#a wonderful moviegoing experience

[mortalityplays]

Hello! i've been listening to the murder-suicide episode on Cats and greatly enjoying myself. I was wondering if you ever saw any clips from the 1988 version? I'd love to see your reaction. especially of the insane horniness that the 2019 version didnt carry. rum-tum-tuggers song is... a great example

I haven't seen a goddamn thing related to Cats outside of that singular moviegoing experience, but I guarantee @cafiffle will know it backwards and forwards. Everything I know about Cats I have learned against my will.

[prettyboysdontlookatexplosions]

i was also going to say this makes me insane because very few moviegoing experiences have given me that sheer flood of thrill and wonder like watching star wars as a kid did but TLJ is absolutely one of them and specifically TLJ made the force feel magical to me in a way it had not since i was a literal child (and this you must understand is a particular sticking point of the generation old enough to have seen star wars at home before the prequels showed up) but actually i guess maybe this kind of is like clarifying or illustrative in that if i were to describe the fantasy underpinnings of star wars i (person who loves the OG and has seen the prequels exactly once and does not engage with the extended universe), i would steal from whoever i was having a conversation with a couple weeks ago who said something like “the force is just george lucas’s filter on whatever half-buddhist new age stuff was circulating in california in the seventies,” and i would mean it as an extremely sincere compliment because of how one of the reasons i was really into star wars as a kid is that i was incredibly compelled by a story where the heroic path was to master your emotions and particularly your anger, this vision of the world where growing up meant calming down, this was super fucking meaningful to me for, i’m sure, Incredibly Normal Reasons, and then turning that into magic, well, actually probably that set the standard by which i judge magical world-building to this day, like is the magic-achieving process in your universe tied to some kind of profound human truth or not, which i guess is why so much fantasy doesn’t interest me at all, because i don’t care about magic for magic’s sake, if it’s not tangled inextricably with your hero’s journey, campbellian or otherwise, it leaves me cold, and like, one of a billion things i thought was awesome about the last jedi was that it went back to the roots of star wars where the force meant something fucking real about what it takes to be a person, and basically plugged it into whatever woowoo spiritual new age currents are swirling around california now, and asked, like, how can we take what was already there and refine it, expand it, make it sing in a new way, while doing actually quite literally the same thing as before? but i guess some people are really into midichlorians or whatever which i guess is fine for them

#like it’s a movie about what i thought star wars was about when i was a kid who loved star wars #the idea that it is only a movie that could have been made by someone who didn’t like star wars….. #rian johnson loved star wars enough to believe it could be art #to me that is a much more valuable love than jabrams’ paint by numbers homage #which thought so little of its audience that it assumed if you gave them something that looked like the star wars they had #you didn’t need to write a story that made sense or characters that felt like people #to be fair i am not accusing jabrams of hating star wars #i’m sure he loves star wars #i am accusing him of being dumb as hell and a piece of shit hack writer #i think i need a snack maybe that will make me sleepy

[coredrill]

fans of the SPIRAL POWER SHOW when their movie theater chair starts spinning:

and more moviegoing/dub thoughts below the cut!!

okay. i'm gonna be as organized as possible about this but i am probably gonna be all over the place and add to it later LMAO. BUT.

4dx thoughts first: jesus fuck lmao. i've never actually been to a 4d movie before and i feel like this experience is NOT representative of what a normal movie would be like but they really shook us around huh!!! i think those seats only stopped moving when kamina died, and i say "i think" bc there may have been more times when they stopped but my ass was unawares because i still felt like i was moving anyways LMAO.

they played an interview with imaishi, koyama, and wakabayashi (most likely filmed at anyc) before the showing (they did it before my dub showing too, even tho i just saw that one in a regular theater) and these mfs are so funny i swear lmao. they were like "we wanted to use the effects to their fullest so we added in movement during the emotional scenes too!" and then wakabayashi was like "i fell out of my seat while watching!" and then imaishi was like "my keys fell out of my pocket and i almost left them in the theater because they were between the seats" and then they laughed and THEN wakabayashi was like "oh wait they're watching gurren-hen right? nvm they'll be fine" but like. that shit felt like a ROLLERCOASTER so WTF IS LAGANN-HEN GONNA BE!!!!!!!!!! it made me so curious so now i also plan to see the sub of that one in 4dx LMAO. me when i literally die because the insane ppl at trigger decided to mimic a galaxy being thrown at a giant mecha and wanted me to feel it.

also. they sprayed us with water during the scene where gurren lagann's spiral energy feeds back and simon/lagann throw up. and like. i mean i can't say i ever WANTED to get vomited on by my fav anime boy, but it sure did happen!

okay. friend-who-hasn't-seen-ttgl-before-thoughts next: i was REALLY surprised how much it hooked him considering that i've always viewed the movies as subpar compared to the show but it REALLY sold him on it!!! and i'm so happy cause idk if he ever would've made it through those first 7 episodes of the show without knowing what was to come lmao. unfortunately he can't make it next week so we'll have to watch lagann-hen later on, as well as the show proper, but i'm SO curious to see what he thinks. especially bc the only complaint he rly had (aside from being violently shaken LMAO) was that simon, kamina, and yoko were really the only characters he could keep track of. like even nia didn't show up early enough for him to really track what was going on with her i think!!

when it comes to lagann-hen i am SO curious what he'll think of rossiu. cause rossiu's my other favorite anime boy but DAMN they really give him like two seconds of screen time total in this movie LMFAO. and THEY DON'T EVEN ESTABLISH THAT HE IS FOREHEAD BOY?????? like they play that scene where kamina's like "i wanna give simon and gimmy and darry and forehead boy a good future" and my friend was like "WHO?" lmao. i guess you're just supposed to see the size of his forehead and come to your own conclusions FDLKSJFHSLKJ. and i did tell my friend that rossiu is Important in lagann-hen but i'm so curious as to whether that whole plot point will actually. like. make sense? and if he can track why rossiu is all of a sudden In Charge and Like That? idk but i can't WAIT to see it. similarly though i do wonder what he'll think of kittan's sacrifice cause kittan got a nothingburger this movie too LMAO.

when it comes to the show i am AGAIN curious what he'll think of rossiu, like what he'll think going from a smaller role for him in the film to a larger role in the show. cause obviously i am -_- at the downsizing but rossiu adds SOOOOOOOOO much to the show on the whole that i wonder if having a different first impression will frame him as a character differently??? IDK!!!! and ALSO i am curious what my friend will think WHEN EXTRA BITCHES START DYING AT THE END LMAO. like it's one thing to do from all of dai-gurren dying to them all living, but from them all living to DYING?????? i'm SO CURIOUS. i feel like watching these movies with him has me appreciating them more in the same way that watching eva with friends made me appreciate eva more too. except i like ttgl a whole heck of a lot more to begin with, even the movies, so i think this might just kill me entirely LMAO.

NOW. ONTO THE DUB.

prefacing this section with Holy Fuck I Am So Glad This Exists I've Cried Over It And Could Cry More. the fact that i've wanted this so bad and it HAPPENED. do the impossible i suppose but i can still HARDLY BELIEVE IT'S REAL. and listening to every single second of it was just a complete and total joy and i wouldn't trade it for anything <3

and now that the sappy stuff is outta the way SAM RIEGEL THE VIRAL THAT YOU ARE!!!!!! he did the ABSOLUTE BEST IMO, he still captured the same voice he did in the show dub AND he managed to like, have a coherent new take on some of the scenes? like during his first or second confrontation with kamina he had this more bored tone that worked SO WELL for me because. yeah!!!! viral thinks humans are inferior at that point, so he WOULDN'T be giving this battle 100%!!!! excellent choices all around and whenever they release this on home video i am gonna listen to this performance for like a week straight.

other generally great stand-outs were LORDGENOME ofc and also dayakka was pretty great too!! they didn't have a whole lot of changes but they worked well in the OG so they ofc worked well here too!! oh and kittan and his sisters too!!! they didn't get as much to do but kittan's still got it and if i heard correctly they even got the same VAs for his sisters too? like stephanie sheh kinon doesn't surprise me bc she's still so active in the industry but kiyal especially sounded rly similar in her like. three lines LMAO.

i WAS actually rly curious abt if they would recast leeron into literally anyone other than "steve blum doing a ~gay voice~" and uh. they didn't lmao. but tbh i think it worked for me anyways; the movies cut out so much of the blatant homophobic jokes which is one super nice thing about them, and also they were SO diligent with getting the rest of the cast back that it makes sense he'd come back too? like i didn't expect DAYAKKA to return but it sure sounded like the same guy to me, let alone the bachika sisters and gimmy and darry, so i get why they kept blum too and it was fine in most parts imo

i really liked bridget hoffman nia too!! she didn't sound the same as hynden walch ofc but i think she gave a great performance and i think it'll be really beneficial to have this sort of continuity of voice going between pre- and post-skip nia.

my adai kiddos...........well jyb didn't have a whole lot of lines as rossiu so i don't have much to say other than i think he did fine with what he had LMAO, i'm SOOOOOO excited to hear him in lagann-hen though!!! especially towards the end, where rossiu's belief gives simon et al the strength they need to finish the battle and win, and also the "so many others like us out there" line....... i MAY burst into tears hearing that in a theater LMAO. also it threw me off when they pronounced darry's name as "dairy" SKLDJFH

YURI LOWENTHAL............oh honey you do not sound like a fourteen year old boy anymore LMAO. it really sounded like he was putting in the EFFORT to make his voice as high as preskip simon's is haha. but his performance was still fucking amazing, especially in the hot-blooded parts where it needed to be, and tbh it was kinda sweet that he sounds different now? like, it's a charming reminder that even if it took a while, enough people loved this story hard enough that the dub got made FIFTEEN YEARS LATER, and simply typing that is making me tear up LMAO so yeah i obviously didn't mind. can't fucking wait to hear him as adult simon tho, that may awaken something in me yet again >:)

aaaaaaaand yoko and kamina lmao. obviosuly these are the hardest to judge because they also, alongside simon, have the most lines? so there is more material to compare LMAO. and both of them certainly gave very different performances that i'm not quite sure how to feel about yet. like the acting itself was still amazing, but it was different and not like sam riegel's in a way that was so obviously elevated that i'm having a bit more trouble parsing my thoughts lmao. like my knee-jerk reaction is "different, so not the thing i love, so worse" but that's not true!!! that's not true at all, and i think i may just need to hear it a few more times for the new inflections and what not to gel with me lmao. though i will say, like literally everyone else, that i think michelle ruff was directed differently as yoko - you could tell there was more effort to make her voice more nasally, or to use her head voice in general, or to sound more cutesy/girly. and i PERSONALLY don't think that's the right choice for yoko, as she's got so much more going on with her gender than just being a cute girl, but this is not the place for that discussion LMAO. so they certainly weren't bad by any means, i think they might just need a few more watches to grow on me the same way the show performances have. or just to have more fleshed-out opinions! anyways, 4k uhd english dubbed bluray WHEN aniplex.

overall the differences were SUPER interesting to hear tho!!! like i'm not well-versed enough in dubbing as a product of the late 00's versus now, but i imagine it's partially changed as an art form and that led to some of the performance differences. in general it was really funny when they slightly changed the dialogue and the lip flaps and pauses wound up in different places!!

the imaishi koyama wakabayashi interview mentioned the same thing that they said at anyc, that they were hoping to make a show that could last ten years. and now 15 years later it's STILL loved enough to get a whole ass new dub and theatrical release. and i just. i'm gonna make myself cry again LMAO, i love this story so much and it's been such a great experience <3

#WHEW felt good to get that all out LMAO #i love u gurren lagann........... #a: ttgl #ttgl: films #t.ttgl

[xtiantr]

Dune Part Two

Spent the weekend catching Dune Part Two in the theaters and boy did have a super fantastic time in the cinema. I brought myself and my casual knowledge of Dune that I gained from watching the first film by Denis Villeneuve in 2021. I loved the film. It was a perfect setup for what would be a masterpiece that is Part Two and it did. Part Two was an instant sci-fi classic, a masterpiece, and an achievement in sci-fi filmmaking. It made me from a casual fan to something more. I am considering digging deeper and buying the books.

Going back to the movie - I was moved. The world-building was intricate. Denis took his time to set everything up and it paid off. He concocted some of the most jaw-dropping images and frames in the genre that is also uniquely his. And the soundtrack? My god. Hans Zimmer really cooked some magic here. There is this scene where Chani and Paul kiss in the desert and that heartfelt symphonic film score is played. I cried. It's just so magical. I feel my heart swelled up in wonder.

Every actor played their part exceptionally well, but Denis made them all somehow better. There is something about his direction that could make any actor 10x better.

When the credits rolled, the cinema lit up in warm orange light. It's like they intentionally set it up like that. The score played and I was just there staring blankly, stunned by what I'd witnessed. I stayed there a little longer and relished the moment with what would be a core memory.

Overall, that was one of the most unforgettable moviegoing experiences that I will hold dear forever.

#updates #film #dune #dune part two

[denimbex1986]

'In another life, Andrew Haigh could've been a shrink.

“There’s an argument that films should be full of queer joy, which I think can be really powerful,” the British director says over coffee. “But you have to look at everything else, too. You’re not going to feel better unless you deal with it all.”

Enter “All of Us Strangers” (in select theaters now, nationwide Friday), a heart-shattering gay drama that tenderly confronts grief, pain, loneliness and resentment. Based on Taichi Yamada's 1987 novel "Strangers," the film follows a middle-aged screenwriter named Adam (Andrew Scott) who’s struggling to write about his late mom (Claire Foy) and dad (Jamie Bell). They were killed in a car accident when he was 12, before he ever had a chance to come out to them. Seeking creative inspiration, Adam ventures back to his childhood home, where he mysteriously finds his parents alive and well.

Haigh was intrigued by the notion of a character who’s lived comfortably in his sexuality for years, being forced to, in essence, come out as gay again.

“All that fear you feel as a queer person, even if you've come out, is still locked away inside you,” Haigh, 50, says. “It really does not take much to be like, ‘Oh my God, I literally feel like I always used to.’“

As queer people can understand, “you’re constantly coming out all the time,” he continues. Is it safe to kiss your partner or hold hands in certain spaces? Should you deepen your voice at work or on the phone? “It’s a very strange experience and you can’t escape it. It was a different time when I came out, but I think young people feel the same way. I don’t think it’s suddenly all great and fantastic now.”

Andrew Scott talks compassion of 'All of Us Strangers'

The movie is frequently dreamlike and disorienting, with shots of Adam staring at his own reflection, which at times morphs and overlaps with those of other people.

I’ve always been fascinated with reflections, and I wonder if it’s a queer thing,” Haigh says. “Your reflection is something different from your inner self; you’re constantly putting on a mask for the world.”

But Adam’s guard comes down as the film goes on, as he falls into bed with a roguish neighbor named Harry (Paul Mescal) and confesses to his parents the ways they hurt him growing up. In one of the most gut-wrenching scenes, Adam opens up about being bullied at school. He bursts into tears when his dad apologizes to him, saying, “I’m sorry I never came into your room when I heard you crying.”

“There’s so much that’s tragic about that: a connection that can happen in that moment that often doesn’t,” Haigh says. “For queer people, that scene really lands because we grew up feeling very isolated and terrified. You just wanted your parents to be like, ‘It’s OK, it’s fine, I love you.’”

For many gay moviegoers, there’s an element of wish fulfillment to the film, as Adam has the sort of honest conversations that they all wish they could have with their parents.

"It's hard, isn't it?" says Scott, who is also gay. "Those small cruelties can't be erased. You just get up and dust yourself off and move on. I think there's something so compassionate in the film that gives people that thing of, 'Oh, wouldn't it be wonderful ...' Even if it's not members of our family that we wish could apologize to us." As a filmmaker, "Andrew is saying, 'I understand that and I'm on your side.' "

As Adam's romantic relationship intensifies, he asks his mom to acknowledge Harry as his boyfriend and not just his "special friend." For those of us whose parents have tried to look past or deny our queerness, those microaggressions can feel like daggers.

“I don’t think anyone realizes how upsetting it is to go through that,” Haigh says. “You’re like, why is my relationship not valued the same as other people’s? But regardless of your sexuality, there are so many things unsaid with your parents. As you get to my age, you are going to lose your parents, so everybody is trying to deal with these very difficult things of, have I said how much I care about my family? And if you could actually have those conversations, what do you say?"

Paul Mescal, director Andrew Haigh on the movie's 'catharsis'

For audiences going to see “All of Us Strangers” in theaters, Mescal encourages them to not get hung up on its unorthodox narrative structure: “It’s not about looking for what’s real and what isn’t,” the actor says. “It’s about the feeling that you’re left with,” capturing “love and how complicated it is.”

Haigh appreciates the ways viewers bring their own experiences with loss, heartache and depression to the story.

“It’s a way for us all to feel like we’ve done our best,” he says, calling the movie a “love letter” to his parents. “My mum has seen it, which was both interesting and complicated for her. She’s seeing a film that is about me and her, in many respects. She was very upset, obviously, but she loved it.”

The film could take both him and Scott to the Oscars, with possible nominations for best adapted screenplay and best actor, respectively. Regardless of where it lands, Haigh is grateful for the “catharsis” it gave him.

“It wasn’t always an easy one,” Haigh says. “I filmed in my actual childhood home, which was a very bizarre experience. There’s a lot of strange elements to it where I forced myself to make it really personal. But I do feel like I understand myself and my parents a little better, which makes me happy.”'

#Andrew Haigh #Andrew Scott #Paul Mescal #Oscars #Claire Foy #Jamie Bell #All of Us Strangers #Taichi Yamada #Strangers

[vonithipathachai]

The Mario Movie and the Place of the Film Critic

So.  I saw the Mario movie at the theater with my friend.  …It was fine.  I figure I probably would’ve enjoyed it more if I had a closer personal attachment to the Mario franchise.  But I think it mostly accomplished its goals of being pleasant, light-hearted, mentally undemanding entertainment for families and fans of the games.

I will say, though, that as someone who doesn’t consider himself a big Mario fan despite having played his share of Mario titles, I found the discourse around the movie’s critical and commercial reception to be far more interesting than the movie itself.  In the days shortly preceding and following its release, I found my YouTube feed being absolutely bombarded with Mario movie-related videos.  These included not only blatant spoilers, but videos from YellowFlash, Ryan Kimel, and other anti-woke content creators weaponizing the movie’s success and using it as an excuse to take the piss out of Disney and the critical establishment (not that Disney and certain critics don’t deserve it).  Now, I do feel I have something to contribute to the conversation, and I lean more on the side of the supporters of the Mario movie than the detractors.  But I’m really not interested in waxing polemic here as, again, there are plenty of other people who are far better known than I am doing that already.  Instead I’d like to ponder how we got to this whole situation between the critics and the audience in the first place and what can be learned from it going forward.  Because I do believe we’re witnessing change in motion as Mario smashes the box office and big movie studios are finding themselves compelled to take notes.  We might as well make the most of it.

The first thing we need to ask, which many who’ve observed large gaps in critical and audience approval ratings on Rotten Tomatoes have wondered, is “What is the purpose of film critics?”  Considering the question from a purely utilitarian perspective, I’m sure most would agree that they (at least in theory) act as a guide for the moviegoing consumer.  We all have limited time and money to spend on media consumption, and we would ideally like to spend as many of these finite resources as possible on “good” movies rather than “bad” ones.  Already we can see an issue here, as what exactly defines “good” and “bad” will vary between individuals.  Some audiences simply want a dazzling audiovisual spectacle to relieve themselves from the suffering of mundane life for a couple of hours, while others may be looking for more substance from things like narrative, actor performances, themes, etc. so that they may feel personally enriched by the movie experience.  Since the very nature of the professional critic’s job demands that the critic think more, well, critically about the movies they watch—carefully analyzing a film’s strong and weak points to argue for or against said film being worth seeing—they naturally fall into the latter category of defining “good” films primarily on the basis of substance.  This is not necessarily a bad thing.  In fact, it can be good, as it creates the potential for meaningful discussion and new perspectives which can help the ordinary audience member appreciate movies in a new light.  It does, however, create an alienating effect between critics and more casual members of the audience.

Further compounding the issue is that the professional critic, once again due to the nature of their job, is likely to have different viewing habits from those of even other substance-oriented individuals within the general audience.  They have to do multiple screenings per week (as many as 10-12 in the UK, not sure about the US) on top of writing their reviews and submitting them before the deadlines.  Not only that, they do not have the luxury of getting to pick and choose only “good” movies to watch, but must watch whatever movies are assigned to them by their superiors, including all of the “bad” and mediocre ones.  When you have to sit through so many movies, especially Hollywood genre movies that tend to follow similar plot beats, you naturally develop more keenly enhanced standards and sensitivity to whatever sticks out, both for better and for worse.  This partially explains how Star Wars: The Last Jedi was able to win significant amounts of critical praise for “subverting expectations” and “taking risks” while at the same time drawing the ire of longtime fans.

With this in mind, it is easy to wonder why anyone would want to be a professional critic at all.  A more pessimistic or distrusting individual might say that critics are driven by a desire for clout and prestige.  Monetary gain would play a limited role at best, as the majority of film critics are in fact paid very poorly and must find additional income elsewhere.  This typically comes through other forms of journalism, as critics are often college-educated with degrees in journalism or communications if not film studies specifically (which in turn explains how many of them can be construed as “woke” or otherwise politically left-leaning).  But when the critic’s more demanding viewing habits have such great influence over how they assess what they watch, this limits the scope of people who take their opinions seriously, usually to fellow intellectuals who may or may not lean left themselves.  Ultimately, the critic persists out of a sheer love for film as an art form, and the advancement of film as art is something their work gives them a vested interest in.

So then where does Mario fit into all this?  When considering the critical predilection for substance instead of spectacle and their more refined viewing standards, along with the Mario movie’s safe, sterilized, corporate-mandated handling of the titular character and his world combined with a barebones and predictable story, it is not difficult to imagine how the movie could be given underwhelming critical reviews, even without accounting for any possibility of woke bias.  If the critics can be said to “hate” the Mario movie, it is because it is antithetical to everything they stand for as intellectuals and lovers of film as art.  It is pure audio-visual junk food.  Well-made and satisfying junk food, but junk food nonetheless.  But as far as its target audience is concerned, this is perfectly fine, even if it could do with just a little more time spent on plot and character development.  Therefore it can be considered a “good” video game movie.  Which makes it all the more curious that the critic scores have caused such an uproar.

As of this writing, the Mario movie sits at a 59% approval rating from critics and a 96% approval rating from audiences on Rotten Tomatoes, which is only a 37% difference.  For context, a movie on the site only needs a 60% critical approval rating to be considered Fresh, leaving it only a single percentage point away from Fresh status.  It does not even have as low of a critical approval rating as similarly critic-Rotten-and-audience-Fresh movies on the site, such as Venom (30%C, 80%A, 50% difference) and Uncharted (41%C, 90%A, 49% difference).  If the critics are too distant from the Mario movie’s target audience for their opinions to be worth consideration, then why is such a fuss still being made?  Wanting to break the “video game movie curse” is no longer a viable excuse; by this logic, Sonic would’ve broken it already with two audience-Fresh movies well before Mario.  The only logical explanation I can think of is that this is purely a matter of personal validation.  The critic scores are essentially the one blemish on what has otherwise been a perfect triumph for Nintendo and its fanbase.  …Either that or all the complainers are just a vocal minority and I’ve unwittingly found myself in one of those echo chambers.  Maybe it’s a little bit of both, who knows.

I’d like to end this piece off with some advice, not that I expect either party to abide by it.  Critics, if you are interested at all in expanding out of the intellectual bubble and gaining greater audience respect, it could be prudent going forward to try and put yourselves in the shoes of the movie’s target audience.  Not every movie is trying or even needs to be Shakespeare or have a profound social message.  Audience members, especially gamers, if you really don’t care what critics have to say about the movies you like, then just act like it.  It makes you look a lot less stupid.  And, uh, enjoy this possible new trend of high-quality Nintendo movies while you can.  Shigeru Miyamoto’s not getting any younger.

#mario #mario movie #the super mario bros movie #super mario #film critique #film criticism

[aliveandfullofjoy]

starting to wonder if oppenheimer just sails to a best picture win lol. it’s so atypical for a modern winner (which for the last decade-plus has generally been something of an underdog with strong acting/writing support) while oppenheimer is a quintessential 90s winner (huge historical epic, loads of money, tech sweeper, plus some acting nominations thrown in) but honestly i just feel the combination of box office success/barbenheimer saving the moviegoing experience and the strong reviews will make it happen.

[jones-friend]

So recently I took it upon myself to watch through all the Fantastic Beasts series. Why? Because after the subpar release of Secrets of Dumbledoor all plans to continue making Fantastic Beasts movies have been axed. The series pulled a Divergent and got cancelled before it finished its series. It is also far past the initial wave of hype of its release, and with all the movies being on HBOMax I did not pay money to see these outside the subscription fee I already pay.

And oh goodness, goodness this is not the viewing experience I expected.

So the first movie is the one that acts the most like a movie. There’s characters with motivations and their actions drive the plot forward. I’m fairly certain JKR did not research 1920′s New York but she never makes the history relevant. So you win some you lose some. The premise is Newt Scamander is a wizard conservationist and his beasts get loose in New York, and they have to gather them back up. Unlike the rest of the movies in this series there are scenes I did like here, for example one winged snake grows to fill its habitat and they have to trick it into going inside a teapot to shrink it back down. It’s delightful.

The actors also bring a lot to what would be some flat characters. Eddie Redmayne specifically plays a Newt Scamander on the autistic spectrum without the movie making a big deal out of it, which makes me think this was a choice by the actor and not the writer. The characters have a wonderful charisma and all the actors are having a great time, its very easy to see why there’s so much fanfiction on this series bc of how underutilized everything is.

There’s a number of missteps, and the movie in my brain is better than the real one bc there’s a number of one off lines they could give to help fix things. And part of the problem I have with JKR’s world is that spells are just kind of nonsense. Newt fixes an entire apartment complex by waving his wand. A lot of her racism is still VERY present here as well, and the UK wizards taking pot shots at the US wizards for being unable to marry muggles is. A choice.

The second movie is where the problems begin. As Dumbledoor gets involved he becomes the main character over Newt. The second and third movies do not have to do with magical creature conservation, the creatures become MacGuffins (the item everyone wants) rather than what the movie interacts with. When we do get a scene interacting with Fantastic Beasts its a surprise, a breath of fresh air. Her terrible wizard politics come back and now Wizard Hitler wants to stop world war II, so its up to our wizarding pals to put an end to his evil deeds. It isn’t good.

But the third movie was something special. Out of all these the first can be a fun movie on its own, the second is Not Great, but the third movie is so unique. I have never had a moviegoing experience where the entire movie fell out of my brain immediately after the credits rolled. The issue is none of the scenes have connective tissue and the movie doesn’t set up or pay off enough elements, so this movie is extremely hard to recall in the correct order of scenes. It was like the men in black neurolized me immediately after the movie was over. So I’ll do my best to recall the plot here:

Newt helps a magical creature called a Qilin give birth. He’s attacked by Evil Wizards and is knocked out, one of his creatures flying him back home. Apparently the Qilin is an important creature to the wizarding world bc it bows to pure of heart wizards and decides wizard president. So it was giving birth 100% alone in the wild unprotected as evil wizards descended on it. Wizard Hitler steals the baby Qilin to make it choose him as wizard president. He also kills it bc its blood lets him see the future inaccurately. Bc of this Dumbledoor assembles wizard avengers and tells them the only way we can combat this is to not have a plan. An hour and a half of not having a plan passes. Wizard Hitler has zombie’d the baby qilin and will use it to become wizard president, but the other high profile expert wizards can’t tell he reanimated it like a puppet. There is a series of action scenes in the same physical set and then the zombie qilin bows to Wizard Hitler, but the good guys bring the secret twin qilin to the ceremony and tell it your undead sister can’t hear you. Then the blood pact necklace that kept Dumbledoor and Wizard Hitler from fighting decides to break and there’s a short fight scene. Then the movie stops.

I’m not trying to exaggerate, make hyperbole, it’s really interesting how unconnected all of this mess is. I wouldn’t recommend watching through the Fantastic Beasts movies as bad movies. I would say the first has good moments and isn’t a wholly bad movie, but that third one. There’s something really special about the third one. Its the only one to have the decency to leave nothing behind after it concludes.

[madly-empirical]

Has Hollywood Gone Batty? 

L.A. TIMES ARCHIVES

AUG. 29, 1993 12 AM PT 

Bravo to author Anne Rice (“Interview With the Vampire’s Picky Creator,” Film Clips, Aug. 22) for having the courage and honesty to publicly voice what thousands of her readers have been crying about for weeks: Tom Cruise is totally miscast as the Vampire Lestat.

Producer David Geffen is dead wrong about casting being solely a director’s choice. As members of the moviegoing public are the ones whose money will dictate how successful the film is or is not, any of the film’s financiers would be smart to listen to them (a great example of this would be the public’s choice of Clark Gable for “Gone With the Wind”).

If the screenplay remains true to its source in its dealings with the homoerotic relationship between the two lead vampires (as well as some subsidiary fangsters they meet along the way), I doubt that anyone could truly conjure the hopelessly hetero Cruise as a character actor strong enough to overcome his more-than-well-established screen persona of boy next door. His support from Geffen, himself only recently out of the closet, is curious, to say the least.

I find it ironic that the long-awaited transition of “Interview With the Vampire” from novel to screen is falling victim to another kind of bloodsucker--the Hollywood kind.

DAVE HUTCHINSON

Mission Viejo

P.S. Besides Jeremy Irons and Daniel Day-Lewis, how about three other fellow Brits for consideration, all with neck-biting experience? Gary Oldman has played gay men and king vampires with a lot of success. Or how about Julian Sands, from the low-budget wonder “Tale of a Vampire,” just released on video? And of course there’s always Ben Cross, who recently hung up his cape as Barnabas Collins in the “Dark Shadows” revival.

*

Fans of “Interview With the Vampire,” be they Cruise fans or not, must surely be aghast at his casting as Lestat. The milk-and-cookies star has neither the physical presence nor the range as an actor to effectively play the role.

Think of Dana Carvey as Dirty Harry, and you can see how implausible is the casting of Cruise as Lestat. Cruise flashing those fangs for the first time will likely engender unwarranted laughter from the audience, just as Carvey as Dirty Harry would saying “Make my day.”

With the attachment of director Neil Jordan to the project, this book seemed destined to become a fully realized artistic success after languishing for 15 years waiting to be made. Jordan should be capable of properly tackling the homoerotic elements of Rice’s sensual story, as he so ably proved with his tale of sexual ambiguity in “The Crying Game.”

Cruise’s experiment in stretching his acting range may be as painful for his audience to watch as Sylvester Stallone’s pathetic forays into comedy have been. And with the potential for a $200-million box office due to the wide public regard for Rice’s novel and the bunch-o-hunks cast producer Geffen has assembled, it is not likely that any changes will be forthcoming (as in Cruise realizing he is very wrong for the part and backing out).

Cruise as the Interviewer, yes. Cruise as Lestat (I’m still trying to stop laughing), no.

JEFF SOFTLEY

Los Angeles

*

Are they out of their cotton-picking minds? Say it ain’t so, Joe!

Back in 1978, when Rice’s “Interview With the Vampire” was first considered for a film adaptation, there was a short-lived plan to star John Travolta as the tormented vampire Louis. Now that scheme is look back on as preposterous.

But here it is 1993, and fans of Rice’s novel are forced to endure the same thing all over again, this time in the far more serious threat of Tom Cruise. Once again, the powers that be have decided to cast a young, “hot” actor they think will best pull in the big bucks, the character be damned (no pun intended).

But what was a bad idea in ’78 is a bad idea in ‘93, and oh, what a character to sacrifice! Here is a character so strong and affecting that he renders poet, novelist and National Public Radio commentator Andrei Codrescu, your Aug. 8 cover subject, momentarily speechless, and causes this same, nominally sane man to state, with apparent conviction, that an imaginary being “lives” in the Lafayette Cemetery.

Where Hollywood has erred, I think, is in the casting of such a familiar actor in the role. Vampires in general, and Lestat in particular, get their kick from their alien-ness, from their difference from the mundane. Tom Cruise is too well-known, too famous and too, well, Tom Cruise to achieve the kind of chilling strangeness the role demands.

If seems so sad to me that the studios give so much weight to the opinions of test audiences once their films are made and the money has been spent. Just this once, it would be nice if they’d listen to their audience before the damage is done.

LAURA S. KING

Anaheim

*

And I thought I was the only one offended by the selection of Cruise to play Lestat. Finally someone with sense speaks out. Thank you, Anne Rice!

Cruise, while perfectly able to play the All-American type, is not cut out to play this most ambivalent (in every sense of the word) character. If producer Geffen and director Jordan would get over the grosses of “The Firm” for just one moment, they would see the inherent problems with this gross miscasting.

Lestat is tall and sinewy, French and aristocratic, the owner of a long, blond mane. In other films, these characteristics might be altered, but not in this case. Many of Lestat’s physical characteristics are direct results of his having become a vampire.

The main problem with the casting of Cruise--indeed the casting of any of the “Vampire Chronicles” characters--is that reader identification and affection are unusually high; readers of the “Chronicles” feel that the characters are their friends. Rice is one of the best writers today at visualization. Reading one of her books is like creating a little movie in the mind. And it is highly unlikely that anyone was imagining Cruise as the vampire everyone loves to lust.

Mr. Geffen, Mr. Jordan, the box-office receipts will swell if you follow the book and the characterizations it outlines as faithfully as possible. Trust me.

ADELE BAYLESS

Los Angeles

*

There hasn’t been such bad casting since “The Bonfire of the Vanities,” and I suggest that producer Geffen look at the box office for that one, despite its being based on a best-selling novel, when he says casting is the job of the director, not a public opinion poll.

Perhaps, with Cruise as Lestat, all of Anne Rice’s fans will just stay home and reread “Interview With the Vampire.”

E. M. BECKMAN

North Hollywood

*

I concur, as would anyone with any taste and insight, that the Vampire Lestat must be played by someone with maturity, character, pathos and vulnerability, not a pasty-faced weakling.

What a shame. A marvelous story and movie are being ruined.

MICHAEL H. SUKOFF

Santa Ana

*

Cruise as the Vampire Lestat is inspired. To compliment this brilliance, Jordan and Geffen should consider cameos by Beavis and Butt-head. Heh-heh-heh.

MICHAEL ROBERTS

Twentynine Palms

*

Cruise as Lestat? Why not Bugs Bunny or Sylvester the Cat, and make it a real cartoon?

Tom Cruise--never!

GARY MANNING

Hollywood

#people hating on iwtv casting #a whole damn list #wow #how did it feel to be that wrong lol #iwtv 1994 #iwtv #lestat #tom cruise #tc #lol

[cometmedalchavez]

LADS. MIGHT BE TIME FOR A NEW PINNED POST.

Here’s my Steam profile if you wanna have a look at that…

And right down below that is a link to my YouTube account!

Also, about the picture I have attached to this… can someone tell Dar-Benn to stop watching so much LowTierGod? It’s getting a little bit concerning.

#pinned post #you should follow me NOW #Spotify

[positively--speculative]

Cinematic universes aren't necessarily automatically bad. They just get exhausting when they're pushed so hard by the studios that produce them.

I know not every Batman movie is connected, but you know why people will still see a Batman movie even when there's a bajillion already made? It's because each movie is spaced apart just the right amount that by the time one comes out, people are open to seeing him again. I mean, let's think about this...Batman Begins came out in 2005, The Dark Knight came out in 2008, and The Dark Knight Rises came out in 2012. That's one trilogy where the movies had a 3-4 year gap between them. And you can love or hate the DCEU, but look at the gaps there. Man of Steel came out in 2013, BvS and Suicide Squad came out in 2016, Wonder Woman and Justice League came out in 2017, Aquaman in 2018, and Shazam came out in 2019. Like, at most, there were two movies released with one year gaps between them. And no, as a whole, the DCEU hasn't done financially as well as the MCU, but they did well enough for there to be sequels to be made.

Like, I remember when I was invested in the MCU and I would most definitely want to see these movies on opening weekend...but I don't know. Maybe it's because I'm older now, but it's just not a priority for me anymore. The last movie I watched was Shang-Chi, which I thought was pretty good. Loki was disappointing despite having a strong start. I haven't bothered to watch the Eternals or Spider-Man: No Way Home yet and I probably won't watch the new Doctor Strange movie (and I didn't really like the first one anyway).

I kind of wish we could go back to the days when sequels were years apart, but that's the thing with fandom demands. Fandom got attached to the Disney/MCU formula, so now it demands everything else be that way too, and it's really killing the moviegoing experience for me.

#mcu critical #disney critical #cinematic universes

[thatted1978]

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts introduces a captivating twist to the franchise by merging the iconic Autobots with a powerful faction known as the Maximals. As a new menace emerges, capable of obliterating the entire planet, Optimus Prime must form an alliance with these beast-like warriors. The Maximals, led by the courageous Optimus Primal, bring their own unique skills and transforming abilities to the table, ensuring an awe-inspiring clash of robotic titans.

At the heart of this enthralling narrative lies the fate of humanity itself. Amidst the chaos and impending doom, two brave humans named Noah and Elena step forward, ready to go to great lengths to assist the Transformers. As the Transformers engage in the ultimate battle for Earth's survival, Noah and Elena become vital allies, their unwavering determination amplifying the stakes and emotional resonance of the story.

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts promises a jaw-dropping cinematic experience like no other. As gigantic mechanical beings clash in epic battles across sprawling cityscapes and breathtaking landscapes, the movie boasts mind-blowing special effects and awe-inspiring visuals that will leave audiences on the edge of their seats. The cutting-edge CGI seamlessly brings the Transformers and Maximals to life, immersing viewers in a mesmerizing world of robotic warfare.

To truly appreciate the grandeur of "Transformers: Rise of the Beasts," there's no better place to witness it than at Movie Lair. Known for its state-of-the-art technology and commitment to delivering the finest cinematic experiences, Movie Lair has garnered a reputation as the go-to destination for movie enthusiasts. Equipped with IMAX screens and immersive surround sound, Movie Lair ensures that every explosive moment of the film is felt with intensity, allowing audiences to become fully engrossed in the Transformers universe.

Moreover, Movie Lair's commitment to customer satisfaction extends beyond its technical prowess. From plush seating arrangements to a wide range of delectable snacks and beverages, the theater's amenities ensure that moviegoers are catered to in every aspect. The comfortable and inviting atmosphere allows viewers to fully immerse themselves in the film's captivating storyline and unforgettable action sequences.

Transformers: Rise of the Beasts promises to be an unmissable addition to the iconic Transformers franchise, bringing together the Autobots and the Maximals in a battle of epic proportions. With humanity's future hanging in the balance, the courageous Optimus Prime, alongside a new generation of Transformers, embark on an exhilarating quest to save the Earth.

For the ultimate viewing experience, head to Movie Lair, where the wonders of Transformers: Rise of the Beasts come alive. With cutting-edge technology and a commitment to customer satisfaction, Movie Lair ensures that every second of this spectacular sci-fi showdown is enjoyed to its fullest potential. Get ready to witness the clash of titans, the triumph of heroes

#movie review #transformers #movies #films

[elizabethanism]

Excerpts from an exquisite letter Roger Ebert wrote to Werner Herzog — "You are the most curious of men . . . "

Dear Werner,

You have done me the astonishing honor of dedicating your new film, "Encounters at the End of the World," to me. Since I have admired your work beyond measure for the almost 40 years since we first met, I do not need to explain how much this kindness means to me. When I saw the film at the Toronto Film Festival and wrote to thank you, I said I wondered if it would be a conflict of interest for me to review the film, even though of course you have made a film I could not possibly dislike. I said I thought perhaps the solution was to simply write you a letter.

But I will review the film, my friend, when it arrives in theaters on its way to airing on the Discovery Channel. I will review it, and I will challenge anyone to describe my praise as inaccurate.

I will review it because I love great films and must share my enthusiasm.

This is not that review. It is the letter. It is a letter to a man whose life and career have embodied a vision of the cinema that challenges moviegoers to ask themselves questions not only about films but about lives. About their lives, and the lives of the people in your films, and your own life.

Without ever making a movie for solely commercial reasons, without ever having a dependable source of financing, without the attention of the studios and the oligarchies that decide what may be filmed and shown, you have directed at least 55 films or television productions, and we will not count the operas. You have worked all the time, because you have depended on your imagination instead of budgets, stars or publicity campaigns. You have had the visions and made the films and trusted people to find them, and they have. It is safe to say you are as admired and venerated as any filmmaker alive--among those who have heard of you, of course. Those who do not know your work, and the work of your comrades in the independent film world, are missing experiences that might shake and inspire them.

I have not seen all your films, and do not have a perfect memory, but I believe you have never made a film depending on sex, violence or chase scenes. Oh, there is violence in "Lessons of Darkness," about the Kuwait oil fields aflame, or "Grizzly Man," or "Rescue Dawn." But not "entertaining violence." There is sort of a chase scene in "Even Dwarfs Started Small." But there aren't any romances.

You have avoided this content, I suspect, because it lends itself so seductively to formulas, and you want every film to be absolutely original.

You have also avoided all "obligatory scenes," including artificial happy endings. And special effects (everyone knows about the real boat in "Fitzcarraldo," but even the swarms of rats in "Nosferatu" are real rats, and your strong man in "Invincible" actually lifted the weights). And you don't use musical scores that tell us how to feel about the content. Instead, you prefer free-standing music that evokes a mood: You use classical music, opera, oratorios, requiems, aboriginal music, the sounds of the sea, bird cries, and of course Popol Vuh.

All of these decisions proceed from your belief that the audience must be able to believe what it sees. Not its "truth," but its actuality, its ecstatic truth.

You often say this modern world is starving for images. That the media pound the same paltry ideas into our heads time and again, and that we need to see around the edges or over the top. When you open "Encounters at the End of the World" by following a marine biologist under the ice floes of the South Pole, and listening to the alien sounds of the creatures who thrive there, you show me a place on my planet I did not know about, and I am richer. You are the most curious of men. You are like the storytellers of old, returning from far lands with spellbinding tales.

I remember at the Telluride Film Festival, ten or 12 years ago, when you told me you had a video of your latest documentary. We found a TV set in a hotel room and I saw "Bells from the Deep," a film in which you wandered through Russia observing strange beliefs.

There were the people who lived near a deep lake, and believed that on its bottom there was a city populated by angels. To see it, they had to wait until winter when the water was crystal clear, and then creep spread-eagled onto the ice. If the ice was too thick, they could not see well enough. Too thin, and they might drown. We heard the ice creaking beneath them as they peered for their vision.

Then we met a monk who looked like Rasputin. You found that there were hundreds of "Rasputins," some claiming to be Jesus Christ, walking through Russia with their prophecies and warnings. These people, and their intense focus, and the music evoking another world (as your sound tracks always do) held me in their spell, and we talked for some time about the film, and then you said, "But you know, Roger, it is all made up." I did not understand. "It is not real. I invented it."

I didn't know whether to believe you about your own film. But I know you speak of "ecstatic truth," of a truth beyond the merely factual, a truth that records not the real world but the world as we dream it.

Your documentary "Little Dieter Needs to Fly" begins with a real man, Dieter Dengler, who really was a prisoner of the Viet Cong, and who really did escape through the jungle and was the only American who freed himself from a Viet Cong prison camp. As the film opens, we see him entering his house, and compulsively opening and closing windows and doors, to be sure he is not locked in. "That was my idea," you told me. "Dieter does not really do that. But it is how he feels."

The line between truth and fiction is a mirage in your work.

Some of the documentaries contain fiction, and some of the fiction films contain fact. Yes, you really did haul a boat up a mountainside in "Fitzcarraldo," even though any other director would have used a model, or special effects. You organized the ropes and pulleys and workers in the middle of the Amazonian rain forest, and hauled the boat up into the jungle. And later, when the boat seemed to be caught in a rapids that threatened its destruction, it really was. This in a fiction film. The audience will know if the shots are real, you said, and that will affect how they see the film.

I understand this. What must be true, must be true. What must not be true, can be made more true by invention. Your films, frame by frame, contain a kind of rapturous truth that transcends the factually mundane. And yet when you find something real, you show it.

You based "Grizzly Man" on the videos that Timothy Treadwell took in Alaska during his summers with wild bears. In Antarctica, in "Encounters at the End of the World," you talk with real people who have chosen to make their lives there in a research station. Some are "linguists on a continent with no language," you note, others are "PhDs working as cooks." When a marine biologist cuts a hole in the ice and dives beneath it, he does not use a rope to find his way back to the small escape circle in the limitless shelf above him, because it would restrict his research. When he comes up, he simply hopes he can find the hole. This is all true, but it is also ecstatic truth.

In the process of compiling your life's work, you have never lost your sense of humor. Your narrations are central to the appeal of your documentaries, and your wonder at human nature is central to your fiction. In one scene you can foresee the end of life on earth, and in another show us country musicians picking their guitars and banjos on the roof of a hut at the South Pole. You did not go to Antarctica, you assure us at the outset, to film cute penguins. But you did film one cute penguin, a penguin that was disoriented, and was steadfastly walking in precisely the wrong direction--into an ice vastness the size of Texas. "And if you turn him around in the right direction," you say, "he will turn himself around, and keep going in the wrong direction, until he starves and dies." The sight of that penguin waddling optimistically toward his doom would be heartbreaking, except that he is so sure he is correct.

But I have started to wander off like the penguin, my friend.

I have started out to praise your work, and have ended by describing it. Maybe it is the same thing. You and your work are unique and invaluable, and you ennoble the cinema when so many debase it. You have the audacity to believe that if you make a film about anything that interests you, it will interest us as well. And you have proven it.

With admiration, Roger

#Roger Ebert #Werner Herzog #letter #letters #film directors #film critic #film #kino #cinema

[nickgerlich]

Bucket Of Wishes

What’s that saying about doing something productive when the world has served you a bunch of lemons? Oh yeah. Put up a lemonade stand. It all sounds so rosy and optimistic, teeming with Yankee ingenuity. It’s just that we don’t see it in real life very often. And when we do, it may be more desperation than business smarts.

Like when I saw that AMC, the beleaguered cinema chain, is launching its own line of popcorn at Walmart. If all goes well, distribution will be increased. And since popcorn is the highest margin in the theatre, given the way people have soured on the movie-going experience, this may be the lemonade they need to survive.

The crazy part of this is that AMC originally announced their retail popcorn plans in November 2021. I am not sure what has taken them this long. Was it difficulty in finding a contract manufacturer? Was it general ineptitude among management? Were there too many speed bumps in gaining distribution?

After all, it’s just popcorn, and the category is already pretty mature. I seriously doubt that consumers have been yearning for more. And to add a little more salt to the wound I am inflicting, do moviegoers base their specific theatre destination on whether it’s an AMC and they can get a bucket of this stuff?

Yeah. I am sitting here scratching my head.

I do, though, have to give them a little bit of credit. While theatres are getting crushed—as they have for many decades now, thanks to distractions and technology—they are at least thinking, maybe wishing, that people will want the same popcorn they otherwise would have purchased had they gone to the movies. Give a few points to AMC for trying to meet people where they are, which, in this case, is on their very own sofa.


I also know it takes a certain level of chutzpah to think that you can just waltz onto a grocer’s shelves based on the power of your name. Sometimes you can pull it off, like when Taco Bell announced its line of salsas. Heck, we can still find Chi-Chi’s salsas, named after a midwest Tex-Mex chain that went belly-up following a major food contamination issue.

AMC resides somewhere in the middle between success story and a brand on the outs, but if I had to pick, it would be the latter. And this time we can blame—or maybe “attribute” is a kinder word—digital progress. Just like theatres of old were victims of television, followed by cable, VHS, DVD, and so forth, now it is streaming that has eroded the movie-going experience.



I just wonder how many people are going to buy AMC’s popcorn, and if they do so out of a thinly-veiled guilt, or even sympathy. Because the coming buckets of this buttery concoction may be among their last if they can’t figure out how to get people to come back to the theatre.

Dr “And I Don’t Eat Popcorn, So There’s That“ Gerlich

Audio Blog

#marketing #popcorn #AMC #movies #theatres #Walmart

[denimbex1986]

'It’s impossible to overstate the significance of Barbenheimer weekend to the domestic box office. The July 21-23, 2023 frame where Barbie and Oppenheimer each debuted to way bigger than expected weekends generated, across the ten biggest movies in the marketplace, a combined $310.8 million, the fourth-biggest single weekend haul in history. Barbie’s $162 million debut was the third-biggest in history for Warner Bros. while Oppenheimer was only the 12th R-rated movie in history to exceed $80 million on opening weekend (it was only the 8th history to cross that threshold without being based on a comic book). After years of Hollywood being terrified of ever opening a major movie the same day as a new Marvel Studios or Fast & Furious movie, Barbie and Oppenheimer showed how counterprogramming can inspire a rising tide that lifts all boats.

Even the most seemingly minor pieces of trivia about the simultaneous opening weekends of Barbie and Oppenheimer reflect just how unprecedented of a weekend this was. In 2020, people wondered aloud whether movie theaters would ever open again, let alone be packed, as the COVID-19 pandemic ravaged the planet. Now, Barbie and Oppenheimer have shown people coming out in droves for wildly different movies that reflect such distinct creative visions and, in their own ways, comment on the world around us. For anyone invested in the future of theatrical exhibition, the weekend of Barbenheimer has been a reason to celebrate. However, even as we savor the spoils of the present, it’s important to look to the future. What does the future of theatrical moviegoing look like now in the wake of Barbenheimer?

What Is Threatening Theatrical Moviegoing?

For years, the biggest perceived threat to theatrical moviegoing was streaming. Specifically, the idea was that audiences would choose streaming over going to the local AMC or Cinemark. The age of Netflix movies and premium streaming programs seemed to give people limitless reasons to stay at home and not go to the movies. The weekend of Barbenheimer, though, seems to have been the final nail in the coffin of the idea that streaming could ever replace theatrical moviegoing. Netflix and other streamers pride themselves on minimal marketing campaigns for their original movies that rarely last more than a few weeks. They likely would never execute the lengthy promotional campaigns for Barbie and Oppenheimer (the latter of which dropped a teaser a year before its debut) that turned these projects into events. Plus, the very act of going out of the house with friends and the scarcity of showtimes (rather than just being able to watch these films whenever you want on Hulu) informed the exciting event nature of experiencing Barbie and Oppenheimer. You had to plan to see these movies, you had to put in effort and anticipation for the big Barbenheimer weekend.

Watching movies at home can be a valid experience, it’s just clearly not a replacement for the idiosyncratic joys of watching Oppenheimer in IMAX 70mm or getting swept up in an enthusiastic crowd gobbling up Barbie. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean threats don’t exist against theatrical moviegoing. In fact, “the calls are coming from inside the house” when it comes to elements jeopardizing modern theatrical moviegoing. Major movie studios like Disney, Warner Bros., and Universal are now refusing to cooperate with the Writer’s Guild and the Screen Actor’s Guild of America on giving their employees livable wages. In the process, the pipeline of upcoming movies has ground to a halt. Nobody can work on realizing upcoming movies that could become as important to the general public as Barbie and Oppenheimer because they have to strike against the studios in response to unfair labor conditions.

Several major motion pictures that could’ve been perfect candidates to ride the wave of renewed interest in theatrical moviegoing in the wake of Barbenheimer, like Challengers, have been delayed by months and into 2024 solely so studios can delay resolving the strike. Movie theaters packed with moviegoers right now will undoubtedly become much emptier in the fall of 2023 as they navigate a dearth of programming inspired by major studios. The unwillingness of corporations like Disney and WarnerDiscovery to cooperate with workers (in the writing, acting, and theatrical exhibition industries) has become a grave threat to moviegoing even as Barbenheimer reaffirmed the very specific joys of theatrical experiences.

Part of why legacy movie studios are prolonging the strike is, unfortunately, matters related to streaming. Striking writers and actors want more transparency on viewership for streaming projects, a matter that companies ranging from Netflix to Disney refuse to budge on. Meanwhile, as other entertainment outlets have pointed out, many modern movie studios are informed by the business practices of Silicon Valley, a jurisdiction dogged by allegations of anti-union practices for over a decade now. Even classic studios like Warner Bros. are now owned by people who are mimicking business leaders who view unions as a problem, not a group of human beings to cooperate with. These issues with corporation leadership will prolong these strikes, emphasize the importance of the demands of striking artists, and underscore the long-term dangers threatening movie theaters. If the existence of big multiplexes is threatened even after the success of Barbenheimer, it won’t be because of artists demanding basic income. It’ll be because of the short-sighted maneuvers of corporations.

Which Movies Are Coming Out in Theaters Next?

The disheartening response from corporations to striking artists is the greatest threat facing the theatrical exhibition industry right now. However, it’s not the only hurdle big screen moviegoing faces in a post-Barbenheimer world. Part of why this weekend proved so successful is that it offered something for everyone. Barbie and Oppenheimer both were movies that Hollywood doesn’t offer every day. The former title was a wacky color comedy with influences ranging from Jacques Demy to Jacques Tati to D.E.B.S. The latter feature was a dialogue-heavy historical epic with no action sequences rooted largely in empty deserts and senate hearings. It’s easy to imagine a timeline where audiences rejected these titles as “too weird” and “too boring,” respectively. Instead, people flocked to Barbie and Oppenheimer because of their unique qualities, not in spite of them. These were films molded by great directors totally confident in the distinctive personalities and ambitions of their projects. That resulted in a pair of must-see films that were like nothing else on the summer 2023 docket.

Unfortunately, the immediate films being sent to theaters after Barbie and Oppenheimer don’t seem to be as risky or distinctive. Sequels like The Meg 2: The Trench and The Equalizer 3 are on the horizon, ditto features like Gran Turismo and Blue Beetle clearly molded after the success of other recent action blockbusters. Worse, few of these projects seem like they’re aimed at women, an under-served demographic in the summer 2023 moviegoing landscape that came out in massive numbers for Barbie. Meanwhile, Oppenheimer showed that audiences will be more than happy to sit for three hours and watch something devoid of fistfights if the storytelling is compelling. Naturally, then, August 2023 is packed with exploding cars, leaping sharks, and superheroes in CG metal suits punching each other.

This isn’t to say that action movies are innately bad nor that any of the proposed films for August 2023 are inherently “evil” or destined to be all-time duds. However, from afar, the marketing materials for these projects seem to be offering more of the same when Barbie and Oppenheimer excelled because they gave audiences a taste of something unique. Worse, Hollywood is cramming a lot of action-heavy tentpoles in just three weeks of August, with minimal variety on display (save for the R-rated comedy Strays). It’s doubtful all these blockbusters aiming for similar moviegoers and aesthetics can excel at once, which seems to ensure that August 2023 won’t have the plethora of hits that the fateful Barbenheimer weekend had.

It takes a long time to make a movie, so the ripple effects of Barbenheimer won’t be felt in Hollywood’s decision-making for another two years at least. Still, this historic box office frame needs to be viewed as a come-to-Jesus moment for studios to invest in all kinds of features. Don’t even just make more films in the mold of Barbie and Oppenheimer. Find other overlooked genres and styles of filmmaking that individual artists are passionate about and finance those titles. The enormous box office success of these two movies broke so many rules for what’s “supposed” to be big at the summertime box office. Hollywood shouldn’t go back to rigidly following the rules of remakes and sequels in the wake of such revenue.

What Hollywood Can Learn from Barbenheimer

It’s remarkable how much Christopher Nolan’s name likely helped Oppenheimer become as big of a phenomenon as it was. One of the few directors out there with clear name recognition with mainstream audiences, Nolan should be seen as a model for how other studios should treat auteurs. The default treatment from major film operations when it comes to distinctive indie filmmakers is to immediately absorb them into a live-action Disney remake or an adaptation of a Hasbro toy. Nolan did a trio of Batman movies, sure, but he also had room in between those films to do original titles like Inception, which solidified him as a must-see filmmaker. Oppenheimer shows the result of giving directors room to carve out names for themselves with original works rather than just being guns-for-hire on tentpole fare. Studios need to take a cue from this director’s career by nurturing a new generation of promising directorial talent long-term. The results of giving these artists room to make fresh original works can be deeply lucrative.

It's also important to underscore how meaningful it was for Barbie and Oppenheimer to feel like movie events that belong to this generation. The summer of 2023 has been dominated by films like Fast X that revolve around fan service to movies from 2011 or titles like The Flash and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, both of which provide lengthy homages to blockbuster icons of the 1980s. By contrast, Barbie and Oppenheimer both belonged to the moviegoers of the here and now. Yes, Barbie dolls have existed for decades and J. Robert Oppenheimer is a historical figure rooted in the early 1940s.

However, the world had never seen a live-action Barbie movie before writer/director Greta Gerwig’s bold cinematic triumph and Oppenheimer was not a remake of an earlier film about “the father of atomic energy” (it was an adaptation of the 2005 book American Prometheus by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin). That’s partially why the Barbenheimer meme spread like wildfire; it was a term and phenomenon that belonged to the younger demographics of today. They didn’t have to share it with prior generations of moviegoers nor were they getting iconography of 1980s/1990s blockbusters repacked to them as something “new.” Barbenheimer and the two movies that Meme focuses on are rooted in the world of 2023. That kind of ownership and uniqueness isn’t something you can manufacture every day, but it is something that could only come about when studios take a risk on non-sequels.

The future of theatrical moviegoing should seem more promising than ever given how well visionary projects like Barbie and Oppenheimer did. Unfortunately, the current mechanics of Hollywood executives, as seen by the disinterest in major studios in cooperating with striking writers and actors, seems poised to squander all the potential for theatrical moviegoing suggested by the weekend of Barbenheimer. If Hollywood studios can recognize the value of ongoing risk-taking and, most importantly, paying their employees a livable wage, maybe Barbenheimer can be the start of a new golden age for theatrical moviegoing rather than a last hoorah for the communal wonders of big-screen experiences.'

#Barbie #Oppenheimer #Christopher Nolan #Barbenheimer #Netflix #IMAX #Screen Actors Guild #Meg 2: The Trench #Gran Turismo #Greta Gerwig #Batman #Inception #The Flash #Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny #American Prometheus #Kai Bird #Martin J. Sherwin

[bloodelves88]

Everything Is Liked Nowadays

In the past 2 years, while trying to figure out if a new video game is worth playing, I've noticed something. Almost every game, good or just okay, are rated highly by users. I usually use Steam user reviews to judge a game, and it worked really well before 2020 or so. When the reviews are positive, I'm pretty much guaranteed to enjoy the game. Nowadays? It's a gamble.

I've also noticed that the exact same thing happens for anime. For anime, I use MyAnimeList ratings. The criteria for me to decide whether or not to watch an anime is if it has a score above 8. This didn't guarantee that I would like the anime, but it was pretty accurate most of the time. Again, this method of filtering seems to have stopped working since 2020.

I've been wondering why this is the case, and I've come to the conclusion that video games and anime have become a lot more mainstream in the recent years, and the lockdown period during Covid has fueled their path towards mainstream status. These two hobbies were definitely not mainstream before 2010, and it only started growing after that. It used to be the nerd thing. The thing the skinny boy with glasses does after school. It used to be something you only share with others when you knew that they were into it as well. Back then, whenever I said I played video games as a hobby, people would reply "Dota?". Nobody ever heard of Company of Heroes, Red Alert, Assassin's Creed, Mass Effect, or even Warcraft. Nowadays, while people still gravitate towards certain titles such as Fortnite, Valorant, Among Us, or Call of Duty, at least the titles are more varied, and people would have heard of Warcraft or Elden Ring.

Now, why would becoming mainstream cause this issue? Here's why:

Mainstream consumers are newbies or casuals.

Now put down your pitchforks, this is not an insult.

I say this as a definition of how they consume content, and the level of enjoyment they would gain from it. I simply mean that they only consume what's being hyped up, what's popular, and what has the best ratings. They are also possibly but not necessarily new in the space, with little to no experience with older content and content beyond what's popular. Think of a moviegoer who only watches Marvel movies. Something like that.

When you live in a bubble like that, the level of exposure to the medium as a whole is really small. So what happens is that these people begin to think that Spy × Family is the best anime released in the recent years, despite it having nothing much interesting going for it other than Anya being cute and funny. They think Stray is a potential game of the year, despite it being just a cat walking simulator. Don't get me wrong - these two examples are good, polished, and well made pieces of content, but ultimately they bring nothing amazing to the table. A solid 7/10 at most.

I'll use Spy × Family to make comparisons here, since MyAnimeList has scores and a top anime list which will make comparison easier.

Currently, Spy × Family has a score of 8.7/10. This puts the anime above classics such as Code Geass, Great Teacher Onizuka, Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, and Death Note. And it's above newer hits such as Your Lie In April, One Punch Man, Made in Abyss, Kimetsu no Yaiba, and Haikyuu. I don't know how anyone who has watched any of the listed anime above can look at me with a straight face and tell me that Spy × Family is better.

Coincidentally, all of the anime I listed came out before 2020, and Spy × Family came out after 2020. I have a strong feeling that Spy × Family was a lot of people's first, second, or third anime (and Kimetsu no Yaiba probably also being one of them), leaving them with nothing solid to benchmark against.

Think back to the point when you first stepped into gaming, anime, movies, or any sort of hobby. You were looking at content for the first time, and it just seemed that nothing could be better than what you just experienced. You would probably have rated lots of things higher back then, compared to now. I myself am guilty of this, and it's perfectly normal behaviour. As a result, a lot of popular content that newbies consume ends up being rated positively as it's designed to appeal to the masses.

Then there's the effect of social media, Youtubers, Twitch streamers, etc. Followers would naturally all have the same tastes towards certain types of content, and if the person they're following likes a certain game or anime, then it drives their followers to consume said content, which in turn brings up the ratings once more since they have a high likelihood of enjoying it. A point could be made about how these followers would be on the hardcore side of things, and you might be right. However I do think that people following Youtubers is also becoming pretty mainstream nowadays, especially among the younger folks.

Put together these two factors (and I believe that these are not the only two), and then apply it to how mainstream consumers are far more populous than the hardcore population, and this would then affect a lot of content. Out of a group of 1000 people, 200 might be hardcore, and 800 might be casual. And to make the ratings exaggerated, if the hardcores gives 0/10 ratings and the casuals give 10/10, you end up with an 8/10. More realistically, the hardcores would give it anywhere between a 6-7/10, and the casuals giving it a 9-10/10, resulting in a score of about 8.5-9.5/10. Apply this to every single piece of content out there, and you end up with everything being rated positively.

So now I have to read the reviews instead of just relying on scores. And even that is starting to become a problem, especially on Steam. The reviews on the store's front page are starting to become absolutely useless and meme-ish, since people are trying to get upvotes and funny votes. Sigh.

Finally, take everything I wrote with a pinch of salt. This is just my speculation and opinion. There's no actual research or statistics backing this up. It's just my guess as to why this has been happening. Am I right or wrong, who knows? I just know that the problem exists.