Last seen movie

Been watching the Story of Film too. It's brilliant. I formally studied film back in uni and so far this has introduced me to more than a year and a halfs study did. And it only gives you just enough to find the film and do the research for yourself, while suggesting what to look for. I've got years of study ahead of me from watching this and I don't think I'm even halfway through yet. The first couple of eps have finally given me my 'in' into silent films. I've always liked the german expressionist and charlie chaplin, most the russian ones suggested have long been on my list. But Ozu was a great discovery for me and the american works influenced by french and german cinema like Sunrise*, I never knew about. I need more hours in the day...I've got over a hundred years of cinema to absorb!

I expect there will be less and less I've missed along the way with each progressive episode but hopefully the missed insights will keep coming. I've just finished the one that contains spaghetti westerns so it's nearly caught up to me being a twinkle in my father's eye.


* edit: no, I did see this in film school but I expect I was more interested in the girl I was sitting next to...raging hormones of an 18 year old...or maybe I sneaked out to go to the on-campus pub. Or both. I did a lot of that. Happy days.
 
Gosh, last movie I saw in the theater was the Hobbit in HFR 3d.

I thought the film had poor character development, and I didn't build an attachment to any of the characters. Gollum was amusing. He had a lot of personality. Everyone else felt like a puppet for the action. I could tell the beginning was really trying hard to develop the characters, but it didn't happen.

Action scenes were fun. Saw a lot of potential visceral impact. A couple people told me the Eagle scene was awesome. I agree. The depth and texture in the dragons eye at the end was stunning. Despite knowing it was CG, the illusion of physicality was present. Can't get that with anything but HFR 3D 4k.

I like HFR. I like it better than 3D. But... it didn't work with this film. Only because film language has not adapted yet. In most viewers minds, HFR means "reality" and makes them much more critical about what is happening. So, it looked like a bunch of full grown men playing dress up. HFR, with the current film language of 24fps=fiction 30+fps=reality, makes it difficult to pull off.

3D is great. But because of the "small window" effect the glasses give, and the fragility of the illusion, and potential discomfort of the experience, it makes it much more difficult to relax completely, forget your surroundings, and get lost in the story. Kind of like bad writing to an other wise great story. You can get through it, but doesn't make it any easier.
 
I saw "Upstream Color" yesterday. There is a lot to chew on in there, but Shane Carruth does show that he is an independent filmmaker to be reckoned with. I really liked the film.

 
bgundu said:
Rust and Bone. Brilliant flik.
Click to expand...


Oh my god. I put it in my netflix cue exactly on the recommendation of someone on dvxuser and today it came. This was one of the worst POS I've seen - it's extremely rare that I can't finish a movie, but I had to quit right around when there was a second slo-mo orca sequence after the chick wakes up in the hospital with no legs. I just couldn't take the utter, utter, utter boredom and primitive filmmaking. Slo-mo and portentous music to establish a mood - facepalm... what, are we twelve years old? I hated it. It kept meandering from the very beginning. It's fine to take a roundabout intro, but for god's sake, make it interesting! Instead, not only was it boring, but it was extremely ham-fisted about the points it was making "the man is pooooor, see how he searches for fooood, the kid is crying 'i'm huuuuungry', the man steals foooood, blah, blah, blah, blah" - oh my effing god, it's like a high schooler's idea of exposition. Maybe it got better, but I just couldn't take it - may it die in a fire. Funny, because I did enjoy "Prophet" though it had its flaws.

But as they say, there is no accounting for taste. To one person it's a brilliant flik, to another it's bottom of the barrel crap. To each his own, I guess.
 
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