Resurrecting the Movies thread...

[Front-Ranger]

I saw It's Complicated a few nights ago and unexpectedly liked it. I feared there'd be too much older-woman-wish-fulfillment content, which sometimes gets so outlandish that it has started really getting on my nerves. While was "aspirational," it seemed reasonably natural in the context of the plot.

I just saw It's Complicated with my Mom. After a bit of a slow start, it was rolling-on-the-floor hilarious in spots! I especially loved Jim Shakowski as Meryl Streep's daughter's fiance. I never thought a movie about fifty-somethings could be so hip and funny!! Since one of my nicknames is Mrs. Robinson, I was happy to see The Graduate make a cameo appearance.

[Jeff Wrangler]

I especially loved Jim Shakowski as Meryl Streep's daughter's fiance.

I think that would be John Krasinski, FRiend Lee--the guy from The Office?

[serious crayons]

I never thought a movie about fifty-somethings could be so hip and funny!!

Because I know plenty of hip and funny fifty-somethings, present company included, my reaction is just the opposite -- why are there so few movies about them?

Or rather, in particular [once again donning Humorless Strident Middle-Aged Feminist hat] so few movies about hip and funny fifty-something women. You do occasionally see hip and funny men, of fifty and beyond, in movies.

[Lynne]

We saw Avatar over the weekend and although R liked it (I think he's a special-effects guy   but he'll have to address that), I was not really impressed.

I appreciate, of course, the parallels of one society enslaving another, robbing them of their natural resources, from the beginning of time to our current relations with fundamentalist Muslims in the Middle East.  And there are plenty of other moral lessons to be learned if you pay attention.

But

I felt like the point was beaten home like the dead horse - much more so than the Crash lessons on racism, and it's not like Crash was very subtle.

I did appreciate what little creativity went into creating the oppressed (blue) society and even more the concept of one species being able to merge with another and thereby understand who they are...that might engender future science fiction goodness.

[oilgun]

We saw Avatar over the weekend and although R liked it (I think he's a special-effects guy   but he'll have to address that), I was not really impressed.

I appreciate, of course, the parallels of one society enslaving another, robbing them of their natural resources, from the beginning of time to our current relations with fundamentalist Muslims in the Middle East.  And there are plenty of other moral lessons to be learned if you pay attention.

But

I felt like the point was beaten home like the dead horse - much more so than the Crash lessons on racism, and it's not like Crash was very subtle.

I did appreciate what little creativity went into creating the oppressed (blue) society and even more the concept of one species being able to merge with another and thereby understand who they are...that might engender future science fiction goodness.

Yikes! 

I guess I'm an Avatard, lol!

[Front-Ranger]

Ha! I must be an Avatard too! Lynne has a point that you don't go to Avatar for its subtle and original script!! It's more like a comics/graphic novel storyline.

[Lynne]

I'm sorry, Friends...I was bored despite the cool special effects.

[oilgun]

Here's an interesting short article from the current issue of The New Yorker about the top two nominated films and the new AMPAS voting process for Best Film:

And the Oscar Goes To
by Hendrik Hertzberg February 15, 2010

[...]

Everyone seems to agree that the director, James Cameron, and his legions of artists and technicians have created a thrillingly immersive, lovingly detailed, surprisingly believable alternative world. There’s been less unanimity about the movie’s “message.” Liberals are unhappy with the white-guy-rescues-the-natives aspect of the story, though this aspect surely has less to do with racism per se than with Cameron’s reliance on old-movie plot devices. Conservatives complain that the picture’s vision of the future (the action takes place in the year 2154) is overly hospitable to century-and-a-half-old lefty talking points.

[...]

This year, the Best Picture list was expanded, partly to make sure that at least a couple of blockbusters would be on it. (The biggest grosser of 2008, “The Dark Knight,” was one of the better Batman adventures, but it didn’t make the cut.) To forestall a victory for some cinematic George Wallace or Ross Perot, the Academy switched to a different system. Members—there are around fifty-eight hundred of them—are being asked to rank their choices from one to ten. In the unlikely event that a picture gets an outright majority of first-choice votes, the counting’s over. If not, the last-place finisher is dropped and its voters’ second choices are distributed among the movies still in the running. If there’s still no majority, the second-to-last-place finisher gets eliminated, and its voters’ second (or third) choices are counted. And so on, until one of the nominees goes over fifty per cent.

[...]

Read more: http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2010/02/15/100215taco_talk_hertzberg#ixzz0g2AucTpN

[Interesting, the link was added automatically]

[Lynne]

Now see, I didn't get that at all. The natives axed themselves with help from a man who was bi-species in some sense. Definitely not a white guy, IMO.

[serious crayons]

Now see, I didn't get that at all. The natives axed themselves with help from a man who was bi-species in some sense. Definitely not a white guy, IMO.

I think of him as a white guy in blueface.