Come Anticipate Martin McDonagh's 'In Bruges'

Ralph Fiennes looks great...rest of movie, not so sure.

should be interesting. he's claimed he only used theatre as a steppingstone to film.

I'll be seeing it, along with that new(ish) Woody Allen flick that Farrell is in. I think this is the first time I can say I've been looking forward to one Colin Farrell movie, let alone two.

My friend was in his play on Broadway for a while, Lieutenant of Inishmore. He saw this at the weekend and said it was really good, trailer looks a bit "Lock Stock" but I've an open mind so far.

Trailer was a bit off putting but there were a few funny lines in it. Could be worth a punt.

Saw Colin Farrell in Bruges when he was filming this.

That is all

i keep wanting this thread to be about michael mcdonald

It's an even funnier Colin F trailer than the Woody Allen 'thriller.'

this looks terrible

From his plays, I expect the film won't be quite as "antic" as the trailer.

I liked "The Pillowman" quite a bit but I haven't seen any of the other plays. thought Six Shooter was pretty overrated though.

apparently so does he! (that Times article last Sun)

Saw it this afternoon. This ends up having more substance than style. I left it feeling more stressed than I did going in, which indicates that it works in a way that's different from, say, Smokin' Aces. Very Catholic.

Why has Nath not posted on this thread yet.

this is a dud.

dwarf jokes. lovable hitmen.

fat american tourists chasing a guy jokes.

lynchian?

2-days-in-the-valley-ian.

2 days in the valley at least had a charlize theron-teri hatcher catfight. in underpants.

the trailer for in bruges looked so bad that i was surprised when i realized it was the mcdonagh movie. still looks like one to catch on late-night cable, at best.

2 days in the valley was really the wrong one to pick but i was looking for something generically post-tarantino.

This looks unbelievably bad

^^ slocki is 'love & a 45' what you're after?

i've liked a few of the plays he's written, on the page anyway. he is a little dubious...

I'm halfway between you guys and the four stars Ebert gave it.

On one hand, I'm so tired of the hitman genre, and on the other hand it seems to be a catalyst for a lot of good writers/actors/directors (Collateral, No Country for Old Men, and to a lesser extent this one).

Huh. I've seen this trailer multiple times (seemingly before the last three or four movies I've seen), and it looks terrible. But then I know nothing about McDonagh's reputation, and it looks like it's gotten good reviews. But I can't say I'm eager to see it.

Oh wait, he's the guy that did The Pillowman? Weird. (Not that I saw it.)

ebert needs to chill the fuck out.

fortunately, it seems, I was sick the day I was sposed to review it.

Apart from the blunt convergences and tie-togethers at the end (the kind of stuff that flies better in a theatrical setting, right?), I liked this. I don't get "generically post-Tarantino" at all, unless we're focusing entirely on style/genre, and not the fact that this has an entirely different kind of content (haha short version = it has content at all, which neither Tarantino nor "generic post-Tarantino" does not, and actual characters, compared to Tarantino/post-Tarantino's collections of quirks with only plot functions)

Certain middle sections, once it's passed on from Farrell being funny to Gleeson being something else -- Gleeson on the phone lying to Fiennes! -- are terrific.

This film was wonderful. I see the Tarantino comparisons, though I also agree that it is more substance than style (unlike Tarantino). But I think it captured the intense joy of seeing his early stuff first time around (plus the seeming digressions actually came to something). Very good.

Mind you, I'm an unashamed fan of Way of the Gun, though I think this is a much better film than that one.

never realized you could stay alive so long after being shot so much!

i hated this movie for wasting another troubled, delicate, quiet, perfect performance by gleeson

thought ferrell was way out of his depth here

the tone of it wavers disastrously between "lock, stock" and something much deeper - only an actor like gleeson could pull off the tightrope act without looking foolish

friends tell me i'll be feeling this but it looks like some old bullshit to me

gleeson has an enormous head

and farrell weirdly reminds me more of george w bush every time i see him

this is truly the worst film i have seen in a long time

it sucks, totally a dressed-up '90s tarantino ripoff. actually though colin farrell was ok tho

This movie won't fucking leave the Mpls. Landmark multiplex. It's been there longer than My Big Fat Greek Wedding.

Longer than March of the Penguins.

really?

is it earning??

does minneapolis have a large irish-belgian community?

It's still showing at Piper's Alley in Chicago, as well.

I liked it well enough when I saw it and have now almost completely forgotten it.

I stand by my month-old praise, though I do still think someone involved should have objected to all the annoying convergences at the end. The pat tying up of meaningless knots does not a climax make, unless you're Larry David.

I was sure the little guy was Peter Dinklidge, but it was not. There could be a good production of True West with those two.

St. Paul has a significant Irish population, but I think it's really more a case of crap boutique indie movies that do even halfway good at the BO get held over just about indefinitely in this town.

i don't get how it's tarantino-esque in "style/genre"? it's not a genre mashup; the camera work isn't gimmicky or "indie" feeling; the chronology isn't all mixed up.. aren't those the things people mean by tarantino's style? on the other hand, it's about hitmen who piss off their boss, have rambling conversations, react with humor to life-threatening situations, take drugs they shouldn't

part of the reason i hated it is that i staked everything on the ending, hoping it would justify the time i'd spent on the rest of it

i thought fiennes was awful

p.s. the "american" accents the fatties had were the most wildly incorrect american accents i've heard this side of radio 4; say what you will about colin ferrell but he could have given them some pointers there

This film is very funny and well-acted. The plot is a little contrived, particularly at the end, but that didn't bother me at all.

This wasn't the madcap comedy the trailers led me to believe it would be, but I thought it was terrific and I think anybody slagging it for being a Tarantino ripoff are completely missing the point.

i have had this on my netflix queue for a while but I keep pushing it back. this thread has convinced me to delete it altogether. i also hate the fuck out of farrell.

I'm usually not a fan either, but he's excellent in this.

Only Tarantino similarities I got were men with guns and elliptical dialogue.

kinda surprised at how relatively grisly this flick was

i have had this on my netflix queue for a while but I keep pushing it back. this thread has convinced me to delete it altogether.

that is weird, what were you hoping we'd say about it? this is a great little film, it is weirdly touching and strange and funny and tightly acted.

this is truly the worst film i have seen in a long time

― Tracer Hand, Monday, June 16, 2008 4:17 PM (5 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

it sucks, totally a dressed-up '90s tarantino ripoff. actually though colin farrell was ok tho

― s1ocki, Monday, June 16, 2008 6:02 PM (5 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I don't feel like I saw the same movie as you people. it's nothing like lock stock, for example, holy shit, that is the worst movie ever. it never once crossed my mind to compare this movie to Tarantino, I don't think it's got anything in common with him.

i also really liked this!

Me too! I love Tarantino, but never got even the slightest nibble of similarity. It's worlds away. Mad Eye Moody = awesome.
And I love Ralph Fiennes in this, he's great in these kind of 'out there' roles. SO great.

it never once crossed my mind to compare this movie to Tarantino, I don't think it's got anything in common with him.

― akm, Friday, December 5, 2008 7:54 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

fwiw the trailer led me to believe I'd be getting something Tarantinoish, but I was damn satisfied (if initially disturbed) by the darker and more substantive tack this took.

I liked that it was willing to delve so deep into their morality...I found that last act really, really moving.

it is weirdly touching and strange and funny and tightly acted.

^^^^ on this. Liked it a lot and Farrell was great.

i really like colin f. a lot in this.

i like how when he's in the park and he was gonna kill himself he cries like you really cry when you cry, like a pathetic bitch and not like some kinda stoic movie tough guy kinda way....

http://www.villagevoice.com/2008-01-29/film/more-adventures-in-gangsterland/
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/mar2008/brug-m19.shtml

M@tt you seem to be king of spoilers

that scene isn't even near the actual climax of the film

gabbneb do you have any opinions of your own or are you just using those as stand-ins since you haven't seen the movie this thread is about

I thought this movie was quite enjoyable, and I fucking hate colin farrell. I will second omar re: unexpected grisliness though.

i have seen this movie, and share the opinions expressed in those reviews. the movie is not worth my taking the time to express them on my own.

this guy

well that should be reason enough for most of the rest of ILX's regular posters to go see it, I think

perhaps they will weigh more carefully than my opinions those of the voice and the worldly socialists. and some other ilxors seem to agree that yr fancy movie sucks.

Is that World Socialist site some kind of satire?

lol worldly socialists

One wants to ask: why? Why make such a film at this point in time? There’s a good deal going on in the world, why this? Does anyone care about a pair of dreamed-up assassins?

what an absurd point this is

what an absurd world

Dudes making movies about hitmen, Gabbneb linking to a bunch of Trotskyites, will the wonders never cease

did David Brooks see this movie?

This is one of my favourite few films of the year. I thought it was great. All three main actors were brilliant. The pay-off was a bit silly.

I mean the pay-off at the tower. The very last scene on the film set I liked.

Popular moods, and even moods within the film industry, have changed. Serious things are going on.

Er...what?
I guess it's all Catholic guilt and whatnot (Bruges represents purgatory, no?) but I liked it, mostly for Brendan Gleeson actually. Someone needs to make a film about a dwarf hitman if it hasn't been done already.

Popular moods, and even moods within the film industry, have changed. Serious things are going on. The flippancy, the annoying and self-conscious “playfulness,” as well as the gratuitous and contrived violence, of In Bruges seem largely beside the point. McDonagh could probably do something better; perhaps he should try a hand at it.

Tres, tres retardé.

king of spoilers? i posted something in the george rr martin thread i had taken down in like 5 seconds.

and i usually avoid ILE film threads. which i will continue to do.

but anyway this movie was good.

I mean I understand dudes are trying to be socially engaged but that's such an oblique way of going about it: McDonagh should clearly be making black comedies about Abu Ghraib!!

Exactly. There are problems with this film, but the idea that people don't want to see silly movies is just ludicrous. Someone should show that guy this year's Sundance selection and some Iraq film box office. Shit, last year's Sundance selection, which included In Bruges, would have made this point.

the idea that people don't want to see silly movies is just ludicrous

they're not saying that people don't want to see silly movies, they're objecting to the trivialization of violence

not that anyone saw this shit

Gross
$7,757,130 (USA) (15 June 2008)
£4,729,687 (UK) (1 June 2008)

zing

they're objecting to the trivialization of violence

haha you're an imbecile.

six shooter was pretty good

the movie is not worth my taking the time
(1 hour ago)

also maybe go to some time management classes

and to say the violence in this movie is trivialized is completely missing the point

the hoos always gotta be more polite about a thing

its a shame when a thing happens i figure you sugarcoat it make it nice for the people

M@tt: no offense intended! just meant to be a playful rib after noticing your mod request on the RR Martin thread.

i've decided to keep this movie on my queue for the simple fact that it inspired this much discussion.

i think the biggest reason i keep pushing it back is because i recently saw L4yer Cake, and don't want it to be like that.

I don't care how much money this movie made. That guy's argument for why it is a bad film is the kind of demonstrative asshattery that is beneath even the worst ILM poster.

What tombot said.

I liked this a lot.

also maybe go to some time management classes

also maybe try anger management classes

see how it is?

objection!

Thread of the week.

i fucking LOVED this.

"two manky whores and a racist midget... i'm going home"

i still think this is great.

i really liked it too (just saw it a few weeks ago)

this movie owned. every Farrell Hater I know even thought he was good in it.

Yes - a terrific film. Agree re it being a "test case" for Farrell Haters, in much the same way that Russell Crowe Haters are almost always won over by Master And Commander.

Bill A otm I think!

(not sure if I know any serious crowe haters)

Results 1 - 10 of about 173,000 for normal beer gay beer. (0.20 seconds)

I have a friend who once claimed that he wanted to have a bare knuckle fight with Crowe, such was his hatred. Once he knocked him out he would then move on to Farrell, who apparently would pose less of a challenge.

got no problem with crowe, but i couldn't stand farrell and nearly gave in bruges a miss.
glad i decided to watch it though farrell was great.

one slight problem with farrell in this movie is that the part is obviously written for someone less good-looking. i refuse to believe that someone who looks like him would be excited or surprised to meet a girl on holiday, no matter how wet behind the ears the character is supposed to be. that's nit-picking though. his performance was great and i'm glad he was in it.

I liked this film, but Ralph Fiennes doing a Ben Kingsley in Sexy Beast stretched the credibility just a little, did anyone think?

Thought Fiennes was terrible - whatta ham

i just pretended he was ben kingsley

ah, reminds me of the "french actresses" thread :

http://z.about.com/d/worldfilm/1/7/J/4/1/ClemencePoesy.jpg

one slight problem with farrell in this movie is that the part is obviously written for someone less good-looking. i

We're talking about Colin Farrell, right?

and he's got these disturbing eyebrows moving all over the place in this...

i just think mcdonagh's looney tunes stuff got the best of him here - it could have ended so much better

"I liked this film, but Ralph Fiennes doing a Ben Kingsley in Sexy Beast stretched the credibility just a little, did anyone think?"

this was my slight problem with this although feinnes is not as objectionable a screen presence to me as kingsley.

Kingsley in the last ten years has been so much fun that I've forgotten the Gandhi years.

Hate Farrell normally, really liked this film.

Yeah it's contrived, but what fiction isn't, and it kind of adds to the silliness and the displacement of it. And unlike a lot of overly contrived movies I didn't really know what to expect next.

I thought this was a wicked little film, thoroughly enjoyed it.

Farrell is always better when he doesn't have to do an accent cf. Intermission

This film is funny.

I liked this film, but Ralph Fiennes doing a Ben Kingsley in Sexy Beast stretched the credibility just a little, did anyone think?

The scene confirming this: Fiennes choosing a gun. The Uzi dialogue was about one line too long, too "offensive," too cute in that post-Tarantino way.

it did kinda feel like a guy ritchie movie when he was onscreen

Really dug this. Not flawless by any means, but a really clever, fun, alarming film.

thought this was really entertaining

threw me for a loop when they did the reveal on ralph fiennes on the phone, totally not who i pictured after listening to just his voice for the first half of the movie

farrell's a p. good comic actor

This film really divides opinion. I've got at least two friends who absolutely hated it, and I just cannot understand why.

Enjoyed it.

Saw Colin Farrell in Bruges when he was filming this.

Aha! What scene? I passed by the set when I came from my knitting class.

I can not express how much I hated this film. Really. I fucking loathed this film so much. It has taught me one thing: that my hatred can go to extremes that I hadn't experienced yet. (hyperbole? yeah I guess)

It's just ridiculous, really. I mean, shit I know this shit's not meant to be realistic but wtf man. Midgets? Drugs? In Bruges? Sure, yeah, but not this bad acid trip. Also the opening scene was edited the worng way cause they walk along the Love Lake and that it didn't fit or sth. I'm trying to erase all memories I had from this movie out of my fucking brain.

just watched this, have to go with akm's "it is weirdly touching and strange and funny and tightly acted". So many great little lines and scenes, Brendan Gleeson was brilliant, I *liked* Fiennes' hamminess.

Finally watched this last week and I really sort of loved it.

CF was great and very funny which I didn't really expect.

I know there were funnier moments/lines but I keep laughing at this:

Ray, you are about the worst tourist in the whole world.
Ken, I grew up in Dublin. I love Dublin. If I grew up on a farm, and was retarded, Bruges might impress me but I didn't, so it doesn't.

Also I lost it when they cut to the party scene and CF was telling the midget about all the midget suicides.

Jordan Prentice is the fucking best

Ray: One gay beer for my gay friend, one normal beer for me because I am normal.

YES!

I want to watch it again now.

just saw this one after having it pop up in my netflix queue as something i would like ... i enjoyed this film a LOT, many great lines (e.g., "two manky whores and a racist midget... i'm going home") and (as someone upthread said) great little scenes. i don't think that this is very tarantino-esque, but it is something that someone who likes tarantino would enjoy IMHO.

this movie is fucking brilliant

i liked it!

i keep knocking this off the top of my netflix but now i will have it delivered

I want to watch it again.

Oh wait - I said that a month ago. Still do!

great stuff

was kinda surprised at how much i enjoyed this

y'all need to see six-shooter

I liked this. Is CF wearing fake eyebrows?

tied everything up just a little too neatly, but really nicely done. really good lines.

You can get Six Shooter on Youtube. It won the Oscar for Live Action Short in 2006, definitely worth a watch

Is there some secret viral campaign to get me to watch this movie? Even the coffee shop girls are talking about it.

people liking stuff isn't a "viral campaign"

ps i didn't like this movie that much

i didn't like this movie that much

I think that's the first time I've heard someone with a sort of non-commitall take on this movie. It's got the most passionate haters 'n' lovers of any sleeper I can think of since maybe "Juno."

(ps I hated this movie through-and-through but I've been fascinated (if baffled) by the way it's been embraced)

yea i didnt *love* it but its v. fun & entertaining and that compensates a lot for the overly synched up/DO U SEE ending.

also yea ferrell's eyebrows totally pwn certain scenes in a good way imo

Finally watched this again and maybe liked it even more than the first time. CF is so funny and I don't think I realized how weirdly touching it was at towards the end between BG and CF. I got a little teary eyed tbh.

super. choppy, funny, bleak. it struck me there is no character in it that has a purely good nature except the hotel owner.

certain sections are stylised (the pinteresque phone dialogue between gleeson and fiennes for example), but the whole piece moves with such a jaunt i could accept the stylistic fluctuations completely.

Just watched it last night on DVD.

The first 3/4 of it were well-acted and unexpectedly funny, most especially Colin Farrell's character. The humor flowed naturally from the characters and I could believe in them as humans, not mere excuses to make gags, as in so many comedies.

Fiennes character more or less ruined the movie for me, but not because of it being poorly acted. Fiennes did about as well as he could with it. More because of the writing. Once Fiennes' character came on screen the plot went downhill pretty rapidly. Nothing that came out of Fiennes character improved the movie, afaics. Although I can see why the screenwriter failed to notice this, because Fiennes character was probably fun to imagine, and looked better in imagination than it did in context.

Problem was, the logic of Fiennes character was so violent that introducing him required the movie to end in a bloodbath that added nothing worthwhile.

I liked this a lot. Why? akm put it just about spot on...

"this is a great little film, it is weirdly touching and strange and funny and tightly acted."

<3

wau at so much of this thread. how the f has this anything to do with tarantino or post-tarantino-ness?

in bruges is a great film, really fuckin funny, though i agree with aimless that it slackens a little after fiennes (who i often like and don't understand the rote hate he gets -- oh no, a posh actor, whatever next) turns up.

i generally like farrell, and he just kills it in this. don't think he was nominated for any awards, which is silly and petty.

(ps ella taylor is a moron out to make her name.)

luv this movie

really need to see it again

So good. Wish my bro hadn't lost my copy of it, could stick it on now.

One of the most underrated, under-seen gems of the decade, hands down. Such an odd mix of stuff linked by some brilliant dialogue, strong performances (yes, even the cartoonish ones) and inexplicable references to "Don't Look Now."

lol as much as i disagree with u hm on avatar, that's how much i agree with you on this

yeah i like this movie, more than i expected. gleeson and farrell are a good team, they should do more together.

this film made me laugh a hell of a lot.

farrell and gleeson both got golden globe nominations, fwiw

"mark that under who gives a shit" - zach g

uh oh, somebody has the mondays!

farrell's irish accent is a travesty tbh

Can you elaborate on that? I was under the impression that he is Irish. Is he hamming it up in this?

In the space of 6 months last year i saw Colin Farrell, a man i'd not seen in any films before, in 2 completely different parts in 2 completely different and utterly amazing films; this and Miami Vice. I was mighty impressed i can tell you, as he'd pulled off that 'little indie-type film/ big hollywood movie' balancing act thing so well.
If i hadn't been told specifically i don't think i'd have even noticed this was the same guy.

He gets a bad rep i recall for some reason or other (though not on ILX maybe?) but he's surely some kind of mad acting genius.

Or he has a helluva agent.

nah chap just raggin on him.

pisces- farrell is usually good value, even in shitty movies. he's hilarious in daredevil, and very good in phone booth and tigerland, which are both well worth catching (not sure i'd say the same about daredevil tbh).

I think it's his rougeish alpha-male public persona that gets people's backs up more than his acting ability. Also he's been in some toss films in his time.

c. 2003–4 or so he was in a ton of mediocre films, and he was shagging everyone, and that got people's backs up.

any of you who haven't seen intermission need to watch it

he's a funny and charming dude when he calms down a bit. 'calming down' may or may not refer to substances wearing off tbh.

and yeah intermission is very good, with a very funny farrell turn

Farrell also did a really good and really convincing post-rehab attrition tour that made up for a lot of lost ground. I mean, he's funny in this movie, but his performance is also very sad and soulful. It's all in the eyebrows.

really need to see it again

― everybody's into weirdness right now (gbx), Saturday, January 16, 2010 6:50 PM (9 months ago) Bookmark

just did---still great

really old-fashioned morality play now that i think about it. not gonna bother to read upthread but i think the tarantino-ish quality can only be found in the fact that it's a "genre" piece that tries (maybe fails iyho) to aim higher.

the soundtrack is really weird. all piano fugues and nu-metal interludes, really doesn't match the tone of the script, but w/e

The main theme is a really nice piece of music imo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnRyHPyGf-s

Carter Burwell is perhaps my favourite modern film composer.

Martin's brother's movie the guard has a 95% on rotten tomatoes

i thought it was fucking awful

i didnt think it was awful, but not very good. definitely wished that gleeson & cheadle had done a new movie with martin instead.

it was cool gleeson was watching the shout on tv in 1 scene

the writing/dialogue was dreadful, every cliche in the world & @ every beat the movie really thinks its clever & funny & isnt even a little

I was sure the little guy was Peter Dinklidge, but it was not. There could be a good production of True West with those two.

― Eazy, Monday, June 16, 2008 6:59 PM (3 years ago) Bookmark Suggest

This blew my mind a little bit, I've been thinking it was Dinklage for years. I am obviously some kind of dwarf racist.

Still not seen In Bruges but this thread has me curious. The trailer looked awful, was it just badly marketed?

Yes.

I remember thinking the trailer looked really bad and was totally surprised by it. It was nothing like what I thought it would be.

lol @ all you dwarf racists

it was cool gleeson was watching the shout on tv in 1 scene

the writing/dialogue was dreadful, every cliche in the world & @ every beat the movie really thinks its clever & funny & isnt even a little

― johnny crunch, Saturday, August 20, 2011 7:08 PM (21 minutes ago) Bookmark

i pretty much agree, but gleeson has a superhuman ability to make anything watchable as long as he's onscreen. his and cheadle's charisma kept the whole thing afloat. and i thought there were a few decent gags, and some cool music. but obv i'd much rather watch a new martin mcdonagh movie with those guys in it

still think its weird to hear ppl talking about this guy considering what a local celeb he was for me growing up. glad for him that this was a hit.

never seen it or anything

A spectacular feature debut from McDonagh, it's great news that In Bruges will soon be followed up by another black comedy, this one going under the brilliantly unsubtle title of Seven Psychopaths. That killer title has already drawn in a stellar cast, with Sam Rockwell, Mickey Rourke and Christopher Walken, joining previous collaborator, Colin Farrell, on the project.

According to Variety, who broke the story, Farrell stars as a writer struggling to complete his latest script, also called Seven Psychopaths, but soon becomes embroiled in some sort of dog kidnapping caper thanks to his two friends, played by Rockwell and Walken. Mickey Rourke will play the decidedly upset gangster whose dog is kidnapped.

this sounds so howlingly dire that it'll make me retroactively hate in bruges

"decidedly upset"

saw 7 psychopaths this morning - blech

Saw the post above and thought, "Wait, is Rourke in this too?" Then googled and found

http://filmdrunk.uproxx.com/2011/11/mickey-rourke-out-of-seven-psychopaths-calls-martin-mcdonagh-a-jerkoff

loved in bruges but im wary about 7 psychos

did not love in bruges and this new one looks like the worst guy ritchie bullshit strain ever

its cool that mcdonagh's keeping the dream of the 90s alive, it just doesnt look that funny

it's exactly the part of 90s cinema nerdery that needs to stay dead

It's too bad because his Irish-centric non-hitman plays are terrific.

zachylon & Eazy both otm

My friend worked on this and he claims he likes it. I remain deeply skeptical.

well it wants 2 have it both ways - it's a send up/deconstruction of all those hitman/killer cliches while also operating w/in that world - main prob is how tone deaf & unfunny it is

chuckled @ walken a few times tho tbh

It's too bad because his Irish-centric non-hitman plays are terrific.

I saw a production of 'The Lieutenant of Inishmore' a few years ago., it was woeful stuff. "Father Ted meets Tarantino", arghh

Kept waiting for "Seven Psychopaths" to be more than what it is, and while I was ultimately disappointed at what it was (meta cliches?) I guess I enjoyed it enough. Can't believe he'd be satisfied with such a hoary screenwriter lives his own story conceit, though. It's been done a lot better (see: "Adaptation," etc.)

Love how often Sam Rockwell is cast for a particular strain of manic overacting. Loved Walken's underacting. Liked Farrell in this, who I think has been solid since sobering up, and got his own overacting out of his system in "Fright Night."

Farrell's performance in IB is one of my favourite of the last five years, and I pretty much hated him before that.

That was his big come back post clean-up, right?

Yeah, "Miami Vice" was two years before that.

Which means there was much soul searching and rehab in between.

Farrell is always better when he's acting in his own accent

love hoos itt

currently watching dis new ting and finding it very hard to watch cuz it is not 1996 and the sense of anachronism is just too great

whoever the bawbag is who isnt farrell i hate him

this is fucking waste

what the fuck nakh, we were watching this not half a fucking hour ago, gave up due to tiredness

are we in a mindmeld? god i hope so

still only el sur from this year, need more of its like

the poster for this always makes me think of the Dream Of The 90s song from portlandia. thats what mcdonagh is doing... living that dream

waste is the word. I liked Walken though. Especially his pronunciation of "hallucinogens"

i did find this to be majorly disappointing. there a couple solid chuckles, but there's nothing even slightly fresh or surprising about it. whereas In Bruges was a huge surprise (maybe just because i wasnt familiar with mcdonagh back then).

it's weird that he wants to jump into "meta" Hollywood shit so soon. Try just making a solid movie first. I've never seen any of the plays

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jit3YhGx5pU

swore i'd never see his stuff again for some reason but will obviously see this

It will end horribly and be absolutely worth every minute

All in for this

yup

mostly lost faith/interest when he made 7 Psychopaths (which i haven't actually seen) but this looks much better

7 psychopaths is terrible but it may have a couple of moments iirc. not gonna watch it again to confirm.

this new one is supposed to be more serious than the trailer makes it seem

7 psychos was terrible, thought this sounded ok but the trailer looks p bad imo

Can't offhand think of a bigger drop in quality between a director's consecutive films than In Bruges>7 Psychopaths.

it's a promise of frances mcdormand cursing out her whole town for an hour or two, what are you talking about

keep forgetting this guy has stopped being a playwright, or put it on the backshelf

I didnt mind 7 psychopaths tbh

me neither. enjoyable overall, with moments good & bad. agree it's a huge step down from in bruges tho.

Def

That is otm

In Bruges suffers badly from the tie everything together traits that mcdonagh suffers so badly from. The main difference in quality is that there's just no beating Brendan Gleeson for adding heft to a midweight smartass violent movie.

Agreed. Fiennes raises the intensity bar a couple of notches too. The smashing of the telephone in the study seems strangely anachronistic.

well, one vote for his new one on Slant. Nice cast anyway.

https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/review/three-billboards-outside-ebbing-missouri

i found this movie troubling in all the ways it intends to be, and extremely well-acted, yet i find myself really annoyed with it. the angle of the police department's track record of brutality and racism, admittedly played up in the marketing but absolutely present in the film, is never seriously dealt with. the screenplay and acting heap tremendous sympathy on woody harrelson (so, what, he's absolved?) and about two-thirds of the way through start developing rockwell in a much more sympathetic direction, and knowing what we know about him this is really, really jarring. i've skimmed some of the rave reviews and i agree with everything they're saying but they do not mention this. a major character is clearly a racist cop who committed these acts of brutality, but it's not dwelled upon, it doesn't seem to come up even after he's committed more serious offenses that by rights should have him in jail, and at the end... well, i won't spoil.

and i'm not saying that the film straightforwardly asks us to like and sympathize with this character, nor that a film about a racist cop has to stop at depicting him as pure evil. because obviously this is a movie where the main protagonist also does some things that go beyond the pale, and we are forced to see her in a complicated moral light. but in 2017 to make a movie about american police, where racially-structured brutality is put in play as a theme, and then to end where we do is very.... weird. imo. it started to feel not like a deliberate provocative choice and more like a tone-deaf outsider filmmaker who Does Not Get It.

but maybe it's just me?

all re: three billboards if that wasn't obvious. i loved in bruges.

I agree with all of that, Doctor C. I was also a bit put off by the scene in which the new chief comes to town, and he's black, and he immediately calls all the white officers crackers and motherfuckers and lays down the law and fires Dixon on the spot. It just seemed so pat, like a fantasy of police accountability--some good black officers in high places could take care of the bad white ones, and that would be that.

(also reading back over my post above: i mean "more serious offenses" as in "additional serious offenses" not that they are "more serious" than the torture that apparently took place before the film started)

I used to think the Coen bros sometimes made bad movies, but really they were just lesser Coen bros movies. This movie and that terrible George Clooney movie that came out showed me what bad Coen bros movies would look like.

I definitely prefer McDonagh writing about Ireland than the U.S.

and yeah agreed with JRN about the new chief. also the only black characters are him, the guy who put up the billboard, and the other gift shop employee. they're all accessory characters with none of the home lives or inner complexity that the rest of the cast are allowed. dinklage gets more screen time and more dialogue establishing his personhood than the woman who is arbitrarily and punitively jailed and then shows up to just be happy as can be that she's out and that mcdormand is still doing her thing. did she have any feelings about this situation?

i think the chief's backstory is that he is lester freamon from the wire.
the mom from it's always sunny was a bit of on-the-nose casting, too.

I might ask that, if you're not going to make a separate thread for it, you'd refrain from "and then this thing happened" about a film that won't be released until next year in a lot of territories. I'm prepared to sacrifice my dignity and call you "Lads" if this will get the work done.

Backing Farrell 💯 on this one...lads

I read this thread backwards and thought you was talking about Colin

Sorry, Andrew. I started out intending to not be spoilery but it got away from me.

new thread: Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri - a Martin McDonagh film with McDormand, Harrelson, Rockwell, and SPOILERS

there’s also been discussion on the woody barrels on thread

lol

I saw a production of 'The Lieutenant of Inishmore' a few years ago., it was woeful stuff. "Father Ted meets Tarantino", arghh

― Michael B Higgins (Michael B), Friday, 12 October 2012 21:56 (seven years ago) bookmarkflaglink

shite

embarrassing

having discussed it with a half-a-bottle-of-red-down mrs mac, we have decided that without great performances, mcdonagh is in fact without merit in any way.

and im not offering but id write ten times better of actual irish dialogue, and god bless our diaspora but fucked if we should tolerate them making cod-irish characters a thing if flann o'brian was mocking yeats himself for doing so a century before this overboosted tart

His only play worth talking about is The Pillowman yeah that’s right

well now

https://www.atgtickets.com/shows/the-pillowman/duke-of-yorks-theatre/

and im not offering but id write ten times better of actual irish dialogue

oh do this already for every sake

breaks my heart to see these powers of anecdote and answerback wasted on ilx alone

read kevin barry

Kevin Barry read Shaw

”Well, they are not going to let me like a soldier fall… But I must say they are going to hang me like a gentleman."

if ilx were up on their barry id poll his short stories, there's stuff in there that broke me and renewed me tbh

I’m not up on my Barry apart from the lad from
Belvedere! What’s he like? Would I like him?

would hope so

he runs a bit towards fascination with the sex he imagines everyone is having and a certain gra for idk rural hippies

but some of the writing is so utterly irish in energy and phrase that i got homesick and sher i never left.

and a few of the tales and characters are pretty unforgettable

There's a Barry essay about living in Cork that's just superbly magical and gritty somewhere on the internets. I thought "City of Bohane" was an attempt at a bogger Mad Max that worked maybe a third of the time but fair play for having a go.

Martin McDonagh is a wasteman who hasnt done anything of any worth and I'm including "In Bruges" in there also.

Well now there's this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRu3zLOJN2c

Banshees is fantastic. I can never remember which McDonagh brother is which, but this is a lot like John Michael's Calvary. The small island grudges thing reminded me of Michael Powell's Edge Of The World too.

I haven't liked a movie this guy's done but I do want to see Colin Farrell get an Oscar so ...

https://i0.wp.com/www.popbabble.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/seven-psychopaths-colin-eyebrows.jpg?w=1600&ssl=1

I liked Calvary, so that's good news to me

First half was a great movie about how difficult it is for men to maintain long term friendships but then it gets progressively more daft for the sake of some high drama

Has this been released everywhere yet? It's one of my favorites this year.

Gonna watch a preview on Wednesday.

Saw it the other night. Pretty good I thought but I did how many people attending where thinking more 'quirky Irish comedy' than 'Martin McDonagh film'

I accept this film as a microcosm of social conflict and dysfunction during the Irish Civil War--without the English as a common enemy the Irish start attacking each other. But dang was that slog to sit through.

It was waaaay too nice.

I liked Banshees, the first time McDonagh has made me think of Beckett (or think of him in terms of Beckett, anyway). Colin Farrell really is good, would be happy for him to get some awards out of it.

the farrell performance is so excellent

i never quite fell for the film but i understand why others have

same

I liked that the movie resisted easy resolutions — part of its point I guess. But for sure Farrell is the main reason to see it. Everyone else is good too, it’s a strong cast.

The funniest thing for me was hearing people express how boring they found some other people.

I thought it was great, want a mini donkey

it's weird that anyone finds the 'other characters' boring, there are only a handful of them and I wouldn't have described Siobhan as boring, or Dominic, who is just tragic.

oh wait, RAG means the characters in the movie describing other characters as dull, I misinterpreted that.

also, I guess it's finally time to say Colin Farrel is an excellent actor; treating his good stuff as an exception these days doesn't give him the credit he deserves.

I found this facile and predictable in the same manner as Triangle of Sadness, another one that left me cold