What Movie Did You Just Watch

[Foggle]

I really liked Happy Death Day.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Nothing wrong with that!

I'm just saying that it falls into a category in which I feel people over-praised the movie. That's just a personal opinion, though, and doesn't mean I think that others aren't allowed to really like it. The same goes for the new Haloween film. I'm glad that fans and critics really enjoy it for the most part. I just don't get why it's being given such accolades among those people, though.

Like Dr. Insomiac, though, I suspect it may he because traditional slasher movies have been dormant for a long while so it gets people all nostalgic for them. In contrast, If a superhero movie came out and had just as many issues nobody would hesitate to call it out for that since we get a pretty steady stream of those movies every year.

[Dr. Insomniac]

I've been thinking about how much of a harder time the other slasher franchises would have coming back, because Halloween had it easy. John Carpenter was still around to give his blessing, Jamie Lee Curtis was back as Laurie, and they could ride simply off of those two notes. Whereas Nightmare on Elm Street has the issue of Wes Craven no longer living, and the Friday the 13th films never had much in the way of a beloved creative figure akin to Craven or Carpenter. And neither have a recurring arch-nemesis to the villain the way Laurie was to Michael, so you couldn't use that as your hook. I guess bringing back Englund and Hodder would bring back some fans, but then you'd have to brainstorm the kind of story that would require old Freddy and Jason to come back over newer versions of the characters.

The Hellraiser movies have a different problem, since hiring Clive Barker and bringing back Doug Bradley would work, but the company that owns the rights is too cheap to do either and would rather let the franchise stew in a dying direct-to-video market.

[Avaitor]

I saw Halloween last night, and I honestly liked it. Granted, it's no masterpiece like the original- you don't get a feel for the crispness of a midwestern autumn like Carpenter successfully evoked, for one. The film keeps the same flat aesthetic that most Blumhouse features maintain, and that's ultimately what it is- a Blumhouse take on a Halloween movie. Not exactly a perfect experience, but I had a good time.

I thought that it had good thrills and was well paced, running exactly as long as it should have. I also really like how the movie ended with three generations of women teaming up, especially since I feel like Karen's know-how in the end filled in some of the gaps I thought her relationship with Laurie was missing.

Granted, I didn't really love any character, although Judy Greer surprised me with a mostly good serious performance (I only fell off with her when she started serving flat exposition, but that's not entirely her fault), and I liked that Toby Huss played her husband, even if it was kind of a thankless role. The Loomis surrogate especially wasn't a favorite. It wasn't stated how long he worked with Dr. Loomis, but you'd think that he would have had enough experience with not just him, but Michael in general to accept that no prodding could have possibly gotten anything out of him, and that he's better off dead.

[Dr. Insomniac]

I've been watching this video analyses on Halloweens 4 through 6, and I understand when you're turning a movie into a franchise, you almost have to expand your previously enigmatic character so he has his own lore and reasons to kill if you don't want to recycle the same movie as the first, but nothing about this sounds like the thoughts and ideas of storytellers or even film executives, but of schizophrenic madmen who contradict themselves at every turn. And what was the lasting influence? Nothing. These movies became non-canon, nobody's ever praised them as more than just guilty pleasure slasher films, and they're mostly seen as that disinherited stepchild era of Halloween between the second and H2O.

[Avaitor]

I've actually been seeing a little bit of reevaluation of 4 in recent years. I've watched it recently, and it's not as bad as I was expecting- it focuses on a sisterly bond that's different than most slasher films (although I also recently saw Slumber Party Massacre, and that has a superior sister dynamic imo), and while Donald Pleasence was showing tear in his performance, he has some good moments.

I wouldn't call it a great movie by any means, not on the level of the original or even 2018, but I'd put it about on par with II, which has some good ideas and scares, even if the concept of Laurie being Michael's sister is really fucking unnecessary. I still need to get to III at some point, having only seen bits and pieces, but I'm not really interested in any of the others.

[LumRanmaYasha]

I've been watching this video analyses on Halloweens 4 through 6, and I understand when you're turning a movie into a franchise, you almost have to expand your previously enigmatic character so he has his own lore and reasons to kill if you don't want to recycle the same movie as the first, but nothing about this sounds like the thoughts and ideas of storytellers or even film executives, but of schizophrenic madmen who contradict themselves at every turn. And what was the lasting influence? Nothing. These movies became non-canon, nobody's ever praised them as more than just guilty pleasure slasher films, and they're mostly seen as that disinherited stepchild era of Halloween between the second and H2O.

The production history behind this franchise is really interesting to me, even as someone who hasn't seen the films. The reviewer put it well when he noted how insecure and unconfident the filmmakers were in their creative vision, too afraid to change the formula that they changed plans constantly to double back on the familiar while unsuccessfully introducing new ideas and throwing them out by the next installment. These kind of production troubles are always fascinating to me, especially when it comes to long-running franchises like this. Learning this stuff almost makes me want to watch the films themselves to analyze them for myself, but when it comes to the Halloween franchise I think Season of the Witch is really the only one I'm genuinely interested in watching, while the rest I wouldn't go out of my way to seek unless I was in the company of friends to joke around with.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

For once, there was actually a screening of an anime film that was within an hour of where I was currently living. I went to see the latest Mamoru Hosoda film Mirai, and as expected it was pretty great. I have yet to see anything by Hosoda that I dislike. His weakest film was probably his entry into the One Piece franchise, but even that was better than the majority of One Piece (and Shonen Jump in general) anime movies, and in general it still had a lot of memorable moments to it. The main thing holding it back was that Hosoda had to try his best to adapt his style to something that fit One Piece, which it really doesn't. When he started doing original works of his own, I feel that he was truly able to flourish his talents as a director in animation. I'll grant you that The Boy and the Beast stumbles a bit compared to his other works, but even that still succeeds in so many ways despite having its clear faults.

As for Mirai, it's both his most ambitious film but also the smallest in scale and scope in terms of the story. That is to say that it shows how much he and his studio have grown in both their animation skills and story-telling capabilities, and this one dealing with more surreal elements than any of his past films has him playing around with style, tone, and color-gradients a lot, so it really is ambitious on a technical level. However narratively it's a very personal and intimate story dealing with the themes of family that are prevalent throughout all of his work, however in this case what makes it different is the perspective in which he chooses to tackle this story from, which is that of a young boy who's beyond his toddler years but not yet of school age. It's nothing new for Hosoda to make his viewpoint characters representative of youth, but he tends to go with teenagers, or at least characters of school age. It's a very interesting move to have this story take place from the perspective of Kun, who falls well below even that age demographic to the point of not even being able to form all of his words and sentences properly. It's also a really interesting move in how he makes it very ambiguous whether the fantastical elements are all in Kun's head or if some are in fact real (some of them kind of have to be if you stop to think about the progression of the story).

At any rate, I'd say that this is a better movie than The Boy and the Beast (again, still really dig that movie, but it is one of Hosoda's weaker efforts in my book) and about on par with The Girl Who Leapt Through Time. I'd still have to say that Summer Wars and Wolf Children are at a pretty even stalemate for my favorite Hosoda film, though. Those are what he produced at the top of his game, IMO.

Well, anyways, as much as I love this movie, I won't be surprised to see it yet again snubbed at the Oscars. It really is a shame how little they actually give a shit about the animation category. We have this movie, Isle of Dogs, and Spider-Verse from this year alone, yet I'm willing to bet you anything that the mediocre Incredibles 2 or Ralph Breaks the Internet will be the only two movies that have a serious shot at winning in this category. To be fair, I haven't seen RBTI yet, but I while I'm sure that I would enjoy it I highly doubt that it would match any of those other movies for me.

[Avaitor]

Mirai got nominated for the Golden Globes, so it may have a chance this time. Being distributed by GKids definitely helps- Funi just do not have the clout to get anything nominated, not Boy and the Beast or even Your Name. That said, it probably won't win, but don't count out Into the Spiderverse, since it's winning a lot of critic's awards. I'm personally not interested in it, though- I don't like Lord and Miller's style, and just like The Lego Movie, what I've seen of the animation gives me a headache.

I hope to see this soon, but I'm also still behind on Hosoda's stuff. I need to get to Boy and the Beast and Wolf Children, but if I get to Mirai first, I'm hitting that up.

As for recent stuff, there are two biggish movies I'm surprisingly interested in, giving their franchise's track records- Bumblebee and Aquaman. Their trailers make them look a little more fun than previous installments in the Bayverse and DCEU (although if I hear "I call it an asswhoopin'" one more time...), and they're both directed by talented filmmakers. Early reception also seems solid, with Aquaman getting decent buzz, and a friend of mine who grew up on G1 but doesn't like the Transformers movies coming out quite pleased with Bumblebee.

That said, they'll both have to wait for Mary Poppins Returns. By far my top priority this month.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Mirai got nominated for the Golden Globes, so it may have a chance this time. Being distributed by GKids definitely helps- Funi just do not have the clout to get anything nominated, not Boy and the Beast or even Your Name. That said, it probably won't win, but don't count out Into the Spiderverse, since it's winning a lot of critic's awards. I'm personally not interested in it, though- I don't like Lord and Miller's style, and just like The Lego Movie, what I've seen of the animation gives me a headache.

Lord and Miller are only producers on this one, though.

Also you're objectively wrong about the animation, so ....

As for recent stuff, there are two biggish movies I'm surprisingly interested in, giving their franchise's track records- Bumblebee and Aquaman. Their trailers make them look a little more fun than previous installments in the Bayverse and DCEU (although if I hear "I call it an asswhoopin'" one more time...), and they're both directed by talented filmmakers. Early reception also seems solid, with Aquaman getting decent buzz, and a friend of mine who grew up on G1 but doesn't like the Transformers movies coming out quite pleased with Bumblebee.

With Bumblebee, while I'd normally have no interest in it, I am very curious to see how Travis Knight handles a live-action film. This could be similar to how Brad Bird transitioned from animation to live-action and (IMO) knocked it out of the park with his own entry into a franchise, Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol. I'm hoping for the best here, since while I don't care a bit about the Transformers franchise itself, I'd like to see Knight's career flourish.

That said, they'll both have to wait for Mary Poppins Returns. By far my top priority this month.

I'm very cautiously optimistic about it. The early reviews have been very positive, but I'm worried because of how critics have a tendency to overhype Disney reboots and sequels. I was baffled by how Cinderella and The Jungle Book got the praise that they did, and stuff like Finding Dory and The Incredibles 2 were just flat-out overrated, IMO. I am not a cynical, anti-blockbuster/franchise moviegoer, but at the same time I'm not blind to Disney's infuriating tendencies to soullessly mine their classic IPs without really understanding what made them work to begin with (and this is coming from someone who was mostly fine with The Last Jedi, mind you).

[Avaitor]

Mirai got nominated for the Golden Globes, so it may have a chance this time. Being distributed by GKids definitely helps- Funi just do not have the clout to get anything nominated, not Boy and the Beast or even Your Name. That said, it probably won't win, but don't count out Into the Spiderverse, since it's winning a lot of critic's awards. I'm personally not interested in it, though- I don't like Lord and Miller's style, and just like The Lego Movie, what I've seen of the animation gives me a headache.

Lord and Miller are only producers on this one, though.

Also you're objectively wrong about the animation, so ....

I thought one of them was a co-writer.

But hey, maybe I'm wrong and it'll live up to the hype. If it hits MoviePass, I'll get to it. Like how I was waiting for Creed II to be available to view from them (my plan is to see it tomorrow), but I was willing to pay cash for Ralph Breaks the Internet.

As for recent stuff, there are two biggish movies I'm surprisingly interested in, giving their franchise's track records- Bumblebee and Aquaman. Their trailers make them look a little more fun than previous installments in the Bayverse and DCEU (although if I hear "I call it an asswhoopin'" one more time...), and they're both directed by talented filmmakers. Early reception also seems solid, with Aquaman getting decent buzz, and a friend of mine who grew up on G1 but doesn't like the Transformers movies coming out quite pleased with Bumblebee.

With Bumblebee, while I'd normally have no interest in it, I am very curious to see how Travis Knight handles a live-action film. This could be similar to how Brad Bird transitioned from animation to live-action and (IMO) knocked it out of the park with his own entry into a franchise, Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol. I'm hoping for the best here, since while I don't care a bit about the Transformers franchise itself, I'd like to see Knight's career flourish.

I'm definitely with you on Bumblebee- without Knight's involvement, I wouldn't give it the time of day. But the CG transformations look more like the real thing than in Bay's films, and he seems to get into the aesthetic, so I am hoping for a good time.

That said, they'll both have to wait for Mary Poppins Returns. By far my top priority this month.

I'm very cautiously optimistic about it. The early reviews have been very positive, but I'm worried because of how critics have a tendency to overhype Disney reboots and sequels. I was baffled by how Cinderella and The Jungle Book got the praise that they did, and stuff like Finding Dory and The Incredibles 2 were just flat-out overrated, IMO. I am not a cynical, anti-blockbuster/franchise moviegoer, but at the same time I'm not blind to Disney's infuriating tendencies to soullessly mine their classic IPs without really understanding what made them work to begin with (and this is coming from someone who was mostly fine with The Last Jedi, mind you).

I have not been a fan of any of Disney's recent remakes (although granted I've still yet to see Pete's Dragon, which I've heard marginally better things about than most of them), and this one does seem to hit a lot of the same plot beats as the original. But from what I understand, the original books were pretty formulaic themselves, and Travers seemed to have a hard time leaving the Banks family alone herself. I'm definitely worried, but Emily Blunt seems like as perfect of a substitute for Julie Andrews as you can get, and I've really liked what I've heard of the new soundtrack. And frankly, I think the world could use another adventure with Mary Poppins, which is why I'm not against a sequel being made. I want it to be good, and the Oscar buzz is a step in the right direction, but we'll see.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Just saw Dragon Ball Super: Broly....

....I've been critical of Super for a while, and this movie is far from perfect....but damn if I didn't thoroughly enjoy it. This feels like the closest thing to what I wanted from the franchise since Battle of Gods. It actually feels like the Dragon Ball lore was expanded in big and interesting new ways by the time the end credits rolled. And the fact that it got me to give a shit about a character that I reviled since his inception is worth commending alone.

Short version: This is not a great movie, but it IS a great Dragon Ball movie, IMO.

[Avaitor]

The nominees for Best Picture are:

-Black Panther
-BlacKKKlansman
-Bohemian Rhapsody
-The Favourite
-Green Book
-Roma
-A Star is Born
-Vice

Wow, I'm slacking- I've only seen 3 thus far (Black Panther, Favourite, Green Book). And I really liked two of them, while I admire Vice more than many, but wouldn't call it as worthy as some others. I guess it's time to play catch up, but I'm not especially interested in Green Book or BoRap.

[Avaitor]

Wow, I've been really busy over the past few days. But I did manage to watch all of the Best Picture nominees just before the Oscars on Sunday, and here's my personal rankings of each of them.

8- Bohemian Rhapsody

A total snoozefest of a biopic, one that you can tell how badly Brian May and Roger Taylor wanted to sanction up the band's history to an unsastisfactory dull degree. Just about the only thing Freddie would have particularly approved of is Rami Malek's performance, which is admittedly solid if slightly overhyped. Not to mention the hackneyed direction from a genuine creep (to think that I used to admire Singer, too), and horrific editing. From what I've noticed, love for this film comes from love of the band, which comes to my own personal problem- I'm just not that into Queen. I've never been, a few songs aside, but I understand enough to know that this just falls flat on its face.

7- Green Book

I went to bat for Three Billboards last year, and still would, but I can't here. I haven't seen Driving Miss Daisy, so I can't make the comparison to it, but the comparisons to Crash are somewhat fair, if off. Crash makes every single point about race even when it has no reason to, and falls flat on its face when it becomes apparent that no one involved knows what it's talking about. Green Book, meanwhile, wants us to think that racism was solved when an asshole became slightly less of a bigot after driving a black person around the deep south, and it also tries to poorly add classicism into the mix with just as much nuance as portrayed in moments of said bigot yelling that said black person isn't black enough for not eating fried chicken or recognizing Little Richard. It's a dumb movie, which I'll grant does have a good performance from Mahershala Ali, although Viggo Mortensen is absolutely dreadful throughout, while Linda Cardellini is traditionally wasted. A poorly deserving BP winner, it only ranks above BoRap for having a couple of moments that genuinely made me laugh, and a slightly more award deserving performance.

6- Vice

I really liked Adam McKay's previous attempt to go political in The Big Short, and I do think that he's done some good work back on SNL and with his work with Will Ferrell outside, but just like Green Book, this is a little too smug for me. Big Short's layman moments work because the stock and housing markets are confusing and require some kind of explanation, but McKay honestly seems to think that we're too dumb to understand who Dick Cheney is and a lot of the things he's done over the years. Probably because we were too busy watching his dumber movies when he and Bush were in office. The ending Fast and Furious joke especially bugged me, because he's really just jamming that down our throats. But I'll give credit that while I only somewhat liked Malek and Ali in their roles above, I truly thought Christian Bale was Oscar-worthy as his turn as Cheney. He captured the mannerisms down to perfection, and made each line reading count. Amy Adams was similarly excellent as
Lynne, even in the moments where McKay haphazardly suggests her as a Lady Macbeth figure. Even Sam Rockwell did well with his little bit as Bush, showing off his outlandish and weirdly charismatic side that made his elections a success. I was less hot on Steve Carrell's Rumsfeld though, which I think Carrell kept a little too much of himself in.

5- A Star is Born

"Shallow" is more or less worth the hype, but the movie basically peaks after that, especially if you're familiar with the story. It's very by the books, and could have easily cut 15 minutes out of its runtime. Cooper is quite good in the role, and Gaga starts off better than she finishes, getting a little too screamy during her angry scenes to really pull it off. If you ask me though, the real MVP is Sam Elliott, who I think does wonders with the little he gets. Dave Chappelle's character is horrifically useless, however. Not bad overall, but I'm not surprised that this lost its hype during the campaign trail- you're honestly better off watching the Judy version again.

4- Roma

I really regret not seeing this in theaters, but we didn't get many chances to hit that up here. Still, even on my TV screen, it's easy to admire how gorgeous and deserving Cuaron's camerawork is. Every banal little detail pops to make the whole screen illuminate. Unfortunately, I couldn't connect to the film too much in terms of story and character, which moved a little too slowly for me. I know it's an unpopular opinion, and I would've been totally fine with it winning, but this just wasn't my first choice.

3- BlacKKKlansman

Terrific! Washington and Driver have excellent chemistry together, and both have a solid and earnest enough character arc separately and together to help build this beyond the usual cop movie formula. What further helps with that, though, comes down to Spike Lee, who helped pen an excellent script and brings so much life and character to its direction. And this is where our attention to editing really should have gone, as some of its cuts are insane. I do think the second act drags a little, however, and I'm not sure how much I love the ending, but this is definitely one of the nominees that feels like a true winner.

2- Black Panther

I've gone over what works and doesn't work for me about BP before, but I will say that if this was my ballot, I'd swap the last two around so this had a greater chance of winning. It would have been terrific to see how film purists AND racists would react to it! I still think this is about as good as the MCU gets, and a genuinely worthy entry for Best Picture. I cannot wait to see what Coogler does next, even (especially?) if it's Black Panther 2.

1- The Favourite

I really need to see more of Yorgos Lanthimos' work. Between this and The Lobster, I like how he sinks his teeth into his work. I like how this is almost like a madhouse period piece, where nothing looks in place and lens are being played with frequently. It helps make getting into their world become easy to accomplish. The acting is also on point throughout, with the three ladies in charge each giving wonderfully nuanced performances, including Olivia Coleman's well-deserved win, as does Nicholas Hoult, who deserved mention this awards season. It basically plays like an 18th century All About Eve, which is totally fine by me.

Overall, I found this year's set of nominees to be lesser, even if I'd otherwise call 2018 a better year than 2017. Still, that year I liked 2/3 films, and really connected to 3 or 4 of them (I would rather be watching Phantom Thread than write this btw), but here I feel like only the top 2 or 3 will really stick out for me in the moments to come. I hope with some of this year's nominations and wins will help to make the next few years allow for more varied BP nominees than stuffy biopics, overdone period pieces, and slightly offense crowd-pleasing dramedies. We'll just have to wait and see.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

BLACKkKlansman was my favorite of the bunch, though I still say that Hereditary was snubbed in terms of not even being nominated for both Best Picture and most definitely Best Actress in a Leading Role. The Academy hates horror movies and clearly undervalues Toni Collette's amazing talent. This also reminds me of when they snubbed Essie Davis for The Babadook.

Still haven't seen Bohemian Rhapsody and honestly don't plan to. Also still need to see The Favourite. I will say that The Lobster is a film that I appreciate on a technical level more than I like. The same can be said for Roma.

For the most part my list would probably be the same as Avaitor's except with BKKK winning out. I still really enjoyed Black Panther, though Infinity War and Spider-Verse basically tie for my favorite superhero flicks of the year. That said I honestly don't have a problem with Black Panther being a Best Picture nominee. It brings me great joy to see elitist ass-holes cringing at the thought of a mainstream blockbuster comic book movie "disgracing" the integrity of good film-making with it's presence as a serious Academy contender. It's not necessarily my favorite, but this is also the same Academy that nominated Avatar as a Best Picture contender, yet there wasn't even half as much outrage for that movie's inclusion as a nominee. Personally, though, I think that genre-film bias is just plain stupid. Fictional story-telling can take countless different forms. The idea that one is inherently superior or inferior to another is fucking ludicrous.