I don’t disagree about Glass.
Wedding Crashers is a banger. Wall to wall laughs. So good that I gave The Internship a shot just to see Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn team up again (it was just okay). Rachel McAdams and Isla Fisher also great. Props as well to Bradley Cooper playing a funny asshole.
What are the thoughts on Swingers itt? I remember watching it like 10 years ago knowing nothing about the movie thinking it was gonna be about debauchery and actual swinging, so I was kinda disappointed, but I might have to revisit
I love Swingers, but it came out exactly when I moved to LA to begin my career in the entertainment industry so how could I not? The Vegas stuff is great, the voicemail is great, the par 3 course etc. They nailed it imo, including the tragic Hollywood bars we all went to.
It’s a stone-cold classic.
Cosigned. Have seen it many times.
Swingers is awesome. Heather Graham and Brooke Langton were certainly very appealing to many young men like me.
(Haven’t rewatched it in a couple of years, but I’d be stunned if my opinion changes.)
I did like the Vegas stuff, the Age of Enlightenment scene and “who’s the big winner in the casino tonight?” You are Mikey, you’re the big winner!
And then I was hoping for more of that and I just remember it got slower and more sad
Edit: I forgot about the voicemail scene lol. That was brutal
It offers a really gratifying conclusion, with the 1-2 punch of Mikey busting out the swing dancing skills and then hanging up mid-“I love you.” I definitely don’t think of it as a movie with a downward trajectory without a notable upswing to redeem it.
I don’t remember much about the movie, but every time someone mentions it I am reminded of the first time I visited LA back in the 90s. My girlfriend and I stayed in a cheap hotel in Hollywood and befriended a local guy there who was in the process of moving. We asked him if there were any groovy bars that we could go to and he said that we should go to the cocktail lounge from Swingers. He spent about two minutes giving me detailed driving directions and since I didn’t know the city I had to get my map out. It looked like it was actually only 10 blocks away and I said it looks like we could just walk over there. At that, he got this very confused look of his face and he said “well, I guess its possible - I never really thought about it.” Still my favorite LA exchange.
Ha that’s a good story, it’s also weird to think about how annoyingly difficult directions were before online maps!
But anyway I’ll watch this movie again this week
There was a specific LA street map called the Thomas Guide. It was a thick spiral-bound book. So if you needed to tell someone where to go you’d whip out your Thomas Guide and give them a page number and coordinates. Like, Thomas Guide page 178 C-4.
I watched it once probably around 10 years ago as well and didn’t like it at all. Didn’t find anything entertaining about it
Well that seems like a pretty big upgrade to what most people were doing then, ie turn left at the overhanging tree, turn right at the big rock, make another left at the house with the white garage etc.
Twisters
Huh. Good movie. Surprisingly good. Even great?
You know how lots of sequels and even reboots are packed full of hacky homages to their predecessor(s)? This movie did not do that. This was not some shitty rehash, and in no way behaved like it was beholden to any sort of Twister canon. They took the concept and they did their own thing. The movie all but 100% ignores that the previous movie happened. I desperately hoped this would be the case, but wasn’t necessarily expecting it to be. I was pleasantly surprised that they came through on this point.
This movie, to me, has a clear advantage on the first one, and that’s without necessarily having better leads. Glen Powell and Daisy Edgar-Jones do a nice job, and they’re not a big downgrade, but they fall short of being Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt. (I’m well aware that a younger generation would very likely quibble with me on that, but fuck 'em.) The biggest thing that I like more about this movie is that the tornadoes are legitimately terrifying. The first movie has much more of a tone of, “yeah technically these things we’re chasing are dangerous, but more importantly: isn’t this a fun hang?” This one made the “fun hang” aspect really secondary and heightened the danger of it all. And that’s a good thing; disaster movies SHOULD have a horror element to them. It would be truly traumatic to have a life-or-death near-miss with one of those things. That felt much better-reflected in this one.
As already indicated, I came at this from the angle of thinking the first one is pretty overrated and feeling that people are too kind to it, so I don’t necessarily expect my stance that this one is better to be the majority view across all movie-watchers, but it’s absolutely the stance I’m taking. And even if you do like the first one, the fact that this is far from a simple rehash will NOT leave you disappointed in any notion of “yeah it was okay, but they just did the same thing a little worse,” since that’s simply not what you’re offered here.
Obviously it’s always better to see movies on a premium screen if possible, but I will note that this is one that falls into the category of “ESPECIALLY see this on a premium screen if possible.” The Dolby seat was rumbling a lot. The feeling of being on a thrill ride at the movies was more palpable than it usually is. It would be a strong exhibit in exactly why Dolby can be worth the money if you’re not otherwise going as an A-List subscriber or whatever.
Anyway, pretty damn surprised to be saying it, but: one of the better movies so far in 2024 IMO. 4/5. (Holy shit this became a long post.)
I told my kids the other day that if we were going to a restaurant in a different part of town and didn’t know how to get there, we would actually call the restaurant for directions. Based on where we were coming from, they always had the exact route ready to go.
I agree with all that. A perfectly serviceable summer blockbuster. The production values were high. No silly looking CGI though out the movie (or flying cows), the rumbling Doby seats really did add something to the movie. I thought Glenn Powell was OK. He’s damn hansom but I don’t know if he has that it factor. Daisy Edgar-Jones is always super charming when she plays a strong headed Midwestern girl though.
I’m something of a Powell skeptic and this role is one that worked for me from him. When this one got started, I thought, “Okay, this is a good way to use him. Have him be a douchebag. You can’t just get me to like him with uncomplicated charm.” And then I sort of groaned when it became obvious that there was an endgame to make him a misunderstood good guy. And I didn’t know that they could make me like him by the end. But they absolutely did. I thought it was a well-crafted character arc, and this doesn’t go in my bad Powell list.
Yeah Im really bummed that he is leading The Running Man, becauss I agree that he does not have the it factor and unless he is playing the role as intended in the book, you need a pretty larger than life actor to carry it.
It definitely does goes in the win column for him. I don’t think it quite rises to “oh yea this guy’s got the magic” but more roles like this where he’s got a good foundation and can find what works for him and he’ll go places
