Yakoob on 28/12/2021 at 00:22
I just saw Don't Look Up last night and very much agree, I enjoyed it a lot. While it is arguably too on the nose, I feel that was more on purpose than poor directing; I think having the ridiculousness so "obvious" is part of the film's message (that, no matter how obvious you make it, people will still deny the issues). Also enjoyed the various archetypes the movie presented (the political demagogue, the doomer millenial/gen-z, the scientist no one believes, etc) and the Dune boy was surprisingly complex for such a small side-character. And for such an absurd movie, the ending was quite poignant and chilling.
I also personally connected with the movie since it embodies the very same messages I talk about in my own games (and currently going thru the same kind of absurd BS where people keep negatively reviewing my game for being about COVID, despite it coming out a full year before COVID).
Starker on 28/12/2021 at 02:24
Quote Posted by Yakoob
And for such an absurd movie, the ending was quite poignant and chilling.
Yeah, those cryochambers were pretty cool, weren't they? Though not half as cool as the Bronterocs.
Matthew on 28/12/2021 at 02:30
Dune: my problem was the same thing I had with BR2049 in that it was ultimately very pretty but felt soulless, to me at least.
Spider-Man No Way Home: loved 75% of the movie, hated the ending.
Hawkeye: I never thought I'd have as much fun watching this as I did; a really pleasant surprise.
Yakoob on 28/12/2021 at 07:46
Quote Posted by Starker
Yeah, those cryochambers were pretty cool, weren't they? Though not half as cool as the Bronterocs.
I'm more referring to the dinner scene in slomo. Didn't expect that extra bit of existential dread at the end.
Starker on 28/12/2021 at 14:29
Yeah, I figured :) I just had to play a little game of word association, since you used the word "chilling".
I was pretty okay with the scene. I got the point it was trying to make and the actors managed to pull it off quite convincingly, but it was a bit jarring (perhaps intentionally) that it was surrounded by absurdism right after and immediately before and it made it feel kind of out of place (again, perhaps intentionally).
What really felt out of place, though, was the president Orlean supporter looking up, seeing the comet, and realising they had been deceived. Never mind that humans just don't operate that way, it kind of felt like the movie had to do away with the political stuff to do the poignant scene and it didn't feel like a satisfying conclusion to the whole "comet bringing jobs" political divide that had been building up up to that point.
Also, I thought the amalgation of existing figures felt a bit frankensteined together and president Orlean in particular -- a reality TV show president who puts her child in a position to work in the White House already feels like it's beyond parody and trying to throw in there a little bit of pantsuit wearing Clinton, who got tired of photographers trying to catch upskirt photos, and secretly cigarette smoking Obama just feels quaint at that point.
And really, the movie would have worked just as well when the ruling party would have been Democrats -- they'd make a committee to swiftly consider the comet issue, then argue endlessly about it only to have their plans torpedoed by Republicans and that one Democrat who thinks the thing is just too expensive and that having comet security would make people complacent and lazy.
Harvester on 28/12/2021 at 15:43
We have spoiler tags, you know? I still want to watch that movie.
EDIT: don't have much time to write a review, but I recommend The Last Duel. It starts as a typical pompous historical drama that Ridley Scott does so well, but then the third chapter reveals that it's actually about something else, and then in my opinion it actually says some sincere and meaningful things about the historical and still ongoing suffering of women at the hands of men. It should also get an award for worst haircuts ever :p
henke on 2/1/2022 at 20:30
Matrix Resurrections
Ok just got back from it. I'll try to keep this spoiler free.
Action
The opening scene is pretty cool and there's some nice moments in the finale, but a lot of the action feels like filler. Nothing as inventive as the action scenes in the original, nor as excessive as those in Reloaded. There's has not been a lot of time and choreography given to the fightscenes, and it doesn't feature any special effect as groundbreaking as bullettime.
Story
Incredibly meta. Like if you thought The Force Awakens was too much of a rethread of New Hope, that's nothing compared to this. This Matrix movie is a movie about the movie The Matrix, OK? The plot is easier to follow than the previous sequels, but not as tight or engaging as the original. The only part I really didn't understand was when they go to rescue Trinity, why does Bugs need to get hooked up and BECOME Trinity for a few seconds? There also wasn't a real clear and strong goal until like the final act. Also I had a hard time believing Trinity would just abandon her kids. Her asshole husband, sure, but they kinda gloss over the fact that this woman just ABANDONED her children.
Uhhh what else
Remember all the great licensed music in the original? There's a good (tho very on-the-nose) needle-drop early in this which made me hope there'd be more of that, but there isn't. The end credits song put a smile on my face, but not much to report music-wise.
Overall, this was ok, an decent enough time at the cinema. But I don't think it's one I'll want to rewatch. Crazyily enough, I think I'd rather rewatch Reloaded and Revolutions before watching this again.
Briareos H on 5/1/2022 at 08:08
Also watched the new Matrix last night. I think that if it didn't look so unattractive and cheap (direction, CG, most of the cinematography, acting, fight choreography), this could have made the whole series more easily digestible for me and even sparked some interest in 2 and 3, which utterly bored me when they came out. But with its shortcomings, it was just an okay experience with some fun ideas. Without the capacity to make a more visually appealing movie, I wouldn't have minded a more radical change in direction, doubling down on the meta with more screen time inside the Matrix, keeping the fully green-screened "real world" to an absolute minimum.
faetal on 5/1/2022 at 13:15
Quote Posted by Starker
What really felt out of place, though, was the president Orlean supporter
looking up, seeing the comet, and realising they had been deceived.Yes, that would have been more plausible if
they'd looked up, seen it and then dismissed it as a special effects stunt paid for by butthurt liberals or something.
rachel on 9/1/2022 at 01:29
The Matrix: Resurrections
I just came back from watching it a second time, and while the first impression was somewhat positive but confused, this second viewing made me appreciate the film a lot more. Resurrections is beautifully earnest about what it sets to do, and what that is is simply, like the first one, Lana Wachowski's expression of her life experience through her art.
(Also, right off the bat, I just loved how familiar faces kept appearing one after the other. There are so many Sense8 actors in there it was like watching a cast reunion, and as a fan I was just super happy to see that. I'm also 99% convinced that the key shop is not just a reference to the Keymaker, it looked exactly like Wolfgang and Felix's shop!)
After two sequels that were kind of okay but mainly kind of a letdown, Resurrections is a sublimation of the original trilogy. It takes their themes and distillates them through the lens of the last 20 years. It is unapologetically Lana's Matrix: a sequel that neither sisters wanted to make originally, but when it became inevitable, one that she had to make to keep control of her story, of her narrative. Because these movies are (or at least, started from) fundamentally autobiographical allegories, it would have been unthinkable to relinquish this control to a studio. That's where the whole hyper-meta first act comes from, with its continuous self-reference that is always just shy of breaking the fourth wall.
spoilerish section follows:
It's no wonder that reflections and mirrors come back as crucial tools and visual cues to navigate between the Matrix and the "real world". Self-image and representation were always at the heart of the first Matrix movie, and this theme comes full circle here again with the added emotional maturity of a person who's lived through transition and can look back at what was. Both Neo and Trinity know what they look like, but what the world sees is a completely different person. And eventually, it is no longer "Thomas Anderson" coming out, as the metro barrels down towards him, shouting "My name is Neo" in a defiant, yet almost intimate act of self-acceptance. It is "Tiffany" who instead asserts her true identity publicly and becomes empowered: "My name is Trinity," she says, and indeed she always was, and nothing her family or society could say or do would change that. It's not an accident that 20 years later, Trinity, not Neo, has become the One.
As someone who is currently transitioning, I may be biased I suppose, but it doesn't matter. The Matrix universe can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people, and that's okay. For me, I don't think you can really dissociate the art from the artist when the art is rooted is such personal life experiences. Resurrections upends the blue pill/red pill binary, because as Bugs say, such a binary solution was always an illusion. Forget about spoons, there is no choice: deep inside, in your heart, you know what you should do to stay true to yourself, and doing anything else would be a betrayal.
All in all, I find Resurrections to be a perfect bookend to the story the Wachowskis started in 1999. It's not without flaws, the meta stuff in the first third was almost a tad too much, the fight scenes are not as clean or memorable as before (although the Analyst subverting bullet time was pretty neat), and I found the Merovingian cameo to be gratuitous. But the film works despite these flaws, because deep down there is so much love for the characters, and so much earnestness in the tale of their literal resurrection, that it's impossible for me not to like it.
It's a leap of faith, and when you find in yourself the courage to take the step... at that moment, that's when you are, finally, free.
4/5