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Post by mllemass on Mar 17, 2017 16:19:34 GMT
I was fascinated by how it was filmed, too. After watching it, I found a behind-the-scenes video and interviews that showed how they really kept Tom Hardy in that car the whole time so that he really was exhausted by the end. And I think they also did something where he wasn't exactly sure what the next phone call would be so that he had to improvise in character.
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Post by roverpup on Mar 18, 2017 18:20:21 GMT
Last night we saw Map to the Stars. It was... interesting. I can't say I loved it but I can say I couldn't turn away from it. I think the main trouble I had with it was that there were no truly sympathetic characters in the entire film and yet they were all very pitiful so I ended up feeling elements of sympathy for all of them. And it of course had Cronenberg's signature style - except it was very muted for most of the movie I thought. In a way (at some point) this film reminded me of the films of Atom Egoyan, another Canadian director who I find intriguing. Julianne Moore was excellent in it, as was most of the rest of the cast. That poem that was used to great effect was extremely haunting... Here's a great examination of the movie through the poem - flavorwire.com/507031/paul-eluards-poem-liberty-is-the-unseen-star-of-maps-to-the-stars:-))
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Post by MagdaFR on Mar 18, 2017 18:35:29 GMT
That poem is from the French poet Paul Eluard.
I can recite it in French and always loved it.
I didn't watch the movie and thus I don't know how was used but it is just a poem to freedom.
Et par le pouvoir d'un mot Je recommence ma vie Je suis né pour te connaitre Pour te nommer Liberté
It was written during WWII when France was occupied by the German.
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Post by roverpup on Mar 18, 2017 19:12:19 GMT
The essay at the end of my post takes a look at the contents of the poem and weaves it thematically to the film. It is a long read but I think the article does an excellent job of essentially unlocks the movie's meaning that goes beyond just a surface examination of the plot that most reviews would give. The director purposely took that poem and used it to explore what the meaning of "freedom" has become in a modern, narcissistic and often soulless "free" society that idolises the cult of celebrity. The article also diescusses the origins of the poem as well to give background to the connection to the them of the film.
:-))
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Post by MagdaFR on Mar 18, 2017 19:32:38 GMT
OK
I didn't look at the link because I didn't watch the movie. Perhaps I'll give the movie a chance. I remember Shailene Woodley's acting was praised.
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Post by roverpup on Mar 19, 2017 4:29:13 GMT
We saw The Captive tonight and I found it entertaining. It was savaged by the critics (there was even an article about how hurt Egoyan was by the critical reveiws after Cannes) and it was a complete flop at the BO. But that has no bearing on how I enjoyed the movie - which I did.
Ryan Reynolds was really, really good as the father of the missing girl. Rosario Dawson was also excellent as the police office involved with the case. I loved the whole tone of the film by Atom Egoyan and although it probably was his most conventional and accessible film to date I fully understand why he made it that way and what inspired him to take on the project.
Sure there were things in the film that didn't quite work as well as they should but I bought into it and found myself swept away with the tension, the cold, and the theme of loss of a child and the destruction of a relationship because of that loss (a theme that haunts a number of Egoyan films).
I also have to mention that I loved seeing Arsinée Khanjian yet again in another Atom Egoyan film. She is such a force even in a very small role. Just a stunning actress and a talented film producer in her own right as well.
:-))
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Post by igs on Mar 19, 2017 19:36:54 GMT
Saw Hidden Figures yesterday. I loved the film, in the first half I thought it was a bit all over the place narrative-wise but it got more coherent as it progressed. I loved how it showcased the different routes these three amazing women took in their lives, and the different ways all of them triumphed. It always shocks me how short a while ago - relatively speaking - the civil rights movement happened, that this amount of segregation still existed in the 1960s.
I don't have much interest in the macho pissing contest aspect of the Cold War - an era that apart from the space race is very intriguing and frightening to think about - so a film that was more focused on the personal pursuits and difficulties these extraordinary women faced was for me a refreshing way to approach the whole race. Much more interesting than the astronauts themselves.
(I'm also totally crushing on Janelle Monáe.)
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Post by roverpup on Mar 19, 2017 20:56:52 GMT
I enjoyed Hidden Figures too (not a favourite of mine but it was entertaining).
But for me the lives of the astronauts are also very interesting. Have you ever read T. Wolfe's book The Right Stuff? It is an amazing book (and the film that it was based on wasn't too shabby either). And as a Canadian our own Chris Hadfield (who is closely associated with my hometown) is a highly accomplished person, worthy of a film for himself. Roberta Bondar is another astronaut whose story is very interesting. As was Yuri Gagarin. Or that of that of the first female in space - Valentina Tereshkova.
There's got to be some interesting stories in those people too. But I might be biased - I love stories of space exploration and the people who did them. I guess it harkens back to my younger days when they used to march us out into the school foyer to watch the launching of the rockets on a small grainy B/W TV. It all seemed so exciting and we didn't have to math sums all afternoon!! LOL!
:-))
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Post by igs on Mar 19, 2017 21:33:39 GMT
I'm not familiar with 'The Right Stuff', but I'm going to go ahead and google it now! Gagarin is probably the most well-known astronaut (well, cosmonaut - there really needs to be a common word for people going to space...) here in Finland - though that might be because there's a very popular Finnish song about him - but apart from that I don't really know much about the people who have gone on space missions. Of course now there's Timothy Kopra who's 1/something-th Finnish, he probably doesn't care but Finnish people are very excited every time there's someone remotely from here who's famous for whatever reason. So we have adopted him as "our" astronaut haha. When I was younger I was super interested in space: constellations, planets, black holes, anything - I'd visit planetariums and observatories, which I loved - but somehow that never extended to the real life individuals who had actually been "to the stars". I do enjoy movies/books with space travel though, be that drama or scifi or fantasy or fairytale. I can imagine though, what it must have been like when the space race was actually happening, it must have been so exciting. Now it just seems like an actual miracle that they managed to get all the way to the moon with that 1960s technology! I mean watching those room-sized computers (love the scene in Hidden Figures where they realize the IBM won't fit through the door lol), people computing by hand...and still they got people to the space and back again alive. It's quite amazing. But it's a bit tainted by the Cold War urgency of it, seems more like an obligation in order to show dominance than true fascination or desire to see what's out there.
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Post by mllemass on Mar 20, 2017 2:15:47 GMT
I just came from seeing Beauty and the Beast. I loved it. The original animated version is one of my favourite movies ever, and I saw the stage version on Broadway.
I like the little changes they made in this movie. I was happy to see the audience full of little kids. Their parents wisely ignored the ridiculous fuss made over the "gay" scene. After the movie, I asked my friend what she thought of the gay scene, and she said "There was a gay scene?".
Exactly!
In fact, the adults in the audience burst into applause at that scene! And then they applauded again at the credits.
And now I'm going to have those songs in my head all night!
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