Donomark

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Everything posted by Donomark

  1. We should make a poll! The Three Women: Sex Workers or Virginal Sisters?
  2. Listened to this twice! T'was interesting hearing Ian's thought on the Star Wars franchise. I was expecting just a *bit* more elaboration on the two most controversial sequel movies (Last Jedi and Rise of Skywalker), but that's what different opinions are for. For my part regarding The Last Jedi, I agree with Dan that it's potentially the smartest Star Wars movie. I think it's inclination for catharsis denial holds it back, as many times the movie gears up for something cool it pulls back as a swerve. The Holdo maneuver is a SW CLASSIC moment, and Mark Hamill's acting is a franchise performance best, but did Luke really need to die? Like, what even killed him? Force strain? Stuff like that made the movie imperfect for myself. Rise of Skywalker is just embarrassing though. The fact that someone has to stand in an exact spot in a field and hold up a thing to match a visual of a thing is about as great of screenwriting as "Somehow Palpatine returned". I agree that it's cool seeing the three mains actually be together, and I do like Ben Solo at the end, but ye gods.
  3. I was absolutely making faces at the end when Pandy when on a rant about the L O G I S T I C S of the Castle servants and their PTSD!
  4. Ooof, oh yeah. God. There's another gay joke or reference where some of the Mothers presume the new male teacher is gay because what kid of Kindergarten teacher would be a man? Then they see it's Arnold, epitome of male beauty, and instantly change their tune.
  5. Pandy's assertion that the bodies strewn across the stairs indicating that the Castle Appliances killed people had me rolling 😆
  6. Can confirm, can't wait for everyone to hear it!
  7. Kindergarten Cop: Directed by Ivan Reitman, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger Another classic Arnie caper knocked off of my to-watch list. This one mostly bounced off me. It's way more akin to parodic "action guy deals with kids" genre that definitely would've probably been the trendsetter for it at the time. I was more invested in the main plot with the bad guy, but even that was rendered fairly thin. Arnold can do no wrong, but I always have a slight issue whenever he's portrayed as just some normal guy and not a big motherfucker. In this, he's Austrian born and he's from a family of cops, but it feels like it still could've been anyone. Commando, Total Recall, Predator...those are Arnie roles. He's the ubermensch, not anything close to an everyman. What I did enjoy was his female partner played by Pamela Reed. That felt exceedingly fresh. A woman who was funny and competent and smart, but not a love interest (she actually has a fiancee so it's never even an issue). It's rare that you see a platonic Dynamic Duo in an action movie, let alone an Arnold film, and I really enjoyed that. Aside from that and the film's star, the movie had little to give me. Scenes like Arnold punching an abusive dad are fun, but you also feel totally manipulated. There's a disgusting scene where Arnold assures a parent that her son is only playing with dolls because he's practicing to look up girls' skirts (which is true), and the two share a sigh of relief. I came this close to turning the movie off after witnessing that. Usually products of a certain time don't go for the three-fer of being perverted, sexist and homophobic all at once.
  8. Best of Enemies: A quick documentary about the late 60s series of debates between Gore Vidal and William F. Buckley Jr., and how the two men grew to hate each other. This is my kind of stuff, very nerdy, almost boring, but personally fascinating to me.
  9. Guardians of the Galaxy vol.3: Directed by James Gunn Reviews came out early in favor of this being the best MCU film since Endgame. After seeing it last night, I can understand how people would come to that sentiment. Like him or not, James Gunn always comes to storytelling with intention. He doesn't just toss off stories and works to make everything he does with superheroes emotional, stakes-driven and action packed. Honestly I've been thinking a lot since we recorded the Flickchart Forum for it, but even though there's a lot of compensatory yelling and laughing in Guardians vol.2, I do think I enjoyed it more than the first one. IT felt a bit weightier. But in terms of emotions and stakes, this one takes the cake. I like that the Guardians have been around for several year, and they are a unit. Yes they're silly, yes they can be goofy, but when shit gets real they snap into action like they're the X-Men. There's a real lack of bullshit with this movie, especially Starlord. But every character is just mega-competent and good at what they do, which works in favor for the film because they are hopelessly outmatched in their weight class. The opening battle scene is great and sets up right away the power scale for all the characters involved. Chukwudi Iwuji plays the High Evolutionary, and he's a great villain. There's no subterfuge of civility or class with him, he's just hatefully evil, but still in the way where he sees himself as beyond morality. As a character, you buy into him and I think from Ronan to Ego to High Evolutionary, it shows a progression with Gunn's Marvel villains. It also works towards this being Rocket's revealed backstory, and really driving the emotional stakes for the film. The first flick was the team getting together despite they're differences, the second one was kind of split between Peter's story with Ego and Rocket's sense of self. This movie has a very simple premise, save Rocket. It's focused, uncomplicated and gives everyone determination. Drax isn't falling on his face to get cheap laughs. Of the team, he is probably the cartooniest, least serious but it works better than it has in past Marvel movies. Matis is WAY improved. I didn't see the Holiday Special, but her character is both really funny and incredibly empathetic. She was one of my favorites in this. Gamorra actually feels like Gamorra to me in this movie, the dealiest woman in the galaxy. It gives Zoe Saldana a chance to be way more than just the colored love interest, which has blanketed too much of her career. Pratt's great, Karen Gillan is awesome as always although there's a brief moment I caught her Scottish Brogue for half a second. . Aside from wanting a bit more room to breathe in some of the general scenes, this is a pretty flawless movie I feel. The stakes are so legitimate, but the Guardians have matured into a classic superhero team so it's not shooting fish in a barrel either. I also liked how they did Adam Warlock. He was played for laughs a lot of the time, to be sure. But he was still massively powerful, and not a joke character like MODOK was in Ant Man 3. It's now Phase 5 and I'm having a hard time thinking to myself why Ant Man 3 didn't suck, aside from Jonathan Majors. Guardians 3 is obviously way better, but in terms of post-Endgame movies, well...nothing's probably ever gonna top Spider-Man: No Way Home for me. Wakanda Forever is also just a superbly strong film that it genuinely bothers me how dismissive people feel okay to be with regarding it in review. I liked Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, but this is better. That movie had tangible flaws, and this one did not. It's the Guardians movie I've kind of been wanting for years, but you had to have the first two to get there. It feels like a real conclusion to a 3 chapter story.
  10. I often bring this up, but during The Resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul storyline during the Grant Morrison/Paul Dini era of the late 2000s, Batman fought the Sensei and got splashed into the Fountain of Youth which de-aged his body a few years, healing his permanent wounds and all. I know that's long since been forgotten, but I found it to be a simple explanation for how he can still pass for his mid-30s when Dick and Babs are both probably pushing 30 now (Oracle was definitely 30 before being de-aged in the new 52).
  11. You had me at "once again low on funds" 😂🤣
  12. Point Break (1991): Directed by Kathryn Bigelowe, starring Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze. This movie came at me in waves. A very nice, artistic opening leads to appearances by John C. McGinley and Gary Busey acting like the utter cartoons they're famous for. Halfway through the first act, I thought this was a hilariously cheesy, wonderfully bullshit 90s action movie. Once Patrick Swayze comes onscreen however, it calms down and becomes something special. Swayze's performance delivers to the film sheer dignity and grace that puts it way above what it could've been with a lesser actor. The action sequences are very good, with the shootout at the suspects home a standout. Keanu's exactly what the online memes say of his acting skill, more or less. He's 100% committed, but his skills ebb and flow between earnest and great and the wrong tone or register. It's not distracting, but it's there. Still, he's ever the likable protag, and his relationship with Swayze's Bodie - while less gay than I was expecting - was sweet nonetheless. I think the film stumbles a bit in the third act. Stuff starts happening rapid-fire where we're not really settled into a mode. All of a sudden Johnny Utah is an unwilling participant with the Ex-Presidents. All of a sudden he's arrested. Now they're jumping out of a plane. Then it's *checks internet* nine months later. That whole last act watched rather awkwardly, but is saved by the ending. The Gray Man: Directed by the Russo Bros. Starring Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans Like Point Break, this movie starts and right away I'm thinking "Oh this is some bullshit". It's written like a highly cliche'd, borderline shlocky early 2000s action movie. Everything is tropey, from Goslin's Sierra Six's troubled childhood and past, to the renegade agent plotline, to the disgruntled superiors throwing things in anger, to the various McGuyver-esque skills Six employs at any given moment. The thing of it is though, the Russos aren't dumb. It becomes apparent that this is clearly them just doing a tropey action movie and having fun along the way. The cast is, frankly, above it's weight class, but everyone delivers. Ana De Armas reteams with Gosling and Evans from Blade Runner 2049 and Knives Out respectively, delivering way more action panache than she did in No Time to Die. Rene Jean-Page plays the douchey chief of command with shady intentions, and Jessica Henwick is his harried second in command. But the MVP of the movie is Chris Evans, who just revels in playing out-of-this world assholes. Nobody does it like him, and though his character is a spiritual successor to Bennett (the final battle was undeniably looking at Commando), he never gets boring. He's funny, wild and alive. Most everyone else is grim-faced and serious, but he holds everything together. This was based on a book and it watches like that, with trading locales at a moment's notice and lore that seems so extraneous it could've only come from adhering to the source material. But while this movie is the least bit creative, it's perfectly fun to watch on a Friday night with some pizza. The action, while not as great as Caps 2&3, is solid and you don't feel cheated. It's a decent rental of a picture.
  13. Deadpool Spidey 3 frustrates at times and often, but while LXG has things that are interesting in it, nothing that rises to the level of awesome. For all its faults, including ones that are endemic to the whole of Raimi's Spider-Man trilogy, at the end of the day it's still a Raimi Spider-Man movie.
  14. That was funny as fuck, is this the goofiest the show ever gets? I was never bored, it was LOLarious from beginning to end
  15. Brotherhood of Justice: starring Keanu Reeves, Keifer Sutherland, Billy Zane and Lori Loughlin a 1986 Made for TV movie based on events from a high school a year before where a group of seniors start a vigilante squad that immediately spins out of control. I genuinely found myself engrossed by this. It's pretty PSA-y, and it's liberal politics are on clear display, but I didn't feel too talked down to, considering the time it was made. Very anti-racist compared to a lot of stuff coming out of theaters in the mid-80s. Billy Zane gives the best performance as an obviously troubled kid, but it's an odd casting of Keanu as the captain of the football team and Keifer as the shy, quiet kid. Nevertheless I dug it for what it was.
  16. John Wick Chapter 4: I loved this. I genuinely think this is a masterwork in action filmmaking, and one of the best action movies of the 21st century. Easily since the Raid movies. More on my thoughts here.
  17. I thought the popular narrative was that Hard Day's Night sucked, but maybe I was conflating that in my mind with the reputation of Head, which I know has a generally negative public perception. I was aware of the scenes of suicide in the movie.
  18. Aqua Teen Forever: PLANTASM: This was a more earnest, honest effort at storytelling than anything else I've seen from the crew of this show, including their previous film which I can't for the life of me remember the plot of. Many scenes are pure exposition, and there's actually a lot of (relative) time and effort put into affirming that the Aqua Teens do genuinely care for each other, no matter what they say. Now, IDK how funny it all comes together. It's a funny film to be sure, but because of the story structure and characterization, there's far less of that cynical punch that the show typically has. The randomness is lessened, and even Carl isn't as mean as he usually is. The very end is much more closer to form, but on the whole it feels as though Dave Willis and co. have mellowed since 2015 when the show originally ended. In will say though that the Mooninities were the funniest I've found them to be in years. They repeatedly interrupt the movie and address/insult the viewer, and every time had me laughing.
  19. The DC animated movies have really leaned into changing things from the comics for a long while now. Hush, Red Son...think the last generally faithful adaptation they did was maybe Dark Knight Returns over ten years ago.
  20. T'was good! Nothing disagreeable on my end, anyone who just obediently conforms to this interpretation as better than the original purely because it's the movie's interpretation is open to a Simpsons-style strangling from me. What's interesting is that Gail Simone 1) eventually copped to it being a pretty antithetic adaptation of the character online, and 2) said apparently she was originally meant to closer embody Cassandra from the comics. With the Brave and the Bold movie on the horizon bringing forth the actual, factual Bat-Family (and James Gunn having repeatedly stated in the past that Cass Cain is a favorite character of his), I'm confident that this version would just be a blip in history.
  21. Just finished watching for the first time and am about to start the download!
  22. The Prestige (Not Seen Either) MOTP Spider-Verse Blade When Harry Met Sally Silence of the Lambs