this hemsworth dude with his generic good looks is the main turnoff for me. seriously, the hacker has to look like an abercrombie model?
― rip van wanko, Tuesday, 16 December 2014 17:33 (nine years ago) link
most of us do *runs hand through hair*
― valleys of your mind (mh), Tuesday, 16 December 2014 17:35 (nine years ago) link
with these mann flicks you've got to just embrace and accept the ridiculousness bc the good shit lies beyond it.
― LIKE If you are against racism (omar little), Tuesday, 16 December 2014 17:50 (nine years ago) link
Brogrammer.
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 16 December 2014 19:09 (nine years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xpfJEBU9BA
― $80 is absurd and very ridiculous! (Sufjan Grafton), Tuesday, 16 December 2014 19:28 (nine years ago) link
Interviews, etc.:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/12/30/blackhat-featurette_n_6395866.html
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Friday, 2 January 2015 05:57 (nine years ago) link
same as ^^
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bVH0bWdP3I
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Friday, 2 January 2015 18:52 (nine years ago) link
"Don't Call Him A Stylist...This Mustard-Yellow Wall Just Happened to Be There"
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-sneaks-michael-mann-20150111-story.html
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Monday, 12 January 2015 18:35 (nine years ago) link
Well, saw a screening of this tonight and, as usual, left humming the scenery and feeling like I'd vicariously just done and felt some very important things.
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Wednesday, 14 January 2015 04:08 (nine years ago) link
Solid flick.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 14 January 2015 04:12 (nine years ago) link
Another interview:
Do you have any Starsky & Hutch memories?I remember writing that there was a robbery, and a car jumped the curb and went through the window of a car dealership. And then they shot it. I said, "Wow, this is crazy. I write this stuff, and they go and do it." So then, of course, the ambition increased.
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Wednesday, 14 January 2015 21:16 (nine years ago) link
blackhat looks pretty bad, doesn't it? i might see it anyway.
― I dunno. (amateurist), Friday, 16 January 2015 00:57 (nine years ago) link
quite amused that michael mann is being interviewed by "men's journal"
― I dunno. (amateurist), Friday, 16 January 2015 00:58 (nine years ago) link
lede: "Michael Mann is a man."
― I dunno. (amateurist), Friday, 16 January 2015 00:59 (nine years ago) link
his fanboys almost give dePalma's a run for their money
― touch of a love-starved cobra (Dr Morbius), Friday, 16 January 2015 19:08 (nine years ago) link
http://i59.tinypic.com/f4r87l.png
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Friday, 16 January 2015 19:26 (nine years ago) link
i thought "public enemies" was pretty indefensible, but some mann-stans still repped for it. i don't have much hope for this one. the reviews from those not in the "converted" camp are pretty dire.
― I dunno. (amateurist), Friday, 16 January 2015 19:44 (nine years ago) link
also what's with mann's cult seeming to grow and grow even when he stops making good movies? something similar happened to paul verhoeven.
― I dunno. (amateurist), Friday, 16 January 2015 19:45 (nine years ago) link
actually i don't know if it's growing or just increasing in amplitude.
― I dunno. (amateurist), Friday, 16 January 2015 19:46 (nine years ago) link
Well, if you are new to Mann, there is no decline, just a pile of cool films to watch in any order. But are any Mann newbies dipping into Mohicans or Ali or Insider, or just sticking with the crime thrillers?
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 16 January 2015 19:51 (nine years ago) link
i thought public enemies was pretty excellent and i really liked the final scene, the one between cotillard and lang.
big miami vice and collateral fan here too. i don't think he's really fallen off that much. i do think he's kind of zeroed in more on his own particular obsessions and moved away from making films as coherent as the insider and heat, but i think for mann that kinda works well.
― LIKE If you are against racism (omar little), Friday, 16 January 2015 19:56 (nine years ago) link
I love Miami Vice and Collateral. Public Enemy was the first of his that did little for me (aside from its innate Mann-ness). But love him or not, from Ali on, he's been pretty divisive.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 16 January 2015 20:00 (nine years ago) link
I can buy the Verhoeven comparison. There seem definite divisions between early period defenders vs. late period.
― Vulvacura (Eric H.), Friday, 16 January 2015 20:08 (nine years ago) link
I'm not even sure many American (at least) Verhoeven folks are into his early (European) period. In his case we're talking middle period Verhoeven. Of course, there has been very little late period Verhoeven. Black Book and Hollow Man is about it for the past 20 years, and the latter is a POS with no fans.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 16 January 2015 20:11 (nine years ago) link
Hollow Man is awesome
― valleys of your mind (mh), Friday, 16 January 2015 20:11 (nine years ago) link
:)
Black Book felt like it was going to be the start of a new phase.
― Vulvacura (Eric H.), Friday, 16 January 2015 20:22 (nine years ago) link
Mark Harris called Blackhat Mann's Marnie, so maybe the Verhoeven early-middle-late thing applies here. Not many love a whole lot of Hitchcock's British movies outside of the obvious highlights (e.g. Sabotage, 39 Steps, Man Who Knew Too Much).
― Vulvacura (Eric H.), Friday, 16 January 2015 20:23 (nine years ago) link
Black Book has bits as inspired as anything V's ever done.
I liked Miami Vice better a second time but all his movies have indigestible hooey in them.
― guess that bundt gettin eaten (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 16 January 2015 20:37 (nine years ago) link
Just got the Lightbox schedule, and they've got a series running over the winter (everything through Public Enemies except The Keep, whatever that is). I've seen them all, but I'll order for Heat and Collateral for sure, maybe a couple of others.
― clemenza, Friday, 16 January 2015 23:36 (nine years ago) link
this was p bad & super dry, i get that is maybe what ur going for, hackers as detached actors, villains lacking motive other than $$, idk that does not make for a v compelling film imo; also i prob havent seen hemsworth ever before but he is such a blank its ridiculous
― johnny crunch, Saturday, 17 January 2015 18:32 (nine years ago) link
'dry' is what I feared. Dry does not suit MM, does it? It's all about mood and a kind of exaggerated pathos backed with some sort of dadtronica.
― wank anything you feel like wanking (rip van wanko), Saturday, 17 January 2015 18:43 (nine years ago) link
About to see this. Bad sign it's on the little screen.
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 17 January 2015 18:53 (nine years ago) link
yea theres little to no mann™ moodiness idk i think w/ such a global scope itd have needed to be 4 hrs if he tried to incorporate it
― johnny crunch, Saturday, 17 January 2015 18:55 (nine years ago) link
this movie appears to have been a bomb which isn't surprising. tbh whatever its merits may be, the ad campaign is awful, one of the worst I've seen recently.
― LIKE If you are against racism (omar little), Saturday, 17 January 2015 19:46 (nine years ago) link
yea my hunch is that the studio could tell it was tracking 2 be a bomb and really amped up that awful (agreed) advert campaign but idk who theyd poss be pulling in w it
― johnny crunch, Saturday, 17 January 2015 20:02 (nine years ago) link
centering the poster ads for your globetrotting action movie around a lock of chris hemsworth's hair is fucking strange.
― LIKE If you are against racism (omar little), Saturday, 17 January 2015 20:10 (nine years ago) link
yeah trailers were abysmal, made me want to see Mortdecai almost
― wank anything you feel like wanking (rip van wanko), Saturday, 17 January 2015 20:32 (nine years ago) link
CitizenFour is the better Mann movie on this subject/milieu, even though it's not his.
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Saturday, 17 January 2015 20:39 (nine years ago) link
That would have made a much better 13 episode cable series. That said, what a weak TV episode. That might be the closest Mann has come to directing a crap episode of Miami Vice. This may be the first Mann with almost nothing going for it - and I'm including The Keep - beyond its innate Mann-ness, but that is not enough here.
LOL at seven foot tall Thor blending in anywhere. And the bad guy was a blank guy. Did he even have a name?
One thing that would have given this more weight, if not made it better, is had it begun with 30 minutes of Thor in prison and how it hardened him and taught him to fight. Also, another 20 minutes to show why he and dude's sister fell in love.
Eh, fuck it. Nothing could have helped. You can't condense a boilerplate miniseries into anything good.
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 17 January 2015 21:20 (nine years ago) link
I liked it as a infosec James Bond movie, but like all good propaganda I liked it without being able to explain why later. Every hacker I know has a braggart/ego streak miles long, but Hemsworth plays it so cool as to be inert.
― Elvis Telecom, Saturday, 17 January 2015 21:47 (nine years ago) link
I found the whole thing so ridiculous it was infuriating. So you have a super hacker, able to summon hundreds of millions of dollars at will, and able to marshall a small militia of psychos, and his grand plan is to what, blow up power plants to make more money?
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 17 January 2015 21:55 (nine years ago) link
And speaking of said militia, you have a group of armed men with machine guns and rocket launchers marauding around, linked to a guy who took out a nuclear power plant and manipulated the stock narket, and US intelligence just doesn't seem to care? Destroying a nuclear power plant and manipulating the stock market you might be two things that would get their attention the most!
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 17 January 2015 21:58 (nine years ago) link
xpost - Well, to control a commodity, which is what's creating the new super-duper-rich. But it sounded ridiculous paired with the manhuntering "That's what you're doing, you sonofabitch, isn't it?" moment. And the line that seemed most ridiculous to me was Hemsworth looking across an empty landscape and rattling through the potential materials this particular landscape could be used to create.
(And all true and otm with the second post!)
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Saturday, 17 January 2015 22:03 (nine years ago) link
But why would he care about controlling a commodity when he can just spike the soy prices and make $75 million, or however much? Just so silly. It didn't even bother to give him a real motive, like "I am a huge hacker asshole, bow before my ego and abilities!" No, just some dude.
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 17 January 2015 23:10 (nine years ago) link
It felt like there were 8 hours missing from this.
every thing people say just makes me more excited to see it. it sounds like a wonderful visual experience unencumbered by boring plot-rubbish. monday. i'll probably hate it.
― Frederik B, Saturday, 17 January 2015 23:21 (nine years ago) link
As much as it looks like a Mann movie, it is not even that visually impressive compared to most Mann films. some helicopter shots of cities at night, some cool reflections. I wish he put as much thought into the story as he did in re-creating the accurate sound of specific gunshots through specific materials.
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 17 January 2015 23:28 (nine years ago) link
it sounds like a wonderful visual experience unencumbered by boring plot-rubbish.
Yes, very.
― Vulvacura (Eric H.), Saturday, 17 January 2015 23:33 (nine years ago) link
Michael Mann's Quantum Of Solace.
― Elvis Telecom, Sunday, 18 January 2015 00:06 (nine years ago) link