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OT: Summer Movies 2022 -- COVID Behind Us? Or Not?

posted 2 years ago by ecarle (14979)
23 replies | jump to latest

Its been interesting to be going to the movies in 2022.

One by one, movies that were delayed in the release(Top Gun 2) or delayed in the making (Elvis -- star Tom Hanks was one of the first cases of COVID when he started work on that movie in Australia in March of 2020), or delayed in both.

I can barely remember the movie now, but didn't the James Bond "No Time to Die" see it release date moved about three times from April of 2020 through the rest of 2020 before landing in late 2021?

In short, COVID is sorta kinda "over" (in the US at least, in most states at least) even as it is still hanging around and making trouble.

But Hollywood went and got some of the delayed "biggies" out -- No Time To Die last year; The Batman back in March and -- a "Summer Slate" now.

Its been good...but bad. I'm reminded of Vertigo, where James Stewart "brings back" his dead love, but its not REALLY her.

We've brought back the summer movie season, but its not REALLY a summer movie season...

To be sure, there have been three "big ones" since May:

Top Gun 2 (which star producer Tom Cruise proudly swears he NEVER would have allowed to go to streaming first or only.) It has made a bazillion gazillon dollars.

Jurassic World: The Last One Maybe(Yeah sure.) It has made a gazillion dollars.

Elvis: I think it opened real good but I'm not sure if it had staying power.

I saw all three of them, at the theater, with lots of other people. We will see if I die.

But in the meantime, I noticed this:

Yeah they had three "big ones" -- and another "big one" right now(Thor from Marvel and hey, I thought Endgame WAS the Endgame? We were supposed to cry and applaud and say goodbye but NOOOOOO...they're all coming back, even if they were dead , some of them.)

But all in all, there just aren't that many big ones made and ready to go. The movies AREN'T back.

Consider the summer of 1982 (forty years ago): ET, Poltergeist, The Road Warrior, Star Trek II, Rocky III, Blade Runner, The Thing, and more

Consider the summer of 1984: Ghostbusters, Indy and the Temple of Doom, Star Trek III, Gremlins, and lots more.

No, they just didn't have enough "big ones' in the pipeline(Brad Pitt and Sandra Bullock have "Bullet Train" coming in the old "one more in August slot, that's it.) And on my most recent trip to the theater (to see Elvis) I noted that we were back to "COVID year trailers" of movies of such little consequence and excitement in the trailers that I don't even believe they ARE real movies.

Quick takes:

TOP GUN 2. Top Gun 2 was a lot of fun, but ol' Tom basicallly took what had been a "military booster movie" in the 80's and turned it into another Mission Impossible action movie -- with touches of The Guns of Navarone and The Bridges at Toko Ri in the mission and Star Wars (the first one, the best one) at the cilmax.

JURRASIC WORLD 3(JURASSIC PARK 6). Jurrassic World has a gimmick: the original Jurassic Park had Sam Neill, Laura Dern, and Jeff Goldblum as the leads...and then split them up into the sequels (Goldblum got one, Neill got one, Dern got a cameo.) Well, "the gang's all here" in this one, along with the new stars(led by Chris Pratt and Opie's pretty redhead daughter). Neill, Dern, Goldblum...Pratt, Howard.)

And something odd happened: I remember thinking that Jurassic Park was no Jaws, that the three leads weren't as interesting(though Goldblum came close) as Schieder, Dreyfuss and Shaw. But....all these years later, Neill, Dern, and especially Goldblum seemed MUCH more intesting than the modern leads.

But here's the problem. The thing that Jurassic Park did really well was to make us WAIT for the dinosaurs in general and REALLY wait for the "killer" dinos -- the T-Rex got a great scene and the Raptors got a great scene and they all came together at the climax.

Well in this new Jurrassic movie, dinos are front and center, always around, always in the frame and only RARELY eating people, and not eating major characters til the very end. (Nifty: we get a call back to the cute little spittin' creature that killed Seinfeld's Newman in the original -- along with a great callback to the Shaving Cream Can McGuffin.)

Noteable: Jeff Goldblum IS a star, kind of . The movie saves Goldblum's entrance for last; it builds up to him. He's an old guy now, but the quirkiness and edgy line readings remain(at his peak, he was a very SEXY weird guy.) Goldblum has The Big Chill and The Fly on his resume, but also the Jurassic movies and Independence Day as blockbusters. I figure he will stick around and play character parts -- he's the best thing in Jurrassic World...which just isn't very good. Too much of a good thing, with no threat from most of the dinos to most of the people (and a "repeater" of a final beast vs beast fight, from other sequels).

For kids, I guess. (Though "on topic": Someone called Jaws -- Psycho at Sea; someone called Jurassic Park ---Jaws on Land. So Psycho influenced all.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

ELVIS: I came to Elvis with Great Expectations. "Moulin Rouge!" in all its craziness is my favorite movie of 2001(I know from the excess) and its writer-director Baz Luhrmann begins "Elvis" with the same "motto" that launched Moulin Rouge over 20 years ago (Somthing like "Love. Comradeship. Peace."" Eh...that's not it...but anyway.)

So the linkage is direct between Moulin Rouge and Elvis...and certainly both films are musicals. Most importantly , both films show off Baz's surreal, CGI-run-rampant style. It was fun to "feel the auteur" again, for me.

But something goes wrong. Tom Hanks dominates as Elvis' evil manager Colonel Tom Parker(who wasn't really a colonel, or really a Tom.) Hanks is buried in a ton of Ugly Guy make-up and a fat suit and sports his most bizarre southern accent yet. (Note: Tom Parker kept Elvis from being with John Wayne in True Grit. The Glen Campbell role. What a coup that would have been. Mia Farrow right after Rosemary's Baby had signed up to play Mattie Ross, but backed out on suggestion of Robert Mitchum , who told her director Henry Hathaway was a yelling tyrant. So we lost Wayne, Presley, Farrow...and got Wayne, Campbell, Kim Darby.)

Hey: the guy who plays Elvis(and he's good) played Charles Manson's main hitman Tex Watson in QT's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. I thought he was too pretty for Tex, but he fits Elvis.

Elvis's famous hits only get played all the way through a few times. The movie makes a good point of giving us Elvis' 1968 NBC special as "how he came back" and in this version, defeated Tom Parker for awhile.

But in the end, Elvis just didn't match Moulin Rouge in one big way: emotion. I felt the tragic love story(fictional) in Moulin Rouge. I couldn't feel the tragic love story here.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

In a telling, cruel but necessary bit of business near the end, we see actual footage of the REAL Elvis Presley performing in Vegas not long before his 1977 death at age 42, from drugs. His face is puffy and bloated, but it doesn't look like the face of a "naturally overweight man." Rather it looks like Elvis's face and head have been blown up like a balloon. You can't SEE Elvis' face. Its amazing that nobody got him help right then and there.

But then the Colonel would have lost his meal ticket.

I don't have a favorite movie of 2022 yet. I don't think it will be one of these three. I have hopes for Brad and Sandra in August and I'm sure the fall will bring something(I'm betting on Scorsese's "Murdering Native Americans" movie with DeNiro and Leo.)

Final take: The movies aren't back yet. And COVID isn't over yet. But we shall endeavor to persevere...

[–] modica (4169) 2 years ago

I haven't been to the movies since February of 2020. I used to go about 2 or 3 times a week. I miss it, but I still am not ready to go back. The BA 5 Omicron variant is very contagious and people are ignoring it for the most part. I almost went last summer, but decided to wait and see and I am glad I did, because it got really bad last fall and winter. Not sure when I will go back, but with an estimated 1 million cases a day in the US now, I am good for now. The media isn't reporting how contagious it is so that people go out and spend money. It's a weird world we live in that most people are ignoring the virus, while there are people like me who stay away from crowds.

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

Its an interesting time for decisions about how to live our individual lives. To the extent that I HAVE chosen to go to movie theaters again...that's the choice I've made.

But it is clear to me that the world is a dangerous place. Always has been really. And...oh, I guess I have nothing new to say on the topic. I suppose I'd prefer to risk my life for a really good movie. These three aren't that, though Top Gun was a fun audience movie. Last Christmas, I felt that I had risked my life for a good movie with Licorice Pizza, but that's just me.

Stay well!

[–] modica (4169) 2 years ago

Don't care for Top Gun. Didn't miss that. I do want to see the Jordan Peele movie badly. Maybe I'll go to a matinee.

[–] ElizabethJoestar (930) 2 years ago

I haven't been to the movies much this year, but that would be the case COVID or not. I did go see The Northman, which was sadly a flop. It was astonishing-- I absolutely loved it.

I'm hoping to see the new Top Gun before it leaves the theater (yeah, I'm super late on that one). My sister went to a matinee screening in the middle of this week and she said the theater was STILL packed. Impressive.

[–] modica (4169) 2 years ago

Packed? In my area matinees during the week don't get many people. You must live in a city.

[–] swanstep (2616) 2 years ago

No, they just didn't have enough "big ones' in the pipeline(Brad Pitt and Sandra Bullock have "Bullet Train" coming in the old "one more in August slot, that's it.)

A few you missed: Lightyear (sort of another Toy Story sequel - tepidly reviewed, made some money), Minions:Rise of Gru (another Despicable Me sequel - tepidly reviewed but making lots of money), Doctor Strange in the Multiverse (tepidly reviewed, made lots of money), just out The Gray Man (from the Russo Brothers who did Winter Soldier, Infinity War Endgame, cost $200 million and is going to be on Netflix next weekend, tepidly reviewed, probably a financial disaster), Nope (Jordan Peele returns after Get Out and US - could be big next week), The Northman (*could* have been a big, weird breakout hit in my view, at least as big as Conan The Barbarian (1982), but the stars didn't align for it).

In sum, my own sense is that there's really *has* been something like a fully functioning 'big' movie industry this year and if you throw in the streaming services that impression only grows: not only has Stranger Things Season 4 been bigger than big in the last month or so, a hugely risky 1 billion+ dollar Lord of The Rings prequel series is just about to kick off on Amazon, and HBO starts its prequel series to Games of Thrones (notwithstanding the bad blood left by how that show tailed off in its last season or so) next month I believe. I mean these are *huge* mega-dollar cultural spectaculars that even allowing for inflation probably jointly cost more than all of 1982's blockbusters put together!

Probably the only thing holding back the industry from popping open the champagne is that overall profit margins are trimmed significantly both by No Russian market for political reasons, No Chinese market for a mixture of political and covid reasons. Hard economic times themselves are often quite good for Hollywood; going back to the 1930s at least, movies are cheap mass entertainment. But these worldwide hard times have a unique character with inflation being caused by supply shocks all over the place from (i) floods and droughts/climate change, (ii) wars and politics, (iii) massive just-in-time network disruptions caused by covid shutdowns, borders closing, worldwide labor immobility. That all may make consumer behavior different this time around. Who knows?

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

No, they just didn't have enough "big ones' in the pipeline(Brad Pitt and Sandra Bullock have "Bullet Train" coming in the old "one more in August slot, that's it.)

A few you missed: Lightyear (sort of another Toy Story sequel - tepidly reviewed, made some money), Minions:Rise of Gru (another Despicable Me sequel - tepidly reviewed but making lots of money), Doctor Strange in the Multiverse (tepidly reviewed, made lots of money), just out The Gray Man (from the Russo Brothers who did Winter Soldier, Infinity War Endgame, cost $200 million and is going to be on Netflix next weekend, tepidly reviewed, probably a financial disaster), Nope (Jordan Peele returns after Get Out and US - could be big next week), The Northman (*could* have been a big, weird breakout hit in my view, at least as big as Conan The Barbarian (1982), but the stars didn't align for it).

--

Ha. Oh, yeah, I forgot about THOSE. I'll admit that I usually forget the animated kids films -- I'm at a point in my life where there are no kids in my family one way or the other (child, grandchild) of age to take. Though that should change in future months/years, and I'll be "back on the kids beat" any time now.

Were Dr. Strange and The Northman "summer movies"? Modernly I see that as a movie that opens on May 1 or after, ending at labor day.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

The "summer movie" season grew interestingly over time. Psycho was a June release(on the East US Coast only, then August on the West Coast and elsewhere, such a weird release pattern). Jaws was a June release. Star Wars established a late May summer season opening(Memorial Day weekend.)

But over time, the studios kept moving the start of the summer movie season back, back, back, to early May.

This led to a rhythm: May, June, and July (especially around the Fourth in the US) were heavy summer movie season -- at least one, maybe more, releases every weekend. By August, usually only one "big one" was saved -- its odd, it seemed to be ONLY one major August release, usually early in the month (in 2004, it was Collateral with Tom Cruise as a a killer), and the summer played out lazily to Labor Day(a "nothing" release weekend) and the fall films rolled out. BTW, there are almost as many Oscar bait releases in the fall now as at Christmas to get a jump on an earlier Oscar season. But Oscar season has "moved back" out towards April. I'm confusing myself.

I think I will stand by this: I'm "out of my demographic"(an older person who likes to go to the theater) but it used to be that yes, there WAS a new movie to see every weekend, and I bulit my week around that if I wasn't travelling in summer. This summer I can't say there has been "a movie per weekend" that works for my age(remove the cartoons), so that's why I counted only 3: Top Gun 2, Jurrassic whatever, Elvis.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

Sidebar on Jurassic Park: those movies came into my life a few decades ago, and I was pretty "adult" back then. I knew that dinosaurs were in the wheelhouse of "kids," and yet Michael Crichton had written a source novel that was actually quite adult and violent (as someone said, had James Cameron rather than Steven Spielberg made Jurassic Park in an Aliens mood, we would have had a much more violent adult movie.)

Anyway, I go to the Jurassic Park movies regularly because (a) they bring back childhood memories of Godzilla movies and (b) in Spielberg's hands at least, they harkened back to the Hitchcock model of suspense and sudden death set-pieces. In Jurassic Park 2(The Lost World) there is a great sequence in which a plucky little milquetoast guy saves everybody from going over a cliff - only to be promptly attacked by TWO T-rexes who toss him back and forth and then pull him apart for a meal like a piece of bacon. I was impressed by such a violent end to such a "nice" character, and this reflects why I keep coming back for those dinosaur "thrillers." Except this new one is terrible -- they treat the dinosaurs as house pets with attitude.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

just out The Gray Man (from the Russo Brothers who did Winter Soldier, Infinity War Endgame, cost $200 million and is going to be on Netflix next weekend, tepidly reviewed, probably a financial disaster),

---

Some interesting gossipy news has come out of The Gray Man. The costs to Neflix and inability to make those costs back in "theater profit" is one part of it. The poor quality of the movie AS a movie is another. Someone has coined a term: "The Netflix Mockbuster" -- a big, expensive movie, with big expensive stars (of our day) that doesn't have any lasting classic quality at all. There was one a few months ago on Netflix with the "terrific trio" of Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds, and Gal Gadot (Red Notice -- a generic title) that I watched. Empty, glib, computer-processed, and though those are clearly three stars who earned their stardom...they aren't quite REAL stars, either. Have either Dwayne Johnson or Ryan Reynolds managed to build a "canon" to match the likes of Paul Newman or Burt Lancaster or even Jack Lemmon(in Reynolds case)?

All that said, Netflix produced my favorite movie of 2018(Buster Scruggs, by the Coens) and of 2019(The Irishman by Scorsese, tied with the QT that year.) Both of those movies rather LOOK like Netflix movies(viewed on TV, at least) but the auteurs and the stars won through: both Buster Scruggs and The Irishman feel like real movies to me, classics of sorts in both cases. My beef: I can't buy those movies on DVD, so I have to keep Netflix if I ever want to rewatch them.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

More fallout from "The Gray Man" -- its makers, the Russo Brothers (very Marvel connected) this week put out an interview where they said movie theaters are "elitist" and maybe people of lesser means(especially in this economy) are better served by streaming.

Its certainly true in certain ways. Movies started as something "the common folk" could see for a nickel, then ten cents, then 25 cents. I believe inflation has been far outpaced these days, with tickets over $10 dollars. IF you buy the popcorn and drinks from which the theater derives ITS income, you are up over $25. And for folks with kids, baby sitters are entered in and...I don't know if it is elitist, but it is expensive.

Its too bad, really. But then sports tickets have zoomed up and a general elitist take on everything seems to be the order of the day. In the US, there are plenty of people who CAN pay these prices, so others just have to decide to "wait for TV" or watch on streaming.

Interesting memory: at a certain point when I didn't live with my parents and was a "starving student," movies at first run theaters were about $3.50. And I really didn't have that to spare every week. So I got "creative." I'd find the money for the "major" first runs like The Godfather, The Sting, and Jaws. But with a lot of movies, I waited a couple of months for them to reach "second run houses" -- $1 for a double feature. A lot of the movies I report on here from my past were not movies I saw first run. I just waited a few weeks for more worn-down prints at cheaper theaters. Still, $3.50 back then was more managable than $15 today.

In Los Angeles before HBO, there was a local kinda-cable channel called "The Z Channel" and we got it at the college dorm. THAT was a big help. I saw The Sting first run in 1973, but I saw The Sting again on "The Z Channel" in 1974. And "Z" was also where I saw a lot of movies I didn't see in the theaters at all -- aha, the "Netflix option" was available DECADES ago

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

CONT

And: in my childhood, one way my parents avoided baby sitter costs was to take the family (a lot) to the drive-in. This was fine when the feature was a Disney or a Doris Day or some such. But it was rough going when the choice was Advise and Consent or A Girl Named Tamiko -- movies made for mature adults where I didn't know what was going on and simply remained in the car hoping for sleep or the movie to end so we could go home. Still, I learned the "basics" of movies older than my age through those drive-in dramas.

So I don't know how right the Russos are....are movie theaters out of the price range of most families today? Are drive-ins gone as an alternative for families? Must we all subscribe to MULTIPLE streaming services to get ALL the possible new movies?

It is a tricky time.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

In sum, my own sense is that there's really *has* been something like a fully functioning 'big' movie industry this year and if you throw in the streaming services that impression only grows: not only has Stranger Things Season 4 been bigger than big in the last month or so, a hugely risky 1 billion+ dollar Lord of The Rings prequel series is just about to kick off on Amazon, and HBO starts its prequel series to Games of Thrones (notwithstanding the bad blood left by how that show tailed off in its last season or so) next month I believe. I mean these are *huge* mega-dollar cultural spectaculars that even allowing for inflation probably jointly cost more than all of 1982's blockbusters put together!

---

Well, OK. Ha. I suppose this is really about me -- trying to adjust to a new movie age and to apply my old principles.

A few times in the past few weeks, I've checked "the movie pages" (now on the internet) to see what's playing at my "local" and -- slim pickings. Again: Top Gun, the dinosaurs, Elvis. The others aren't of interest to me.

As for streaming, that's certainly a lot of money being spent on a lot of properties and continuations of stories that have never much caught my fancy. I'm not really a Game of Thrones guy. I'm a Mad Men guy, and a Sopranos guy and a "stand alone movie" guy. I guess I'm still an "auteur" guy, too: in recent years, my favorites have been made by Scorsese and QT and the Coens and PTA and Alexander Payne, etc.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

But I'll let this slip: I'm not that big on multi-series seasons(will I live long enough to finish them?) but right now I'm finishing the final seasons of two series -- week by week, not binging -- at the same time. "Better Call Saul" (Bob Odenkirk in a fine prequel to Breaking Bad) and Animal Kingdom(somewhere lesser writing about a crime family in the SoCal beach region -- aging Ellen Barkin played the evil matriarch but has left the show. They are both good and I hope they end well. I finished Ozark (nice guy Jason Bateman in a bad guy husband role, with Laura LInney as his even more evil wife) and found it very lacking at the end. All these "Mexican cartel shows" are copycatting each other.

And I've been watching the aged Steve Martin and Martin Short with the young Selena Gomez and their twee murder mystery "Only Murders in the Building" on Hulu. Its cute, and they've found a parade of high-class stars from the show. Nathan Lane. Sting. Jane Lynch. And recently ...Shirley MacLaine(I didn't recognize her at 88, I KNEW the actress in the role had to be a star; I looked it up.)

So there, see -- I DO sample streaming. And its good enough for my taste and age bracket but...something's still missing that used to be there "at the movies."

I know that in certain ways, I am simply not the demographic sought by Hollywood anymore. I've told the story of almost being kept out of a screener of Cast Away back in 2000 because I "was too old" and that was 22 years ago. So be it. They keep making the product, I'll keep watching it, and sometimes (Licorice Pizza, Buster Scruggs) really LOVING it.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

Probably the only thing holding back the industry from popping open the champagne is that overall profit margins are trimmed significantly both by No Russian market for political reasons, No Chinese market for a mixture of political and covid reasons.

---

So interesting to me that for some years now, grosses have been offered up for "international worldwide grosses" -- living here in the US, I'm long past the days when The Godfather was a blockbuster because it made $100 million "domestic." And yet, we've heard that if Hollywood LOSES that Chinese market(especially) and now the Russian market -- some of these really expensive movies don't break even.

--

Hard economic times themselves are often quite good for Hollywood; going back to the 1930s at least, movies are cheap mass entertainment.

---

Absolutely. From the beginning and certainly in the Depression. In another post here, I've gotten into the Russo brothers calling movie theaters "elitist" today -- but they are still affordable ENOUGH. Especially if you skip the popcorn.

---

But these worldwide hard times have a unique character with inflation being caused by supply shocks all over the place from (i) floods and droughts/climate change, (ii) wars and politics, (iii) massive just-in-time network disruptions caused by covid shutdowns, borders closing, worldwide labor immobility. That all may make consumer behavior different this time around. Who knows?

--
Who knows indeed, and in general. I remain heartened -- in my circle -- by how many young people around me are focussed intently on having babies and raising children. They BELIEVE in the future. They WANT the future. And there will be plenty of audiences for kiddie movies, always.

I dunno. Thinking back to the summer movie season of 1975, Jaws was pretty much it. There were some other movies, but not a lot of choices. I guess one adapts to changes in all directions. Its better than that summer.

[–] ccr1633 (1413) 2 years ago

I know that in certain ways, I am simply not the demographic sought by Hollywood anymore.

I have a 12 year old son. My wife indulges him with the latest Pixar fare, Marvel multiverse films, etc., most of which I cannot stand (my son enjoys them) despite having been a long time comic book collector. I happily leave to her the duty of sitting through this detritus. When I have my son to myself and we're free from her modern tiger mom tastes, I lavish him with Jaws, Deliverance, Dirty Harry, The Terminator, Alien & Aliens, Escape From New York, The Road Warrior, and other violent classics so that he knows it's possible for kids to be captivated by movies that feature adults almost exclusively. I can't say he likes these films better than the latest dumped out of the Disney garbage scow, but he does appear entranced for the most part. I often wonder if Hollywood has a quantifiable rationale for pretty much dispensing with mature adult actors who didn't begin as Brad Pitt or Leonardo DiCaprio, both of which, incidentally, I still see as kids who happen to have gotten older.

[–] swanstep (2616) 2 years ago

Some interesting gossipy news has come out of The Gray Man. The costs to Neflix and inability to make those costs back in "theater profit" is one part of it. The poor quality of the movie AS a movie is another. Someone has coined a term: "The Netflix Mockbuster" -- a big, expensive movie, with big expensive stars (of our day) that doesn't have any lasting classic quality at all.

I've seen The Gray Man now... and it's an OK popcorn flick I suppose, but, gah, how basic standards of movie-making have slipped. So much of the action is such a blur of angles that it's simply unintelligible what's going on. This point cam to a head for me in one of the big action sequences of the film: a fight on board a plane that destroys the plane and then preciptates the hero being flung out without a parachute and having to freefall onto an enemy parachute and somehow takeover that parachute himself (on which much more later). Ryan Gosling dispatches at least 10 guys while on the plane but I literally have no idea *how* he actually did what he was supposed to have done - everything is such a fast-cut, shaky whirl/blur. Moreover much of the background at any time looks completely digital/CGI so at no point is there any sense of reality to any of the situation's basic jeopardy. The plane's not real, nobody's actually filming off the ground anywhere. Somehow TGM manged to cost $200 million but they couldn't spring for any of the aerial photography that James Bond Films pioneered and everything from Point Break to Nolan's Batman films to Top Gun:Maverick have built upon. (Cont.)

[–] swanstep (2616) 2 years ago

Things then get much worse when Ryan Gosling gets tossed out of the plane without a parachute. You really *are* asking to be compared with Moonraker, Point Break, and the like then. As soon as Gosling is out of the plane we're in brutally unconvincing CGI hell and then when it comes time to commandeer an enemy's parachute we're back to more frantically cut, shakey-cam, unintelligible action. I *literally * do not know what Gosling's character did to take advantage of the enemy's chute (he didn't unsnap it and commandeer it for himself I'm sure but what then was it that he actually did: just hang on to the strings of the open parachute while sort of standing on the other parachutists's shoulders? Maybe, but I really didn't get it). Compare with the Bond and Point Break sequences, where we're both convinced of the basic stuntman-driven reality of the situation and we understand *exactly* how Bond or Keanu is cleverly trying to take control of the enemy's chute and the situation. In TGM, there's no real stuntwork and we're left to guess at the hero's actions. The action sequence in TGM has no real jeopardy, so *isn't* thrilling, and isn't intelligbile enough to impress in a clockwork-toy, Mission-Impossibley way. The upshot is that a *sort* of scene that *should* be a highlight of a big-budget Hollywood film is just hot garbage here.

The rest of TGM isn't quite as bad as this relatively early sequence but I myself never quite recovered from it.

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

I've seen The Gray Man now... and it's an OK popcorn flick I suppose, but, gah, how basic standards of movie-making have slipped. So much of the action is such a blur of angles that it's simply unintelligible what's going on.

--

A real problem these days, though at least 20 years old -- I place some blame with the Bourne movies.

---

This point cam to a head for me in one of the big action sequences of the film: a fight on board a plane that destroys the plane and then preciptates the hero being flung out without a parachute and having to freefall onto an enemy parachute and somehow takeover that parachute himself (on which much more later)

--

And here's a tough reality: haven't we seen THAT scene(hero freefalling onto a villain and getting his parachute) a few too many times already(in at least one Bond movie?)

One way in which Hitchcock lucked out by dying when he did is that, for the most part, he didn't have to repeat his climaxes. Oh, perhaps he had a few too many "hanging people"(Saboteur, Rear Window, Vertigo) but he managed to find different places and ways to climax his movies. And I daresay once he took his finale to Mount Rushmore...he rather closed the book on great American locales.

But Hitchcock has been gone for decades and the thrillers that followed him only have so many cards to play.

I recall how, in 2002, Spider Man 2 had a big scene on an elevated railway and then in 2005, Batman Begins had a big scene on an elevated railway. BOTH scenes were exciting enough, but one felt that the filmmakers had just given up on trying to do something new.

So the thrillers pretty much have to "rinse and repeat' on action finales these days.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

Which brings me to this: word has it that the high-paying Netflix gave Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans 20 million EACH to appear in The Gray Man. That's top dollar, and its what it takes to make an otherwise same old, same old action thriller an "event." Movie stars are doing GREAT by Netflix movies. I'm sure that that OTHER Ryan (Reynolds) got that kind of pay for Red Notice -- along with The Rock and Gal Gadot.

The issue is: what are WE getting for that top pay?

That said, I know that Netflix has managed to field some true Oscar bait in recent years(Roma) and I count at least two "real" movies(Buster Scruggs from the Coens and Scorsese's The Irishman) so all is not lost.

Its just that they seem to think that these overly expensive action epics are the way to go and...they clearly don't have the scripts for them.

Which reminds me:

Right now on Netflix is an action movie I watch quite often --"The Professionals" from 1966. Its dated from its era in certain ways(not ENOUGH action), the second act is more exciting than the third act, and some of writer-director Richard Brooks macho lines are overripe and hammy.

But for the most part, it is a GREAT action picture -- it has character and gravitas and stars Lee Marvin and Burt Lancaster(in that order of quality) as two old friends with a HISTORY as Americans in the Mexican revolution and the weathered middle-aged faces to prove it (the Mexican wife of Marvin, we learn, was tortured and killed for her revolutionary ways). I can't see Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans in these roles.

Oh, well -- I suppose we all become "get off my lawn" types as the years go by. I'm reminded always that I now "live in the future" with these CGI High-Def 4K Netflix productions.

CONT

[–] ecarle (14979) 2 years ago

Which reminds me: there was an actually funny SNL skit years ago where an actor was led into a green screen room and attacked by men "all in green" while being slug about in a trapeze and things were thrown at him ("You're being attacked by a meteor shower!" yells the director as the actor is pelted with soft green balls.)

I always think of that skit when I watch these CGI action sequences. (The Professionals was shot outdoors, with stunt men taking real falls.)

That said, the one "all green screen movie" I ever saw and really LIKED was Robert Rodriguez's "Sin City" of 2005, which used green screen to stylize all the action in a literal comic book world.

Thats one.