What Are You Watching?

**allegate** · 08-05-2021, 10:55 AM

Watched Pleasantville last night for the first time in years.

Jesse Walker, writing a retrospective in the January 2010 issue of Reason, argued that the film was misunderstood as a tale of kids from the 1990s bringing life into the conformist world of the 1950s. Walker points out that the supposedly outside influences changing the town of Pleasantville—the civil rights movement, J. D. Salinger, modern art, premarital sex, cool jazz and rockabilly–were all present in the 1950s. Pleasantville "contrasts the faux '50s of our TV-fueled nostalgia with the social ferment that was actually taking place while those sanitized shows first aired."

This film predates MAGA and yet it still excoriates it.

edit:

Reading the Ebert review and this sticks out:

We observe that nothing creates fascists like the threat of freedom.

**poinoup** · 08-05-2021, 05:38 PM

I'm about halfway through the Woodstock '99 documentary. Jesus...

**Findus** · 08-07-2021, 07:16 PM

Watch the Sound with Mark Ronson is a great series on Apple TV+. Lots of great guests on the show.
Each episode focuses on a different music studio topic.
Auto-Tune
Sampling
Reverb
Synthesizers
Drum Machines
Distortion

**Jinsai** · 08-08-2021, 10:27 AM

Oh wow... Pleasantville is such an incredible movie. I actually might need to put that on right about now...

and also... yeah Explorers is almost Goonies-level 80’s fun... it’s just too bad they didn’t land the ending. The strange shift at the end to “dumb comedy for kids” is so strange, but maybe at this point it’s endearing

**MrLobster** · 08-09-2021, 10:59 AM

Originally Posted by Jinsai

Oh wow... Pleasantville is such an incredible movie. I actually might need to put that on right about now...

Part of any good sci-fi collection...

**Jinsai** · 08-09-2021, 05:05 PM

The new Suicide Squad movie is incredible. I hate 99.9% of comic book movies, but I love this one.

**ekrekel** · 08-10-2021, 12:35 PM

Just finished Amazon's ZeroZeroZero. Sort of a Narcos Mexico type show, but the way they shot and produced this is very well done. I watched half of the first episode and set it aside for a few months. At suggestion from others I picked it back up and binged the rest in 3 days. It's good.

**allegate** · 08-13-2021, 11:33 PM

A) finished Schmigadoon! on AppleTV and it was as close to brilliant as you can come with a musical television show. The Martin Short cameo was truly wasted and useless but the rest of the show was so great. Long shots of singing and dancing with no cuts so you can just breathe in the musical air. So refreshing. And the overall idea on relationships? Wow. Kind of great. I loved how the story line resolved and even how the episode ended.

There was one song that, well, I'm not even sure it was a song. There were almost no rhyming parts, the singing wasn't sung, and it was just in general a mess but it somehow worked? I dunno because it was performed by one of the more powerful voices on the show and she didn't use it at all. it was wild.

Schmigadoon! is a parody of, and homage to, Golden Age musicals of the 1940s and 1950s.[5] The series stars an ensemble cast led by Cecily Strong and Keegan-Michael Key. It is directed by Barry Sonnenfeld, with choreography by Christopher Gattelli.

B) Free Guy was pretty dang good. There are some obvious reshoot scenes (that are also obvious spoilers so nothing from me on that) but they were a lot of fun. Spoiler: pandering if you're a negative nancy but fun. I'm not going into my review mood for nitpicks because it was just fun, something that you can watch and not worry about a sequel (yet) or a post-credits scene or "does it matter if I haven't seen all of the previous 20 films...?" or anything like that. Not knocking those films at all - I have seen all of the previous 20 films, some more than once? - but if you're worried* about that kind of thing this is a great alternative.

My son said the map that is shown for all of two seconds was Portland, OR but I don't know. I believe him - he loves maps - but it was honestly two seconds and I wasn't paying attention to the map.

*Obviously it also depends on your local theater experience. there were only 15 people in there and we were all very far apart from each other and the three of us had our masks on the whole time. No popcorn, no drink.

unrelated to anything at all:

edited to add this from Ryan:

EDIT: so the timeline for the Disney purchase puts this as a mostly-Disney movie and not a Fox one so some things make more sense.

**allegate** · 08-18-2021, 11:01 PM

Watched "The Green Knight" again on the A24 screening room...thing...they did tonight. Not as impressive on my television vs. the movie screen but still a great film. Second watch let me know that what I enjoyed was due to prior knowledge (not the film, the story itself) and Arthurian side-legends and general mysticism and just movies in general. Hard to explain, but my wife and son were iffy on it for the same reason the husband/wife duo I saw it with prior actively disliked it. It's like...why can't you have a non-hero's journey once in awhile?

**elevenism** · 08-19-2021, 12:45 AM

Originally Posted by Kodiak33

Have any of you watched The White Lotus yet? I think it's fantastic.

Is it really? I saw a couple YouTube trailers that made it look interesting and I was going to dive in.

But, when I saw "Comedy/Drama" and no "mystery" or "thriller" in the description, I balked.

**Kodiak33** · 08-19-2021, 12:43 PM

Originally Posted by elevenism

Is it really? I saw a couple YouTube trailers that made it look interesting and I was going to dive in.

But, when I saw "Comedy/Drama" and no "mystery" or "thriller" in the description, I balked.

Hah! It's definitely not a mystery, I would say more of a dark comedy. It's fucking great. The acting and writing are supurb, just check it out if you can. It's only 6 episodes I believe.

**allegate** · 08-20-2021, 10:37 AM

why is it so popular to tell everyone that doing what they want is wrong? Holy crap the ovacular fortitude.

**MrLobster** · 08-25-2021, 11:14 AM

Finally watched "The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part" last night. A worthy sequel to the first one.

Part of the reason I waited this long is because I was disappointed with the LEGO Batman movie and didn't want to tempt fate quite so quickly...

**allegate** · 08-25-2021, 12:41 PM

I really like how somberly it treated the story. I know a lot of people were put off by the "you're not #1" storyline and it caused a dip in the franchise.

Despite grossing $192 million worldwide against a budget of $99 million, the film became the franchise's second box office disappointment after The Lego Ninjago Movie. As a result of this, Warner Bros. sold the film rights of The Lego Movie franchise to Universal Pictures, which was later set for a five-year deal.

and we'll never see another one.

**Space Suicide** · 08-29-2021, 11:00 PM

**bobbie solo** · 08-31-2021, 04:45 AM

Originally Posted by Space Suicide

first time?

**Space Suicide** · 08-31-2021, 06:03 AM

Originally Posted by bobbie solo

first time?

Yesssssssss.

**elevenism** · 08-31-2021, 06:10 AM

Originally Posted by Space Suicide

Yesssssssss.

This is the Twin Peaks of our generation, imho. It's just utterly incredible, and will become THE cult classic of the 2010s. There just isn't much that's better.

**Something Underneath** · 08-31-2021, 09:26 AM

Originally Posted by elevenism

This is the Twin Peaks of our generation, imho. It's just utterly incredible, and will become THE cult classic of the 2010s. There just isn't much that's better.

Season 2 is the weak spot but then again Twin Peaks had the same weak spot[the season where filler took over]

**elevenism** · 08-31-2021, 10:03 AM

Originally Posted by Something Underneath

Season 2 is the weak spot but then again Twin Peaks had the same weak spot[the season where filler took over]

Agreed. With Mr. Robot, I think the main problem is that it becomes a little too cryptic.
But, I think this problem would be diminished with a binge watch, as opposed to.waiting a year and trying to keep up every week.

**Volband** · 09-01-2021, 12:49 AM

Pig - it got overhyped imo. It's an okay movie, but I genuinely expected something great given all the praise.

Dark (Netflix series) - A very impressive 8/10. By the end the lovey-dovey stuff and the less and less subtle hints were a tad bit too much, but overall a very nice show.

Nobody - Never seen the John Wick movies, really likes Bob Odenkirk, so liked this movie as well. The change of tone is imo a bit jarring after the bus scene, but it's a popcorn flick, so whatever.

Death Note (anime) - So, I've seen this like 3 times already, but tried to introduce someone else into it. Had to stop around episode 7, because it was... just wasn't as good as I remembered from my childhood lol. Like, I genuinely laid back and expected that others will be impressed, but I was sweating bullets from all the lame stuff (mostly L being able to read the script to the whole story) and how I actually drummed this series up. Don't get me wrong, I still rate it highly and would recommend to anyone who have never seen it at least once, but I wouldn't want to be in the room with you - for most of you, this is a net positive though.

Band of Brothers - still good

The Pacific - still shit

The Outpost (movie, 2019) - It's like a B movie with a big budget. I can't decide if it was terrible or watchable. Like, I never really liked it, but I always wanted to see what happens next. I guess it's dumb fun - results may vary for US natives, as the real events it depicts may be sensitive for you.

I never cared for Kung Fu Panda, but I had to watch so many episodes from the tv series that I actually want to see the movies now. Can't say the same about Madagascar.

I should probably finish Mr Robot as well, seeing all the positive reviews. I really enjoyed S1 and S2, but then I had to wait a year, and once S3 dropped I just quit quarter way through the first episode of the season when nothing happened. Kind of left it at that. Then a year later I saw people raving about S4...

**r_z** · 09-01-2021, 10:26 AM

What about The Pacific you didn't like?

**MrLobster** · 09-05-2021, 05:22 PM

**Jinsai** · 09-08-2021, 02:24 PM

World's Greatest Dad is the most underrated Robin Williams movie. This is genius and harrowing.

**elevenism** · 09-08-2021, 03:52 PM

Wu Tang: An American Saga season 2 starts today!

**allegate** · 09-13-2021, 11:50 AM

Watched Lilo & Stitch again last night. I don't know why but it's my favorite Disney movie. And the way our family has been going for the past week it hit a little different than usual. very weird.

anyway, love this little movie. it's got way more heart than a lot of their animated - hell, even live action - output from the same timeframe.

weird, explains the scene and the way it is in the film though.

The biggest change came to the film's third act, which had Stitch, Nani, Jumba and Pleakley hijacking a Boeing 747 jet from Lihue Airport to save Lilo; the scene had the quartet chasing Gantu through downtown Honolulu, scraping against buildings and coming dangerously close to the ground. Following the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center in 2001, this sequence was revised so that they instead flew Jumba's spaceship through the mountains of Kauaʻi. This revision was done primarily by replacing the CGI model of the 747 with that of Jumba's spaceship, with only a few shots in the sequence fully re-animated.

I thought that looked different.

A scene was modified for the UK home video release.^[15] In the original, Lilo hid in a clothes dryer, which was changed to a commode with a cabinet and pizza box used as a "door" to avoid influencing children to hide in dryers.^[16] The UK edit was later used for the film's Disney+ release.^[16]

regarding the score: did Silvestri re-use a lot of themes for this? I swear there were several parts where I was like "is this from something?" because it just seemed like a call to something instead of an original score piece.

final edit: mind blown that sweet little Lilo is also Samara from The Ring and Samantha Darko.

**mfte** · 09-14-2021, 08:34 AM

This is pretty incredible.

The Romanovs. The Real History of the Russian Dynasty.

**Volband** · 09-15-2021, 09:40 AM

Originally Posted by r_z

What about The Pacific you didn't like?

The whole love-plot felt off and was boring. Band of Brothers had some ups and downs, I never really dig the market garden (Replacements) episode for example, but it was at least eventful. I just gave up on TP during that episode where our guy was off-duty and tried to get laid or something. It boggled my mind that the same people did both shows, so I can't even say that the new producers sold out to the Hollywoord tropes.

**allegate** · 09-15-2021, 11:48 AM

Watched this last night. It's not a hard-hitting documentary but it is an interesting look at the history of socialism in the country.

also I thought it was 2018/2019-ish but then they get into Covid. Also the way that they didn't get AOC tells me they tried.

**Ruined** · 09-16-2021, 07:05 PM

I know I'm late to the party with FX's Devs, but, holy shit it's so good. I actually started watching by accident as it began playing after another show of mine had finished. I wasn't really into the promos as it seemed a little too abstract for me, but, damn! Glad to be wrong about this one.

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