What's the most pretentious film you've ever seen?

Pigman II

pre·ten·tious adj.
Claiming or demanding a position of distinction or merit, especially when unjustified.
Making or marked by an extravagant outward show; ostentatious.

My own nominations would have to go to Moulin Rouge, Independence Day and Pearl Habour but I'm sure you've all got your own 'favorites', so lets hear em!

smiaras

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Kali

Kill Bill.

lodgepole

The Pillow Book.

And everything else that Peter Greenway has directed, that i've seen.

Stark

Solaris.

BlitzKrieg

the two matrix sequels

mycroft

I wouldn't describe Pearl Habour or Independence day as pretentious, just bad.

A pretentious film is a film with delusional of grandeur or aspirations of communicating on a higher intellectual or emotional level.

And spend some time watching student films *shudder* then you'll know pretentious.

I remember watching a group of US shorts at the old dublin film festival, and it so happened the director of one had been in dublin, so he was introduced before the screening of six shorts.

Some good some bad, some surreal. Some recieved polite applause, some more so.

Then came his one, black n white, decaying sea front setting, overblown music, waffer thin plot, and the traditional kids find gun one dies at the end, plot which drives half the student films ever made.

Dead silence after the film, except for people coughing and avoiding eye contact with the beret wearing fecker......

I love that memory

Agent Orange

Donnie Darko.

Pretentious garbage at its worse.

Weird and surreal for weird and surreal's sake. No point, no theme. A rather deliberate attempt at manafacturing a cult movie.

ObeyGiant

Oh, just stop being so contrary.

Tyrrial

Pearl Habour load of american crap, as if we don't get enough of it!

Retr0gamer

The two matrix sequels.
Solaris (yawn!)

Also both Elephant films.

Duo

Magnolia.

I mean. What? Well, I'm assuming it was pretentious. It was just so dull... I THINK THAT SAYS IT ALL.

Zoton

Mullholland drive, Blue Velvet, Magnolia, Godfather part 3

patch

Zardoz.
A peice of crap directed by John Boorman, starring Sean Connery wearing a nappy. And floating giant statue heads.

Miguel_Sanchez

Jackass the Movie.

Those pretentious bastards.

shotamoose

There's a lot of "I didn't understand it so it must have been pretentious" going on here. If you thought the film was bad give a reason other than "I didn't get it" or "it tried to communicate something to me, what a waste of time". Sure, maybe there wasn't anything to get, but has it occurred to you that you just missed something?

Lex_Diamonds

Crushproof - trying to make some grand social statement, goes down in flames.

Four Rooms - Where to begin, while it wasnt completely without merit a large part of it was most definitely pretentious rubbish.

ObeyGiant

One question.. when people are complaining about Solaris.. do they mean the Tarkofsky original, or the Soderbergh remake?

adonis

pearl harbour, without a doubt

adonis

no way david lynch's films should be considered pretentious.
the point is being missed if you do..
although wild at heart could deemed as

TwoShedsJackson

The Thin Red Line.

2001: A Space Odyssey.

Pretentious shite both.

Stark

Originally posted by ObeyGiant
One question.. when people are complaining about Solaris.. do they mean the Tarkofsky original, or the Soderbergh remake?

The Soderbergh remake for me anyway.

Ebony

oh my god! mullholland drive was the most pretentious piece of crap I'v ever seen. It tried too goddamn hard to act like a dahli-esque film all deeper images and hidden subtext (yawn) when it was just a deeply pathetic reason for david " im so unorthadox!" lynch, to film some girl on girl action! loooser!

ixoy

What IS pretentious, without a doubt, is "Dogville". There's a dog whose a chalk outline in it. Nicole Kidman tends gooseberry bushes that are chalk outlines on the ground, and then goes to open an invisible door, complete with door opening effects. And the film's in chapters. And it has a narration. It wins.

Capt'n Midnight

BLUE - Ken Russel - turn down the sound and you'll see what I mean.

Special mention to the Cohen brothers for Fargo - the bit at the start where it claims to be a true story is fiction.

Chad ghostal

Originally posted by Capt'n Midnight

Special mention to the Cohen brothers for Fargo - the bit at the start where it claims to be a true story is fiction.

its a black comedy. this was part of the humour,
pretentious implies sincerity.

.theres a smell of troll feet.. .

Pepe LeFrits

Yep, The Thin Red Line. I thought it was alright the first time, i fell asleep the second.

Karl Hungus

Oh god... The Thin Red Line, what self-important drivel!

And the Matrix movies...
Top of the list for pretention!

A huge stinking pile of pseudo-intellectualism that fizzles out in what seems like Dragon Ball Z on an ego trip.

DapperGent

Originally posted by Ebony
oh my god! mullholland drive was the most pretentious piece of crap I'v ever seen. It tried too goddamn hard to act like a dahli-esque film all deeper images and hidden subtext (yawn) when it was just a deeply pathetic reason for david " im so unorthadox!" lynch, to film some girl on girl action! loooser!

It's not his fault you're too stupid to get it.

ixoy

Originally posted by kaids
Yep, The Thin Red Line. I thought it was alright the first time, i fell asleep the second.

True. It is pretentious (albeit nice photography). Still not as pretentious as houses that have chalk outlines for walls...

lodgepole

Originally posted by adonis
no way david lynch's films should be considered pretentious.
the point is being missed if you do..
although wild at heart could deemed as

And Eraserhead.

eggshapedfred

I'm not sure if these are pretentious but I have to say I really hated Shakespeare In Love. especially Gwynnie and her condescending British accent.

also The Road to Perdition. awful film. I presume that the huge pauses in the middle of most of the scenes were meant to be dramatic tension, as in "here's a big pause. this bit's deep<nudge nudge>" but to me it was just boring. possibly the worst film I've ever seen.

Capt'n Midnight

Originally posted by Chad ghostal
its a black comedy. this was part of the humour,
pretentious implies sincerity.

.theres a smell of troll feet.. .

My point was that it was setting it's self up as something it wasn't right from the start. You are implying the same - it was much more tragic than funny. Occasional light relief doesn't make a film a comedy.

=======================

In General (not a reference to the above - but it reminded me)
Most Hollywood films that try to do more than one genre - dramadies etc. Europeans can do that much of the time - few big Hollywood films seem to be able to.

Frank Grimes

Already been said but anyway, Kill Bill.

Linoge

Originally posted by Jeff_Lebowski
Jackass the Movie.

Those pretentious bastards.

StevO wasted his peformance in that film.
If I had to name one pretentious film it would be Airplane. The jokes were just too far beyond anyones intellectual understanding, it was obviously going for an oscar.

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned it but Mystic River would be very high in the pretentious category. All that deep meaningful sh!t dialogue. If an hour of that crap was cut from the film it would have been good.

I agree about Kill Bill, I hated that film, the dialogue wasn't anywhere near PF, RD or JB.

Owenw

Originally posted by k.oriordan
The Soderbergh remake for me anyway.

Solaris should be given the award for Most Misleading Trailer Ever. It was made out to be a sci-fi movie when it was really a love story of sorts.
I guess even Hollywood didn't 'get it'

My vote would go to The Hours. That thing meandered on and on. I guess the title was meant to be a caution for anyone with Attention Deficit Disorder
A pointless film with some tenuous link between the 3 women. Yawn.
The acting was the only redeeming factor.

IMHO of course

ixoy

Originally posted by Linoge
I agree about Kill Bill, I hated that film, the dialogue wasn't anywhere near PF, RD or JB.

It wasn't meant to be - he said as much. It was a different type of movie. Volume II is meant to be more character/dialog based.

'The Hours' also had a whiff of pretension, especially when the director would show, say, one character knocking on the door and then the character in another storyline opening their door. The constant smart cuts between the story stank of a director who needed smacks delivered.

Still at least the houses weren't made of chalk.

Retr0gamer

One question.. when people are complaining about Solaris.. do they mean the Tarkofsky original, or the Soderbergh remake?

Soderbergh remake for me. Not a patch on 2001

Forgot to mention Thin Red Line. Great battle scenes but the rest was like watching 3 hours of a speech from the arcitect form matrix reloaded.

Dont be at yourself

Rules Of Attraction, by about a gazillion miles.

ixoy

Rules of Attraction wasn't THAT pretentious (ok, so it moves backwards but Ian Somerhalder is cute!).

I almost forgot - Meg Ryan's "In the Cut". Everything shot in soft focus, employing blurred edges....

Devious

Two words. American Beauty. I mean, for Gods sake, a plastic bag as an object of beauty? That my friends, is the definition of pretentious.

ObeyGiant

Originally posted by ixoy
I almost forgot - Meg Ryan's "In the Cut". Everything shot in soft focus, employing blurred edges....

If this is all it takes for a film to be labelled pretentious, almost every soft-core porno ever made is "pretentious".

ixoy

Originally posted by ObeyGiant
If this is all it takes for a film to be labelled pretentious, almost every soft-core porno ever made is "pretentious".

Ya seen the movie? It's not meant to be soft core porn. Just pretentious. We can probably add a 1/3 of the movies shown in the IFI.

Actually my favourite is the student short in "Family Guy" with a clown and pancake flipping. That epitomises pretension.

ObeyGiant

Originally posted by ixoy
Ya seen the movie? It's not meant to be soft core porn. Just pretentious. We can probably add a 1/3 of the movies shown in the IFI.

I was just foolin', G. Naw, I haven't seen the film. Meg Ryan makes me want to puke blood. YES, WE KNOW YOU JUST LIKE YOU JUST HAD SEX. YOU'VE LOOKED THAT WAY FOR 15 YEARS NOW. NOW IT'S TIME FOR YOU TO LEARN HOW TO ACT.

All the same, I'm stunned at some of the suggestions people are making here for 'pretentious' films.

patch

Yup, it seems if people don't like a movie, it gets the label.

Agent Orange

More rubbish:

Down By Law

Jarmusch cannot, CANNOT direct. Ghost Dog my arse.

ObeyGiant

Originally posted by Agent Orange
Down By Law

I think, by now, we've all learned to ignore Agent Orange. Troll, or just being contrary? Who knows? Who cares?

Anyway, for anyone who hasn't seen Down By Law yet.. No, it's most certainly not pretentious. Yes, it is amazing.

First person to try and stick Koyaanisquatsi onto this list: I will fucking cut you.
I mean it.

Agent Orange

Sorry for having an opinion, mate.

And I think you mean "Koyaanisqatsi".

ObeyGiant

Originally posted by Agent Orange
Sorry for having an opinion, mate.

Oh, I'm not suggesting you don't have an opinion, or even that you should keep them to yourself. I'm just pointing out that your opinions have all the characteristics of either someone who is being deliberately, predictably contrary, or a troll.

That's all.

Originally posted by Agent Orange
And I think you mean "Koyaanisqatsi".

I did, thanks. My over-eager fingers got the better of me.

By one letter.

Stark

Originally posted by Devious
Two words. American Beauty. I mean, for Gods sake, a plastic bag as an object of beauty? That my friends, is the definition of pretentious.

American Beauty was a great film. The plastic bag wasn't the focus of the film, it was simply to show the inside of the kid's mind. If anything, the kid was pretentious not the film.

Ebony

Originally posted by DapperGent
It's not his fault you're too stupid to get it.

ok first of all david lynch dosent want ANYONE to get his movies thats the point thats why hes makes them pointless and secondly if you think that it has some hidden message that only you and your buddy david get then you're the stupid one!:D