Movies/Shows you're watching.

[Bosco]

Regarding something I totally didn't expect to come across (and probably something nobody cares about)... I Just skimmed over the preview for Netflix's 'Jingle Jangle' Christmas movie, and the main theme song "This Day" sounds like a ripoff of "Loaded" or "I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have" by Primal Scream.

Here is the Choir version of the song (similarities take place at 1:00 mark)

For what it's worth there is two other versions of the "This Day" track in the soundtrack.

[Bosco]

We are in the midst of some strong winter weather here in the midwest, and I'm trying to add some watchable likeminded movies to consume while I unwind at night.

Here is some top films that come to mind which have snow/winter in them, which are not largely Christmas related:

Fargo
Empire Strikes Back
The Thing
The Hateful Eight
The Shining
Groundhog Day
Dumb & Dumber
Hanna
For Your Eyes Only
Cool Runnings


If you have any to suggest, I would gladly appreciate.

[satur8]

I immediately thought Hanna, The Shining, and Fargo. Because, all I saw on your list was The Empire Strikes Back, and you don't need another movie after that.

Then I instantly thought of The Nightmare Before Christmas, Edward Scissorhands, and Batman Returns, and then realized they are all Tim Burton films, which your list is missing.

And then I thought of Gremlins and Trading Places, and realized I am very much stuck in the last millennium.

Finally, I decided to suggest Frozen but thought I should let it go and instead remind people that Strange Brew was a thing. And since we're referencing Canada, it's always a good time to watch Super Troopers, snow or not.

[Csar]

Ha, theme based movie watching, I love that!

Hm, let me think...

- The Revenant is heavily snow-related
- North Country with Charlize Theron has a little bit of it too
- A Most Violent Year
- The Mothman Prophecies
- the Swedish Millenium Trilogy and or Hollywood's one-off Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
- A bunch of early Bond movies (On Her Majesty's Secret Service, the Spy Who Love Me ...)

Ones that I haven't seen yet but sound interesting:
- the Snowman (thriller)
- Smilla's Sense of Snow (haven't seen that yet, but snow is literally in the title)
- the Grey with Liam Neeson
- Vertical Limit
- Grumpy Old Men
- Wind River

[Wolkenkrabber]

films that come to mind which have snow/winter in them, which are not largely Christmas related:

If you have any to suggest, I would gladly appreciate.

Insomnia (2002)
Wind River (2017)
Just look at those Rotten Tomatoes scores! I 💓 both
of these.

One that IS Christmas related that I watched on Christmas Day was Fatman, with Mel Gibson as Santa Clause. I kinda liked it.
[Anyone/Everyone watched Ricky Gervais giving Gibson a hard time at the Golden Globes? Worth a look on YouTube]

Ps I finished the Bond films.
I realised I had never watched:
On Her Majesty's Secret Service
Licence To Kill.

The former was quite good, despite the fact that Bond & Blofeld didn't recognise each other. They had met at the end of the previous film, You Only Live Twice. Is it because they were both played by different actors??
(Actually it's because they made the films in a different order to the books, and OMHSS stuck closely to the book)

Licence To Kill was the lowest grossing Bond film, I believe. And I can see why. It felt like an extended TV movie of Miami Vice. In a bad way.

I still think Octopussy was bad. A hot mess really. But agree with Enjoyed's comments on the Fabergé egg auction. As for the Tarzan noises and the "tennis crowd" reactions, the less said the better! Sir Rog was enjoying it though.

Also in my continued quest to link Bond visuals with Chems visuals, I wonder if Baron Samedi the witch doctor with the painted face in Live & Let Die may have influenced Acid Children/Angry Neighbour guy's look?

Gah! Csar has jumped in since I started typing (Wind River)

PS The Grey is good!

[ThePumisher]

Licence To Kill was the lowest grossing Bond film, I believe. And I can see why. It felt like an extended TV movie of Miami Vice. In a bad way.

Where can i sign this? This movie is a phenomenon: Worst Bond movie with one of the best themes.

Ones that I haven't seen yet but sound interesting:
- Smilla's Sense of Snow (haven't seen that yet, but snow is literally in the title)

Do it!





I've recently watched Giri/Haji on Netflix. Totally worth a watch. First episode is not that interesting, but with episode 2 ongoing it is one of the best shows i have seen in a couple of years.

Another show i can recommend - from the three episodes i have seen so far - is Undercover. A Belgian/Dutch series, also on Netflix.

[Born In Planet Dust]

Other good winter movies...

Better Off Dead
Ski School
Alive

[Bosco]

Awesome suggestions, guys. I've seen most of the ones you've all listed and I confirm they are all quality films. But there is a few I definitely have been meaning to catch (Strange Brew, Insomnia) that I'll eventually get to!

I would really like to rewatch The Mothman Prophecies. I remember renting that when it was first available, and really being creeped out. Overall, I think I liked it. As a side note, I've noticed this film has gotten a bad rap. I'm curious how I'll view it with a more mature take.

North Country is definitely worth a watch. Certainly not something you wanna take in if you're fatigued by the the current state of social injustice. Whether you like the movie or not it's supported by a great cast.

Ski School looks familiar and I see it has the eyebrow guy from Summer School. Looks like it has a lot T&A, so I'm sure I caught this on free preview from our cable company of Showtime or Cinemax, back in the day.

Agree Wind River was great. Go watch.

And finally, The Revenant is probably the ultimate cold weather movie, yet, I find this movie the hardest to recommend. First class cinematography, and pretty awesome performance by Tom Hardy. And that's about it. I don't hate Leonardo DiCaprio, but I think he was a total miscast for this film. No denying the audacity it took for his role.

[Conn6orsuper117]

surprised no mention of the Revenant yet

EDIT: I truly am blind.

[Bosco]

surprised no mention of the Revenant yet

Sir,

The Revenant

- The Revenant is heavily snow-related

[ThePumisher]

and suddenly i remembered seeing this norwegian documentary including snow. and chainsaws.

oh, and talking about snow...

[Bosco]

I think that was mostly the case for all the old timey Christmas movies, too (White Christmas). Potato flakes became the substitute. So instead of giving you lung cancer they would dry the ever-loving fuck out of you with starch.


Thin Ice

If you're a fan of Alan Arkin (and when's the last time we've seen Greg Kinnear?), you'll find this little Comedy/Crime story amusing. I haven't seen it for quite a while, but from what I remember it captures winter in Wisconsin pretty well. Kind of a Fargo knockoff, without the try-hard accents.

Trailer:

[Bosco]

I've been meaning to watch more works by Lars Von Trier, and I just finally got to watch the very divisive, Melancholia. I must say I was BLOWN AWAY.

Seriously though, I thought the film was pretty spectacular. The problem being, it's nearly impossible to recommend. It's an impossibly slow film that is only captivating through visuals and metaphorical story telling. Not only is the movie depressing, but if you suffer from depression, it might not totally be healthy to watch this film.

Yet, I feel like this movie needs to be seen...

Maybe the best recommendation is to give the very stylized prologue in the film a watch. In the very least you'll get a brief taste of the beautiful symphonic sounds of Richard Wagner.

[Wolkenkrabber]

BBC Four broadcast this three-parter back in late 2018. I thought it was very well made. I particularly enjoyed the first 2 parts. The third part suffers from being about the "EDM" era, which I'm not so keen on. But that's not really the programme-makers fault.

Anyway, someone has put it all on YouTube. Might be of interest to those who wouldn't have seen it on the BBC. I have no idea how long it will last on YT.

Can You Feel It: How dance music conquered the world

[Csar]

Thanks for sharing, Wolkenkrabber! Just finished watching part 3 (saving the best ones for later) and I have to admit, I enjoyed it more than I thought I would based on your brief description. All in all very insightful and very well put together, imo. Only the last 12 minutes or so were about said representatives of American inspired "EDM". But even that segment was interesting as it deals with the commercialization of current electronic music.
It's a shame, though, that not even once the Brothers were mentioned in some fashion or asked to comment. The closest we got was Pete Tong's quote of "Superstar Dj, here we go".

Edit:
Just skipped through part 2 and at around 16:46 there's that bassline sample from Shriekback's "My Spine is the Bassline" which I heard in the precious Confront Your Demons mix for the first time

[Wolkenkrabber]

By the time of Avengers Endgame I had kinda had enough of all the Marvel Superhero/Avengers stuff. The bigger these films got, the less I dug them. Remember the days of Iron Man 1? No bloated cast where multiple "superheroes" seemed to be literally waiting to say ther line. Ah, good times.

Then Wandavision came along and it intrigued me - because y'know it looked different,and it wasn't clear what was going on (Like Stranger Things in the first season). But by the end, it was back to sky-beams and CGI fights. Zzzzz.

With this in mind, I understand that season/series 1 of the Falcon & The Winter Soldier is finished.
Shall I bother with it, or will I be ultimately disappointed/bored?

*EDIT* while I'm asking...Has anyone seen seasons 2 and 3 of Jessica Jones? Season 1 was pretty good, even if the ending somehow didn't hit with as much impact as I expected. Defintely the most gruesome "superhero" (ish) thing I've ever watched (um...unless you count The Boys).

[inchemwetrust]

Netflix quickie thoughts:

Queens Gambit - chess master with bits of drinking, drugs, and replaying chess moves at night. Some sexy time with guys and girls. Love the dated cinematography look of the film, and a pretty damn good score too! On the last episode right now.

Selena the series - well expanded film on her history, good family moments make is somewhat bearable in season 2 because the Astrodome scene was at the end, and well...you know what was next. But they didnt go full throttle on that sad part but kept it more about her legacy and how she wanted to be remembered. Stands out even if your not a fan of her music. A+ on the casting for the roles, which were close-dead on look alikes for the real people they played!


Army of the dead - Opening scene....YEAH! The rest is ok. Not as good as Snyders 2004 DOTD, but has some great moments.

Spoiler

Chambers went out with guns blazing and a better sendoff than 'Aliens' Vasquez! But im pissed that she wasnt saved!

[satur8]

Anyone watch Mare of Easttown? It was a decent mini series, but let's talk about the dialect. I live about 40 miles from there and that accent was done very well. Many, but not all, people speak exactly like that. Education and profession are factors, but it's there. I personally dislike the accent and try not to let it come out, but sometimes some words are just natural for the area. For instance, I am sure to say "water' where many locals certainly say "wudder", but sometimes my "o" sound in words like "home" or "go" is somewhat similar to what was represented. Then again, some people here have extreme accents and don't realize it. Accents and dialects are fascinating to me.

All of the references were real local locations, and that was interesting. I didn't grow up there, but I actually lived in Delaware County, PA...commonly known as DELCO, for a decade as an adult and was surprised how much was genuinely shot locally.  Some of those locations were very near my old home. Yes, Delaware County is dumpy. Yes, Wawa is king and Yuengling and Rolling Rock are very common beers in the non-craft bars: WaWa coffee is good, but those beers may as well be local versions of Budweiser or Coors...ew. And, despite being a very populous, overcrowded area (which was not always represented in the show in terms of city level traffic  jams in suburbia and such), yes, everyone seems to knows each other or a family member. I don't think it was a particularity flattering representation of the area, but it was definitely fair. These days I live in northern Delaware, but that accent is really a Philly accent that is still present here, where as southern Delaware has a southern draw despite being north of DC. It's so weird to explain the dynamics in-between Philly and DC, especially when you also factor in New Jersey and Maryland. The geography all falls under NY metro, Philly metro, of DC metro when it comes to the suburbs. And central PA may as well be West Virginia...no offense to those from either area.

And then there was the exaggerated SNL skit. Too funny!

BTW - Inchem...I loved The Queen's Gambit.

[ThePumisher]

I loved The Queen's Gambit.

ditto

[Csar]

Anyone watch Mare of Easttown? It was a decent mini series, but let's talk about the dialect. I live about 40 miles from there and that accent was done very well. Many, but not all, people speak exactly like that. Education and profession are factors, but it's there. I personally dislike the accent and try not to let it come out, but sometimes some words are just natural for the area. For instance, I am sure to say "water' where many locals certainly say "wudder", but sometimes my "o" sound in words like "home" or "go" is somewhat similar to what was represented. Then again, some people here have extreme accents and don't realize it. Accents and dialects are fascinating to me.

All of the references were real local locations, and that was interesting. I didn't grow up there, but I actually lived in Delaware County, PA...commonly known as DELCO, for a decade as an adult and was surprised how much was genuinely shot locally.  Some of those locations were very near my old home. Yes, Delaware County is dumpy. Yes, Wawa is king and Yuengling and Rolling Rock are very common beers in the non-craft bars: WaWa coffee is good, but those beers may as well be local versions of Budweiser or Coors...ew. And, despite being a very populous, overcrowded area (which was not always represented in the show in terms of city level traffic  jams in suburbia and such), yes, everyone seems to knows each other or a family member. I don't think it was a particularity flattering representation of the area, but it was definitely fair. These days I live in northern Delaware, but that accent is really a Philly accent that is still present here, where as southern Delaware has a southern draw despite being north of DC. It's so weird to explain the dynamics in-between Philly and DC, especially when you also factor in New Jersey and Maryland. The geography all falls under NY metro, Philly metro, of DC metro when it comes to the suburbs. And central PA may as well be West Virginia...no offense to those from either area.

Hey, that was quite an interesting read there, Satur8! I love languages and am likewise fascinated by accents/ dialects and local idiosyncracies. Sounds like from that perspective it could be fun to watch - provided I can understand a thing.