New movies: Theater + Popcorn + Coke

[ElvisJJonesRambo]

James Bond: No Time to Die (October 8th) --- This is a given for me. Better have the real music.
Dune (October 22) --- sure, why not.
Top Gun: Maverick (November 19) --- Tom Cruise flicks are good. Saw the original, cultural mover.
Elvis (June 3, 2022) --- Will be seeing this at least x3 times.
Indiana Jones 5 (July 29, 2022) --- Really, I'm a sucker. #2/#4 were awful
World War 3 (September 2, 2022) --- cast looks good, Spielberg signed off on it

That is, Lord willing. I might be dead. Boast not thyself on tomorrow, for you know what a day may bring.

-Legend

[OldSarge]

If you're really willing to get your geek on there is the upcoming
Foundation Series Unfortunately, it is only going to stream on Apple TV+. [:(]

[ElvisJJonesRambo]

ORIGINAL: OldSarge

If you're really willing to get your geek on there is the upcoming
Foundation Series Unfortunately, it is only going to stream on Apple TV+. [:(]

thanks. Saw a trailer, looked good.

[Rising-Sun]

ORIGINAL: ElvisJJonesRambo

James Bond: No Time to Die (October 8th) --- This is a given for me. Better have the real music.
Dune (October 22) --- sure, why not.
Top Gun: Maverick (November 19) --- Tom Cruise flicks are good. Saw the original, cultural mover.
Elvis (June 3, 2022) --- Will be seeing this at least x3 times.
Indiana Jones 5 (July 29, 2022) --- Really, I'm a sucker. #2/#4 were awful
World War 3 (September 2, 2022) --- cast looks good, Spielberg signed off on it

That is, Lord willing. I might be dead. Boast not thyself on tomorrow, for you know what a day may bring.

-Legend

Well none of those i am interesting, maybe James Bond with daniel in it. There are a few i am looking forward to...
Greyhound - with Tom Hanks
Morbius - Sadly been push back
Vemon 2
I am legend 2 (dunno if i will like it)
and finally Suicide Squad 2

Btw saw the Greyhound trailer on youtube, arent those german torpedoes suppose to be magnetic? The one i saw just passes the destroyer, look brand new and look like its has copper tip.

[ElvisJJonesRambo]

Have yet to see Greyhound. Tom Hanks was the initial turn-off. Tired of that guy. He's been in some good movies, but his acting sucks.

[RFalvo69]

ORIGINAL: ElvisJJonesRambo

ORIGINAL: OldSarge

If you're really willing to get your geek on there is the upcoming
Foundation Series Unfortunately, it is only going to stream on Apple TV+. [:(]

thanks. Saw a trailer, looked good.

They just had to turn Gaal Dornick and Salvor Hardin into black women, but these are the times we live in I guess.

[gamer78]

I think it is less about the times we live in more about which country produce these films according to their cultural& ethnic audiance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6r-fXRHRnVg
"That’s How The Witcher Characters Should Really Look Like |🍿 Ossa Movies"

Witcher books are Polish origin but characters race and hair colour more likely we see in Netflix episodes more like an American cultural characters. It is natural.

[gamer78]

ORIGINAL: gamer78

I think it is less about the times we live in more about which country produce these films according to their cultural& ethnic audiance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6r-fXRHRnVg
"That’s How The Witcher Characters Should Really Look Like |🍿 Ossa Movies"

Witcher books are Polish origin but characters race and hair colour we see in Netflix episodes more like an American cultural characters. It is natural.

Double post by mistake[;)]

[lenna0428]

Shang-chi by Marvel

[RFalvo69]

ORIGINAL: gamer78

I think it is less about the times we live in more about which country produce these films according to their cultural& ethnic audiance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6r-fXRHRnVg
"That’s How The Witcher Characters Should Really Look Like |🍿 Ossa Movies"

Witcher books are Polish origin but characters race and hair colour more likely we see in Netflix episodes more like an American cultural characters. It is natural.

Dune was written by Frank Herbert, who was American, but they just had to race&gender&age swap Liet-Kynes - a white old man with dark complexion (like a Greek or a Sicilian) in the book. Of course the real point of contention about the book, i.e. the problematic use of the trope of the "White Saviour" - something debated about since the book was published in 1965 - isn't touched here. [8|]

BTW, I saw Dune - OK not in the best theatre - and they played incredibly safe. David Lynch movie was, admittedly, very flawed but he managed to bring on screen a lot of cool concepts from the book. You saw the Emperor, the Navigators, the Navigators folding space, Princess Irulan putting front and center the importance of Dune, the spice and the Freemen...

Villeneuve choose to "film only half of the book so to render it justice and none of the above is even present. The result is not a simpler movie, but a simpler movie and a plot-holes ridden mess. Actually, I don't remember even a memorable scene from this movie that wasn't already done by Lynch.

If your sons/daughters want to see this movie for Timothy Chemelèet and Zendaya, be advised that Zendaya appears in the last three minutes or so. Since I guess that Villeneuve knew well how desperate this situation was, he resolved it by having over and over Paul getting "visions" of Chani. These visions are all the same: Zendaya walks away from the camera and then she turns. I swear that this is repeated eight-nine times through the movie. Even the teen-ager daughter of a friend of mine commented that Zendaya should win the Oscar for "Best Supporting Actress that Turns".

I guess that in the right theatre it must be visually and aurally stunning (even if the "wailing Arab widows" score by Hans Zimmer is debilitating). Don't expect much more. After watching this new version look for the wonderful three hours fan edit of the original freely available on YouTube: it will help you to understand what is actually going on.

Edit: I forgot about Baron Harkonnen. In the original movie, Kenneth McMillan's portrayal scared me out of my wits. Here they have one of my favourite actors, Stellan Skarsgard, and he is incredibly fat and stares evilly from the shadows. The end. Oh, boy... [8|]

[A side note: Foundation and Dune. We are two on two: two sci-fi classics "reimagined" in a way that turns them into pale shadows of the original, with more anxiety devoted to gender and racial quotas than in understanding what the original authors put in their works, what can be still relevant today, and why.]

[Lobster]

ORIGINAL: OldSarge

If you're really willing to get your geek on there is the upcoming
Foundation Series Unfortunately, it is only going to stream on Apple TV+. [:(]

If you are hoping this follows the books you will be sorely disappointed. It deviates considerably. I guess you can say it's based on the books. Like it has the same title and a couple of characters are there and the Empire falls but that's about it. The guy who is producing it wants to take it to eight seasons. Good luck with that. It's Apple. Short attentions span corporation.

I am looking forward to Dune. Last iteration was a complete disaster.

Edit: Removed observation about 'inclusion' because it might go down that road. [:D]

[DD696]

A few weeks ago I was reading the new book "Jurrisac Park" (google objects to my spelling and thinks that it should be Juristic Park). Regardless of the google god, my daughter wanted to go see the movie and begged me to stop reading it as we were going to the movie that afternoon.

I kept reading. Needless to say - well, I shouldn't say that or someone will obviously object, the movie was very disappointing.

Maybe it was more like a few months ago.

[bomccarthy]

ORIGINAL: RFalvo69

ORIGINAL: gamer78

I think it is less about the times we live in more about which country produce these films according to their cultural& ethnic audiance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6r-fXRHRnVg
"That’s How The Witcher Characters Should Really Look Like |🍿 Ossa Movies"

Witcher books are Polish origin but characters race and hair colour more likely we see in Netflix episodes more like an American cultural characters. It is natural.

Dune was written by Frank Herbert, who was American, but they just had to race&gender&age swap Liet-Kynes - a white old man with dark complexion (like a Greek or a Sicilian) in the book. Of course the real point of contention about the book, i.e. the problematic use of the trope of the "White Saviour" - something debated about since the book was published in 1965 - isn't touched here. [8|]

Okay .... This is getting a little ridiculous, complaining about switching the gender/race identity of a character in a science fiction work. A film based on a novel is a creative interpretation of the story - some elements are changed. Stephen King had no problem with the most recent film version of Pet Sematary, where the fates of the two children in the story were swapped; he did have a problem with Stanley Kubrick replacing the entire underlying theme of The Shining. Having a young Black female actor play a character whose race and gender is not vital to the story (set on a planet far in the future) does not seem to be a reason for old White men to start staring dejectedly at the reflection in their soup.

[DD696]

I resemble being an old white man. Do you think that as such we are not allowed to have an opinion?

I can answer that. Obviously you do not think I am entitled to speak.

To which I say - look two lines below. Two means the first and then the second, toes or fingers, whichever you are more comfortable with.

[Lobster]

ORIGINAL: bomccarthy

ORIGINAL: RFalvo69

ORIGINAL: gamer78

I think it is less about the times we live in more about which country produce these films according to their cultural& ethnic audiance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6r-fXRHRnVg
"That’s How The Witcher Characters Should Really Look Like |🍿 Ossa Movies"

Witcher books are Polish origin but characters race and hair colour more likely we see in Netflix episodes more like an American cultural characters. It is natural.

Dune was written by Frank Herbert, who was American, but they just had to race&gender&age swap Liet-Kynes - a white old man with dark complexion (like a Greek or a Sicilian) in the book. Of course the real point of contention about the book, i.e. the problematic use of the trope of the "White Saviour" - something debated about since the book was published in 1965 - isn't touched here. [8|]

Okay .... This is getting a little ridiculous, complaining about switching the gender/race identity of a character in a science fiction work. A film based on a novel is a creative interpretation of the story - some elements are changed. Stephen King had no problem with the most recent film version of Pet Sematary, where the fates of the two children in the story were swapped; he did have a problem with Stanley Kubrick replacing the entire underlying theme of The Shining. Having a young Black female actor play a character whose race and gender is not vital to the story (set on a planet far in the future) does not seem to be a reason for old White men to start staring dejectedly at the reflection in their soup.

Then you obviously have your head in the sand. Otherwise you would have heard the complaints about straight people playing homosexuals, Italians playing Native Americans, straight people playing transexuals. The list goes on and on and on. Why does this door only swing one way? Why is the 'old white guy' always the bad guy when he complains about something others complain about with impunity? That is the problem. You want equality. Great. Let's do equality equally. I'm outta this convo...too biased.

[ElvisJJonesRambo]

Lets represent more classes. 1970s and 1980s had these stars:

Nick Nack, Corky, and Mask.

[RFalvo69]

ORIGINAL: bomccarthy

ORIGINAL: RFalvo69

ORIGINAL: gamer78

I think it is less about the times we live in more about which country produce these films according to their cultural& ethnic audiance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6r-fXRHRnVg
"That’s How The Witcher Characters Should Really Look Like |🍿 Ossa Movies"

Witcher books are Polish origin but characters race and hair colour more likely we see in Netflix episodes more like an American cultural characters. It is natural.

Dune was written by Frank Herbert, who was American, but they just had to race&gender&age swap Liet-Kynes - a white old man with dark complexion (like a Greek or a Sicilian) in the book. Of course the real point of contention about the book, i.e. the problematic use of the trope of the "White Saviour" - something debated about since the book was published in 1965 - isn't touched here. [8|]

Okay .... This is getting a little ridiculous, complaining about switching the gender/race identity of a character in a science fiction work. A film based on a novel is a creative interpretation of the story - some elements are changed. Stephen King had no problem with the most recent film version of Pet Sematary, where the fates of the two children in the story were swapped; he did have a problem with Stanley Kubrick replacing the entire underlying theme of The Shining. Having a young Black female actor play a character whose race and gender is not vital to the story (set on a planet far in the future) does not seem to be a reason for old White men to start staring dejectedly at the reflection in their soup.

I have no problem with changing the source material - if done for a reason. Kubrick did it all the times but the results were not masterpieces by chance. "Barry Lyndon" - my favourite Kubrick movie - starts as a picaresque novel written in first person by someone who hypocritically blames the world for his misfortunes. The movie is a drama told in third person; and yet the satirical undertones are all there and Barry remains the main actor of his own downfall. Maybe Kubrick knew that he had already used the novel's approach in "A Clockwork Orange", but you can easily see the logic underneath the changes. Regarding "The Shining", it is known that Kubrick didn't really like the novel. What he liked were the building blocks and he used them to do his own very successful tale.

But the point is that Kubrick and others worked hard to bring their visions on the screen and all this work is there to be seen - because it is there for a reason. In "Foundation" you race&gender swap Gaal Dornick and Salvor Hardin... Why? Maybe you want to modernise the tale by including topics that are relevant today. After all "Foundation" had always been about politics and the evolution of societies. But this is not what happens here. Dornic is mostly used to show a young black female mathematician (who, we are already shown, is almost better than Hari Seldon just like that) to patronise a group of older scientists who are trying to decide "what to save of mathematics" (???) by reminding them that all mathematics is important. I mean... For real? This was written and approved?

Then we have Salvor Hardin, who has been gender&race&age&job&mind swapped. When Anacreon menaces the Foundation we are shown that she is the only one looking for weapons. What? Hardin's motto, most famously, was "Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent". Hardin knew very well that a scientific foundation could not hope to survive the belligerent planets surrounding it by using violence. The beauty and undying relevance of "Bridle & Saddle" (which is the title of the original tale) is how Hardin understands how science is the key in that crisis - and how things at the end play out in a surprising but logical way. Here... dunno. Maybe she will wise up. After all she is a black woman, so, in this kind of production, gifted with superintelligence by default (we already saw her discovering things she couldn't possibly know, over and over, thanks to "hunches" - which breaks the whole "Foundation" bedrock: no character has mental powers...)

I have nothing against movies who present relevant topics in a honest way. Among the movies that I liked the most in the last few years I can cite "Moonlight", "Tangerine" (and, by the same director, "The Florida Project"), "The Dallas Buyers Club", "Hidden Figures", "Get Out", "His House"... (the last two using horror in a strongly symbolic way). My youngest daughter (whose informal surname is "La Pasionaria") suggested me to check out "Transamerica" and "The Normal Heart", and both were wonderful.

Here? "Let's show that we are relevant by putting on screen how many women and people of color as it is humanly possible - the reason why the character was written in a certain way be damned. Also, let's make them the best in everything and everybody else a lesser stupid, so we can then parade around and show how socially conscious we are! " This is not "being socially conscious": it is being lazy - and hypocrites.

Like a friend of mine said after "Dune", should they remake 'Training Day' today, it would be Denzel Washington's character the white one, and Ethan Hawke's the black cop.

[gamer78]

I think it is mostly economic reasons behind all reasons and maybe diaspora about how film makers, or capitalism works. Less about their conscious or modern they are. Ethnic minority (shouldn't be called minority if they born in foreign contry and learned as it fist language IMHO) get some wealth now. And promoting Rainbow LGBT Pride flag of companies are also not innocent.

I've watched latest Netflix hit "Squid Game" made by S. Korea. There was Pakistani character with a good nature and polite&innocent posture while some Koreans are greedy and bad.

Then looked at wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistanis_in_South_Korea

"The Pakistani students studying in South Korean universities are predominantly students of MS and PHD in the fields of science and engineering." It seems they are not immigrants will be future diaspora.

[ElvisJJonesRambo]

You make good point. They're not foreigners, until they cross over the border. I spent couple months working in Korea, South. Seoul to be exact. Didn't consider myself an alien or foreigner, told them I'm American. Forgot tell them "North", but they knew. Those Koreans rather nice, smoked too many cheap cigs. Had passport and embassy fee of $150. Really liked Seoul, even though i couldn't handle subways or crowds. Lots of Koreans in Korea.

[JWW]

Dune. I just want to see the new Dune. Not concerned about race of this character or another. Just want it to be a good movie. Been so long since I've read Dune that I only remember the general plot.

Changing race of characters. I have no problem in most cases. Sometimes it doesn't work when a conversion of a play or novel absolutely has to have a character of a certain race for central plot and theme reasons. Let's see Black Panther with a white man playing the Black Panther. [Though I did read just yesterday a good discussion about who needs to be Black Panther in the apparent Black Panther sequel, with some good arguments for Okoye, a black female warrior.] Atticus Finish of To Kill a Mockingbird can't really be played by anything but a white man. Othello can't really be played by anything but a black man. Though sometimes roles can be reversed or altered for good effect. Hamilton is an example. I think Hamilton will in the end be recorded as a mediocre musical, but the character decisions were interesting and worked. I taught high school English in my second career after my Army career. I taught Othello a few times before state curriculum requirement basically mandated I teach certain texts for uniformity for state standardized tests and other reasons. In one case I was teaching it with a class that was all black with one white guy. The white guy wanted to read the Othello parts. We had a class discussion. All the black kids agreed that was cool. So all the black kids got the white parts and the white kid read Othello, and everyone loved it. I think they got more out of it than any of my other classes that year.

That turned into a long digression. Sorry.