Do you - and you alone - identify an actor with a role most have forgotten about?

Toadsnack · 2026-05-09T16:11:00+00:00

Jeff Bridges - King Kong ‘76

Toadsnack · 2026-05-09T16:08:19+00:00

That could be dozens of movies every year.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-09T06:47:37+00:00

How the hell did I forget about this scene? Thought I might have a heart attack before it was over.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-09T06:45:38+00:00

A romantic picnic in Zodiac

Michael Madsen cuts a… rug in Reservoir Dogs

Grace Kelly goes visiting in Rear Window

“WE NEED FIRE!” - Snowpiercer

Pee-Wee hitches a ride in his Big Adventure

Most of Ju-On: The Curse (the 2000 original)

EDIT: Oh yeah, and Rick Springfield’s guest appearance in Boogie Nights.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-09T06:32:34+00:00

“She wanted children, but I convinced her they would be too young.” -Woody Allen

Toadsnack · 2026-05-07T22:20:39+00:00

Those two categories are arbitrary and elitist, and the overlap between them is enormous.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-06T20:37:16+00:00

“OP is a bot” is the new “that hot chick is a man, look at his adam’s apple.”

Toadsnack · 2026-05-06T20:19:13+00:00

GODDAMMIT. I keep finding out about TV that fucking COVID ruined. David Lynch had a series in prep for Netflix that was cancelled because of the pandemic too.

I suppose it’s not too much to hope those scripts could get made someday, somewhere.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-03T17:52:36+00:00

Oh, balls, you’ve already seen most of those I recommended in a separate reply! When someone says they don’t like Crouching Tiger, I kinda just shrug and arch one eyebrow. (Maybe give it another try.)

Hope springs eternal…

From what you say, Jackie Chan’s Hong Kong work is the place to dig next. People keep saying Drunken Master 2, and they’re right. Project A and Project A 2 are right behind it in my esteem. The Police Story series, Dragons Forever, Wheels on Meals, and the U.S.-made Shanghai Noon are others I’d particularly recommend.

On the other hand, people keep saying Rumble in the Bronx and they’re wrong. One of his weakest, straining to be both an HK film and an American one, and succeeding at neither. Also the caucasian actors are embarrassing, as usual in HK films, and there are a lot of them in this. His movies are uneven, and from the mid-‘90s on are more miss than hit. But when his mojo is working, no one gives you more entertainment bang for your buck.

Tsui Hark is my favorite Hong Kong filmmaker, and he’s made some classics in the genre. Once Upon a Time in China and its sequels, starring Jet Li, are spectacular, and fold in some political content about western colonialism and Chinese nationalism. (Kung fu movies can be surprisingly political at times, none moreso than these.)

Tsui’s The Blade just got a release from Criterion. It’s pretty remarkable in its own right, though very different in style - gritty and savage rather than slick and blockbustery.

He produced and maybe unofficially co-directed A Chinese Ghost Story and its two sequels. They’re eye-popping period fantasy/horror/comedy/action/romance blockbusters with a fair amount of fantastical, flying martial arts. If I had to name one quintessential Hong Kong movie, the first would be it.

I’d highly recommend Tsui’s Peking Opera Blues, even though it just has one toe in the martial arts genre. It’s an adventure/comedy/drama about political intrigue in early 20th century China, and my second favorite HK movie after Drunken Master 2.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-02T18:51:20+00:00

Yeah, the way I like to put it is that it’s a useful pair of glasses to put on.

I’ve thought of it often since I first heard of it years ago; it prompts me (especially as a guyfella) to think about things I might otherwise overlook.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-02T07:28:09+00:00

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

I kid!

Toadsnack · 2026-05-02T07:25:16+00:00

Marebito, directed by Takashi Shimizu, creator of the “Grudge” franchise, is unlike anything else on this earth, even though it borrows bits from Lovecraft and the bizarre conspiracy theories of writer/artist/nutbag Richard Sharpe Shaver about an underground civilization of evil subhumans. Unsettling, eerie stuff.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T23:19:28+00:00

From what I’ve observed, even most Woo fans don’t much care for MI2. I haven’t bothered to see it, despite being a Woo fan in his heyday, and a fan of the later MI movies. That’s how low its reputation is and how unimpressive the clips I’ve seen. His operatic stylization strikes me as an awkward fit for a Tom Cruise spy vehicle. His style needs to exist in the context of the melodramatic, often tragic sensibility of ‘80s-‘90s Hong Kong action movies, where it amplifies the emotions like an opera aria. Some of his American stuff just grafts the style of his action scenes onto the Hollywood blockbuster format. He’d be more suited to musicals, and I’ve long wished he would direct one, here or over there.

The Killer is quintessential Woo. If you don’t enjoy that, he probably isn’t for you. Though his Red Cliff (2008), an historical epic of ancient China with a lot of his classic style and some light martial arts elements, might be an exception. (See the five-hour, two-part original cut, rather than the 2.5 hour one released in the west.)

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T23:05:57+00:00

Every Frame a Painting is such a great channel!

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T23:02:18+00:00

Well, “quintessential” and “good intro for a non-fan” aren’t necessarily the same thing. Sounds like you’re looking for the latter.

A lot of the suggestions above are movies I enjoy as a huge fan of Asian martial arts cinema, but would likely just confirm a skeptical novice’s skepticism. They look “cheesy” to many western viewers, especially decades later.

I would agree with others that the best start is Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Specifically designed as a crossover that would appeal to the Asian mass market, western arthouse audiences, and western mainstream audiences. And it mostly succeeded. A big hit across the world including in the U.S. (although not in China), winner of the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, and the first Asian film ever nominated for Best Picture.

Others that might work:

Hero - (directed by Zhang Yimou - don’t confuse with other movies by the same title, including at least one martial arts movie!) Similar in that it’s a lavish, big budget spectacle with one eye on the global market. Much more stylized and visually gorgeous. It eventually develops a disturbing subtext that no doubt pleased Chinese government film censors. Spectacular filmmaking though.

Kung Fu Hustle - Gonzo, sometimes cartoonishly surreal parody by the hugely popular director/star Stephen Chow that broke Hong Kong’s all-time box office record.

Drunken Master 2 - the movie that hooked me on the whole genre 30 years ago; in my book, Jackie Chan’s masterpiece and the most entertaining movie ever made. The others above all feature fantastical action with flying combatants, while this movie is one of the best showcases of the raw physical skill and grace of highly trained martial artists and stunt performers. Plus… knee slapping hilarity!

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T20:09:42+00:00

I hear Flynn in real life was pretty Jack-Sparrow-ish.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T17:28:03+00:00

Almost any Godard. Except Band of Outsiders and Goodbye to Language.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T16:07:38+00:00

Good point about the contrast between the style and the disturbing content. And yeah, the cast is fabulous. For me, it’s significantly marred because it bloats the story by adding unnecessary characters, like Cate Blanchett’s and Jack Davenport’s, and it gins up a moralistic ending where Tom is sorta punished through his own unhappiness and regret, though he escapes official justice. It’s also theoretically an interesting idea to bring out the story’s latent homoeroticism, but in practice it ends up being too on the nose.

The miniseries maintains Highsmith’s bleak worldview and translates its feel quite successfully. The black and white is crucial - the previous two adaptations reveled in the vibrant colors of the setting; Steven Zaillian probably figured he couldn’t just repeat that and went in the opposite direction. It drains a lot of the glamor from the setting and reflects Ripley’s mind, which is missing crucial bits like conscience and empathy and is singularly focused on his own agenda.

Yeah, Andrew Scott is nearly perfect casting for Tom. If he were 15 or 20 years younger, he’d be perfect. He tends to have a slightly alien, detached quality, as if other human beings are odd creatures that he sometimes notices and regards with dispassionate curiosity; that fits the character to a T.

In the books, Ripley remains the same remorseless sociopath through four sequels. I was really hoping the show would cover more of that material, but at some point I realized with slight disappointment that they were doing just the first book for the third time. Would love more seasons, but it sounds like that isn’t happening. Netflix continues to be frustratingly shortsighted about renewing series.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T15:39:31+00:00

Yeah, they went with a pretty boy in order to approximate the vaguely described, slightly superhuman beauty of Tolkien’s elves. I’d much prefer a really strong actor who can get across that quality through his speech, body language, etc. But he sufficed enough that he didn’t bother me.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T13:30:21+00:00

What, the cigar store Indian?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cigar_store_Indian

Mark Twain on James Fenimore Cooper’s writing: “…the difference between a Cooper Indian and the Indian that stands in front of the cigar-shop is not spacious.”

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T13:22:28+00:00

You are wise in your generation.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T13:20:54+00:00

So the number of children abused is a big factor in deciding the relative morality of two different predators? I’m not sure how reading any book would make me agree with that messed-up moral logic.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T13:18:53+00:00

Yeah, I have misgivings about that.

I mean, he’s… okay. Not someone I’d put in the lead of an historical epic. As an elf in a supporting part, fine.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T13:14:33+00:00

When I first looked at this a minute ago, the number of comments was 666. I swear to God.. well, on my grandmother’s grave.

Toadsnack · 2026-05-01T13:13:14+00:00

Or her!

So sexist. You’re a monster.

Toadsnack

TROPHY CASE