dazed
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Post by dazed on Sept 19, 2019 19:09:57 GMT
Mise well start this thread up since showtimes start tonight here. I’ll most likely catch this Sunday afternoon.
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Post by Sharbs on Sept 19, 2019 19:27:24 GMT
catching tonight!
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Post by stephen on Sept 20, 2019 4:52:01 GMT
Just got back from it, and I gotta say: it might take the crown of being the biggest disappointment of the decade for me. Nothing about it worked on a narrative level, nor on a performance level, and although the technicals were breathtaking, it all amounted to a whole heap of "who cares?" by the end.
It frustrates me because it had a pretty solid blueprint to follow. The Apocalypse Now comparisons are pretty valid, as for the first half-hour it hits those beats almost exactly. But the film's internal logic starts to crumble and fall apart by the time they get to Mars, and by the time the rocket takes off from there, it starts to lean into the realm of the ludicrous pretty heavily, so that by the time the film's final chapter begins, disbelief hasn't just been suspended; it's been untethered and sent on a collision course with a gas giant.
I've long been critical of Pitt's capabilities as a leading man. I feel like he can be really good when given a plum role to play, but if he's tasked to carry a movie by sheer virtue of his presence, he often comes up short. This is a major issue here, as Roy McBride is probably the most opaque cipher of a role he's ever been burdened with. To be fair to Pitt, it's not a part anyone could do wonders with; if they were aiming for a Marlow/Willard surrogate here, there's so much more they could've done with the role. Pitt's failings can be charted as a script issue more than anything else, but he certainly does it no favors, and his dead-eyed somnulence is damn near slothlike. But if Pitt's saddled with having to mine a nothing character, Tommy Lee Jones literally does the barest minimum I've ever seen from him. Jones is a natural talent who just has an innate charisma and watchability, but that is weirdly absent here. It's like watching two husks of great actors acting as marionettes to an unseen puppeteer who hasn't figured out how to make his creations emote or evoke any sort of human response. Ruth Negga's wasted, Donald Sutherland does nothing of note except make me realize how fucking old he is, and Liv Tyler drew the easiest paycheck of all time.
In short, Ad Astra is basically the end result of James Gray looking at Interstellar and thinking Nolan was being way too subtle. Some gorgeous imagery cannot salvage what, ultimately, wasn't just a misfire; this was a tricked-out rocket blowing up on the launchpad.
EDIT: I just wanna add: this whole movie makes a lot more sense if you view it as a Jacob's Ladder scenario: that Brad Pitt dies when he falls off the antenna, and the entire movie is his demolished nervous system sparking a few final haphazard images of his regrets before sputtering into darkness. [/p]
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Post by wilcinema on Sept 20, 2019 6:40:37 GMT
Agreed, Stephen. Ever since I saw it in Venice, this movie has left a bitter taste in mouth. So much squandered potential.
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Post by evilbliss on Sept 20, 2019 12:54:42 GMT
Seeing it tonight in IMAX. Can't believe I'll be watching a James Gray movie on IMAX. Is it worth it on this huge screen?
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Ad Astra
Sept 20, 2019 16:10:03 GMT
via mobile
Post by quetee on Sept 20, 2019 16:10:03 GMT
Yikes so i guess rumors are true about fox making changes.
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Post by stephen on Sept 20, 2019 17:11:22 GMT
Yikes so i guess rumors are true about fox making changes. I mean, let's not put the onus entirely on Fox recutting this after the fact. The issues with this movie are in its DNA, not just in the edit.
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Post by Johnny_Hellzapoppin on Sept 20, 2019 18:48:42 GMT
Gonna see this tomorrow, I hope to at least like it. I don't really have any expectations of it, so that might be a good start.
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Post by Tommen_Saperstein on Sept 20, 2019 18:56:19 GMT
I guess I'm waiting for the screener
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Post by Sharbs on Sept 20, 2019 22:35:44 GMT
I guess I'm waiting for the screener Are you retarded or something? people can have different anticipation levels, ya twerp
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Post by Sharbs on Sept 20, 2019 22:37:13 GMT
Really liked it. The more expansive and even silly at times it gets the more introspective it becomes. Pitt is fantastic and I believe to be perfectly cast. Rewatching this weekend
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Post by Viced on Sept 20, 2019 23:05:30 GMT
Are you retarded or something? people can have different anticipation levels, ya twerp But to say "guess I'm waiting for a screener" after 2 negative reactions on here is pretty ridiculous. Especially for a movie that obviously looks like something that'll benefit from the theater experience.
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Film Socialism
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Post by Film Socialism on Sept 20, 2019 23:31:34 GMT
seeing it tmrw - first hollywood film i've been genuinely excited for in like a year and a half lol
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Post by Ryan_MYeah on Sept 20, 2019 23:39:28 GMT
people can have different anticipation levels, ya twerp But to say "guess I'm waiting for a screener" after 2 negative reactions on here is pretty ridiculous. Especially for a movie that obviously looks like something that'll benefit from the theater experience.After Life of Pi, I’m skeptical of any movie that *needs* a theater experience to be better. I’m being slightly facetious, of course. I love the theater, and I’m excited for this movie (EDIT: And having A-List coupled with FandangoNow, I hardly have to worry about being picky anymore), but a movie depending on the big screen doesn’t signify it has a long shelf life.
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Post by Ryan_MYeah on Sept 20, 2019 23:46:35 GMT
For those who’ve seen it, is or isn’t Pitt’s character on the spectrum?
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Post by DeepArcher on Sept 21, 2019 0:01:17 GMT
For those who’ve seen it, is or isn’t Pitt’s character on the spectrum? I don't recall it being mentioned once. If he is, it's not at all emphasized.
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Post by Ryan_MYeah on Sept 21, 2019 0:08:06 GMT
For those who’ve seen it, is or isn’t Pitt’s character on the spectrum? I don't recall it being mentioned once. If he is, it's not at all emphasized. I can’t recall where I found it (it could have been stupid Wikipedia), but I remember reading that he was, so that’s nice to hear. I just naturally have a problem with Hollywood writing autism, because they can only seem to write them as stereotypes.
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Post by stephen on Sept 21, 2019 0:09:18 GMT
I don't recall it being mentioned once. If he is, it's not at all emphasized. I can’t recall where I found it (it could have been stupid Wikipedia), but I remember reading that he was, so that’s nice to hear. I just naturally have a problem with Hollywood writing autism, because they can only seem to write them as stereotypes. Evidently, it was a character trait in the original script.
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Lubezki
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Post by Lubezki on Sept 21, 2019 0:45:02 GMT
For folks who have seen it: Interstellar or Ad Astra?
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Post by stephen on Sept 21, 2019 1:18:08 GMT
For folks who have seen it: Interstellar or Ad Astra? Interstellar.
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Post by DeepArcher on Sept 21, 2019 1:31:04 GMT
Well, "biggest disappointment of the decade" sure is a strong overstatement (at least it would be for me), but "worst victim of studio meddling of the year" probably isn't one?
Watching this I kind of felt like someone watching the original theatrical version of Blade Runner in 1982. There is a masterpiece in here, and sometimes it makes itself apparent, but then, hardly a full minute of Hoyte van Hoytema's gorgeous imagery passes without a Pitt narration unnecessarily playing over it. Then there's the ending, which takes such a hard left-turn that it kinda screams Disney interference. And sure, on one hand it feels an appropriate conclusion for the character, but on the other hand, it's abrupt and kinda silly and really feels like it goes against the grain of all the thematic ground that Gray was laying throughout the film. I've noticed that some lukewarm/negative reviews for this have called it "bleak," but -- and maybe this is the sadist in me speaking -- to me, it almost didn't go far enough into Heart of Darkness territory. But knowing Gray, it really felt like that's what he wanted to do.
The trailers for this were sort of all over the place. The first trailer made it look like a Geostorm and the final trailers made it look like Apocalypse Now in space. It sounds improbable that the same film could be advertised in two drastically different molds, but the first couple acts of Ad Astra prove how it was possible: it's a crazy wish-wash of ideas, at times presenting itself as a campy disaster movie before becoming an introspective psychological spade drama in the next scene. The Interstellar comparisons are ultimately even more pertinent than even the trailers suggested; it's a beautiful mess that gets increasingly ridiculous as it goes along, but it's easy to get swept up in it all and the third act hits hard.
Though Ad Astra certainly feels much less ambitious than Interstellar, which again is where a lot of its problem lies, in that it feels incredibly cut-down. There's a lot of great world-building that's hinted at, but we're only ever given the short end of that stick; there are great supporting characters and pivotal relationships we hardly see any of; and the most affecting part of the film, the final act, ultimately only feels like a small fraction of the climax it could've been. That third act is when it starts to turn into a rather beautiful story of the torment of trying to separate yourself from the shadow of your parents, of cutting your ties to the past so that you can move on with a future of your own that acts in defiance of your upbringing and the person you were "meant" to be. Max Richter's heavenly score is the perfect accompaniment to this very personal journey through the cosmos, and, as I've said, it's visually astonishing and ultimately totally transportive. It's just hard not to feel like Disney gave us a different film from the one James Gray intended -- and it's hard not to feel a little disappointed in that end result.
Oh well. It grew on me as it went along, I watched it half-asleep, and it has moments of brilliance. But I feel like there must be a better, more melancholy, more expansive, untampered 3-hour cut just waiting for me to be obsessed with.
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Post by DeepArcher on Sept 21, 2019 4:10:21 GMT
For folks who have seen it: Interstellar or Ad Astra? Pretty comfortably Interstellar, but if you made 'em the same length then we'd have a good comparison.
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Post by The_Cake_of_Roth on Sept 21, 2019 16:30:31 GMT
Like The Immigrant, this is a movie I feel like I should have loved but only ended up sort of liking because of some nagging flaws. A lot of the voiceover is bad or unnecessary, certain plot points in the second half are indeed ridiculous, and I felt like this movie needed to go darker by the end... it shouldn't have resolved itself as neatly as it did imo. The ending stretch was sort of anti-climactic, and I felt like more should have come out of the final act.
Having said that, I was totally on this movie's wavelength for much of its runtime. While the writing is probably its weakest aspect, the film is spectacular on an aesthetic level, and I could have bathed in the film's colors and soundscape for another hour. Even when Gray's films don't completely work for me, he has a great sensibility, and his films always feel great.
Overall, not as good as Lost City of Z, which covered some very similar thematic territory.
7/10ish
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Post by Johnny_Hellzapoppin on Sept 21, 2019 18:53:56 GMT
This was on odd film. A real hodgepodge of ideas that didn't play out to much other than a bit of a mess. That's not to say that the film didn't have many individual facets that could be appreciated and even admired. The main issue for me was that it just kept seeming like it was building to bigger moments that then ultimately petered out into nothing of note or interest.
The script was poor, but the aesthetics were top notch. The acting was bland and the pacing was sloppy, but at the same time my interest in it and hopes that it might culminate into something special in the last act never waned. Unfortunately my commitment wasn't rewarded, and it just fizzled out into forgetfulness.
When people ask me what I thought of the film, I'll have to give to worst response possible, that being 'meh'.
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Film Socialism
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Post by Film Socialism on Sept 21, 2019 21:58:36 GMT
james gray can do no wrong, this was pretty great. love how he handles melodramas. lot of little things that make this operate smoothly, and him going into quasi malick territory was a cool mixup.
more genre films by competent directors please
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