Secret Santa: Entertainment Board Reviews and Commentary 2018 Edition

HissatsuShoujo said:
Ocean 8:

My only complaint, it should have been gay as fuck though. Gayness makes everything better.

7/10
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Imagine the most gay ass number, that would be the next Ocean's movie. Lesbians, Gay dudes, drag queens, everything robbing some straight white old man business' casino chain. It will be some of the most fabulous shit you ever did see, nominated for costume design, musical score, directing, cinematography and a lot of the minor awards. But it would be tasteful gayness, not offensive to all but the most hardcore of the libs who oppose something so tongue-in-cheek outlandish biz. RuPaul also has an amazing cameo in it.
 
Primer

Primer is a beautiful disaster of a movie. It's a high concept science fiction film shot by a bunch of amateurs on no budget and it is very obvious they didn't know what they were doing. However, what the movie lacks in technical competence it makes up for with a tight script that is well thought out, intelligent and is the best example of a time travel movie with no logical flaws or plot holes. The film is a fascinating take on an old concept coming at the topic from the perspective of engineers rather than screenwriters.

Primer is the story of a couple engineers Abe and Aaron trying to get ahead in life by working on inventions in Aaron's garage in their spare time. Eventually they invent a thing even they aren't quite sure what it is or what it does, but they know it could change the world. Eventually Abe figures out that one of the effects of their machine is the ability to send objects back in time. After lots of experimentation he figures out the exact rules of the machine before telling Aaron about the machine. From there the guys formulate rules and have long conversations about how to make some money from their invention without creating time paradoxes, alternate time lines and all the other potential headaches that come with time travel. What starts as a simple money making scheme eventually spirals into a series of betrayals and twists as the temptation of the machine is too much for either man to handle.

Primer is the kind of movie that needs to be watched more than once to fully understand the story. While there's a lot of dialogue explaining the nature of the machine and the mechanics behind the time travel the movie expects you to keep up with all the multiple versions of the character and who time traveled when. There's no exposition to explain it and the movie doesn't make any kind of flow chart. Keeping up is nearly impossible on your initial watch. Rewatches help because you can notice clues you missed with your foreknowledge. This is one of Primer's most intriguing elements. It's a movie that was designed to be watched more than once and even then I had to take notes the second time I watched to get everything straight. Watching it now years later and feeling I have a good grasp of events I feel smug watching and understanding the film without any aid. The only other movies that really make me feel this way are David Lynch films.

The other aspect of the film I really enjoy is it was written by an engineer that refused to dumb down the dialogue. The movie presents a complex idea of time travel and its mechanics and it expects the audience to figure it out without simplified explanations that would skip a lot of the nuances in the more techincal parts of the dialogue. This is a film that trusts the intelligence of its audience and isn't afraid to leave you in the dust if you're not paying attention.

The film isn't just a technical manual for its theory of time travel, it's a character study of its two main character Abe and Aaron. Abe is controlling and cautious, Aaron is more reckless and careless. Its a classic odd couple scenario, but in this film they don't balance each other out. Instead it leads to a lot of mistrust and paranoia as the two try not to just work out how to time travel safely, but also debate the morality of what they are doing. Their opposite personalities lead then through a dark path that only make the moral more murky as they're put into increasingly compromised positions having to deal with double and triple versions of themselves in a way that doesn't cause complete chaos to the world around them.

The acting of the film is amateur hour. None of the actors in the film were professionals. Compounding the problem Aaron's actor is also the film's writer and director. He had no experience with any of those jobs. It leads to a film where describing the acting as wooden is being charitable. However, for the leads at least the wooden acting works in the context of the film. They're both awkward nerds that are better with science and numbers than human interaction. It leads to them having an inability to communicate, which makes their misunderstandings and lies in the movie make even more sense. It takes a bit of getting used to, but I was so engrossed by the script that it was something I can overlook.

From a technical perspective the movie is a hot pile of shit. The direction is lifeless, half the movie is shot out of focus, some of the audio is garbled and hard to understand and the backgrounds are cheap and hastily thrown together. The music is basic as fuck and sounds like it was borrowed from some stock music, but it's still more technically competent than the rest of the movie. Not all of these problems can be based on a lack of budget. There are plenty of shoestring budget movies out there that look professional and some even excel beyond that. This is just a case of no budget combined with a bunch of amateurs derping their way through making a movie.

As much as I'm dumping on the actual fimmaking if I'm to lay my cards on the table Primer is like a lovely idiot savant of a movie. It's bad at so many things, but absolutely genius in the areas its excels. The result is an engrossing film that makes up for its myriad of flaws. I believe it's the best written time travel movie I've ever seen. It's a challenge to watch, but when all the pieces fall into place it's damn rewarding too. 7 out of 10
 
The Magnificent Seven [Obligatory about 'Seven Samurai better' comment]

It was kinda hard to watch this without comparing it to Seven Samurai, as I thought it was a fantastic movie ever since I saw it, and I must say, seeing the same plot from Seven Samurai as a western was pretty damn cool, and it improved it from the action side as I thought that Seven Samurai's action was it's weakest aspect both times I watched it. There are quite a few other things that I can say this movie does great, such as the great music themes, most of the dialogue is damn quotable, and the shorter length of the movie makes it more comfortable to watch (3 and a half hours are far too long, especially for a person like me who can't stand sitting still even for 2 hours straight ;D).

Also some of the characters being much more interesting than their counter parts in Seven Samurai, who some felt like they didn't contribute much to the cause since arriving. Like Bernardo being a much cooler version of Heihachi who felt like he was there just to keep the morale high, and the connection he made to the kids and his comments about their parents. Lee I think isn't taken out of any of the originals, as he didn't feel like he resembled any of them, ended up one of the best of the cast for me, due to his internal conflicts as he's so paranoid and feels like he's on the edge a lot of the time. And one of the best bit (and the only thing that annoyed me in the original) is the bandit's leader Calvera, who had enough screen time to do enough stuff to feel cool and threateni, unlike his counterpart in the original who unfortunately barely had any, even though he was great in that small time he was on the screen.

Still, a lot of the originals' cast was a lot more colorful and interesting, even the few who barely made an impact during the fights like Heihachi. Kyuzo is much more interesting than Britt (Who is not a bad character by all means), he didn't feel very distant from the rest of the cast, and how skilled made him standout a lot more than here since he was able to beat people with guns using a sword. And Kikuchiyo who was by far the best of the characters in the original, he constantly acted like a buffoon an delinquent and was full of life, he was the center of the attention most of his screen time, and even made the least uneventful of scenes entertaining with his energetic attitude. Not to mention

The things he does during the final battle, from the solo mission when he infiltrates the enemies and kills one of the snipers and comes back unscaved, and up to his tragic death after he gets shot by the bandits' leader and still manages to take him with him.

He's one of my favorite fictional characters of all time, and I feel like Chico (who's more of a combination of him and Katsushiro's idealist and proud young boy) is much less interesting than him, even if he's not a bad character himself.

For me it's not as great as Seven Samurai, which is an easy top 10 material for me (out of the 12 movies that I watched lol). Tt really can stand on it's own and is a great remake. I'll certainly be happy to rewatch it in the future. 8/10

ZetsubouKaiji said:
However, what the movie lacks in technical competence it makes up for with a tight script that is well thought out, intelligent and is the best example of a time travel movie with no logical flaws or plot holes.
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I'll put this high on my priorities list.
 
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Dark Star

A droll parody of 2001: A Space Odyssey marks launches the careers of future legends John Carpenter and Dan O'Bannon. Dark Star started as a student film short when Carpenter and O'Bannon were still in film school. Eventually the movie was spun into a full feature even if it was still made on a shoestring budget. The interiors may look like cardboard and plywood, but Carpenter still meticulously fills every frame with life, despite looking cheap the film is never visually dull.

With Carpenter in the director's chair O'Bannon wrote the script. The movie is mostly a slice of life series of vignettes showing the deplorable conditions of the Dark Star and it's crew of scruffy, ill tempered hippies. The hippies have been on a pointless mission to destroy dangerous planets to make way for colonization efforts that will never happen because of extravagant government waste and resulting budget cuts. The movie's satire isn't exactly subtle, but it works in its own quirky way. The pacing isn't the best and some segments drag on for way too long. However, most of the segments are based on weird concepts that are low key funny enough to keep them interesting. The best sequence in the movie is when the crew has to convince a sentient bomb stuck in the bay not to explode by teaching it philosophy.

The most interesting part about the script is how much of this movie served as a prototype for O'Bannon's script for Alien. This movie is a comedy, but the sequence with Pinback (played by O'Bannon) chases the beach ball alien around the ship has a lot of tension and elements that would be reused in aliens. The dynamic between the crew of Alien would also be influenced by Dark Star. The science fiction of the 50s and 60s focused on squared jawed classical heroes, but Alien is about a bunch of rough space truckers that have much more in common with the low brow hippies of Dark Star.

It's pretty clear that Carpenter hadn't quite grasped the art of directing actors this early in his career. The acting in the film is pretty terrible across the board and it effects the humor. The film could have been a lot funnier with better comedic timing. The actors all have pretty poor line reads and should have done more takes. However, more takes cost money, a resource that Dark Star was already short on. Carpenter makes up for the poor direction of the actor with some inspired camera work. There are some impressive sequences like Pinback's battle with an elevator that are made all the funnier for clever camera trickery to create an additional sense of danger despite the chintzy sets.

It's hard to say much about the characters of the film. They're all surely and depressed hippies. They've all got unique traits, but none are fleshed out enough to feel particularly well rounded. The replacement captain Doolittle has given up on the mission and just wants to blow shit up, Talby mostly isolates himself in his observation dome very reminiscent of the cockpit in Space Battle Tiramisu, Pinback is the crew's punchingbag and boilers just wants to shoot holes in the ship with the laser gun. The characters are amusing because they're so over the wonder of space travel that they just want to listen to country music and look at pictures of naked ladies because they're so bored and lonely. They're extra irritated for most of the movie because their toilet paper blew up.

The satire of the film of the film holds up well today. While, the type of movies that are being lampooned don't get made much anymore everyone is familiar enough with the conventions of those films to understand the parody. The criticism of irresponsible government spending is both depressing and timeless. The government threw these guys out in space and then abandoned then. They occasionally send patronizing messages to the crew telling them they're heroes, but they won't do anything more to support the crew despite the ship being a massive hunk of shit that's falling part. Even requests for essential supplies are denied.

Overall, Dark Star is amateur and rough around the edges, but it's an impressive first effort. 6 out of 10
 
Anthropophagous(1980):

AhahahahaAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHA. I don't think I can stop laughing maniacally here. The acting's pretty wooden, the soundtrack can be pretty derpy at times, but the gore however is indeed great. There's not a lot that happens in the film for the 2/3rds of it, mainly about building atmosphere and setting a mood which is all quite fine since that's what Italian horror does and also not making sense. But you're really watching it for the cannibal, who by the way actually looks great to me, has an imposing tall intimidating figure and the practical effects for the gore are great. This film's obviously got like no budget, but imagine if it did?
Ripping out a fetus from a pregnant mother and eating it, best part.

Move over leatherface, there's a more hardcore cannibal DEN U!

6/10 For I am nothing but a perverse weirdo who likes the blood.
 
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The Babadook
It's a good story about grief and loss, but as a horror, it's really not my thing. It failed to hold my interest, even if I theoretically should like how low-key and downright muted everything is. There just wasn't anything there for me to like.

The plot and characters are effective and without much narrative fat, and the scenes aren't drawn out or wonky in any way. I am a filthy pleb, but I have no complaints about the technical aspects of the film. It's just not very exciting. The actors are good, though. They really sell the illusion that this is a struggling family in a horrible Australian suburb (all of Australia is horrible, though, due to being upside down), and it adds to the atmosphere and sense of blurred lines between what's real and not.

I am never ever having kids. 5/10
 
Whiplash

People think this film is a drama about music and following your dreams at any cost. It's not.

Whiplash is a film about Stockholm syndrome and abusive relationships. Andrew and Fletcher embark on a power struggle that will spiral both of their lives into depths that neither of them could foresee, culminating in a climax that raises them both up to new heights. But at what cost?

The strength of this film comes in the chemistry between Teller and Simmons, and they play off each other like rubidium in water, it is a force to watch them both and you cannot take your eyes off them. Each beat (lol) of the story is carried by their performances, even when things become a little ridiculous.

The film has a message too, that sometimes the cost of sacrificing everything for your dream isn't the right thing to do. Andrew does some dickish stuff to try and become the world's best jazz drummer, but he's still not quite Fletcher, who believes his abuse of his students is the only way to have them achieve anything at all.

The music choices for the movie are great whether you're a fan of jazz or not, the performances are great, and I pretty much enjoy every minute of watching this. 4/5
 
In that case

Snowpiercer

Holee shiet. This is the best sequal to willy wonka and the chocolate factory that ever was. I really really enjoyed a lot of the scenes and twists in this show even though the final one was really obvious, there were still times when the movie threw me for a loop and a lot of it was in the presentation. I really enjoy my shows that take place on trains, they might be some of my favorite kinds of stories because of forcing that confined kind of creativity in narratives. All the action was really great in my opinion, the story was good, the acting was good and there was even some acting from chris evans. Not shockingly good but... it was a thing.

I also really enjoy really gritty movies done right, and this one was dark. There were several parts where i cringed in the best kind of way, and to be frank not all of the movie was that kind of unrelenting attack on titan feeling of oppressive darkness, because throughout the whole thing I couldn't stop being entertained with the feeling that maybe the whole thing wasn't too serious. There is some actual goofy shit in this movie too, aside from everything serious, the way it's presented is that but the more you think about it the more it seems like dark comedy at times. But i digress, this was a well shot movie with a good story, though it had its problems I hardly even cared about them.
8/10
 
Pitch Black (2000)

This was a pretty good movie :o Lots of action, lots of edge-of-your seat suspense, lots of fun. Admittedly, I felt the beginning maybe could have used just the teeeeensiest bit of extra exposition to better frame the story and introduce these characters. It could have pushed it to that next level... buuuut on the other hand exposition is boring and it would have been really hard to do that without it either dragging on too long or feeling like a slap-dash excuse for everything else, so I'm not too broken up about it. Regardless, there's not really too much to talk about since the story is a little bare-bones, but as an action-y sci-fi thriller it was enjoyable.

I hear there's a sequel in Chronicles of Riddick that I'll have to watch sometime, outside of SS...
 
The Secret of NIMH

I watched the second movie as a kid, it was the greatest shit to my young mind with all the zip, zazz and zambomafoo of the"Just Say Yes" song of Evil Martin and the magnificently hammy actor. He was the sequel, making everything else in it pale in comparison. I can't go back and watch it now because it being a sequel without the maker would mean it's probably shit and it probably is crap but that song was the bees knees.


Yup, that is all I remember from the movie. Maybe the doctor and the ball from a few minutes earlier but nothing else. Nothing at all.

What also confirms it being shit is how high quality The Secret of NIMH is. It still holds up and while it has some deus ex machina, crockery and a plow scene that may not have had the effects that match some of the zazzier zazz, it still has a main character you care about, comic relief for the kids, minor characters import to the plot who are actually incredibly awesome, a well and generally simple tale with stakes I wasn't expecting and it wasn't bogged down with too many wacky antics.

Mrs. Brisby, that fox is a stone cold mama jama. She goes on this awesome adventure to save her kid, gets into danger and meets a great cast, escapes from danger and shows that just because you're a main character, doesn't mean you have to fight everything and win. She's just an adorable mouse in a red shawl; she isn't a badass like her husband Johnathan. She isn't some hero who learns to fight. She is a regular person who just goes on an journey for her kids, and acts as such. She musters courage throughout and it builds up but it isn't overly prevalent in her staring others down or anything. She is the smallest person around, encountering a giant ass fat cat, crow and rats, let alone others. And it makes you like her even more; she doesn't give up, acts like a person in her situation would do, and is rational to a T. Excellent main character.

Supporting cast is also solid, from secondaries to minors who get one scene. And I want to give a shoutout to Brutus. That boy is fucking gangsta. No words, only fierce badassery. He is like the Balrog or some shit, you don't fuck with him and all Mrs. Brisby did was walk in there. It was a tense, action-packed visual explosion, one of the scenes where it nails the special effects and this isn't even going into the build-up of the clash. It showcases how well the animation and art style holds up, the visual splendor of treasure and artifacts with the doom and gloom of the general feel of the Rat Enclave.


Then you have people like The Owl (Hardcore gangsta who respects bravery and shit, like one scene and he. Owns. It) or characters with more scenes like Jeremy (Bumbling comic relief that grew on me in the movie), Justin (The guy who would be a hero in any other movie but is just a captain or something here, not as heavily prominent as Mrs. Brisby but plays a good role without overly heavy amounts of shipping) and Nicodemus, the old ass pimp rat who narrates some and is hella awesome. The voice work for all of them, let alone Mrs. Brisby is spot-on. This is some high-shelf stuff and despite some padding and irrelevancy with Jeremy, the rest of the cast serve a purpose for the greater story. And the villain, not as heavily prominent too but he is a solid enough villain with a moment where he becomes more animalistic and primal, kinda like Ratigan from The Great Mouse Detective where he shows more rat traits as it goes on; giving in to being a rat. Jenner (Villain) shows some of these traits in the climatic fight just like Ratigan and even throughout you could see some of the mice acting like mice, running on all four paws and not just around humans or anything; It's enjoyable to see how they're still animals and not animals with human traits.

But the deus ex machina at the end was cheese. We get hints that the amulet is magical and shows it's power for those who have bravery and inner courage but it was some crazy shit and saves the day. They did write themselves into the corner with the progression of the climax but you can't have all that death, right? And some comic relief padding but those are just niggling nitpicking and don't ruin the story, even if there's also some last second "throw the dog a bone" for an ending. But it provides some backstory to NIMH, not overly prevalent or heavy but it's both needed and somehow gives even more depth to these 3D characters, in a segment that has not only great animation and some questionable monkey looks, but a stunning look of fear on some mice. That look, that was prime.

This is a great movie. Excellent movie. It has characters you care about, developed even if you don't have an affinity for them. Gorgeous, special effects that hold up and isn't all sunshine and rainbows, more serious than not and is pretty dark, giving youngsters some props by not dumbing it down. Some thrills and tension because of Mrs. Brisby, who is an absolute perfect main character. It's still worth watching and while the stakes might not be grand, it's grand in their small world.

9/10
 
The Royal Tenebaums

This was fucking GREATNESS. I dunno, I didn't expect to be into this film as heavily as I was since drama and specifically family drama isn't what I watch a lot of movies solely for, but Wes Anderson's idiosyncratic quirky style always seems to draw me in, as well as his lavish set design. It's really quite fabulous how his films look. Like I was watching a fractured fairy tale and the unclear time period only adds to the fantastical feel. It's got awkwardly funny humor, while also having an emotionally resonant undercurrent of sadness/melancholy with these fractured geniuses and the cast are all pretty fantastic. Hackman was definitely a stand out and pure joy to watch. It's a film with a ton of heart to me, as it tackles depression, parenthood, love and so fourth. Man, that one scene,
with the suicide was fucking SHOCKING and disturbing though, all while Eliot Smith was being played, holy fucks.
Anderson pretty much does such a good job in examining the relationships/dynamics between all these quirky characters and making them feel so human. A dysfunctional family piece at it's finest.

9/10 film for sure.
 
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