Also, a bit miffed at all the reviews who characterize these college kids as dummies. They're all actually pretty smart - Thor as an econ wiz was worth a chuckle, and I actually liked when the other hunk put on his smart glasses to look at something - but their behavior is directed contrary to said smarts. They're literally made to behave like dummies
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 14 April 2012 03:02 (eleven years ago) link
thought cabin was pretty great. speakerphone gag was perfect
― these pretzels are makeing me horney (Hungry4Ass), Saturday, 14 April 2012 03:12 (eleven years ago) link
Yeah, a big point was making them into the stereotypes. Also Rex Reed not getting the Final Girl wasn't actually a virgin was pretty wtf (except not coz its Rex Reed but you know).
― stay in school if you want to kiw (Gukbe), Saturday, 14 April 2012 03:16 (eleven years ago) link
Wasn't quite sure why the victims are allowed to "win," or why all the other countries seemed to have failed/succeeded, persevering over evil, given what's at stake. I suppose all those unanswerable loose ends constitute a big part of its ridiculous charm. Regardless, the Japanese schoolgirls got the biggest laugh when I saw it.
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 14 April 2012 03:25 (eleven years ago) link
hahaha. the japanese thing killed me.
― stay in school if you want to kiw (Gukbe), Saturday, 14 April 2012 03:27 (eleven years ago) link
Wait, was this 3-D?
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 14 April 2012 03:29 (eleven years ago) link
no. it was going to be, but due to MGM clusterfuck we were spared that indignity.
― stay in school if you want to kiw (Gukbe), Saturday, 14 April 2012 03:31 (eleven years ago) link
saw cabin in the woods early this afternoon. dug it a lot, though i can't quite say it's great. i do have this advice: if you have any interest in it at all, do not read anything about it, do not talk to your friends about it, do not wait for DVD, do not read this thread, just go.
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Saturday, 14 April 2012 23:31 (eleven years ago) link
lol rex reed http://www.observer.com/2012/04/cabin-in-the-woods-rex-reed-richard-jenkins-bradley-whitford/
(spoilers within)
― these pretzels are makeing me horney (Hungry4Ass), Saturday, 14 April 2012 23:43 (eleven years ago) link
I'll second contenderizer.
― "Fourvel - it's like Fievel, but one less." (R Baez), Saturday, 14 April 2012 23:46 (eleven years ago) link
I doubt if these people even know who Sigourney Weaver is.
― boy, was that Dan Fielding hungry for some cake! (forksclovetofu), Sunday, 15 April 2012 00:14 (eleven years ago) link
here's a screenshot of the betting board from cabin: http://i.imgur.com/BQaLg.jpg
― these pretzels are makeing me horney (Hungry4Ass), Sunday, 15 April 2012 00:16 (eleven years ago) link
sold when i saw "angry molesting tree"
― boy, was that Dan Fielding hungry for some cake! (forksclovetofu), Sunday, 15 April 2012 00:18 (eleven years ago) link
The way the opening scene cut to the title: Funny Games?
― "Fourvel - it's like Fievel, but one less." (R Baez), Sunday, 15 April 2012 00:18 (eleven years ago) link
lol Deadites
― stay in school if you want to kiw (Gukbe), Sunday, 15 April 2012 00:22 (eleven years ago) link
yeah i thought of funny games too, though where haneke is a stern moralizer who wants to chasten his audience, cabin in the woods gives the horror audience more of a gentle ribbing
― these pretzels are makeing me horney (Hungry4Ass), Sunday, 15 April 2012 00:22 (eleven years ago) link
Good to have that screenshot. I only caught a glimpse of "dismemberment goblins", which was enough for a laugh.
― "Fourvel - it's like Fievel, but one less." (R Baez), Sunday, 15 April 2012 00:26 (eleven years ago) link
"Reptilius" would have been damn awesome.
You can't see it on there, but I think one category was just called "Kevin." I don't know if that's supposed to be like Freddy, Michael or Jason, or just some fictional ... Kevin.
― Josh in Chicago, Sunday, 15 April 2012 00:56 (eleven years ago) link
Oh, wait, there it is: Kevin, bottom left.
What I thought was oddly funny ... what if the kids in the cabin had accidentally raised killer robot insect with giant saws or whatever? Would have made a hilariously poor fit for the spooky woods.
― Josh in Chicago, Sunday, 15 April 2012 00:58 (eleven years ago) link
We Need To Talk About Kevin.
― "Fourvel - it's like Fievel, but one less." (R Baez), Sunday, 15 April 2012 01:01 (eleven years ago) link
what if the kids in the cabin had accidentally raised killer robot insect with giant saws or whatever? Would have made a hilariously poor fit for the spooky woods.
still pretty scary though. plus kill you good, by the looks of things.
was really hoping for a screenshot of that board, so thanks, h4a. passed by too quickly in the movie for me to catch stuff like "deadites" and "angry molesting tree". lol @ "witches" and "sexy witches". will take option #2, if it's all the same to you.
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Sunday, 15 April 2012 02:30 (eleven years ago) link
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, April 13, 2012 8:02 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
[mild spoilers ahead, so...]
yeah, i thought the film handled this very well. not only are the kids forced into their roles, they're textually framed as "horror movie types" from the very beginning: the introductory shot of the panty-clad protagonist as seen voyeuristic 80s-style makes this comically clear. to say nothing of the opening sequence that foregrounds the film's twofold reality. those scenes put such huge quotation marks around the presence of the kids in the movie (and the movie as a whole, tbh) that i had no problem accepting the first act's more contrived and familiar aspects. by the time we got to mordecai the harbinger and the straight-up evil dead cabin, it was clear that the cliches were pretty much the entire point.
while watching, i liked how up-front the film was in letting us in on its first-level secrets, but in retrospect, i might have appreciated a bit more restraint. by the time we got to the reversals and expansions about halfway through, there wasn't much mystery left, which drained the subsequent absurdity exhibition of its power to really surprise me. overall, i liked it a lot, but a bit of the air did fizzle out in the ott final act.
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Sunday, 15 April 2012 02:49 (eleven years ago) link
Disagree, but not vehemently. Leaving the reveal til the end would have been mindblowing, but left the entire first half pretty tediously cliched. Knowing they were playing around from the get go was sort of crucial.
― jungleous butterflies strange birds (Eric H.), Sunday, 15 April 2012 03:08 (eleven years ago) link
I think it was very well measured. I didn't expect it to go as bonkers as it did. I guess Meta's only direction to go is out.
― stay in school if you want to kiw (Gukbe), Sunday, 15 April 2012 03:25 (eleven years ago) link
("The Japanese are the only other viable market currently running!")
Ha. I like the furious STATE-OF-THE-GENRE-RIGHT-NOW of the movie the more I think about it. It may or may not toss posterity out the window, but whatever - the manipulators/manipulatees scenario may probably always be potent. Or not.
― "Fourvel - it's like Fievel, but one less." (R Baez), Sunday, 15 April 2012 03:28 (eleven years ago) link
anyone seen the divide? very bleak
― JacobSanders, Sunday, 15 April 2012 03:34 (eleven years ago) link
remind me: pontypool is yea or nay?
― boy, was that Dan Fielding hungry for some cake! (forksclovetofu), Sunday, 15 April 2012 03:40 (eleven years ago) link
i like pontypool, its worth watching
― JacobSanders, Sunday, 15 April 2012 03:43 (eleven years ago) link
Finally got around to Stake Land last night. I liked its faux-Malick lyricism and affectless voiceover more than I usually like actual Malick lyricism and affectlessness. The story felt very third- or fourth-hand, too much like I Am Legend or 28 Days Later or whatever other apocalyptic vampire/zombie movies you might name. But the downbeat vibe was an interesting approach, and there was some legitimately gorgeous filmmaking.
― something of an astrological coup (tipsy mothra), Sunday, 15 April 2012 04:18 (eleven years ago) link
did rex reed even watch the same cabin in the woods that i did?
― humba (NZA), Sunday, 15 April 2012 05:55 (eleven years ago) link
well he thought the virgin was actually a virgin so I don't think so
― stay in school if you want to kiw (Gukbe), Sunday, 15 April 2012 05:57 (eleven years ago) link
also, since we've gone all Glenn Kenny, here's Wells: http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2012/04/underground_hor.php
― stay in school if you want to kiw (Gukbe), Sunday, 15 April 2012 05:58 (eleven years ago) link
very enthusiastic yea from me, but it's pretty divisive, so no promises
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Sunday, 15 April 2012 06:11 (eleven years ago) link
someone make a Cabin In The Woods thread
― Number None, Sunday, 15 April 2012 06:16 (eleven years ago) link
Leaving the reveal til the end would have been mindblowing, but left the entire first half pretty tediously cliched. Knowing they were playing around from the get go was sort of crucial.
yeah, i agree with you there. i guess i wasn't clear. i liked that we knew from the outset that a game was being played and who the players were. my criticism, and it's a fairly mild one, is that i felt that the film gave the larger game away a bit too soon. we quickly came to understand so much of the film's overall design that after the first forty minutes or so, there weren't any real surprises left. we just got to see how things played out. a more conventional approach would have been to hold enough back so that we could learn about the next-level stuff along with the protagonists, and i think that might have served the final act a little better. would at least have allowed the ever-increasing absurdity to be disorienting, rather than merely comical. think this could have been accomplished without ditching the basic structure.
i dunno, maybe that "merely" was unfair. this winds up being a strangelove-style satirical comedy more than a "proper horror film, and there's nothing necessarily wrong with that.
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Sunday, 15 April 2012 06:23 (eleven years ago) link
xp
ok
I've debated it here at length, but I think "Pontypool" is one of the best movies I've seen in years.
― Josh in Chicago, Sunday, 15 April 2012 13:01 (eleven years ago) link
I'll add another yea for Pontypool.
― "Fourvel - it's like Fievel, but one less." (R Baez), Sunday, 15 April 2012 15:42 (eleven years ago) link
I think pontypool is rampagingly adequate.
― Rango Unchained (jjjusten), Sunday, 15 April 2012 18:19 (eleven years ago) link
pontypool is better on the second viewing
― humba (NZA), Sunday, 15 April 2012 23:51 (eleven years ago) link
i will never know if that is true
― Rango Unchained (jjjusten), Monday, 16 April 2012 01:17 (eleven years ago) link
Was surprised to see The Wicker Tree on sale at Best Buy last night for 14 bucks. Worth buying, or just worth seeing? It beckons me strongly...
― bit.ly sno cone maker (Jon Lewis), Friday, 27 April 2012 17:49 (eleven years ago) link
I did the same double take, as it was on a center rack facing the front door with the likes of MI4
― diamanda ram dass (Edward III), Friday, 27 April 2012 17:51 (eleven years ago) link
Wicker Tree is...something. Worth seeing, definitely. A friend of mine is quoted on the jacket, though, which was nice to see!
― Simon H., Friday, 27 April 2012 18:30 (eleven years ago) link
one of the reviews of "cabin in the woods" was mentioning those recent-ish french horror movies that were talked in this thread, made me think to check-up on those guys and it turns out the guys who made "Inside" made a new one, "livid". I checked it without knowing/seeing a thing about it and it was ok.
― Sébastien, Monday, 30 April 2012 17:33 (eleven years ago) link
*trailer-like mild spoiler*
the subject of the movie appears on the betting board of "cabin in the woods", haha.
― Sébastien, Monday, 30 April 2012 17:40 (eleven years ago) link
thanks for the tip, sebastien, gonna watch livide tonight
― Choc. Clusterman (contenderizer), Monday, 30 April 2012 21:56 (eleven years ago) link
Okay, so Livide is wonderful! Not perfect by any means, but I had a hell of a lot more fun with it than I was expecting (wasn't a big fan of writer-director team Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury's previous À l'intérieur). It's a hybrid of a number of different horror approaches and tropes, generally gothic in style and more seductive than coherent.
It contains winking references to a number of classic horror films, but never succumbs to meta-movie jokeyness. Despite it's self-awareness and fan-letter trappings, Livide is quite serious and straightforward about its aims as a traditional horror film. It's spooky, atmospheric, increasingly dreamlike, visually inventive and rather old-fashioned in many respects, especially recalling the more surreal European horror films of the 70s and early 80s. And it's only occasionally punctuated with the kind of slam-bang gore and action you might expect from the writer-director team. Recommended.
― Choc. Clusterman (contenderizer), Wednesday, 2 May 2012 10:07 (eleven years ago) link
wanna stress that's it not a perfect film by any means. the acting isn't great, the ending is iffy, its more a mash-up of borrowed bits than an original work of its own, and the characters & dialogue are pretty dull. the emphasis is clearly on the visuals and atmosphere, which is fine, but the film takes a while to really get going in that department.
― Choc. Clusterman (contenderizer), Wednesday, 2 May 2012 16:46 (eleven years ago) link