General Movie Discussion - **please mark spoilers**

[DoctorDodge]

Fantastic! Yes, I think this list would certainly help in giving me the right amount of incentive in watching a fair number of films that I should've watched a long while ago (including both Repulsion and Cul-de-Sac, Jean, which I know I should've watched sooner, and I apologise. On the plus side, I'm sure i have a decent internet connection to properly watch them now, so I will finally be able to watch both very soon, if everything works out ok)!

[DoctorDodge]

New Dredd image released!

http://www.empireonline.com/news/story.asp?NID=31491

Ok, whilst the helmet is a little too big, I still love the whole early Dredd vibe I'm getting from this. To be honest though, the biggest reasons I'm getting excited, is (a) creator John Wagner is actually involved in this adaptation, and (b) Alex Garland's written the script. So I'm looking forward to this a little more than the average comic movie, especially since Dredd is one of my favourite comic characters ever, and if done right could be a lot more fresh than many other comic book movies released in the past few years (Nolan's Batman films and Scott Pilgrim being exceptions, of course).

Now when are they going to release a sodding trailer, damnit?!?

[mystima]

Saw the trailer for the new Sherlock Holmes movie. Looks to be one heck of a ride.

http://www.imdb.com/rg/VIDEO_PLAY/LI.../vi3605306393/

[DoctorDodge]

Pfft, it's the new series of Sherlock you should be looking forward to, mystima. Easily one of the best new shows of last year. A trailer for that is something I'm looking forward to!

[DoctorDodge]

Oh, flip.

http://www.comingsoon.net/news/movienews.php?id=80109

September 2012? Was seriously hoping for a spring release date. Well, maybe I was just hoping for a trailer pretty darn soon, as a fan of the Judge, but meh. At least I can't get excited about it now.

[alkanto]

Well, at least you have confirmation of it now! And September 2012, you say? I might be in England by that time...and it's always good to go to movies with friends

[DoctorDodge]

That would definitely be cool! I spose one thing I'm very glad about is that they haven't done anything as stupid as give it a summer release, where it would suffer huge losses when put up against a film as big as Dark Knight Rises.

[mystima]

would love to see the series but we don't get it here...boohoo...at least for now anyway. unless it is picked up by one of the broadcast stations here. will have to wait till it is streaming on netflix.

[DoctorDodge]

I know Sherlock was on PBS Masterpiece last year in the US, so I'm guessing when the 2nd series is broadcast it'll be on there too. But Netflix is definitely the most likely place to check it out atm, as there were only 3 90-minute eps made of the show.

[fernandito]

Happy Birthday, Stanley Kubrick !

[Jean]

happy birthday!!!

[DoctorDodge]

So, new photos of the Dredd movie revealed that show a lot more of the film in action:

http://www.superherohype.com/news/ar...d-photos-debut

As a fan of ol' Stony Face, what do I think? Not sure on the uniform at the moment, if I'm really honest. It looks practical, but it doesn't seem as...colourful as the comic. I'm not asking for a 100% faithful costume, but it does seem a bit plain. Then again, the Batman costume in the movies also takes out the grey and blue gloves, and that looks pretty cool in action. Urban as Dredd looks majorly constipated in a couple of those pics, so he's got the look nailed, at least. At this point, I don't expect Dredd to be a 3 dimesional character - yes, there have been excellent character development stories for him in the comics, but he is at the end of the day an uncompromising fascist bastard. Hell, best Dredd story ever America was him at his uncompromising fascist bastard best! I'm not expecting a story half as good as America, quite frankly, but still, I can't judge (no pun intended) until it's actually out. I'm not going to get massively excited about this film, but I'm also not gonna condemn it, either. I think I'll just have to wait and see. Still, so glad to see at least some pics to keep me going in the long wait till September next year!

EDIT: Oh, and Olivia Thirlby does look pretty kickass as a young Anderson!

[Yaksha]

Just saw the trailer for Fincher's version of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. It got me even more interested in seeing it than I already was

[fernandito]

The trailer with The Immigrant Song ?

[Yaksha]

Yep. Looks pretty damn good.

[DoctorDodge]

I just watched it, and I gotta agree it does look very cool.

Now I really do need to get round to finishing that book. It was great what i read of it, but i get so easily distracted sometimes...

[Seymour_Glass]

I just do not like the idea of people as talented as Fincher and the Coens doing remakes.

[DoctorDodge]

Does the remake thing really apply in this case though, when in fact both original films were adaptations of novels - essentially remakes, but in another medium? One of the greatest remakes ever made is of course The Thing, and even the original The Thing from Another World was based on the novel Who Goes There? (One I'm very interested in reading, I must say.) It may be easier to think of someone talented as Fincher not out to make an English remake, but making his own interpretation of the original novel.

Of course, what it really comes down to is that remakes do not necessarily mean "weaker film" (although I still prefer the Infernal Affairs trilogy to The Departed), is that just a lot of remakes are done to cash in on films and given to shit directors. In my opinion, what really sets out remakes like The Thing and True Grit is that they're done by directors with actual talent.

[candy]

Hmmm, just thought of a crazy idea when I realised that I haven't given a seriously in-depth movie review of why Withnail & I is one of the greatest films ever, and then I remembered the list I started and ended in Baker's Dozen a week or so ago: 13 Greatest British Movies. I also remembered what I said I wanted to do: to watch every single movie on the list. Well, here it is for reference:

13 greatest British movies
1. Withnail & I
2. Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
3. Shaun of the Dead
4. Hot Fuzz
5. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
6. 28 Days Later
7. Harry Brown
8. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
9. This Is England
10. Snatch11. Cul-de-Sac
12. Harry Potter
13. Quadrophenia
Really looking at it, there's only 4 films I've yet to watch on it (5 if you include Deathly Hallows Part 1, as the Harry Potter one wasn't very specific). I'm now currently considering whether I should do an in depth review over the next 13 weeks of each of these films. Admittedly, for a few of them, there's so little for me to say on them, I could just repost my old reviews from a few months ago. Idk, depends if anyone's interested or not. Should I even bother? I do like watching my British films, I must admit.

I have high lighted the ones I have seen, and I would say they are all worth a watch. Some of them are better than others - individual taste etc.
There are other British films that I rate either just as highly or higher than these, as some of them are not what i personally would call the best of British but each to their own

My own personal favourites from the list are
harry brown
monty python
Hitch hikers
28 days later

[DoctorDodge]

Yes, there's a few on there that i certainly wouldn't put in my personal favourite list, candy, (particularly Hitchhiker's and even Monty Python, if i'm honest) but yes, as you said, to each their own.

[Seymour_Glass]

Does the remake thing really apply in this case though, when in fact both original films were adaptations of novels - essentially remakes, but in another medium? One of the greatest remakes ever made is of course The Thing, and even the original The Thing from Another World was based on the novel Who Goes There? (One I'm very interested in reading, I must say.) It may be easier to think of someone talented as Fincher not out to make an English remake, but making his own interpretation of the original novel.

Of course, what it really comes down to is that remakes do not necessarily mean "weaker film" (although I still prefer the Infernal Affairs trilogy to The Departed), is that just a lot of remakes are done to cash in on films and given to shit directors. In my opinion, what really sets out remakes like The Thing and True Grit is that they're done by directors with actual talent.

All this is true. Hmm. I guess it's just the impending sense of my own mortality, wanting me to get my hands on as much new material as I can before i go.

[pathoftheturtle]

Does the remake thing really apply in this case though, when in fact both original films were adaptations of novels - essentially remakes, but in another medium? One of the greatest remakes ever made is of course The Thing, and even the original The Thing from Another World was based on the novel Who Goes There? (One I'm very interested in reading, I must say.) It may be easier to think of someone talented as Fincher not out to make an English remake, but making his own interpretation of the original novel.

Of course, what it really comes down to is that remakes do not necessarily mean "weaker film" (although I still prefer the Infernal Affairs trilogy to The Departed), is that just a lot of remakes are done to cash in on films and given to shit directors. In my opinion, what really sets out remakes like The Thing and True Grit is that they're done by directors with actual talent.

All this is true. Hmm. I guess it's just the impending sense of my own mortality, wanting me to get my hands on as much new material as I can before i go.

Pardon, but I'm not sure I understand your point. What do you mean by new material? Different productions of a story can offer differing entertainments, if entertainment is what you're after in this life, and if what you're looking for is meaning, so as to perhaps actually understand what wasted time genuinely means, then you can often find more meaning than you'd realized in new interpretations of really deep old ones.

[fernandito]

While I understand what you're driving at Path, I coincide with Seymour's view - to an extent. I too find myself looking for completely fresh material to mire myself in as opposed to a slightly modified interpretation/rehash of an idea or ideas fleshed out in a different medium.

[DoctorDodge]

Well, here's the thing, feev: there's been so many interpretations done of so few ideas that it's kinda difficult to find anything truly original these days. Take, for example, Shutter Island and Inception: both deal with questions of reality, of how you can be sure you can trust your own mind, and both deal with Leo having a little bit of trouble getting over his wife. In fact, films like Ghost in the Shell and The Matrix have also explored the possibility that your idea of what you think is real is wrong. (A little less, in the case of the former, but it's still there.) What makes Inception so brilliant arguably is the way the story is told, and the added twist of making it something of a heist movie makes it much more interesting, as well as how the physics of the dreams are truly explored. A fantastic film, but it could be argued that it's core idea isn't exactly that original, which is one reason why I wasn't very keen to see it at first.

[fernandito]

I understand that. What I'm getting at (or trying to, anyway) is that I like to make a drastic switch of gears each time I finish a story, in any format. If I read a reality warping story with sci-fi trappings - we'll stick to the Matrix example - I like to follow it up with something completely different, like an auto biography or a high fantasy fable or whatever. There's a plethora of interpretations on a sundry of concepts and ideologies and I hate to feel like I'm missing out on them by sticking to certain genres (for lack of a better word), no matter how wide that circumference is, ya feel me ?