Movie Reviews Part the 12th: Does Gimli hate file conversions as well? Stay tuned!

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Temper your expectations, they were made for TV with much lower budgets, different filmmakers and a small production window. Part 2 is pretty weak, but 3 is good, though you've seen the highlight. That does kind of go along with the quality of the bookoksas well.
 
I didn't think there was THAT much of a drop-off, to be honest. The mysteries themselves weren't as interesting as in Dragon Tattoo, but I was really only watching for Noomi Rapace and the character, so the further exploration of her past and issues was engaging.

I also didn't find much of a difference between Played With Fire and Hornet's Nest, either.
 
The drop in quality for me comes in the ridiculous nature of the denouement of part 2, and the overall lack of intricacy by comparison to the original.
 
That said I've only seen the last two once, they're on NetFlix, I've been meaning to watch them again.
 
Yeah Ebert tends to favor the first one. *crossing fingers that Fincher will do a better job*

The trailer for the new one looks suitably stylish.
 
Touché. But in this case they're based on separate novels, unlike Deathly Hallows.
 
Play with Fire and Hornet's Nest demand to be watched back-to-back. I was enamored with Dragon Tattoo and the series as a whole when I saw them last year, by now my opinion has cooled.

The material's too novelistic for me to get into aside from Rapace's performance.
 
I agree they're to be watched back to back, I was must arguing the fundamental difference in calling Deathly Hallows one movie versus these, :wink:.

I think Dragon Tattoo is a strong film, the other two work only because of your investment in the characters. That said, the material is very much watered down to work on film, I'm curious of Fincher's film can get more of the depth across.
 
If you want to argue construction, the Dragon Tattoo movies were edited from a grander mini-series. Though they were based off of three different books, the series had an ongoing narrative.

All Finch has to do is deliver on a kick-ass genre film and I'm sold. It would be unfair to expect an out-of-nowhere masterpiece like Zodiac.
 
I saw all three 'dragon' movies in the theater. All were worth the price of admission and cost of popcorn. I'm not going to nit pick on which one may have been better.

I will just say Fincher remaking this is very similar to the re-make of 'Let the Right One In." The American movie was decent, but the first film is the better experience with better casting.
 
The Fincher film will likely be better, actually, although I'd be very surprised if Mara can top Rapace's perf.

The question isn't of quality but in why Fincher would choose to waste his time with this redundant material. I don't really care what he sees in it, this American remake of a recent foreign success crap should be beneath him.

And before you throw out The Departed, keep in mind how different Monahan's script was from Infernal Affairs. TGWTDT is set in the same place, same characters, etc.
 
Zaillian's script apparently has a different ending. Judging from interviews, he sees it as an attempt to make a decidedly adult series like New Hollywood studio pictures. Aside from the tonal similarities, Fincher jumping behind this project reminds me of Friedkin's Sorceror. I'd love to see it and I'm sure that it's fantastic, but there's always going to be a nagging "why?" behind it.

How do you feel about Spike Lee's Oldboy, Laz?
 
DGAF, I'm just happy about the other film he's working on, his first original screenplay in a while.

Even if it is a "sequel" to Do The Right Thing.
 
The huge emphasis that's always placed on the content or source material of an auteur's new projects puzzles me to an extent.
 
Give me a break, Lance. I'm a pretty strict auteurist but that sounds like a pretentious caricature of one. Yeah, some of these guys can turn shit into gold; it's fair to wonder why they're playing with shit in the first place when they're at strong positions in their careers.

Are you telling me if Fincher was directing Battleship it wouldn't matter to you? We may draw the line in different places but we're still drawing a line.
 
I'm not saying there's no place to draw a line, but it seems you get pretty riled up over this sort of shit to no real end. Which is basically all that I said - the emphasis placed on these sorts of things just seems disproportionate to me, especially when the specifics of the actual film as it will exist in its finished form are ever far from known at any stage really prior to seeing it in whole. So yeah, if Fincher (though not the strongest example for me personally, obviously) said he were directing Battleship I'm sure I'd be curious, but probably more interested than anything in seeing how he refines and explores his own formal preoccupations - I wouldn't expect him to be wasting his time making the same film Peter Berg is, in other words, so what difference does it make?
 
DGAF, I'm just happy about the other film he's working on, his first original screenplay in a while.

Even if it is a "sequel" to Do The Right Thing.

That came out of nowhere. I'm much more excited for that as well. Best case scenario: Oldboy's successful enough to give him cache to get more of his projects funded.
 
Fair points, Lance. It's just a little frustrating, and I will say that I don't see Fincher as a formalist in the way that I look at Soderbergh, whose hypothetical Dragon Tattoo would intrigue me more. I see Fincher capable of much deeper work beyond the flashy aesthetics, and so it seems a shame to waste the critical (and financial, to an extent) cache of The Social Network on this kind of instant remake.

Of course, this is coming from someone who adored and was deeply moved by Benjamin Button, which for me is not only his most poetic work, but also pulled career-best (up to that point, at least) perfs from his leads. I'm sure many Fincher fans would rather see him do another Alien installment than another "prestige" film but I think he would have been perfect for The Great Gatsby, for example.
 
I could see that, but I'm interested in what Fincher the all-around artist is going to mine from the Dragon Tattoo film(s), since he himself has said how long he's wanted to work on such a maturely themed big franchise like this. Meaning his passions are definitely in it, and it's going to be the best film he's going to make at this very exact point in his career... then who knows where he'll go next.

Also, I wouldn't go so far as to say he's strictly a formalist, or even if he were, that being one would limit his skills or interests purely to superficial aesthetics. Those with the strongest command over form, and whose work is predominantly formal achieve just as much depth or poeticism in their work as anybody.
 
Haven't we done this argument to death? Finches taking a year to make a movie that he wanted to is not a big deal, he's in a prolific period. Let's be more worried that he's possibly serious about doing 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea or Jolie's Cleopatra.
 
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2

Apart from the Gringotts part at the start, the movie kinda felt less a movie and more like an incredibly drawn-out collection of final sequences. I thought that the first part was overall a better film and had two of the best and most inspired moments in the entire movie series (the dance to Nick Cave and the animated Deathly Hallows sequence), but in some ways I enjoyed this one more because 1) action moved back to Hogwarts, 2) the supporting cast of characters were more prominent (yay Luna, Neville and Professor McGonagall :heart:) and 3) no more camping scenes.

- I was always a bit meh about Daniel Radcliffe as Harry, granted Harry like Frodo in LoTR is a bit of a thankless role but I just always found him a bit of a blank. His turn here was really impressive though. Can't pin it down, but I just felt like Harry here had more of, I don't know, inner life?

- Snape:
I don't remember the book all that well now, but I think it didn't have a scene with Harry confronting him in Hogwarts Hall and screaming what an evil so-and-so he is. In that case I'm glad they put it in because, after so many books of build-up of hatred their interaction in the final book was IMO a total fizzer. Having said that, Snape crying and Harry collecting his tears was waaaay too mushy, even with the softer movie!Snape. Snape's flashbacks were nicely done, though the youngifying effects were a tad distracting - I just wish filmmakers would stop using them until they actually look 100% convincing.

- I liked that Voldemort was menacing and creepy again. I thought he was very effective in GoF, but in the later movies he was strangely inert.

- I hated "all Slytherin students are bad" in the book and hated it in the movie too :angry:

- The final battle was rather anti-climatic and
Voldemort confetti
was a tad silly, but at least I'm glad they left out the convoluted explanation about the wands.
 
Winter's Bone

I enjoyed this. Ultimately there's not a lot of agency in Jennifer Lawrence's character, but as a slice-of-life in the Missouri Ozarks it was definitely worth watching. I grew up somewhat separated from this level of poverty, but they definitely nailed the omnipresent Dish Network satellite dishes, for one.
 
now England has two boys who dress up, one as a Knight, for real, they go out protecting people, they call themselves real superheroes and Im thinkin.....................



movie influence much?


they were on morning TV prog, this morning.

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:D
 
Midnight in Paris 8.5/10 - Finally a new Woody Allen movie I can enjoy. It's more like the older more popular style. Instead of looking at the glass completely empty he can find it at least half-empty. :wink: Hemingway's view of love and truth just had me guffaw. :lol:
 
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