Author Topic: Movies you've seen lately (Read 946,030 times)

40hz · « **Reply #125 on:** August 04, 2013, 04:33 PM »

Quote from: Renegade on August 04, 2013, 04:06 PM

Quote from: 40hz on August 04, 2013, 03:54 PM
And I'd like to see At the Mountains of Madness get made so badly that I don't think I really care who (within reason) makes it at this point.

I was kind of hoping that it would get made well!

(Sorry - that was just such a wonderfully low-hanging dangling participle that I had to pick it~! )

I'm just happy whenever I throw such an easy ball that somebody out there takes a swing at it. (What's the point of words if there's no wordplay to go along with them?)

And that's not a dangling participle. That's a dazzling participle, I'll have you know.

Vurbal · « **Reply #126 on:** August 04, 2013, 04:35 PM »

Quote from: 40hz on August 04, 2013, 04:23 PM

One way we could guarantee a film never gets made: Let briliant Terry Gilliam direct, the masterful Joss Whedon write the script, and for the coup de grâce cast the lovely Summer Glau in there someplace. Ever notice how any time one of those three show up the project suddenly experiences an incredible string of bad luck?

If Joss Whedon was writing I'd rather it died in pre-production. Don't get me wrong, I love his glib dialog, but for Lovecraft? Might as well make it a romantic comedy.

Vurbal · « **Reply #127 on:** August 04, 2013, 04:42 PM »

Quote from: Renegade on August 04, 2013, 04:24 PM

Quote from: Vurbal on August 04, 2013, 04:08 PM

Wait, did you just call me old? I'll have you know I didn't get Basic D&D until Christmas of 1983 which means I had to buy my original cover PHB used. That makes me a kid compared to most of the other Champions players I know. I'm certainly not old enough to remember any version of Deities and Demigods with Cthulu in it.... if something like that existed.... which I wouldn't know.....

Just get off my lawn!

Hahahahaa!

I have an original Deities & Demigods with all that in it. Though I bought it well after it came out - found it in a store one day and snatched it up real quick.

(I also have Chainmail in my collection.)

Posting here reminds me why the Hero System forum has been my main haunt for more than a decade. In Champions years I'm almost a kid. In Internet years I should be in a nursing home.

In my day I was lucky to have access to a PDP-8 from a wide format teletype terminal when I started learning Basic. The first year comp-sci students at Iowa State were still stuck with punchcards.

40hz · « **Reply #128 on:** August 04, 2013, 04:47 PM »

Quote from: Vurbal on August 04, 2013, 04:17 PM

And if anyone does want some good advice on writing there's a lot of it in that book. It helped me improve my writing immensely and I don't write fiction.

+1. An excellent writing book. I own dozens. King's book is one of the best.

Vurbal · « **Reply #129 on:** August 04, 2013, 04:53 PM »

Quote from: 40hz on August 04, 2013, 04:47 PM

Quote from: Vurbal on August 04, 2013, 04:17 PM
And if anyone does want some good advice on writing there's a lot of it in that book. It helped me improve my writing immensely and I don't write fiction.

+1. An excellent writing book. I own dozens. King's book is one of the best.

I think the best advice for me was when he talked about going through his first draft to identify themes so he could focus on them. It really helps make your writing a lot more cohesive.

40hz · « **Reply #130 on:** August 04, 2013, 04:58 PM »

Quote from: Vurbal on August 04, 2013, 04:35 PM

Quote from: 40hz on August 04, 2013, 04:23 PM
One way we could guarantee a film never gets made: Let briliant Terry Gilliam direct, the masterful Joss Whedon write the script, and for the coup de grâce cast the lovely Summer Glau in there someplace. Ever notice how any time one of those three show up the project suddenly experiences an incredible string of bad luck?

If Joss Whedon was writing I'd rather it died in pre-production. Don't get me wrong, I love his glib dialog, but for Lovecraft? Might as well make it a romantic comedy.

Hmm. Maybe. But glib isn't an absent element with Lovecraft. He was enamored of witty exchanges and slangy dialog in his letters. And some of his earliest works threw in a little comedy.

Er...I'm also from New England, and FWIW, much of the dialog with (and between) the common gentry in Lovecraft's stories could pass for glib and/or funny dialog around here. Guess it's one of those regional things though.

But no worries. If Joss gets involved it will die. Despite everyone's best efforts. It's just the way it goes.

wraith808 · « **Reply #131 on:** August 04, 2013, 05:01 PM »

Quote from: 40hz on August 04, 2013, 03:54 PM

And I'd like to see At the Mountains of Madness get made so badly that I don't think I really care who (within reason) makes it at this point.

Michael Bay? How about Cameron? Or Ridley Scott!

Sorry for that visual

wraith808 · « **Reply #132 on:** August 04, 2013, 05:02 PM »

Quote from: Vurbal on August 04, 2013, 04:35 PM

If Joss Whedon was writing I'd rather it died in pre-production. Don't get me wrong, I love his glib dialog, but for Lovecraft? Might as well make it a romantic comedy.

I totally agree. I love Whedon, but some things just weren't meant to mix.

wraith808 · « **Reply #133 on:** August 04, 2013, 05:08 PM »

Quote from: Renegade on August 04, 2013, 04:24 PM

I have an original Deities & Demigods with all that in it. Though I bought it well after it came out - found it in a store one day and snatched it up real quick.

I bought mine new from the store.

I was like 10 or so at the time... but still.

The funnier thing... I worked at that same store 8 years later... and the person I bought it from was still working there. And he wasn't the owner. Flash forward 20 or so years with me working part time there sometimes (for credit, natch)... and that guy was still working there when the store closed down.

Vurbal · « **Reply #134 on:** August 04, 2013, 05:09 PM »

Quote from: 40hz on August 04, 2013, 04:58 PM

[Hmm. Maybe. But glib isn't an absent element with Lovecraft. He was enamored of witty exchanges and slangy dialog in his letters. And some of his earliest works threw in a little comedy.

Er...I'm also from New England, and FWIW, much of the dialog with (and between) the common gentry in Lovecraft's stories could pass for glib and/or funny dialog around here. Guess it's one of those regional things though.

Yeah he definitely had some humor and I wouldn't put anything past Whedon. He just tends to remind me more of 40's Cary Grant, cute rapid-fire repartee but I guess Firefly's humor had a more serious edge.

Jayne, your mouth's talkin. You should see to that.

Vurbal · « **Reply #135 on:** August 04, 2013, 05:12 PM »

Quote from: wraith808 on August 04, 2013, 05:01 PM

Quote from: 40hz on August 04, 2013, 03:54 PM
And I'd like to see At the Mountains of Madness get made so badly that I don't think I really care who (within reason) makes it at this point.

Michael Bay? How about Cameron? Or Ridley Scott!

Sorry for that visual

What the hell. Why not Uwe Boll. He can turn any movie into a horror story.

Sorry, I forgot that's horrible not horror. My mistake.

40hz · « **Reply #136 on:** August 04, 2013, 05:25 PM »

Quote from: Vurbal on August 04, 2013, 04:42 PM

In my day I was lucky to have access to a PDP-8 from a wide format teletype terminal when I started learning Basic. The first year comp-sci students at Iowa State were still stuck with punchcards.

Lucky you! I was stuck with punch cards until I finally decided to declare CS as a second major. You had to be a CS major to be given access to a terminal- or allowed to use PL/I (or Stony Brook Pascal or all those other "new" languages) in my college back then. Otherwise it was punch cards and COBOL or WATFOR/WATFIV and SPSS for "the civilians."

Vurbal · « **Reply #137 on:** August 04, 2013, 05:26 PM »

Quote from: wraith808 on August 04, 2013, 05:08 PM

Quote from: Renegade on August 04, 2013, 04:24 PM
I have an original Deities & Demigods with all that in it. Though I bought it well after it came out - found it in a store one day and snatched it up real quick.

I bought mine new from the store. I was like 10 or so at the time... but still.

The funnier thing... I worked at that same store 8 years later... and the person I bought it from was still working there. And he wasn't the owner. Flash forward 20 or so years with me working part time there sometimes (for credit, natch)... and that guy was still working there when the store closed down.

I was just lucky to have parents who saw it as a good creative outlet instead of being ignorant about it. I really had no idea how cool my Mom was.

We didn't have a game store in town though. There was a weird little store called Varsity News Stand that carried the 3 main AD&D books plus modules and dice. Actually they carried quite a bit of Traveller too now that I think about it. The PHB I only got by chance when I went to a Mensa meeting with my Dad. The guy hosting it had a 17 year old son who had stopped gaming.

This thread makes me feel like a nerd. That's what happens when your childhood idle is Bob Noyce and you game with one of the pioneers of distributed cracking. Better an old nerd than just plain old.

Vurbal · « **Reply #138 on:** August 04, 2013, 05:30 PM »

Quote from: 40hz on August 04, 2013, 05:25 PM

Quote from: Vurbal on August 04, 2013, 04:42 PM
In my day I was lucky to have access to a PDP-8 from a wide format teletype terminal when I started learning Basic. The first year comp-sci students at Iowa State were still stuck with punchcards.

Lucky you! I was stuck with punch cards until I finally decided to declare CS as a second major. You had to be a CS major to be given access to a terminal- or allowed to use PL/I (or Stony Brook Pascal or all those other "new" languages) in my college back then. Otherwise it was punch cards and COBOL or WATFOR/WATFIV and SPSS for "the civilians."

It helps when the local college is insanely expensive. The funny thing is Grinnell is a liberal arts school. It wasn't until quite a while later I appreciated the irony of a school where Bob Noyce got introduced to transistors not buying PCs for the students until 1999 or maybe 2000.

wraith808 · « **Reply #139 on:** August 04, 2013, 05:46 PM »

Quote from: Vurbal on August 04, 2013, 05:09 PM

Yeah he definitely had some humor and I wouldn't put anything past Whedon. He just tends to remind me more of 40's Cary Grant, cute rapid-fire repartee but I guess Firefly's humor had a more serious edge.

Jayne, your mouth's talkin. You should see to that.

One of my favorite quotes. But one of my favorite dark episodes was War Stories. The part while they were getting tortured? There was some comedy gold there... but you felt bad for laughing.

wraith808 · « **Reply #140 on:** August 04, 2013, 05:47 PM »

Quote from: Vurbal on August 04, 2013, 05:12 PM

What the hell. Why not Uwe Boll. He can turn any movie into a horror story.

Sorry, I forgot that's horrible not horror. My mistake.

OMG... I'm just hoping that Uwe Boll never gets another cent to make a movie. I swear, he must have some really good dirt on someone to get the names and the money and the rights to continue to slaughter movies.

40hz · « **Reply #141 on:** August 04, 2013, 06:45 PM »

Quote from: wraith808 on August 04, 2013, 05:47 PM

Quote from: Vurbal on August 04, 2013, 05:12 PM
What the hell. Why not Uwe Boll. He can turn any movie into a horror story.

Sorry, I forgot that's horrible not horror. My mistake.

OMG... I'm just hoping that Uwe Boll never gets another cent to make a movie. I swear, he must have some really good dirt on someone to get the names and the money and the rights to continue to slaughter movies.

Nope. Just a clever business model. According to Wikipedia:

Quote

Boll's movies have often performed poorly at the box office in the United States. House of the Dead, which was budgeted at $12 million, made $5.73 million in its opening weekend,[6] Alone in the Dark, which was budgeted at $20 million, made $5.1 million,[7] and BloodRayne, which was made for $25 million, made $2.42 million.[8] The least profitable commercial performance of his career was In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale, which made barely $10 million worldwide at the box office on a $60 million budget.

Until the law was changed in 2005, Boll was able to acquire funding for his movies thanks to German tax laws that reward investments in film. The law allowed investors in German-owned films to write off 100% of their investment as a tax deduction; it also allowed them to invest borrowed money and write off any fees associated with the loan. The investor was then only required to pay taxes on the profits made by the movie; if the movie loses money, the investor would get a tax writeoff.[citation needed]

In the DVD commentary of Alone in the Dark, Boll explains how he funds his films: "Maybe you know it but it's not so easy to finance movies in total. And the reason I am able to do these kind of movies is I have a tax shelter fund in Germany, and if you invest in a movie in Germany you get basically fifty percent back from the government."

Boll has received a lot of negative publicity regarding this funding method.[9]

More details on how it works then and now can be found here.

Speaking as a person with a degree in accounting (yes, there really are such people!) it's actually pretty fascinating how this all works. Learn something new every day! $:-\$

wraith808 · « **Reply #142 on:** August 04, 2013, 07:25 PM »

But what I don't get is his cast. Everyone knows who Uwe Boll is and what kind of movies he makes. But they still sign up for it... do they need the paycheck that bad?!?

And I'm not talking the bit people... he gets some pretty big names, and drags them along with him.

Vurbal · « **Reply #143 on:** August 04, 2013, 08:41 PM »

Quote from: wraith808 on August 04, 2013, 07:25 PM

But what I don't get is his cast. Everyone knows who Uwe Boll is and what kind of movies he makes. But they still sign up for it... do they need the paycheck that bad?!?

And I'm not talking the bit people... he gets some pretty big names, and drags them along with him.

Some of them baffle me. Others not so much. I think the best answer I've ever heard to a question like that was when some bobble head entertainment "reporter" asked Ice-T why he agreed to be in the brilliant satirical farce Leprechaun In The Hood. It was a farce, right?

Anyway his answer went something like, Who am I to turn down [$whatever] to be in a movie?

Shades · « **Reply #144 on:** August 04, 2013, 09:38 PM »

The last Uwe Boll movie I saw, was titled: Attack on Wallstreet and I must say that is wasn't that bad, story-wise or in the acting. Actually, I liked the end-scene...for a "Boll" it was rather clever.

And if you must know, I did see quite a lot of Uwe Boll movies...mainly because I want to see how bad a game-concept can be tortured.

Having said that, I did like some of the jokes in the movie Postal, where he also features as an actor and makes jokes about his movies being financed with Nazi-gold...

panzer · « **Reply #145 on:** August 07, 2013, 09:58 AM »

97% Owned - Economic Truth documentary:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcGh1Dex4Yo

Overdose: The Next Financial Crisis:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ECi6WJpbzE

Renegade · « **Reply #146 on:** August 07, 2013, 02:26 PM »

Quote from: panzer on August 07, 2013, 09:58 AM

97% Owned - Economic Truth documentary:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcGh1Dex4Yo

Overdose: The Next Financial Crisis:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ECi6WJpbzE

Downloaded 'em! Got "Overdose" playing now... Not sure if I've seen them or not, but they're right up my alley. (Oooh! Gerald Celente! Love that guy!)

Topical, but not a film, you might like a series of articles I wrote on banking. They have some accompanying software (simple stuff - Windows, Mac, Linux, Web, Android versions) to go along with them to help demonstrate. This is the best place to start:

http://cynic.me/2012/05/28/frackin-reserve-the-mechanics-of-fractional-reserve-banking-1-6/

The general category for them is here: http://cynic.me/tag/fractional-reserve-banking/

I add a couple new perspectives in there, but a lot of it has already been said numerous times before.

The last article in the series lists a number of documentaries and films that are similarly themed to what you've posted above. (They were also published at The Activist Post and reposted quite a few times, which made me happy!

)

linguistixx · « **Reply #147 on:** August 07, 2013, 04:18 PM »

I have recently seen the film "No limit" with Bradley Cooper. At the beginning I thought this is gonna be another boring comedy movie, however this movie turned out to a lot of fun. It was maybe just me that had that picture of Bradley Cooper as the "Hangover Guy" in my mind.

Shades · « **Reply #148 on:** August 08, 2013, 02:16 AM »

I wouldn't a stockpile of those pills myself

I'm now taking a look at the Hannibal TV series...interesting in ways Bones never was.

wraith808 · « **Reply #149 on:** August 08, 2013, 02:26 AM »

Snitch. Based on a true story... I hope not too closely, because though the movie was excellent (and they didn't make a typical The Rock film out of it), the subject matter was sickening.