Poor Things is an obviously great movie that I didn’t like very much for some reason. It was worth a watch but i can’t imagine ever wanting to watch it again.
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I’m sure you are joking but just in case, the title is existential not economic. I only post this because some people close to me, who normally get films, seem to be so confused by poor things. One buddy is convinced it’s like a soft core male gaze porn. lol. You can’t miss the point more if you try. It’s like the people who critique Dune for being a white saviour narrative.
I thought it was “Pour Things”, a documentary about craft beer. Boy was I confused for the first hour!
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Poor Things might be a top 5 OAT film for me. Will have to see if I get similar enjoyment on rewatch.
Finally saw Zone of Interest and I’m not that high on that one. It’s a well done film, but I feel like the point could have been made in a 30 minute film. I guess it would’ve helped if I’d seen LKJ’s primer that you need to know what to expect going in (i.e. not a story). I guess my mood already soured with:
The 3 minute opening black screen, then the 5 minutes of nothing happening with the family, as they slowly walk to the lake.
After that, it would’ve been tough to win me back. Although I’ve softened from my initial view that it’s pretentiousness for pretentiousness’ sake and think I might enjoy it more on rewatch (many years down the road). I’d still only rate it 6/10 though. Sucks that it’s gonna win best int’l. film, but I guess it’s the type of film they drool over. Give me Perfect Days instead.
Maestro pretty weak as well. Feels like the film was pointless and only made to show that Cooper can do a pretty spot on Bernstein impression.
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I think maestro is worst of the ten for sure.
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I definitely don’t think The Zone of Interest is pretentiousness for the sake of it, I absolutely think the artistic value is there. Same as Fossil, I won’t be rewatching soon, but I kind of suspect I will at some point.
But yeah, underlining the point: if you haven’t seen it yet and are going to, I definitely think it’s a situation where going in fully immersed in spoilers is the right move, and I can’t recall another film where that would be my specific advice.
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Zone of Interest didn’t live up to expectations, but I don’t regret seeing it.
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I think I liked it a bit more than you but I also don’t imagine I’ll want to watch it again, at least anytime soon.
Watched “American Fiction” last night, and I haven’t laughed that hard watching a movie alone since “Superbad”. They aren’t remotely the same style of comedy, but AF is very funny. The scene where the agent finger guns himself to the head had me laughing so hard I had to rewind the movie to see what I’d missed.
Maybe I was just in the right mood for it, but I thought it was great.
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Totally agree. Several scenes had me literally belly laughing. Such a great movie.
The ad campaign seemed to miss the mark but I guess it’s a hard film to classify. It’s so genre flipping.
I don’t think it’s remotely close.
There have been worst BP nominees, but the gap between worst and 2nd worst in a particular year has to be among the biggest in history.
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I just watched the ABC’s of Book Banning, an Oscar-Nominated short documentary about restricting/removing books from school libraries. I really enjoyed the approach the film took. While there are some interviews with authors and activists, most of the film is dedicated to hearing from students. I was impressed by how thoughtful and articulate even some of the younger kids were, and was glad to hear their perspectives.
Also, I have to admit that I found myself reflexively thinking that some of the books were probably not age appropriate, which made me think a lot about some of my own ideas about taboos, propriety, and when/how to engage with challenging ideas.
Would recommend. I watched it on Paramount+, but probably available other places if you don’t have that streamer.
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I honestly think most (but not all) years have a worst nominee that is worse than Maestro. I do think the clear #10 ranking of it in this field - which I absolutely agree with, no hesitation - is probably causing it to be discussed as if it’s worse than it is.
That said, it’s definitely frustrating that the Academy insisted on taking Bradley Cooper’s bait here. There was a pretty easy chance to go 10-for-10 here, and they just opted out.
Jack Black is the best.
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On one hand, Poor Things is so well made and affecting, but the trailer proved true in telling me this movie wouldn’t be for me. Turning it off halfway through.
One huge lol the movie made was when saying eunuchs have no libido and cannot orgasm. Yes they cannot ejaculate, but that’s not the same thing. So it’s still asking a lot for a movie to understand what it’s saying with these things regarding eunuchs, as well as trans and intersex people. I think the movie’s focus on jumping furiously is one reason this stood out as low hanging fruit they missed.
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I mean, you’re fact checking a movie in which a man sewed a pig’s head on a chicken’s body successfully
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I’m not familiar with the movie, but it sounds like the kind of animal I wouldn’t want to run into in a dark alley.
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That’s not really fair to my point. Some divergences make sense as part of the premise. This isn’t one of them. Anyway not a big deal and it makes sense for the character to struggle with sexual function, just not for the reasons he specified.
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It’s actually a quite cute lol.
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I was joking, but “the poor” actually did get some treatment in the film not long after the point at which I made that post so there’s that.
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