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Ace_Spade's Replies
Too many to count! From top to bottom, I thought this was a wonderful film. I loved its innocence and charm, but I was surprised by how really, really funny it was.
Favourite gag that springs to mind is Mr. Brown on the phone with Curry: "It's Mr. Curry doing a silly voice!"
While I doubt he expected her death, Bond lives in a world filled with death and carnage. He's always prepared for the worst and uses assets, like Jill, to complete his missions. Not that he's completely unfeeling and uncaring, but he can be quite inured and cruel. It's likely he knew that harm or death were probabilities and took the chance anyway.
I'm a big fan of a bunch of Batman films already. I feel like Batman, Batman Returns, Mask of the Phantasm, Batman Begins, and The Dark Knight all accomplished what they set out to do. They're pretty top-notch. I can't think of anything that the filmmakers could have done which would have earned an R rating and that might have made the movies better.
Logan and Deadpool earned R ratings and were worth it. Would watching the Joker get much more sadistic be any better? I doubt it.
By Revenge of the Sith, I didn't care. The first two of the prequel trilogy were so uninteresting to me that I didn't bother going to see the third one in theatres.
Now it's deja vu, because I'm seriously weighing the pros and cons of seeing the ninth one when it comes out.
Emmy's the main star of the show. She's also entitled to ask for whatever money she thinks she can get. That's how contract negotiations work.
You're right, Macy's turning in a brilliant performance, and he's the biggest name attached, but after so many seasons, it's safe to say that people are probably tuning in to watch Emmy's Fiona as much (or more) than Macy's Frank.
I haven't watched a *lot* of the show, but from what I've seen, Frank is kinda like Jack Sparrow. He's killer funny, and a big draw, but you couldn't watch a show *about* Frank. That's what the Pirates sequels never worked: comic relief isn't main character.
But, the bottom line is that it's all negotiation: get what you can get. If you deserve a raise, ask for it. More power to ya'.
It shows the desperate and squalid conditions on the trip. It shows the edge she's being pushed to so that when she gets to New York, we understand how psychologically blasted she is. This informs her homesickness, speaks to her inexperience at travel, and shows the ordeals she endures.
Do we need specifically to hear that sound effect? No. But the fact that the movie unblinkingly shows these conditions is important to understand the immigrant's mind, psyche, and emotional state, and to show the world that the protagonist inhabits.
I think Sarah had love for Anne, but also craved political power and was certainly abusive; it looked like an abusive relationship to me. She gaslit Anne, belittled her, bullied her, and was generally very mean-spirited. So, while I agree: Sarah was in love with Anne, I think she was still an awful person.
Abigail, on the other hand, was motivated by personal social ladder-climbing, but once at the peak, I don't think she would have continued to bully Anne in the same way.
So: bullying with love, or manipulation with indifference/ spite? Who's worse?
Anne, remember, could also be petty, selfish, and horrid. But she evoked sympathy because she was being used and abused (plus a lot of her selfishness came from her upbringing).
Sarah also was wielding political power she wasn't supposed to have by birth or election. Abigail was spiteful, too (the rabbit's neck).
One of the things I love about the film is its ability to present a balanced triangle, people who behave badly but who aren't unsympathetic, either. It's a wonderful film.
Lack of political subtext? Iron Man was about a capitalist arms dealer learning the error of his money-seeking, murder-profiting ways. Politics, messages, etc., can be put into film without it being a bad thing. It's how it's done that breaks it.
That's a plothole problem with the prequel trilogy. One of many.
The dialogue is very good, but I would't say the film is, overall, a Coen-quality film.
I liked the movie a lot. I think it's got some great twists, but I think it's also a bit uneven in terms of tone and the subplots meander a touch.
It's like a B+/A- kinda range.
Nice.
Yeah, I can find a bunch of Seinfeld scripts online, but not Curb. I was just curious what they look like because this kind of outline-only scripting is pretty rare.
Yeah, it doesn't seem real. According to the cast, Larry David doesn't write that much dialogue. They say he'll only write a couple lines per episode (at most) and the rest of what he writes is just the scenario.
The Major doing a Pollock. That nearly made me choke.
I love these. I think American Graffiti on Tatooine is hilarious (although very well done), and the episode focusing on Leia's acquisition of the plans is so much better than Rogue One.
They released versions awhile ago (mid-2000s) that had the current updated version (with whatever BS George put in there) packaged with a "bonus disk" of the original film without any updates at all.
Lucas was clearly bitter about it (the bonus disk versions don't have updated sound or picture quality as though George was going, "You don't like my edits? You want the original films? FINE! HERE! THEY'RE UNCHANGED IN ANY WAY! HUMPH!")
Here's a link on Amazon:
New Hope:
https://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Episode-IV-Limited/dp/B000FQJAIW
Empire:
https://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Empire-Strikes-Limited/dp/B000FQJAJG
I couldn't find Jedi. Sorry...
In the original trilogy, I'm most bothered by Obi-Wan Kenobi's "different point of view" excuse - clearly written post-facto to explain this plot hole. It's a pretty weak explanation (and one reason I've never bought into George Lucas' rhetoric of his having planned the whole thing from the start).
The prequels make more inconsistencies/plot holes. There are too many. Lots bother me, but one of the biggest is that they split the twins up to ensure that Darth Vader can't find them. They give Leia to Bail Organa and she is hidden on Alderaan, given his name and thousands of light years of distance. Then they hide Luke by calling him Skywalker and sticking him on Vader's home planet...with Vader's only other living relatives... What...? Obi-wan also changes his name to "Ben", but ignores the "Kenobi" part...so many things of this nature drive me mad and contribute to my dislike of the prequels.
Once you stack the new films on top... Whoo, boy! Where to start? Again. Dozens of inconsistencies bug me here, but for my biggest, I'm going to have to go with Luke Skywalker going from a can-do, optimistic, spiritual guru to a depressed hermit with no will to live ignoring the Force. Though a close second is the Republic being in charge of the galaxy for a few decades without noticing the First Order building a planet-sized superweapon about a solar system away. Ah, heck, I also really, really, really hate the inconsistency in Han's character. Scurvy but loyal, cares for Leia, Chewy, the Falcon...abandons Leia and loses the Falcon. Nope.
Yeah, Zorro is another great jumping-off point. Unfortunately, there are a few genres that Hollywood sorta stopped making entirely. Swashbuckler is one of them. Epics are another. They don't really make them any more, and when they do, they rarely do them right. Pirates is an exception (Lord of the Rings for epics). Few and far between. Oh, well. At least I've got Errol on DVD.
I don't even think the stock market plan would work short term. Here's an Atlantic article explaining why it would definitely not work:
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/07/banes-plan-to-bankrupt-batman-doesnt-make-any-sense/260191/
I still don't buy the Blake stuff. To clarify: I know what it was supposed to show me, but the connection between the two feels forced and implausible. I definitely do not buy that Bruce would admit anything based off of such a small interaction.
You're right: Batman *could* have done all of that with the fire bat. But even that demands the question as to when he did it and to what end. Batman was retired and depressed for eight years. When did he put that bat there? I'm not saying he couldn't have, it's just a lot of disbelief to suspend.
The aggregate of the minor nitpicks, the major flaws, and the (to me) slipshod scripting add up to a Dark Knight trilogy ending that wasn't satisfying (for me). I respect that you love the movie, more power to you, but it just didn't work for me.
The power gets turned off at Wayne manor. I don't think it would get that far. I don't even buy it working moderately in the short term. I guess you do, and that's fine, but to me, it's still a huge plot hole.
I know that it was done to show Blake understood Wayne. It felt rushed, cheap, and shoehorned in. It makes no sense that Bruce would admit to being Batman based on one conversation. There's a lot of other stuff around Blake I find frustrating, in terms of plot, character development, pacing, etc.
Every available unit is not the same thing as literally every cop. If we aren't supposed to think that Gordon made a good move, I'd say that makes it worse. Gordon is good at his job. This is his job. If we non-Commissioner people can tell it's a bad move, Gordon shouldn't be making it. That contradicts his characterisation in both the comic books and the previous two movies of the trilogy. As a minor note, I said this was a "character problem" not a plot hole. I listed it among other problems I have with the film. I know it's not a plot hole by the technical definition, but it's still sloppy script writing and character work.
The fire bat is activated by a flare set to liquid on the ice. It's unlikely that Batman set it up ahead of time. To me, that moment is like the kamikaze attack in Star Wars: The Last Jedi - it's a really cool moment, visually stunning, but raises some serious questions plot-wise.
I don't want to give the impression that I hate everything about the movie, either. While I was disappointed by it, I liked a lot of the action, there were some thrilling moments, Hathway's Catwoman was great, I liked the ending, and the setup a lot... There's just a lot of stuff I didn't like.