OncomingStorm93

I throughly enjoyed TMNT, and am excited for sequel prospects, but thought the first 2/3rds of this film were overly reliant on pop-culture references, and while I pretty much understood and appreciated them all, it seemed like a crutch. But the dialogue and internal dynamics amongst the turtles was aces. I was never a “fan” of this franchise, but I do want to see more of these specific characters just having casual interactions with themselves and outsiders.

Doing the B2B tonight after being off the grid in Yellowstone for a week. The numbers these two films have been putting up over the past week is pure joy to watch as a fan of the theatrical experience. Great ideas, greatly executed, greatly marketed. It’s all about quality from top to bottom of the studio system. And audiences still reward original quality Fall season is also the most interesting I can remember since before Covid.

In regards to the Oscars race, this is shaping up to be the most exciting season in eons. Oppenheimer looks to be nominated broadly across the creative and technical categories. Barbie is a lock for best picture nomination as well, and numerous others. ATSV should be a best picture nom IMO, I doubt it will be, but it's a damn masterpiece of storytelling and animation. Killers of the Flower Moon and Napoleon should both be strong players. Dune 2 could be another Denis Villeneuve masterpiece. There's a handful of brilliant indie films (Margaret, Past Lives) that deserve recognition. Whereas this time last year I was already 100% on board with EEAAO's inevitable widespread victory.

The Flash was the "Dark Phoenix" of the DCEU Blue Beetle is the "New Mutants" of the DCEU

I'm also a big Tenet fan. Script has a lot of issues, but the directing is on point and I'm a sucker for espionage films and time travel films. So right up my alley. Just wish Nolan had assistance on the script. As for JDW, his character was drawn blankly. Didn't even have a name! Not sure where JDW was supposed to be drawing acting/character inspiration from, when bouncing between heavy exposition scenes where he's just asking questions to his scene partner, and the big set pieces. It does seem like Nolan nailed the screenwriting element with Oppie though.

I'm surprised with how much RDJ's performance is being hyped up. Wasn't expecting it to be prominent, he's been barely shown in the marketing, at least to my knowledge.

Funny enough, it was initially Nicholas Hoult https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/nicholas-hoult-why-dropped-out-mission-impossible-1235375211/ Which doesn't make sense for plot reasons, given Hoult is currently 33 years old...

Thanks. I've got a Dune 2/Wonka one out tomorrow 👀

Figured this is as good a time and place as any to share this edit of mine from a month ago. For your consideration, Barbie trailer Oppenheimer style and Oppenheimer trailer Barbie style

Upon second viewing, my opinion of the film has lowered. The numerous exposition-heavy scenes throughout this film are far less engaging once you know the film's plot after the first watch. Too many scenes in this movie of 4+ characters exchanging information, one line of dialogue at a time, as if they rehearsed their explanations. Too many questions being asked by POV characters as a way of getting information to the audience. These scenes have been in other MI films, but this film basically has an extra 45-minutes of them. It's grating. Very very grating. That's what I suspect reviewers and commenters are saying when talking about the complex plot. It's not that the plot is particularly complex, it's that there's so so so much "tell" rather than "show", and with a 2:45 runtime it's too much, at least upon rewatch. Fallout --> Ghost Protocol --> Rogue Nation --> DR1 --> MI1 --> MI3 --> MI2

I spent a couple days on the line with the writers in Culver when they started, at Sony and Amazon/Scrubs season 9. Can’t imagine being out there today though.

Maggie gives the strike 2 “B+ Cinemascores” out of 5. As an editor in LA, I’m going on strike in solidarity with the writers and editors until the strikes end, or my next gig. Whichever happens first. I’m not picketing in this heat wave though.

You’ve been a member here for all of two weeks… no?

Got out a few hours ago, been digesting. Unsurprisingly, it's very very very very very very very good, and at many times great. But it falls just shy of the past three. It does everything as well as you could hope for; the action, the humor, the stakes, the character interactions, the stunts, the production values... it's all there. But I don't think there's any individual artistic or technical element that is better than the respective element from the GP-RN-F stretch. I thought the first two-thirds of the film were stronger than the last third, aside from the conclusion to the train sequence. In particular, the espionage thriller elements of those first two thirds I found is where the film was at it's finest. Haley Atwell was fantastic as always, I knew she was prominent in the film but I wasn't expecting her to be second-billed. Esai Morales was utterly forgettable, but that's more do to how bland his character was. A shame. Lorne Balfe's score was less remarkable than his Fallout score. I missed the bongos. I missed the intensity of the music from the HALO jump. Along those lines, the cinematography here was very solid but seldom as vibrant as, let's say the helicopter chase from Fallout, with those beautiful landscapes. The action was great here, but again just falling short of that Fallout intensity. And while I didn't mind the exposition-heavy scenes early on, it got grating when they were still happening deep in the third act. There's a couple story/character decisions that I'm disappointed with. For all the talk of this being the "funniest" MI film, and I did laugh strongly throughout, I'm still not sure anything was funnier than "no shit" in Protocol, Ethan's car chase while half-dead in Rogue Nation, or Benji not giving Ethan the right directions in Fallout's London chase. All in all, still a great action film that I look forward to catching again in theaters, but in a few months from now if I need to toss a recent action film, I'm going with John Wick 4. That said, the stage has been set for Dead Reckoning Part 2 to climb to new heights.

It already exists. It’s called Jack Reacher and it’s very underappreciated.

Are you accusing Warner Bros. of incompetence? How dare you. WB has clearly been the most stable and successful decision makers in the industry over the past half decade.

See you in a week with the receipts

It’s also been free promo for their own movie. Producers hate free promotion for their own films. The only thing they despise more than that is Dead Reckoning Part 1. This is well known in industry circles.

Didn’t realize I was in the presence of a time traveler. Can you tell me what CinemaScore DR1 got? Since you clearly know, being from the future an all that jazz. Btw, DR1’s IMDB score is currently .5 higher than Fallout’s.

Maybe they call themselves the "Qanon Shamman". Maybe they ransack the capital in hoodies with giant Qs. Maybe they wave around Q flags. Maybe they tag themselves as Qanon on Twitter. Maybe they shout their catchphrase WWG1WGA. Maybe, like in the case of Jim Caviezel, they speak at a Qanon convention in Vegas and spew rancid Qanon talking points while standing in front of an actual Q It's not like these people have been trying to hide.

Looks like Perri got to see this pre-premiere

Wikipedia sums it up pretty well: "The core QAnon conspiracy theory is that a cabal of Satanic, cannibalistic child molesters are operating a global child sex trafficking ring which conspired against former U.S. President Donald Trump during his term in office." Started on 4chan or 8chan, one of those, by someone named Q claiming to be a Trump admin official, who kept talking about "the storm" that was coming that would bring this sex ring down, among other nonsensical promises. The roots are in a conspiracy theory about a sex ring operating out of a DC pizza joint frequented by known Democrat political operatives. Many Trump officials publicly supported Qanon, including and probably most notably Trump's first Director of National Intelligence, Michael Flynn. Qanon supporters were a sizeable contingent in the planning of, and attempted carrying out of the January 6 insurrection designed to overthrow the democratic process in the United States. Now you know. No more plausible deniability. Your welcome.

I think multiple things can be true at once: 1: The film itself, in a vacuum, appears to be a quality product that's not inherently conspiratorial 2: The film is produced by and frontlined by highly conspiratorial people 3: Child sex trafficking is a real problem, pedophilia in certain elite circles is a real problem 4: The film is acting as and being promoted within conservative media as a dog whistle for Qanon 5: The film's release rollout and box office success are worth studying All in all, a perfectly engineered culture war trojan horse, which I'm sure was the intent of the producer and promoters. On the surface to a casual viewer, mostly innocuous stuff, but designed to get the uninitiated into the rabbit hole, while turning a profit from those already in the cult. All while churning the culture waters like we're seeing here right now.