Films that made you go "HUH?!"

Mr Sleep · Post by **Mr Sleep** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 8:29 am

Originally posted by Kayless

Well for starters, we'd have to get you to see LotR for the truly great film it is. Then we go from there.

If we did that wouldn't we be in denial which could cause some repressed emotions to come out

Kayless · Post by **Kayless** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 8:41 am

Originally posted by Mr Sleep

If we did that wouldn't we be in denial which could cause some repressed emotions to come out

Come on, let it all out! Break free of your dementia! Reminds me of the Simpsons:
Shrink: Tell me, do you hate your father?
Homer: Sometimes. But the one I really hate is your father!

Leonardo · Post by **Leonardo** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 10:48 am

Another HUH Movie:

Angel Heart: Simply disturbing. One of my favorites, can´t explain why I forgot it on my other post.

@Weasel: Good movie with Dustin Hoffmann: Wag the Dog. It makes for advertising men what Devil´s Advocate makes for lawyers.

HighLordDave · Post by **HighLordDave** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 11:35 am

End of Days: Ah-nold. "Acting". Yech.

Basic Instinct: Sharon Stone is very hot. Does she kill Michael Douglas at the end?

Back to the Future II: Biff from the future goes back to the past and changes history, yet when he returns the DeLorean, it's to his old future, not the future he would have created by altering the timestream (so that Doc and Marty don't know he stole it). If you're going to make up rules about time travel, at least stick to them.

Bloodstalker · Post by **Bloodstalker** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 11:37 am

Al those movies that used to come on on USA's Up All Night with Rhonda Shear......man, none of them ever made any sense.

Georgi · Post by **Georgi** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 10:42 pm

Originally posted by HighLordDave
Back to the Future II: Biff from the future goes back to the past and changes history, yet when he returns the DeLorean, it's to his old future, not the future he would have created by altering the timestream (so that Doc and Marty don't know he stole it). If you're going to make up rules about time travel, at least stick to them.

LOL

Time-travel movies are always full of awkward paradoxes, aren't they?

Originally posted by Dottie
Anyone else who wants to join those who do not rate a movie after the special effects budget?

Sure, I'll join that... but it won't stop me liking LotR

I could give you a whole list of movies that were special-effects driven nonsense. But not every movie that uses special effects abandons every other element of the movie; LotR is much, much more than some special effects.

Dottie · Post by **Dottie** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 10:45 pm

Originally posted by Georgi

Sure, I'll join that... but it won't stop me liking LotR I could give you a whole list of movies that were special-effects driven nonsense. But not every movie that uses special effects abandons every other element of the movie; LotR is much, much more than some special effects.

Let me suggest a cease-fire concerning the LotR topic. If nothing else for the sake of not spamming up this thread.

Georgi · Post by **Georgi** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 10:55 pm

Originally posted by Dottie
Let me suggest a cease-fire concerning the LotR topic. If nothing else for the sake of not spamming up this thread.

Hey, I suggested that ages ago, it was you and Kayless who carried on arguing it...

And I was replying to HLD's comment on BttF, I just couldn't resist adding that in

C Elegans · Post by **C Elegans** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 11:18 pm

posted by Sleep

That would probably be Abyss, aluded to earlier in this thread, not a great film by my standards, it is okay, but not exactly a masterpiece

I actually thought it was absolutely horrible - especially the ending. The only good water-based movie I can think of is Das Boot, it's slow but it's good.

posted by Humanflyz
Oh, about 2001: Space Odyssesy, you really have to read the series to understand the story.

You think so? I never read the books, but I thought I understood the story quite well. Perhaps I didn't...

posted by Georgi
I'm still confused about this one. I read the book (not recommended unless you have a strong stomach...) just to see if it was any clearer, and I was no less confused at the end of it. I think it's deliberately open-ended.

Hm, the book allows for both interpretations too, but not as much as the movie IMO, so I definitely think the reader is supposed to be in some doubt, but conclude it was real. That's my interpretation.

I didn't find EWS confusing so much as just bad (glad to see someone agrees... Kubrick's masterpiece indeed!). It's beautifully made, but the storyline, the "acting", and parts of the script (the last line springs to mind) weren't that good.

I agree wholeheartedly, and to me Kubrick's masterpiece certainly is A clockwork orange. EWS was beautiful yes, but IMO rather meaningless and the acting was flat, to say the least.

Georgi: Hey, I was the first to criticise that line! Yes, it sucks... but it doesn't ruin the whole movie

Dottie: No, they have a good pack of other scenes to do that. But that was the only one i could fit into one line.

ROFL

Back to Movies I don't understand

A Chinese ghost story - a Chinese film, has anyone seen it? Is she a ghost? Do they both become ghosts? Or he also a ghost from the start? Or are none of them ghosts?

Dreams - Akira Kurosawas last movie I think, very beautiful but was there something you should understand? Or not?

Oh, and this Australian movie, I don't remember the name of it but it was supposed to be a comedy, it was about a young boy who had all sorts of problems at home and in school, he was bullied, he's step father abused him and killed his dog, I think, and the movie ended with him getting relegated from school and making a lot of fish-tanks flood the place. What was so funny? It looked like social realism to me

Tamerlane · Post by **Tamerlane** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 3:46 am

Originally posted by C Elegans
Back to Movies I don't understand

A Chinese ghost story - a Chinese film, has anyone seen it? Is she a ghost? Do they both become ghosts? Or he also a ghost from the start? Or are none of them ghosts?

God, I seen this movie so many times. I always assumed she was the ghost.

Moleman · Post by **Moleman** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 10:04 am

Film that made me go "HUH?": Fight Club.

I had to think it through a couple of times to get it, but still there's some black holes.
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The very end for example, so he shot himself in the head? And lived? What about his alter-ego, did he shoot himself in the head so that only his other personality was killed? Did he blow up the whole city/nation/world?!

[Makes mental note: Go and edit your wierd outburst at the "Time well spent?" -thread before anybody sees it...

Mr Sleep · Post by **Mr Sleep** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 12:40 pm

Originally posted by Moleman
Film that made me go "HUH?": Fight Club.
The very end for example, so he shot himself in the head? And lived? What about his alter-ego, did he shoot himself in the head so that only his other personality was killed? Did he blow up the whole city/nation/world?!

[Makes mental note: Go and edit your wierd outburst at the "Time well spent?" -thread before anybody sees it...

SPOILER INDEED

Shooting himself broke the psychosis he got into, he in essence killed Tyler Durden by shooting him, although he lived because the shot was not a fatal one.

They also blew up 3 sky crapers, what relevance this had, i do not know, i have only watched end twice, so i can't tell you.

i noticed anyway

Ned Flanders · Post by **Ned Flanders** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 1:18 pm

I rented training day last night. pretty good movie, good acting by hawke and a very convincing job by denzel although I don't really remember him ever being bad.
Movie spoilers big time
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Anyway, the "Huh?" comes in towards the end of the movie when Denzel leaves hawke for dead in the mexican gangster household. The wallet of the girl he saved earlier in the movie falls out his pocket and she just happens to be the niece of the guy with a double barreled sawed off shotgun pointed at his throat. Hawke explains the story and the guy calls his niece who verifies and describes the looks of teh cop who saved her. They then decide to let Hawke live. Who wrote this crap? The movie was so good up until that point. Maybe something else should've happened to denzel where he still didn't get the money to the russians by twelve midnight; but Hawke should have been blown away in the bathtub.

Perhaps the whole sequence is a double standard. When Hawke saves the girl, Denzel tells him that's not their job and he shouldn't have bothered. Is this the act of nobility paying off later in the movie. I don't know but I still say it is garbage. Up until that point, I thought it was a great movie. I rented the DVD, so I listen to the directors commentary version tonight. I am real curious to hear what he had to say about that scene.

EMINEM · Post by **EMINEM** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 2:57 pm

Another "HUH?!" movie I recently saw was "The Fast and the Furious." Now don't get me wrong, I thought it was the best independent of 2001, and the 150+ million gross receipts it has generated is well-deserved, but what I don't understand is the ending where Vin Diesel drives off into the blue, leaving behind a home, two half-dead friends (the big stupid one, and the little scrawny fellow with A.D.D), and a devoted sister, in order to escape the police on his tail. Diesel's reasoning that he'd rather die than go back to prison, and that the momentary rush of freedom, adrenaline, and nitrous oxide that courses through his veins when drag racing being the only thing he lives for, I found completely out of character. He struck me as a father/big brother figure to his little gang, holding down a respectable business, paying off a mortgage, and even leading them spiritually. And then he suddenly forsakes all that so he can continue racing cars in Mexico... HUH?!?

I think it would have been more in line with his character (not to mention a better finish to a film) had he turned himself in to the police and done his time, promising to pick up the pieces of his life once he gets out. Hi-jacking those trucks was obviously his idea, anyway, and he should have taken responsibility for it, as well as the injury done to his friends in that last botched-up attempt to steal some Sony Playstations. Anyway, unless a sequal is forthcoming - or better yet, a DVD with an alternate ending - the Fast and Furious will remain stalled on my HUH?! list of movies.

fable · Post by **fable** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 8:04 pm

My "Huh?" movie would have to be Matrix, possibly the worst film I've ever seen. Typical instance: the renegade guy who's betrayed the group kills them one by one, as they're in the Matrix. Then he starts talking, with a long, annoying, stupid monologue that doesn't fit his character, but allows him to supposedly build up suspense before killing the hero and heroine...which we all know he isn't going to do, anyway. He gets killed by a man he supposedly killed a few minutes ago, who miraculously "got better."

Talk about having no idea of what to do...

Dottie · Post by **Dottie** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 8:20 pm

@Fabel: A thing worse than that was imo the explanation to why the machines had enslaved humanity. I mean for good sake, didnt anyone ever explaine the basics about human energy sources and nutrition to them?

fable · Post by **fable** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 8:23 pm

Originally posted by Dottie
@Fabel: A thing worse than that was imo the explanation to why the machines had enslaved humanity. I mean for good sake, didnt anyone ever explaine the basics about human energy sources and nutrition to them?

Agreed: cliched as can be, and about on par with 1950s robot-on-rampage films. Then there was that part where the hero and heroine, inside the Matrix, do 360 degree spins, and shoot dozens of enemy agents to death who just stand there. It was more like a geek's idea of being macho than anything remotely understandable or even explainable in terms of their universe's rules.

Dottie · Post by **Dottie** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 8:31 pm

Originally posted by fable

Agreed: cliched as can be, and about on par with 1950s robot-on-rampage films. Then there was that part where the hero and heroine, inside the Matrix, do 360 degree spins, and shoot dozens of enemy agents to death who just stand there. It was more like a geek's idea of being macho than anything remotely understandable or even explainable in terms of their universe's rules.

Well, lets be fair. The agents arent just standing there, they are busy fireing huge amounts of bullets into the walls and the surounding air.

Besides its a well-known fact that people doing cartwheels are impossible to harm.

C Elegans · Post by **C Elegans** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 9:49 pm

Originally posted by Tamerlane

God, I seen this movie so many times. I always assumed she was the ghost.

Perhaps you are right, it was many years I saw it, and it was the first Chinese movie I saw, so maybe I read too much into it since I constantly had the feeling there were more behind the surface that I should understand.

@Fable & Dottie: I absolutely agree with you about The matrix, what a cheap, trivial cliched story presented in a glossy package! The only reason I saw the movie, was because at the time, I was working as a clinician at a psychosis ward for patients who had their first episode of schizophrenia. After having met 3 young male patients in a few weeks, who all told me "it feels just like Matrix, have you seen it?" I sort of felt it was my duty to see the movie although I heavily suspected I wouldn't like it. Anyway, I see at a service to my patients

I wouldn't say it's the worst movie I've seen though - long ago, a friend fooled into watching "Pretty women" because he had misunderstood the reviews and believed it was a serious movie about life as a prosititute. And what about From dusk to dawn? I saw it as part of bet between two of my friends, what a pain, I'd rather go to the dentist and have a root canal made.

Ned Flanders · Post by **Ned Flanders** » Fri Mar 22, 2002 12:19 am

From dusk til dawn is your classic b movie. You can't expect it to be good. Put together a lame plot, with moderate acting, lots of violence, some critters, a couple of sexy broads and voila, a cult film has been made. If you take the approach that's it's actually a comedy, it becomes more viewable. Perhaps it's embarrasing to say, but the b movies are one of my favorite genres of film. I find them usually entertaining, they amuse me, and lots of them have rewatchable characteristics.

Again, I never said they were good movies, just entertaining.