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Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Sat Nov 09, 2013 11:51 pm
by The Original BJ
Uri wrote:One more thing, although I’m not sure there’s a point for me posting here, since lately I feel that whenever I do, it’s like shouting into a void (and admittedly, I have been mostly shouting, but I believe for a good reason).
I always enjoy reading your comments. Is that enough of a point to keep posting here?
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Sat Nov 09, 2013 7:42 pm
by OscarGuy
Or they don't feel like trying to debate those who believe they are right and cannot accept that they are wrong.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Sat Nov 09, 2013 2:06 pm
by ITALIANO
Uri wrote:One more thing, although I’m not sure there’s a point for me posting here, since lately I feel that whenever I do, it’s like shouting into a void (and admittedly, I have been mostly shouting, but I believe for a good reason).
They don't reply but believe me - they know that you are right.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Sat Nov 09, 2013 6:55 am
by Uri
One more thing, although I’m not sure there’s a point for me posting here, since lately I feel that whenever I do, it’s like shouting into a void (and admittedly, I have been mostly shouting, but I believe for a good reason).
Anyway, regardless of my feelings about Gravity, there was something I saw in a piece about it in this weekend paper in Israel and I saw it here too which bugs me. In what shape or form is Gravity a science fiction film? It’s a piece of fictional narrative and I guess it’s about “Science”, but farfetched as it might be, it is a realistic (as in movies realism) depiction of the way human activity in space is “really” is. It’s about a string of factual based events and actions, and although the probability of all of them happening in a sequence the way they do here is extremely, to say the least, unlikely, still silliness does not Science Fiction make.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Thu Nov 07, 2013 4:29 pm
by ITALIANO
Uri wrote:Really? REALLY????
For many years now, for better or worse, I hardly ever go and see a film without having a rather sufficient idea of what the film is, certainly when the film is as heavily buzzed as this one. I've never been as wrong with my pre viewing conceptions as I was this time. For some reason I was under the impression that this was about an astronaut being stranded in space to actually die there (I was truly shocked by the way the film ended), and that the point was that it was some kind of meditation about the way a person deals with its own demise. Ok – although the initials have long been associated with existentialism, I had the vague notion that even after seeing Gravity, SB would still bring “Samuel Beckett” to mind and not “Sandra Bullock”, but I wasn't ready for this level of, well, for lack of a better term, arrogant stupidity. It was just another Armageddon , only this time starring the more spunky, less attractive star of Forces of Nature. Did the people who made this film actually believed that having Bullock posing soberness and un-cutesyness , mechanically throwing in a dead child for supposedly emotional gravitas and having Clooney tiredly recycling all the veteran-cop-on-his-last-day-in-service clichés could camouflage what is basically the video game logic, mentality and structure (it’s all about repetitively getting to the next level until hitting the jackpot) of it? I’m officially, overwhelmingly pissed off with this one.
I love you when you are angry
And like you many people - who go to this movie after those absurdly positive reviews - are getting VERY angry. But then I guess that while some reviewers are just idiots, others aren't necessarily stupid - they are just easily influenceable: this is the movie one MUST like now, the movie which will win Oscars, the movie which could even win Best Picture! They aren't culturally, intellectually prepared to see through the hype, and they desperately want to be part of the winners' circle. So this triumph of emptiness is suddenly considered a masterpiece of 2001-level, rather than the pleasant but absolutely unmemorable rollercoaster ride that it actually is. And I find all this very depressing (Sonic Youth even felt guilty for not "getting" it - as if this were a Godard or a Tarkovski!).
As for the xenophobia, well, of course I got it - but let's face it, it's not the first American movie which suffers from it.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Thu Nov 07, 2013 4:14 pm
by Uri
p.s. I’m doing my best to ignore the unpleasant xenophobic undertones thrown in here (Marco, this is the time for you to complain about the use of the stars and stripes). And please spare me the he’s-not-an-American-director tune.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Thu Nov 07, 2013 4:11 pm
by Eric
OscarGuy wrote:I'd say the same reason Kathryn Bigelow won is the same reason Steve McQueen will win, except that McQueen's actually generated great material prior to his potential win this year than Bigelow did when she won.
I'm having trouble knowing where to begin parsing this statement for overall wrongness.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Thu Nov 07, 2013 3:51 pm
by Uri
Really? REALLY????
For many years now, for better or worse, I hardly ever go and see a film without having a rather sufficient idea of what the film is, certainly when the film is as heavily buzzed as this one. I've never been as wrong with my pre viewing conceptions as I was this time. For some reason I was under the impression that this was about an astronaut being stranded in space to actually die there (I was truly shocked by the way the film ended), and that the point was that it was some kind of meditation about the way a person deals with its own demise. Ok – although the initials have long been associated with existentialism, I had the vague notion that even after seeing Gravity, SB would still bring “Samuel Beckett” to mind and not “Sandra Bullock”, but I wasn't ready for this level of, well, for lack of a better term, arrogant stupidity. It was just another Armageddon , only this time starring the more spunky, less attractive star of Forces of Nature. Did the people who made this film actually believed that having Bullock posing soberness and un-cutesyness , mechanically throwing in a dead child for supposedly emotional gravitas and having Clooney tiredly recycling all the veteran-cop-on-his-last-day-in-service clichés could camouflage what is basically the video game logic, mentality and structure (it’s all about repetitively getting to the next level until hitting the jackpot) of it? I’m officially, overwhelmingly pissed off with this one.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Thu Nov 07, 2013 2:32 pm
by Greg
Although, Cuaron is Hispanic, and there has never been and Hispanic Best Director winner either.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Thu Nov 07, 2013 2:23 pm
by OscarGuy
I'd say the same reason Kathryn Bigelow won is the same reason Steve McQueen will win, except that McQueen's actually generated great material prior to his potential win this year than Bigelow did when she won.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Thu Nov 07, 2013 1:18 pm
by Mister Tee
Eric wrote:A) Never bet on the split; and B) frankly, Hollywood liberal guilt would never allow this to happen.
Plus, I'd add the split usually goes the other way: "tougher" subject matter takes director, more popular film takes picture.
But "B" is predominant. The howls if a black director were bypassed while his film was voted best picture would be deafening. (Take the ludicrous "it's because she's a woman" publicity Streisand's Prince of Tides exclusion caused, and magnify by 1000)
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Thu Nov 07, 2013 12:59 pm
by Eric
A) Never bet on the split; and B) frankly, Hollywood liberal guilt would never allow this to happen.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Thu Nov 07, 2013 12:49 pm
by Reza
Is there any chance of a film-director split again this year? Best Picture to Slave and Best Director to Gravity.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Wed Nov 06, 2013 6:39 pm
by OscarGuy
I think he was just throwing out ballpark ages, not choosing to be specific. Saying "a mid-to-late-40's woman playing a mid-to-late-40's woman" is a bit rough to say.
Re: Gravity reviews
Posted: Wed Nov 06, 2013 5:36 pm
by Big Magilla
Sandra Bullock is not 45. She'll be 50 on her next birthday.