Alien: Romulus

Kurtis

Philly_Q said:

grappagreen said:

CaseOfAce said:

Haych said:

Alien was probably the best sci-fi horror film ever. 

what about John Carpenter's The Thing ?

Defo up there and another film I watch every year!

The Thing is my brother's absolute favourite film.  One of mine too, and the first "X" certificate I ever saw in a cinema, a couple of weeks after my 18th birthday.

Did you wait till you reached 18 before watching one? 

Philly_Q

Kurtis said:

Philly_Q said:

grappagreen said:

CaseOfAce said:

Haych said:

Alien was probably the best sci-fi horror film ever. 

what about John Carpenter's The Thing ?

Defo up there and another film I watch every year!

The Thing is my brother's absolute favourite film.  One of mine too, and the first "X" certificate I ever saw in a cinema, a couple of weeks after my 18th birthday.

Did you wait till you reached 18 before watching one? 

Not particularly.  I don't remember there being any X I was desperate to see before I was 18.  But I've always looked younger than my age, I think there was an assumption that I'd be challenged and I wouldn't be able to prove my age.  As it happened, there was no fuss when I saw my first AA (Blazing Saddles) and first X (The Thing).  This was all a long time ago of course....

Kurtis

Philly_Q said:

Kurtis said:

Philly_Q said:

grappagreen said:

CaseOfAce said:

Haych said:

Alien was probably the best sci-fi horror film ever. 

what about John Carpenter's The Thing ?

Defo up there and another film I watch every year!

The Thing is my brother's absolute favourite film.  One of mine too, and the first "X" certificate I ever saw in a cinema, a couple of weeks after my 18th birthday.

Did you wait till you reached 18 before watching one? 

Not particularly.  I don't remember there being any X I was desperate to see before I was 18.  But I've always looked younger than my age, I think there was an assumption that I'd be challenged and I wouldn't be able to prove my age.  As it happened, there was no fuss when I saw my first AA (Blazing Saddles) and first X (The Thing).  This was all a long time ago of course....

There was a petrol station where I grew up that had some videos that would let us rent anything when we were about 14/15. Bad Taste was a favourite. 
That and just passing tapes about at school etc. 
These days kids look at all sorts online. 

Philly_Q

Kurtis said:

There was a petrol station where I grew up that had some videos that would let us rent anything when we were about 14/15. Bad Taste was a favourite. 
That and just passing tapes about at school etc. 
These days kids look at all sorts online. 

Oh yes, in the early days of video rentals it was a free-for-all.  Home videos weren't certificated until 1984, so my younger brothers saw all sorts of dodgy stuff before they were 18... our main video rental emporium was upstairs in Burton, the clothes shop, which seems so weird looking back.  And then of course we went into the video nasties era...

Longtallronnie

Read some spoilers online (I won’t post here, they’re easy enough to find) and I’m even less enthused now. 

Sporky

WYNIR0 said:

Sporky said:

WYNIR0 said:

Sporky said:

WYNIR0 said:

My faves in order, as you asked. (you did!)

I remember that as clearly as if it was fifty years ago! 

You asked me at the premier of Alien as I remember.

Incredible that they let me in aged 4.

I was an old looking 7 so they let it slide.

Probably the beard. 

Kurtis

Philly_Q said:

Kurtis said:

There was a petrol station where I grew up that had some videos that would let us rent anything when we were about 14/15. Bad Taste was a favourite. 
That and just passing tapes about at school etc. 
These days kids look at all sorts online. 

Oh yes, in the early days of video rentals it was a free-for-all.  Home videos weren't certificated until 1984, so my younger brothers saw all sorts of dodgy stuff before they were 18... our main video rental emporium was upstairs in Burton, the clothes shop, which seems so weird looking back.  And then of course we went into the video nasties era...

That does sound weird! 

I was aware of the term "video nasty" at the time but too young to really understand. I remember "banned on TV" doing the rounds a bit later but not something that I was interested in. I dare say it was great advertising for some movies most people probably wouldn't even be aware of.

I did go through a wee spell not that long ago where I found the idea quite interesting and looked into some of them. 

Philly_Q

@Kurtis there's an old documentary about the video nasty days - called Ban the Sadist Videos! - which is worth a look if you're interested.  It's on YouTube and also Amazon Prime.

It's quite hard to pin down exactly what was on the "video nasty list" as it kept changing, and also there was more than one list, but over the years I have seen the vast majority of the films.  There are, I think, a few which are still unavailable (although no longer banned).  Most of them would never have been banned were it not for the weird hysteria of the time.

(I posted a YouTube link but took it out as the image might have put some people off their brunch)

Kurtis

Philly_Q said:

@Kurtis there's an old documentary about the video nasty days - called Ban the Sadist Videos! - which is worth a look if you're interested.  It's on YouTube and also Amazon Prime.

It's quite hard to pin down exactly what was on the "video nasty list" as it kept changing, and also there was more than one list, but over the years I have seen the vast majority of the films.  There are, I think, a few which are still unavailable (although no longer banned).  Most of them would never have been banned were it not for the weird hysteria of the time.

(I posted a YouTube link but took it out as the image might have put some people off their brunch)

Cool, thanks, I'll check that out.

The main things seemed to be rape scenes and animal cruelty. Some of the most banned films around the world are religious stuff though, the da vinci code being one. 

TheMarlin

Longtallronnie

Just read that the director gathered all the old FX guys from Aliens to work on it. All the aliens will be animatronic/puppets instead of CG. 

Sporky

Oooh. Muppets In Space Redux. 

Grumpyrocker

Longtallronnie said:

Just read that the director gathered all the old FX guys from Aliens to work on it. All the aliens will be animatronic/puppets instead of CG. 

That's the sort of nonsense lots of directors say these days. Throwing talented FX people under the bus. For example "we did it all for real" when almost every aircraft in Top Gun Maverick was a CGI replacement, and that's ok. 

Longtallronnie

TBF he did say he’s not anti CGI and still uses it when needed but in this case, he wanted the sets and Aliens to be physically there so the actors can react to them etc. 
I’m still not overly excited but at least found that a bit encouraging. 

Grumpyrocker

I don't think it matters much these days. Filmmakers like to pretend practical is better because it's a marketing thing, but if the CG is good people just can't tell. But for some reason audiences have been told CGI is bad. 

stickyfiddle

Grumpyrocker said:

I don't think it matters much these days. Filmmakers like to pretend practical is better because it's a marketing thing, but if the CG is good people just can't tell. But for some reason audiences have been told CGI is bad. 

Yeah this 100%. 

Full 3D-rendered CGI came in at a time when physcial sets and modelmaking has hit its peak after 70+ years of development. and bad CGI looks dreadful against even average built sets. But good CGI has always been great - Terminator 2 and Jurassic Park still both look exceptional, using a brilliant mix of the two techniques. I suspect the Star Wars prequels are half the reason people still hate on CGI

Sporky

stickyfiddle said:

I suspect the Star Wars prequels are half the reason people still hate on CGI

I think there are limits to what we can blame Jar Jar Binks for.

Grumpyrocker

stickyfiddle said:

Grumpyrocker said:

I don't think it matters much these days. Filmmakers like to pretend practical is better because it's a marketing thing, but if the CG is good people just can't tell. But for some reason audiences have been told CGI is bad. 

Yeah this 100%. 

Full 3D-rendered CGI came in at a time when physcial sets and modelmaking has hit its peak after 70+ years of development. and bad CGI looks dreadful against even average built sets. But good CGI has always been great - Terminator 2 and Jurassic Park still both look exceptional, using a brilliant mix of the two techniques. I suspect the Star Wars prequels are half the reason people still hate on CGI

The irony is there are more model shots and practical effects in The Phantom Menace than any other Star Wars movie. 

It's well worth watching the video I posted above (and the other parts in the series) to see how much photoreal CGI you never ever notice, but how directors are throwing FX artists under the bus. 

Longtallronnie

I don’t think the director in this instance is throwing anyone under a bus. 

He said he still uses CG FX but this was one area where he wanted to use animatronics/puppets. 

The key thing for me is to execute it well, whatever method you use. If you’re noticing the effect more than the story that’s being told, they’ve fucked up one way or another imo. 

Grumpyrocker

Longtallronnie said:

The key thing for me is to execute it well, whatever method you use. If you’re noticing the effect more than the story that’s being told, they’ve fucked up one way or another imo. 

Yup, that's the trick.