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Post by greeny11 on Feb 14, 2021 21:11:07 GMT
Love Behind Bars
A rom com
A lovely movie with a fairly coherent plot, with no human deaths! Henry Lewis was the source of most of the comedy this evening - his interjections in the 'Dig to the Core' were hilarious, as were his turns as a possum and a blanket. Also, Lauren appearing in the prison wall was hilarious, and Nancy's verse about the scientific benefits of walnut hazlenut lattes was very good. It was nice to see LGBTQ+ couples represented as well as Sam (Ellie) and Tony (Harry).
Can't believe there are only 4 movies left! I hope everyone who has taken part in the live streamed shows gets to do at least one movie next week in the final weekend.
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Post by Dawnstar on Feb 14, 2021 21:48:54 GMT
I didn't enjoy tonight's show as much as I was expecting to. Usually I love the rom coms. I think the problem was that by trying to feature 3 couples there wasn't enough time to get to know any of the couples sufficiently to really want them to get together. To be honest, I found the most touching relationship to be that between the Warden & his dead dog/ghost of dead dog. Which isn't quite what you want from a rom com! The Warden was definitely my favourite character too.
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Post by marob on Feb 14, 2021 22:42:03 GMT
Can't believe there are only 4 movies left! I hope everyone who has taken part in the live streamed shows gets to do at least one movie next week in the final weekend. I’ve ended up watching them all, so I’m sad it’s ending, but a little bit relieved as it’s getting expensive. Weirdly I’m watching a lot more online now than when everything was streaming for free. Missed Josh Elliott this week, so glad to see he’s told someone on his twitter that he’s back next weekend.
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Post by bob2010 on Feb 15, 2021 12:57:07 GMT
Had my first experience with this last night with the Valentine special, however I was a tad disappointed by it. There were some funny moments, but the 'film' itself only lasted around 50 mins and there were moments where the storyline didn't seem to be going anywhere.
I'm considering giving it another try next week, however I was wondering how others felt last night's film compared to their other ones? As perhaps it's just not my type of humour.
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Post by greeny11 on Feb 15, 2021 16:10:36 GMT
Yes, the films do generally only last 50-55 minutes. The storyline not going anywhere very frequently happens in these films (as is the nature of improv, I guess this is likely to happen), this one actually had more of a storyline than most.
For me, it wasn't as funny or chaotic as some of their previous efforts, but again, with improv, some are going to be better than others. Looking at my favourites of the live streamed shows - their funniest work (for me) comes when they do horror/action/adventure films. When they get a genre outside of that, it's still good, but not quite as funny - especially the ones which are definitely family friendly.
My favourites from the first live-streamed run were: Cat In The Habit (Period drama) From Russia With Gloves (a spy thriller) Flat Pack Attack (a fantasy horror).
My favourites from the January run are: The Primary Cape Crusader (superhero film) Suicide Squid (supposedly a superhero film) Now Museum Now You Don't (a musical heist/action film) Light Over The Rocks (biopic) Look Out 1 and 2 (pirate/action) Enter the Elephant (kung fu/action)
Yes, that is 9 out of 22 they have done so far but they were all brilliantly funny. All the others had great moments, but the ones above were consistently funny and entertaining. It is the luck of the draw though. (Yes, I did have to go back through this thread to remember the film names!)
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Post by pianowithsam on Feb 15, 2021 16:26:19 GMT
Can't believe there are only 4 movies left! I hope everyone who has taken part in the live streamed shows gets to do at least one movie next week in the final weekend. I’ve ended up watching them all, so I’m sad it’s ending, but a little bit relieved as it’s getting expensive. Weirdly I’m watching a lot more online now than when everything was streaming for free. Missed Josh Elliott this week, so glad to see he’s told someone on his twitter that he’s back next weekend. Absolutely in the same position as you, aha! Shame it's coming to a close but haven't been looking at my bank balance in the last few weeks. Have just been paying the £10 each time Really pleased to hear that Josh is back in next weekend.
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Post by pianowithsam on Feb 15, 2021 16:31:43 GMT
Had my first experience with this last night with the Valentine special, however I was a tad disappointed by it. There were some funny moments, but the 'film' itself only lasted around 50 mins and there were moments where the storyline didn't seem to be going anywhere. I'm considering giving it another try next week, however I was wondering how others felt last night's film compared to their other ones? As perhaps it's just not my type of humour. I'd also agree with some of the other comments above in saying that this was one of the weaker shows. As it has been said, this is improvisation so one show cannot be representative of all of them. There have been some absolutely hysterical shows over the last few months, with some moments leaving me creasing for weeks. I may be wrong (and some people may disagree) but I think a genre like a rom-com would be unlikely to be picked by the 'Zoom' audience in a regular show, given its lack of potential action and 'places to go' if that makes sense. Watching a number of these shows, you quickly realise that the storylines are incredibly bizarre and random, with many random moments, characters and scenes. A rom-com is more set in stone with the setting up of the story being more pre-defined. With the other shows, there really has been no sort of indication of what will happen, which has made them so great. If you are looking for a cohesive and steady storyline however, this probably won't be for you, haha. And yes, the movies typically last around 50 minutes. Sometimes an hour at most.
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Post by greeny11 on Feb 15, 2021 16:56:44 GMT
I would agree that rom-com would be unlikely to be chosen normally, it was fixed for this one show because of it being Valentine's Day. In fact looking back, this was the first rom com of the live streamed series. I would also say the quality of audience suggestions also plays a part in the quality of the film.
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Post by Dawnstar on Feb 15, 2021 17:20:37 GMT
Managed to double post while trying to amend & the second one has the amendments so deleting this.
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Post by Dawnstar on Feb 15, 2021 17:24:27 GMT
Had my first experience with this last night with the Valentine special, however I was a tad disappointed by it. There were some funny moments, but the 'film' itself only lasted around 50 mins and there were moments where the storyline didn't seem to be going anywhere. I'm considering giving it another try next week, however I was wondering how others felt last night's film compared to their other ones? As perhaps it's just not my type of humour. I've seen quite a lot of MMNs (last night was my 78th) & I would not rank last night's show very highly among them. Out of the 22 livestreamed ones, I'd put in in my bottom 5. I'd also say it might have been the one I was most disappointed with, because I was really looking forward to seeing a rom com. Yes, the films do generally only last 50-55 minutes. The storyline not going anywhere very frequently happens in these films (as is the nature of improv, I guess this is likely to happen), this one actually had more of a storyline than most. For me, it wasn't as funny or chaotic as some of their previous efforts, but again, with improv, some are going to be better than others. Looking at my favourites of the live streamed shows - their funniest work (for me) comes when they do horror/action/adventure films. When they get a genre outside of that, it's still good, but not quite as funny - especially the ones which are definitely family friendly. I may be wrong (and some people may disagree) but I think a genre like a rom-com would be unlikely to be picked by the 'Zoom' audience in a regular show, given its lack of potential action and 'places to go' if that makes sense. Watching a number of these shows, you quickly realise that the storylines are incredibly bizarre and random, with many random moments, characters and scenes. A rom-com is more set in stone with the setting up of the story being more pre-defined. With the other shows, there really has been no sort of indication of what will happen, which has made them so great. If you are looking for a cohesive and steady storyline however, this probably won't be for you, haha. And yes, the movies typically last around 50 minutes. Sometimes an hour at most. Looking at my list of all the live MMNs I've seen, 7 of the 56 were rom coms, so it's a genre that does get chosen with reasonable regularity. 4 of those 7 I remember enjoying very much indeed. The other 3 I confess I can't remember so well but don't remember not enjoying them, at any rate. I though part of the problem of last night's show was that the storyline was too obvious. However I don't think this was due to it being a rom com per say but because the initial setting of the scene made the prison so nice & all 3 couples so definite that there wasn't much to do except wallow in the unreal niceness! Henry L then had to do a sudden volte-face of character in order to introduce an attempt at antagonism to give the plot some impetus but, while amusing, it was so overboard that it was obvious it would all be reversed before the end. I didn't think any of the 3 couples worked very well: Hope & Clara were already a happy couple so didn't really have anywhere to go, Mark & Raoul's screen time was only one (admittedly lingering!) glance before they got together at the end, and Tony was sabotaging his relationship with Sam before it had really started (I got what Harry was aiming at but didn't think it worked in context). Which for me left a rom com where I didn't care much what happened to any of the couples & I think that in order for a rom com to be successful you have to be really rooting for the romantic leads to get together at the end.
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Post by pianowithsam on Feb 15, 2021 17:30:56 GMT
Had my first experience with this last night with the Valentine special, however I was a tad disappointed by it. There were some funny moments, but the 'film' itself only lasted around 50 mins and there were moments where the storyline didn't seem to be going anywhere. I'm considering giving it another try next week, however I was wondering how others felt last night's film compared to their other ones? As perhaps it's just not my type of humour. I've seen quite a lot of MMNs (last night was my 78th) & I would not rank last night's show very highly among them. Out of the 22 livestreamed ones, I'd put in in my bottom 5. I'd also say it might have been the one I was most disappointed with, because I was really looking forward to seeing a rom com. Yes, the films do generally only last 50-55 minutes. The storyline not going anywhere very frequently happens in these films (as is the nature of improv, I guess this is likely to happen), this one actually had more of a storyline than most. For me, it wasn't as funny or chaotic as some of their previous efforts, but again, with improv, some are going to be better than others. Looking at my favourites of the live streamed shows - their funniest work (for me) comes when they do horror/action/adventure films. When they get a genre outside of that, it's still good, but not quite as funny - especially the ones which are definitely family friendly. I though part of the problem of last night's show was that the storyline was too obvious. The initial setting of the scene made the prison so nice & all 3 couples so definite that there wasn't much to do except wallow in the unreal niceness! Henry L then had to do a sudden volte-face of character in order to introduce an attempt at antagonism to give the plot some impetus but, while amusing, it was so overboard that it was obvious it would all be reversed before the end. I didn't think any of the 3 couples worked very well: Hope & Clara were already a happy couple so didn't really have anywhere to go, Mark & Raoul's screen time was only one (admittedly lingering!) glance before they got together at the end, and Tony was sabotaging his relationship with Sam before it had really started (I got what Harry was aiming at but didn't think it worked in context). Which for me left a rom com where I didn't care much what happened to any of the couples & I think that in order for a rom com to be successful you have to be really rooting for the romantic leads to get together at the end. I don't think the problem was with it being a rom com per say though. Looking at my list of all the live MMNs I've seen, 7 of the 56 were rom coms. 4 of those 7 I remember enjoying very much indeed. The other 3 I confess I can't remember so well but don't remember not enjoying them, at any rate. Yeah, I agree. I felt the storyline was too 'pre-defined' like I said. My feeling of rom-com's not really working as genres for improvised movies was just based on all of the livestreams that I have seen. Haven't been as fortunate as to have seen 78 shows. Wow! As far as I remember, there hasn't really been a MMNI where the story was driven by a love story, thus making the end goal more ambiguous and unknown. I think everyone expected a happy and conclusive ending, given the labeled 'Valentine's Day rom com special', so the less exciting and more predictable movie can be forgiven.
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Post by Dawnstar on Feb 15, 2021 17:46:13 GMT
Yeah, I agree. I felt the storyline was too 'pre-defined' like I said. My feeling of rom-com's not really working as genres for improvised movies was just based on all of the livestreams that I have seen. Haven't been as fortunate as to have seen 78 shows. Wow! As far as I remember, there hasn't really been a MMNI where the story was driven by a love story, thus making the end goal more ambiguous and unknown. I think everyone expected a happy and conclusive ending, given the labeled 'Valentine's Day rom com special', so the less exciting and more predictable movie can be forgiven. I feel as though I've seen a lot of improvised rom coms because nearly all the Showstoppers' shows are effectively rom com musicals. I can only think offhand of one Showstopper I've seen that didn't have any romance (& it probably would have had they not managed to set the 2 main characters up at the beginning with an age gap of about 30 years!). Most of them worked for me! I think you need to have either a stronger element of uncertainty as to whether a romance will work (love triangles can help with this) or some sort of plot driver besides the romance that interferes with said romance in a plausible way. It also probably helps if either one main romance is focused on or if multiple romances are more interdependent rather than just all happening in the same place like last night's 3 romances did. I'm now musing on how I'd re-write last night's movie to make it more to my liking!
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Post by david on Feb 15, 2021 22:06:30 GMT
Having watched last night's MMN, the Rom-Com film unfortunately didn't really work for me. I think that out of the all the MMN I've watched since December, this has to be the one that I was least engaged with over the hour and would certainly come last in my list any personal ranking of MMN films to date. As an improv show, I don't think that the Rom-Com genre worked that well I didn't get that many laugh out loud moments watching it in contrast to the other films that Mischief have performed. I think that because the team have only got a short space of time to develop the concept of each film, with Rom-Com I think you need to be able to build the characters and their romances up over a long period and 60 minutes for me wasn't enough to engage with any of the couples.
On a more positive note, I'm glad to see Josh will be back for the final weekend shows.
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Post by greeny11 on Feb 18, 2021 21:08:33 GMT
The Temple of the Red Giraffe
An 'adventure' movie.
Harry Kershaw - you utter legend. Only Harry could be a salacious filing cabinet and sing a song about trousers - I was literally crying with laughter. We also got a reprise at the end which was brilliant too. Lauren Shearing was hilarious everytime she said something - her riddle followed by Niall's riddle made no sense but were brilliantly funny. Henry L and Henry S brought the tone down as they watched the campers in their tent which was very funny, as was all that nonsense with the Pishans.
Nancy as Emmy, Jonathan in the ensemble tomorrow which is a must see.
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Post by david on Feb 18, 2021 21:12:23 GMT
With tonight’s adventure film “The Red Giraffe”, this one was just Harry Kershaw living his best life with his Trouser song. What a song! This was worth watching just for that. Another hours entertaining madness from the Mischief crew. It’s great to see JS will be on stage tomorrow whilst Nancy is in the directors chair. Can’t wait!
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Post by marob on Feb 18, 2021 21:15:57 GMT
That filing cabinet song has got to be the highlight of the run for me. Made me cry with laughter too, and was even funnier for having made the cast lose their composure.
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Post by Dawnstar on Feb 18, 2021 22:05:32 GMT
I feel tonight showed that, as per some of our comments after last Sunday's show, a coherent plot is not at all necessary! Tonight's plot descended into a shambles. I'd really like to re-watch the last 10 mins to see if I can make any sense of it. (Why did there seem to be two Gildroy seniors? Who was whose father?) But the show was hilarious!
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Post by david on Feb 18, 2021 22:34:48 GMT
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Post by greeny11 on Feb 18, 2021 22:40:14 GMT
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Post by Dawnstar on Feb 18, 2021 22:50:04 GMT
If only the shows were available to watch again I would totally be going through them all to identify which each of these clips comes from! Also, how did you manage to get the Youtube link for this? I was trying to get the video URL earlier to save it but when I right-clicked on the video it just keep taking me back to the tweet. ETA Ignore me. I've realised it's on their Youtube channel so you presumably got it via that rather than via the tweet.
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Post by greeny11 on Feb 18, 2021 22:55:58 GMT
I feel tonight showed that, as per some of our comments after last Sunday's show, a coherent plot is not at all necessary! Tonight's plot descended into a shambles. I'd really like to re-watch the last 10 mins to see if I can make any sense of it. (Why did there seem to be two Gildroy seniors? Who was whose father?) But the show was hilarious! Good luck in trying to make sense of it - as far as I could tell, the already tenuous plot disintegrated completely not long after the introduction of the salacious filing cabinet!
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Post by david on Feb 18, 2021 22:56:49 GMT
Dawnstar , the YT clip just popped up when I opened up YT for something entirely unrelated to MMN. I agree with you. It's a shame we can't watch these MMN back as I'd love to rewatch them again and watch the films that I missed. Edit - Just seen your extra post!
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Post by pianowithsam on Feb 18, 2021 23:01:55 GMT
Thoroughly looking forward to seeing Jonathan as part of the improvising team tomorrow. As funny as it was, Harry Kershaw making him improvise a 'musical limerick' about window washing whilst hopping (during Oscar's short cameo in the midnight performance a few weeks back) made it rather difficult to extract anything from, haha! Can't wait.
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Post by Dawnstar on Feb 18, 2021 23:16:23 GMT
Good luck in trying to make sense of it - as far as I could tell, the already tenuous plot disintegrated completely not long after the introduction of the salacious filing cabinet! I was just about following it until about the last 10 minutes but once the wrong father turned up in the temple most of the rest of it didn't make much sense! Thoroughly looking forward to seeing Jonathan as part of the improvising team tomorrow. As funny as it was, Harry Kershaw making him improvise a 'musical limerick' about window washing whilst hopping (during Oscar's short cameo in the midnight performance a few weeks back) made it rather difficult to extract anything from, haha! Can't wait. That scene was hilarious because of Harry taking over Oscar's chair rather than anything Jonathan was doing during it! I've seen him in the ensemble for 4 shows back when they were at the Arts Theatre & he was rally good when he was in full shows rather than 2 minutes.
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Post by fiyero on Feb 19, 2021 18:25:19 GMT
I’d decided I was done with the online shows. I’ve loved them but loved the in person ones more. This has got me back for one last show tonight though. I loved Jonathan’s enthusiasm when he did his speeches at the end when I saw them live and will be great to see him in the cast
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Post by pianowithsam on Feb 19, 2021 21:06:55 GMT
An absolute hilariously wonderful gigantic mess of a show tonight. Loved every minute of it.
Can we all agree that Jonathan's first song started out to be arguably one of the best (if not THE best) songs of the streamed shows? Went downhill very quickly though, haha.
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Post by greeny11 on Feb 19, 2021 21:09:48 GMT
Nightmare on Bone Street
A horror/slasher film
A film that made little sense, but a lot of death, a lot of humour, and the director picking on one actor (in this case, Jonathan) to do ridiculous stuff - which sums up a lot of the films in this run. Dave's corpsing from last night continued tonight - highlights include: Jonathan and Niall trying to harmonise, Henry Shields using Bryony as a massage chair, and Dave using Niall as some other form of chair, Henry Lewis as an armoire, Jonathan being forced to do all sorts of ridiculous things, Henry L/Dave/Bryony as a tumble drier, and Jonathan being tumble dried! I must say, Jonathan has a really good singing voice!
Think my favourite quote was Dave pleading with Niall not to harmonise with him!
That was Nancy's last film of the run - which has brought home how sad I am that this is nearly all done.
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Post by david on Feb 19, 2021 21:26:44 GMT
With tonight's MMN it was really great to see Jonathan Sayer on stage in a film before the end of the run. A great evening's again courtesy of Mischief Theatre. With only 2 shows left 😢 I'm sure we are in for a fantastic weekend of total madness.
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Post by marob on Feb 19, 2021 21:40:25 GMT
After all the stick he’s given the cast over this run it was nice to see Jonathan being on the receiving end. Just a shame Harry Kershaw wasn’t there as well.
And I most certainly did enjoy the armoire.
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Post by greeny11 on Feb 19, 2021 21:44:17 GMT
To be fair to Jonathan, the first half of his solo number was genuinely the best song they've done so far - as with Mischief, the quality took a dip but he is clearly a very good improviser. Also, the fact he is quite small allowed them to do some very funny physical comedy which they haven't been able to that much of until now. If they were to return for another season of live streams/stage shows (depending on the Covid situation), I would love to see the Oscar/Emmy role rotated more to allow Jonathan to feature in the improvising cast more frequently.
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