Thursday, July 16, 2020

This Week in (Virtual) Tickets: 6 July 2020 - 12 July 2020

Love not feeling great at this particular point in history!

This Week in Tickets

I mean, I knew I wasn't sick in any sort of dangerous way - something on the pizza I made one night had probably been in the fridge too long after being opened (a thing that happens when you live alone and try not to hit the grocery store every other day), so it had me feeling lousy after eating it and watching Shanghai Triad, I slept lousy, thought I was doing okay the next day but had to lay down for a while, then had to make those hours back up at work later in the week. Totally knew that was what it was, but you can't help but get a little more tense about such things right now.

The movie? Good! After all, even lesser Zhang Yimou is pretty good, and this was him in his early Gong Li-starring run, with a sting you don't notice until you've had a bit of time to sit with it. I'm more than a bit curious how Zhang's films will get rolled out once China gets serious about re-opening theaters - some things have had whole year delays, others have gone to VOD, and who knows how getting released in China will translate to coming to North America, as Zhang's last, Shadow, skipped its National Day day-and-date and got a more mainstream release.

The only other movie-watching I did over the weekend was to drop Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse into the player for the first time. Surprise, it is still pretty great.

Sunday, I got the PUZ files of the last three years of the Boswords crossword tournament, and I have no idea how well I did on solving them. I got mostly scores in the 3000 range, according to Across Lite, but have no idea if that's "OK for someone who hasn't been solving much in the past few years", "respectable", or "contender". Guess I'll find out in a week and a half!

Got something a bit more ambitious planned for the next couple of weeks, so there will be stuff on my Letterboxd page, even if it's mostly just logging. Wish I could be in Montreal!

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

* * * ¾ (out of four)
Seen 11 July 2020 in Jay's Living Room (off the shelf, 4K Blu-ray)

I think that this is the first time I've seen the movie flat, as both times I saw it in theaters were in 3D, and it's a thing that I couldn't help thinking about while watching it, because the animation style is very much designed so that you will notice where things are in terms of distance even without the glasses. On the 4K disc, the sharpness and bold color accentuates that, giving a feeling of depth. It also just highlights how gorgeous a movie it is: Detailed while still being cartoony, packed with creativity and detail despite never being too overwhelming, able to make deliberately different styles work together.

Some of the details show a little more wear on multiple viewings, although far less so than one may expect from this sort of fantasy - you can more often see the elegance of how Miles having a supervillain uncle is not just an ironic coincidence. I like the material with Peter B or Miles making fools of themselves with women less and less each time, but that's the sort of cringe-y stuff that I never really go for, and it's a part that gives the movie something for everyone.

It's telling, I think, that while ordering other stuff on Amazon that day, I stumbled on a decently-priced copy of the 3D disc from the UK and ordered that. As much as I know 3D has become a complete niche item in the USA (for no good reason! 4K sets have the high frame rate and Bluetooth needed to manage 3D!), it's still annoying that I have to double-dip across continents to get both the hi-res and 3D versions of a movie, although this is definitely one where it's worth the extra money and shelf space.

What I thought the first time and the second

Shanghai Triad
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

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