The Revenant
Might be the most beautifully shot movie I've ever seen. Dicaprio knocks it out of the park, as does Hardy, and I like the overarching themes (and I love the ending, but then again...). I'm not sure that it's my favorite movie that I saw this past year, but it's quite possibly the best.
I like movie endings of this type that are ambiguous.
Kick-Ass 2
Watched over the weekend as the kid napped. It's...basically an even more mean-spirited take on the first one. Didn't hate it, but I also must be a fairly different viewer than I was when I watched the first one, because while that movie worked for me, this one just sort of didn't.
Attack on Titan
Still pushing through. Really liking it.
Started up Firefly again yesterday (my...third watch, I think?). Goodness, but I like that show, even if I haven't hit the episodes I'm not as fond of yet.
Yay for Firefly!
Curious about which are the episodes you're not as fond of?
Yeah, Heart of Gold, is for sure my least favorite. If I want to watch Unforgiven, I'll probably just watch the the one with Eastwood and Morgan instead of the warmed over, toothless one set in space.
Not a huge fan of Safe (though the "Big Damn Heroes" line salvages it) or The Message, which is fairly unmemorable, as far as the rest of the episodes are concerned.
I'd agree with Safe, but I remember thinking The Message had a fairly strong punch at the end, which does the trick for me.
The Revenent was great. Note to Jeff A -- bears are NOT cool on this movie
Depends on your prospective, bro. The bear kinda got a raw deal.
The sound design for The Revenent was done by my best friend's younger brother. (Like free, a Mound HS grad.)
he did good work.
Looking forward to seeing it. Jonny does really good work. Cool guy, too, and I'm not just saying that because he's bought a of couple paintings from me. 😉
You're damn right, he did.
Might be the most beautifully shot movie I've ever seen
I was totally immersed in the picture until some asshole got and then answered a call when Glass makes his return to the fort. I turned around and said, "really?, REALLY!?!?". He didn't seem phased by my question, and continued to have his conversation. I was able to get back into the mood of the picture, but holy hell.
I might go with Lawrence of Arabia for beautifully-shot films. But, special for Stick, let's not forget about a certain sled.
Anybody have any good shows that can be watched as a family? Wife worked her way through much of Once Upon A Time on her own, but over Christmas/New Year, we finished it off as a group, which was fun. Two-year old was mostly ambivalent, but nine and six-year-olds were into it. Combat was magical and not gratuitous or gory (to include the removal of hearts). Sensuality was pretty tame.
Just curious.
I have watched the first season of Flash and the entire series of Chuck with the kids. Both are on Netflix.
Flash started to get a little hokey at the end of season 1. Violence is tame. I'd say less than Once Upon... No sensuality I can recall.
Chuck definitely had some gratuitous swimsuit /underwear shots. Some suggestiveness. The last couple seasons stunk but was really entertaining before that.
generally agreed on Chuck. It was adorable for most of its run.
very vaguely apropos, the Mrs and I were big fans of Scarecrow and Mrs. King. I always thought that was a very adorable show.
Chuck was the first one that sprung to mind, with caveats that Algonad mentions...especially the lapse in quality in later Seasons.
HPR really got into Granite Flats and EAR and I enjoyed it to the point where we didn't want him watch it without us.
Kids in the early 60s in a small town dealing with local mysteries, mostly about Sputnik or aliens or something.
EAR just started watching Great British Bake-off or whatever that BBC-via-PBS import is.
I watched episode 2 and man did I want some biscuits. Way less fluff than any American-made competitive baking show I've seen.
Critiques are enjoyably direct in that British way. Like I imagine Simon Cowell before he became self-parody.
EAR commented that a lot of the competitors remind her of the human characters in Aardman movies.
I love Bake Off. I want a Paul Hollywood bread baking book.
Oh yeah, I watched a season of that. What fun.
A month ago, at Christmas time, I actually watched a couple of movies. They were both on TV, but still, they were movies.
"Shaun the Sheep"--I had seen a few of the videos and enjoyed them, but it seems to me one of the hardest things about any movie comedy is putting in enough story to keep things interesting without putting in so much that there's not enough room for the gags. It seemed like that would be especially hard when none of your characters actually talk. No need to worry. It was fun and inventive from beginning to end. Four out of four bears.
"Hugo"--It's a Martin Scorcese film with Ben Kingsley and Sacha Baron Cohen in it, and it got eleven academy award nominations, so I assume it's a fairly noteworthy movie, but I'd never heard of it. It was on TVLand on Christmas night for some reason. It starts really slowly, and I would have given up on it had it not been for Mrs. A. It turned out to be worth hanging in there for. It gets rolling about two-fifths of the way through, and you really start to care about the characters. It's a 3-D movie and I saw it in 2-D, so I'm sure I missed some good visual effects. Three out of four bears.
Saw Hugo in the theater (2-d, as I generally abhor 3-d and did not even recall that there was a 3-d version). I thought it was a fabulous love letter to early cinema.
I think that if I would have known what it was going into it, I would have had more tolerance for the film. As it was, I had no clue, and was quite dissatisfied. I've been told consistently that I'm wrong about that, and I'm willing to concede to those views. But I probably wouldn't watch it again.
I loved the cinematography and the sets and the acting. I just had zero interest in the story. I honestly remember little about the plot but remember I was constantly amazed at the artistry of the film.
I thought it was a fabulous love letter to early cinema.
Once it got going, I agree. It just took a long time to get going.
Shaun the Sheep is Aardman Animations -- no need to worry!
I've watched many episodes of Shaun, but not the movie.
I find so many things about the show enjoyable. The theme, the lack of villainy, the little bits of poo that increase in the meadow throughout the day, ...
Eh... I started Season 7 of Parks & Rec. I'm only 2 episodes in (3?), and so far... it isn't what it once was.
I gave up on Making A Murderer because they were really stretching that stuff out. And it's too much like work.
Don't worry about Parks and Rec season 7. It starts off slow, but the last half is a good sendoff.
Oh yeah, it's still better than almost anything else. I just thought season 6's ending was perfection, so it's a big jump from that to the start of 7.
Episodes 6-9 of Making a Murderer are really slow and could have been one episode. Watch episode 10. There is one reveal there that still amazes me.
The one thing I'll say about Episodes 6-9 is that while they are slow-ish, they can't even begin to compete with the tedium that would be experienced from sitting through the 8 weeks of testimony from the two trials. I think it would have been tough to condense those four episodes into one, but two or three might have worked.
[Related to the length of the trial.] One thing that wasn't really touched on in jury selection is that when you have a low-income defendant, how do you get any low-income jurors to sit on the jury for a six-week trial? I don't know what they pay jurors in that part of Wisconsin, but in King County, jurors get $10/day, same as they have since the '50s. If your in a job where you get paid by the hour, you can't really afford to miss six weeks of work.
I dread ever being on a jury for something like a murder trial. I can't focus on anything for any length of time, really. I just would be the worst juror if it took more than like 2 days.
I don't worry about my focus, I worry about staying awake.
that's contempt-able!
I resorted to PEDs. (Caffeine, which I usually avoid.)
Medical malpractice (civil case) for 3 weeks was serious enough for me. I'd do it, but would not look forward to sitting on any felony case.
this is a great point, ubes.
It was addressed in the Paper of Record a couple of years ago by a Chicago economist, who noted that, at the time, Cook County jurors were paid $17.20 per day. I believe the current federal rate is $40/day. Here in Cali, it's $15/day (after the first day) plus 34 cents/mile. In Minnesota, it's $10/day plus 27 cents mileage; in Washington state it's variable between $10 and $25/day plus mileage. All according to this source.
In Cali, extreme financial hardship is a valid excuse from jury duty. But to qualify, the potential juror must be (a) self-employed and the sole source of income for his/her household or (b) the sole source of income and his/her employer does not pay for jury duty. That seems like a recipe for excluding a lot of folks, albeit not all poor ones.
Washington state must be similar, those stipulations sound similar to what my judge was asking other potential jurors looking to excuse themselves from jury duty. The judge seemed to be striking a balance between enforcing the rule and letting people go if it seemed like they were going to make themselves a nuisance, even if they didn't meet the letter of the law when it came to the hardship.
A few years back I was excused from jury duty because the teaching gig I had accepted for the semester was how I earned full tuition remission. Whether that fell under the "employer does not pay for jury duty" provision or some other combination of hardship/employment responsibility, I'm not sure because I was able to beg off before I was ever summoned to the court for selection.
My jury duty experience came during spring break of my freshman year of college, so financially I came out ahead. Not to mention the free dinner and free night at a hotel with an assigned roommate (with no television and no phone because sequestered)!
Finally finished the original Star Wars trilogy with the kids. Turns out it was the 6-year-old daughter that really thought Darth Vader was the best. And she just knew he was going to save Luke. Fun to have those conversations. I hear there might be a new one coming out, so we'll probably have to see that.
They delayed Episode 8 until December for maximum money making script rewrites. I'm more bummed than upset because the only 18 months from 7 to 8 was rather short.
Been watching The Expanse on SyFy. So far, so good.
I have Inside Out and Antman from the library to watch, but have to hold off and wait for my daughter to be able to watch it as well.
Funny story regarding The Expanse; bridging movie day and book day.
I was at the library and saw a book that looked interesting called Nemesis Games. I picked it up and then saw that it was part 5 of a series. Well, that's no good. So I looked for Book 1: Leviathan Wakes. Picked it up and instantly fell in love with it. The next day I was on the internet and saw something about this show called The Expanse. I couldn't believe that they had already made a show out of these books! Amazing!
I'm going to read through the books first, then give the shows a shot, hopefully they'll be coming to Netflix.
I will have to check out The Expanse. Probably make it my next show after I finish Jessica Jones.
Inside Out and Ant-Man are both great. Ant-Man is really the only movie on my seen list for this month, but I had a ton of fun watching it and so did my 2.5 year-old when he woke up for the last half hour.
Oh yeah, I watched Ant-Man!
Probably my least favorite Marvel movie besides Iron Man 2? That's not really a damning statement though, because I enjoy the heck out of comic book movies, and would recommend it all the same. I just wanted more of what was in it, I think.
As I'm reading the Harry Potter books I'm watching the movies. I'll probably wait until I've seen all 8 to comment.
Watched Vertigo yesterday for the first time. Man Hitchcock was a master with the camera. Gorgeous, gorgeous film. The mystery was mildly entertaining, and there were slow spots where James Stewart just acts misogynistic and generally creepy, so yeah. I had a hard time buying the romance.
Veritigo is great. That scene when she walks out of bathroom in green glow then the 360 degree camera work for the kiss - goosebumps just writing that.
But yeah, the misogyny. Jimmy saying "it couldn't possibly matter to you" as he urges Judy to change her hair is priceless.
The green glow was one of the things I was thinking about.
Still working through X-Files, finished 20 episodes, and ST:TNG, 15 minutes into Home Soil. We were on break for a while from lack of time until last weekend. X-Files might be going back on break until after the revival is over.
Watching The Expanse. It's great. They have changed a number of things but I'm hoping it's more Game of Thrones tweaks rather than large re-imaginings of events.
As I said in the FMD post, I have been plowing through Star Trek Deep Space Nine. I'm into Season 5 now (just cleared the Tribbles episode!) One thing I have been loving is that we get to see the politics of Cardassia and Bajor and the Ferengi (its probably no surprise to hear I like the ongoing Klingon political drama that happened in TNG). I also have been loving the Odo character. He could probably have a half hour short season spin off show where he is investigating a case and I would love it. Quark and Rom have been fun too.
I've been stuck on Season 5 since 2010. It's really embarrassing. I just lost inertia. Seasons 3-5 were so awesome, too. I don't like all of the actors, but the plots and characters are drawn so much deeper than on TNG.
That's one thing I've noticed by giving it a fresh look, the whole series seems a bit more cohesive than TNG. I loved a lot of the themes in TNG, but since their charter is to be going and exploring new parts of the galaxy, they wind up in totally unrelated places week to week. This makes sense as the chronicle of a ship exploring the galaxy, but I think it made it harder to have longer story arcs.
They also had a bajillion writers and their creator died halfway through the show. Harder to have cohesion that way.
Huh. Not really my recollection of TNG. Seemed to me that there was tremendous character development of the core characters as individuals and as an ensemble over the course of the series. (The films struggled to bring the same sense of camaraderie, IMO).
Back on DS9, one of my favorite scenes of the whole series involved Quark and Garak discussing root beer.
Riker's development completely stalled after season three. They always worked on PIcard's development, but the rest would often go long stretches without much advancement. You could tell Pillar worked hard on it after Roddenberry died, but at some point I think he focused more of his energy onto DS9. He treated Worf way better on DS9, not just an angry guy who loses every battle.
I don't think Piller was directly involved with DS9 any more by the time they brought Worf over (he switched to Voyager when that started). The Worf development on DS9 is probably directly attributable to Ron Moore (and indirectly to Ira Steven Behr, who was the showrunner from season 3 on till the end).
ah, thanks.
To my mind, the characters of TNG were stronger, independently, than those in DS9. But the relationships that didn't involve Wesley or Worf seemed to be more static.
The characters developed, but not due to any overarching story arcs. Q pops in here or there, and while there are some connections in the story line, you could basically sub him with a random mischievous omnipotent being and you wouldn't really lose anything. Troi's mom appears in multiple episodes, but she could basically be any telepathic character and you wouldn't really lose anything. The Borg are the best recurring storyline in that you have different elements that repeat over the years and we see them change over time. (It was no coincidence that they were the main subject of one of the movies.) We see some of the other races pop up in different places, but they aren't really developed.
Which is fine, I loved TNG because of the way they looked at the characters on the ship, but DS9 is interesting in a different way. Fewer random, one-off species are introduced and instead we get more depth on the dynamics of Cardassia vs. Bajor, Cardassia vs. the Federation, the Ferengi via Quark, Rom, Nog, internal Bajoran politics, the big players on the other side of the wormhole.
I completely agree. I think there are some flaws, in the actors and some of the characters. But the interactions and relationships they have... wow.
IIRC, the developments in 6 and 7 are even deeper than they'd been, I think. And there's a new character introduced (Vic) who I think really tie things together in a nice way.
Plus "Far Beyond The Stars" is one of the best episodes of TV ever. Brilliance.
yea, that was an amazing episode.
Morn has to be my favorite character.
I plowed through Making a Murderer this weekend, despite being initially reluctant to start it. And despite thinking I probably wouldn't like it, I thought it was great. I think it hit a little bit closer to home than Serial because I'm from a small town in the rural Midwest. I also think sitting on a jury for a 3-week trial a couple years ago gave me a different perspective on it than I would have had before that.
I've also been hitting Deep Space Nine hard lately, I'm early in season 3 at the moment. I'm really enjoying it more than I expected, I think it was hard for me to watch consistently or something when it was originally showing.
Yojimbo is on deck.
Anyone else see The Big Short? I need to stop seeing depressing Wall Street movies on Christmas with my dad (bet you can't guess the other one). We also saw Black Swan on Christmas as well as 7 Pounds. What is wrong with us?
Anyway, loved the movie. A lot of fun. Kind of want to read the book now since I loved Moneyball.
Michael Lewis does a great job of making complex topics understandable. I've liked a number of his books.
I thought The Big Short was a good book, but I'm not excited at the idea of watching a movie based on the book.
I'll tell you this: I was impressed that it translated. It's fairly gripping, actually.
I'll second this notion. I was riveted by the storytelling, and appreciated the various devices used to explain very complex issues in layman's terms. (Yes, I know that it's essentially sexist to have a woman in a bubble bath explain subprime mortgages, but I paid attention.... ... ... . . . ). The performances were also excellent.
I watched Captain Phillips over the weekend. It was good but I have trouble with true stories. I know the ending so there is really no doubt what will happen. I know the good guy lives in almost every movie but there is at least a little doubt if you don't know.
I saw Midnight Cowboy as part of my never-ending quest to see every Best Picture winner that's gone almost nowhere in the past five years. This was one of my favorites; Hoffman gets most of the love for this, but for me this is all about the development of Jon Voight's character. This is funny, ballsy, smart and heartbreaking. Definitely one of my favorite Best Picture winners.
I also did a mini-marathon of the first five episodes of Daredevil, which is an excellent show. I guess I expected something good by comic book standards (I don't mean to knock the genre; it's just that when you watch a comic book movie, you know for the most part what you're going to get), and this show is great by any measure. The characters are deeply complex and the acting is top-notch (well, I'm not totally in love with Foggy, but his calculated idiot charm is growing on me).
Meanwhile, I still have a few episodes left of...well, almost everything. I'll get to the end of something at some point. I hope.
There was a time when I wanted my movie collection to include a copy of every Best Picture winner.
Then I saw The Apartment.
Dude, Crash and The English Patient are RIGHT THERE.
I have successfully avoided both.
I liked Crash.
Yikes. That's probably the worst-written movie I've watched in the last ten years, though I suppose I did see one of the Transformers movies.
I saw 50 Shades, so I got you beat.
Crash was a manipulative mess.
I realize it has flaws, but I've always been drawn to stories with large ensemble casts that intersect in almost overly coincidental ways.
What can I say, I like what I like.
I'm also known to like some Nickelback songs, and Friends.
I found Crash manipulative and I still kind of liked it. I find Nickelback samey and drab, but I like a couple of their songs. I find Friends horribly acted and poorly written for the most part, but I still like it on in the background.
I once recorded Crash on the DVR. Wife and I gother about ten minutes in before we realized we were watching the wrong Crash.
The other one is...interesting.
I knew there was an NC-17 something or other like that one out there.
James Spader?! That's a long way from Stargate, man.
Secretary?
Did not know that one was out there...clearly he moved in the direction of darker roles, but Stargate was a favorite of the wife and a high-school hanging out kind of movie for us, so I knew that one fairly well.
He's done a whole bunch of weird, dark crap if memory serves. I never really saw any of it, but that's what I recall.
It's very dark. And, not that well written.
I enjoyed Spader in whatever David E. Kelly shows he was in, but not so much that I watched regularly.
I liked him a lot in Blacklist, which puts him in the dark yet comic role of international mastermind criminal turned state's witness. (Sorry if I spoiled the first fifteen minutes of episode 1.)
We watched the first two seasons of Blacklist on Netflix a while back. Really, he and Harry Lennix are the only things saving that show from it's inability to move things forward at a reasonable pace. But man! are those two enjoyable to watch.
Yeah, I was surprised that I liked a show that much where I really didn't believe the (other) lead's acting.
I liked Peter Stormare's presence, too. But that could have been me just wanting him to believe in nothing and/or sell me a VW.
The inconsistencies in the "science" kinda bothered me -- sometimes he'd land with a thud against something, other times he'd punch right through. Also, a 3-story fall in a tank isn't something you'd easily walk away from. Also, it's pretty far out there for a single scientist making breakthroughs in molecular physics and insect communication. Did I mention that I was thoroughly entertained?
Was that Thomas train at the end. My son got one just like that for Christmas and there is no way those batteries were still working.
I think my biggest problem was that I saw everything cool about the movie in the trailers, so it had very few surprises.
And this doesn't apply to every movie?
Almost every.
I was pleasantly surprised with The Force Awakens.
you don't say...
I'm about halfway into Antboy: Revenge of the Red Fury, which is a Danish teen comic story.
I didn't realize that it was Antboy 2 until right now, but it makes sense. I thought it just skipped the origin and dropped us into a world where he already was a known superhero.
I wonder if Netflix has Antboy 1?
I watched Anthony 1 & 2 with the boy. Both were cheesy but 1 was much better.
+$1 WGOM to autocorrect
Haven't watched any movies recently, but I have polished off a shows:
Daredevil: Good timing, I guess, since the next season should be out in a couple months. I don't really care for the Marvel universe (cinematic or otherwise), but have enjoyed Daredevil since one of my dad's friends (who has run more than one comic shop) hipped me to Frank Miller's Daredevil run. So I don't really care about the broader context in which the show is set; the banality of references to "The Incident" really irked me, however. I mostly enjoyed the show for what it was, but found some of the major developments in the last couple episodes pretty disappointing.
The decision to kill off Ben Urich's character seems very shortsighted. I understand they wanted to stretch the show's emotional resonance in the last episode and that killing off a character viewers could admire was a means to that end. But it's absolutely the same kind of plot decision that gets mocked time and again: the black character always gets killed. Marvel shouldn't be in the habit of eliminating great characters of color from their properties, and it seems like a digital journalist could have been a good person to have in the mix for a second season.
Alfred Hitchcok Presents: I've been watching the occasional episode of this series and enjoying how fresh the medium was when it was in production. I watched it on Nick at Nite when I was a kid, so reconnecting with it has been fun. Many of the stories are drawn from other Hitchcock-associated properties or old time radio plots, but the acting is pretty solid and the direction is fun. Seems like a show like this could survive a modern interpretation if there was someone of Hitchcock's stature willing to support it.
M*A*S*H: I grew up watching this show. I somehow got & watched the first four seasons on DVD while I was in Iraq. (Talk about surreal – try watching a show set in Korea and reacting to the disaster of Vietnam while in Iraq. Yeah, that was a trip.) I finally watched the whole thing – all 256 episodes. While I understand the view that it lost steam in later years, I think the show's writing remained stronger throughout than critics have given it credit for; several episodes per season through the last, shortened installment were still pretty high-quality. The performances could still hit the high notes, though it was something like watching a favorite singer try to hit the same notes in their forties that they did in their twenties. It's possible, just not as easily or regularly achieved. Am I glad I watched every episode? Yep.
I don't remember which seasons of M*A*S*H I liked better, other than I thought the show got more mature as it went on and became less slapsticky. I liked Honeycutt more than Trapper and Winchester more than Frank. And Hot Lips became a better character as did Klinger as things went along. I do remember though that I felt Alda became a little preachy as things got toward the end, and it was like he was dominating too much of the show. I can say that the final few episodes are dynamite. It's just too bad Radar wasn't there anymore.
I was one of the few who actually watched AfterMash
I watched the first half-dozen or so episodes. As I recall, it was...not very good.
There weren't many more than a half-dozen episodes, I think
In fact, there were thirty. It shows how much respect and affection people had for M*A*S*H that it was allowed to stumble along into a second season.
no kidding. I really wanted it to work too
what about Trapper John, M.D.?
That show annoyed me. Not the show, per se. But the ridiculous effort to capitalize on the character even though it really wasn't the character.
MASH is on in reruns on a few different channels. I'll watch a later season episode over an early season. I have a strong dislike for Frank Burns.
My problem with the Frank Burns character is that they made him so incompetent and pathetic that he couldn't do anything right. He eventually just became everybody's punching bag.
yeah, he went from adversary to annoyance
AIR RAID!!!!
J and I watched Jessica Jones at the beginning of the month. It was so, so, so, so, so good. It was a difficult as hell watch, but worth it.
We also watched The Rock fight an earthquake in San Andreas. It was even stupider than I imagined, and it was glorious.
My PSA would be that Mr. Robot is now out on home video, so if you have a chance, definitely check it out.
Amen on Jessica Jones.
I actually saw San Andreas as well, during one of my rare nights where I pine for a predictable blockbuster. Indeed, there were no surprises, so I guess I got what I wanted out of it.
We're almost done with Making a Murderer. No spoilers. Also about caught up on Curb Your Enthusiasm. Don't laugh at me.
Watched Bears, Tomorrowland, and Hotel Transylvania 2 with the kids. They were all varying levels of okay. The Tale of Princess Kaguya was a trip, as expected.
Watched Age of Adaline I found it decent. My wife really enjoyed it. That's a good compromise. I enjoyed Trainwreck more than I expected. Ant-Man, not as much as I expected.
I have Birdman in house for a rewatch with my wife. Excited. I also have The Swimmer on tap, which for some reasons seems a good follow up.
Trending on fb right now is that Hayao Miyazake has confirmed the "Fan Theory" or "Urban Legend" that in Princess Mononoke, Lady Eboshi's bandage-wrapped and isolated gun workers were...
Over the past few weeks we watched three space movies: Star Wars The Force Awakens, The Martian, and Star Trek Into Darkness. I liked all of them, but I've always loved space movies and probably cut them some critical slack that I don't give other genres. Now we have to watch some of the Oscar contenders. From what I've heard about The Revenant, I'm willing to pay just to see if the cinematography is as stunning as advertised. Oh, we also starting watching a new PBS series (co-produced with BBC) called Mercy Street, about nurses at a Union army hospital in occupied Virginia, and I recommend it if you're into historical drama.
I'm with you: I really enjoy the Star Trek reboots and finally saw The Martian on a flight last week.
The Revenant was amazing on all fronts. Total recommend it.
Just finished my second viewing of Birdman (with my wife this time). Loved it even more than last time. I don't think anyone will ever make another movie that hits so, so many of my movie-geek sweet spots.
The Revenant
Might be the most beautifully shot movie I've ever seen. Dicaprio knocks it out of the park, as does Hardy, and I like the overarching themes (and I love the ending, but then again...). I'm not sure that it's my favorite movie that I saw this past year, but it's quite possibly the best.
Kick-Ass 2
Watched over the weekend as the kid napped. It's...basically an even more mean-spirited take on the first one. Didn't hate it, but I also must be a fairly different viewer than I was when I watched the first one, because while that movie worked for me, this one just sort of didn't.
Attack on Titan
Still pushing through. Really liking it.
Started up Firefly again yesterday (my...third watch, I think?). Goodness, but I like that show, even if I haven't hit the episodes I'm not as fond of yet.
Yay for Firefly!
Curious about which are the episodes you're not as fond of?
The Revenent was great. Note to Jeff A -- bears are NOT cool on this movie
Depends on your prospective, bro. The bear kinda got a raw deal.
The sound design for The Revenent was done by my best friend's younger brother. (Like free, a Mound HS grad.)
he did good work.
Looking forward to seeing it. Jonny does really good work. Cool guy, too, and I'm not just saying that because he's bought a of couple paintings from me. 😉
You're damn right, he did.
I was totally immersed in the picture until some asshole got and then answered a call when Glass makes his return to the fort. I turned around and said, "really?, REALLY!?!?". He didn't seem phased by my question, and continued to have his conversation. I was able to get back into the mood of the picture, but holy hell.
I might go with Lawrence of Arabia for beautifully-shot films. But, special for Stick, let's not forget about a certain sled.
Anybody have any good shows that can be watched as a family? Wife worked her way through much of Once Upon A Time on her own, but over Christmas/New Year, we finished it off as a group, which was fun. Two-year old was mostly ambivalent, but nine and six-year-olds were into it. Combat was magical and not gratuitous or gory (to include the removal of hearts). Sensuality was pretty tame.
Just curious.
I have watched the first season of Flash and the entire series of Chuck with the kids. Both are on Netflix.
Flash started to get a little hokey at the end of season 1. Violence is tame. I'd say less than Once Upon... No sensuality I can recall.
Chuck definitely had some gratuitous swimsuit /underwear shots. Some suggestiveness. The last couple seasons stunk but was really entertaining before that.
generally agreed on Chuck. It was adorable for most of its run.
very vaguely apropos, the Mrs and I were big fans of Scarecrow and Mrs. King. I always thought that was a very adorable show.
aren't you all cuddly...
hey, what can I say? I have a soft spot for sap.
everything's adorable!
Chuck was the first one that sprung to mind, with caveats that Algonad mentions...especially the lapse in quality in later Seasons.
HPR really got into Granite Flats and EAR and I enjoyed it to the point where we didn't want him watch it without us.
Kids in the early 60s in a small town dealing with local mysteries, mostly about Sputnik or aliens or something.
EAR just started watching Great British Bake-off or whatever that BBC-via-PBS import is.
I watched episode 2 and man did I want some biscuits. Way less fluff than any American-made competitive baking show I've seen.
Critiques are enjoyably direct in that British way. Like I imagine Simon Cowell before he became self-parody.
EAR commented that a lot of the competitors remind her of the human characters in Aardman movies.
I love Bake Off. I want a Paul Hollywood bread baking book.
Oh yeah, I watched a season of that. What fun.
A month ago, at Christmas time, I actually watched a couple of movies. They were both on TV, but still, they were movies.
"Shaun the Sheep"--I had seen a few of the videos and enjoyed them, but it seems to me one of the hardest things about any movie comedy is putting in enough story to keep things interesting without putting in so much that there's not enough room for the gags. It seemed like that would be especially hard when none of your characters actually talk. No need to worry. It was fun and inventive from beginning to end. Four out of four bears.
"Hugo"--It's a Martin Scorcese film with Ben Kingsley and Sacha Baron Cohen in it, and it got eleven academy award nominations, so I assume it's a fairly noteworthy movie, but I'd never heard of it. It was on TVLand on Christmas night for some reason. It starts really slowly, and I would have given up on it had it not been for Mrs. A. It turned out to be worth hanging in there for. It gets rolling about two-fifths of the way through, and you really start to care about the characters. It's a 3-D movie and I saw it in 2-D, so I'm sure I missed some good visual effects. Three out of four bears.
Saw Hugo in the theater (2-d, as I generally abhor 3-d and did not even recall that there was a 3-d version). I thought it was a fabulous love letter to early cinema.
I think that if I would have known what it was going into it, I would have had more tolerance for the film. As it was, I had no clue, and was quite dissatisfied. I've been told consistently that I'm wrong about that, and I'm willing to concede to those views. But I probably wouldn't watch it again.
I loved the cinematography and the sets and the acting. I just had zero interest in the story. I honestly remember little about the plot but remember I was constantly amazed at the artistry of the film.
I thought it was a fabulous love letter to early cinema.
Once it got going, I agree. It just took a long time to get going.
Shaun the Sheep is Aardman Animations -- no need to worry!
I've watched many episodes of Shaun, but not the movie.
I find so many things about the show enjoyable. The theme, the lack of villainy, the little bits of poo that increase in the meadow throughout the day, ...
Eh... I started Season 7 of Parks & Rec. I'm only 2 episodes in (3?), and so far... it isn't what it once was.
I gave up on Making A Murderer because they were really stretching that stuff out. And it's too much like work.
Don't worry about Parks and Rec season 7. It starts off slow, but the last half is a good sendoff.
Oh yeah, it's still better than almost anything else. I just thought season 6's ending was perfection, so it's a big jump from that to the start of 7.
Episodes 6-9 of Making a Murderer are really slow and could have been one episode. Watch episode 10. There is one reveal there that still amazes me.
The one thing I'll say about Episodes 6-9 is that while they are slow-ish, they can't even begin to compete with the tedium that would be experienced from sitting through the 8 weeks of testimony from the two trials. I think it would have been tough to condense those four episodes into one, but two or three might have worked.
[Related to the length of the trial.] One thing that wasn't really touched on in jury selection is that when you have a low-income defendant, how do you get any low-income jurors to sit on the jury for a six-week trial? I don't know what they pay jurors in that part of Wisconsin, but in King County, jurors get $10/day, same as they have since the '50s. If your in a job where you get paid by the hour, you can't really afford to miss six weeks of work.
I dread ever being on a jury for something like a murder trial. I can't focus on anything for any length of time, really. I just would be the worst juror if it took more than like 2 days.
I don't worry about my focus, I worry about staying awake.
that's contempt-able!
I resorted to PEDs. (Caffeine, which I usually avoid.)
Medical malpractice (civil case) for 3 weeks was serious enough for me. I'd do it, but would not look forward to sitting on any felony case.
this is a great point, ubes.
It was addressed in the Paper of Record a couple of years ago by a Chicago economist, who noted that, at the time, Cook County jurors were paid $17.20 per day. I believe the current federal rate is $40/day. Here in Cali, it's $15/day (after the first day) plus 34 cents/mile. In Minnesota, it's $10/day plus 27 cents mileage; in Washington state it's variable between $10 and $25/day plus mileage. All according to this source.
In Cali, extreme financial hardship is a valid excuse from jury duty. But to qualify, the potential juror must be (a) self-employed and the sole source of income for his/her household or (b) the sole source of income and his/her employer does not pay for jury duty. That seems like a recipe for excluding a lot of folks, albeit not all poor ones.
Washington state must be similar, those stipulations sound similar to what my judge was asking other potential jurors looking to excuse themselves from jury duty. The judge seemed to be striking a balance between enforcing the rule and letting people go if it seemed like they were going to make themselves a nuisance, even if they didn't meet the letter of the law when it came to the hardship.
A few years back I was excused from jury duty because the teaching gig I had accepted for the semester was how I earned full tuition remission. Whether that fell under the "employer does not pay for jury duty" provision or some other combination of hardship/employment responsibility, I'm not sure because I was able to beg off before I was ever summoned to the court for selection.
My jury duty experience came during spring break of my freshman year of college, so financially I came out ahead. Not to mention the free dinner and free night at a hotel with an assigned roommate (with no television and no phone because sequestered)!
Finally finished the original Star Wars trilogy with the kids. Turns out it was the 6-year-old daughter that really thought Darth Vader was the best. And she just knew he was going to save Luke. Fun to have those conversations. I hear there might be a new one coming out, so we'll probably have to see that.
They delayed Episode 8 until December for
maximum money makingscript rewrites. I'm more bummed than upset because the only 18 months from 7 to 8 was rather short.Been watching The Expanse on SyFy. So far, so good.
I have Inside Out and Antman from the library to watch, but have to hold off and wait for my daughter to be able to watch it as well.
Funny story regarding The Expanse; bridging movie day and book day.
I was at the library and saw a book that looked interesting called Nemesis Games. I picked it up and then saw that it was part 5 of a series. Well, that's no good. So I looked for Book 1: Leviathan Wakes. Picked it up and instantly fell in love with it. The next day I was on the internet and saw something about this show called The Expanse. I couldn't believe that they had already made a show out of these books! Amazing!
I'm going to read through the books first, then give the shows a shot, hopefully they'll be coming to Netflix.
I will have to check out The Expanse. Probably make it my next show after I finish Jessica Jones.
Inside Out and Ant-Man are both great. Ant-Man is really the only movie on my seen list for this month, but I had a ton of fun watching it and so did my 2.5 year-old when he woke up for the last half hour.
Oh yeah, I watched Ant-Man!
Probably my least favorite Marvel movie besides Iron Man 2? That's not really a damning statement though, because I enjoy the heck out of comic book movies, and would recommend it all the same. I just wanted more of what was in it, I think.
As I'm reading the Harry Potter books I'm watching the movies. I'll probably wait until I've seen all 8 to comment.
Watched Vertigo yesterday for the first time. Man Hitchcock was a master with the camera. Gorgeous, gorgeous film. The mystery was mildly entertaining, and there were slow spots where James Stewart just acts misogynistic and generally creepy, so yeah. I had a hard time buying the romance.
Veritigo is great. That scene when she walks out of bathroom in green glow then the 360 degree camera work for the kiss - goosebumps just writing that.
But yeah, the misogyny. Jimmy saying "it couldn't possibly matter to you" as he urges Judy to change her hair is priceless.
The green glow was one of the things I was thinking about.
Still working through X-Files, finished 20 episodes, and ST:TNG, 15 minutes into Home Soil. We were on break for a while from lack of time until last weekend. X-Files might be going back on break until after the revival is over.
Watching The Expanse. It's great. They have changed a number of things but I'm hoping it's more Game of Thrones tweaks rather than large re-imaginings of events.
As I said in the FMD post, I have been plowing through Star Trek Deep Space Nine. I'm into Season 5 now (just cleared the Tribbles episode!) One thing I have been loving is that we get to see the politics of Cardassia and Bajor and the Ferengi (its probably no surprise to hear I like the ongoing Klingon political drama that happened in TNG). I also have been loving the Odo character. He could probably have a half hour short season spin off show where he is investigating a case and I would love it. Quark and Rom have been fun too.
I've been stuck on Season 5 since 2010. It's really embarrassing. I just lost inertia. Seasons 3-5 were so awesome, too. I don't like all of the actors, but the plots and characters are drawn so much deeper than on TNG.
That's one thing I've noticed by giving it a fresh look, the whole series seems a bit more cohesive than TNG. I loved a lot of the themes in TNG, but since their charter is to be going and exploring new parts of the galaxy, they wind up in totally unrelated places week to week. This makes sense as the chronicle of a ship exploring the galaxy, but I think it made it harder to have longer story arcs.
They also had a bajillion writers and their creator died halfway through the show. Harder to have cohesion that way.
Huh. Not really my recollection of TNG. Seemed to me that there was tremendous character development of the core characters as individuals and as an ensemble over the course of the series. (The films struggled to bring the same sense of camaraderie, IMO).
Back on DS9, one of my favorite scenes of the whole series involved Quark and Garak discussing root beer.
Riker's development completely stalled after season three. They always worked on PIcard's development, but the rest would often go long stretches without much advancement. You could tell Pillar worked hard on it after Roddenberry died, but at some point I think he focused more of his energy onto DS9. He treated Worf way better on DS9, not just an angry guy who loses every battle.
I don't think Piller was directly involved with DS9 any more by the time they brought Worf over (he switched to Voyager when that started). The Worf development on DS9 is probably directly attributable to Ron Moore (and indirectly to Ira Steven Behr, who was the showrunner from season 3 on till the end).
ah, thanks.
To my mind, the characters of TNG were stronger, independently, than those in DS9. But the relationships that didn't involve Wesley or Worf seemed to be more static.
The characters developed, but not due to any overarching story arcs. Q pops in here or there, and while there are some connections in the story line, you could basically sub him with a random mischievous omnipotent being and you wouldn't really lose anything. Troi's mom appears in multiple episodes, but she could basically be any telepathic character and you wouldn't really lose anything. The Borg are the best recurring storyline in that you have different elements that repeat over the years and we see them change over time. (It was no coincidence that they were the main subject of one of the movies.) We see some of the other races pop up in different places, but they aren't really developed.
Which is fine, I loved TNG because of the way they looked at the characters on the ship, but DS9 is interesting in a different way. Fewer random, one-off species are introduced and instead we get more depth on the dynamics of Cardassia vs. Bajor, Cardassia vs. the Federation, the Ferengi via Quark, Rom, Nog, internal Bajoran politics, the big players on the other side of the wormhole.
one-upsmanship
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgzbKe6_DN4
I completely agree. I think there are some flaws, in the actors and some of the characters. But the interactions and relationships they have... wow.
IIRC, the developments in 6 and 7 are even deeper than they'd been, I think. And there's a new character introduced (Vic) who I think really tie things together in a nice way.
Plus "Far Beyond The Stars" is one of the best episodes of TV ever. Brilliance.
yea, that was an amazing episode.
Morn has to be my favorite character.
I plowed through Making a Murderer this weekend, despite being initially reluctant to start it. And despite thinking I probably wouldn't like it, I thought it was great. I think it hit a little bit closer to home than Serial because I'm from a small town in the rural Midwest. I also think sitting on a jury for a 3-week trial a couple years ago gave me a different perspective on it than I would have had before that.
I've also been hitting Deep Space Nine hard lately, I'm early in season 3 at the moment. I'm really enjoying it more than I expected, I think it was hard for me to watch consistently or something when it was originally showing.
Yojimbo is on deck.
Anyone else see The Big Short? I need to stop seeing depressing Wall Street movies on Christmas with my dad (bet you can't guess the other one). We also saw Black Swan on Christmas as well as 7 Pounds. What is wrong with us?
Anyway, loved the movie. A lot of fun. Kind of want to read the book now since I loved Moneyball.
Michael Lewis does a great job of making complex topics understandable. I've liked a number of his books.
I thought The Big Short was a good book, but I'm not excited at the idea of watching a movie based on the book.
I'll tell you this: I was impressed that it translated. It's fairly gripping, actually.
I'll second this notion. I was riveted by the storytelling, and appreciated the various devices used to explain very complex issues in layman's terms. (Yes, I know that it's essentially sexist to have a woman in a bubble bath explain subprime mortgages, but I paid attention.... ... ... . . . ). The performances were also excellent.
I watched Captain Phillips over the weekend. It was good but I have trouble with true stories. I know the ending so there is really no doubt what will happen. I know the good guy lives in almost every movie but there is at least a little doubt if you don't know.
I saw Midnight Cowboy as part of my never-ending quest to see every Best Picture winner that's gone almost nowhere in the past five years. This was one of my favorites; Hoffman gets most of the love for this, but for me this is all about the development of Jon Voight's character. This is funny, ballsy, smart and heartbreaking. Definitely one of my favorite Best Picture winners.
I also did a mini-marathon of the first five episodes of Daredevil, which is an excellent show. I guess I expected something good by comic book standards (I don't mean to knock the genre; it's just that when you watch a comic book movie, you know for the most part what you're going to get), and this show is great by any measure. The characters are deeply complex and the acting is top-notch (well, I'm not totally in love with Foggy, but his calculated idiot charm is growing on me).
Meanwhile, I still have a few episodes left of...well, almost everything. I'll get to the end of something at some point. I hope.
There was a time when I wanted my movie collection to include a copy of every Best Picture winner.
Then I saw The Apartment.
Dude, Crash and The English Patient are RIGHT THERE.
I have successfully avoided both.
I liked Crash.
Yikes. That's probably the worst-written movie I've watched in the last ten years, though I suppose I did see one of the Transformers movies.
I saw 50 Shades, so I got you beat.
Crash was a manipulative mess.
I realize it has flaws, but I've always been drawn to stories with large ensemble casts that intersect in almost overly coincidental ways.
What can I say, I like what I like.
I'm also known to like some Nickelback songs, and Friends.
A perennial favorite.
I found Crash manipulative and I still kind of liked it. I find Nickelback samey and drab, but I like a couple of their songs. I find Friends horribly acted and poorly written for the most part, but I still like it on in the background.
I once recorded Crash on the DVR. Wife and I gother about ten minutes in before we realized we were watching the wrong Crash.
The other one is...interesting.
I knew there was an NC-17 something or other like that one out there.
James Spader?! That's a long way from Stargate, man.
Secretary?
Did not know that one was out there...clearly he moved in the direction of darker roles, but Stargate was a favorite of the wife and a high-school hanging out kind of movie for us, so I knew that one fairly well.
He's done a whole bunch of weird, dark crap if memory serves. I never really saw any of it, but that's what I recall.
It's very dark. And, not that well written.
I enjoyed Spader in whatever David E. Kelly shows he was in, but not so much that I watched regularly.
I liked him a lot in Blacklist, which puts him in the dark yet comic role of international mastermind criminal turned state's witness. (Sorry if I spoiled the first fifteen minutes of episode 1.)
We watched the first two seasons of Blacklist on Netflix a while back. Really, he and Harry Lennix are the only things saving that show from it's inability to move things forward at a reasonable pace. But man! are those two enjoyable to watch.
Yeah, I was surprised that I liked a show that much where I really didn't believe the (other) lead's acting.
I liked Peter Stormare's presence, too. But that could have been me just wanting him to believe in nothing and/or sell me a VW.
You were expecting a Crash Davis biopic?
I've seen parts of that one. It's... interesting.
Cronenberg. Okay, that makes sense.
...and saw Ant Man last night.
My biggest problem:
I think my biggest problem was that I saw everything cool about the movie in the trailers, so it had very few surprises.
And this doesn't apply to every movie?
Almost every.
I was pleasantly surprised with The Force Awakens.
you don't say...
I'm about halfway into Antboy: Revenge of the Red Fury, which is a Danish teen comic story.
I didn't realize that it was Antboy 2 until right now, but it makes sense. I thought it just skipped the origin and dropped us into a world where he already was a known superhero.
I wonder if Netflix has Antboy 1?
I watched Anthony 1 & 2 with the boy. Both were cheesy but 1 was much better.
+$1 WGOM to autocorrect
Haven't watched any movies recently, but I have polished off a shows:
Daredevil: Good timing, I guess, since the next season should be out in a couple months. I don't really care for the Marvel universe (cinematic or otherwise), but have enjoyed Daredevil since one of my dad's friends (who has run more than one comic shop) hipped me to Frank Miller's Daredevil run. So I don't really care about the broader context in which the show is set; the banality of references to "The Incident" really irked me, however. I mostly enjoyed the show for what it was, but found some of the major developments in the last couple episodes pretty disappointing.
Alfred Hitchcok Presents: I've been watching the occasional episode of this series and enjoying how fresh the medium was when it was in production. I watched it on Nick at Nite when I was a kid, so reconnecting with it has been fun. Many of the stories are drawn from other Hitchcock-associated properties or old time radio plots, but the acting is pretty solid and the direction is fun. Seems like a show like this could survive a modern interpretation if there was someone of Hitchcock's stature willing to support it.
M*A*S*H: I grew up watching this show. I somehow got & watched the first four seasons on DVD while I was in Iraq. (Talk about surreal – try watching a show set in Korea and reacting to the disaster of Vietnam while in Iraq. Yeah, that was a trip.) I finally watched the whole thing – all 256 episodes. While I understand the view that it lost steam in later years, I think the show's writing remained stronger throughout than critics have given it credit for; several episodes per season through the last, shortened installment were still pretty high-quality. The performances could still hit the high notes, though it was something like watching a favorite singer try to hit the same notes in their forties that they did in their twenties. It's possible, just not as easily or regularly achieved. Am I glad I watched every episode? Yep.
I don't remember which seasons of M*A*S*H I liked better, other than I thought the show got more mature as it went on and became less slapsticky. I liked Honeycutt more than Trapper and Winchester more than Frank. And Hot Lips became a better character as did Klinger as things went along. I do remember though that I felt Alda became a little preachy as things got toward the end, and it was like he was dominating too much of the show. I can say that the final few episodes are dynamite. It's just too bad Radar wasn't there anymore.
I was one of the few who actually watched AfterMash
I watched the first half-dozen or so episodes. As I recall, it was...not very good.
There weren't many more than a half-dozen episodes, I think
In fact, there were thirty. It shows how much respect and affection people had for M*A*S*H that it was allowed to stumble along into a second season.
no kidding. I really wanted it to work too
what about Trapper John, M.D.?
That show annoyed me. Not the show, per se. But the ridiculous effort to capitalize on the character even though it really wasn't the character.
MASH is on in reruns on a few different channels. I'll watch a later season episode over an early season. I have a strong dislike for Frank Burns.
My problem with the Frank Burns character is that they made him so incompetent and pathetic that he couldn't do anything right. He eventually just became everybody's punching bag.
yeah, he went from adversary to annoyance
AIR RAID!!!!
J and I watched Jessica Jones at the beginning of the month. It was so, so, so, so, so good. It was a difficult as hell watch, but worth it.
We also watched The Rock fight an earthquake in San Andreas. It was even stupider than I imagined, and it was glorious.
My PSA would be that Mr. Robot is now out on home video, so if you have a chance, definitely check it out.
Amen on Jessica Jones.
I actually saw San Andreas as well, during one of my rare nights where I pine for a predictable blockbuster. Indeed, there were no surprises, so I guess I got what I wanted out of it.
We're almost done with Making a Murderer. No spoilers. Also about caught up on Curb Your Enthusiasm. Don't laugh at me.
Watched Bears, Tomorrowland, and Hotel Transylvania 2 with the kids. They were all varying levels of okay. The Tale of Princess Kaguya was a trip, as expected.
Watched Age of Adaline I found it decent. My wife really enjoyed it. That's a good compromise. I enjoyed Trainwreck more than I expected. Ant-Man, not as much as I expected.
I have Birdman in house for a rewatch with my wife. Excited. I also have The Swimmer on tap, which for some reasons seems a good follow up.
Trending on fb right now is that Hayao Miyazake has confirmed the "Fan Theory" or "Urban Legend" that in Princess Mononoke, Lady Eboshi's bandage-wrapped and isolated gun workers were...
AmazingObvious and unnecessary Revelation!Over the past few weeks we watched three space movies: Star Wars The Force Awakens, The Martian, and Star Trek Into Darkness. I liked all of them, but I've always loved space movies and probably cut them some critical slack that I don't give other genres. Now we have to watch some of the Oscar contenders. From what I've heard about The Revenant, I'm willing to pay just to see if the cinematography is as stunning as advertised. Oh, we also starting watching a new PBS series (co-produced with BBC) called Mercy Street, about nurses at a Union army hospital in occupied Virginia, and I recommend it if you're into historical drama.
I'm with you: I really enjoy the Star Trek reboots and finally saw The Martian on a flight last week.
The Revenant was amazing on all fronts. Total recommend it.
Just finished my second viewing of Birdman (with my wife this time). Loved it even more than last time. I don't think anyone will ever make another movie that hits so, so many of my movie-geek sweet spots.