watching there will be blood with irony poisoning transforms it into a romp about one man’s dedication to sigma grindset
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Part of me believes this is the intended reading. It’s tonally so different from all of the directors earlier films, this makes it seem more of a piece with like Magnolia or Boogie Nights
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I keep imagining a version with Jon Brion instead of Jonny Greenwood
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I watched Dinner for Schmucks which is very much a comedy with paul rudd and steve carrell that just barely manages to avoid using any slurs. Honestly it was fine but it makes me realize how far I am from identifying with straight white dudes who don’t have their heads on straight.
Like, one of the side characters (played by Jemain Clement) is this oversexed trashy artist who talks about sex and death, mostly, and is obviously meant to be The Dumbass. He’s treated with more respect than I expected from a 2010 comedy (he’s not actually trying to steal the dude’s girlfriend!! he’s just kind of a dipshit!!) but he’s clearly meant to be A Joke.
The problem is that I was way more into him as a character than Guy Who Needs To Realize That Money Isn’t Everything. He just wants to have sex and take pictures of his dick and put it on gallery walls!! How is this not an admirable goal? How is this not what we all want from life, to some extent??
Maybe I want the guy who dresses up like satan and makes dumb faces to get with the guy’s girlfriend - I think he might be better for her!! paul rudd sucks!!!
Anyway 4/10 would not recommend but I did love all the tiny dioramas with “taxidermy” mice in them - there are like 30 of them throughout the movie and they’re all very charming!!
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actually my biggest issue with this movie is that it couldn’t decide whether it thought the titular schmucks were actually schmucks or admirable people. it wants us to laugh at them, but also feel bad for them when the bad guys laugh at them. I don’t think it’s asking a lot for a movie (even a 2010 comedy with paul rudd and steve carrell) to have a point of view
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In my memory that was like the last high profile theatrical comedy thing without even a hint of apatow/Seth roganness to it. Despite presence of Rudd and Carrel. Like it’s just so goofy. A relic
yeah like, the climactic dinner scenes were legit great, just absolute chaos in a way i wasn’t expecting.
the best gag is zach galifianakis taking off his jacket to reveal the turtleneck underneath is just the collar and a bib, fantastic shit
i kind of want to watch the original french movie this was loosely based on because i assume it’s more farcical
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classic Bugs Bunny flapping dickey gag
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Just came back from being a tourist in Seattle. While there, we did the underground tour, then immediately went to re-watch Malignant, which contains a chase scene in the Seattle underground. So we were rewatching this movie less than 2 hours after being in the tour ourselves.
We could not BELIEVE how accurate their depiction of the underground tour was. There are a few scenes that take place in the starting room of the underground tour, and it is based SPECIFICALLY on the starting room of the Bill Speidel underground tour, down to the objects in the room and the size, color, and location of the photographs on the walls. If you have seen Malignant–when the older woman who works as a tour guide is standing in the basement room with the bar in it, and the bar has a large black and white photograph in it, that room is EXACTLY identical to the first room of the Bill Speidel tour. The funny thing is that they did not actually film it in the opening room of the tour probably because the floor of that room IRL is so uneven that it is extremely dangerous to walk on without paying close attention. Probably would have been too hard to have actors perform in there without tripping all over the place.
I still love Malignant. It is so fucking corny. In particular I love the scene where Gabriel is trying to leave the police station, and he sees the two cops trying to leave through the opposite door, and he’s just SO mad at them that he throws a chair 50 feet across this massive gymnasium sized room and fucking takes them both out with laser precision, and then they fall on the ground groaning and rolling around like cartoon characters. It’s unbelievably funny.
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going to see tsai ming-liang give a talk later… maybe we can hang out after bc some straight guy i bully (im sorry but theres few things funnier to me than bullying a cishet cinephile guy who is shorter than me) organized his chicago visit and maybe this entire us trip??? anyways unlike most like queer arthouse cinema fans i have (in spite of its Official Critereon Status) actually seen dragon inn…
anyways yeah gb,di very important and cool movie about cruising! at the movie theater
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This was a rare movie where like, the story isn’t good, the characters honestly aren’t good, it’s not particularly funny, but the animation is just a ton of fun, and the actors somehow come across via facerig or bodyrig or whatever tf they use. I can’t think of a recent movie where characters were this lively, beyond of course Spider-Verse.
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we made a lot of eye contact and i did bully the cinephile into taking me as his +1 lol. tsai was very sweet and talked abt having a panic disorder and showed some paintings of his boys in bed and childhood apartment
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My flight didn’t have Moonshot I Am So Mad!!!
Unable to sleep and unenthused I watched all 3 hours of The Batman. This big stupid huge movie that is about leaving and going back to the club. It was really stupid and unnecessary but the fight scenes are almost good compared to modern things. It keeps circling and scraping good ideas in the stupidest way. And I was right it is unwatchable outside of near pitchblack settings. Love to watch it on a seatback.
Then with heavy skipping watched that Unbearable Weight of Unspeakable Talent or what have you with Nick Cage. It failed because I know what Nick Cage’s family looks like and what he looks like driving around LA and that his agent definitely isn’t Very Famous Person Neil Patrick Harris. Amazing Nick Cage can do such a bad job playing himself.
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remembering the spectacle bit of this post and not much else set me up to feel real clever when i watched the thing just then, cheers
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glad i wrote obliquely enough. it’s hard not to look
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the God wes studi on his experiences in vietnam
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The Artist
Ok it was pretty cute, not super compelling, but nice to have on while being able to talk over it. I don’t think it’s Best Picture material but the novelty of watching a silent film in high definition is enough of a draw that I wanted to watch it. John Goodman shows up and is pretty good, alongside James Cromwell. There’s a scene where the protagonist has a dream with sounds, except for his voice, and it’s pretty well done.
Movies about the Romance Of Old Hollywood have a weird charm to them, I think everyone wants to be famous but not in the post-modern hyper connected sense. Like, you just want a job where you look nice and make stuff that a lot of people see, then go home to a modestly sized mansion.
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Rachel Weisz my forever crush
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