The Syndicate

timmer wrote:

Ricochet wrote:So OMG, it starts. Now that it started, I want to thank Alison for my role and, of course, the Academy...

I knew it was Hitch, but the quote "For me, the cinema is not a slice of life, but a piece of cake" made me think of Wes Anderson, but Alison cut him out of the picture as well.

It seems obvious, but just to be clear... Mongoose=Alison?

Sorry about that. I should probably stick to forum names from now on.

So OMG, it starts. Now that it started, I want to thank Alison for my role and, of course, the Academy...

I knew it was Hitch, but the quote "For me, the cinema is not a slice of life, but a piece of cake" made me think of Wes Anderson, but Alison cut him out of the picture as well.

thellama73 wrote:
I completely agree with you. There was some movie I was watching (I forget which one, I want to say Swordfish or something like that) where everything was SO YELLOW it was terrible and distracting. I think you can get away with a little more of it in an artier film like Memento, but it can easily be taken too far.

Probably not the one you're talking about, but the only recent movie with intentionally sickening use of yellow (actually, pretty much the whole piss palette) I can remember is Enemy - it even gets much of its flak for this particular aspect, but I personally feel the whole movie (thus, even the use of color) is done in a very smart way.

I'm not very good at judging visual aspects, usually. I pretty much scratch my head every year with the Oscar nominations for Cinematography and especially Art Direction, except if one movie really stands out.

That's ok, it's not as if I didn't dread the moment I'd be first to be sacrificed as the noob I am.

I'll also be in Bucharest until Tuesday, but I'll be able to pop in at least once a day, maybe just not chat so much about movies. Please don't lynch me either.

Bucharest, by the way, is a European capital where, at a movie theater in its city centre, I could not see Blackhat because I was the only one who showed up there wanting to see it.

sabie12 wrote:

Ricochet wrote:I'm too much of a scaredy cat to watch horror. Although I did watch the Babadook recently, due to hype.

Horror is fun to watch with friends when you can make fun of it together. If only I had friends... sigh haha

I don't have friends either. I only have a girlfriend who will not tolerate nightmare-inducing cinematic experiences.

I'm too much of a scaredy cat to watch horror. Although I did watch the Babadook recently, due to hype.

A Person wrote:

Metalmarsh89 wrote:

A Person wrote:

Ricochet wrote:

thellama73 wrote:(looking at you, Michael Bay!)

Well he must be somewhere around here.

He's probably just waiting for the thread to blow up.

Voting for Walt Disney might just do it.

It would certainly make it more animated.

But everyone would be back alive the next day after being killed.

thellama73 wrote:(looking at you, Michael Bay!)

Well he must be somewhere around here.

Also, this poll (and Voopy's list) lacks Jahar Panahi.

S~V~S wrote:

Ricochet wrote:

Long Con wrote:
I have never seen Casablanca. I don't like old movies, I like modern ones. I saw Citizen Kane at some point, and I don't really remember a single frame of it, I just know it bored me. I saw Gone With The Wind recently, and I enjoyed Rhett Butler's character, disliked the main chick, and just didn't feel immersed or invested in the storyline all that much.

I usually feel the same about the "Golden Age" Hollywood and old, cheap Sci-Fi movies. At least in case of the latter, I realize it's probably because of being fed too much blockbuster CGI these past decades.

Oh I love all those bad sci fi movies, Plan 9 etc, and movies with the underwater scenes shot through fishbowls. I love them mainly in a MST3K kind of way, but even without Tom Servo and Crow, I appreciate the imagination that went into them. But yeah, the CGI gets more real every year.

I'm not very good with bad or "so bad it's good" movies, either. I watched once a MST3K take on Space Mutiny, together with Matt, and recently we have a friend over for New Year's Eve who's a fan and showed us some killer American educational shorts parodies. I also watch the Best of the Worst series made by the Red Letter Media guys (the ones with the Plinkett reviews).

I meant SF films more like The Day the Earth Stood Still, Andromeda Strain, Dark Star, The Man Who Fell on Earth (even if it stars a totally, yet typically cuckoo David Bowie). Incidentally, my favourite such movie so far would be a rather esoteric Czech movie called Ikarie XB-1, because looks like a bootleg Star Trek episode, but it's also more existential underneath.

Metalmarsh89 wrote:

Ricochet wrote:

Long Con wrote:
I have never seen Casablanca. I don't like old movies, I like modern ones. I saw Citizen Kane at some point, and I don't really remember a single frame of it, I just know it bored me. I saw Gone With The Wind recently, and I enjoyed Rhett Butler's character, disliked the main chick, and just didn't feel immersed or invested in the storyline all that much.

I usually feel the same about the "Golden Age" Hollywood and old, cheap Sci-Fi movies. At least in case of the latter, I realize it's probably because of being fed too much blockbuster CGI these past decades.

What's CGI?

Computer-generated imagery.

Long Con wrote:
I have never seen Casablanca. I don't like old movies, I like modern ones. I saw Citizen Kane at some point, and I don't really remember a single frame of it, I just know it bored me. I saw Gone With The Wind recently, and I enjoyed Rhett Butler's character, disliked the main chick, and just didn't feel immersed or invested in the storyline all that much.

I usually feel the same about the "Golden Age" Hollywood and old, cheap Sci-Fi movies. At least in case of the latter, I realize it's probably because of being fed too much blockbuster CGI these past decades.

So the poll has no bearing on the game, but its discussion does?

Oh oh.

von Trier's Melancholia opened me to Wagner. No joke. Ironically, though, most wagnerians I've read actually despise his (mis)use of Wagner in that movie. I finally listened to the whole Tristan und Isolde after seeing the movie and I was instantly transfixed. Melancholia, incidentally, is also the type of movie that's totally bonkers, but in a rather good way.

Also, I'm getting confused why some are writing in normal color and others in green on basically the same subject, i.e. talking about movies.

I saw at least one film by only 45 or so of those directors.

I still have a list of Voopy's favourite movies, I think.

Mongoose wrote:

zeek wrote:No Hitchcock on the poll

Hitchcock was a big omission -- I didn't put any of the characters I had in my game in the poll (which was an easy way to delete the poll options from 210 to 50), but I forgot I deleted him. He might pop up somewhere later k.

Vic/Ric - You are just remembering wrong, sug. My living room is Hitchcock themed. I should take pictures. He's actually my favorite director (I refer to PT Anderson as my favorite living director because I am ridiculous).

Then I'm alone again in being mostly underwhelmed by him

Mongoose wrote:

Canucklehead wrote:

Mongoose wrote:

Canucklehead wrote:Hmmmmm....I am by no means an expert in or connoisseur of film, so imma just vote for a woman, cuz there are practically none on the list.
Ava Duvernay is absent, and Kathryn Bigelow is spelt wrong which made her hard to google, and Nora Ephron made "Julie and Julia" which I hated, and while I loved "The Virgin Suicides", "Marie Antoinette" was an abomination that should've revoked Sofia Copola's filmmaking liscense, so that leaves me with Susanne Bier, of whom I have never heard, but whose films I may now watch just because I now feel an intimate connection with her because I just typed a long and unnecessary paragraph justifying a vote for her.

I truly believe Susanne Bier is the most gifted filmmaker alive today. I had Penny Marshall and others on the list too (Catherine Hardwicke, foreign directors, Mira Nair etc). but you can only have 50 poll options.

In that case, I am legit excited to watch her films! Where should I start? The one she won the Oscar for? (Keep in mind I am a cinema neophyte and may not appreciate some of the subtler/more technical aspects of filmmaking...

In a Better World won her the Oscar, but I loved After the Wedding in a nearly erotic way. It's being currently remade by Hollywood, who also remade her film Brothers.

Cinema neophytes are welcome!

I didn't like that much the movie that won the Oscar. I'm pondering if enough time has passed for me to watch the original Brothers, given that the Hollywood version was awful.

zeek wrote:No Hitchcock on the poll

I remember Alison not liking him, so it's not surprising.

That movie was genuinely bonkers, but in all sorts of good ways, I thought.

I don't know, atm, if I should just dive into Inherent Vice or attempt the book first.

I haven't seen enough films by any, in order to really name a favourite auteur. It would have been easy if Kubrick or Bergman would have been in the poll, but they're not. My favourite film ever is by Kurosawa, but I should really see his classic ones already. So I'll go with Mike Nichols, because he made my other favourite film ever (which is technically a mini-series) and also the breathtaking Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf. I may not end up enjoying every movie by him (I think only one third of the The Graduate is good, Catch-22 is a complete dud), but right now he's a legit choice for me. And he'll be missed.