Uncut Gems - upcoming Safdie Bros film with Adam Sandler (!)

16-01-2020 6:22pm

cdgalwegian wrote: »

The brothers also said they had also asked Jonah Hill to star, as well as Howard Stern (?).

I could see Jonah Hill working in the role also. But he would not have worked as well as Sandler. Hill is a bit too young.

yabadabado · 16-01-2020 7:02pm

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

While I assume Good Time is widely seen at this stage, it is worth digging out Heavens Knows What for those who haven't got around to it. I saw it before the other two, so has been interesting to see how the brothers have built on the style and ideas they established earlier (still haven't seen their really early stuff, mind you). Boasts a tremendous lead performance from Arielle Holmes, and as a drug addiction drama boasts the same sort of non-judgmental representation of its 'larger than life' characters as both Uncut Gems / Good Time did.

Really enjoyed Heaven Knows What.

Their doc about Lenny Cooke is a very good watch if you can find it.

PressRun · 16-01-2020 11:22pm

I could see Jonah Hill in the role too, Howard Stern is not an actor exactly (though I'm aware he has been in a movie about himself), so I'm not sure what it would have been like with him. Might have still worked, not sure.

There's something chaotic about Sandler though, something nearly off about him, that really works for this film and I'm glad he starred.

Wombatman · 20-01-2020 12:50pm

Rollicking, often tense, roller-coaster ride following the escapades of degenerate gambler Sandler.
Novel storyline with some convincing characters, dialog and performances.

Loved the farcical scene when Sandler is getting what for in the back seat of the car.

8/10

Fysh · 23-01-2020 12:22am

Got to see this tonight at the cinema, and for me definitely worth seeing there - partly the big screen but particularly a proper sound system. I can totally see what johnny_ultimate meant about it being stressful - the pacing is different to the relentlessness and manic energy of Good Time, but I've rarely found my self so on edge watching someone insistently follow a pattern of self destructive behaviour as in this. Gripping stuff, and a phenomenal turn from Sandler.

pixelburp · 23-01-2020 8:50am

Man. All this talk of stress and anxiety the film is meant to induce, it's going to give people a complex if they watch this and DON'T suffer the same fate. Is it that inevitable?.

homerun_homer · 23-01-2020 11:28am

It's not on Netflix until 31st yet I'm hearing people I've recommended to in work having watched it via other means. Given copies are available this time of year from awards season it's mad that they don't have it out officially sooner.

Fysh · 23-01-2020 11:50am

pixelburp wrote: »

Man. All this talk of stress and anxiety the film is meant to induce, it's going to give people a complex if they watch this and DON'T suffer the same fate. Is it that inevitable?.

Are you getting anxious about whether watching it will make you anxious?

speedboatchase · 23-01-2020 3:21pm

homerun_homer wrote: »

It's not on Netflix until 31st yet I'm hearing people I've recommended to in work having watched it via other means. Given copies are available this time of year from awards season it's mad that they don't have it out officially sooner.

Iirc correctly, they need for the movie to have a cinema run for it to be eligible for Oscar contention (and other awards). Previously, cinemas were quite against Netflix's flimsy initial plans to distribute their Oscar contenders for a week or so before putting them on their platform. That makes sense - the shorter the cinema window, the less likely people would to pay attend a screening. So both sides seemed to have settled on a longer theatrical period.

Basq · 23-01-2020 11:35pm

Absolutely loved this.. nerve-shredding yet fun with a career best (not that it'd take much) from Adam Sandler.

Easily best movie I've seen the last year!

johnny_ultimate · 24-01-2020 2:20am

speedboatchase wrote: »

Iirc correctly, they need for the movie to have a cinema run for it to be eligible for Oscar contention (and other awards). Previously, cinemas were quite against Netflix's flimsy initial plans to distribute their Oscar contenders for a week or so before putting them on their platform. That makes sense - the shorter the cinema window, the less likely people would to pay attend a screening. So both sides seemed to have settled on a longer theatrical period.

Important to remember this isn’t actually a Netflix production - they just picked up the distribution rights to it for the UK / Ireland. Their release strategy here could be somewhat dictated by A24’s in the US.

For the most part though the release does follow their recent (and welcome) pattern of a three week theatrical run ahead of the streaming release. That said, both Marriage Story and The Irishman ran for a whole lot longer post-streaming release, so they’re obviously much more liberal than they were and more cinemas are happy to accept the situation.

weemcd · 26-01-2020 10:49pm

Wow. It's the film equivalent of standing outside chain smoking, waiting for someone to come round and kick your head in for not having the money you owe them. You can smell the stale sweat, the bad cologne and of course the piles of dirty, stinking money.

It's fùcking phenomenal. It will give you actual anxiety. At certain points the screen is swarming with characters talking and shouting over each other. Someone is yelling into a phone in the background on loudspeaker, with the other two phone lines on hold, lining up to add to the chorus of insults and fùck you's. Out in the hallway someone else is buzzing at the door and yelling to be let in. Claustrophobic and overwhelming, there are a few dark laughs, but it's relentless for the most part. A+ for making you feel something.

johnny_ultimate · 26-01-2020 11:52pm

Wayward and very specific thought on both this and Good Time, so spoilers for both.

There’s something grimly string about the way the Safdies handle the deaths of key characters. It’s Ray falling from the window in GT, and Howard being brutally wiped out here. They’re both filmed in very different ways (one from far away, one right up close) but they had the same gut-level impact for me. It’s the brutal, immediate shock of it I think - something you lose when the film dwells on it too long or makes a big holy show about it. Here, Howard dies in this vivid explosion of euphoria, tension and chaos, and that so much other stuff is being thrown at the screen simultaneously that you’re sort of overwhelmed by the immediacy of it all.

Think the only other current director whose films handle death in a way that properly rocks me is Ari Aster - again, a certain bleak casualness to the way he dispatches characters that’s as striking as it is shocking.

pixelburp · 31-01-2020 10:33am

This dropped today on Netflix; at Johnny U's suggestion on the Netflix Recommends thread, I'm going to try and watch this in one sitting to maintain the pulse of the thing.

Will be interesting to see if opinions diverge, now that the environment to watch it in has changed.

Deisler · 01-02-2020 1:34am

Watched it tonight on Netflix excellent flik. Shame it got unnoticed by Oscars but their loss.

unplayable · 01-02-2020 1:33pm

Fantastic such an uncomfortable watch but wow brilliant

Osmosis Jones · 02-02-2020 3:33am

I'd been hyping this movie up to myself for months, finally just watched it and it exceeded my expectations. The Safdies have me in the palm of their hands, between this and Good Time I will watch absolutely anything they make from here on. The sheer anxiety they can induce through their movies is just incredible.

buried · 03-02-2020 11:44am

Absolutely marvellous stuff. One of the best I've ever seen. Nice and intense, with a great satirical dig of the classless pursuit of money and shiny thing$ that makes demented goons out of everyone addicted to the pursuit. The district feels like a Character itself doing it's best to curse everyone in it. Editing and photography is just top class. Great soundtrack too. Just Great. A proper film of our times. These lads are just gifted. 10/10

El Duda · 03-02-2020 12:15pm

Great to see people loving this.

If you think this is great, make sure you see The Lighthouse. It's EVEN better.

yourdeadwright · 03-02-2020 12:19pm

This was brilliant , it actually makes you stressed out watching it,
You'd want to be in a good mood going into it or it might annoy you but at the same time that makes it brilliant as that is what the movies sets out to do ,

Its make you feel uncomfortable and feel his stress,

Effects · 03-02-2020 12:20pm

El Duda wrote: »

If you think this is great, make sure you see The Lighthouse. It's EVEN better.

If you think the Lighthouse is great, then you actually need to see Parasite. It's even better again.

Salary Negotiator · 03-02-2020 12:21pm

yourdeadwright wrote: »

This was brilliant , it actually makes you stressed out watching it,
,

The soundtrack was very unsettling and kept me on edge for most of the film.

johnny_ultimate · 03-02-2020 12:27pm

Effects wrote: »

If you think the Lighthouse is great, then you actually need to see Parasite. It's even better again.

And Portrait of a Lady on Fire is just as good as Parasite :pac:

2019 was, in short, a hell of a year for film - and there’s a glut of seriously great films getting a belated release here over the next few weeks.

El Duda · 03-02-2020 1:21pm

Effects wrote: »

If you think the Lighthouse is great, then you actually need to see Parasite. It's even better again.

Parasite is out on Friday and it is the last film on my 'must see' list from this awards season.

Portrait of a Lady on Fire and The Farewell have also peaked my interest but it was;

The Lighthouse
Little Women
Uncut Gems
1917

The Lighthouse

That had be hyped. After these are out of the way, it's...

Lefty2Guns · 03-02-2020 2:28pm

Watched this yesterday while hungover and I only realised after about 1 hour in that the film was intentionally set up to put you in AS's shoes and melt your head.

At first I taught it was my hangover but it definitely done the trick. Great performance by Adam Sandler.

I also enjoyed Good Time.

Stone Deaf 4evr · 03-02-2020 4:49pm

On foot of advise here, We watched it on friday night, phones left in the kitchen so as not to break the tension.

Jaysus, it was hard going, not really any like-able characters and the constant noise / sensory overload was hard to take when trying to relax after a hard week at work.

Its a film I'd recommend, but couldn't say I actively enjoyed, purely from the discomfort it creates.

El Duda · 03-02-2020 5:19pm

Was about to re-watch this on Friday with the Mrs. Just before we were about to watch it, she gets a phonecall to let her know a colleague has died.

Sat down to watch it last night and the dog started puking up.

God knows what'll happen if we try and watch it tonight.

johnny_ultimate · 03-02-2020 5:39pm

El Duda wrote: »

Portrait of a Lady on Fire and The Farewell have also peaked my interest but it was;

TBH both films were comfortably among my favourites of last year, and while I really liked The Lighthouse I’d comfortably rank both of them above it (for reference: Portrait and The Farewell are on the same tier as Parasite / Uncut Gems / Little Women, and far far above 1917). Would not for a second consider skipping them.

pixelburp · 03-02-2020 5:58pm

The bottled, cinematic equivalent - and as guaranteed to agitate - as being at an airlines customer desk for a cancelled flight. At Christmas. In a blackout. And the airport's on fire. That sounds like a criticism, but in truth it's the opposite: the film barely let up, screaming along at a pace both stressful and yet, despite the histrionic tone, quite absorbing. I couldn't look away, even as my blood pressure went up. It was also tactile in a fashion I hadn't seen in an age; it felt grubby and raw, every sense overpowered by the noise, sights and even the smells in your head. The cast of (what I suspect were) game amateurs lent the story an authentic, lived-in feel. Maybe some truly were genuine jewelry district workers.

Adam Sandler channeled Pacino to the point that at times he even sounded eerily alike the elder method actor. And as with all his best performances, Sandler's was living on a hair's edge of self destruction, a man spiralling out of control, even while trying to spin even more plates.

How on earth do you even shoot a film like this, everyone shouting over each other constantly? How did the directors judge their work "stressful enough"?

Osmosis Jones · 03-02-2020 7:02pm

There's one scene in the bail bonds office in Good Time where there are like 3 conversations going on at once all talking over each other, and I feel like that scene was essentially just a proof of concept for this entire movie.

Osmosis Jones · 03-02-2020 7:38pm

I keep just thinking back to tiny little details in this movie, like

at the end of the movie when KG is on TV doing his post-game interview he says a line like "when I'm out there it's just me and the rock" and in basketball slang the "rock" is the ball, but in the context of the movie it's obviously the opal. It's just such a clever little repurposing of already existing footage

fin12 · 03-02-2020 9:48pm

I really didn’t expect the ending. Adam Sandler is a brilliant actor.

turbbo · 04-02-2020 11:33am

Watched it last night - loved every minute of it and the soundtrack as jazzy as it was really contributed to it. Amazing film making. Imagine a movie with a story in 2020 who'd have thunk it. Adam Sandler is shockingly good too - he actually has serious talent when channeled properly his last stand up special on Netflix was really good too - but some of his comedy movies are absolute dog dirt. This is definitely his finest movie.

Gamb!t · 04-02-2020 2:50pm

Thought it was an ok movie but the music annoyingly bad in it.

DaeryssaOne · 04-02-2020 3:04pm

While I appreciate how good and incredibly intense this movie is I would not recommend it if you're not willing to immerse yourself fully in it.
I watched it when I wasn't feeling particularly well and couldn't cope with ALL the shouting. It is constant and feels like you're watching an episode of eastenders on steroids!

turbbo · 04-02-2020 3:43pm

Gamb!t wrote: »

Thought it was an ok movie but the music annoyingly bad in it.

It annoyed me at the start as I thought it was kinda overpowering - but then I settled right into it(I wasn't expecting to). I think it's because it distracts a bit from the main character and provides some relief from the onslaught of events.
I think it works really well.

buried · 04-02-2020 8:48pm

I'm a big fan of Oneohtrix Point Never anyways myself, so I really did enjoy the music score and I thought it worked brilliantly in parts. Same for the one he did for 'Good Time', both are a kind of updated hyper colour version of some of the classic Vangelis film scores which I also love. Lovely colourful synth lushness which makes a refreshing change from a lot of the loud doomfull synth scores you hear now on a lot of other films. Y'know, the ones that just go "BBBBBBBRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR" over and over and over to different scales of the exact same sound.
Love the way a few modern day pop tracks get thrown into the mix along with all of the works Lopatin scores himself too. Wouldn't exactly like those sort of pop tunes but I enjoy the way the Safdies throw them into the mix alongside the scores done by Lopatin. If any of you liked the score you should check out his albums "Rifts" "Replica" "R plus Seven" & "Garden of Delete" too. Really good.

Shane St. · 06-02-2020 4:59am

Don't see the hype with this one.
Thought Sandler was ok. Found it irritating all the constant shouting and noise. I get that this was their intention but it does not make for a good movie experience or something I would want to see again.

DaveyDave · 06-02-2020 5:01am

Shane St. wrote: »

Don't see the hype with this one.
Thought Sandler was ok. Found it irritating all the constant shouting and noise. I get that this was their intention but it does not make for a good movie experience or something I would want to see again.

Agreed. Sandler was decent but right away the shouting, talking over each other etc was ridiculous. The trippy music was out of place too in some parts.

It got a bit better towards the end as it got more tense and less shouty but it felt like it could have been much better.

Was debating whether to see it in cinema for weeks, glad I didn't. Surprised as it's gotten so much praise.

Oranage2 · 06-02-2020 6:04am

turbbo wrote: »

Watched it last night - loved every minute of it and the soundtrack as jazzy as it was really contributed to it. Amazing film making. Imagine a movie with a story in 2020 who'd have thunk it. Adam Sandler is shockingly good too - he actually has serious talent when channeled properly his last stand up special on Netflix was really good too - but some of his comedy movies are absolute dog dirt. This is definitely his finest movie.

Those terrible Adam Sandler movies are amongst the highest grossing, so you can see why he does them.

I wasn't going to watch this because it was Adam Sandler but it was so good. Only scene I didn't like was how he was explaining how he got his high with the basketball player, don't think I bought KG's acting.

El Duda · 06-02-2020 9:23am

Watched this again last night. Even on a second viewing it was clammy, uncomfortable and very stressful. Her indoors didn't really enjoy it but she did make a few comments afterwards. Usually if she doesn't enjoy something she just gives it "meh" but she did engage with the story.

We both agreed that

the tattoo

is very

poignant and a symbol of the futility of Howard's existence.

All in all, more of an experience than an enjoyment.

pixelburp · 06-02-2020 9:53am

Shane St. wrote: »

Don't see the hype with this one.
Thought Sandler was ok. Found it irritating all the constant shouting and noise. I get that this was their intention but it does not make for a good movie experience or something I would want to see again.

TBH, that's kind of the point though; take away the noise and shouting and it robs the film of its identity. Like saying Back to the Future would be a better film without the DeLorean. Sure, it's definitely not a movie for all seasons, but was quite deliberately crafted to soak the viewer in the world of the character we followed: the chaos, the unrelenting pace and pulsing stress of it all; the film put you right at ground level of Howard's world and didn't let you go, wouldn't let you blink or take breath. Many films that deal with ostensibly stressful environments or careers - like stockbrokers - often fail to convey that sweaty nonstop intensity, the composition of cinema detached from the immediacy of it all. Uncut Gems nailed it, got under my skin, and set my heart-rate up. It certainly did its job.

PressRun · 06-02-2020 10:40pm

It's essentially a movie about gambling addiction. Gamblers live on the edge. It should be stressful to watch.

johnny_ultimate · 06-02-2020 11:25pm

Few suggestions that the film isn’t particularly ‘enjoyable’ to watch... but gotta say I found it absolutely compulsive viewing that I couldn’t look away from. Has far more energy and things to keep you hooked than the vast majority of films. Sure, it’s stressful and intense and rather exhausting... but it’s also one of the most intensely watchable films of the last few years for me, and one that grabbed my attention in ways most popcorn fodder or blockbuster fare doesn’t. Definitely ‘enjoyable’ for me in that sense.

buried · 06-02-2020 11:47pm

I was laughing my arse off at it. Especially that scene

at the end when Kevin Garnett is roaring at him "Why were you getting someone to jack up the bids? You don't know I know you are doing all this? What the f**k man"

I was bent over laughing, then

Howard flips around the laptop with all the bet prices for the game that night

I lost it altogether.

Its the perfect depiction of a total degenerate clown totally out of control.

weemcd · 07-02-2020 9:53am

I watched Good Time last night and I was absolutely blown away. Now I loved Uncut Gems but Good Time is twice as good. There's 4 or 5 moments in the film I was howling with laughter. It's so fùcked up.

I'll watch anything the brothers do now. They are incredibly talented.

turbbo · 07-02-2020 12:26pm

weemcd wrote: »

I watched Good Time last night and I was absolutely blown away. Now I loved Uncut Gems but Good Time is twice as twice as good. There's 4 or 5 moments in the film I was howling with laughter. It's so fùcked up.

I'll watch anything the brothers do now. They are incredibly talented.

It's defo next on my list - they sure know how to stitch a story together.

Osmosis Jones · 09-02-2020 1:56am

Well they certainly channelled the vibe of the movie in their Spirit Awards acceptance speech

https://twitter.com/thepopcornreel/status/1226296746118012928?s=20

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts · 09-02-2020 2:44am

Julia Fox’s vocal fry was a great touch.

Optimalprimerib · 09-02-2020 4:12am

Every inch of this movie from the characters, music style and direction wanted to stress you out. It was a horrible experience but captivating at the same time.

It was amazing to think that this was Julia foxes first main acting role. I thought she was excellent.

I am also glad that Netflix also added some studio Ghibli films this month. The perfect destressing antedote to this anxiety attack.

Uncut Gems - upcoming Safdie Bros film with Adam Sandler (!)

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