[Movies] Talk about the last movie you saw 2: Electric Threadaloo

Shawn

Shawn

Space Jam: A New Legacy
My daughter and I had a back-to-back movie weekend. We watched the original Space Jam yesterday evening and the new one this morning.
I've never liked Space Jam. I was 16 when it came out and I was super excited for it. I grew up on the Looney Tunes and I absolutely loved Who Framed Roger Rabbit. I turned out to be incredibly disappointed. The poor acting, the low quality animation, and most importantly of all... the lack of funny from the Looney Tunes. Watching it nowadays I can also add in terrible direction overall as one of the main problems. The film was never supposed to be anything more than a cash grab and they knew it. The director had no interest in making anything decent.
I will say that the Pulp Fiction moment still makes me laugh though.

So how was the "sequel". Well first I have no idea where the sequel falls. Some of the characters are aware that they have played with Michael Jordan in the past, Bugs even mentions that this scenario sounds familiar, but there's no absolute confirmation. Lola is the only one who seems to retain any knowledge of how to play basketball at all. The aliens from the first film make an unneeded cameo and the poster to the original shows up as one of the many movies that are part of the "Warner Bros Subverse". So let's just assume it's completely apart from the original. If anything it's almost a remake just because stakes and scenario are very similar.

But overall it's BETTER than the original. Just not by much. Direction is better. Acting is better. Even some of the humor is better. Labron James at least makes some effort to act surprised by the situation. No "what's going on here?" style-Jordan deliveries. And when the tunes are allowed to act like tunes they actually kinda entertained me a bit.
 
Ravenpoe

Ravenpoe

Space Jam: This doesn't deserve a subtitle so let's just say 2

Wow. That was... that was something. @Shawn might have liked it better than 1 but... I have to assume Michael Jordan kicked his dog, that's the only possible answer.

If I had to say something nice about Space Jam 2, I would say it is a series of moving images set to sound, and in that regard it is technically a movie. The original Space Jam isn't good, it's like maybe a 6 on a scale of 10, but at least it has a premise, builds a world, and then has a plot that moves through that premise, with consistent rules that allow you to see actions and consequences.

SJ2 is basically Ready Player Dumb. It has no consistency, constantly breaks its own rules, and also seems to think that just showing badly portrayed references in the background will make up for it. "Oh, well maybe it's meant for kids." Yeah, I'm sure kids love A Clockwork Orange and Matrix references. Really tapping into the zeitgeist there.

I watched this trainwreck and I feel stupider for having done so. Also, I want to point out that 1: they don't play basketball (they play a video game that's as close to basketball as mario kart is to stockcar racing) and 2: They don't even go to space. WB didn't even have enough faith in their animators to allow for constant 2D animation, I have to assume 3D was just cheaper to do. Because all of the money of this movie had to go to LeBron and not to anyone writing or directing this dreck.

I went in expecting this movie to be bad and yet I was still disappointed.
 
Shawn

Shawn

Ravenpoe said:
Space Jam: This doesn't deserve a subtitle so let's just say 2

Wow. That was... that was something. @Shawn might have liked it better than 1 but... I have to assume Michael Jordan kicked his dog, that's the only possible answer.

If I had to say something nice about Space Jam 2, I would say it is a series of moving images set to sound, and in that regard it is technically a movie. The original Space Jam isn't good, it's like maybe a 6 on a scale of 10, but at least it has a premise, builds a world, and then has a plot that moves through that premise, with consistent rules that allow you to see actions and consequences.

SJ2 is basically Ready Player Dumb. It has no consistency, constantly breaks its own rules, and also seems to think that just showing badly portrayed references in the background will make up for it. "Oh, well maybe it's meant for kids." Yeah, I'm sure kids love A Clockwork Orange and Matrix references. Really tapping into the zeitgeist there.

I watched this trainwreck and I feel stupider for having done so. Also, I want to point out that 1: they don't play basketball (they play a video game that's as close to basketball as mario kart is to stockcar racing) and 2: They don't even go to space. WB didn't even have enough faith in their animators to allow for constant 2D animation, I have to assume 3D was just cheaper to do. Because all of the money of this movie had to go to LeBron and not to anyone writing or directing this dreck.

I went in expecting this movie to be bad and yet I was still disappointed.
Click to expand...
Say what you will but this 30 seconds of screen time makes 2 the superior film.
1626508882019.png
 
Last edited:
Tiger Tsang

Tiger Tsang

ThatNickGuy said:
The Muppet Movie (1979)

I've felt pretty depressed all day today, but my best friend and I decided to have a movie night. We both had bad days today, honestly. I hemmed and hawed over my movie collection on what to bring to watch. She didn't grow up on The Muppets like I did and had never seen the original movie. And to be perfectly honest, I'm not sure I ever actually sat down and watched it, either. I would catch it on TV when I was younger, but never actually watched it, I don't think.

Turns out, The Muppet Movie was exactly what both of us needed to brighten our spirits. Because I grew up on it, I'm pretty much convinced 99% of my taste of humor comes from The Muppets and this movie proved it. It's ridiculous, completely destroys the fourth wall at time, and has some fantastic jokes that had us both roaring. There so much lampshading in it that I'm almost convinced Muppets might as well have invented it (they didn't, but you know what I mean).

If I hadn't seen it before, I'm dearly sorry I hadn't seen it sooner. If I had, I'm dearly sorry it took me this long to rewatch it.
Click to expand...
The Muppet Show was a Pre-cursor to the Animaniacs. Lots of subtle adult humor *not raunchy necessarily* but on the surface family friendly. The Christopher Reeve episode is a prime example.
 
Bubble181

Bubble181

figmentPez said:
Raya and the Last Dragon

Overall it was a movie. Clearly a lot of effort went into making this a Disney™ movie. People spent years of their lives ensuring that this would be a Disney™®© movie. And that's what it is, a movie.

It's not just the Disney-face dragon, either. Every bit of design just screams "this was made to be immediately identifiable as Disney and as marketable as possible to a worldwide audience". It's not bad, it's just made to a very exact standard.

The real kick in the face for me comes at a point where a character describes their plan for doing a thing, and the movie, ever so briefly, switches to an alternate art style for like 15 seconds, and there's this beautiful glimpse of what the entire movie could have been. The people working on this movie absolutely have artistic skill, but they're hobbled by having to make it DISNEY.

If you want an animated movie, go watch The Mitchells vs the Machines instead.
Click to expand...

Watched this one Friday evening.
What kind of "broke" this movie for me is the simplicity of the story. I didn't object to the visuals, in fact I liked many of it. This just seemed....marketed to a younger audience, and a bit inconsistent.
A lot of the animation is really quite "realistic". A lot of the scenes are, too. Kung fu fighting with moves that, you know, real people could conceivably make. The BadAss Woman
(Namaari)
smacking down an underling followed by "Well, anyone else got any questions?" but the smackdown is literally just tripping them over your foot. That's realistic-y and grounds the movie. But then other moments, some of it is way out there or just...Not so good. I've gotten used to animated characters' mouths moving in time with the English language, but not quite syncing up to dubbed versions (which I'm occasionally forced to endure because of children present). Disney spends quite a bit of time and energy making the mouth movements not quite line up with English so that they can sort-of-also-work for other languages. In Raya, though, they don't seem to line up with anything at all. Definitely not English, French or Dutch.
There's very, very little in the way of humor. Yes, there's technically some visual humor, but it fell fairly flat. The comic relief characters aren't especially funny. Raya's got a cute and original pet, but it doesn't actually serve any purpose. There are no actual real jokes. Baby Noi with her monkeys is even less of an actually funny character than the Minions.
The story isn't just simple, it's one-level. Most good Disney movies have stories that work on different levels, being fun or interesting for kids and adults. This....nope. The "Kumbaya we can only overcome by all trusting each other and working together" morale is perfectly fine if a bit worn thin, but there's absolutely no added levels. This could fairly easily have had a second interpretation about pollution - heck, the whole world goes to crap because of separate groups being selfish and not caring about others, it's practically screaming for it! But it isn't.
The world, while interesting in some ways, being some sort of (as far as I know) fictional semi-Chinese-mythology world, also isn't consistent at all. In the "kids' movie" sense, which also plagued Harry Potter for example. How big are things? How bad has it gotten? How do things actually still work? In HP a LOT of retconning and building layers upon layers of stuff sort of worked to make it fit together (most of the major issues with the Wizarding World stem from the first two books really not being made with the intent of creating a consistent universe). That might be possible with Kumandra (the world/country it is set in), but it'd be a challenge.
Raya is forced to go explore Every River in The World. This takes her 6 years. Fair enough, we get a map of the country, we know it looks kinda big. but we also see her visiting the capitols of all five nations in less than a day of traveling. Heck, in the climax
Tong can go visit his village, be reunited with his family, and then get back with all of those people in time to be with Raya's reunion with her father, which is later the same day.
. If those 5 spots on the map can easily be traveled, this isn't a world or even a country - this is five villages in a small valley somewhere...Which means travelling all the rivers should take a couple of weeks, given that
Raya's immune to the bad guys, has a super speedy steed, and has a clear map pointing them all out

The voice acting/casting was really good, I really liked the music (though it's not a Disney musical movie with songs, which I tend to prefer). The atmosphere building was great.

In many ways this is similar to Brave - a young girl with no special powers setting out to restore balance in a small world divided into a number of clans/groups - just with a different coat of paint. I just liked Brave better.

I get that a lot of people really like this movie for what it represents - it's the first big South-East-Asian-styled Disney (Mulan is Chinese, Moana South-Pacific, etc). It's another movie with a female protagonist who is actually a protagonist - she doesn't need a guy to help her or save her. I'm pretty sure it's the first movie where there's this much female representation (I actually think this might fail the reverse Bechdel test? There may be a worldbuilding conversation somewhere in the beginning between two guys. I don't mean this to say I mind, I don't). Like Elsa in Frozen, Raya doesn't have or show any need for a romantic subplot or love interest (and of course, this means a part of the shipping crowd insists she must be lesbian and in a sequel she'd have to be paired off with the spoilered person higher up). Honestly, that probably is the only person there's any connection shown with - but I think leaving a 16 or 17 year old girl without a Life Long True Love is in general a better idea - the notion you're supposed to find The One when you're young is toxic and needs to die.

All in all...Well, I'm not in a good position to compare to the most recent Disneys, having not seen Luca, Finding Dory, Frozen II or Soul, yet. Looking at the Disneys from the past, say, 10 years, so the ones I'd consider "modern"....It can't hold a candle to Moana or Princess and the Frog, I'd definitely consider Zootopia and Coco better movies, Big Hero 6 has a much stronger ensemble and a more involved story... Tangled had its music going for it and the fourth-wall-breaking humor aimed at an adult audience. I'd probably even consider Wreck-it Ralph a better movie overall.
It may be that I was pre-occupied and stressed when watching (which is why I went for a new Disney, hoping it'd make me laugh or cry or make me melt or whatever), but I'd probably have to put it at the bottom of the list. Not because I hated it - I didn't, it had quite some good things going for it - but it just didn't accomplish anything special.
It's "a Disney movie made by committee".
 
Simfers

Simfers

And to follow that quite in-depth review with something completely different:

I saw Black Widow in the theaters on Saturday. I liked it quite a bit! Not my favourite MCU film, but it was fun!

That is all.
 
Vrii

Vrii

The Tomorrow War is absolutely awful. The premise is stupid, the details are stupid, the conclusion is stupid. I could go into detail, but that'd be more effort than the writers put into the script, so I'm not going to.

Just terrible.
 
Far

Far

Vrii said:
The Tomorrow War is absolutely awful. The premise is stupid, the details are stupid, the conclusion is stupid. I could go into detail, but that'd be more effort than the writers put into the script, so I'm not going to.

Just terrible.
Click to expand...
When they focused on Mr. Pompeii I thought "That kid is gonna have some dumb fuck super-specific knowledge that saves them in the end." Imagine that...

When Pratt shows up in the future and Command starts directing him around "That's his daughter." Who would have thought...

The 15 minute science time jamboree in the middle could have been a 2-minute montage and still worked to show their growing bond and nothing would have been lost.

At this point, after she reveals he comes back, is all withdrawn, leaves them, and then dies, I look at him and say "If this was a better movie than I can already tell this is going be, they won't be able to totally complete the toxin, he'll go back with the nearly completed version and become obsessed with completing it, never being able to crack it, alienating his family and be stuck in the same cycle knowing that they will never complete it. Alternatively, he will leave it to her and her having it before she had in the original timeline does allow her to complete it. Either would have been better than what we ended up with.

Of course not.

Instead, we get dei ex machina to the fucking extreme and every character introduced up to this point fills an incredibly specific purpose, welcome back Mr.Pompeii and very convenient Father Jacked Killer Simmons, the ex-military pilot that just happens to be able to fly them to Russia under radar cause that's just what he does day to day conveniently.

Dumb awful dreck.
 
Yoshimickster

Yoshimickster

That film always read like a bad knock-off of the Blood-Space War from "Welcome to Nightvale", not surprised it was garbage.

Gunpowder Milkshake

First act kinda lulled here and there, but once the action got going it got freaing GOING, especially in the climax.
 
AshburnerX

AshburnerX

Space Jam: The Quest to Sell More Merchandise

I think I laughed twice in the entire movie.

Once when Granny quoted the fucking Prince Basketball story from the Chapelle Show. Blouses, indeed.

The other time is when they hyped up getting Michael Jordan back for a few minutes to psych them up during half-time and instead it's Michael B. Jordan (the actor).

That said, seeing a lot of the old Hanna-Barbera cartoon characters in 3D was kind of cool, even if they were only in the background. Space Ghost and The Herculoids were especially notable. Don Cheadle was also pretty fun because he's just chewing the scenery anytime he's on screen and just having the time of of his life.

Otherwise? Yeah, the movie is trash. The original movie kind of works because it came out during a time in Jordan's career where it was clear he was kind of just... lost, professionally and the movie was able to feed off that vibe to make an otherwise mildly entertaining movie have some actual emotional resonance. This one doesn't have that because LeBron isn't lost, he's just here for a check. Skip this one unless you really wanna see some impressive 3d model work.
 
figmentPez

figmentPez

Staff member
Uncle Frank
Paul Bettany and Sophia Lillis

I really enjoyed this one. It's about a period piece set in the 1970s about a teenage girl who doesn't really fit in the small town she comes from, and her uncle who really doesn't fit in. One part quirky family comedy, one part coming of age story, two parts heavy drama with a few gut punches of reality on the side.
 
Tinwhistler

Tinwhistler

Yoshimickster said:
Gunpowder Milkshake

First act kinda lulled here and there, but once the action got going it got freaing GOING, especially in the climax.
Click to expand...
I watched this last night. When I'd first seen the trailer, I thought "Oh nice, Jane Wick."

It ended up being a little goofier than I'd have liked, and something about Karen Gillan's acting was slightly off-putting to me. But it was generally enjoyable.
I'd give it about 3.5 out of 5 stars.

I think I'd have given it more stars if it could have decided if it was a gutsy action flick or a goofy kids flick. Instead, it was kind of both, and I just didn't fully connect with the vibe.
 
Celt Z

Celt Z

Tinwhistler said:
I watched this last night. When I'd first seen the trailer, I thought "Oh nice, Jane Wick."

It ended up being a little goofier than I'd have liked, and something about Karen Gillan's acting was slightly off-putting to me. But it was generally enjoyable.
I'd give it about 3.5 out of 5 stars.

I think I'd have given it more stars if it could have decided if it was a gutsy action flick or a goofy kids flick. Instead, it was kind of both, and I just didn't fully connect with the vibe.
Click to expand...
When Mr. Z and I watched it the other night, we agreed that it felt like a live-action anime. The timing, the dialogue, the colors, the framing of shots, the choreography, etc. Your description of "could have decided if it was a gutsy action flick or a goofy kids flick" feels very in-line with that.
 
Shawn

Shawn

Jungle Cruise
As far as movies go it's a fun ride. It's another 'movie that has a theme that's similar to that of a ride at Disneyland so "hey let's throw in some references to the ride and name it after it for the product tie-in."' In fact that's not the only thing this movie has in common with Pirates of the Caribbean:
Yet another deathless curse that keeps it's victims in a constant state of torment and immortality.
 
Last edited:
sixpackshaker

sixpackshaker

RKO 281
The making and unmaking of Citizen Kane.

The movie reminded me that Melanie Griffith is a really good actress. She really carried this movie for me. She did not hit a wrong note through the whole movie.
 
Fun Size

Fun Size

The Empty Man: I'm a sucker for a cheesy 'the legend says' movie, and this one did it well. Found a way to wind the legend into a bigger concept that played well. Also, not reliant on jumps - mostly atmosphere, which I like a lot.
 
Dirona

Dirona

The Green Knight

Bizarre, beautiful, utterly insane, and I adored it. I'm a massive Arthurian nerd, and the Gawain poem is probably my favourite.
Fabulous sound design, especially on the titular character. Seriously *chef's kiss*. Loved it, sounded like home.
Odd costuming choices.
Interesting soundtrack.
Definitely will not be everyone's (or even most people's) cup of tea.
Weird structure overall, and generally just batshit weird. But, ya, it scratched a weird nerdy itch that I didn't realize needed scratching.
 
Celt Z

Celt Z

Dirona said:
The Green Knight

Bizarre, beautiful, utterly insane, and I adored it. I'm a massive Arthurian nerd, and the Gawain poem is probably my favourite.
Fabulous sound design, especially on the titular character. Seriously *chef's kiss*. Loved it, sounded like home.
Odd costuming choices.
Interesting soundtrack.
Definitely will not be everyone's (or even most people's) cup of tea.
Weird structure overall, and generally just batshit weird. But, ya, it scratched a weird nerdy itch that I didn't realize needed scratching.
Click to expand...
But now the important question.... how was their use of coconuts?
 
Celt Z

Celt Z

Fear Street (1994, 1978, 1666)
I had a lot of fun watching these. More fun than I've had watching horror in a while. They're not going to blow your mind or reinvent the wheel, but they were fun, gory stories. I didn't read a lot of R.L. Stine when I was younger (I skipped from Scary Stories to Tell In the Dark to Stephen King's works), so I didn't notice any references. But I did see the homages to several of the most famous "scary movies" and thought they were well-done. My biggest complaint is it was sometimes shot TOO dark to see what's going on. (I wonder if that saves on the budget? When they don't have to show the gore in much detail?) I liked the reverse reveals, and the casting was a good mix of newbies and familiar faces.
 
Fun Size

Fun Size

Celt Z said:
Fear Street (1994, 1978, 1666)
I had a lot of fun watching these. More fun than I've had watching horror in a while. They're not going to blow your mind or reinvent the wheel, but they were fun, gory stories. I didn't read a lot of R.L. Stine when I was younger (I skipped from Scary Stories to Tell In the Dark to Stephen King's works), so I didn't notice any references. But I did see the homages to several of the most famous "scary movies" and thought they were well-done. My biggest complaint is it was sometimes shot TOO dark to see what's going on. (I wonder if that saves on the budget? When they don't have to show the gore in much detail?) I liked the reverse reveals, and the casting was a good mix of newbies and familiar faces.
Click to expand...
I just have to finish with 1666, but the first two were a great flashback to my video store days.
 
Celt Z

Celt Z

Fun Size said:
I just have to finish with 1666, but the first two were a great flashback to my video store days.
Click to expand...
I wasn't looking forward to 1666 as much as the first two chapters (witches/puritans aren't really my thing), but I ended up enjoying it a lot. I think it was a good way to bookend and bring everything back together.
 
Frank

Frank

Dirona said:
The Green Knight

Bizarre, beautiful, utterly insane, and I adored it. I'm a massive Arthurian nerd, and the Gawain poem is probably my favourite.
Fabulous sound design, especially on the titular character. Seriously *chef's kiss*. Loved it, sounded like home.
Odd costuming choices.
Interesting soundtrack.
Definitely will not be everyone's (or even most people's) cup of tea.
Weird structure overall, and generally just batshit weird. But, ya, it scratched a weird nerdy itch that I didn't realize needed scratching.
Click to expand...
I loved it too for the exact same reasons.

I wish there were more movies like it. I need to watch it again to see what that single frame was during the scene with St. Winnifred.

I would fist fight a komodo dragon for the storybook Arthurian legends book I had as a 7 year old where I first read all these legends. The art was so kick-ass. I vividly remember how the green knight was depicted.
 
Last edited:
Far

Far

I'm like ultra late on this it feels like, and actually Bo Burnham in general, but INSIDE is all kinds of good.

What finally made me watch it was doomscrolling through instagram stories and hearing "Bezos I" over and over and finally looking up what it was from. It's part of a current trend where...a specific group of people...use the "Look where you came from, look at you now" line to show their glow up. Then I'm watching and "White Woman's Instagram' plays and, Iike, come on.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top