I can and just did. In chronological order it would be a dull and predictable movie. They took a rubbish plot and shuffled it up. It doesn't make it a good plot.
Artificially limiting the audience's access to events does not make those events any more credible or dramatic.
If you watch Citizen Kane already knowing what Rosebud is, you'll still appreciate a fantastic story. When I watch Memento already knowing what order things happened, the individual scenes just seem ridiculous.
The problem is that Memento’s plot is structured around the reversed chronology. Sure if you watch the whole thing in order, the plot is predictable, but that’s because the main twist is then presented in the first scene.
The whole point of Memento’s structure is that it fucks with your perception of the events that occur. Just saying “oh well watching it in order is boring” is really stupid.
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What I mean is that if it was a good story it would be good in its own right, and then get shuffled up. Anyone can shuffle up a continuty. It just seemed like a lazy way of trying to seem challenging and intellectual. Hence 'gimmicky'.
Anyone can shuffle up a continuty. It just seemed like a lazy way of trying to seem challenging and intellectal. Hence 'gimmicky'.
Quite a few movies tried to do what Memento did, there's a reason you don't hear about them at all.
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“I always believe the movies I've made are smarter than the way they are perceived by sort of mass culture and by the critics,” Snyder said, a statement he immediately followed by saying, “Also, ‘It looks like a video game.’
Hmm. Well I haven't watched it recently enough to give any more specific criticisms, and I doubt either side of this argument is going to change their opinion.
Moving on. I rewatched some of the first series of Psychoville. Now there was a good show.
Oh yeah. I completely forgot to metion I also watched Quadrophenia in Media (We are doing about Youth Subculture.) I thought it was a very good film, It really intrigued about Mods and Rockers and how they were. Saying that though - according to my teacher the film was a bit inaccurate in how they acted.
Oh and get this, We are doing Youth Subcultures and we are NOT studying Punk. What a load.
Well, there goes watching Memento I guess since I read those posts.
But
We didn't spoil anything
If anything, more of Donnie Darko has been spoiled by this discussion than Memento.
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“I always believe the movies I've made are smarter than the way they are perceived by sort of mass culture and by the critics,” Snyder said, a statement he immediately followed by saying, “Also, ‘It looks like a video game.’
My grandmother was obsessed with Norman Wisdom films when I was a kid, but I can only remember On the Beat and Up in the World. Maybe one where he played an army recruit.
So good though. Especially On the Beat.
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“I always believe the movies I've made are smarter than the way they are perceived by sort of mass culture and by the critics,” Snyder said, a statement he immediately followed by saying, “Also, ‘It looks like a video game.’
I fucking love Norman Wisdom. A Stitch in Time was one of the funniest things I ever saw, especially when Grimsdale tries to get him to jump in front of the van to get into hospital.
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My grandmother was obsessed with Norman Wisdom films when I was a kid, but I can only remember On the Beat and Up in the World. Maybe one where he played an army recruit.
So good though. Especially On the Beat.
i haven't seen many of his films, but i've seen On The Beat. that was a laugh.
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I fucking love Norman Wisdom. A Stitch in Time was one of the funniest things I ever saw, especially when Grimsdale tries to get him to jump in front of the van to get into hospital.
i really need to get the set or something, because there are too many of his films that i haven't seen yet.
a couple of favourite scenes from Follow A Star:
skip to 2:30
there's tons more scenes that had me in stitches, but these are the only ones i could find.
I think "dated" is a better word than "stupid". I see a lot of things which are now regarded as clichés, which are, in my opinion, the best parts.
I like The Good, the Bad and the Ugly more, though.
I should also mention Unforgiven which is much more recent, but I liked it as much as any of them. Very different tone, though - different kind of film.
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Last edited by OddjobAbe; 03-07-2012 at 03:32 PM..
I think "dated" is a better word than "stupid". I see a lot of things which are now regarded as clichés, which are, in my opinion, the best parts.
I like The Good, the Bad and the Ugly more, though.
It’s probably the biggest Western cliché in existence now, but the final standoff is pretty much my favorite scene from any movie.
I love whole Dollars trilogy, and I keep meaning to try and find similar films from the genre.
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A couple of reviewers have referred to this film as twaddle, and that to enjoy it you have to have had your brain melted from actual thought. Another reviewer has detailed the film's allegory, which is fair enough, but then allegory is what you go to church for, not why you buy a movie. Although I speak for myself. Who knows.
The thing is, El Topo is less like a movie, or even an art film. It's more an insanely theatrical hallucination. There are no recognisable human beings in it - as in, no-one behaves in a manner you have witnessed in real life. It is deadly serious, and then there's lowbrow hijinks. There's lots of mime in it. The first line of dialogue, which is a long time coming, is "I am God." And there's some weird violence - the first sequence ends with a naked child killing an old man with a gun. So, you know, I'm just saying.
But it is incomparable, which is why people get so upset. If there's a genre frame, it's the revenge western - but even then, you know, not really. And yes, it is pretentious. But not in a French relationship-drama way; more in a "I do not know what is happening but it appears to mean something" way. Which can be frustrating. But then, you shouldn't only eat hamburgers. Vary your diet.
This sounds amazing, I’ll have to look into it.
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It's an acid western apparently, which... sounds like a genre that's totally me.
I'll have to give this one a go too.
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“I always believe the movies I've made are smarter than the way they are perceived by sort of mass culture and by the critics,” Snyder said, a statement he immediately followed by saying, “Also, ‘It looks like a video game.’
Yeah. It's actually a lot of fun to watch, too. A lot of pretentious, arthouse films that try to really say something that you can't quite put your finger on can be not a lot of fun to watch. El Topo is a fucking riot.
Huh? Evil Dead was good, I've seen it. What was so horrible about that? You do know that Irreversible has a rape scene that lasts for around 8 minutes and some people couldn't even watch the movie because of that?
i've seen Irreversible. in my opinion, it was fucking disgusting and i didn't enjoy watching it, i felt grimy afterwards. the story is absolutely shit and i think the only reason it's known today is due to the brutality of the murder scene and length of the rape scene. there's no need to drag something out that long, no matter how poignant or disturbing it's meant to be, and the film itself is nothing special.
of course, me saying that will only encourage your curiosity, so have at it if you really want.
i've seen Irreversible. in my opinion, it was fucking disgusting and i didn't enjoy watching it, i felt grimy afterwards. the story is absolutely shit and i think the only reason it's known today is due to the brutality of the murder scene and length of the rape scene. there's no need to drag something out that long, no matter how poignant or disturbing it's meant to be, and the film itself is nothing special.
of course, me saying that will only encourage your curiosity, so have at it if you really want.
Miloš sees a young girl, Jeca, whose abusive mother has disgraced herself by becoming a whore... led into a dark room where he is fellated by a nurse, and sees screens showing Jeca seductively eating an ice lolly... instructed to receive oral sex with the abused mother while Jeca watches... Vukmir tries to explain his artistic style to Miloš by showing him a film of Raša helping a woman give birth to a baby girl, but then proceeding to rape the newborn in what the director calls "a new genre - 'newborn porn'"... Miloš brutally beats and rapes Jeca's mother handcuffed to a bed before decapitating her with a machete in order to induce rigor mortis... a catatonic Miloš is sodomized by Vukmir's security... views Lejla questioning Vukmir and wanting to help Miloš, only to later be seen chained in the middle of a room with all of her teeth having been removed... masked man enters the room, forces his erect penis down her throat and pinches her nose until she suffocates... Miloš is led to Jeca's home where an elderly woman whom we presume is Jeca's paternal Grandmother praises him for killing the prostitute mother, and asks him to cement his masculine status by having sex with Jeca herself, calling it a "virgin communion", adding that she in turn had lost her own virginity to her own father... finds out that he eventually ended up in an alleyway and watched a provocatively-dressed underaged girl walk by. Unable to stop himself masturbating at the sight of her, he was beaten by thugs who also accosted this passing girl... made to have anal sex with two bodies hidden under covers on a bed... masked man begins to have sex with the larger body beside the second one Miloš is raping... removes the covers to reveal that Miloš's smaller body to be his own son Petar who is also drugged and by now bleeding profusely from his rectum... female doctor then enters having apparently, under the influence of the drug Miloš had injected into her throat, forced a drainpipe into her vagina as a dildo, before collapsing with blood pouring from her genitals... Miloš finishes by shoving his penis into his empty eye socket... director instructs the actors to begin the rape of the bodies, saying, "Start with the little one".
