Netflix: instaView rec's

[oftpiste]

Sorry.... not Netflix..... X-finity. I was going to Netflix (which is available through Xfinity) and saw a Prime logo. Clicked on a couple of things and there it was, a sign-in option, on my TV that does not have a Prime app and in an evening fog thought it was through Netflix.

So apparently Xfinity now offers Prime access, which still requires a subscription.

Sorry for the false alarm.

[Elkhound Odin]

for the Prime connection through xfinity, you have to log on to your prime acct on a computer/tablet and enter the code displayed on the TV. After that the TV is recognized as a Prime entity.

[oftpiste]

^^ Yup. I was pretty happy to do that as I was pondering getting new TV's with Prime apps.

[dookeyXXX]

Coen brothers The Ballad of Buster Scruggs released on Netflix 11/16 looks superb

It is.

Looks great; just promise me they don't sneak George Clooney in there and I'm all in.

(SPOILER: they don’t; at least I didn't see him anywhere...)

Just watched Ballad of Buster Scruggs. Really not what I expected but couldn't stop watching, wondering, or slightly dreading just how far the Coen brothers were going to take each story. A heavier movie than I was expecting.
The Rolling Stone review is pretty spot on.

Yeah, it definitely has some heavy, dare I say, morbid moments for sure.

Watched it (The Ballad of Buster Scruggs) last night. Giggled the whole way through. Felt a lot like "Raising Arizona" to me. Liked it.

Raising Arizona is one of their films I never really got into. May have to re-visit it as a slightly more mature adult...

I was expecting a mash of blazing saddles, the three amigos, and a million ways to die in the West with darker comedy films like raising Arizona, oh brother where Art thou, fargo, the hateful eight, etc. It started out that way, but got a bit more serious/dark than I anticipated. More "frontier fatalism" (per Rolling Stone) than I anticipated. The unconnected vignette structure reminded me of tales from the crypt, particularly during the "meal ticket" chapter.

It felt more like a Western take on Creepshow, to me. (knowing full well that Creepshow was based on the Tales From The Crypt comics, btw).

Very interesting movie. I thought a few of the vignettes were really good. A few seemed to stretch a bit to make them so fatalistic.

I thought the tone of the film overall was a bit front-loaded with over-the-top violent humor in the first two vignettes, then got progressively darker, with the "All Gold Canyon" Tom Waits segment breaking up the bleak tone for a hot minute before the film returned to the kind of morbid, and as you said, fatalistic, tone. Still dug it thoroughly, though.



I am not currently subscribing to NF streaming. However, The Ballad of Buster Scruggs screened at a local cinema in Incline Village recently as part of a small film festival, so I plunked down $12 to go see it. Ethan Coen actually strolled in, introduced the film (“I hope that most you have not watched this on Netflix yet...”) and after a 15-minute delay they ran the film.
I totally dug it.
To me it was a pastiche of every single Western film trope as if they had been re-imagined by O. Henry and Edgar Allan Poe with some consulting from Shirley Jackson and Roald Dahl.
I couldn’t stop laughing during the first vignette where they completely took the piss out of the singing cowboy sub-genre. Loved how they paid homage to Clint Eastwood (Hang ‘Em High) in the second entry. “Meal Ticket” was perhaps the darkest slant on the traveling medicine show imaginable. Tom Waits absolutely owned his piece and perhaps stole the show overall (this is the second film I’ve seen him in this year where he was the stand-out). "The Girl Who Got Rattled" was a great take on the wagon train motif, and the final vignette was a strange trip indeed, tweaking the stagecoach theme to the extreme.
Again, I laughed, was transfixed to the screen the whole time, shook my head a few times, but was completely entertained from start to finish. This anthology does to the Western genre what Creepshow did to the modern horror film genre (I can't think of another anthology over the past 30 years or so that I've dug as much as these two).


For those hankering for more, two of the vignettes were based on/inspired by short stories by Jack London and Stewart Edward White.

Here are those stories:

"All Gold Canyon" (the Tom Waits segment):
http://www.online-literature.com/lon...pohEXZ7CIAuMLc

"The Girl Who Got Rattled" (the wagon train segment):
https://americanliterature.com/autho...2y9nLScbb0kPII

[muted]

Raising Arizona is the funniest movie ever, you have to watch again. it was funny when it came out IMO, but when I watched it after getting married and was about to have kids, it hit home in a way I would never imagined.

Buster Scruggs was great, but it was so disturbing I was wondering what the Coen brothers are saying about humans or life in general. Was it all a just a joke or more than that?

[dookeyXXX]

Raising Arizona is the funniest movie ever, you have to watch again. it was funny when it came out IMO, but when I watched it after getting married and was about to have kids, it hit home in a way I would never imagined.

Buster Scruggs was great, but it was so disturbing I was wondering what the Coen brothers are saying about humans or life in general. Was it all a just a joke or more than that?

Personally, I think they just love the Western genre and wanted to really f$%k with it.
I also think they may be heavily influenced by the adult themed short stories of Roald Dahl, who, while best known as a children's author, wrote some really dark stuff for older folks.
Also, if you think about it, all of their films have a dark, slightly malevolent undertone that is heavily masked by absurdist humor...

Will most def re-visit Raising Arizona. It took me a few times to "get" Lebowski, to be honest. Miller's Crossing was always my favorite of theirs, followed by O' Brother Where Art Thou?.

[bodywhomper]

Thanks for the dialog about this. Looks like I'm gonna get some roald Dahl adult lit from the library soon.

I've only seen the first vignette so far, which was entertaining. though morbid, it had a tone of comic book exaggerated/unrealistic violence. At least that's my take to it.

Sent from my SPH-L710 using TGR Forums mobile app

[dookeyXXX]

Thanks for the dialog about this. Looks like I'm gonna get some roald Dahl adult lit from the library soon.

I've only seen the first vignette so far, which was entertaining. though morbid, it had a tone of comic book exaggerated/unrealistic violence. At least that's my take to it.

The titular vignette came off as if Quentin Tarantino had directed a Gene Autry film, imho.


Also, in regards to Dahl, Amazon Prime has his old TV series, Tales of the Unexpected, available for streaming right now. For the series they turned his stories into teleplays (Dahl actually introduces each episode).

[bodywhomper]

Thanks!

I did not think it reached the level of Tarantino violence.

Sent from my SPH-L710 using TGR Forums mobile app

[powpig]

Thanks for the dialog about this. Looks like I'm gonna get some roald Dahl adult lit from the library soon.

Easy access Roald Dahl content would be to watch You Only Live Twice. He wrote the screenplay. Does that count?

[bodywhomper]

Easy access Roald Dahl content would be to watch You Only Live Twice. He wrote the screenplay. Does that count?

Counts! especially relevant to the thread topic!

But I like real books, too.

[SkiBall]

Are we including Hulu here? Just started Killing Eve. Seems like it could be a winner...if you are into hot female assassins and some dry humor.

[dookeyXXX]

Easy access Roald Dahl content would be to watch You Only Live Twice. He wrote the screenplay. Does that count?

This got me to mosey on over to IMDb where I learned that he also penned the screenplay for Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (wondering if he was pals with Fleming?) as well as the screenplay to the first (and best, imho) filmed version of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory...both of those films had really dark and creepy elements to them, fwiw.

[PNWbrit]

Are we including Hulu here? Just started Killing Eve. Seems like it could be a winner...if you are into hot female assassins and some dry humor.

It's excellent.

Think I'd mentioned it earlier.

[Danno]

My Uncle Oswald is easily the funniest book I've ever read, VERY adult lit from Dahl.

[PNWbrit]

in regards to Dahl, Amazon Prime has his old TV series, Tales of the Unexpected, available for streaming right now.

If these are the old British made ones.. I remember being scared silly by some of them as a kid.

Cool

[dookeyXXX]

My Uncle Oswald is easily the funniest book I've ever read, VERY adult lit from Dahl.

Not familiar with that one. Gonna have to check it out.

Now I'm thinking we might have to create a "ROALD DAHL APPRECIATION" thread, eh?



Sorry for initiating the topic drift...

[bodywhomper]

This got me to mosey on over to IMDb where I learned that he also penned the screenplay for Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (wondering if he was pals with Fleming?) as well as the screenplay to the first (and best, imho) filmed version of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory...both of those films had really dark and creepy elements to them, fwiw.

Chitty chitty bang bang is also streamable on Netflix...

[PNWbrit]

Chitty chitty bang bang is also streamable on Netflix...

Cool!

Van Dyke really nails the Brit accent.

Speaking of which... All Things Considered were talking about a new Mary Poppins movie with the dude who wrote Hamilton cast in the role of "cockney gas lighter".... wtf... it's like black face.

[Supermoon]

How is that anything like black face?

We saw them filming that movie when I was in London last fall

[PNWbrit]

How is that anything like black face?

[Supermoon]

Isn’t that just soot?

[PNWbrit]

Isn’t that just soot?

Give your sarcasm meter a hard smack.

[Supermoon]

Ha. Point taken

[Danno]

Not familiar with that one. Gonna have to check it out.

Now I'm thinking we might have to create a "ROALD DAHL APPRECIATION" thread, eh?



Sorry for initiating the topic drift...

Done https://www.tetongravity.com/forums/...28#post5535928