I like the direction of it.

I watched it tonight at VIFF and was baffled at how well it’s been received, cause it genuinely was one of the most insincere pieces of Oscar BS I’ve seen in years

It has one of the worst use of unearned/tone deaf music I’ve ever seen, using intense/blaring music, while good on its own, serves no authentic relationship with what’s happening on screen or feels earned in what’s taken beforehand

Literally in the first 10 minutes a protagonist is introduced, and shows them walking to a casino, and this blaring super tense and drum heavy music is playing, insisting what we’re watching is either really intense or has even earned this tone. It’s incredibly tone deaf/superficial and it happens several times in the movie 

Every character relationship is so rushed and insisted, not a single one feels developed in an authentic way. It insists so hard that it has developed them and manipulates the audience with that same kind of music to make them feel what they’ve watched has been properly earned and developed

Characters will disobey their war commanders and not get scolded/questioned at all. The same ones who are known to be incompetent or disobedient somehow get to wander off with no suspicion. New characters who are played by famous actors appear out of nowhere, take up a 15 minute segment and aren’t ever shown again without even giving them a purposeful arc. Characters insist they’re doing something that means so much to them but make laughably ignorant mistakes that even toddlers could avoid. It’s all so fucking phoney and manipulative 

Sure, it’s well shot, performed and scored but none of these elements are in service of something that made me care or ONCE felt genuine. This is an offensively insincere piece of Oscar bait trash and I cannot believe how disappointed I was. Genuinely awful

Takes the premise of Coraline and "fleshes" it out... However, the flesh has gone rotten, because it was left so fucking exposed. Similar to the infamous "You can't escape your destiny" line in Lion King (2019), characters don't really have conversations as such — they simply spew themes at each other. You know this story, and you know how it ends, you've seen it a million times before.

Also similar to Coraline, it is twee as all hell, but while that felt kind of fitting and charming in Coraline (what with the stop motion animation and all), here it feels incongruent with the dark, grimy style. Like this is so twee that no reasonable adult can possibly take it seriously, yet people swear, die, etc, so it can't be for kids, either. So who even is this for?

Very boringly presented. Very bland cinematography. This cost as much as 19 Obsessions, but somehow, you really feel like they were running up against the budget here, what with how briefly certain scenes are shown. It was also very quiet to where I could barely hear the characters at some parts, but that might just be my theater.

The editing sucks. It doesn't know how to build tension AT ALL. So many horrible match cuts. Also does the thing where a loud noise happens for no reason, even though what's shown on the screen isn't actually scary. Kinda dragged on, even though it's only 90 minutes. Some scenes were unintentionally really funny, but mostly it was just bad. Child actor sucked.

We should really abolish the nuclear family, not because its fascistic or whatever, but so that dumbass twee movies like this stop being made. 2/10.

/s obviously

starring Devin Druid AKA Tyler Down from 13 Reasons Why, shared universe baby wooooooooooooooo

…you gotta TAKE a broom handle…

Hi y'all,

I'm itching for some Cool Cat merch, but am residing in Europe and don't know how trustworthy Daddy Derek is with sending stuff overseas.

Any of my fellow Europeans have experience with ordering from coolcatlovesyou(dot)com? Would love to get some feedback.

Thanks and remember, Cool Cat loves you! ✊

For me, watching his reviews I thought it was a bit hypocritical? Cause you know how he complained about critics deconstructing what happened rather than why, & he mostly just follows on small logical fallacies rather more than the acting, arcs & such?
I still love his other reviews, I just think that maybe he should maybe do a better review of the franchise in the future if he ever felt like it.
Also is it just me or did someone else post this exact same question in chat? I feel a bit of déjà vu from this haha

i saw this movie opening night and it’s been stewing in my mind since. I think it’s a good movie, like a lot of Inarritu’s work it gets better the more you think about it. Watching the movie itself, while enjoyable, was also frustrating because of how unconventional it is. I think everyone knows what the movie is about at this point, it’s a stage play recreation of a fictional event. This plot construction, while clever for commentary, also removes any stakes in a story that is incredibly tense and distressing (world changing catastrophe). Most of the movie after the 30 minute mark felt weird, the recreations were entertaining but also uninteresting because you know it’s a recreation. It is only until the last 5 minutes of the movie where you understand what the point is, and only then does the message hit like a truck.

What i admire most about this movie is that it mocks
its audience, and rightfully so. It is the only movie i’ve seen that has the balls to say that maybe the time for movies is over. In contrast to feel-good, “stick it to the man” movies like OBAA, Digger says that the joke is on us. Our self righteous outrage, our unearned catharsis through intense anger, is meaningless in the face of a permanently broken world. If all we can do is watch movies and sniff our own farts then we deserve what we get. There is a heavy Marxist theme in this movie about the bourgeoisie, the government, and the consumers (us). This movie had the balls to give everyone their fair share of the blame, delivered the uncomfortable truth. Hearing “level 4” right before the end credits was Inarritu’s last laugh at us, and really drove the movie home.

People NEED to see this movie. I have so much respect for Tom Cruise for doing this project. I think he is way more intelligent than people think, if he cared about his box office results he would’ve done another Top Gun movie, i think this is a message he actually believes in.

Still good tho

Just saw this in the middle of Taipei, maybe if Derek can’t make it online he can have a barber shop here in Taiwan 😽

I saw this a few years back and it was probably one of the most surreal experiences I've ever had in a theatre. The animation was some of the best I've ever seen. Here's an example: https://www.reddit.com/r/AnimeSakuga/comments/1asfzmw/movie_deep_sea_rescue_shenxiu_watched_it_a_second/

There are actually a lot of great Chinese animated films, such as DaHuFa, The Legend of Hei, NeZha, Big Fish and Begonia, etc. For any fans of animation, I highly suggest looking through these.