Topic: The Movie Thread

@WanderingBullet i still don't get how Jane Foster can gain the power of Thor if Mjolnir was destroyed in Ragnarok unless she is either A: from another timeline or B: from another universe or C: they get another Mjolnir from another timeline/universe

@FullbringIchigo Oh, you make an interesting point. Did they actually confirmed her character was going to wield Mjolnir? I kept thinking about how she's gonna be female Thor when stature wise she's kinda small that I didn't think about hammer part. The multiverse part would work cause Dr. Strange 2 is apparently about the multiverse as the title suggests.

@WanderingBullet yes they did confirm she will be Wielding Mjolnir

also Strange 2 has a lot of promise with a title like that but on the flip side it could overload the entire franchise, they need to be REAL careful doing that kind of thing

@KratosMD Cube is kinda nuts. Not a lot on Netflix films wise these days. Overlord is very good in my opinion, that’s on Prime.

Yeah with everyone starting their own streaming service nowadays Netflix has lost alot of movies and shows. Heck I wouldn't be surprised if in a few years Netflix is gone unless they become like the indie movie channel or something.

@kyleforrester87 Yeah Overlord is great, it has also just appeared on Sky Cinema/NOW TV for the folks that have those.

@FullbringIchigo I may be being daft but didn't Thor have Mjolnir at the end of Endgame?

Eh, I think they'll be able to hold on strong with their original content, a lot of which is pretty popular, rather than focusing on indie films or folding.

Disney will certainly shake things up though once they launch their service.

@ZeD wasn't it put back afterwards?, when Steve took the Stones back to their original places in time he took Mjolnir with him

@FullbringIchigo Did a quick google and yes you are correct. That would make the new film rather interesting. The film is released AFTER the next Strange film. Maybe that is the key?

Just got back from The Lion King. It was... underwhelming. Other than a few changed lines and one added scene, it's practically a shot-for-shot remake of the original animated film, but with all the personality sucked out of it. The vast, lush Pride Lands now just look like any random place in Africa. In the original, when the cubs entered the elephant graveyard, it felt spooky and magical, almost like they were transported to an alternate dimension. Here, it just feels like they stumbled across a dark spot with some old bones in it. The worst thing about this is the voice actor for Scar: all of the same lines are here, but without Jeremy Irons' theatrical performance, which was equal parts sarcastic, menacing, and hammy, they just feel... empty. The voice actor sounds like he's bored and reading off the lines in the script for a paycheck. Timon and Pumba are largely similar: they sound... somewhat similar, but without the distinctive voice work and vibrant personalities. In all cases, the visuals contribute to this lack of personality: the best and worst thing I can say about this film is that it feels like Disney filmed some animals and dubbed voices over them. Is it remarkable that they've made a film that's 98% CG look almost indistinguishable from real life footage? Maybe. But it's also a shame that they went to all this work to create something that feels so wholly inferior to the original. This didn't need to exist.

Most of the songs are... not destroyed, but, again, just inferior versions of what was found in the original. There's no song in this that felt like it contributed anything to what was already achieved in the original. In Circle of Life, while this cover is perfectly acceptable, it lacks the pop that the original singer gave it. I Just Can't Wait to be King sounds OK, but, given that the sequence is entirely lacking in the vibrant cartoonishness of the original (lots of cuts, animals jumping around, interesting scene framing, etc. are replaced with... realistic CG animals walking or running around), it didn't impress at all. Scar's villain song had almost all the lyrics changed and was just flat out ruined. It doesn't even sound like a song most of the time. I didn't even know what it was supposed to be the very end, which is similar lyrically to the original. None of the striking scenes where green gases burst into the pitch black of night, or the chilling shot where the Hyenas are marching in succession before Scar, their long shadows cutting into the face of the rock behind him. Hakuna Matata is... OK, but, again, the visual elements are significantly less memorable, which makes the sequence feel far less playful. Can You Feel the Love Tonight was well-done, and was the one sequence in the film that didn't feel quite undermined in some way (although I can actually think of one shortcoming: they don't have the sequence as adults where they start wrestling like they did as cubs, only to realize their affection when Simba pins Nala down and she licks him while wearing the "come hither" expression, giving the sequence a thematic connection to their wrestling earlier in the film).

It's not aggressively bad like Beauty and the Beast, but it also doesn't improve on the original in any way, and when contrasts do exist, they're never in the remake's favor. This film feels uniquely pointless. I don't really like the phrase "cash grab," as all films are basically made to generate revenue, but this feels like a cash grab, like they drained all of the expression and emotion out of the original cartoon to make this realistic facsimile that never leaves much of an impression at all.

EDIT: Oh, and whoever voiced Pumba can't sing.

@KratosMD These are are some horrors/psychological thrillers that I’ve enjoyed on Netflix (UK).....
The Haunting Of Hill House (series), The Invitation, Creep, Creep 2, Apostle, The Ritual, Get Out, Mama, Hannibal (series), Cube, Hush, The Thing, Life, From Beyond, As Above So Below, The Cabin In The Woods, Before I Wake....and probably others that I don’t remember right now.....
These are 2 movies that I haven’t watched yet but have heard only good things about...
Gerald’s Game, The Perfection.

@Ralizah I am not a fan of these Disney remakes at all. Not to say that the idea of a remake is always inherently bad but they are largely, let's do the same film again with shiny effects and sell the nostalgia factor when, in the case of the Lion King, the original is just very good. I have no problem with films being made to make money, but the best blockbusters achieve that while trying to bring something creatively to the table. These just purely exist to return a good profit on the investment.

@Frigate I read the graphic novel after the film, and I wish that it was closer to the source material. The film feels quite bland compared to it.

@Rudy_Manchego I don't mind when they bring something new to the table. Remakes like The Jungle Book and Cinderella changed things up a bit to fit the new format, and they felt like transformed experiences as a result. And I thought both were quite a bit more interesting than their cartoon counterparts. Mulan also looks like it's changing up a bit, so I'm curious to see how that turns out.

This, however, was just disappointing.

@ZeD perhaps it will, we can but wait and see

@Ralizah @Rudy_Manchego Yeah, Disney are really pumping out these live-action remakes. Every week a new one comes out and they all get mediocre reviews. I agree that Cinderella and Jungle Book were quite enjoyable, but after watching Beauty and the Beast (my favorite of the older animated movies, not to mention Emma Watson being a favorite actress) I was disappointed such that I’ve skipped all of these more recent ones. Looks like I’ll probably skip Lion King too.

@Ralizah I will be honest and say I haven't seen Jungle Book but seen most of the others. I am not sure that many of them have really added much to the stories - at least I don't seem them to be reimaginings of the concept or anything, just corrections to the execution.

As @Th3solution said, I am not sure that any of them are 'bad' per se. Just, in my mind, terminally average and unncessary. From a Disney point of view, so far anyway, they are adapting 'good' films so there is minimal risk in making a bad one it comes with brand awareness.

The only exception so far is possibly Dumbo because that was very much not a literal adaptation and was also not a good film in my opinion. Then again, at its core it is about a flying elephant.

I'm a bit disappointed that Idris Elba won't be the lead in the new Blade movie. Mahershala Ali is alright, but I can't really picture him in the role.

But he's not a bad actor. He could very well pull it off. That's the only one of the Phase 4 Marvel films that I'll likely be seeing at release. I won't touch Thor: Love and Thunder with a hundred foot stick (didn't like normal Thor with the affable and hunky Chris Hemsworth, so a gender-flipped version with one of my least favorite actresses? Nuh-uh.), and I don't feel the need to see more Captain Strange, or whatever his name is.

@Th3solution I didn't mind Emma Watson before, but I have to admit that I don' know if I can enjoy her work anymore after she ruined Belle in Beauty and the Beast. It's not really her fault, though: she was SO miscast.

Has this been posted yet? I hadn't heard about this. Haha. No old movie is to be spared.