Movies we are looking forward to seeing

[Sunsilver]

Maria, I did some archaeological field work when in university, as well as taking an advanced course where I studied the bones from a proto-Huron indigenous site. So, yeah, definitely understand their points!

[Frelga]

The Emersons would concur. They somehow manage to solve murders and have adventures while observing strictest scientific processes.

Amelia Peabody movie when?

[Sunsilver]

John Williams, who is now 90 years old, will be doing the music for the Indiana Jones movie!! :o Skip to 13:13 in the interview to hear about it.

https://www.globalplayer.com/videos/2Js ... ANrXFmtCAQ

You will have to register for a free account to view the video, but it is well worth it.

[Frelga]

If you are like me, you wondered if the world really needs an Al Yankovic biopic. It does. It absolutely does.

[Sunsilver]

Movies we are NOT looking forward to seeing. Oh the schadenfreude!!

https://www.thedailybeast.com/anti-woke ... 23G9d4PnDI

[Snowdog]

↑ That would have bene amusing for a few minutes at best! ↑

A movie I am looking forward to is the Netflix remake of All Quiet On the Western Front

[Sunsilver]

Snowdog, heartbreaking! :'(

Reminds me of an old poem I learned (memorized) in school:


You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and pray you'll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.

S. Sassoon - Suicide in the Trenches

[Snowdog]

I watched 'All Quiet On The Western Front' the other night, and I have to say I have mixed feelings about it. It was a really good World War 1 movie, and even would qualify as 'excellent' if it had another title. This is not a 'remake' of the old classic 1930 movie. The 1979 movie was a 'remake'. This was more a 'reinterpretation'. It left out large portions of the story, and made some novel parts up. One part they did get right, and very well done, is the two soldiers in the muddy shell hole. That was as gripping as the book and both movies. Summary, it's worth watching for the wartime tech and battle scenes, but don't expect a telling of the Erich Maria Remarque novel story.

I think the next movie I'm looking forward to is the 2nd Dune.

[Túrin Turambar]

This popped up out of nowhere given the fame of the director and lead, but looks extremely impressive:

[Frelga]

I haven't watched the trailer yet, but history Twitter seems excited. Not by potential historical accuracy, necessarily, but they approve the vibes.

[Dave_LF]

It'll probably be very good, but honestly my knee-jerk reaction is that the absolute last thing the world needs right now is to give an insurgent imperialist the antihero treatment.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I don't disagree with you, Dave, but:

1) the trailer looks very compelling; and

2) is there a more compelling figure in history than Napolean?

[Frelga]

Is violent megalomania really humanity's most compelling trait?

[Túrin Turambar]

The "great moderniser sweeping away feudalism and spreading the Enlightenment across Europe" versus "vain tyrant waging incessant wars to aggrandise himself and put members of his family on foreign thrones" debate on Napoleon goes back to his contemporaries, so I expect we'll see it continue in light of this film. Making a hasty judgement from the trailer, it doesn't look like a hagiography.

I'm more worried that it will try to pack too much into too little time to have real depth. From the trailer I can see shots of the Revolution, Egypt campaign, coronation, Austerlitz, and what looks like Waterloo. The best biographical films I've seen have focused on a single episode in the subject's life - Invictus, Selma, Lincoln, Darkest Hour - while films which have tried to span a entire life, particularly a busy one - Alexander, Long Walk to Freedom - have come across as a bit of a superficial greatest hits mashup. But we'll see.

[Frelga]

The "great moderniser sweeping away feudalism and spreading the Enlightenment across Europe"

I am far from a Napoleonic scholar so it's not a surprise that I've never encountered that take before, but it seems a bit sus. Especially since he specifically declined to make a promise to "sweep away feudalism" and liberate Russian serfs, a decision that may have cost him the victory.

[Túrin Turambar]

The "great moderniser sweeping away feudalism and spreading the Enlightenment across Europe"

I am far from a Napoleonic scholar so it's not a surprise that I've never encountered that take before, but it seems a bit sus. Especially since he specifically declined to make a promise to "sweep away feudalism" and liberate Russian serfs, a decision that may have cost him the victory.

It isn't a take I agree with, and even some of his fans backed away when he declared himself Emperor, but he had (and has) his fans. I've added a biography of Napoleon to my to-read list to brush up.

On an entirely different point -

Something which is lost carrying this over into English is that Napoleon was a foreigner in France. France conquered Corsica in the year of his birth, he only started learning French at school, and he spoke with a heavy Corsican accent (Corsican being in the Italian language family). To understand how much of an upstart Napoleon came across as, you need to imagine him speaking with an Italian accent among an elite speaking perfectly-correct Parisian French. Nationalism, curiously, can be strongest on the margins.

As a side note, Hitler is another example of this phenomenon. He spoke German with a rural southern accent, having grown up on the German-Austrian border, yet was thrown in among and ended up ahead of an elite which spoke with upper-class Prussian accents. I have no doubt this affected his often-unfavourable image with the Prussian officer class.

[Frelga]

And Stalin, nee Jughashvili, was Georgian and spoke with a trace of accent all his life. Although arguably nationalism was not the primary force behind his ascent to power.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

This is probably getting beyond the scope of this thread, but I'm curious to know what your opinion is as to what was the primary force behind Stalin's ascent to power.

[Sunsilver]

The world news thread would be a good place to have that discussion, I think...

Certainly a topic worth discussing, and I'm sure Frelga's take on it is much better informed than us N. American born peeps.

[Frelga]

This is probably getting beyond the scope of this thread, but I'm curious to know what your opinion is as to what was the primary force behind Stalin's ascent to power.

I am really not an expert, as the topic was verboten during the Soviet years. But FWIW, my opinion is that he was a ruthless strongman who rose to power in post-revolutionary chaos because unlike his more idealistic comrades, power was what he wanted.

Lenin, in his last testament wanted Stalin removed from the position of the General Secretary, for that exact reason.

The murder of Sergei Kirov was possibly the final step in the consolidation of power, or maybe the first step in the purges of all potential opposition