Movies - Take Two. Action!

[nycsteve]

Williams was the CLASSIC case of bipolar.

When he was uppity-up-up he was truly amazing! But the public didn't get to see his flip side, when he was downedy-down-down. Those episodes must have been devastating, to be just as depressive as he was manic when he was up.

I was wondering if he could turn on manic at will , for a performance. If he had no control , there must have been times he deflated on stage . I had always thought coke was part of the mile a minute pace . He was definitely more than a high energy stage act , he was capable of excellent movie parts. A unique man indeed.

[Scott Bails]

I always thought that the "manic" was drug-fueled.

[rcarlberg]

He said not.

Believe what you feel is the truth.

[Painter]

I was wondering if he could turn on manic at will , for a performance... I had always thought coke was part of the mile a minute pace...

I always thought that the "manic" was drug-fueled.

According to the documentary, he fed off of the "high" of performance. There is no doubt that at the peak of his fame during the "Mork" years, most of the manic was fueled by coke. But someone said in the docu that the more coke he did as the night(s) grew later, the less funny he became. And apparently, he quit coke right after Belushi died. I had forgotten that he was with Belushi for part of his (Belushi's) last night.

Williams did strike me as both someone who really got a buzz from live interaction with an audience, and as someone who felt that when he was in the public eye he always had to be "on", performing, which must have been exhausting. The docu mentions that, sober or otherwise, he would push himself beyond the limits of his body and energy reserves.

[Gruno]

I saw a documentary, Inside the Mind of Robin Williams.

For searching purposes, it is titled Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind

I just downloaded it, thanks!

[GuitarGeek]

re: Robin Williams,

I always disliked seeing him on talk shows, because, well, I imagine it must have been the manic thing. Like you'd see him on Letterman, he couldn't just come on, sit down and sanely talk about whatever the new project was, the way most talk show guests do. I remember suggesting once that it was like he was auditioning for his first role, like he was demonstrating to some director his comedic abilities (as if it was still necessary) or maybe still on coke. But I guess bipolar will do that to you.

I was having a conversation with someone about comedians, about which ones "couldn't switch it off" or were "funny all the time". This guy made the comment that "Robin Williams can't turn it off" . I didn't think to say it at the time, but it made me wonder how that worked when he was playing dramatic roles.

He had quite a few movies I liked: Club Paradise, What Dreams May Come, Good Morning Vietnam, Moscow On The Hudson, and The World According To Garp. He was also the perfect live action Popeye, too.

[mozo-pg]

For searching purposes, it is titled Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind

I just downloaded it, thanks!

No problem.

I think Robin was much more than having a biplor disorder. Foremost, he was a world class comedian, actor, father, friend with humanitarian tendancies. I'm glad the movie focused on the later and not the former.

[DocProgger]

You want to see a completely different non comedic Wiilliams, check out the chilling One Hour Photo.

[Jerjo]

I've seen enough docs on comedians to make me think that Robin was one of those guys that could turn it up for a TV appearance but calm back down. There are plenty of musicians who are shy and withdrawn off stage but get 'em up on stage and they're on fire. One sci-fi author I follow talks about doing book tours and conventions; he basically spends a good part of the day being this entertaining, wise-cracking extrovert. At the end of the day he's exhausted and back to being an introvert again.

It seems that some celebrities that can switch the star power/charisma on and off but they have to be incredibly self-aware. I read an interview some years ago, I can't even remember for sure who it was, maybe it was David E Kelly but I can't be certain. Anyhoo, someone married to an A-list actress. They were sitting in a limo approaching the red carpet and she said, "OK, get ready because I'm going to be HER now." They get out of the limo, photogs flashing, and he looks over at his wife and she's gone from the woman he knows to HER, the one the public sees on the red carpet. He said it's disorienting no matter how many times he's seen her do it.

[UnderAGlassMoon]

He had quite a few movies I liked: Club Paradise, What Dreams May Come, Good Morning Vietnam, Moscow On The Hudson, and The World According To Garp. He was also the perfect live action Popeye, too.

Agree, and I would add Mrs. Doubtfire and The Birdcage, although Hank Azaria as Agador Spartacus practically stole that movie, Robin was very good. Oh and of course as the voice of the Genie in Aladdin, he did steal that movie.

[JKL2000]

Maybe JKL is smart enough to avoid the POS that is Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Who the fuck needs it? I saw at in th university theater when I was going to school and I still regret it. There's enough pain and shit in the world without it.

It always just looked super low budget and like Motel Hell, The Hills Have Eyes, and I Spit on Your Grave. There’s not much in the “slasher” genre I have much interest in. I don’t even like “Halloween” that much, although it’s ok.

[Progatron]

It always just looked super low budget and like Motel Hell, The Hills Have Eyes, and I Spit on Your Grave. There’s not much in the “slasher” genre I have much interest in. I don’t even like “Halloween” that much, although it’s ok.

I still have a soft spot for the genre. My friends and I were obsessed with horror movies as teenagers! There was a really big independent video store around here in the mid-80s that had a massive horror section with lots of the obscure, low budget ones (including slashers) and we rented as many as we could afford. I'd probably be bored watching them now, as my tolerance for bad acting and poor production has gone way down, but there's a nostalgia element to it for me (and I saw and loved all four of the titles you mention!)

I totally get why people don't like horror movies. My wife hates them. She says she can't understand why on earth anyone would want to be scared or horrified if they can avoid it. I don't have an answer, I'm afraid. But now I'm looking forward to October, traditionally the big horror movie month for myself and many others.

[Scott Bails]

I totally get why people don't like horror movies. My wife hates them. She says she can't understand why on earth anyone would want to be scared or horrified if they can avoid it. I don't have an answer, I'm afraid.

I chuckled.

[Progatron]

I chuckled.

ZING!

[Hal...]

You want to see a completely different non comedic Wiilliams, check out the chilling One Hour Photo.

That's a good movie!

[GuitarGeek]

You want to see a completely different non comedic Wiilliams, check out the chilling One Hour Photo.

He was also very good in an episode of Law And Order: SUV,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Author..._Victims_Unit)

[Scott Bails]

He was also very good in an episode of Law And Order: SUV,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Author..._Victims_Unit)

Yeah, that was really good.

[JKL2000]

——— NO SPOILERS PLEASE ———

So because of some discussion here, I’m watching Unbreakable for the first time. I didn’t really know anything about it going in.

All I want to know is - did someone say that Unbreakable, Split, and Glass are somehow related? Or maybe it was only those last two?

I want to watch these all before having anything spoiled. Also The Happening.

EDIT:

Wait a minute, WTF? I just finished Unbreakable. I thought I was only about 2/3 Into it and it suddenly ended. That sucked!

I’m not really a big Shyamalan fan, but even for him this sucked.

Hopefully Split and Glass are better.

[Scott Bails]

I haven't seen Split yet, but yes, it is "in the same universe" as Unbreakable, and Glass appears to unite the two films, with characters from both.


I really enjoyed Unbreakable. I watched it a few months ago, and it's interesting watching it now, considering how superhero films have boomed recently.

[GuitarGeek]

On the topic of horror movies, to me, it's has to be a good movie. That rules out most of the slasher subgenre. I like a lot of pictures I've seen from the 30's-70's, things like the Universal horror movies, as well as many of the Hammer pictures (I still say Christopher Lee was the definitive Dracula). One movie I saw recently was a film with both Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi in it, called Black Cat, which I rather liked (if you've ever seen the Monkees movie Head, the bit seen on the television with Lugosi and another actor having an exchange about "Supernatural mumbo jumbo" is from this movie).

I like a lot of the low budget stuff that was done in the 70's, I mean, I've seen so many of those movies I can't even tell you the titles of all of them. I certainly liked Night Of The Lepus and Kingdom Of The Spiders. There was a movie that was somehow related to the Dark Shadows TV series, I've forgotten the title, but Kate Jackson was it (this being several years before Charlie's Angels when this one was made).


I also have a soft spot for "Jaws knock offs", so I've seen stuff like Tentacles, Up From The Depths, Piranha (and it's sequel, Piranha II: The Spawning), Barracuda, etc multiple times. Which reminds me, I need to get the DVD's of a couple of those movies (I've already got the others), having watched copies taped off late night TV in the late 80's and early 90's and DVD-R copies derived from torrents for many years.

Then there's things like An American Werewolf In London. That movie is just...I dunno, it's not exacxtly played for laughs, but there's some great moments in that movie. The scene in the theater, where David Naughton's character converses with his undead friend Jack, as well as his victims, is one of the greatest things I've ever seen in my life. The fact that each time we Jack, he's a little more decomposed, that's another thing that's just portrayed brilliantly. Oh, and this movie has the greatest monster transformation ever captured on film.

I also remember liking Wolfen and a couple of the movies in the Howling franchise (I saw at least three), though I remember little about them.

But as I said before, I think largely, the ability to make good horror movies has been largely forgotten. Everyone's trying to "out Savini" Tom Savini (kinda like how certain drummers seem bent on trying "out Peart" Neal Peart), and they fail to understand the difference between "scary" and "shocking". They take the same old tropes and repeat them, and just come up with ever more gruesome ways of dispatching the victims.

There's a bit in one of the later Friday The 13th movies where Jason literally eviscerates a woman with his machete. While she's having sex. If you know anything about slasher films, you know what the number one rule to surviving one is (everyone together, in 4 part harmony): Never, EVER have sex! So the second you see a guy and a girl shagging, you know they're basically toast. It happens in every Friday The 13th movie, it certainly happened in the first two Halloween movies, it happened in at least the first Nightmare On Elm Street movie. It's so damn predictable, it's not even funny.

It's to a point where it basically becomes more about sadism than it is about generating any kind of atmosphere or anything. I think Roger Ebert (or was it Gene Siskel? Please don't tell me it was Michael Medved!) was right when he said you get the feeling the writers of these pictures are actually rooting for the killer. That's why Michael, Jason and Freddie keep coming back (well, that and the fact that the respective franchises remained profitable).

Another thing about the Friday The 13th franchise is, the whole business of Jason still being alive was tacked at the last minute, at the suggestion of Savini. I guess thanks to Scream, everyone now knows who the killer in the first movie is (it used to be a good trivia question, because most people either had never seen the movies or had forgotten how the last reel of the first movie played out). The guy who actually wrote the original movie said that Jason was always supposed to be a victim, not a killer. He had drowned years ago, that's why his mother goes on a rampage. But Savini had just recently seen Carrie, and he felt they needed something good to "make people jump out of the chair" so suddenly Jason apparently either is merely only undead or perhaps even still alive, and his presence leaves the door open for a sequel.

A lot of times, you almost feel like you're watching a movie produced, directed and written by guys who were total dorks in high school, and these films are them getting their revenge on "the cool kids" who ostracized them back then. In fact, I remember Robert Englund even saying that's why he thought the Nightmare On Elm Street franchise was so popular, because much of the audience has that very motivation, to vicariously "get back" at their high school tormentors (or at least getting back at the girls who wouldn't give you the time of day back then and they guys they usually took up with).

There have been some horror movies in relatively recent years I liked. I never did see the original Blair Witch Project, but I did see the sequel (largely because I heard David Torn was involved in making the soundtrack), which I thought was reasonably good, with a very creepy atmosphere.

I thought the Evil Dead franchise was awesome, or at least the original four movies were. I never bothered with the reboot. The TV show Ash Vs Evil Dead was great too. The scene in the second movie, where Bruce Campbell's hand is trying to kill him is one of the funniest things ever. Lots of great funny moments on the TV show too.

And speaking of Bruce Campbell, I also really liked Bubba Ho-Tep (directed by Don Coscarelli, the same man who gave us the classic Phantasm). It's even better with the DVD audio commentary, where Campbell, in the guise of "The King" comments on the movie, as if they were able to actually get Elvis Aaron Presley to watch the movie, and he spends the whole time ripping it to shreds, kind of the way your parents might "tear apart" rock music or something like Star Trek or whatever else you held dear to your heart that they clearly didn't.

[JKL2000]

I haven't seen Split yet, but yes, it is "in the same universe" as Unbreakable, and Glass appears to unite the two films, with characters from both.


I really enjoyed Unbreakable. I watched it a few months ago, and it's interesting watching it now, considering how superhero films have boomed recently.

I guess I should live with it a little longer. I guess I was disappointed in the ending, and felt misled, which I suppose was the point.

[rcarlberg]

I also have a soft spot for "Jaws knock offs", so I've seen stuff like Tentacles, Up From The Depths, Piranha (and it's sequel, Piranha II: The Spawning), Barracuda, etc multiple times.

That reminds me: what about those movies about the giant underground worms? Now those were GOOD MOVIES.

[JKL2000]

Saw a preview last night for an upcoming movie or series made for Showtime starring Reese Witherspoon, and it used Yes’ “Your Move/I’ve Seen All Good People” as background music all the way through.

[NogbadTheBad]

Saw a preview last night for an upcoming movie or series made for Showtime starring Reese Witherspoon, and it used Yes’ “Your Move/I’ve Seen All Good People” as background music all the way through.

Big Little Lies?

[Scott Bails]

That reminds me: what about those movies about the giant underground worms? Now those were GOOD MOVIES.

The first Tremors was pretty good, in a campy sort of way. Never saw any of the myriad sequels.