Nobody Cares about TV and Film

[bubblesort]

I'm all caught up on Foundation, on Apple+, and I like it so far. They changed things, so book purists hate it, but I think most changes were well done. For example, they gave the empire a tribunal of 3 emperors, cloned from Cleon, and I think once people see how they did it, they like it, even if they are book purists.

That said, I think the editing is horrible. Absolute worst editing I've seen in years. It's confusing, and allows no emotional connection with characters as they do things like weep for loved ones or give up and attempt suicide. During heavy exposition, I just minimize the screen so I don't have to look at it while I listen. Also, the action is like cheap CW action.

I give them a pass on the action and editing, though, because the pandemic lockdowns hit halfway through production. Here's the show runner talking about it. Here's the editor talking about it. I'm guessing the editor just didn't have much to work with, so he had to resort to distracting quick cuts to make things work. If I didn't know about the lock downs, I'd hate the show, but given the situation, I can cut them some slack for the first season.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

I am curious about the series. I would consider the books unfilmable as written, so change is good in this case.

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

 

[Free]

Peter Scolari, 'Bosom Buddies' and 'Girls' Actor, Dead at 66

Peter Scolari, the actor who starred alongside Tom Hanks in 'Bosom Buddies' and won an Emmy for his work on 'Girls,' has died at 66.

www.rollingstone.com

He definitely had some strong acting and comedy chops.

 

[bubblesort]

Just saw Dune. Hated it.

Sound mixing was garbage, the shot composition was dumb, the color grading was boring, the pace was obnoxiously slow, and I find Villeneuve's obsession with brutalism repulsive. Villeneuve just has bad taste.

 

[Jopsy Pendragon]

...

Strong agreement over Foundation. The first 5 episodes are kind of a trainwreck.

But I have to disagree on Dune. I think I still like his Blade Runner 2049 more. The only offputting thing about Dune was that I'd seen the other one too recently and my brain kept trying to compare them in my head.

 

[Lexxi]

Some of the Foundation episodes were interesting; some were incredibly boring to the point I kept fast forwarding.

Saw Dune. My review after I saw it, if I haven't mentioned it here (I've mentioned it at least two places, one was Twitter and I can't recall what the other place was, though might might have been twice on Twitter): A very very long film that seemed to be a lot more style over substance.

I've tried several times to see Blade Runner 2049 but haven't done so yet (I don't mean I've tried to watch and couldn't get past a certain moment, I mean I kept setting myself up to watch the film, and not being able to start it).

 

[bubblesort]

 

[bubblesort]

I finished my MCU chronological marathon. Endgame was way worse than I remembered. After watching that... they have no laws of time travel in the MCU, at all. The writers are just too stupid to do it right. Also, I will always hate Civil War. Hulk was a lot better than I remembered, and Dr Strange was pretty good, too.

Anyway... for my next project, I'm doing what I call the grossest films. I'm going to watch the highest grossing films from every year between 1910 and today, kind of. My financial information starts at either 1913, or 1915, and the lists conflict a lot for the first couple decades or so, so the early films are a bit fuzzy. For 1910-1913, I am just picking random films that came out in those years. Also, I'm giving myself a bit of wiggle room around things like Griffith's Birth of a Nation. I've seen it, in a film class (the professor was a Catholic monk), and yeah, it's disturbing, and bad, and all that, and I just don't want to deal with it again. In fact, I might just steer clear of Griffith all together, because if you've seen one of his films, you've seen them all. He made a career on telling one story, and remaking it over and over. For 1915, instead of Birth of a Nation, I'll watch de Mille's Carmen, instead. I'll probably also divert a bit to watch silent versions of Alice in Wonderland and 3 silent Wizard of Oz films that Frank L Baum himself was involved with, in 1914. Mostly I want to watch the highest grossing films, though.

So the first film is The Abyss, AKA The Woman Pays, which has absolutely nothing to do with submarines or aliens. It's an interesting movie, anyway. Not good, but you know... worth a watch. 30 mins long, free on youtube. It's a Danish film, about a woman who courts a high class man, then runs away with a circus performer who wears his cowboy hat sideways or backwards. It looks like, in 1910, that's like wearing a baseball cap sideways or backwards. Then she has a circus act with him where she lassos him, does this hip wiggle dance around him, and then bites his neck like a vampire. This got the film banned in Norway and Sweeden. I always thought Theda Bara was the original vamp femme fatale, but this predates her Cleopatra by 7 years. After her wild west vampire act, another dancer kisses her man, so she attacks her and rips out half her hair on stage, during a performance. They're both fired from the circus, so they go to a fancy restaurant, where she plays piano and he parties. When the bill comes, he can't pay it, so he turns her out, forcing her to sleep with other restaurant patrons, to pay the bill. Forced prostitution It's really disturbing. She cries so much the first John pays her without having sex with her, I think (the film is a bit degraded). The second man attacks her when she resists, and she stabs him to death in self defense. The film ends with the cops taking her away. The most disturbing part to me is that this film wasn't banned for rape or exploitation. It was banned for Asta Nielsen wiggling her hips in a slinky black dress.

There's no sound in it at all, but I found that Caravan Palace's album Panic fits the film almost perfectly. I didn't go to any trouble to sync it perfectly at all. I started the album, then hit play on the film, probably was half a song in, but the scene changes and mood fit so nicely together.

 

[Fionalein]

With no prior knowledge Villeneuve's Dune is uncromprehensable. It's just fan art IMHO...

 

[Free]

 

[Noodles]

Isn't this on HBO Max? Why would you pay to see the movie and make a bootleg with a handicam when you could pay for 1 month of HBO and just screen record it?

 

[Free]

Isn't this on HBO Max? Why would you pay to see the movie and make a bootleg with a handicam when you could pay for 1 month of HBO and just screen record it?

Because Bill Gates is tracking your HBO activity.

 

[Noodles]

Because Bill Gates is tracking your HBO activity.

He is already tracking me in Windows and with my Vaccine, I can't believe this dude is stalking me so much, I know I am awesome and all but doesn't he have better things to do with his billions of dollars?

 

[Free]

He is already tracking me in Windows and with my Vaccine, I can't believe this dude is stalking me so much, I know I am awesome and all but doesn't he have better things to do with his billions of dollars?

What can I say. People like Gates find a lot of time on their hands when they are divorced.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

I couldn't get the vaccine because I don't have a TPM chip.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Anyway... for my next project, I'm doing what I call the grossest films. I'm going to watch the highest grossing films from every year between 1910 and today, kind of.

There is a series of articles on the AVClub called The Popcorn Champs that covers every highest-grossing film since 1960, starting with Spartacus. It does a good job of providing context for what was happening both culturally and in film for each of the movies, as well as assessing their impact. It's worth reading along with A History of Violence, which covers the most influential action film each year starting with Bullet.

 

[danielravennest]

Anyway... for my next project, I'm doing what I call the grossest films. I'm going to watch the highest grossing films from every year between 1910 and today, kind of.

You can also look at top grossing films of all time, adjusted for inflation. Only doing the top film of each year might miss some good ones if a year had two or more high-grossers.

Top Lifetime Adjusted Grosses

www.boxofficemojo.com

 

[Noodles]

There's no sound in it at all, but I found that Caravan Palace's album Panic fits the film almost perfectly. I didn't go to any trouble to sync it perfectly at all. I started the album, then hit play on the film, probably was half a song in, but the scene changes and mood fit so nicely together.

That music did work surprisingly well with that.

It's also incredibly hard to focus on a movie with no sound or dialogue.

 

[Essence Lumin]

Anyway... for my next project, I'm doing what I call the grossest films.

There's this particular scene in Pink Flamingos.

I'm going to watch the highest grossing films from every year between 1910 and today, kind of.

Never mind.