A24

I listened to something by Bach with recorders and string orchestra. People say Bach is cold and mathematical. While the latter might be true, the former certainly isn't.

The Hobbit

Something tells me you watch ....
 

Season 4 Finale

 
 
 
 
 
 

Season 4 Episode 9: Wiedersehen
 
 

Yep. In that regard, the series is reminiscent of '70s cinema, when they weren't afraid to show an actor thinking (without revealing precisely what).
 
You think Jimmy will turn into Saul next season? Of course, I need to watch the last couple of episodes. I don't know how this season ends. 

Season 4, episode 8: Coushatta
 
 
It is clear now that Kim loves Jimmy when he's a bad boy. 
 
 
Another fine episode! To be honest, I like this season more than the previous one (which was too 'been there, done that'). I have a feeling we're starting to approach the period of Saul Goodman.

Thanks to the internet, every movie is great now.

Empire of the Sun (1987)
Brilliant WWII drama displaying such powerful themes and clever devices, ushering in the first waves of Spielberg's "mature" films, from a directorial standpoint. The loss of innocence motif is hit so very finely, aided by a young Christian Bale, whose performance is admirably good for his age at the time. There are oodles of little Spielbergisms that I simply can't get enough of, many of which revel in deep symbolism and striking imagery. I was particualrily fond of a scene when Jamie returns to his home after being separated from his parents in the crowd. When he goes into his parents bedroom and finds the powder all over the floor, hand and foot prints tell a story of their own. Jamie opens the window and the wind blows away the memory manifest in the prints in the powder, as if to suggest some sort of escape from nightmarish circumstances, a breath of air to one who is suffocating, so to speak. Williams' score is something of a dark horse- it is probably one of the most underrated in his filmography. Simply put, a darn fine film on so many, many levels!
 
**** out of ****

Thanks to the internet, every movie is great now.

You can just imagine the outrage if this sophisticated ping pong of rape drama, societal satire and character study would have been made in Hollywood today. But Paul Verhoeven has always been the master of the ambiguous which is not in vogue right now and in his old adage he's probably better than ever - less flashier, but as extreme. Verhoeven didn't find an american actress for 'Elle', none of Hollywood's female stars wanted to play a middle-aged woman who is raped but not only refrains from reporting it, she actively refuses to be a victim. She checks for HIV at lunch, buys pepper spray and only a few days later tells her ex-husband and business associate between champagne and appetizer that she has been abused.
 
Which is of course an invitation to outrage, how a movie could dare to play down the traumatic violence of a rape. In fact, at the first portrayal of the rape (it cold-starts the movie) is irritating. But the attack will be shown two more times, and each time it's filmed a bit differently, reflecting Huppert's changing reflection of reality. But this movie goes much further, not only with a tangled web of interpersonal relations but deft satire of modern bonhomie, french in this incarnation. I was intrigued how the movie would resolve this and came away chuckling.
 
'Elle' reveals the shallowness of the old accusations of misogyny against Verhoeven (whose weary worldview more than anything exposes weaknesses of both sexes, male more so):  none of the male protagonists amount to much, they all hide behind offensively displayed masculinity - and sexuality - but in reality suffer from of self-doubt and weakness. All the more fitting that at the end of the film, it is two women that go together into the horizon, leaving the men behind (matter-of-factly and figuratively). That Verhoeven is able to 'hide' this pointed satire in a deliberately exaggerated thriller construction is 'Elle's claim to fame: only through its sharpened depiction the movie is able to expose the ill cracks of relationships in modern western society - and there are a myriad of interesting images going on, on top of it. As such, it was a refreshing change of pace to the behavioral codes attached to such things in many tv shows and dramas. As Verhoeven is 81 years now, i sincerely hope there's another one or two movies in him.

Jay trying to clean up these threads: 
 

Ever since the theater represents only a fraction in the life cycle of movies.

While I don't watch films on my phone, I do think that a truly good film works regardless of viewing conditions. It'll just suck you in.

MOS and BvS are earnest superhero movies.

This is complete BS. Both films have problems, yet both films have their strengths. MoS has too much destruction porn and the shallowest romance I've ever seen in a superhero movie, but the action is good and the tone was different enough for Superman to be interesting for that outing. The infamous "Martha" scene at the end of BvS deserves the hate it gets, but the first 90 minutes of that movie, at least in its extended form, is perfectly acceptable Batman.

Here are some fairly recent movies that are very good but nobody here has ever heard of:
 

 

 
 

 
 

Return of the Jedi isn't an awfully good movie. I wouldn't use it as an example for anything, really.

So what's her motivation to join the dark side? And how have the previous films worked towards this change?

One day I'll wake up to realize all of this was just a bad dream.
 
Meanwhile I'm stuck in Disney's Matrix!

People were expecting a different film and so they watched Blade Runner with the wrong mindset, at least those who had a mind. 

It worked best as a Bloodboalian JWFan fan film.

He actually agrees with the haters. Now let's hear why he still thinks it's great ....
 
So he says he's able to discard the surface to see what's underneath it. So it's very different from what you expect. Well, I would hesitate to call it vastly different to what came before. Spaceship, crew, female lead, android, landing on unknown planet, touching eggs, dead and destruction. 
Okay, so he loves the theme of 'Who gave birth to us?', and I agree that this new theme for the Alien universe. However, I don't understand how one could call it "deeply satisfying", if all other elements that lie on top of this theme make it difficult for me to give the movie some serious thought. Before I delve deeper, I need to be intrigued, and not feel the urge to throw bricks at the screen. I've watched the movie again to see if I overcome the problems I had encountered during the first watch but it wasn't the case. There are too many decisions taken in this movie that I just didn't like.