Official Quarantine Movie of the Week with Runners Up

[GrahamS. 803]

Official Movie: Jupiter Ascending! This seemed to be the movie that most people agreed on.

Runners up: Charlie’s Angels and Charlie’s Angels:Full Throttle..

I have not seen either of these, so let’s start with one in case it’s too excruciating to make it to two.

Extra Credit: Whatever Other movies you want to pick. I might shoot for John Carter, Tremors, or Popeye.

If people want to add extra credit suggestions for last minute viewing, do it!

[Omaxem 232]

I am ready to discuss this very pretty, very dumb film whenever you guys are. 

Don't know if it was mentioned in the HDTGM ep, but the names are next level in-your-face stupid. The dog guy is called Caine. The bee guy is called Stinger, but then they doubled down, 'cos is last name is Apini. The bird bounty hunter? Ibis. Jupiter? The planet where the human refinery is built. The shifty guy, Eddie Redmaynes PA? Chicanery. It's beyond basic, if they did it in a writing 101 class they'd get a note about it from their teacher.

[GrahamS. 803]

I started it and my mind was blown in the first 15 minutes. Quite frankly, I’m glad I didn’t watch this in an altered state because I would  have been thoroughly confused.

i will watch the rest tonight and will be ready to talk about it. I have a thousand comments from the opening already. I don’t know how Netflix Party  works, but something like this would be the perfect candidate!

thanks for responding!

P.S., i also started Charlie’s Angels....that’s bananas as well. My parents live two blocks from me but they like watching movies and shows that are largely higher quality, so I have to fit these other films in when I can.

[GrahamS. 803]

“Portaling can be a little rough on the royal bowels.”Actual line of dialogue.

Romantic repartee “I love dogs, I’ve always loved dogs.”

This movie is a trial even as bad movies go. I’m starting with this halfway through the movie because it’s halfway between boringly inane and Ed Wood level bonkers. I’ll just write comments as I go.

The dialogue, plot, character names and characterizations could honestly be better written by elementary school students.

so the aliens can brainwash earthlings to forget them. But during that battle in Chicago, they cause SO MUCH damage there’s no way a massive police task force wouldn’t be involved and people would have taken Tons of footage on cellphones/what-have-you.

why would Jupiter agree to her creepy cousin’s scheme to sell off her eggs? Did the aliens take over the clinic? How exactly did that whole sequence work?

”Does any part of you want to bite me? Go ahead.”

Channings rollerblade skates are hilarious.

holy shit there’s  a Brazil-esque bureaucratic sequence in this movie.

Man this movie makes me doubt every movie the Wachowskis have ever been involved in. They definitely have a human-farming fetish. I think the only film I’ve seen of theirs that hasn’t been a part of the plot is Bound?

the costume/creature design team hopefully at least was high while making this.

Eddie Redmayne’s delivery is bonkers, but honestly it’s the least of this film’s problems. Like the Star Wars prequels, ALL the performances are stilted. AND based in outer space politics that I don’t give a shit about!

How is Channing not dead when shot into space?

It’s films like this that make me curse CGI

Wow, I’ve just checked the timer and I still have 42 FUCKING MINUTES TO GO! Seriously, fuck this film.

ive read about how trippy and wild this film is. No one’s really talked about how boring it is inbetween those moments. I’m about to start fast forwarding. 
 

in retrospect, I think Eddie Redmayne gives the only interesting performance in this film.

”buried in several tons of hurricane”??!! 

i used to rollerblade in the 90s before homophobia killed that activity. They wouldn’t be very handy in a battle situation, particularly against demon things. Just sayin’.

So since Jupiter owns the Earth, we can blame her for COVID-19, right? 

I’m glad HDTGM did Fateful Findings and The Visitor when they came to Seattle.

[Omaxem 232]

14 hours ago, GrahamS. said:

“so the aliens can brainwash earthlings to forget them. But during that battle in Chicago, they cause SO MUCH damage there’s no way a massive police task force wouldn’t be involved and people would have taken Tons of footage on cellphones/what-have-you.

This. Plus the fact that that whole sequence ( that is beautiful btw ) took like six months to shoot, and during those six months no one came forward to say, hey, so... the people in the streets, are we... are they just going to keep on driving, minding their own business? No one is stopping, taking pic... NO?! No. Cool, cool.

14 hours ago, GrahamS. said:

“holy shit there’s  a Brazil-esque bureaucratic sequence in this movie.

Flew right over my head ( twice ), only got it when i saw the wiki page. The tonal and visual shift was so jarring that it completely took me out of the film.

14 hours ago, GrahamS. said:

“How is Channing not dead when shot into space?

This is actually realistic. You'd die from hypothermia before you'd suffocate for lack of oxygen, but he's only out of the ship for a couple of seconds, so he could, theoretically, survive it ( i learned this from watching The Expanse  ). Besides, he's supposed to be genetically augmented/enhanced, maybe that helped.

14 hours ago, GrahamS. said:

Eddie Redmayne’s delivery is bonkers, but honestly it’s the least of this film’s problems. Like the Star Wars prequels, ALL the performances are stilted. 

in retrospect, I think Eddie Redmayne gives the only interesting performance in this film.

NO. No. I didn't care for it, and it's all i see whenever i see him in anything now. I'd love to see the notes he got on set though. Mila Kunis deserves better than this, and Charming Taters was charming, as long as i didn't see his ears.

The final kicker for me was the final battle, when the refinery is collapsing, and suddenly we go from a super elaborate hyper detailed CGI fantasy ( Taters vs Reptilian Overlord ) into an 80s hair rock music video ( Jupiter vs Mommy Issues ). It takes talent to make real fire look fake, but they sure pulled it off. 

.

I think i enjoyed it more than you. Beyond the idiotic script and the hubris of thinking they could actually pull this off, there are some really gorgeous shots, and the ships and the tech where beautifully rendered. The problem with the Wachowskis is that they can't edit, they just throw everything at the screen, but imo too many ideas >>> a lack of ideas, even if means things get messy.

Final thoughts : So the human aliens/emperors whatever, main race caused the extinction of the dinosaurs ( cool idea ), then kinda stepped back for SIXTY FIVE MILLION YEARS, came back, spliced their DNA into Neanderthals ( I guess? Another cool idea ), got those extinct ( not cool ) and created humans. Meanwhile, i live in a 70 sqm apartment and i can't find a 10€ voucher that i know i got in February. Also, is the refinery causing the Great Red Spot in Jupiter? Again, another cool idea.

[GrahamS. 803]

2 hours ago, Omaxem said:

16 hours ago, GrahamS. said:

Eddie Redmayne’s delivery is bonkers, but honestly it’s the least of this film’s problems. Like the Star Wars prequels, ALL the performances are stilted. 

in retrospect, I think Eddie Redmayne gives the only interesting performance in this film.

NO. No. I didn't care for it, and it's all i see whenever i see him in anything now. I'd love to see the notes he got on set though. Mila Kunis deserves better than this, and Charming Taters was charming, as long as i didn't see his ears

I listened to the HDTGM episode (#112, I think?) last night while I was trying to fall asleep. Some highlights:

Apparently, this was a 600 PAGE script—doing the math, that’s approx. 5 (5!) two-hour long movies, more or less—compressed into one two-hour-Long movie.

Jason and Paul (June was absent) backed me on Eddie Redmayne’s performance. They felt like he “got it” in terms of going bonkers, whereas Mila seemed weirdly nonplussed by life-altering revelations. As for Channing, they revealed it was hard for him to speak because the Wachowskis had him wear fake teeth to appear more wolf-like. Plus, the only other Redmayne movie I’ve seen is the first Harry Potter prequel and I wasn’t wowed by that either, so I don’t have much to compare this performance to.

honestly, I find “bad” movies hard to get into by myself, PARTICULARLY heavy-CGI ones. When I do watch them, I like my bad movies old-school, because if the movie is giving me uninvolving videogame sequences to watch, I’d rather just turn on my X Box. I really enjoyed about 45+ minutes of this movie on a WTF level (truly, some of the dialogue was hilariously terrible), but then It went into CGI hyper-Drive and alien politics and ended up boring the shit out of me. 

I haven’t finished Charlie’s Angels yet, and that’s pretty dumb, too—but at least it’s dumb in a fun way. Sure, it feels like a bunch of ads or trailers strung together, but they at least seem like they’re having a good time and that shows in the movie.