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March 29, 2024, 11:16:55 AM

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Stuff I wanted to/should have liked in my teens (Buffy, Matrix and Kevin Smith)

Started by willbo, January 16, 2022, 07:28:32 PM

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willbo

not being able to get into these three films/series really bothered me in my teens.

Buffy - I felt i should like/support it because - all my cool gothy/punky friends liked it, as a big horror/fantasy/comics fan I wanted to bond with my friends over a geeky TV series like I had with X Files and all the Star Treks, as an 80s horror fan I thought I should be enjoying its fresh take on the genre, I could hear that all the references were clever and stories were witty. China Mieville was a supposedly a huge fan and read fanfic all day.

I just didn't like the characters that much or care about the soap opera aspect. I thought Buffy and Xander had unpleasant facial expressions and sarcastic voices and I didn't warm to them.

Matrix - I was a huge fan of sci fi films, liked cyberpunk and had read William Gibson and stuff, liked martial art films. I thought that a cyberpunk themed film becoming so huge among my friends should be something to celebrate.

after seeing it...I just thought it was a moderately entertaining, arty, sci fi/fantasy/action movie, like the Crow, Tank girl, demolition man, Dark City, hard boiled, Existenz and tons of other films I'd seen in the 90s. Liked it but it didn't really stand out to me, definitely not as much as those other films I listed, which i really do have affection for. The "everyone's trapped in VR" theme was stuff I'd seen in other sci fi films/books so it didn't blow my mind like everyone else.

Kevin Smith - I love stoner/buddy movies, I love Cheech and Chong, Bill n Ted, Wayne's World, Dazed and Confused, Empire Records...even Beavis and Butthead. I just couldn't warm to the characters in Jay n' Bob films. They seemed really aggressive, like shouting "fuck you" to each other all the time, and they all seem to have that 90s American sneer that Buffy and Xander have. John Cusack in High Fidelity had the same "hip sneer" all time too, and I'd rather watch that than a Clerks film.

again felt like I "should" like them cause all my stoner buddy dudes worshipped his films.

Magnum Valentino

Kevin Smith is shit and it's good and right that anyone who loved him as a teenager (like I did) see him now for what he really was - an extraordinarily lucky and low-ceilinged filmmaker who caught just enough of the zeitgeist to get his foot in the door of an industry that he was unable to stay afloat in. He has nothing to say and nothing remains of his voice with which to say it.

mothman


willbo

Quote from: Magnum Valentino on January 16, 2022, 07:42:05 PMKevin Smith is shit and it's good and right that anyone who loved him as a teenager (like I did) see him now for what he really was - an extraordinarily lucky and low-ceilinged filmmaker who caught just enough of the zeitgeist to get his foot in the door of an industry that he was unable to stay afloat in. He has nothing to say and nothing remains of his voice with which to say it.

I guess he's pretty similar to his buddy Harry Knowles in that. Its just occured to me that whole "dudes talk about movies" that Clerks had is dominant now with RLM on youtube, etc. I guess he also predicted Marvel getting big.

Bad Ambassador

Tried watching Dogma, which I remembered as his best film, a few months ago. Turned it off after 10 minutes as it was too obnoxious.

willbo

i thought Mallrats and chasing Amy were ok as films. I just never got the worship for the characters.

Magnum Valentino

That's the only one I've been able to enjoy since I realised "hang on, this cunt is entirely unlikeable" when his second standup DVD came out.


Spiteface

I still kinda like him, but with SModcast, I think Scott Mosier (whenever he's actually on these days) is the funnier of the two.

0h, and Angel was a better show than Buffy and this is a hill I will die on.

willbo

I watched Buffy with friends and relatives all the time, and I always thought it was ok. I just never got sucked in.

Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth

I felt that Buffy/Angel were very overrated at the time. Even as a teenager, I was rather skeptical of Whedon's feminist credentials, (although I take no joy in him being revealed as an abusive prick). My housemate and I watched them recently and, while they've still got their share of problems, I enjoyed them a lot more.

I watched Clerks a few years ago and still liked it. I'm not sure I'd bother with the rest of Smith's films though. Him being a limited talent who was just in the right place at the right time seems like a fair summation.

mothman

The (to me, anyway) rather vague circumstances behind how some of his higher-profile never-weres (Superman, Fletch) fell through leads me to wonder whether people had his measure even back then...

Famous Mortimer

I watched up to the college season of Buffy and got bored of it. It had said everything it needed to say, same with Angel after a season or so.

Kevin Smith is a weird one for me, because I loved Clerks so damn much. I bought a laserdisc player just so I could watch Clerks in that format, as it had a ton of special features. But I completely lost interest in him after Dogma, and find his shtick incredibly boring now. Magnum Valentino summed it up very well.

Glebe

Was never arsed with Buffy or Kevin Smith but I enjoyed The Matrix.

Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth

Quote from: Famous Mortimer on January 16, 2022, 10:50:47 PMI watched up to the college season of Buffy and got bored of it. It had said everything it needed to say, same with Angel after a season or so.
Buffy certainly seemed to lose something once they blew up the school. The monsters as metaphor thing seemed to have less emphasis. I'd say Angel was the opposite, with it getting more interesting towards the end.

After Mad Men, it's weird seeing Pete Campbell duffing up vampires.

bgmnts

I only ever saw Jay and Silent Bob as a kid and didnt think much of it. I sort of liked Dogma I think.

Matrix always was absolutely ace though. It's one od those perfect films for me, everything just clicks in the place.
As a thick cunt kid I have a very strong memory of being fascinated by the scenes with Neo and Oracle (there is no spoon) and it was just a great spectacle with great effects and musical and action. Then the sequel came out and I didnt give a shite. I did love the game though.

Obvioisly I was watching these in the early to mid 00s, I honestly cant remember anything good coming out around that time.

I swear to god I remember liking both a Razorlight and a Snow Patrol album which shames me to this day. But also loved Demon Days so I sort of had shit taste most of the time. I wish I was into more stuff though.

13 schoolyards

Quote from: willbo on January 16, 2022, 07:28:32 PMMatrix - I was a huge fan of sci fi films, liked cyberpunk and had read William Gibson and stuff, liked martial art films. I thought that a cyberpunk themed film becoming so huge among my friends should be something to celebrate.

after seeing it...I just thought it was a moderately entertaining, arty, sci fi/fantasy/action movie, like the Crow, Tank girl, demolition man, Dark City, hard boiled, Existenz and tons of other films I'd seen in the 90s. Liked it but it didn't really stand out to me, definitely not as much as those other films I listed, which i really do have affection for. The "everyone's trapped in VR" theme was stuff I'd seen in other sci fi films/books so it didn't blow my mind like everyone else.

The Matrix was one of those films you occasionally get that summarises a genre so well it kills it stone dead. All through the 90s there was a steady trickle of average to above average films about hackers and virtual reality and cyberpunk and Russell Crowe being a computer-generated serial killer who comes to life using nanobots. None of them hit big enough to have a real impact, so when The Matrix came along (and was in a lot of ways just a more stylish recap of what had gone before), loads of people thought it was doing something new and exciting. I loved it at the time (and still do I guess), but mostly for the action scenes which - again, were nothing really ground-breaking as Hollywood had been ripping off Hong Kong techniques for years - but were definitely more stylish than anything else action-y Hollywood had done in a while.


dissolute ocelot

Kevin Smith's early stuff was fine as low budget comedies; nothing earthshattering or innovative, but if you want jokes about comic books and sex, it's there. It's arguably downhill from Clerks I.

Season one of Buffy was definitely not the best; it improved a lot by the middle of season two when the plots got more dramatic and epic, and James Marsters (Spike) showed up along with Drusilla. But season one was very teenage "I love her, she loves him, he loves someone else..." and the plots were likewise on the stupid side (although some were amusing). It's entertaining if you're invested in the characters. I did know people who got into Buffy much later, like in college (s4-5) or even the angsty season 6, but that's a bit weird.

Matrix was just very cool: running around in black fetishwear talking on flip-phones and jumping into phone booths, what's not to love? At the time a lot of people were saying "Actually Dark City is much better" but they were wrong.


JaDanketies

Yeah I never really got the Jay and Silent Bob thing. I remember the 'clit commander' joke.

I watched 20 minutes of Superbad for the first time a year or two ago and turned it off. Didn't understand why anyone would watch it. Is it just funny cos of swear words?

My brother loved Buffy when it was airing and my oldest friend and my fiancee both love Buffy. So presumably it has something going for it. It's never really gripped me. I watched the Hush episode intently - often argued to be the best buffy episode - but it seemed pretty same-o to me. Buffy kicks some evil ass with her karate / kung fu moves, the end.

Pink Gregory

I generally liked all of Buffy, but it does peak at season 2.  Although I personally like 6 a lot it wouldn't at all work standalone.

willbo

I liked Superbad though it did creep me out a bit with how nerdy the kids were

Sebastian Cobb

Quote from: 13 schoolyards on January 17, 2022, 05:04:25 AMThe Matrix was one of those films you occasionally get that summarises a genre so well it kills it stone dead. All through the 90s there was a steady trickle of average to above average films about hackers and virtual reality and cyberpunk and Russell Crowe being a computer-generated serial killer who comes to life using nanobots. None of them hit big enough to have a real impact, so when The Matrix came along (and was in a lot of ways just a more stylish recap of what had gone before), loads of people thought it was doing something new and exciting. I loved it at the time (and still do I guess), but mostly for the action scenes which - again, were nothing really ground-breaking as Hollywood had been ripping off Hong Kong techniques for years - but were definitely more stylish than anything else action-y Hollywood had done in a while.



Conversely one I rewatched recently and was much better than I remembered it to be was Strange Days.

chveik


evilcommiedictator

I'll put up a big rep for the Philosopher's commentary for The Matrix and it's sequels, if you liked that kind of thing and wanted to listen to Cornell West talk about how much he loves humanity.

The realization that in The Matrix's machine world, each entity is it's own thing with desires and motivation, not just a singular AI is really cool and explains more of the factionalism of the machines

Sebastian Cobb

the ideal part of the matrix world would not be living in the simulation, just live conciously in the the warm womb things while your food and waste is taken away.

JaDanketies

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on January 17, 2022, 10:43:00 PMthe ideal part of the matrix world would not be living in the simulation, just live conciously in the the warm womb things while your food and waste is taken away.

Just get a feeding tube and a colostomy bag. I don't know what people who live like that are complaining about. I'm fucking sick to death of being continent.

13 schoolyards

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on January 17, 2022, 06:24:47 PMConversely one I rewatched recently and was much better than I remembered it to be was Strange Days.

Yeah, Strange Days is excellent (aside from the revolutionary rap guy's song being so bad). Tom Sizemore's hair deserved an Academy Award too.

I was thinking more of obvious VR stuff like The Thirteenth Floor (which it seems was also 1999) and The Lawnmower Man.