The Movie/Film Thread

[kuro_neko]

Originally Posted by Tokyo Jihad

Is this a bad thing? Yeah he tries to intellecualize the characters/circumstances or else we'd just be watching The Expendables.

I'm not saying I think Nolan is a perfect director, but I feel like his (internet) popularity might be his only real crime here.

I second this.

Melancholia didn't feel like two films to me because neither half works on its own. You require the first half to understand certain aspects about Justine and the wedding and you require the second half to understand a lot about the first half. There was a lot in that movie that you had to read between the lines and almost every major plot point wasn't verbalized, which was quite nice.

the music seriously gave me really bad anxiety. I almost had to leave the theatre during parts of the second half.

[The Most Curious Thing]

Memento.

Nolan had a career before Batman/Inception.

[TurtleFu]

Things I don't like about Nolan:
1) His poor track record of women in his films. The women are always plot devices in service to the (male) protagonist, he has fridged women in his films, and they never go beyond stereotypes (ie Femme fatale or The male protagonist's conscience)
2) His poor directing of action scenes. They are disorientating and confusing. If he's going to make action movies, he needs to be able to make coherent action.
3) His faux-intellectual plots with humongous plot holes

I brought up RED because its the last action movie I saw that I liked. It wasn't smart. It wasn't intellectual, or art. But it was clever. It was just fun. I think that in many cases, unless you can pull it off really well, action movies should just be fun. See, if a film tries to be smart, it just draws attention to the plot holes. But if a film is a fun action movie but has plot holes, you can ignore them and just watch the fun action movie.

And yes, I definitely am singling Nolan out because of his popularity. But I feel like he has real flaws, and people are just ignoring them. If we want to look at films critically, then why are we giving Nolan a pass?

[Tokyo Jihad]

Lets address these in a more aesthetically pleasing order.

3) That comes with the territory when making a stylized plot. There are very very few "out there" plots that don't have plot holes of some magnitude. Hell, even down-to-earth stories have plot holes. Mulling over these kinds of stories (and discovering inconsistencies) is part of the fun/experience. Generally, for a air tight stylized story, someone in the story is going to have to over-explain things -- which isn't fun to watch. In Inception they explain few things, but just enough for the audience to buy, understand, and get on board. If movies like Inception, or The Fountain, or Science of Sleep, or Inglorious Basterds bother you with too many plot holes that don't work "irl," remember, these are fictional tales, and all the mythology seems to mesh in their universe.

1) But I wouldn't say he's made poor female characters. Nolan's movies tend to be very protagonist-centric, so most or all other characters don't get developed much beyond how they relate to the protagonist. Carrie Ann Moss in Memento wasn't a very nice lady, but showed a type of evil relationship that can occur in the situation of the movie. In the two Batman movies the girl isn't developed much -- because she isn't Batman.
Then we get Ellen Paige and Marion Cotillard. Easily the second and most integral characters to the protagonist. The latter is very well developed even if she is the antagonist. And the former plays a similar role to Rachel in the two Batman movies, forces the hero to make the tough decision.

It would be awesome for Nolan to try his hand at a Luc Besson-esque style action movie, but we've got what we've got. We can argue that Harvey Dent or Joseph Gordon-Leveitt weren't well developed characters either, that only serviced the protagonist. This is just how Nolan focuses the story.

2) I've seen the shot-by shot commentary of the convoy scene in the Dark Knight too. I found it very amusing. Everything pointed out was spot on, but missed the point. In film school you learn you should always make the more emotional cut over anything else. And I think thats what happens. When I watch the movie I'm not keeping track of how many cop cars are still driving, what side the bullets are being fired from, where on the axis we are. I'm focused on what the story is telling me. An argument can be made that in real life, its very hard to keep ones orientation in such a fire fight. I think this is Nolan's aim. I know that is a little weird when he seems to be otherwise quite an objective storyteller. Yeah, maybe he does play fast and loose with angles and cuts in an action sequence. So what? Even if there's a little disorientation, I still know who is the good guy, who is the bad guy, and what is at stake.

[TurtleFu]

1) Is understandable, even though I feel like you're basically saying "Yeah, there are plot holes, but it's a movie so relax!"
3) I feel like that's an excuse. "The action scenes are poorly directed because they are supposed to be disorientating!". You can make good, exciting action that is still coherent and ALSO gets across the chaotic emotions. If you're saying that IRL action is chaotic, so then it's okay to play loose with action in film, then that is basically giving a pass to all bad action directors.

2) However, I cannot excuse. I may not have mentioned this before, but representations of women in genre fiction is something that I pay very close attention to. I'm a bit of a feminist, is what I'm saying.
In BOTH Batman films, Rachel exists only in service to Batman. She basically acts as his conscious. She's a device, not a character, and in the second one she is outright FRIDGED. (Look it up)
Inception's treatment is bad too, because Ariadne is, once again, just an audience proxy and the protagonists conscious. Marion Cottilard's character is a combination of two tired tropes: The femme fatale and the "crazy lady".
In Memento, Natalie is a straight up Femme Fatale.
In Nolan's films, you have only a couple of options for women: Femme Fatale, Dead Wife, (Male) Hero's Conscious, Audience Proxy. I'm not calling him a misogynist, but I find it disappointing how other popular directors can make complex female characters, but Nolan relies on tropes and stereotypes to service his male protagonist.

It's not horrible, it's better than "Lol women are sex objects, get back in the kitchen!". But still, not very progressive.

My over-overall point is this: When the internet and break room were ablaze with Inception's Best Picture Oscar "snuff", I completely understood why it wasn't nominated.

[Tokyo Jihad]

3) No its not. I know you love to hate on Nolan, but I think there's an obvious difference between a scene in Dark Knight or Inception or one in Blood Rayne

2) This is the case for every secondary character in his movies. They are all serving the protagonist. Singling out just the female characters is just being contrary.

[TurtleFu]

Yes, one is an action movie that pretends to be "smart" and one is a dumb action movie. Even before I watched that dissection of the car scene in The Dark Knight, when I was watching the movie for the first time, my brain just sort of checked out. I gave up trying to understand what was going on, and it drew me out of the movie.

And every single one of Nolan's protagonists are male, and his female characters, despite there being fewer of them than the male characters, die more frequently. (Think about the band of brothers in Inception. Each one has a personality, something that makes them distinctive. They aren't complex, but they are at least unique. Nolan's women are all cut from the same cloth)
I mean, I understand that Nolan's films are heavily character driven, but isn't that a problem too? Better directors can juggle multiple characters arcs.

And the other thing is this: I enjoyed Inception, The Batman Movies, The Prestige, and Memento. They are all good films, despite their flaws. But they have flaws. And pointing out their flaws doesn't mean I don't like them, or I don't like Nolan. It just means Nolan isn't perfect. So I'm not "hating" on Nolan. I'm just looking at his films critically.

[deadgrandma]

No complaints on his action scenes here brah

As far as female protagonist, I highly doubt it was a conscious decision. That and 2 of his films are BATMAN movies ffs.

I think I shoulda said 2 episodes rather than movies when it came to melancholia. The music was da best part

[zombiestrip]

Late to the party. Can I jump in?

Originally Posted by TurtleFu

Snyder is kind of like Nolan. They make blockbusters that people like to pretend are somewhat artistic so they can feel better about themselves. "Oh, I'm smart, I understood INCEPTION!".

I happen to disagree. Snyder and Nolan are world's apart, in my opinion. All anyone has to do to prove that Nolan is capable of providing an intelligent, original and edgy independent film is to look at either "Following" or "Memento" (and to a lesser extent, "Insomnia"). Snyder, on the other hand, has had help mostly from material that's already handed to him on a platter. Having said that though, I still have respect for both filmmakers - both just have different visions when it comes to making films.

And yes, Nolan is terrible at creating action sequences but he's slowly gotten better if Inception was anything to go by (the fight scenes Batman Begins are a crime).

Ironically enough, Nolan is serving as the "consultant" over the new Superman movie to which Snyder is directing.

Originally Posted by Tokyo Jihad

I'm not saying I think Nolan is a perfect director, but I feel like his (internet) popularity might be his only real crime here.

I agree with Jihad. I think a lot of the issue surrounding Nolan is the fact that the Internet worships him, which in a way put him in the realm of being "overrated" and "overexposes" in a lot of people's minds. That's not to say that I think he's that though. I liked Inception - I thought it was a great that an idea for an original film that's not based on a comic, toy, book or TV show sprouted and was hugely successful. Some may argue that Nolan only got the film made because Warner Bros wanted to ensure that he'd stay around for The Dark Knight Rises. But for all of Inception's hype, even I think it's a bit overrated, ESPECIALLY, when it came time for Awards season when people were saying Inception was snubbed. Christ, just look at where Inception is ranked on IMDB! Again, a lot of this is probably just due to internet worship.

[Tokyo Jihad]

Originally Posted by zombiestrip

Ironically enough, Nolan is serving as the "consultant" over the new Superman movie to which Snyder is directing.

Good catch! I remembered the Nolan connection, but forgot Snyder was chosen to direct.

Every movie got snubbed at the Oscars though. King's Speech, give me a break.