B Movies

Re:$7 Champagne

Dr_Gor — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 22:35:21 GMT

"... beat the monkey..." ?

Re:$7 Champagne

joem18b — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 20:52:15 GMT

Macabre_FilmNut:

joem18b:

one of the new releases has a monkey in it (can't remember which one) and the movie doesn't have the spca seal of approval in the credits because they beat the monkey to make him perform. (or so i heard on the radio yesterday.)

Are you talking about Argento. If so Mother of Tears: The Third Mother (2007) has a monkey in it, actually its one of the evil witches and its in Homage to Phenomena (1984).

does Speed Racer have a monkey in it? somebody beat the monkey to make him perform and spca took away the movie's seal of approval. but what good does that seal do, anyway? how many viewers even see it in the crawl?

Re:$7 Champagne

joem18b — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 20:50:37 GMT

Risselada:

joem18b:

Trader Joe's has a pretty good bottle of German champagne for about $3.75.

Hey I love Trader Joes! What's the exact name of the champagne??

can't remember the name. just go to the small sparkling wine section and there is a $3.99 bottle, german. not bad!

Re:$7 Champagne

Risselada — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 16:42:29 GMT

SkyPilot:

Risselada:

There's something about the Indiana Jones series that feels like it just requires old fasioned effects. CGI in this movie just feels so wrong some how! The real Indiana Jones never uses computers.

I'm with you on that all the way; the Indiana Jones series was inspired by old-fashioned pulp adventures!

Alright I've seen the new Indiana Jones now. It's a fun movie, but I feel like my predictions were right. Everything was a bit more cartoony feeling. The stunts were just a little too ridiculously fake with all the CGI. And the bugs looked so fake compared to all of the bugs and critters you know were totally real in all of the previous movies.

Re:$7 Champagne

Risselada — Thu, 22 May 2008 15:19:09 GMT

joem18b:

Trader Joe's has a pretty good bottle of German champagne for about $3.75.

Hey I love Trader Joes! What's the exact name of the champagne??

Re:$7 Champagne

Macabre_FilmNut — Sat, 17 May 2008 18:54:49 GMT

Dr_Gor:
SkyPilot:

Are they really rats on fire?

Yes. In Europe there were not as stringent 'animal cruelty' laws as there are in the US. It is quite obvious that the makers of this movie bought (or caught) some rats and set them on fire and filmed them scampering about for a COUPLE of scenes in this movie! Animal cruelty in the movies is nothing new ( Cannibal Holocaust, Cannibal Ferox) But when I mentioned that "Conan The Barbarian" was filmed in Europe specifically so that they could use 'trip-wires' on the horses, a certain young lady abanded our group forever out of disgust. I guess some people feel pretty strongly about this subject. < GOR >

Trip-wires on horses? Interesting. I knew about the cannibal movies, but not that.

Re:$7 Champagne

Macabre_FilmNut — Sat, 17 May 2008 18:52:17 GMT

joem18b:

one of the new releases has a monkey in it (can't remember which one) and the movie doesn't have the spca seal of approval in the credits because they beat the monkey to make him perform. (or so i heard on the radio yesterday.)

Are you talking about Argento. If so Mother of Tears: The Third Mother (2007) has a monkey in it, actually its one of the evil witches and its in Homage to Phenomena (1984).

Re:$7 Champagne

joem18b — Sat, 17 May 2008 05:54:15 GMT

one of the new releases has a monkey in it (can't remember which one) and the movie doesn't have the spca seal of approval in the credits because they beat the monkey to make him perform. (or so i heard on the radio yesterday.)

Re:$7 Champagne

Dr_Gor — Sat, 17 May 2008 00:37:15 GMT

SkyPilot:
Are they really rats on fire?

Yes. In Europe there were not as stringent 'animal cruelty' laws as there are in the US. It is quite obvious that the makers of this movie bought (or caught) some rats and set them on fire and filmed them scampering about for a COUPLE of scenes in this movie! Animal cruelty in the movies is nothing new ( Cannibal Holocaust, Cannibal Ferox) But when I mentioned that "Conan The Barbarian" was filmed in Europe specifically so that they could use 'trip-wires' on the horses, a certain young lady abanded our group forever out of disgust. I guess some people feel pretty strongly about this subject. < GOR >

Re:$7 Champagne

joem18b — Fri, 16 May 2008 23:10:20 GMT

Trader Joe's has a pretty good bottle of German champagne for about $3.75.

Re:$7 Champagne

Macabre_FilmNut — Fri, 16 May 2008 03:23:28 GMT

Dr_Gor:
I think Peter Jackson proved that CGI effects CAN be PERFECT with his LOTR trilogy. They can also be pretty dismal... try watching "King Of The Lost World" sometime ! I much prefer the 'old-school' method of film-making... Romero, Fulci, Argento, D'Amato, Bava, Leone, Barker, Craven, Hooper, H. G. Lewis... It just looks more 'real' if it is filmed for 'real' ... check out the 'Rats-On-Fire' in "The Hunchback Of The Morgue" ... That is a little TOO real for comfort... < GOR >

For a moment there I thought Argento lost his touch with tthe Master of Horrors stuff, don't get me wrong i very much like it, it just wasnt like his older stuff. Then i ended up with a copy of Mother of Tears: The Third Mother (2007). Wow. Its not your typical Argento, except for the filming is beautiful. I remember this long tube, that I would put up to my eye, when I was kid and I would spin the end so it forms a kalidascope of different color and shapes! Well the opening of this movie was like that with occult art and other different paintings. For some reason I just love the way he did the begining of this film.

Re:$7 Champagne

SkyPilot — Fri, 16 May 2008 02:47:12 GMT

Risselada:

There's something about the Indiana Jones series that feels like it just requires old fasioned effects. CGI in this movie just feels so wrong some how! The real Indiana Jones never uses computers.

I'm with you on that all the way; the Indiana Jones series was inspired by old-fashioned pulp adventures!

Re:$7 Champagne

Risselada — Thu, 15 May 2008 19:16:15 GMT

In response to Kevin and Adam

I totally agree that there is something much more endearing about knowng the creativitiy that went into tangible effects rather than just CGI stuff.

Even though CGI looks so amazing you can still somehow detect when it's fake, even subconciously. Even if they are advanced enough to include realistic imperfections or make the CGI object look like it fits with the grain of the film or the quality and angle of the lighting, it has always been completely programed. Where as with real effects the results are often unpredictable which makes them so real. Things don't always line up right on camera, or things go out of focus, or something is exposed that you didn't expect. Not only that, actors are reacting to something that might really be there instead of something added later.

Just like the difference between the old and new Star Wars movies. I'm very curious to see how this difference plays out in the new Indiana Jones movies as well. There's something about the Indiana Jones series that feels like it just requires old fasioned effects. CGI in this movie just feels so wrong some how! The real Indiana Jones never uses computers.

Re:$7 Champagne

SkyPilot — Thu, 15 May 2008 04:12:24 GMT

Are they really rats on fire?

Re:$7 Champagne

Dr_Gor — Thu, 15 May 2008 00:10:07 GMT

I think Peter Jackson proved that CGI effects CAN be PERFECT with his LOTR trilogy. They can also be pretty dismal... try watching "King Of The Lost World" sometime ! I much prefer the 'old-school' method of film-making... Romero, Fulci, Argento, D'Amato, Bava, Leone, Barker, Craven, Hooper, H. G. Lewis... It just looks more 'real' if it is filmed for 'real' ... check out the 'Rats-On-Fire' in "The Hunchback Of The Morgue" ... That is a little TOO real for comfort... < GOR >

Re:$7 Champagne

SkyPilot — Wed, 14 May 2008 05:55:50 GMT

Kevin, I totally agree with you, but I wonder if this is just a film-geek preference thing.

I forget where I read this, but it was in the context of how English literature scholars read vs. how average book fans read; specialists pay attention to form, consumers pay attention to realized content. So if we're specialists, fine, I'm okay with that. Perhaps I should just admit my preference for non-CG problem solving is precisely that -- a subjective preference.

But what about form affecting the power of the content? Let's get concrete here: does anyone find the CG Yoda superior to Jim Henson's? Admittedly it's pretty sweet when he starts wreaking havoc with his lightsaber, but what stuck with me when I was a kid was that ultra-present tangibility of Henson's Yoda--that frickin weird little green monster was as real as Luke!

Anybody know a kid who saw Episode I before Return of the Jedi? I'd like to ask him what he thought of Jabba the Hutt in that movie, because when I saw it I was unimpressed. Henson's Jabba the Hutt is remarkable, a monolith in my childhood memory, because of that disgusting puppet portrayal.

Yeah, CG just can't gross me out like organic matter can. And that's at least one edge a low-budget project will always have.

Re:$7 Champagne

porcupine — Tue, 13 May 2008 19:20:48 GMT

I think there is something to be said for the way low budgets force creativity. This is especially clear when it comes to visual effects. While I like what CGI can do for big budget movies, one of the really fun things about b-movies (and most old action/sci-fi/horror movies) is that it's fun to see the creative problem solving the effects team had to come up with.

It's so much more gratifying to find out the effects team dyed a bunch of egg whites green and dumped them in a vat with dry ice than to here some CGI guy say, "this shot had to be rendered overnight, on an awesome computer!"

Re:$7 Champagne

SkyPilot — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 19:34:12 GMT

Risselada:

Has Spielberg made a movie like this subsequent. With a singular, relentless, non-human but somehow almost unstoppable villain?

I haven't seen it, but it looks like E.T. is in that vein. (kidding)

Re:$7 Champagne

Risselada — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 19:32:40 GMT

SkyPilot:
More generally though this seems to be a question about what gives a movie its verve: is it the filmmaker's youth? Is it the filmmaker's conviction in the subject? And how does the movie's budget play into this?

This isn't just a question about movies, because every time we say of a musical act that we "like their earlier stuff better" I feel like we're getting at a similar issue.

I will not deny that youth seems to be a big factor. Or possibly it's just youth in terms of how long they've been in the industry or how long they've been successful in the industry.

I think it's very hard many artists, no matter how original, risky, or raw they may have seemed in their youth to not eventually look at their artform as more of just their job or source of income after a certain number of years of success. I don't even think they are doing this on purpose. They still seem to think that what they are doing is fresh and original, but they have learned the commercial side of things.

Or else what they were doing when they first started seemed risky and different at the time, but now that they have done the same kind of thing so many times it doens't feel new anymore. But somehow even artists who are aware this is happening seem to do no better when they specifically try to do something different. It's like they suddenly do something different just becuase they realize they are falling into a trap of doing the same thing over and over not because they genuinely feel the urge to do something that just happens to be different.

I think the most successful artists realize what's different about them. What makes them special and what the essence of their artwork is that makes it really appealing. And they hold on to that while evolving and making changes around it. Now what that one thing is could be anything, and sometimes it's difficult to pinpoint. It can be very equivocal.

Re:$7 Champagne

Risselada — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 18:55:48 GMT

Dr_Gor:

Risselada:

I agree. And what about Steven Spielberg whose greatest movie in my opinion is Duel. Then they gave him quite a bit more money to do Jaws which was just as awesome. But after that I think his movies got too "big".

Interesting that you should mention those two movies, Rizzo. Did you know that Spielberg intended for JAWS to be a sequel to Duel ? I actually heard him say this in an interview. Actually there ARE a few similarities... raplace the truck with a shark and Dennis Weaver with 'Martin Brody' and there you have it. Also, you will notice that he used the exact same orchestral sound effect at the end of both movies... When the truck is plunging over the cliff and when the exploded shark is sinking to the bottom of the ocean it is the exact same sound effect! check it out! I also heard that he 'lifted' this sound effect from an earlier dinosaur movie, The Lost World I think, where it was the sound of a T-Rex dieing or something like that...

Yes Gor, I have identified these similarities myself as well. Has Spielberg made a movie like this subsequent. With a singular, relentless, non-human but somehow almost unstoppable villain?

Re:$7 Champagne

SkyPilot — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 21:24:06 GMT

porcupine:

What about former low-budget directors taking the helm of super hero mega-movies? I'm think particualrly of Sam Rami doing the Spider-Man movies and Christopher Nolan doing Batman Begins. You could accuse them of "selling out," but I think that phrase is pretty much meaningless. It's just a different phase of their careers. Personally I think that Nolan is moving into that phase waaaaaay better than Rami.

Kevin, Nolan may be an example of somebody who got better after getting money. I think the low-budget Following is weaker than all of his later films, but I wonder if that has more to do with experience than money. In other words, maybe his later movies don't seem indulgent and bloated (like Spiderman 2 and 3) because his skill is growing in equal proportion to the budget?

porcupine:

Speilberg got too big? Speilberg just became Speilberg.

RISSELADA: "Well I've still always wondered what Spielberg might do with a challenge to make a movie now on an extremely limited budget. I think the result might be something I would prefer to what he's able to make with his seemingly unlimited wealth."

Kevin, I believe that when Rizzo says Spielberg "got too big" he's saying that Spielberg's later movies lack the energy of Duel and Jaws. What do you think about that, anyone?

More generally though this seems to be a question about what gives a movie its verve: is it the filmmaker's youth? Is it the filmmaker's conviction in the subject? And how does the movie's budget play into this?

This isn't just a question about movies, because every time we say of a musical act that we "like their earlier stuff better" I feel like we're getting at a similar issue.

Re:$7 Champagne

Dr_Gor — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 18:24:41 GMT

Risselada:

I agree. And what about Steven Spielberg whose greatest movie in my opinion is Duel. Then they gave him quite a bit more money to do Jaws which was just as awesome. But after that I think his movies got too "big".

Interesting that you should mention those two movies, Rizzo. Did you know that Spielberg intended for JAWS to be a sequel to Duel ? I actually heard him say this in an interview. Actually there ARE a few similarities... raplace the truck with a shark and Dennis Weaver with 'Martin Brody' and there you have it. Also, you will notice that he used the exact same orchestral sound effect at the end of both movies... When the truck is plunging over the cliff and when the exploded shark is sinking to the bottom of the ocean it is the exact same sound effect! check it out! I also heard that he 'lifted' this sound effect from an earlier dinosaur movie, The Lost World I think, where it was the sound of a T-Rex dieing or something like that...

Re:$7 Champagne

Risselada — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 17:05:27 GMT

porcupine:

Speilberg got too big? Speilberg just became Speilberg.

What about former low-budget directors taking the helm of super hero mega-movies? I'm think particualrly of Sam Rami doing the Spider-Man movies and Christopher Nolan doing Batman Begins. You could accuse them of "selling out," but I think that phrase is pretty much meaningless. It's just a different phase of their careers. Personally I think that Nolan is moving into that phase waaaaaay better than Rami. I just watched the first Spider-Man the other day, man that is a bad movie. You talked about Star Wars Episode I, go back and watch Spider-Man, the dialogue is just as bad.

Well I've still always wondered what Spielberg might do with a challenge to make a movie now on an extremely limited budget. I think the result might be something I would prefer to what he's able to make with his seemingly unlimited wealth. I wonder if sometimes we are more forgiving to a movie when we know it had to work with limitations, which makes it more impressive.

I actually thought about mentioning Raimi as well. Sometimes he still seems to use B-movie techniques in his huge budget Spider-man films. Which leads me to believe he might almost still feel more comfortable in that role. And I agree with you that the first Spider-man ain't THAT great. And I heard the third was was the worst.

Re:$7 Champagne

SkyPilot — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 03:10:09 GMT

Risselada:

And what about Steven Spielberg whose greatest movie in my opinion is Duel. Then they gave him quite a bit more money to do Jaws which was just as awesome. But after that I think his movies got too "big".

I like Jaws too, and to me it's more of an exploitation creature feature than a blockbuster.

Can you think of anyone who has given more consistently thrilling movies after they hit the big time? I'm pretty ignorant about Hitchcock (I've only seen Rope and Rear Window) but from the reviews I've seen, his later movies are more revered than his earlier contract work.

Re:$7 Champagne

porcupine — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 22:04:38 GMT

Speilberg got too big? Speilberg just became Speilberg.

What about former low-budget directors taking the helm of super hero mega-movies? I'm think particualrly of Sam Rami doing the Spider-Man movies and Christopher Nolan doing Batman Begins. You could accuse them of "selling out," but I think that phrase is pretty much meaningless. It's just a different phase of their careers. Personally I think that Nolan is moving into that phase waaaaaay better than Rami. I just watched the first Spider-Man the other day, man that is a bad movie. You talked about Star Wars Episode I, go back and watch Spider-Man, the dialogue is just as bad.

Re:$7 Champagne

Risselada — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 17:16:08 GMT

SkyPilot:

B movies can be like a seven dollar bottle of champagne, miles away from the real thing but every bit as fun.

I sometimes wonder if the most "alive," vervacious movies are necessarily made on a low budget...

Compare Star Wars: Episode IV to Episode I.

Or True Romance, Reservoir Dogs, and Pulp Fiction on the one hand -- the getting-bloated Kill Bill 2 on the other hand, followed by the totally hit-and-miss Death Proof.

Energy and entropy, Mssrs. Lucas and Tarantino! What's going on here, money or ego?

I agree. And what about Steven Spielberg whose greatest movie in my opinion is Duel. Then they gave him quite a bit more money to do Jaws which was just as awesome. But after that I think his movies got too "big".

$7 Champagne

SkyPilot — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 18:04:08 GMT

B movies can be like a seven dollar bottle of champagne, miles away from the real thing but every bit as fun.

I sometimes wonder if the most "alive," vervacious movies are necessarily made on a low budget...

Compare Star Wars: Episode IV to Episode I.

Or True Romance, Reservoir Dogs, and Pulp Fiction on the one hand -- the getting-bloated Kill Bill 2 on the other hand, followed by the totally hit-and-miss Death Proof.

Energy and entropy, Mssrs. Lucas and Tarantino! What's going on here, money or ego?