What was the last film you watched?

[caerau]

I'm not sure I concur that Dune is 'fairly simple' - it's a pretty deep book - one issue I think personally is that if anything is close to unfilmable, it's Dune as so much of it is in the heads of the characters.  Hence they decided to invent a 'weirding module' to replace the weirding way which is largely in the mind.  So instead of a 'psychological metaphysical way of thinking and behaving' (if I have that right) - we had a gun FFS 
That for me was the biggest insult in there.

[citoyen]

Well the comics are very earnest if you have a look.

I liked Watchmen and Dark Knight. They were good stories. At least, I thought so when I read them, back when I was about 15.

My favourite superhero comic story ever was Zenith from 2000AD, which was both exciting and funny. Shame they never made a film of that. (Or maybe it's not such a shame, given the likely mess they would have made of it.)

[citoyen]

Dune

First time I've re-watched it in ages.  I forgot how spectacularly bad it is.     It's a shame Jodorowsky's vision was never realised.

I went to see that in the cinema and left feeling slightly sick and wanting to shout at people. I'd watched a film that had sandworms and beautiful style (the lead playing paul atreides is well cast, to be fair). Then the director and script writer had taken a fairly simple story, torn it up and written a pile of utter confusing shite.

Ha! Now, Dune is a film that I really enjoyed. I never thought it mattered too much that it made absolutely no sense whatsoever. Nor did I mind the terrible acting and script. I just liked the people riding round the desert on giant space worms and killing people just by shouting at them.

Story-wise, Dune is essentially about a small planet rebelling against the schemings of a pan-galactic trade empire under the leadership of a young cult hero with powers he never knew he had, which is pretty much the same story as The Phantom Menace. And I know which of those two films I'd rather watch again.

[citoyen]

So instead of a 'psychological metaphysical way of thinking and behaving' (if I have that right) - we had a gun FFS 
That for me was the biggest insult in there.

Stuff 'in the mind' doesn't generally work so well on screen though.

It's best not to be too precious about book to film conversions - you're always going to be disappointed. I read the first few books of the Dune series and enjoyed them for what they were. The film is its own thing and best enjoyed for its own silliness.

[mattc]

Well the comics are very earnest if you have a look.

I liked Watchmen and Dark Knight. They were good stories. At least, I thought so when I read them, back when I was about 15.

My favourite superhero comic story ever was Zenith from 2000AD, which was both exciting and funny. Shame they never made a film of that. (Or maybe it's not such a shame, given the likely mess they would have made of it.)

(don't remember Zenith ... 2000AD had a lot of interesting things in it, even looking back)

Yes, the Watchmen and Dark Knights were good. (I'd say the same about some "proper" books that I read as a teenager.)

Folks forget that these things are more like fable than modern drama/crime/adventure stories. It's crazy to compare the Batman stories with Morse, or with Val McDermid books.

[caerau]

So instead of a 'psychological metaphysical way of thinking and behaving' (if I have that right) - we had a gun FFS 
That for me was the biggest insult in there.

Stuff 'in the mind' doesn't generally work so well on screen though.

It's best not to be too precious about book to film conversions - you're always going to be disappointed. I read the first few books of the Dune series and enjoyed them for what they were. The film is its own thing and best enjoyed for its own silliness.

Well yeah I said that didn't I?  'close to unfilmable'


I'm not precious about Dune - I enjoyed the miniseries of the first three books quite a lot (I said 'ish' because it wasn't first class - just enjoyable tosh really )

I just thin David Lynch's film is a steaming pile of poo 

[spesh]

Neither the Lynch nor the Sy-Fy channel's adaptions are perfect, but I can enjoy both on their respective merits.

It's rare that a cinematic rendition of a book actually matches the vision of the director in our imaginations anyway.

[Kim]

The Lynch Dune is best regarded as one of a series of strange films starring 1980s pop stars (see also: Labyrinth), rather than anything to do with the books.

[caerau]

Well the comics are very earnest if you have a look.

I liked Watchmen and Dark Knight. They were good stories. At least, I thought so when I read them, back when I was about 15.

My favourite superhero comic story ever was Zenith from 2000AD, which was both exciting and funny. Shame they never made a film of that. (Or maybe it's not such a shame, given the likely mess they would have made of it.)

(don't remember Zenith ... 2000AD had a lot of interesting things in it, even looking back)

Yes, the Watchmen and Dark Knights were good. (I'd say the same about some "proper" books that I read as a teenager.)

Folks forget that these things are more like fable than modern drama/crime/adventure stories. It's crazy to compare the Batman stories with Morse, or with Val McDermid books.

If any superhero film is 'earnest' then it's Watchmen - though I have to say I loved it.     It annoys me however as it's so damn earnest that I can't get the wife to watch it with me as she can't be doing with it, so I have to watch it alone in bed when I'm ill and such 

[caerau]

Story-wise, Dune is essentially about a small planet rebelling against the schemings of a pan-galactic trade empire under the leadership of a young cult hero with powers he never knew he had, which is pretty much the same story as The Phantom Menace. And I know which of those two films I'd rather watch again.

A young cult hero is a member of one of those great families but also the premature culmination of a breeding programme that's being going on for centuries by a secretive group of super-nuns who have perfected a 'weirding way' of mind craft along with other forms of mind-technology elsewhere which is all needed because computers were banned many years ago by a 'Butlerian jihad' - hence they have trained 'computer guys' (mentats) and other weird organisations that do shit loads of weird stuff.  Including interstellar space pilots who are mutated beyond normal form because they need that 'Old spice melange' that is needed to trip out on to get the mind to do those incredible calculations needed for space travel.
Don't forget that the 'old spice' is only found on the desert plate Dune and it's mixed up with those sandwort thingies and that the natives are hard as nails because they live in that harsh environment which trumps the special fighting abilities of the Emperor's Sardaukar - whose harsh planet of origin is like paradise compared to the Desert of Dune.  Then there's the other major power-elites who've come along to fight for the only source of spice, plus CHOAM, Tleilaxu, Bene-Gesserit... my head is beginning to hurt now.

Yeah simples


You can boil any story down to Boy-meets-girl or whatever if you try hard enough - I struggle to think of a more complex series of books then Dune - though (as I've said elsewhere on here) - it does disappear somewhere up the copious backside of a giant half-human half Sandworm around book four and this person here, although he did struggle through the final ones - thought they got so complex they were almost incomprehensible by the end.


Anyway, sorry I'll STFU about Dune now 

[mrcharly-YHT]

Dune is pretty simple.

There are 4 parties. Paul (and family), the Harkonnens, the emperor (and supporters) and the navigators. Everyone depends on the navigators. The navigators are dependent on the spice but nobody else knows that.

There are no double-crosses

(click to show/hide)

apart from Paul's teacher at the very start

, no side-switching, so very few plot twists.

It is a very linear plot. Paul develops his powers, gathers his forces and knowledge. Some interesting stuff happens. It's a rollocking good yarn.

[Legs]

I struggle to think of a more complex series of books than Dune

Maybe Stephen King's Dark Tower series? (I've never read Dune, though, so I'm only basing this suggestion on what you've written!)

[caerau]

I struggle to think of a more complex series of books than Dune

Maybe Stephen King's Dark Tower series? (I've never read Dune, though, so I'm only basing this suggestion on what you've written!)

We'll have to swap our book collections to answer this

[spindrift]

Hacksaw Ridge

Much better than the trailer. Trailer's stupid and dreadfully edited, the film's pretty good, Garfield's fantastic, Vince Vaughn's miscast a bit, Hugo Speer's brilliant and the coda is a punch to the guts. The W Virginia accent is extraordinary, those vowels!

[caerau]

Dune is pretty simple.

There are 4 parties. Paul (and family), the Harkonnens, the emperor (and supporters) and the navigators. Everyone depends on the navigators. The navigators are dependent on the spice but nobody else knows that.

There are no double-crosses

(click to show/hide)

apart from Paul's teacher at the very start

, no side-switching, so very few plot twists.

It is a very linear plot. Paul develops his powers, gathers his forces and knowledge. Some interesting stuff happens. It's a rollocking good yarn.

I suppose I can acknowledge that if you look at it like that, the first book is so - which is probably why it is by far the best one.
Although I think the Bene Gesserit cannot be discounted as a fifth party - assuming you are not counting them as Emperor's supporters - they are entirely independent I think and are very much playing their own game.  I guess the Tleilaxu et al. don't *really* come into it until later.

[Ashaman42]

Last night we watched Chef which was light fluffy fun, exactly what I needed after a very stressful week.

And tonight we watched Her which we really enjoyed, I went in knowing more about it than I wanted but it still wasn't quite what I expected. Had an Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind feel to it which is no bad thing.

[andrewc]

The Dune TV series was far more faithful to the books, but didn't have the scale required.   There may be a remake in the offing http://screenrant.com/dune-movie-denis-villeneuve-director/

[T42]

As I recall the FX in the TV version were somewhat hokey. Both versions threw away the important parts of the novel by turning an 8-year-old into an adolescent and eliminating the introspection, which is where at least half of the story takes place.

I hope they don't film more than the first book: after that, the sequels were little more than industrial cashing-in.

[mrcharly-YHT]

Ms Peregrine's home for peculiar children
I had hopes for this. It had a stellar cast. The book is quite good.
It was a pile of trash with stupid massive inconsistencies. Props disappeared then reappeared. Lead boots that made a character sink one minute didn't stop them swimming like they were wearing flippers the next. What a load of stupid bilge.

iBoy
A stupid premise, set in a London inner city sink estate. Really good acting, plot ok, if predicable. Good characters. Maisie Williams is entertaining, she can act, not just in game of thrones.
 

[ian]

I confess that despite several valiant attempts, I've never got to the end of Dune.

[caerau]

I confess that despite several valiant attempts, I've never got to the end of Dune.

The film or the book?  Getting to the end of the book *series* now that DEFINITELY requires a major effort.  Particularly if you include the newer extended series - even I haven't managed the latter.

[ian]

I might have gotten through the book back in my teens. I have a limited tolerance for multi-volume sci-fi tomes. The movie though, I always drift off (to sleep, to the kitchen, the pub).

[Ruthie]

Lion

It was great.  And I was in bits through most of it.  Snot all over my best coat.

My God, I'm so lucky to have been born here.

[citoyen]

(don't remember Zenith ... 2000AD had a lot of interesting things in it, even looking back)

Zenith was an 80s brat-pack superhero-cum-popstar, the offspring of two hippy superheroes from the 1960s who were killed by the CIA. His superpowers were linked to his biorhythms, so only intermittently active.

In this alternative universe, the original superheroes were the creation of the WWII arms race, so you had the Brit superhero Maximan fighting the Nazi Masterman, both destroyed when Berlin is nuked. Ultimately it turns out the whole superpowers thing is linked to supernatural beings from another dimension and shit gets proper weird.

I remember it being very funny. It was pretty much written as a reaction/antidote to all the angsty stuff like Dark Knight and Watchmen and even in its most Lovecraftian moments, never took itself too seriously.

[Riggers]

Toni Erdmann, on Friday, and it was great.

Tenderly funny and laugh-out-loud on several occasions. Sub-titled, so you have to concentrate, specially at my age and in a nice warm cozy cinema.