Discuss and Rate the Last Film You Watched

[Ag3ma]

Some suggested answers:

2. The ends on a little bit of an awkward note. The emperor surrenders, the great houses say "No", literally in the same scene they load up all the freman on ships to go fight a holy war and conquer the galaxy. This doesn't make any sense because A. The Great houses have the planet surrounded by warships, they could just blow them all up. B. How exactly are you going to take over the galaxy with a couple million troops.

In the setting of Dune, computers and AI are strictly limited because of a revolt by sentient machines in the past.

The role of computers are therefore replaced by highly trained humans - in particular here we care about who replaced computers for navigating space ships, which is the personnel of the Spacing Guild. However, these navigators require the Spice mined from Arrakis to expand their minds to do that job. So whoever control Arrakis controls space travel... which also means that they can shut it down, and the entire empire falls, and the noble families lose all their trade wealth, etc.

Paul and the Fremen have the ability to destroy spice production forever, and with it galactic civilisation. So everyone concedes, because better a new emperor than losing everything.

There's a lot more to it, or so I hear. That the galaxy is technologically weak, most of the great houses don't have much firepower. That said supposedly by the end of the war 62 billion people die. The numbers are difficult to digest. I looked around online, but everyone seems to say "yeah its just super vague, maybe Paul can see the future and win all battles...or something"

The emperor is the emperor mostly because he has the Saurdarkar (spelling?). These are people who grew up on a hellish world which has made them as hard as nails and pretty much unbeatable, and so the emperor has the best army. The emperor also ensures that the militaries of all the other nobles are weak. If I remember rightly, one of the reasons the emperor sets out to destroy the Atriedes (generally they have become too politically respected and admired) is also that they have managed to train a small cadre of troops to be as effective as the Saurdarkar, and that is a definite no-no in the eyes of the emperor. This is also an attraction of the Fremen, because they also live on a hellish world, and have become as hard as nails, like the Saurdarkar.

Everyone has knives because shield technology exists that blocks fast moving projectiles and makes lasers unusable. However, guns and bombs etc. still do exist if desired - including orbital bombardments of nuclear weapons. So if you think in terms of the Fremen bombarding whole worlds from orbit, they wouldn't need to smash that many to rack up 60 billion casualties.

Besides, Paul is emperor. I don't fancy there's going to be that much organised resistance to his army except on a planet-by-planet basis, even if it's out of control and rampaging through the galaxy.

 

[Piscian]

Some suggested answers:



In the setting of Dune, computers and AI are strictly limited because of a revolt by sentient machines in the past.

The role of computers are therefore replaced by highly trained humans - in particular here we care about who replaced computers for navigating space ships, which is the personnel of the Spacing Guild. However, these navigators require the Spice mined from Arrakis to expand their minds to do that job. So whoever control Arrakis controls space travel... which also means that they can shut it down, and the entire empire falls, and the noble families lose all their trade wealth, etc.

Paul and the Fremen have the ability to destroy spice production forever, and with it galactic civilisation. So everyone concedes, because better a new emperor than losing everything.



The emperor is the emperor mostly because he has the Saurdarkar (spelling?). These are people who grew up on a hellish world which has made them as hard as nails and pretty much unbeatable, and so the emperor has the best army. The emperor also ensures that the militaries of all the other nobles are weak. If I remember rightly, one of the reasons the emperor sets out to destroy the Atriedes (generally they have become too politically respected and admired) is also that they have managed to train a small cadre of troops to be as effective as the Saurdarkar, and that is a definite no-no in the eyes of the emperor. This is also an attraction of the Fremen, because they also live on a hellish world, and have become as hard as nails, like the Saurdarkar.

Everyone has knives because shield technology exists that blocks fast moving projectiles and makes lasers unusable. However, guns and bombs etc. still do exist if desired - including orbital bombardments of nuclear weapons. So if you think in terms of the Fremen bombarding whole worlds from orbit, they wouldn't need to smash that many to rack up 60 billion casualties.

Besides, Paul is emperor. I don't fancy there's going to be that much organised resistance to his army except on a planet-by-planet basis, even if it's out of control and rampaging through the galaxy.

I'm not disagreeing that that is the in book logic. I'm saying that the ending is filmed awkwardly.

 

[thebobmaster]

A ★½ review of Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989)

"This voyage is doomed." "Yeah, tell me about it." This is another case of the original concept of a Friday the 13th sequel being discarded at some point. This was originally meant to be a direct follow-up to Part VII, with three different people writing scripts featuring Tina in some role...

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[thebobmaster]

A ★★★ review of Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993)

"We're going to Camp Crystal Lake." "Oh, yeah? Planning on smoking a little dope, having a little premarital sex and getting slaughtered?" This film's production had some issues, although it is heavily disputed who was responsible for that. If you ask the producer, Sean S. Cunningham, it was the...

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[Phoenixmgs]

Poor Things - 8/10

This movie is definitely not for some people and some will probably turn it off like 5 mins in and be like WTF. I actually knew nothing about the movie before watching it and messaged a friend group chat where most have seen it and said like "5mins into Poor Things... uhh... wtf?" The basic premise (slight spoiler but it's revealed rather quickly and not really a twist or anything) is that a woman jumps from a bridge to commit suicide while 8-9 months pregnant, a mad scientist/doctor finds her and decides to put the brain of the baby into the mother's head. So the movie is essentially about a person learning about the adult world while being an innocently minded kid. The start of the movie the main character Bella played by Emily Blunt can barely walk and knows like a word or two and ends with her being able to understand and discuss philosophies. The movie explores like EVERYTHING (for both better and worse) including like ALL the sexual stuff that would occur if a child's mind was inside an attractive woman's body. Overall it's a solid movie that does interestingly explore how humans learn about the world around them from baby to adult. Visually it starts as like an old black and white monster movie (Frankenstein) and transitions into Terry Gilliam territory. The movie does throw too many themes and ideas at you as it seems like it wants to be a movie about everything and doesn't really focus on a single theme. The movie is said to be about women empowerment but for the first half of the movie, it's not about that at all and the main character could be dude and nothing would have changed. The movie is an interesting watch as long as you don't mind the uncomfortable parts (and there are many).

 

[hanselthecaretaker2]

Poor Things - 8/10

This movie is definitely not for some people and some will probably turn it off like 5 mins in and be like WTF. I actually knew nothing about the movie before watching it and messaged a friend group chat where most have seen it and said like "5mins into Poor Things... uhh... wtf?". The basic premise (slight spoiler but it's revealed rather quickly and not really a twist or anything) is that a woman jumps from a bridge to commit suicide while 8-9 months pregnant, a mad scientist/doctor finds her and decides to put the brain of the baby into the mother's head.

So the movie is essentially about a person learning about the adult world while being an innocently minded kid. The start of the movie the main character Bella played by Emily Blunt can barely walk and knows like a word or two and ends with her being able to understand and discuss philosophies. The movie explores like EVERYTHING (for both better and worse) including like ALL the sexual stuff that would occur if a child's mind was inside an attractive woman's body.

Overall it's a solid movie that does interestingly explore how humans learn about the world around them from baby to adult. Visually it starts as like an old black and white monster movie (Frankenstein) and transitions into Terry Gilliam territory. The movie does throw too many themes and ideas at you as it seems like it wants to be a movie about everything and doesn't really focus on a single theme.

The movie is said to be about women empowerment but for the first half of the movie, it's not about that at all and the main character could be dude and nothing would have changed. The movie is an interesting watch as long as you don't mind the uncomfortable parts (and there are many).

*fixed*

 

[Phoenixmgs]

*fixed*

Lol, I didn't realize I wrote that much as I usually keep it pretty short.

 

[thebobmaster]

A ★★★ review of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986)

"Dog will hunt!" The production on this film was troubled by that good old thing called "studio interference". Specifically, after filming on another movie called Invaders From Mars went over schedule, the studio responded by cutting the budget of this movie, resulting in Tobe Hooper needing to...

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[Gordon_4]

Lol, I didn't realize I wrote that much as I usually keep it pretty short.

Eh, it wasn’t that your review post was long. Rather nicely in-depth really, it’s just it was Holy Wall of Text, Batman

 

[thebobmaster]

A ★★★★★ review of The Last Voyage of the Demeter (2023)

“We’re a doomed crew, Mr. Clemens, on a doomed ship. We no longer plot our course. The devil below does. We all know where he plans to deliver us, Mr. Clemens. To hell. One by one.” To say this film has had a troubled production is putting it mildly. The genesis for this film came when writer...

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[thebobmaster]

A ★★★★½ review of Hellraiser (1987)

"Jesus wept." This film had a bit of a problem with production, mostly due to the budget, or lack thereof. Clive Barker, who also wrote the book the movie is based off of, The Hellbound Heart, was limited to one house set and one camera, which caused him to rely on overhead and zoom shots due to...

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[Xprimentyl]

Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark: Meh / Great

A group of kids break into an abandoned house and find an old book of scary stories ostensibly written by a long-dead girl, Sarah Bellows, who was imprisoned and tortured by her own family. Troubles arise when the spirit of Sarah starts writing new stories in the book, stories about these new kids, and they start coming true...

These stories were a huge part of my growing up. I remember reading Alvin Schwartz's Scary Stories, and enjoying them, but as an adult thinking back, they were really... not inappropriate, but certainly a bit much for an elementary-aged kid. The stories are fittingly creepy, and ultimately harmless, but the imagery... the imagery is what really stuck with me ever since. It's horrific and haunting, way above the paygrade of the intended audience of children. I mean look at some of this shit:



Nightmare fuel, right?! The stories I largely forgot, but the imagery, illustrations by Stephen Gammell, man, that has stuck with me for decades! The movie is mostly throwaway, but I'd be lying if I said the way they realized some of the imagery that haunted me as a kid didn't stir up some old emotions, and yes, fears. They literally looked at Gammell's work from the '80s books, and translated them point-for-point to the screen, and it was just... jarring. The scene with the pale, grinning woman with the long black hair in the red hallway gave me the exact anxiety as the illustration did in the '80s. And I also specificaly remember my fucking 3rd grade teacher singing us "The Hearse Song" to creep us out... 3rd grade!! When the song is played in the film, the 8-year-old in me started singing along, and it was a WTF moment.

In looking up the series on Wikipedia to find Gammell's name, apparently, I'm not alone in my reticence. There has been controversy surrounding these books and whether or not children are a suitable audience. at age 43, I'd say no. At least, I personally wouldn't let my kids read them. They didn't scar me or anything, and I don't think they'd scar children now, but they certainly are a bit heavy on the macabre to hand to an 8-year-old ducked under a blanket with a flashlight trying to freak themselves out for fun.

But back to the film, nothing of note if you've no nostalgic ties to the source material.

 

[thebobmaster]

The illustrations in Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark kick-started my love of horror literature. I still remember some of those illustrations even decades later.

 

[Xprimentyl]

The illustrations in Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark kick-started my love of horror literature. I still remember some of those illustrations even decades later.

I can't say the illustrations kick started any sort of passion for me, but they are certainly cemented in my brain. They are beyond disturbing, and I mean that in a positive way in that they did their job almost too well. They look like something you'd find in a Necronomicon-like tome. If you were to ask me to draw a nightmare, those images would be it. And the art style, for as dark and disturbing as it is, is strangely beautiful. They present the feeling of vaguely recalled memories.

 

[thebobmaster]

A ★★★ review of The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)

This review may contain spoilers. Visit the page to bypass this warning and read the review.

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[thebobmaster]

A ★★★½ review of Predator 2 (1990)

“It’s all right. I’m a cop.” “I don’t think he gives a shit.” This film didn't have a very troubled production, but there were a few bumps along the way. The primary one being that due to an inability to agree on terms, Arnie decided to nope out of this one, and there were a few different people...

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[Gordon_4]

A ★★★ review of The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)

This review may contain spoilers. Visit the page to bypass this warning and read the review.

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Trust me, compared to the novel, the story in the movie IS very streamlined. Also Sarah isn’t a palaeontologist, she’s meant to be some kind of wildlife expert. Sadly for the movie she ended up absorbing the character traits of Dr. Richard Levine, who is a palaeontologist, but also a complete dunce at working in the field. She’s much cooler in the book.

And yeah, they cut a scene from the movie of Roland Tembo kicking some thugs ass in a diner or something because it made him too sympathetic.

I like the movie personally but its moral compass is not pointing magnetic north.

 

[thebobmaster]

Trust me, compared to the novel, the story in the movie IS very streamlined. Also Sarah isn’t a palaeontologist, she’s meant to be some kind of wildlife expert. Sadly for the movie she ended up absorbing the character traits of Dr. Richard Levine, who is a palaeontologist, but also a complete dunce at working in the field. She’s much cooler in the book.

And yeah, they cut a scene from the movie of Roland Tembo kicking some thugs ass in a diner or something because it made him too sympathetic.

I like the movie personally but its moral compass is not pointing magnetic north.

I didn't hate the movie, hence why I gave it 3 stars, so slightly above average. It just felt...a bit soulless, for want of a better words. As for the comparisons to the book, that's pretty interesting stuff. Even if I was familiar with the book, however, I would try my best to not let it factor into my review. I review the movies as best as I can as movies first, adaptations second. To me, if you need to be familiar with the source material to fill in plot holes or clarify things, you have not done a successful job as an adaptation.

 

[Gordon_4]

I didn't hate the movie, hence why I gave it 3 stars, so slightly above average. It just felt...a bit soulless, for want of a better words. As for the comparisons to the book, that's pretty interesting stuff. Even if I was familiar with the book, however, I would try my best to not let it factor into my review. I review the movies as best as I can as movies first, adaptations second. To me, if you need to be familiar with the source material to fill in plot holes or clarify things, you have not done a successful job as an adaptation.

Broadly the movie follows the plot reasonably closely, although there was a cut subplot about BioSyn (they’re the guys Nedry was taking bribes from and stealing embryos for) having an operative on the island as well, but it intersected so minimally with the main plot it’s loss wasn’t a big deal. It’s mainly that some characters were folded into others; Levine and Harding are one example, and Eddie Carr also took on bits of Doc Thorne’s character. And Kelly, Malcolm’s daughter is a composite of two kids who tagged along. And honestly the movie doesn’t suffer for this process as most of the issues are baked in from the word go.

I disagree that the movie is soulless; but it does lack the spark of wonder present in the original. But my guess is that it’s because the tone is more fatalistic and grim.

 

[Piscian]

A ★★★ review of The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)

This review may contain spoilers. Visit the page to bypass this warning and read the review.

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Reddit has surprisingly finally come full circle on the original trilogy. Everyone now seems to agree Lost World was a bit of a nonsensical dumpster fire. Id need to dig it up but last year some famous YouTubers like RLM did an analysis of the film and pointed out it is rife with technical errors and plot holes.

It was also revealed that Lost world went through rewrites during production which explains the bizarre back snd forth between the island and San Francisco that makes it look like the island is just off the coast, like 5 minutes away.

For me I think it kinda boils down to that same Southpark writing class I quote. You can't make a movie that is "This happens, then this happens, then this happens".

By the time you get to the third act the audience has forgotten how they got there. You gotta create and solve problems in Arcs that audiences can absorb.

Id literally have to watch it for a 6th to try and tell you in detail what the plot was, where as with 1 and 3 its very basic. They go to the island for a reason, things go bad, they gotta escape, the end.