the best actors), the plot is so nonsensical that it's clearly written by a neural network (although I liked the general idea that a Wes came up with). Maybe if Wes hadn't been too lazy and written the script completely on his own, while choosing the biography of Oppenheimer instead of the biography of a non-existent playwriter, it would have turned out to be a masterpiece. Overall, the movie disappointed me.

I still want to check it out. But even though I haven't seen it I'm going to defend the acting style Anderson always uses in his films. For whatever reason he directs his actors to deliver dialogue in a dry and monotone way. It might take getting used to for some, but I always know to expect it.

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

I still want to check it out. But even though I haven't seen it I'm going to defend the acting style Anderson always uses in his films. For whatever reason he directs his actors to deliver dialogue in a dry and monotone way. It might take getting used to for some, but I always know to expect it.

Oh, I'm damn used to this style from Russian movies since the late nineties. This style is called "Actors don't care, they're waiting a smoke break."

This was not so conspicuous when the main character of the movie was a child. It could be explained to that this was a child's view. Now the main character is a photographer-actor with a fake beard and it doesn't work.

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

The other day I watched Predator (1987), after Prey, then I watched The Predator (2018).

I saw the first film as a child, but only a fragment, on a VCR while visiting my relatives. Even now, the film makes a deep impression. I especially liked the gradual, phased exploring of an unknown threat. In an unexpected way, it works even now, when people know Predators like the back of hand. Very good pace, plunging into a nightmarish story.

And The Predator... Iron Man with a Predator suit... Another teenage chewing gum about superheroes. This movie sucks so much that I remembered that I had already watched it in 2018 only after seeing the climactic scene on the starship's roof: it's the only thing that I remember back then.

I also now think that while Prey does return to the roots of the series, it didn't manage to capture ten percent of the original vibe. I think in order to shoot a real return to the roots, instead of Predator, you will have to take a completely different creature, with a completely different civilization. Of course, this will be a radical reboot, which hardly anyone will agree to, but this is the only way to return the feeling of exploration to a wide audience.

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

I already tried to watch Pink Flamingos once a few years ago, then I didn’t like it and quit at the tenth minute, although in general I like trash films. Day before yesterday I've watched it in its entirety. I still don't like it. Perhaps the problem is that it hasn't aged well. It was as if the director was trying to collect in one film all the disgusting things that exist, from the senseless killing of animals to Nazi symbols, presenting it as a supposed manifesto of a New America. Now that society as a whole is neutral towards LGBTQ+ people and NO longer considers them dirty perverts who are ready to commit any perversion for the sake of perversion, the movie began to look like just an insult like blackface. Back then, a gay director might have found it quite fun to troll society in this way; now it's completely off target. And in terms of humor, the movie looks like a gore version of the Benny Hill show. One thing hasn't changed: it's still the most disgusting movie ever made. I had to skip the ****hole scene; the director still managed to find an unbearable spectacle for me.

But even here I haven't seen a more horrific scene than when a child played with a corpse at Weekend at Bernie's.

[dead0man]

I went through a John Waters phase, I liked the later works (Cecil B., Pecker, A Dirty Shame) over the "classics", which I agree were just gross for gross sake.  Which is fine, somebody had to do it.  I suppose the Troma Films did (do still actually) push the same buttons, Waters was just more "artsy" (gay?) about it.

[dead0man]

The Venture Bros movie has come out, to wrap up the series.  I bought it a few weeks ago, but I think it's on Max for free now.  If you liked the show (and you probably would if you watched it), the movie is just way more of the same.  Good stuff.

The Metalacolypse movie is coming out too, can't wait.


<and to mention two things that are epic that more people should see but most people have never hear of, RRR on Netflix and Patriot on Amazon>

[Oleg 🇰🇿🤝🇺🇦]

I went through a John Waters phase, I liked the later works (Cecil B., Pecker, A Dirty Shame) over the "classics", which I agree were just gross for gross sake.  Which is fine, somebody had to do it.  I suppose the Troma Films did (do still actually) push the same buttons, Waters was just more "artsy" (gay?) about it.

I think Peter Jackson is superior to them in this field. Troma Films are too teenage, although they also show to some extent the truth of life, Pink Flamingos is entirely speculative, an armchair thing, closed in on itself. Peter Jackson's trash is truly innovative and also hyper-realistic in depicting real life, especially in Meet the Feebles. It's a huge loss for global culture that he stopped making trash movies.

I would also like to mention Svetlana Baskova, who is very famous among the Russian-speaking audience, but is hardly known in the world. There is no director who could more accurately reflect the vibe and thinking of Russian life.

[Progressive Pessimist]

In today's entry of "I can't believe I watched this:" the somewhat infamous Hallmark TV movie, 'Riding the Bus With My Sister.'

This movie would be your typical clichéd, predictable, schmaltzy Hallmark movie if it wasn't for Rosie O'Donnell's baffling performance as a special needs woman, which is what I watched it for. And it did not disappoint. This is tough to watch for how over-the-top and misguided this portrayal is but you also can't look away. She sounds like Pee-Wee Herman! It would be insulting to people with actual mental disabilities if it didn't make O'Donnell look bad. This is the ultimate example (more than 'I Am Sam') of going full...uhhh...you know. This movie is loosely based on a true story but I can't imagine the author of the book being very flattered by this adaptation of her sister, or even if herself. Andie McDowell plays the main character, the sister of O'Donnell's character, and she is terrible too. She puts on this weird transatlantic affectation that comes and goes, and her character is just a complete superficial b****.

It was surprisingly engaging though for how much of a trainwreck it was, but it also made me feel bad for the supportive cast, who were serviceable in their roles, and for the real people this film may have based its characters on. Not to mention that this was directed by Angelica Huston who clearly did not inhetit her father's aptitude to direct. I do feel bad for her too though because how could anyone direct this screenplay with those two lead stars?

[T'Chenka]

Swiss Army Man (2016)

directors Daniels (Daniel Schienert, Daniel Kwan)

4 / 5 stars

An absurd movie that's surprisingly deep and philosophical. Much like Everything Everywhere All At Once, it fools you and lures you in with it's silliness, only to get real on you.

Also, this movie in particular should be required viewing for all Atlas posters. Anybody who's seen it, you probably know what I'm talking about.

[Progressive Pessimist]

Swiss Army Man (2016)

directors Daniels (Daniel Schienert, Daniel Kwan)

4 / 5 stars

An absurd movie that's surprisingly deep and philosophical. Much like Everything Everywhere All At Once, it fools you and lures you in with it's silliness, only to get real on you.

Also, this movie in particular should be required viewing for all Atlas posters. Anybody who's seen it, you probably know what I'm talking about.

Love this movie. It's either the smartest dumb movie ever or the dumbest smart movie.