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Most overrated movie you've seen - Knock-out

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    Most overrated movie you've seen - Knock-out

    I'm sorry I don't understand your first paragraph. It seems contradictory.

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      Most overrated movie you've seen - Knock-out

      Jimski wrote: It's not the ending that specifically annoyed me. I just didn't care enough about the character to care about the ending. It's just that people go on about the whole Rosebud thing as if it actually matters what it was (which I guess is your point about the McGuffin).
      Rosebud is the device that drives the story, but it doesn't really matter. The story is about how Charles Foster Kane became this force of darkness (and, despite all his denials, Welles was very much thinking of Randolph Hearst when he conceived Kane).

      As I said, I can see why people might not like it, and more so that most people will feel let down by it after all the hype. In that sense, Citizen Kane is a logical inclusion on this thread.

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        Most overrated movie you've seen - Knock-out

        Basically what I am saying is that your list is certainly a list of positive attributes a film may have, but that they aren't worth all that much if one finds oneself still "watching the film" rather than "immersed in the film".

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          Most overrated movie you've seen - Knock-out

          G-Man wrote:
          As I said, I can see why people might not like it, and more so that most people will feel let down by it after all the hype. In that sense, Citizen Kane is a logical inclusion on this thread.
          Yes, I certainly didn't hate it, and I could appreciate some of its positive qualities (e.g. some from Amor's list higher up the page), but it was more than a little dull. Nothing pulled me into its world.

          A modern example that ticks similar boxes, but again leaves me feeling a little cold, is There Will Be Blood.

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            Most overrated movie you've seen - Knock-out

            Jimski wrote: Basically what I am saying is that your list is certainly a list of positive attributes a film may have, but that they aren't worth all that much if one finds oneself still "watching the film" rather than "immersed in the film".
            The level of immersion you feel is surely down to those attributes though, isn't it? I mean there are other contextual factors, like how you're feeling that day, or whether there's popcorn on the floor under your seat, but otherwise it's just you and what's on the screen.

            The "watching/immersion" duality I'd suggest is more of a polarity. Some films engage us more than others because the highly complex, but often quite arbitrary, skill set required has meshed more or less satisfactorily.

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              Most overrated movie you've seen - Knock-out

              Oh indeed, and the whole thing is highly subjective, but it is noticeable that when people talk up Citizen Kane there is a tendency to talk of the technical aspects at the expense of the characters, story, dialogue, etc. - I'd argue that the latter list is the one more likely to induce immersion in a film than the former. It tends to suggest to me that it's a film-makers' film, one that is appreciated mainly because of the great artistry that was put into it. (It reminds me of the sort of attitude in pop music that places prog rock above "Dancing Queen".)

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                Most overrated movie you've seen - Knock-out

                You could well be right — re the technical stuff versus the more subjective qualities. And it could also just be that those qualities are easier to talk about. More concrete, with a history, a canon and so on.

                It brings to mind (for obvious reasons) the Bacall-Bogart on-screen relationship in the first three movies they made together. None of them — with the possible exception of The Big Sleep — is any more than competent as 'cinema,' but all are utterly memorable because you can see the sparks and smell the pheromones. Even they still had to be communicated though, and the attributes of film are probably the only way it could be done, even today.

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                  Most overrated movie you've seen - Knock-out

                  I didn't watch Citizen Kane for years and it built up over those years that I assumed that it would be completely over-rated when I saw it. As it goes, it came on TV one day and I sat down and watched it just as any other film and it was really good. Not the best film ever but an engaging engrossing film that stands up on its own merits.

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                    Most overrated movie you've seen - Knock-out

                    George Burnage Shaw wrote: Blade Runner's opening scene was based on Wilton Chemical Plant on Teeside. Scott grew up there, I think.
                    Correct (apart from your spelling of Teesside), he's from South Shields and grew up in Stockton.

                    Bored of Education wrote: In the "Making of Blade Runner" documentary, Scott says it was based on Port Talbot" and, apparently, he mentioned it in an Empire magazine as well. Having said that, any inspiration is going to be an amalgam of influences so all the ones mentioned could be part of it.

                    Apparently, Wilton Chemical Plant was approached by scouts for one of the Alien films so he certainly was thinking about it when he made movies.
                    Scott also said in an interview :
                    There's a walk from Redcar into Hartlepool... I'd cross a bridge at night, and walk above the steel works. So that's probably where the opening of Blade Runner comes from. It always seemed to be rather gloomy and raining, and I'd just think "God, this is beautiful."
                    So it's fair to assume that it's at least a composite of the two. Wilton looks like this, by the way :

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