What MOVIE(s) have you been....seeing? watching?

It's not just that. My recollection is that the film is basically filmed as a dirge where no one is ever going to get out or outsmart the alien. So it's not just that they get beat, it's also that the movie never gives you any sense they might win.

Still haven't had time to see TLJ...but I have caught up on some others.

IT was pretty great. I loved it, but I did not think it was in the least bit scary- rather, all of the scary stuff was interesting, surprising, or really inventive. I'm not sure it really works as a horror movie but as a coming of age drama, which is kind of odd! The thing is, and this is totally in keeping with the novel, the things that were scary were the things that would scare children but maybe not adults. In the book, it actually used classic monsters a couple of times and, like, a big monster bird. So it sort of made sense that the overall atmosphere was "spooky" rather than "terrifying". What IS scary is stuff that was in the book too, like how It can get you just about anywhere.

The kids were all great, and I liked moving the timeframe up to the 80s- that made total sense to me. Pennywise was well done, I think the makeup and CGI (and the actor!) did an excellent job of making him seem surreal and "off". But there again, I didn't really feel like he was scary, as an adult. But there again, that's kind of the point.

I was pretty surprised to see references to the turtle...I'm really wondering if they'll go that route in Chapter 2, especially since they didn't do the Ritual of Chud and all of that.

The one big issue I have with it is odd...if you stripped out all of the R-rated material - the language, the sex talk, some of the more grisly scenes - this would be an AWESOME horror movie for kids. It doesn't really need all of that stuff to work, and I found myself wishing that it were a PG or PG-13 film. But overall, I really liked it a lot and it was exactly what I wanted from IT. The slideshow scene is still the best part in all versions of the story. Freaky!

I also finally finished Valerian. "Finally" because it took me like 5 tries to get through it. I really, really, really wanted to love this movie. I love the Fifth Element. I love Luc Besson. I love French sci-fi comics. And there are lots and lots of things I love in Valeran, but the movie is just not good. Yes, it's fun in places and yes, it's beautiful. But the two leads completely sabotage the whole thing. They are TERRIBLE, and what's worse they have that "I have no idea what all this shit is about" aura about them that you see in films where the actors are not completely committed to what they are doing. Their relationship was a joke, and their interactions were positively awful. And for all of the really neat, fun, and cool stuff in it, there's parts that are just terrible- like everything to do with Rhianna. And Ethan Hawke...WTF. The whole thing comes across like a very expensive vanity project with far more heart than sense, which could have been great, but it just can't hang together when the leads are so bad and so disengaged with the setting. So many amazing vistas, sci fi concepts, aliens...wasted, really.

I was really excited to sit down to watch it, but yeah...five times, and I've only seen the last 20 minutes or so once. Hugely disappointing.

Valerian is terrible. There are a lot of great ideas in there, but everything you say is correct. Maybe wanting a worthy successor to The Fifth Element was asking too much, but it's a mess. And not a fun mess like Jupiter Ascending, or Repo The Genetic Opera. Just sad.

I watched 'IT' last night. It did nothing to me. It's long, boring and empty.

Like many other movies of its time I found it to lack on script, pacing and an overall purpose to exist.

Now, I haven't read the book and the format I enjoy 'IT' the most is this one:



Now, that's awesome!

The movie rubbed me the wrong way, from the not-so-funny dick jokes, to the lack of nuance when displaying the adults, I mean few are shown, fewer yet talks, we don't even got to meet Bill's(?) mother, even though apparently she would get highly upset the boy built an impressive model of the sewers in search of his lost brother.

The older film had a real sense of danger that is replaced by random violence on this one. To me it did not feel like IT could strike anywhere, it felt like IT stroke every three pages of the script.

If in some years IT will be remaked there is nothing I'd want to be kept from this movie, perhaps some scenes like the slideshow one, but then we'll be so advanced technically that we should come up with something better.

4/10

To some degree, you have to approach IT (in particular the new film) like Peanuts. It is a story that occurs almost completely in the world of kids. Adults are outside of this, which is why, for example, they don't see anything but the kids do. They don't "wa wa wa" like Peanuts, but that is essentially about as far as their input really matters. So I'm not overly concerned with how adults are/are not shown in the film...they are, fundamentally, side players at best and irrelevant at worst. Because they just aren't part of this insular world that kids at that age create.

As for the dick jokes, no, they weren't funny. But they also weren't supposed to be. They were annoying, crude, and juvenile- which is what the character of Richie Strozier is. I think everybody had a Richie Strozier in their friend group - the guy that didn't know when to shut up, that had some kind of vulgar comment for everything. Desperately trying to prove how mature and adult they were by trumpeting that they aren't a virgin and using lots of bad language. But it's tricky from a screenwriting perspective to put that over on an audience, because they risk having the reaction you did- that it was just unfunny dick jokes. But I totally got it because I had my own Richie Strozier, his name was Billy Wiertz.

I think one thing that you might be reacting negatively too also is that it's only half the story- it really needs the adult half of it to fully work, and I don't think it stands alone without it. But there, I've read the book and have an idea of how this all pans out generationally.

Wife and I saw Lady Bird recently. She is 32 and also went to Catholic school at the same time as the main character in the movie. We both really disliked the movie. The main character was a selfish bitch, the side characters, aside from the mom, were one notes. The story didn't go anywhere. Great acting all around. But did not like the movie. Coming of age movies that I really like include Kings of Summer, Perks of Being a Wallflower, Short Term 12, and especially Copenhagen. All better than Lady Bird.

Michael Barnes wrote: Still haven't had time to see TLJ...but I have caught up on some others.

I am eagerly awaiting this as while I normally have the complete opposite opinion to you on movies, I think you will be one of the few that loves this one.

I’m going tomorrow! On a real IMAX screen!

I thought I remembered Barnes defending Valerian right before it came out

I was excited about the idea of a Valerian movie, but in the trailer, the stars looked like a couple of very angst-ridden 14 year-olds. Hard pass.

Roy Moore raves it as being hot as hell

Tickets for TLJ with the kids tomorrow morning. Couldn't go earlier in the week as I was traveling.

Then I can stop hiding from the Internet and engage.

Not Sure wrote: Then I can stop hiding from the Internet and engage.

Bad idea.

Watched Outlander (2008). I enjoyed it since it was a strange scifi combo of Alien and Beowulf.

Watched The Lost Boys yesterday. When I watched this as a 15 year old I identified with Sam and the Frog Brothers, riding their bikes around and staking vampires. In my 20's I identified with Michael, saw the seductiveness of the Lost Boys lifestyle, hanging out with your friends and being cool forever. Yesterday was the first day I realised that Grandpa is the coolest character in the movie. Every single line he says is quotable and everything he does is awesome. Not a single wasted moment in that performance by Barnard Hughes.

Slumdog Millonaire is a worse film than I remember. I watched it again yesterday and couldn't help but find it lacking.

The problem is that, when you get past the actual plot there's not much to the film. Characters are unidimensional and often assholes for the sake of being assholes. The policeman toruting the protagonist, the brother raping the female protagonist or the TV presenter trying to make the protagonist lose are acts that exist, simply, to screw the protagonist over. The female protagonist being a "sexy lamp" with no personality, dirve or abilities whatsoever doesn't help matters, either.

The cinematography is also more cluttered and blurry than actually interesting. There are tons of dutch angles that don't do much but make the film harder to follow. So yeah, didn't like it at all.

Now, Doctor Strange I liked. It's a fun film that may not be as interesting or unique as other Marvel movies but it's well-done. Most notably, it is much, much better at framing battles and actions than other Marvel films. There are less cuts, more establishing shots and characters actually move around a phyisical space. At least most of the time, the "mirror universe" battle is a mess that should have been simplified.

Something I also liked: This is one of the very few films with female mooks. This is a massive pet peeve of mine and it's particualrly glaring in films that are very obviously going for a "feminist" or "diverse" cast.