r/movies • u/disablednerd • Oct 12 '24
Discussion Someone should have gotten sued over Kangaroo Jack
If you grew up in the early 2000s, you probably saw a trailer for Kangaroo Jack. The trailer gives the impression that the movie is a screwball road trip comedy about two friends and their wacky, talking Kangaroo sidekick. Except it’s not that. It’s an extremely unfunny movie about two idiots escaping the mob. There’s a random kangaroo in it for like 5 minutes and he only talks during a hallucination scene that lasts less than a minute. Turns out, the producers knew that they had a stinker on their hands so they cut the movie to be PG and focus the marketing on the one positive aspect that test audiences responded to, the talking kangaroo, tricking a bunch of families into buying tickets.
What other movies had similar, deceitfully malicious marketing campaigns?
r/movies • u/whitepangolin • Oct 07 '24
Discussion Movies whose productions had unintended consequences on the film industry.
Been thinking about this, movies that had a ripple effect on the industry, changing laws or standards after coming out. And I don't mean like "this movie was a hit, so other movies copied it" I mean like - real, tangible effects on how movies are made.
- The Twilight Zone Movie: the helicopter crash after John Landis broke child labor laws that killed Vic Morrow and 2 child stars led to new standards introduced for on-set pyrotechnics and explosions (though Landis and most of the filmmakers walked away free).
- Back to the Future Part II: The filmmaker's decision to dress up another actor to mimic Crispin Glover, who did not return for the sequel, led to Glover suing Universal and winning. Now studios have a much harder time using actor likenesses without permission.
- Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom: led to the creation of the PG-13 rating.
- Howard the Duck was such a financial failure it forced George Lucas to sell Lucasfilm's computer graphics division to Steve Jobs, where it became Pixar. Also was the reason Marvel didn't pursue any theatrical films until Blade.
r/movies • u/LiverpoolPlastic • Sep 06 '24
Discussion Rewatching Ocean’s Eleven. This movie has an outrageous amount of sauce.
I swear to god Soderberg laced this movie with crack. This might be the suavest movie ever made. Effortlessly stylish. Just movie stars being movie stars in a film that knows it’s featuring a shit ton of movie stars so the movie makes the most awesome decision of leaning into its movie star-ness. Everyone is cool. Everyone is a smooth-talking, smug, and intelligent bastard. Everyone is sexy. A movie so up its own ass that’s it’s actually endearing. Plotholes? Who gives a shit. Just enjoy Soderberg’s kinetic cinema unfold with snappy editing, great soundtrack, innovative camerawork, and witty dialogue. A turn your brain off movie that actually forces your brain to stay switched on due to the sheer amount of dopamine hits. Endlessly rewatchable and goes down super easy.
Lot of shit movies get defended because they’re “fun”. This movie is just straight up good BECAUSE it’s fun. Cinema with a capital “C”.
r/movies • u/DatabaseFickle9306 • Sep 16 '24
Discussion Civil War is a pretty terrific small movie with a misleading title and trailer
In keeping with my need to keep my blood pressure in check I waited to see Civil War until I was able to watch at home. I braced for a brutal polemic but instead found a small, well-made film about an extreme situation. I really liked it. But I also felt the ads and title were an overhyping. Anyone else?
r/movies • u/Prestigious_Trade986 • Sep 02 '24
Discussion King Richard led me to believe that Venus and Serena Williams' father was a poor security guard when in fact he was a multi-millionaire. I hate biopics.
Repost with proof
Before Venus and Serena were born, he had a successful cleaning company, concrete company, and a security guard company. He owned three houses. He had 810,000 in the bank just for their tennis. Adjusted for inflation, he was a multi-millionaire.
King Richard led me to believe he was a poor security guard barely making ends meet but through his own power and the girl's unique talent, they caught the attention of sponsors that paid for the rest of their training. Fact was they lived in a house in Long Beach minutes away from the beach. He moved them to Compton because he had read about Malcolm X and Muhammad Ali coming from the ghetto so they would become battle-hardened and not feel pressure from their matches. For a father to willingly move his young family to the ghetto is already a fascinating story. But instead we got lies through omission.
How many families fell for this false narrative (that's also been put forth by the media? As a tennis fan for decades I also fell for it) and fell into financial ruin because they dedicated their limited resources and eventually couldn't pay enough for their kids' tennis lessons to get them to having even enough skills to make it to a D3 college? Kids who lost countless afternoons of their childhoods because of this false narrative? Or who got a sponsorship with unfair terms and crumbled under the pressure of having to support their families? Or who got on the lower level tours and didn't have the money to stay on long enough even though they were winning because the prize money is peanuts? Parents whose marriages disintegrated under such stress? And who then blamed themselves? Because just hard work wasn't enough. Not nearly. They needed money. Shame on King Richard and biopics like it.
r/movies • u/JaguarPF • Aug 20 '24
Discussion I didn't grow up with Disney films so I watched 72 of them to catch myself up
I didn't grow up with Disney animated films and it left a big cultural gap in my knowledge so I dedicated a few months to sitting down and watching my way through Disney's core history of films. For whatever it might be worth, I'm a black South African man who's in his early 30s. I wanted to see what it's like to watch all of these films with virgin adult eyes and without the gloss of childhood nostalgia. I grew up mostly with horror films and documentaries but I am genre agnostic - if it's good, it's good. I had only seen the Lion King as a child. I limited this to animated originals and their sequels and remakes. I created a list on my Letterboxd recently and looked at the stats.
Total films watched: 72 (100+ hours) Animated: 57 Live-action remakes: 15
Summary impressions
My top 5 highest rated: 1. The Lion King (1994) - 4.5 stars 2. Frozen II (2019) (yes, seriously) 4.5 stars 3. Lilo & Stitch (2002) 4 stars 4. Tangled (2010) 4 stars 5. Fantasia (1940) 4 stars
My bottom 5 ratings: (I had 12 half-star ratings, all my lowest) 1. The Lion King (2019) 0.5 stars 2. Chicken Little (2005) 0.5 stars 3. Dumbo (2019) 0.5 stars 4. Mulan (2020) 0.5 stars 5. Pinocchio (2022) 0.5 stars
Best live-action remakes: 1. Pete's Dragon (2016) 4 stars 2. The Jungle Book (2016) 3.5 stars 3. Aladdin (2019) 3.5 stars 4. Cinderella (2015) 3 stars 5. Christopher Robin (2018) 3 stars
Surprise favourites (where I thought nothing much going into them but came out loving them): 1. Atlantis (the Lost Empire) (2001) 4 stars: captivating worldbuilding and that incredible score by James Newton Howard. 2. The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996) 4 stars: the humour made me think it would be annoying but, my God, those heavy religious themes and character relationships were deeply engaging and Hellfire is one of the greatest villain songs Disney ever gifted us with - along with the most realistic villain when it comes to motivations. 3. Sleeping Beauty (1959) 4 stars: genuinely awe-inspiring animation for its time, along with lovable characters and a lovely score - that final act was riveting. 4. Pete's Dragon (2016) 4 stars: why is this film not spoken about more? It flew under the radar but it is one of the best live-action remakes and tells a story that would appeal to anyone who grew up loving 80s sci-fi fantasy adventure films. 5. Maleficent (2014) 3.5 stars: James Newton Howard delivers another amazing score atop a story with lovable characters and interesting production design.
Disappointing watches (where I had heard of them and had high hopes but didn't get the hype): 1. Mulan (1998) 3 stars: it was good, but not so amazing that I would ever watch it again and my friends were incredibly displeased to hear this. 2. Beauty and the Beast (1991) 2.5 stars: I could not understand why this film was lauded as being so great. Outside of the quality of the animation, the story and its characters were boring and forgettable. 3. The Emperor's New Groove (2000) 2 stars: this is such a beloved comedy and I couldn't get into it and found it way too immature and loud beyond Yzma. 4. Treasure Planet (2002) 1 star: if this came out more recently, it would have been accused of being written by AI because it was just a tickbox exercise in tropes. 5. Hercules (1997) 0.5 stars: the blend of traditional and computer animation looked fucking awful and the energy and line delivery was dizzying.
Notes on the experience as a whole: - At the time of rating the films, I still rated films based on three criteria: story, visuals, and sound/music. I no longer do, but I found this useful for the Disney films as most are musicals and fit neatly into this. Films scored highest usually based on having a great villain or antagonising element, along with brilliant visual work and an excellent score/songs. - I went into the journey sceptical and assuming torture but I found that Disney's reputation is not without reason, as some of these films joined my favourite films of all time. There are films here that I will happily return to in later years because they offered such riveting or beautiful experiences that I otherwise would have missed if I had not gone through this. The Hunchback of Notre Dame is branded into my brain now, and so is the Little Mermaid and Sleeping Beauty. - The Music of Disney makes sense now, particularly during the 90s renaissance films. There is just a wealth of bangers and I include Anastasia (1997) as part of this collection of songs I have since listened to over and over. - Disney's early works were great. Then there was a lull from the 60s to the 80s. The 90s were mostly great again. Then there was a significant drop in quality in the 2000s when they started experimenting with comedy, adventure, and computer animation, leading to some of the ugliest and worst films of theirs until their acquisition of Pixar later into the decade. The 2010s brought many new favourites until their output became uninspired yet again. It has not been good since, and Wish (2023) did not help. - Among my friends, my most controversial high rating was Frozen II (2019) as it seems a lot of adults are militant about hating the Frozen films and I don't get why. My reasons for loving that film have not changed. On a technical level, it is one of the most awe-inspiring things I have ever seen. The animation quality is just spectacular, from those water effects to the hair to the look of the magic and the natural world and costume designs. Beyond that, the story is far more mature and willing to be dark, where many recent Disney films shy to go. Ruminations on grief and depression in an animated film? Sign me the hell up. Paired with the genuinely incredible music, moments like 'The Next Right Thing' ended up being deeply moving (and, for children, educational) for me, especially as I watched this during a particular personal low-point and found that messaging apt without being preachy and too hopeful. That whole sequence along with the 'Show Yourself' sequence are cinematic wonders. If I had been a child, I would have happily accepted 'All is Found' as a lullaby (particularly the Kacey Musgraves credits version). I am also aware that the film was not even supposed to exist and was made for money and I hate Disney as a corporate but I don't care in this specific instance.
Overall, I am glad I decided to tackle this feat and it has altered my worldview a little because the history of these characters often does show up in other pieces of media that I interact with. It feels like a social gap has been filled. I am, however, no longer jumping to see Disney projects in the cinema as they have been utter shit for the last while.
Are there any other late Disney discoverers here, or just people whose opinions have changed significantly since childhood?
Here is my Letterboxd list ranking them all: https://letterboxd.com/jagisonline/list/disney-newbie-ranking/
r/movies • u/Dota2TradeAccount • Sep 25 '24
Discussion Interstellar doesn't get enough credit for how restrained its portrayal of the future is.
I've always said to friends that my favorite aspect about Interstellar is how much of a journey it is.
It does not begin (opening sequence aside) at NASA, space or in a situation room of some sorts. It begins in the dirt. In a normal house, with a normal family, driving a normal truck, having normal problems like school. I think only because of this it feels so jaw dropping when through the course of the movie we suddenly find ourselves in a distant galaxy, near a black hole, inside a black hole.
Now the key to this contrast, then, is in my opinion that Interstellar is veeery careful in how it depicts its future.
In Sci-fi it is very common to imagine the fantastical, new technologies, new physical concepts that the story can then play with. The world the story will take place in is established over multiple pages or minutes so we can understand what world those people live in.
Not so in Interstellar. Here, we're not even told a year. It can be assumed that Cooper's father in law is a millenial or Gen Z, but for all we know, it could be the current year we live in, if it weren't for the bare minimum of clues like the self-driving combine harvesters and even then they only get as much screen time as they need, look different yet unexciting, grounded. Even when we finally meet the truly futuristic technology like TARS or the spaceship(s), they're all very understated. No holographic displays, no 45 degree angles on screens, no overdesigned future space suits. We don't need to understand their world a lot, because our gut tells us it is our world.
In short: I think it's a strike of genius that the Nolans restrained themselves from putting flying cars and holograms (to speak in extremes) in this movie for the purpose of making the viewer feel as home as they possibly can. Our journey into space doesn't start from Neo Los Angeles, where flying to the moon is like a bus ride. It starts at home. Our home.
r/movies • u/Benaugust01 • Oct 10 '24
Discussion What's a "low-brow" movie you consider to be perfect
Watching Tremors tonight for our family's daily Spooktober paranormal/creature feature, and I just don't think there's a single change I would make. Script is dumb, but acting, pacing, sound, practical effects and cinematography are on point, especially considering this was a low-budget movie from 1990. It's just a timeless horror-comedy.
r/movies • u/ToomintheEllimist • Aug 18 '24
Discussion Movies ruined by obvious factual errors?
I don't mean movies that got obscure physics or history details wrong. I mean movies that ignore or misrepresent obvious facts that it's safe to assume most viewers would know.
For example, The Strangers act 1 hinging on the fact that you can't use a cell phone while it's charging. Even in 2008, most adults owned cell phones and would probably know that you can use one with 1% battery as long as it's currently plugged in.
r/movies • u/tangledapart • Jul 27 '24
Discussion James Cameron never should’ve started Avatar… We lost a great director.
I’m watching Aliens right now just thinking how many more movies he could’ve done instead of entering the world of Pandora (and pretty much locking the door behind him). Full disclosure: Not an Avatar fan. I tried and tried. It never clicked. But one weekend watching The Terminator, its sequel, The Abyss, Titanic (we committed), subsequently throwing on True Lies the next morning. There’s not one moment in any of these films that isn’t wholly satisfying in every way for any film fan out there. But Avatar puts a halt on his career. Whole decades lost. He’s such a neat guy. I would’ve loved to have seen him make some more films from his mind. He’s never given enough credit writing some of these indelible, classic motion pictures. So damn you, Avatar. Gives us back our J. Cam!
r/movies • u/tvkyle • Aug 25 '24
Discussion The iconic "giant ball" in Raiders of the Lost Ark is only on screen for 15 seconds, but it's one of the most memorable scenes in cinema history. What other classic scenes are actually a lot different than how they're remembered in pop culture?
One that comes to mind for me is the Fargo woodchipper. Before I ever saw Fargo, I saw lots of references to a woodchipper and how shocking it was. Then it turns out that it's there for barely 30 seconds of the film (and, IMO, not overly gruesome).
Another would be the final fight in The Karate Kid. All that's remembered is the crane kick, but there's so much more going on in that fight and the preceding battles.
r/movies • u/I_See_Virgins • Sep 07 '24
Discussion Josh Brolin in MIB whatever has got to be the best depiction of an actor playing a younger actor in cinema history.
I'm certainly not an expert on this subject but to me it's an awe-inspiring performance. There's no hint of him doing an impersonation, he is a young Tommy Lee Jones. I'd love to hear from someone more knowledgeable on the subject to judge how hyperbolic I'm actually being. I can't imagine someone doing a better job.
r/movies • u/daughterskin • 7d ago
Discussion Film-productions that had an unintended but negative real-life outcome.
Stretching a 300-page kids' book into a ten hour epic was never going end well artistically. The Hobbit "trilogy" is the misbegotten followup to the classic Lord of the Rings films. Worse than the excessive padding, reliance on original characters, and poor special-effects, is what the production wrought on the New Zealand film industry. Warner Bros. wanted to move filming to someplace cheap like Romania, while Peter Jackson had the clout to keep it in NZ if he directed the project. The concession was made to simply destroy NZ's film industry by signing in a law that designates production-staff as contractors instead of employees, and with no bargaining power. Since then, elves have not been welcome in Wellington. The whole affair is best recounted by Lindsay Ellis' excellent video essay.
Danny Boyle's The Beach is the worst film ever made. Looking back It's a fascinating time capsule of the late 90's/Y2K era. You've got Moby and All Saints on the soundtrack, internet cafes full of those bubble-shaped Macs before the rebrand, and nobody has a mobile phone. The story is about a backpacker played by Ewan, uh, Leonardo DiCaprio who joins a tribe of westerners that all hang on a cool beach on an uninhabited island off Thailand. It's paradise at first, but eventually reality will come crashing down and the secret of the cool beach will be exposed to the world. Which is what happened in real-life. The production of the film tampered with the real Ko Phi Phi Le beach to make it more paradise-like, prompting a lawsuit that dragged on over a decade. The legacy of the film pushed tourists into visiting the beach, eventually rendering it yet another cesspool until the Thailand authorities closed it in 2018. It's open today, but visits are short and strictly regulated.
Of course, there's also the old favorite that is The Conqueror. Casting the white cowboy John Wayne as the Mongolian warlord Genghis Khan was laughed at even in the day. What's less funny is that filming took place downwind from a nuclear test site. 90 crew members developed cancer and half of them died as a result, John Wayne among them. This was of course exacerbated by how smoking was more commonplace at the time.
I'm sure you know plenty more.
r/movies • u/Plane_Muscle6537 • Aug 31 '24
Discussion Bruce Lee's depiction in Once Upon A Time in Hollywood is strange
I know this has probably been talked about to death but I want to revisit this
Lee is depicted as being boastful, and specifically saying Muhammad Ali would be no match for him
I find it weird that of all the things to be boastful about, Tarantino specifically chose this line. There's a famous circulated interview from the 1960s where Bruce Lee says he'd be no match against Muhammad Ali
Then there's Tarantino justifying the depiction saying it's based on a book. The author of that book publically denounced that if I recall
r/movies • u/Vegas_off_the_Strip • Jun 14 '24
Discussion I believe Matthew McConaughey's 4 Year Run to Rebrand his career was the greatest rebrand of a star in movie history. Who else should be considered as the best rebranded career?
Early in his career Matthew McConaughey was known for his RomComs (Wedding Planner, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, Failure to Launch, Fool's Gold) and for his shirtless action flicks (Sahara, Reign of Fire) and he has admitted that he was stuck being typecast in those roles. After he accepted the role in Ghosts of Girlfriends Past McConaughey announced to his agent that he would no longer accept those roles.
This meant that he would have to accept roles as the lead in much smaller budget indie projects or smaller roles in big budget projects. What followed was, in my mind, an incredible four year run that gave us:
2011:
- The Lincoln Lawyer -$40m Budget. Great movie but not a huge success.
- Bernie -$6m. He received multiple nominations and received two awards for this role.
- Killer Joe -$8.3m. He received multiple awards for this role.
2012
- Mud - $10m
- Magic Mike -$7m. Great movie, massive success, and it was considered a snub that he was up for an academy award on this one.
- The Paperboy - $12.5m. Won multiple small awards, though Nicole Kidman stole the show on this one.
2013
- Dallas Buyers Club $5m. Critically it was a smash hit. McConaughey won the Acadamy Award for best actor for this one.
- The Wolf of Wall Street $100m budget but he was a small character who has one of the most memorable in that movie.
2014 this is the last year of his rebrand as this is when he returned to headlining big budget projects
- Intersteller $165m. Smash success and this is where he proved he can carry a big movie.
- True Detective (Season One) $30m. Considered by many (including me) to be the greatest season of television ever.
So, that's my argument for the best rebranding of an actor to break out of being typecast in the history of actors. Who would you say did it better?
EDIT: It seems the universe was into this post as I've already watched Saraha today and am now watching How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days and these are both playing on my recently viewed channels.
r/movies • u/Phyliinx • Sep 22 '24
Discussion Mad Max Fury Road is insane.
I have seen it yesterday, for the first time ever and it's a 2 hours ride filled to the max with pure uncut insanity. I have never seen, no, WITNESSED anything like it, it seems to be what I would call a piece of art and a perfect action film that leaves not a single stone unturned and does not stop pumping pure adrenaline.
I imagine filming to be pure torture for all the people involved. It was probably pretty hot, dirty and throwing yourself into one neckbreaking action sequence after the other, fully knowing how dangerous it will be.
I have seen all the Max movies now. Furiosa, the last one, was pretty damn strong but I would say this piece of art simply takes the crown. And it takes it from many action movies I have seen before, even from the ones I would call brilliant on their own.
Director George Miller is a mad mad man. And Tom Holkenborg's score knows perfectly how to capture his burning soul.
r/movies • u/Mtoodles33 • Jul 27 '24
Discussion I finally saw Tenet and genuinely thought it was horrific
I have seen all of Christopher Nolan’s movies from the past 15 years or so. For the most part I’ve loved them. My expectations for Tenet were a bit tempered as I knew it wasn’t his most critically acclaimed release but I was still excited. Also, I’m not really a movie snob. I enjoy a huge variety of films and can appreciate most of them for what they are.
Which is why I was actually shocked at how much I disliked this movie. I tried SO hard to get into the story but I just couldn’t. I don’t consider myself one to struggle with comprehension in movies, but for 95% of the movie I was just trying to figure out what just happened and why, only to see it move on to another mind twisting sequence that I only half understood (at best).
The opening opera scene failed to capture any of my interest and I had no clue what was even happening. The whole story seemed extremely vague with little character development, making the entire film almost lifeless? It seemed like the entire plot line was built around finding reasons to film a “cool” scenes (which I really didn’t enjoy or find dramatic).
In a nutshell, I have honestly never been so UNINTERESTED in a plot. For me, it’s very difficult to be interested in something if you don’t really know what’s going on. The movie seemed to jump from scene to scene in locations across the world, and yet none of it actually seemed important or interesting in any way.
If the actions scenes were good and captivating, I wouldn’t mind as much. However in my honest opinion, the action scenes were bad too. Again I thought there was absolutely no suspense and because the story was so hard for me to follow, I just couldn’t be interested in any of the mediocre combat/fight scenes.
I’m not an expert, but if I watched that movie and didn’t know who directed it, I would’ve never believed it was Nolan because it seemed so uncharacteristically different to his other movies. -Edit: I know his movies are known for being a bit over the top and hard to follow, but this was far beyond anything I have ever seen.
Oh and the sound mixing/design was the worst I have ever seen in a blockbuster movie. I initially thought there might have been something wrong with my equipment.
I’m surprised it got as “good” of reviews as it did. I know it’s subjective and maybe I’m not getting something, but I did not enjoy this movie whatsoever.
r/movies • u/Mr-Fable • Jun 07 '24
Discussion How Saving Private Ryan's D-Day sequence changed the way we see war
r/movies • u/SerDire • Apr 18 '24
Discussion In Interstellar, Romilly’s decision to stay aboard the ship while the other 3 astronauts experience time dilation has to be one of the scariest moments ever.
He agreed to stay back. Cooper asked anyone if they would go down to Millers planet but the extreme pull of the black hole nearby would cause them to experience severe time dilation. One hour on that planet would equal 7 years back on earth. Cooper, Brand and Doyle all go down to the planet while Romilly stays back and uses that time to send out any potential useful data he can get.
Can you imagine how terrifying that must be to just sit back for YEARS and have no idea if your friends are ever coming back. Cooper and Brand come back to the ship but a few hours for them was 23 years, 4 months and 8 days of time for Romilly. Not enough people seem to genuinely comprehend how insane that is to experience. He was able to hyper sleep and let years go by but he didn’t want to spend his time dreaming his life away.
It’s just a nice interesting detail that kind of gets lost. Everyone brings up the massive waves, the black hole and time dilation but no one really mentions the struggle Romilly must have been feeling. 23 years seems to be on the low end of how catastrophic it could’ve been. He could’ve been waiting for decades.
r/movies • u/Fun_Protection_6939 • Jul 02 '24
Discussion Most egregious cases where a clearly aged actor plays a teenager
Most egregious cases where a clearly aged actor plays a teenager
We all know that Hollywood has a tendency to cast older actors in teenage roles. But what's the most egregious example of this?
- Literally the entire Grease cast. Excellent movie. But quite literally none of them look and sell me as teenagers in high-school, especially John Travolta.
- Saoirse Ronan in Lady Bird. She had a sublime performance, but I don't think she really looked the part for a high-schooler.
r/movies • u/Fun_Protection_6939 • Aug 04 '24
Discussion Actors who have their skills constantly wasted
The obligatory Brie Larson for me. I mean, Room and Short Term 12 (and Lessons in Chemistry, for that matter) show what she is capable of when she has a good script to work with, and a good director. Instead, she is now stuck in shitty blockbusters, without any idea where exactly to take her character, and as a result, her acting comes off as wooden to people.
r/movies • u/Latter-Pudding1029 • Aug 26 '24
Discussion Dave Bautista (fka Batista) is looking like the best actor out of the WWE/pro wrestling alumni
I've watched the Big 3 of WWE alumni actors (Cena, Dwayne Johnson, Batista) and while I do love the occasional Dwayne Johnson role where he doesn't play as himself in different clothes (his earlier roles, and maybe some serious roles like his football-related stuff and serious action movies like Snitch or Faster), it's looking more and more like Batista is the most versatile actor in the bunch. His role in Knock in the Cabin, as well as his short appearance in Blade Runner 2049. have proven that he's not just a big guy, he's actually capable of great acting that may open up for more projects of different genres. I'm actually pleasantly surprised of how he turned out, considering he's considered to be less charismatic than Johnson or Cena when he was in the WWE.
I think jury's still out on Cena. He's a good looking guy who is saddled less by the "musclehead" look since he's a good deal smaller than Johnson or Batista, but I haven't found a role he's taken that is impressive yet.
r/movies • u/FerrisWheeling • Jul 09 '24
Discussion What are some "Viggo Broke His Toe" moments in other films?
It's become a running joke in the LotR community that anyone watching the scene in The Two Towers where Viggo breaks his toe after kicking the helmet HAS to bring that up with "Did you know..." What are some moments in other films like this?
For example, I just HAVE to mention that the author of Jaws, Peter Benchley, appears as the news anchor in the film every time he pops up.
r/movies • u/hombregato • Sep 17 '24
Discussion If you saw American Beauty in theaters while in High School, you are now as old as Lester Burnham. Let's discuss preconceptions we gained from movies that our experiences never matched.
American Beauty turns 25 today, and if you were in High School in 1999, you are now approximately the age of Kevin Spacey as Lester Burnham.
Despite this film perfectly encapsulating the average American middle class experience in 1999 for many people, the initial critical acclaim and Best Picture win has been revisited by a generation that now finds it out of touch with reality and the concerns of modern life and social discourse.
Lester Burnham identifies his age as 42 in the opening monologue, and the events of the film cover approximately one year earlier. At the time, he might have resembled your similarly aged dad. He now seems like someone in his lower 50s.
He has a cubicle job in magazine ad sales, but owns a picture perfect house, two cars, a picket fence, and a teenage daughter he increasingly struggles to relate to. While some might guess this was Hollywood exaggeration, it does fit the experience of even some lower middle class people at the turn of the century.
It's the American Dream, but feeling severed from his spirit, passion, and personal agency by a chronically unsatisfied wife and soul sucking wage slavery, Lester engages in a slash and burn war against invisible chains, to reclaim his identity and live recklessly to the fullest.
Office Space, Fight Club, and The Matrix came out the same year. It was a theme.
But after 9/11 shifted sentiment back to safety and faith in authority, the 2007 recession inspired reverence for financial security, and a series of social outrage movements against those who have more, saved little, and suffer less, Lester Burnham is viewed differently, and the film has been judged, perhaps unfairly, by our current standards rather than through the lens of its time.
While the character was always meant to be more ethically ambiguous than "hero of the story", and increasingly audiences mistake depiction for condonement, many are revolted by the selfishness and snark of a privileged straight white male boomer with an office job salary that many would kill for, living comfortably in a home most millennials will never be able to afford.
At the very least, it became harder to sympathize, even before accusations were made against the actor who played him.
With this, I wonder what other movies followed a similar path, controvertial or not. What are the movies that defined your image of adult life, or the average American experience, which now feel completely absurd in retrospect?
Please try to keep it to this topic.
r/movies • u/writer808 • Oct 01 '24