Comments | talvalin: September's films (67

talvalin

September's films (67 - 76)

Dec 12, 2006 12:10

67) DOA: Dead Or Alive - exploitative, mindless, excessive wire-fu, and yet oh so very entertaining. Probably bears no resemblance to the source material, but who cares? Also, Devon Aoki is not remotely attractive. Seriously. Whoever cast her should be taken out and shot. I would have happily settled for a Chinese actress to play the Japanese ninja ( Read more... )

52filmchallenge, films, ineptitude

Comments 17

chickenfeet2003 December 12 2006, 13:00:35 UTC

I f you liked Casablanca I highly recommend To Have and Have Not.

pashazade December 12 2006, 13:18:30 UTC

You'd never watched Casablanca? Don't you know that all stories are one, and that one *is* Casablanca? Call yourself a film buff.....pah! Pah, I say!

Tuesday is overreaction day..

cross_scars December 12 2006, 13:25:34 UTC

I took the fantasy elements of Pan's Labyrinth to be "real". I have certain other issues with the film, even if I liked it, but the real/illusion argument isn't one of them.

I guess I should watch Election II. I've purposely avoided it believing it would be another poor, quick-fire HK sequel (like, as you say, Infernal Affairs) but I know it's had a good reception and that I should revise this opinion.

davenchit December 12 2006, 15:21:46 UTC

You *are* a film buff. I know a few people, "casual" watchers of films, who finally got to see Casablanca. They were disappointed. The typical reaction was "Oh, but it was so cliched", a reaction which left me gibbering with rage. I don't kill them though, I just tell them, "It seems cliched because a thousand romantic movies made in Hollywood after Casablanca took some part of that movie- a scene, a look, a line- and made it part of itself." I've seen similar reactions to the Seven Samurai as well. Horsemen riding down to pickets and carefully erected wooden stakes? Thirteenth Warrior. Short cameos introducing the characters? Good, the Bad and the Ugly? A handful of flawed warriors protecting a defenseless village against bandits? Too many to count.

talvalin December 12 2006, 15:55:50 UTC

I'd been looking forward to seeing Seven Samurai for years, but I waited until I could see it in a cinema. Luckily when the chance came, it was a worthy cinema (the NFT Cinema 1) and I was blown away. I couldn't believe how a 50 year old film could be that awesome. Three hours long and I didn't feel it at all - I love Kurosawa's films generally, but this is far and away his best work.

My film buff friend despairs of the fact that his girlfriend loves watching films but refuses to watch anything black and white. At least she watches foreign films without complaining about having to read sub-titles but still...

davenchit December 13 2006, 04:37:38 UTC

>but refuses to watch anything black and white.

The indescribable horror. I think many people associate black and white with obsolete technology and those funny, jerky movies of the 1930s. They don't realise it is a different medium altogether, with its own rules and style.

rparvaaz December 28 2006, 12:09:37 UTC

>> but refuses to watch anything black and white.

Heh. Didn't you have the same problem a few years back?

Thread 11

eclexys December 18 2006, 15:16:26 UTC

I'll just note that in addition to stupid science, the formaldehyde scene at the beginning was based on a popular anti-American myth that the USFK is poisoning Korean soil, quite literally. Apparently some small amount of the stuff was dumped into the Han River, and a big deal was made. No big deal was made about the many companies around Seoul indiscriminately and illegally dumping ( ... )

eclexys December 18 2006, 15:17:52 UTC

Whoops, forgot to mention, I was rantng about The Host. As for The Bow I haven't seen it, but I heard it wasn't worth it. If you liked it, maybe I'll give it a go.