2005 Film List - Page 6

Elizabeth S · 01-03-2006, 10:57 PM

I presume Jason Whyte's not around the forum? (He hasn't updated his first post since May.)

Does someone want to start the 2006 Film List?

Adam_S · 01-04-2006, 12:37 AM

Cinderella Man -

Really excellent and well made film. it's basically Rocky and not quite as compelling, but still a damn good story very well told. More impressed with Reese Witherspoon and Paul Giamatti than Russell Crowe who has been better, but is still excellent here. Good script from Goldsmith, good direction all around. Excellent editing on the fights, very nicely done. Strong but very bland flawless film, at least the ending doesn't go off into lala 'the audience is retarded' land that Million Dollar Baby chose, on the other hand its still not as compelling as that film.

Upside of Anger -

Solid film with a bit of a surprise ending, mostly its all about the script and performances but well made all around I was just never really interested nor did I care about any of the characters though I found Costner charming and funny, it's clear why he is an A list star and none of the other participants are.

Adam

Travis_S · 01-04-2006, 12:38 AM

Yeah, last year the 2005 film list and Track the Films you Watch in 2005 threads co-existed. It should be the same thing this year. I was thinking about starting a 2006 list but was waiting for someone else to. I'll start one now.

Seth Paxton · 01-04-2006, 08:20 PM

King Kong
7.5 of 10
One word - overwritten.

There are too many extra characters, too many redundent scenes, too many non-essential scenes, and what is there often runs on 2 minutes too long.

The original is McKee template at its best. You're on the boat with the girl in just a few minutes, the entire opening premise laid out. Here there must be about 30 minutes of character background spoonfeeding that it utterly pointless. Did we need to meet this grandpa type in the girl's background? Is her plight not enough just as a girl on the street stealing food just to live, instead we must know the details of how she got that way and how far she's almost willing to go?

Get on with it already. Really AWFUL screenwriting there. The second the plucky young shipmate and the rugged veteran sailor who found him as a stowaway make their appearance you're hard pressed not to groan.

On top of that just edit some of this stuff down. The action scenes run on and on and on at times which kills the "pop" of a great action moment. And the "Bronto run" features some dreadful green-screen work and yucky CGI.

Kong on the other hand is brilliantly created. The CGI for him is a big reason this film remains a 7.5 and it will make you wonder why Jackson wasn't in a bigger hurry to get to him in the first place.

I did feel for Kong and the film got increasingly better as it went along, with less and less pointless scenes showing up. That's not to say that a certain "skating" scene in the park won't feel like needless extra emotional manipulation in the last act, but at least its not 80% waste like the first act is full of.

So Kong = great. Jack Black is pretty impressive despite having his own character rewritten in a rather silly way. Watts is okay, but rather bland by the standards of her other work.

This should have been a 4 character piece ala Closer, that tight. Just some extras to take up space with zero development. All the emotional dynamics should be with Kong, Watts, Black and Brody. EVERY other character introduced in Jackson's film is completely overwritten and distracting.

Pry them out, trim a lot of the story/action scene fat off, and in there you have a pretty good remake of a classic film.

Very frustrating to see it turn out like this. At least the original is out on a fantastic DVD and displays what great, crisp storytelling is like.

Seth Paxton · 01-04-2006, 08:26 PM

Quote:

Yeah, last year the 2005 film list and Track the Films you Watch in 2005 threads co-existed. It should be the same thing this year. I was thinking about starting a 2006 list but was waiting for someone else to. I'll start one now.

I didn't get why there was so much spin off onto the "Films you watch" thread in the first place. I'm all for people documenting that stuff, but I need a place that is only talking about the films of THIS YEAR.

Mentioning things here is fine, and mentioning the current year views in the other thread is appropriate. But do a copy and paste of entries on your "track the films you watch" into the thread for just the current year's films.

I don't want to sift through people's feelings about seeing Halloween, Citizen Kane, This is Cinerama, or Sixteen Candles for the first time just to find out what they thought of Brokeback Mtn or Syriana.

One thread is a group diary of film viewing in general, the other is about the crop of films for a given year. Just like the AFI or S&S challenges wouldn't be folded into the "track the films you watch" thread either.

Brook K · 01-05-2006, 05:52 PM

I'll continue participating in both threads, in the same way.

I agree with the jist of your Kong comments Seth, the backstory was additional bloat not necessarily needed in a 3 hour+ film, but I found that material (at least the Jack Black moviemaking stuff) more worthwhile than a lot of the utterly ridiculous Skull Island stuff.

I liked Upside of Anger more and Cinderella Man less than you did Adam, but agree with a good deal of what you wrote. Maybe I'd like Cinderella Man more if I could see this Reese Witherspoon cut.

Adam_S · 01-05-2006, 11:32 PM

Quote:

Maybe I'd like Cinderella Man more if I could see this Reese Witherspoon cut.

another fabulous example of why posting in the AM (before dawn) is bad for me.

Thought of a good description for Crash today, "it's the best Max Fischer production ever made!"

I read the American Cinematographer article on Walk the Line, just patheticly poor, Phedon Papamichael comes across as bland and uninteresting as his bland cinematography. Cinematography is part of the film arts, use it to help your movie, Sideways managed it, Capote managed it, you're not trying to make Tommy Boy here, but damn if that's about the level reached.

Now I'd say Walk the Line is overall a little better than Ray, but Ray was a compelling film to watch, I can't say that I'm constantly compelled by Walk the Line, rather occasionally bored (and this still when I'm really interested in the subject!). It's no wonder the film is getting no awards notice, there's nothing visually memorable about the film outside of its advertising.

A damn shame for a well constructed film.

There are a lot of good movies out there, but not many I'm interested in rewatching often. I think that's a problem, many well made films, but few that people are connecting to passionately (still need to see mountain and munich)

Adam

Jason Seaver · 01-05-2006, 11:47 PM

Added Munich, which is excellent, and In My Country (under its original title of Country of My Skull), which I probably would give more than two stars if I saw it today, but that's how it struck me when I saw it way back in April '04 (it got swallowed when I switched to an automated list-file-generator and forgot to put it in the database).

Seth Paxton · 01-06-2006, 03:07 AM

Adam, agree with the Ray-WTL comparison in terms of script (better with WTL) vs look (better with Ray). Ray had great musical sequences that worked better than the story set up for them. WTL's great musical moments are completely created by the story (not talking about the actors, who were great) rather than the photography.

I have Island in, Dukes on the way, and I'm going to try to dig in to the meat of the Oscar flicks missing from my list in the next 3-4 days. I'm going into hardcore movie mode to get on track.

Then I need to apply that to the S&S stuff with 2 discs just sitting here waiting on me week after week.

Brook K · 01-06-2006, 06:11 PM

Had Wednesday off from work and found a theater that started showing at 10 am so I was able to squeeze in 2 movies before picking the kids up from school. Still have a lot of work to do with Walk the Line, Munich, Brokeback, The Producers, and a number of smaller releases to see.

I have 2046 and Broken Flowers coming from Netflix after seizing the queue back from my wife who took it over while I was out of town. The first 20 spots on my queue are now taken up by 2005 films as I'm putting off older movies, my Miike festival and a blaxploitation retrospective in a catchup effort.

Wolf Creek (2005) - Had seen some raves about this recent Australian horror flick that had me excited, only to be let down yet again. Two of the three main characters are somewhat likeable but it's your basic young people stuck in the wilderness get kidnapped, tortured, escape from, hunted, etc.... by your basic crazy killer who attempted and failed to become a compelling horror villain. - C

Syriana (2005) - Technically well done and strongly acted but a bit too stuffed and abstract with it's multiple storylines. It could have stuck to a more central theme and driven that home better and more directly than diluting its focus by having to deal with so many characters and situations in 2 hours. I never really found it confusing as others have complained about; just too overwritten and manufactured for its own good. If you're going to attack the government and the abuses of misdirected capitalism, just go ahead and do it rather than trotting out easy targets like villainous middle managers, an oil exec, and the always reliable greedy corrupt lawyers.

Thought it also erred in detailing all this corruption and 'world's a terrible place stuff" for pretty much the entire running time and then still try and have an uplifting ending that doesn't address any of the points of the film. Delivers drama and the pleasure of watching a collection of very good actors ply their trade, but ultimately unsuccessful as a "message" film. - B-

You make very good points about the flippant and disingenuous treatment of religion in the film, Adam.