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LeftSideCut (3776 KP) rated Sin City (2005) in Movies

Jan 7, 2021 (Updated Jan 11, 2021)  
Sin City (2005)
Sin City (2005)
2005 | Action, Drama, Mystery
I absolutely adored Sin City when it first released way back in 2005, and I still do to a point, albeit a little less than I used to.
The main positives are of course the cast, and the style.

The cast is stacked - Bruce Willis, Rosario Dawson, Benicio Del Toro, Brittany Murphy, Michael Madsen, Clive Owen, Micky Rourke, Jessica Alba, Elijah Wood, Powers Boothe, Devon Aoki, Rutger Hauer, Michael Clarke Duncan, Carla Gugino, Jaime King... that's a fair ensemble if you ask me.
The style is of course a huge part of Sin City. It's neo noir black and white with splashes of colour translate perfectly from page to screen. 15 years later, the effects still look pretty decent and the overall look of the film is practically watching the graphic novels come to life, a strength that is bolstered by the cast involved.
It has a cheesy yet engaging screenplay - the runtime clocks in at over two hours, but never gets boring (just about), and the constant growly voiceovers and on the nose script beats could have potentially been laughable in anyone else's hands, but Robert Rodriguez somehow gets away with it.

The comics ultraviolence is well realised - the movie doesn't shy away from the grimness of proceedings. Some of the content however feels a little problematic in this day and age. The whole thing is plagued by a steady stream of misogyny, which would have probably been toned down if released today, but in my opinion, it's never glamorised. 95% of the male characters are grim shitbags, and the audience know it well.

I understand why a fair few people have an issue with Sin City and it's content, but personally, I find it to be a unique film with plenty of positives, a project that respects it's source material, and just about manages to avoid falling inside of its own arse.
  
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Lenard (726 KP) rated Voyagers (2021) in Movies

Apr 18, 2021  
Voyagers (2021)
Voyagers (2021)
2021 | Adventure, Sci-Fi, Thriller
2
5.7 (3 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Voyagers is the story of an 86-year voyage to a life sustaining planet in another galaxy. How did they stock the ship for the crew? When the 1st generation crew dies, who is going to train the next generation? Will the next generation listen since they are the first crew's children? Next question: you are going to bred a crew from intellectual superior Earthlings and keep them isolated in a facility so they will not miss the Sun or anything on Earth. How will these children develop a circadian rhythm since human circadian rhythms are based on the Sun? How do you settle upon 30 crew members? Could you have 60 crew members and give each a different circadian rhythm so you would have 3 shifts of 20 and someone would always be monitoring the vessel? Would that be more efficient and safer than all 30 being on the same cycle? These are just the science-y questions for this story.
Now, the actual film. The writer decides to quickly dispatch the lone "adult" in this cast of YAs. Slowly the crew descends into Lord of the Flies. At one point, I was wondering which one is the Piggy. Hint: brown and male. There is a little twist where one of the crew turns paranoia into a weapon and launches a leadership campaign. I enjoyed the concept of an alien that was not there, but could attack anyone. It never went far as the movie turned into a battle of arms rather than wits. I prefer not to critique films based on what should have been done. But shouldn't the crew have learned at some point that the pressure outside in outer space on a metal tin can travelling at interstellar speeds creates friction which reverbs inside. Then the film could have focused on a more politically tinted parable.
One scene disturbed me. The acting of Lily-Rose and Fionn is so bad that I thought a porn scene had been edited into the space opera.
  
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Juliette Jackson recommended track Rip It Up by Orange Juice in Rip It Up by Orange Juice in Music (curated)

 
Rip It Up by Orange Juice
Rip It Up by Orange Juice
1982 | Pop, Punk
(0 Ratings)
Album Favorite

Rip It Up by Orange Juice

(0 Ratings)

Track

"It's such a tune! That's the main reason it's on this list, I want everyone to listen to it more. I love the vocal delivery – that crooning is my favourite – that really smooth, male, cheesy-sounding vocal: I love it. “I love the sentiment. I don't know exactly what it's about but I'm guessing it's about when you meet someone for the first time and you screw it up and you gotta start again. Or you meet someone and you're too awkward to be cool and you're like ""fuck! I just wish I could meet you all over again and be a cool, normal person.” I love the lyrics ""When I next saw you, my heart reached out for you! My hands stuck like glue to my sides."" It sounds like the feeling you have in a dream where you can't run. It's another one we listen to in the van all the time. It's just such a banger. “We always wanted to do a cover of it but we haven't quite got round to it yet. I really enjoy covers. It's really fun to take someone else's song and rip it up, pull it apart and add new music into it, whole new parts, or take lyrics out and put new lyrics in and just fuck it up. I love playing covers live and surprising people with them, because we can see it in their faces: they know we're playing something they know, but they can't work out where they know it from, because we're playing it so differently. “At the moment we're covering Bonnie Tyler's “Total Eclipse of the Heart” and it's just so bombastic: I didn't wanna totally change it. We used to play a cover of Madonna's “Beautiful Stranger” and that one was really different from the original. If we did ‘Rip It Up’ I'd definitely sing it in that crooning voice, because I love it so much. I'd get Celia to try and play that weird bubbly bass line with some cool pedal."

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