MUWT 2: The Quickening

I watched Kong Skull Island and if that isn’t a MGS adaptation demo reel I don’t know what is.

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I saw Call Me By Your Name and Timothee Chalamet has a nosebleed after making out with Armie Hammer.

Screenwriter James Ivory of Merchant Ivory fame must really be into anime.

This is the same joke I made with Lady Bird where Lady Bird gets a nosebleed after making out with Timothee Chalamet.

This cannot be a coincidence. Forces are at play.

On a more serious note it was a beautiful romantic heartbreaking film. Of the “prestige” films of the Fall I mostly saw from leaked screeners, it and Phantom Thread are by far my favorite.

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I finally got around to seeing days of being wild. at a cinema to boot (a humourlessly pristine cinema which does not allow snacks or drinks, but a cinema all the same). I can’t say for certain how much of it I understood—it of course being in chinese with japanese subtitles—but I was a lot less lost than I was last year when I watched fallen angels at the same place. it’s really taxing to watch a film like that, trying to keep up with the words while losing yourself in the film’s dreamy atmosphere. fun though. and it seems studying really does work after all

curious about the lovely final scene with tony leung getting ready to go out. as far as I could tell he’s only in that one scene. I thought the film still had some extra story to tell, but then it just ends. also I didn’t know that days of being wild forms a sorts of trilogy with in the mood for love and 2046, so now I realise that I watched the films in entirely the wrong order over the course of the past twelve years or so. sums up my life quite succinctly, that

Daniel Day-Lewis is a hungry boy.

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somebody stop Roland Emmerich. send him down to whatever hole Bryan Singer’s hiding in

I watched killzone 2 today and that was a darn good time. Tony Jaa, be in more stuff, you goof.

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So is the super bowl over yet? Netflix apparently announced they’re putting out Cloverfield 3 after the game. Work buddy was telling me he thought they were going to play a trailer during half-time or something and I should watch it and I was like ehh I didn’t see the first two but I heard the second was pretty good.

So now I flip on netflix to watch more of Altered Carbon (which I’m finding pretty enjoyable four episodes in) and I see the Cloverfield thing advertised and I’m like wait this is the movie work buddy was talking about but instead of a trailer they announced they were just releasing the movie.

The description mentions scientists on a space station and an alternate reality and also it’s got Daniel Brühl so basically this is my kind of movie already.

Also did you know Wesley Snipes was in two movies last year? Apparently they are both terrible but I am just glad to see him getting back to work because I was worried he wouldn’t be in movies anymore after that whole going to prison for three years for tax fraud thing that happened. Wikipedia says he was in Expendables 3 in 2014 as well as a Spike Lee joint called Chi-Raq in 2015 but I didn’t see either of those either. I know his career will probably never fully recover but I miss seeing Wesley Snipes in the movies. I hope he can do that Blade cameo in one of these Marvel movies he mentioned being interested in doing a while back.

Wesley was good in Expendables 3.

Wesley was possibly the only good thing in Expendables 3.

Snipes has this movie on Netflix which is Blade except a Western with zombies.

It’s not very good.

Oof. Poor guy. Having to start all over.

Did you know the prison he went to is the same one holding “Little Allie Boy” Joseph Alphonse, a boss for the Colombo mob in the 80s and 90s? I wonder if they ever met each other during Snipes’ stay.

Chi-Raq is a Spike Lee joint that sounds worth seeing then i moved to Japan.

Unfortunately, this is quite a disappointment. I would recommend the second one, though. And the first one has its moments if you can get past the first 20 minutes or so.

The third one just seems to have an irredeemable script, other than the last ten seconds.

Edit: Actually, I think I was mistaken about the last ten seconds. I thought that the capsule got swallowed. That would have been no more ridiculous than many of the other events in the film, but at least an amusing way to wrap things up.

Yeah I figured out “the twist” before the plot revealed it because I was already familiar with the various versions of the story of the Philadelphia Experiment so when the first wtf moment happened I was like oh that’s like what that guy said really happened during the Philadelphia Experiment I’ll bet that’s what’s going on and come to find out ten minutes that, yep, that’s what was going on alright.

I watched the rest thinking there might be another twist but there wasn’t. That final shot though was indeed pretty cool. I would have written it to be less explain-y overall and more mysterious and just let the viewer put it together as they watched it. Like the 2010 Netflix movie Monsters (which I think is still up so if you haven’t yet check it out). As it is though it feels more like a rote, by-the-numbers exercise of tying the first two movies into a larger context in order to build a brand for future movies/etc.

Seriously everyone should watch Gareth Edwards Monsters. It is my favorite GE movie. It’s also absolutely not a netflix film dog. Indepedent venture.

Yes I know there are only three.

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I watched 10 Cloverfield Lane AKA Cloverfield 2. That was really good. Had a very good narrative arc with the ambiguity at the beginning as to John Goodman’s character and the story he gives Mary Elizabeth Winstead’s character to the gradual reveal that actually he is fucked in the head and maybe the outside isn’t as bad as he’s saying it is and then the big reveal at the end that yeah he was fucked but the outside is much worse.

I could see wanting to build a franchise out of this. Bit of a shame that The Cloverfield Paradox was their next play.

edit-Just read Cloverfield 2 started out as its own thing and was later adapted into the franchise. So that makes a lot of sense. Original Creative Output: 1, Zombie Leviathan Movie Industry: 0.

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Unsurprisingly, this didn’t come to my city. But I got to see it last night and it is a good one. I generally decide which movies are my favorites based on how much I think about them later. There are some scenes from this one that I think will stay with me.

I’ve never been to the area depicted in the film, but we’ve had foster kids stay with us at times over the years and this reminded me of some of the stories we’ve encountered in connection with that.

I agree with you about the effectiveness of the seemingly-incongruous ending.

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I sat down and watched- no, watched isn’t the right word - I witnessed the endless awe that is Geostorm.

Now, before I get to writing about this movie that doesn’t deserve much, if any, words committed in its name, make no mistake, Geostorm is a bad movie. It’s terrible. It’s mindbogglingly horrendous. The degree to which it is the opposite of good strains credulity. There’s probably a good reason it sat in the hands of Warner Bros. for years, not getting released, before being quietly shoved out in October, where it probably got pulled a week later because why the fuck would a theater show this when it could show It for the umpteenth time for Halloween. You should not watch it. At the same time, not ever seeing it would be to deny yourself pure, unadulterated madness of the finest caliber.

Geostorm is the product of writer-producer-director Dean Devlin. Now, some of you will see that name and either shudder or roll your eyes. For those of you less acquainted with the cinematic genre of destruction porn, Dean Devlin was the partner-in-crime to Roland Emmerich; the duo made fine films like Universal Soldier, Stargate, Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow. Dean Devlin knows how to write a script wherein the Earth is very thoroughly fucked up by aliens or nature, which takes the form of cities blowing up real good. This is no mere fly-by-night big budget disaster set-piece demo reel; nay, this is the master of depicting Earth getting flattened being allowed to finally ascend to the director’s throne on a major feature film, with a star-studded cast in tow and buyoed by that sweet, sweet Chinese money.

And what does he do with it? He tries to have an actual goddamn plot.

The setup is that nature has decided that enough was enough and in the far flung year of 2019 tries to just up and kill humanity with disasters. Humanity doesn’t take kindly to this and instead builds a planet-wide network of satellites to control the fucking weather, an international effort led by the US (and China, don’t forget China!), controlled from the International Space Station V. The mastermind behind this system? Gerald Butler.

Butler’s character is supposed to be a rebellious genius, a guy who takes no shit and gets things done. Up until he decides to berate bureaucracy and gets fired from heading up Dutch Boy (like the kid who stuck his finger in the dike). By his own brother.

Three years later and Dutch Boy is malfunctioning. OR IS IT? Not that the movie is trying to set up any kind of mystery or anything, of course it’s fucking sabotage. As the the system is set to be transferred to the international community from US control in 2 weeks, Andy Garcia as the mayor of NYC from Ghostbusters:ATC as the president orders asshole brother to get Butler back up into space to fix this shit ASAP because it’s an election year. Butler goes up into space and quickly finds things are awry and after nearly being killed twice, sends his brother a coded message indicating a conspiracy at the highest levels of the US government. Also, at some point, a chunk of Hong Kong gets blown up.

And then the movie just kind of meanders in this dumb sabotage-conspiracy plot for the next hour or so. And you’re just looking on and wondering When is the Earth going to get fucked up already? Like, I get that there has to be a reason for things, but considering the villain’s plan is to destroy most of the Earth and have a new world order, everything leading to such a shortsighted goal seems… dumb? But like, five things happen between Butler going tinfoil hat and Shit Blowing Up Real Good. And even with the movie spending nearly all of the second act with the characters figuring out what the hell is going on, it still feels like someone snipped 20 or 30 minutes out because you get introduced to a bunch of characters on the ISS and they have personalities but you never see them enough to a good grasp of them.

Anyway, after Dean Devlin burns money for 80 minutes, shit goes down and the titular Geostorm is summoned as… a bomb countdown. Now, they define a geostorm as the perfect confluence of man’s ability to control weather as going pear-shaped and Earth getting fucked up even worse than nature can do, but you only get to see snippets of it. Rio gets hit by a freezing tsunami, which is kind of a cool visual. Tokyo gets struck by meteor hail. Moscow literally gets a heat laser shot at it. Mumbai gets like, 50 tornadoes. Orlando is attacked by super lightning, which blows up the Democratic National Convention (if only…) and asshole brother, cool Secret Service girlfriend and the President, who they’ve kidnapped because he’s the killswitch to Dutch Boy, drive through while evading the goons of the Secretary of State, who is the head of the conspiracy.

Now, you’re probably asking why the Secretary of State would try to destroy 99% of the world and humanity (you actually probably asking yourself why the hell you’re still reading this). And asshole brother asks him. And his response?

MAGA

This was the point where I knew I was no longer dealing with a mere Bad Movie. Oh no, I was in deep. There’s no coming back from this.

Meanwhile, back in space, the ISS is going to self-destruct because it can do that and the Geostorm is nigh. Butler figures out that it’s the head programmer he met when first getting back into space is the inside man, which I guess the plot alludes to but the guy has less than 5 minutes of screentime so whatever, lets fucking go. They fight and he accidentally shoots himself out into space because he shot a window. Butler, now armed with the killswitch, has to reboot the system, which will fix everything because that’s how he made it, okay.

The only evidence we’re shown of people finding out about this is a local Atlanta news broadcast, which also has live footage of an explosion on the ISS(?), informs their viewers that there are two people on board when Butler didn’t even know he had someone helping him until she saves the day(!?!) and that Butler and nice German space lady get back safely by hitching a ride on a weather satellite(!?!?!?).

It was around this point where I was screaming at the movie rather loudly and violently. I took all of the other bullshit in stride. The Sec. of State wanting to take the world back to 1945 was ridiculous. But this fucking local newscast having access to all this info as we’re seeing it on screen? That shit broke me.

dean no

Anyway, everyone is safe (except for all the people who died, fuck them) and everyone forgives America and Butler and six months later he’s going back to space to unfuck Dutch Boy and the movie ends with a voice over promoting the idea that we’re all in this together and we’re all one people, stop all the fussin’ and feudin’.

FUCK YOU DEAN DEVLIN

Geostorm comes with my highest recommendation

bring liquor

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he has nothing to do with this though.

ah, you’re right. I had conflated this with the rumors that he was rebooting Stargate. my bad.

statement still stands though, guy’s a major creep

Phantom thread reminded me too much of the worst aspects of my own personality while also being the second movie in memory to confront me with the idea of Daniel Day Lewis as a being that fucks?? So that’s a win I guess.

Lewis getting all his obligatory award nominations while Vicky Krieps gets ignored for holding opposite and sometimes pushing him right off the screen sure is something.

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