Controversial Opinions (For Everything Other Than DC Comics)

[The Darknight Detective]

There are a series of videos on Youtube that redo the Harryhausen stop motion with a higher frame rate, so the movement seems more fluid. Kind of amazing to think that that's all the animation needed at the time. Like how silent movies are shown at the wrong speed, so the motion looks herky jerky but if you just adjust the speed, they look more realistic.

But like ChadH, I like the Harryhausen stop motion just as it is because that movement gives it a certain flavour I've come to enjoy.

Speaking of silent films, I like them, too. My copy of Orphans of the Storm should be here within a few days.

[The Darknight Detective]

This would seem to be one of those D.C. topics we're not supposed to talk about--but . . .

I rewatched SUPERMAN (1978) yet again, just recently. I've lost count, but this must be like thirty times I've watched it by now. It remains one of my all time favourite movies. And Geoffrey Unsworth's cinematography is magnificent. He should have got an Oscar for his work on that movie. He did get the Oscar (posthumously) for TESS the next year, but the work he did on SUPERMAN was far more challenging and shows the range of his abilities as a director--from the farm fields of Kansas (actually Alberta) to the cold, colourless realm of Krypton to the spires of Metropolis.

I think that practical effects age better than digital effects. Practical effects are real--they are things actually happening in front of the camera. Digital effects attempt to replicate that but they never can completely (as yet) look like a practical effect, like something that was real in front of the camera. And because digital effects creep every year toward better replicating a practical effect, a movie only one year old can seem wrong to us.

But all movies are authentic to their time. To call them dated is an empty criticism. It points out the obvious--that a work of art is an artefact of the time in which it was created. That's why art is so interesting to us--because we study it for what it says about us at that point in time. I doubt that there's much art that isn't authentic to the time it was made.

However, as far as the "Say Jim" line that was inauthentic at the time I saw it in December 1978--and it's been just as tone deaf and offensive each time I've seen it since. And I'm not the only one in 1978 who felt that way. A great many people pointed to that brief scene as howlingly inappropriate. It nearly kills the whole sequence, which is one of the most impressive sequences in the movie--it's just that everything else is so good, you almost forget how bad that hiccup is.

Passing off tone deaf scenes in movies and T.V. shows as just representing the period in which they were made is a terrible excuse. It's not that people didn't know better. 1978 isn't the 8th century. The world had gone through wars, genocides, fights for civil rights, equal rights. To claim that the people who wrote those lines, cast the actors, clothed them, directed them and made the decision to leave that in the final cut--that they didn't know any better is bending over backwards to give people of privilege a pass for knowingly doing things that were glaringly wrong.

It's the kind of excuse that you hear from old, straight, white males all the time--"I didn't know any better." Like they weren't alive and awake through all the upheaval of the 1960s and 1970s and were somehow oblivious to the issues of the disenfranchised. As if they should be forgiven for being ignorant in a time when these issues were all around them.

And it's an offence to all those good people that did know better and made movies and T.V. shows that were authentic to their time and showed people of colour as they really are and not according to moribund stereotypes. The thing of it is, I continue to see new movies that have just as much tone deaf and offensive content--so what's their excuse?

Wasn't the "Say, Jim" guy a pimp?

[Kirby101]

Wasn't the "Say, Jim" guy a pimp?

Why yes, he was. Had two "girls" and a pimpmobile.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

How do people find Ray Harryhausen. I think his movies still stand up and the stop motion FX doesn't feel dated to me. Even with the flawless CGI we have today.`

Harryhausen was a master of his craft. Period. Full stop. End of story. Between the Sindbad films, Jason and the Argonauts and The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms, his creations were nothing short of amazing.

[The Darknight Detective]

Why yes, he was. Had two "girls" and a pimpmobile.

I thought I recalled it correctly. I wasn't sure if Jim thought it was a gay slur or not.

[newparisian]

Quantum of Solace is awesome!

[Jim Kelly]

I thought I recalled it correctly. I wasn't sure if Jim thought it was a gay slur or not.

No, I thought it was a slur against Black men--as in "they are all pimps" and dress like that and talk like that and just exist to be made fun. That's about the only significant person of colour in the entire movie (the only one with lines that I can remember) and he's presented as an object of fun. I felt conflicted the first time I saw that scene--because it was nice to see more than just the usual white people in a movie, but it was a bad stereotype.

[godisawesome]

Quantum of Solace is awesome!

While I’d rate it 3rd out of the Craig films, it’s not a distant third for me, and still well ahead of Spectre, if for no other reason than that Mr. White and Quantum are a hell of a lot creepier and impressive with how subtle and sinister they are compared to the trying-too-hard take on Bloefeld and Spectre in that film.

The “We have people everywhere...” (unknown mole starts killing people in that very room) scene is a hell of a lot more intimidating than having the obviously evil intelligence minister turn out to be, well, exactly as evil as he seemed, and the Quantum meeting during the Tosca performance is the right kind of redux of a Spectre meeting, rather than just making everything bigger like the Spectre movie does.

Plus, I love how laughably banal but genuinely clever Quantum’s scheme is.

They really should have just kept Quantum and used it to create Spectre and Bloefeld, rather than trying to unveil them in a more classic form in that movie. Bloefeld the adopted brother trying to run a blatantly obvious evil empire out of jealousy kind of sucks. What would have worked better would have been to have Bloefeld be the mastermind behind Vesper’s deception in Casino Royals, but strictly in a professional sense, have his Spectre be the “ghost” of Quantum, and have his grudge be as simple as being angry at Bond unraveling his previous organization.

[newparisian]

While I’d rate it 3rd out of the Craig films, it’s not a distant third for me, and still well ahead of Spectre, if for no other reason than that Mr. White and Quantum are a hell of a lot creepier and impressive with how subtle and sinister they are compared to the trying-too-hard take on Bloefeld and Spectre in that film.

The “We have people everywhere...” (unknown mole starts killing people in that very room) scene is a hell of a lot more intimidating than having the obviously evil intelligence minister turn out to be, well, exactly as evil as he seemed, and the Quantum meeting during the Tosca performance is the right kind of redux of a Spectre meeting, rather than just making everything bigger like the Spectre movie does.

Plus, I love how laughably banal but genuinely clever Quantum’s scheme is.

They really should have just kept Quantum and used it to create Spectre and Bloefeld, rather than trying to unveil them in a more classic form in that movie. Bloefeld the adopted brother trying to run a blatantly obvious evil empire out of jealousy kind of sucks. What would have worked better would have been to have Bloefeld be the mastermind behind Vesper’s deception in Casino Royals, but strictly in a professional sense, have his Spectre be the “ghost” of Quantum, and have his grudge be as simple as being angry at Bond unraveling his previous organization.

100% agreed. QoS is def #3 on Craig's tenure; but yeah a damn good, very lean, brutal film. Not a wasted scene. The movie just clicks along.

Man, God IS awesome. But so are you haha

[TheRay]

Load and Reload are the best albums that band ever cut.

[Surf]

I thought I recalled it correctly. I wasn't sure if Jim thought it was a gay slur or not.

No, I thought it was a slur against Black men--as in "they are all pimps" and dress like that and talk like that and just exist to be made fun. That's about the only significant person of colour in the entire movie (the only one with lines that I can remember) and he's presented as an object of fun. I felt conflicted the first time I saw that scene--because it was nice to see more than just the usual white people in a movie, but it was a bad stereotype.

C'mon, 'JIM' was Superman. As in "Excuse me White man, that is one striking attire you have on that even as I- a Pimp lol have never seen outside of a comic book. Might you been in need of mental health services?" Then he takes off in the air and you get your 'whoo'.

In the 70's if you needed to get a random white dude's attention for say, a light for a cigarette or the time, you might have used 'Jim'. As opposed to 'Jack' where it might have been for a more, uh curt greeting as it was. I feel that's going a little hard at the idea that was a cruel jab on some level I'd say. In that world no one knows what a Superman even is, the reaction, even if you disagree with the messenger, is pretty genuine. There's a mention of Rex Reed at some point in this one or one of them. Metropolis was representing New York in the 70's and suffice to say, there was a certain element that was much more pervasive than what Manhattan has looked like for the last 30 some odd years. That's to say there was about a 100% fewer sex shop elements in the middle of it. I wanna say that was, **** without looking it up, they guy that played in Uptown Saturday Night that was head of the other gang opposite of John Amos. He's been in a lot of stuff at the time. He was the Jamaican in Predator 2 I think. Damn I can't remember his name off the top of my head. Watch it not even be him... anyway.

You do have a point in that's likely the only brotha with a speaking part in the film. I feel there's one walking in the background of the Daily Planet newsroom in a Margot Kidder shot.

[TheRay]

Death Magnetic was also fantastic.

[DrNewGod]

The notion of A Trinity is somewhat defensible at DC, but ludicrous at Marvel.

[C_Miller]

This feels like it's getting to be an unpopular opinion, but I enjoy the Oscars. I like the pomp and circumstance, I enjoy seeing the celebration of Hollywood and everything that comes with that. Even if they rarely honor my favorite movie of the year, I still enjoy it in the same way that I enjoy the World Series when the Mets don't play or the Super Bowl when the Bills don't play.

[The Darknight Detective]

The notion of A Trinity is somewhat defensible at DC, but ludicrous at Marvel.

DC's Trinity are the three superheroes who have been in continuous publication from the GA, so it's completely defensible there. Marvel, using the same reasoning, actually have a greater number than three when it comes to superheroes in continuous publication since the beginnings of that company.