Joined Dec 2005
Blade in Backwards
Forum Thread
A "Hey I just watched a movie" thread
April 23, 2010 at
06:49 PM
One of the other forums I go to has one of these threads and I've been turned on to some good movies that other regulars just watched. I was kind of surprised not to see a similar thread here (at least not that I could find.) 
I just rewatched "Kinamand" - a cute drama about a Danish plumber who gets involved in an arranged marriage with a Chinese illegal. Good stuff (Netflix instant.)
So what have you folks watched recently?
April 15, 2011, 3:13 am: System Notice: This thread has been automatically renewed after reaching a post limit. Most of its content has been moved to this thread for reference purposes.
I just rewatched "Kinamand" - a cute drama about a Danish plumber who gets involved in an arranged marriage with a Chinese illegal. Good stuff (Netflix instant.)
So what have you folks watched recently?
April 15, 2011, 3:13 am: System Notice: This thread has been automatically renewed after reaching a post limit. Most of its content has been moved to this thread for reference purposes.
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Awesome! This is one of those things that a kid will remember forever!
Then last night we finished off Ghost Rider (2007). I won't call it a great movie by any means, but after suffering through TPM it was an improvement. I liked Ghost Rider more than I did when I saw it at the theater way back in 2007.
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Do you have any links to share with us?
:edit: OK I viewed the older posts for this person....not a spammer at all. Leaving my cynical post on the board for all to see.
:edit: update....oooohhh my Monkey-senses were tingling...it was a spammer!!! Hot dog!
Dave
Dave
When a show fills you with a long-lasting urge to beat the entire cast senseless with garden tools, that's usually a bad sign. In this particular case, however, it's a bad sign.
...where was I? Oh yeah....
Not a movie, but it's a series that's available on DVD, so it almost counts. The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is one of those anime series that I think everybody has already watched except me, so I set out to join the rest of the video-watching world. It's a popular title with a big fan base, but somehow I managed to miss out on the warnings I know must be out there of what was really lying in wait for me.
Haruhi Suzumiya, the titular character, is a borderline (or maybe not so borderline) sociopath with a few minor delusions that generally don't interfere too much with her ability to live a semi-normal life. She is doubly fortunate in being both cute and perky, an important detail which keeps her from being murdered by the remaining cast within the first five minutes of each episode.
In what's basically a Twilight Zone episode turned into an animated series, her "delusions" are actually quite real and their main difference from reality is that they don't go far enough. (No more on that lest I spoil the series.)
Unexpectedly, as the series progresses, no romances begin to brew, we never see a glimpse of a hidden tender side, and there's not really any character progression or change, but it's generally entertaining nonetheless as Haruhi drags her associates along on various misadventures.
Or at least it remains entertaining through the first season. In the second episode of the second season, the cast becomes trapped in a "time loop" reminiscent of "Groudhog Day," except without the humor or funny parts and our characters forget everything when they get reset--so, learning nothing from history, they are doomed to repeat it.
And thus, season 2, episode 3, is a repeat of episode 2, with the same actions, dialog, inflection, etc....only the characters are wearing slightly different outfits and when they sit at a table in a restaurant, they sit in a different order.
Then episode 4 is a repeat of episode 2, with the same actions, dialog, inflection, etc....only the characters are wearing slightly different outfits and when they sit at a table in a restaurant, they sit in a different order.
Followed by episode 5 which is a repeat of episode 2, with the same actions, dialog, inflection, etc....only the characters are wearing slightly different outfits and when they sit at a table in a restaurant, they sit in a different order.
...you get the idea. This continues unabated all the way through and including episode 9 (of only 13 episodes in the season). Every few episodes there'll be something that hints at the possibility that they'll get out of the loop...but they don't. Absolutely nothing different happens.
Bill Murray was able to escape his time loop in 101 minutes (including credits). When Dr Who found himself trapped in a Chronic Hysteresis Loop, he had it tamed in under five minutes flat. Not so Haruhi and Co., who spend most of the season repeating the same episode over and over again.
The overwhelming question is "Why?" What sane production company would do something like this? Did they actually want their entire fan base to either vow never to watch again or just collapse, twitching, into a post-otakulyptic catatonic state? I admit, even I kept watching, convinced by my limited grasp of the finer points of screenwriting that, eventually, *something* would happen. There must be *some* kind of progression, some gradual revealing of clues, some revelations about the characters, *some* kind of character progression so that when they exit the loop, they have somehow gained from the experience--or at least been changed by it.
But that never happened. Not in the smallest, tiniest, most miniscule bit. The "joke" was all on the audience.
Eventually, they stopped repeating the same episode over and over again, and the season ends with the rather slow-paced behind-the-scenes adventure of making the student film Haruhi & Co shot that we saw at the beginning of the series.
Overall Rating: "Meh+" I enjoyed it mildly, at least the first season, but I remain baffled by the second...not with the plot or the events portrayed, but why someone would make it at all.
Overall Rating: "Meh+" I enjoyed it mildly, at least the first season, but I remain baffled by the second...not with the plot or the events portrayed, but why someone would make it at all.
That said, I'm not sure on what planet any anime is so mainstream as to be called something the entire video community has already watched, but I know I kinda wanna torture myself with this series... and I don't even like anime. Either that, or like "Curb Your Enthusiasm" I just enjoy the synopsis while I could never actually watch the show.
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