Gaming World Forums
General Category => Entertainment and Media => Topic started by: helter skelter on April 18, 2008, 02:57:38 am
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In class today we were deconstructing short films for analysis and assessment and all of that business, pretty much like a normal Friday for me. But we watched this one short film, ran for about 11 minutes are so and it was intense. I can't remember the name or director right now but it was an incredible event for me, and it's the first time I was ever emotional during a film. Basically it was a response to the 9/11 attacks, but the way in which it was delivered was disturbing and sad and just fucking hopeless. It was pretty much a black screen for the most part, different sounds building up, news reports, half-heard chants, intense shit like that. Then some footage of the planes striking the towers, you know, everything you've seen before.
But then it got to this one section of phone calls from the people who died in the event, played over shots of bodies falling out from the towers... Just really fucking intense and mortifying, presented the whole event in a way I'd never even thought about. Just seeing someone so desperate to live that they would jump to certain death sooner than die in the crash or fire... Fffffff Jesus. It was really powerful and I felt absolutely shitty the whole time, just confronted with all this. I actually had to leave after it was shown and collect myself. This is pretty odd since I am never really affected to that degree.
Anyway share similar experiences in film that made you happy, sad, nervous, etc.
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A number of German language movies recently, the highlights being: Stalingrad, Sophie Scholl: Die Letzen Tage (The Last Days), Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others) and Der Untergang (The Downfall)
all of these movies in their own way left an impression on me that didnt go away for some time after.. though Sophie Scholl I should think is just about the most intense movie I have ever watched. I dont even know how to describe it, but it is almost painful to watch.
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the only movie i can ever really recall actually like IMPACTING ME ON A SEVERE EMOTIONAL LEVEL would probably be Schindler's List. I mean it's just so fucking tragic.
And Radio. That shit is so sad.
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Night and Fog (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_and_Fog_(film)) was pretty emotional. And Fahrenheit 9/11 was actually pretty emotional too, despite the fact that it wasn't credible or whatever.
In terms of narratives and not documentaries, Requiem for a Dream would probably be the most intense movie I've seen.
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^I agree with Night and Fog, that shit just puts everything into perspective about the topic and it's pretty depressing.
Schindler's List was pretty incredible in terms of power, it's probably my favourite movie all in all. The ending is a bit Spielberg tear-jerker but it works so well in the context and is definitely incredibly moving. Goeth throughout the movie is pretty disturbing as well.
American Beauty is another amazing movie that really struck a chord with me (and I think it'll keep becoming more relevant as I get older). It just showed the difference that one average person can make to the people around him, and what even a weak man will do when pushed too far.
Irreversible is bloody intense, and even ignoring the 'big two scenes' it's a pretty powerful film. It shows the darker side of love - what you can be driven to do if something close to you is threatened or destroyed. It also shows the dark side of personalities in general, and how even a seemingly calm, collected and quiet person can explode because of terrible events. It's a pretty flawed film in a lot of ways but definitely worth a watch (even if you won't want to watch it again).
Idi I Smotri is a pretty amazing war film that gets overlooked often, and shows the devastation war causes on a grounded, human level. The barn scene is pulled off so well - it presents the utterly hopeless circumstance and the pain of the protagonist so clearly it's almost scary. The bleak, unrelenting cinematography is incredible.
I think on a lighter note The Shawshank Redemption (while being almost cliched in discussions nowadays) shows the power of hope and what a man driven by it can be set to do. The ending prison sequence is one of the most amazing in any film ever.
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heh, obv. pulp fiction.
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gregory peck's speech near the end of to kill a mockingbird is approx 75% of the reason I'm becoming a lawyer.
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gregory peck's speech near the end of to kill a mockingbird is approx 75% of the reason I'm becoming a lawyer.
...because it is just that that incredible.
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I've seen a lot of really emotional/powerful films so it's pretty hard to just pick them out of my head. It's kind of a dumb reply but RECENTLY the scene in Babel where Brad Pitt is thrusting money into the hands of the guy who stuck with him after his wife got shot and pretty much ensured their safety/success throughout the whole movie and this guy who is obviously pretty poor and not well off is adamantly refusing the money, always warms the cockles of my heart.
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You know, I had a whole detailed list of these (with pictures) that was lost in the archives... :(
I'd like to repost it. Is there any way to access the archives?
But uh, if I had to name one... Children of Men, where all the war stops and the soldiers stop to look at the baby.
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"Where's my snake?"
"Well, he... he met with like an accident. He passed away."
:(
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I watched Shoah fairly recently and I've probably never been so affected by a film. Afterwards I had a hard time sleeping, eating or talking about anything else for a little while.
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i gotta see to kill a mockingbird again. i done the film and book in highschool, and we all loved it. it was pretty remarkable, the ENTIRE CLASS thought the experience was really great and we all got into the story and the themes. that never happened with anything else.
but i haven't watched the movie since then nor read the book. i'm going to.
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ps fucking Mulholland Dr. is the most depressing shit ever especially for faggots like me
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Does this include fear? If so I pick Nosferatu. Just seeing the thing run to a corner of the screen still gives me nightmares.
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Riki-oh. It's only powerful because it's the bloodiest movie next to Dead Alive. It's a gore-fu flick with guys so powerful they punch holes through people, kick dogs in half, level entire walls with a single punch, and so on. Absolutely nuts.
Preview: http://youtube.com/watch?v=8vMKN1tYknE
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Uh, I mean more like, films that provoke an intense emotional response in you.
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Hmm... Probably Antoine Fisher. During his childhood, his caretaker molested him, and there was a really intense scene portraying that. The actual sex was off-screen. You could hear was was taking place though, with the hitting and the woman saying things. Right before the worst happens, Antoine runs out of the house with his clothes all messed up like it actually happened. My stomach dropped after I first saw that.
There were some other intense scenes in there too, like when his best friend tries to rob a store, but gets shot in the back of the head. I'm almost crying every time I finish that movie.
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The Land Before Time
(https://legacy.gamingw.net/etc/www.scruffles.net/spielberg/movies/images/landBeforeTime-1.jpeg)
watch for that sharptooth
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Uh, I mean more like, films that provoke an intense emotional response in you.
To name a few,
Into the Wild
Just the whole story of Christopher McCandless and his arrogance and self-centredness in wanting to get away from society and go live in the wilderness and the people he continued and the effect he left on them. I didn't really know how to feel but I could really relate to him.
Children of Men
Speculative science fiction concerning how the state of the world would be if childbirth stopped. It just made me feel really grim and sad, man. That shit was really depressing.
Babel
Connecting stories about four different groups in different countries to show troubles with miscommunication and other stuff. The segments with the deaf Japanese girl played by Rinko Kikuchi provoked the most emotional response in me.
The Last Temptation of Christ
I'm not a Christian. I'm not even religious. But I'd take this movie over any rehashed Jesus story any day because of the intense human side it portrayed Jesus to have.
The Thin Red Line
Stories about a number of soldiers and sergeants involved in Guadalcanal. I think The Thin Red Line touches on a broad number of topics than any other war movie I have seen. Well, as far as what goes on in a soldier's head during the war, that is. It provides an angle that we don't usually see in war movies and it made me feel sad as hell.
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Uh, I mean more like, films that provoke an intense emotional response in you.
The mixture of disgust, amazement, hilarity, and whatever else I can't put a name on was pretty intense in that movie. But I suppose you mean more of an "inspiring" film.
Then I would say Big Fish or Charlie Chaplin's City Lights. BF is the most recent resuscitation of the importance of myth (quite engaging) with very touching latter scenes, and CL was probably Chaplin's best film (though not the funniest, that would be Modern Times) as The Little Tramp gets a job to support a blind girl he falls in love with, and has one of the best/most tender endings on film, I think.
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Bridge to Terabithia ;_;
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I watched Shoah fairly recently and I've probably never been so affected by a film. Afterwards I had a hard time sleeping, eating or talking about anything else for a little while.
yeah I had that reaction one time recently after watching a movie, and I distinctly remember having that kind of thing going on after watching this interview tape of a family friend who died recently.. he had escaped from some extermination camp in poland during the last stages of the final solution and made it here somehow and eventually was a consultant to Spielberg when he made Schindler's List... pretty powerful fucking stuff. I remember when I was 10 years old he showed me the tattoo on his arm and I fucking cried. It actually is bringing back tears now just thinking about it.
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unsarcastically, Big Fish I agree with. I always had a weird connection with that movie.
And Life is Beautiful. I remember watching that for the first time when I was much younger, and it was the first real foreign film I ever saw. Was a great introduction to the world outside hollywood.
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It's kind of hard to come by on DVD, but there is a melodramatic silent film by F.W. Murnau (Nosferatu guy for most) called Sunrise (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0018455/) which I think is a particularly powerful little movie.
The story is both horrifying and inspiring at the same time, it revolves around a man and wife who've drifted out of love. The husband has a mistress from the city who convinces him to murder his wife and marry her, and so the first half of the film follows the husband as he plans to murder his wife, and it builds up to one of the most suspenseful scenes I think I've ever seen. The second half is one of the most inspiring things ever as the husband and wife fall back in love after the husbands failed murder attempt.
The film is really amazing, particularly the second half when that expressionistic touch really kicks in and shows what I guess could be called the feeling of being in love just personified on the screen. There is a shot where the couple walks through the city and it dissolves into this surreal landscape, sort of showing you what it feels like for the couple, then back to the city where they've caused this traffic jam because they're so oblivious to anything around them. :)
It's just great. I'd recommend maybe trying to get it on Netflix, if they have it.
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I agree with big-fish, it had a epic Disney feeling but in a more adult way.
requiem for a dream pretty much toke away my appitite, and the ending kept repeating in my head, the music also played a big role.
another would be oldboy, I had goosebumps all over my body during photo-album swap.
unbreakable even though Elijahs theory was fantasy it made a good, the ending just swept me away
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At the end of The Life Aquatic when they all see the Jaguar Shark. That is such a magical scene from one of my all time favorite movies. You just get such a feeling of... Tranquility, and childlike wonder... I love it.
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That Life Aquatic scene was cool. I like the song used (Sigur Ros - "Staralfur") more than the scene though!
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Yeah, that Life Aquatic scene definitely made the whole movie worth it in my eyes. It was pretty decent up until then but the scene where they see the Jaguar Shark definitely bumped it up a couple points in my book.
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I watched Elephant (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363589/) recently, and I couldn't sleep the night after. I'm pretty sure it's a 'just me' kind of thing, perhaps because I was paying far too much attention to Alex Frost's performance, but yeah. Tis a powerful film, plus I'm a sucker for long shots.
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"Where's my snake?"
"Well, he... he met with like an accident. He passed away."
:(
what is this from (mulholland dr considering you posted about it right after??)???
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I watched Elephant (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363589/) recently, and I couldn't sleep the night after. I'm pretty sure it's a 'just me' kind of thing, perhaps because I was paying far too much attention to Alex Frost's performance, but yeah. Tis a powerful film, plus I'm a sucker for long shots.
HELLS YEAH. This is probably the most disturbing movie I've ever seen. I like how they put in some surreal events to make it seem like it can happen anywhere.
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I watched Elephant (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363589/) recently, and I couldn't sleep the night after. I'm pretty sure it's a 'just me' kind of thing, perhaps because I was paying far too much attention to Alex Frost's performance, but yeah. Tis a powerful film, plus I'm a sucker for long shots.
I quite liked this film but found myself strangely unaffected. I guess I knew what was going to happen at the end so it didn't really seem all that shocking (although it was filmed very well). I was probably just in an unemotional mood when I watched it.
Alex Frost was good in this film, I thought. Most of the actors were.
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yeah I had that reaction one time recently after watching a movie, and I distinctly remember having that kind of thing going on after watching this interview tape of a family friend who died recently.. he had escaped from some extermination camp in poland during the last stages of the final solution and made it here somehow and eventually was a consultant to Spielberg when he made Schindler's List... pretty powerful fucking stuff. I remember when I was 10 years old he showed me the tattoo on his arm and I fucking cried. It actually is bringing back tears now just thinking about it.
Christ. I'm currently taking a course on Nazi cinema and cinematic representations of the Holocaust for my history degree and simply because of the subject matter it's been the most emotionally involving, not to mention overwhelming thing I've ever studied. Of course, a great deal of what we've been looking at has been modern cinema and the different kinds of representation of the Holocaust in films rather than the actual history of the event itself, but still, y'know? It's such a perversely fascinating yet utterly heartbreaking and Absolutely Fucking Awful thing to look at really.
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what is this from (mulholland dr considering you posted about it right after??)???
It's from A Clockwork Orange. It's a really sad scene. :(
Also since I'm posting again I'll just say Hotel Rwanda. I was reminded about it in ASE's zoo thread. The scene where the foreigners are being evacuated but all the rwandans have to stay behind is one of the saddest things I think I've ever seen. Just so many little things about that scene. Like, the hotel employee holding the umbrella over the cameraman, even though he's being left behind to die. Or the fact that a dog is allowed on the bus over humans. It's the only movie I've seen in recent memory that made me cry. :(
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That Life Aquatic scene was cool. I like the song used (Sigur Ros - "Staralfur") more than the scene though!
man I love that. I think the whole film is pretty powerful though. Something about it has this really tired "what the hell happened to me?" kind of feel. I found the film hilarious and was laughing a lot throughout, but I also felt quite somber and very alone by the end of it.
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man I love that. I think the whole film is pretty powerful though. Something about it has this really tired "what the hell happened to me?" kind of feel. I found the film hilarious and was laughing a lot throughout, but I also felt quite somber and very alone by the end of it.
yeah that would be the wes anderson touch (read: ANY OTHER WES ANDERSON MOVIE EVER).
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It's from A Clockwork Orange. It's a really sad scene. :(
Also since I'm posting again I'll just say Hotel Rwanda. I was reminded about it in ASE's zoo thread. The scene where the foreigners are being evacuated but all the rwandans have to stay behind is one of the saddest things I think I've ever seen. Just so many little things about that scene. Like, the hotel employee holding the umbrella over the cameraman, even though he's being left behind to die. Or the fact that a dog is allowed on the bus over humans. It's the only movie I've seen in recent memory that made me cry. :(
By a similar token The Killing Fields is a fantastic movie (spoilers coming up, so be warned if you haven't seen it!) - the foreigners being evacuated while the locals are left behind comment reminded me a lot of The Killing Fields. It's basically a story of friendship set upon the backdrop of Pol Pot's 'Year Zero' campaign. Seeing anyone who spoke a language other than the native one being dragged off and shot was pretty sad. The whole fact that Dith Pran had to pretend to be a simpleton just to avoid getting killed was pretty horrible - as was the bit where he's leaving the camp and has to wade through that swamp-like area packed with dead bodies. The most emotional part was the end where him and Sydney get reunited though - I thought that whole part was really well done.
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It's from A Clockwork Orange. It's a really sad scene. :(
ah that is on my list of movies to watch, and i have the book as well but i haven't been able to read it yet.
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If anyone can find it, I'd HIGHLY recommend watching Dekalog (Or The Decalogue as it is called in English). It's a Polish film series released in 1989, originally made as a television miniseries. It consists of ten one-hour films, each of which represents one of the Ten Commandments and explores possible meanings of the commandment—often ambiguous or contradictory—within a fictional story set in modern Poland. The order in which you watch the 10 films has no relevance - although certain prominent characters in one film will often show up as characters in the background of the other films. Each film leaves you with a profound sense of meaning... it's just amazing.
(I do own a box DVD set of the films... if anyone is interested in them I could rip them and put them up on the Zoo).
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oh fuck someone brought up the Decalogue FUUUUUUCK.
I have the first one but I didn't get to see it yet.
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So, I guess I'll be the kid that mentions "Crash". I know a lot of you guys didn't like the film too much, but I found the movie to be such an emotional rollercoaster. Really, really effective.
I also cried at the end of Serendipity (one of the best Romantic Comedy's ever, btw). :)
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I'm going to have to disagree with you and say Serendipity is the worst romantic "comedy" I have ever seen.
Like, I can watch stuff like How To Lose A Guy in 10 Days or The Notebook or even LEGALLY BLONDE, because as stupid and vapid as they are, at least they don't portray stomping over peoples' hearts as some glorified version of love.
Serendipity is about two people who meet at a ice skating rink, and after 10 years the two of them are about to get married. They choose to go on trips by themselves and the bulk of the film is nothing but ridiculous NEAR-MISSES where they almost but not quite bump into one another. And then they both give up, but as they're heading back they manage to meet up and they LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER.
Except, what about their fiancees?
What about their families?
They don't give a shit about them. All that matters is this juvenile attraction between them that they just never came to grips with, and in pursuing their idea of "love" they proceed to ignore everyone that truly loves them, leaving this trail of destruction and sadness behind them, oblivious.
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b...but true love.
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I'm going to have to disagree with you and say Serendipity is the worst romantic "comedy" I have ever seen.
Like, I can watch stuff like How To Lose A Guy in 10 Days or The Notebook or even LEGALLY BLONDE, because as stupid and vapid as they are, at least they don't portray stomping over peoples' hearts as some glorified version of love.
Serendipity is about two people who meet at a ice skating rink, and after 10 years the two of them are about to get married. They choose to go on trips by themselves and the bulk of the film is nothing but ridiculous NEAR-MISSES where they almost but not quite bump into one another. And then they both give up, but as they're heading back they manage to meet up and they LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER.
Except, what about their fiancees?
What about their families?
They don't give a shit about them. All that matters is this juvenile attraction between them that they just never came to grips with, and in pursuing their idea of "love" they proceed to ignore everyone that truly loves them, leaving this trail of destruction and sadness behind them, oblivious.
ummm he was crying because it was so sad for their fiancees maybe??
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If anyone can find it, I'd HIGHLY recommend watching Dekalog (Or The Decalogue as it is called in English). It's a Polish film series released in 1989, originally made as a television miniseries. It consists of ten one-hour films, each of which represents one of the Ten Commandments and explores possible meanings of the commandment—often ambiguous or contradictory—within a fictional story set in modern Poland. The order in which you watch the 10 films has no relevance - although certain prominent characters in one film will often show up as characters in the background of the other films. Each film leaves you with a profound sense of meaning... it's just amazing.
(I do own a box DVD set of the films... if anyone is interested in them I could rip them and put them up on the Zoo).
I put them on my netflix list and I'm pretty excited to watch them. I've only seen the movie versions, A Short Film on Killing and A Short Film on Love, but Krystof Kiewswolski is really one of my favourite filmmakers.
If you enjoyed the Decalogue I'd recommend some of his other stuff, because he deals with very simular themes in all his films. Of chance and meaning in life, pretentious stuff, etc.
What was your favourite from the Decalogue?
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(I do own a box DVD set of the films... if anyone is interested in them I could rip them and put them up on the Zoo).
If you could maybe put your favourite up (so I and others can scope it out) that'd be awesome. It sounds really interesting.
ah that is on my list of movies to watch, and i have the book as well but i haven't been able to read it yet.
The book is pretty dense but it's a fantastic read. If it annoys you then check out the movie regardless as it's easier to digest (while still capturing the feel).
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Well, Decalogue #2 is up on the zoo at the moment. I'm going to be slowly uploading the rest in chronological order.
PS: My preference order: 4>6>1>9>10>2>5>7>8>3
But they're all still pretty good!