The Movie Thread Reloaded

[RandyB]

Cuties


Nothing like a big controversy to get me interested. So I went ahead and watched it. I rather liked it. Despite all the people flipping their caps on social media over pedo bait, this is not that kind of film. It's not even anti-child sexualization (though that it a part of the film) so much as about children growing up and trying to find acceptance in an adult world, and doing it very poorly as you'd expect of a child.


To sum up, a young girl, Amy is upset, I would go so far as to say traumatized, by her father bringing another woman into their family. IE polygamy. She rebels in various ways, by stealing from her mother, getting in fights, and yes, doing some rather inappropriate sexualized behavior. It's a biting criticism of tradition and Islam in specific and how that impacts a young girl who can't process it all.

Counterpoint:

https://www.menofthewest.net/cuties-boiling-the-cultural-frog/

[Ratman_tf]

Cuties


Nothing like a big controversy to get me interested. So I went ahead and watched it. I rather liked it. Despite all the people flipping their caps on social media over pedo bait, this is not that kind of film. It's not even anti-child sexualization (though that it a part of the film) so much as about children growing up and trying to find acceptance in an adult world, and doing it very poorly as you'd expect of a child.


To sum up, a young girl, Amy is upset, I would go so far as to say traumatized, by her father bringing another woman into their family. IE polygamy. She rebels in various ways, by stealing from her mother, getting in fights, and yes, doing some rather inappropriate sexualized behavior. It's a biting criticism of tradition and Islam in specific and how that impacts a young girl who can't process it all.

Counterpoint:

https://www.menofthewest.net/cuties-boiling-the-cultural-frog/

I unwisely spent the weekend arguing on twitter over the film. I disagree with the article and I'll leave it at that, because the argument just goes in circles at this point.

[jhkim]

There was a Power Pack movie?

TV series pilot that never got past a limited showing. One of my players way back knew some of the production crew. That and the New Mutants pilot. But that one at least followed the comics a little more. Ive seen both.

Huh! Thanks for the info, I hadn't known about this. I just watched the pilot with my son. It was cheesy with terrible effects, but it captured a lot of the original comics that he loved when he was young, so it was fun to watch. It got the kids spot on, I thought - good casting.

[Omega]

While net was down recently sat down and watched a Russian movie called Koma that was recently translated and released subbed and dubbed. I went with the subbed version.
The movie is about an architect, well either that or a player who realllllly likes Star Frontiers too much and built a while diorama city in his apartment... heh. Said architect was recently in a car accident. Then the cracks start to show, quite literally, that he is essentially still in the accident. He is in a coma in a hospital somewhere and his mind is in some sort of shared universe composed of the memories of everyone whos ever been in a coma. Its a truely weird alien geometry.
The architect is helped by some fellow coma patients and very quickly learns that this mindscape is not safe as there are things dwelling in it that hunt the patients relentlessly.
From there the rules of this otherworld are learned. Some of the inhabitants have a power of some sort, such as healing, sensing the monsters, mapping the network of connections between memory nodes, and so on.
The movie is well made and looks great. The mindscape is really well done and the monsters are unusual (though could have been a bit more alien looking. But there is a reason they are not.) The story itself goes in some interesting and unexpected twists and turns even. Its not great of course, but its fairly entertaining and a fun concept that does not get used much.
Feels a bit like what you'd get if you mixed The Odyssey TV series from the 90s with The Matrix and a touch of White Wolf's Orpheus.

[harryhouse]

Since we have almost nothing to do but to  sit at home, i recently watched the whole harry potter movie collection. man i though im not gonna like it because i watched them when i was a kid but to be honest some of them are good !

[Omega]

this is funny funny timing as just came across an old kids movie from the 80s called... The Worst Witch. based on the YA series from the 70s by Jill Murphy.

Any of this sound familliar?

A young student at a witches boarding school. She is a bit accident prone and picked on by the other students except for 2 friends who help or hinder her efforts. She has a snobbish upperclass rival and one of the teachers has it in for her while the head of the academy tries to help her.

The movie has Faruza Balk as Mildred, yep, Dorothy from Return to Oz. (and Mercedes in GTA Vice City), Diana Rigg from the Avengers as Mrs Hardbroom, and... Tim Curry? Yep, Tim Curry, singing...Some of the visuals arent bad for an 80s movie and of course Diana Rigg allways looks good in black. ahem.

Double-bill this with Babes in Toyland featuring Drew Barrymore and... Keanu Reeves? yup, Keanu.

The 80s was a weird era mm-hmm.

[soundchaser]

Recently made it to theaters to watch Tenet and Infidel. Both pretty good. I have Caviezel's son in a college class this semester... I had some nice chats about the movie and other acting topics with him.

[Ghostmaker]

Movie related:

https://cbsaustin.com/news/local/texas-grand-jury-indicts-netflix-over-cuties-movie-claiming-it-sexually-exploits-minors

TLDR: Texas grand jury just indicted Netflix over 'Cuties'.

Hard to say if this will stick or not.

[Bedrockbrendan]

Watched Bride of Frankenstein last night for the first time in ages. Forgot how fun it was as a horror movie. I always remembered the tragic end, but forgot about things like the ballerina homunculi. Definitely enjoy this one more than the first Frankenstein film (though that is good too). Classic horror movies often have a bit more fun and humor in them, and it was refreshing to see that on display. Hoping to watch some of my favorites this month if I have time.

[Omega]

Check out the two "House of" movies as well as they are actually pretty good. John Carridine makes for a rather dapper Dracula and Lon Chaney Jr reprises his role as the Wolf Man in House of Frankenstein with Boris Karloff as the mad scientist. And House of Dracula has some interesting twists and turns in it. Carridine and Chaney return and Glenn Strange plays the Monster in both. House Of Dracula was one of Lionel Atwills last movies. Jane Adams who plays the Hunchback in House of Dracula also played Vicky Vale in the two Batman serials.

[Bedrockbrendan]

Check out the two "House of" movies as well as they are actually pretty good. John Carridine makes for a rather dapper Dracula and Lon Chaney Jr reprises his role as the Wolf Man in House of Frankenstein with Boris Karloff as the mad scientist. And House of Dracula has some interesting twists and turns in it. Carridine and Chaney return and Glenn Strange plays the Monster in both. House Of Dracula was one of Lionel Atwills last movies. Jane Adams who plays the Hunchback in House of Dracula also played Vicky Vale in the two Batman serials.

That is a good idea. I have not watched those since I was a kid

[Omega]

Saw "The Call Up" since it was officially on YouTube for free.

In what appears to be a very near future setting MMO players are invited to play in a new game called The Call Up in a large rented office building.
The players wear a bodysuit armour and helmet that puts them into a high end VR experience. Things start to look odd pretty quick when they discover they can not leave. And things only get worse from there as they play a VR military sim. As you can likely guess. It turns out to be a deadly game.

This one was 50-50 for me. I liked the sets and characters and the initial premise was good.
But...
The execution of the plot got progressively un-likable and at points a bit too predictable. What was not predictable was the bewilderingly arbitrary way many die in this.

Can I recommend it? Not sure really. Its a bit too YMMV. But hey its free for now.

[Sparrowhawk131]

Social Dilemma was a very interesting piece to watch. Nothing was shown that I wouldn't be aware of already but still, well-made and builds a very negative feeling about this whole deal of social media

[Thornhammer]

Mosul on Netflix is pretty damn good.

It is about the Ninevah SWAT team fighting against ISIS. Violent. Intense. Something a little different that isn't from the American perspective.

If you like modern war movies, don't miss it.

[Pat]

I watched The Rise of Skywalker. It's not brilliant and doesn't break any new ground, but it's much better than I expected. The trappings were great, and the emotional beats were solid. The plot was a bit of rushed nonsense, but it held together enough. The climax wasn't that great, but the denouement and the wrapping up of the various plot and character threads were better. They powered up Ren too much, but, to be fair, that did that to the other force users as well (it wasn't her uberpower during the finale). The nostalgia got a little heavy for my taste, but it was integrated fairly well. The dialog was functional at presenting information and reinforcing characterization, but not a single line rises to the level of poetry. The acting was sufficient. It's not memorable, but it is watchable.