Movies

I can understand people looking at the cast and the budget and the trailers and going into the film expecting one thing and getting something entirely different. I, however, thought this movie was incredible. And terrifying.

I'm not really one to watch movie trailers anymore. They're too long and tell too much of the story while too often setting up misguided expectations. But they're also difficult to avoid.

I went into this movie knowing little more than some visuals from the trailer, it's Coppola with Driver, and it's been poorly reviewed.

After watching the film on the comfort of my couch, I was gassed. This movie is a warning. It's warning us about greed and capitalism and nationalism and rejecting our humanity. There have been countless works of fiction warning us about the consequences of merely being human. It's evident that too few of us have been heeding these warnings.

Having little knowledge of the stories this is based on (see: Catilinarian conspiracy), I searched for some interviews with Coppola. Now, you can say a movie should be complete all on its own without additional knowledge; and that's fine. I disagree. I enjoy movies that pull from other works and history. This film retches with metaphor and I love it. I like stories that breathe outside the theater, that ask me to make connections, that keep me thinking about them long after the credits are over.

The premise of the film is that the United States was intentionally based on the Roman Republic and, like Rome, is on a course towards collapsing. It's a great argument that Coppola has illustrated and it should be a moment for us all to reflect upon. He's been working on this film since the 1980s it could not be more pertinent right now. We should dissect this film as we should dissect the rise and fall of Rome.

The film claims, Utopia isn't a place - it's the commonness of genuine debate, empathy, equity, and not being a pawn in a corporatocracy.

It ends in a way today's youth should resent. It says, look at all this shit your elders and governments have done - now it's up to you to fix it. Because if you don't, sorry, but you're on the path towards the Empire of America. Still, it says so in a hopeful way.

I don't think it's a perfect movie. I wish some things were done differently - perhaps a little more specifically or apparently - a tiny bit more cohesion. My politics and my rage-buttons might prefer more direct lines to modern day personalities. But I really enjoy the opportunity it gives us to debate and compare and to, maybe, step outside our echo chambers.

Compared to the vast majority of cinema that's been put out in recent years, Megalopolis "leaps into the unknown". Preexisting Hollywood franchises are continually regurgitated for people who fear the unknown. Discomfort is divisive. Populism is comforting. Populism rejects freedom. What's gained from repetitiveness but disconnection from our imagination? Imagination created the gods. We need to reject populism to create great things.

The film itself may have some flaws but Coppola's story is monumental. I'm looking forward to watching this movie again and studying up on the rise and fall of the Roman Republic and the Catilinarian Conspiracy.

From the producers of 'Fall Guy' and 'Nobody,' the film also stars Timothy Olyphant and Juliette Lewis and is shooting in Finland

"Deadpool & Wolverine" got off to a strong start in its streaming debut.

A small-town feud, an internet conspiracy, and an assassination attempt on the President. Welcome to Mississippi where this jaw-dropping story spirals from local drama to a national scandal. Buckle up for a wild ride. This isn’t fiction—it’s Tupelo.

After an extremely limited theatrical release caused hubbub from film fans online, Clint Eastwood’s “Juror #2” will be streaming on Max in December. The courtroom drama has set a Max streaming release date for Dec. 20, just in time for the holidays.

Al Schwimmer was the man behind the early military might of Israel and his story is becoming a movie from Warner Bros. and Aaron Sorkin

The "Challengers" star will appear opposite Emily Blunt in the Universal/Amblin film due out May 2026

Article (paywalled)

Non-paywalled link.

Watch the trailer for #TheAmateur starring Oscar® winner Rami Malek (“Bohemian Rhapsody”) and Academy Award® nominee Laurence Fishburne (“What’s Love Got to Do with It”). The all-new espionage thriller opens in theaters nationwide April 11, 2025.

. The White, The Yellow And The Black (1975)

AKA 'Samurai' and 'Shoot first... Ask Questions Later'. A pretty funny and well written spaghetti western. Worth a watch if your looking for some light entertainment and a few laughs.

. Get Him To The Greek (2010)

Don't understand why films like 'Superbad' (2007) and '21 Jump Street' (2010) become beloved classics while this was forgotten. It's got the comedy of a raunchy late-2000's Seth Rogan like film and the action of a James Bond movie. The inclusion of Pedo Diddy didn't age well but that can be forgiven.

Did anyone else scream laugh out loud when they unzipped the pod and out popped Matt Damon like we did? Watching the rest tonight.

UPDATE: OK finished this movie now. Not really recommending it.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/21949599

Netflix is marking the two-year anniversary of its entry into advertising by revealing its ad tier now reaches 70 million monthly active users worldwide.

Guy Ritchie's next feature delves once again into the backstabbing world of the British aristocracy

It is a tender and intimate look at the lives of young people in the 60s in Paris. The film follows two characters, male and female as they navigate love and the changing, ever turbulent landscape of life. The film explores the two of them through 15 interconnected but separate parts and every part has a monologue or introductory text on screen. These don't often talk about the film but also outside of it as well, most of them are for us the audience even when they relate to the plot.

The film is a drama about youth and their struggles to live and react and adjust in a world that is uncertain and cruel and things that are happening in such a wide scale that we have no control over them. It feels like a glimpse into that era, as if we're seeing how people must have lived, thought, loved and died in that time. This is pronounced more through the use of shots of people wandering in the streets going to and fro in between the 15 parts.The themes that are talked about here resemble the ones found in Alphaville even though genre-wise these both movies are very different. Love and it's need in human life, violence and power and using that to decide things in other people's lives, the word "tenderness" and it's importance in the narrative, poetry and the attitude different characters have to it.

This was so refreshing and different and bolder than most modern movies being made today, it isn't afraid to talk about things it wants to yet there is a tenderness to it though it's less romantic than Alphaville

SPOILERS for all ahead:

Can the Joker universe (Joker and Joker: Folie a Deux) and The Batman universe (The Batman, its upcoming sequels, and The Penguin TV series) be considered the same continuity in headcanon, even if not in reality?

The way they're structured seems like they almost could be in the same universe, and many people questioned if they were at some point before it was confirmed they weren't. Joker kind of acts as an origin story for the Batman mythos and his "Rogues Gallery" generally, not for any specific version of Batman, but it seems to connect quite well with Matt Reeves' The Batman: Bruce Wayne is a child in Joker, Harvey Dent is quite young in Folie a Deux and just had his villain arc set up, and the new version of the Joker we see in Arkham at the end of the second movie was also not much older than Bruce at the time, so that they could serve as villains for him once he grew up. And we seemingly saw a version of the Joker in Arkham at the end of The Batman; maybe that's him, or yet another person who carried on the mantle of the Joker that was established in the 2 Joker films.

I want to make clear that I'm not asking if they are in the same universe, I know they're not (officially)... nor am I asking if they should cross over in some way, I don't think they should. Just whether they could be compatible in theory.

Also, I'm aware that the tone is different, though very similar. I don't think The Batman's depicition of Gotham, Arkham and society in general are quite as bleak/cynical or the people in it are quite as horrible as in Joker's version, but Joker is seemingly set a long time before The Batman so that could explain the differences there as the society progressed and became a bit less harsh by the time of The Batman. They share a gritty, slightly mature style focused on Gotham's underworld and the grounded nature of only showing criminals and people that could exist in reality.

The one continuity issue I see is regarding what happened to Bruce Wayne's parents, but if that one element was removed could they otherwise be conciliated? Also, couldn't we just argue that the criminals that killed his parents in The Batman were actually Joker's followers just presented differently (and with different actors playing his parents of course)? We didn't see much of that time period when Bruce was a kid in The Batman, so it's possible there was an Arthur Fleck that had started a riot at the time?