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What Is The Last Film You Watched? (Older Films)


Mr. Breathmask

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The LOTR are only true to the books on a basic plot level: situation A leads to situation B. I don't think the same spirit is there...at all, apart perhaps the Shadow of the Past sequence, which remains the highlight of the whole movie trilogy

There's a ton of genuine Tolkien backstory alluded to in the films, some of it directly, some of it only indirectly (clearly if you know it). Stuff of the sort that I didn't pick up until repeated readings. And except for a few serious blunders in ROTK, most of the changes totally work. Faramir for example, while seemingly ruined from his saintly book representation, is ultimately pretty much the same character in the film, but with an arc that brings out the Denethor/Boromir/Faramir backstory. In the extended cut, that is; in the theatrical version, he sucks.

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Backstory for its own sake sometimes is more a sort of fan service that an acurate translation of the spirit of the book. And I'm particularly repulsed by those "trailer-like" sentences said by the charaters throughout the movies, like "If you want him, come and claim him" (which I suppose it's PJ understanding of what "If you want him, come and get him" would sound like in Middle Earth), "The age of man is over, the time of the orc has come" or "The Battle of Helm's Deep is over, the battle for middle earth is about to begin". Or when Eowyn slays the witch king, where PJ used only the very first sentence "I'm no man", just for the sake of the "fuck, yeah!" moment, when the dialogue in the book was absolutely terrific.

This is not a matter of not using the dialogue from the books verbatim. But those examples couldn't be further away from the spirit of the book. And they clash violently with those moments that do convey the spirit of Tolkien.

Added to this, I really dislike PJ's instincts as a filmmaker (we have disagreed about King Kong in the past), and I can't help but seeing these movies as being disappointingly average. As much as I respect your opinions and tastes, Marion, which I sincerely think are far more educated and cultivated than my own

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"If you want him, come and claim him" (which I suppose it's PJ understanding of what "If you want him, come and get him" would sound like in Middle Earth), "The age of man is over, the time of the orc has come" or "The Battle of Helm's Deep is over, the battle for middle earth is about to begin". Or when Eowyn slays the witch king, where PJ used only the very first sentence "I'm no man", just for the sake of the "fuck, yeah!" moment,

I love every one of those lines! :)

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His will was set, and only death would break it...

Paler indeed than the moon ailing in some slow eclipse was the light of it now, wavering and blowing like a noisome exhalation of decay, a corpse-light, a light that illuminated nothing.

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The use of a couple of gay fairie names makes it feel or poetic like.

I don't see why a version of that wouldn't have worked as dialogue, other than being really cheesy. But those scripts are full of it.

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Jacko, Boyens and Walsh had to streamline all that long-windedness for film, obviously. Otherwise the dialogue of those scenes would have added up into minutes and even hours.

I like how they still largely preserved the weight and eloquence of those passages when they made the necessary changes.

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The game's better.

The game IS great fun, in fairness ... unlike other 'open world' games, I don't have the sense of dread with it that I don't stand a hope in hell of ever finishing it or the bafflement at just what exactly I'm supposed to do next (I remember experiencing that with both one of the Just Cause and Far Cry games).

Misery - had been years since I'd seen this. Definitely in the higher class of Stephen King adaptations, with terrific lead performances from James Caan and Kathy Bates, decent suspense and a nice streak of black humour.

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Awhile back I watched 28 Hotel Rooms on Amazon Prime.

I liked its simplicity and direction. Almost a collection of short films featuring the same characters, the story chronicles how these two strangers meet and hook up and then develop a years long affair solely in hotel rooms on their business trips. I think there is only one scene that isn't in a room, but in the hotel restaurant at the beginning, and then only a couple of establishing shots of airports, etc. It creates this really claustrophobic feeling of just seeing similar room after room, which coincides with how their relationship blows up over time. No names, no other characters, just Man and Woman. Nice little film with good performances from Chris Messina and Marin Ireland.

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Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol - Finally caught up with the series (well, almost). Was really looking forward to this one, having loved the third installment and being assured by some folks around here (mostly Steef) that GP was better than MI:III. Which left me . . . disappointed. Not hugely; GP was a good movie, and a fitting entry in the series, but I didn't find it nearly as intense and enjoyable as the third. Which was a little baffling, since I've considered B.B. to be just about as good a director as J.J. in most situations. (If this is the tiebreaker, J.J. will walk away with the award.) I'm not sure what about it rubbed me the wrong way. It just seemed a little more . . . forced than the last one. It came off as trying too hard at times. The team wasn't nearly as interesting and engaging as the one in MI:III, with the exception of Jeremy Renner, who's connection story took things up a notch. (Simon Pegg was his usual, unchanging, Peggish self, but Ving Rames's absence was a sore blow—though I really enjoyed his cameo at the end.) The action wasn't as memorable, nor was the storyline. A good, but not truly great, entry in the series. (*** out of ****)

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Are you sure you're not talking about J.J. Abrams' film? The only thing that stood out was a Vatican sequence. The other stuff had very little to do with M:I series. It's just a wrong type of story.

Two films that followed it were infinitely superior and brought back the fun of original concept.

Karol

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