Suicide Squad **Spoilers**

[OutOfTheCube]

Originally Posted by Itse

What they should have done is the Marvel thing. Harley Quinn / Joker backstory at the very least should have been it's own movie.

So, so many of the problems with the DCEU could've been solved with a solo Batman movie vs. Joker/Harley prior to these two.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by OutOfTheCube

So, so many of the problems with the DCEU could've been solved with a solo Batman movie vs. Joker/Harley prior to these two.

Yeah, but they want it NOW!!!

[Cecil Terwilliger]

Sounds like they had a blast making the movie!

Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje received sticky Playboy magazines. Then, as a horrible denouement, Leto sent the rest of the cast anal beads and used condoms.

‘‘I did a lot of things to create a dynamic to create an element of surprise, a spontaneity and to really break down any kind of walls that may be there,’’ Leto told E! News. ‘‘The Joker is somebody who doesn’t really respect things like personal space or boundaries.’’

That still wasn’t enough for Ayer, who told Yahoo! Movies that he forced his cast into fist fights with each other.

‘‘The rehearsal was very intense,’’ Ayer said. ‘‘It wasn’t a normal rehearsal, we’d talk about their lives, their history, and really got them to open up as people to each other. I also had them fight. I had them fight each other. You learn a lot about who a person really is when you punch them in the face. It gets rid of a lot of the actor stuff.’’

It wasn’t all fighting. According to Cara Delevingne, who plays Dr. June Moone, Ayer specifically asked her to walk into the woods and strip naked if there was a full moon. She told W magazine that’s exactly what she did.

Jai Courtney, meanwhile, who plays a character named Boomerang, told Empire that he took mushrooms and proceeded to stub lit cigarettes out on his arms during a Skype video call with Ayer. And, according to io9, Akinnuoye-Agbaje spent his time in make-up listening to tapes of Issei Sagawa, a Japanese man known for killing and eating a Dutch woman in Paris in 1981.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/mov...6RN/story.html

[Strange Brew]

^ yeah I read that too. Too bad none of that dynamic made it into the movie. As for Leto's approach - seems rather pointless considering he really only shared the screen with Harley.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

Sounds like they had a blast making the movie!

This reminds me of a very interesting story about method acting in Hollywood these days. It's clearly purposefully divisively written, but a worthwhile read. (There's a lot more to it than just Leto.)

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertain...acting/494777/

Watching Leto tell one disturbing tale after another makes one thing abundantly clear: Method acting is over. Not the technique itself, which has fueled many of cinema’s greatest performances and can be a useful way of approaching difficult roles. But Leto’s stories show how going to great lengths to inhabit a character is now as much a marketing tool as it is an actual technique—one used to lend an air of legitimacy, verisimilitude, and importance to a performance no matter its quality. Leto’s Joker is the latest evidence that the prestige of method acting has dimmed—thanks to the technique’s overuse by those seeking award-season glory or a reputation boost, as well as its history of being shaped by destructive ideas of masculinity.

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by Itse

This reminds me of a very interesting story about method acting in Hollywood these days. It's clearly purposefully divisively written, but a worthwhile read. (There's a lot more to it than just Leto.)

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertain...acting/494777/

Yeah, stuff like that doesn't make me go "Oh cool, I should totally see that movie!" It makes me roll my eyes and think "What a bunch of hipster doofuses."

[Cecil Terwilliger]

One thing I find interesting is how the movie is being judged at the box office.

Some media reports point to SS being a huge success by beating the surprise hit GOTG from Marvel, which seems crazy since Guardians was a completely unknown property and ended up being a huge commercial and critical success. Not sure beating Marvel's D list heroes is something to be proud of.

Then there are a bunch of comparisons to Deadpool, which opened on a long weekend and was R rated. Not sure I'd be bragging about barely beating a movie about yet another D list hero with half the audience, especially since Deadpool beat Suicide Squad by almost $10M over the first 4 days (although their 6 day numbers are almost identical).

It isn't like suicide squad is filled with A list DC characters but considering this movie had way bigger names attached and really pushed Joker/Batman/Harley aspect and of course, Will Smith, it probably should do better.

I am interested to see what industry reaction and DC/Warner reaction will be to this move in the long run. Will they just be happy it made a bunch of money and didn't fail? Or will the string of successful but poorly received movies finally cause some concern?

[Swarly]

Originally Posted by RyZ

Since its a DC property Im sure the vast majority of this board hated it before they even saw it (if they have even seen it before bashing it), but I thought the movie was a whole lot of fun. Super high energy, plenty of laughs, great soundtrack, great action sequences and performances by the key players.

..snip...

Certainly not by me, I wanted to enjoy this movie and I can even agree with you on most of those points, it was high energy, some laughs, okay action, but the soundtrack??? that was one of the worst parts of it. I specifically remember getting into a scene and there is some Eminem playing (which I like) and the song is going, then it skips part of the song and I'm completely taken out of the moment thinking wtf, then it keeps skipping/dubbing the song so there are no bad words (stupid PG-13). Either play the song or don't, but don't give me some watered down radio edit version, completely ruins the scene.

Another beef I had with the movie, unrelated to your post RyZ, was the scene at the end where they make a big slow motion production of Harley throwing her gun to Deadshot. As if it was the most critical thing in the world, oh how he needs that gun to blow up the tornado. He needs it so much, nothing else matters, nothing else could do.... oh wait, as he is catching the gun you clearly see a gun strapped to his outer forearm. Come to think of it he probably has one on his other arm too, and probably a bunch more strapped all over his body as he is Deadshot after all. Moments like that completely take me out of the movie and make me shake my head and ruin an otherwise decent scene.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by rubecube

Yeah, stuff like that doesn't make me go "Oh cool, I should totally see that movie!" It makes me roll my eyes and think "What a bunch of hipster doofuses."

I wouldn't use the words "hipster doofuses". Other than that I agree. I became almost totally disinterested in Revenant for example after all the stupid hype about a millionaire playboy deliberately putting himself through rough things to convince people he can look like he's gone through rough things.

Acting is make-believe.

If you have to actually do it to make me buy into the idea that you did it, then you're not that great at acting.

[Cecil Terwilliger]

I recall watching a red carpet interview with Anthony Hopkins a number of years ago. It would've been around the time of red dragon or Hannibal.

The interviewer asked him how difficult it was to get into character to play a role like Hannibal Lecter. Hopkins responded that it was easy, but not in terms of acting skill. He was just referring to the fact that it was no more difficult to get into character to play Hannibal Lecter than it was any other character. They asked how he did it and he said something like "I just do, it's my job, it's what they pay me for". That's impressive. Not eating buffalo liver and running naked through the woods during a full moon.

[Matata]

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

One thing I find interesting is how the movie is being judged at the box office.

Some media reports point to SS being a huge success by beating the surprise hit GOTG from Marvel, which seems crazy since Guardians was a completely unknown property and ended up being a huge commercial and critical success. Not sure beating Marvel's D list heroes is something to be proud of.

Then there are a bunch of comparisons to Deadpool, which opened on a long weekend and was R rated. Not sure I'd be bragging about barely beating a movie about yet another D list hero with half the audience, especially since Deadpool beat Suicide Squad by almost $10M over the first 4 days (although their 6 day numbers are almost identical).

It isn't like suicide squad is filled with A list DC characters but considering this movie had way bigger names attached and really pushed Joker/Batman/Harley aspect and of course, Will Smith, it probably should do better.

I am interested to see what industry reaction and DC/Warner reaction will be to this move in the long run. Will they just be happy it made a bunch of money and didn't fail? Or will the string of successful but poorly received movies finally cause some concern?

SS looks poised to take a big dip this weekend, SS exploded out of the gate, but I don't think it has the legs to keep up with GoG total box office: http://deadline.com/2016/08/weekend-...on-1201802677/

GoG was a genuinely great movie made by a beloved studio, SS is an uneven movie made by a struggling studio. I expect the week 3/4 box office numbers will show GoG to really start pulling ahead.

[Swarly]

Originally Posted by Matata

SS looks poised to take a big dip this weekend, SS exploded out of the gate, but I don't think it has the legs to keep up with GoG total box office: http://deadline.com/2016/08/weekend-...on-1201802677/

GoG was a genuinely great movie made by a beloved studio, SS is an uneven movie made by a struggling studio. I expect the week 3/4 box office numbers will show GoG to really start pulling ahead.

exactly, GoG was in the top 3 weekend spots for 8 weeks. It had legs generated by positive word of mouth. SS has negative word of mouth floating around I'd be surprised if it was top 3 for 3 weeks at this point.

[Locke]

I thought this was a really well written article that sums the whole debacle up rather nicely.

In recent years, the war between movie fans and film critics — if, in fact, it is a war — has had its flare-ups. Remember what happened when “The Dark Knight Rises” was about to be released in 2012? It may seem like a tempest in a batcave now, but the collective desire to see that movie struck such a frenzied nerve of anticipation that a handful of critics who gave it negative reviews actually received death threats.

The critics who panned “Suicide Squad” were basically right. In the end, who’s seriously going to hold up this movie as an accomplished pop model of comic-book storytelling? I don’t need to rehash all the criticisms, but as many reviewers pointed out (quite rightly), the premise doesn’t parse: Where the grungy antiheroes of “The Dirty Dozen” were put together to fight the Nazis, the members of the down-and-dirty Suicide Squad are assembled when they barely have a foe, and the foe they wind up having — the Enchantress (and is anyone going to pretend that this swirlingly impersonal CGI demon is an ace villain?) — would never have existed if it hadn’t been for the attempt to assemble the Suicide Squad in the first place.

http://variety.com/2016/film/columns...an-1201836484/

[pgsieve]

Just saw it last night. Some random thoughts:

1. I thought the acting was quite good, and Leto was the best Joker to date.
2. The storyline and lines given to the actors and actresses were terrible. Leto and gang could only do so much with what they were given. I don't understand how the criticism doesn't fall completely on the Director and whoever wrote such an awful, pointless story.
3. I don't see how this movie helps or moves forward any other story in the DC Universe. At the end of the day, all of the "drama" in the movie could have been left alone if they didn't release them. The group isn't going to be strong enough to fight the Justice League (which was my whole idea for why I thought they were making the movie)
4. It's the first movie that I left thinking... That was a major corporate sell out

[Cecil Terwilliger]

I'm too lazy to go and find it but I read a couple of articles in the last few days about all the changes.

Apparently it was a lot darker, especially the Harley/Joker relationship. It was much more love/hate with some abuse thrown in, like in the comics.

Also the reason the first 30 mins felt like one big extended trailer is because the whole movie was edited by the company that makes movie trailers. That's why it seemed like a bunch of random clips sewn together with no coherent story, just cool music and 10 second cuts.

Originally the characters who seemingly just showed up at random were supposed to get a bit more screen time and the bar scene, which was one of the few character moments in the film, was way longer.

It still would have had a stupid weak villain that made no sense but sounds like it could have been a bit better.

[CaptainCrunch]

The Internet is an amazing study in power shifts.

It used to be that the mega corps, and movie houses had a ton of power because they had the resources to really become a power presence, then it shifted to the consumer side with review sites, Now its really shifted to groups of people that I tend to think are internet anarchists that just want to see things burn.

[Cecil Terwilliger]

If you want to give attention to segments of the internet, be it twitter or message boards or FB or whatever, where people spew hate and complain about anything and everything, then it is pretty easy nowadays. Just look at the way the media starts controversies about everything by selectively using a few tweets from stupid people.

But what is happening with SS, Fantastic Four and BvS is that fans are reacting very harshly to studio interference and screw ups. Do they make the pendulum swing too far? Maybe but channeling that internet rage is just a darker reflection of how a large segment of the movie going public feels, specifically the segments that have an appreciation for comic book sourced movies.

Deadpool proves the opposite. This isn't just a bunch of people who want everything to fail. But when things fail, they fail hard. And when they succeed, they are the greatest thing ever.

[djsFlames]

Sausage Party is better. More cohesive, intelligent, better character development, superior humour and underlying themes. Comparable action.

[Erick Estrada]

So I saw this last night as my boys had been bugging me for weeks. I'll give it a 6/10. The movie itself is a 1/10 but I thought they did a really good job on the cast as the characters were likeable with enough funny moments to make the movie passable. I just don't understand how a studio can invest this much money and bring in top shelf actors for a script this bad. I imagine 100 movie scripts get rejected daily in Hollywood that would blow this out of the water. I blame the studio as they should have some means of quality control. At the end of the day it's akin to hiring Michael Schumacher (in his prime) to race for you and supplying him with a Ford Pinto.

[nik-]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

The Internet is an amazing study in power shifts.

It used to be that the mega corps, and movie houses had a ton of power because they had the resources to really become a power presence, then it shifted to the consumer side with review sites, Now its really shifted to groups of people that I tend to think are internet anarchists that just want to see things burn.

Well this piece of #### movie made half a billion so far. So I'm not sure how much power these corps and studios have really lost.