domain:freddiedeboer.substack.com
you stick an eye patch on a kid character, you make it look like your movie is going to be A Moral Lesson And Lecture About The Differently Abled And Inclusion, not a fun sci-fi romp for the kids
I strongly suspect this was a major part of the flop, especially since the very minimal marketing really made it look like “eyepatch kid movie, also with some aliens or something.” Especially when paired with the very generic artstyle… a big draw for Pixar movies was always the excellent animation, this looked like it could’ve been any random direct-to-streaming slop.
The concept of “kid gets accidentally called up to be Earth’s ambassador to aliens” is a good idea, too! Just bring some actual creativity to the art and don’t feel obligated to make it a coming-out allegory or totally centered on him being a weird outcast or whatever (to be fair I don’t know if that last part is true but it’s hard to imagine it isn’t, what with the eyepatch and all). Clearly that’s a huge ask for Disney these days though (and by extension Pixar).
Edit to add: the title of the movie was pretty awful as well. Like who (or what) the hell is “Elio”? It gives you absolutely nothing to work with, nothing about space or aliens or anything. So matching that up with the bland art and the minimal marketing gives no hook at all to actually want to go out and see it.
zeke5123a
2hr ago
My favorite line was “they do move in herds.” Here was a guy who spent his life claiming to be an expert but the statement revealed his inner uncertainty.
Just chefs kiss.
That and the whole hubris of man theme.
What did you mean when you said "This worldview would seem to conflict with HBD theories. Indeed, one would have to conclude that whites are an inferior race. "
Who would have to conclude that? Under what suppositions?
Maybe the problem here is you reading things that aren't there, not my writing.
Don't insult my intelligence. I know exactly what you're trying to insinuate. You're quite straightforwardly saying "If you assume X, then Y is a logical conclusion. Since X-supporters don't believe in Y, they must be either idiots or are lying." Of course you're wrong about that, but that's besides the point because you just go "tee hee that's not what I meant XP" instead of defending your position.
stuckinbathroom
2hr ago
I often think about Blood Simple, the Cohen Brothers first film. Film opens with this lady talking about how much she hates her husband. Among the gripes she has, she mentions that he bought her a gun as a gift. Giving your wife a gun as a present? Can you even imagine such a thing? It's a six round revolver. Over the course of the 90 minute runtime, it discharges exactly 6 rounds. If you've been counting during the film, by the final scene you know exactly how it's going to end. It's a simple concept, but well executed. Everything has a set up, everything has a payoff.
Sounds like they took Chekhov’s gun and dialed it up to 11, as it were
ZanarkandAbesFan
2hr ago
Exactly. Watching Dr Grant see a sauropod for the first time is infinitely more impactful than any moment in any of the more recent films despite the much worse CGI in the original precisely because it's actually a superbly made film that understands setup and payoff.
ulyssessword
2hr ago
If I ask an LLM about anything, I need to do the research that I would have done even if I had not asked the LLM.
I'm almost with you there. I need to to some of the research I would've had to do without the LLM, but it adds enough to displace a Google search or two while being faster and easier.
faceh
2hr ago
Hitchcock and, later, Spielberg and James Cameron were my main thoughts on directors that could pull all three off.
Indiana Jones (the first 3) is the series the comes to mind as the paragon of balanced action-characters-plot, mixed to perfection.
The mods are only human. I haven't dived deep enough to evaluate the merits of your particular ban, but for what it's worth, I've been banned several times. I don't hold any grudge against the mods for that. My bans were generally in the nature of "I got emotional and I started to really lay into my political opponents in an obviously angry and uncharitable way". I do sometimes get annoyed by the fact that I feel that people on this forum often break the "Don't attempt to build consensus or enforce ideological conformity." rule by assuming that social conservatism is good, without actually justifying it. But I don't feel that this happens because the mods are ideologically biased. I think it happens because I think that this forum has more social conservatives posting (though not necessarily lurking or voting) than social liberals like myself, so social conservatives just create more content for mods to address than social liberals do. Certainly there are plenty of snarky posts and consensus-building posts here by conservatives that don't get modded, but I don't feel that the mods are trying to support conservatism, it's just that there are a lot of snarky and consensus-building conservative posts to go through compared to snarky and consensus-building liberal posts, so it's very easy to find examples of the former that slip through the net.
While this forum leans right, I often see posts of mine that are left of the average get upvoted by quite a bit. You might be surprised how receptive you find some people here if you argue for your political opinions plainly and calmly, laying out arguments for why they are accurate and/or beneficial, rather than with anger. I extend this appeal, also, to some of the more snarky and angry right-wingers here: please put aside the emotional fervor and try to just argue for your political opinions plainly and calmly, rather than in a perpetually angry and conspiratorial mode.
Instead you post: Acktually, if HBDers really believed what they say, they "would have to conclude that whites are an inferior race." Therefore all HBD enjoyers must be nazi white supremacists.
What I actually said was:
whites, who all the statistics show have higher incomes, higher IQs, higher educational attainment, and lower unemployment
Maybe the problem here is you reading things that aren't there, not my writing.
ZanarkandAbesFan
2hr ago
It's strange to me that anyone wouldn't get extreme uncanny valley vibes from films involving photorealistic anthropomorphic animals.
If you want to understand the position of HBD enjoys better, you are perfectly allowed to lay out your current understanding of the HBD viewpoint and then ask about the parts that you think don't make sense.
Instead you post: Acktually, if HBDers really believed what they say, they "would have to conclude that whites are an inferior race."
I disagree with you guys and don't identify as part of your political tribe.
Who is "you guys" and who is "your political tribe???"
ajuuiomml
2hr ago
Blockbuster movies make half their money or more in the foreign market. They are designed to be easily digestible and offend not the sensibilities of the foreign market. That only leaves room for action sequences for some reason. It’s just dollars at the end of the day.
Goodguy
2hr ago
Superman was created by Jews, so it's not surprising if there are elements of Jewishness to him. I don't really see much that is specifically Jewish about him, though. For example, the notion of "really powerful being who is orphaned in a foreign culture and has to discover the powers he has by virtue of his birth" has as many examples in European cultures as it does in Semitic cultures. Kal-El does sound Hebrew, but that's a minor thing. What kinds of Jewish-coded characteristics do you have in mind?
Skulldrinker
2hr ago
The bulletproof suit enables lazy writing.
hanikrummihundursvin
2hr ago
Buddy, I don't think you do. I specifically remember some of your reports which were based on nothing more than you not liking what was said.
I doubt it. I don't report a lot. And in a holistic review I'd wager over ~99% are good reports.
If you mean you think peoplecoughJews are "shamelessly" reporting people for anti-Semitism
No, I meant what I actually wrote, not your bad faith paraphrasing.
and I'd say Jew-haters and incels are actually much more prone to mash the report and downvote buttons.
I doubt what you are saying is accurate, given how antagonistic and petty you get over the subject matter. But on the flipside, people who criticize jews are, as far as I can tell, vocal and make arguments when allowed. Unlike what is displayed here. Regardless of how many are allegedly behind the scenes hitting the report button.
ArmedTooHeavily
2hr ago
The toaster fucker greentext might answer your question.
AlexanderTurok
Alt-MSNBC
2hr ago
On the sidebar it says "This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases." In this thread, it is claimed "the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here."
After my ban for this comment, it's hard to take that seriously. It did not include personal attacks, name-calling, strawmanning, or attempting to enforce ideological conformity. It "spoke plainly" and provided evidence. Yet the mods banned me for it, saying I was being an "immense pain in the ass."
I think the mods, and most people here, believe that they want this to be an open discussion forum with people of many different viewpoints, but when they're actually confronted with it, they feel it's an "immense pain in the ass." They called me an "obnoxious trolling shitstirrer." Yes, I am a shitstirrer in the sense that I say things that go against the dominant ideological viewpoint here, and I know in advance that hostility is likely to result. But isn't that what you want here, rather than another online echo chamber? I'm sure many of you have experience being "shitstirrers" in online spaces where you're in the ideological minority, now the shoe's on the other foot.
The mods accused me of "snarling" at my enemies, which gets to the meat of the issue: do you want an ideologically diverse forum or not? I freely admit I have a contempt for forms of conservatism and white nationalism I see as third-worldist. (Anti-vax, raw milk, conspiratorial, superstitious, fetishizing low-skilled manual labor, etc.) That's why I disagree with you guys and don't identify as part of your political tribe. If you think I'm a "leftist," try talking to a real one, the kind who uses terms like "patriarchy" or "heteronormativity" non-ironically. They do NOT like you. They see you as a malignant, cancerous influence on America. If you don't want to have a discussion forum with people who dislike you, change your rules to state that they aren't welcome. If, on the other hand, you want people from other tribes to be in this "jury," then you've got to accept them as they are rather than the imagined versions who disagree with you but like and respect you and never come around to actually posting here.
It seems to me that what some people here want is a forum with "left-wing" equivalents of David French. For the unfamiliar, David French is an allegedly "conservative" columnist for the NYT whose articles are just one after another telling liberals they're right and that conservatives are gross and mean and only ever making "we need 50 Stalins" criticisms of the Left. Thing is, French doesn't play this role for free. And you should be glad you don't have David French's, as I suspect that they have had a detrimental impact on the Left's electoral fortunes. If your only exposure to "conservatives" is people like David French, you're going to get a warped view of American politics that will lead to bad election strategy.
None of this is to say you should get rid of your rules against shaming, strawmanning, name-calling, etc. Maybe a new rule should be "be as polite as possible without being insincere." I admit that this is a tough balance to strike, I just think that right now the Motte is too far toward forced politeness leading to ideological conformity.
ArmedTooHeavily
3hr ago
Did it, or did everybody just collectively forget about all of the forgettable trash?
ArmedTooHeavily
3hr ago
Alien: Romulus is excellent.
ZanarkandAbesFan
3hr ago
Now whether you were genuinely promoting the idea, or using a Socratic method to pick apart the assumptions of the OP, that I failed to figure out.
The latter. Not that I'm totally convinced that OP's premise is wrong (and I don't really agree that it's an intractable problem) but my issue was more with taking it as truth to the extent that we can start thinking about what the broader implications might be.
Tanista
3hr ago
I mean, sure. But you'd really hope that such people would want reassurances that the woman was there willingly and weren't coerced, drugged, or blackmailed into it themselves. I think most 'normal' people would be sketched out, even if they don't immediately go to the cops.
This is topical again because of Diddy but, when people see people hanging around a rich, powerful guy and being used for sex, they assume "whore" not "sex slave".
Because, y'know, there are a lot of whores out there.
AlexanderTurok
Alt-MSNBC
3hr ago
With that said, I don't really support Aarvoll's project. I don't want to live in an intentional ethnic enclave in Arkansas, I want to live in Manhattan. There's no logical avenue to political and cultural power with this project. At best, it goes nowhere, at worst it gains the smallest amount of traction and gets absolutely crushed, ruining the lives of good people and blackpilling many more.
It may not get crushed, if you buy a house from a real estate developer who discriminates, you're not liable. If the ADL comes up with some legal wizardry that you're liable for "conspiracy to discriminate" or whatever, the Supreme Court is different from what it was in the 1970s and may follow the letter rather than the "spirit" of the law. And if you lose and they try to evict you, let the world see when thugs come in and try to throw you in jail for the crime of wanting to live next to other white people. Polygamy was illegal in Arizona and Utah and yet when they raided the community in the Short Creek raid of 1953, it was a PR disaster for the government. Again, it isn't the 1970s anymore.
I would not have personally banned you and I don’t think you’ve ever posted anything banworthy.
But @netstack was correct that based on your comment record, you’re here to pick fights rather than engage in constructive dialogue. Like everywhere else in the world, we have multiple competing values that we want to balance: we want a diversity of viewpoints represented, but we also don’t want people who are just here to pick fights.
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