The "last movie I saw" thread

[MarkGrace]

Interesting that two critics I respect in PAC and Katy liked the movie.

Did either one of you find it the least bit tedious, ponderous and slow moving?

Slow moving? I think you're getting it confused with American Huzzzzle. WOWS was undoubtedly long, but it cracked with energy and pace the whole time. Never really felt long to me.

btw, :finger3:

[Topper]

Slow moving? I think you're getting it confused with American Huzzzzle. WOWS was undoubtedly long, but it cracked with energy and pace the whole time. Never really felt long to me.

btw, :finger3:

It was ponderous to me.

Was it Matthew Mc. who gives that stupid diatribe about doing drugs to Belfort? It took forever to get through each scene. The point of each scene was obvious from the opening nano-second and the viewer was left to endure it for extremely long periods of excruciating time.

Hustle on the other hand was meticulous in adding details and nuance.

BTW, thanks for the offer, but I am married and otherwise taken care of. I think Jacob, imanihonjin and UVACoug might take you up on your offer though.

[MarkGrace]

I own a copy of Boiler Room and have seen it multiple times (I really like it) and it even has scenes that Scorsese could have seized upon and made his own- like the scene in Boiler Room where the guys from the office get together and watch the movie Wall Street over and over and mouth all the words along with Gordon Gecko. Because even though they were earning millions and had the fancy suits and shoes and cars, they still shlubs from jersey and had nothing interesting about their lives, and Boiler Room makes this poignant point.

I think PAC made this comment, too. Marty and Leo have talked about this at length, and said it was a very deliberate decision. What is the point they were trying to make? There's an excellent article from the New Yorker today, and I think this is why:

Too much has been made of the movie’s lack of attention to Belfort’s victims. The complaint is shortsighted: the victims are everywhere. Early on, some are heard on the phone, looking to make money through investments that they don’t earn (take seriously, after all, the lurid concept of “unearned income” and let he who has no 401(k) throw the first stone). Later, others are shown studying Belfort’s sales techniques in order to move from the ranks of the taken to those of the takers. To see Belfort’s victims, look in the mirror—and look there to see Belfort’s collaborators, too. There are no innocents in Scorsese’s vision; the movie is a unified field of dubious desire, of temptation, evil, and sin.

I think by not showing the victims directly they are making a statement about complicity. When you watch the exchanges depicted in the movie, the transactions are generated on the client side from the same place they are with Belfort -- they are people who are acting greedily with the desire for easy money. There's a circular nature to the thing where our own greed helps create people like Belfort. And again I think that's what's great about the 4th wall approach; letting Belfort speak directly to us makes us all feel like we're in on it.

WOWS is a fun movie but it isn't a personal movie that Scoresese makes.

Another interesting bit from the article:

“The Wolf of Wall Street” is an X-ray of the ubiquitous and the inadmissible. It lends new meaning to the tell-all: there’s no fleeting desire or base thought that can flicker through Belfort’s mind that Scorsese can’t or won’t show—and nothing he shows flickering onto the screen that can’t give outrageous delight. That’s the reason for the critical outcry. It’s tempting to ascribe the complaints to an op-ed mentality—to critics who fall back on politics to justify their involvement with anything so suspect as the entertainment industry or so frivolous as aesthetic pleasures, and the more extreme the aesthetic (as in the case of Scorsese’s movie), the more righteous the response in the name of principle. But there’s something else at stake in their reproaches that gets even closer to the specific greatness of Scorsese’s achievement. Critics railing at the movie aren’t just railing at Belfort, or even at the world; those who are decrying its extremes are maintaining their own innocence, protesting all too much their immunity to its temptations.

In a recent interview in Le Nouvel Observateur, Scorsese speaks about sin and redemption, citing his adolescent viewing of “The Threepenny Opera,” and Mack the Knife’s final monologue: “exactly like Chaplin in ‘Monsieur Verdoux,’ he flings back at his accusers their own turpitudes.” He says of his characters in “The Wolf of Wall Street,” “I’m really afraid that there’s no redemption possible for the wolves,” and adds:

I’m a lapsed Catholic, for sure. Which is what allows me to make films, to work in the entertainment business. Otherwise, I wouldn’t make any concessions. I’d be praying constantly. Making films means grappling with the outer world, confronting it.
In the interview, Scorsese discusses his own years wasted on drug use in the seventies, and admits:

I was like Leonardo DiCaprio in “The Wolf of Wall Street”: I wanted to go to the very end of my limits. I almost died from it. The day that I looked at myself, I saw a disappointing man. I admit that there are certain elements in Leonardo DiCaprio’s character that are autobiographical. I lived a crazy period. I had finished shooting “The Last Waltz,” which was the height of madness, and I began working on “Raging Bull.” Everything changed. I’m not like Mack the Knife, who doesn’t make anything, doesn’t produce anything. I create. It makes a hell of a difference.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/movies/2014/01/the-lasting-power-of-the-wolf-of-wall-street.html

The whole thing is excellent and worth the time. There are a bunch of great essays floating around on the movie right now, and for me reading them has been the most exciting reaction to any movie since The Master. Controversy is so much more entertaining than general consensus!

[Topper]

I think PAC made this comment, too. Marty and Leo have talked about this at length, and said it was a very deliberate decision. What is the point they were trying to make? There's an excellent article from the New Yorker today, and I think this is why:



I think by not showing the victims directly they are making a statement about complicity. When you watch the exchanges depicted in the movie, the transactions are generated on the client side from the same place they are with Belfort -- they are people who are acting greedily with the desire for easy money. There's a circular nature to the thing where our own greed helps create people like Belfort. And again I think that's what's great about the 4th wall approach; letting Belfort speak directly to us makes us all feel like we're in on it.



Another interesting bit from the article:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/movies/2014/01/the-lasting-power-of-the-wolf-of-wall-street.html

The whole thing is excellent and worth the time. There are a bunch of great essays floating around on the movie right now, and for me reading them has been the most exciting reaction to any movie since The Master. Controversy is so much more entertaining than general consensus!

The essays are better than the movie, which was tedious and slow moving for me.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

I took my daughter to that second Hobbit film. Good hell there's a ton of bloat in the two Hobbit movies so far. The Lord of the Rings is probably around 1,500 pages or so altogether and they made three movies out of those. The Hobbit was probably around 300 pages and Peter Jackson somehow thought it was fine to make another trilogy (with three movies that are close to three hours long) out of that. I know they're incorporating a few elements of that other Tolkien book, but good freaking hell there's a lot of made up crap.

One of the strongest aspects of Lord of the Rings was how well Jackson whittled down the material and put it in a form that translated extremely well to the screen. With the Hobbit movies he's done the exact opposite. For some reason he shoehorns in Legolas with a totally pointless storyline. On top of that, Bilbo seems to only be somewhat of a side character in this. There's equal screen time given to Orlando Bloom and the guy that plays the head dwarf. They should have made four movies out of the Lord of the Rings and only two movies out of the Hobbit that were only two hours a piece.

[MarkGrace]

It was ponderous to me.

Was it Matthew Mc. who gives that stupid diatribe about doing drugs to Belfort? It took forever to get through each scene. The point of each scene was obvious from the opening nano-second and the viewer was left to endure it for extremely long periods of excruciating time.

Hustle on the other hand was meticulous in adding details and nuance.

BTW, thanks for the offer, but I am married and otherwise taken care of. I think Jacob, imanihonjin and UVACoug might take you up on your offer though.

That McConaughey scene was so great -- I laughed the whole time and could have watched/listened to him much longer. I expected him to have a bigger role based on the trailer and was a bit disappointed he didn't.

[Katy Lied]

I think I like Hustle better than Wolf. It's not clearcut, though. I loved the characters in Hustle-- Irving Rosenfeld is no less a sleazy con artist than Jordan Belfort-- they're both low hanging fruit. But in the same way an everyman is put through his paces and comes out a winner in movies like Mr Smith goes to Washington, so too does Rosenfeld get squeezed and pressured until he strikes back triumphantly in the only way he knows how. Whereas Belfort strikes it easy and rich from the beginning.

[Topper]

That McConaughey scene was so great -- I laughed the whole time and could have watched/listened to him much longer. I expected him to have a bigger role based on the trailer and was a bit disappointed he didn't.

I can enjoy base humor, but what was funny about it? It was utterly ridiculous and banal. OTOH, having friends who have been destroyed by cocaine use, it seemed to make drug abuse trivial. I mean the context wasn't Cheech and Chong, which back in the day was humorous in a base sort of way.

The context of that sort of humor made it unimaginable. Would that happen in a locker room and would people laugh? Yes.

The purpose seemed to be to shock the audience to make the audience complicit in the deceit of Belfort, but for some of us, it bored us and made us wonder how anybody could be deluded by him.

[Topper]

I think I like Hustle better than Wolf. It's not clearcut, though. I loved the characters in Hustle-- Irving Rosenfeld is no less a sleazy con artist than Jordan Belfort-- they're both low hanging fruit. But in the same way an everyman is put through his paces and comes out a winner in movies like Mr Smith goes to Washington, so too does Rosenfeld get squeezed and pressured until he strikes back triumphantly in the only way he knows how. Whereas Belfort strikes it easy and rich from the beginning.

That's what I liked about Rosenfeld. There is more grittiness in his character. Belfort is sleaze from the get go, with nothing earthy or down to earth.

The fact anybody falls for the Belforts of the world constantly astonishes, all sizzle but no steak.

[PaloAltoCougar]

Interesting that two critics I respect in PAC and Katy liked the movie.

Did either one of you find it the least bit tedious, ponderous and slow moving?

Mine was a very qualified endorsement. But I have to say that "tedious, ponderous and slow moving" wouldn't be on my list of criticisms. The performances were too good, and much of the story line too compelling/disturbing, for me to have been bored. In fact, I thought the movie moved along very well and didn't seem like three hours at all.

[Topper]

Mine was a very qualified endorsement. But I have to say that "tedious, ponderous and slow moving" wouldn't be on my list of criticisms. The performances were too good, and much of the story line too compelling/disturbing, for me to have been bored. In fact, I thought the movie moved along very well and didn't seem like three hours at all.

The reason is I describe it that way is the telegraphing of its point to the point of redundancy and hitting you over the head. It beat a dead horse a hundred times. I wanted the movie to make another point.

[UVACoug]

Anyone else see Inside Llewyn Davis yet? It is a film that probably requires multiple viewings to fully appreciate, but I found it pretty interesting on the first viewing. Oscar Isaac was terrific. I am hot and cold on the Cohens generally (loved Fargo, didn't love NCFOM), but I think this one belongs in the great category. Need to go see it again though.

[UVACoug]

That McConaughey scene was so great -- I laughed the whole time and could have watched/listened to him much longer. I expected him to have a bigger role based on the trailer and was a bit disappointed he didn't.

I think it was McConaughey's best performance of the year, and that is saying something given his roles in Mud and Dallas Buyers Club. He is also supposed to be great in HBO's new anthology series True Detective. It is amazing how big of a turn around he has made in the last few years. I remember when his acting was the butt of several jokes.

[LA Ute]

This was an interesting read -- it's by the real wolf's daughter:

An Open Letter to the Makers of The Wolf of Wall Street, and the Wolf Himself

[Applejack]

Anyone else see Inside Llewyn Davis yet? It is a film that probably requires multiple viewings to fully appreciate, but I found it pretty interesting on the first viewing. Oscar Isaac was terrific. I am hot and cold on the Cohens generally (loved Fargo, didn't love NCFOM), but I think this one belongs in the great category. Need to go see it again though.

I was really excited about this movie, but left really disappointed. Maybe it was a case of high expectations, but I never cared about the main character. Ultimately, it is one of my least favorite Coen brothers movies. :disappointed:

Other movies I've seen recently:

American Hustle (meh, too slow and kind of predictable).
Nebraska (Loved it).