Movies in General

Anyone watch 无名 or 深海 ? They looked good in the trailers but didn't get very high ratings on douban

ficker22 said:

Why is it that Zhang Yimou films can't get the quality of Hero and Shadow and the likes anymore?

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Over the last decade Zhang Yimou has fallen into the pit of money I'd say, and I don't have high opinions of his previous films as well. He is great at making grand scene with great color and that's about it.

If he happens to have a good script then he might make a good movie out of it, but he has been making shit movies with shit scripts like three times a year for many years straight, this latest offering "Full River Red" only took him like 50 days to make....

I have previously mentioned my love of Denis Villeneuve films and I recently came across a fantastic video essay that explains why:


I love films that acknowledge the world as being beyond our ability as individuals to control or even understand, and which is therefore profoundly unsettling. Basically, the antithesis of the standard heroic formula.

Beyond this specific video, Like Stories of Old is simply a fantastic channel for lovers of cinema.

Ok, those are my plugs for the day.

getready said:

Me too, the first movie was intimate and not overly convoluted, I do not like movies that try to be too smart and ends up being too complex and hard to follow. The first one was just nice. Although I was not fully able to appreciate the emotions of father son and family dynamics since it was based primarily on I believe the migrant worker family situation in China , it was still very powerful.
I thought all the actors performed well, none of the supporting actors felt out of place. Although wu mengda stood out as well to me since growing up watching him, he was mostly associated with comedy roles and particularly with Stephen chow. Sad that he passed away and he could not reprise his role in the prequel.

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2nd one has a smooth plot that makes everything seamlessly flow together into the events of Wandering Earth 1.

ficker22 said:

Why is it that Zhang Yimou films can't get the quality of Hero and Shadow and the likes anymore?

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Because he is old and his talent is not outstanding.
The film "Hero" is not highly rated in China. Zhang Yimou shot a typical "foreign trade film":In order to win awards and serve Western audiences who have no knowledge of China.

This film proves his ability to create grand scenes, but his film narration is very bad. Once he breaks away from the realistic style, he will only show a bad tendency that is incompatible with the public's values.

MwRYum said:

Japan never stop dreaming to revive their "imperialist glory", as shown.

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Don't worry too much. I'm sure this is a bad work, because the author Kawaguchi Kaji's military knowledge is very bad
Such as:

——Use J-20 to throw torpedo
And...

——Use F-35JB to strafe the deck of CV-002.
So you don't have to expect too much from this movie.

Don't know where to put this but I just saw this video and watched it on Youtube. This is the 2nd time I have seen Epic Games ICVFX demonstrated this proprietary tech that will now if not already bleed into the movie industry.

First one was this demonstration 3 years ago:


And now this:

Bellum_Romanum said:

Don't know where to put this but I just saw this video and watched it on Youtube. This is the 2nd time I have seen Epic Games ICVFX demonstrated this proprietary tech that will now if not already bleed into the movie industry.

First one was this demonstration 3 years ago:

And now this:

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The Mandalorian is already being made using this, so was the latest Antman that just came out, but with that film many have reported it looking especially flat and claustrophobic in that it was obvious that it was stage-shot and heavily composited.

Though fancy and hi-tech as it may seem, primarily due to the Unreal engine finally catching up to near photo-real real-time rendering, it's really just a tool like any other and it won't immunise any given production from a bad process, even big Hollywood tentpoles.

Epic calls this the "Volume" like they own the trademark but James Cameron also calls his version of virtual stage the 'Volume' which differs from Epic's that he's been using since producing the first Avatar in mid to late 2000s, which is more actor-centric i.e. 'performance capture' with post-capture photography being an integral part of the production process i.e. 'virtual camera'; whereas the Epic version offers real-time rendering of virtual backgrounds and real-time photography as a low-cost and time-sensitive alternative to post-production visual effects, and also so that actors have something to orientate and act against.

enroger said:

Trust me, Full River Red is shit, it has been ridiculed to death in Chinese internet. Don't be fooled by the high box office, a lot of shady shits happened like box office manipulating, whole thing smells like a big money laundry exercise.

The plot is dumb as shit and has nothing to do with real history, if I tell you the plot it would make you bust a vein. If you're still hell bent on watching it wait for pirate ok? Don't contribute to people that fuck up the Chinese movie industry.

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Haha I see. That's disappointing. With the stellar cast and Zhang yimou as director I thought it's a can't miss. Zhang yimou can be abit hit and miss, for example I never bothered to watch the wall......but it seemed like his Oscar baiting days are over. Kinda sad to hear this one is pretty bad.

I actually don't mind historical movies that are revisionist if they are done well, the plot is reasonable and the acting is good. Well I won't watch it in theatres anyway since I am still reluctant to go watch movies in one. Plus I doubt they will show it here. So hopefully will catch it on Netflix or pirate it someday. Thanks for feedback though.

getready said:

Haha I see. That's disappointing. With the stellar cast and Zhang yimou as director I thought it's a can't miss. Zhang yimou can be abit hit and miss, for example I never bothered to watch the wall......but it seemed like his Oscar baiting days are over. Kinda sad to hear this one is pretty bad.

I actually don't mind historical movies that are revisionist if they are done well, the plot is reasonable and the acting is good. Well I won't watch it in theatres anyway since I am still reluctant to go watch movies in one. Plus I doubt they will show it here. So hopefully will catch it on Netflix or pirate it someday. Thanks for feedback though.

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I enjoyed it. Maybe the guy couldn't understand the movie. It's a fiction that took great liberty with "history", but I don't think it tries to pretend it's historically accurate. 苑舉正 made a commentary on the movie. He was very complimentary. He concludes that cultural soft power is useless without military hard power. (Song emperor was kidnapped by the Jin because it was militarily weak despite Song, according to 苑, being at the height of Chinese culture. The movie doesn't directly talk about this though.)