BobO'Link

Ahhh... I forgot about those doing that one. From what I hear/read it was a *very* good choice.

I finally saw Captian America over the weekend. While I enjoyed it I was somewhat surprised it contained very little "comic book movie" type action. I've never really read the comic so was only vaguely familiar with the back story. Even then, it somewhat hurt the film as I found myself constantly awaiting the next "big step" in Cap's history. Part of me kept waiting for it to turn into a "summer comic book film" and it didn't. Whether it's consistent with the comic or not (I've not researched it to see), I found it enjoyable in a very retro Sky Captain kind of way. I'm wondering if they'll do the same type treatment with Wonder Woman should it *ever* be filmed.

gp1086

Watched Lethal Weapon 2 last night and was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. On par with the first one, in my opinion. Joe Pesci was excellent and a nice surprise - I always thought he didn't come until the third installment.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

I caught 2 minutes of Catwoman last night, flipping through the channels. It was some fight scene and it was godawful. I think the worst thing about it was the choice of music. It was some R&B song. There's a reason why R&B songs aren't normally used in action sequences. I realized the only reason they called it Catwoman was so they could give this crappy movie a higher profile but that just causes the pendulum to swing that much harder the other way when it turns to crap.

The only reason it should have been made was if they had to do it to keep a license for it and even then, you pull a Fantastic Four and just never release it.

GoldenWheels

I caught the same showing. Different two minutes...but I didn't make it much longer than you! Woof! (meow?)

Greg MacGuffin

Lethal Weapon 2 is great. I remember my dad took me and my brother to see it at the drive-in when it first came out. Due to nostalgia, I think it's actually my favorite in the series.

BobO'Link

I had good luck with VTTBOTS S2V1 so I went by today to pick up S2V2. If your local store doesn't have them in stock they are on sale for that price on the BB website with free shipping (the link is to the full list of $9.99 titles). There are several TV seasons/volumes at that price.

gp1086

I was excited to check out Mulholland Dr for the first time tonight. Then I turned on my TV, went to DVR list, selected the recorded program, and bam...blank screen. Shut off TV and tried again, still no luck - damn. Right next to it was Meet the Deedles, so that got the watch instead and filled my second "M" of the challenge. Was pretty dreadful to make it through what I believe was Paul Walker's first leading role in a feature film, but I did it. Think this DVD is OOP, as it's running pretty expensive on Amazon.

Whiskey Warfield

I just finished the 43rd movie on my list and I have come to the conclusion that movie critics and experts are full of shit. Seriously, a full 3/4 of these are the drizzling shits. Specifically, WTF "Vampyr"?? Not to mention those terrible, terrible experimental films that up until I saw them considered them parodies of things which did not exist in real life. Like on "The Critic", I was all LOL ROFL no way is this shit real. Oh yes, it's real. And far shittier than you can imagine. Willy Wonka could not imagine the pure awful of some of this crap. And I must see it before I die? Fuck you, movie snobs! Fuck you in your virgin everything! No more psychotropic inverted photographic-negative lunch-whistle soundtracked garbage! I'm going back to shit with plots! Where I don't have to "interpret" shit! Like Batman! Which is on the list!


Shit is awful, B.

gp1086

I hear you. If I'm going to complete a "list", it's going to be the IMDB 250 - since it's a mix of reviews/ratings from both critics and more casual movie watchers.

I watched Army of Darkness the other night. Have to say that I can't call myself a fan of the Evil Dead series. The first two bad, but I guess kind of fun - really didn't like this one though.

BobO'Link

I've never seen that film so looked up a few reviews just to see what critics/experts say. One comment struck me: "If you go into Vampyr looking for inert entertainment you're bound for nothing but frustration..." That single comment screams "ART FILM" which is s a genre I've *never* much cared for and generally try to avoid. Like you, I don't want to *have* to look for "meaning" in a film. I watch to be entertained. I once looked at that "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die" list and shrugged it off as the majority of it looked like Art Film material. I know it's not fair, but every time a "must see" film is a non-English language film I automatically assume it's an Art Film and promptly ignore it. The few exceptions to that is if the film is in either Japanese or Chinese or labeled as Sci-Fi/Horror. Those I'll research first. I admire your tenacity attempting such a list considering your general dislike for the Art Film.

walletboyniac

Was Leonard Maltin involved? Cuz that dude's a colossal douche.

I've finished seasons 3 & 4 of Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, and have 2 Melissa Joan Hart movies to go. This includes Drive Me Crazy. Deep Hurting! Once I start in on the other stars/guests/what not, I think it will be fun again.

mrcellophane

I glanced at your list and agree that a lot of those films are not for everyone. I may be in the minority, but I love art house, avant-garde, and experimental films. Some of these films really explore the ramifications and test the boundaries of what a film can be. Of course, entertainment has historically been the primary motivation behind filmmaking, especially since it is an art form that only came around after capitalism. Anyway, I'm yammering, and just wanted to provide an contrasting view that these films are not shit, but innovative and influential pieces of cinema. Of course, my opinion may be moot since my friends often call me a film snob, a declaration I try to negate by pointing out that Wet Hot American Summer, Batman Returns, and Rat Race are among my favorite movies.

I'm finding out about several authors whose books have largely forgotten. Joan Crawford's Humoresque, a film that I watched yesterday, was based on a short story by Fannie Hurst. Hurst's books are mostly out of print, but were also the basis of both adaptations of Imitation of Life. She strikes me as another Edna Ferber whose forgotten books were adapted into memorable films.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

I have to disagree on the 1001 movies list. I've seen about 3/4 of them and most of those aren't close to being art films. Another tip-off on art film is when people say that it's a visual film.

http://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/am...ubversive+art/ on the other hand, is a complete pile of shit. Films with dudes having sex with each other isn't groundbreaking unless one isn't aware that there's tons of other homemade films just like the ones in the list. Stag films aren't groundbreaking, especially when the ones on that list aren't all that old.

http://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/jo...sential+films/
This guy has a chunk of films that you used to find in the middle of the night on Cinemax and Showtime. I'd know since that's when I saw a bunch of these. The ones I'm talking about are usually late 80's to early 90s detective style crime films with bad saxophone music.

I'm of the opinion that most art and art critics have a job that's less about the art and more about being able to sell an artist. That's why you can have a painting come out from nowhere that people go ape shit over until they find out who the real artist is, and then it's not great anymore. So basically it's all one big circle jerk.

BobO'Link

It *has* been a very long time since I looked at that list and my memory is pretty clouded about the true contents. I remember thinking that I'd never watch many of the films on the list and it seemed like there was an over abundance of "foreign language" films, which I somewhat unfairly and automatically put in the "art film" category.

Based on your comment I gave it another look. I currently have 271 films checked on that list and there are another 32 or so I would willingly select to watch. The rest fall into the category of "I'll only watch it if someone else makes the choice". There *still* seems to be an over abundance of foreign language films. While I don't avoid them they typically are not among my top choices as they take more active viewing than most due to the need to use subtitles. Generally foreign language films *must* be of a genre I typically watch *and* be significant in the genre. Most of those on that list do not fit that description.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

I'd say about half the foreign ones in the list I've seen weren't bad. I watched a lot of older American ones and those were mostly pretty good. The one thing that site has made me do is realize I hate most French cinema. French films where the main actor is supposed to be a tough guy makes my eyes hurt from the amount of eye rolling it induces.

Mondo Kane

Care to list which ones they are?

*Back to topic* I really need to pick things up. Thought I would've averaged about 3 or 4 movies a day, but it's clear that I got too much in a comfort zone with just 2 movies. Starting this week, That's gotta change!

lisadoris

Starting the DS9 portion of this challenge. Let's see how many episodes I can watch between now and the 31st.

Undeadcow

Kudos to zaphod2467 for his End of the World challenge, that is an excellent idea.

Seeing all the challenges catching up on unwatched movies/tv non-challenges (like my own) makes me wonder if the Make Your Own Challenge hasn't become stale and meaningless.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

Give me some time and I'll dig up some names. It's been awhile since I've seen and checked them.

Here's an indie one in the same style. It's got the sax in the background and time travel. What they did with the background wasn't that bad but if someone is walking forward, the background doesn't need to be panning to the left or right.
http://ubu.com/film/rappaport_exterior.html

Dimension X

I'd only expected to watch about two a day, but I'm way behind on my Commentary Track Challenge. Earlier in the month, I had some other stuff come up that ate into my movie watching time, and I just haven't gotten back into it yet.
It looks like about a quarter of the lists are "unwatched piles" Challenges. During the first two MYOCs, I was against allowing that as a theme (especially since there are already "unwatched pile" threads), but I decided not to argue against it, and to allow "unwatched" as a theme this time. What do the rest of you folks think? Should "unwatched" be allowed as a MYOC theme or not?

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

Heck yeah. For some of us, this is one of the few times a year we can watch things we normally don't get around to due to other challenges. Some people might not have enough unwatched to do a more specific type of challenge, so a general one like that would help.

Greg MacGuffin

I would say no. There is already an Unwatched thread every month, run by cardsfan. I think part of the appeal of this challenge is seeing the creative ideas that people come up with. It seems like if people have a large enough unwatched pile, they should be able to come up with some kind of unifying theme. For example, I'm doing a foreign language challenge, but most of my titles are from my unwatched pile, so I'm killing two birds with one stone.

Having said all that, I don't really care what other people watch.

BobO'Link

I lean towards the "only if there is a theme of sorts *in* the unwatched pile" camp. That is, *use* the unwatched pile as your sole source but have some type theme other than "Watch Stuff From My Unwatched Pile". I thought about doing a "Unwatched Pile" theme bit it felt like a copout simply because the only person who knows what's in the pile(s) is the person who owns the pile(s). So.... I used mine but added a theme of watching *only* 50s/60s TV. *Everything* I'm watching is from my "unwatched" TV pile *but* only stuff from those 2 decades. That left out *tons* of other TV series I'm itching to get to but it restricts me enough so that it feels more like a true "theme". If I didn't specifically mention I'm only watching from the unwatched piles no one would be any the wiser.

So... all that to say. I vote *against* using strictly/only "Unwatched" as a theme in the future.

Indy24LA

I vote sure... I like how the Make your own challenge plays fast and loose with the rules compared to other challenges.

Cardsfan111

If asked my opinion, that's how I see things as well. I focus on my unwatched pile every month, so I try to do something to narrow the focus somehow for the MYOC.