[Severian]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

i was coherent enough not to insult you while explaining why i haven’t paid that much attention to nolan’s work, but i guess could start going off about the moronic mass audiences looking in overproduced blockbusters for some deeper meaning that’s just not there—or nah, i just won’t. who has the time?

Okay, I yield! Yield!!!

yeah i’ve been reading reviews by women and the issue with female representation is brought up often but not always negatively— one critic i read was saying that the film does not portray an idealized world but rather the world as it is (as blade runner does) and therefore it’s clearly justified in its depictions, even though they are, in themselves, bothersome.

Ah. See, I hadn’t thought about it like that. I’ve been steering clear of the reviews on this one because this was, honestly, a fucking HUGE thing for me, and I’ve been hoping for something like this — but ONLY if it could be done PERFECTLY— for actual decades. So I want to make sure my opinion is mine, and not colored by the reviews. But this is pretty interesting. I’d love to read a female’s take on the “Joi” character, for instance... so maybe I will read past the simple “5 Stars” and “90-something percent” now that I’ve had a week to let the thing sink in.

i wasn’t suprised by gosling. he managed to carry drive with an even more inexpressive face than this one. but yeah that movie lasted 1/2 the time as this one.

but you gotta remember though— the other character here is the cinematography itself and all those moody, abstract shots. so it’s kind of a tag-team job.

what i was suprised with is that i could not just endure but actually enjoy all of the ambient shots. usually i’m first to condemn what i see as such gimmicks. but here, with a great display of balls for an “action” movie, it works very well. and extra thanks to the director for not filling the whole 3 hours with explosions.

You’re absolutely right about Drive. That’s the one that made me notice him as an actor. And the “carrying” he did in that films was probably quite a bit more intense. Close-ups and slow zooms and what not. Lots of his face and silence. So that was no small feat. But I feel like Drive was peppered with several pretty juicy smaller parts — Bryan Cranston, Carey Mulligan, Oscar Isaac, Albert Brooks — that helped make the thing flow. In BR2049, Gosling was the emotional center of everything the audience experienced. It was almost like watching the movie THROUGH him. Not to say the other actors weren’t good in this, because they were. I rarely find Harrison Ford so palatable. And yeah, the runtime.

Anyway, I felt the exact same way about the ambient shots.
I too have a rough time with that kind of thing when it’s just filler, or explosions and nonsense to compensate for a lacking script, and I’ll admit I was apprehensive when I walked into the theater, thinking “Man, I’m gonna wish I was at home if this starts to drag.” But I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it too. I don’t think I looked away from the screen once. Not at my phone or my watch or my Red Vines. I was glued to this thing.

And the cinematography — just, fucking hell. Incredible. The cinematography in the original was great and definitive as well, and I feel like they maintained the spirit of that by making it an equally important player in the sequel... just adapted for new technologies and modernized, but with the same immersive awesomeness as the first. Only, like you said, with added elements and explosives and a much more expansive perspective.

I actually even kind of liked the way Leto played Wallace as sort of a pompous, country preacher-mad scientist hybrid. I almost expected him to say “Carole Aaaaaan!” a few times. I didn’t hate that affect. I think there are probably other actors who would have been better and more powerful in the role, but I was expecting to fucking hate him as I always do, and I was pleasantly surprised. I think this director, Villeneuve, brings out the best in everyone a bit.

Comparisons to Nolan aside... really I just think they have a similar flair for tension and a similar love of memory and perception and whatnot. Also some stylistic similarities, in color and tone and stuff, but whatever.

Blade Runner, bitches!