Saw Top Gun Maverick today. Better than the original.

My impression was that the carrier launch sequence at the opening of the film was a shot-for-shot remake of the same sequence from the first film, but with F/A-18s instead of F-14s. Has anyone else thought so?

Warrant Officer Coleman follows Maverick through the movie. He's in the Control Room in the Mach 10 test flight; counts push-ups when Mav "kills" his students at Top Gun; and is Mav's crew chief when launching off the carrier in the final mission. The Navy doesn't mate Captains and Warrants like that.

In the scene where Maverick first meets Penny (Jennifer Connelly), the David Bowie song "Let's Dance" is playing in the background. I had to explain the allusion to my son, who has never seen "Labyrinth" with Connelly, Bowie, and Bowie's codpiece.

Penny is a single mom who runs (owns?) a bar, but can afford a mint classic 1973 Porsche 911 and a $100-200k J/125 sailboat. Makes sense that she would date Maverick, who (as previously mentioned) flies a P-51 on an O-6 salary.

The Navy includes women as Aviators now, so the Obligatory Beach Sports Scene is coed, and is nowhere near as homoerotic as it was 36 years ago.

I thought Iceman's wife looked familiar. It's Tia, Macauley Culkin's big sister from Uncle Buck.

Ed Harris was completely wasted. In fact, the whole "test pilot" sequence was superfluous -- they should have opened with Maverick being called to Top Gun (or better, with a combat sequence showing H_ngm_n getting his kill, or something with Rooster.)

MINOR SPOILER WARNING-- ROT-13 (copy scrambled text to https://rot13.com/ for translation)

Arne gur raq, jura U_atz_a oentf gb Ebbfgre nobhg uvf gjb xvyyf, V qba'g haqrefgnaq jul Ebbfgre qbrfa'g fnl "Fb jung? V whfg cvpxrq hc 3. Fhpx vg." (Zv-24 + onpxfrng ba 2 Fh-57f).

ANOTHER MINOR SPOILER WARNING

When you seen a movie like this, you have to suspend disbelief -- I get it. But . . .

V fhccbfr vg vf cbffvoyr gung Haanzrq Rarzl Abeqvp Pbhagel pna unir na S-14 fvggvat va n erirgzrag ng n qvfgnag nve fgevc. Naq gung vg'f n unatne dhrra, jvgu gur enqne fgevccrq bhg bs gur pbafbyr -- gung znxrf frafr. Ohg vg'f znvagnvarq ng ynhapu ernqvarff? Naq vg'f nezrq? Naq rira shryrq? Lrnu, evtug.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Bill Mullins,

Minions made over 108 M this weekend in its debut.

Lightyear, meanwhile, has been out over 3 weeks and it has struggled to make that amount. I think it is up to 105 M domestically.

Thanks to yet another stupid trend on TikTok, Minions has caused a few problems at cinemas here in the UK. I don't know if it has appeared in any other countries, being TikTok based it is possible.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-61988793

quote:

Originally posted by Kevin F:
Thanks to yet another stupid trend on TikTok, Minions has caused a few problems at cinemas here in the UK. I don't know if it has appeared in any other countries . .

Right now this stupidity with "gentleminions" seems to belong all to you guys. However if they keep reporting on it, it could catch on over here too, although I don't get it at all. Role playing at the midnight showing of "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" I get. What teenager wants to act up at a kiddee film? Is it just for the dare?

Well, we've had them lay down in the middle of traffic intersections before. That trend was short lived when a couple of them got run over.

TikTok needs to be looked at for a lot of reasons probably best not discussed here, but some of these TikTok challenges should be enough to get it banned all by themselves. Of course that would be censorship and no doubt it would upset its 1.1 billion users. I'm not one of them, so I wouldn't care.

quote:

Originally posted by Kevin F:
Thanks to yet another stupid trend on TikTok, Minions has caused a few problems at cinemas here in the UK. I don't know if it has appeared in any other countries, being TikTok based it is possible.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-61988793

What makes it worse is that the trend has been endorsed by Universal Pictures

John

quote:

Originally posted by Kevin F:
Thanks to yet another stupid trend on TikTok, Minions has caused a few problems at cinemas here in the UK. I don't know if it has appeared in any other countries, being TikTok based it is possible.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-61988793

It usually plays on enough screens, maybe they can sell regular and limited douche bag showings. Now, if we can only get the douche bags to know they are one.

quote:

Originally posted by Bill Mullins:
Saw Top Gun Maverick today. Better than the original.

Not to mention it should have been the shortest movie ever. Pretty sure if your test plane breaks up at 10+g's you won't be hikin it to the nearest diner.

Not sure if I liked it better than the first. It introduced too many characters to really care much about any of them. Relied heavily on backstory with a sketchy timeline. I thought the human conflict and romance in the first film were better connected. The new one is more like a Tom Cruise ego fest.

Technically it was better and was a fun ride but I seriously don't get the box office numbers on this one.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: mykdude,

Just seen 'Thor: Love and Thunder'. Fairly standard Marvel movie. Funny in places, silly in places and quite serious at times. It's probably fair to say there is something for everyone. Christian Bale certainly plays an interesting main villain but the cudos have to go to the various SFX teams involved in putting this production together. I'd love to see members of these teams sitting on the media/promotional panels that will be popping up over the next few days rather than the 'main' stars. I'd be much more interested in hearing how they approached the graphics than the usual tired tales that the actors come out with

The only spoiler I will throw out is that there are two credit scenes to look out for. The second comes after all the credits have run, so be patient. No hints about what they contain though

quote:

Originally posted by Kevin F:
Fairly standard Marvel movie. Funny in places, silly in places and quite serious at times. It's probably fair to say there is something for everyone.

Apparently even more for everyone was planned. According to reports they filmed whole scenes with additional actors that was left on the cutting room floor. This seems like a big waste of money to me, but I guess the studio doesn't care about the budget if it makes its projected amount.

Still seems like certain directors are given too much freedom, until they hit a bomb of course. Lena Headey is being sued by an agent for part of her fee in this movie, when she never makes an appearance. Now that is a waste of talent. Perhaps there will be a director's cut some day.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
Apparently even more for everyone was planned. According to reports they filmed whole scenes with additional actors that was left on the cutting room floor. This seems like a big waste of money to me, but I guess the studio doesn't care about the budget if it makes its projected amount.

Still seems like certain directors are given too much freedom, until they hit a bomb of course. Lena Headey is being sued by an agent for part of her fee in this movie, when she never makes an appearance. Now that is a waste of talent. Perhaps there will be a director's cut some day.

Maybe, I will certainly look at adding the blu-ray release to my collection when it appears, especially if is available in 3D as some parts of this film would definitely benefit from that format.

As for cameos, without giving away any details, there is one big cameo which is frankly pretty naff. I'd much rather have seen whatever Lena Headey did as she can at least act

quote:

Originally posted by mykdude:

Technically it was better and was a fun ride but I seriously don't get the box office numbers on this one.

Cause there is nothing else worth watching lately. This is the first movie I've wanted to go see at a theater in a year or more. (and once I spent $38 for a matinee show + snacks for my son and myself, it will be a while before I want to do it again. Streaming at home is much easier and cheaper.)

Trying to decide if I want to do an essay on all that was wrong (tactically, technically, militarily, etc.) with the final mission. Appetizer: Flares aren't a countermeasure for radar-guided missiles.
(Don't go see a military/technical movie with an engineer who's worked for DoD for 40 years . . . )

Thor 4 opens today, the latest Marvel movie.

quote:

Originally posted by Tommy C:
Thor 4 opens today, the latest Marvel movie.

It opened here in the UK yesterday, which is how I was able to see it

quote:

Originally posted by Bill Mullins:
Flares aren't a countermeasure for radar-guided missiles.

Yeah but it looks cool!

Looks like the critics are less in love with Thor 4 than 3. Audience is roughly the same. Early reports estimating $140M domestic for the weekend.

International two day total at about $50M.

The more the film makers and actors talk, the less likely I am to want to see these new movies. Just like with Jurassic World Dominion, these people can't shut up about how great they all are and how they put so much relevant meaning about our world and society into dinosaur and superhero money grabbers. They don't want to talk about their contracts though.

To Taika Waititi, Natalie Portman, Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson . . . Christian Bale is method, so haven't heard much from him.

quote:

Originally posted by mykdude:

quote:

Originally posted by Bill Mullins:
Flares aren't a countermeasure for radar-guided missiles.

Yeah but it looks cool!

That it does.

About 15 years ago I was on a test at Ft. Bliss/ White Sands, for a Patriot live fire. It was a whole lot of sitting around under tents in the desert. I got a lot of reading done, as I recall.

One afternoon, we were standing around and a line of 4-5 C-17s was flying inbound from the north. The first one started popping flares out and it was spectacular. Then the rest of the group did the same, one after the other. It was as good as fireworks.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Bill Mullins,

Looks like 5 of the top 6 films this week are solid hits! Elvis may cross the line with some international help but it is also the type of film that still has plenty of life post box office.

Maverick will break the $600M domestic and possibly international mark this week.

Universal is schooling up Disney on how to make an animated film. Step 1. You don't spend $200M on an animated film!!! (or a western)

The Black Phone has cruised well past 3X its production budget domestically. This is from writer Joe Hill who is also responsible for Locke and Key.

Going to see Thor this afternoon. WooT!

Love and Thunder is a well made and enjoyable film but Ragnarok it is not.

Although not as dumb as Jurassic World the story is straight out of the Disney cookie cutter division. Go to the bathroom, take a smoke break or just run a 15 minute power nap. You're not going to come back wondering what you missed.

With decades of never ending source material the MCU has no excuse for bland story telling.

I wonder how much Guns N Roses got paid for this gig?

quote:

Originally posted by mykdude:
Love and Thunder is a well made and enjoyable film but Ragnarok it is not.

I'm one of the few that don't care for Ragnarok. It's way too goofy.

That said, I thought Love and Thunder was great! Honestly, the only Thor movie I'll likely watch again and again.