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Zero Dark Thirty, opens 1/11/2013 - Page 2

post #31 of 251
12/22/12 at 6:29pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by gwsat View Post

Thanks for your report! I am looking forward more than ever to seeing Zero Dark Thirty next month when it opens wide. As I noted in my post starting the thread, I deeply admire Jennifer Chastain's talent and look forward to seeing her in this film

I thought she did an outstanding job in "Take Shelter" and "The Debt". Hard to believe she was a voice actor for Madagascar 3!
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post #32 of 251
1/7/13 at 8:52pm
I know that Kathryn Bigelow is a critics' and Hollywood's darling but I was a little disappointed in how this film was put together. The raid itself was nicely done but the lead up seemed to meander and just didn't have the tension I was anticipating. There were some great individual moments and fascinating details of the investigation in the first part of the film but I guess I just don't get Bigelow's style. Of course, I wasn't a huge fan of her work on Hurt Locker either. I thought an effective score was missing in action also. However, I did find enough compelling content to warrant additional viewings and a blu ray purchase.
Edited by Jim S - 1/7/13 at 9:02pm
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post #33 of 251
1/7/13 at 9:04pm
I really just wish Ms Bigelow is done with this political agenda seriousness now with back to back Hurt Locker & Zero Dark 30 she can do IMO what she does best is something like a sequel or prequel to Point Break which was her best and most entertaining film to date. A little more cheese and less caviar.
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post #34 of 251
1/7/13 at 10:06pm
^^^^^

Or maybe release Strange Days on Blu-ray.....damnit!
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post #35 of 251
1/7/13 at 11:11pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jim S View Post

I know that Kathryn Bigelow is a critics' and Hollywood's darling but I was a little disappointed in how this film was put together. The raid itself was nicely done but the lead up seemed to meander and just didn't have the tension I was anticipating. There were some great individual moments and fascinating details of the investigation in the first part of the film but I guess I just don't get Bigelow's style.
The accuracy of this movie has already been questioned...check out some of the printed material available.

Quote:
Of course, I wasn't a huge fan of her work on Hurt Locker either.
Me too.
She got extra brownie points for being the Cameron's ex-wife...and a convenient way to deny Avatar gold.rolleyes.gif
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post #36 of 251
1/8/13 at 9:01am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jim S View Post

I know that Kathryn Bigelow is a critics' and Hollywood's darling but I was a little disappointed in how this film was put together. The raid itself was nicely done but the lead up seemed to meander and just didn't have the tension I was anticipating. There were some great individual moments and fascinating details of the investigation in the first part of the film but I guess I just don't get Bigelow's style. Of course, I wasn't a huge fan of her work on Hurt Locker either. I thought an effective score was missing in action also. However, I did find enough compelling content to warrant additional viewings and a blu ray purchase.

The Hurt Locker made me an ardent Kathryn Bigelow fan, 10 Stars out of 10, so I am really looking forward to seeing Zero Dark Thirty on Friday, when it opens here in OKC. Also, I think very highly of Jessica Chastain's work. The only problem with all of this is that I will be going into Zero Dark Thirty with such high expectations, the film is going to have to be very good indeed to match them. I'll report what I think after I have seen it.
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post #37 of 251
1/8/13 at 6:48pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by oink View Post

The accuracy of this movie has already been questioned...check out some of the printed material available.

I'd question what the media is arguing in the first place. The so called "Torture" thing is blown out of proportion.
Any of us old enough to remember 80s, 90s films have seen it before. The current PC who-ha on this is over the top (serves the film well)
The procedural in the main body of the film is well done, but no more than anything else in a basic "Spy Craft" type film or
perhaps Syriana type political mode if you will. The end has nothing specifically graphic and shows only a shadowy, glancing image
of the expected target. It might chill some who are caught up in the "Court History" of the event.

What interested me was the use of several versions of the mission that evolved in media after the fact. Nicely done. Covers
a few asses quite well. If you didn't study the details, this will go right past you.

It's worth a pass, no matter how you see the surrounding BS. Ms B makes another war film. Her motives can be argued at a later date
and in another forum wink.gif

Best
e
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post #38 of 251
1/8/13 at 6:54pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by gwsat View Post

The Hurt Locker made me an ardent Kathryn Bigelow fan, 10 Stars out of 10, so I am really looking forward to seeing Zero Dark Thirty on Friday, when it opens here in OKC. Also, I think very highly of Jessica Chastain's work. The only problem with all of this is that I will be going into Zero Dark Thirty with such high expectations, the film is going to have to be very good indeed to match them. I'll report what I think after I have seen it.

Been eagerly waiting to see what others think about the film!

I know I enjoyed it and it tied with Django for Best film of the year for me
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post #39 of 251
1/8/13 at 7:35pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by oink View Post

The accuracy of this movie has already been questioned...check out some of the printed material available.

One need only to checkout the ending credits: based on actual events with some fiction. That fiction is not specified and some of those events may have had nothing to do with Bin Laden.
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post #40 of 251
1/8/13 at 11:41pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by fookoo_2010 View Post

One need only to checkout the ending credits: based on actual events with some fiction. That fiction is not specified and some of those events may have had nothing to do with Bin Laden.
In these DisUnited States of Idiocracy few will notice that.....wink.gif
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post #41 of 251
1/9/13 at 7:10am
I see the pre-reviews are already flowing in.rolleyes.gif My comments were more related to filmmaking craft and I didn't sense anything particularly controversial or an indictment of anyone in particular. My BS detector went off a few times but, in general, not more than any other Hollywood depiction of historical events. Based on my limited reading on the manhunt, it felt like they generally got it right (as far as you can do that in an interesting way for a commercial movie, in a couple of hours). However, having read Mark Owen's book, the depiction of the raid was very well done (I hesitate to say superb only because it missed some details from the book I would have liked to see depicted).
Edited by Jim S - 1/9/13 at 10:22am
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post #42 of 251
1/9/13 at 9:02am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jim S View Post

I see the pre-reviews are already flowing in.rolleyes.gif My comments were more related to filmmaking craft and I didn't sense anything particularly controversial or an indictment of anyone in particular. My BS detector went off a few times but, in general, not more than any other Hollywood depiction of historical events. Based on my limited reading on the manhunt, it felt like they generally got it right (as far as you can do that in an interesting way for a commercial movie, in a couple of hours). However, having read Mark Owen's book, the depiction of the raid was very well done (I hesistate to say superb only because it missed some details from the book I would have liked to see depicted).

I agree with your point that it's always necessary to cut filmmakers some slack when they present historical events. The historical facts are certain to occasionally give way to the drama. I can live with that. I am hearing that the last hour of Zero Dark Thirty is absolutely riveting and am really looking forward to seeing it.
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post #43 of 251
1/9/13 at 9:22am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jim S View Post

However, having read Mark Owen's book, the depiction of the raid was very well done (I hesistate to say superb only because it missed some details from the book I would have liked to see depicted).
The one book on 911 and the aftermath I refuse to buy/read.
At the very least, the guy should be excommunicated.
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post #44 of 251
1/9/13 at 10:29am
Quote:
Originally Posted by oink View Post

She got extra brownie points for being the Cameron's ex-wife...and a convenient way to deny Avatar gold.rolleyes.gif

As I know has already been explained to you, Cameron and Bigelow are on good terms these days, and he was very supportive of her and The Hurt Locker when they were nominated.

Cameron already has an Oscar. He didn't need to be "denied" anything. If the Academy wanted to stick-it to Jim Cameron, they either wouldn't have nominated him at all, or would have given the award to the other nominated sci-fi movie that year about a human man who turns into an alien and joins the other aliens to fight his former allies.
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post #45 of 251
1/9/13 at 10:42am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Josh Z View Post

As I know has already been explained to you, Cameron and Bigelow are on good terms these days, and he was very supportive of her and The Hurt Locker when they were nominated.
Yes, I knew that.

Quote:
Cameron already has an Oscar. He didn't need to be "denied" anything. If the Academy wanted to stick-it to Jim Cameron, they either wouldn't have nominated him at all, or would have given the award to the other nominated sci-fi movie that year about a human man who turns into an alien and joins the other aliens to fight his former allies.
District 9 is a fine little film....winning BP of the Year?
Uh, no.
There isn't anything epic about D9.
For a sci-fi to win the AA there has to be something truly special and unique.

To give BP to THL over Avatar or IB or Up or even Up in the Air was a travesty IMO.
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post #46 of 251
1/9/13 at 6:50pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by oink View Post

The one book on 911 and the aftermath I refuse to buy/read.
At the very least, the guy should be excommunicated.

Yes indeed
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post #47 of 251
1/10/13 at 2:44pm
Ms Bigelow was on the Late show last night and Letterman was just goo goo ga ga over this movie and said it was the best movie he's seen ever and urged everyone to go see and if you don't something is wrong with you bla bla bla. Well not sure if he was just kissing her ass because she was there smokin hot and knew that it would prob win best picture at the Academy or not but I really didn't buy his act. Comingsoon.net just released 2 reviews and they were noting great a 7.5 and 8.0. One guy said it was not up to snuff with the Hurt Locker which is pretty sad because that was already an over rated snooze fest to me anyways. Just going with the trailer and the story being a true story based on material from the hunt down of Bin Laden I'm pretty sure I will enjoy this more than the Hurt locker.
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post #48 of 251
1/10/13 at 3:12pm
Holy snubville batman, did anyone see the list of Oscar nods yet? Ms Bigelow was nom for best director category, has that ever happen before where a big film getting so much press and awards get a best picture nomination and NOT get best director? it's always goes hand in hand. Wow, this is quite a shocker...zero dark 30 if anything deserves a best dir nod IMO.
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post #49 of 251
1/10/13 at 4:27pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by zoey67 View Post

Holy snubville batman, did anyone see the list of Oscar nods yet? Ms Bigelow was nom for best director category, has that ever happen before where a big film getting so much press and awards get a best picture nomination and NOT get best director? it's always goes hand in hand. Wow, this is quite a shocker...zero dark 30 if anything deserves a best dir nod IMO.

Yes I did, partner, and I was shocked and offended that both Kathryn Bigelow and Ben Affleck were passed over for best director noms in favor of a guy who directed a semi-obsucure foreign language film. Hint to the Academy: Amour is not The Artist, at least for American audiences. If this makes me a Xenophobe, I can live with it.

CAVEAT: I have not yet seen Zero Dark Thirty (going tomorrow) but loved Affleck's Argo. The inclusion of Amour, a film so obscure that I had no interest in seeing it in a theater, over the wonderful Argo, which I saw in the theater the week it was released, offends me.
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post #50 of 251
1/10/13 at 11:37pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by zoey67 View Post

Just going with the trailer and the story being a true story based on material from the hunt down of Bin Laden I'm pretty sure I will enjoy this more than the Hurt locker.
Quote:
Wow, this is quite a shocker...zero dark 30 if anything deserves a best dir nod IMO.
I am confused by these 2 statements zoey....

Quote:
Originally Posted by zoey67 View Post

Ms Bigelow was nom for best director category, has that ever happen before where a big film getting so much press and awards get a best picture nomination and NOT get best director? it's always goes hand in hand. .
Actually, it has happened before...and I want to say recently.

Quote:
Originally Posted by gwsat View Post

Yes I did, partner, and I was shocked and offended that both Kathryn Bigelow and Ben Affleck were passed over for best director noms in favor of a guy who directed a semi-obsucure foreign language film. Hint to the Academy: Amour is not The Artist, at least for American audiences. If this makes me a Xenophobe, I can live with it.
The AA has a category called "Best Foreign Language Film."
Sadly, the Academy has been forgetting this for quite a long time now.rolleyes.gif
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post #51 of 251
1/11/13 at 8:02am
Quote:
Originally Posted by oink View Post


I am confused by these 2 statements zoey....
Actually, it has happened before...and I want to say recently.
The AA has a category called "Best Foreign Language Film."
Sadly, the Academy has been forgetting this for quite a long time now.rolleyes.gif
ok I'll try to clarify. Zero dark 30 source material being so closely tied to the "real" events that went down with the attack on Bin Laden that IMO the work and labor process for this movie far more encompasses the Hurt Locker which was more fiction and not based on a true event. Ms Bigelow has more pressure this time in gathering so much "classified" evidence and will be more scrutinized if anything was not accurate and to me this film was more complex and labor intensive than the Hurt locker that if she got an Oscar nod in direction for the Hurt locker yet was snubbed this time didn't make a whole lot of sense to me.
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post #52 of 251
1/11/13 at 8:39am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by oink View Post

The AA has a category called "Best Foreign Language Film."
Sadly, the Academy has been forgetting this for quite a long time now.rolleyes.gif

Yep and the Academy doubled down and nominated Amour for Best Foreign Language film on top to its Best Picture and Best Director noms. To make matters worse, it appears that the film has never opened widely in the US. Can't think about any of this too deeply, though, for this way lies madness.smile.gif
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post #53 of 251
1/11/13 at 10:19am
Quote:
Originally Posted by zoey67 View Post

ok I'll try to clarify. Zero dark 30 source material being so closely tied to the "real" events that went down with the attack on Bin Laden that IMO the work and labor process for this movie far more encompasses the Hurt Locker which was more fiction and not based on a true event. Ms Bigelow has more pressure this time in gathering so much "classified" evidence and will be more scrutinized if anything was not accurate and to me this film was more complex and labor intensive than the Hurt locker that if she got an Oscar nod in direction for the Hurt locker yet was snubbed this time didn't make a whole lot of sense to me.
OK, got ya.

Quote:
Originally Posted by gwsat View Post

Yep and the Academy doubled down and nominated Amour for Best Foreign Language film on top to its Best Picture and Best Director noms. To make matters worse, it appears that the film has never opened widely in the US. Can't think about any of this too deeply, though, for this way lies madness.smile.gif
The deal is this: either use a special category for foreign (non-english) language films or get rid of it.
Can't have it both ways.
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post #54 of 251
1/11/13 at 1:41pm
Thread Starter 
Just got back from seeing this wonderful, wonderful film. Zero Dark Thirty was, at once, chilling and horrifying but deeply satisfying too. It's now clear to me that the controversy generated by Zero Dark Thirty has come almost exclusively from hard right and hard left extremists. The lefties got their panties in a wad because they couldn't stand the idea that "enhanced interrogation" (torture) actually produces actionable intelligence once in a while and that the executive order to stop it might have done some occasional harm. The wing nuts on the right couldn't stand it because it gave the Obama administration full marks for its courage in allowing the op to assassinate Bin Laden to go forward, despite the absence of definitive proof that he was where the CIA thought he was. The controversy generated by the film, I think, is the reason the Academy committed the travesty of passing over Kathryn Bigelow for a Best Director nomination.

The horrible, dirty and dangerous job the CIA and Seal Team Six people did disturbed me, deeply. These were patriotic people, operating at the pointy end of a very dirty spear. Some died but even those who avoided physical damage paid a profound psychological price for the job they did in finding Bin Laden. When the movie ended, I wanted to cheer because the monster Bin Laden had been eliminated but wanted to cry for what my fellow Americans had to do to get him. Maybe I will do both.

The large ensemble cast contains some of my favorite actors, including but not limited to, Jessica Chastain, Jennifer Ehle, Jason Clarke, Mark Strong, James Gandolfini, and too many more to mention here.

Jesus, what a great film Zero Dark Thirty is!
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post #55 of 251
1/11/13 at 2:22pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by gwsat View Post

Just got back from seeing this wonderful, wonderful film. Zero Dark Thirty was, at once, chilling and horrifying but deeply satisfying too. It's now clear to me that the controversy generated by Zero Dark Thirty has come almost exclusively from hard right and hard left extremists. The lefties got their panties in a wad because they couldn't stand the idea that "enhanced interrogation" (torture) actually produces actionable intelligence once in a while and that the executive order to stop it might have done some occasional harm. The wing nuts on the right couldn't stand it because it gave the Obama administration full marks for its courage in allowing the op to assassinate Bin Laden to go forward, despite the absence of definitive proof that he was where the CIA thought he was. The controversy generated by the film, I think, is the reason the Academy committed the travesty of passing over Kathryn Bigelow for a Best Director nomination.

The horrible, dirty and dangerous job the CIA and Seal Team Six people did disturbed me, deeply. These were patriotic people, operating at the pointy end of a very dirty spear. Some died but even those who avoided physical damage paid a profound psychological price for the job they did in finding Bin Laden. When the movie ended, I wanted to cheer because the monster Bin Laden had been eliminated but wanted to cry for what my fellow Americans had to do to get him. Maybe I will do both.

The large ensemble cast contains some of my favorite actors, including but not limited to, Jessica Chastain, Jennifer Ehle, Jason Clarke, Mark Strong, James Gandolfini, and too many more to mention here.

Jesus, what a great film Zero Dark Thirty is!

best you've seen this year?
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post #56 of 251
1/11/13 at 2:32pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by mr. wally View Post

best you've seen this year?

Indeed.smile.gif More seriously I told my daughter that I have seen more extraordinarily good films since Christmas than I had seen in the previous six months or a year. As noted in other threads, I loved Lincoln, Les Mis, and Django too. To have four such wonderful films come out so near to each other was pretty unusual.
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post #57 of 251
1/11/13 at 6:00pm
It's been fun.
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post #58 of 251
1/11/13 at 7:37pm
Went to see it this afternoon. Missed the first few minutes but enjoyed it... somewhat. It could have been the fact that I almost dozed off a few times. Not that it was completely boring. Not sure if it's a fair comparison between The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty. I did feel tension the first time I watched HL, not so with ZDT. Sound design was good; in the theater I saw it at the helicopter sounds were especially loud and almost chest thumping. Fair amount of surround activity. Black levels were a bit high, perhaps because of the digital projection. I may see it again to catch the portion I missed.
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post #59 of 251
1/12/13 at 8:22am
Saw it last night and thought it was well done in all respects. Gripping, and compelling, but without any of the over-the-top bravado that mars so much of what Hollywood churns out. It really conveyed the needle in the haystack problem and the odds against a solution. Nice to see a production w/o shaky camera, quick cutaways and the other vogue techniques that probably could have found their way into movie at various points. I will be seeing it again, and a BR buy when it is released.
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post #60 of 251
1/13/13 at 6:25pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by oink View Post

The accuracy of this movie has already been questioned...check out some of the printed material available.
Me too.
She got extra brownie points for being the Cameron's ex-wife...and a convenient way to deny Avatar gold.rolleyes.gif

Read Mark Owens book "No Easy Day". Mark Owens wrote the book to set the record straight since the press "short stroked" this story to fill their own needs. The movie and book are 95-98% in line with one another about the raid itself. I throughly enjoyed this movie and the book. We will never know the full story since most of what happened is secret. And Seals are not under the Pope, so they can't be excommunicated.

Jeff
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