Topic: The Movie Thread

@GirlVersusGame Yeah, it's a strange mess. Very curious to see it again. I notice that it is still running a few places in town, but I think I'll wait for streaming nonetheless. Will be checking out a Norwegian Christmas movie tomorrow that's been getting rave reviews as a potential "Christmas classic for the entire family" and the trailers makes it look very charming, so maybe I'll get into the Christmas spirit early this year (I'm typically all "bah, humbug" until the family gathering on Christmas Eve, which I dearly love. Being a cynic atheist who has seen through the capitalist attempt to guilt us into spending as much money as possible is the only way to show our love for our friends and family, preferably from early October and onwards, will keep the Christmas spirit at bay until I get to spend a peaceful evening with my beloved family)

@BearsEatBeets Yeah, I'll be skipping Avatar regardless (haven't seen the second one as I've only recently stopped hating the first one )

I quite liked House of Dynamite too and it's weird, but I feel it maybe gets talked about way more than it warrants? It's a fine thriller with some interesting things to say about the world we live in, but I don't feel like the movie itself is all that "important" as some would claim (though its themes may be, so maybe that's why it's generating so much conversation? Well, I say "conversation" when it is more "people yelling their opinions at each other online", of course). I didn't mind the ending either, the details that are missing aren't relevant to the things the movie wants to say, in my opinion.

@FuriousMachine I tend to use services that break (legally) street dates so it doesn't surprise me that it's still running in theaters. Christmas being in January means not watching actual Christmas movies right around now but I think I'll make an exception. It's usually National Lampoons, Scrooged, Muppets, Die Hard (with the guys) I don't know too many others. Maybe also Bad Santa with Billy Bob Thornton, it felt like he wasn't acting half the time, just being himself. Is this the same movie?

A grieving woman forges a deep connection with a Norwegian man when he discovers she has a troll figurine from his hometown. She soon agrees to accompany him to Norway to uncover the troll's origins and find her own path to healing, love and family.

I might be looking for the wrong name or read it wrong, you can never be sure with Norway.

Being a cynic atheist who has seen through the capitalist attempt to guilt us into spending as much money as possible is the only way to show our love for our friends and family.

• There's a lot of truth to those words, I think it's one of those not being able to put the djinn back into the bottle situations. Especially when those wishes were granted and people can't see through the treasure, the sparkle blinds and distracts them from what they already had right in-front of them. I have gifts from two years ago that I never opened, it's not that I'm ungrateful. I try to prioritize time not things. I like the together part, the snow, the cold, the fire and the light, the rest I don't have words for.

@GirlVersusGame I didn't post the title of the movie I'm seeing tomorrow because I don't think it even has an English title and the Norwegian title would probably mean very little to most people on here. The synopsis you posted is definitely a different movie altogether, this is a kids/family movie about a family of mice living in a house that suddenly gets infested with humans during Christmas. A pretty much direct translation of the title would be something like "when the nights get long", which are the opening words to a beloved Christmas song, "Musevisa" ("The Mouse Song"), from 1946 (and which forms the lose basis for the movie I'm seeing)

EDIT: I'm spreading misinformation here. The name of the movie is not "when the nights get long", but rather "If nobody gets caught in the trap" (meaning that if everybody manages to stay away from the mousetrap, it will be a good Christmas for the family of mice)

EDIT 2: Seems it has a proper English title after all, per IMDB: A Mouse Hunt for Christmas

@FuriousMachine Okay I was definitely looking at the wrong one, it happens in my language too so I get it. The story sounds great, thanks I'll keep an eye out for it.

@GirlVersusGame travesty!

1. No Drive?

2. No psychopathic christmas ginger breads?

You must put your foot down next time 😤

@FuriousMachine cynics, you say? Never heard of 'em. Must be a Norwegian thing... A big vat of Baileys and a 'Home Alone' and 'Christmas Vacation' double showing should do the trick for me. I'll surely be prancing through the snow (dull rain) in no time after that. And anyway, to anyone wanting to be treated, are we not gift enough, I say! Are we not gift enough? 😁 What? We're not. Maybe a blank cheque will do, then.

And although i'm being a silly bugger about it, elevated stress can be real at this time of year, i've slipped into it a few times, so I hope you find joy in the genuine parts of the season. For me it is just the atmosphere, you know the dreaded 'Hygge' that the hipsters stole from the Scandinavians. That, for me is just what Christmas always was anyway, a mix of nature (from the pagan elements) coziness, togetherness, warmth and light, all stemming from generally making the winter bearable in the northern hemisphere. I don't think that needs fancy words, it is how we as humans have always survived, but now it is coca cola coloured and marketed as a reason to spend spend spend (oh no, veering back towards the cynical)

I actually dread to think of all the slow boats from China stuffed full with billions of tonnes of Temu crap. They are probably all there right now in the Suez Canal, creeping like impending doom. Oh, how am I going to save this comment now?

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good-night.

watching Dead Pit on Tubi today along with a couple more episodes of season1 of Pirates of Dark Water

@Ravix Ah' so you caught me, I'm getting to it. No Gingerbread Men either no, just a man running in a towel. You'd probably like it, not the towel but the actual movie. The visuals can be striking, very Cyber Punk at times. I imagine they'd hit your 4K itch, lots to see, and quite layered.

@GirlVersusGame ah, no more blind buys for me (maybe) I have a 'like/dislike' relationship with Stephen King as it is, but I haven't even seen the original movie... I know... shocking. Towel or otherwise it would feel wrong to get the new one without even knowing the old one. My instincts say that an Arnie 80's or 90's movie will always be better than any remake, but I am just basing that on Total Recall, to be fair 😬

You cannot escape the eye of Sauron in this matter, no 😛 But I also don't want to push you towards Drive too hard. Even if I feel like every scene is lit and composed so beautifully that it is worth watching, even without the story, it is proper cinematography porn, for want of a better description. And yes it is a violent, raw movie, but it is deeply tender so I have no issue calling it a romance movie.

@FuriousMachine oh yes, mentioning Sauron, I also finished the latest LotR trilogy watch recently, and I agree with what you had said, previously. Maybe the third is a bit more dissapointing overall. The first half possibly more glaringly. Still worthwhile as the complete package, but it does seem easier to rewatch the first 2.

@Ravix You haven't seen the original Running Man? How is that even possible, and I thought I was sheltered. It might be unfair to compare the two, they are two very different movies with a very light connection to the premise. For example in the original the area to run is a kind of closed off waste-land. In the new one it's the entire state, nor is there someone dressed like a Christmas tree chasing the new guy. When you compare all of those subtle differences it becomes a new movie altogether. I never watched the remake of Total Recall and never will. The first one is too perfect, no one else sees reality like Paul Verhoeven does and it's probably because he's insane. He's able to take that insanity and channel it into great movies. Every producer or studio Executive that's even met him said 'I can't work with that man, he's a lunatic', maybe.

I escaped the real Sauron a long time ago by never finishing that first Lord of The Rings movie, I'll get to it eventually. I know the story, boy finds ring, goes on an adventure with said ring, throws it into a volcano then I'm assuming goes home. I never saw the Hobbit either but I bet that has a ring too.

@GirlVersusGame you mock that I haven't seen the running man and then say you never finished The Lord of the Rings???

Hmm, yes. It has a ring, just the one... but the tale is of friendship, selflessness and survival in a world of conflict, selfishness and destruction. Timeless, for reasons I can't quite fathom.

I can definitely confirm that avoiding the remake of total recall is a wise choice. I can't even remember if it managed address the deeper plot points, probably not. And it's not like they are super subtle messages in the orignal. Maybe i'd just totally zoned out by the 'reveal' in remake because it is horrible.

Insane, maybe. But what would the state of the world and creativity within be without at least a little of that? It'd probably be a world with 14 'Fast' franchise movies, and I can't see that ever being the case...

If killer gingerbread is off the cards, what are you planning on seeing next? Apart from Drive 😛

@Ravix I just couldn't get into it at the time, I think I fell asleep and when I woke up the trees were walking. Everyone was walking so I fell asleep again. Your synopsis makes me consider a possible re-watch. I didn't know it was about friendship too. I'd like to think that they haven't made fourteen of those movies, I've probably seen three. The first one will always be my favorite, they were driving real cars on real roads not space ships on the moon or wherever they go now. I'll eventually try Marvel at some point too, I've seen half of the first Avengers movie and the first Spiderman (Sam Rami)

Looks like it's Dracula: A Love Tale. I do like Luc Bessons work.

Jesus, poor Rob Reiner and his wife. Absolutely mad, the same year as Hackman and his wife too. In shock, he was a great filmmaker and always came across like a really nice guy. Hopefully they find out what the hell happened. Guess the project he was working on about Trump and Putin’s relationship will never come to fruition.

Reporting that it was his son that did it. What a horrible tragedy. Heartbreaking.

Aarrrgh!! Now that Christmas has all but bled me dry, Turbine sees fit to release one of my most wanted movies on 4K, Peter Jackson's "The Frighteners" on a 3-disc special edition, with a street date of tomorrow (Dec. 18th), no less. Naturally, I just got the notice that it has shipped and is on its way It is quite possibly my favourite Peter Jackson movie. I fully expect a steelbook to be announced as soon as I get this one.

Also, Kino Lorber Studio Classics will release Kenneth Branagh's "Dead Again" on 4K in February, but I haven't found any pre-orders for that one yet.

@nessisonett Such a horrific story. It's not often a celebrity death like that is under such miserable circumstances. It truly took me aback for a bit to have to imagine that scene upon reading. Just everything about is is tragic. I hope their family will be able to recover to some degree. I wish all the best to their family and especially the daughter who found them. Trump's reaction to it over the last days has also been, predictably, disgusting. I didn't think I could like that man any less. I'm glad to see even people from his own camp speaking out against such horrible comments. What a sick man. Rob and Michele Reiner deserve better.

That's really awful but saying his son did it isn't that surprising. It's what I saw with a lot of Hollywood kids, a lot of drugs and if there were underlying untreated issues it would set them off. Too many murders like that just get classified as something else or hushed up It's unfortunately a lot more common than people think. Untreated mental illness can be a time-bomb for families and it's often the parents who have to pay for it. Right before the Holidays too. Surviving family members who experience something like that didn't just lose family members they lose the ability to cope during Christmas and it's not a Holiday that's easily avoided. I wish mental health was taken more seriously, events like that are avoidable if the person gets help. I don't know what the Orange Man said, nothing good I'm sure.

A word of warning for anyone interested in the 4K of Boogie Nights, it seems that in America at least the disc does not have Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos.

http://youtube.com/post/UgkxTvTspqy6C-mLn5o2I2FHESuEaDCFMcGW?...

This was an interesting article about the differences of disc vs streaming. I am constantly asked "why bother buying the movie on disc when you can stream it for free?" and when I answer quality they mutter disbelievingly that it can't be that much of a difference, 4K is 4K, whether it's on disc or streaming, right?
Wrong and I've been looking for a clear and concise article to support my argument and I've finally found it! Maths to the rescue

The Lie of 4K Streaming (nowplayingpodcast.com)

@FuriousMachine "why bother buying the movie on disc when you can stream it for free?"

• You should ask them what to do when a company like Apple or Amazon decides to remove a book that you bought from a device you also bought, or a piece of music from a movie or a game.

Then there's Spotify, they removed Skin (from Skunk Anansie, old UK Punk/Rock band) Can you even imagine waking up one day and saying 'I'm going to watch Dark City today' and having to rely on streaming or even digital purchase and not just walk into the room and pick up the disc. Sometimes it sounds like digital only people just want to watch what's popular and once it goes out of style they move to the next thing. Isn't that the thinking with social media, the constant scrolling onto the next thing. That's more or less Netflix and of course they remove content after a while. It makes me wonder what hobbies will look like in ten years, will people actually be using paper to draw on, will they know the feel and smell of a book, or even that smell you get from a new game, how will they even feel art if it's always through a screen. I know you are talking about the actual visual fidelity but both go hand in hand when people push digital.

I think convenience clouds actual worth. People are going to wake up one day and realize they don't know the value of anything because for example a very sharp and well put together box-set might cost X amount and you can open it, look at it, and say yes this is well made. Then another person will pick up the remote and scroll to Netflix and watch the exact same show and not get that real connection to something tangible. Trust me I know what some of that feels like with some other things and once you are there it's very hard to apply that value or worth, I think media as a whole is headed there. I don't need to listen to a record to know it's superior and finally crafted but when I do I can hear the difference. Maybe over time peoples senses will actually adapt to that lower fidelity, muted realism, it's a scary thought but humans do adapt. Do you remember in Interview with the Vampyre when he's slowly experiencing day-light again and sunrise through his time in the theater?

Then out of curiosity, boredom, who knows what, I left the old world and came back to my America. And there, a mechanical wonder allowed me to see the sun rise for the first time in two hundred years. And what sunrises, seen as the human eye could never see them: silver at first, then, as the years progressed, in tones of purple, red, and my long lost blue.

It will be like that but backwards, they'll lose that refined ability to feel colour and depth, unless of course they find a physical medium of art but I see less and less people at art galleries, or book stores.

Actually here's a perfect example. Someone used to send me sunrises from their daily morning walk, I had maybe one hundred from them. Every day they'd do that. It's not all that different than what Louis said because the technology improved and their pictures improved with it. I think with media people won't realize what they have until it's gone or they won't experience it the same way from the start and they won't know the difference. I can look at that sunrise and say yes that's lovely, and give a compliment for how well they framed the picture, perhaps compare it to the rule of thirds and break it down to grids in my mind but that's it. I wasn't there, they were, fidelity can feel like that too. If I don't go out all that often I do feel that sensitivity to light and even temporary slip to depth of field. It's not the same kind of immersion or visual accuracy, that's what Netflix feels like when I watch it too. Flat and lacking accurate representation.

@GirlVersusGame Most of the people asking me don't really care about owning media themselves, but they do labour under the misconception that high quality streaming is just as good as physical. Quality seems to be lowest on the list of priorities for pirates as well, file-size seemingly being king. At least it was back when I got most of my tv shows that way. Difficult to find anything above 720p and even those would be heavily compressed. And this was maybe only 10-15 years ago, when ample HD space and high speed internet were readily available and fairly cheap most places. Don't know how it is these days, but would expect 4K being rare as unicorns and insanely compressed if they even exist.