22nd Hall of Fame

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I may be the only one who is impressed by Waco here haha. Oh well, Thems the breaks sometimes.
I do feel Genocide is much better, and there are certainly better docs out there as well, but Waco (and I’ll be reviewing it shortly) is much better I think then some people are giving it credit for.
Documentaries are a tricky thing in general, as they don’t follow any typical formula, which is among the reasons why I love them.
Still....it’s better then Super Size Me haha
I haven't read any of the reviews on Waco, so I don't know what the complaints are, if any...I do hope to watch it tonight...then I'll post my thoughts. I usually love documentaries. We'll see



I was thinking about watching Waco next as well, but I should probably wait until I'm in the right mind set to give it a fair shot. Normally I'd rather stare at a blank wall than have to sit through a documentary, even if the subject matter interests me.



The trick is not minding
I was thinking about watching Waco next as well, but I should probably wait until I'm in the right mind set to give it a fair shot. Normally I'd rather stare at a blank wall than have to sit through a documentary, even if the subject matter interests me.
From now on, I’m nominating nothing but docs just for you! MwaHahaha!





Mildred Pierce (MIchael Curtiz, 1945)
Imdb

Date Watched: 05/23/2020
Cinema or Home: Home
Reason For Watching: 22nd MoFo Hall of Fame
Rewatch: No


I don’t really have a whole lot to say about this one. I appreciated the portrayal of an independent woman, but there wasn’t a whole lot else that I liked about it. Well, maybe Ida. She was kind of funny. Everybody else though was pretty s***ty, while not being s***ty enough to root against because they were mostly being s***ty to each other. They all deserved each other as far as I could see.

And while it certainly is not the worst offender I’ve seen, my experience suffered even more so from the stilted acting that was common for the time. It takes me out of a movie anytime someone sheds obviously fake tears (that are not fake within the context of the story) or when two characters are talking and one suddenly stops then a unnatural space of silence happens before the other person starts talking and yet I as the viewer am supposed to believe that the first person was interrupted by the second. And that’s not even taking into account the annoying dialogue, especially between Monty and Mildred when they were at the beach house the first time. I also cringed anytime Butterfly McQueen’s shrill voice was heard. Holy crap that woman is annoying.

But if I’m totally honest I was at least never bored of the film. Annoyed, yes. Absolutely. But not bored. So at least there’s that.




2022 Mofo Fantasy Football Champ
Shine



It was weird that this one kind of slipped through the cracks and that I had never really heard of it before this.

I'll be in the minority but I feel like without Geoffrey Rush this film may not really be much. He definitely was the best part of the film, and even then so, he really isn't even in it all that much for playing the lead role and having it cut into basically thirds with kid David and Adolescent David. But he did do a real fine job portraying what seems like a very difficult character, so it was a well deserved Oscar from the looks of it. I feel like David's father did pretty well too, but again, it felt like he wasn't in the film all that much either.

The father/son relationship was the best part of the film for me. Actually, the film felt a bit rushed to me, especially the second half. Of course, I knew next to nothing about the main character going in, so maybe that hindered my enjoyment of it all. And like others, I'm not too big into the piano history type stuff in general unfortunately.

It was a decent film for me, but I wasn't floored. The biopics I've seen seem to be either hit or miss with me. I'll let this one probably stand in the middle though.






I, Daniel Blake (Ken Loach and Laura Obiols, 2016)
Imdb

Date Watched: 05/25/2020
Cinema or Home: Home
Reason For Watching: 22nd MoFo Hall of Fame
Rewatch: No


I, Daniel Blake is a bleak film that stands as a searing indictment of a system that is ostensibly designed to help people but actually serves to degrade and humiliate them.

Dave Johns and Hayley Squires are both excellent as two people who form a friendship and bond over their shared troubles. Both are driven to desperate acts to survive and both do what they can to support each other. Both struggle to maintain their dignity.

There is some humor here, the pacing is good, and the film lacks much in the way of filler, but it is a very difficult watch emotionally and I often found myself in need of tissue to wipe my tears. But it’s that sort of thing that makes for a moving and memorable experience and for that I highly recommend it.

As as an aside, the other thing I highly recommend is to turn on subtitles. As an American, I sometimes struggled to understand the dialogue.




There is some humor here, the pacing is good, and the film lacks much in the way of filler, but it is a very difficult watch emotionally and I often found myself in need of tissue to wipe my tears.
I'm going to wait to rewatch this until my room mates aren't home, because I also cried a little when I saw it the first time. I'm not sure if it'll have the same emotional impact the second time around, but I find that I get more invested when I'm watching a film completely alone.



The thing isolated becomes incomprehensible


I, Daniel Blake (Ken Loach and Laura Obiols, 2016)
Imdb

Date Watched: 05/25/2020
Cinema or Home: Home
Reason For Watching: 22nd MoFo Hall of Fame
Rewatch: No


I, Daniel Blake is a bleak film that stands as a searing indictment of a system that is ostensibly designed to help people but actually serves to degrade and humiliate them.

Dave Johns and Hayley Squires are both excellent as two people who form a friendship and bond over their shared troubles. Both are driven to desperate acts to survive and both do what they can to support each other. Both struggle to maintain their dignity.

There is some humor here, the pacing is good, and the film lacks much in the way of filler, but it is a very difficult watch emotionally and I often found myself in need of tissue to wipe my tears. But it’s that sort of thing that makes for a moving and memorable experience and for that I highly recommend it.

As as an aside, the other thing I highly recommend is to turn on subtitles. As an American, I sometimes struggled to understand the dialogue.

DID I JUST MADE MISS VICKY CRY????

Close the HoF, I win. 3 in a row. Hooray!!!

Nice HoF everyone, on to the 23rd.




Waco The Rules of Engagement (1997)

I'm very curious as to what everyone has wrote about this documentary. Myself, I love documentaries, but it's going to be hard to rate this one. The production values weren't high, but yet the subject matter really got to me in a way no film ever could.

The doc was able to present information that made me do a 180 on the Waco incident. Anytime a doc can change your mindset that's powerful stuff. All I had remembered about the Waco incident was that some kook, cult leader held up in a religious compound ended up committing mass suicide by burning their own building. That's what I had though happened...The doc presented evidence, such as the infrared recordings that totally changed my mind.

You know it's hard not to react to the incident, vs purely judging the doc's production values. So I'm not going to try...

David Koresh was a nut case and it never ceases to amaze me how people can follow a nut case right into the grave. I never knew Koresh was a polygamist and was accused of being a pedophile. I can't stand to look at the guy he just creeps me out.

For all the crazy **** that the Branch Davidians embraced, they didn't deserve to be gassed to death & machined gunned down by the FBI! Wholly **** I can't believe the images of the FBI using machine guns on the backside of the compound where no one could see them. I mean the children in there didn't deserve to be cooked alive....When it's all over, it's very telling that the FBI removes the Davidian's flag and runs their own FBI banner up the flag pole. Then the FBI proceeds to alter the crime scene and conveniently lose evidence that could've proved the FBI's wrong doing.

Mind bending stuff!....Thanks Wyldesyde for nominating this illuminating doc!
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Thursday Next's Avatar
I never could get the hang of Thursdays.
Shine

"Your first concert in years and you wear odd shoes."


I really don’t know why I’ve never watched this film before, since I’ve always known of it. Anyway, now I have!

Biopics generally are not my favourite sort of film. I hadn’t heard of Hefgott before watching this and I don’t know how close this story is to real life, but it’s almost always better not to know, so I haven’t looked it up.

It’s interesting that Geoffrey Rush won awards for this, since he is in less than half of it. I think the actor who plays the younger David, Noah Taylor, who has been in lots of things since like Peaky Blinders and Game of Thrones, deserves more credit. Although Rush is very good, as always.

I found the first half to be more interesting than the second half. There was more focus and more insight into the characters. I found it quite sad as well. The second half just seemed a bit more disjointed. We never really get any explanation about David’s illness, he just seems to randomly meet people, then move somewhere else - and him getting married seemed to come out of nowhere.

I enjoyed the music in the film, especially the Rachmaninoff.

One sad thing about it for me was that I think my mum would have loved this film, but she died last month and so I can’t recommend it to her.




State of Siege (1972)


State of Siege is a dark political thriller with the potential to be great; unfortunately, it is not great. But it has some really good things going for it. The camera movements are slick and unique, although they began to grate on me nearing the end. It's a highly mobile style, one that can work for intense scenes but falls flat when we're just looking for a dialogue or character building moment.

Being based on true events, State of Siege strikes up an almost documentary style. It certainly offers very little in the field of character development. While that can be interpreted as a bad thing, it does work quite well in setting up the facts - not emotions - of the situations. Of course, being a fictionalized movie, the viewer should expect emotions.

The first and foremost thing a filmmaker should be out to do is create an emotional connection between the story and the viewers. Plenty of movies based on true events have been able to do that, and plenty have twisted reality to be able to achieve that affect. State of Siege seems unwilling to present anything other than "events" and "facts" and "conversations". It doesn't dive into its characters, and certainly doesn't dive into swirling emotions beneath all of this.

That's entirely fine, since State of Siege, at the end, is intended as a political commentary on the United States governmental and official corruption, especially in Latin/South America. Heck, it's a general criticism of power corruption around the world. That's an important message, and I admire State of Siege for so boldly tackling it. I just wish some emotional tug had been established, allowing the viewer to be more engaged in this important story.

In the end, if you came searching for an intense, politics-first movie-second, thriller, you will get that. State of Siege has a ton of great elements going for it, as I said. As for me, I would have preferred something of a little more substance to draw me in. Still worth a watch for those who think this might be for them!



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