Which reminds me, '96 also saw two "John Travolta is magic" movies.
― rhymes with "blondie blast" (cryptosicko), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:30 (eight years ago) link
Kind of love independence day
― Rainer Weirder Faßbooker (wins), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:32 (eight years ago) link
How bad was Summer '96 for movies? I actually remember enjoying The Rock.
― rhymes with "blondie blast" (cryptosicko), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:33 (eight years ago) link
man, a phenomenon / michael double feature might be the least appealing billing of any of the pairs mentioned on this thread so far. tbh i've never seen either one but i remember both just radiating "touching" in a really depressing way.
independence day is super problematic but super watchable. certainly way more memorable scenes, characters, visuals, jokes than any of the other 90s disaster films.
― never ending bath infusion (Doctor Casino), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:34 (eight years ago) link
I remember lots of people pointing out at the time that Mars Attacks! and Independence Day have very similar plots/concepts
― soref, Friday, 25 March 2016 16:37 (eight years ago) link
Even back when I was the audience for most of the big releases (I was 17-turning-18 in '96), I still knew well enough to avoid that Travolta twofer.
Nathan Rabin is braver than I.
― rhymes with "blondie blast" (cryptosicko), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:38 (eight years ago) link
Dissuading details from Wikipedia: Contrary to popular depictions of angels, Michael is portrayed as a boozing, smoking slob – yet capable of imparting unexpected wisdom.[1]
― never ending bath infusion (Doctor Casino), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:40 (eight years ago) link
Xxxp Jokes is the main one imo, it's the only one where emmerich's strict adherence to "in every ____ ever" formula lands, because the actors sell the types
Also remember outside of the states the July 4th stuff plays as comedy, 100%
― Rainer Weirder Faßbooker (wins), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:41 (eight years ago) link
it plays as comedy to me too! i mean i am definitely not putting it forth as a movie that'll really stir your heart and make you proud to be an american or whatever. but man is it fun watching will smith and company flying jet fighters at UFOs, or bill pullman in the creepy area 51 basement with the slimy tentacle alien and brent spiner.
michael rogin's BFI book on the film is a good read too btw.
― never ending bath infusion (Doctor Casino), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:45 (eight years ago) link
Would read
― Rainer Weirder Faßbooker (wins), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:49 (eight years ago) link
This reminds me of something I've been thinking about for a while. All the foreign films that make it to the US and get reviewed by the mainstream press seem to be of the "good for you" variety - earnest dramas about prejudice and sorrow, heartfelt tales of the human condition, blah blah blah. But I'm convinced other countries produce just as many dumbshit popcorn movies as America, proportionally - I just never hear about them. So in other countries' big dumb action movies, is there the same amount of hyperbolic nationalism and flag-waving? Is there a French equivalent to Michael Bay? And without totally hijacking this thread, what are the stupidest, most crowd-pleasingly boneheaded foreign movies folks can think of that I might want/need to see?
― the top man in the language department (誤訳侮辱), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:51 (eight years ago) link
Feel like American chauvinism expressed via Hollywood is a fairly distinct phenomenon with few analogues? But as regards dumbshit patriotic films we could be here all day
― Rainer Weirder Faßbooker (wins), Friday, 25 March 2016 16:56 (eight years ago) link
xp
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yysbbPStfWw
― emil.y, Friday, 25 March 2016 16:57 (eight years ago) link
There was also a Sylvester Stallone disaster movie in 1996 or 1997 where people got caught in a car tunnel, I remember seeing that one at the cinema.
― Tuomas, Friday, 25 March 2016 17:01 (eight years ago) link
Daylight!
― Rainer Weirder Faßbooker (wins), Friday, 25 March 2016 17:05 (eight years ago) link
That came just after cliffhanger - in both he plays a character haunted by flashbacks of a disaster he failed to prevent
― Rainer Weirder Faßbooker (wins), Friday, 25 March 2016 17:06 (eight years ago) link
Oh yeah, Daylight, that was from 1996 too.
It seems weird that several neo-disaster movies came out in 1996 already: Daylight, Tornado!, Independence Day, Twister... Considering the production time for your regular feature, it seems like there should be some ur-example that inspired this fad? Maybe it was indeed Jurassic Park? Or Speed? Or maybe they were all already anticipating Titanic, which must've been in the works for quite some time?
― Tuomas, Friday, 25 March 2016 17:14 (eight years ago) link
xp and that disaster was called "Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot!"
THANK YOU AND GOODNIGHT
― T.L.O.P.son (Phil D.), Friday, 25 March 2016 17:21 (eight years ago) link
xpost Was the success of Titanic always a foregone conclusion, though? I mean, the odds were in its favour--Cameron had been having a monster 90s (correct me if I'm wrong, but I think The Abyss was his only major film that underperformed according to expectations), but it was still a wildly expensive production featuring two non-superstar leads. Hard to imagine now, of course, but I think there was always the potential for it to flop.
― rhymes with "blondie blast" (cryptosicko), Friday, 25 March 2016 17:22 (eight years ago) link
Everyone thought it would flop iirc.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 25 March 2016 17:53 (eight years ago) link
Including me (and my parents), when we saw it during its like first or second week. Like people in the theatre (a suburban multiplex, not at all some hipster enclave) were laughing at the dialogue, Billy Zane's acting, etc.
― rhymes with "blondie blast" (cryptosicko), Friday, 25 March 2016 18:00 (eight years ago) link
Dark city, matrix, existenz, gattica
― Ecomigrant gnomics (darraghmac), Friday, 25 March 2016 18:09 (eight years ago) link
Yeah famously it had been building up a follywood rep before its release xxp
― Rainer Weirder Faßbooker (wins), Friday, 25 March 2016 18:10 (eight years ago) link
there were 2 near-simultaneous Hitchcock biopics a couple of years ago
seem to recall 2 Truman Capote biopics a couple of years before that?
― disco Polo (Noodle Vague), Friday, 25 March 2016 18:16 (eight years ago) link
Yep
Despicable me and megamind
― Ecomigrant gnomics (darraghmac), Friday, 25 March 2016 18:22 (eight years ago) link
megamind wasn't about truman capote
― never ending bath infusion (Doctor Casino), Friday, 25 March 2016 18:24 (eight years ago) link
black hawk down / behind enemy lines (both 2001)
― Laertiades (imago), Friday, 25 March 2016 19:18 (eight years ago) link
Braveheart (1995)Rob Roy (1995)
― calzino, Friday, 25 March 2016 19:29 (eight years ago) link
dont tell me there's some comic book guy called the Magician
― we can be heroes just for about 3.6 seconds (Dr Morbius), Friday, 25 March 2016 19:34 (eight years ago) link
http://static.comicvine.com/uploads/scale_large/0/3125/1197318-fb19.jpg
― Tuomas, Friday, 25 March 2016 19:58 (eight years ago) link
http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/marvel_dc/images/e/e5/Zatara_001.jpg
― Tuomas, Friday, 25 March 2016 20:04 (eight years ago) link
The Double (2013, adapted from Dostoevsky's The Double)Enemy (2013, adapted from Saramago's The Double)
Both deal with doppelgängers and identity.
― emil.y, Saturday, 26 March 2016 15:42 (eight years ago) link
Nice! That's a perennial of course. Does anyone remember double take, the film about Hitchcock, Borges and doubles? Written by Tom McCarthy!
― Rainer Weirder Faßbooker (wins), Saturday, 26 March 2016 16:11 (eight years ago) link
The Football Factory (2004)Green Street (2005)
Followed by hundreds of terrible football hooligan films available at tesco
― Rainer Weirder Faßbooker (wins), Saturday, 26 March 2016 16:15 (eight years ago) link
you can find some of those films if you scroll right to the very very bottom of netflix's british films list
― Laertiades (imago), Saturday, 26 March 2016 16:19 (eight years ago) link
i have never watched one but it strikes me as the sort of thing one might do in pursuit of the fake real
― Laertiades (imago), Saturday, 26 March 2016 16:20 (eight years ago) link
Platoon (1986)Full Metal Jacket (1987)Good Morning, Vietnam (1987)Hamburger Hill (1987)
There are shitloads more from the 80's Nam boom, but these were the Oscar bothering type ones that ran concurrently.
― calzino, Saturday, 26 March 2016 16:25 (eight years ago) link
Hmm, the academy stopped liking Kubrick after Barry Lyndon, and FMJ only got one nod, for Screenplay, so I dunno if I would count it as "Oscar bothering." Also, while FMJ is the only one out of the three of those that I've seen (never saw HH) that I actually like, any trend that can swing as wildly from FMJ to GMV has something more going on in it than the usual spikes in the popularity of disaster flicks.
― rhymes with "blondie blast" (cryptosicko), Saturday, 26 March 2016 16:41 (eight years ago) link
yeah i mean, kinda not very surprising that there would be movies about vietnam being made in the 1980s!
― never ending bath infusion (Doctor Casino), Saturday, 26 March 2016 16:45 (eight years ago) link
they were probably attempting to bother the oscars I should have said, fuck 'em anyway cos Barry Lyndon is a great movie.
― calzino, Saturday, 26 March 2016 16:53 (eight years ago) link
World Trade Center (2006)United 93 (2006)
― Rainer Weirder Faßbooker (wins), Saturday, 26 March 2016 17:04 (eight years ago) link
there was a Flight 93 in 2006 too!
― Laertiades (imago), Saturday, 26 March 2016 18:06 (eight years ago) link
let's roll (the cameras!)
Went The Day Well (1942)Saboteur (1942)
― calzino, Saturday, 26 March 2016 18:12 (eight years ago) link
oops forgot the question mark
― calzino, Saturday, 26 March 2016 18:13 (eight years ago) link
Deep Star Six (1989)Leviathan (1989)
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 26 March 2016 18:17 (eight years ago) link
Oh, man:
Terminal Velocity (1994)Drop Zone (1994)
Competing skydiving thrillers!
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 26 March 2016 18:18 (eight years ago) link
Without Limits (1998)Prefontaine (1997)
(Both pretty good, actually)
Mission to Mars(2000)Red Planet (2000)
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 26 March 2016 18:20 (eight years ago) link
touching the void was alas a full 3 years after vertical limit xp
― Laertiades (imago), Saturday, 26 March 2016 18:21 (eight years ago) link
In The Last Starfighter (July 84), a humanoid space-fighter pilot teams up with a vaguely reptilian alien; through adversity they become close friends.
In Enemy Mine (Dec. 85), a humanoid space-fighter pilot teams up with a vaguely reptilian alien; through adversity they become close friends.
― living colour me badd english beat happening (Ye Mad Puffin), Saturday, 26 March 2016 18:23 (eight years ago) link