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Overly appreciated movies?

Metatron

One Too Many
Messages
1,536
Location
United Kingdom
For me Tarantino films. I understand that you are supposed to enjoy the little detail here and there that is a homage to this and that,
but I don't think the films have enough substance to stand on their own.
Kill Bill in particular. I think half an hour of limbs being chopped off, whether it be serious or ironic or whatever, is a waste of time and an insult to the viewer's intelligence.
 
I've not seen it but I always thought I would hate it.

My problem is that I have often quite irrational prejudices against actors/filmmakers/subjects etc. So I find myself not watching films because of these prejudices. For example, I refuse to watch Woody Allen films: I saw the first five minutes of one (I can't recall the title but it was on a double-bill with Young Frankenstein sometime in the late 1970s *) and I thought it was truly awful. I walked out and, as far as i recall, I haven't seen one of his films since then.

* I can't remember the film's title but can remember who I was with (my dad), the cinema we were in(Granada 2, Bedford) and where we were sitting (by the aisle, halfway down, right hand side). It's strange how memory works.

I used to be the same. Then I saw Everything you Wanted to Know About Sex, and I was convinced to give his stuff a chance. Like most great artists he succeeds in fits and starts. Lots of crud in amongst the genius. The best comparison is a musical one. Try to get someone who came of musical age in the late 70s to middle 90s to like Bob Dylan. His utter garbage Jewish/Catholic/Oops I'm Jewish again truly awful period has tainted opinions on Dylan to this day.

Out of interest: I haven't seen The King's Speech: what were the historical distortions?

I liked the film. Certainly not art, and not a great movie, but a decent story and watchable. And hey, anything Royal and portraying the Royals as "normal" is always going to succeed in the rest of the (untrammelled) world.
 

Two Types

I'll Lock Up
Messages
5,456
Location
London, UK
Try to get someone who came of musical age in the late 70s to middle 90s to like Bob Dylan. His utter garbage Jewish/Catholic/Oops I'm Jewish again truly awful period has tainted opinions on Dylan to this day.

I should fit squarely into that category, but I actually quite like some of his stuff.
 

Two Types

I'll Lock Up
Messages
5,456
Location
London, UK
Blimey, I keep coming up with more stuff I just don't get: The Marx Brothers.

We have worked our way through a box set of all their films (so at least, for once, I can say I'm speaking from the perspective of having seen the films I'm criticising) and I just didn't like them. There was nothing there for me. I tried, and I failed.
 

The Wiser Hatter

I'll Lock Up
Messages
4,765
Location
Louisville, Ky
Love the Marx brothers. But their humor is based on the times and American/ immigrant humor so
I can see how that would be hard to understand. Having watched a lot of English comedy shows I sometimes don't get some joke either and have to research by a word or phase was fun. But I have been watch British TV now for a long time. My wife only watches Downton Abbey and the like she doesn't get ant British humor at all.
 
Messages
12,017
Location
East of Los Angeles
Blimey, I keep coming up with more stuff I just don't get: The Marx Brothers.

We have worked our way through a box set of all their films (so at least, for once, I can say I'm speaking from the perspective of having seen the films I'm criticising) and I just didn't like them. There was nothing there for me. I tried, and I failed.
I'd say you succeeded rather than failed. You watched the movies, and determined they weren't to your liking. I believe comedy is quite possibly the most subjective of all forms of entertainment; as the saying goes, "Dying is easy; comedy is hard."
 

LizzieMaine

Bartender
Messages
33,757
Location
Where The Tourists Meet The Sea
Blimey, I keep coming up with more stuff I just don't get: The Marx Brothers.

We have worked our way through a box set of all their films (so at least, for once, I can say I'm speaking from the perspective of having seen the films I'm criticising) and I just didn't like them. There was nothing there for me. I tried, and I failed.

The Marxes, along with other similar teams like Wheeler and Woolsey, Olsen and Johnson, and the Ritz Brothers, are very much like sardines: either you absolutely love them or you just can't stomach them. There are very few people who are neutral.
 

topango

Familiar Face
Messages
64
Location
General Sheridan's Rental
The Shawshank redemption. It may or may not be over appreciated, but it is definitely over shown. If you are interested in seeing it just turn on the Shawshank redemption channel on cable.
 

Old Rogue

Practically Family
Messages
854
Location
Eastern North Carolina
True...and the same with The Green Mile here lately. However,in my view..Two exceptional movies..!!
HD

I agree with that HD. I finally got around to watching The Shawshank Redemption several weeks ago, and I really liked it. I first saw The Green Mile a number of years ago, it was a great movie also. That being said neither are movies that I'd want to watch over and over.
 

p51

One Too Many
Messages
1,119
Location
Well behind the front lines!
Directors, like most artists, have, I feel, a limited amount of good work in them. George Lucas is a classic example. The man cranked out some pretyt amazing stuff then went into a slow, self-indulged slide into mediocrity (at best). Some say that of Tarantino, and I can't find much to argue with them on that point. I loved Tarantino's early work but clearly now he's just making movies that he wants to watch with no regard for if they're any good or not. I like, "inglorious" mostly for the cool ending where Hitler gets schwacked and any movie finally addressing the fact that people couldn't just walk into a group of German soldiers, speaking German, and not cause some alarm about whether you're really German or not. Other than those two points, I can see why so many others hated it.
I'd say you succeeded rather than failed. You watched the movies, and determined they weren't to your liking.
Great point.
The Marx Brothers I can take or leave. I can see either side of an argument on love or hate them.
I love the three stooges but I can also understand folks who don't 'get' them (they're usually women, I've noticed) either...
 

Denton

A-List Customer
Messages
324
Location
Los Angeles
Here is a heretical opinion of mine. I have never really liked The Philadelphia Story. There are many fine touches in the film, lots of good performances. But the screenplay annoys me. It is so pious about its frivolity.

I especially can't stand the scene where Tracy's father shows up and reveals that his infidelity is actually her fault. In a different movie, this scene might have been played for comedy -- I can imagine a character in a movie written by Preston Sturges patiently explaining that when someone commits adultery, the children are always the real culprits. But in The Philadelphia Story, this scene is yet another humiliation that Katherine Hepburn's character has to endure so that she can be a better human being.

I get a similar feeling from Holiday, also written by Philip Barry. (Also directed by Cukor, and also with Hepburn and Grant, but I'm pretty sure that the weird ideas are Barry's.)
 

rjb1

Practically Family
Messages
561
Location
Nashville
Here is an example of the subjectivity of sense of humor, as has been mentioned:
"Aw c'mon. Can you really say that Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis weren't hilarious in Some Like It Hot?"
Answer: Yes, not amusing, not funny, and definitely not hilarious - but that's based on my own sense of humor. It's a personal difference ... Not better or worse, just different.
 

Smithy

I'll Lock Up
Messages
5,139
Location
Norway
"inglorious"

"Inglourious Basterds" is in my over appreciated book. Apart from Christoph Waltz's performance (which was outstanding) I thought the whole thing was very ho-hum.

I liked "Pulp Fiction" but I reckon that's another one that people go a little bit OTT about.

But "Django Unchained" is streets ahead my favourite Tarantino. I simply love that movie.
 

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