The biggest box office turkeys of 2016

http://www.msn.com/en-us/movies/gallery/turkey-flops-the-least-profitable-films-of-2016/ss-AAkCEHz?li=BBnb2gg

Fortunately for me neither me or my TBM dad dragged us off to these movies...

This reflects my politics, but I recommend watching Snowden.

I just saw Hacksaw Ridge, and it's one of the worst war movies I've ever seen. It has that boring Hallmark Romance opening, and when the guy finally gets to basic, I thought, okay, here we go. But the basic training sequence was poorly done. If you want to see basic training, watch Full Metal Jacket. This one's like summer camp. Then some intense battle starts, but it devolves into some impossibilities. I'm not gonna spoil the ending or anything, but this movie is not recommended.

Isnt that movie directed by Mel Gibson!??

donbagley Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I just saw Hacksaw Ridge, and it's one of the
> worst war movies I've ever seen. It has that
> boring Hallmark Romance opening, and when the guy
> finally gets to basic, I thought, okay, here we
> go. But the basic training sequence was poorly
> done. If you want to see basic training, watch
> Full Metal Jacket. This one's like summer camp.
> Then some intense battle starts, but it devolves
> into some impossibilities. I'm not gonna spoil the
> ending or anything, but this movie is not
> recommended.


I heard the same thing about it... that it's really no good. .

Might I add that the Japanese soldiers are presented as a yellow horde with no individuality. I can't believe someone thought that was a good idea. It's 2016, for fuck's sake.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/23/2016 09:01PM by donbagley.

I love full metal jacket . I love Lee Emory in it. Can't believe that the Gomer Pyle like guy is the detective on Law and order criminal intent.
I like Gunny in mail call on the history channel, and his glock commercials, very funny.

Full Metal Jacket was possibly one of the most frightening movies I've ever watched. Kubrick really knew how to Jung and Freud the hell out of the audience with modern, pop-culture references.

The actor that plays Gomer Pyle, Vincent D'Onofrio, pops up in some random roles. He was the "Thor" in Adventures in Babysitting and Carl in The Cell. The visuals in the latter are enough to make me watch that movie again.

"Sir, does this mean Anne Margaret isn't coming?"

Wow, no agenda in that review!

I'll have to watch it. My brother was in the army at the tail end of Vietnam and I remember how tough it was on him. He ended up in the hospital, too.

I do like going to the movie theater. I spend all my time at home working and it is a break for me. My dad took us to the movies a lot when we were young or my parents would send us on Saturdays for the matinee, so I love going. All my siblings do, too. And my TV is only 32 inches!?!? ha ha ha

I loved Hurt Locker, too, and some of the others. I've been a fan of Jeremy Renner ever since.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/27/2016 05:02PM by cl2.

I loved Free State of Jones.

I have yet to enter a theatre in 2016. Not one my favorite places. Several of the turkeys have appeared on my sat TV movie package but I have not watched them. I hardly ever watch a movie in real time. PVR's are wonderful. If the flick doesn't pass my 20 minute test I can stop it, erase it and feel smug in my good judgement.

RB

I saw Hacksaw Ridge on bootleg at home. Movie theaters suck ass, in my opinion. I haven't been to one this year. Last year I went to American Sniper and walked out before it was over. It seems no one can make a decent war movie anymore.

War movies I think are very good:

Platoon
Full Metal Jacket
Saving Private Ryan
Hamburger Hill
Apocalypse Now
Black Hawk Down
Band of Brothers (high end series)
The Hurt Locker
The Deer Hunter

Special mention: Dr. Strangelove (satire)

Agreed on theatres sucking. At home I've got a big flat screen, Klipsch surround sound, cheap popcorn and I can fart indiscriminately. Perfect!

Nice. I have a four foot flatscreen and Infinity speakers with a NAD receiver.

My sound's as good as any theater other than IMAX.

My sound is better than a theatres too...and I don't play it at ear pain decibel levels like most of the theatres here do.

RB

I have yet to see a movie in IMAX. Closest one is in Calgary....and I'm too cheap to pay for it.

RB

I think it's for young people. It's like a movie turned into a rock concert. I saw a 3D there and the technology can put objects right in your lap. There was a globe of the Earth that appeared to be rotating about eighteen inches in front of my face. My hand went right through it. The projector is the size of a Smart car, and the film reels are huge. The sound system has forty or fifty speakers and the amplifiers are measured in kilowatts. You have to pay for it, and the price is really too steep for a movie.

I saw an IMAX demo at the Spokane Worlds Fair in '74. Not since. It's Canadian technology too.

RB

We went to Expo '74 in September. A few things stand out; the big white 'tent' thang on the island, the bust of Lenin in the Russian pavilion, and IMAX. If I'm not mistaken, wasn't it meant to thrill the audience? I believe there were camera views of being on a roller coaster which did make my tummy a bit 'dizzy'. And wasn't there a camera view from an airplane zipping across the top of a forest, then BAM, right over the edge of a canyon, making me think the floor was about to drop out from under me. I haven't been in an IMAX theater since. And wasn't the screen curved, around half the room?

Word, I invested in the Bowers & Wilkins Panorama 2, so no need to go to the movies ever again.

When we do go, though, it's the dine-in theatre with the big reclining chairs and plenty of booze.

a built in subwoofer and Nautilis tweeters. Hot damn, I bet it sounds good. Surround speakers just don't fit in every room. A good soundbar is a good solution. An awesome soundbar is even better, and you have one.

A friend of mine who is a retired Marine said that Full Metal Jacket is extremely accurate in its portrayal of boot Camp. Did you know that R. Lee Ermey, the Gunnery Sgt, is actually a retired Marine? He told Kubrick that the way it was written wasn't realistic, so Kubrick let him go off script.

The stress was intense, and I was actually hospitalized at one point.

To name a few: Back to Bataan, They Were Expendable, Run Silent Run Deep, Silent Running, Up Periscope, Darby's Rangers, The Longest Day, In Harm's Way, An American Guerrilla In The Phillipines (with Tyrone Power), From Here To Eternity, The Young Lions, The Battle of the Bulge, 36 Hours (with James Garner and Eva Marie Saint), Ambush Bay, The Wackiest Ship in the Army, A Bridge Too Far, The Eagle Has Landed, and my favorite: Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison.

I enjoy it when a new WWII movie is made in old-school style such as "The Great Raid" and "U-571."

Don, add Gregory Peck in "Pork Chop Hill" to your list. I'd love to see a good movie made about the 1st Marine Division at the Frozen Chosin. I've had my share of rough spots, but I just can't imagine anything that brutal.

So basic training depicted in "Hacksaw" doesn't measure up to what Kubrik portrayed in "Full Metal Jacket?" Could be the difference between Army basic and the Marines. In the former, you learn to DO things; in the latter, you BECOME someone--a Marine.

Lastly, the Japanese did engage in massive human wave assaults, and typically fought to the death. Okinawa was brutal. The cost of that battle in blood and treasure was responsible for two remarkable decisions: 1) Truman's decision to drop our (only) two atomic bombs, and 2) the manufacture of hundreds of thousands of Purple Hearts, in anticipation of the casualties it would take to conquer the Japanese home islands. Every Purple Heart (including mine) awarded the last 71 years is from that inventory.

I think any list of good war films should include Clint Eastwood's Flags of my Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima. They are both about the battle for Iwo Jima in WW2, the first told from the American perspective and the second from the Japanese perspective. If anything the second is the better of the two.

I saw Hacksaw Ridge and though that Gibson did not dwell too much on the training aspect of it. The various sections of training were pretty much deliberately telescoped as the focus was not on the toughness of training but on the evolution of Doss's coming out as a CO. I thought, too, that the scene underground where Doss the medic attended the wounded Japanese soldier was a powerful moment of humanness for both Goss and the Japanese soldier.

I don't know how accurate this film is to the real story. Gibson has been guilty of gross distortions in some of his films, notably Braveheart and The Patriot, but if it is close then Doss was certainly an exceptional individual.

I went to Army boot camp in Texas in 1977, and the Kubrick movie was closer to my experience than any other. They did not fuck around. And all the insults and screaming were exactly the same.

I very strongly disagree with your assessment of Army boot camp.

My one experience with Army training was at Fort Benning. After Parris Island and Camp Geiger, Jump School--for the elite Rangers and Green Berets--was a walk in the park. During an orientation formation, I was astonished hear grumbling when told we would have a daily three-mile run.

If you think a three mile run in combat boots is a walk in the park, then we don't see eye to eye. I concede to your point. You must be one tough guy.

We did did ruck marches, double-time, of 3, 4, 6 miles. Sure wish I had that body now!

I saw none of them.

I hate going to the theater. I'd much rather stay home in house clothes with the dog. I haven't gone to see a film since "I am Legend."
If a movie looks good, I'll wait for the DVD or Amazon prime video.
Although, I am thinking of getting cable again.....

Other Susan

Roger that on stayin' home with the dogs. Nothin' better than watching a movie in yer jammies with the dogs and fresh popcorn. Beats any theatre I've ever been in.

RB

ps: our Cocker Spaniels love popcorn too!

I went through boot camp at the end of the Vietnam War. It was a serious exercise in preparation and combat training. At graduation, we were told very soberly of wartime statistics. It was a lot to process for a 21 year old. No one standing there at attention had any misconceptions of what lay ahead.

From the 1960s up to about the turn of the century, I saw just about every movie that came along. Then, starting about 2001, my interest declined and I have seen only a few movies in theaters since then. The last two were Helen Hunt in "The Sessions" (2012) and Judi Dench in "Philomena" (2013). I blame it on the corporatizing and politicizing of the movie industry.

I still watch movies on DVD and on cable, but I tend to favor the classics. In the last few days I have seen "The African Queen" (1951) and "A Night at the Opera" (1935), both on cable. I would probably have trouble naming a dozen contemporary movies or movie stars.

And who are these "Kardashians" that everybody keeps talking about?

I'm glad you mentioned "Philomena," with Judi Dench. I loved that one. And the one she did with a number of other excellent British actors, about the home for old folks in India. Being both ancient and tired, I don't remember the name, but it was wonderful.

"Philomena" sounds wonderful, is it on Netflix or Amazon Prime so I may watch it?