Cinema Thread, because movies is a stupid word

[aurelius]

This has a comical headline. Long awaited? No. I'm a pretty big fan of the three Indiana Jones films, and I can safely say I have no interest at all of seeing a new one. 0.

After Indy beat the Nazis, doesn't he get to retire? Also, Harrison Ford is 79.

[mouse]

https://collider.com/indiana-jones-5-fi ... ison-ford/

This has a comical headline. Long awaited? No. I'm a pretty big fan of the three Indiana Jones films, and I can safely say I have no interest at all of seeing a new one. 0.

Fool me once? Shame on... shame on you... Fool me... ya can't get fooled again.

The image of Shia LeBouf swinging on vines with monkeys burned into my memory has prevented me from ever paying money for another Indiana Jones property...

[mouse]

This has a comical headline. Long awaited? No. I'm a pretty big fan of the three Indiana Jones films, and I can safely say I have no interest at all of seeing a new one. 0.

After Indy beat the Nazis, doesn't he get to retire? Also, Harrison Ford is 79.

Didn't read the article, but I would imagine Indy is after that delicious soft reboot money... probably to pass the torch to his son Tom Holland...

Speaking of... I took my kids to see Uncharted and it was probably a better Indiana Jones movie than this movie will be...

Only part I got excited for was Nolan North's cameo... but my kids thought it was great...

[dw]

Saw The Batman.

Not that great I thought, it lacked the epicness and sense of profundity that Nolan's movies sometimes achieved.

Going more personal sounds good but really, the Batman personal drama is just not that interesting. Or at least hasn't been made that interesting yet.

One of the woke grace notes drew an audible groan from an audience member which amused me.

The detective stuff was good. It actually reminded me more of the Arkham games than anything else.

[aurelius]

Saw The Batman.

Not that great I thought, it lacked the epicness and sense of profundity that Nolan's movies sometimes achieved.

Going more personal sounds good but really, the Batman personal drama is just not that interesting. Or at least hasn't been made that interesting yet.

The detective stuff was good. It actually reminded me more of the Arkham games than anything else.

I thought it was great. Felt like a noir movie at times. There was a buddy cop dynamic with Gordan and Batman that I liked. The villains were great. Great casting overall. Bravo to Colin Ferrel and the makeup team. I want to see more Penguin. I like that they dropped the whole 'Bruce Wayne' schtick. This is an unstable man that has chosen to put on bullet proof armor and fight criminals at night. It is 3 hours long and it did not feel like it.

A subtle change I liked: The Batman was on the ground unless specifically he needed to be on a rooftop. I always thought all the shots of the Batman on a top of skyscraper odd. How much crime is up there? How did he get up there? Riding the elevator in full bat gear not so subtle.

It is definitely doing its own thing. Has an old school, slow boil plot. It won't be everyone's cup of tea.

One of the woke grace notes drew an audible groan from an audience member which amused me.

I must have missed that.

[Inverstone]

Looking forward to seeing this. I was drawn into Batman's mythos back when he was "the World's Greatest Detective" and solved mysteries.
I remember in part, taking up weight training around 12 yrs old (along with Steve Reeve's Hercules movies) because that's what Bruce did to become Batman. (Training with a French Detective in Paris (?) was not in the cards for me, though...). I liked the more down to earth origins of the self made man as opposed to the (much) later Ninja/Tibetan mythos training.
Nolan's films were great #2 being a masterpiece, but I missed those aspects. Avoiding spoilers as much as possible until it's streamed.
The Denny O'Neil with Neil Adams period was along these lines- focused more on mysteries and riddles in the comics, and the art was great too.

[mouse]

Felt like a noir movie at times.

Has an old school, slow boil plot.

This is exactly what I'm hoping for... and why my kids aren't going whenever I see it lol

Might be the first movie I ever go to the theater by myself to see.

[aurelius]

Might be the first movie I ever go to the theater by myself to see.

I saw it by myself. The GF started to overly complain that it was 3 hours long: "3 hours? I'm supposed to sit there for 3 hours? Is it jail?" So I only bought 1 ticket.

[dw]

I also saw it by myself, out of town on business.

I have a perverse desire to see it again even though my review wasn't that positive. Really just want to see more Riddler. I also liked the scoring of the movie...the music was much less obvious and 'bolder' than any of the other superhero movies.

[aurelius]

I also saw it by myself, out of town on business.

I have a perverse desire to see it again even though my review wasn't that positive. Really just want to see more Riddler. I also liked the scoring of the movie...the music was much less obvious and 'bolder' than any of the other superhero movies.

Took a page out of Star Wars. Characters had 'theme' music. Batman's was more like a villains theme song. Like a minimalist Vader's imperial march. Very effective score. And of course Nirvana's 'Something in the way'.

[TimK]

Saw The Batman last night. I really wanted to love this movie but I didn't. I did like the badass theme music and the film noir aesthetic but it just didn't land that well overall for me. It definitely felt like a 3 hour movie. I kept thinking about how this was basically "What if Se7en was a Batman movie?"

SpoilerShow

Dark, gritty film noir in a filthy city where it's constantly raining, serial killer targets his victims in ways that expose their corruption, with gruesome methods, two detectives team up to catch him, killer has some sick fascination with one of the detectives and he becomes a target, detectives find killer's apartment complete with lunatic journals that give them more clues, catch killer and take him into custody but he continues to wreak havoc despite being imprisoned...

And I would have been totally on board with all of that but it just dragged for me and didn't pack much of a punch. I think I'm kind of over the whole "Batman doesn't kill people" thing in general and in this particular movie, when you're going for such a pitch black tone, it comes across as a little silly IMO. Especially at the end where

SpoilerShow

There's an army of terrorists spraying bullets into a crowd of unarmed civilians and he just goes around stringing people up with his grappling hooks and attempting to subdue them with deliberately non-lethal methods. I mean, maybe that would be a good time for the gloves to come off... and then the whole character turn in the end seemed a little unearned... like, he was always abiding by his non-lethal code of honor from the beginning even in situations where seemed really stupid, so I never really felt like he was on the verge of turning into a villain or anything.

Also, I didn't think the action scenes were very good overall especially the last one in the stadium with the incel militia or whoever they are. The car chase with Penguin was the best but that was 100% spoiled in the trailer and seeing the full scene didn't really add much.

[dw]

Saw The Batman last night. I really wanted to love this movie but I didn't. I did like the badass theme music and the film noir aesthetic but it just didn't land that well overall for me. It definitely felt like a 3 hour movie. I kept thinking about how this was basically "What if Se7en was a Batman movie?"

SpoilerShow

Dark, gritty film noir in a filthy city where it's constantly raining, serial killer targets his victims in ways that expose their corruption, with gruesome methods, two detectives team up to catch him, killer has some sick fascination with one of the detectives and he becomes a target, detectives find killer's apartment complete with lunatic journals that give them more clues, catch killer and take him into custody but he continues to wreak havoc despite being imprisoned...

And I would have been totally on board with all of that but it just dragged for me and didn't pack much of a punch. I think I'm kind of over the whole "Batman doesn't kill people" thing in general and in this particular movie, when you're going for such a pitch black tone, it comes across as a little silly IMO. Especially at the end where

SpoilerShow

There's an army of terrorists spraying bullets into a crowd of unarmed civilians and he just goes around stringing people up with his grappling hooks and attempting to subdue them with deliberately non-lethal methods. I mean, maybe that would be a good time for the gloves to come off... and then the whole character turn in the end seemed a little unearned... like, he was always abiding by his non-lethal code of honor from the beginning even in situations where seemed really stupid, so I never really felt like he was on the verge of turning into a villain or anything.

Also, I didn't think the action scenes were very good overall especially the last one in the stadium with the incel militia or whoever they are. The car chase with Penguin was the best but that was 100% spoiled in the trailer and seeing the full scene didn't really add much.

Part of the problem relates to being PG-13 imo...

SpoilerShow

Think how much more powerful the incel mob scene would have been if they actually allowed the massacre to get off to a respectable start. People getting gunned down left and right, screaming, blood, crying and then Batman shows up just as some little kid is about to get a bullet or whatever...

As it is, there's no real suspense because nothing is ever at stake in these spectacles because nobody ever dies in the big action scenes.

[aurelius]

Everyone is ignoring

SpoilerShow

Batman would have killed hundreds of people with his entrance. That much shattered glass falling on a packed stadium?

[mbasic]

I saw the last Starwars thing trapped in a hotel room in the middle of nowhere....the one where Rey kills Palatine ....again. Boy that sucked.

Saw the 2nd Suicide Squad. It was mildly funny, esp. how John Cena (?) would kill anyone, even a child, to protect the (honor of) USA. Otherwise it sucked .

Movies suck in general for the most part anymore.
Dune and Joker were ok/good.
The Accountant was mildly entertaining, but not good-good.

I don't think I'll bother to see the new BatMan (until its shown on regular cable TV.)

[mbasic]

Regarding Batman not killing his enemies.... They should spin that into he mames them horribly, but does not kill them.

Like have him cut off an arm, an ear .... Or throw one of those neato Bat shaped throwing knives/blades/Chinese stars right in a dude's eye....but he doesn't die.

After the fight is all said and done, subdued enemies strewn about.....shown him tourniquet-off what's left of the one dude's arm, so he doesn't bleed out, to get the point across to the audience.

Lolz

[hector]

Regarding Batman not killing his enemies.... They should spin that into he mames them horribly, but does not kill them.

Like have him cut off an arm, an ear .... Or throw one of those neato Bat shaped throwing knives/blades/Chinese stars right in a dude's eye....but he doesn't die.

After the fight is all said and done, subdued enemies strewn about.....shown him tourniquet-off what's left of the one dude's arm, so he doesn't bleed out, to get the point across to the audience.

Lolz

I think this is what Robin ends up doing in his HBO show Young Titans.
Not exaggerating. Throws a ninja star into a guy's eye in the first episode.

[stuffedsuperdud]

Saw The Batman.

Not that great I thought, it lacked the epicness and sense of profundity that Nolan's movies sometimes achieved.

I saw that they drew heavily from Batman Year One, one of my favorite story arcs. This is the kind of storyline where Nolan's epic style is probably inappropriate though as these early adventures ware decidedly not that epic; I thought the Year One elements in Batman Begins was the weakest part of the movie, as they had to level him up too quickly so that we could have the 2nd half happen. Actually, if I had it my way, The Batman would be a gritty R-rated HBO type series, but I guess that's not where the $ or legal licensing stuff is at.

Going more personal sounds good but really, the Batman personal drama is just not that interesting. Or at least hasn't been made that interesting yet.

This is an unstable man that has chosen to put on bullet proof armor and fight criminals at night. It is 3 hours long and it did not feel like it.

Anyone gets getting major Taxi Driver vibes from this? I like how they made an honest attempt at portraying how fucked up a person needs to be to put on a Halloween costume and beat up bad guys at night because he's mad about what happened to his parents. Like, if a character like this showed up in real life NYC or Chicago we'd all be hiding from him, not embrace him as a savior. When he goes into detective mode though, yea, the Arkham games certainly come to mind. I'm given to understand that that's its own thing in the works now? Please tell me this is true. If they could do an appropriately Lovecraftian version of it, well, mmmmmmm chefskiss.gif.

One of the woke grace notes drew an audible groan from an audience member which amused me.

I must have missed that.

I imagine it's that little throwaway line from Selina that the town is being ruined by rich old white-privilege guys? No biggie... even though I don't think the guys she's thinking of typically have names like Carmine Falcone and look like John Turturro.

[mouse]

if I had it my way, The Batman would be a gritty R-rated HBO type series, but I guess that's not where the $ or legal licensing stuff is at

I mean... that is/was supposedly the plan. There is supposed to be a tie-in series for HBO akin to Gotham but I think it got put on hold or something...

Still haven't seen it...

Regarding Batman not killing his enemies.... They should spin that into he mames them horribly, but does not kill them.

Batfleck killed mofos in Dawn of Justice... straight up shot them too which is another Batman no-no...

Batman has killed bad guys in the books too... it's a trope that needs to... uhm... die...

[mgil]

Also saw The Batman.

It was a good example of what film noir would be in the modern era with a superhero. That being said, it was a little too slow of pace. The supporting cast was very effective. Also, despite Batman being the dark knight, I don’t know if the film noir aesthetic truly works here.

DC has been hit or miss with Batman. The early Burton films were on mark, the Nolan movies were on mark, I think this one is close. The Burton and Nolan movies were well supported by the actor in the titular role. I think that is were this one is weak. Pattinson isn’t bad, but he’s a bit lacking, especially as Bruce Wayne. It’s not enough Jekyll/Hyde for the role.

[stuffedsuperdud]

DC has been hit or miss with Batman. The early Burton films were on mark, the Nolan movies were on mark, I think this one is close.

Gilchrest why you no like homoerotic Buttman & Throbbin? I was 9 and 11 when the two Schumacher movies came out and was jolted into the world of bicuriosity. A little part of me is to this day...openminded...when it comes to leather daddies.

The Burton and Nolan movies were well supported by the actor in the titular role. I think that is were this one is weak. Pattinson isn’t bad, but he’s a bit lacking, especially as Bruce Wayne. It’s not enough Jekyll/Hyde for the role.

For me the dichotomy between Bruce and Bats has always been weaker than writers would like, just the other way. That is, Gotham's seedy underworld may be scared of Batman but I never really understood why, since he very clearly has a strict-ish code and is generally understood to be a mostly nonlethal man in a costume. You're more likely to be killed by colon cancer or texting while driving than by Batman, right? Robert Pattinson brings a strange variant to this problem, where his mentally unwell Bruce Wayne actually made the Batman side potentially much more unpredictable and scary for me, but then it kind of fell flat because Pattinson me just isn't intimidating in that way that guys like Tom Hardy can be.

SpoilerShow

In that scene where he's standing around a dead body with a bunch of GCPD and quietly tells the cop what the answer to the riddle is, I was almost like. "Shut up, nerd."