Killers of the Flower Moon (2023)

[Butchers Blind]

Cinemas need to bring back the intermission for films as long as this. There's no way I'm sitting there for three and a half hours without needing to go out for a piss and a vape at some point. Scorsese should understand this, being 80 years old. I bet he has to have two pisses and a ten minute snooze if he watches one of his own films. Bring back the lady at the front with a torch selling ice creams from a box too. Bring it all back.

They should provide piss bottles like those people who work for Amazon.

[bobloblaw]

There is a fair bit of jaw jut acting from Leo in this.

felt like his jaw was doing a De Niro tribute/parody at times

[Ant Farm Keyboard]

One thing that I loved is that even De Niro was no criminal mastermind. He was smart compared to the rest of the gang, but he was only able to carry on his plan because nobody cared about the death of Native Americans, even very rich.

There's a scene that takes place at the barber's after Jesse Plemons joins the plot where I could swear

Spoiler alert

that he's doing a Trump impersonation, with a lot of lines like "really fine fellow, really fine".

[close]

[non capisco]

^ Yeah, thought that as well! I think he almost certainly is.   

[Johnboy]

Saw this last night, loved it, a late masterpiece

[mjwilson]

Cinemas need to bring back the intermission for films as long as this. There's no way I'm sitting there for three and a half hours without needing to go out for a piss and a vape at some point. Scorsese should understand this, being 80 years old. I bet he has to have two pisses and a ten minute snooze if he watches one of his own films. Bring back the lady at the front with a torch selling ice creams from a box too. Bring it all back.

There was a quote going round recently saying that they had to build naptime into the schedule for The Irishman for De Niro etc.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

You go and have a nice lie down Bobby. We'll wake you up in time for Homes Under The Hammer.

[Blinder Data]

intermissions should be mandatory for films over three hours. i was dropping off towards the end.

i agree that it seemed to slow down when the FBI showed - scenes got longer with fewer cutaways and lots of ACTING

de niro was v good and would be a deserving award winner. i can't buy dicaprio as anything but a tryhard, but he was decent. lily gladstone was also very good. did anyone else find the sound a bit funny? de niro in particular seemed quiet

i think i preferred the book, which places the FBI investigator at the centre, including frequent communications between him and Hoover in Washington. ernest and molly's relationship is left as a mystery but i understand how that strand would be better for the film. the book has an ill feeling of uncertainty and dread throughout the whole thing as you make out who's behind it, which would've been much more difficult to convey on film.

one thing i missed from the book was the sense of conspiracy between hale and the other whites that is revealed towards the end of the book in devastating fashion. the book places this story in historical context - i suppose by dramatising it, naturally the audience's focus is drawn too much to individual characters rather than the system

i really liked scorsese popping up at the end. reminded me of mandela at the end of malcolm x - a bit of extradiegetic declamation is a suitable coda for a tragic and true tale

please make a shorter film next time though, marty

[Ant Farm Keyboard]

At times, it looked like DiCaprio was paying tribute to James Cagney in a mixture of Public Enemy and White Heat.
There's at least four musicians cast in minor roles. I wasn't able to spot any of them before the credits, while some of them were quite famous.

What I also loved in that film is the way many plot elements are casually revealed, sometimes with a delay.

Spoiler alert

It starts with the "natural deaths" montage where a "suicide" takes place in broad daylight in the most incidental manner possible, but it's extremely interesting with the way Ernest's involvement is shown. There are the conversations with his uncle that make us know he's doing stuff for him, but we could assume he isn't doing anything illegal at the moment. Then, we suddenly see him as part of the masked trio that robs Indians, we learn half an hour after footage was first shown that he was the one who killed the private investigator.
It adds to the cognitive dissonance about the character, who's a loving husband, yet does unmentionable things to the family of his wife or to his wife herself without any second-guessing.

[close]

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

It's an excellent film, but...

Spoiler alert

... the cameo from Jack White during the epilogue is incredibly jarring.

[close]

[Butchers Blind]

It's an excellent film, but...

Spoiler alert

... the cameo from Jack White during the epilogue is incredibly jarring.

[close]

Yeah, took me out a bit because I  was thinking

Spoiler alert

oh, that's Jason Isbell. Oh that's Sturgill Simpson. Oh that's Pete Yorn

[close]

[Terry Torpid]

There's also a bloke at the end who looks like a young Don Rickles, so much so I thought it must be a son of his.  No Rickles in the cast list, though.

[El Unicornio, mang]

This was good, wouldn't put it as one my favourite Scorsese but all round masterful filmmaking. At age 80, hope he's got a few more left in him. Big laugh from everyone at the guy

Spoiler alert

asking about if he'd get the insurance money if he adopted the two kids then killed them

[close]

Saw it at early afternoon showing with about 20 mostly OAPs. My friend got told off by a pair of old ladies sitting behind us for rustling her Haribo packet, even though they were talking throughout the whole film. Also someone's phone went off every 20 minutes.  Has kind of reminded me why I prefer to just wait and watch films at home if even a showing with a handful of people is annoying. Didn't find the length as bad as I thought but definitely felt my bladder straining at the 2 hour mark.

[holyzombiejesus]

Saw it at early afternoon showing with about 20 mostly OAPs. My friend got told off by a pair of old ladies sitting behind us for rustling her Haribo packet, even though they were talking throughout the whole film. Also someone's phone went off every 20 minutes.  Has kind of reminded me why I prefer to just wait and watch films at home if even a showing with a handful of people is annoying. Didn't find the length as bad as I thought but definitely felt my bladder straining at the 2 hour mark.

I've just come out of the "elevenses" showing at my local cinema and that was pretty bad. Old women having normal volume conversations up in the balcony and loads of people rummaging in their bags for 'toffees'. Kind of spoiled it.

[selectivememory]

Firing squad for people who talk in cinemas, honestly. Just wretched, selfish behaviour.  If you can't shut up for two or three hours, stay at home.

I was fortunate, was a bit annoyed by someone a few rows ahead who checked their phone on a few occasions, but otherwise everyone was well-behaved.

[13 schoolyards]

An acquaintance of mine is utterly convinced that the second they get a VR headset to create a convincing virtual cinema screen - ie, strap on a pair and it's like you're looking at an IMAX-sized screen from prime position while you're still in your lounge room - then regular cinemas are totally fucked, every one of them closed within six months.

My counterpoint is always "nah, people are always going to want that group experience you get from a crowded cinema", but then I remember just how shit that experience is 99 times out of a hundred and yeah, maybe he has a point

[holyzombiejesus]

Why don't cinema seats have headphone sockets? Would that work?

[El Unicornio, mang]

An acquaintance of mine is utterly convinced that the second they get a VR headset to create a convincing virtual cinema screen - ie, strap on a pair and it's like you're looking at an IMAX-sized screen from prime position while you're still in your lounge room - then regular cinemas are totally fucked, every one of them closed within six months.

That's been available for a few years. I used to watch films that way on my Quest 2 (particular in lockdown) and you have the choice of watching alone (which is a bit eerie) or having virtual friends (real or AI) in the seats around you throwing popcorn around and etc, although having a headset on for 2 hours can be a bit uncomfortable.







Probably too much of a faff for most people, and I think folks still like the thing of going to a place and meeting up with friends. It's not even just about the viewing experience, as these days you can get a massive screen and decent sound system for relatively cheap.

[lipsink]

I suppose the problem with this film was always going to be

Spoiler alert

it's a tribute to the Osage people who were murdered but they hardly really appear cos half way through the film most of the Osage characters are gone so they feel a bit sdielined in the narrative as it focuses on a load of white men.

Maybe I'll need to watch the film again but I'm unsure why Gladstone is getting all the plaudits. She basically spends half the film bed bound or looking zonked out while DiCaprio and DeNiro largely carry the film.

[close]

[convulsivespace]

I thought this was a bit of a mess. Mainly in the script, though the direction, cinematography, and acting were merely decent and not spectacular. Great character actors, including the musicians.

It's not paced well and doesn't justify the runtime, simultaneously trying to do both too much and too little. Too much because it throws in a bunch of different plot ideas in a rushed manner, particularly during the last third, and too little because it utterly fails to capture the actual story of what happened with the Osage murders.

I read that Scorsese's first draft of the script focused on the FBI arriving and investigating what was going on (which I take it is also the structure of the book), and that would have made far more sense for a movie treatment. But St. Leo DiCaprio wanted to play Ernest rather than the Jesse Plemons role so we got this instead.

[Pink Gregory]

An acquaintance of mine is utterly convinced that the second they get a VR headset to create a convincing virtual cinema screen - ie, strap on a pair and it's like you're looking at an IMAX-sized screen from prime position while you're still in your lounge room - then regular cinemas are totally fucked, every one of them closed within six months.

I'm not even really a cinemagoer and I resent the idea that what everyone ultimately wants is to consume at home, completely isolated, forever.

[Noodle Lizard]

Ah I'd avoided this thread until I saw the film, and now I feel bad that I don't think it was anything close to a masterpiece. Perhaps I was expecting another Silence or Kundun, meditative Marty, but ultimately it's another reskin of Goodfellas (corrupt people do bad things for money, good guy government gets 'em). Obviously the true story is interesting in and of itself, and something I'd like to learn more about, but despite its runtime I think this film missed opportunities to analyse the psychology which led to an entire town being complicit in such activity in the first place.

Marty himself gets up at the end to read Molly's obituary. I dunno. It's a film about persecution/minor genocide of Native Americans, but it's written and directed by white men and the vast majority of praise will be directed towards white men too (not to downplay Gladstone's performance, which was very good, but Molly all but disappears for most of the second act).

Its length isn't a problem, although I agree with some of you that the pacing felt off in some portions. During a slow stretch, a lady near me got up for a wee (or maybe a quick poo, I didn't ask) and I almost wanted to brief her on the two major things that had suddenly happened in her brief absence. When Big Brendan Fraser turned up, I realised there must be a lot more left than I assumed. The Irishman had this issue too.

I'm being very critical. It's not a bad film by any means. I think part of my disappointment comes from knowing it's quite possibly Marty's last film, and it just didn't feel as personal to him as even The Irishman. It felt like a film for the Oscars.

[beanheadmcginty]

I am surprised cinemas are so reluctant to put intermissions in long films like this. Surely it creates an opportunity to sell more overpriced snacks, which is where all the profits come from anyway.

[Johnny Textface]

I am surprised cinemas are so reluctant to put intermissions in long films like this.

I don't think it's upto them. I heard some cinemas did start doing this but faced legal action from the Studio.. i.e. this is not how the filmmaker intented it to be seen.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

It was Vue in the UK that started offering showings with an intermission, which you wouldn't expect from a multiplex chain. I for one applaud them, and hope they have the bollocks to keep on offering intermissions for anything over 2 and a half hours long.

https://variety.com/2023/film/news/killers-of-the-flower-moon-intermission-violations-apple-paramount-martin-scorsese-1235771093/

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/oct/28/uk-cinemagoers-hail-return-of-intermissions-as-films-hit-three-hour-mark

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

Stuff and things.

I've just been to see it and this is pretty much spot on. I was never bored exactly, but the characterization and plotting are amazingly thin, regardless of the run time. Say what you will about Oppenheimer, but at least it actually filled it's duration.

And it is indeed a bit crap that Molly gets sidelined for most of the film and we don't even get to see her, or any of the Osage people, receive justice at the end. I'm sure someone can explain why it's totally artistically justified, but it wasn't dramatically satisfying.

[finnquark]

Cinemas need to bring back the intermission for films as long as this. There's no way I'm sitting there for three and a half hours without needing to go out for a piss and a vape at some point. Scorsese should understand this, being 80 years old. I bet he has to have two pisses and a ten minute snooze if he watches one of his own films. Bring back the lady at the front with a torch selling ice creams from a box too. Bring it all back.

This is basically the experience at Marple Regent, where we saw this tonight. Despite the interval, the largely septuagenarian audience were restless, and several left early as it was getting on a bit.  £5.50 a ticket and only 2 quid for ice creams at the interval.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

They had an interval and they were still restless? What do the old cunts want, piss bags on the back of the seats?

[centristmelt]

I bet they arrived 30 minutes before the film started too, fucking boomers.

[finnquark]

The guy behind us fell asleep after an hour and started snoring. His wife didn't wake him, so when the very loud bang in the film happened, he woke with a start. 'Have I been asleep?' They actually left shortly after the start of the second half. The interval was 2 hours in, so 80 mins left to go - they lasted 20 minutes, probably just enough time for them to munch on their ice cream tubs.