Lol yup. It’s a masterpiece compared to the early Sonic the Hedgehog.
Gladiator 2
7/10
Bleh, this just highlights how good the first movie was, especially how narratively effecient it was. It hammered from the get go and reinforced throughout the whole movie that Maximus was a leader. He could lead an army or a ragtag group of gladiators, but he’d befriend them, rally them and inspire them. The idea of the Colosseum and the fights as a scripted WWE, and each battle having narrative heft, leading up to the conclusion.
This one the main guy was supposed to alternatively be a guy full of rage, but also rally his Gladiators, hate Rome, but be inspired by the ideal of Rome. Narratively it’s a mess while being bloated.
Someone said Paul Mescal doesn’t have what it takes to be a leading man, and he doesn’t, but the film also doesn’t help him out. When Denzel said he saw rage him him I was like ‘what rage?’. After finds his dead wife he’s… kind of just lead off with the soldiers? He is kind of crazy with the monkeys but then kind of semi fights the Gladiator leader?
I could go on… how we’re just told the emperors are bad for Rome but we never see it except for them being pale and kind of queer, how Denzel is kind of right that really the only reason anyone cares about Paul Mescal is being of his bloodline, which is a terrible why of deciding who should rule.
Any ways, if anyone deserves to be the King, it’s Denzel. He’s in a whole other Shakespearean movie and he is killing it. 10/10 chewing scenery. Almost kind of embarrassing when he has to go back and interact with the A plot.
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Rosemary’s Baby
Chilling and effective, tho a little goofy near the end vis a vis HAIL SATAN lol. Reminded me of Hereditary.
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I liked the part where every character spent the whole movie telling Mia Farrow that her hair looked like shit when it didn’t.
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Lol right? She was gorgeous. The first sign she couldn’t trust them.
I also loved the appearance of Randolph Duke from Trading Places.
Shots fired
He’s old, give the poor guy a break lol
After reading parts of the article, it looks like Scott is ready to start directing Broadway.
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Save for the bad-looking CGI that again made an appearance in certain scenes, Gladiator II was a pretty good-looking movie overall. Feels like that’s among the least of the movie’s problems.
Unfortunately, Ridley is a high-volume director who makes no real attempt to avoid making bad projects, and many of the bad ones also never felt like they were worthwhile swings to begin with, so you have no idea what you’re going to get with his stuff. Feels like he has a name that is just as famous as many of the highest-profile directors of our lifetimes, but he’s at or near the bottom of that list in terms of average quality of work. Luckily for him, if you make one of the GOATs like Alien, it’s legitimately impossible to ever fully lose the good will of most cinephiles.
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I think it’s kind of amazing I’ve never done work for a Ridley Scott movie.
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Alien
Blade Runner
Thelma & Louise
Gladiator
Hannibal
Black Hawk Down
Matchstick Men
The Counselor
The Martian
All the Money in the World
Ten GOAT movies out of thirty or so total. I’ll take it, but damn that’s a lot of trash in his ratio.
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Clever move, casually slipping Ridley Scott’s Hannibal into a GOAT list and hoping nobody would notice.
I need to get back to Blade Runner at some point. I did not like it the first time I saw it. But then I forged ahead and watched Blade Runner 2049 anyway, and not only liked it quite a bit but it felt during watching it like it unlocked the original for me. I just haven’t circled back yet. Feels like my chance of rehabbing my opinion of that one on rewatch is pretty high.
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I hope so.
Hey maybe give Hannibal another shot too. Maybe just me but I really like it.
Oh I’ve seen it multiple times. I was stoked as could be for it and was there opening night at the theater. And I came away kind of doing the “I’m going to pretend that I liked that better than I did, because as this movie’s #1 hype man I don’t feel like I can admit to others or myself that it wasn’t what I was hoping for.” And then I spent quite a bit of energy talking myself into it in the way that probably every movie fan with motivated reasoning has been guilty of at some point, and I snapped up the DVD as soon as it became a thing. After rewatch, it’s not that I hated it, but I had to admit that it just wasn’t anywhere near as good as I desperately wanted it to be.
Granted that I probably haven’t watched it in over 20 years at this point, but I imagine it will be tough to ever really get motivated to. But, with maybe the exception of the fact that I placed unrealistic expectations on it, I definitely think I gave it a fair shake.
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Definitely time for a rewatch imo
But you make some good points, and especially with the conviction that you gave it a fair shake, I think it’s fine for you to give your time to all of the other movies you’ve never seen. Even if some of your choices are goofy as hell.
Twenty years ago, I thought Silence of the Lambs was just okay.
You still planning on watching Another 48 Hours?