So played straight, unlike What’s Up Tiger Lilly?
Ok, the headline is slightly deceptive, essentially because it does include films mentioned, but graphic IP I assume. Netflix has acquired (Mark Millar of) Millarworld and will produce unspecified “new content” and may include some old content.
I haven’t actually seen that, so I don’t know for sure, but this isn’t actually a redubbed show. It’s a high production value original, pretending to be a dub. But yes, it’s basically played straight. It’s still pretty farcical (the most recent episode I watched revolved around the detectives trying to figure out what Monopoly was - answer: a tool for indoctrinating people into capitalism). But it’s pretty much all deadpan.
Anyway, if you have Amazon Prime, watch it, it’s really good.
This is an incredible amount of effort to put forth to just be amusing. Such a bizarro project.
Whoo, watched this the other night, that really stuck with me.
Just started watching two pretty great shows on Netflix.
The first is Last Chance U, a Hard Knocks style documentary set in a high powered, football oriented community college in Scooba, Mississippi. This is a place where troubled Div 1 players can go and try to rehab their image following a scandal. Pretty wild stuff and it’s hard to not root for these guys who are caught up in a system designed to exploit them. The one shining light is the academic guidance counselor and even she admits that her main goal is to keep them eligible to play rather than any academic achievement.
The second is Atypical, a family drama about a high functioning, autistic, high school male. Mom is Jennifer Jason Leigh and Dad is Michael Rappaport. This is another short season (6 shows) series that seems like a good way to find an audience with a limited investment. I loved this and found myself frequently moved by the story beats. JJL is as lovely and damaged as ever.
Netflix is spending $9 BILLION (with a B) on original content next year. This is more than all the other Hollywood studios combined. A movie service that lets you watch one movie a day in theatres, MoviePass, just dropped their price from $50 a month to $10 a month, same price as Netflix. To compete with them. An unheard of price for the movie theatre experience. It reeks of desperation to try and scale to me.
I think theatres are about done, and will be about as popular as musicals and plays in the next 10 years. Streaming will take over and customized content and videogames (even more) will be the wave of the future. I kinda hope to lead that revolution with my Cinematic AI when it’s finished (God it’s complicated and hard to design and code, but it’s coming along nicely).
Anyway, Netflix is the 800 lb. gorilla in the room. Only Disney could take them on directly. Netflix has a market cap of $77B and DIS a market cap of $160B. Viacom is at about $12B. Universal at $1B. These are like baby companies next to Netflix. They are the juggernaut, and if they keep pouring money into content creation they are going to dwarf CBS, NBC, all the TV studios, all the movie studios combined. There are only two companies with enough capitalization to take either DIS or Netflix: Comcast and Amazon. Amazon has a better chance, I think Comcast is a dinosaur.
The only real competitor left is Hulu, which is a joint venture for a lot of companies with existing content. But it doesn’t create it’s own (or it’s not well known).
So it comes down to Netflix and whomever wants to compete with them. This is going to be an exciting time for entertainment in the next 10 years.
Maybe, but people want things to do on dates, in a group, etc.
We don’t go out to the movies because we’re dying to see something on the big screen. We go to get out of the house, do something together out of the house, and so on.
And no matter how large our TV is, the theater screen is bigger. And it’s fun (most of the time) to see a movie with other people in the audience. There’s something about the theater experience that isn’t duplicated by watching a movie with a few other people in the home, just like there’s something about watching a movie at home that isn’t duplicated in the theater.
By the way, I never heard of MoviePass. Their website is broken right now. If there are enough theaters in my area (zip 63119) that work with it, I think I’ll get one. All I need to do is see two movies a month to make it worthwhile.
Apple announced they will spend $1B on original content. I don’t know what their market cap is (I’m lazy) but don’t they have something like $100B in the bank? They could match Netflix very easily if they wanted to.
Apple is in the game? I had no idea. I’ve never heard of an Apple original series. That’s probably … bad.
But they could certainly be a player. An INSANE $815 BILLION market cap and over $250 billion in cash. What the hell are they waiting for? Perhaps it’s not their core business (it’s not) and they are rightly hesitant. But the big cash investment in content is interesting. What are they making?
I wouldn’t say anything about Apple behind original TV is bad or good. They simply fund it.
I just watched the pilot episode of Mr. Mercedes on cable. It’s an AT&T original. You wouldn’t think of AT&T as a place for TV content, but the pilot was good and I’m looking forward to the rest of the series.
Yeah I go out to movies to not only see movies but to have dinner, hang out with friends… I don’t do the musicals and plays because they’re a lot more expensive and movies have a wider appeal.
I don’t think movies are done anymore than TV is done.
I think there can be a market for things like a binge-watch of Stranger Things 2 at a theater. Three episodes Friday night, three on Saturday night, and the final two on Sunday night. Or three on Friday and five on a long Saturday night, with breaks to buy from the concession stand.
And you have theaters now that deliver food to you while watching the movie. I find them a bit too expensive, but for something cool like Stranger Things 2 I might be all in.
I don’t think theaters are obsolete. I think they can offer more than they do now. People like to get out of the house, and people like witnessing things as part of a group.
To temper the Netflix talk some they are borrowing massively to do it all with the whole growth at any expense ideology, long term will have to see how it plays out.
Theaters I still will think get decent business for years to come for big movies people still like to see on a big screen. It’s the middle tier that has been basically killed off as most will just wait to watch at home.
I’m a Netflix booster, but the difference is that the TV studios make money, whereas Netflix is burning cash at a ridiculous rate ($500m a quarter, twice what it was a year ago). It can’t sustainably invest $9bn a year in content. Its market cap may be impressive now, because it’s still growing subscribers and hence revenues at a decent whack, but we’ll see how long that lasts and how expensive it becomes to maintain. International is expected to be profitable for the first time by year end, so that’s a good sign
I’m not sure if people still occasionally throw recommendations in this thread. Over the weekend I happened upon two great movies, similar but different in that one was fiction, and one wasn’t, but you’d be hard pressed to actually know that after watching them. I apologize that one is on Netflix, while the other is on Amazon Prime (but also Netflix DVD if you still subscribe.)
The first is an older standby that I hadn’t seen but was recommended to me:
Best in Show (2000) (Netflix Instant)
If you’re a lover of dogs and comedy, this is gold. Excellent comedy setups and characters combined with the craziness of showing dogs, it is over the top in the best possible way. The comedic actors in this are amazing in playing what are both believable yet funny takes on everyone you know or would think would be associated with dog shows. I loved it.
But on a whim, my GF and I stumbled upon the trailer for the second movie:
Chicken People (2016) (Amazon Prime)
I have to say, we both thought this was a comedy. It certainly starts that way. But as you begin to understand this is an actual movie about actual people, and come to terms with how over the top the subject is, you suddenly find yourself entranced by the people and of course, chickens, involved. You can’t help but learn something while all this goes on, and it goes without saying, you become attached to both the people as well as their motivations and their animals as well.
If you’re up for some fun, I would encourage watching them back to back. One lends a comedic take on how we think characters would be, while the other gives an amazingly real take on just how larger than life characters like that can be.
There’s a strong case that it’s Guest’s best film. I still prefer Spinal Tap, but it’s close.
And I didn’t even realize that was the same actor! That’s a tough call but Spinal Tap will always be a favorite and he was part of why. I feel like in Best of Show he was part of an awesome ensemble but still great.
Actor and writer. And he directed BiS.
Now I have to more of his movies.
I adore A Mighty Wind, which is “about” folk music. People really like Waiting For Guffman, but I have yet to see it, to my shame. He did a Netflix exclusive, Mascots, which got middling reviews, as did For Your Consideration. He usually works with the same ensemble (eg Eugene Levy, Fred Willard, Parker Posey, Harry Shearer, Michael McKean).