FANTASTILICIOUS FUN FOR FILM FANS 089: your top 10's of 2020 and most anticipated films of 2021?

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  • WalecsWalecs On Her Majesty's Secret Service
    Posts: 3,157
    No, no, no, no.

    I completely disagree.

    I have watched dozens of american/english movies in their original versions and then dubbed in italian (which is my language), and I have to say that italians do it even better than english/americans.
    Not only italian dubbers get rid of certain actor's terrible accents (like Connery's "sh" or Lazenby's australian accent), but they even act way better than the original actors (which is weird, since most of italians actors can't act at all, whereas most of italian dubbers act in superb ways).

    I have heard a lot of critiscm towards Lazenby, Brosnan, Denise Richard or Halle Barry, and I can assure you that Bond movies improve a lot when dubbed in italian.
  • chrisisallchrisisall Brosnan Defender Of The Realm
    edited August 2014 Posts: 17,687
    It was a cold day in late 1991, and a movie I had been waiting for for five long years was finally coming out. I went the first evening all alone, bucket of popcorn (extra butter) & large Coke, sank into the theatre seat and began munching. Then it began: the worst 91 minutes of my theatrical life ever: Highlander 2. It began very badly, and went downhill from there. I stopped eating my popcorn about the time the flying things appeared, the previously masticated kernels churning in my stomach. I wanted to cry, but swelling & terrible anger prevented it. I wanted to leave, but a nearly imperceptible filament of misplaced hope kept me from it. On screen Connery & Lambert argued over which of them had taken more bullets- my scowl disappeared. For a moment. Then the horror of the last act came & went. I left the theatre a shattered man, a victim of a drive-by celluloid shooting that had lived.
    I got home, guzzled a six pack of Budweiser as fast as I could & put on Highlander to erase this dreadful memory.
  • chrisisallchrisisall Brosnan Defender Of The Realm
    Posts: 17,687
    Oh. Sorry, I missed the 'OO7' prefix... my bad.
    So, worst OO7 theatrical experience... not nearly as bad as Highlander 2, MR in 1979. Just silly. Jaws bit the boat & Dolly sunk it for me.
  • HASEROTHASEROT has returned like the tedious inevitability of an unloved season---
    edited November 2014 Posts: 4,399
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  • edited August 2014 Posts: 1,631
    I've had so many bad experiences in the theater that I no longer go to the movies, except on the rarest of occasions. I've been maybe twice in the last 4-5 years, one of which was for Skyfall, although that was towards the end of its theatrical run when there was only myself and a small handful of other people in the theater.

    Possibly the worst experience I had was when I first tried to see Casino Royale. I went on the first Saturday it was open, and went to one of the later showings, maybe a 9 or 9:30 showing. Theater was packed and rather loud and unruly. There was quite a bit of talking during the PTS, but I managed to shut it out since I really wanted to see the film. After the title song, however, things just turned bad. During the parkour chase, there was just a lot of shouting at the screen, people cheering Bond on and such, but in a manner that made it literally impossible to watch the film. And it wasn't just one person, it was the whole theater. It just wouldn't stop and then there was a good deal of talking over the scenes immediately following that, at which point the friend I was with had already left the theater to go talk to the manager. About the time when M and Villiers are exiting the hearing Bond Bond's embassy activities, I got a tap on the shoulder from my friend who had had enough and said he was leaving, so I left as well, having seen not much of Casino Royale, but having been very impressed with what I had seen, but disappointed that I hadn't been able to enjoy it.

    Went the next day to a showing just after noon and had no trouble, as there weren't that many people in the theater.

    I've had some other, absolutely awful experiences in the cinema, but this was one of only two or three times I've walked out of a theater, and it happened to be Bond related.
  • chrisisallchrisisall Brosnan Defender Of The Realm
    Posts: 17,687
    HASEROT wrote: »
    Batman and Robin
    This was my first ever taste of walking out of a movie disappointed.. i was 13 when i saw this pile of crap in theater.. and I remember as a young kid, very much looking forward to seeing the movie - as at the time I really liked Batman Forever
    I... sort of kind of liked... Batman Forever, due mostly to the gorgeous Ms. Kidman, but it really sucked IMO.
    Batman & Robin was at least a funny throwback to the Sixties, and Arnold was hilarious.
    Both should never have been made, but B&R was way more enjoyable for me.
  • HASEROTHASEROT has returned like the tedious inevitability of an unloved season---
    edited November 2014 Posts: 4,399
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  • chrisisallchrisisall Brosnan Defender Of The Realm
    Posts: 17,687
    HASEROT wrote: »
    i can only watch Batman & Robin, if a drinking game is involved.... then it becomes fun :)
    That's a given, my friend! :))
  • Posts: 5,767
    I had some experiences with noisy people in the cinema, for instance the occasion where a foreign guy apparently tried explain the whole film to some ladies who apparently didn´t understand any English. Luckily, asking them to shut up helped. So it wasn´t all that bad because I got to see the last 3/4 of the film.

    I had some occasions where I had the feeling I was the only one in the cinema interested in the film, but luckily my town is full of cinemas, and long years of thorrough practical research enable me to chose the right cinemas and the right screening times :-).

    I guess sometimes one has to have just dumb luck. When I wet to see World War Z, I thorroughly enjoyed a tense atmosphere. The same week a friend told me when she went to see it the whole cinema laughed at the zombies, which I would have found more horrible than any zombies could ever be.
  • MajorDSmytheMajorDSmythe "I tolerate this century, but I don't enjoy it."Moderator
    Posts: 13,882
    Believe it or not, it isn't the Craig Bonds, but the Star Wars film that was released in 1999. I was so bored, my arse fell asleep and the rest of me wanted to follow suit. It was a school trip, the other film (we had a choice of two films) was 10 Things I Hate About You. I have never seen, 10 Things so I don't know if I made the right choice.
  • DarthDimiDarthDimi Behind you!Moderator
    Posts: 23,447
    Mine was The Blair Witch Project in '99.

    Firstly, the place was nearly sold out. My friend and I found two empty seats in the VERY FIRST ROW, at the very right of said row. Watching a found footage film from a ridiculous angle, with the camera going up and down, shaking left and right, I developed a sense of nausea. So after about 45 minutes I had to go to the men's room to expel some ugly coughs and splash some water in my face. I did, but believe it or not, I accidentally used the wrong door to get back in. So when I suddenly found myself back in the ally behind the building, I knew something was wrong. And of course that door was one of those you cannot open from the outside. I had to pass by the ticket control again, had to search all my pockets for my ticket to prove I really wasn't trying to sneak in and lost more minutes doing all this.

    Finally, having lost about 10 minutes by now, I got back in. Fortunately, I managed to finish the movie and see the bits I still think are the strongest.

  • DarthDimi wrote: »
    Foreign films should be subtitled, not dubbed.

    Comments? :)

    After some years of pondering about this and discussing about it with some French fellow moviegoers, I have now strong opinions about it. But I'll make only one comment : many people talk about good dubbing vs bad dubbing, and of course it is important to acknowledge that bad dubbing can destroy something.

    But why is the problem with "bad" subtitles almost never talked about ?

    They have sometimes only a dozen of words to transcribe what's been said in a few seconds on the screen, and miracles do not exist when Basil Exposition is spouting lots and lots of words.

    One example I give to French moviegoers who are so sure that dubbing can never live up to subtitling, is to look at "The Sting" with French subtitles on and French dubbing on. Surprise, surprise, sometimes the biggest loss is not where it seems.

    FYI, Moore had a very good dubber here in France - for instance The Persuaders' dubbing is ace, even if it takes some liberties with the original material.

    On the other hand, starting from Goldeneye, the French dubbing of the last Bond movies
    is not very good I'm afraid. One of the weirdest dubbing I've ever heard in a movie ever is actually in Goldeneye (in the DB5/Ferrari scene : Let's put that behind us, shall we? = Jetez votre bonnet par-dessus les moulins! = Throw your bonnet over the windmill !). A very rare way to say that, it makes Bond sound like an old French teacher !

    All the online piracy may destroy the subtitle industry... Free subtitles are more and more available, done by fans, why would one bother to pay translators to do a good job ? I even used to contribute to a French/English translation forum (for the French native speaker part, don't worry), and we could see amateur dubbers who came and wanted very fast answers to very short sentences without any context (ie : they're translating the subtitles files without even knowing yet what's happening on the screen !)

    Finally, if you think, as an US or UK readers, that all this subtitles/dubbing debate is irrelevant for you, I'm not so sure... The typical Hollywood blockbuster uses a very simple English and cast actors who have no strong accents, mostly because it can give the foreigners some illusions they are bilingual and they can understand the original movie :)



  • DarthDimiDarthDimi Behind you!Moderator
    Posts: 23,447
    <center><font color=#E9AB17 size=6><b>008</b>
    Do you think Steven Spielberg is overrated, underrated, ...?</font></center>

  • HASEROTHASEROT has returned like the tedious inevitability of an unloved season---
    edited November 2014 Posts: 4,399
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  • NicNacNicNac Administrator, Moderator
    Posts: 7,567
    I used to think there was a certain snobbish culture creeping in with regards to Spielperg. His early movies were great entertainment but hardly art, from the viewpoint of critics and Hollywood in general.
    Well, I think he proved himself as a true film artist as early as Dual, which was a TV Movie. Pioneers like Griffiths, Hitchcock and Welles were lauded because of their ability to push boundaries back and create moving images that no one else had managed to do.
    Spielberg did much the same, but at a time when less was more and directors like Altman and Scorsese were creating sparse, moody and dangerous dramas. So clever camera work in Jaws was admired but he wasn't considered a great artist.

    Now of course he is considered one of the greats, especially after Schindler's List. I still think he is underrated to a certain degree, and should be mentioned in the same breath as the early directors I mentioned earlier.
  • 4EverBonded4EverBonded the Ballrooms of Mars
    Posts: 12,459
    Probably rated where he should be, in general. His latter films are not as great, but he has given us many excellent, even outstanding films indeed.
  • Posts: 1,595
    He made Jaws, Raiders, Schindler's List, and Jurassic Park. Those 4 alone (plus several of his other great films) affirm his standing as one of the greats.
  • DarthDimiDarthDimi Behind you!Moderator
    edited August 2014 Posts: 23,447
    Personally, I think Spielberg is the greatest! I'm also convinced he won't be fully recognised as such until the unspeakable has happened. Like Hitch, Spielberg has managed to combine quantity with quality. Just look at his body of work. This is the man who more or less started with a strong thriller: Duel. He made a horror masterpiece with Jaws and a Sci-Fi classic with Close Encounters. This is also the man who made the best Bond film Eon never made with Raiders Of The Lost Ark. He made the ugliest creature imaginable, E.T., into a cute little friend neither children nor adults grow tired of. Jurassic Park left us all speechless in '93 and Schindler's List may very well be the single most powerful testament of the horrors of WWII. That is if you're not talking about the actual battlefields of WWII, in which case Spielberg also provided us with the excellent Saving Private Ryan. But why stop there when you can make the second best Phillip K. Dick adaptation with Minority Report and the amazing Munich? And we're far from done. How about Lincoln? Obviously I have deliberately left out a number of films, like War Of The Worlds and Tintin, because I know they tend to polarise fans. But even those more heavily debated films are IMO a true testament of Spielberg's genius.

    Spielberg is also one of my favourite film critics / analysts / ... in making-ofs, documentaries, ... When he speaks about Stanley Kubrick, he can do so in not just the voice of preprogrammed admiration, but as a true connoisseur, an expert, a teacher almost. Spielberg's commentaries are my favourites because of how insightful and deliciously educational they almost always are.

    Steven Spielberg will turn 70 in 2016. By then he will have directed 32 movies and produced many more.

    I praise the likes of Lang, Welles, Hitchcock, ... People know I simply adore Kubrick and Mann. But Spielberg is my generation's Mozart: quite simply THE greatest.

    /fanboy mode
  • chrisisallchrisisall Brosnan Defender Of The Realm
    Posts: 17,687
    @DarthDimi said it all for me.
  • Jaws and Raiders alone would be enough to make him one of the best but then he's also done Saving Private Ryan, Munich, etc. No ammount of praise will ever be enough, it's impossible to overrate him. He's not just made a load of amazing films, he's shaped film history and his legacy will live on for years after he's gone.

    Cubby was an idiot for not letting him direct a Bond film. Although if he had done we might not have had Indiana Jones so I think it all worked out for the best in the end.

  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    Depends who you ask. I think he is both, and that is due to the diversity of films he has made. Personally, I love some of them and loathe some others. But there is no way you can deny that he knows his craft. Those jews! Eh, Gibson? (forgotyourusername from when you were a member here...)
  • MurdockMurdock The minus world
    Posts: 16,328
    Neither really. He made an impact and it's stuck. He hasn't done much lately so I would say he's neither Over or Underrated.
  • Posts: 5,767
    Jaws is one of my all time favorite movies.
    Recently I´m waiting patiently to be wowed again. Wouldn´t mind him directing a Bond, as long as he doesn´t put any kids in.
  • edited August 2014 Posts: 45
    Tend to agree with @Thunderfinger, the opinions on Spielberg tend to be polarizing so I find it difficult to say whether he's overrated or not in any general sense of the word. For his qualities, his best work certainly speaks for itself. Other of his films may not quite be my cup of tea. But to hark back to the original question on page 1: even though I don't really follow his career closely, I have seen most of his films anyway which might be all that needs to be said. He's certainly brilliant at what he does and I agree with @DarthDimi that his stature most likely will stand the test of time.
  • Posts: 7,653
    when I look at the list of work by Steven Spielberg nobody can say he is overrated, his work has value and has pushed the borders & possibilities of the industry. And like any genius he has done some lesser work but generally I find that I enjoy his output.
    Some of his work will remain classics forever.
  • Posts: 6,396
    Agree with everything that's been said thus far.

    Jaws and Raiders are and will remain two of the most perfectly crafted films of all time.
  • Posts: 2,341
    I think Steven Spielberg gets his just due. He is a very competent and complete film maker. As director or producer, his films has grossed more juice (well into the billions). He is loved by not only the fans but the critics as well. He has done all genres unlike some who only do one kind of film (Quentin Tarantino comes to mind here) but he has hits in drama (Schindler's List, The Color Purple), family (ET), horror (Poltergeist, Jaws), war (Saving Private Ryan).
    Spielberg can be mentioned up there with the "greats" like Frank Capra, Hitchcock, and others.
  • DarthDimiDarthDimi Behind you!Moderator
    Posts: 23,447
    Folks, I find the praise for Spielberg heart-warming. :-)
  • DaltonCraig007DaltonCraig007 They say, "Evil prevails when good men fail to act." What they ought to say is, "Evil prevails."
    Posts: 15,686
    Spielberg is my favorite director. Munich, Saving Private Ryan, Schindler's List, Minority Report, Catch me if you can, Raiders, E.T., Last Crusade are among my favorite movies. I agree with @haserot, Spielberg is on his own level, so he is neither overrated or underrated. :)
  • DarthDimiDarthDimi Behind you!Moderator
    Posts: 23,447
    <center><font color=#E9AB17 size=6><b>009</b>
    What is your favourite Hitchcock film?</font></center>
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