What I've Been Watching: The Catch-All Film Thread

I saw the remarkably poignant movie Don’t Look Up, on Netflix. Pretty great. And pretty grim since that’s where we’re headed. And worse, this will likely only help to entrench people in their beliefs even more. But still, a pretty fun ride.

The Matrix Resurrections

Honestly, I'm not even sure where to begin. If you were a fan of the original trilogy, you probably shouldn't watch this. It'll only piss you off.

I'm struggling to find the words to describe it. Resurrections is more like a parody of the original films than a sequel. It's that bad.

Weaving and Fishburne must be breathing a huge sigh of relief that they avoided this.

Like most people, I haven't seen this one yet:


Moonfall. Coming February '22. According to Wikipedia:


Hmmmm…..

pibbuR who is even more suspicious about this one than the idea of nuking a dying sun to get it going again.

I've only seen about 1/2 of Matrix Resurrections, and stopped it there. Maybe I'll resume it later on or maybe I won't, but I wasn't feeling it at all. I kind of liked the first 45 mins, before they bust Neo out of the Matrix again. But after that it just feels like it turned into what I remembered the 2nd and 3rd movies turned into, but somehow even worse due to not even having the entertaining action scenes. These scenes just feel uninspiring and badly done. I either grew out of seeing those kinds of fight scenes, or they're just boring as hell.

Also, what's with Keanu's acting. Some of the times it feels like he's just phoning it in. Other times he's somewhat decent.

Yeah, I doubt there's anything too impressive about the second half of the movie, but maybe I'll find some more patience tomorrow, to finish it. I hope there's at least an interesting philosophical idea that they end with, since I was onboard initially with the idea. But the execution of it is pretty bad. Feels very low effort.

Originally Posted by danutz_plusplus
I've only seen about 1/2 of Matrix Resurrections, and stopped it there. Maybe I'll resume it later on or maybe I won't, but I wasn't feeling it at all. I kind of liked the first 45 mins, before they bust Neo out of the Matrix again. But after that it just feels like it turned into what I remembered the 2nd and 3rd movies turned into, but somehow even worse due to not even having the entertaining action scenes. These scenes just feel uninspiring and badly done. I either grew out of seeing those kinds of fight scenes, or they're just boring as hell.

It was the opposite for me. I almost didn't make it past the first 45 minutes. I only kept going out of a morbid curiosity.

Resurrections is nothing like the 2nd or 3rd Matrix films. You should rewatch those. Even the 3rd movie, which was a big step backwards from the first two imo, was much better than this shit.

Originally Posted by JDR13
It was the opposite for me. I almost didn't make it past the first 45 minutes. I only kept going out of a morbid curiosity.

Resurrections is nothing like the 2nd or 3rd Matrix films. You should rewatch those. Even the 3rd movie, which was a big step backwards from the first two imo, was much better than this shit.

Might be that I went into it with so little expectations after hearing the overwhelming negative remarks, but I felt ok about the premise and the meta nature of it. I even felt somewhat ok about the new Morpheous, even though he doesn't hold a candle to Fishbourne. But the new Smith is just awful.

Yeah, I don't remember much of the 2nd and 3rd movies, aside from the fact that they felt like endless action scenes, which I do remember kind of enjoying it. Especially in part 2. But at least they kept the same atmosphere, which is totally missing in this one. The grey, black and green tint is also missing, and I also kind of miss that.

I'll be curious if I manage to finish it in the following days. And I hear the end is also kind of wishing for another sequel. Though I honestly can't see where they could take it that's anything original. That was the issue with the first movie. The meat of the philosophical ideas were explored in the first one, and nothing else was left for the sequels.

Originally Posted by danutz_plusplus
And I hear the end is also kind of wishing for another sequel.

Originally Posted by JDR13
The Matrix Resurrections
I'm struggling to find the words to describe it. Resurrections is more like a parody of the original films than a sequel. It's that bad.

I guess that is all I needed to hear - I am one of those who basically think of 'The Matrix' as a single movie with a couple of bad copy-cats that came out as cash grabs (like buddy cop movies in the late 80s) … about the same way I think about 'Die Hard'.

So - since I consider that none of the follow-ups are within an order of magnitude of the original, I can only imagine what I would think about this dumpster fire!

Good to know about The Matrix Resurrections, I already had some doubts but now I'll definitely skip this one.

Aren't the two Wachowski "brothers" working together anymore?

Yeah, I finished the other half of Resurrections. God does it go full stupid. It’s really not even worth wasting breath on.

EDIT: I actually started typing out and listing all the moronic things that happen in the second half, and just deleted everything I typed out. It's just not worth it, it's so bad.

But one thing I have to mention is the jumping off the building, of both of them. God did that look awful. Almost like they were suspended via wires. And the taking off. Looked absolutely cheap. And I think I rememered reading some news articles about the filming of that scene in whatever city they filmed that in. It almost looks as if they didn't even care anymore, while working on it.

I'm really curious what motivated this sequel. Did they make bank off of it? Did they manage to fleece WarnerBros for some significant money? They obviously didn't care about it. And I wonder how did the money people at WarnerBros greenlight this. Did they see the script and greenlit it? Or did they just do it without seeing anything before hand? Really shows how these studios have way too much money if they can throw around millions just like that.

Lol. All sounds about like what I'd feared. Good to know, as I watched the trailer and decided not to do that to myself, unless persuaded otherwise.

Originally Posted by Ripper
Lol. All sounds about like what I'd feared. Good to know, as I watched the trailer and decided not to do that to myself, unless persuaded otherwise.

Some of the worst moments are in the trailer. "Mr. Anderson!" and "I still know kung-fu". Just absolute bangers.

It's absolutely impressive how bad it turned out in the end. They resurrected a dead series just to piss on its corpse.

I mean, in a certain way, you have to appreciate that. I'm not sure what's worst, if it would've turned out unremarkable and stale/boring. Or this. I think this is worst. It just shows total disrespect.

I'm hoping Red Letter Media will have some fun with it.

Originally Posted by Redglyph
Aren't the two Wachowski "brothers" working together anymore?

I don't know the reasons why, but it was only the Wachowski now known as Lana who did this. Maybe the other one simply had enough sense to say "no thanks".

Originally Posted by danutz_plusplus
But one thing I have to mention is the jumping off the building, of both of them. God did that look awful. Almost like they were suspended via wires. And the taking off. Looked absolutely cheap. And I think I rememered reading some news articles about the filming of that scene in whatever city they filmed that in. It almost looks as if they didn't even care anymore, while working on it.

Indeed, the FX in some of the scenes were of inexplicably poor quality. That, and the choreography for the fight scenes was nowhere close to the level of the original films.

Originally Posted by danutz_plusplus
I'm really curious what motivated this sequel. Did they make bank off of it? Did they manage to fleece WarnerBros for some significant money? They obviously didn't care about it. And I wonder how did the money people at WarnerBros greenlight this. Did they see the script and greenlit it? Or did they just do it without seeing anything before hand? Really shows how these studios have way too much money if they can throw around millions just like that.

I have a feeling this was more about Lana wanting to tell her story than anything else.

Originally Posted by Redglyph
Aren't the two Wachowski "brothers" working together anymore?

It would have been SO easy to NOT show your transphobia here …

Originally Posted by JDR13
I have a feeling this was more about Lana wanting to tell her story than anything else.

… see? (recognize the actual identity of the person you are referring to).

Originally Posted by Ripper
I'm hoping Red Letter Media will have some fun with it.

I'm starting to get suspicious about the whole continuum of almost deliberately bad movies.

Movies that sound bad on paper, are just purely nostalgia bait and literally nothing more, that have awful scripts and actors that are just there for a pay packet - and yet they get greenlit over and over again.

And it can't just be pure stupidity. There has to be some rationale behind it.

I'm starting to wonder if studios now make these things intentionally, for two reasons:

1. To divert the trolls away from their core products. While the trolls have lots of free meal tickets with XYZ film, they'll not need to bother with XYZ film for their breadtube. This being REALLY bad makes this other bad thing look like Citizen Kane.

2. There is likely now serious bucks to be made in the rip-pissing market. This month's shit-reel review will get 2 million viewers PER CHANNEL, and there are literally hundreds of channels now dedicated to shitting on shit films, all getting millions of views (and ad revenue).

A sort of loss-leader strategy but with lots of hidden returns that vastly counter any actual losses found in the individual film's balance sheet.

TBH, I've always been astonished by some of the scripts the movie industry decided to back with millions of dollars. I think that in showbiz, Hanlon's Razor tends to apply.

Lately I've been catching up on movies in the Insidious and Conjuring franchises. Of the ones I've already seen, I liked the earliest ones a lot (i.e. Insidious 1 & 2 and The Conjuring 1 & 2), but the spin-offs like Annabelle and The Nun were very disappointing (though the Nun was definitely an effectively scary villain).
Here's what I've seen over the last few weeks:

Insidious: The Last Key (2018)
Not sure why this isn't "Insidious 4", especially given that it occurs chronologically directly after the prequel, Insidious 3. This is a real mixed bag, feeling like it didn't know what it wanted to be about. It has some effective scares, but as a whole, didn't work for me. Lin Shaye truly phoned in her performance in this one. 2 out of 5 silly looking creatures with keys attached to their fingers from me.

The Curse of La Llorona (2019)
This should have been creepy as fuck, but was completely ineffective. Linda Cardnelli gave a solid performance, but virtually every one else in the movie looked like they didn't want to be there. Maybe the Tuco actor (Breaking Bad) would have been more convincing if he went apeshit on the ghost for spilling his meth or something. 2 out of 5 unconvincing ghost ladies that won't stop moaning.

Annabelle: Creation (2017)
I thought Annabelle was disappointing, so it was a pleasant surprise that this one was fairly decent. Certainly gave me the willies on occasion. The main flaw was that it relied on people doing the most unrecommended shit in order for bad stuff to happen, but I suppose that's not uncommon in this genre. 3.5 creepy dolls that keep moving when you're not looking at them.

Annabelle: Comes Home (2019)
This movie relies on "people doing the most unrecommended shit in order for bad stuff to happen" and dials it up to 10. It's certainly entertaining (basically a modern "13 Ghosts"), but a little silly. Why have this evil shit "safe guarded" in the most pathetic way possible? The Warrens need their ghost-keeping license revoked based on this film. Still, yes, fun in parts. 3 out of 5 random assortment of spooky relics that do shit when you're not looking.

The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (2021)
Less scary than the first two Conjurings, but I'm glad they went for a slightly different formula in this one. I quite enjoyed it, so was surprised to find that the director also directed the disappointing La Llorona one (above). As per usual, Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson gave a solid performance as the (sanitised for fiction) Warrens. This movie relied on certain characters being incapacitated for long enough for shit to go bad that their special knowledge would have otherwise nipped in the bud, but I'll forgive it for that for otherwise keeping me entertained. 4 out of 5 creepy looking fetishes surreptitiously placed under your bed.

Originally Posted by txa1265
It would have been SO easy to NOT show your transphobia here …



… see? (recognize the actual identity of the person you are referring to).

Well, that's how I first knew them and how they've been called a long time, there's no phobia about it.

Originally Posted by Redglyph
Well, that's how I first knew them and how they've been called a long time, there's no phobia about it.

True, not phobia … like the Morgan Freeman quote: "I Hate the Word Homophobia. It's not a Phobia. You're not Scared. You're an Asshole."

Had you said "the Wachowskis" … not a problem. Please learn to show respect rather than bigotry.