quote:

Originally posted by djkopernikus Haven't seen a finnish movie yet which I can recommend...

I was going to say Trollhunter, but that's Norway


Stuff lately
The Accountant, didn't much like it and sort of zoned out about halfway through
Blair Witch, not great 'jump scare' movie, which I guess did ok for it, but wasn't exactly horror.
Sicario, wow this was a full on movie. It also has a soundtrack which is excellent
Spectral, fairly good for a low budget sci-fi and interesting enough to be engaging
13hours, interesting enough if you like action movies
Star Trek Beyond- its bad, just don't

Rogue One, dressed up my smallest kitten as a jedi to hang out with the other nerd kids and I think they all enjoyed whacking each other with plastic light-bats in the foyer more than the film. Its a little more adult oriented than the other movies which isn't bad.
Dressing up as princess leia to play along with them, maybe not the best idea

quote:

Originally posted by Lira Looks interesting, will do By the way, is there a Finnish film you'd recommend? I've seen some Swedish flicks, but I don't think I've ever seen a movie by a Finn...

There's a really good reason nobody's seen Finnish movies, though - they suck. Even we don't watch them.

___________________
Latest releases:
Endless Cycles [Capital Heaven]
The Charlatan [Morphosis]

I really enjoyed Rogue One. It had some flaws and it took a while to hit its stride, but by the end I was fully won over. Definitely the first modern Star Wars film to live up to the original trilogy. It also made me realise that a lot of the stuff everyone praised The Force Awakens for doing - namely, looking and feeling like Star Wars - wasn't actually that noteworthy. Rogue One felt closer to the originals than TFA, and managed to achieve it without imitating A New Hope scene-by-scene in a bullshit postmodern pseudo-remake stylee.

___________________
Mixes:
> Higher Peaks [Progressive House]
> Dance:Love:Hub Afterparty (The Return) 23.11.24
> Surface Tension [Progressive Trance]
> Back To Deep [Deep Trippy House]
> Terra Nova [Modern Progressive Trance]

If you enjoy any of these sets and want to hear me live, I'll be playing a 2 hour progressive trance set at Basing House in Shoreditch, London on 11th October.
I'm also a resident at our bi-monthly party Kibosh in Manchester: https://www.instagram.com/kibosh.mcr/

quote:

Originally posted by SYSTEM-J I really enjoyed Rogue One. It had some flaws and it took a while to hit its stride, but by the end I was fully won over. Definitely the first modern Star Wars film to live up to the original trilogy. It also made me realise that a lot of the stuff everyone praised The Force Awakens for doing - namely, looking and feeling like Star Wars - wasn't actually that noteworthy. Rogue One felt closer to the originals than TFA, and managed to achieve it without imitating A New Hope scene-by-scene in a bullshit postmodern pseudo-remake stylee.

totally agree and i don't get some of the negative comparisons to 7 at all. it's pretty hard to do something genuinely risky in SW since we've still got a fair way to go before any film couldn't turn a profit, but i thought rogue made some (relative) ballsy choices. the lack of opening crawl was pretty massive imo and instantly told the audience this film would be a bit different.

my only complaints were vader's appalling voice effects and the music score. but i have a james earl jones (and jedi) obsession so am probably being a bit harsh.

___________________

Agreed on both counts. Vader was voiced by James Earl Jones but sounded completely different to the original films. I would have liked more of the original score as well.

It definitely wasn't perfect. The opening 20 minutes in particular were pretty bumpy. A lot of rapid chopping and changing between planets and a slew of introductions to characters, some of whom I still didn't know the name of by the end of the film. There are also a couple of minor plot hang-ups throughout the story if you pay close attention. For a film with so much money thrown at it, these are rough edges you'd expect to have been smoothed down.

With that said, once it built up a head of steam it just went from strength to strength. The last hour was pure Star Wars pornography for the type of fan (like me) who'd spend his childhood imagining huge space battles between Star Destroyers and Mon Calamari cruisers, or AT-ATs rampaging across alien landscapes. I expect The Force Awakens and its cuddly young adult characters played better with the kind of touchy-feely dipshit who always wanted to dress up in costumes and pretend to waft a light-sabre around while using Jedi mind tricks on bullies.

I've noticed recently that established film critics seem to be getting increasingly out of line with science fiction fans I know and trust personally. Everyone I know thought Rogue One pissed all over TFA, and yet the latter had a much better critical reception. Similarly (and on the subject of new films) the critics lathered Arrival with praise as big, thoughtful science fiction, and yet all the SF fans I've spoken to agreed with my opinion that it was a load of pretentious, vacuous dogshit.

___________________
Mixes:
> Higher Peaks [Progressive House]
> Dance:Love:Hub Afterparty (The Return) 23.11.24
> Surface Tension [Progressive Trance]
> Back To Deep [Deep Trippy House]
> Terra Nova [Modern Progressive Trance]

If you enjoy any of these sets and want to hear me live, I'll be playing a 2 hour progressive trance set at Basing House in Shoreditch, London on 11th October.
I'm also a resident at our bi-monthly party Kibosh in Manchester: https://www.instagram.com/kibosh.mcr/

quote:

Originally posted by Lilith I was going to say Trollhunter, but that's Norway

The Autopsy of Jane Doe is by the same director. Watched that the other day too and it was good! One of the better horror picks I've seen on Netflix in some time.

quote:

Originally posted by Lira By the way, is there a Finnish film you'd recommend? I've seen some Swedish flicks, but I don't think I've ever seen a movie by a Finn...

Will a "documentary" do?

quote:

Originally posted by SYSTEM-J It definitely wasn't perfect. The opening 20 minutes in particular were pretty bumpy. A lot of rapid chopping and changing between planets and a slew of introductions to characters, some of whom I still didn't know the name of by the end of the film. There are also a couple of minor plot hang-ups throughout the story if you pay close attention. For a film with so much money thrown at it, these are rough edges you'd expect to have been smoothed down. With that said, once it built up a head of steam it just went from strength to strength. The last hour was pure Star Wars pornography for the type of fan (like me) who'd spend his childhood imagining huge space battles between Star Destroyers and Mon Calamari cruisers, or AT-ATs rampaging across alien landscapes.

Well given that Edwards had really only directed a handful of medium, and one big budget films in his entire career, I don't think it was ever going to be perfection.

It was further complicated by the fact the studio hated his first cut, and then demanded 40% of the scenes reshot, and that's probably why the film is a little disjointed in flow. For commercial reasons (i.e. making the biggest year in revenue for any studio in history for BV) they coulnd't push back the release date and apparently only just made the deadlines for the final cut of the film. I have no doubt we'll eventually get a director's cut with the CGI faces fixed and a better edit.

quote:

Originally posted by SYSTEM-J I expect The Force Awakens and its cuddly young adult characters played better with the kind of touchy-feely dipshit who always wanted to dress up in costumes and pretend to waft a light-sabre around while using Jedi mind tricks on bullies.

Absolutely right; in fairness to Abrams though, he was primarily concerned about getting the "tone" right, which given the pressure on him to deliver a sequel of the biggest franchise in history was no small task, and he did deliver a good movie.

quote:

Originally posted by SYSTEM-J I've noticed recently that established film critics seem to be getting increasingly out of line with science fiction fans I know and trust personally. Everyone I know thought Rogue One pissed all over TFA, and yet the latter had a much better critical reception. Similarly (and on the subject of new films) the critics lathered Arrival with praise as big, thoughtful science fiction, and yet all the SF fans I've spoken to agreed with my opinion that it was a load of pretentious, vacuous dogshit.

Don't forget the payola that happens with Critics. While the ones worth their salt will not call a turd a rose, they can be easily swayed to say an average/good film is incredible, and with TFA, the marketing pressure was probably intense. I've seen instances where a a major studio's film was crap, they did press screenings and there was a an agreement that if nothing nice was to be said then it wasn't said at all. One fairly well known critic broke the embargo two days before release and there was an out and out war between the studio and the critic. It resulted in that critic basically being blacklisted from most press screenings and film festivals and the sad part was, he was absolutely right, the film was dogshit but it cost the studio nothing to make and there was a lot of hype around it so they stood to make a nice profit.

Similar thing happened to the girl with the dragon tattoo.

I think more than ever, you're seeing a disconnect between critics and well educated fans opinion and I reckon it has a lot to do with marketing and money towards the former.

I'm aware of all the re-shoot blather, but from what I've read it's the film's ending that wasn't coming together very well, and that ultimately turned out to be the strongest act.

With that said, I can definitely believe there was more material from the opening scenes that was cut out, as these scenes really aren't edited very well and the pacing is a bit off. The film finds its rhythm once they set off on their mission and touch down on the planet of Jehda. I think the problem is that there's a lot of characters and plot devices that need putting in their place, in a story that takes place on numerous different planets, in order to get the ball rolling.

I suspect some slightly tidier writing in the script could have got some of this information across better. Did we really need to cut to Jedha to see Riz Ahmed's character being manhandled about, for example? While his character has his own little arc which can be considered thematically relevant, it's fairly lightweight in the overall picture and I would have pared him right down so he's introduced to the audience at the same time as he is to the protagonists. It's one of those instances where as a writer you sometimes have to sacrifice some of your message for the sake of smoother storytelling.

___________________
Mixes:
> Higher Peaks [Progressive House]
> Dance:Love:Hub Afterparty (The Return) 23.11.24
> Surface Tension [Progressive Trance]
> Back To Deep [Deep Trippy House]
> Terra Nova [Modern Progressive Trance]

If you enjoy any of these sets and want to hear me live, I'll be playing a 2 hour progressive trance set at Basing House in Shoreditch, London on 11th October.
I'm also a resident at our bi-monthly party Kibosh in Manchester: https://www.instagram.com/kibosh.mcr/

quote:

Originally posted by SYSTEM-J Agreed on both counts. Vader was voiced by James Earl Jones but sounded completely different to the original films.

vader sounds subtly different between all 3 originals, with jedi being (imo) easily the best. in rogue one though, jones just sounds like an old man with very little effects work at all? i've seen people justify this by saying he sounds closer to a new hope this way, but even if that were true (and i don't think that it is), i think SFX continuities are really dumb. i suspect they just dropped the ball here (or are just not as vader-voice obssessed as some ).

quote:

Originally posted by SYSTEM-J I would have liked more of the original score as well.

yeah it was pretty lacklustre across the board. i get that they wanted to do things differently and i realise that playing the same half-dozen tracks for 40 years works against that, but even the phantom menace had a decent new theme i quite liked.

quote:

Originally posted by SYSTEM-J It definitely wasn't perfect. The opening 20 minutes in particular were pretty bumpy. A lot of rapid chopping and changing between planets and a slew of introductions to characters, some of whom I still didn't know the name of by the end of the film. There are also a couple of minor plot hang-ups throughout the story if you pay close attention. For a film with so much money thrown at it, these are rough edges you'd expect to have been smoothed down. With that said, once it built up a head of steam it just went from strength to strength. The last hour was pure Star Wars pornography for the type of fan (like me) who'd spend his childhood imagining huge space battles between Star Destroyers and Mon Calamari cruisers, or AT-ATs rampaging across alien landscapes. I expect The Force Awakens and its cuddly young adult characters played better with the kind of touchy-feely dipshit who always wanted to dress up in costumes and pretend to waft a light-sabre around while using Jedi mind tricks on bullies. I've noticed recently that established film critics seem to be getting increasingly out of line with science fiction fans I know and trust personally. Everyone I know thought Rogue One pissed all over TFA, and yet the latter had a much better critical reception. Similarly (and on the subject of new films) the critics lathered Arrival with praise as big, thoughtful science fiction, and yet all the SF fans I've spoken to agreed with my opinion that it was a load of pretentious, vacuous dogshit.

well im not much of a film critic as you know, but i've moved away from movies as i think tv has been providing much better scifi/fantasy products for a while now (prometheus was the last straw for me, christ).

rogue one managed what TFA couldn't though- referencing the original trilogy without being a poor, "greatest hits" knock-off.

___________________

Girl on the train. Geez this was boring as fuck. Watched 20mins and that was it.

___________________
mattiollikainen.blogspot.com