IgnisExcubitor

If you like 80s - 90s kids movies, or movies by Spielberg or John Hughes then Shazam is for you. As a fan of those things I had a great time watching this one. 

Mark Strong has not got a lot to play with, and yet he creates a decent villain. But the hero of this movie are the kids. I will count Zachary Levi as a kid too. And they are all likeable. There is recklessness in their approach towards the powers and I thought that was a good way to build up the story. There is a lovely tribute to Tom Hanks' Big. I will even forgive them for stealing a joke from Kung Fu Panda 2.

On a side note, so the rumours around Henry Cavill are true then. 

Yep, wasted a good cast, money (seemed like a lot of cash was splurged on this) and a good opportunity. 

I think they tried to capitalise on Narcos' popularity. Nothing wrong in that. Look at American Made. Tried to cash in on Narcos' popularity but also made such a fun if not great flick.

22 hours ago, Inverted said:

 

Oddly enough, I felt like Hereditary got unfairly ignored after an initial pre-release buzz. The fact that Toni Collette hardly got nominated for anything was absolutely bizarre. 

Hereditary and The Witch - two of the creepiest movies to come out in recent times. It's nice that horror films are taking the creepy rather than scary route. Us did that too, but those two films above were down right creepy, in a good way. 

@topic

Just finished watching Triple Frontier and I have to agree with @Viva la FCB. To add to his points :

The best thing about this video is that Bayern fans in the comments section laughing instead of getting pissed. Kudos to them. 

Sam Curran is a special kid. What a bowling performance and what a comeback. 

Most English players are looking in good form. 

2 minutes ago, Cicero said:

So if you liked Get Out, you'll really like Us?

You will definitely like it, cause I know you love your horror movies. It's more on the creepy side than the scary side. 

I thought Get Out was a decent flick, not a great flick as it was made out to be. It was a decent horror flick centred around the race dynamics. In the current climate it was bound to become huge.

Now Us on the other hand is brilliant. I saw it on the weekend. It's smarter, darker and creepier. It has several references to old flicks, loads of symbolism, small dose of good humour and a good OST. It's not perfect and some things could have been handled in a better manner, but the movie as a whole was quite wonderful. 

12 hours ago, Stan said:

Started watching Cricket Fever on Netflix. Another of those docu-series - the ones that followed Man City, Juventus, Sunderland etc.

This one focuses on Mumbai Indians following their 2017 IPL Victory. Started watching first couple of series and main focuses so far were the auction, Ishan Kishan/Aditya Tare, the Pandya brothers and the first game.

@IgnisExcubitor @AMG @Mel81x @Devil-Dick Willie @Azeem @Asura

Not sure how much you guys watch of the IPL but I know you're all interested in Cricket so may be of interest?

I wrote about it in the cricket thread. 

As a fan of the Mumbai team, I enjoyed watching it. It's a decent watch, bit like Sunderland Till I Die, because it ends in disappointment. 

Personally thought only Shane Bond, Pollard, Bumrah and Cutting come out looking good from it. Can't say the same about the owners. Also, thought Ishan comes across as a spoilt brat, but to be fair to him he was just seventeen. 

The most interesting moment for me involved Siddhesh Lad and Mahela. That was brutal to watch. I didn't like how coldly Mahela dealt with the situation. He almost seemed dismissive of the lad, but then you have to see things from his perspective, as well. And sometimes it's better to be frank.

A really good watch if you want to know how things work at that level. 

PS: Fire in Babylon is absolutely amazing, by the way. 

Yep, and then there is the solar mission (Aditya) as well, amongst several others. 

Yep. Great news and mostly it's a show of strength to China. Also, gives us a seat at the big players' table when it comes to the matters of space. 

Apparently, we had all the plans since the last decade, but the previous govt didn't allow the scientists to go ahead. The present government did. For all the stick that the present govt (and the ruling BJP party) gets (and some of it is justified), when it comes to taking strong decisions they have led the way. May it be the nuclear tests in the late nineties(the last time BJP was in power), or conducting military attacks on terrorist camps in Pakistan and Myanmar, or this. 

Also, we would have achieved a lot more in our space program if the Kerala branch of the Congress government hadn't  imprisoned Nambi Narayanan (a leading scientist) under false spying charges. The man and the country lost more than two decades. 

Rewatching The Wonder Years. Some of the comedy and acting seems a wee bit dated(mostly Wayne's parts), but everything else is still absolute class. Especially the way they have handled issues so sensitively. 

Ashwin has done it before in an International match, only for the then captain Sehwag to take back the appeal. 

This is something that he believes strongly in. These are his tweets from 2016.

And as for the Butler dismissal. These are the first three balls of the over. So Ashwin had every right to do what he did. 

I liked Akash Chopra's point. Imagine Butler goes for a quick single and makes it by a couple of centimetres. He does that because he had an advantage. 

On a sidenote, the limited overs formats are already hugely in favour of the batsmen. 

The meltdown has been epic on this. Butler not shaking Ashwin's hands was immature. Reading Royals' brand ambassador, Shane Warne's tweets on this was hilarious. Him of all people to take a moral stand. 

Anyways, MCC have also backed Ashwin. It's allowed in the rules. Ashwin did no wrong. 

But you know this is definitely not like the love+death thing. This is like a typical desi parents thing. Once your offspring crosses into the 20s, the answer to all his/her problems is 'Beta Shaadi karlo'.

The way his brother talks there seems just like that. And having watched him in that documentary on MI, Fizz comes across as a quiet, obedient kind. I mean he never stepped outside his hotel room and hardly interacted with anyone. 

@Mumbai Indians documentary

A really decent watch. A lot of people come out looking good from it, especially Pollard and Shane Bond. Rohit is hardly involved in the planning. 

Also, I know the owners have a say in sporting matters (which is a shitty thing), and the MI owners didn't seem that mental and involved, but it still made me uncomfortable watching them suggest changes to the coach Jayawardene when things weren't happening for the side. At times you feel like Mahela wants to punch the young Ambani. 

WTF, how can this be a reason?

On a different note, started watching Netflix's Documentary on Mumbai Indians' last season in IPL. The documentary is called Cricket Fever. One episode down and its a nice insight into the inner workings of an IPL side. The fact that the season ended in a disappointment for the defending champions should make this interesting. Bit like Sunderland Till I Die. 

I doubt whether we will see Ox in action this season. Gomez on the other hand would be involved in matches in the next month. 

On a side note, anyone else read the Swiss national team's press release on Shaqiri? Apparently, he is suffering from a sensitive problem. They haven't named the exact reason or cause, but have stated that he is suffering from 'pubic inflammation'. Might be an explanation as to why Klopp isn't using him. 

On 06/03/2019 at 23:59, Tommy said:

In the tram today, there was a young man who wore some really odd glasses and unusual clothes. It made him look like a character from a Wes Anderson movie. So I have a few Wes Anderson movie soundtrack songs on my phone and put one of them on while looking at this guy. Cracked me right up. 

 

So yea, my humour is not very sophisticated. 

I can see myself doing the exact same thing. 

Our lives revolves a little too much around TV and movies, mate. 

Australia won against a side that was heavily experimenting and resting key players. 

Having said that, they deserved the series win. I was fairly impressed with Ashton Turner in the fourth match. 

On 09/03/2019 at 00:17, nudge said:

It's also worth noting that Conrad was not a native English speaker and only learned it in his twenties; that's impressive to see how he mastered the language but it also might explain why his style was too heavy on metaphors and felt a bit pretentious overall. 

I was never a fan of the modernist stream of consciousness style in literature (except Knut Hamsun's Hunger) anyway and my enjoyment of Heart of Darkness suffers a lot from that but at least it's still readable and the plot is interesting and quite fascinating. Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time is THE "modern classic" that I just couldn't read - getting through one novel was tough, all seven volumes is nearly impossible.

I wasn't aware of that. It's actually admirable how wonderful is English is then. 

It is a brutal read as the book progress. I actually enjoyed it - not something I thought of the book when I started it. 

10 hours ago, nudge said:

I have a love/hate relationship with that book. Love the symbolism, the flow and the way it captures the feverish mood of that trip through the jungle but darn it can be tough to get into... Especially the first third of the book or so. 

I am at the 24th page, and I agree the beginning was a bit messy. Still it's a good read but after a little while you realise that there are a tad too many metaphors. Suppose that's just how they wrote in the past. 

At 90 pages I should be done by tomorrow. 

Found a whole bunch of classics on Amazon Kindle (mobile app) with expired copyrights, which I haven't read. Going to go through them starting with Heart of Darkness. 

@Bluewolf loved that movie. Sam Neil and the kid were brilliant. It's from the same guy who made Thor Ragnarok. 

I would recommend you to check out his other movie 'What we do in the shadows'. You will love that do. 

Maybe @Mel81x 's family owns a few bars back in Goa . 

On a serious note, I do think his house in Bangalore must have the latest gadgets. 

1 minute ago, MUFC said:

11 days, 11 nights.

Did you mean to mention that here, or was this accidental. 

I actually prefer the sequel. Watched those movies as a teenager. Italian B movies from Joe D'amato and Tinto Brass. 

Watched Instant Family with zero expectations, and it was actually a well made movie. Feel good and actually funny. Quite a decent watch. 

Watched Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, and I think it's the best Spiderman movie. Loads of humour, beautiful animation, pop-culture references and a refreshing take on Spiderman.