Movies

The "based on a true story" tag is often applied to fictionalized events that have no stronger connections to reality than Gone with the Wind has with the historical events it's set in. The very idea of what a true story is has reached a point where narrative - in any shape - couldn't tell you what it is any longer. It's safe to say that these are all publicity stunts. Whether they're more obviously packaged publicity stunts (see Blair Witch Project, where the alleged true story was completely fictionalized from the start) or less so (say United 93, to quote a bona-fide serious and interesting movie) has become largely irrelevant for the purpose of deciding whether "things like these" happen or not in the world. I'd like to remind you that, since Fight Club (based on a novel founded on pure invention), actual Fight Clubs have become fairly popular in several countries: mimicking and mirroring are not prerogatives of art.

The book Mediated, by Thomas Zengotita, offers a whole array of possibilities ranging from Real real to Staged observed real repeated to Overtly unreal realistic to Unreal real. I agree with marduk (in case that's what he meant ;)) that we should be as jaded about the supposedly truthful representations of evil as we are about the fables concerning its non-existence.
 
rahvin said:
The "based on a true story" tag is often applied to fictionalized events that have no stronger connections to reality than Gone with the Wind has with the historical events it's set in. The very idea of what a true story is has reached a point where narrative - in any shape - couldn't tell you what it is any longer. It's safe to say that these are all publicity stunts. Whether they're more obviously packaged publicity stunts (see Blair Witch Project, where the alleged true story was completely fictionalized from the start) or less so (say United 93, to quote a bona-fide serious and interesting movie) has become largely irrelevant for the purpose of deciding whether "things like these" happen or not in the world. I'd like to remind you that, since Fight Club (based on a novel founded on pure invention), actual Fight Clubs have become fairly popular in several countries: mimicking and mirroring are not prerogatives of art.

The book Mediated, by Thomas Zengotita, offers a whole array of possibilities ranging from Real real to Staged observed real repeated to Overtly unreal realistic to Unreal real. I agree with marduk (in case that's what he meant ;)) that we should be as jaded about the supposedly truthful representations of evil as we are about the fables concerning its non-existence.
Click to expand...

Way more beatifully put, but yes, thats what I meant. ;)
 
I saw In Her Shoes. It was actually fantastic... about little and big mistakes, broken family bridges and how difficult it feels to mend them etc... all the charaters were likeable, even Cameron Diaz who played a totally ditzy blonde who fucks over her sister constantly. The film was hyped to me as "the only good chick flick"... And to an extent I'd agree... but thats not to say I haven't seen other highly enjoyable chick flicks.

And this worries me... For some reason recently I've found I enjoy chick flicks more than actions and thrillers... Wonder why that is. I'm a pretty manly man when it comes to anything else.
 
I´ve just finished "Falling Down" together with a friend, such a brilliant movie! Best part might be the Whammy Hamburger scene, where D-fens gives a lecture on the "the customer is always right" rule, angered about not being able to get breakfast server because he´s 5 minutes to late for the breakfast menu.
 
Watched that movie in a class in my senior year of highschool. Great movie. Even greater class. "Madness in Literature". Brilliant, but the best part was that it was taught by two teachers who had a fake feud going on (basically, all the students thought they hated each other, so they played along with it).

No, I take that back. Best part was the final projects. One was a group project, which was to make a powerpoint or somesuch with visual images of madness, which could be accompanied by music. Going for sheer shock value, I threw a bunch of random symphonic black metal songs together, put a family guy clip in the middle, and we just used the craziest images we could find on the net. That and the video of the town trying to blow up a dead whale with dynamite.

The other part was a paper (b/c it's a lit class, of course). Had to write a piece that exemplified the themes we learned, etc. My teacher hands it back to me...
Prof: Awesome job! You really nailed the concept schizophrenia on the head. I can't imagine the research you did!
Me: Um...
Prof: ... Ok, lets just pretend we didn't have this conversation, so I can keep on thinking you're normal.

On the movie, though, I liked the first half much better. It started to get a little ridiculous in the second half, like with the rocket.

~kov. :teehee:
 
The Descent - genuinely scary, even through all the jumpy moments. The ending... it made me wonder when she found a chick who supposed to be dead by then and had that conversation, but last few minutes made it clear that it wasn't some screenplay fuck-up... or was it?

Jackass: Number Two - funny, but it looks odd how Bam gets scared all the time, seems like the guy had it with years of pranking people and will be suffering from a full-blown paranoia in no time... if not already.

The Family Guy - Season IV - I have no idea why I've been ignoring it all along :D Low-blow and hilarious.
 
Kovenant84 said:
Yeah, so the new Transformers trailer is out. My childhood has come back to life.

Except now my childhood is really dark, and moves too quickly for me to actually see anything.

~kov.
Click to expand...

Yeah, it's been out last week.. real Bay movie - explosions, colors a-la The Island, huge robots and stuff, he was so boastful about the new trailer, like, he made real pros to work on it, and I mussay, that trailer totally blows after listening to him.

Not a single character shown, just robots, kabooms and shit, which is all good, but so far it looks boring.
 
BABEL
-------------

Reviews match in agreement in the vein of: "Babel is my film of the year, and probably the best film I've seen in quite a few years. The film looks at relationships, from husband/wife, parent/children, brother/sister and plays around the themes of love in adversity"

I watched the movie, and it looked to me like a bunch of scarcely believable random stories, roughly described. I fail to see any brilliance regarding Brad Pitt's performance, who has proven to be one of the best american actors nowadays, and barely grasps any significance in this movie.

There are three stories. The one starred by Pitt and Cate Blanchett is purely circumstantial, no depth whatsoever. The one with the japanese girl is bizarre and nonsensical, a particular case of a messed up teenager, nothing interesting aside from the cultural edge. Third one, starred by a middle aged mexican woman who babysits two american kids, have to go to a wedding, and carries the children along, resulting in the woman being caught as an illegal, and subsequently deported.

Now, I understand that, when one writes a book or directs a movie, it is because of some message wanted to be passed on, expression of some sort in a readable/watchable format. This might be the abstract vision of its creator, shapeless but meaningful.

I fail to see any meaning in "Babel", I can't understand what the director intends to express with Cate Blanchett being shot in the middle of the desert (maybe it is a hidden demand for better health care in Morocco?). Does the japanese girl represent anything in particular? Teenagers in Japan are screwed up?

As for the production, I still wonder why the image of an helicopter flying is kept for thirty seconds long. From that on, everything else goes down the hill...

As a footnote, the brilliance of the three stories being remotely connected is non existant, there is nothing else but mere coincidence put as an extraordinary (forced) link what vaguely interleaces them.

And everybody liked it... argh!!!


|ng (Living into Matrix... consciously rejecting the program...)
 
I finally watched Sympathy for Lady Vengeance a while ago. Not nearly as great as Oldboy was, nor as intensely violent. I still love Chan-Wook Park's directing, but the script of Lady Vengeance felt much weaker than that of Oldboy (I'm currently reading Garon Tsuchiya's original Oldboy-manga, btw, and it's just wonderful). Some great performances by a few actors, as could be expected, but I suppose one needs to be a parent to fully empathize with many of them - there was no way I could understand the emotions they went through in the film, as I've never had children of my own. It is one of those movies which I can honestly call "very good, but just not what I wanted".

I hope that now that Park has finished his vengeance-trilogy he will try something completely new, as he is an amazingly talented director in my opinion. I can see him kind of moving away from his old style with Lady Vengeance, but he was still too stuck on certain routines. And he needs another great script like Oldboy.

-Villain
 
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