The Movie Thread Reloaded

[Lurkndog]

If you have hbo,  WATCH WESTWORLD!

I've already seen the first two seasons. I will probably watch seasons 3 and 4 at some point.

I'm currently watching Peacemaker and The Flight Attendant Season 2.

[Battlemaster]

Season 3 lacked Anthony Hopkins, and the loss was felt keenly.

[hedgehobbit]

I enjoyed The Batman quite a lot, I really liked the emphasis on Batman being the Dark Knight Detective this time around. It gave him much more interesting things to do. I thought Pattinson did a good job as both Batman and Bruce Wayne.

I wish I hadn't heard that this was a "detective" movie before watching it. The Batman doesn't actually figure anything out before it's too late and the story didn't make much sense. This is why I don't watch movie trailers, as I don't want the movie spoiled by false expectations.

[Reckall]

I enjoyed The Batman quite a lot, I really liked the emphasis on Batman being the Dark Knight Detective this time around. It gave him much more interesting things to do. I thought Pattinson did a good job as both Batman and Bruce Wayne. They also did a good job making a Catwoman who is walking the gray line between heroine and villain. Jeffrey Wright didn't convince me that he was Jim Gordon, but it was enough for me that he was Jeffrey Wright.

I was enjoying The Batman, but I felt that there is a fine line between paying homage to David Fincher and blatantly ripping off Seven. Also, the final "big scene" was unusually badly shot, but I don't hold it to the movie. The shooting was ravaged by the first wave of COVID and finished with Matt Reese directing the actors and the crew via radio. Not the best way to run a production.

I also watched Death on the Nile. I thought the high-budget cinematography was pretty, but actually took away from the movie because it was distracting. I've read the book, but it was so long ago that I don't remember it clearly. Perhaps I should reread Agatha Christie as an adult. I thought they foreshadowed the murder way too hard, so much so that basically all Gal Gadot got to do was swan around saying stuff like "Gosh, I sure hope nobody murders me. Better stay off the train."

I never read Agatha Christie. I read almost all Ellery Queen when I was a kid - because I loved the TV show - and then Philip Marlowe. Raymond Chandler, BTW, hated Agatha Christie's novels because "either the plot was stupid or she cheated". I know that I'm unjust towards poor Agatha, but after reading Chandler's rants I never picked up one of her books

[Reckall]

If you have hbo,  WATCH WESTWORLD!

I've already seen the first two seasons. I will probably watch seasons 3 and 4 at some point.

Don't. Just don't. Remember the show for the first two seasons and pretend that the rest doesn't exist.

[HappyDaze]

If you have hbo,  WATCH WESTWORLD!

I've already seen the first two seasons. I will probably watch seasons 3 and 4 at some point.

Don't. Just don't. Remember the show for the first two seasons and pretend that the rest doesn't exist.

To my regret, I failed to do this with BSG, but thankfully I've stuck with it for WW.

[Lurkndog]

I never read Agatha Christie. I read almost all Ellery Queen when I was a kid - because I loved the TV show - and then Philip Marlowe. Raymond Chandler, BTW, hated Agatha Christie's novels because "either the plot was stupid or she cheated". I know that I'm unjust towards poor Agatha, but after reading Chandler's rants I never picked up one of her books

I had never heard that, and I really respect Chandler's work. That's awesome, thanks for sharing!

I've never read Ellery Queen either. Hmm...

The last mysteries I really read were Craig Johnson's Longmire books, because I liked the show. Though, with both show and books, I got to the point where they seemed to wear out the premise, and I stopped before the end.

[Omega]

If you have hbo,  Dont WATCH WESTWORLD!

Fixed that for ya. heh.

Though honestly the first and second season are ok overall. But the further the show goes the worse it gets. Eventually things go totally off the rails. YMMV on if/when you hit the "fuck this!" threshold.

[Omega]

While we are on the subject of detective series.

Some years ago I got for Kat some translated episodes of a series called Magistrate Dee, AKA: Amazing Detective Di from 2004 A semi-historical period piece from china with Dee having to solve various crimes and usually someone loses their head. Literally. Rather nice production too.

Way back in the 70s there was a TV pilot based on one of the books. 

[Pat]

While we are on the subject of detective series.

Some years ago I got for Kat some translated episodes of a series called Magistrate Dee, AKA: Amazing Detective Di from 2004 A semi-historical period piece from china with Dee having to solve various crimes and usually someone loses their head. Literally. Rather nice production too.

Way back in the 70s there was a TV pilot based on one of the books.

Have you see the more recent Detective Dee movies? I found them to be big, mindless spectacles. Entertaining, but forgettable.

[bromides]

Watching the Villeneuve Dune again... the Liet Kynes switch was the worst kind of diversity casting, serving no purpose except to manage the quota.

It's the absolute worst kind of diversity casting. Pointless, bland, nonsensical.

I don't care about Chani. Zendaya is the flavor of the month, and we don't see enough of her in Dune to know if she's going to make a good Chani, anyways. Like Chalamet, Zendaya will bring in an audience of mindless summer children.

It's the Liet Kynes casting (which also makes no sense given the age of Liet compared to Chani) which is backwards and regressive.

The Dune movie is good as spectacle, but I thought Lynch's movie was even better at spectacle - including the Guildsmen, Vladimir Harkonnen, and all of that... without needing a second movie.

I want to like Dune, but every time I see it, it's so frustratingly uneven.

[Reckall]

Watching the Villeneuve Dune again... the Liet Kynes switch was the worst kind of diversity casting, serving no purpose except to manage the quota.

It's the absolute worst kind of diversity casting. Pointless, bland, nonsensical.

That switch, BTW, symbolises how current Hollywood is so preoccupied by virtue signaling that they are forgetting how to write. When the surviving Atreides ask Liet why she didn't warn them about the Harkonnen she says that she serves the Emperor, which is the correct answer... but then we discover that she is a Freemen! So, the Freemen had a secret way to warn the Atreides but they somehow like more the Harkonnen?

To add nonsense to nonsense, she is then immediately killed in a way no Freemen would have allowed for: walking on a crest of a dune in full sight during the day. Soldiers that fought in North Africa were smarter than that. But when you can race, gender and age switch a character, who needs basic writing skills? See also that horrifying adaptation of Asimov's "Foundation" on Apple+.

[Battlemaster]

Damn, rekall, is foundation that bad? I wanted to see it someday.

[Reckall]

Damn, rekall, is foundation that bad? I wanted to see it someday.

The visuals are stunning and Jared Harris embodies how I always imagined Hari Seldon. The end.

"Foundation" to me is the pinnacle of how virtue signalling is now considered the "new storytelling". The biggest offender is Salvor Hardin, who in the show is a black young woman whose job is "Warden of the Foundation". She tries to find ways to fight the militaristic planets that surround Terminus and openly derides the idea that "Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent" when her father reminds her of it - something akin to sacrilege towards the original text.

Gaal Dornick is another example. Again, now she is a young black woman from a backwater planet who, basically, while being raised on a planet of fishers and farmers, invents mathematics up to psychostoriography out of thin air. The show then goes to astounding narrative extremes to keep her "relevant" to the plot when in the book the character died 100 years before.

But, as amazing as it may sound, these are not the problems of the show. If you want to do something unrecognizable from the book amen to that. The problem is that the plot (which, 30 minutes in, has nothing to do anymore with Asimov's book) is a trainwreck full of plotholes and logic lapses. The IMDB comments page is full of people who say "I haven't read the books so I can't comment about the differences, but this show is a hot mess" - which is the best proof of how this is another example of "virtue signaling trumps basic storytelling skills".

The irony is that they put in a storyline centered on the Emperor that is completely original - and, as it happens, it is the best part of the show. But this proves, once again, that these hacks will never write their own original story. They do know that they can't write, so never in the World they will renounce to famous "brands" to sell their poo. Next in line will be "The Rings of Amazon" - a show that, right now, is in full panic mode after internet as a whole made clear how they did cross a line too far.

[Wrath of God]

It's the Liet Kynes casting (which also makes no sense given the age of Liet compared to Chani) which is backwards and regressive.

Actress playing Liet is 21 years older than Zendaya, so generally speaking I'd say it's possible option.
But yeah Liet is otherwise wasted.

I mean even racegenderswap don't justify changing cool death scene into this bland mess from movie.