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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 26, 2022 19:03:23 GMT -5
I haven't had a lot of time to watch movies of late. I did recently watch High Roller: The Stu Ungar Story starring Michael Imperioli as Stu Ungar. For those who don't recognize the name, Ungar was almost unquestionably the greatest gin rummy player of all time, arguably the greatest poker player of all time and possibly the greatest blackjack player of his time. He was, legitimately a genius at card games. He also was a degenerate gambler and developed an absolutely crippling cocaine addiction that eventually killed him at age 45.
At this point I should know better than to watch bio-pics, particularly of people I know quite a bit about. This one made so many of the same Hollywood bio-pic decisions that didn't need to be made because Ungar's life and the truth was far more interesting than what was presented in the movie. Imperioli was an odd choice for a diminutive Jewish guy. Not that Imperioli is huge, but Ungar was on the short side of 5'6" and didn't weigh more than 110 pounds when he was actually healthy. And Imperioli just can't help looking and sounding Italian. They changed the names of absolutely everyone in the movie, including Ungar's parents who were both long dead. They went to great lengths to show Ungar buying and wearing the trademark cobalt-blue round sunglasses he wore when he won the 1997 WSoP Main Event, but not the reason, which was to disguise the fact that his nose had completely collapsed from sustained cocaine use. Nor did they actually show the reason he started using (it was very common among poker players in the 70s and 80s who would play in 24-48 hour bursts to stay awake). The timelines of the movie were all messed up.
I just need to stop watching bio-pics. They're almost always awful.
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Post by berkley on Jan 26, 2022 20:34:05 GMT -5
I haven't had a lot of time to watch movies of late. I did recently watch High Roller: The Stu Ungar Story starring Michael Imperioli as Stu Ungar. For those who don't recognize the name, Ungar was almost unquestionably the greatest gin rummy player of all time, arguably the greatest poker player of all time and possibly the greatest blackjack player of his time. He was, legitimately a genius at card games. He also was a degenerate gambler and developed an absolutely crippling cocaine addiction that eventually killed him at age 45. At this point I should know better than to watch bio-pics, particularly of people I know quite a bit about. This one made so many of the same Hollywood bio-pic decisions that didn't need to be made because Ungar's life and the truth was far more interesting than what was presented in the movie. Imperioli was an odd choice for a diminutive Jewish guy. Not that Imperioli is huge, but Ungar was on the short side of 5'6" and didn't weigh more than 110 pounds when he was actually healthy. And Imperioli just can't help looking and sounding Italian. They changed the names of absolutely everyone in the movie, including Ungar's parents who were both long dead. They went to great lengths to show Ungar buying and wearing the trademark cobalt-blue round sunglasses he wore when he won the 1997 WSoP Main Event, but not the reason, which was to disguise the fact that his nose had completely collapsed from sustained cocaine use. Nor did they actually show the reason he started using (it was very common among poker players in the 70s and 80s who would play in 24-48 hour bursts to stay awake). The timelines of the movie were all messed up. I just need to stop watching bio-pics. They're almost always awful.
I never heard of him until a few hours ago when I saw the book pop up on goodreads, but he sounds like an interesting character, to say the least. Looking him up on wikipedia, I see there was a 2006 documentary about him done by ESPN, think I might try watching that rather than the biopic. I have problems with that genre and tend to avoid them, especially if the subject is anyone who lived in the age of film and video.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 26, 2022 22:04:56 GMT -5
I haven't had a lot of time to watch movies of late. I did recently watch High Roller: The Stu Ungar Story starring Michael Imperioli as Stu Ungar. For those who don't recognize the name, Ungar was almost unquestionably the greatest gin rummy player of all time, arguably the greatest poker player of all time and possibly the greatest blackjack player of his time. He was, legitimately a genius at card games. He also was a degenerate gambler and developed an absolutely crippling cocaine addiction that eventually killed him at age 45. At this point I should know better than to watch bio-pics, particularly of people I know quite a bit about. This one made so many of the same Hollywood bio-pic decisions that didn't need to be made because Ungar's life and the truth was far more interesting than what was presented in the movie. Imperioli was an odd choice for a diminutive Jewish guy. Not that Imperioli is huge, but Ungar was on the short side of 5'6" and didn't weigh more than 110 pounds when he was actually healthy. And Imperioli just can't help looking and sounding Italian. They changed the names of absolutely everyone in the movie, including Ungar's parents who were both long dead. They went to great lengths to show Ungar buying and wearing the trademark cobalt-blue round sunglasses he wore when he won the 1997 WSoP Main Event, but not the reason, which was to disguise the fact that his nose had completely collapsed from sustained cocaine use. Nor did they actually show the reason he started using (it was very common among poker players in the 70s and 80s who would play in 24-48 hour bursts to stay awake). The timelines of the movie were all messed up. I just need to stop watching bio-pics. They're almost always awful.
I never heard of him until a few hours ago when I saw the book pop up on goodreads, but he sounds like an interesting character, to say the least. Looking him up on wikipedia, I see there was a 2006 documentary about him done by ESPN, think I might try watching that rather than the biopic. I have problems with that genre and tend to avoid them, especially if the subject is anyone who lived in the age of film and video.
I’ve seen the ESPN documentary and it’s not bad. Better than the movie but a little glitzy for a sports documentary. Both his ex-wife and his daughter were interviewed for the ESPN piece, as was his good friend Mike Sexton, so factually it was a whole lot better. Ungar was a super interesting guy. Genius level IQ. Child prodigy at playing competitive gin. But had no idea how banks or checking accounts worked. Turned to poker when nobody would compete with him at gin any longer and became easily the best tournament player of his day and possibly ever. Won $1 million dollars winning the 1997 WSoP Main Event ( he had to split with Benny Baxter who staked him the entry fee) and blew through the $500,000 in about six months on sports and horse race gambling and cocaine. I’ve moved his biography way up on my reading list.
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Post by Batflunkie on Feb 2, 2022 21:50:41 GMT -5
Watching Nineteen Eighty-Four on Hulu right now. Seen it before, loved it
I think this particular version reinstates the original music from Eurythmics
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Post by tartanphantom on Feb 3, 2022 11:41:35 GMT -5
Most listened to songs of 2021 # 54 - Indianapolis - The Bottle RocketsI love me some Bottle Rockets and I really love this song. It reminds me of a lot of days gone by trying to travel in vehicles that had no business going out of the drive-way, much less going out of the city. "Can't go west, can't go east I'm stuck in Indianapolis with a fuel pump that's deceased"
You must be low on sleep... wrong thread, brother.
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Post by EdoBosnar on Feb 7, 2022 5:29:46 GMT -5
So I watched this little cinematic gem from 1981 last night...
This was, in fact, the first time I've watched Escape from New York all the way through; I'd seen in it pieces before a number of times when I stumbled across it on TV, usually coming in when it was already a third or half-way through (and once I saw a bit of the beginning but then turned it off because I had to go do something else). For some reason, I never bothered renting it. So anyway, I was really happy to finally see this, uninterrupted, and man, did I enjoy it. What's not to like? It's a really solid dystopian action flick with an outstanding cast. Thinking about it, I also realized that this movie (followed by The Thing a year later) probably marked the moment when Kurt Russell shed his reputation as the star of Disney kiddie movies and made-for-TV specials.
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Post by codystarbuck on Feb 7, 2022 23:52:16 GMT -5
So I watched this little cinematic gem from 1981 last night... This was, in fact, the first time I've watched Escape from New York all the way through; I'd seen in it pieces before a number of times when I stumbled across it on TV, usually coming in when it was already a third or half-way through (and once I saw a bit of the beginning but then turned it off because I had to go do something else). For some reason, I never bothered renting it. So anyway, I was really happy to finally see this, uninterrupted, and man, did I enjoy it. What's not to like? It's a really solid dystopian action flick with an outstanding cast. Thinking about it, I also realized that this movie (followed by The Thing a year later) probably marked the moment when Kurt Russell shed his reputation as the star of Disney kiddie movies and made-for-TV specials. Well, the Elvis tv biopic was the breakthrough, but Escape and the Thing cememented it. John carpenter was good to Kurt Russell and they have remained fast friends. Have you seen the deleted scenes, from the very beginning? I had only seen the theatrical version; but, had read the novelization, before I ever saw the movie, on Cinemax (1982 or 3-ish) and it included those scenes, plus expanded a bit on the characters. They teased it a bit, on the anniversary VHS, with a quick clip, during an interview with Carpenter; but, only included the footage on Laserdisc and the Special Edition dvd. I picked that up and finally got to see it, though I could see why Carpenter cut it and took up the story at the prison control facility. The country was supposed to be criss-crossed by underground rapid transit trains and Taylor wires them in to pick up a train, after Snake hits the bank. They are then cornered in a terminal, in San Francisco. The terminal was actually the new Atlanta metro system. The novel hinted that gas attacks during the war with the USSR was the source of people turning crazy and the level of violence and crime increasing, leading to the prison and the crazy predators being shut up inside. A lot of the exteriors in the film were shot in East St Louis and St Louis. ESL had been gutted by a large fire and had a lot of burnt out buildings, in the area; plus, they were willing to cut power across several blocks, for filming. They used one of the bridges across the Mississippi for the 39th Street Bridge, at the end of the film. Loved the story and the film. Russell plays it well and the cast is great, though Isaac Hayes is better when he is not trying to deliver lines. The fight between Snake and Slag (pro wrestler Ox Baker) was shot in the old Union Station, before they remodeled it as a shopping mall and hotel. I wanted to enjoy Escape from LA; but, it was pretty much just a remake, with weaker characters and a bunch of LA/California jokes. Also, being forced to shoot hoops vs being forced to fight a gladiator is no contest. I did like Snake's weapons better, though, and wish they could have given him something more like the CAR-15 modification he had in LA, vs the Ingram Mac-10 he had in NY. The novel described a "breakdown rifle" and Russell is holding something like that, in some versions of the poster (looked like a modified AR-7 Survival Rifle and some artist exaggeration). The rifle seemed more like something the police would use and issue Snake, for his gear. The holster rig also sounded way cooler in the book, than what the prop guys came up with. they needed to hit a surplus store to outfit it better. Great read.....
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Post by codystarbuck on Feb 8, 2022 0:19:09 GMT -5
ps Loved Big Trouble in Little China and would have loved to have more Jack Burton movies!
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Post by EdoBosnar on Feb 8, 2022 6:07:30 GMT -5
(...) Have you seen the deleted scenes, from the very beginning? (...) Nope, this was the theatrical version. My point about Russell, though, was that - despite appearing in the Elvis biopic (and also the critically panned Used Cars a year earlier) - he was at that point still sort of perceived as the 'Disney kid movie' guy. I specifically recall back in the spring of 1981 when the trailer for this movie would appear on TV that a lot of kids my age (7th grade) and older (high school kids) were kind of mocking the idea of Russell being some kind of tough-guy action hero. Then after the summer, everyone who had seen the film were saying it was awesome and Russell was a complete bad-ass.
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Post by Batflunkie on Feb 8, 2022 10:42:28 GMT -5
ps Loved Big Trouble in Little China and would have loved to have more Jack Burton movies! Well Boom has plenty of Jack Burton comics...
I watched Corvette Summer yesterday
Pretty fun little movie, I think my favorite part was when I saw Kim Milford in there from Laserblast, mostly because Mark Hamill was in it and Milford's character shot up a Star Wars sign in Laserblast
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Post by EdoBosnar on Feb 8, 2022 12:25:23 GMT -5
It's been ages since I've seen it, but I remember enjoying Corvette Summer.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Feb 16, 2022 13:32:27 GMT -5
I took the opportunity to watch the five Silly Symphony cartoons produced by Walt Disney in 1929. Disney produced five SS cartoons, the first five in the series, appearing one per month from August through December of 1929. They were directed by Disney and/or Ub Iwerks, with Iwerks doing the lions share of the cartooning and with music by Carl Stallings. All were black and white and all came in at around the six minute mark.
General thoughts before any more specific comments: This is very primitive compared to what we'd see even two to three years later. Story-wise there's almost no plot to any of the shorts. They are, by and large, an excuse for animated dance numbers punctuated by the type of cartoon humor that you'd see from pretty much any animation department at the time. The lush Disney style was yet to come. It's also a bit jarring to see some of the subject matter. While animated shorts at the time were all-ages rather than being strictly aimed at children, it's still odd to see wanton animal cruelty, beer drinking and satanic imagery in animated shorts.
Skeleton Dance - The first Silly Symphony short and a rightful classic. The film starts with some classic graveyard/horror imagery with an owl in front of a full moon, spooky trees and bats before going in to a full "Danse Macabre" by a group of skeletons. This includes what may be the first use of a skeleton using bones to play the xylophone on vertebrae or ribs. This is an important little film and set a lot of tropes. It also sold the series to Columbia Pictures for distribution.
El Terrible Toreador - To me this was the weakest of the five shorts for 1929. It's nominally an homage to Carmen. The film starts with a waitress accosted by a gentleman and saved by a toreador. It then segues to the bull-ring, where the toreador and a very non-threatening bull play chase around the ring, before a rather gruesome ending. There's not a lot here and the rubber limbed human characters were already looking a tad old-fashioned by 1929.
Springtime - This almost feels like a trial run for 1932's Flowers and Trees. Well...maybe in the first minute or two. We then get a number of insects and small animals eating each other and being eaten in turn. A bird devours a caterpillar segment by segment. A number of frogs are eaten by a stork, who in turn appears to drown in a pond. But it's all to rather jaunty music, so that's good.
Hell's Bells - For my money, the most visually interesting of the five 1929 films. This one is set in Satan's throne-room and is replete with horror imagery, flames, and jump-scares. We get a Hell-Cow that gives fire milk and Satan feeds an imp to Cerberus and tries to feed another, which leads to his comeuppance. I can only imagine the wailing and gnashing of teeth by the religious right if this appeared today.
The Merry Dwarfs - This one was almost as weak as El Terrible Toreador. There's not much going on here other than a Dwarf village doing some semi-cute shenanigans to classical music. Until the end when they break out the beer. Even then it's still not terribly interesting, but it adds enough edge to be slightly better than Toreador.
An interesting exercise in watching some cartoons that are perilously close to a century old.
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Post by tartanphantom on Feb 16, 2022 14:48:14 GMT -5
I took the opportunity to watch the five Silly Symphony cartoons produced by Walt Disney in 1929. Disney produced five SS cartoons, the first five in the series, appearing one per month from August through December of 1929. They were directed by Disney and/or Ub Iwerks, with Iwerks doing the lions share of the cartooning and with music by Carl Stallings. All were black and white and all came in at around the six minute mark. General thoughts before any more specific comments: This is very primitive compared to what we'd see even two to three years later. Story-wise there's almost no plot to any of the shorts. They are, by and large, an excuse for animated dance numbers punctuated by the type of cartoon humor that you'd see from pretty much any animation department at the time. The lush Disney style was yet to come. It's also a bit jarring to see some of the subject matter. While animated shorts at the time were all-ages rather than being strictly aimed at children, it's still odd to see wanton animal cruelty, beer drinking and satanic imagery in animated shorts. Skeleton Dance - The first Silly Symphony short and a rightful classic. The film starts with some classic graveyard/horror imagery with an owl in front of a full moon, spooky trees and bats before going in to a full "Danse Macabre" by a group of skeletons. This includes what may be the first use of a skeleton using bones to play the xylophone on vertebrae or ribs. This is an important little film and set a lot of tropes. It also sold the series to Columbia Pictures for distribution. El Terrible Toreador - To me this was the weakest of the five shorts for 1929. It's nominally an homage to Carmen. The film starts with a waitress accosted by a gentleman and saved by a toreador. It then segues to the bull-ring, where the toreador and a very non-threatening bull play chase around the ring, before a rather gruesome ending. There's not a lot here and the rubber limbed human characters were already looking a tad old-fashioned by 1929. Springtime - This almost feels like a trial run for 1932's Flowers and Trees. Well...maybe in the first minute or two. We then get a number of insects and small animals eating each other and being eaten in turn. A bird devours a caterpillar segment by segment. A number of frogs are eaten by a stork, who in turn appears to drown in a pond. But it's all to rather jaunty music, so that's good. Hell's Bells - For my money, the most visually interesting of the five 1929 films. This one is set in Satan's throne-room and is replete with horror imagery, flames, and jump-scares. We get a Hell-Cow that gives fire milk and Satan feeds an imp to Cerberus and tries to feed another, which leads to his comeuppance. I can only imagine the wailing and gnashing of teeth by the religious right if this appeared today. The Merry Dwarfs - This one was almost as weak as El Terrible Toreador. There's not much going on here other than a Dwarf village doing some semi-cute shenanigans to classical music. Until the end when they break out the beer. Even then it's still not terribly interesting, but it adds enough edge to be slightly better than Toreador. An interesting exercise in watching some cartoons that are perilously close to a century old.
The unsung hero of these shorts is not Walt Disney, but rather, Ub Iwerks. The guy was way ahead of his time in terms of animation art design. After he left Disney and started his own studio, he birthed the "Flip the Frog" and "Willie Whopper" characters.
Personally, I'm a huge fan of Iwerks' career handiwork.
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Post by codystarbuck on Feb 16, 2022 15:12:27 GMT -5
I took the opportunity to watch the five Silly Symphony cartoons produced by Walt Disney in 1929. Disney produced five SS cartoons, the first five in the series, appearing one per month from August through December of 1929. They were directed by Disney and/or Ub Iwerks, with Iwerks doing the lions share of the cartooning and with music by Carl Stallings. All were black and white and all came in at around the six minute mark. General thoughts before any more specific comments: This is very primitive compared to what we'd see even two to three years later. Story-wise there's almost no plot to any of the shorts. They are, by and large, an excuse for animated dance numbers punctuated by the type of cartoon humor that you'd see from pretty much any animation department at the time. The lush Disney style was yet to come. It's also a bit jarring to see some of the subject matter. While animated shorts at the time were all-ages rather than being strictly aimed at children, it's still odd to see wanton animal cruelty, beer drinking and satanic imagery in animated shorts. Skeleton Dance - The first Silly Symphony short and a rightful classic. The film starts with some classic graveyard/horror imagery with an owl in front of a full moon, spooky trees and bats before going in to a full "Danse Macabre" by a group of skeletons. This includes what may be the first use of a skeleton using bones to play the xylophone on vertebrae or ribs. This is an important little film and set a lot of tropes. It also sold the series to Columbia Pictures for distribution. El Terrible Toreador - To me this was the weakest of the five shorts for 1929. It's nominally an homage to Carmen. The film starts with a waitress accosted by a gentleman and saved by a toreador. It then segues to the bull-ring, where the toreador and a very non-threatening bull play chase around the ring, before a rather gruesome ending. There's not a lot here and the rubber limbed human characters were already looking a tad old-fashioned by 1929. Springtime - This almost feels like a trial run for 1932's Flowers and Trees. Well...maybe in the first minute or two. We then get a number of insects and small animals eating each other and being eaten in turn. A bird devours a caterpillar segment by segment. A number of frogs are eaten by a stork, who in turn appears to drown in a pond. But it's all to rather jaunty music, so that's good. Hell's Bells - For my money, the most visually interesting of the five 1929 films. This one is set in Satan's throne-room and is replete with horror imagery, flames, and jump-scares. We get a Hell-Cow that gives fire milk and Satan feeds an imp to Cerberus and tries to feed another, which leads to his comeuppance. I can only imagine the wailing and gnashing of teeth by the religious right if this appeared today. The Merry Dwarfs - This one was almost as weak as El Terrible Toreador. There's not much going on here other than a Dwarf village doing some semi-cute shenanigans to classical music. Until the end when they break out the beer. Even then it's still not terribly interesting, but it adds enough edge to be slightly better than Toreador. An interesting exercise in watching some cartoons that are perilously close to a century old.
The unsung hero of these shorts is not Walt Disney, but rather, Ub Iwerks. The guy was way ahead of his time in terms of animation art design. After he left Disney and started his own studio, he birthed the "Flip the Frog" and "Willie Whopper" characters.
Personally, I'm a huge fan of Iwerks' career handiwork.
Yeah, I was gonna say.....Ub Iwerks was the genius at Disney. He made the bulk of the early technical innovations, and then left. It's rather like Stan & Jack, in that Kirby's imagination and plots fueled Stan's work and Ub Iwerks technical skill fueled Disney's development. Walt was shrewd enough to surround himself with talent, as he was never going to make it on his own skill as a draftsman or animator. Walt's real skill was as producer and promoter, which, again, kind of dovetails with Stan's, as an editor and cheerleader for the company. Not saying Stan didn't write and Walt didn't direct; but, that the collaboration with more talented people elevated their own work. Early animation is about sound and motion, as it was a novelty. You have to move into the later 30s for story to become more important. Early Warner Bros is the same, especially the Harmon-Isings stuff. New directors brought more plot and story into the cartoons, as well as more verbal gags, rather than just sight gags. I'm more a fan of the early Fleischer cartoons, in comparison to Disney, of the same era. Disney moved ahead in the features; but, the Fleischers were still competitive in the shorts, even in color shorts as Popeye and Superman easily stack up to the color Mickey and Donald Duck pieces. When it comes to cartoon shorts, I'm a Looney Tunes guys, as their anarchic style and anti-authoritarian attitude make for more more consistent humor and wild fun. Disney's shorts varied wildly and it's really only the Donald Duck and Goofy ones that I consistently enjoy. Donald is structured far more like the Looney Tunes pieces, while Goofy cartoons tended to follow the same structure as Tex Avery's stuff, especially his MGM cartoons about cars of the future and other pseudo-newsreel parodies.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Feb 16, 2022 16:54:19 GMT -5
Iwerks was a brilliant cartoonist, but it's been so long since I've seen the stuff he did after he left Disney that I can't say how it stacks up. The Simpsons episode "The Day the Violence Died" is a pretty brilliant spoof of the Disney/Iwerks relationship.
The Fleischer's were really the only serious contenders with Disney quality-wise through most of the 30s and early 40s.
I'm a huge fan of the Schlesinger/WB cartoons, but the first actual Bosko cartoon wouldn't appear until April of 1930 and their cartoons were decidedly second tier until the late 30s. By that point Disney was aiming for a different niche than what the Schlesinger group were aimed at.
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