I found this to be a disappointing movie. I understand everything in PedroPT's post, but it still seems to me that the religious themes are very superficial.. often obnoxious. The snakes & mazes were especially gimmicky.
All of the characters behaved in reckless and absurd ways. Loki lets snap judgements dictate all of his actions, breaks into basically every house in the movie, and randomly disregards possible leads while doggedly pursuing others. The police chief and him yell at each other constantly and thus encourage each other to act even more rashly (one hopes that this is not how actual police behave). Jackman's character immediately turns violent, psychopathic, and insulting at every opportunity, and worse, the movie seems to justify (or at least consider to be of ambiguous merit) vigilante torture as a means of obtaining information.
It is shocking to me that people believe this movie raises any serious moral questions or issues (whether about torture, vigilantism, or 'the individual and the institution'). As far as I can see, it does not; it has nothing significant whatever to say on these topics.
The connections between the different possibilities which Loki followed are very contrived; is there even a single piece of clue or information that they don't force to be valid and relevant at the end? Perhaps some people see that as a developed and intricate plot, but it makes me feel somewhat like rolling my eyes.
For all that the atmosphere and cinematography were praised, I was also unimpressed with them. Yes, much of it is dark, but I didn't find the use of light or darkness to be particularly meaningful. Maybe I just didn't get the style... I was hoping it would be more like the old german expressionism in use of light, but oh well. I think it would have benefited from some longer and wider shots, but I can't really pretend to know anything about cinematography.
As others, I'm a fan of Gyllenhaal, but I think it's a shame he does so many bad movies like this. His unique charisma and acting style are probably the only redeeming part of this mess.
loading replies
I'm taking the bait :). A two seems like a rather strong dislike.
I found this to be a disappointing movie. I understand everything in PedroPT's post, but it still seems to me that the religious themes are very superficial.. often obnoxious. The snakes & mazes were especially gimmicky.
I don't think the religious themes were there for the audience to take as a big plot point. It's just another thing to add mood and characteristics.
All of the characters behaved in reckless and absurd ways. Loki lets snap judgements dictate all of his actions, breaks into basically every house in the movie, and randomly disregards possible leads while doggedly pursuing others. The police chief and him yell at each other constantly and thus encourage each other to act even more rashly (one hopes that this is not how actual police behave).
[...]
The connections between the different possibilities which Loki followed are very contrived; is there even a single piece of clue or information that they don't force to be valid and relevant at the end? Perhaps some people see that as a developed and intricate plot, but it makes me feel somewhat like rolling my eyes.
Most of the things you mention are just the edge the movie packs. It wanted to be a dark piece and this is a way of accomplishing that. I don't think Loki had much of a choice of handling the case except for looking into previous offenders and reports. His methods were also etablished as alternative which you just have to take as his thing. Needless to say that we don't see all his (wasted) efforts on screen.
Jackman's character immediately turns violent, psychopathic, and insulting at every opportunity, and worse, the movie seems to justify (or at least consider to be of ambiguous merit) vigilante torture as a means of obtaining information.
It is shocking to me that people believe this movie raises any serious moral questions or issues (whether about torture, vigilantism, or 'the individual and the institution'). As far as I can see, it does not; it has nothing significant whatever to say on these topics.
Jackman's character also had his issues resulting in him taking such strong actions. You can argue about how serious moral questions in fictional movies can be but it makes for a discussion. I doubt the question hasn't crossed your mind.
For all that the atmosphere and cinematography were praised, I was also unimpressed with them. Yes, much of it is dark, but I didn't find the use of light or darkness to be particularly meaningful. Maybe I just didn't get the style... I was hoping it would be more like the old german expressionism in use of light, but oh well. I think it would have benefited from some longer and wider shots, but I can't really pretend to know anything about cinematography.
There were some great shots but most of the time I didn't pay much attention to it since it worked for me (the opening was beautiful and for example the rush to the hospital at the end). The movie was already long so there wasn't really much to play with for them.
Too bad you didn't like it but I know that suspension of disbelief can ruin an entire movie. I just feel a 2 is needlessly harsh even if you didn't enjoy the movie that much.
Why the hate?
Is the source material so sacred that everybody is pissed because this is too American or something?
I liked it. There are remakes of Japanese movies that are much worse.loading replies
@xander75 This played out like Twilight for edgy teenagers... "Death Note" is kinda pulpy at times but at least it has tension and some smarts.
I didn't realize this was a Predator movie the first time I saw the poster and thought this was some random horror movie but the positive buzz certainly didn't pass me by so here we are again. After watching it I'm certainly... shocked?
From the get go this did very little to pull me in, be it the CG animals, one-dimensional plot or the the selfish attitude of our heroine. Now obviously one can argue how much that all matters when the action is good but it didn't really scratch that itch for me either... the Predator fighting with the animals was certainly entertaining but random guys biting the bullet with mostly offcam/unclear CG gore not so much. Would have been nice if they showed some wits when they fought him at the camp but somehow him going invisible is enough reason to lower their weapons and start talking to each other. She saw how the camouflage works multiple times in action already..?!!
What all those scenes, and the movie poster for that matter, certainly established, is that our protagonist has little to worry and that a showdown was coming but I would never have predicted the amounts of bullshit that would contain:
- Somehow becomes a baller and expert in alien technology. Knows when the Predator is coming, takes her magic herbs to immediately lower her blood temperature (but is not shivering and still standing up) and is in the Predators path who obviously doesn't see a standing corpse right in front of it or notices her moving out of the way...
- Never used the gun but knows the right angle to shoot and remove his mask (betting on this being a weakness when this did little to stop it before).
- Gets to conveniently escape for the n-th time and has enough time to finish up some traps (which the Predator even hit on some random tree lol).
- Gets hit to the head twice from the shield that cut through the Predators limbs, spear and even stone but is unscathed.
- Can easily remove a fang attached to it's face to save herself just in time.
- GPS dog that always magically reappears is ready to bring her the tomahawk...
- Manages to sit on top of the Predator and even pull him into the bog with a tiny rope and a much much smaller statue.
- The Predator obviously submerges immediately, but little does it know of her the grand plan to have him placed at that exact LOS of the mask in anticipation that he is gonna fire from his gun (despite not having had his mask for the whole time) while he is already targeted by the laser the entire time... b r a v o. Obviously that one shot was also enough to kill it.
...
Honest to god - how does a movie with such a contrived finale get so much praise, or even leave the script writing phase??loading replies
@nytemyst I mean almost any movie needs to be given some leeway when it comes to realism or logic but merely featuring an alien life force in it shouldn't excuse a bad script... This one is asking for quite a lot.
The best thing about this episode is the amount of fragile lowkey pro-rape men whining and triggered about it.
loading replies
@gonzopersona Seeing how you throw the word "rape" around you are not quite as woke as you think you are. I sincerely hope this is not how you see people IRL who do not share your tastes in pop culture.
Excuse me this is supposed to be taking place on Valentine's day and they say that in 2 days Trezzure is performing in Glastonbury, but Glasto is taking place in the summer..
Royal was crazy Wolf from the Walking Dead
Once again the story was all over the place
loading replies
@tasa24 Yeah... they just fund/buy existing projects and make them "fit" with their desired holiday thus making most of them superficial to the concept (ex. https://twitter.com/stardustchelsea/status/1052786025192415232).
Just a small note to potential watchers: this is not the best place to start with Fate/stay night. You are looking at the adaptation of the visual novel's third route and at this point they assume you are familiar with the stories players and initial outline. That said: I think ufotable did a fantastic job with this. I struggled a bit when they did the fast-forward but after that it was quite the threat.
loading replies
@dipperdolphin https://anidb.net/perl-bin/animedb.pl?show=rel&aid=3348 :smile:
I just went with the production order of the shows tbh. but there is probably "no right" for anime watchers. What I'd not recommend is to go with the chronological order. Fate/Zero was a prequel released after the fact so I don't see the need to watch that first. I knew beforehand that Deen's adaptation isn't the most popular (and am to this date not the biggest Fate fan) but at least that way the bar will not drastically change between shows. Just take your time going through them as you will have to watch the setup of the routes quite a few times... the third movie is still far away at this point.
Like most PG-13 offerings, Searching is just emmental: full of holes, cheesy and too much will make you queasy. And it's not really gouda.
The movie's not a total waste, however. The found footage aspect (the film is entirely presented through screen activity on mobile phones, laptops, desktops...) is well done and the actors often hit their marks.
The film's major drawbacks, however, are the ending, which we know as soon as we see the film's MPAA rating (no matter how clever they think they are at trying to convince us otherwise) and the WTFs, like the police don't check a missing teen's text messages and no one has ever heard of catfishing .
Hey, if the film isn't going to give me any credit, I'm certainly not above doing the same.
loading replies
Why the f*** is this getting 49% from 9 votes only when it's not even out yet. C'mon bitches, be real, the trailer is awesome.
loading replies
@snowfall That's why you're rating it a 10 ;)? Probably users having their movie scrapped wrongly (considering the 80 plays and 300 collected stats).
This movie is absolutely amazing and I don't understand all the negative reviews. Really? You didn’t understand what this movie is about? Really? You were expecting a horror, fantastical movie?
Let me make it easy for you. This movie is about depression. Being at a strange place. Not feeling belonging to a place. This is like Lars von Trier’s Melancholia. Except this is much better and less boring than Lars von Trier’s movie.
I was planing on watching this movie in 2-3 sittings thinking it will be slow but this movie completely surprised me and I watched it from start to end. Juno Temple plays so well in this and I could completely understand her pain.
loading replies
Really? You didn't look at any of the promotional artwork, trailer or description? Except for the French posters it is made to look like a (traditional) horror movie: www.youtube.com/watch?v=elU_AlgW6Lw. I can totally understand anyone with that reaction!
It's been over a year since I watched this but I don't think this was about depression nor should be compared to Melancholia. The "Magic" (from the movie title) is the catalyst for things going wrong here.
I enjoyed the mood anyways but if you were looking for a horror movie with a regular structure this will not satisfy you. If the marketers were a little bit more upfront about the content the rating would be a lot better for this on IMDB too because it is not a bad movie making.
Finally had a chance to see this... it's been two years since it's premiere at TIFF and some evil mastermind deceided to move the release date further up ;(. Thankfully it did not disappoint.
It's pretty much a crowd pleaser so I would recommend to watch it in the cinema. Barrett's script puts it well above the regular horror fare we get this days and Wingard does a good job directing. It's of course not without flaws; the shaky cam in the beginning is a bit much and the usual horror logic applies. That said: it doesn't really matter. Your dark soul will have plenty of fun with it.loading replies
The blender scene was just awesome. That's how you pander to horror fans :)!
At this point "Dread Central presents" is code for really bad flicks for me (excluding international imports)... Yes, the creepy mute clown idea isn't bad (and would fit in with other iconic horror characters) but somehow this ended up way worse than the already weak anthology he spawned from. The script is absolute garbage. Nothing is made off the "Halloween" setting and you can really tell that they had no idea how to get to 90 minutes because not only is it full of dumb clichés but they also bring in characters when they need a quick kill. I was bored out of my mind before the the mid point and I can only stomach so many "UHHHH, I STABBED HIM ONCE, LEFT MY WEAPON THERE AND NOW I'LL CERTAINLY RUN TO SAFETY AND HE WILL TOTALLY NOT COME BACK" moments > lmao at the terrible wooden plank scene. There's a surprisingly gory kill in there but the rest cannot even shine there due to editing/FX.
loading replies
@mr-sackamano Even more reason to make it count.
Anyone know why this episode hasn't aired yet? The episodes were monthly up until July, when everything seems to have just halted.
loading replies
@littlegreycells The episodes are (supposed to be) Holiday themed hence the irregular release schedule.
How the hell has Borat not been cancelled in 2020? It's a wealthy Western man caricaturizing a poor Kazakh in public spaces as a crazy and ignorant racist. He's basically inciting racism while wearing blackface and people are like, "He's so hilarious! haha"
For people claiming Sacha Cohen is "oh, so against PC-culture, he doesn’t care", then why does he retired his other 'satirical' characters like: Ali G (black culture), Dictator Aladeen (Arabs), Bruno (gay people)? Oh, that’s right, he is scared of 'cancel culture'. Cohen has a Golden Racism Pass for Borat because American 'cancel culture' is veeeery selective on who they target, and this is due to the famous American ignorance. Here is the loophole: all ex-Soviets countries/cultures are free to ridiculed. American humor has always been about making fun of other countries. They also love making fun of immigrants’ accents. But since they don't want to be seen as racists (even though they are), it's their loophole to still make jokes at the expense of certain nationalities. It’s a vile double standard.
Borat is a racist caricature of a central Asian person, no it's not funny, and no it's not 'satirising racism' to perpetuate hateful stereotypes about Central Asia. And miss me with the, 'this movie mock America and not Kazakhstan' shit. Can you imagine the outrage it would provoke if the very same movie was filmed mocking black people? Or trans people?
And meanwhile, Sacha Cohen is the spokesman for the ADL which polices the portrayal of Jewish people. Oh, the irony.
loading replies
@guenguer Wait what, he was actually honored by the ADL? The irony is indeed strong with that one.
That's a strange one but since it's for the 4th of July it's not the worst idea to take on political hot topics. These days most of the media produced with a message is usually a left leaning and this one could also just have been that too but despite some easy jabs at Trump it actually also questions the idealization of the "American Dream" of those looking to cross (&the "nice people"). Now don't get me wrong; this is far off from being grounded in reality which also makes it hard for me to accept this as anything relevant to the discussion but it's worth pointing out that it isn't just a "you have to think" lesson.
From a fictional movie standpoint it was a weird mix of previous ideas (ie. "The Stepford Wives" or "Sleep Dealer") which were decently executed but also not without it's heavy "horror" label. I'm sort off glad it didn't go the "Undocumented" route which was sort-off implied from the intro (and given her previous works not unexpected).
It's OK to pass the time but anything else concerned with the morality of the topic was not really coherent to me thus only a 5 (no idea how we are supposed to read Shawn Ashmore's character or them getting really violent to get out of an "assimilation" facility and her killing her rapist and their baby being the reinforcement needed to go back DESPITE all of this happening BECAUSE she wanted to get away from that)...loading replies
@tdshelley082 I mean certainly but not many women want to keep their "rape" baby... Early on we get reinforcement that she does not believe in abortion but certainly does not want the kid which is why I find it odd that she afterwards really wants it but still has the desire to off the father and to go back. She wanted to escape that reality...
Is it a political dipshit episode again?
loading replies
@hildebread As @mansemat metions; it's certainly political to a degree but it's not a coherent message for either side of the spectrum.
Shout by jumper
I was cringing at the antagonist’s dumb mistakes like I would the protagonists in a horror movie.
Movie took itself way too seriously to have such a generic motivation for henry cavil. First half of the movie was fine. IMO first half should've had more henry, and there should’ve been more focus on the fights rather than the chases. but the second half was so predictable and boring, really just took me outta the movie.
This movie is trash, and they should stop making this series.
loading replies
@michael-scott-fan-page Good job on pointing out the main issues of this one and I'm glad that for once a critical comment is actually upboated on trakt. No idea why this got the cool "best non-Marvel action movie" vote on so many 2018 lists ;~.
I APPLAUDED IT FOR BEING DIFFERENT
loading replies
@maniacb Yeah I'd expect auto-scrobble to be quite dangerous on youtube :D...
I APPLAUDED IT FOR BEING DIFFERENT
loading replies
@maniacb This is now a dead meme by deletion from TMDB.
It seems like the script for this was just grabbed from a pile at random and slightly rewritten to tie it into the franchise.
Poorly acted, poorly written, poorly paced and just generic in every way possible. After the brilliance of 10 Cloverfield Lane this was a huge letdown.
loading replies
@ryanimator Well, this actually did happen http://collider.com/god-particle-cloverfield-movie-details-oren-uziel/ ;)...
The first bit is all right, nothing special but not too terrible but it builds up so that the last ten minutes are FANTASTIC. You don't expect any of the final twists.
loading replies
@jadedchick85 Yes because none of them made any sense lol :)
Denis Villenueve. A solid lineup. A different take on first contact. I loved Sicario but went in expecting a cerebral epic sci-fi.
That was a mistake.
Good things:
- Some really nice visual scenes
- Interesting aliens Calligraphy aliens!
- Clear theme of communication is omnipresent
- A neat score that might be awesome in a different movieBad things:
- The acting
- The lack of emotional reaction to ALIENS! The students asking to turn on the TV, all of the main characters
- Lack of useful characters Only the aliens and Louise actually did anything the entire movie.
- Supporting characters are very stupid in an attempt to foil the main character slightly
- Very clumsy exposition. Genre-typical news reports, voice-overs, dumb characters asking stupid questions.
- Very slow pacing. This worked in parts of Sicario, but didn't work in this movie because there was no tension. The main characters never seemed remotely threatened.
- Lousie showing up at school thinking everyone will be there after aliens arrive and there's a state of emergency
- Why can't you translate alien language like you can translate Farsi. This is a paraphrase but in the spirit of what Colonel Weber was saying.
- Useless love interest when the costars have no chemistry.
- Ultrasecure military base lets someone steal a ton of explosives and put it in an ALIEN SPACECRAFT without anyone noticing.
- Many unbelievable plot points
- Poor dialogue Let's make a baby - real quote
- Poor handling of the major plot points Looking through time seems to undermine the fact that the aliens need help. Why did one have to die if they could see the future? Why did only one die when they were right next to each other?
- Very heavy handed moral messaging that didn't align with the rest of the movie.
- Why couldn't Ian also see into the future as he studied the language, or any of the others?Overall extremely disappointing. I'm honestly surprised critics or general moviegoers like this. The premise was very good. It's a real shame the execution failed so miserably.
loading replies
@corn ok cool, there is absolutely no way one could be a douche with sarcasm. /s /s /s /s
(we should probably not derail this any further ;))
Denis Villenueve. A solid lineup. A different take on first contact. I loved Sicario but went in expecting a cerebral epic sci-fi.
That was a mistake.
Good things:
- Some really nice visual scenes
- Interesting aliens Calligraphy aliens!
- Clear theme of communication is omnipresent
- A neat score that might be awesome in a different movieBad things:
- The acting
- The lack of emotional reaction to ALIENS! The students asking to turn on the TV, all of the main characters
- Lack of useful characters Only the aliens and Louise actually did anything the entire movie.
- Supporting characters are very stupid in an attempt to foil the main character slightly
- Very clumsy exposition. Genre-typical news reports, voice-overs, dumb characters asking stupid questions.
- Very slow pacing. This worked in parts of Sicario, but didn't work in this movie because there was no tension. The main characters never seemed remotely threatened.
- Lousie showing up at school thinking everyone will be there after aliens arrive and there's a state of emergency
- Why can't you translate alien language like you can translate Farsi. This is a paraphrase but in the spirit of what Colonel Weber was saying.
- Useless love interest when the costars have no chemistry.
- Ultrasecure military base lets someone steal a ton of explosives and put it in an ALIEN SPACECRAFT without anyone noticing.
- Many unbelievable plot points
- Poor dialogue Let's make a baby - real quote
- Poor handling of the major plot points Looking through time seems to undermine the fact that the aliens need help. Why did one have to die if they could see the future? Why did only one die when they were right next to each other?
- Very heavy handed moral messaging that didn't align with the rest of the movie.
- Why couldn't Ian also see into the future as he studied the language, or any of the others?Overall extremely disappointing. I'm honestly surprised critics or general moviegoers like this. The premise was very good. It's a real shame the execution failed so miserably.
loading replies
@corn you can't flag your shouts as reviews... trakt decides that by itself, by #words or paragraphs I guess. no need to douche.
Possibly Shinkai's best work so far, and as a massive fan of both 5cm and Garden of Words I do not say that lightly. The animation is breathtaking as always but some scenes go beyond mere visual splendor and are just mesmerizing. The characters are so fun to be around and you'll find yourself rooting for them and hoping it all works out. I was slightly concerned when I saw the "boob fondling" scene in the trailer but even that becomes a genuinely charming gag throughout the movie, believe it or not!
As to be expected of Shinkai, the film also takes you on a roller coaster of emotional highs and lows and keeps you guessing how it will end until pretty much the last minute.
I cannot recommend this enough.
loading replies
@maniacb So this isn't "Freaky Friday" glossy edition :)?
Why the f*** is this getting 49% from 9 votes only when it's not even out yet. C'mon bitches, be real, the trailer is awesome.
loading replies
@snowfall looks like nesting from the email link is wrong :(.
Why the f*** is this getting 49% from 9 votes only when it's not even out yet. C'mon bitches, be real, the trailer is awesome.
loading replies
@snowfall Well, the scraping part comes before the scrobbling > applying the meta data to the movie ☺
Like its name, this movie is a bit of a trainwreck. For one, it is far too long. And while Amy Schumer proves that she has the stuff to potentially make rom-coms funny again, the script of this movie does not give her the opportunity this time. There are a few laugh out loud moments, but most of the jokes fall flat.
loading replies
Huh? She wrote the script herself.
I'm inclined to only give it a "meh". Feels like a movie I would have liked if I was a little kid. There were a bunch of characters that hardly had any lines and if they spoke they described their archetype, seriously? Marvel has a tendency to shoehorn in horrible dialogue for their "universe" but that was just especially low. And whatever the romance in this is supposed to be: not buying it^2.
The production values of the movie are high so it works as a popcorn movie but all the raving comments the movie had in advance had me hoping for a good movie.
(Baby Groot is one of the worst things I ever saw on screen btw.)loading replies
@ManiacB @deanzel I admit that I have the tendency to shit on things but that scene really annoyed the fuck out of me. There is a reason why I avoid things like Pixar movies because I know they are not for me but Marvel is a tricky beast and they certainly want to sell toys too. Even better that the cool dads are going to see the same movies.
I'm inclined to only give it a "meh". Feels like a movie I would have liked if I was a little kid. There were a bunch of characters that hardly had any lines and if they spoke they described their archetype, seriously? Marvel has a tendency to shoehorn in horrible dialogue for their "universe" but that was just especially low. And whatever the romance in this is supposed to be: not buying it^2.
The production values of the movie are high so it works as a popcorn movie but all the raving comments the movie had in advance had me hoping for a good movie.
(Baby Groot is one of the worst things I ever saw on screen btw.)loading replies
@deanzel ♡＾▽＾♡ http://i.imgur.com/abO7tug.jpg
/1 0 c h a r
Consider me slightly pissed at this movie... I wish I would have neglected for the "FROM THE PRODUCERS OF" blurp like I usually would but the internet PR never sleeps.
The premise of the movie is cool and timely but it is really freaking boring for like the whole run time. They don't do much other than search for the edgiest "haunt" all movie long while stopping by at like 8 of them. Half of them would already have been enough because I wouldn't even call the people here characters so little interaction/time they had with each other.
Once they seem to get to the "place" it throws away it's main idea and comes along with the most generic baddies around and pulls an anticlimactic shitty ending.
Just like many other found footage movies this one is extremely guilty of idiotic and illogical camera recordings. The main story points make hardly any sense and are a cheap plot device.
At least it wasn't that predictable and had a few OK scenes at the "haunts".loading replies
@Pedro I sorta like em too and I didn't flat out hate the movie... it just ruined it for me because they could have done something good. The scenes with the girl on the poster were cool but could have done w/o the misleading camera distortions. There is some good footage there from some of the haunted houses so you'll probably enjoy it too but I'm not sure if you end up liking it very much because the movie makes some severe mistakes imho (there are glowing reviews to be found for this anyways).
Am I the only one that didn't laugh a single time during this movie? :/
loading replies
I guess she came on a bit strong with all the farting but I found it enjoyable ;).
