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AlmostAGhost

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Posts posted by AlmostAGhost

  1. Posted

    6 minutes ago, Cinco DeNio said:

    I was reading reviews and one thing made me scratch my head.  It needs a little set up.  Roger Ebert's review mentions how the cameras focused on the band since the audience reactions would be out of sync with what's on screen.  Another review mentions that the band only wanted actual concerts to be filmed, and not to do any studio work since the band would lose the audience energy.  It doesn't make sense to me. (I guess the band stopped making sense.)  The film works because it ignores the audience but the Talking Heads wanted the movie done this way because they wanted the audience to be there?

    I don't think those two things are incompatible, are they?

    1. Audience reactions can be out-of-sync to what's on screen (granted, I don't know if this is true)
    2. Having an audience helps lift a band's performance

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  9. Posted

    6 minutes ago, grudlian. said:

    I just scanned this list but a ton of these movies aren't even remotely related to back to school or coming of age. I'm not going to formally argue against Josie And The Pussycats being canonized in some way but this ain't the category for it.

    The correct answer is Hoop Dreams though. If they are looking at foreign films, might as well look at documentaries (which should have been included anyway). So, Hoop Dreams, Hoop Dreams and maybe Hoop Dreams.

    Yea, people can't read. Kate in the Facebook made it very clear what the prompt was and there were so many that were like 'How about Boyz N The Hood?' 

    I told her on twitter I hope she culls it down and removes all those, so when we vote on the final choice it's out of just school-based things. But that's up to her. I also think she should lose some of the things like Carrie, which fits, but may be better served saving for a horror set.

    Amy called it "Unspooled's school-movies miniseries" on twitter if that's any extra guidance. 

    My main point was to just compile everything so there's a nice big overview of the genre (even if it has a wider focus than intended or necessary).

    Having read through all the suggestions on FB and on twitter, the ones that come up most frequently seem to have been Eighth Grade, Elephant, Book Smart, something by Linklater, any of the Hughes films, and Hoop Dreams

  14. Posted

    12 minutes ago, ol' eddy wrecks said:

    I don't know what you took as a shrug to Mean Girls (though possibly I don't know what you mean by "shrug").

    I read it as, you didn't like I put it and 400 Blows together, so I took you dismissing one and not the other.

    Quote

    And generally speaking, I don't think The 400 Blows is in want of critical respect (in terms of best of lists).

    Well now I'm curious what you think we were doing for the last two years? 

  15. Posted

    perhaps i'm a hypocrite for not defending House Party in the same way as Mean Girls, i dunno. 

    still if you aren't happy with the movie choices that's fine too, i'm not trying to argue that. i think they slot in nicely with the point of Unspooled myself, and expand our palette a bit too, at least this first batch does.

  16. Posted

    4 minutes ago, ol' eddy wrecks said:

    "Re-consideration" for The 400 Blows? Um, that is Truffaut's debut film and one of the movies that kicked off the French New Wave.  And on the BFI Sight & Sound polls, for the 2012, it landed at 39 on the critic's poll and 13th on the director's poll (people give more credence to the critic's poll).  It's generally pretty well acclaimed (and yes, there's at least one Simpson's clip of it - and if my recollection is correct at least one visual homage in the episode where Bart played hookie).

    Unless you meant reconsideration that it doesn't deserve that acclaim.

    (Ftr, I'm not as big on the French New Wave as other people and it's been 20 years since I saw this one, but seeing it next to Mean Girls for "needing reconsideration"... like I said, unless you meant in the other direction...)

    Uhh no, neither of those, I just meant 'reconsider' as in the same way we reconsidered all 100 of the AFI movies. Wasn't that one of the points of the last 100 weeks?

    And turns out, they only thought like half of them were still great, so it's worth doing.

    I'm sure 400 Blows will come out positively, but it's still worth taking a look through new, modern eyes. 

    And your automatic shrug to Mean Girls is why it should be looked at and I think the point of season 2. Let's also look for movies that aren't traditionally filling out the role of 'greatness', and see before we decide? Maybe there's room for new definitions. Mean Girls is very popular, influential, made into a musical, etc. Maybe it satisfies, maybe it doesn't, worth a discussion. Why is it not an equal to 400 Blows? Who says? Break down those traditional definitions.

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  17. Posted

    1 minute ago, grudlian. said:

    Based on the way this was framed in the episode, it very much felt like removing 50 to fit 50 different movies. That's fine although I still disagree with kicking off an arbitrary number of movies. If someone thinks 50 (or more) of the movies aren't worthy, fine.

    But I've disagreed with a lot of ideas the podcast has presented like "one movie per director" or "needs (more/less) of a genre". I think that violates the purpose of the list but that's a discussion we've all had multiple times here. So, maybe we don't need to get into it again.

    If they completely move away from the AFI list (which is fine with me for a number of reasons), then this new season is fine. The show has changed purposes and outgrown the AFI. Cool. But I'm wary about this going into it because sounds like it's just a vaguely themed "pick a movie and talk about it" podcast. As much as I like Paul and Amy, I'm unlikely to stick around for that.

    I was worried about that too and even told Paul about it; he responded that he thought the DNA of having a 'great' movie every week would still be there. That was my hope for season 2.

    My concern was they'd just be doing like, say, House Party on the regular. I wouldn't stick for that either. But these seem all borderline notable and worth taking a closer look. House Party shouldn't. 400 Blows? Mean Girls? Those are worth a re-consideration for a new more modern pool of 'great' movies.

  18. Posted

    Thought I'd move the discussion from the 'upcoming episode' thread

    What are your favorites from this genre we should check out?

    I think it is not totally clear if these have to be school-based or just coming-of-age films in general?

    I googled last night some lists of best coming-of-age films and a lot didn't seem to quite fit this upcoming set of movies, so I'm not sure what the boundaries are exactly. I guess we could ask Paul or Amy.

    I'm throwing my hat in the ring for Rushmore though, my favorite movie ever

  19. Posted

    25 minutes ago, ol' eddy wrecks said:

    I guess it depends on the framing.  It sounded like the pivot away from doing the list still sounded like, "what we'd like to put on the list."  Which then is a, "what list?," because as of right now, it sounds like "replacement for the AFI top 100 list," which gets back to grudlian's point of, kind of weird to talk about foreign films for the AFI list, since the AFI list is, well, it is what it is.

    I suppose there is a framing that makes the progression make sense*, but at the moment, it still feels like it highlights the flaw in the original conceit of using the AFI list as the marker (too restrictive, too American-centric).

    *: In terms of progression it might make sense to work up to a more international list, such as The Sight & Sound (or the top 100 from TSPDT) in something like a hypothetical season 3 (or if they're doing the Sight & Sound list, the season timed with the expected 2022 update).

    Yea maybe, but I took it as more similar to Amy's other podcast The Canon, and they will decide if something is worthy of inclusion just of a vague 'great list'. They have found a lot of things for this via the AFI list, and now time to diversify.

    I guess we'll know after the first ep when they conclude their thoughts on Mean Girls. 

  20. Posted

    2 hours ago, grudlian. said:

    Kind of strange to include 400 Blows and Battle Royale on possible inclusions to the AFI list.

    I am glad we're getting other countries. The AFI isn't really part of this anymore, I don't think.

  21. Posted

    Season 2: Genre Exploration!

    First up, the genre of 'Back To School' Coming Of Age films

    8/20: Mean Girls
    8/27: Stand and Deliver
    9/3: 400 Blows
    9/10: Rebel without a Cause
    9/17: Cooley High
    9/24: Fast Times at Ridgemont High
    10/1: (use #BackToUnspooled suggest the last movie)

    (suggestions for the last one that they mentioned: Grease, Battle Royale, Election, Dazed and Confused, Back To School)

     

  22. Posted

    It's the end of Season 1... welcome to the AFI Thunderdome! Amy and Paul discover which movies from the AFI 100 surprised and stuck with Unspooled listeners the most, reveal their top 10 and bottom 10 films from the list (along with Producer Josh and Engineer Devon) and make some hard decisions regarding which films deserve to stay in the 100, and which should get cut.

    Stick around until the end for a big announcement about Season 2, which begins August 20th.

    Go to unspooled.com to see Paul & Amy's ranked list of their top 40 films from the AFI 100!

  23. Posted

    my picks

    Best Picture: 2001
    Best Director: Charlie Chaplin Modern Times
    Best Actor: Marlon Brando A Streetcar Named Desire
    Best Actress: Barbara Stanwyck Double Indemnity (I don't know if this is a crazy pick but as I was looking over the movies, she was calling me)
    Best Supporting Actor: Ian McKellan Lord of the Rings
    Best Supporting Actress: Ingrid Bergman Casablanca (almost picked Carrie Fisher)
    Best Screenplay: Spike Lee Do The Right Thing

     

  24. Posted

    2 hours ago, grudlian. said:

    I'll do the best picture only. I'd need to put a lot more thought into the other categories.

    Best Picture top 10 in no particular order:

    All About Eve
    Bridge On The River Kwai
    Parasite
    Moonlight
    No Country For Old Men
    Silence Of The Lambs
    Rocky
    The Godfather
    Marty
    Casablanca

    Best picture bottom 5 (keep in mind I haven't seen every best picture winner and a lot of the ones I haven't seen are considered the weaker ones):

    Crash
    Tom Jones
    Around The World In 80 Days
    Gigi
    My Fair Lady

    I meant to pick award winners from the 100 AFI movies we just finished, but this is an interesting thread too!

  25. Posted

    17 minutes ago, Cinco DeNio said:

    How can you tell if a movie is on Pluto?  I can never find a search function.

    https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/1776

    justwatch is the site i use

    but within Pluto, if you go to the 'musicals' listing and then to the end and see 'all musicals' that's the best way to go, I think. there's not so many movies on there, so the 'all' listings for each genre are easy to scroll through

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