What Movies Have You Seen Lately?

Quote: Evenbob

Clint Eastwood nails it again in a summer of
BO bombs.

Again, EB conflates the quality of a movie with it's box office success or failure.

Those Transformers movies made a lot of money, I bet he thinks they were robbed of all the Oscars!

Sully is opening today and gets an 83% on
Rotten Tomatoes. I hope it does as well
as American Sniper for Eastwood.

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/sully/

Quote: Evenbob

Sully is opening today and gets an 83% on
Rotten Tomatoes. I hope it does as well
as American Sniper for Eastwood.

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/sully/

No way in hell it is as financially successful as American Sniper (I'm sure Sully is a better film though - it's doubtful there are any fake babies in supporting roles).

Quote: ams288

(I'm sure Sully is a better film though -

Strike one: perpetuating the myth there's only one qualified pilot in the cockpit.

Fact is, the first officer was flying the plane when the birds struck the engines. Due to the loss of electrical power when the engines went, though, only the left side controls and monitors worked. That's why Sullenberger took the controls. He had to.

I watched Sully tonight in IMAX.

The best parts are the scenes on the plane and the recreation of the water landing (it's kind of split into three chunks at separate parts of the movie).

The biggest problem is Clint Eastwood's direction. He just does not have a director's eye for where to put the camera, how to frame a shot, or how to light a scene.

A lot of the movie is people sitting in conference rooms talking over what happened. These scenes are shot as if they were made by a film student with a $200 budget. Just ugly to look at. Static camera shots; characters weirdly positioned on the edge of the frame; very bland lighting.

And then - the scenes with the plane are much better shot and look very good (mainly because they are very CGI heavy - that takes a lot more preparation and planning than Clint just showing up in a conference room and pointing the camera at Tom Hanks).

Quote: ams288

I watched Sully tonight in IMAX.

Some early buzz on it seems to have placed the NTSB investigators as the bad guys, trying to demonize Sully. Did it seem to you that way?

Quote: Nareed

Some early buzz on it seems to have placed the NTSB investigators as the bad guys, trying to demonize Sully. Did it seem to you that way?

Oh absolutely 100%.

Given Clint Eastwood's world view, I am not surprised.

Anna Gunn (Skyler from Breaking Bad) plays one of the NTSB people. She is a great actress in a totally thankless role here. She basically glares at Sully most of the movie and then has a couple lines near the end.

Quote: ams288

Oh absolutely 100%.

Thank you.

That settles it. There's no way I'm watching this movie.

Flying today is safer because of thorough investigations after every accident and, as important, every incident.

I saw a link for a review of "Arrival" on The Verge. I did not read it. This is the kind of movie I'll try to see without finding out too much about it.

I did see the trailer again, pausing them often to look at details. I caught a few things that seem interesting.

Quote: Nareed

...Flying today is safer because of thorough investigations after every accident and, as important, every incident.

True, but who'd want to watch the film if there wasn't any drama? I don't think it is positioning itself as a factual biography. The actual investigation was a love fest celebrating the crew's heroic actions (well except for the flight attendant who opened the rear door even though water was visible in the window, nearly drowning everybody).

I wonder how it would have been if everyone but the cockpit crew perished. Would his actions still be celebrated, even though the results were tragic?