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Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

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    Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

    Sneak Preview night again - cheap tickets, surprise film. As we took to our seats, my heart sank. The first words that came up on the screen were 'Sean' and 'Penn'. He's producer and co-writer of this master-flop.

    The Gunman has zoomed in to my top five list of Worst Films Ever. It doesn't help that I find action films inane and moronic - the combat equivalent of hard core porn. On top of all that, though, comes the quality of plot, script and acting you'd associate with the most ham-fisted soap opera. Still, it wasn't a bad night - we laughed our asses off and stayed until the end, because who would watch a speeding car heading towards a precipice and then turn away at the last minute?

    So, in a sense, highly recommended, especially if you hate Sean Penn and need some new material to slag him off.

    There's a political message that's so ham-fisted (delivered by a newsreader in the film's final line) that you can only imagine Penn thinks like this: "I've got something to say about the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo. So I'll make a crappy, crass action movie to raise the political consciousness of the kind of meat-headed fuckwit who would go and watch a crappy, crass action movie, but who doesn't know or care about what or where the Democratic republic of Congo is." The self-defeating vanity of Hollywood, in action.

    #2
    Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

    You are a special one when it comes to film. How can one not like plenty of what Sean Penn's done?

    This one, however, I watched the trailer and it looked crap.

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      #3
      Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

      Sean Penn... another method actor who takes himself awfully seriously. He was good in Dead Man Walking, but playing a sociopath probably came easy to him.

      He has the right take on politics, I give him that.

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        #4
        Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

        He takes himself awfully seriously, when?
        I've mentioned it before more than once. I'm not overly impressed with actors/actresses. They make a living pretending to be someone else. That's basically it. I'm impressed with good storytellers. I'm not even that impressed with directors. The unsung heroes of movie making are the ones in charge of photo. The camera guys. Interstellar wasn't beautifully shot because of McConaughey* or Christopher Nolan. It was Hoyte van Hoytema who also set the mood in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Let the Right One In.
        Ingmar Bergman would be a half-arsed bullshit artist without the magnificent Sven Nykvist.
        Then of course you have a few directors who are also great storytellers and good with camera direction. A lot less than one thinks are good with the latter.

        Anyway, what on earth does that even mean?
        "Takes himself awfully seriously"
        Do you want a list of members on OTF who take themself awfully seriously?
        Or, to make it it more easy, a list of members who don't take themselves awfully seriously.

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          #5
          Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

          What a very strange post.

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            #6
            Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

            I thought it made enough sense, well within PPV's oeuvre. Interesting you should think it notably strange.

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              #7
              Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

              Mystic river, Bad boys, I am Sam, Milk and always very cool on every talk show I've seen him. Always like "why did you invite me? I'm just an actor. Don't you have more important people to talk with?"

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                #8
                Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                It's also a strange conclusion that he takes himself seriously when you look at how engaged politicaly in the most humble way he is.

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                  #9
                  Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                  Pietro Paolo Virdis wrote: Mystic river, Bad boys, I am Sam, Milk and always very cool on every talk show I've seen him. Always like "why did you invite me? I'm just an actor. Don't you have more important people to talk with?"
                  False humility is even more nauseating than rampant arrogance.

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                    #10
                    Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                    I know that I not only come across as a majestic dick but too often behave as one. Majestic not the kind you could build a career in pornography with but the other when you're being an arse. I'll give my love to film a rest now.

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                      #11
                      Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                      You do realise that my comment was about the guy who ties up women to administer sustained beatings, not about you, right?

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                        #12
                        Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                        Tracers - another bust on Monday night, but not bad enough to be funny, just excruciatingly dull. I begged frau imp for us to leave, but she has Swabian blood and won't be denied the full value of her €5.50, and she found some positive things to say about it. I can't recall what they were, though, because on the way home, every time she said something positive about the movie I knocked it back down, and she pointed out quite fairly that I was determined to hate everything about it. But also quite fairly, there was everything about it to hate.

                        So, "the world of parkour" as basis for an 'action' movie. Instead of chase scenes with people running, there are chase scenes of people jumping unlikely heights, depths and gaps, then rolling over. Lots and lots and lots of them. Still the bullets miraculously miss the hero, a blank space of a character named Cam who owes money to the Chinese mafia (baaaad), and falls in with a parkour gang with a cute chick (oooh, it could be love!), run by a dubious guy who is living with the cute chick (oh no, oh no - obstacles to the love!). Cam only owes the money because he took out a loan because his mom was sick and he wanted to pay her medical bills and save her house from being foreclosed on, but he was too late and she died and now he owes this debt to Bad Guys and he's a Good Guy, and his landlady throws him out so he's sleeping rough, and the Chinese mafia confiscate the old car that belonged to his dad - oh no, oh no, what's he going to do? Surely there's no hope.

                        Horrifyingly, there's room left for a sequel. And the Chinese mafia who extorted Cam and beat him up and took his car are alright really because they gave him his car back and a diamond to get out of town with. Awwww, dey as cute as da chick Cam gets In The End. Fucking hell, what an utter pile of shitey codswallop, with some hasty plot turn thrown in about the parkour gang leader working with the cops that I didn't even get, possibly because I no longer cared and wanted out and home to bed.

                        Given the choice of watching for a second time The Gunman or Tracers, or a bullet to the head, I'd take a bullet to the head, but if it was only between The Gunman and Tracers I'd take The Gunman so that I could scorn Sean Penn again for a couple of hours.

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                          #13
                          Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                          G-Man wrote:
                          Originally posted by Pietro Paolo Virdis
                          Mystic river, Bad boys, I am Sam, Milk and always very cool on every talk show I've seen him. Always like "why did you invite me? I'm just an actor. Don't you have more important people to talk with?"
                          False humility is even more nauseating than rampant arrogance.
                          That trait is one of the main reasons why i detest Phil Taylor so much. Apologies for bringing darts into a debate about Sean Penn but you nailed my thoughts on the sex pest more accurately than i ever could and i had to acknowledge it.

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                            #14
                            Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                            Yes, that nails Taylor perfectly.

                            Going back a bit, does Penn "tie up women to administer sustained beatings"? I have a vague recollection of some unpleasantness towards Robin Wright but nothing that serious.

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                              #15
                              Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                              I believe G-man was referring to his sustained assault on Madonna

                              http://www.cracked.com/article_20560_5-beloved-celebrities-everyone-forgets-did-terrible-things.html

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                                #16
                                Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                                Crumbs, I never knew (or, more likely, completely forgot) about that.

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                                  #17
                                  Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                                  After the third successive disaster, we've decided to take a break from Sneak Preview. Last night's waste of €11 and 90 minutes was 'Unfinished Business', an alleged comedy about a small businessman taking his two colleagues on a work trip to Berlin via Portland. I don't even have the energy to start denigrating it, but pointless plot, hollow script and attempting to combine gratuitous grossness with a 'serious' theme (bullying at school) gave this chronic bust at least a dozen reasons to fail. Avoid.

                                  Sad to see the brilliant Tom Wilkinson in such a dejected role as a sad sack 67-year-old fixated on "boobs". I hope the cheque will make up for the dent in his reputation.

                                  How, just how, does this fucking shit ever get made?

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                                    #18
                                    Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                                    Tom Wilkinson has few stinkers in his filmography; a man's got to eat. His reputation will probably survive this.

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                                      #19
                                      Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                                      Even for a recent Vince Vaughan movie, the stench around 'Unfinished Business' has been toxic. I'm surprised anyone could be unaware of what a turkey it is.

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                                        #20
                                        Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                                        In our defence, and to reiterate, the point of Sneak Preview is that you don't know what you're going to see.

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                                          #21
                                          Sean Penn's 'The Gunman'

                                          Ah sorry, I misunderstood and thought 'Unfinished Business' was a "break from Sneak Preview". I see what you meant now.

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