Solo speaks the truth :yes:
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Solo speaks the truth :yes:
Yeah, I just watched Born on the Fourth of July and there is no comparison. Everything made after Deer Hunter and Apocalypse Now has nowhere near the power.
There ends my brief Vietnam marathon. :whew:
Platoon likewise doesn't deserve to be alongside those two films. Full Metal Jacket, if it had never gone to the war and had enough material to fill a feature ending with the suicide of Private Pyle, that would have made it a solid #3. As-is, since Kubrick didn't have enough material to make that movie the back half really wrecks it. Seriously, an imported palm tree every 50' or so and those hideous choppers were a bad idea.
It's a very dreary movie but I didn't hate Casualties of War. While slick, it doesn't have the epic scope of the above.
I think Oliver Stone is massively overrated myself. I did enjoy his biopic of The Doors, but that's it.
Full Metal Jacket - yeah, I don't like the second half nearly as much the first half.
Of his directed films I enjoy watching Any Given Sunday the most. Special mention goes to The Hand. There are several films he's written though that I enjoy the hell out of, including Scarface and the original Conan the Barbarian (co-written).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isHWcYQIkgU
Conan and Scarface - I'll give him credit for that, but just for writing them, though. Any Given Sunday and The Hand don't interest me, neither do his other stuff mostly. I like The Doors because of the portrait it paints of the 60s.. plus Val Kilmer played a great Jim Morrison impersonation.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes(2014) 8/10
Kill Your Darlings, 2013. 7/10
http://www.celebstoner.com/assets/im...urDarlings.jpg
Apocalypse Now Redux - I'm not really the biggest fan of this movie, the scale of it is amazing though. I just find it doesn't draw me in as much. I think it has the best portrayal of the Vietnam War, though. Robert Duvall and his obsession with surfing is just hilarious. I agree with your assessment, BurnetRhoades, in that it perfectly captures the madness and hypocrisy of war. The soundtrack is also a blast to listen to. I still think I prefer The Deer Hunter, although Apocalypse Now is the ultimate Vietnam War epic.
I really liked the Redux when I first saw it, because I'd read about all that went into it years prior in an issue of Film Threat magazine (the same issue shows a side-by-side comparison of Heat and LA Takedown, the '80s made-for-TV movie of Mann's that would someday become Heat). But in years since I don't have the patience for this cut anymore. To me, it's just more. The theatrical edit has better flow and recognized these sub-plots that don't ultimately have anything to do with the central story are just fine for books but often not successful in narrative film.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes 9/10
True Romance 9/10 (One of my all time fav's!)
What I remember from Heart of Darkness is these scenes, and the re-encounter with the downed Playboy Bunnies, was Coppola trying to be almost scenario-for-scenario faithful in its telling of the story. It's a worthy goal except that the two mediums are quite different. This may or may not have been where he advises other filmmakers to "kill your darlings," in other words, no matter how good a scene is and how precious it might be to you, the filmmaker, or how much work it was to create, don't be afraid to edit it out if the overall film will be better and stronger without it.
Yeah, Bridge on the River Kwai totally trumps Apocalypse Now in its narrative. My favourite Alec Guinness performance (yes, better than Obi-Wan).
Such an awesome film.
Frozen
Fast and the furious 5
Robocop remake
The Hurt Locker - :rock: Best Picture.. well deserved.
That was one of the best moments I've ever seen on the program. You could see the shock in that smug prick Cameron's face who thought it was a lock-up on his Fern Gully in space shit. Best Oscar moment ever. And that he lost to an ex makes it even more delicious.
She is. Definitely. He's really only good in the edit bay anymore and has been a shitty writer since 1991.