First Man (2018)

All non-Nolan related film, tv, and streaming discussions.
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BlairCo wrote:
October 12th, 2018, 2:19 am
Not to lower one as to raise the other, but I felt like Chazelle succeeds in shooting his movie more like a documentary than Nolan did with Interstellar.
This is true.

For better or worse.


-Vader

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This is far better than Interstellar by any metric I can think of.

I don't agree that it doesn't cohere, I think that Chazelle's choice of Cassevetes-style point-blank intimacy, favouring tight closeups over masters runs through all sequences. Those choices domestically and at NASA acclimatise us for the preference for perspective shots on the missions (giving, probably for the first time, a sense of the actual difficulty of what is being attempted when all you have is a tiny portal), and again extreme closeups on analogue dials and readouts. In short I think Chazelle gives you the terror and makes it more real than it ever has been before. The IMAX sequence provides a brilliant contrast but then again it's consistent, favouring the tight close-up on Armstrong.

I don't understand the Tree of Life comparison beyond the era and type of neighbourhood they're living in. There may be a faint hint of the more abstract editing but there's no gliding Lubiezki-style photography going on here, and the angles chosen are largely pat. The focus moments are things like the shot held on Gosling at the White House on the phone.

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ArmandFancypants wrote:
October 12th, 2018, 5:15 pm
This is far better than Interstellar by any metric I can think of.
So it's basically the best movie of all-time? Cool

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LelekPL wrote:
October 12th, 2018, 5:40 pm
ArmandFancypants wrote:
October 12th, 2018, 5:15 pm
This is far better than Interstellar by any metric I can think of.
So it's basically the best movie of all-time? Cool
:lol:

This is why people make fun of Nolan fans.

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ArmandFancypants wrote:
October 12th, 2018, 5:15 pm
This is far better than Interstellar by any metric I can think of.

I don't agree that it doesn't cohere, I think that Chazelle's choice of Cassevetes-style point-blank intimacy, favouring tight closeups over masters runs through all sequences. Those choices domestically and at NASA acclimatise us for the preference for perspective shots on the missions (giving, probably for the first time, a sense of the actual difficulty of what is being attempted when all you have is a tiny portal), and again extreme closeups on analogue dials and readouts. In short I think Chazelle gives you the terror and makes it more real than it ever has been before. The IMAX sequence provides a brilliant contrast but then again it's consistent, favouring the tight close-up on Armstrong.

I don't understand the Tree of Life comparison beyond the era and type of neighbourhood they're living in. There may be a faint hint of the more abstract editing but there's no gliding Lubiezki-style photography going on here, and the angles chosen are largely pat. The focus moments are things like the shot held on Gosling at the White House on the phone.
Most of the domestic scenes take on the textural quality of memory and total subjectivity. That is where the comparison to Malick is found. What's captured is often free-wheeling and spontaneous, a series of moments and details and brief glimpses of faces, objects and spaces, like Super-8 home movies or documentary connected through quick cuts of free-associative editing choices. A lot of this feels borderline abstract.

While the handheld style carries over to the NASA scenes, what's shown and how is motivated by narrative and plot. There's specificity where elsewhere there is transient images and sounds. Gone is the free-associative editing. The blend of documentary and extraction is present during the set pieces, so they do cohere there, but for me, only to a point.

The critical absence of cohesion for me is in how the lives of the people around Niel, his family, friends, even his own feelings, are left smeared and indistinct. They too are in abstract. And yet, the movie demands huge audience emotion when it switches back into a narrative mode---various accidents and deaths, and the internal challenges faced by Niel, his family, coworker. Those two oppositions--the elusive elements and the narrative--never cohere completely.

I'm interested to revisit the film, especially since this isn't the movie I was expecting to get when I walked in.

(also I think comparing First Man to Interstellar in basically any way beyond technical cosmetics is bizarre and wrong-footed, Interstellar has far more metaphysical ideas on its mind attempting to blur science, religion humanity and love all into a thesis of ideas. That's why it's unwieldy and messy. First Man is a simpler movie about simpler things told in a far more simple way.)


-Vader

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This was wonderful

And I had little interest going in. Chazelle is amazing

Foy was the MVP

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Currently in the flop zone, might change later on, but that seems unlikely.£

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Master Virgo wrote:
October 13th, 2018, 10:01 am
Currently in the flop zone, might change later on, but that seems unlikely.£
Nice Guys and Blade Runner flopped with great reviews too. Gosling has no draw power at all.

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Gosling is the new Leo for me, I don't care about his bo potential, he's the only actor signing in into a project that gives it a quality guarantee.

He's really selective since 2013 and hasn't been in a single bad project

Song to Song was shot in 2012 like Gangster Squad. He's been on a crazy streak since

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Allstar wrote:
October 13th, 2018, 10:19 am
Master Virgo wrote:
October 13th, 2018, 10:01 am
Currently in the flop zone, might change later on, but that seems unlikely.£
Nice Guys and Blade Runner flopped with great reviews too. Gosling has no draw power at all.
More or less true but there are Z factors in all of these cases. He keeps picking really "arty" mid to high budget projects that are almost always marketed really really poorly.


-Vader

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