Sod it! Can't wait! I'm going to watch it now!

Yeah, I actually read a lot of musicians didn't get Spinal Tap because it was so similar to what they actually did. Steven Tyler, Ozzy, etc.

"Anvil" is very high on my Netflix queue, I'll be getting to it shortly.

I've heard he's ok in "Punch-Drunk Love" and the movie is supposed to be good, but I haven't been able to start watching it yet because I know that Sandler's in it.

He's very good in Punch Drunk Love & Mak I'm surprised you haven't seen it yet! It's Paul Thomas Anderson for christ's sake! It's a bloody gem of a film - in my top five of romcoms ever made. A bit of trivia: after making Magnolia and at Cannes, Anderson announced that his next project was to be comedy starring Adam Sandler. The announcement was greeted with derision by the press. But Anderson had the last laugh - when PDL was finally released he deservedly won the Best Director Palm d'or for it. And surely Sandler's best work by a million (frequent flyer) miles kind of like The Truman Show was for Jim Carrey. And of course Emily Watson is in it - her best role since that startling debut in Breaking the Waves. Great supporting roles from, among others, a rather malevolent Phillip Seymour Hoffman & Luis Guzman as well. It's a brilliant piece of direction - in much the same way as Fargo is for the Cohn's in terms that there is simply not an extraneous scene. Anyway, you've just gotta see it - that includes you too Liam.

PDL is also on my Netflix Instant Watch queue, I'll watch it in the next couple of days then.

Did you ever see "Funny People"? It was way too long (by like 30 minutes) but I really enjoyed it. I was hoping he would start making more good films like that, but then he came out with Grown-Ups, Jack and Jill, and a bunch of other movies I will never watch in a million years.

Funny People is really good, it's because it isn't a stupid comedy, it's darker, and Adam Sandler is really good in it. I hate him with a passion though, his only decent film bar Funny People is Happy Gilmore, and even some of that is too stupid to watch.

The documentary "Anvil! The Story of Anvil" instantly reminded me of Spinal Tap. It's not as funny, but it's got a lot of heart, and I'd say it's one of the best movies about music that I've seen. And I don't even like Anvil's music(at all).

Oh my god, what a great doc that is. Brought me to tears. I'm glad you mentioned it. I hope people get a chance to see it sometime.

When it came out, there were rumors it was fake. It's not. It's just very, very good.

Did you ever see "Funny People"? It was way too long (by like 30 minutes) but I really enjoyed it. I was hoping he would start making more good films like that, but then he came out with Grown-Ups, Jack and Jill, and a bunch of other movies I will never watch in a million years.

I sort of enjoyed that. A bitter-sweet movie, I thought. I liked its darker aspects. Bogus ending, IIRC.

Skip past this if you like. It's what I wrote after seeing Anvil. It has mild spoilers. Also, it's long.

Anvil! The Story of Anvil

Steve "Lips" Kudlow

Robb Reiner

Directed by: Sacha Gervasi

I think they came to laugh at Anvil tonight. But they weren't laughing when they left. I think they were a lot closer to crying. I know I was.

They came expecting a documentary version of This is Spinal Tap. They came expecting a story about fifty year old metal-rockers playing to mostly empty rooms. Middle aged men with bald spots and straggly gray locks chasing a hair-band dream of fame and fortune. With a film title that parodies the band's leaden, unsubtle style of music -- Anvil! The Story of Anvil -- why wouldn't you come to laugh at these guys?

But something interesting happens to us between the bookends of this documentary, between two concerts in Japan that are separated by thirty years of hope and heartache. A transformation. And maybe a catharsis.

The film opens with the first concert, at an outdoor stadium rock festival in Japan in 1984. On the bill are Scorpions, Whitesnake, Bon Jovi and Anvil. The crowd goes crazy. But while Scorpions, Whitesnake and Bon Jovi go on to realize their dream of fame and fortune, Anvil fades into obscurity. No-one can explain why. Their peers, the guys on the bands who made it, generously credit Anvil with creating some of heavy metal's fundamentals. Pressed to explain why Anvil never hit it big, the best anyone can come up with is that somehow, they just weren't in the right place at the right time.

Thirty years later, lead singer Steve "Lips" Kudlow is delivering meals to the needy for a living and drummer Robb Reiner is busting rocks. These guys are perilously close to the poverty line. And they're still playing. Still searching for the break that seemed so close that day in Japan, sacrificing everything in their lives for it.

At first it's funny to watch them play to empty bars and thud power chords to incredulous wedding parties. But these guys are so desperately earnest, so hopelessly sincere, you can't help but feel sympathy. Then they embark on a disastrous European tour bungled by an inept rookie manager whom they met on the internet. It all goes horribly wrong. You or I would pack it in. Give it up. But not Lips or Robb Reiner. Especially Lips. He has an improbable, almost impossible optimism.

And I think it's somewhere in there, after the rotten tour and during the recording of their thirteenth album (for which they had to pay production costs out of their own pockets) that we become emotionally invested in these guys. And by that, I mean we experience a profound empathy. I think we begin to identify their struggle as our struggle. We displace our thwarted hopes and aspirations onto them.

So that by the time the band goes back to Japan for the first time in thirty years for another mega metal festival and they seem to catch one more rotten break - they're billed first, playing at 11 o'clock in the morning --- you can sense people in the theater rooting for these guys. Sharing their dread of playing to a giant hall with nobody in it.

What happens next is really moving. And I think that emotion is a testament to the film's ability to draw you into these characters and their Sisyphean persistence. Intentionally or not, director Sacha Gervasi is involving us in an experience much greater than one band's struggles. Gervasi may have been an Anvil fanboy back in the 80's, and this may have started as a bit of a vanity project. But it has become is something much larger; no less than a moving tribute to the power of the human spirit.

No, I don't think anyone was laughing when they left. I think they were a lot close to crying. I know I was.

Edited February 17, 201214 yr by wxwax

Sod it! Can't wait! I'm going to watch it now!

So?

Yes. it was brilliant! I entered this thread a wee while ago to write about it, but was so overawed by wxwax's analysis that I crept out again.

I may worry you if I say there was quite a lot in it that I could identify with! What I particularly liked us that there was no attempt made to judge the actions of the characters.

Today I watched "Happythankyoumoreplease", directed, written, and starring Josh Radnor (main character in "How I Met Your Mother"). It's pretentious, it's pretty uneven, and it tries to tell too many stories, but I still enjoyed it (it takes a lot for me to not enjoy a movie). From Wikipedia:

A story of relationships, happythankyoumoreplease deals with the struggles facing several pairs trying to find their way. The film centers on Sam (Radnor) and Rasheen (Aligeri), a writer and foster care child who meet when Rasheen is abandoned on the subway. Through this story we learn of Sam's best friend Annie (Åkerman), an Alopecia patient trying to find a reason to be loved, his cousin Mary Catherine (Kazan) and her boyfriend Charlie (Schreiber), a couple facing the prospect of leaving New York, and Mississippi (Mara), a waitress/singer trying to make it in the Big Apple.

You can definitely tell it's a Sundance-type of movie. I think I enjoyed it more than I should've because it was fun seeing Radnor as someone other than Ted Mosby. They could've cut it down to just the Sam/Rasheen story and it would've been better (although I feel like that story has been told a lot).

I have a lot on my Netflix queue, but here is what I have coming up in the immediate future:

Anvil

Senna

Punch Drunk Love

Tiny Furniture

Shaolin Soccer

Elite Squad 1 & 2 (Brazilian action films that I have heard are just insanely good, well maybe just the 2nd)

Edited February 18, 201214 yr by ace

Taken as a tribute, Senna is fantastically entertaining. Taken as a documentary intended to disseminate facts, it's quite a bit less. Deceptive, even dishonest.

They do a great job of creating a story with heroes and villains. How much of that story is what actually happened, though, is not an open question. It didn't.

I very much enjoyed it, though. Mostly I liked the old racing film, some of which has bever been seen before. And the behind-the-scenes drivers meetings are fascinating. Senna himself was someone special and he deserves a film, so I'm glad it exists.

Handle with care, is my opinion.

Yes. it was brilliant! I entered this thread a wee while ago to write about it, but was so overawed by wxwax's analysis that I crept out again.

I may worry you if I say there was quite a lot in it that I could identify with! What I particularly liked us that there was no attempt made to judge the actions of the characters.

I'd love to read your longer response to the film, moi. Especially since you, too, liked it! I agree, the treatment of the principals is never judgmental.

Missed opportunity looms large in your life?

What I particularly liked was that there was no attempt made to judge the actions of the characters.

Quite.

I really have no idea who Senna is (never followed any auto racing sport), but I'll keep what you said in mind.

I'm watching the 2008 Star Trek movie. I really enjoyed it when it came out. I thought it was a great combination of humor and adventure.

It isn't aging well. Upon a second viewing the writing is weak and derivative. And those damn J.J. Abrams lens flares are getting on my nerves.

...surely Sandler's best work by a million (frequent flyer) miles kind of like The Truman Show was for Jim Carrey.

To me the best thing Jim Carrey has ever done (by far) is "The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind". He's quite good in "Man on the Moon" as well. He makes that hyperactive acting style of his work in that movie.

Shaolin Soccer

It's a funny little curiosity, but not much of a movie. All I can remember from it are the football scenes. Was there a plot?

To me the best thing Jim Carrey has ever done (by far) is "The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind".

Kaufman fan right?

To me the best thing Jim Carrey has ever done (by far) is "The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind". He's quite good in "Man on the Moon" as well. He makes that hyperactive acting style of his work in that movie.

It's a funny little curiosity, but not much of a movie. All I can remember from it are the football scenes. Was there a plot?

I can remember watching that Shaolin soccer thing and it was pretty goo, though I had no idea what the hell was going on.

"Shaolin Soccer" is done by the same guy who did "Kung-Fu Hustle", which I thought was fantastic. Check out that movie if you get a chance.

"Shaolin Soccer" is done by the same guy who did "Kung-Fu Hustle", which I thought was fantastic. Check out that movie if you get a chance.

Second that. Kung Fu Hustle is a hoot and a half.

To me the best thing Jim Carrey has ever done (by far) is "The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind".

I know a lot of people like that movie. I've only seen it once, but it went over my head. I found it hard to watch.

Kaufman fan right?

Andy or Charlie?

a bronx tale , A deNiro film I'd missed, easy viewing of the gang type film

The Secret World of Borrower Arrietty

Great studio Ghibli film. Doubt half of you know what Studio Ghibli is...