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Post by politicidal on Jul 20, 2017 3:43:04 GMT
That was it?
I didn't expect to take the contrarian position on this but I wasn't too impressed by this and I was sincerely looking forward to LOGAN. I'm surprised to have instead some of the same issues with LOGAN as I did BVS yet I haven't heard much grumbling over LOGAN since I guess Zack Snyder didn't direct it. To sum it up, I found it too long, characters get shortchanged, the pacing is really off, the villains are weak af, the emotional arc didn't feel complete, and the climax felt underwhelming compared to the previous action scenes.
Yes, Hugh Jackman is awesome in this but only perhaps I felt like I shared a link with him and was getting as frustrated and annoyed with this movie as much as he was with every new plot development and obstacle. Then again, if I were him, I'd have given up that bratty kid to the white trash rejects from Men in Black/SHIELD at the start of the movie. Yea I hated the kid. I didn't buy for a second he'd grow an attachment to this twerp.
Seeing Patrick Stewart as a crazy old man was amusing at first but then it was depressing and seeing him leave the picture as he had didn't help. His relationship with Wolverine as depicted in the movie was the real draw for me, not that punk kid. It was so refreshing to see someone call out Logan for his 'boring shit'. Oh and Stephen Merchant as Caliban? Could have been any other character and a less expensive actor for that matter.
I was really irritated to see actors Richard E. Grant and Boyd Holbrooke wasted as Dr. Rice and Pierce who in a less ambitious movie would basically amount to Dr. Frankenstein and Igor as far as their threat level was concerned. We get another tease about Mr. Sinister because people expect some sort of Easter egg these days.
I know it sounds foolish to complain about the dark tone since it's Hugh Jackman's last time playing the character. But perhaps I'm disappointed that this is what type of story he goes out on and it plays it so po-faced and serious the whole time it's just as oppressive as with BVS. Perhaps that unfulfilled potential is the whole point and I'm an ignorant rube for not getting it. It's still not very interesting.
So James Mangold stripped away the CGI and incessant action for really what amounts to a chase movie. And a drawn out one at that. Sure, the cinematography is gorgeous but the plot's central 'mystery' and twists didn't seem to warrant 137 minutes as a running time. The revelation as to what happened to the other XMEN was interesting and their memory being crystalized as comic book heroes was admittedly amusing.
I gave it exactly 4/10 for Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, the mostly good action, and the scenery being pretty. I couldn't catch this in the theater when it was released but I'm glad I missed it. I'd hate to have paid $10.50 to only end up watching a big budget remake of Blood Father (2016).
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barkingbaphomet
Junior Member
all backlit and creepysmoking
@barkingbaphomet
Posts: 2,252
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Post by barkingbaphomet on Jul 20, 2017 11:09:17 GMT
well... i agree about the villains and cinematography.
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Post by taylorfirst1 on Jul 20, 2017 17:00:06 GMT
4/10? Absurd.
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Post by politicidal on Jul 20, 2017 22:13:06 GMT
I didn't expect to end up here but I found it rather ponderous.
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baj2
Sophomore
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Post by baj2 on Jul 21, 2017 0:39:40 GMT
Logan/Wolverine has always railed against his nature - he didn't really accept the fact that he was a killing machine ( not even from his first incarnation in the franchise) and it is the duality in his nature that Mangold focused LOGAN on. Even the choice of X-24 was poetic almost -- X-24, Logan's own clone, represented the dark side of his character and their final fight represented how Logan dealt with the dark side of his nature. The entry of X-23, another of his clones, was the promise of his better nature ( someone who shunned violence when it could be helped ...and was actually running away from the threat of becoming a killing machine). I thought the relationship between Logan and Laura was excellent because he was actually seeing himself in her ( she was just a kid... but she knew what she would like her future to be, away from conflict. ). Prof X was the father figure who started as his mentor in the first franchise movies ...but has now become old and stricken with disease ( which was very realistic) but his condition gave Logan a chance to take care of him ( as he himself had taken care of Logan in the past). Laura completed that family unit. It was the dynamics among them in a long journey which gave the movie its dramatic depth. True, there were action scenes that were also well-done -- but they were more to illustrate that Logan was what he was - a reluctant fighting machine when he needed to be.
I look at this movie as more than just a comicbook/superhero movie -- it was the story of a tired fighting machine ( much like the tired gunslinger of the classic western) seeking redemption through his foster father and his clone daughter. Will he ultimately find it...and will he be happy with his redemption? That seemed to me was the ultimate fate of Logan...and from that last scene, he seemed happy with his redemption.
Sorry to hear you don't share similar views. Maybe a second viewing may change your mind?
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Post by taylorfirst1 on Jul 21, 2017 14:48:41 GMT
Logan/Wolverine has always railed against his nature - he didn't really accept the fact that he was a killing machine ( not even from his first incarnation in the franchise) and it is the duality in his nature that Mangold focused LOGAN on. Even the choice of X-24 was poetic almost -- X-24, Logan's own clone, represented the dark side of his character and their final fight represented how Logan dealt with the dark side of his nature. The entry of X-23, another of his clones, was the promise of his better nature ( someone who shunned violence when it could be helped ...and was actually running away from the threat of becoming a killing machine). I thought the relationship between Logan and Laura was excellent because he was actually seeing himself in her ( she was just a kid... but she knew what she would like her future to be, away from conflict. ). Prof X was the father figure who started as his mentor in the first franchise movies ...but has now become old and stricken with disease ( which was very realistic) but his condition gave Logan a chance to take care of him ( as he himself had taken care of Logan in the past). Laura completed that family unit. It was the dynamics among them in a long journey which gave the movie its dramatic depth. True, there were action scenes that were also well-done -- but they were more to illustrate that Logan was what he was - a reluctant fighting machine when he needed to be. I look at this movie as more than just a comicbook/superhero movie -- it was the story of a tired fighting machine ( much like the tired gunslinger of the classic western) seeking redemption through his foster father and his clone daughter. Will he ultimately find it...and will he be happy with his redemption? That seemed to me was the ultimate fate of Logan...and from that last scene, he seemed happy with his redemption. Sorry to hear you don't share similar views. Maybe a second viewing may change your mind? The clips and quotes from "Shane" made this analogy even more poignant. Excellent review baj2.
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Post by sdrew13163 on Jul 23, 2017 20:20:39 GMT
I'm surprised you didn't like it.
Although when I saw it in theaters I actually was shocked that it wasn't a little more divisive.
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Post by politicidal on Jul 23, 2017 20:42:27 GMT
I'm surprised you didn't like it. Although when I saw it in theaters I actually was shocked that it wasn't a little more divisive. I didn't expect to find myself on the same side of the fence as Rex Reed of all people but here I am.
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Post by mikef6 on Sept 7, 2017 4:25:46 GMT
Logan / James Mangold (2017). Four pluses: 1) I always enjoy Patrick Stewart in just about anything; 2) Ditto Richard E. Grant; 3) The young actress who plays the new mutant (Dafne Keen) does very well in a role in which she is entirely (until almost the end) mute; 4) Johnny Cash’s “When The Man Comes Around” plays over the end credits. Other than that, this is a Bad Movie in almost every regard. There is nothing in it that we haven’t seen a hundred times before. In the title role, Hugh Jackman channels Humphrey Bogart as the cynical loner who doesn’t want to get involved, who “sticks his neck out for nobody,” until he goes all-in for the good side (Casablanca, To Have and Have Not, Key Largo, The Harder They Fall). The action/fights are very repetitious: heads roll, arms roll, blades penetrate bodies. Worst of all: it is a Road Trip movie where mis-matched characters have to bond during a long automobile journey.
A few years ago, I decided I needed to see more multiplex fare so squirmed my way through “Captain America” and “Thor” before I said “No more comic book super heroes.” But I watched “Logan” because a production team spent six weeks in the New Mexico desert about 4 miles from my house filming the scenes that feature the old factory with the downed water tower that appear in the film’s first half hour. On a morning run, I even saw the battered limousine (if you have seen the movie you know what I am talking about) being transported on a flat bed truck on its way to the filming location. When the set was first constructed, it was covered in the newspaper and TV news flew over in a helicopter, but that ended coverage so, apparently, there were no Hugh Jackman or Patrick Stewart sightings in Albuquerque. So it is possible – nay, even probable - that everything they did for that month and a half was all for green screen projection and no movie stars ever saw the place in person.
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baj2
Sophomore
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Post by baj2 on Sept 7, 2017 15:21:54 GMT
It was Hugh Jackman who did the filming in New Mexico ( Abiquiu/Chama/RioRancho/etc). Please click on the image to see it full-blown and Hugh's thank-you message to New Mexico. http://instagr.am/p/BJDxeB5jP2T
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Post by mikef6 on Sept 7, 2017 16:21:33 GMT
It was Hugh Jackman who did the filming in New Mexico ( Abiquiu/Chama/RioRancho/etc). Please click on the image to see it full-blown and Hugh's thank-you message to New Mexico. http://instagr.am/p/BJDxeB5jP2T Thanks very much for that. I was thinking that six weeks was too long to just be shooting scenery, but couldn't find any further information. New Mexico always has been a popular place for Hollywood filming (a lot of westerns from the silent era on), but over the last decade or so movie and TV filming here has really exploded. Some of the young people who have grown up here call The Land of Enchantment (the state's motto) The Land of Entrapment, but adults seem to love it. Julia Roberts has a ranch near Taos. Dennis Hopper also owned a home near Taos until his death. Bryan Cranston has a house in Albuquerque since coming here to film Breaking Bad. The author of the Game of Thrones books, George R.R. Martin, lives in Santa Fe and owns an independent movie theater there. And that's not nearly the end of the list. It is not surprising that Jackman loved the place. Thanks again.
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Post by Primemovermithrax Pejorative on Sept 7, 2017 16:33:26 GMT
Wolverine as a character is not really a super hero. He does not wear a costume, he does not really seek to do good nor does he feel good about it. He gets caught up in situations.
Very far removed from a classic super hero persona. I tended to see him and the X-men of the movies as just mutants, not super heroes.
Didn't McCloud come from Taos, New Mexico?
"There you go."
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Post by Vits on Oct 19, 2017 16:50:48 GMT
BATMAN V SUPERMAN wasn't criticized for being serious; it was criticized for being serious without a real point. LOGAN is about a man who's lost everything. It's also about a warrior whose physical state has deteriorated. Since he knew he couldn't die, he never had goals. Now that it looks like he could die, he doesn't know what to do with his life.
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