sycasey 2.0

Same! When I saw this movie back in 2001 I thought it was just another mediocre rom-com with a slightly unusual premise. It still plays that way now, only we also add some "yikes" moments for its treatment of gay and trans characters. I can sing and drum a little. For drumming, any band where you just have to rap out a basic beat and not do anything fancy. AC/DC fits the bill pretty well. For singing, Hootie all the way.

I agree with those who claim that neither film is quite Canon-worthy (I like them both fine, but as cinema they're nothing remarkable), but I throw my vote to Field of Dreams based on cultural impact. I think you very much have to see this movie in order to understand endless jokes and references to its various tropes, particularly the whispery voice telling our protagonist what to do and the magical cornfield where ghosts appear. If you're a baseball fan, this is easily on the shortlist of Top 5 movies you absolutely HAVE to see. I know baseball is declining in popularity these days, but it's still a major part of American history and, by extension, of its cinematic history. This is definitely in the Baseball Movie canon. I'm not sure there's anything of cultural import in Driving Miss Daisy you're going to MISS all that badly if you haven't seen it. Most of what it does has been covered in other films (often in better ones). It's a reasonably well-executed version of its story, but not terribly deep or challenging. I agree with the podcast hosts' claims that the performances do a lot to elevate it, Morgan Freeman especially, but whatever subversion or interesting depth you get there isn't carried through in the on-screen presentation, which largely feels like a big, warm hug from start to finish. I acknowledge that Field of Dreams also feels like that, but at least there's some storytelling invention along the way.

If the filmmakers were on their game, they would have started playing "Jumper" right about there. "Wish you could step back from that ledge, my friend."

I am, but that's only because I was so disinterested/afraid of relationships that I didn't have a real "sweetheart" until I was 24. Only assorted crushes and fumblings until then. When I locked in, I locked in. I'm also very aware that this is far from typical.

Oh boy. There are few things I find more tiresome in pop culture than the endless discussion of the various subdivisions of music fandom and what kind of music you are "allowed" to like to remain in said subdivision. This is not exclusive to music fandom (see the ridiculous Marvel-vs.-DC movie rivalry) but the current seems to run strongest there. The older I get, the less I care about this stuff. (EDIT: Sorry, not trying to insult anyone personally here, as I don't think the discussion has gotten super-toxic in this thread. Just commenting on general social trends and where this kind of thing tends to go.)

I can no longer watch a Mark Wahlberg movie without hearing everything as his impression.

I don't have a strong preference, but upon this most recent rewatch of Midnight Cowboy, I was bugged by some of the filmmaking strategies that are hopelessly stuck in the 1960s (the Warhol party sequence especially), though of course the movie has other strengths enough to overcome that. Butch Cassidy is also dated in its way, but the framing of the story, using sepia tones and deliberately drawing attention to the fact that this is taking on old-fashioned myth-making, helps everything go down more smoothly. I'd also argue that this is the more influential film, with the quippy, buddy-cop relationship between the two heroes having been repeated across so many popular action movies in its wake. So I throw my vote to Butch & Sundance.

If we took a re-vote for 1968, 2001: A Space Odyssey would almost certainly win. That said, I have never seen Oliver!

Buying albums isn't something I do anymore, but I have consistently bought every AC/DC album, ever since they became "our band" for my high school friend group. (This wasn't a contemporary act, we went to high school in the mid-90s. We were just the "classic rock" dorks.) That said, I probably won't continue doing so, after Malcolm Young's death. Feels like it's not going to really be the same band anymore. For film directors, there are many: Tarantino, Coen Bros, PT Anderson, Wes Anderson, all will get me in the theater no matter what. I've been pretty consistent with Spielberg and Scorsese too. If Miyazaki is not actually retired and makes another movie, I'll also be there for that.

Yeah, same thing happened to me with recognizing that Young Jimmy Smits was the guy from Pee-Wee's Big Adventure. Though I suppose I'm not sure if that person actually read the board.

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, because even before rewatching the movie last week (not having seen it in probably 20 years or so), I could have also easily rattled off "Wouldn't It Be Loverly," "On the Street Where You Live," and "Get Me to the Church" as memorable songs from My Fair Lady, in addition to the two you listed here. After watching it again, I'd have to say that "With a Little Bit of Luck" and "Just You Wait" are also pretty memorable. (The Rex Harrison numbers are maybe more stylistically memorable than musically.) Anyway, I also had problems with the movie (for similar reasons to yours), but personally I can't impugn the music.

In fairness to My Fair Lady, I think it has more than two great songs in it.

EDIT: Never mind, looks like I duplicated a previous Freejack post.

Bump bump bump. I just watched this and boy is it perfect for HDTGM. They've already done Superman 3 and 4. This is right in that wheelhouse.

Cory McAbee's follow-up is also pretty good: Stingray Sam.

I did enjoy how Russ threw La La Land in her face after that comment, though.

Addendum: I also found it odd that both podcast hosts thought that Mrs. Banks attaching her suffragette sash to the kite represented the idea that she's giving up on her cause. I don't read it that way at all: I see it as her adding something of her own to the thing her family built together. It's not like they're throwing the kite away after flying it, or that she can't get another sash. Do other people read this as a rejection of the suffragette movement? The only previous scene where she mentions it is when she marches with the chimney sweeps, and she still seems pretty gung-ho there. I don't see any other evidence that she's giving up the cause.

Mary Poppins by a country mile. My Fair Lady held up pretty poorly upon recent rewatch. It's way too long and too much in debt to the source material, Hepburn does her best but is plainly miscast, and Higgins' misogynistic abuse isn't well-contextualized enough to always read as satire. It's a tough watch with a lot of great songs in it. I understand the satiric intent, but it's not always carried off well. Russ Fischer appears to be living on another planet in finding it boring, because every time I watch Mary Poppins I am transported in exactly the way it wants me to be. Not a single scene is boring; each one builds to heights of entertainment that most 1950s musicals can only dream of. It certainly is vignette-y, but I'm with Amy that these vignettes are perfectly executed across the board. To me, Banks' redemption doesn't read as a theme they threw in at the end, but rather something that has been stealthily weaved in throughout the picture and comes unexpectedly to the forefront as exactly what it always should have been about. The whole movie is about the kids being shown something magical and wonderful by Mary Poppins, and then their father pooh-poohing it at the next opportunity. They constantly show Banks missing the strange and funny things happening around him (in the very first scene, when he barely seems to notice the women running around to fix the furniture after the cannon blast), and then to put a button on it, Mary sings "Feed the Birds" specifically to teach the children about this. This idea that Banks needs to learn to appreciate life and have more fun could hardly be more signposted. The surest sign for me that Mary Poppins belongs in the Canon is that it felt meaningful in completely different ways when I was a kid and now, as a grown man and father. I loved the colorful song-and-dance numbers and the comedy as a child. Watching it as an adult, Banks' realization about how much of his children's lives he's missed hit me like a ton of bricks. "Go Fly a Kite" actually chokes me up now, realizing what Banks is doing and how much he's cast off to do so. Easy vote. Poppins is the more meaningful, the more culturally relevant, and the more cinematically inventive film.

That's what I remember, that if you accepted the silliness of the premise (a massively popular rock band decides to pluck some guy off the street to be their singer), it was pretty much a normal movie after that.

It's been a long time, but . . . . I don't remember this movie being all that bad?

No, you are not the only one. It's uncanny.

For those who might be interested, looks like Devin (among others, including his accuser/victim) will be interviewed for a PBS series starting tonight: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/devin-faraci-film-blogger-accused-sexual-assault-breaks-silence-pbs-series-metoo-1081031

I'll say that I also really liked KStew in Adventureland.

HOW is My Fair Lady not available to stream anywhere? Seriously, who dropped the ball on this?

Both of the lead characters are completely vacant shells who never learn anything, and yes that is the problem with Twilight as a whole. It's really the writing of the original books that's the root problem, more than any director or actor who tried to take it on.