The Northman

[Drunk Monk]

The Northman (2022) by Robert Eggers

What a cast.

(And sword-hacking!)

The Northman (2022) by Robert Eggers

What a cast.

(And sword-hacking!)

Cool.

All I could think was the line "What, the curtains?"

Nicole Kidman is now in everything.

Nicole needs to make a film with Michelle Yeoh. That would be a great bridge for 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon (if anyone still plays that).

Screener next week.

[Greg]

I won six degrees of Kevin Bacon years ago so I stopped playing.

[Greg]

Why are you going to this?

[Drunk Monk]

obvs

[Drunk Monk]

Since my mom's hospital went radio silent, there wasn't much I could do tonight so I retreated to this screener. It was great to see Patrick and catch up. It was even greater to see this film. This is a great film. An epic Viking film. Violent, visceral, vikings. The vikingest film I've seen. 

It's the same director as The Lighthouse http://www.brotherhoodofdoom.com/doomFor...p?tid=5487 and Dafoe has a juicy cameo. It has that same sense of style, the sheer terrifying awe of nature, the abstract visionary and hallucinatory moments, the intensity of characters. Some of the panoramas are so expansive that the demand the big screen. And ultimately, the story is shakespearean in magnitude. In fact, it's almost a retelling of one of Willy's most famous plays. 

But my gosh - so violent. Sanguineous maximus. And gritty brutal nasty violence. Not for the squeamish. 

At the same time, it evokes viking myth like no other viking story I've seen, and I did a bit of a dive into that world with Vikings Valhalla - http://www.brotherhoodofdoom.com/doomFor...p?tid=6759. I was on that viking long ship for a bit. Still am but I had to take a break because I kinda vikinged out. After this, all viking tales pale by comparison.

And those sword fights. Wow. Almost all the battle scenes are long shots - not quite oners but very respectable in their complexity and duration. And that final sword fight was one of the most epic sword fights I've seen...ever. 

So yeah, totally D00M recommended. 

It was good to escape into a movie for a few hours. The best medicine I could've had.

[Drunk Monk]

Dreamt I was partying with vikings and played a rhyming song game.

The weird thing is I woke with the game some in my head. It’s totally playable.

---

It’s weirding me out. I must’ve learned this game somewhere else. The melody and cadence are twin ear worms.

And btw, Viking life sux (but it was a lovely pagan party in my dream)

---

Also Nicole’s part is fire. Her big scene is so intense. And she gets a sword fight. Yeah, this film really worked for me.

So violent
So visionary
So Viking

[Drunk Monk]

And now, I've forgotten the melody and cadence to that Viking song game. Like a ghost in the wind...

Upon morning after reflection, this movie had more entrails than any I can remember. Many of the scenes are haunting me with their epic Vikingness.

[Drunk Monk]

Sad to hear this. Glad I got in there one last time (not that I went there very often). Also glad it was for this - a great movie. It is a magnificent movie theater. 

Shattuck Cinemas is closing, as downtown loses another movie theater

May 19, 2022 | 10:02 AM
Shattuck Cinemas will close for good this month, in a blow to cinema lovers that leaves downtown Berkeley with just one movie theater.
There are conflicting reports about why the theater is closing and how long fans of the 10-screen multiplex have to catch one last showing.
Two theater employees told Berkeleyside that its final day in business will be Tuesday, May 24, while Margot Gerber, a spokeswoman for operator Landmark Theatres, said the Shattuck will stay open through the end of the month. The theater’s website does not list any showings beyond Tuesday.
Gerber wrote in an email that the Shattuck is closing because “our landlord is moving forward with redevelopment of the property,” referring to a project proposed at 2065 Kittredge St. that would demolish its theaters. 

Tommy Sinnott, director of investments for CA Ventures, the Chicago-based development firm that owns the site, gave a different explanation, writing in a text message that the project was “absolutely not” to blame for the theater’s closure, and that Landmark “did not express interest to renew” its lease. The 2065 Kittredge St. project has not yet cleared the city approval process and is set to go before the Landmarks Preservation Commission in June.
The Shattuck opened in 1988 on the ground floor of the Shattuck Hotel complex and developed a reputation over its more than three decades as a home for independent and critically acclaimed films. Landmark, a West Hollywood-based chain, has operated the Shattuck since 1994, the same year it took over the California Theatre around the corner on Kittredge Street.
Two decades ago, the Shattuck and the California were among a half-dozen movie theaters spread around downtown Berkeley; by next month, only the United Artists theater at 2274 Shattuck Ave., owned by the Regal chain, will remain.
COVID-19 and the rise of streaming services have hit Landmark and other theater operators hard. The company permanently shuttered the California Theatre last fall, saying the building’s owners declined to renew its lease, and Deadline reported last week that the chain was closing its “flagship” theater in Los Angeles. The California Theatre’s owners have said Landmark stopped paying rent shortly before the pandemic began. 
Over the past decade, the Shattuck has been drawn into the battle over proposals to build housing on its downtown Berkeley block. While the multiplex’s marquee and entryway are on Shattuck Avenue, its theaters are part of a property on the western side of the block bound by Harold Way, Allston Way and Kittredge Street, that developers have long wanted to demolish for new apartments.
After opponents protested a previous plan to build an 18-story high-rise at 2211 Harold Way with a “Save Shattuck Cinemas” campaign, the project’s owners agreed to replace the Shattuck by building a new 10-screen theater within the development. That agreement ultimately helped kill the project, its representatives said, by adding to construction costs. 
CA Ventures’ eight-story project, which includes nearly 200 apartments, does not include plans to replace the theater.

[thatguy]

I think my parents to us to see Paint Your Wagon there when it was on its first run in the theaters. We lived in Kensington and my dad worked at the (Lawrence Livermore) Rad(iation) Lab(oratory) above the University. 

I have vague memories of that theater. I have vague memories of Berkeley: Krishnas everywhere, shopping with my mom at the co-op, the underground comix at the bookstore. Giovanni's pizza, Mr. Mopps toy store, the hardware store with the electric train that constantly circled the inside of the store... 

--tg

[Drunk Monk]

It has these lavish facades. I’m told they’re different in each screen room. The one we were in was Egyptian themed with pillars and golden hieroglyphics. It adds to the experience while your waiting for the movie to start, heightens the drama…

[Drunk Monk]

So yeah, totally D00M recommended. 

I confess that I was under a lot of mental duress when I fawned over this intense ultravi. Plus they gave me a cool T-shirt at the screener. But I stand behind my review.  

This is now available on Amazon Prime. So when you’re ready for a major helping of visceral ultravi, this is waiting for you. 

Enjoy!

[Greg]

My schedule has opened up. We shall see,

[cranefly]

Finally saw this.  Probably a mistake after watching the Ottoman drama-documentary.  I liked how they psyched themselves into animal states for battles, only to return to human states after.  So the growling and barking was nice.  But at the same time their speech (colorful as it was) seemed cumbersome and slowed down their actions at key points.  The protagonist son seemed musclebound and a bit slow with the sword, and he tended to exaggerate his blows, where I would have preferred finesse.  So it was a lot of shouting and big swings, and clashing.

Still, I recognize that this is a solid depiction of Vikingness, and it's high on the list of some people's best of 2022 films.  It's just that I found the Ottoman doc series format more historically informative and equally sanguinous and in many ways better paced.  And it had Nick Cage!

I mean Vlad.