The Last Movie You Watched

[Gawdzilla Sama]

The Boys in Company C - the best movie about Vietnam war, and yet it's so obscure.

"Nobody saw who killed the guy that shot me."

"Maybe he died of natural causes."

"He had half his head shot off!"

"Around here that's a natural cause."

[AniKoferBo]

Cold Mountain

[Rev. Rye]

This week in the Deep Hurting Project, the third installment in the franchise that should never have existed, Norm of the North: King-Sized Adventure. I tried to write this up last night, but a few rogue presses of the tab button caused me to lose all my work about an hour in, so I decided to restart today:

• Well, this is nice; it takes about three minutes for Norm to actually show up. Nice to delay the inevitable, even if it involves exchanges like "the artifact belongs to the people" "but I'm a people."
  
• Somehow, the lemmings' fur texture works looks a hell of a lot better in this film, even as the animation is degrading for everybody else, and for whatever reason, Fong's fur has become a hell of a lot lighter
  
• One of the biggest problems with this film (besides being a Norm of the North film), is that there's a shitton of padding. It starts with Norm naming the colours of the Aurora Borealis, then having Norm repeatedly go over whether or not Olympia and Fong have promised, then explaining what an app is, then epxlaining the properties of the misty mountain glacier (like that it's mountainous and misty), then insisting that he's going to do it alone, having the lemmings try to follow him into the cave even as he insists he has to do it alone, and that's just in the first ten minutes!
  
• Why does Socrates sound like a low-rent James Mason over his comparatively mid-Atlantic dialect in the previous two films? Why do I get the feeling I could do a better James Mason than this guy?
  
• And why would Norm let his son add a UFO tracking app to his phone? And how does one track UFOs which are, by their very definition, unidentified?
  
• You know, the first time I watched this, I was frustrated with how they were trying to railroad the lemmings into the expedition yet again, but this time, I'm a bit more charitable, saying that at least they could be a good food source.
  
• So, the artifact has a computer chip implanted into it?
  
• I'm still legitimately shocked by the fact that the lemmings managed to pee their way through the ice in the cave-in.
  
• Dexter has a pair of komodo dragons named Chaos and Mayhem
  
  
  
• And hearing Olympia call Norm while he's hanging on the helicopter, I just watched an episode of Archer where he calls Lana and asks her to check her bank account while she's suctioned to a skyscraper 30 stories above the ground, and this sounds a lot like that. And she does this multiple times.
  
• Why is "nevertheless" so out of character for a bear to say? 
  
• And Fong apparently had a bunch of #1 fingers laying around in his trunk so the lemmings could point to the artifact.
  
• So, with Norm and the lemmings in the back after Dexter jumped out of the plane, who the fuck is even piloting?
  
• Also, you gotta love the fact that the universe hates Dexter just enough that it lets him think he's going to fall on some sacks, a gust of wind lets him move just onto a pile of dish that's just randomly there.
  
• This seems like a bizarrely convoluted scheme: create a magical artifact that allows the public to witness the treasures of China once every hundred years. Also, why the fuck did the rise of the PRC not disrupt this continuity.
  
• It's just a little over a half of the movie's runtime, and there's been at least four instances where Norm narrowly avoids losing control of the artifact.
  
• You know, the knowledge that Dexter was threatening Chen could have come a bit earlier so it didn't look like he was randomly shifting his opinion of his grandfather's work on a dime.
  
• Also, why does his grandfather look like he's his older brother at the oldest? Or are they just clones of Montgomery Clift, one of which somehow got a genetic mutation that made him look a little more Asian?
  
• You'd think that when the lemmings tied the Komodo Dragons' tongues together, they'd have used a tighter knot.
  
• Now it looks like China has its own answer to the lemmings: snub-nosed monkeys. Fortunately, they seem to be a bit more tolerable. Unfortunately, they vanish after about a minute.
  
• So, how does Chen recognise Dexter when all he's seeing is a helicopter that doesn't even belong to him?
  
  
  
• It's impossible to run a boat on dry land?
  
  
  
• "You take the high road and I'll take the low road" is not a phrase that works for your situation. He flew onto the top of a mountain and you have to climb up it. 
  
• Yep, I've heard worse than Stan's "singing."
  
• You know, if you were going to spend the night raiding this mountain cave that's only open for one night a century, that's going to require a Hell of a lot of centuries.
  
• Why do these treasures look so underwhelming? 
  
• Somehow, Stan's singing in English sounds worse than when he was singing in the language of polar bears.

Well, at least this could have potentially been a decent movie if it wasn't connected to Norm of the North. The fourth movie (because, yes, there is one, and there'll probably be even more) isn't available at the local library, but it is available on Netflix. I may or may not watch it later. Now, I've got to cleanse my palate with some Tarkovsky, because Kino Lorber recently had a sale on select DVDs and Blu-Rays and I got the new Blu-Ray (the 4K restoration) of The Sacrifice.

[Rev. Rye]

This week in the Deep Hurting Project: Trolland

• It starts off sort of good, with Dick van Dyke narrating the story of interactions between humans and trolls, even if Dick van Dyke's in his nineties and he's starting to sound like Skip Spence when he did "Land of the Sun" after about 25 years of retirement, and no doubt several years on first-generation antipsychotics screwing with his ability to talk.
  
  
  
• The second humans start to appear, however, the defects in the animation become abundantly clear: The movement is unnatural (like the least fluid movement I've ever seen in a film), the lip-sync is virtually nonexistent, and when characters are at rest, they move like they have some sort of neurological disorder, either like they're desperately trying to hide that that they have Dr. Strangelove syndrome or like they have tardive dyskinesia.
  
  
  It's that awkward moment that you find yourself nostalgic for Kiara the fucking Brave.
• Good thought, good deeds, good words? Are the trolls Zoroastrian?
  
• Is Dick Van Dyke's jaw merging with his walking stick?
  
• Holy Hell, that kid sounds like he's 40. And what kind of name is Freden? Okay, apparently it's actually Hayden. And why did his clipboard just fly into the hands of the bullies?
  
• So, why is the main troll so convinced that humans aren't that bad long before he met his first human?
  
• Well, I'll be damned, that "We are Passengers" song is actually pretty good. Even if it is spoiled by this nature walk with absurdly low poly count wildlife. 
  
• Does that perky teenage camp counselor have a bald spot?
  
• And now we've got a scene where the lead troll and Hayden talk about how he's left home and warning him about the master prank to flood the picnic area, but it's ruined by the fact that, in addition to all the normal problems, it looks like Hayden's levitating when we actually see his legs, and the background keeps shifting WITHIN SHOTS, so a brief exchange about how the lead troll tries a not-Pop Tart for the first time comes across like he's trying something a bit more exotic... At least it would if the content wasn't so boring.
  
  
  
• Turning a kid against his friend is not a prank; that's deception.
  
• A trip to the front page of the Internet? But I thought Reddit already had a shitton of trolls!
  
• Got God on the phone, Said It won't be long, I see bugaboos, I see Styrofoams, my hood goin' brazy, where did we go wrong? I see bugaboos, I see Styrofoams, get Top on the phone.
  

Hopefully, next week, we'll be able to watch Bigger, Fatter Liar, but that's going to hinge on my being able to reacquaint myself with the first film. Hopefully it won't be too long before they finally find it at the library.

[Fake Messiah]

Suburbicon - obviously a commentary, if not straightforward lesson, for people enticed by MAGA scheme, that 1950s weren't great.

[Sal]

The Irishman (2019) - 10/10

Quite the ensemble of legendary actors, not to mention a 3½ hours long feature film.

[chimp3]

"The Other Side of Hell" - Alan Arkin, 1978. Kind of a Noir "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest".

[Rev. Rye]

Welp, because A) my Blu-Ray player has crapped out and a replacement won't be here until Thursday, B) Even if it weren't, the movie I had on hold for this week, Bigger Fatter Liar, is in limbo for whatever reason, and C) there's still one movie from a certain franchise that just happens to be on Netflix I need to take on, here's Norm of the North: Family Vacation, the latest film in the franchise that should probably have never been a franchise. 

• Well, it's nice to see the lemmings beating the crap out of each other for an excavation project.
  
• So, there's a shrub poking out of some extremely thin ice that's only noticed because the camera zooms in on it for some reason. How the fuck is that supposed to work?
  
• He is awake, Caribou, being asleep and playing with your phone are different things.
  
• And Socrates is back to his normal(ish) voice.
  
• Why does the orca sound like a mobster who got castrated?
  
• Well, it's nice to know that the consequences of Norm's very relaxed issues to being king of the north are coming back to bite him. It's a shame that the consequences (besides his rare uses of his kingly duties letting his kids down) are so nebulous.
  
• And the lemmings are trying to build a tower that looks a lot like a penis. Also, if they were supposed to be such good builders, why did they have to resort to peeing a hole in the ice cave in the last movie? And why did they have the rabbit try and make the ice sculpture if the lemmings were apparently such craftsmen? And why was that Mount Rushmore thing that the sequels keep rubbing in our faces so absent in the original film?
  
• So, this Asian guy that I hope isn't one of the guys from the last movie comes in on this old, Asian-looking ship and tries to steal Norm's crown and the presence of such a ship this far north, I feel like I should make a joke about the Franklin expedition, but I'm just kind of annoyed that the most I can do is equate the thief's struggles to escape Norm's wrath to what Alison and I do between the sheets.
  
• An endless winter falls upon the North? I'm just so baffled by why this would even be a problem in the fucking Arctic that I almost forgot to wonder why this would trigger a reference to the tornado scene in The Wizard of Oz.
  
• And somehow the underwater scenes are the most visually appealing scenes i the entire franchise, even if the way the echolocation works makes no sense.
  
• So, a ship made entirely of ice is headed for China? To a city that's inland? To be fair, Harbin does seem to have some harsh winters comparable to Chicago, and - crap, the fucking PRC is the one bankrolling these endless sequels, aren't they? 
  
• And how does Norm's presence cause the sea around him to randomly freeze in one scene? And how does Fong know about this vacation?
  
• And why does China this time around look like it's just the North Pole except with a fairground that looks like it's made of ice and blacklight paint for some reason?
  
• Okay, fun fact, shortly before watching this, I watched Wolf of Wall Street, so by a bizarre twist of fate, I've just watched two movies in a row that involve characters eating a live fish out of a fish bowl.
  
  
  
• That dance looks more like the mashed potato than the watusi.
  
• Why do two of these funhouse mirrors look the same? I get the feeling that they're doing it wrong.
  
• So, there's one scene where the lemmings are riding what looks like a giant slide and I think they crap in mid-air and a stork child mistakes it for snow and...
  
• I have no idea what the chaos that breaks out when it turns out Norm's lost his crown even is. Just random fighting?
  
• Fucking Hell, that snow tiger's going to be the secret villain, isn't it? Now we've got latter-day Disney cliches that have grown stale even for Disney to deal with.
  
• Actually, it looks like they're going to subvert this trope, since the tiger seems legitimately shocked by his being robbed. 
  
• So, it's the tiger's twins who stole the crown, and once the movie reveals that they were the culprits, it just devolves into a bunch of set pieces and I just get so bored I keep watching JHS' video on "Why you need an EQ pedal" to keep up my interest.
  
• And that thunderstorm is why making a ship entirely out of ice is so impractical.
  
• Fucking Hell, that Orca is basically a walking Deus Ex Machina. Or is that a swimming Deus Ex Machina?
  
• And you gotta love that those newscasters are actually enjoying the coming eternal winter.
  
• And of course Norm comes just in time to avert the crisis because why wouldn't it work that way?
  
• And why would the coming of winter coincide with a shining sun? In the fucking Arctic? You know what? Fuck it. This movie's made for idiots and evidently some higher-ups in the People's Republic of China.
  
• And it all ends with, of all things, a fucking big musical dance number of, and I wish i was making this up, the orcas singing "I'm a Little Teapot." 
  
  
  Fucking Hell, I'd even prefer the one in the Down the Rabbit Hole video that apparently decided "sleves" was a word.

And thankfully, I'm now done with this franchise, because there's only ten movies left in the Project (barring the possible points where I have to go back to using movies uploaded onto YouTube) and hopefully I'll get through them all before Norm of the North 5 comes out. I don't even know if they're making that, but I'm not going to bother with it.

Okay, for those of you who want to know what I think about The Wolf of Wall Street:

---

It's a damn good film. It's darkly comedic, insane, and it feels a hell of a lot shorter than 3 hours long. It definitely deserves its place on IMDB's Top 250 list. Two things worth noting that I finally picked up on:

• Close watching and finally figuring out how to do a proper progressive freeze-frame on the one Blu-Ray player in the house that actually works now, in that famous scene, despite her claims to have thrown away all her panties and the pretty heavy implication that she's going commando while she's teasing Jordan Belfort, is clearly wearing white panties when the camera shows her uncrossing her legs when she's finally found out that Mr. FuzzyBear is broadcasting her lady parts to the guards.
  
• This is the first time I've watched this film since I became a fan of Last Podcast on the Left, and I'm kinda disappointed that Henry Zebrowski's role was so small, and given his tangential remarks and his large-looking frame, I find myself wondering if maybe Ben Kissel should have been cast instead.
  

---

[The Valkyrie]

Birds of Prey (with a lot more in the title)

DC have had some real stinkers when it comes to movies in the past few years (and the less said about the casting of Batman in the past few years the better).

However, they have had a couple of mediocre movies amid the general faeces that didn't make it to the sewer. Wonder Woman being one of them.

Then we get to Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of one Harley Quinn...

Margot Robbie reprises her role as Harley Quinn from the Suicide Squad movie.

Except...

This movie is a delight from the beginning to end. It is quite fast paced and genuinely funny in many places while having some fight scenes that made me cringe.

Ewan McGregor as the bad guy really helps, too.

It's not quite Deadpool level of fun, but it's a solid 9/10 on my Givafuckometer.

The lowpoint is part of the soundtrack with a terrible remake of Pat Benatar's "Hit me with your best shot".

[Gwaithmir]