Stratovarius Community

I think the test of a movie is the test of the watcher. If the watcher thinks a movie is boring, than the movie did not fit with the thought process at the time of watching the movie. It says more about the person than the movie. Pick anything and we can always find someone that hates it and insults others for liking it.

This is a movie I will be seeing as soon as it comes in from Netflix:

Tripping the Rift: The Movie

I haven't seen the series in a long time (except for watching it on Netflix).

Two weeks ago I went to see "Defiance" with Daniel Craig and Liev Schriber who star as two of four brothers who set up a Jewish partisan unit operating in the forests of Beylorussia, and behind German lines, during WWII.

If you can get past some of the standard Hollyweird vehicles, such as love triangles and squabbling siblings, this largely true period film is actually pretty good.

The brothers are challenged beyond normal human endurance as they try to feed and protect an ever growing number of Jewish refugees, desperate to escape certain death at the hands of the Einsatzgruppen, Gestapo, and their Gentile Beylorussian collaborators.

Work at times with the Russian partisans, they extract bloody revenge on the Germans and collaborators, and disrupt their supply lines, while also obtaining the food and weapons that they need to survive.

A Russian friend attended this release with me. He found the film overall to be historically accurate, but also was tortured by the constant switching back and forth of dialog from English to Russian- and he also decided that the English subtitles did not do justice to accurately translating what was being said in Russian, although he did praise Schriber for accurate dialog in the scenes that he did with real Russian actors who potrayed the Soviet partisans.

We both agreed that this film is a welcome addition to what we consider to be a rather sadly underrepresented theater of the war.

Have seen Léon, the pro yesterday... surprised how good the movie is! although how he can escape out of his room was a bit predictable if you've seen the silence of the lambs

Thanks for the spoiler.
Just kidding, but I also enjoyed Léon too. It's astonishing to see how Natalie Portman at the age of 12 or so outplays Jean Reno and Gary Oldman.


Just watched:
Root Of All Evil?
Part I: The God Delusion
Part II: The Virus Of Faith
Documentary by evolutionary-biologist and renowned spokesman for atheism Richard Dawkins criticising and openly mocking (organised) religion. It sees him travelling from America's bible belt via France to Jerusalem, rarely giving time for people who share his agenda to reinforce his arguments but almost solely letting fundamentalists of Christianity, Judaism and Islam to freely express themselves and letting them make his point for him. The pseudo-science behind creationism and 'intelligent' design that several groups, especially in America, demand to be taught in science-classes along with factual science is also criticised.
[achievement unlocked: longest, hardest and the most incoherent paragraph I've ever managed to write]

I have great admiration for Dawkins, but most of the time he seems to be painfully struggling when trying to defend his strive for reason and logic against people who seem to be even more determined towards ignorance and intolerance. Root of All Evil? might be way too aggressive to make theists think of all the valid points he makes. His book, The God Delusion, explains his point a lot better than this, but I would still recommend this to all theists and atheists alike. Also, if anyone were to ask me why I personally choose not to believe in any supernatural deity, I can at least save my breath by simply telling them to find and watch this.

I've been trying to replenish all the time I haven't laughed wholeheartidly, and what's better than Monty Python, or anything associated with them?

I saw The Holy Grail, no comments here.

From series, I've seen Fawlty Towers, and I'm just beginning all of Flying Circus.

The curious case of Benjamin Button. AWESOME!

Lurdi wrote:The curious case of Benjamin Button. AWESOME!

Saw that yesterday and I agree, it was awesome indeed.

Repo! The Genetic Opera

It's insane. Metal/goth/rock opera about a not so far future where people get sick and need lots of organ transplants. There's a bio-tech company that provides the organs but if you fail to pay - they send the assassin (repo-man) to cut the organ away. The story is about one such guy, played by Antony Stewart Head (Giles from Buffy the Vampire Slayer).

It's a movie that combines him, opera singer Sarah Brightman, the singer of an industrial band Skinny Puppy, some other good actors and Paris Hilton, everyone singing and it's directed by the guy who directed most of the Saw movies.

Highly recommended.

Watchmen

I don't remember being so awed by a movie since probably The Return Of The King. This movie is perfect in every aspect and worth many repeated viewings. I can't find enough words to describe just how awesome this movie is ...

Shurik wrote:Watchmen

I don't remember being so awed by a movie since probably The Return Of The King. This movie is perfect in every aspect and worth many repeated viewings. I can't find enough words to describe just how awesome this movie is ...

I'm going to see that in 6 hours. I've been expecting a lot from it ever since I first heard they were going to make it, but according to what I've heard, it's going to be even better.

Shurik wrote:Watchmen

I don't remember being so awed by a movie since probably The Return Of The King.

Right, not gonna see this one then.

Gran Torino 9/10
Sunset Blvd. 9/10
Zoolander 6/10
Cars 6/10
The Incredibles 7/10
Fantasia 10/10
Hobgoblins 1/10
Manos - The Hands Of Fate 1/10

SPAWN

my favorite movie

Taras Bulba
If I will say that I have no words I will say nothing. It's the first time during many years when I don't feel shame for the movie that was made by Russians, it's not Nochnoy Dozor or something like that! I hate battles that are made with computer and I hate historical unauthenticity in movies! So, in this movie there's no both. It's made excellent, very high quality! The only thing that provoked my perplexity was that Zaporozhsky Cossacks while dying glorify Russian land. Well, nevermind, it's the little things, the movie was made with the purpose to make a patriotic one, and creators were succeeded in doing it. The movie is VERY patriotic. Recast is great, they play excellent, about a half of the movie I naturally cried of patriotic feelings that overfilled me, and of being sorry for dying heroes.
I recommend to everybody to watch it, you won't be sorry! $25 000 000 of budget wasn't spent for nothing

Morgana wrote:It's the first time during many years when I don't feel shame for the movie that was made by Russians, it's not Nochnoy Dozor or something like that!

Hey, I looooved Nochnoy Dozor! I know I'm alone here, none of my friends can stand it. I thought it was really fascinating and, in its own way, very beautifully made movie.
In fact, my current avatar is a cut-out from the sequel's, Dnevnoy Dozor's poster. I liked that even more and I'm anxiously waiting for the third part.

Last night me and my sister saw Hard Candy.

I Love You, Man

So hilarious!

Mormegil wrote:

Morgana wrote:It's the first time during many years when I don't feel shame for the movie that was made by Russians, it's not Nochnoy Dozor or something like that!

Hey, I looooved Nochnoy Dozor! I know I'm alone here, none of my friends can stand it. I thought it was really fascinating and, in its own way, very beautifully made movie.
In fact, my current avatar is a cut-out from the sequel's, Dnevnoy Dozor's poster. I liked that even more and I'm anxiously waiting for the third part.

Oh COME ON!!! It's a bad parody to Hollywood movies, not more!!! To tell the truth "Taras Bulba" is the first Russian movie during last years that is really really nice. And Nochnoy Dozor, Dnevnoy Dozor, Svolochi and 9th Rota are the pieces of shit.

Morgana wrote:

Mormegil wrote:

Morgana wrote:It's the first time during many years when I don't feel shame for the movie that was made by Russians, it's not Nochnoy Dozor or something like that!

Hey, I looooved Nochnoy Dozor! I know I'm alone here, none of my friends can stand it. I thought it was really fascinating and, in its own way, very beautifully made movie.
In fact, my current avatar is a cut-out from the sequel's, Dnevnoy Dozor's poster. I liked that even more and I'm anxiously waiting for the third part.

Oh COME ON!!! It's a bad parody to Hollywood movies, not more!!! To tell the truth "Taras Bulba" is the first Russian movie during last years that is really really nice. And Nochnoy Dozor, Dnevnoy Dozor, Svolochi and 9th Rota are the pieces of shit.

I didn't think of it as a Hollywood-parody. More like a b-class scifi/fantasy script with a big budget, made by David Lynch on a really bad acid-trip. I don't know why, but I really enjoyed them.
You think Russian movies are bad? At least you had Tarkovsky and Eisenstein. You should see Finnish movies.
And about Taras Bulba, I might check it out if I have a chance.

NeverendingAbyss wrote:I Love You, Man

So hilarious!

I know, it's hard for boys to watch this film!

Mormegil wrote:You think Russian movies are bad? At least you had Tarkovsky and Eisenstein. You should see Finnish movies.
And about Taras Bulba, I might check it out if I have a chance.

Well, Tarkovsky and Eisenstein are another kind of movies at all. I meant modern movies that Russian directors make. These movies have no idea, they have no sense, they have just action, explosions, and budget. Directors try to copy Hollywood action movies to make "the same" or "similar" but they make it bad. The last time when I saw good movie was "The barber of Siberia" by Nikita Mikhalkov. Of course Russia has another good movies but they are not famous overseas. For example "The Muslim" by Vladimir Khotinenko. It's the great movie about a guy who was in Afghan captivity for 7 years and then he came back to small Russian village as a muslim. It's a movie about simple folk's thinking, about religion, about correlation of different religions... It's the deepest movie I have ever seen. But I doubt that you will find it in translation...

The only thing that provoked my perplexity was that Zaporozhsky Cossacks while dying glorify Russian land.

That's straight from Gogol and I don't think he, as a 19th century Ukrainian writer, intended to make Zaporozh Cossacks praise today's Russia, so if this movie is made to invoke patriotic feelings in today's Russia, the director missed the point ... Gogol meant Russia in broad sense (today's Russia, parts of Ukraine and Byelorussia), as it was in 17th century when the tale takes place.

Nochnoy Dozor was great, so was Dnevnoy Dozor. I haven't seen much of Russia's current cinema offerings (and as I understand, most of it indeed qualifies as crap), but I absolutely loved Den Viborov and Den Radio and sort of liked 9 Rota. 9 Rota was an obvious attempt at making a Full Metal Jacket type of movie, but it was well-made.

Shurik wrote:Gogol meant Russia in broad sense (today's Russia, parts of Ukraine and Byelorussia), as it was in 17th century when the tale takes place.

I agree with the first part of this sentense: Gogol meant Russia in a broad sense. But you're wrong about Cossacs. THEY didn't mean Russia in a broad sense, they were "self explanatory", war was their job, and there was Zar in Russia but they weren't subordinate to him. So I think that Gogol a little bit idealized Cossacs in his book according to his view of Russia in a "broad sense".

Shurik wrote:9 Rota was an obvious attempt at making a Full Metal Jacket type of movie, but it was well-made.

A horrible piece of crap, that's what it is. I think one of the producers was Finnish, that's probably the reason why the film is so awful...

Carcass wrote:

Shurik wrote:9 Rota was an obvious attempt at making a Full Metal Jacket type of movie, but it was well-made.

A horrible piece of crap, that's what it is.

+ 1000000

9 Rota wasn't particularly much worse than much of the stuff that comes out of Hollywood (now, there's a ringing endorsement! ). Though, as far as Afghan war movies go, I thought Afganskiy izlom was better (which, if I'm not mistaken, shares a director with Taras Bulba).

So I think that Gogol a little bit idealized Cossacs in his book according to his view of Russia in a "broad sense".

"Little bit" is a big understatement. Parts of Taras Bulba tell about the stuff they did to Poles and Jews and for the whole book Taras and his buddies call the Jews "Zhid" and curse them almost constantly. Funny thing, all this antisemitic stuff was cut from the version of the book I read in school.

What was so bad about 9th Rota, apart from not being original and being very far from the story of the actual 9th Rota? Technically it was good, the characters were good enough for me to care about them ...

Shurik wrote:"Little bit" is a big understatement. Parts of Taras Bulba tell about the stuff they did to Poles and Jews and for the whole book Taras and his buddies call the Jews "Zhid" and curse them almost constantly. Funny thing, all this antisemitic stuff was cut from the version of the book I read in school.

What was so bad about 9th Rota, apart from not being original and being very far from the story of the actual 9th Rota? Technically it was good, the characters were good enough for me to care about them ...

I know about this side of critics of the movie "Taras Bulba", you're right. But I think it was made on the ground of political correctness
And about 9th Rota - believe me, these dialogues and character are absolutely unrealistic. I'm the serviceman's daughter and believe me, servicemen behave another way. I cannot point to details but in common this movie looks like a product of civilian people who have never seen servicemen and their life.

NordicStorm wrote:9 Rota wasn't particularly much worse than much of the stuff that comes out of Hollywood.

True :3