for breakfast today i watched
BLADE (1998)

21 years later (holy fuck) still looks fucking great!
and i think the matrix copied some stuff from it too

Did I give the impression I have the “she’s be pretty if she smiled” mentality?

I mean, I thought she was adorable, and I hope that doesn’t sound creepy (running around with no socks on — high point of the movie :) ) — but she also kicked ass.

I thought she was great.

I haven’t seen Endgame. Finally had a few free, non-sick hours this weekend and it’s no longer at my theater.

But yeah, it wasn’t great, it was just fun. Could have used more serious, hard-SF tones like those few moments where it feels like Interstellar, and also could have done more with the Skrulls, because what a threat, potentially! But overall, fun ride. No real complaints. It was an easy B.

Watched this this weekend. Had a lot of fun. Very entertaining and very much like the spiderman comics of my youth.

No, Severian, I was not directly including you as someone with that mindset. These were complaints that faceless trolls made for Captain Marvel, and using them as a way to make the movie seem like it was the worst MCU movie ever made when you know that those guys were only dismissing and diminishing its quality cause they didn't like that it focused on a woman, that it would have some kind of pro female message(cause they want mindless entertainment and not liberal propaganda, but all art, even mainstream movies are political in some aspect I believe), and be preachy. Cause they forget or ignore that even the first Iron Man, has a anti-weapons of mass destruction message among all its fun and action.

I think this is possibly my favourite of all the MCU movies.

How cute is Tom Holland though?

Yup. I hate comic book alt-righters. They’re are ... sadly many of them.

American Honey

Loved this. It's better than it probably even needed to be. It could've gotten just by doing the usual Larry Clarke/Harmony Korine thing which, on the surface it sort of does, but it goes a bit deeper than either of those, has a bit more to say, feels more serious. All round just better.

This had been on my to-watch list for the longest time and you two spurred me to do it so I chose it for film night last Sunday.

I really enjoyed it. A lot more than I expected. Notable points-

I could never tell whether the guy who plays the mob boss was terrible or did that style of acting so well because he was actually decent. I leaning towards he was terrible.

Anita Pallenberg. My god *bites fist*

Some of the ideas in it were well ahead of its time. The whole cross dressing, androgyny and gender fluidity is pretty out there for the period.

The last shot where you think it's James fox being taken away and then it turns out to be Mick Jagger was just stupid. There was no need for it. All it does is make people "ooh what does it mean" when actually it doesn't mean anything.

To be a fly on the wall for Jagger's life in that period would have been something.

I don't think anyone involved really knew (or cared) what it was all meant to be about. The 2nd half anyway feels like arriving at a party stone-cold sober, just as everyone there is coming up on some seriously interesting drugs.

Yeah that bit where Jagger reading that long passage. Alright lad, move it along.

Always loved Fox's line to Jagger, "You'll look funny when you're fifty"

But seriously, I think it's a brilliant film. It feels authentic in a way that say Blow Up never does. Everyone, especially in the 2nd half, feels like they're essentially just playing themselves, like they're not even trying to be anyone else, lending it an almost documentary feel. Just stick a handful of egomaniacal narcissists in a house, give them some drugs and set the cameras rolling. Definitely my favourite British 'sixties' film.

Had to watch this for Media. Quite enjoyed it, it set up its premise well

Still think this is whatshisname’s best.

Shame they had to muck it up with a trilogy

I've never actually seen an M. Night Shyamalan film until now - from what I've gathered on the internet, he seems to have flanderised like nothing else.

I didn't expect the twist at the end, but I'm a very oblivious person when it comes to these things. (Dad prides himself on picking The Sixth Sense early.)

Sixth Sense was an easy spot.

So was Unbreakable, but I’m saying that 20 years after first seeing it so maybe I’m full of shit

MEGASPOILERS

haha yeah la pallenberg was something

i don’t know that it was ahead of its time with the crossdressing specifically. people had been there long before



if anything the revolution is this was more explicit where old hollywood was more coded, but that was the glorious 70s letting it all hang out.

it wasnt just the clothes, check out the way jagger was lit on some of those scenes. it’s the kind of glamour light that was used for (again) marlene dietrich, or lauren bacall.





i.. disagree with your last shot evaluation. i definitely said “what was that about” but did not feel tricked or conned or cheated nor think now in retrospect that i was.

we’ve taken enough shrooms to get a whole vietnam platoon high. we’ve been already in psychedelic space for more than half the movie. we’ve talked about performance and the demon that has left them. we’ve swapped hair, roles, clothes, genders, everything. the whole foundation of the gangster genre has been shattered. i mean the narrative style of the beginning should suffice to show that, but it goes way beyond into a whole questioning of “reality”.

the gunshot? turner (turner! not a random name) offers himself rather than... the shot is... what the fuck is it? the head, opening like a tunnel? the randy newman lyrics? sure, shootin my supply through my demon’s eye could just be read in the ejaculate sense or maybe something else? i don’t think it’s a simple swap, i think it’s meant to be a lot more ambiguous and have you wonder. has the demon moved on/swapped heads? is chas going to his greatest performance having taken on turner’s demon? is chas doing a turner performance after turner did a chas performance?

also “persona” came way first, with psychoanalysis i stead of shrooms. it’s not a completely new thing it’s just more colorful. per so na per for mance

also this reminds me of the cortázar story, la noche boca arriba. lml @ translation... i can’t find it. roughly “the night lying prone” or something, great little short story. if “blow up” came from him i wonder if this text had some sort of influence here. i’d suspect it had, said or unsaid.

anyway it’s not that, was my point, it’s not a “trick”, or a gimmick, it’s a larger mindfuck overall, and central to the movie, which is why it’s fucking great. it’s really not reducible to explanations... but if it is i wouldn’t wanna.

anyway...

robert bresson

pickpocket (1959)

the year is the oddity there. it feels like a much older film. but also... timeless.

ah damn, and he knew how to pick his non-actors (who went on to act..)

a note on light

the classic way to light up the subjects in hollywood was very gendered. here is a great example of it

the men are lit from the side which sharpens the features and lines of the face and is more “macho”



the women are lit from above, the higher the better, which softens/erases any wrinkles and reduces any possible double chin

i need to add another post to fit more pictures

this is still used to this day

above

side

above

side


you see?

the light is gendered/gendering