One of the things I want to do, is to replace the bad dubbing in bud spencer movies. Use the actual voices of bud spencer and terence hill, clone them and make them speak English. Then use Ai video generation to adjust lip syn so that it looks completely natural. Then the characters would sound more natural, and you wouldnt get that second rate movie feeling. And you could focus on the story. This would also be a perfect strategy for other badly dubbed films, such as those from Hong Kong. Some of those old movies are in fact worth watching, and it would be clearer if that awful dubbing was solved the way i say. by voice cloning from original actor's voices and then ai adjusted lip sync.

Crimebusters!

Belmondo is a B movie actor, many of film were B-movies. He played in genre movies, often action comedies, L'as de L'as, Le Cervau, Animal etc. De Funes specialized in comedies. When i say B-movies it is not derogatory in any way, but a way to set them apart from these slightly self conscious drama movies that win oscars, or the cahiers directors of the new wave. They were both in the entertainment business. Some of the plots in a Belmondo movie resemble a Van Damme movie today, but without the martial arts. Bud Spencer and Terence Hill adds that physical element, but in a way that makes them into European Jackie Chan movies, in a way. The stylized fist fight with a gleam in your eye. It is physical comedy in a sort Chaplin of tradition. Remember also that the modern spy thriller was created when hitchcock arrived from Babelsberg where he had been educated during the silent era, and then he filmed the pioneers of the british thriller genre, Joseph Conrad (secret agent) and John Buchan (39 steps, that is invasion literature) and Ethel Lina White (Lady Vanishes), and Farjeon (number seventeen). Then he moved to the US, and continued developing this. But the genre was created in the UK, using all these british writers in british made films with british actors. he also made a serial killer movie, The Lodger (Marie belloc lowndes story). And in Germany Billy Wilder, Fritz Lange and Peter Lorre (the famous villain of the murder movie M), were refuges from europe to hollywood. lange fled from persecution and his nazi wife, and then helped spur the noir film tradition, which used the novels written in the us by old american soldiers of WWI, Hammet, Chandler, Burnett, but also the Brit Graham Greene, a later generation of that type of story. But the point is that these were European immigrants to the US, and they created many iconic movies of the Hollywood golden age. And through immigrants like Von Sternberg, Wilder and Lange that lighting you see in those alleys was created. They were not the only source, but the ones i mentioned were all european trained. The film school generation drew heavily on the European tradition, but often serious films. But Tarantino, a generation after them, remade one of the most iconic spagetti westerns Django. Had it not been for him, those old Django movies would not have been lauded the way they have. And Eastwood created his career using Leone as a director, another import from Europe. He also starred alongside Burton in an Alistair Maclean movie, a scottish writer who shaped action movies in a major way. It should also be noted that a huge number of iconic Hollywood movies are REMAKES of classic French genre movies. They bought the scripts, and we in Europe only remember the English language version? Many people do not even know this? And if you removed all the old British actors from the Hollywood golden age (James Mason, Cary Grant, Laurence Oliver, Ralph Richardson, John Guilgud, Alec Guinnes, Audrey Hepburn, Julie Andrews, Christopher Plummer, Richard Burton, Charlie Chaplin etc), there might not even be anything to term a Hollywood Golden Age? Ingrid Bergman and Greta Garbo were swedes, and Charles Boyer French.

Even today, European actors are very important in Hollywood (think Anthony Hopkins, Michael Caine, Sean Connery, Ralph Fiennes etc). Arnold is Austrian and van damme Belgian.

The point here is that Europe has made great entertainment, they have just been prevented from making most of it at home. But what if they were not? What you are seeing in the classic movie Casablanca, is a tiny american icon on plateau shoes telling a Swedish actress that he really likes to look at her, just before she boards the plane to Hollywood.

Do de Funes and Belmondo count as B Movies actors? Not so sure.

Everything is CGI, they strangle and choke your emotions with horn-blowers and fanfares and explosions, and then hammer the moral of the movie into your head with a sledgehammer in drawn-out and nauseating camera-staring monologues. And there is also a limit to how much interest I am able to muster for the psychological dilemmas that come with superpowers.

The fans being pissed might actually mean the writers got it right. Not all stories get a happy ending. If killing a character got more engagement or attention to the show, then from a success perspective it was the right call. As for story telling, it will always be debatable what was right.

Because they are just a 90 minute commercial now.

This is the correct answer.

I think we found it legit on Apple TV. Not sure if bootlegs or youtube versions exist. Yarr.

Movies (and video games) are now made by huge companies with shareholders and a ton of overhead. This makes them harder to be profitable and risk averse. They're also more formulaic.

As a consequence, the indie scene is popping for video games at the moment. I assume there is similar impetus for movies, but indie movies have less visibility than indie video games (it's also easier to make a game alone at home).

I hope you like it, but I was not a fan.

It somehow both felt like every other generic superhero movie that's come out in the last 10 years, while also feeling like they tried to shove the plot of a season of TV into 2 hours.

Oh, awesome! Universal Language is even Canadian. I'll have to check it out. Thanks!

I keep hearing good things about it too. I'm not a huge fan of the DC movie universe, but I may have to give it a go.

Oh I'm old (and lucky) enough to have seen it in theatres when it came out. I was absolutely blown away. The newest ones hardly had any dinosaurs imo. So it felt half-ass for dino-lovers and half-ass for action lovers, and catering to no one in particular. Such a shame.

The latest Superman was quite entertaining, felt like a breath of fresh air from the stale movies recently

You should watch the original Jurassic Park movie - it's a great film. Jurassic World was a soulless reboot.

Not at all. I read what you wrote and liked it.

Some writers understand all this, and know they have to keep you engaged in ways so you'll accept known tropes while you're aware of them.

Those would be the experienced writers.

The problem is that inexperienced writers are cheaper to hire...

It's because they suck.

You won't go wrong with my favorite movies! Feel free to tell me what I should add to my watchlist, too (second tab): https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mL45-PN_KhrJM8LqPFhO5xhys26RGXDKWpVoqpuEpf8/edit

It's because no one takes risk in Hollywood and thus every movie there is close to entirely recycled. There are exceptions. But perhaps you should look at the Cannes audience awards over the last few years and try watching some of them. There is novel stuff out there. An indie movie like "Universal Language" beats Marvel movie #72 in my books now. As I age even more so.

Bingo.

Some writers understand all this, and know they have to keep you engaged in ways so you'll accept known tropes while you're aware of them.

Blockbuster movies seem to struggle with this (or don't even bother), which is why I don't bother with them.

You can see the same issues in TV shows, which is why I find most of them uninteresting.

I'm actually old, 60. And, man, is it hard to find something to watch that will engage me.

Like you said, characters making clearly stupid choices at the start of the show just to have a problem to solve for the rest of the show is annoying.

There really are only a few universal stories that many people can connect with. And, that is what mass entertainment needs to be, stories that many (paying) people can relate to. Which necessarily means we will quickly start to recognize one of the usual suspect main stories underlying the facade of details that dress it up.

You might find trying genres you don't usually watch more interesting. Not every show or movie involves characters dying.

It's very simple. Too many modern movies don't tell a compelling story in an interesting way. Full stop. That's it.

I'm not an anime fan, so I can't really recommend something in that genre, but if you give me an idea about the genres you're into, I'll be happy to give you some suggestions. I've seen thousands of movies.

Did you mean that I should lower my bar, by your last sentence?