Page 67 of 97

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: December 30th, 2019, 7:56 am
by Suits
I watched the first three episodes of Castlevania on Netflix last night.

It’s really very compelling.

The first episode is gnarly and gives some context to the whole Dracula thing.

Trevor Belmont is funny too and not how I would have expected him to be.

I’m really very impressed with it, it’s cool.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: December 31st, 2019, 9:16 pm
by fieldy
I watched the bbc adaptation of War of the Worlds.

this story has always interested me in its different tellings, and being local to Horsell Common I always look to watch or listen to the different versions.

the BBC version was on the whole very good, the bit that I felt was a bit odd however was the jumping between two different timelines. I won't spoil it here but I would recommend it to fans of the HG Wells original or Sci-Fi fans in general.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 3rd, 2020, 9:48 pm
by Alex79
Watched Don't Fuck With Cats on Netflix. Incredible. The last 20 minutes was like watching The Usual Suspects or Memento or something! Really good television. If you've been put off because you think it's about cats, it's not. It's about a group of online amateur investigators hunting a killer. Really recommend it.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 4th, 2020, 11:36 am
by Alex79
Not in the least. You do see footage of a dead cat, but it's not gory, it just looks asleep. It's not a pleasant watch in places, but it doesn't dwell on the macabre. It's much more about the manhunt. It really is a fascinating watch.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 4th, 2020, 11:49 am
by Suits
Finished the Castlevania series on Netflix last night.

The penultimate episode of season 2 is incredible.

It seems to follow the story of the third game, Dracula's Curse.

Well looking forward to the new third series that's in production.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 7th, 2020, 7:35 am
by Alex79
Next: Don't Fuck With Cats...??

:D

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 7th, 2020, 2:24 pm
by KSubzero1000
Have you had the chance to check out The Day the Earth Stood Still yet?

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 13th, 2020, 1:42 am
by ThirdMan
Lucky (Now TV)

Harry Dean Stanton's final screen appearance is, appropriately enough, a meditation on ageing and dying. David Lynch cameos as a best friend with a tortoise problem and Alien fans will delight in seeing Stanton and Tom Skerritt reunited very briefly for a small but rather touching scene. It's the directorial debut of John Carroll Lynch, known to us all as 'Norm' from the Coen Brothers' Fargo. That's plenty for nerdy cineastes to get their teeth into! However this is ultimately the Harry Dean Stanton show. It's a deeply humane and quietly rebellious goodbye.

Jojo Rabbit (Cinema)

I took against this quiet strongly right from the get-go and simply had no way back in. It's not funny. The performances are ill-fitting and under-directed. Rebel Wilson continues to make a career out of goading people into laughing at her obesity, and yet failing, which makes her efforts even more pathetic. I've read some very passionate appraisals and defences of the film. Those people are more articulate and insightful about cinema than I could ever hope to be. But when the dust settles I'm left with a comedy that didn't make me laugh even once and for me that's fatal.

The Two Popes (Netflix)

Anthony Hopkins and Jonathan Pryce tear it up as the titular pontiffs. Hopkins begins in earnest with a slight German inflection but then remembers he's Anthony Hopkins and immediately starts doing whatever the hell he wants. By the end he's Pope Lecter XVI and he'll eat your communion bread with some rosary beads and a bottle of holy water. But I enjoyed it. I had to do some heavy lifting to put aside my contempt for Catholicism and the Chair of St Peter in particular, but it works quite well as an examination of abdication and faith. Beware though, it's ultimately a PR exercise for Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger and he doesn't deserve one.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 13th, 2020, 10:13 am
by ThirdMan
I'm steadily making my way through The Sopranos, this time accompanied by the excellent The Sopranos Sessions, as recommended by Darren of this parish. This is my fourth run-through of the entire series. Needless to say it's my favourite TV show of all time. It's interesting that so many discussions about the Golden Age of TV refer to "shows like The Sopranos" or words to that effect. However, for me, there are no other shows like it. How I wish there were!

It's not perfect, nothing is, and you can occasionally peer behind the curtain and witness the artifice involved. A notable example is the introduction of Ralph Cifaretto in season 3 who was clearly drafted in to fill a Richie Aprile shaped hole in Tony's life (although he eventually becomes much more than that). Ralph had never been mentioned before and then suddenly he's in everyone's hair and is even having an unlikely sexual relationship with Jackie Aprile's widow. There's a cosiness to the plotting that is characteristic of the rolling, uncertain nature of TV shows, even one of this calibre. Ralph is a classic mid-series antagonist, pulled out of thin air and then burned down to the nub when he's not needed anymore. Tony Blundetto and Phil Leotardo are some of the shows other agents of convenience. Both were serving long prison sentences in an off-screen green room, a plot device that David Chase returned to time and time again when introducing new people.

A second example is Furio Giunta's burning flame for Carmella. Every man has an inner life but when the episodes are binged back-to-back his sensitive volte-face clashes with the woman-beating, child-slapping, body-chopping, coke-snorting Camorra we know him as. Again, there's a malleability and convenience involved. Certain characters can be whatever they're needed to be. In contrast, in the very first episode Christopher is seen as a volatile, impulsive and dangerous character, but with a creative urge that's in conflict with his career as a Mafioso. The writers could then pull him in all sorts of directions because it's all there in episode 1, just waiting to be unpacked. That's clearly better writing but in long-form TV, predicated on seasonal renewal, that's not always possible.

Either way these aren't weaknesses per se. They're the building blocks of a masterpiece, a sneak peak into the greatest sausage factory TV ever produced. And as I'm now learning through The Sopranos Sessions, for every instance of convenience there are one hundred more of foreshadowing and long-term planning, particularly so when the show's status was secure and Chase and co. knew they'd only run out of road when they wanted to.

I'm nervous about the upcoming The Many Saints of Newark feature film. I don't want a prequel. It's not needed. But will I be there on day one? Silly question.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 13th, 2020, 8:34 pm
by dezm0nd
Fleabag on the iplayer. Funny, rude and got quite a poignant message running through it all. Not laughed out loud at TV in a while but this one got me.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 13th, 2020, 8:37 pm
by dezm0nd
ThirdMan wrote: January 13th, 2020, 10:13 am I'm steadily making my way through The Sopranos, this time accompanied by the excellent The Sopranos Sessions, as recommended by Darren of this parish. This is my fourth run-through of the entire series. Needless to say it's my favourite TV show of all time. It's interesting that so many discussions about the Golden Age of TV refer to "shows like The Sopranos" or words to that effect. However, for me, there are no other shows like it. How I wish there were!
Ah I enjoyed that book especially reading it alongside the show. Glad you did the same. The Sopranos is absolutely must-watch TV and I really wish more people would reciprocate when you tell them it's good. I've watched The Wire! WATCH MY BLOODY SOPRANOS. GANDOLFINI IS THE BEST

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 13th, 2020, 10:32 pm
by ThirdMan
clippa wrote: January 13th, 2020, 2:53 pm Nice to have you back, man!
That's very kind of you. It's good to be back. ThirdMan 2.0. New and improved (or, at the very least, properly medicated).

I've read back through the thread and I can see that you've been putting in the hours! Kudos to you.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 13th, 2020, 10:41 pm
by ThirdMan
dezm0nd wrote: January 13th, 2020, 8:34 pm Fleabag on the iplayer. Funny, rude and got quite a poignant message running through it all. Not laughed out loud at TV in a while but this one got me.
I loved it as well. My better-half had been raving about it for months so I came to it with very high expectations. But they were met and eventually exceeded. I particularly enjoyed how she played around with the fourth wall breaking in the second season. It was a jolt to the system, almost unsettling. I'd no idea what was happening or even what genre the show was morphing into.

dezm0nd wrote: January 13th, 2020, 8:37 pmI've watched The Wire! WATCH MY BLOODY SOPRANOS
I'm glad I'm not the only one that feels that way. The Sopranos is/was huge and I find it odd and frustrating that so many people haven't watched it and likely never will. Especially now when binging on long-form TV is so common. Is it because it's not new and shiny? Don't answer that! It's too depressing.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 13th, 2020, 11:06 pm
by ThirdMan
The Gentlemen (Cinema)

Another preposterous study of geezerhood from the director of Aladdin. What a bizarre career trajectory Guy Ritchie has enjoyed. And he's certainly enjoying himself here. It's ridiculous and resulted in several scoffs and one "Oh c'mon" from yours truly. And yet laughter eventually trickled out. Hugh Grant has never been so seedy. Okay, maybe once, but never on screen. Ditto Colin Farrell who lays down some authentic Irish dialogue ("fucking eejit") and knows how to wear a pair of Adidas Originals. I'm loath to recommend it because it's so stupid, however I was just about won over by the throwback nature of its profanity and cheap thrills. It also contains one line of scorchingly relevant dialogue: "There's only one thing worse than looking after spoiled toffs and that's looking after their spoiled off-spring". Guy Ritchie, Royal correspondent?

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 20th, 2020, 4:14 pm
by ThirdMan
1917 (Cinema)

Superb stuff from Sam Mendes who has once again torn himself away from the stage to deliver an outstanding piece of widescreen cinema. What a curious mix of talents! George MacKay is tremendous. A long face and sullen eyes doesn't sound like Hollywood material. Yet it didn't do Buster Keaton any harm and there's something similarly honest and mournful about this young man. His face is going to tell a lot of stories in the years to come.

It's a very contemporary film in how its drama unfolds. It's also brilliantly paced and its score quickens the pulse like a modern blockbuster should. It's presented as a single shot just like Birdman (and God of War!) however unlike the former it serves, rather than supersedes, the drama. It maintains tension and keeps you in lock-step with the characters' grueling trek across a bed of senseless carnage. As with Hitchcock's Rope, which was comprised of just 10 segments, you can sometimes see the joins, but it works. I'm not sure how long Mendes' opening shot is or exactly where it ends but it's surely 7 or 8 minutes of pin-point preparation and execution and is up there with the very best. It's also understated, which virtuoso single shots never are. It's closer to Bela Tarr's Sátántangó than Robert Altman's opening to The Player, which is single shot directing at its most gaudy and self-conscious.

It should be quite obvious by now that I loved 1917 so it saddens me to say that its only real spoilable moment was ruined by the trailer. Mendes was questioned about this on BBC radio over the weekend and he said that individual shots, when taken out of context, don't reveal anything. Bullshit. The trailer ends with an image of George Mackay and if you walk into the theatre with that still in your head you will, within 2 minutes, be able to predict the film's key moment. I spent the first act waiting for it to happen and, bang on schedule, it happened. An absolutely disastrous trailer but a tremendous film.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 21st, 2020, 1:06 am
by ThirdMan
clippa wrote: January 21st, 2020, 12:23 amSounds like a shoe-in for the inevitable Huckleberry hound reboot!
Ha! Good call.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 21st, 2020, 1:44 am
by ThirdMan
Bombshell (Cinema)

The story of how Fox News mogul Roger Ailes sexually harassed his racist, homophobic staff. And we're supposed to just sit there and pretend that the real life bombshells aren't the hateful bigots that they are. It's a big ask and I wasn't quite up to the task.

In certain corners of the internet it's being completely shredded and yeah, it pretty much deserves what it gets. The film wants to trade on the victimisation of its characters without unpacking their real-life personas. But you cannot have it both ways. Gretchen Carlson is a homophobe, Megyn Kelly is a racist and Roger Ailes was an abusive pervert. Any film about those three that doesn't address all of those facts has failed, miserably. That it tries to pull the wool over our eyes with half-truths and cheap gags is insulting. That it portrays Rupert Murdoch as the voice of reason is cause for serious concern.

The performances are excellent, particularly Margot Robbie's composite character who is objectified and humiliated by the monstrous Ailes (an almost unrecognisable John Lithgow). It's a tense and sickening encounter that goes some way toward explaining what sexual harassment must feel like (I can't know for sure, but I suspect it's at least as grueling as this degrading scene).

Pirate it to enjoy the committed, Oscar-nominated performances but don't give the writer or director your money. I did and it's enough for all of us.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 21st, 2020, 6:27 pm
by duskvstweak
January has been 70s SciFi month on the Criterion Channel streaming service. So far, I've watch A Boy and His Dog, No Blade of Grass, THX, Death Race 2000 and Rollerball. I've got another five of these movies to watch by the end of the month!

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 23rd, 2020, 1:14 pm
by Jon Cheetham
1917

Saw this as well and agree with everything Third man said - it really is a great piece of filmmaking. The long shots, the use of light and shadow in a pivotal moment, the set design, all top tier. I barely watch war films but I'd recommend this to anyone, easy. Thank goodness I didn't see any trailers though! That's a bummer.

The Lighthouse

Talking of brilliantly made films - some of the best creeping, slow-burning dread I've seen onscreen. This film is fucking menacing. Thanks to the incredible performances of Defoe and Pattinson, there's moments of dark and desperate humour to be had as well. And line readings that will stick with me forever.

Re: Whatcha Been Watching?

Posted: January 23rd, 2020, 5:09 pm
by Jon Cheetham
I've not seen The VVitch but was reading about it after The Lighthouse and it looks great. Definitely on my list!