thought Spotlight was really good, but 7.5/10 for me, it was a necessary movie, but seemed to me to be really pretty non artistic in just about every respect. A great average film?

I just saw Michael Moore's new one, I'd recco it, esp for USA residents who don't know much about the rest of the world. Italian segment was pretty enlightening and entertaining, as was the Slovenian part

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ly4_QiXv8es


"Is this the great big penis competition?"

Haven't seen SPOTLIGHT yet, but it seems like it has a ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN sort of feel. No?

Excision. Great movie.

Saw Black Caesar at Anthology last night,

Finally watched Ant-Man.

Could have been better.

This is what we've got lined up for tonight:



I remember hearing a ton of positively gushing reviews of this film back when it was on the festival circuit. It's about a cult leader (Vincent Cassel) with a ton of wives and hundreds of children, which he raises and trains as assassins.

Heard it's utterly disturbing and totally fucked up, but those are the film's and roles Cassel does best. Looking forward to it.

Just went through a run of SHIT movies....



I had high hopes for Crimson Peak because I like Del Toro, but goddamn.... this was a beautifully filmed movie but the story could have been cut by like 40%...Gothic horror is not my thang. The ghosts looked cool, but I have never found ghosts scary, since they are incorporeal and cannot actually touch you or hurt you..... boring.



wow this was boring. I turned it off about 45 minutes in because I COULD GIVE A FUCK. I love comics, and I thought the first Avengers movie was great fun, but jesus fuck this thing sucked from the get. Does it get better? I will watch the rest of it eventually but it was a fucking letdown.



I watched this last night. I am a big fan of Danny McBride and especially Sam Rockwell, but fuck if this was not the slowest wanna-be satire around. McBride is hilarious in his scenes, but the rest of the movie unfolds as the glacial pace of a typical indie flick. fucking dull as fuck.

This was funny and thoughtful, and I was very very glad it was not a musical.

This was ok, but nothing close to what I was expecting. It's not especially sinister or frightening. In fact it's probably the most lovable role Cassel has ever played. I was hoping to see some insane villainous shit here... But it was surprisingly mild and very subtle. More of a think piece. Which I would have been more into if I knew that's what I was going to get. I was pumped to see a demented ass film, and this was strangely melancholy. Is Cassel a villain? Yeah, I guess. But he's more tragic and sad than terrifying. And it had one of those open endings that really wasn't open. You know what happens, but for some reason the director pulled a "you tell me!" At the last second. Not a great move.
Good enough film, but meh.

I forgot to mention: that scene in Ant-Man where they're fighting in the falling briefcase and the iPhone starts to play "Plainsong" by the Cure? That wa awesome. It was supposed to be funny, I guess, because they didn't let it play for long, but had the song truly been accompanying thay sequence, it would have been fucking AWESOME.

At it was, it just was a nice 20 seconds of an otherwise so-so movie that made me want to listen to Disintegration. If I had been able to pick, at that moment, between letting the song play through without the movie, or having the movie play through and cut the song off, I would have gladly listened to "Plainsong" while staring at a blank screen.

it was much better than age of ultron though.......

This came on randomly.. i didn't know anything about it. I liked it

Yeah, what the hell was that about anyway? What a shitfest. Why throw the Maximoffs in there if you're not going to have a link to X-Men? There are now two different Quicksilvers in two different franchises from the same comic book company! Well, I guess one of them might be toast, but still. Stupid.

And the Hulk and Black Widow getting romantic? What? Why!? What?! Fuck it.

The first one was fun as hell, though I didn't care for the childish bickering (save that for Civil War). It was like a big bright loud comic book happening in front of you. The second one was just ick.

I wonder if Cap's going to die in Civil War, leading to an Avengers 3 and 4 that feature Falcon in the Cap costume. That would be weird. And dumb. I don't like Falcon.

But yeah, Ant-Man was way better than Ultron.

Saw this last night. Liked it a lot. Quite the freakout film, a la classic Tarantino in my eyes. (I hated HATED Django Unchained soooo much)
harsh!

^ My 60-something year old mother has watched this about 5 times, and she usually can't tolerate violence. I'm waiting til it comes to the dollar theater for the big screen experience. Looking forward to it a lot.

Fun fact: An antique Martin guitar was smashed to bits during the filming of this when there was some miscommunication on set. I understand Kurt Russel thought it was the fake one, but ended up destroying an irreplaceable artifact. Needless to say, Martin Co. has announced it will no longer be lending out guitars for films. How far down the ladder do you think it went before some poor bastard had to be the one to make the call to Martin Co.?

My wife told me that last night after we watched the film. This happens all the time too, like when cities allow film crews to use public spaces as locations and they trash the shit all to hell, or destroy the concrete, or ruin the landscaping....

I'm so glad to hear you liked it!!

I'm quite a Tarantino fan. I actually loved Django Unchained, even though it was a very strange blend of American western, Spaghetti Western, modern revenge story and distinctly unsophisticated gore fest (with a few stylistic choices that made it just plain not work as a historical film -- yeah, Tupac didn't help the authenticity), but it was still dope.

Anyway I'd heard mixed things about Hateful Eight. My father, who shares my love for Tarantino, saw it and said, "I think Tarantino's time is coming to an end." Which made me nervous. As did the fact that it was not up for Best Picture, which is uncharacteristic of Tarantino flicks in general.

But my confidence has been bolstered, and now I'm gonna make sure I see it ASAP.

Did I mention that the best part about that PARTISAN film is that the soundtrack was done by Oneohtrix Point Never? I had no idea.

Tarantino is one of my peoples!!!

I love most of his movies, and even the ones I do not like story-wise (Django, Kill Bill Pt.2 ) were beautiful to look at.

I remember watching Reservoir Dogs for the first time, and True Romance (which would have been much better if he had directed it) and going, jesus christ here is a guy making movies I wanna see!


my list of the official tarantino movies in order of preference

Reservoir Dogs
Jackie Brown
Pulp Fiction
Inglorious Bastards
Hateful Eight
Kill Bill Vol. 1
Kill Bill Vol.2
Django Unchained
DEath Proof

The only two I hated were the last two on the list, and I am not a big fan of KIll Bill Vol 2. I found it boring and slow.

There hasn't been a Tarantino film I've hated. I hear all the reasons why people don't like his movies, and they aren't necessarily wrong in some of their big grips, but for me his movies are a lot of fun. I'm even a big fan of Death Proof, which I never understood the quite sexist argument of ladies who just talk throughout the film. Opposed to Reservoir Dogs where its just a bunch of guys talking? Kill Bill is my favorite movie, and while I have never seen The Whole Bloody Affair version I still count it as one movie, so I don't say I love Vol.1 but hated Vol. 2. I dig both. I've only seen The Hateful Eight once, but I said that might be my second favorite Tarantino movie behind Kill Bill. I've yet to see it a second time to cement that opinion, but its a good one.

the only one I actively wanted to stop watching because I did not enjoy it was Django. Maybe I just hate DiCrapio....

I didn't bother with Django, i didn't like anything about it so it didn't catch my attention and i actually LIKE DiCaprio

Rob yr crazy Resevoir Dogs is total shit and further i found it racist.. I'm not sure Tarrantino understands the nuance between "nigger" and "nigga" and so takes way too many liberties..p


Pulp Fiction is clearly his true masterpiece. It is as perfect as a film can be, at every levelevrlm i can't find a single flaw..

Jackie Brown is close, and i sometimes think to rank it above Pulp Fiction but then i remember everything about Pulp Fiction..

Kill Bill 1 and 2 are definitely third, Inglorius is good.. but no Kill Bill by any definition.

Then Inglorious Bastards which i enjoy but has its flaws too..

DeathProof as fourth because its good but not as complete.

I heard i would adore Hateful Eight but i haven't seen it.

And yeah, i found zero interest in django so id have to rank it last since i didn't even bother to see it

I think Tarrantino has become a brand like Apple, people "dig" his flicks even if they suck or aren't as good as the others because they have been branded.

Rob yr crazy Resevoir Dogs is total shit and further i found it racist.. I'm not sure Tarrantino understands the nuance between "nigger" and "nigga" and so takes way too many liberties..p


Pulp Fiction is clearly his true masterpiece. It is as perfect as a film can be, at every levelevrlm i can't find a single flaw..

Jackie Brown is close, and i sometimes think to rank it above Pulp Fiction but then i remember everything about Pulp Fiction..

Kill Bill 1 and 2 are definitely third, Inglorius is good.. but no Kill Bill by any definition.

Then Inglorious Bastards which i enjoy but has its flaws too..

DeathProof as fourth because its good but not as complete.

I heard i would adore Hateful Eight but i haven't seen it.

And yeah, i found zero interest in django so id have to rank it last since i didn't even bother to see it

There is racial insulting in all of Tarantino flicks. Just like Scorcese. The people they choose to write about ARE racist and bigoted. These are not educated people!

I love Reservoir Dogs for the audacity of it at the time it came out. It was like seeing the first Die Hard. Every scene was something new, shown to us in a new way, and not dictated by the standard tropes of hollywood filmmaking.

There is some truly "hateful" racial shit in Hateful Eight... I think Tarantino likes to use these scenes to remind everyone about what many otherwise uplifted and nice white folks actually say when they are with "their own."

I mean, that whole scene where Tarantino himself rants about headless N+++++s and shit in Pulp Fiction is brutal to me too.... I did not and still do not think it nice....

but then again, Traantino always tries to show the equal assholeness of people, regardless of color, and the equal deviousness of people, regardless of color. Everyone in his films is a liar of sorts....

I agree. He portrays nearly all the white people in that film very negativity.

Agreed but he MILKS it. For example in Resevoir Dogs NOTHING in the film ever even remotely suggests that it is a problem or character flaw. Indeed if you didn't actually know Tarrantino you'd almost believe HE was racist for glorifying those characters flaws and all.. At least in Pulp Fiction we get the idea that the heroin dealer and that Jimmy are actually racist assholes (well less with Jimmy his wife was black but hey, maybe is one of those jungle love racists who actually sleeps with black people to demean them??)


I agree that IN ITS OWN CONTEXT AND TIME PERIOD it was a radical kind of film. BUT I just don't think it stands the the test of time. It has not validity outside of its own time period. Some films are both a product of their era and yet also timeless. I just don't think Resevoir Dogs fits the bill and so I can't possibly rank it above the other Tarrantino flicks which DO survive a time and era change. Pulp Fiction is as good and relevant now as it was groundbreaking in 1994. Kill Bill still kicks ass today as much as it did ten years ago!


Yes but again, its not the presence of racism itself, its how does the film USE racism as a device. What is its role and function in the film? In Resevoir Dogs again I just don't see the racism in those characters being vilified enough.. Sure we can say, "Hey they are cold blooded killers and assholes so duh they suck as people" BUT clearly the film is intending to be a gangster flick that GLORIFIES and romanticizes such assholes. So why have them ALSO be racist?? Its a clear mixed message and it irks me EVERY SINGLE TIME i watch it..



See my above comment about his exact scene. Indeed in that scene is one where i particularly think that Tarrantino didn't understand the nuance between how Sam Jackson says "nigga" and how his own cameo character Jimmy says "nigger".. Possibly when he wrote it he intended Jimmy to have an inflection and pronounce it "nigga" to imply that Jimmy and Jules were tight the way that Marceles calls Vince "my nigga"??

Its like The Game said, "The word nigga ain't nothing like nigger one is slang for my brother one is hanging dead take a picture.."


True but again the question is, what purpose does racism as a device serve in his films? In Inglorious Bastards its clear the racists are BAD. In Pulp Fiction its less clear but we see its not exactly good. But in Reservoir Dogs? The lines are too blurred...

I think you have too much of an emotional and experiential attachment to the film and aren't seeing it for what it is.. And hey, that is cool, I respect your personal sense of TASTE but when we are doing a quality comparison of his filmography? I think we need to separate our personal tastes from the overall quality of the work itself.

Now I personally think Pulp Fiction is one of MY ALL TIME FAVORITE flicks, period. BUT, I can also analyze and evaluate it based on its own merits as much as my own personal enjoyment of it

I concur with all that. I tend to give him the benefit of the doubt in that when he was doing Reservoir and writing true romance and natural born killers, he may have thought that it was an obvious thing that these asshole's racism is wrong, but it is NOT obvious, not when there is nothing in the story itself to show that to the audience....

It is used in Hateful Eight more intelligently, as there is the conflict of an ex-Rebel general and an ex-Union Major butting heads.....

Wait, I thought Natural Born Killers is Oliver Stone? Tarrantino worked on that? I ADORE that flick, it in my all time great films pantheon!

Tarantino WROTE it. He was to direct it but studio wanted a big name.

Stone said the script was so goddamn dope that he HAD to do it..

My honest opinion of why Reservoir Dogs was more overtly racist than the later flicks is I think Tarrantino himself realized he inaccurately used racism as a device, that the lines were too blurred, and he began to shift towards developing the plot and character development more clearly in the films. I think Pulp Fiction reflects that as again, "nigga" is generally used more than "nigger" and especially in the scene with the contrast between the experience of Butch and Vince with Marceles.. When Marceles asks Butch, "Are you my nigga?" I think its very clear that Butch interpreted that to mean "are you my nigger" as in "are you my bitch" because he clearly didn't like the situation and replied "it certainly appears so" whereas when Vince came in Marceles was like "Vincent Vega is in the house? My nigga" and Vince goes over and has a bromance moment!

I don't think Butch is any way a racist character, but what we see is that within the film itself Tarrantino acknowledges the cultural difference between "nigga" and "nigger".. That is what makes the Jimmy scene all the more perplexing! I mean, that interchange between the Butch and Vince scenes is seamless and flawless transition between the two different uses of the "same" word based on inflection and cultural sub-meaning...

My own personal feeling is that Jimmy meant to say "nigga" but was so damned nervous (as he clearly was flustered, the acting in that scene is BAD, and we have to imagine that was the "best" take since you know, films are edited for quality) he didn't pull it off and between all the bad takes that was the better of the mix and made the final cut.

And when Tarrantino reflects on it, he supposes, "Hey Jimmy has a black wife, Jules is his friend.." so the people will understand that Jimmy isn't really racist just slightly confused in his vocabulary and slang

Now that I think about it...

I wondered if Jimmy was "higher on the ladder" than Jules, or was closer to Marceles.

Jules looks a little uncomfortable. Because he's being chewed out?

Or is Jimmy taunting him? "Yeah, I said it. And you can't do shit. This is how I am venting my frustration at the situation."

That thought occurred to me a few times. It's certainly "nigger." Jimmy could just be trying to piss off Jules, without really being racist himself. Hence the wife?

There's an essay by bell hooks on this n-word subject worth looking up. Might do so myself since I haven't read it years.

I think Tarantino gets a but unfairly criticized, it feels like if he uses the N word in his movies or even with The Hateful Eight he was getting criticized for how violently Jennifer Jason Leigh's character gets treated and then people wonder if he's a misogynist when in Kill Bill all the female characters in that are much smarter and stronger than any of the male characters. If people are going to watch his films and count every time he uses a racial slur or has a character act violently towards a woman I think they are just looking for things to hate not just about his movies but him.

For the rest of his flicks i don't have a single problem but Reservoir Dogs feels gratuitous and not in anyway related or relevant to the plot or story. In flicks like Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown they "make sense" within the plot and who the characters are..

I see it a little differently. I think with Reservoir Dogs part of the point was to turn a fairly simple story on its ear. It's a pretty generic story, but it's written and executed with the artistry of an excellent ensemble stage drama. Others have mentioned how every scene was something new and unexpected, and I think the language factored into that. In 1993, there were racial issues that people just didn't touch. Not if they wanted to be successful. I think the language was a deliberate way to unsettle the audience and create a dialogue about the characters and the film, just as the "torture" scene did, and just as so many Tarantino films do.

I could be wrong though. But I saw it as another broken rule, and damned if it wasn't pretty fucking realistic. Not that I spend time with gangsters, but I've been around a lot of small town white guys, and they're at roughly the same level of intellectual development and cultural sensitivity.

Regarding DJANGO, one of the things I love about that film that I never heard anyone really talk about was the fact that the Christopher Waltz character could barely bring himself to use the word "nigger" even when he was in the midst of a long con to gain the trust of ruthless plantation owner types.

I mean, it was palpable. You could see it on his face... And he was the major moral compass of the film. The Yoda, the Gandalf, the Commissioner Gordon (sorry)... So it carried a lot of wait to see a white man who was almost physically pained by saying that word. A man who hated and loathed racism so much that he was willing to throw everything away just to avoid shaking the hand of the reprehensible Mr. Candy.

I think that was a deliberate move on Tarantino's part, to make not only the jeep but the true conscience of the film reject racism so completely, and at such a catastrophic cost. (Really, from the perspective of Django and his wife, it was kind of a dick move...) But it was "right" and it seemed to speak volumes about Tarantino's own racial conscience. In a way I think he was trying to make amends for his past "questionable" use of racial slurs.

By the way, here's my list:

1. Pulp Fiction (come on... It's like Apocalypse Now or Citizen Cane. It's just goddamn perfect. It made screenwriters the world over throw up their hands and say, "that's it, I'm out, there's no point anymore)
2. Kill Bill (volumes 1 and 2; they're inseparable. Taken as a whole, they're a masterpiece. I know it has a crazy cult following, but I still think it's his most underrated film. It has everything anyone could ever want out of a revenge epic. Brilliant and beautiful, and funny and absurd. Heartbreaking even... And not just because of the five-point palm exploding heart technique;) )
3. Jackie Brown/Django Unchained
4. Reservoir Dogs
5. Inglorious Bastards
6. Death proof (I actually haven't seen this one, which is why it's at the bottom. I forgot it existed. Keep meaning to see it, but .. meh)

I'm sure I'll like Hateful Eight just fine.

This book is a masterpiece. Dumas is one of the most original, innovative, and genius authors of all time. This novel remains my favorite novel ever and every time i read it i am as enthralled as i was the first time i read it in 6th grade! It is one of those novels that you simply HAVE to keep reading.

What i loved originally about this movie is that it is truly rare. Its one of few film renditions of novels that ACTUALLY does a great job of duplicating the experience of the novel. Indeed i remember when i first watched this movie it was almost identical to how i had imagined the novel in almost every detail. The actors truly pulled off the nuance and feel of the novel. The cinematography replicated the feeling of the narration of the novel.

And what was even more fantastical is that they filmed at almost every actual location from the novel. It blew my mind because i had accurately imagined all the setting even though i had never seen most of it until the film. I watched the behind the scenes, the producers explained that waspart of their intent and they went meticulously out of their way to film at all of the actual locations from the novel.

Watching it at random tonight years later every thing, both film and novel are exactly as i remember. And i really wish i had the time to read the book

And severian, rob, lifedistortion, about Tarrantino flicks, the beauty of art is WE ARE ALL right l. Art inherently reflects multiple perspectives and interpretations.

Too true.

Well, good art does. ;) I myself was extremely unsettled by the language in Reservoir Dogs... Not just the big N, but the big C, "faggot," and so on. It was jarring, possibly because I was pretty young when that film came out. But it still kind of punches at me when I watch the film now.

But in Pulp Fiction, regarding Jimmy's character, it strikes me as almost comic. Extremely comical actually. So in a way that might actually be more offensive. I'm not sure. But I to see Tarantino whining about the dead (cough) in his house is just hysterical. I still think it was meant to push buttons, perhaps with a little additional confidence from the reception Reservoir Dogs received. But Pulp Fiction is truly a black comedy (unfortunate phrase for the purposes of this conversation, but accurate) and I think because of the lightness and absurdity of the scene, it comes across as less vicious than it does in RD's.

I think Tarantino's entire career has been something of a story about one man's struggle to create an accurate depiction of race issues in film, throughout 2 decades during which the cultural conversation on race has changed so dramatically. He's never been one to take a politically correct stance on anything, at least not in his films, so I feel that Django Unchained was sort of his way of defining his views on racism once and for all.

I haven't seen the Hateful Eight. Maybe it's a regression, or maybe he thinks Django clarified his position and made it "ok" for him to return to a more grizzly, blasé use of racially charged language. I don't know. But indeed the reason I rank Django so highly (it might actually be above Jackie Brown now that I think on it) is because of the character of Dr. King Shultz, and Waltz's extraordinary performance, which earned every bit of the Oscar it received. Possibly the most moral character in the history of Tarantino's films.