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She was on Maltin On Movies a couple of months ago and it really opened my eyes to what Twilight could've been, and how much she actually saved it from worse. She mentions that after Thirteen had all of this indie cred people were just handing her scripts and they were all TERRIBLE including this script written based off Twilight, however there were things within it that interested her and so she did her own research and read the book and found that this script had wildly differed from the source so much that it was barely the same story anymore. For example - she said that at the very end of the movie Bella ends up in Florida on a Skeedoo racing away from the FBI. It was only because Hardwicke actually cared about the story rather than Hollywood blockbuster shit that we even got something as good as this is, and then she went on to say how much more she wanted to do but the studio had such little faith in her and in this movie that they continuously TOOK MONEY AWAY from her budget so she had to cut a lot of stuff out that she wanted in. Also, she did talk about being labeled difficult and she said she knows exactly why it happened, and it was because she had this scene she really cared about getting correct (I think it was the baseball scene?) and there was something she was trying to get done but the studio people were being such dicks about it and no one was listening to her that she just broke down for about 30 seconds behind a tree and cried for like literally a tiny bit and then composed herself and went back to work. After that she knew the studio looked down on her even more and suddenly she became a difficult emotional woman.

So I love this movie and I'm glad I get the chance to talk about it. I just got back from vacation (or should I say holiday). First I'm a lover of all things R&H and this is a great adaptation of their musical. My only real compliant about the musical itself isn't necessarily about THIS version but that there doesn't seem to be a definitive version. Since R&H wrote the LAW version for TV initially, they (and others) have felt the need to tweak this with more, different songs, whether that's on stage or filmed. I remember in 97, I was not a Brandy fan but I was a fan of Jason Alexander and Victor Garber and Bernadette (I'm a theater nerd, what can I say) and this is probably her best performance as actor, but with the supporting cast they surrounded her with, that's not surprising. This isn't Whitney's best performance but it's her last great performance I think (when did the Preacher's Wife come out?) This was also the start of a brief Renaissance of ABC Wonderful World of Disney musicals that included Bye Bye Birdie (with Jason Alexander), The Music Man (with Matthew Broderick and Kristen Chenoweth), South Pacific (with Glen Close and Harry Connick Jr), and Once Upon A Mattress (with Carol Burnett). These vary in quality and adherence to the original sources with Mattress in particular taking quite a bit of liberties, despite having probably the second best cast. I'm kind of surprised with this surge that NBC and Fox has been doing with the live musicals that Disney/ABC hasn't tried bringing this back. And speaking of Mattress, it wasn't until that musical that I realized that "Cinderella" isn't her name. She is "Ella of the Cinders" meaning she comes from, sleeps, etc in the cinders. Finally the tree is Ella/Cindy's mom and gives her the dress is something that Sondheim uses in Into The Woods. He also uses the multiple balls (IIRC) and the tar on the steps.

Hi Zukes! Welcome to the forum!

one thing in actually glad about in this version is that they give the stepmother a song because it's BERNADETTE PETERS FOR CHRIST SAKE! She HAS to sing! I just wish it wasn't the song they chose which is from a completely different musical. I feel like it doesn't fit into this one as well. I wish I'd they were picking new material they had gotten a different song? It's ok but it could have been better.

Is it weird that I’m feeling very protective of these movies? I think I’m getting to the point where I don’t like calling movies “bad.” I feel like people are being mean.

Hello. If you liked the .com / .comedy riff on today's pro version, you might want to check out the Mike Lawrence episode. In it there's a hilarious popcorn gallery question that's thematically similar. Best wishes! Gonna go paste this over to redit as some of those folks really seem to love the show and might want a few more laughs.

On the topic of the Twilight movies the director of the first one really got fucked over apparently. I encourage everyone to read this article by The Daily Beast : https://www.thedailybeast.com/catherine-hardwicke-broke-records-with-twilight-then-hollywood-labeled-her-difficult Basically Catherine Hardwicke worked her ass off trying to make this source material not suck . For example she fought with the author to have diversity in the cast : " But Meyer, who was raised Mormon in Phoenix, Arizona, “had not really written it that way,” Hardwicke says. “So she probably just didn’t see the world that way. And I was like oh my God, I want the vampires, I want them all—Alice, I wanted her to be Japanese! I had all these ideas. And she just could not accept the Cullens to be more diverse, because she had really seen them in her mind, she knew who each character was representing in a way, a personal friend or a relative or something.” She says Meyer pointed to her books’ description of the vampires: “She said, I wrote that they had this pale glistening skin!” " In the end she convinced her to let one of the evil vampires be a black actor they were looking at. Then there's the fact she was the first woman to ever direct a movie this big. Apparently when movies do well directors often get gifts. Catherine's gift? A fucking mini cupcake. " When I went in I saw that there were massive bouquets and balloons and bottles of wine, and crazy gifts sent to them by all the distributors around the world or whoever, all their friends,” she recalls. “So I actually had it in my mind, wow, this is a pretty unprecedented success. I had heard these rumors that when a director does something like this they give them a car, they give them a two-picture deal or something like that. They give them an office and ask them what they want to do after this.” Hardwicke pauses. “And then I got a mini cupcake that day. I was like oh, OK, cool—coming in here, I’m sort of working for free, doing this online stuff, and that was what I was offered: a mini cupcake.” This women's other film Thirteen was nominated for a fucking Oscar not to mention the crazy money she just got you! And she gets a mini cupcake?!? Even worse she was taken off the sequel New Moon and then basically labeled the deadly "difficult". I may not like Twilight but I feel terrible for how Catherine Hardwicke was treated. She deserved so much better.

It's really good! Only came out a year after this musical. There seemed to be a feminist renaissance of Cinderella and fairy tales.

Obviously the ads are pretty explicit that I shouldn't get high and drive (a car), but can I get high and: drive cattle across an open plain? drive my wife bonkers with silly string? drive 55 with Sammy Hagar (the Horrible)? - if he's driving and sober, of course be really driven about my (lack of) career and life choices? Thanks in advance, Buster Britches

Was that the Joy Division one? That was awesome

What about calling them "unsuccessful" instead of "bad"?

I have some issues with this list. Some of the voters are clearly just MST3K fans. While I love that show, I don't think the movies they pick generally fit the kind of HDTGM vibe (Mac and Me excepted). They lack the kind of sincerity and heart that makes a movie not just bad, but tragic.

I think that quote about Holocaust movies not being entertainment, really hits the mark for me. It's probably why I haven't re-watched it since high school. And I think it's why it's so hard to critique in the same ways as the rest of the AFI list. It exists in a world all it's own. Maybe that's why it belongs not only on the AFI list, but so far near the top. There's just nothing else like it. Spielberg is the master of drawing out emotions, and he really succeeded with Schindler's List, such that my memories of it are enough.

What the fuck did I just watch? I can't WAIT to talk about this movie!

He was more known doing blockbusters at that point than doing what people would consider serious movies. So, if you're talking about cultural importance, that aspect is probably more important. Back to, if I read Night before Schindler's List came out, I had to double-check dates. I'm not positive if that was the case. The timing was very close. It depends if I read Night in 8th grade or 10th grade (8th and 10th grade both covered the Holocaust - weirdly I think in English classes). Ninth grade history did cover the Holocaust as part of World War II. Schindler's List came out in the second half of my freshman year of high school. I'm pretty sure 9th grade history was when I was shown American footage of soldiers liberating Jews in concentration camps. Seeing living people emaciated beyond what I thought was physically possible to be alive - that left a stronger impression on me than anything I would end up seeing in Schindler's List. Though to clarify, 15 year old me did like Schindler's List. It was just as I got older a little older that I came to dislike it. My memory is stronger in its belief that I read Night before seeing Schindler's List. I suspect I did not see it in theaters. We did watch it 10th grade and they showed it in prime time TV unedited and without commercials (I think we at least read Night before that though). I will also point out (though for what point, I don't know), in the This American Life episode, the students said they didn't know anything about the Holocaust when they went into the movie theater, but they did say, "I think we talked about it a bit in 8th grade, and the teacher gave us a brief lesson about an hour before going into it." I'm trying to organize my thoughts on the most concise way to express why I don't like the film these days, and i don't have time tonight, and I'm not entirely sure when I'm going to get time soon. Visiting family next week and I'm going to try to cram some movie watching in before I go. I'm sure we'll eventually get a streak of movies where I don't have a lot to contribute about them, and that's when I'll get some lengthy posts in on Schindler's List.... and A Clockwork Orange as well... Yeah, set expectations appropriately low on this happening. One small interesting thing I came across, while looking for links on the topic of other movies that portray the Holocaust, I found this quote: https://www.nydailynews.com/archives/gossip/benigni-life-isn-beautiful-spielberg-article-1.822494 Stumbled across it, while I was looking to find old articles confirming Spielberg did not like Life is Beautiful as I remember hearing at the time. It doesn't refute that a Holocaust movie shouldn't have entertainment qualities to it, but since everyone it seems, has been praising the movie for being entertaining, seeing that attributed statement makes me think he wasn't going for that (though I also think he failed in refraining from doing so, and his natural instincts took over). Related to Paul being surprised that people didn't like Schindler's List for being entertaining, Spielberg's negative reaction to Life is Beautiful seemed to be seemed to their dislike of Schindler's List. And on that note, (I'd have to dig up the links I found), Son of Saul, which I have not seen, came out a few years ago, and Lanzmann (director of the documentary Shoah, and I believe I read, he didn't like Schindler's List either, but I'd need to double check that. Art Spiegelman, who wrote the graphic novel, Maus, really hated Schindler's List, based on how he read in that roundtable I linked to) and J. Hoberman (the critic who did that critical Village Voice review of Schindler's List), were both fine with it. Though, as Hoberman noted in his review, for some, the fictional narrative format is still inappropriate for the Holocaust. Though, for me thus far, Paul raised the question of, "what do they want then? It sounds like they ultimately just want a documentary." You know, what did I watch instead? A nine and a half hour documentary (though reading the round table, it really did put Marcel Ophul's documentaries on my radar, which they hadn't been before). For the sake of that conversation topic, catching up with Son of Saul might have been the more appropriate comparison.

I don't mind the Twilight movies - although it took me a while to come around on them. They're fun to tease and they obviously mean a lot to many. I have to admit, the last time I binged them (in August), they really worked for me - unironically. They fulfill a niche and she (Stephanie Meyers) obviously caught lightning in a bottle when she wrote them. No judgements from me That being said, I had a lot of fun watching Holiday in Handcuffs, too. It might just be that I like bad movies - lol

Have you guys seen that RANKER did a list of worst movies ever and TWILIGHT was the "winner." I didn't care for the book or the film, personally, but I understood why young girls did. (Like for me I had already read VAMPIRE DIARIES and seen BUFFY so it seemed old hat.) And I don't know why this struck me as so wrong but it doesn't seem correct. I mean I got through TWILIGHT easily compared to HOLIDAYS IN HANDCUFFS. Thoughts? ETA It now seems that some TwiHards have gone in and voted Gigli to the top.

Depends if in those 2 minutes you know you're going straight to the bone zone or not

Wait! episode two hundred and WHAT!? Lol, this one I gotta listen to!

I love you for that Legally Blonde reference!

Yea I did watch it in the '90s and then again last week (though it took me like 3 or 4 sittings). I don't love it, but I think it's ok. Very basically, I think my criticism is the lack of artistry/poetry in the filmmaking side of it. It does feel to me less like a movie open to arguing about though, for sure. I feel like anything critical I think, I have to also go "but I do recognize this and that..." But then, that does sort of match how I feel about it -- I do really like the emotional tale of Schindler and how it builds to his ending scene, but really am not so sure I'm behind the filmmaking used to tell it. A lot of positive reactions note how beautifully shot the film is, but I just don't think it's interestingly shot at all. I get that being 'plain' or making it feel like a documentary/reality is a valid way to go, so I don't particularly hold this against the movie. But I don't know what people are seeing there?

For me, I didn't watch it and it's been well over a decade since I saw it. So, I don't have much to say except in very broad strokes. Plus, it really is the probably definitive narrative film on the holocaust both in reputation and merit. There are other good ones (I remember really liking The Shop On Main Street), but outside of The Pianist, I don't think there are others that come close in the general consensus. As others have said, I'm curious (and shocked) how this came to be the introduction to the holocaust for Americans. The statistic from Amy seems unbelievable. Roosevelt even ordered footage be filmed to prove it happened. So, how were we unaware? I was going enough that, in 1993, we probably wouldn't have discussed the holocaust in school in gory detail. I know we watched some documentary in church youth group around this time but maybe we wouldn't have without Schindler's List being released. But I feel like I certainly would have been aware of the holocaust without this movie.

I wouldn't call this a bad movie at all, and it still holds up pretty damed good 25 years later. It's pretty good for what it is. Sure, I wouldn't cast Roddy Piper in "There Will Be Blood" or anything, but he was better in this movie than any other former WWF wrestler has ever been in anything else. I'm surprised Hollywood hasn't rebooted it yet to be honest. By the way the South Park guys did the fight scene shot for shot here.