The Film Corner

[Geo]

I watched The Stepford Wives yesterday from the 1975 version with Katherine Ross yesterday. Joanna’s fear struck me as a moral foreigner in a community when Joanna said to the psychiatrist “I won’t be here when you get back. There will be someone with my name. She will cook and clean like crazy, but she won’t take pictures and she won’t be me.” (around 88:00 in the movie) The quote expressed my emotional horror at the mindless people around me every time I enter my job. These companies impose restrictions on us and make us less like humans and more like automatons just as the men in the movie replaced the women with robots. I suspect companies and employment kill the inner spirit of some of my coworkers like the men imposed fear on Joanna and leave moral empty shells of people wandering the world for the next pleasure hit from consumption as the alleged true form of happiness.
The movie also struck my anger and fear in my search for more assistance against the imposition of other people’s values on me. Joanna’s desperate pleas for assistance struck this fear and anger when Joanna says to Bobbie “Look, I bleed. When I cut myself, I bleed. Do you bleed? Bobbie: Why, look at your hand? Joanna: No. You look! (stabs Bobbie)” This entire scene played into my fears of imposed conformity because superiors will kill a person’s spirits without remorse. I fear a similar thing will happen to me after I have achieved my goals from graduate school over the next three to four years.

As if the same isn't tried again and again by dictators and repressants in communist/maoist/whatever countries
At least companies' influences usually don't go beyond the thousands/tens of thousands people range.

[Elok]

Watched Sanjuro with the kids.  It needed some explanation but was still good fun.  Kurosawa knew his stuff, it seems ...

[Unorthodox]

I randomly got tipped off to this show by a scrolling text at the bottom of the screen while hEt was watching a harry potter marathon...and it just said "mayan mythology set to anime", and I was in. 

I've seen the first two episodes and it gets my full endorsement.  It's not the tightest animation or voice acting, but it goes FAIRLY all in on the mythology.  Maybe a slight bit of revisionism, but not at ALL afraid to show the realities of human sacrifice either. 

[Unorthodox]

Other holiday viewing this year:

Santa Jaws. 

Awful.  Plain awful.  And not in the fun way lie Sharknado. 

Letters to Satan Clause.

A purposeful riff on all hallmark movies, it does it well enough to be slightly entertaining, but Satan could have used some more screen time. 

You Better Watch Out

I hadn't seen this one before...I really wish they would have gone all in on the ending.  Kind of ruined it for me a bit.  Surprisingly solid acting.   

About 20 minutes of the Grinch musical.  Bleh. 

[Unorthodox]

I randomly got tipped off to this show by a scrolling text at the bottom of the screen while hEt was watching a harry potter marathon...and it just said "mayan mythology set to anime", and I was in. 

I've seen the first two episodes and it gets my full endorsement.  It's not the tightest animation or voice acting, but it goes FAIRLY all in on the mythology.  Maybe a slight bit of revisionism, but not at ALL afraid to show the realities of human sacrifice either. 

So...a couple more episodes in and I've cooled off considerably.  For some inexplicable reason, the first couple episodes earn their TVMA rating 'naturally' if that makes sense.  From there we are introduced to a couple characters who have a particular fondness of the f-bomb.  Not that I'm necessarily a prude, but it really feels out of place here and feels more lie bad dialog writing. 

I'll finish it off eventually just because the source material, but it's not so much top of my to do list anymore.

[E_T]

It's an unfortunate thing at times, when what could be a good story concept runs into the lack of being able to keep the actual story moving forward and keeping it fresh.  It takes a good trick to do at times.  Sorry to hear it...

[E_T]

UnO, have you seen anything on Shudder and your thoughts about the website?

[Unorthodox]

There's been a thing or two come up in the news that would spark my interest there, but I've never actually gone there. 

It's AMC movie stuff, and IMO not worth the $6/month.  They'd be better off making an AMC + ish channel for the same price and package all their [poop] together. 

[E_T]

I've seen many trailer ads on you tube and many of the things look fairly (for me) interesting.  I still have some issues overall with "horror", but if is good story along with the "guts and gore", well...   And the best can be entirely bloodless...

[E_T]

Any thoughts on the Remake of "The Stand"?

[Unorthodox]

Back to Onyx Equinox,

I think I've identified the issue.  It's like they have a great story board for what should have been 2-3 seasons, and they're trying to dump it all into one season.  We don't really have enough time to get to know or care about many of the characters and they just come off as insert trope here.  There's very little of the lighthearted side stuff that is part of what made Avatar such a good series.  They even get fast-travel to eliminate the need of journeys between plot points.  We're closing in on the end, and all the relationships feel forced and shoehorned in as a result. 

I'm just hoping for some big God vs God blowout at the end at this point. 

[E_T]

A Divine Cliffhanger??

[Unorthodox]

Any thoughts on the Remake of "The Stand"?

I generally wait for a series to be complete so I can binge it.  I think it's only 4-5 episodes in right now?  Word on the street isn't great though.  Seems they altered the book way too much. 

[Buster's Uncle]

The book is a bit of a mess - that somehow comes together to be really good.  The last try was probably as good as an adaption of the story as is going to happen.

[Unorthodox]

Onyx Equinox final couple episodes. 

THIS is the second to last episode, and the best of the series, IMO, with a possible exception of the pilot.  Ironically, those are the two episodes that actually make some attempt at showing some backstory for the gods. 

THIS, the series needs more of THIS.  The names are impossible enough to keep track of, and you NEED this kind of stuff to feel any connection to the characters being discussed. 

So, series as a whole:  Really fun design of the monsters and gods.  Really bad at introducing characters/making you care about them.  So-so action.