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List the films you've seen at the cinema: 2016

M

metalguru

guilty bystander
Joy - The new David O. Russell and Jennifer Lawrence film (following American Hustle and Silver Linings Playbook). Also with Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro.

Not very good. Overlong, and the basic outline for the film (a loosely based true life story of a mop manufacturer) just isn't interesting enough, even with a few David O. Russell style quirks thrown in.

The compensations? Some of the photography is quite good, and Jennifer Lawrence's performance is compelling.
 
Suffragette - was a bit wary this might be UK custom drama by numbers in the way Testament of Youth was but it's much better than that. Really good performances, especially by Anne Marie-Duff. If I was been picky I'd have liked a little more about the different strands within the movement but it's not really fair to criticise it for not being the film I want. Overall definitely worth seeing.
 
The Revenant.

Absolutely gobsmackingly stunning. Gripping from minute to end, Leo really is magnificent, Hardy n Gleeson too. It will win every award going.

Been to see Star Wars and Sisters too. They were good.
 
Yes, I agree about The Revanent, not long home cinema and still coming down from the myriad of emotions. I gasped at certain parts.
 
I thought The Revenant looked beautiful in a Malick/Herzog way and was an amazing technical feat, but there is no depth to the film. It's a bog standard survival/revenge story and for a film which is so convinced of its own visionary brilliance I would expect something more. Irranitu makes his films harrowing but that isn't the same as being meaningful. That said, it's the film of his I liked the best (or more accurately, disliked the least) and on a superficial adventure movie level it worked just fine. But it's too thematically flat to be the masterpiece some declare it go be.
 
The Revenant, aka how many ways can you not kill Leonardo DiCaprio :D

Visually gorgeous with the landscape being the unsung star of this film, I tend to agree with Reno in that it's a pretty basic survival/revenge story. This doesn't in any way take away from excellent acting performances delivered by the main characters - although tbf I can't remember the last time either Leonardo DiCaprio or Tom Hardy weren't worth their salaries.

I reckon it'll be Leo's year at last.
 
I haven't seen anyone else clam The Revenant is anything other than a straightforward survive and avenge tale. And...? The Arikara add a little bit of depth to it, but mainly add more tension. Is it meant to be 'visionary' because it's relatively slow, and has lingering shots? I thought that was just there to help immerse you in the story and give you an idea of how hard the journey was.
 
belboid said:
I haven't seen anyone else clam The Revenant is anything other than a straightforward survive and avenge tale. And...? The Arikara add a little bit of depth to it, but mainly add more tension. Is it meant to be 'visionary' because it's relatively slow, and has lingering shots? I thought that was just there to help immerse you in the story and give you an idea of how hard the journey was.
Click to expand...
Many a hyperventilating review appears to declare it a masterpiece and its currently clearing up all the awards going.

Irranitu clearly aims for something along the lines of Herzog's Aguirre or Malick's The New World here. There comes a point where the virtuosity of the 20 minute held shots just become an end in itself rather than being in the service of what is a very thin story. Revenge plots are always inherently problematic, appealing to an audiences lowest impulses. A great film examines those impulses, this doesn't. There is good and there is bad and you get your cathartic pay off. The End.

I thought all the stuff with the Native Americans was embarrassingly on the nose and preachy. Di Caprio is clearly the good guy for having a Native American wife and kid and we even get flashbacks to his blissful life of "going native". People rag on Avatar for this type of thing, but you change the genre from digital fantasy blockbuster to pseudo art-house and the same thing gets praise.

I don't mind films which are style over content but the epic aspirations of the film aren't supported by the content. It makes me question why so much effort heaped on something so shallow. All the film wants to convince you of is what an "visionary" director Irranitu is and that physical suffering sucks.
 
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Hardly Irranitu's fault what reviewers say. And no, it's not Herzog. It's a massive Hollywood movie, not a artsy European movie, so I don't expect it to be much more than what is put in front of the camera. It's an anti-action movie, and a reaction to the effects heaviness of Gravity. But, like Gravity and a good action movie, it looked amazing and drew me in entirely, despite knowing for at least an hour (my concept of time grew more and more distorted as the pressure on my bladder increased) how it was all going to finish.
 
I was going to go and see Joy, then I read that Jennifer Lawrence plays Robert de Niros mum and I thought I'd leave it.
 
belboid said:
Hardly Irranitu's fault what reviewers say. And no, it's not Herzog. It's a massive Hollywood movie, not a artsy European movie, so I don't expect it to be much more than what is put in front of the camera. It's an anti-action movie, and a reaction to the effects heaviness of Gravity. But, like Gravity and a good action movie, it looked amazing and drew me in entirely, despite knowing for at least an hour (my concept of time grew more and more distorted as the pressure on my bladder increased) how it was all going to finish.
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Seems an odd way to put it. It's not like Irranitu was aiming for bad reviews, he got exactly the acclaim he was aiming for. And in every interview he points out what hardships he and the crew went through. He is complicit in his own myth making.

This is indeed a Hollywood blockbuster but it's in art house drag. It clearly mimics the pacing and look of a certain type of art house film, specifically the ones I mentioned. Irranitu always thinks he has something to say about the human condition, but has never been more than a purveyor of misery porn. That for once he doesn't try to say about something about the state of the world (or about art as with Birdman) is what makes The Revenant more bearable than his previous films.

The Revenant's most impressive sequence is as reliant of groundbreaking CGI as Gravity is. I have no problem with that, the bear sequence is stunning, but to claim that it's a corrective to Hollywoods CG reliance is disingenuous, no matter how often Di Caprio or Hardy or Irranitu say that in interviews. And Gravity (which is no less visionary a film) gets it all done and dusted in just over 90 minutes.
 
The bear is puppetry, rather than CG tho, isnt it?

I largely agree with everything you're saying, except I just really don't mind at all. And, of course they say talk lots about the hardships on set, it's a good story!
 
belboid said:
The bear is puppetry, rather than CG tho, isnt it?

I largely agree with everything you're saying, except I just really don't mind at all. And, of course they say talk lots about the hardships on set, it's a good story!
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It's all CGI. It would be impossible to do this with puppets.
 
Blimey, that's an impressive bit of CGI then. Even if it did completely undermine my argument, dammit.

I wonder what the puppeteers did.
 
Two from the Godard season.

Le Petit Soldat. French intelligence and Algerian independence activists battle it out in Geneva. Initially banned in France due to its depiction of the French using torture (the Algerians do too). Surprisingly apolitical given the subject matter.

Le Mepris. Can't believe I've never seen this before, quite blew me away. Sad, sexy and very French.

And two from 2015 I saw last weekend as a double bill (which made for a cheerful afternoon...)

99 Homes. Single father Andrew Garfield is evicted from his home by evil property mogul Michael Shannon. A bit obvious and depressing but good performances.

Mississippi Grind. Gambling addict Ben Mendelsohn goes on a road trip with Ryan Reynolds. Mendelsohn great as ever, Ryan Reynolds has kind of passed me by but thought he was pretty good too.
 
belboid said:
Blimey, that's an impressive bit of CGI then. Even if it did completely undermine my argument, dammit.

I wonder what the puppeteers did.
Click to expand...
There was a motion capture actor to track the CG bear, just like what Andy Serkis does for LOTR and the Planet of the Apes films:

Meet Glenn Ennis, a.k.a the bear from ‘The Revenant’

One reason why this scene would have been impossible to do with a trained bear or with practical effects is that it is one long, continuous shot. There are no edits where it would be possible to hide any trickery between shots. It is very impressive, but then that's what CGI can be when enough money and care goes into it.
 
Le Mepris at the Mayfair Curzon

Nice use of technicolour for the Italian landscape, particularly on a grey early January day, and it was really good to see Brigid Bardo acting, and Jack Palance and even Fritz Lang!

But overall very slight..and the extended scene with the argument between Paul and Camille was simply tedious.
 
The Hateful Eight. Slightly surprised that I didn't think it was too long, very well paced, indeed. Smart and frothy, sumptuous and silly, highly enjoyable. Except the projectile vomiting, I could have done without that
 
Joy: slow to star; but picks up from the moment Bradley Cooper appears.

The Revenant: 2 and a half hours of ice cold grimness
 
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