These were all enjoyable movies. But Clooney's acting to me was vanilla, maybe the role was vanilla. I think he is cast as good guy with a problem, good guy who solves the problem, conflicted, mostly bad guy, charming criminal we tend to support for sad cute puppy face. Maybe he is not relatable because of his good looks for most of us. Not his fault :) But think of Paul Rudd, who is also charming but has 10 times more angles complexity, dimensions to a role. Clooney has maybe 4, his characters become him, whereas Rudd becomes the character. Well, what do I know. I could be totally wrong....
Movie/film suggestions.
While this is of course a forum for the discussion of all things audio/hi-fi and music, pretty much all of us are also lovers of movies, the enjoyment of which is effected by the reproduction of the sound they contain (with the exception of silent movies 
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I've been focused on David Lynch movies since his death, but with current events so much a part of our lives at the moment, I plan on re-watching a movie I’ve seen only once, and years ago. That movie is:
The Madness Of King George. Apropos, no?
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@grislybutter: I haven't seen Clooney in that many movies, but the only role I saw him really "sink his teeth into" was the one in O Brother, Where Art Thou?. In The American he displays no personality whatsoever. A very "flat" performance. But the story is an interesting one.
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@grislybutter that is a pretty good synopsis. In my opinion, there are some movies that Clooney has been in where that worked well (the Clooney character, that is) but there are actors that can actually act much better and that is what makes them a pleasure to watch. |
@immatthewj I don’t mean to say: Clooney is a bad actor/not great/etc. I have some unpopular views about actors, e.g. I don’t think De Niro is that good (as in: some think he is the best). It’s a combination of looks, acting skills, personal background and roles that define that greatness. In short, bad actors would never get a role even in a low budget movie. They are all very talented. I grew up watching Eastern European movies where a 1/3 of the actors are terrible. Small talent pool. In the US/Hollywood, looks will never be enough. There are 100s of Brad Pitts sleeping in their cars on Sunset Blvd, waiting for their first roles. A good example is Tom Hanks. He had some classic roles in his 30s and 40s, for the ages. He couldn’t not be great. And then he just became too great and saying lines was sufficient, he had the charisma, the looks and hopefully the chemistry with Meg Ryan or whoever. Lately he is grumpy old man or predictable tough guy. I am suffering when I watch him. In Otto, in my opinion he is horrible. His son on the other hand is a delight. I could say the same thing about Denzel. Predictable roles and performances. Yet, he is still 110% on top his game, however much or little the role asks from him, he brings it, it’s a delight to watch him even in a reverse mortgage commercial. Hanks is just annoying. No, old people don’t act this way.. Please watch some old people live in their suburbia duplex. |
@grislybutter , among the many things I do not claim to be is a movie critic; I doubt that there are any actors out there who could care less about what I think;. regardless, I still offer my opinion to anyone who will waste their time listening to me. Personally, I do not think that George Clooney is a great actor, but I do think that he has played some roles that are perfect for his acting. It is heresy to type this, but I don’t think that Clint Eastwood is a great actor either. On the other hand, I’ve watched certain movies that made me think of Matt Damon as an extremely versatile actor, and the same for Al Pacino. |
Was Jeff Daniels in Rancho Deluxe? I remember when I was in my teens and growing up in Montana, Rancho and Thunderbolt And Lightfoot were both popular movies there because I think both were filmed in Montana. (I know that quite a bit of Thunderbolt was filmed in Great Falls.) Neither one of them did much for me at that tender age, and now I am afraid that they do even less. |
@immatthewj Matt Damon can be pretty powerful. So is Pacino. I was very pleasantly surprised with goofy old Ted Danson in Man on the Inside. One of the best performances ever, he is the coolest! |
Here are a couple of more that I enjoyed and may not be super well known. I liked them because they both portrayed a gritty story that seemed believable to me, and although there were no superstars of the acting world, I thought that the actors that were cast did an okay job of coming off as realistic, Winter’s Bone (a google says 2010) did feature Jennifer Lawrence, John Hawkes, Dale Dickey . . . and was set in the Ozarks and involved a situational crisis related to poverty in the meth belt. I didn’t think Wind River was as good, but it was still quite watchable for me. Set on The Wind River Indian Reservation of Wyoming (which is no doubt partly the reason I enjoyed it--I could relate to the setting) it was a tale that revolved around the murder of a Native American woman. (I just did a google and see that it was a 2017 Taylor Sheridan Movie which doesn’t really win any points from me, as I cannot stand Yellowstone.) Anyway, it featured Jeremy Renner who came off a bit bigger than life, but I guess you gotta have that with Taylor Sheridan, and in my opinion he did not ruin the movie. Also featured were Elizabeth Olsen and Gil Birmingham. |
At Any Price starring Dennis Quaid as a farmer/seed salesman in the mid-west was another movie I enjoyed. The actors seemed believable in their roles of everyday people in a life-situation that went sideways. I found We Need To Talk About Kevin (Tilda Swinton, John C. Reilly) to be intense in a creepy sort of way. |
Being a Steve Carell fan I wanted to see Vice for his portrayal of Donald Rumsfield (with Christian Bale as Dick Cheney). I found it to be an interesting/entertaining movie. I also enjoyed The Wrestler with Mickey Rourke and Marisa Tomei. And speaking of Mickey Rourke, I can just about watch Body Heat (William Hurt, Kathleen Turner, Ted Danson) just for his (Rourke’s) classic lines: "I got a serious question for you: What the f*** are you doing? This is not s*** for you to be messin’ with. Are you ready to hear something? I want you to see if this sounds familiar: any time you try a decent crime, you got fifty ways you’re gonna f*** up. If you think of twenty-five of them, then you’re a genius -- and you ain’t no genius. You remember who told me that?" and "I hope you know what you’re doin’. You better be pretty damn sure about it, cause if you ain’t sure, don’t do it. Of course, that’s my recommendation anyway -- don’t do it. I tell you, counselor, this arson -- this is serious crime." And I thought it was a nice touch when, in the movie The Counselor, McCarthy uses that when Brad Pitt is advising Michael Fassbender, Westray: "Maybe I should tell you what Mickey Rourke told what’s-his-face? That’s my recommendation anyway, Counselor. Don’t do it." The Counselor: "Because arson is a serious crime?" Westray: "Yeah, and so is this." And there were a lot of other reasons that I liked Body Heat. |
NASCAR has got to be the most boring spectator sport I have ever forced myself to try to watch, but Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby is hilarious. The interaction between Ricky Bobby's juvenile delinquent kids and their grandmother, the disfunctional relationship between Ricky Bobby and his father, the scenes in the movie where Ricky Bobby's dad is trying to teach him how to drive fast again . . . plus a great sound track! |
I didn't think Jeff Daniels was in Rancho, but then again, Sam Waterston was in it and that was back before I knew who he was, so I thought that maybe the same was possible for Jeff Daniels also. |
Charley Varrick |
+1 @nonoise for another vote for No Country For Old Men. I've listed several movies I enjoyed, but that is one of my all time favorites. |
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Thank you, @thecarpathian , typo duly corrected: Almost Famous was a decent movie with a musical theme to it that had a serious plot but also had plenty of humor interjected. |